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What do dreams mean?

See what "VIY" is in other dictionaries. VIY - WHO IS HE? Where is Viy

Viy - in Little Russian demonology, a formidable old man with eyebrows and eyelids reaching to the very ground; V. cannot see anything on his own, but if several strong men manage to raise his eyebrows and eyelids with iron pitchforks, then nothing can hide before his menacing gaze: with his gaze V. kills people, destroys and turns cities and villages to ashes
Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron

There are two versions about the origin of this name. If you believe the first of them, then the Ukrainian word "vіi" can be translated as "eyelashes", which has a direct bearing on the hero’s eyes. Another option says that this name comes from the word “to curl” - Viy resembles a plant, is covered with dried earth, and its legs are like tree roots.

“Viy is a colossal creation of the common people’s imagination,” wrote Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol in a note to his story of the same name. - This is the name given to the Little Russians for the chief of the gnomes, whose eyelids go all the way to the ground. This whole story is a folk legend. I didn’t want to change it in any way and I’m telling it in almost the same simplicity as I heard it.”

Indeed, fairy tales with a similar plot are well known in the mythology of the Slavic peoples. But none of them contains a character like Gogol’s Viy. Just as it is not found in any other folklore works.

Slavic mythology, as the most ancient, quite accurately describes Viy’s “device”:

Viy himself never came and will never come himself It’s generally dangerous to wake him up and disturb him, and even dark entities don’t bother him again, and it’s not just his strength, his appearance, even the devils, ghouls, ghouls, cause horror and tremble with fear of him….

Viy is a soulless, emotional being he has no feelings at all: anger, hatred, anger. Unlike Pannochka, when she, in her rage, anger and hatred of Khoma, shouted: “Call me, Viya!” All the entities she summoned were horrified, how can you awaken an ancient God?! But the lady’s order was carried out - Viy came to remove the amulet, the protection where Khoma was hiding, to show the way.

Viy does not move on his own, cannot open his own eyelids, instead of arms and legs there are roots covered with earth. The ghouls dragged him and placed him near the circle and opened his “eyelids.” Viy's finger pointed at poor Khoma.

So where did such a strange image of Viy appear in Slavic mythology and folklore?
The main characteristics of our character help us find the answer: hairiness, possession of herds of bulls and involvement in the underworld. These signs make us recall one of the most ancient and, moreover, the main East Slavic gods of pagan times - Veles (Volos). Until the beginning of the 20th century, the custom persisted after the harvest of leaving a bunch of unharvested ears of grain in the field - “For Veles on his beard.”

There is undoubtedly a kinship between the images of the Slavic Veles-Viy and the Baltic Veles, or Vielona, the God of the Other World and at the same time the Patron of Cattle (cf. the Slavic Veles - the Cattle God).

Vielona, Wels, Lithuanian Velnas - lit. vеlnias, velinas
According to a German author of the 17th century. Einhorn, the month of October was dedicated to Wels - Wälla-Mänes (cf. also Latvian. Velu Mate - “Mother of the Dead”).
The name for the “window” in the swamp is also known: lit. Velnio akis, Latvian. Velna acis - literally: "eye of Velnyas".

East Slavic Veles (Volos) is extremely close to the Baltic Vels (Velnyas). He was popular and was considered the god of “all Rus'” in contrast to Perun, the patron saint of the princely squad. In Kyiv, the idol of Perun stood on the mountain, and the idol of Veles on Podol, in the lower part of the city.

In Etruria, in the sacred city of Volsinia, a god was worshiped, whose name is conveyed differently: Velthuna, Vertumna? Velthina, Veltha - “the main deity of Etruria”

The religious symbol of God Viy is the All-Seeing Eye - meaning “nothing can hide from the judge’s gaze.” Presumably, his idol was also depicted with such a symbol.

Many researchers of Gogol's story have noted the similarity of this mystical character with a destructive gaze with numerous folk beliefs about St. Kasyan. He is known as a talented spiritual writer and organizer of monasteries.

Kasyan

In Russian folk traditions, legends, beliefs, the image of “Saint Kasyan”, despite all the righteousness of the life of a real person, is depicted as negative. In some villages he was not even recognized as a saint, and his very name was considered shameful.

According to some beliefs, Kasyan - fallen Angel who betrayed God. But after repentance, he was chained and imprisoned for his apostasy.
The angel assigned to him beats the traitor on the forehead with a heavy hammer for three years in a row, and on the fourth he sets him free, and then everything he looks at perishes.

In other stories, Kasyan appears as a mysterious and destructive creature, his eyelashes are so long that they reach his knees, and because of them he does not see God’s light, and only on February 29 in the morning, once every 4 years, he lifts them and looks around the world - what if his gaze falls, he dies.

In the Poltava region, Kasyan is represented as a black creature covered with wool, with skin like oak bark. He lives in a cave, covered with earth. On February 29, his huge eyelids are raised by various evil spirits, Kasyan looks around the world, and then people and animals get sick, pestilence and crop failure occur.

In East Slavic folklore there are also other characters, possessing characteristics similar to Viy.

So, for example, in A fairy tale about Ivan Bykovich, recorded by the famous collector and researcher of Slavic folklore Alexander Nikolaevich Afanasyev (1826 - 1871), it is said that after the hero defeated three multi-headed monsters (snakes) on the Smorodina River, their witch mother was able to deceive Ivan and
“dragged him into the dungeon, brought him to her husband - an old old man.

On you, he says, our destroyer.
The old man lies on an iron bed, sees nothing: long eyelashes and thick eyebrows completely cover his eyes. He then called twelve mighty heroes and began to order them:
- Take an iron pitchfork, raise my eyebrows and black eyelashes, I’ll see what kind of bird he is that killed my sons. The heroes raised his eyebrows and eyelashes with pitchforks: the old man looked..."

The motif of eyelids raised with a pitchfork (shovel, hooks) is widespread in East Slavic fairy tales. For example, in Volyn a sorcerer is often mentioned Mangy Bunyaka, or the Naughty Bonyak; his eyelids are so long that they can be lifted with a pitchfork.

Sometimes he appears in the form of “a terrible fighter, with his gaze killing people and turning entire cities into ashes, the only happiness is that this murderous gaze is covered by clinging eyelids and thick eyebrows.” In the beliefs of Podolia, he is known as Solodivius Bunio, who destroyed an entire city with a glance; his eyelids also lift like pitchforks.

This apocryphal appearance of Judas (giant eyelids and a heavy, clumsy body) also determined the main features of Viy. Gogol, forcing him to look at Viy Khoma Brutus, who is in spiritual laziness and does not trust in God, shows the careless student his evangelical double.

Relentless and merciless Viy was considered the judge of the dead, a hellish fiery judge, whose throne is located inside the earth. In his hands is a fiery scourge, his eyes are closed with eyelids lowered to the ground, but he still sees and knows. If his eyelids are lifted, and his servants lift them with pitchforks, then he sees everything that is completely hidden from others. A man dies from Viy’s gaze.

“- Bring Viy! Follow Viy! - the words of the dead man were heard. And suddenly there was silence in the church: a wolf's howl was heard in the distance, and soon heavy footsteps were heard running through the church; Looking sideways, he saw that they were leading some squat, hefty, club-footed man. He was all covered in black earth. His legs and arms covered with earth stood out like stringy, strong roots. He walked heavily, constantly stumbling. Long eyelids were lowered to the ground. Khoma noticed with horror that his face was iron. They brought him by the arms and stood him directly in front of the place where Khoma stood.

- Lift my eyelids: I can’t see! - Viy said in an underground voice - and the whole host rushed to lift his eyelids. "Don't look!" - some inner voice whispered to the philosopher. He couldn’t bear it and looked.

- Here he is! - Viy shouted and pointed an iron finger at him. And everyone, no matter how many there were, rushed at the philosopher. He fell lifeless to the ground, and the spirit immediately flew out of him out of fear.”

N.V. Gogol

The image of Viy expresses the hope that in the other world he will inevitably be rewarded, take revenge on all those who lived on earth dishonestly, unjustly, not according to conscience and trampled on others with impunity. Nothing can be hidden from Viy, nor can one beg his forgiveness. In addition, it was believed that this judge of the dead sent terrible night apparitions and nightmares to people, especially as a warning.

Viy- commander over the evil spirits created by Chernobog. All of it is at his disposal. He himself is always underground, because he is afraid of sunlight.

Viy is a character in Ukrainian demonology, a formidable old man with eyebrows and eyelids reaching down to the ground. Having huge eyes with heavy lids, Viy kills with his gaze.

Viy cannot see anything on his own, but if several strong men manage to raise his eyebrows and eyelids with iron pitchforks, then nothing can hide before his menacing gaze: with his gaze Viy kills people, destroys and turns cities and villages to ashes.

In one of the fairy tales there is a mention that Kashchei the Immortal raises his eyelids with seven pitchforks.

“And suddenly there was silence in the church; a wolf's howl was heard in the distance, and soon heavy footsteps were heard echoing through the church; Looking sideways, he saw that they were leading some squat, hefty, club-footed man. He was all covered in black earth. His legs and arms covered with earth stood out like stringy, strong roots. He walked heavily, constantly stumbling. Long eyelids were lowered to the ground. Khoma noticed with horror that his face was iron.”

(N.V. Gogol “Viy”)

Viy (Vyy, Niy, Niya, Niyan) is the son of Chernobog and the goat Seduni. Lord of the Pekel kingdom, king of the underworld (Navi, the Underworld), lord of torment. The personification of those terrible punishments that await after the death of all villains, thieves, traitors, murderers and scoundrels, in other words, all those who lived unrighteously and violated the laws of Reveal and Rule (in Christianity, “sinners”). The fair and incorruptible Judge Viy is looking forward to all of them.

In East Slavic mythology, Viy is the spirit who brings death. Having huge eyes with heavy lids, Viy kills with his gaze. In Ukrainian demonology - a formidable old man with eyebrows and eyelids reaching down to the ground.

Viy cannot see anything on his own; he also acts as a seer of evil spirits (which can be seen in the work of N.V. Gogol); but if several strong men manage to lift his eyebrows and eyelids with iron pitchforks, then nothing will be able to hide before his menacing gaze: with his gaze Viy kills people, sends pestilence to enemy troops, destroys and turns towns and villages to ashes. Viy was also considered the sender of nightmares, visions and ghosts.

In ethnography, the assumption is made that it is with the image of Viy that the belief about the evil eye and damage is associated - that everything perishes and deteriorates from a bad look. Viy is also associated with the seasonal death of nature during winter.

There are two assumptions about the origin of the name Viya: the first is the Ukrainian word “vii” (pronounced “viyi”), which translated from modern Ukrainian means “eyelids”; and the second - with the word “to curl”, since the image of Viy resembles some kind of plant: his legs are entwined with roots and he is all covered with dried pieces of earth.

According to the “Book of Kolyada”: “Viy, the brother of the sky god Dy, serves as a commander in the army of Chernobog. In peacetime, Viy is a jailer in Pekla. He holds in his hand a fiery scourge with which he treats sinners. His eyelids are heavy; Viy’s henchmen are holding them with pitchforks. If Viy opens his eyes and looks at a person, he dies. Viy cannot stand sunlight, so he always prefers to stay underground.”

According to Slavic beliefs, Nav (it is also sometimes called Dark Nav as opposed to Light Nav - Slavi) is divided into three kingdoms. For the time being, the ruler of Upper was Goryn. After the death of Goryn, this layer of Navi was empty for a long time until it was occupied by Veles. From time immemorial, the Lower Kingdom was ruled by Koschey. But Chernobog gave the middle Kingdom to Viya. Although, in fact, there are other versions of the administrative-territorial division of Navi. According to some, Viy owned the Upper Kingdom, according to others, the Lower Kingdom. However, this information has nothing to do with the essence of the interpretation of Viy’s image.

Viy seemed to our ancestors as a powerful, almost invincible monster (less often, a scary, stooped old man). He was strong and clumsy, controlled the dark incarnations of all the elements. At the same time, Viy was served by all kinds of evil spirits, without which this terrible god, at a minimum, could not look at the world. The fact is that Viy had some kind of congenital defect - his eyelids were too heavy for him to keep them open without outside help. Obviously, the curse of Svarog, sent to the head of the defeated Chernobog during the Primordial Battle, is to blame. One way or another, Viy could not hold his eyelids on his own, so his servants constantly supported them with black, red-hot pitchforks (this episode is well known to all of us thanks to the immortal work of Nikolai Gogol).

Anyone whom Viy looked at immediately died (if he was mortal) or turned to stone (if he was a being of a higher order). Not many gods had the courage to face Viy in a fair fight. However, this monster did not win a single victory over the Irian gods, despite all its terrifying power. But Viy spoiled a lot of blood for the human race. Being a strong magician, he constantly sent epidemics and natural disasters to people.

At the same time, it is worth noting that there are also positive features in Viy’s appearance. For example, Viy with particular enthusiasm harasses people who are evil or spiritually weak. But Viy can easily let go of a person who is strong both in body and will. Thus, this god has a certain amount of justice, albeit a very peculiar one.

It is difficult to say what exactly our ancestors hid in Viy’s appearance. Obviously, this is one of the embodiments of the dark component of human nature, deep animal evil, which seeks to destroy everything in its path and moves forward without clearing out the road. However, if a person’s will is strong and his spirit is strong, then he is quite capable of changing the vector of direction of this destructive energy, perhaps even using it for the benefit of himself and others.

In Ukraine there is a character, Solodivy Bunio, or simply Naughty Bonyak (Bodnyak), sometimes he appears in the form of “a terrible fighter, with a look that kills a person and turns entire cities into ashes, the only happiness is that this murderous look is covered by clinging eyelids and thick eyebrows.” “Long eyebrows to the nose” in Serbia,
Croatia and the Czech Republic, as well as in Poland, were a sign of Mora or Zmora. this creature was considered the embodiment of a nightmare.
Came to the blind (dark) father Svyatogor visiting Ilya Muromets, in response to the offer to “shake hands,” gives the blind giant a piece of red-hot iron, for which he receives praise: “Your hand is strong, you are a good hero.”
The Bulgarian Bogomil sect describes the Devil as turning to ashes all who dare to look him in the eye.
In the tale of Vasilisa the Beautiful , who lived in the service of Baba Yagas, it is said that she received a gift for her work - in some cases - a pot (stove-pot), in other cases - a skull. When she returned home, the skull-pot burned her stepmother and her stepmother's daughters to ashes with its magical gaze.

These are not all the sources about the ancient Navya deity Viy, who has analogues among the ancient Irish - Yssbaddaden and Balor.
In the future, he probably merges with the image of Koshchei (the son of Mother Earth, initially an agricultural god, then the king of the dead, the god of death). Close in function and mythology to the Greek Triptolemus. The duck, as the keeper of the egg after Koshchei’s death, was revered as his bird. In Orthodoxy it was replaced by the evil saint Kasyan, whose day was celebrated on February 29.

Kasyan looks at everything and everything withers. Kasyan looks at the cattle, the cattle fall; on the tree - the tree dries.

Kasyan on the people - it’s hard for the people; Kasyan on the grass - the grass dries; Kasyan for livestock - the livestock dies.

Kasyan squints at everything...

It is curious that Kasyan is subordinate to the winds, which he keeps behind all sorts of locks.
Noteworthy is the relationship between the words KOCHERGA, KOSHEVAYA, KOSHCHEY and KOSH-MAR. Koshch - “chance, lot” (cf. Makosh). It was assumed that Chernobog stirred the coals in the inferno with pokers, so that new life would be born from this dead matter. There is the Orthodox saint Procopius of Ustyug, depicted with pokers in his hands, as, for example, on the bas-relief of the Church of the Ascension on B. Nikitskaya Street in Moscow in the 16th century. This Saint, introduced in the 13th century, is responsible for the harvest, he has three pokers, if he carries them with the ends down - there is no harvest, upwards - there will be a harvest. In this way, the weather and crop yields could be predicted.
Koschey in a later era emerged as an independent cosmogonic character who causes living matter to be deader and is associated with chthonic characters such as the hare, duck and fish. Undoubtedly, he is associated with seasonal necrosis, he is the enemy of Makoshi Yaga, who guides the hero into his world - the kingdom of death. The name of the heroine abducted by Koshchei is also interesting - Marya Morevna (mortal death), i.e. Koschey is an even greater death - stagnation, death without rebirth.
The annual veneration of Viya-Kasyan took place on January 14-15, as well as on February 29 - Kasyan Day.

In a note to his story “Viy,” Gogol wrote that he was only retelling the folk legend with virtually no changes—“almost in the same simplicity as he heard.” Indeed, fairy tales with a similar plot are well known in the mythology of the Slavic peoples. But none of them contains a character like Gogol’s Viy. Just as it is not found in any other folklore works.

As if out of nowhere, this terrible character appears in the story only for a moment and immediately disappears again into oblivion. This mysterious demon of death, to whom the author devoted almost a dozen lines of the story, is written in such bright, expressive colors that it invariably attracts the attention of researchers of Gogol’s work.

Most of them believe that the story is undoubtedly based on a folk tale, which was reinterpreted and processed by the author. Probably, Gogol changed the ending of the legend, revealing to readers the mysterious image of Viy - the product of his own imagination. And yet, Viy did not appear out of nowhere - he has “folklore prototypes”, some of the characteristic features of which, apparently, were used by Gogol.

Thus, many researchers of Gogol’s story noted the similarity of this mystical character, with a destructive gaze, with numerous popular beliefs about Saint Kasyan. The Christian Church celebrates the feast day of St. John Cassian the Roman (5th century) on February 28 according to the old style, and on February 29 in leap years. He is known as a talented spiritual writer and organizer of monasteries.

In the popular consciousness there was a different image of Kasyan, which had nothing in common with the canonical one. He suddenly turned from a real person into some kind of almost demonic creature, which is given epithets - merciless, formidable, vindictive. According to some beliefs, Kasyan is a fallen angel who betrayed God. But after repentance, he was chained and imprisoned for his apostasy.

The angel assigned to him beats the traitor on the forehead with a heavy hammer for three years in a row, and on the fourth he sets him free, and then everything he looks at perishes. In other stories, Kasyan appears as a mysterious and destructive creature, his eyelashes are so long that they reach his knees, and because of them he does not see God’s light, and only on February 29 in the morning, once every 4 years, he lifts them and looks around the world - what if his gaze falls, he dies.

Almost all legends about Kasyan emphasize his demonic essence and the extraordinary destructiveness of his gaze as a result of his connection with the devil, which makes Kasyan similar to Gogol’s Viy. Certain similarities are also revealed when comparing Viy with the pagan Beles - the ancient patron of hunters, who also personified the spirits of killed animals and was associated with the world of the dead.

But, probably, the most important prototype of Viy for Gogol was Judas Iscariot, whose appearance is guessed behind the figure of Gogol’s demon when referring to some apocryphal texts. In these non-canonical writings about the appearance of Judas, shortly before his death, it is reported that his eyelids became huge, grew to incredible sizes, preventing him from seeing, and his body became monstrously swollen and heavy. This apocryphal appearance of Judas (giant eyelids and a heavy, clumsy body) also determined the main features of Viy. Gogol, forcing him to look at Viy Khoma Brutus, who is in spiritual laziness and does not trust in God, shows the careless student his evangelical double.

It is possible that the image of Viy Koshchei corresponds to the Immortal. According to E. Dmitrieva, the features of the pagan god Veles were transferred to the image of Viy.

The motif of a terrible look in the Ukrainian tradition is associated with two characters - Saint Kasyan and the mangy Bunyak (Polovtsian Khan). Saint Kasyan, in one of the Poltava beliefs, raises his eyelashes on February 29 - and “whatever he looks at then, everything perishes.” The leader of the horde, Bunyak (from an unidentified chronicle), destroys the city with the power of his gaze. Also in Ukraine, whirlwinds and tornadoes were associated with “vієm” (that is, “wey”). According to the Belarusian legend, Kasyan sits in a cave and does not see “God’s light” because of the eyelashes that reach his knees. On the basis of the Ukrainian legend about Viy, Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol created the story “Viy”.

The word “viy” was not recorded in Ukrainian dictionaries until the appearance of the story of the same name by Nikolai Gogol.

Viy Gogol

Viy is a colossal creation of the common people's imagination. This is the name given to the Little Russians for the chief of the gnomes, whose eyelids go all the way to the ground. This whole story is a folk legend. I didn’t want to change it in any way and I’m telling it in almost the same simplicity as I heard it.
Note by N.V. Gogol

The name of the evil spirits “viy” and his long eyelashes clearly indicate a word in Ukrainian. viya - eyelash and povika - eyelid, and also, possibly, Ukrainian. howl - howl.

In Gogol's work, Viy is squat and club-footed; with sinewy arms and legs like strong roots; all covered in black earth; with iron fingers and face; long eyelids lowered to the ground. His appearance is preceded by a wolf's howl. He does not kill with a glance, but rather removes the effect of all amulets against evil spirits when looking at him. He is, as it were, a guide, and not the killer himself. And the main character of the story, Khoma, dies not from Viy’s gaze, but from his own fear.

In modern culture

Notes

, With. 90.
, With. 124.
, With. 176.
// Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron: in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - St. Petersburg. , 1890-1907.
, With. 310.
Geyshtor Alexander. Stribog // Words of Mythology / Translated from Polish - K.: TOV "Vidavnitstvo "Klio"", 2014. - P. 178. - ISBN 978-617-7023-22-6.
, With. 90.
Rustam Shayakhmetov. On the absence in the Ukrainian language of the concept вій and the time of fixation in dictionaries of the onym вій // Toronto Slavic Quarterly. - No. 38 (Fall 2011). - pp. 225-228.
Levkievskaya E. E. On the issue of one hoax, or Gogol’s Viy in the light of Ukrainian mythology // Studia mythologica Slavica. - Ljubljana: Piza, 1998. - T. 1. - P. 307-315.
, With. 152-154.
, With. 307.
, With. 309.
Eihwaz. Single "Viy" Eihwaz (undefined) .

Literature

Abaev V.I. The image of Viy in the story by N.V. Gogol // Russian folklore. Materials and research. Volume III / Ed. A. M. Astakhova and others. - M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1958. - P. 303–307.
Viy // Shaparova N. S. Brief encyclopedia of Slavic mythology - M.: AST: Astrel: Russian dictionaries - 2001. - 624 p. - P. 169
Dmitrieva, E. Viy - who is he? // Science and life. - M., 2002. - No. 8.
Golden rules of folk culture / O. V. Kotovich, I. I. Kruk. - Mn. : Adukatsiya i vyhavanne, 2010. - 592 p. - 3000 copies. - ISBN 978-985-471-335-9.
Ivan Bykovich// Russian folk tales by A. N. Afanasyev: In 5 volumes - M.: TERRA - Book Club, 2008. - T. 1. - 320 p. -

One of the strangest and most mysteriously contradictory characters of the Slavic epic could have remained on the margins of Russian folklore, if not for the attention of the great writer to him N.V. Gogol and his story "Viy", first published in the collection “Mirgorod” in 1835.

In his comments to the story V.A. Voropaev and I.A. Vinogradov note: “According to the research of D. Moldavsky, the name of the underground spirit Viy arose in Gogol as a result of the contamination of the name of the mythological ruler of the underworld “iron” Niya and the Ukrainian words: “Virlooky, goggle-eyed” (Gogol’s “Little Russian Lexicon”), “viya” - eyelash and “poviko” - eyelid (see: Moldavsky D. “Viy” and the mythology of the 18th century // Bibliophile’s Almanac. Issue 27. M., 1990. P. 152-154).

Still from the film "Viy"

Obviously, another word from Gogol’s “Little Russian Lexicon” is connected with the name Viya: “Viko, a lid on a dizhe or on a skryne.” Let us remember the “dija” in “The Evening on the Eve of Ivan Kupala” - a huge tub of dough walking “squatting” around the hut - and the “skrynya” in “The Night Before Christmas” - a chest bound in iron and painted with bright flowers, made by Vakula to order for the beautiful Oksana.. .

And in Gogol’s extract from a letter to his mother dated June 4, 1829, “On the weddings of Little Russians,” where we are talking about the preparation of a wedding loaf, it is said: “They make the korovai more carefully, but in their way on the wiki (...) they put it without a lid in stove, and put the viko on the dizha.”

The architecture of the temple depicted here - wooden, “with three cone-shaped domes” - “baths” - is also essential for understanding the story. This is a traditional southern Russian type of three-part ancient church, widespread in Ukraine and at one time dominant for it. In the literature, however, there are references to the fact that tripartite wooden churches in Ukraine were predominantly Uniate churches.

This directly echoes one observation made by researchers long ago - that the Viya gnomes stuck in the windows and doors of the church definitely correlate with the chimeras (see below) of Gothic temples, in particular, the gargoyles of Notre Dame Cathedral. By the way, the main character of the story, Khoma Brut, who bears a “Roman” name, is a graduate of the Bratsky Monastery, which was at one time a Uniate monastery.

Another “Catholic” sign in “Vie” appears in the contrast here of the dilapidated iconostasis (with the darkened, “gloomily” looking faces of the saints) to the “terrible, sparkling beauty” of the witch, whose coffin was placed “opposite the altar itself.”

It can be assumed that the very image of the dead beauty was inspired by Gogol from a “Catholic” source - namely, K. Bryullov’s painting “The Last Day of Pompeii” with a beautiful dead woman in the foreground, to the image of which Gogol, who adores Italy, repeatedly returns in his dedicated painting Bryullov's article of the same name.

To understand Gogol’s intention, it is necessary to note that Gogol uses the word “gnome” in “The Book of Sundries” to mean “sign”: “The following gnomes represent apothecary weight...”

Remember how Gogol did? “Suddenly... in the midst of silence... he again hears disgusting scratching, whistling, noise and ringing in the windows. He closed his eyes timidly and stopped reading for a while. Without opening his eyes, he heard how suddenly a whole multitude crashed onto the floor, accompanied by various knocks, dull, ringing, soft, shrill. He raised his eye a little and hastily closed it again: horror!.., these were all yesterday’s gnomes; the difference was that he saw many new ones among them.

Almost opposite him stood a tall man, whose black skeleton moved to the surface and through his dark ribs a yellow body flashed. Standing to the side was something thin and long, like a stick, consisting of only eyes with eyelashes. Next, a huge monster occupied almost the entire wall and stood in tangled hair, as if in a forest. Through the network of these hairs two terrible eyes looked.

With fear, he looked up: above him there was something in the air in the form of a huge bubble with a thousand pincers and scorpion stings stretching out from the middle. The black earth hung on them in clumps. With horror, he lowered his eyes to the book. The dwarves made a noise with the scales of their disgusting tails, clawed feet and screeching wings, and he only heard how they searched for him in all corners. This drove out the last remnant of hops that was still fermenting in the philosopher’s head. He began to read his prayers zealously.

He heard their fury at the sight of their impossibility of finding him. “What if,” he thought, shuddering, “this whole gang will fall on me?..”

“For Viem! let’s go get Viy!” many strange voices shouted, and it seemed to him as if some of the dwarves had left. However, he stood with his eyes closed and did not dare to look at anything. “Viy! Viy!” - everyone made noise; a wolf howl was heard in the distance and was barely, barely separated by the barking of dogs. The doors opened with a squeal, and Khoma only heard how whole crowds poured out. And suddenly there was silence, as in the grave. He wanted to open his eyes; but some threatening secret voice told him: “Hey, don’t look!” He showed an effort... Through something incomprehensible, perhaps stemming from fear itself, curiosity, his eyes accidentally opened.

Before him stood some kind of human image of gigantic stature. His eyelids were lowered to the ground. The philosopher noticed with horror that his face was iron, and fixed his burning eyes again on the book.

“Lift my eyelids!” Viy said in an underground voice, and the whole host rushed to lift his eyelids. “Don’t look!” some inner feeling whispered to the philosopher. He could not resist and looked: two black bullets were looking straight at him. The iron hand stood up and pointed her finger at him: “Here he is!” - said Viy - and everything that happened, all the disgusting monsters rushed at him at once... lifeless, he fell to the ground... The rooster crowed for the second time, the dwarfs heard his first song and the whole crowd rose to fly away, but not here. “That’s what happened: they all stopped and got stuck in the windows, in the doors, in the dome, in the corners and remained motionless...”

So who is Viy? This is the god of the earthly kingdom. In Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian mythology, he was considered a creature whose one glance could bring death. His eyes were always hidden under eyelids, eyebrows or eyelashes. He was the son of Chernobog and Marena, the goddess of death. He served as a commander in the army of Chernobog, and in peacetime he was a jailer in the underworld. He always had a fiery scourge in his hands, with which he punished sinners.

Ukrainian legends mention that Viy lived in a cave where there was no light; he was often depicted covered with fur (a clear hint at Bigfoot?). He looked like the Ukrainian Kasyan, the Byzantine Basilisk, the Volyn sorcerer “mangy Bunyaka”, the Ossetian giant warrior and others.

The fame of this generally little-known creature, as we have already said, was brought by the story of N.V. Gogol. The fact is that in the epics of Belarusian Polesie, death was represented in the image of a woman with large eyelids. In the chronicle legend of the 16th century, which described the last days of Judas, it was specified that his overgrown eyelids completely deprived him of his vision.

Maciej Stryjkowski in the “Chronicle of Polish, Lithuanian and All Rus'” in 1582 writes: “Pluto, the God of Pekel, whose name was Nyya, was revered in the evening, they asked him after death for better pacification of bad weather.”

"Long eyebrows to the nose" in Serbia, Croatia and the Czech Republic and Poland were a sign of Mora or Zmora, a creature considered the embodiment of a nightmare.

Having come to stay with the blind (dark) father Svyatogor, Ilya Muromets, when asked to shake hands, gives the blind giant a piece of red-hot iron, for which he receives praise: “Your hand is strong, you are a good hero.”

The Bulgarian Bogomil sect describes the Devil as turning to ashes all who dare to look him in the eye.

The fairy tale about Vasilisa the Beautiful, who lived in the service of Baba Yaga, says that she received a pot (stove-pot) as a gift for her labors in some cases, and a skull in others. When she returned home, the skull-pot burned her stepmother and her stepmother's daughters to ashes with its magical gaze.

These are not all references to the ancient deity called “Viy”.