Artistic closeness of Shor heroic epic and shaman texts

The paper deals with common features of Shor epic and shaman texts. Researchers of the Shor epic tradition (e. g. A. I. Chudojakov, G. B. Sychenko, D. A. Funk) have already described a number of common storylines: a journey to other worlds, a mental vision of the path of a hero or shaman, faith in the helping spirits ( töster or qay eezi ). The parallelism between the epic and shaman traditions is also evident from the fact that both genres use a musical instrument as transportation means to other worlds. This work focuses on further common features of Shor epics and shaman texts. They both use «small» folklore genres (proverbs, sayings, good wishes, cursing, etc.) as well as common stylistic and compositional devices: figurative language (tropes), parallelism, alliteration, repetitions. All these devices are used with minor variations in both types of texts. Proverbs, sayings, good wishes, cursing formulas are used by shamans and story-tellers with different purposes. In epic stories, a good wish of long life can be both directed to real listeners and epic characters. However, during ritual actions, the travelling shaman utters the wish that the doors should be open first of all for himself or herself since he may be threatened by otherworldly spirits or they may hinder the way. The saying A wild goat has fur while a human being has a name is used in shaman mystic actions for establishing contact with a stranger. In epics, it is also used during the ceremony of Name Giving, one of Shor epic formulas. Cursing expressions are directed to the character’s opponents and enemies in epic stories while a shaman uses them against various spirits. Figurative language means and various compositional devices are widely used in both types of text: rhythmic and syntactic parallelism, initial and final alliteration, Aesopian language, repetitions with minor variations, etc. Heroic stories and shaman ritual texts are the parts of the oral tradition of folklore. Consequently, both story-tellers and shamans could use the common inventory of stylistic devices, making the narration more colourful, enriching it with semantically exact definitions of the highest artistic value.

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