--- title: Chapter II. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 10 — Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Musc… · full text with trees description: Chapter II. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 10, «Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore»: the whole chapter, every sentence with its dependency tree and pragmatics. It begins: To the hero's adventures while with the Water King, and while escaping from him, an important parallel is offere --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collecti…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/) / Chapter II. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 10 # Chapter II. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 10 Chapter II. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 10 of «Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore»: the whole text, 125 sentences and 2656 words. Every sentence has its own page with its syntax tree and pragmatics, parsed by Mova itself. **1** [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/page/2/) - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/1/) — To the hero's adventures while with the Water King, and while escaping from him, an important parallel is offered by the end of the already mentioned (at p. 92) Indian story of Sringabhuja. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/2/) — That prince asks Agnisikha, the Rakshasa whom, in his crane-form, he has wounded, to bestow upon him the hand of his daughter--the maiden who had met him on his arrival at the Rakshasa's palace. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/3/) — The demon pretends to consent, but only on condition that the prince is able to pick out his love from among her numerous sisters. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/4/) — This Sringabhuja is able to do in spite of all the demon's daughters being exactly alike, as she has told him beforehand she will wear her pearls on her brow instead of round her neck. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/5/) — Her father will not remark the change, she says, for being of the demon race, he is not very sharp witted. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/6/) — The Rakshasa next sets the prince two of the usual tasks. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/7/) — He is to plough a great field, and sow a hundred bushels of corn. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/8/) — When this, by the daughter's help, is done, he is told to gather up the seed again. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/9/) — This also the demon's daughter does for him, sending to his aid a countless swarm of ants. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/10/) — Lastly he is commanded to visit the demon's brother and invite him to the wedding. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/11/) — He does so, and is pursued by the invited guest, from whom he escapes only by throwing behind him earth, water, thorns, and lastly fire, with all of which he has been provided by his love. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/12/) — They produce corresponding obstacles which enable him to get away from the uncle of his bride. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/13/) — The demon now believes that his proposed son-in-law must be a god in disguise, so he gives his consent to the marriage. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/14/) — All goes well for a time, but at last the prince wants to go home, so he and his wife fly from her father's palace. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/15/) — Agnisikha pursues them. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/16/) — She makes her husband invisible, while she assumes the form of a woodman. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/17/) — Up comes her angry sire, and asks for news of the fugitives. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/18/) — She replies she has seen none, her eyes being full of tears caused by the death of the Rakshasa prince Agnisikha. - [19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/19/) — The slow-witted demon immediately flies home to find out whether he is really dead. - [20](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/20/) — Discovering that he is not, he renews the pursuit. - [21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/21/) — Again his daughter renders her husband invisible, and assumes the form of a messenger carrying a letter. - [22](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/22/) — When her father arrives and repeats his question, she says she has seen no one: she is going with a letter to his brother from Agnisikha, who has just been mortally wounded. - [23](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/23/) — Back again home flies the demon in great distress, anxious to find out whether he has really been wounded to death or not. - [24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/24/) — After settling this question, he leaves his daughter and her husband in peace. - [25](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/25/) — See Professor Brockhaus in the "Berichte der phil. hist. - [26](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/26/) — Classe der K. Saechs. - [27](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/27/) — Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften," 1861, pp. - [28](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/28/) — 226-9, and Professor Wilson, "Essays, &c.," ii. p. 136-8. - [29](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/29/) — Cf. - [30](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/30/) — R. Koehler in "Orient und Occident," ii. pp. - [31](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/31/) — 107-14.\] - [32](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/32/) — In another story a king is out hunting and becomes thirsty. - [33](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/33/) — Seeing a spring near at hand, he bends down and is just going to lap up its water, when the Tsar-Medved, a King-Bear, seizes him by the beard. - [34](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/34/) — The king is unable to free himself from his grasp, and is obliged to promise as his ransom "that which he knows not of at home," which turns out to be a couple of children--a boy and a girl--who have been born during his absence. - [35](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/35/) — In vain does he attempt to save the twins from their impending fate, by concealing them in a secret abode constructed for that purpose underground. - [36](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/36/) — In the course of time the King-Bear arrives to claim them, finds out their hiding-place, digs them up, and carries them off on his back to a distant region where no man lives. - [37](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/37/) — During his absence they attempt to escape being carried through the air on the back of a friendly falcon, but the King-Bear sees them, "strikes his head against the earth, and burns the falcon's wings." - [38](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/38/) — The twins fall to the ground, and are carried by the King-Bear to his home amid inaccessible mountains. - [39](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/39/) — There they make a second attempt at escape, trusting this time to an eagle's aid; but it meets with exactly the same fate as their first trial. - [40](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/40/) — At last they are rescued by a bull-calf, which succeeds in baffling all the King-Bear's efforts to recover them. - [41](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/41/) — At the end of their perilous journey the bull-calf tells the young prince to cut its throat, and burn its carcase. - [42](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/42/) — He unwillingly consents, and from its ashes spring a horse, a dog, and an apple-tree, all of which play important parts in the next act of the drama. - [43](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/43/) — \[148\] - [44](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/44/) — In one of the variants of the Water King story,\[149\] the seizer of the drinking kings' beard is not called the \_Morskoi Tsar\_ but \_Chudo Morskoe\_, a Water Chudo, whose name recalls to mind the Chudo Yudo we have already met with. - [45](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/45/) — \[150\] The Prince who is obliged, in consequence of his father's promise, to surrender himself to the Water Giant, falls in love with a maiden whom he finds in that potentate's palace, and who is an enchantress whom the Chudo has stolen. - [46](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/46/) — She turns herself into a ring, which he carries about with him, and eventually, after his escape from the Chudo, she becomes his bride. - [47](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/47/) — In another story,\[151\] the being who obtains a child from one of the incautious fathers of the Jephthah type who abound in popular fiction, is of a very singular nature. - [48](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/48/) — A merchant is flying across a river on the back of an eagle, when he drops a magic "snuff-box," which had been entrusted to his charge by that bird, and it disappears beneath the waters. - [49](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/49/) — At the eagle's command, the crayfish search for it, and bring back word that it is lying "on the knees of an Idol." - [50](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/50/) — The eagle summons the Idol, and demands the snuff box. - [51](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/51/) — Thereupon the Idol says to the merchant--"Give me what you do not know of at home?" - [52](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/52/) — The merchant agrees and the Idol gives him back his snuff-box. - [53](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/53/) — In some of the variants of the story, the influence of ideas connected with Christianity makes itself apparent in the names given to the actors. - [54](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/54/) — Thus in the "Moujik and Anastasia Adovna,"\[152\] it is no longer a king of the waters, but a devil's imp,\[153\] who bargains with the thirsting father for his child, and the swan-maiden whose shift the devoted youth steals bears the name of Adovna, the daughter of Ad or Hades. - [55](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/55/) — In "The Youth,"\[154\] a moujik, who has lost his way in a forest makes the rash promise to a man who enables him to cross a great river; "and that man (says the story) was a devil." - [56](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/56/) — \[155\] We shall meet with other instances further on of parents whose "hasty words" condemn their children to captivity among evil spirits. - [57](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/57/) — In one of the stories of this class,\[156\] the father is a hunter who is perishing with cold one night, and who makes the usual promise as the condition of his being allowed to warm himself at a fire guarded by a devil. - [58](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/58/) — Being in consequence of this deprived of a son, he becomes very sad, and drinks himself to death. " - [59](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/59/) — The priest will not bury his sinful body, so it is thrust into a hole at a crossway," and he falls into the power of "that very same devil," who turns him into a horse, and uses him as a beast of burden. - [60](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/60/) — At last he is released by his son, who has forced the devil to free him after several adventures--one of them being a fight with the evil spirit in the shape of a three-headed snake. - [61](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/61/) — In the Hindoo story of "Brave Seventee Bai,"\[157\] that heroine kills "a very large Cobra" which comes out of a lake. - [62](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/62/) — Touching the waters with a magic diamond taken from the snake, she sees them roll back "in a wall on either hand," between which she passes into a splendid garden. - [63](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/63/) — In it she finds a lovely girl who proves to be the Cobra's daughter and who is delighted to hear of her serpent-father's death. - [64](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/64/) — Demon haunted waters, which prove fatal to mortals who bathe in or drink of them, often occur in oriental fiction. - [65](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/65/) — In one of the Indian stories, for instance,\[158\] a king is induced to order his escort to bathe in a lake which is the abode of a Rakshasa or demon. - [66](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/66/) — They leap into the water simultaneously, and are all devoured by the terrible man-eater. - [67](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/67/) — From the assaults of such a Rakshasa as this it was that Buddha, who was at the time a monkey, preserved himself and 80,000 of his brother monkeys, by suggesting that they should drink from the tank in which the demon lay in wait for them, "through reeds previously made completely hollow by their breath." - [68](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/68/) — \[159\] - [69](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/69/) — \* \* \* \* \* - [70](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/70/) — From these male personifications of evil--from the Snake, Koshchei, and the Water King--we will now turn to their corresponding female forms. - [71](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/71/) — By far the most important beings of the latter class are those malevolent enchantresses who form two closely related branches of the same family. - [72](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/72/) — Like their sisters all over the world, they are, as a general rule, old, hideous, and hateful. - [73](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/73/) — They possess all kinds of supernatural powers, but their wits are often dull. - [74](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/74/) — They wage constant war with mankind, but the heroes of storyland find them as easily overcome as the males of their family. - [75](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/75/) — In their general character they bear a strong resemblance to the Giantesses, Lamias, female Trolls, Ogresses, Dragonesses, &c., of Europe, but in some of their traits they differ from those well-known beings, and therefore they are worthy of a detailed notice. - [76](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/76/) — In several of the stories which have already been quoted, a prominent part is played by the Baba Yaga, a female fiend whose name has given rise to much philological discussion of a somewhat unsatisfactory nature. - [77](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/77/) — \[160\] Her appearance is that of a tall, gaunt hag, with dishevelled hair. - [78](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/78/) — Sometimes she is seen lying stretched out from one corner to the other of a miserable hut, through the ceiling of which passes her long iron nose; the hut is supported "by fowl's legs," and stands at the edge of a forest towards which its entrance looks. - [79](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/79/) — When the proper words are addressed to it, the hut revolves upon its slender supports, so as to turn its back instead of its front to the forest. - [80](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/80/) — Sometimes, as in the next story, the Baba Yaga appears as the mistress of a mansion, which stands in a courtyard enclosed by a fence made of dead men's bones. - [81](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/81/) — When she goes abroad she rides in a mortar, which she urges on with a pestle, while she sweeps away the traces of her flight with a broom. - [82](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/82/) — She is closely connected with the Snake in different forms; in many stories, indeed, the leading part has been ascribed by one narrator to a Snake and by another to a Baba Yaga. - [83](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/83/) — She possesses the usual magic apparatus by which enchantresses work their wonders; the Day and the Night (according to the following story) are among her servants, the entire animal world lies at her disposal. - [84](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/84/) — On the whole she is the most prominent among the strange figures with which the Skazkas make us acquainted. - [85](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/85/) — Of the stories which especially relate to her the following may be taken as a fair specimen. - [86](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/86/) — THE BABA YAGA. - [87](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/87/) — \[161\] - [88](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/88/) — Once upon a time there was an old couple. - [89](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/89/) — The husband lost his wife and married again. - [90](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/90/) — But he had a daughter by the first marriage, a young girl, and she found no favor in the eyes of her evil stepmother, who used to beat her, and consider how she could get her killed outright. - [91](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/91/) — One day the father went away somewhere or other, so the stepmother said to the girl, "Go to your aunt, my sister, and ask her for a needle and thread to make you a shift." - [92](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/92/) — Now that aunt was a Baba Yaga. - [93](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/93/) — Well, the girl was no fool, so she went to a real aunt of hers first, and says she: - [94](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/94/) — "Good morning, auntie!" - [95](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/95/) — "Good morning, my dear! what have you come for?" - [96](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/96/) — "Mother has sent me to her sister, to ask for a needle and thread to make me a shift." - [97](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/97/) — Then her aunt instructed her what to do. " - [98](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/98/) — There is a birch-tree there, niece, which would hit you in the eye--you must tie a ribbon round it; there are doors which would creak and bang--you must pour oil on their hinges; there are dogs which would tear you in pieces--you must throw them these rolls; there is a cat which would scratch your eyes out--you must give it a piece of bacon." - [99](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/99/) — So the girl went away, and walked and walked, till she came to the place. - [100](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/100/) — There stood a hut, and in it sat weaving the Baba Yaga, the Bony-shanks. **1** [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/28/page/2/) - ← previous: [Chapter II. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/27/) - next →: [Chapter II. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/29/) - ↑ back to [Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg22373/)