The Incantations of Tubyaku Kosterkin

Abstract

Aado LintropTubyaku Kosterkin was probably the last great Nganasan shaman.His father Dyukhade became well-known to the researchers of shamanism after the Russian ethnologist Andrei Popov had published his first book about Nganasans in 1936.Last chapters of this book ("Tavgitsy") contain rich data about Nganasan shamanism, obtained mostly from Dyukhade.The story about his initiatory visions and the description of his clean tent rite, lasting for seven days, have been quoted by many scholars (e.g.Eliade 1974: 38-42).People said that before the birth of Tubyaku all of Dyukhade's sons had died in their babyhood.When his eldest wife was pregnant again (he had three wives), Dyukhade foretold that this time a boy would be born who would open the way for other sons.Tubyaku was born "in the shirt".He got his name from a button-like mole on his neck.The divination of Dyukhade turned out to be trueafter the birth of Tubyaku he had other sons indeed.For many years Tubyaku lived in tundra as a hunter, fisherman, reindeer breeder, and a practising shaman.In the end of the 1940s, when the local Soviet authorities undertook the liquidation of shamanism in Taimyr, Tubyaku was imprisoned.He was indicted for shaman's practice not directly, but for accepting fees for his shamanist activities.After being released from prison in the 1950s he continued to shamanise.Tubyaku's father was not the first shaman in the Kosterkin family.According to the legend told by Boris, the youngest son of Dyukhade, all shamans in their family stemmed from the ancient tribal shaman who, together with his children, survived from a great epidemic.The eldest son of this shaman had a daughter, Neiming.Neiming gave birth to a child -a snow-white boy with a long nose and big eyes.Neiming said, "I want to go away with my son and stand on my own feet.Let my son's name be Lambie (the Eagle).Let him also be called the Great and the Tall.His father was like a great eagle -the Eagle god."They began to live on their own.Lambie became a very powerful shaman.When he shamanised he turned totally invisible.(Simchenko 1968: 207-208.)Some people believe that the shaman gift of the Kosterkin family springs from Neiming (Gracheva 1981(Gracheva : 73-74, 1983: 134): 134), but Boris said that the ancestor of Dyukhade was Neiming's younger cousin Syry'a (the White), also a great shaman (Simchenko 1968:210).