The Golden Baba today appears only in myths and legends. Presumably, it was she who was the main idol worshiped in ancient times by the peoples of North-Eastern Europe and North-West Siberia.

Myths about the golden idol

The earliest mention of a golden idol is found in the 13th century in the Scandinavian “Saga of Saint Olaf,” part of Snorri Sturluson’s “Earthly Circle.” The saga tells that around 1023, the Norwegian Vikings, led by the famous Thorir the Dog, went on a campaign to Biarmia (Bjarmaland) - that was the name of the legendary state, which spread in the 9th-12th centuries in the region of the Northern Dvina, Vychegda and the upper reaches of the Kama. In Rus' it was called Perm the Great. They managed to secretly penetrate the Bjarm sanctuary - Yomali, guarded by six shamans. There they saw many treasures and a large gilded statue. The idol had a precious chain around its neck and a golden crown decorated with twelve different images on its head. On her lap lay a bowl filled with silver coins mixed with soil. The Vikings took with them as much money and treasure as they could carry. Finally, one of them, Carly, cut off the head of the idol, seduced by the chain. But on the way back, the Vikings were met by the guardians of the sanctuary, and they had to flee, leaving behind all the loot.

We also find information about the cult of worship of the Golden Woman in the Sofia Chronicle for 1398 in connection with the death of Bishop Stefan of Perm. It says that Stephen sowed the faith of Christ on those lands where they had previously worshiped animals, trees, water, fire and... the Golden Woman.

In the 15th century, the Novgorod Ushkuiniki, having visited the Ural lands with goods, brought news of "unknown people in Eastern country, growing small, eating each other and praying to the golden idol".

A lot of legends about the Golden Woman circulate among the Komi, Khanty and Mansi. So, Mansi reindeer herders tell this legend. The golden woman was alive and could walk on her own. When she was crossing the Stone Belt, as the Ural Mountains were called in ancient times, a local shaman tried to detain her, since she considered herself the mistress of the place. Then the idol screamed in a terrible voice, and from its screams every living thing for many miles died. The daring shaman fell backward and turned to stone.

The Yakut epic describes a copper statue standing in the middle of impassable swamps. When enemies approached, she allegedly began to make a sound reminiscent of the chirping of many crickets, and also emitted a blue glow into the sky.

The Nenets have a myth that once a year, when the Great Sun appears in the sky, the Solar Woman rises from under the frozen ground, carrying a baby in her womb.

The cult of the “golden goddess” among the Slavs

It seems that the Golden Woman was worshiped in Ancient Rus'. In the pagan legends of the Slavs, the Temple of the Golden Baba is mentioned, located “in the country of Obdorsk, at the mouth of the Obigo River”(probably referring to the Ob River). She was considered the patroness of pregnant women and midwives. Gold, silver and furs were sacrificed to her. Even foreigners came to worship the idol. Researchers of ancient Slavism believe that the Golden Baba was the main one among Rozhanitsa - goddesses responsible for human destiny.

According to most researchers, we were talking about the Mansi goddess Sorni-ekva, whose name translated means “Golden Woman”. Prince N.S. Trubetskoy, who was engaged in ethnography, believed that this was Kaltash-Ekva, the wife of the supreme Khanty-Mansi god Numi-Tarum, who patronizes all living things and determines the fate of every person.

Where to look for the Golden Woman?

It is assumed that with the advent of Christianity, the pagans began to hide the statue so that it would not be destroyed. Quite detailed information about this can be read in books about Rus' by European travelers of the 16th century. True, information about the location of the sanctuary of the Golden Baba is quite contradictory. For example, M. Mekhovsky in his “Essay on Two Sarmatias” (1517) writes that the idol is located beyond Vyatka "on penetration into Scythia". But S. Herberstein in 1549, A. Guagnini in 1578 and D. Fletcher in 1591 indicate that it is hidden near the mouth of the Ob.

In his notes made during a trip to Russia, the Roman envoy Sigismund Herberstein reports: “They say, or, to put it more accurately, they fable, that the idol of the Golden Old Woman is a statue in the form of an old woman holding her son on her lap, and there again another child is visible, about whom they say that this is her grandson. Moreover, it was as if she had placed some instruments there that produced a constant sound, like trumpets. If this is so, then I believe that this is due to the strong and constant wind blowing on these instruments.".

On one of the maps of the medieval cartographer G. Mercator, published in 1595, near the mouth of the Ob River, a statue is depicted with a child in her arms and the signature “Golden Woman” (Slata baba).

In the Uvat Local History Museum “Legends of the Gray Irtysh”, located in the Tyumen region, you can see an exhibition dedicated to the Golden Woman. The exhibits include the Kungur Chronicle, according to which 400 years ago the idol was in the Demyansky town in the Uvat region, but after the capture of the town by the Ermakov Cossacks, led by Ataman Bryazga, the statue mysteriously disappeared. In the center of the museum hall there is a reconstruction of the altar with a gilded figure of the goddess, reproduced from the drawings of the chronicler S.U. Remezova.

In 1961, the statue was allegedly discovered in the vicinity of the village of Yuilsk in the upper reaches of the Kazym River, approximately 270 kilometers north of Khanty-Mansiysk. But it turned out to be not gold, but wooden, covered with silver on top. Therefore, there were rumors about a substitution. However, everyone who dealt with the idol died one after another. Although it is clear that the information is completely unverified... Moreover, the “Idol of Yule” soon disappeared.

Where the mysterious Golden Woman is now, if she really exists, is unknown. Maybe the idol is hidden in one of the hidden Ural caves, waiting in the wings...

There have been many legends about the Golden Woman since ancient times, she was described many times by alleged eyewitnesses, adventurers of all stripes searched for her long and persistently, either in Europe or in Siberia. According to rumors, in last time she was seen in the 30s of the last century in the secret sanctuary of the Kazym Khanty in the Ob River basin, according to other sources - also in Yugoria in 1961, but the trouble is - they could not find her! And did it really exist, and if it did, has it survived to this day?

It is believed that the Golden Woman is a legendary idol that was worshiped by the inhabitants of North-Eastern Europe and North-West Siberia. The first mention of it is contained in the Scandinavian sagas: in 1023, the Vikings attacked Biarmia (Norwegian - Bjarmaland), led by the famous Torer-Dog. Biarmia is also known to us only from sagas; according to one version, it was located on the territory of the Arkhangelsk region in the Northern Dvina River basin, according to another, on the southern shore of the White Sea, from where the Zavolotsk trade route led to the Volga basin. Biarmia is identified by some historians with Permia.

On the Dvina, the Vikings discovered the sanctuary of Yumala (or the Slavic Perun) - the heavenly deity of thunder, who, as the highest deity, was credited with the creation of the world. In the sanctuary there was a huge wooden statue, on its knees was a silver bowl filled with silver coins mixed with earth. On the head of the statue there was a golden crown, decorated with twelve different images, and on the neck was a necklace. How things ended for the Vikings, the chronicles are silent.

In Russian chronicles, the first mention of the Golden Woman is contained in the Novgorod Sofia Chronicle for 1398 in connection with the death of the missionary Stefan of Perm. Stefan preached Christianity to the Komi population on Perm land, argued with the Perm priests, and meanwhile the archers destroyed ancient sanctuaries and built churches in their places. The chronicle says: “Teach the Perm land the faith of Christ, but before they bowed to the beast and tree, water, fire and the Golden Woman.”

Then a rumor spread that the shamans, saving the Golden Woman from Christians, transported her to Siberia. At the end of the 15th century, Moscow governors Semyon Kurbsky and Pyotr Ushaty, at the head of an army of four thousand, went beyond the Urals in an attempt to find the Golden Woman. They captured and plundered many Ugra villages, searched many secret places, but found nothing.

Western European travelers of the 16th century also did not ignore the Golden Woman in their books about the Russian state. According to the “Essay on Two Sarmatias” (1517) by the Polish historian and geographer Matvey Mekhovsky (1457-1523), the Golden Woman is located beyond Vyatka “when penetrating Scythia,” and other authors place it already near the mouth of the Ob.

Baron Sigismund von Herberstein (1486-1566), Austrian ambassador to Moscow, published the book “Notes on Muscovite Affairs” in 1549, and on the map of Muscovy attached to the book in the Tyumen region (Chingi-Tura) he directly indicated the location of the Golden Woman near mouth of the Ob River (SLATA VAVA). He described the Golden Woman in the form of an old woman, in whose womb there is a son and another child is visible - a grandson. Just a real goddess of the family!

A. Guagnini in 1578 wrote about an idol carved from stone in the form old woman with a child in his arms, and next to another child - a grandson (one can assume that he simply used the description of S. Herberstein). But D. Fletcher (1591) wrote about a rock in the lower reaches of the Ob, which has the appearance of a woman in rags with a child in her arms. An image of a statue with a child in her arms and the signature “Golden Woman” (Slata baba) at the mouth of the Ob River appears on some Western European maps of the Russian state of the 16th century, in particular, on the map of Muscovy by A. Jenkinson from 1542, who made the following inscription on it: “ ...The priest asks this idol about what they should do and where to migrate, and the idol gives answers to the questioners, and the predictions definitely come true.” Even the famous Flemish cartographer Gerhard Mercator wrote Zolotaia baba at the mouth of the Ob on his 1595 map.

Russian scientists of the 18th century. G.F. Miller and I.I. Lepyokhin put forward a hypothesis that the Golden Woman, an ancient Komi deity, was taken to the Ob by Komi pagans who did not want to be baptized. But the famous Russian ethnographer, Prince N.S. Trubetskoy believed that the Golden Woman was Kaltas, the wife of the supreme Khanty-Mansi god Numi-Torum, the mother of all living things, the goddess of fertility and fate.

In Europe, the Golden Woman has been somewhat forgotten, but in Western Siberia they still seriously believe in her existence. According to the Siberian Kungur Chronicle, the Golden Baba was four centuries ago in the Demyansky town in the lower reaches of the Irtysh (the territory of the current Uvat district of the Tyumen region), but after the capture of the town by the Ermak Cossacks under the leadership of Ataman Bogdan Bryazga (autumn 1582), she mysteriously disappeared. The defector told the chieftain that there was an idol made of pure gold in the town, but since the idol was not found, the detachment rushed in its footsteps. In May 1583, on the Ob River in Belogorye, the Cossacks discovered the prayer site of the Golden Woman, but they found nothing there, and returning from the campaign, the Cossacks were ambushed and all died. (According to Ostyak beliefs, the prayer site was protected by a spell, and anyone who disturbed the peace of the Golden Woman must die.) After some time, the missing idol appeared in the basin of the Konda River, the left tributary of the Irtysh.

In the Uvat Museum of Local Lore, in accordance with the drawings of the chronicler S. U. Remezov, an altar with a figure of the Golden Woman, covered with real gold, standing above it was reproduced. The chronicler, most likely, did not see the idol, and from whose words he drew it is unknown, but in the chronicle it is described as follows: “A naked woman sitting on a chair with her son, receiving gifts from her own.”

In 1657, the Kondinsky monastery was founded on the Konda River to fight paganism. The monks searched for and burned “shaitans” - wooden gods in furs. Missionary Grigory Novitsky, who preached in early XVIII century Christian teaching Ostyaks, tried to find the Golden Woman and destroy her. He collected a lot of information about the idol itself and about the secret sanctuary in which the Golden Baba was kept, and where only the tribal leader and the shaman had the right to enter. He learned that the Golden Woman was located in the area of ​​the river. Conda and from 1712 for 9 years he actively hunted for her. In the end, he was killed by the people guarding the shrine. After him, the unfinished book “Description of the Ostyak People” remained in the monastery.

Since people believe in the Golden Woman, then, of course, they look for her. At the end of the 19th century, the famous Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky (his ancestors once reigned in the Konda River basin, where the Kandinsky surname came from), while still a student, went to Western Siberia to the Zyryansky region, where the Golden Woman was supposedly worshiped. I made a lot of sketches during my search. future artist: Mongolian-type chapels, ancient burial mounds, wooden sculptures, but there was no Golden Woman among them. Distressed by the failure, the artist wrote in his diary that the Golden Woman “is completely unknown to the Zyryans. The memory of her is lost forever."

A sad fate befell other adventurers. Journalist Vasily Dyatlov wrote in the article “The Spell of the Golden Woman” (Itogi Magazine, 2001): “The legend says that somewhere among the swampy swamps there is a statue of the Kazym goddess, made of pure gold, hidden. They have been looking for the golden woman for a long time and continue to look for it to this day. And these searches were always accompanied by events that resembled mysticism. So, in the second half of the 18th century, an expedition of Cossacks set off to the lower Ob region in search of a golden statue. About two dozen armed horsemen with replacement horses and deer disappeared without a trace. The same fate befell the NKVD detachment, which in the 30s was sent to search for gold for the dictatorship of the proletariat. None of the fighters managed to return from the campaign.”

But according to the ethnographic expedition of the Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which visited the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug in the summer of 1990, the situation was somewhat different. In 1933, the NKVD authorities arrested a shaman who showed them the way to the sanctuary, but the Khanty guarding the sanctuary offered armed resistance to the NKVD officers and four employees died. As a result of the ensuing repressions, all adult Khanty men were destroyed, and old men, women and children died of hunger in the winter, since all their guns were confiscated and they could not get food for themselves.

As for the Golden Baba, who was kept in the sanctuary, she disappeared. There is an assumption that it was melted down (if it was gold). However, the Khanty-Mansiysk Local History Museum stores exhibits that came from the storage facility of the local KGB department. If the Golden Woman was not golden, then isn’t she still in some special storage facility?

So, the mystery of the Golden Woman has not yet been solved. Where did she come from? What kind of goddess is this? Where is she now? Maybe the future will show...

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In the very heart of the mountains Northern Urals there is a mysterious place - the Manpupuner plateau. The reindeer herders of the local Mansi people call it the “Small Mountain of Idols.” And this name is not accidental. Seven bizarre stone figures rise like frozen giants. An ancient Mansi legend says that once upon a time the stone pillars were seven Samoyed giants who walked through the mountains to Siberia to destroy the Vogul people. But when they climbed Manpupuner, their leader-shaman saw Yalpingner, the sacred mountain of the Voguls, in front of him. In horror, he threw his drum, which fell on high peak Koip, rising south of Manpupuner, and all his companions were petrified with fear.

Scary idol

But there is another legend, which, however, is less often heard from the Mansi, who every summer drive herds of deer along the Ural ridge. If you look at Mount Koip from a small nameless hill located to the west of the Ural Range, you can clearly see a woman lying on her back with sharp, frightening facial features.

According to the legend that I heard from reindeer herders, this is a petrified shaman, punished for trying to insult one of the most ancient idols, once revered by all the peoples of the North - the Golden Woman. When the idol was crossing the Stone Belt - the Ural Mountains, the shaman, who considered herself the mistress of the mountains, tried to detain the Golden Woman. The idol screamed in a terrible voice, and from the sound of this voice every living thing died for many miles around, and the shaman fell backward and turned to stone.

The screams that the Golden Woman made are evidenced not only by Mansi legends, but also by the memories of foreigners who visited Rus'. Thus, the Italian Alexander Guagnini wrote in 1578: “They even said that in the mountains next to this idol they heard a sound and a loud roar like a trumpet.”

What is this mysterious idol that led to local residents fear with a terrible roar? Where did he come from and where did he disappear to?

Deity of Perm the Great

In Russia, the oldest written mention of the Golden Woman is the Novgorod Chronicle of 1538. The chronicle speaks of missionary activity Stefan of Perm. He walked around the Perm land and erected temples on the site of ancient sanctuaries. The chronicle records that Stephen sowed the faith of Christ on those lands where animals, trees, water, fire and... the Golden Woman were previously worshiped.

Legends about the Golden Woman, hiding somewhere in the North, appeared a long time ago. They are associated with the legendary vast country, spread in the 9th-12th centuries in the forests covering the valleys of the Northern Dvina, Vychegda and the upper reaches of the Kama. In Rus' these lands were called Perm the Great, and in Scandinavian countries- the powerful state of Biarmia or Bjarmaland. The peoples inhabiting this territory worshiped a huge idol - the Golden Woman. Her sanctuary, located, according to the Scandinavian sagas, somewhere at the mouth of the Northern Dvina, was guarded day and night by six shamans. Many treasures were accumulated by the servants of the idol, which bore the name Yumala in the sagas. Perm the Great was rich in the skins of valuable fur-bearing animals. Merchants from Khazaria, which lay in the lower reaches of the Volga, and Vikings from distant Scandinavia paid for them generously.

However, time passed. The strengthened neighbors of Perm the Great extended their tenacious hands to this rich but sparsely populated region. At first it was the Novgorod ushkuiniki, then the squads of the Moscow Grand Duke. Fleeing from Christianity, worshipers of the idol hid the Golden Woman either in the Ural caves, or in impenetrable forests along the banks of the Ob, or in the inaccessible gorges of the Putoran mountains on Taimyr.

In search of a shrine

Where did such a strange deity come from among the Mansi people? Most scientists believe that the Golden Woman is the Mansi goddess Sorni-ekva. This name is translated into Russian as “golden woman.”

Opinions differ regarding the origin of the idol itself. Biarmia history researcher Leonid Teplov suggests that the golden statue could have been taken from the sack of Rome in 410 during the attack of the Ugrians and Goths. Some of them returned to their homeland to the Arctic Ocean, and the ancient statue became a symbol of the northern people.

Other scientists follow the path of a mysterious goddess from China, believing that this is a statue of Buddha, who in the Celestial Empire merges with the image of the goddess Guanyin. There are supporters and Christian origin Golden woman. They suggest that this is a statue of the Madonna, which was stolen during a raid on one of the Christian churches.

They tried to take possession of the Golden Woman for a long time. During their campaigns in Ugra, the Novgorodians willingly plundered pagan sanctuaries. They tried to get to the golden idol hiding in the dense forests, but in vain. Ermak’s daring troops were also interested in the statue. They heard about the Golden Woman from a Chuvash who fled to their camp during the siege of a Tatar settlement. The Chuvash said that in the besieged settlement the Ostyaks prayed to “the golden god who sits in the bowl.” Hearing about the gold, the Cossacks rushed to attack the settlement with renewed vigor. After a bloody battle, they took the walls, but did not find the precious idol. On the eve of the assault, they managed to take him out of the besieged settlement through secret underground passages.

The second time the Cossacks heard about the Golden Woman was when they reached Belgorod on the Ob. Here was the most revered temple by the Ostyaks. It is here that, according to rumors, the shrine was brought Siberian peoples. But this time Ermak failed to reach the Golden Woman. When his troops approached, the residents managed to hide the idol. The Cossacks asked the Ostyaks about the Golden Woman, and they confirmed that indeed “they had a great prayer service to the ancient goddess.”

Robot worship?

The researchers of our time have not neglected the Golden Woman. Ufologists showed great interest in the idol. Ufologists say that this deity is not at all similar to other shrines northern peoples, it seemed to fall from the sky.

It was this version of the origin of the golden idol that was once put forward by ufologist Stanislav Ermakov. He believes that the Golden Woman is an alien robot, which for some reason, perhaps due to a partial malfunction, was left on Earth by its owners. For some time, the Golden Woman could move, and it is with this that the Mansi legends about the “living” idol are connected. Then, according to Ermakov, the robot gradually began to fail. At first he could still make some sounds, and then he finally turned into a golden statue.

I had the opportunity to work for several years in the Northern Urals, in places through which, according to researchers, the golden idol passed, hiding from persecuting Christians. In the Urals, I heard several stories from Mansi reindeer herders related to the Golden Woman.

In the Northern Urals there is a dome-shaped mountain, Manya-Tump, covered with dense forest. Until very recently, reindeer herders, driving their herds along the Ural ridge in the summer, did not even come close to the mountain. “It’s been a long time since you walked the mountain. Whoever walks will get sick for a long time and die. Old people speak - there stood the navels, Sonya Equa, the Golden Woman. It was scary to walk close. Baba shouted widely. People speak in a scary voice."

A little north of Manya-Tump rises another mountain, with which legends about the terrible cry of the Golden Woman are also associated - Koyp. The surroundings of this mountain are surprisingly suitable for the birth of the legend about the temple of the idol. At the foot of the mountain lies an almost round lake. On its shore you can see blocks covered with lichen, in which, with a little imagination, you can guess the remains of an ancient sanctuary.

Mansi herds driving in the summer always come to this sanctuary to leave their gifts on a quadrangular granite slab, as if carved by people.

Between the Manya-Tump and Koyp mountains there is another place that may also be associated with the terrible screams of the Golden Woman. This is Mount Otorten, the highest point in the Urals. In the winter of 1959, a well-trained group of skiers from the Ural Polytechnic Institute died here. Rescuers who went in search of tourists found a tent with a cut-out back wall and bodies lying in deep snow. The expression of mortal horror was frozen on the faces of all the dead.

Some members of the commission that investigated the causes of the tragedy believed that the reason that led to such terrible death, there could be exposure to high-intensity infrasound.

What could make such murderous sounds? Let's return to Stanislav Ermakov's version of the extraterrestrial origin of the Golden Woman. Why space robot, created by a civilization far ahead of the earth's, suddenly partially failed?

One episode in the description of the Viking Thorir Hund’s campaign to Biarmia can help answer this question: “The Vikings happily sailed at the mouth of the Dvina to the trading city in Biarmia... The temple of the highest deity of the Biarmia, as the Vikings reliably knew, was located in deep forest, near the mouth of the Vin (Dvina) River. That’s where they planned to get through...

Thorir Hund, thrusting his ax into the gate, climbed over it with his help. Carly did the same, and they let their comrades inside the fenced-in space. Approaching the mound, the Vikings collected as much money as they could carry...

They reached the very image of Yumala, which towered among the sacred fence. A precious chain hung around the neck of the Burmese god. Carly was seduced by the chain and cut the idol’s neck so hard with an ax that the head fell off his shoulders with a terrifying crack.”

A Viking would hardly be able to cut off the head of a cast statue. It would be another matter if in front of him stood a robot consisting of a metal frame coated with a thin layer of gold. The guards of the sanctuary arrived in time and drove the Vikings away. They miraculously managed to get to the ships, abandoning the collected treasures.

Where is the golden idol now? Three inaccessible corners of Russia are called the final refuge of the Golden Woman: the lower reaches of the Ob, the upper reaches of the Irtysh in the Kalbinsky ridge and the impassable gorges of the Putorana plateau.

In the very core of the mountains of the Northern Urals there is a mysterious place - the Man-Pupu-Ner ridge. The Mansi reindeer herders who wander here call it the Mountain of Small Gods. And this name is no coincidence. Seven bizarre stone figures rise on the flat surface of the ridge. One resembles a petrified woman, the other a lion, the third a wise old man with his hand raised.

Seven Frozen Giants

Tourists from different cities of Russia are in a hurry to see the famous Pechora “blockheads” and hastily pass by the lonely high conical peak of Mount Koyp. In Vogul, Koyp is a drum. One of the legends of the Mansi people connects this peak with its famous neighbors. Once upon a time, seven Samoyed giants walked through the mountains to Siberia to destroy the Vogul people. When they climbed the Man-Pupu-Ner ridge, their leader-shaman saw in front of him the sacred Vogul mountain Yalping-ner. In horror, the shaman threw his drum, which turned into Mount Koyp, and he and his companions froze in fear and became stone blockheads.

But there is another legend that can also be heard from Mansi, but much less often. Koyp looks like a conical mountain from the side of the stone blocks. But if you look at it from a small nameless ridge located to the west, you will clearly see a woman with sharp facial features lying on her back. This is a petrified shaman, punished for trying to insult one of the most ancient idols, once revered by all the peoples of the north - the Golden Woman. When the golden idol was crossing the stone belt of the Ural Mountains, the shaman, who considered herself its owner, wanted to detain the Golden Woman. The idol screamed in a terrible voice, and every living thing for many miles around died of fear, and the arrogant shamaness fell on her back and turned to stone.

The screams that the Golden Woman makes are evidenced not only by Mansi legends, but also by the memories of foreigners who have visited Rus'. Here, for example, is what the Italian Alexander Guagnini wrote in 1578: “They even say that in the mountains next to this idol they heard a sound and a loud roar like a trumpet.”.

What is this golden idol, the appearance of which is accompanied by a terrible scream and roar? Where did he come from and where did he disappear to?

Great Biarmia

In Russia, the oldest written mention of it is the Novgorod Chronicle of 1538. The chronicle talks about the missionary activities of Stephen of Perm. Stefan walked across the Perm land, destroyed ancient sanctuaries and erected Christian churches in their place. The chronicle says that Stefan sowed the faith of Christ in the Perm land among the peoples who previously worshiped animals, trees, water, fire and the Golden Woman.

But legends about the Golden Woman, hiding somewhere in the North, appeared a long time ago. They are associated with the legendary, vast country, spread in the 9th-12th centuries in the forests covering the valleys of the Northern Dvina, Vychegda and the upper reaches of the Kama. In Rus' it was called Perm the Great, in the Scandinavian sagas the powerful state Biarmia or Biarmalandia. The peoples who inhabited it worshiped a huge golden idol - the Golden Woman. Her sanctuary, which according to the Scandinavian sagas was located somewhere near the mouth of the Northern Dvina, was guarded day and night by six shamans. Many treasures were accumulated by the servants of the idol, which bore the name Yumala in the sagas. Perm the Great was rich in the skins of valuable fur-bearing animals. Merchants from Khazaria, which lies in the lower reaches of the Volga, and Vikings from distant Scandinavia paid for them generously.

On ancient maps of Muscovy, near the mouth of the Ob, the inscription “Golden Baba” is often found. Sometimes the inscription accompanies the drawing beautiful woman. The inhabitants of the North worshiped her. The Siberian golden idol teased the imagination, and foreigners traveling around Rus' willingly included stories about it in their books.

Russian chroniclers described the customs of ancient Perm as follows: “They worship idols, sacrifice to them... they come from afar, bringing gifts... or sables, or martens, or ermines... or foxes, or bears, or lynx, or squirrels... gold, or silver, or copper , or iron, or tin". The northern lands are rich in gold. But what about diamonds? After the recent discovery of deposits of these precious stones near Arkhangelsk, doubts disappeared.

But time passed and the stronger neighbors of Perm the Great extended their tenacious hands to this rich but sparsely populated region.

First, the Novgorod ushkuiniki, then the squads of the Moscow Grand Duke, increasingly began to make their way into the once reserved northern forests. Fleeing from Christianity, admirers of the Golden Woman hid their idol either in caves on the Ural ridge, or in the impenetrable forest-tundra of the Ob River, or in the inaccessible gorges of the Putoran Mountains in Taimyr.

Where did the Mansi come from such a strange deity? It is so uncharacteristic of the customs of this people that it seems to have fallen to them straight from the sky. Most scientists believe that the Golden Woman is the Mansi goddess Sorni-Ekva, whose name is translated into Russian as “golden woman.”

Regarding the question of where the golden statue on Perm land came from, opinions differed. Biarmia history researcher Leonid Teplov suggests that the golden statue could have been taken away from the burning sack of Rome in 410 AD during the attack of the Ugrians and Goths. Some of them returned to their homeland to the Arctic Ocean, and the antique statue, brought from a distant southern city, became an idol of the northern people.

Other scholars trace the path of a mysterious goddess from China, believing that this is a statue of Buddha, which in Chinese Buddhism merges with the image of the goddess Guanyi. There are also defenders of the “Christian” origin of the Golden Woman. They suggest that this statue of the Madonna was stolen during a raid on one of the Christian churches.

Hunt for the Golden Woman

They tried to take possession of the Golden Woman for a long time.

In search of treasures, the Vikings scoured the most remote corners of Eastern Europe. Usually they acted under the guise of merchants. One day, the Vikings managed to attack the trail of the Biarm sanctuary and rob it. There was a wooden copy of the Golden Woman in it. The original remained inaccessible to the Scandinavians. In the 11th century Biarmia was conquered by the Rus. The Russians, unlike the Germans, did not destroy other people's sanctuaries. They were satisfied with the usual tribute. The Golden Baba continued to be the main protector of the Biarms. The more Christianity grew stronger, the more intolerant it became towards foreign gods and customs. At the end of the 14th century, Bishop Stefan Khrap, the future Saint Stephen of Great Perm, arrived in the Kama region. He was a person of outstanding intelligence and education. At the same time, the bishop was stern and adamant and was eager to eradicate paganism in the lands entrusted to him. The chronicler dispassionately reports: “Vladyka Stefan was furious at the Perm idols, their filthy, idolized, sculptured, hollowed-out gods. In the end he crushed, dug up, burned with fire, chopped with an ax, crushed with a butt, incinerated without a trace, in forests, and in graveyards, and at boundaries, and at crossroads.”.

From the life of St. Stephen, we know that the missionary preached among the admirers of the Golden Baba. Of course, he would give a lot for the possession of the main shrine of the pagan Permians. But the idol disappeared. Only later did it become clear that he had been taken beyond the Ural Mountains. In the middle of the 15th century, Moscow governors began to conquer the Northern Trans-Urals. They made their most outstanding campaign in 1499-1501. A large army of 4 thousand people at that time, led by Semyon Kurbsky and Pyotr Ushaty, crossed the Subpolar Urals in winter. The skiers went out into the Northern Sosva basin and fought all over the Ugra land. They captured 42 fortresses and colonized 58 local princes. But main value Ostyaks, the idol of the Golden Baba with temple treasures, could not be found.

The borders of Muscovite Rus' moved further and further to the east and southeast. The Golden Woman had the same path. The later the message about it, the further from ancient Biarmia we find it. Later, the trace of the idol was lost. Explorers in the 17th century traveled the length and breadth of Siberia, but the mysterious idol is not mentioned in Russian documents of that era. At the same time when foreigners placed the Golden Baba on the shores of the Arctic Ocean, she was known much further south.

At the end of the 16th century, Volga robbers plundered the sovereign's ship sailing to Astrakhan with “treasury and gunpowder.” The royal ambassador was killed in the battle. Ivan the Terrible's patience has come to an end. The Cossacks, saving their lives, fled to the Ural outskirts of the state. They were readily accepted by the Kama merchants and salt industrialists the Stroganovs. Beyond the Stone Belt lay the Siberian kingdom of Khan Kuchum. This descendant of Genghis Khan continually ravaged the Kama villages and took the inhabitants into slavery. The arriving Cossacks were given the task of discouraging Kuchum from attacking.

The campaign for the Stone was led by Ermak Timofeevich Alenin. Maxim Stroganov added 300 of his warriors to his Cossack detachment of 540 warriors. The army of the Siberian Khan was many times larger than the aliens and even had guns brought from Kazan. But nothing saved her from destruction. After several victories in the fall of 1582, the Russians settled in the capital city of Siberia. North of the city they encountered Ostyak idols. Ermak dispatched Captain Bogdan Bryazga to capture the Demyansk and Nazym towns. These towns lay in the lower reaches of the Irtysh and near its confluence with the Ob. The defenders of one of the fortresses put up fierce resistance. For three days the Cossacks stormed its walls and were about to turn back. But then they heard a story about the siege from the local Chuvash, who had once been brought by Kuchum’s warriors from Rus': “They pray to the Russian God, and that Russian God made of cast gold sits in a thicket”.

The news about the Russian golden idol struck the Cossacks so much that they forgot about the retreat. The Chuvash volunteered to steal the statue and entered the fortress. We were looking forward to his return. But the spy returned empty-handed. Strong security prevented the plan from being carried out. When the town was captured, the idol disappeared. Having reached the Ob, Bogdan and his comrades approached Belogorye, sacred to the Ostyaks. Here was the “great prayer place of the ancient goddess.” Several years before the conquest of Siberia, Poland already knew that the Golden Baba was a woman with a child in her arms. The Belogorsk idol looked the same: “naked, sitting on a chair with her son.” Later sources call him the Golden Baba.

The Belogorsk goddess was terrible. Here's what the hikers said about it: “And they give her a share of every industry. And if anyone breaks this law, he will be tormented and tormented. And whoever brings it not from the heart and with pity will fall before it and die. It has many priests and a great community.". Bogdan was not afraid to disturb the sacred peace and entered Belogorye. Then the mistress of the Ugrians ordered to hide her idol, and hid the huge place of prayer so that the aliens could not find it. Soon after returning from the campaign, the Cossacks, along with Bryazga, were ambushed and exterminated.

A year later, a well-armed detachment of Ivan Mansurov approached Belogorye. At the mouth of the Irtysh, the soldiers cut down a fortress and spent the winter. A large Ostyak army surrounded the fortification and launched an attack all day. The next day the besiegers brought the goddess, placed her under a tree and began a prayer service for victory. The Russians did not wait for the end of the prayer service, after which the Golden Woman was supposed to show her power. In order not to tempt fate, they hit the crowd with cannons. One of the cores reached the target. From the chronicles we learn: “The tree, under which stood the Besurmen idol, was broken into many parts, and the idol crushed them.”.

Despite the assurances of the chroniclers about the destruction of the idol, reports about the Golden Baba appeared later. At the beginning of the 18th century, Philotheus and Grigory Novitsky unsuccessfully chased after her, exterminating the remnants of paganism among the Trans-Ural Ugrians.

In the 20th century, the fight against paganism continued. The year was 1933. The competent authorities received a signal. It turned out that the Khanty, who lived along the Kazym River (the right tributary of the Lower Ob), hide the Golden Baba and worship her. The battle with the “religious dope” was in full swing. The Kazym shaman was captured and thrown into a dungeon. After some time, the specialists obtained the necessary information. It was necessary to kill two birds with one stone - to strike at religious remnants and replenish the country's budget with a product made of precious metal. A group of security officers went to the secret temple. But then the taiga hunters rebelled and shot the uninvited guests. The reprisal was quick. A new detachment of atheists destroyed almost all the men of the taiga tribe. The guns of those who remained were taken away, dooming them to starvation. The sanctuary was destroyed. What happened to the Kazym idol of the Golden Baba still remains a mystery.

Mistress of the Copper Mountain

The supreme goddess of the Ugrians was known as different names: Golden Baba, Sorni-Ekva (literally “golden woman”), Kaltash-Ekva, Yoli and others. The Supreme God Numi-Torum was her brother and husband. This progenitor of the human race endowed newborns with souls. The Ugrians believed that souls sometimes take the form of a beetle or lizard. Their divine mistress herself could turn into a lizard-like creature.

Bazhov's wonderful tales describe the Mistress Copper Mountain. The folklore of Ural miners knows another name for her, Golden Baba. The mistress of the underground storerooms of the Urals often appeared before people's eyes in the form of a huge lizard with a retinue of colorful lizards. The Miner's Golden Woman, like the Belogorsk goddess, did not like the greedy and crooked.

The hostess appears before us primarily as the owner of copper ores and malachite. She herself wore a malachite dress and her name was Malachite. But all this means that the idol of the Golden Woman, from whom the fabulous Mistress of the Copper Mountain originated, was copper. The green dress appeared because over time copper becomes covered with a green oxide film.

The ancient goddess of Belogorye was a copper statue turned green by time. It becomes clear why the chronicler kept silent about the material of the idol and did not call it the Golden Woman. In fairy tales we also find memories of the golden Russian God. In the Urals they knew the golden Great Snake, that is, the Great Snake. He already lived underground and could take the form of both a snake and a human. This creature had power over gold.

Among Ugric antiquities there are many copper products. Traces of ancient mining and metallurgical production are often found in the Urals. For example, they dotted the Gumeshevskoye copper deposit. Gumeshki are located near the sources of the Chusovaya River. The first miners appeared here 35 centuries ago. It was in the Gumeshki area that the main events of Bazhov’s tales took place.

Russian miners associated their underground patrons with the era of the “old people,” among whom were the same Ugrians. Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the identity of the underground lords of the tales and the Ugric gods.

About what we're on on the right track, says the testimony of Yulia Leta. This 15th-century Italian historian knew about the copper statues of the Ugrians who lived near the Arctic Ocean. Leth believed that the Ugrians were part of Alaric's barbarian army and captured the sculptures during the sack of Rome. Russian fairy tales have given us a guiding thread that leads to another mistress of the copper mountains. Strange as it may seem, at the same time we find ourselves in places thousands of kilometers away from the Urals.

The Yakuts living on the Lena have myths - olonkho. They talk about many gods. But Dies Emeget (“copper woman”) is endowed with special power. The copper idol was the goddess of the Adyarai tribe. The epic Yakuts were either at enmity with the Adyarais or conducting peaceful trade with them.

The country of the Adyarais lay on the shores of the Arctic Ocean on the extreme western limits of the world known to the Yakuts. It was ruled by Dies Emegat and the blacksmith Kuettenny. Geographical landmarks and the name of the blacksmith lead us to the Kets. The Kets were famous for their blacksmithing skills, rare in the North. Blacksmiths in ancient times were both ore miners and metallurgists. Now there are very few Kets left. They live in the lower reaches of the Yenisei. Previously, Keto-speaking tribes were known over vast areas.

Of all the groups of Yakuts, only one lives off the coast of the Arctic Ocean. These are the so-called Dolgans, occupying a significant part of the Taimyr Peninsula. In the past, the Dolgans and the Kets lived side by side. It was from the Dolgans that information about the tribe of the copper idol came to the rest of the Yakuts. The Kets speak a language that is not similar to Ugric. But before the revolution they were called Ostyaks, like the Ugrians. Consequently, despite the linguistic differences, there was much in common in the culture of both.

Judging by the names of the Norilsk rivers and lakes, both Kets and Khanty lived on their banks. The Yakuts called them all Adyarai. The interest of Adyarai blacksmiths in this area is not accidental. The richest copper-nickel deposits are concentrated here, and next to them are reserves of coal necessary for smelting the ore. Moreover, in some places ores and coal come to the surface.

The cult of the Golden Woman was accompanied by musical instruments. The Ural Mansi Sambindalov conveyed local legends as follows: “It was scary close to the mountain. Baba screamed loudly". I haven't read Mansi historical works. Meanwhile, long before him, Alexander Guagnini (1578) wrote: “They even say that in the mountains, next to this golden image, they heard some sound and a loud roar, like a trumpet.”.

Sigismund Herberstein, who visited Muscovy twice at the beginning of the 16th century, knew about these same trumpet sounds. In the Yakut olonkho the copper idol looks like this:

Spinning on my back,
Spinning obsessively
Screaming
Bouncing up and down
Like a cricket, it began to ring.

Olonkho researchers noted that in the songs of the idols one can clearly hear bell ringing. They even identified it with a bell.

Travelers of the early 17th century saw lights in the Norilsk region and smelled the sulfur that usually accompanies the smelting of sulfide ores. At the same time they heard a bell ringing. Consequently, in the kingdom of the copper idol there really were bells, and the olonkho data are accurate. In the Urals, the Golden Baba was accompanied by horn music, and on the Yenisei - by bells and the sound of rattles.

The Kets were aliens in the North. Their ancestral home lay in Southern Siberia. But the Ugrians also moved to the Ob region and Eastern Europe from Southern Siberia. Once upon a time, both peoples were neighbors, which explains their common features. The main center of copper production in Southern Siberia lay in the Minusinsk Basin. From here the Mistress of the Copper Mountain was supposed to begin her journey to the North.

Egyptian

Herberstein's story about the Golden Woman has long puzzled scientists. Here it is: “The idol of the Golden Woman is a statue representing an old woman holding her son in the womb, and that another child is already visible there, who, they say, is her grandson.”

It turns out that there is another child inside the unborn child. Such an unlikely situation was clarified after the discovery of a bronze figurine of the Ugric goddess in the Urals. An image of a man appears from the body of the goddess, and another face looks out from his womb. Before us is a mythological image.

It seems that the secrets of the Golden Woman have been exhausted. It was not difficult for ancient metallurgists to make a copper idol. Locally produced figurines of the Golden Woman, of course, existed. But the famous idol itself was made in completely different times, far from Russia.

Several drawings have survived and verbal portraits Golden Baba. She either stands, holding a spear in her hand, or sits in a chair with a staff or a child in her arms. Sometimes, along with the baby, an older child appears next to the chair. The goddess appears sometimes in clothes, sometimes without them.

The Golden Baba is the supreme Ugric deity. But historians suggest that the statue originally depicted some other goddess. There are very different opinions on this matter: the Mother of God, the Slavic Golden Maya, Buddha, Guanyin, etc.

The key to unraveling the mysterious appearance is given by Bazhov’s tales. In them, the Golden Snake is a golden man with a beard twisted into such tight rings that “you can’t straighten it out.” He has green eyes and a hat with “red gaps” on his head. But this is an image of green-eyed Osiris.

The beard of the Egyptian god was pulled back into a narrow, tight bun. The pharaohs who imitated him had the same beard. It is enough to recall the famous masks of Tutankhamun from his golden sarcophagi to understand what the rings on the beard of the golden man looked like. A hat with “red gaps” “pschent” is the white and red crown of a united Egypt.

The wife and sister of Osiris was the green-eyed Isis - the goddess of fertility, water, magic, marital fidelity and love. She patronized lovers. In the same way, the Ural goddess is the goddess of waters, closely associated with the theme of love and marital fidelity.

The image of the green-eyed Mistress of the Copper Mountain goes back to Isis. Today we can tell what the copper statue of an Egyptian woman looked like. Let us remember that the Golden Woman was depicted as a Madonna. The image of the Virgin Mary with the baby Jesus arose under the influence of the sculptures of Isis with the baby Horus. One of these idols is kept in the Hermitage. Naked Isis sits and breastfeeds her son. On the goddess's head is a crown of snakes, a solar disk and cow horns.

Egyptian myths help us understand a lot in our tales. Here, for example, is a magic green button. It was given to Gornozavodskaya Tanyusha by the Mistress of the Copper Mountain, and through the gift the girl communicated with her patroness. The Egyptian gods had the wonderful eye of Wadjet (“green eye”). It also provided the owner with protection and patronage. Isis-Hathor was the guardian of the Eye and its embodiment.

Isis was known as the goddess of music. Because of this, her cult in the North was so loud. At one time, the goddess invented the sistrum rattle, with which she was often depicted. The base of the sistrum was usually the figure of a cat with a human head.

Talking earthen cats were in the retinue of the Mistress of the Copper Mountain. In Ural tales, Isis’s cat appears either as the cat Fiery Ears, who protected the brave Dunyasha, or as the domestic Murenka, who persuaded the goat Silver Hoof to amuse the girl Darenka with gems.

In one of the tales we meet ants running along a treasured path. They have golden little shoes on their feet. The paws increased in size as their owners moved. We see echoes of the Egyptian myth about the scarab beetle rolling the sun across the sky.

The Egyptians themselves called Isis Iset. Near Gumeshki the source of the Iset – “the river of Isis” – originates. Through this river, Ural copper entered the forest Trans-Urals. The earthen cat was known in Sysert, whose name comes from sistrum. Once upon a time there was a temple in which the musical animal of the goddess was kept.

Osiris, aka the Golden Man, in the stories of Western Europeans looks like a child standing next to the Golden Woman. Consequently, his golden idol was miniature. Bazhov's tales feature another miniature golden character - a female one. The Golden Goddess takes on the guise of Ognevushka-Jumping, a red-haired factory girl, a blue snake, and old lady Sinyushka. This mistress of gold veins lived in the water, protected girls and pure-hearted miners.

Before us is Isis again, but now golden. This means that the name Golden Baba was not born out of nowhere. At first this was the name of the golden figurine, and later the copper statue of Isis and all her other images.

Petria knew that the Golden Baba was Isis (1620). But no one believed him. The appearance seemed too surprising Egyptian sculptures in Siberia.

Siberian Slavs

The most burning secret of the Golden Woman turned out to be her in Russian sounding name. The Ob Ugrians had one more thing, and again Slavic - the Old Woman. The Belogorsk Golden Baba was called Slovutes by the Ostyaks, that is, “Slavic woman”. Her Irtysh husband, Golden Osiris, was directly called the Russian God. In addition, the country of worshipers of Russian gods was called Siberia. Medieval authors associated this name with the Slavic word “north”. But then this correct explanation was considered incredible and others were invented.

The clue to the appearance of Slavic names is contained in the news of Muslim writers of the early Middle Ages. Al-Masudi (10th century) describes three temples of the Slavs. The transcript of his story shows that one temple with the idol of “Saturn” stood in the Minusinsk Basin. The second, with a gold idol and a statue of a girl, is in the Taimyr region, the third is in the Urals.

Abu Dulef (10th century), who visited here, wrote about the veneration of “Saturn and Venus” in the Minusinsk Basin. Ibn Muqaffa (8th century) called the inhabitants of this place Slavs. Under Saturn eastern authors the god of the underworld Veles - Osiris is hiding, and under Venus is the goddess of love Morena - Isis.

The Slavs have lived in the Minusinsk Basin since the Cimmerian era. They belonged to the so-called Tagar archaeological culture. The Tagarians were talented miners, metallurgists and blacksmiths. Under the pressure of the nomadic hordes, mixed streams of Slavs, Ugrians and Kets left the area of ​​the upper Yenisei to the east and north. The divided people also divided the shrines. Golden Osiris and Copper Isis ended up in Taimyr, from there they went to the Kama region, then to Western Siberia. The Golden Isis was transferred to the Urals. Copper Osiris remained in place.

The Minusinsk Slavs settled in the Irtysh basin and in the southern part of the Urals, which at that time were called the Slavic Mountains. Over time brutal wars and mixed marriages led to the fact that Slavic speech ceased to be heard in these places. Only the Golden Woman kept the secret of the disappeared people.

Traces of the presence of the Slavs on Siberian soil were felt for a very long time. Back in the 14th century, Elomari knew fair-haired and blue-eyed Siberians. He wrote: “Their figures are a perfect creation in beauty, whiteness and amazing charm; their eyes are blue."

Ermak's Cossacks, who broke through the Stone Belt, sometimes met genuine giants among the short and Mongoloid aborigines, and indescribable beauties among the aborigines.

Legacy of the Mother of the Gods

Travelers of the 19th century noted that in their time the Ob Ugrians no longer had ancient idols, and later copies were kept in the temples. They were made very simply. The idol was buried in a mixture of sand and clay and molten metal was poured into the resulting mold. One such Silver Woman was apparently purchased by the Finnish scientist Karjalainen and taken to his homeland. Apparently, another similar idol fell into the hands of Soviet security officers and died. Are the chroniclers really right, and a cannonball destroyed Copper Isis back in the 16th century? No. The core did not harm her.

Only later sources report the destruction of the idol. From earlier and more reliable sources it is known that the core was crushed only by a nearby tree. Later this story was somewhat embellished.

After the fall of the kingdom of Kuchum, Copper Isis and Golden Osiris were transferred to an ancient temple near modern Norilsk. Somewhere in the Taimyr mountains of Putorana they are hidden to this day. The trace of the Golden Isis is lost near the sources of Chusovaya and Iset. Tales point to Azov Mountain near the modern city of Polevsky. Copper Osiris never left the Yenisei. Someday, an archaeologist's spade will stumble upon sculptures made in Egypt almost 30 centuries ago.

The Golden Woman sits among her priceless treasury. Over the centuries, expensive sables and overseas fabrics turned to dust. But the main thing has survived - the memory of the Great Slav, who gave life to the race of people and gods. In her renewed appearance of the Mother of God, she looks tenderly at us from the walls of Orthodox churches.

Alien trace

Ufologists did not pass by the amazing Golden Woman, completely different from the other idols crudely carved out of wood by shamans. They knew that the amazing idol was worshiped, and is still worshiped, by the Khanty and Mansi peoples. The metal Golden Woman seemed to have fallen from the sky. Or maybe she really fell?

This version of the origin of the golden idol was put forward several years ago by ufologist Stanislav Ermakov. He believes that the Golden Woman is an alien robot, for some reason, perhaps due to a partial malfunction, left on Earth by its owners. For some time, the Golden Woman could move, and it is with this property that the Mansi legends about the “living” golden idol are associated. Then, it seems, the robot began to gradually fail. At first he could still make sounds, and then he finally turned into a golden statue.

Several stories from Mansi reindeer herders unknown to S. Ermakov confirm his hypothesis.

In the Northern Urals stands the dome-shaped mountain Manya-Tump, covered with dense forest. Until very recently, reindeer herders, driving their herds along the Ural ridge in the summer, did not even come close to the mountain. This is what the Mansi guide Peter told about it to cameraman M. Zaplatkin, who was shooting a film about the stone idols of Man-Pupu-Nera: “A long time ago it was impossible to walk the mountain. Whoever walks will get sick for a long time and die. Old people say - there stood the navels, Sonya Equa, the Golden Woman. It was scary close to the mountain. Baba screamed loudly. People speak in a scary voice".

A little north of Mount Manya-Tump rises another mountain, with which the legends about the terrible cry of the Golden Woman - Koyp - are also associated. I already talked about it at the beginning of the article. The surroundings of this mountain are surprisingly suitable for the birth of the legend about the temple of the Golden Woman. At the foot of the mountain lies a completely round lake. This is no longer the case in the Northern Urals. On its shore you can see blocks covered with lichens, in which, with a little imagination, you can guess the remains of a sanctuary.

Mansi reindeer herders driving their herds in the summer always come to this sanctuary to leave their gifts on the quadrangular granite block, as if carved out by human hands.

Between the Manya-Tump and Koyp mountains, near which, according to Mansi legends, the cry of the Golden Woman was heard, there is another place, also, perhaps, associated with terrible screams. This latest event just happened in our time. This place is Mount Otorten, the highest point of the Northern Urals. In the winter of 1959, an experienced, well-trained group of skiers from the Ural Polytechnic Institute died here. Rescuers who went in search of tourists found a tent with a cut-out back wall and the bodies of 9 hikers lying in deep snow. The expression of mortal horror was frozen on the faces of all the dead. According to the commission that investigated this tragedy, one of the reasons that led to such a terrible death could be exposure to high-intensity infrasound.

Stanislav Ermakov made the assumption that the Golden Robot Woman, abandoned by aliens, could not only speak, but also move. What and when made the robot motionless? This question can be answered by one curious episode contained in the description of the Viking Thorir Hund’s campaign in Biarmia: “The Vikings happily sailed to the mouth of the Dvina to the trading city of Biarmia. Everyone who had gold and goods for exchange received a good profit. At the end of the bargaining, with a full load of expensive fur goods, the Vikings descended the Dvina and, going out into the open sea, began to hold council.

The temple of the supreme deity of the Biarms, as the Vikings reliably knew, was located in a dense forest, not far from the mouth of the Vin (Dvina) River. It was there that they planned to get through and, if they were lucky, take possession of the treasures collected there. Thorir Hund, thrusting his ax into the gate, climbed over it with his help. Carly did the same, and they let their comrades inside the fenced-in space. Approaching the mound, the Vikings collected as much money as they could carry. They folded them into their dress.

They reached the very image of Yumala, which towered among the sacred fence. On the neck of the Biarmian god hung a precious gold chain. Carly was seduced by the chain and cut the idol’s neck so hard with an ax that the head rolled off his shoulders with a terrifying crack.”

A Viking probably would not have been able to cut off the head of a cast statue. It would be another matter if in front of him stood a robot consisting of a metal frame coated with a thin layer of metal. The guards of the sanctuary arrived in time and drove the Vikings away. They miraculously managed to make their way to the ships, abandoning the treasures collected near the Golden Woman.

Where is the idol or broken robot now? Three remote, hard-to-reach corners of Russia are traditionally named as the final refuge of the Golden Woman: the lower reaches of the Ob River and the upper reaches of the Irtysh in the region. Kalbinsky ridge and impassable gorges of the Putoran mountains on the Taimyr Peninsula. But perhaps the idol with the terrible, deadly voice is much closer. And it hides somewhere in the triangle between the mountains Koyp, Otorten and Manya-Tump. This assumption is more logical if we assume that the Golden Woman “screamed” at Otorten. The hunt for it continues: some are looking for a priceless historical relic, others are looking for gold, and others are looking for a treasure trove of alien technology.

Golden Baba, Zarni An, Kaltas, Dyes Emiget, Sorni Nai, Sorni Ekva, Golden Mother of God - these are only some of the many names that were used to call the golden idol, which appeared from nowhere on the temples of ancient Biarmia, Ugra and Perm and disappeared to unknown destination.

This idol has been worshiped for centuries by peoples living on both sides of the Ural Mountains. Everyone longed to meet her, eager to touch the secret. In the impenetrable taiga wilds, envoys of Ivan the Terrible, white atamans and red commissars, intelligence agents, scientists and thousands of unknown fortune hunters searched for her. But it didn’t fall into anyone’s hands. The Golden Baba is on the list of “One Hundred Great Treasures” of human history, and is still mysterious and incomprehensible. The face of Zarni Anh shines on the coat of arms Republic of Komi.

The most ancient written information about the Golden Baba is found in the Novgorod Sofia Chronicle for 1398. Reporting the death of Saint Stephen of Perm, it was noted that he lived “among infidel people, neither knowing God nor knowing the law, praying to an idol, fire and water, and stone, and the Golden Woman, and the sorcerer, and the tree.”

The first news about the Golden Baba in the books of Western European travelers and writers appeared in the 15th century. Until the mid-19th century, the totem appeared in the works of dozens of authors.

But, at the same time, not one of them personally saw the idol. This is one of the phenomena of the Golden Woman - only those who have not seen her write and talk about her. And those who saw are silent.

It is interesting that in Komi folklore there is not a single, even indirect, mention of a female deity that once existed. Maybe it was simply not customary to talk about this in vain. Nevertheless, famous writer M. Lebedev, in essays about Perm the Great, pointed out that “some researchers of the religious life of the Komi people attach special importance to the cult of the Golden Woman, and on her behalf they are inclined to produce even the very name of the Zyryans as people who revere the Golden Woman, or, in Komi, Zarni An "

The Orthodox missionary G. Novitsky, who preached Christian teaching to the Ostyaks at the beginning of the 18th century, tried to find the hidden statue and destroy it. He failed to do this.

But he collected information both about the idol itself and about the secret sanctuary in which it was kept. Russian historians V. Tatishchev and N. Karamzin wrote about the idol. The Englishmen E. Jenkinson and A. Weed placed the Golden Woman on their maps of Muscovy.

It is also surprising that the descriptions of the Golden Woman are different for all authors. In some sources, this is a statue in the form of an old woman, in whose womb there is a son, and through him another child is visible - a grandson (matryoshka principle). For others it is simply a statue of a standing woman, for others it is the same, but with a cornucopia, or in the form of the goddess Minerva with a spear in her hand. There are drawings where the Golden Woman resembles a sitting Madonna with a child in her arms. In some sources she is described as dressed in loose clothes, in others - naked.

In 1904, the old Mansi Savva told the traveler K. Nosilov: “A naked woman - and that’s all. Sitting. There is a nose, there are eyes, everything is done like a woman should.” The sizes also differ: 30 centimeters, “the average woman” is life-size and “an arshin taller than the healthiest man.” By the way, scientists have calculated that with such a height, if the golden statue is solid, its weight will reach three tons.

There are several versions of the origin of the Golden Woman. Some say that it was brought from China, others consider Iran or India to be its homeland, and others say Ancient Rome. True, some scientists are still in favor of the fact that the Golden Woman is the work of local craftsmen.

Probably the most original version The appearance of the idol was put forward by ufologist S. Ermakov. He believes that this is an alien robot left on Earth. For some time he was still able to move, and it is with this property that the legends about the “living” deity are associated. Then, it seems, the device began to gradually fail until it finally froze.

The later the story about the Golden Woman is dated, the further to the east her location moves. At first it is placed on the territory of Vyatka or Perm, a little later it is already in Obdoria to the west of the Ob; finally, it is located even further east.

The movement of the totem from west to east is an undoubted fact associated with Christianization. And already in the middle of the 16th century, the Golden Woman was beyond the Urals. By the way, also on Sarin maps, from century to century, the legendary country of Biarmia “roamed” to the east.

The secret of finding the ancient idol could well have been kept until the 1930s in the Komi village of Pomozdino. The unexpected connection of this village with the Golden Baba was pointed out by the author of the book “Treasures of the Gulag” A. Martynenko. His book is based on diaries and notes real person- doctor Alexander Afanasyevich, whom political repressions of the Stalin era brought to the infirmaries of Soviet camps. In these places, patients were admitted to hospital bed most often in a hopeless state and, dying, they shared their most intimate and secret things with the doctor.

The hero of the book first heard about the Golden Woman in the Solovetsky special purpose camp in 1928 from a prisoner, a professor at St. Petersburg University, an archaeologist and an expert on the North. He said that in a secret place on the territory of the Komi region there was the main temple of all northern peoples.

The main idol was made of pure gold and was called Zarni An. When the time for Christianity came, the shamans gathered for a council and hid the golden goddess. And so that the place would not be lost, they decided that ten shamanic clans would become the keepers of the secret. They had to pass the secret on from generation to generation. Centuries passed. Zarni An was visited from time to time by the main shamans, and information about her was passed on among the people, becoming a source of inspiration. At Soviet power Almost all the guardians were arrested and shot, their houses were destroyed, and their families were scattered. The fate of the golden goddess has become a legend.

Soon after the war, the doctor ended up in one of the camp hospitals in Sverdlovsk. A boy was brought to him, dying of severe pneumonia, who was worried about only one thought: he, the son of a shaman, holds the secret of the whereabouts of Zarni An and swore an oath to his father to pass on this secret to his son, but now he is dying, and the place where it is kept ancient idol, will be lost forever.

The boy said his name was Mikhail Ignatov. And that he comes from the village of Pomozdino. He indicated the place where the idol was kept. But most of the story was in the Komi language, and the entire coordinate system was based on the terms of folk astronomy. Alexander Afanasyevich nodded his head, but could neither really understand nor remember anything. In addition, he was constantly distracted by other patients. The doctor decided to continue the conversation the next day, but he himself was transferred to another hospital. The boy's trace was lost. He had almost no chance to live.

In 1961, a statue resembling the descriptions of the Golden Woman was found in one of the storehouses near the village of Yuilsk. The chairman of the local collective farm ordered the transfer of the find to the Khanty-Mansiysk local history museum. A team of seven people arrived from the city. They entered the storehouse, but found there not a golden idol, but a wooden one, trimmed with silver. It is believed that he was replaced before the museum workers arrived. The golden statue was hidden in a safe place on an island among the swamps. And then, allegedly after the construction of a hydroelectric station on the Ob, the water level rose, and the island disappeared under water.
The head of the Russian public scientific research association "Cosmopoisk" V. Chernobrov believes that the Golden Woman is at the same time mysterious place, and a miraculous statue. It contains the secret knowledge of ancient civilizations. In 1987, Kosmopoisk activists made the first attempt to check several versions of the location of the relic in the Tyumen region. Alas, even then it was not possible to find old people who could tell something about the Golden Woman.

In September 1999, Kosmopoisk researchers, finding themselves near the Golden Gate in the remote taiga in the very north of the Sverdlovsk region, remembered the famous “namesake” of this place, recalls V. Chernobrov. - We managed to descend into several vertical passages of the cave. However, a sudden multi-day rainfall and flood prevented a detailed exploration of the dungeons. Thus, the Golden Baba is becoming more and more surrounded by rumors and legends, taking its place on a par with Atlantis and Hyperborea, but rather as some part of the global version of the “golden period” of human history.
Arthur Arteev