It is difficult to establish precisely the time of creation of the Olonkho. As with any work of oral folklore, the text of Olonkho evolved through the Olonkho-tellers, enriched over time with new information about the life of the people. In the Olonkho texts one may find traces of history – thus they resonate with recollections of the great Mongolian emperor Genghis Khan and also reminiscences of more recent battles of the Sakha with the Tungus people, and, possibly, considerably earlier ones reflecting the fall of the Xiongnu empire. In Manas, for example, we also find mention of the Junghar state (17th-18th centuries.), of Genghis Khan (13th century), and of the conflicts with the Rouran Khaganate – one of the people which came onto the historic arena after the Xiongnu (3rd century BC to the 3rd century AD). Of course, all this can be used for dating but one cannot expect to do so with any great precision. It is frivolous, in my opinion, to try to establish the relevant periods (the folklorists tend to get preoccupied with it). Realistically, what we see in Olonkho are (a) references to the Junghar wars are not there – which means that in the 17th century, the olonkhosuts lived far away from the Junghar khanate; (b) references to the expansion of the Genghis Khan empire are abundant – which means that the olonkhosuts lived not too far from all the paths on which the Mongolians travelled (thereby contradicting the idea that the ancient Sakha settled on the banks of the Upper Lena in the 10th to the 11th centuries); (c) references to the second Turkic Khaganate are there, e.g. Etuken/Utuken etc. – from this we can infer that in the 8th to the 10th centuries, the olonkhosuts were settled not far from those places (and possibly already composed some proto-Olonkho); (d) the fact that many Olonkho have common plots with Mongolian epics shows that, above all else, there were contacts and we know from other sources that there were indeed contacts. V. Rassadin on the one hand, and S. Kałużiński and M. Stachowski on the other, divide these contacts into two distinct periods – one in the ancient Turkic epoque, approximately the same 10th-11th centuries with the dialects of the Daghur type, the other – with the Buryat around the 16th century. To ascertain the date of the earlier periods is hard, but the similarities of all the Turkic epics makes you think of the epoch of the disintegration of the proto-Turkic ethnos, that being – Xiongnu, the Han dynasty in China, i.e. from the 3rd century BC to the 3rd century AD. As for the struggle between tribal and feudal systems, this is not a guideline for dating because for the nomads feudalism came and went many times, eventually automatically collapsing into a tribal form in the countryside.
In the research works of the renowned folklorists and historians that are included in this publication some suppositions are made about the origin of the Olonkho; partially they are connected with outdated historic theories; but in general we should agree with the fact that the Olonkho epic shows considerably closer ties with other Turkic and Mongolian epics than with those of the Extreme North and, therefore, has been carried by the Yakut to their modern territory from the South.
The translators and editors have made an enormous effort, trying to adequately convey the poetic peculiarities of the Olonkho text into English – principally the poetic imagery directly connected with the vast landscapes of the North, and the ornate rhythmical text with an abundance of alliterations. The language of Olonkho is archaic, many words that are present in the text are no longer in use, one can only guess at their meanings. This language is waiting for its researcher(s).
It is very important that, finally, the English readership can acquaint themselves with yet another ancient and complex culture, comprising a huge territory, and up to now serving as a spiritual support to a whole nation. We should also hope that the appearance of this translation will stimulate new researches into the Olonkho in Yakutia itself as well as throughout the world.
Those who wish to acquaint themselves more widely with the texts of Olonkho and access the current scientific works on it should visit the Olonkho site created by the researchers: http://olonkho.info. The site functions in Russian, Sakha and English.
Olonkho – the Ancient Yakut Epic
Innokenty Pukhov
Dr of Philology
Honoured Worker of Science of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)
The extensive collection of Olonkho – the heroic legends of Yakutia – is the pearl in the crown of the Yakut peoples’ literary art, indeed it is their favourite and most distinctive type of literary art.
Innokenty Pukhov
Olonkho is the general name for the entire Yakut heroic epic that consists of many long legends. While their average length runs from ten to fifteen thousand verses, some of the longer Olonkho legends extend to over twenty thousand verses. In the past, Yakut Olonkho-tellers created even larger pieces by blending different plots together; regrettably those pieces were never recorded.
In actual fact, there is no specific data as to how many pieces of Olonkho existed during the time when the epic flourished. We can certainly say that there was ‘a significant number’ of them. Furthermore, it is very difficult to estimate how many pieces of Olonkho co-existed at the same time. The fact is that a plot of any one Olonkho piece can be more or less freely transferred into another piece, or simply reduced, by leaving out entire plot lines, or specific details, episodes, and different descriptions. The main characteristic feature of the Yakut epic, and the reason for the legends’ similarity, lies in the scope for ‘interpenetration’ and the opportunity to reduce or enlarge the length of Olonkho without ruining its content and the logical sequence of the events’ development.
The Yakut Olonkho is an epic of a very ancient origin. The stories originate from the times when the Yakut people’s ancestors lived on their former homeland and closely communicated with the ancestors of the Turkic and Mongolian peoples living in the Altay and Sayan regions. This is proven by the fact that there are common features in the Olonkho plot and the other people’s epic plots, as well as some similarities in the language structure and vocabulary. There are general features in the heroes’ names (khan – khan, mergen, botur, etc.). The word kuo in the main heroine’s name that the modern Yakut people had forgotten about serves as a permanent element of the name in its modern form.
In the other Turkic people’s epics a similar word ko means ‘beautiful woman’. In Olonkho the story-tellers sometimes add the particle alip to the name of the evil character, thereby changing its meaning to ‘an evil sorcerer’ (Alyp Khara). Alp and alyp are known among the Turkic peoples as words denoting ‘a hero’. Consequently, the Turkic alp (alyp) is represented in Olonkho as an evil enemy. In Olonkho there is such a notion as yotugen (yotuget) tyordyo. It is a place where all the Under World creatures live, the synonym of the Under World, the place, where these creatures bring their captives from the human tribes and torture them. Meanwhile, the ancient Turks used the word otiikan (or utiikan) to denote highlands in modern Northern Mongolia. Clearly, the notions alyp and yotugen entered the Olonkho narratives as echoes of past battles between the ancient Turkic and Mongolian peoples. There are many similarities in the verse structure and also the character of the descriptive passages in different episodes of the Olonkho and the Altay and Sayan people’s epics.
These similarities help to provide an approximate estimate of the timeline when the first Olonkho piece was created. The similar features of Olonkho and the epic of the Turkic and Mongolian peoples of Siberia could only have occurred in the period when there was direct