Geser. The Вuryat heroic epic

This motive has its parallel in a Tibetan legend, describing the fight between the white and black snakes that come out of the mangus’ nostrils or in the Tibetan version of the Geser epic where the two snakes fight having come out of the mangus’ ears.

The nomad tribes of Central Asia left the monuments resembling the “deer stones” or the stone slabs with the engraved inscriptions, magical formulas. In Transbaikalia and Mongolia they found the sacral writings on rocks, the so-called rock paintings or petroglyphs on which depicted most frequently was an eagle in flight.

They date back to the second half of the second millenium B. C. They all are of the conventional nature and are given as symbol or sign. There is much in common between the drawings mentioned and the zurags on the Balagan ongons (mascot, amulet). The ongons are the symbols of the ancestors’ spirits and the eagles are also thought to be the spirits of the ancestors. The Baikal region is abundant in the legends of the genealogical totems depicted in the form of a flying eagle. According to those legends the host of the Oikhon (Olkhon) island on the Baikal, married a tengri’s daughter. She gave birth into a son, Burged by name which means “eagle”. He adopted the eagles as sons. The latter gave the beginning to the kin of the Ol’khon shamans who were known as the shubuuni noyod (lords of birds). They say that earlier during the sacrifice ritual to Khan Khoto Babai they made the three replicas of the eagles from the birch bark. There are the beliefs that the eagle was a shaman. One can come across his image everywhere. We might just mention in this respect Khan-Garudi. Garudi came originally from India perhaps via Tibet, its image might have intermingled with that of the eagle, the cult of which is so widely spread in Buryatia.

The heroic epic ofВ the Mongolian tribes is rich inВ the other diversified mythological elements.

One could mention the demons that appeared out ofВ the remnants ofВ the evil deities thrown down toВ the Earth. Geser has the reputation ofВ the destroyer ofВ the demons and monsters, the personifications ofВ the dark chthonic forces. The epic tells ofВ the Tengris coming down toВ the Earth, ofВ the middle place between the Sky and the Earth, ofВ the dragons, ofВ the various monsters such as mangadkhais, manyheaded snakes, birds, huge dogs, frogs, ants.