Storozheva A. A.

The image of a wolf in the steppe animalistics of Ancient Rus’: semantics and poetics P. 84 -92.

UDC 821.161’01-1.09

DOI 10.37724/RSU.2023.80.3.008

 

Abstract. The study deals with the semantics of the image of the wolf and the poetic means of its creation in the historical and military texts of Ancient Rus’. The wolf-image has a wide potential in the context of steppe animalistics, since its artistic interpretation is due to a wide range of factors: religious, ethnic, and historical. The most complete understanding of the ideas of a Russian person about the world around him through the images of animals, to draw a conclusion about the evolution of the perception of nature allows a comparison of folklore and literary material of works of different genres from antiquity to the present. many Russian and foreign scholars have dwelt on the symbolism of animalistic images and their artistic embodiment in literature. Their conclusions show that  the wolf archetype was formed in paganism, when totem animals were subjects of tribal worship. During the formation of major world religions, the cult of the wolf was reconsidered, and it acquired both positive and negative connotations in the art of ancient Rus’. This is reflected in the etiological legends that reveal the origin of the predator animal, which cannot be simplified to a single version. The purpose of the current study is to identify the spectrum of semantic meanings, the ways of artistic implementation and the functions of the wolf figure in animalistic fragments of ancient Russian texts associated with the steppe areas. The subject of the study is the dual image of the wolf, identified in the animal world of the steppe locus as one endowed with many mythologized features. This analysis of ancient Russian writing, where the animal world of the steppe locus is significant, made it possible to identify several meanings of the wolf image: wolf-warrior, enemy, werewolf and heretic, due to various literary and folklore sources, both Christian and pagan symbols.

 

Keywords: image of a wolf, symbol, ancient Russian literature, animalistics, steppe area, mythologism.

 

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