Volgid: some Mari and Udmurts

[Ilmatar]

This udmurt (if that's what she is) has very similar drum and clothes to the Sámi?
( I made it an url link, as the picture is big)

I doubt that the ancestors Sami were wearing those dresses 4000 BC when leaving the Urals. The Sami dress at least is said to have evolved from the 16th century Spanish court dresses and its' more popular adaptations. Mari and udmurt dresses seem more like adapations of the 16th-17th century Russian fashion, itself reminiscent of the Byzantine fashion. And jewels made of coins look almost Ottoman.

[zemelmete]

That's interesting to see how dresses do change due time. Let's say khanty (oh, sorry that I speak about them again, but they are good example, because many of them still are wearing traditional clothes in everyday life) earlier dressed much more in european side and clothes didn't differ much from east-european folk dresses. In the last time (especially in 20th century) their folk-costume turned much to siberian side (particularly nenets).

Old khanty costume:



New khanty costume:

[jam]

Well, The blue red color male clothes are fairly new, but the old white women clothing is not, as I understand.

However, that doesn't explain the shaman drum!!!

[Ilmatar]

I think that the Sàmi Shamanic drum has a great resamplence even to the ones used by some American Indian tribes. Therefore I'd say similar Shamanic Drums may have once been used all over the Northern Hemisphere.

[zemelmete]

jam said:

This udmurt (if that's what she is) has very similar drum and clothes to the Sámi?
( I made it an url link, as the picture is big)
www.suri.ee/hoimup/hp2001/olga2.jpg

Unfortunately, the page is in Estonian:
www.suri.ee/hoimup/hp2001/olga.html

By the way I posted her picture once. Her name is Olga Aleksandrova.



Her biography briefly:
Born in 1963 (Udmurtia). Studied in Udmurtian state university philology. In 1987 graduated Moscow state institute (in profession - director in crowd scene). Olga Aleksandrova is also director of drama. In 1991. she made performance in old-russian language. Later O. Aleksandrova made performances after udmurtian folklore. She was interested much in finno-ugrian folklore and ethnography. O.Aleksandrova made mono-performance "three wedding songs", which was played not only in Russia, but also in Finland (1994), Norway, Sweden, Germany, Hungary, Estonia, Czechia, France, Netherlands, Canada, USA. In 1987-2000 she was the main director of youth theatre in Izhevsk (Udmurtia). Since 2003. O. Aleksandrova is art director of the first professional ob-ugrian theatre in Khanty-Mansijsk (Western Siberia).

[jam]

I didn't know that, She sure looks different sitting by that desk

[zemelmete]

Shamans in finno-ugric speaking nations usually dressed in white dresses (white colour in finno-ugric mythology counted as good, lucky colour). As I understand, bad shamans dressed in black (which counted as bad, unlucky colour).

Khanty shaman dress:

[Ilmatar]

I noticed a very significant difference between the Ugrian and the Sàmi trums: The Sàmi drums usually have illustrations on their drums. The most popular theme before the event of Christianity among the Lapps was the Tree of Life (basicly a cross). Later on some Christian themes were added to the illustrations. According to the chronicles the use of the drums went on well to the 18th century. Shamans used to throw bones to the drum and predict the future according to which part of the drum they fell on.

[zemelmete]

Yes, saami and ugrian shaman traditions do differ strongly. One interesting thing is, that ugrian shamans often played musical instrument, similar to finnish kantele, instead drums. That is one of things what strongly differ ugrians from other siberian nations. Even neighbour samoyeds didn't have such instument and they used drums only in shaman practice.

[jam]

This is a Sámi Drum, although they often are oval:


The actual construction look much more like the Udmurt than the Kanthy drum, though the Udmurt one is without any ilustrations.

Here's white (formal) Sámi clothes:



When I talked about similarities, I wasn't talking about the design or cut of the clothes, but the patterns and colours used!

[jam]

This is a more typical Sámi drum:

[jam]

Nenets also have drums in similar style, But does all this originate with the Nenets?



This link:foto.ravna.no/detail.asp?product_id=0001-06

[zemelmete]

jam said:

The actual construction look much more like the Udmurt than the Kanthy drum, though the Udmurt one is without any ilustrations.

Actually khanty hadn't special form of shaman drums. Form of drums varied from place to place and drums of different khanty groups were more similar to neighbour nation (nenets, kets or selkups etc.) drums than they were similar each to other inside one nation. In some parts khanty didn't use drums at all. National musical string instrument, called narsjuh or narkasjuh (which, as I said, looks similar to kantele), was played more often in shaman ceremonies.
Kantele, narsjuh, sankviltap and other similar instruments in finno-ugric nations, seems, are original finno-ugrian musical instruments and previously were shaman instruments. Reading Kalevala - finnish national poem, I had such feeling that some of main heroes there (Väinämöinen and other, who played kantele) were shamans actually.

jam said:

Nenets also have drums in similar style, But does all this originate with the Nenets?

Hard to say. Some things really are similar in regarding shaman drums. For example both saami and nenets usually made drums from white reindeer skin, which was big rareness. But there are also big differences. Nenets didn't make pictures on drums as saami did.

[jam]

Heres some more Nenets pattern:



If I understand you correctly, you're half Kanthy, but also a little bit Nenet?

[zemelmete]

jam said:

If I understand you correctly, you're half Kanthy, but also a little bit Nenet?

Well I don't know really if there were nenets among my ancestors. The thing is that I don't know almost nothing about ancestors from my mother side.
I guess I have some nenets blood because my mother looks strongly mongoloid, more, than khanty in average.