Who is Viy? Viy is an underground god in Slavic mythology. God Viy is in the northern tradition of fortune telling and magic.

Viy- V Slavic mythology a demonic creature that gives people nightmares; he is capable of killing a person and destroying an entire city with a glance, but his eyes are covered iron ages, which his evil servants must lift with an iron pitchfork.

Sources:

● M.B. Ladygin, O.M. Ladygina Brief mythological dictionary- M.: Publishing house NOU "Polar Star", 2003.

Dictionary of pagan concepts and gods

(Niya, Niam) - mythical creature whose eyelids descend to the very ground, but if you lift them with a pitchfork, then nothing will be hidden from his gaze; word viii means eyelashes. Viy - with one glance he kills people and turns cities and villages to ashes; fortunately, his murderous gaze is hidden by thick eyebrows and eyelids close to his eyes, and only when it is necessary to destroy enemy armies or set fire to an enemy city, do they lift his eyelids with a pitchfork. Viy was considered one of the main servants of Chernobog. He was considered a judge over the dead. The Slavs could never come to terms with the fact that those who lived lawlessly, not according to their conscience, were not punished. The Slavs believed that the place of execution of lawless people was inside the earth. Viy is also associated with the seasonal death of nature during winter. He was revered as the sender of nightmares, visions and ghosts, especially for those who do not have a clear conscience. ...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”). ... Today Viy is at rest,” the two-headed horse yawned with one head, and licked his lips with the other head, “Viy is resting: he destroyed a lot of people with his eye, and from the country-cities only ashes lie. Viy will accumulate strength and get down to business again(A.M. Remizov. “To the Sea-Ocean”).

encyclopedic Dictionary

in East Slavic mythology the spirit, deathly. Having huge eyes with heavy lids, Viy kills with his gaze.

Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron

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. Afanasyev sees in V. a reflection of the ancient and powerful deity of the Slavs, namely the thunder god. The processing of the legend about Vie by N.V. Gogol is known.

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 contamination of the name of the mythological ruler of the underworld “iron” Niya and 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. pp. 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're talking about about the preparation of a wedding loaf, it is said: “The korovai is made more tightly, and in their way, on the wiki (...) they put it in the oven without a lid, and the korovai is put 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 that tripartite wooden temples 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 the cathedral Notre Dame of Paris. By the way, bearing a “Roman” name main character story - Khoma Brut - a student of the Brotherhood 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 he himself image of the dead beauty was inspired by Gogol’s “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 to the 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 with a shudder, “this whole gang will fall on me?..”

“For Viem! Let’s go get Viy!” shouted many strange voices, 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 very 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 was, all the disgusting monsters rushed at him at once... lifeless, he fell to the ground... The rooster crowed for the second time. The dwarves heard his first song. 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 governor in the army of Chernobog, and in Peaceful time was a jailer in underground kingdom. 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 last days 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.”

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 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”.

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 from similar plot well known in mythology 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 folk tale, which was rethought 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 character traits 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 folk beliefs about Saint Kasyan. Christian church celebrates the feast day of St. John Cassian the Roman (V century) on February 28, old style, and on leap years- February 29. He is known as a talented spiritual writer and organizer of monasteries.

IN popular consciousness there was another image of Kasyan that had nothing in common with the canonical one. He suddenly turned from real person into some almost demonic creature, which is endowed with epithets - merciless, formidable, vindictive. 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.

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.

VIY VIY

in East Slavic mythology, a character whose deadly gaze is hidden under huge eyelids or eyelashes, one of the East Slavic names of which is associated with the same root: cf. Ukrainian Viya, Viyka, Belarusian. weika - “eyelash”. In Russian and Belarusian fairy tales, V.’s eyelids, eyelashes or eyebrows were raised with pitchforks by his assistants, why does a person, who could not withstand V.’s gaze, was dying. Preserved until the 19th century. The Ukrainian legend about V. is known from the story by N.V. Gogol. Possible correspondences of the name V. and some of its attributes in Ossetian ideas about the Vayug giants (see. Waig) force us to recognize the ancient origins of the legend about V. This is also evidenced by parallels to the image of V. in the Celtic epic, and the abundance of typological parallels in mythological functions eyes.
Lit.: Abaev V.I., The image of Viy in Gogol’s story, in the book: Russian folklore, v. 3, M.-L., 1958; Ivanov V.V., About one parallel to Gogol’s Viyu, in the book: Works on sign systems, v. 5, Tartu, 1971; him. The category of “visible” and “invisible” in the text. Once again about East Slavic folklore parallels to Gogol’s Viy, in the collection: Structure of texts and semiotics of culture, The Hague-P., 1973.
V.I., V.T.

(Source: “Myths of the Peoples of the World.”)

(Niya, Niam) - a mythical creature whose eyelids descend to the very ground, but if you lift them with a pitchfork, then nothing will be hidden from his gaze; the word "wii" means eyelashes. Viy - with one glance he kills people and turns cities and villages to ashes; fortunately, his murderous gaze is hidden by thick eyebrows and eyelids close to his eyes, and only when it is necessary to destroy enemy armies or set fire to an enemy city, do they lift his eyelids with a pitchfork. Viy was considered one of the main servants of Chernobog. He was considered a judge over the dead. The Slavs could never come to terms with the fact that those who lived lawlessly, not according to their conscience, were not punished. The Slavs believed that the place of execution of lawless people was inside the earth. Viy is also associated with the seasonal death of nature during winter. He was revered as the sender of nightmares, visions and ghosts, especially for those who do not have a clear conscience. “...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”). “... Today Viy is at rest,” the two-headed horse yawned with one head, and licked his lips with the other head, “Viy is resting: he destroyed a lot of people with his eye, and from the country-cities only ashes lie. Viy will accumulate strength and get down to business again” (A.M. Remizov. “To the Sea-Ocean”).

(Source: “Slavic mythology. Dictionary-reference book.”)

See what "VIY" is in other dictionaries:

I; m. In Slavic mythology: a supernatural creature with a deadly gaze hidden under huge eyelids or eyelashes. ● By popular ideas, Viy is a formidable old man with eyebrows and eyelids reaching to the very ground. By itself, he cannot be seen... ... encyclopedic Dictionary

In East Slavic mythology, a spirit that brings death. Having huge eyes with heavy lids, Viy kills with his gaze... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

A person from Little Russian demonology; an old man with eyebrows and eyelids reaching to the ground; but if you raise his eyelids and eyebrows, his gaze kills and destroys everything he sees. This legend was processed by Gogol in “Viye”. Dictionary foreign words, included in... ... Dictionary of foreign words of the Russian language

Noun, number of synonyms: 4 fictional creature (334) hero (80) niya (2) ... Synonym dictionary

Viy- Viy, Viya, sentence. p. about Vie (myth.) ... Russian spelling dictionary

"V" request is redirected here; for the American golfer, see Vee, Michelle. This term has other meanings, see Viy (meanings). Viy is a character of Ukrainian demonology in the form of a formidable old man with eyebrows and eyelids right up to... ... Wikipedia

Viy- I; m. In Slavic mythology: a supernatural creature with a deadly gaze hidden under huge eyelids or eyelashes. According to popular beliefs, Viy is a formidable old man with eyebrows and eyelids reaching to the very ground. By itself, he cannot be seen... ... Dictionary of many expressions

VIY- (character of the story of the same name by N.V. Gogol; see also VIEV) Jealousy, / wives, / tears... / well, them! – / the eyelids will swell / just right for Viy. / I am not myself, / but I am / jealous / for Soviet Russia. M928 (355); The terrible legacy of the philistines, They are visited at night by the Non-Existent... ...

-VIY- see Kyiv VIY... Given name in Russian poetry of the 20th century: a dictionary of personal names

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 lift his eyebrows and eyelids with iron pitchforks, then nothing can hide before his formidable... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary F.A. Brockhaus and I.A. Efron

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.

Ethnography suggests that it is precisely with the image of Viy that the belief about the evil eye is connected - that everything perishes or gets spoiled from a bad look.

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

The ancient Slavs called Viem the sender of nightmares, visions and ghosts. They appeared to those who had an unclean conscience. In this he is related to Niyan, the king of hell.
Viy also served Chernobog in his kingdom and judged the dead for their misdeeds.
Our fairy tales tell of a mighty old man with huge eyebrows and unusually long eyelashes: his eyebrows and eyelashes were so thick that they completely obscured his vision; for him to look at the world, he needs several strong men who could lift his eyebrows and eyelashes with iron pitchforks.

Then nothing will be hidden from his gaze (the word “vii” means eyelashes).
The folk legend about Viya is familiar to anyone who has only read Gogol; however, some curious features were not included in his poetic story.
In Podolia, for example, Viy is represented as a terrible fighter who kills people with his gaze and turns cities and villages to ashes; fortunately, his murderous gaze is hidden by thick eyebrows and eyelids close to his eyes, and only in those cases when it is necessary to destroy enemy armies or set fire to an enemy city, they lift his eyelids with a pitchfork.
In such a grandiose image, folk fantasy depicted the thunder god (grandfather Perun): from under cloudy eyebrows and eyelashes he casts lightning glances and sends death and fires...
In the legends of the Czechs and Slovaks there is a giant named Quick-Sighted. With his sharp, all-seeing glances, he sets everything on fire, and even rocks crack and crumble into sand.
What’s interesting is that the word “Viy” is undoubtedly consonant with the name ancient god Hindu Vayu.
He was the god of storms and hurricanes, killing all living things. He was usually called ruthless: “You can follow the path that runs fast river, but you cannot go the way of the ruthless Vayu...”
He ruled over the underworld. Isn’t this our Viy, who in ancient times was also mentioned as the patron of all-destroying hurricanes and even participated in sending the Great Flood to the lands?

N. GOGOL. VIY

The ill-fated seminarian Khoma Brut comes to church to read funeral prayers over the coffin of the lady witch he killed:

“He stopped for a minute. In the middle, the coffin of the terrible witch still stood motionless... having drawn a circle around him, he began to recall all his spells. The silence was terrible; the candles fluttered and bathed the entire church in light...
Suddenly... in the midst of silence... the coffin lid burst with a crash and a dead man stood up. He was even scarier than the first time. His teeth clashed terribly, row on row, his lips twitched in convulsions, and spells flew, squealing wildly.
A whirlwind rose through the church, icons fell to the ground, and broken glass windows flew from top to bottom. The doors broke off their hinges, and an untold force of monsters flew into God's church. A terrible noise from wings and scratching claws filled the entire church. Everything flew and rushed around, looking everywhere for the philosopher.

Khoma lost the last remnant of hops in his head. He just crossed himself and read random prayers. And at the same time I heard how devilry rushed around him, almost catching him with the ends of her wings and disgusting tails. Everyone looked at him, searched for him and could not see him, surrounded by a mysterious circle.

Bring Viy! Follow Viy! - the words of the dead man were heard.

And suddenly there was silence in the church; a wolf 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 arms and legs covered with earth stood out like stringy, strong roots.
He walked heavily, stopping every minute. 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 everything, no matter how much it was, rushed at the philosopher. Lifeless, he fell to the ground, and immediately the spirit flew out of him out of fear.”

S. GORODETSKY. VIY

Because of distant distant centuries,
Because of the darkness, because of the impenetrable darkness,
From under a pile of gray boulders
It comes out like a snag that’s not right.
The skin is wrinkled, hanging like a rag,
Teeth are covered with white dust.
Apparently the stake was driven past him:
I couldn’t find peace underground!
And what kind of beds are under the ground?
The darkness and the heat are annoying.
And up, angry and angry,
Viy struggles through and gets out.
He wanted to look
To live and be young.
Got out. He sees a noose and a bag.
“What is this,” he thinks, “what is it?”
“Lift my eyelids! - shouts.
- I see neither happiness nor will.
The groan is nailed to the sad earth,
I thought: people won’t moan anymore!”
Oh, my old, my stupid Viy!
Let me close my eyelids tighter!
Our life has been deprived of all lives!
You shouldn't have come out of the womb!

As if we are boiling in resin, but we live,
We even sing songs and laugh.
Tears will fall - we don’t tear up the songs.
Laugh, we’ll wipe ourselves off with our sleeves.
Heavy! You can not understand,
What a life, what an earthly matter.
Goodbye, turn back
We are again for ours, for the intoxicated.
Just say to the globe,
To become more overgrown with grain
Yes, behind the sun in an unknown darkness
More fun, more fun flying.

Slavic mythology