The legend of mankurt is a hymn to mother's love essay. Mankury
Reply posted by: Guest
essay on the topic “fairytale sounds in the library” today the boy Anders went to the library to write a book. night has come. The boy falls asleep from stress. A dream opens before him, full of mythical sounds and creatures. he hears fairy-tale creatures calling him to their world. getting up from his chair, the boy walked across the endless expanses of the fantastic and huge world. Anders is called by the call of adventure and courage. A world of sounds filled with the splendor of fairy-tale creatures awaits him ahead. he hears the voice of beautiful creatures. Anders' mind was filled with curiosity, but he didn't know what he was about to go through. he reached the place where the voice was heard. Seeing that a battle is taking place ahead between evil and good, Anders begins to run. he runs and runs. but doesn't know where. suddenly he heard his mother's voice. she says, "go to the waterfall." the boy went and saw mermaids there. they sat on the stones and sang charming songs. the spell of the song took possession of the boy, and he walked away, hearing nothing but their singing. Having reached the edge of the cliff, he again heard his mother’s voice. his mother asked him: “Stop!” Anders didn't listen and jumped off the cliff. Just at that moment morning came in the library. the dream dissolved and the boy woke up. scared, he ran. but, not knowing that the sounds and dreams in the library were real, he never stayed in the library at night.
Reply posted by: Guest
angel - one who evokes sympathy and location.
Watermelon is a large, round, juicy, sweet fruit of a garden plant from the pumpkin family.
cornflower is a light blue wildflower, a weed that grows in rye and other grains.
evening - evening, one of the daytime modes.
nail - a pointed metal rod, usually iron, with a head at the blunt end for driving.
explanation:
I can add more, but it’s not clear here. what words do you not know? I'll write them.
Reply posted by: Guest
autumn leaves.
one maple leaf was afraid that someone would step on it. happy people came to the park. The children saw beautiful leaves and began to collect them. They brought it home and made crafts.
p - [p] - consonant, voiceless paired, hard (paired)
a - [a] - vowel, stressed
p - [p] - consonant, voiced unpaired, sonorant (always voiced), hard (paired)
k - [k] - consonant, voiceless paired, hard (paired)
The word has 4 letters and 4 sounds.
concept
According to Aitmatov, a captive destined for slavery had his head shaved and a shiri was put on it - a piece of skin from the neck of a freshly killed camel. after that, his hands and feet were tied and a stock was put on his neck so that he could not touch his head to the ground; and were left in the desert for several days. in the scorching sun, the shiri shrank, squeezing the head, the hair grew into the skin, causing unbearable suffering, intensified by thirst.
after some time, the victim either died or lost memory of his past life and became an ideal slave, deprived of his own will and infinitely obedient to his master. Mankurt slaves were valued much higher than ordinary ones.
“And the day lasts longer than a century” tells how the young Kipchak Zholaman, the son of Donenbai, who was captured by the Ruanzhuans, was made a mankurt. His mother Naiman-ana searched for her son for a long time, but when she found him, he did not recognize her. Moreover, he killed her on the orders of his masters.
Mankurt , according to Chingiz Aitmatov’s novel “Buranny Stop Station” (“And the day lasts longer than a century”), this is a captured person, turned into a soulless slave creature, completely subordinate to the owner and not remembering anything from his previous life.
There is also a version that the word Mankurt comes from the abbreviation of the expression “mani kurtagan (mani kurtagan)”, which means “rotten essence”, “rotten foundation”
There are two ways to create mankurt:
1) One source claims that a ring of raw lamb skin was put on young people’s skulls, and they were buried in the steppe under the heat of the sun! When the skin dried out, the slave lost his memory (when the skin dried out, the skull was deformed, while the brain was partially destroyed, and by the way, the bandage had to be adjusted to a certain place on the skull) and became an animal that carried out the orders of the owner (he could even kill his own mother without hesitation).
2) The second method existed among the Yakuts. A hole was made in the skull of the mankurt for a special piece of wood (a stake-shaped chip with scars applied, at a certain distance), this stake was driven into a hole, which also had to be made in a certain place of the skull (depending on the person’s body weight and the approximate structure of the skull according to a certain mark , which was determined by the shaman and inserted the pin) and after 2 days the person became a mankurt! (But in the second case, the shamans knew how to prevent the process with the help of some kind of infusion! And in the first case, it is almost impossible to stop the process)
Turkic legend about mankurt says that during one of these raids the Dzungars captured a young warrior known in the Steppe for his courage. It was a noble prize. He could have been married to a Dzungarian woman and made his hero. One could learn from him the military art of his opponents. It could have been sold at a profit. Finally, it became evidence of the military dexterity of the Dzungars, who captured a Kazakh warrior. But he always looked longingly to the west and endlessly made daring attempts to escape. He was beaten, chained to a tree, starved, but he again tried to escape. Two years later, the Dzungars decided that they would at least use the strength of the batyr and his skills as a cattle breeder. To do this, it was only necessary to break his will and, most importantly, the desire to go home to the Kazakh Steppe.
One summer, when the days were especially hot, the Dzungars took the warrior to a deserted place, shaved his head, put fresh skin on it, put stocks on his neck and legs and left him alone. Under the rays of the scorching sun, the skin began to dry out and, shrinking, tightly fit the horseman’s head. The wide block on the neck did not allow him to reach his head with his hands to rip off the skin, or to smash his head on the ground. It was impossible to reach any river or mountain in order to drown or crash. The path was not close, and there were pads on my feet. He was tormented by thirst all day, and at night, when he could rest from the heat, the torture began: a terrible itching on his head was driving him crazy. The horseman began to howl. He prayed to Tengri for the Dzungars to come and kill him. A day later, the skin dried completely and covered the horseman’s head with a steel helmet. The skin did not stretch, holding the skull in a vice, and every attempt to open the mouth in a scream resulted in a painful shock. Two more days passed in unbearable pain under the mercilessly scorching sun. The hair sprouting on the head could not break through the dried and hardened skin, and in search of a way out, hundreds of thousands of needles dug into the skin on the skull, growing inside and irritating the nerve endings under the skin. It seemed to the horseman that the tips of thousands of daggers were digging into his skull. On the fifth day without water under the merciless sun, in continuous physical suffering, he fell into an unconscious state.
Then they started bringing him water twice a day. The pain subsided. Dzhigit dreamed only about water, there were no other thoughts. The person who gave him something to drink became a god for him. Three weeks later he was brought to the Dzungar camp, almost unconscious, but alive.
They took him out, but he was no longer a proud and daring horseman, but a silent slave devoted to his master. The children teased him, and the girls, who had dreamed about him just yesterday, looked away in disgust. Those men who had seen life and had the courage of warriors, looking at the silent coward who endured humiliation with humility, a former warrior, felt shame for what they had done. However, we gradually got used to it.
The once brave Kazakh captive was forgotten by everyone, and now a timid, big man with an empty gaze loomed before his eyes. Mankurt was unpretentious in food, extremely hardy, childishly obedient and, which was his main advantage, he did not strive for anything, did not dream of anything, did not remember anything.
One day, in the Dzungar camp, where the mankurt lived, a decrepit, emaciated old man appeared with a stick. He peered into the faces of the young men. He did not know the language and everyone considered him deaf and dumb. The next morning, when the old man was about to continue his journey, he saw a herd leaving to the side. The one he was looking for followed the herd. It was his grandson. But at the same time, it wasn't him. The limp gait and dull gaze of the horseman made the old man doubt. Mankurt walked past, holding tightly to the skin on his head at the sight of a stranger.
The old man shuddered and tried to speak to the horseman. The Dzungars realized who he was, and, deciding to punish the weak old man who dared to appear here, they ordered the Dzungar, who knew the Kazakh language, to tell the story of the mankurt. Laughing, they told the old man about what the once brave horseman had become, now silently enduring insults. Not a single muscle moved on the aksakal’s stern face; only with his black, bony hand he clutched his stick tighter. After listening to the story to the end, the old man walked away.
But he did not go far, but hid near the location of the Dzungarian camp. So the day passed, night was approaching. The aksakal recalled how almost three years ago, when he and the old men were taking women and children to the steppe, his son and eldest grandson with other horsemen of the village galloped off to recapture the cattle taken away by the enemies. The cattle were captured, but the grandson was lassoed and taken to distant lands. They waited for him for a month, and then the old man began to get ready for the journey. If a grandson died, his body should be given to the earth according to the custom of his ancestors. This duty sustained the old man’s strength throughout three years of long wanderings.
Now he knew that his grandson was alive and well. But he is NOBODY. Only barbarians could come up with such torture. The Dzungars said that the Chinese taught them to take away a person’s memory. The Kazakhs, who from time immemorial have honored their ancestors and their roots, would prefer to kill a person than to deprive him of his memory. Any Kazakh child knows his family in seven generations, the life history of his ancestors, the names of the great Kazakh warriors and famous battles. And the men tried to live with dignity, knowing that their actions would be judged by seven generations of descendants, proud or ashamed of their ancestor. Memory was everything for a Kazakh. This was his education. Knowledge was passed on from father to son, from grandfather to grandson. The history of the clan, customs, traditions, nomadic routes, sites of encampments and hidden wells, chronology, the ability to “read” nature and use it wisely, military strategy, sites of other clans, the structure of life, the hierarchy of relations within the clan - everything that the memory stored constituted a picture of the nomad's universe. A Kazakh without memory - nothing could be worse. Now his grandson had no memory. This means there was no man. What remains is an empty shell. It would be better if he were deprived of his legs and arms, even though he would remain human. Why didn't they just kill him?! Only a coward destroys the memory of an enemy he could not break. Destruction of memory is also death for a person, but simply killing him is still more honest. To kill without depriving the enemy of his memory, his love for his homeland, his loyalty to his people is respect for the enemy, respect for the strength of his spirit.
Tears flowed from the old man's eyes, but he was calm. His journey has come to an end. It remains to check whether the Dzungars told the truth. Closer to dawn, the old man found Mankurt sleeping under a tree. He called him affectionately, as in childhood: “Zhanym menin, goat menin, botam.” Mankurt opened his eyes, and, looking warily at the old man, right hand He grabbed his head and pulled himself into a dive with his left hand. The old man repeated the words and when the mankurt swung, with a lightning-quick movement he plunged the knife into his grandson’s heart... Soon the woman who brought the mankurt food reported that he had been killed. The Dzungars, without saying a word, turned to the west and saw a lonely hunched figure far on the horizon. There was both anger and confusion in the men's eyes. They did not send a chase. Who needs him, a poor, weak old man...
In Aitmatov’s work, the nomadic Zhuanzhuans, who invaded the Central Asian steppes, used nightmarish torture to make a kind of biorobot “mankurt” out of disobedient captured warriors who did not want to become slaves, who had forgotten their relatives, name and their people so much that, according to the novel “Stormy Station” (“And the day lasts longer than a century”), according to the legend, one of them killed his mother - without malice, without remorse, dispassionately, indifferently...
This is how Chingiz Aitmatov describes the fate of those who ended up in mankurts.
The Ana Beyit cemetery had its own history.
The legend began with the fact that the Ruanzhuans, who captured the Sarozeks in past centuries, treated the captured warriors extremely cruelly. On occasion, they sold them into slavery in neighboring regions, and this was considered a happy outcome for the captive, because sooner or later the sold slave could escape to his homeland. A monstrous fate awaited those whom the Ruanzhuans left in slavery. They destroyed the slave's memory with a terrible torture - putting a shiri on the victim's head. Usually this fate befell young men captured in battle. First, their heads were shaved clean, and every hair was carefully scraped out at the root. By the time the shaving of the head was completed, the experienced Juanzhuang slaughterers were slaughtering a seasoned camel nearby. When skinning a camel skin, the first step was to separate its heaviest, dense nuchal part. Having divided the neck into pieces, it was immediately put in pairs on the shaved heads of prisoners with instantly sticking patches - like modern swimming caps. This meant putting on the shiri. Anyone who underwent such a procedure either died, unable to withstand the torture, or lost his memory for the rest of his life, turning into a mankurt - a slave who does not remember his past. The skin of one camel was enough for five or six widths. After putting on the shiri, each doomed person was shackled with a wooden neck block so that the subject could not touch his head to the ground. In this form, they were taken away from crowded places, so that their heartbreaking screams would not be heard in vain, and they were thrown there in an open field, with their hands and feet tied, in the sun, without water and without food. The torture lasted several days. Only reinforced patrols guarded the approaches in certain places in case the captives' fellow tribesmen tried to rescue them while they were alive. But such attempts were made extremely rarely, because in the open steppe any movements are always noticeable. And if subsequently rumors reached that so-and-so had been turned into a mankurt by the Ruanzhuans, then even the closest people did not try to save or ransom him, because this meant regaining the stuffed animal of the former person. And only one Naiman mother, who remained in legend under the name Naiman-Ana, did not reconcile herself with such a fate for her son. The Sarozek legend tells about this. And hence the name of the Ana-Beyit cemetery - Mother's Rest.
Most of those thrown into the field for painful torture died under the Sarozek sun. One or two mankurts out of five or six remained alive. They died not from hunger or even from thirst, but from unbearable, inhuman torment caused by drying, shrinking rawhide camel skin on their heads. Inexorably shrinking under the rays of the scorching sun, the width squeezed and squeezed the slave's shaved head like an iron hoop. Already on the second day, the shaved hair of the martyrs began to sprout. Coarse and straight Asian hair sometimes grew into the rawhide; in most cases, finding no way out, the hair curled and went back into the scalp, causing even greater suffering. The last tests were accompanied by a complete clouding of reason. Only on the fifth day did the Ruanzhuans come to check whether any of the prisoners had survived. If at least one of the tortured people was found alive, it was considered that the goal had been achieved. They gave him water to drink, freed him from his shackles, and over time they restored his strength and raised him to his feet. This was the mankurt slave, forcibly deprived of memory and therefore very valuable, worth ten healthy slaves. There was even a rule - in the case of the murder of a mankurt slave in internecine clashes, the ransom for such damage was set three times higher than for the life of a free fellow tribesman.
Mankurt did not know who he was, where his tribe came from, did not know his name, did not remember his childhood, father and mother - in a word, Mankurt did not recognize himself as a human being. Deprived of an understanding of his own self, mankurt had a number of advantages from an economic point of view. He was equivalent to a dumb creature and therefore absolutely submissive and safe. He never thought about running away. For any slave owner, the worst thing is a slave uprising. Every slave is potentially a rebel. Mankurt was the only exception of his kind - the impulses for rebellion and disobedience were completely alien to him. He did not know such passions. And therefore there was no need to guard him, keep guard, and especially suspect him of secret plans. Mankurt, like a dog, recognized only his masters. He did not communicate with others. All his thoughts came down to satisfying his belly. He knew of no other worries. But he carried out the assigned work blindly, diligently, and steadily. Mankurts were usually forced to do the dirtiest, hardest work, or they were assigned to the most tedious, painful tasks that required stupid patience. Only the mankurt could withstand the endless wilderness and desolation of the Sarozeks alone, being inseparable from the distant camel herd. He alone replaced many workers at such a distance. All you had to do was provide him with food - and then he was constantly at work in winter and summer, not burdened by wildness and not complaining about deprivation. The owner's command was above all else for the mankurt. For himself, apart from food and cast-offs, just so as not to freeze in the steppe, he did not demand anything...
It is much easier to remove the head of a prisoner or inflict any other harm to intimidate the spirit than to take away a person’s memory, destroy his mind, tear out the roots of what remains with a person until his last breath, remaining his only gain, leaving with him and inaccessible. nom for others. But the nomadic Ruanzhuans, who had endured the most cruel form of barbarism from their utter history, encroached on this innermost essence of man. They found a way to rob slaves of their living memory, thereby inflicting on human nature the most serious of all conceivable and unimaginable atrocities. It is no coincidence that, lamenting for her son, who was turned into a mankurt, Naiman-Ana said in frantic grief and despair:
“When your memory was torn away, when your head, my child, was squeezed like a nut with pincers, tightening your skull with a slow collar of drying camel skin, when an invisible hoop was placed on your head so that your eyes bulged out of their sockets, filled with the ichor of fear, when on a smokeless fire Sarozek's dying thirst tormented you and not a drop fell from the sky onto your lips - has the sun, which gives life to everyone, become for you a hated, blinded luminary, the blackest among all the luminaries in the world?
When, torn by pain, your cry stood heart-rendingly in the middle of the desert, when you screamed and rushed about, calling on God day and night, when you waited for help from the sky in vain, when, suffocating in the vomit expelled by the torment of the flesh, and writhing in the vile shit that flowed from a body twisted in convulsions, when you were fading away in that stench, losing your mind, eaten by a cloud of flies, did you, with your last strength, curse God for creating us all in a world abandoned by him?”
MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE OF RUSSIA
Federal state budget educational institution higher professional education
"RUSSIAN STATE HUMANITIES UNIVERSITY" (RGGU)
FACULTY OF SOCIOLOGY
Essay
on the topic of:« Mankury»
Rogoza Sofya Olegovna
Head Roslyakov A.B.
Moscow 2015
Among the deep and cardinal changes that characterize shifts in Russian culture, special mention should be made of the phenomenon associated with historical consciousness and historical memory, which was especially clearly manifested in Mankurtism. This phenomenon marks historical unconsciousness, various shapes falsification of the past, ignoring previously accumulated spiritual wealth, dissecting historical events and processes.
Something similar, but in a social sense, is happening now in many CIS countries. Many people know nothing about the past not only of their people, their country, but also of their area where they live, about the traditions and history of their family. At the same time, there are people whose policy is aimed at ensuring that this oblivion not only continues, but also intensifies, so that a person is not interested in his past, the past of his environment, his homeland. All this allows us to say that mankurtism, as historical unconsciousness, manifests itself in different forms, which we would like to pay attention to.
First of all, complete ignorance of the past plays a huge role in the formation of mankurtism. In many post-Soviet states, there are political forces that want to erase the entire history, without exception, associated with the existence of the Soviet country, to present it as some kind of failure in the development of civilization. And therefore, “this story” can be ignored and completely ignored.
Closely related to this position is such a form of mankurtism as the deliberate distortion (falsification) of the past, when historical events, life and deeds politicians(and not only them) are reduced to the point of unrecognizability, to the point of being deprived of all meaning and plausibility of their actions, causes and consequences of ongoing events. The situational nature of such interpretations and explanations of the historical past is usually transient, but during the period of their functioning, people’s worldview and their activities can lead to significant costs, distortions, and sometimes even to social disorientation of huge masses of people. In Russia, this was expressed in attempts to idealize the tsarist regime, when the activities of the Romanov rule were presented as a blessing, as the pinnacle of civilization, as an ideal of social order. Nicholas II was especially “lucky” in this sense, whose activities were painted in the most rosy colors. And this despite the fact that he was called “bloody”, that they did not understand his favor towards Rasputin, they talked about mediocrity in politics and glaring mistakes, which allowed even monarchist-minded researchers to call him a “historical nonentity”, because it was his activities to a large extent contributed to the collapse of Russia.
During the period of transformation of post-Soviet states, one of the alarming symptoms, marking the emergence of Mankurtism with an ethnic accent, become the ambitions of the ruling nationalist leaders, seeking to argue their claims to power through evidence, whose people are “ancient”, whose ancestors contributed more to history than neighboring peoples. The controversy surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh is indicative in this regard. Azerbaijani and Armenian politicians, relying on the “conclusions” of their historians, have been proving for many years who was the first to appear on this land, who developed it, who made it what it really is. At the same time, data from archaeological and ethnographic research are presented, the works of various thinkers and different eras are cited with one single, but mutually exclusive goal - to prove the birthright of one side or the other. Reflecting on such situations, the famous historian M. Gefter figuratively said: “Now there is no coffin that has the right to declare: I am closer to heaven.” Such approaches to the historical past only lead to increased tension and aggravation of interethnic relations.
Ethnic mankurtism is aimed at ignoring historical realities, at refusing to recognize the fundamental changes that have taken place, and at trampling on the interests of other peoples. In this regard, I would like to recall the history of the emergence of the Dnieper Moldavian Republic (Tiraspol). The population of this unrecognized state consists of one third Moldovans, a third Russians, and a third Ukrainians. Frontal attempts to “Moldavanize” and even “humanize” this part of the former Soviet republic led to opposition, and then to bloodshed, to a military confrontation, as a result of which people died. It was during this period that in the historical consciousness of some of the peoples inhabiting this republic, “zigzags” occurred in the public perception of reality. On the one hand, this was a reaction to many years of ignoring such ethno-national factors as the oblivion of the native language, the reduction of its teaching, the diminishing role of national literature, the intensive process of Russification, etc. On the other hand, complete ignorance of the new historical situation, when the desire to preserve the historical and national past was reduced only to concern for state independence, affecting only one part of the population, forgetting about other forms of solving pressing problems related not only to the Moldovan, but also to other peoples who have inhabited this territory for centuries.
Mankurtism is generated by the creation of fictitious false events, pseudo-processes, and quasi-historical persons. These unique artificially created phantoms are especially clearly manifested when the historical consciousness of individual peoples is examined, when, when assessing the past, events that seem to determine their fate stick out in their memory. Here there is an amazing interweaving of rational and emotional perception, a zealous but poorly balanced assessment of the turning points in the life of one’s people and their consequences.
This paradoxical combination of past and present, the significance of past events for orientation in the present shows that historical memory is a powerful, active phenomenon that has no less influence on people’s behavior than their assessment of their present economic situation, their unsettledness and restlessness during this transition period. Moreover, it can be argued that it is historical memory that can aggravate or weaken the perception of what is happening in personal and public life events, exacerbate negative characteristics, help calm public and group mood.
Methods based on vanity and attempts to elevate oneself above others play a significant role in the formation of historical mankurts. It should be noted that this is a feature of historical memory when hyperbolization, an exaggeration of individual moments of the historical past occurs in people’s minds, because it practically cannot lay claim to a direct, systemic reflection - it rather expresses an indirect, although updated perception and the same assessment of past events.
The significance of hyperbolization of historical consciousness and historical memory increases in “eras of shocks and catastrophes,” during critical periods in the life of society, when, as a rule, intensive processes of revaluation of existing orientations and the historical past occur. It is during this period that fundamental changes in existing values occur; processes that are not always understandable to people encourage people to look for answers to problems that concern them in a variety of spheres of life, including in the historical past. Under these conditions, distorted historical consciousness becomes a powerful factor that generates myths, creates fiction, fantasies, and creates an imaginary image of a “heroic” or “brilliant” past in the lives of these people. This is also facilitated by the false innovative conclusions of politicians and scientists who impose their not entirely correct methods and conclusions.
Mankurtism is also formed through personal “national orphanhood,” which is expressed to a large extent in the fact that it has become characteristic of the historical memory of the past of one’s people, one’s family, and one’s immediate environment. Added to this is ignorance of the history of one’s village, city, or region.
This personal spontaneous mankurtism manifests itself primarily in complete or almost complete atrophy in relation to the historical past. This phenomenon is generated by the low level of citizenship of people who are not interested in the history of the country, their people, the costs of studying at school and university, and upbringing in the family. These data indicate that this phenomenon was achieved to a greater extent both spontaneously, due to the lack of purposefulness of family education (lack of traditions), and as a result of government policy and position. The result of this situation is that such people often do not recognize the need for patriotic behavior skills and often become imitators of the style and lifestyle of the population of other countries. Moreover, this is usually the basis for the rejection of everything national, the rejection of national pride, even to the point of betrayal of the Motherland. This position sometimes tries to justify itself by focusing attention only on current problems, on the concerns of today.
This nationwide oblivion is complemented by the fact that a huge layer of historical consciousness associated with personal life, with those events and phenomena that fill people’s everyday lives, is also deformed and has the features of spontaneous mankurtism. The activities of national heroes, geniuses, talents, their exploits and achievements are stored in the cumulative historical memory as in a kind of museum. They are known from textbooks, scientific and fiction. But there are only a few of them. The memory of millions and millions of others is stored in the storerooms of this museum, in the memory of only loved ones, relatives, and friends. But these are millions of bricks in the foundation of our historical memory, nameless workers and witnesses, without whom History itself is unthinkable and, what is especially important, our involvement in it. A person cannot fully feel like a citizen of a country if he not only does not know the significant events and milestones in its history, but also the pedigree of his family, the history of his city, village, his region in which he was born or lives.
Conclusion
Mankurtism is synonymous with slavery. But this is not a physical, but a spiritual concept. Under certain circumstances, a person, due to influence on his psyche from the outside, turns into such a person.
IN mass consciousness Nowadays there is a widespread opinion that anyone who does not know their native language and traditions is a mankurt. In essence, ignorance of the native language is not yet a mandatory sign of Mankurtism.
Mankurt should be called someone who, living in normal conditions, is not forcibly deprived of his roots, but voluntarily renounces his language, native culture, arrogantly and arrogantly treats everything native, preferring only foreign things, in his opinion more modern and civilized.
Mankurtism is not an external form, but an internally essential phenomenon. Based on external signs, it is incorrect to classify this or that person as a mankurt.
Mankurtism undermines the ideas of patriotism, strengthens nihilism towards one’s own past, and subordinates people’s consciousness to other ideals and goals that are either alien in nature or do not correspond to the national mentality. All this destroys the ideological basis of the people’s consciousness and ultimately destroys the ideals and ideological basis of the life of the people, without which any state cannot exist.
Russian journalist and publicist Vladimir Solovyov writes about mankurtism:
“It has become fashionable to speak disparagingly about one’s homeland. Not about the government, but about the Motherland. For me these people do not exist. There is nothing to talk about with them. They are a genetic mutation. Historical memory, respect for the memory of ancestors are empty words for them. Of course, they breathe, walk, eat and consume. But for me, mankurts are not people. Chingiz Aitmatov was right. They show their inferiority through aggression - everyone is to blame, of course, except themselves. There are quite a lot of them and they believe that the number justifies them.”
Unfortunately, the current generation now suffers from historical unconsciousness. The majority do not know, and more often do not want to know, the recent past of their people. Unfortunately, painful unconsciousness is developing, already acquiring global proportions.
mankurtism social historical falsification
The term “mankurt” was coined by Chingiz Aitmatov in his famous novel “And the day lasts longer than a century.” In this work of art, a mankurt is a person who is captured and, with the help of brutal torture, turned into slavery soulless creature, who has forgotten everything about his past life and carries out any orders of his master. The word has become widely used in a figurative sense, and has become the contemptuous nickname “mankurt” that goes to those who forget and disdain the culture of their people.
Etymology of the word
There are several versions of the origin of the word. Presumably Chingiz Aitmatov, inventing the term “mankurt,” took as a basis the ancient Turkic adjective mungul, meaning “stupid, unreasonable, devoid of reason.” In Kyrgyz modern language The word munju is used to denote a mutilated person. Taking into account the mutual influence of Kyrgyz, it can be assumed that the noun “mankurt” comes from “manguu” - a form of the word that has the meanings: “stupid, stupid, feeble-minded” and “idiot”. It is possible that the lexeme "mankurt" was formed by merging the ancient Turkic roots gurut - "dried" and man - "to gird, put on a belt."
Ruanzhuan tribe
In the fourth or fifth century AD there was a migration process. During the period of unrest in the steppes of Turkestan, Western Manchuria and Mongolia, an alliance of nomadic tribes arose, which included runaway slaves, impoverished peasants, and deserters. United by a common unenviable fate, people were forced to eke out a miserable, beggarly existence, so they formed gangs that traded in robbery. Gradually, the gathering of bandits turned into a people who went down in history under the name of the Ruanzhuans. This tribe was distinguished by primitive laws, lack of writing and culture, constant combat readiness and fierce ruthlessness. The Ruanzhuans controlled the lands to the north of China and became a real curse for nomadic Asia and neighboring states. Mankurt is a man enslaved by these terrible people.
Description of torture
It is no coincidence that the legend described by Aitmatov talks specifically about the Ruanzhuans. Only this rootless, merciless, barbaric people were capable of inventing such a sophisticated, inhuman torture. This tribe treated prisoners especially cruelly. In order to turn a person into an ideal slave who would not think of rebellion or escape, his memory was taken away by putting a shiri on him. Young and strong warriors were selected for the procedure. First, the unfortunate people had their heads completely shaved, literally scraping out every hair. Then the camel was slaughtered and the thickest, nuchal part of the skin was separated. Divided into parts, they placed it on the heads of the prisoners. The skin, like a plaster, stuck to the freshly shaved skulls of people. This meant putting on the shiri. Then the future slaves were put in stocks around their necks so that they could not touch their heads to the ground, their hands and feet were tied, they were taken out to the bare steppe and left there for several days. Under the scorching sun, without water and food, with their skin gradually drying out and a steel hoop squeezing their heads, the captives most often died from unbearable torture. Within a day, the hard, straight hair of the slaves began to sprout; sometimes it penetrated the rawhide, but more often it curled and pierced the scalp, causing burning pain. At this moment, the prisoners completely lost their minds. Only on the fifth day did the Ruanzhuans come for the unfortunate ones. If at least one of the captives remained alive, it was considered lucky. The enslaved were freed from their bonds, given something to drink, and gradually restored to strength and physical health.
The value of a mankurt slave
People who do not remember their past were highly valued. They had a number of advantages from an economic point of view. Mankurt is a creature not burdened with the consciousness of its own “I”, attached to its owner, like a dog. His only need is food. He is indifferent to other people and never thinks about running away. Only the Mankurts, who did not remember their kinship, could withstand the endless desolation of the Sarozeks, were not burdened by savagery, and did not need rest and help. And they could perform the dirtiest, tedious, painful work for a long time, steadily, monotonously. Usually they were assigned to a camel herd, which they vigilantly guarded day and night, winter and summer, without complaining about hardships. The master's command was above all else for them. Mankurt was equivalent to ten healthy slaves. It is known that for the accidental killing of such a slave in internecine wars, in order to compensate for the damage, the guilty party paid a ransom three times greater than for the destruction of a free fellow tribesman.
The legend of mankurt
In the novel “And the Day Lasts Longer than a Century” one chapter is devoted to an ancient legend. Aitmatov talks about the unfortunate fate of a woman named Naiman-Ana in his legend. Mankurt, whom the heroine of the story accidentally heard about, turned out to be her missing son in battle. Usually, even if the relatives of a mutilated prisoner learned about his terrible fate, they never tried to save him. A person who does not remember kinship retained only the outer shell. Naiman-Ana thought differently. She decided to bring her son home at any cost. Having found him among the endless Sarozeks, the woman tried to restore the young man’s memory. However, neither the warmth of his mother’s hands, nor her persistent speeches, nor the lullabies familiar from childhood, nor the food prepared under his native roof helped the captive remember his past. And when the insidious Juanzhuans inspired the mankurt that Naiman-Ana wanted to deceive him, take off his hat and steam his tormented head, the slave, with an unwavering hand, shot an arrow into his mother’s heart. A white scarf fell from the hair of the dying woman and turned into the Donenbai bird, which continued to scream, reminding the mankurt of his father and his forgotten native land.
Folklore source
The author of the legend, as already mentioned, is the famous writer Chingiz Aitmatov. The legend of mankurt, in turn, comes from a real folklore source. The writer in one of his interviews says that in the epic "Manas", one of the greatest legends of the Kyrgyz people, there is a mention of the threat of one of the warriors to another, in case of victory, to put a shiri on his head in order to take away his memory. The author did not find any other information about this cruel violence against the human mind either in folklore or in literature. Researcher K. Asanaliev, studying the epic "Manas", found in it lines in which enemies are trying to put shiri on young Manas.
Historical accuracy
Shiri is cattle, from which nomadic peoples in ancient times made dishes. The Kirghiz also had a funeral custom associated with the use of shiri. If, due to unfavorable circumstances, it was necessary to postpone the funeral of the deceased in another area, his body, in compliance with all the required rituals, was wrapped in bread and hung on a high tree. In the spring, the deceased was taken to the family cemetery and buried there. There is a known mention of the lexeme “shiri” in the meaning of “a cap made of rawhide, put on the head of the person being punished.” This type of torture was widely used among nomadic peoples. The drying skin of the animal shrank, causing unbearable pain to the person. Mankurt is a person who lost his memory under the influence of such torture, according to Aitmatov. If we assume that the term “shiri” is of Mongolian origin, then its meaning is “skin, leather, rawhide.” In the Kyrgyz language, along with the lexeme “shiri”, derivatives are used: “shiresh” - “to grow together, stick together” and “shirile” - “to put a shiri on the head”.
Legend Meaning
The legend about mankurt is closely related to the main theme of the novel’s narrative, “And the day lasts longer than a century.” It describes modern mankurts. Chingiz Aitmatov sought to convey to his readers the idea that a person deprived of historical memory becomes a puppet, a slave of the concepts and ideas imposed on him. He does not remember the instructions of his father and mother, forgets his real name, loses contact with national culture of his tribe and loses his identity. Of particular importance in the legend is the fact that the unfortunate mankurt, who lost information about his human essence, retained the memory of how to shoot from a bow, and therefore how to kill. And when the enslavers turned the young man against his mother, he destroyed her with his own hands. - the basis of the human soul, an inoculation against immorality and immorality. Naiman-Ana is a symbol of this memory, tirelessly reminding people of the lessons of the past.
Use of the word
According to the journal "Science and Life" mankurt is an example of a lexeme recently introduced into the Russian language. Currently, the meaning of this word has narrowed to the concept of a person who does not remember kinship, who has forgotten about his ancestors. The information that this loss occurred as a result of an external influence on the psyche and turns the subject into a slave of his master is gradually lost in the meaning of the noun “mankurt”.
The term has gained great popularity in Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tatarstan, and Bashkortostan. In these countries the word "mankurt" has negative meaning, it is used to describe people who forget their national language and culture.
From other authors
The publicist Vertiporokh Liliya calls a mankurt a man “whose heart and brains were removed by the empire, leaving only his stomach.” Konstantin Krylov describes the use of the term “mankurt” in the eighties of the last century as an unfair and contemptuous description of a person who is not very interested in “the day before yesterday’s news” about other events in Russian history, but who thinks more about the present and future of his country. Publicist and journalist Vladimir Solovyov calls citizens who disparage their homeland mankurts. He considers people for whom respect for the memory of their ancestors is empty words a genetic mutation.
