Yermak Timofeyevich in Russian Folk Poetry

Abstract

FOLK POETRY of every age and country has tended constantly to confuse historical and mythical heroes by ascribing to the former all the qualities of the latter, until it is impossible to know the historical basis for many of the exploits which are recounted. Russia is no exception to this rule. Yermak Timofeyevich, the first conqueror of Siberia in the reign of Ivan the Terrible (the latter part of the sixteenth century), so fascinated the minds of the folk poets that he became a national hero. We have the original songs which describe his invasion of Siberia and his earlier life along the Volga River, but in a short time Yermak appears in songs where he clearly does not belong, and he ultimately makes his way into the byliny or national epics, so that we can see clearly in his case the path which he took in becoming a legendary figure. The personality of Yermak Timofeyevich is very obscure. We know nothing definite about his life until he suddenly appears at Perm with a band of Cossacks and, in some connection with the trading family of the Strogonovy, invades Siberia. We are not even sure of his name; for Yermak is not a Christian name, and though the New Chronicle calls him Yermolay, Yermak is the name by which his associates knew him and it is under that name that he has become famous. M. Putsillo ( K voprosu, kto byl Yermak Timofeyevich, pokoritel' Sibiri, Russky Vyestnik, Vol. 156, p. 275ff.) considers many of the difficulties in the common narrative and cites other authors as V. Bronevsky, who wrote a history of the Don Cossacks in which Yermak figures, but there seems to be no other evidence than that of the historical songs. These songs have been collected in a volume by V. Th. Miller entitled Historical Songs of the Russian People of the XVIXVII Centuries (Istoricheskiya Pyesni russkago naroda XVI206