Kutkh (also ''Kutkha'', ''Kootkha'', ''Kutq,'' ''Kutcha'' and other variants, russian: Кутх) is a

Raven spirit Many references to ravens exist in world lore and literature. Most depictions allude to the appearance and behavior of the wide-ranging common raven (''Corvus corax''). Because of its black plumage, croaking call, and diet of carrion, the raven i ...

traditionally revered in various forms by various indigenous peoples of the

Russian Far East The Russian Far East (russian: Дальний Восток России, r=Dal'niy Vostok Rossii, p=ˈdalʲnʲɪj vɐˈstok rɐˈsʲiɪ) is a region in Northeast Asia. It is the easternmost part of Russia and the Asian continent; and is admin ...

. Kutkh appears in many legends: as a key figure in creation, as a fertile ancestor of mankind, as a mighty

shaman Shamanism is a religious practice that involves a practitioner (shaman) interacting with what they believe to be a spirit world through altered states of consciousness, such as trance. The goal of this is usually to direct spirits or spir ...

and as a

trickster In mythology and the study of folklore and religion, a trickster is a character in a story ( god, goddess, spirit, human or anthropomorphisation) who exhibits a great degree of intellect or secret knowledge and uses it to play tricks or otherwi ...

. He is a popular subject of the animist stories of the

Chukchi people The Chukchi, or Chukchee ( ckt, Ԓыгъоравэтԓьэт, О'равэтԓьэт, ''Ḷygʺoravètḷʹèt, O'ravètḷʹèt''), are a Siberian indigenous people native to the Chukchi Peninsula, the shores of the Chukchi Sea and the Beri ...

and plays a central role in the mythology of the

Koryaks Koryaks () are an indigenous people of the Russian Far East, who live immediately north of the Kamchatka Peninsula in Kamchatka Krai and inhabit the coastlands of the Bering Sea. The cultural borders of the Koryaks include Tigilsk in the south ...

and

Itelmens The Itelmens (Itelmen: Итәнмән, russian: Ительмены) are an indigenous ethnic group of the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia. The Itelmen language is distantly related to Chukchi and Koryak, forming the Chukotko-Kamchatkan language ...

Kamchatka The Kamchatka Peninsula (russian: полуостров Камчатка, Poluostrov Kamchatka, ) is a peninsula in the Russian Far East, with an area of about . The Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Okhotsk make up the peninsula's eastern and west ...

. Many of the stories regarding Kutkh are similar to those of the Raven among the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, suggesting a long history of indirect cultural contact between Asian and North American peoples.

Names

Kutkh is known widely among the people that share a common

Chukotko-Kamchatkan The Chukotko-Kamchatkan or Chukchi–Kamchatkan languages are a language family of extreme northeastern Siberia. Its speakers traditionally were indigenous hunter-gatherers and reindeer-herders. Chukotko-Kamchatkan is endangered. The Kamchatkan ...

language family. Regionally, he is known as '' Kúrkil'' among the Chukchi; as ''Kutq'' among the

; and as ''KútqI'', ''KútqIy'', or ''KúsqIy'' among the southeastern

and ''KúykIy'' or ''QúykIy'' among the northwestern

. In Koryak, the name is employed commonly in its augmentative form, (''KutqÍnnaku'', ''KusqÍnnaku'', ''KuyÍnnaku'') all meaning "Big Kutkh" and often translated simply as "God".

Myths

The tales of Kutkh come in many, often contradictory versions. In some tales he is explicitly created by a Creator and lets the dawn onto the earth by chipping away at the stones surrounding her. In others he creates himself (sometimes out of an old fur coat) and takes pride in his independence from the Creator. In some, Kamchatka is created as he drops a feather while flying over the earth. In others, islands and continents are created by his defecation, rivers and lakes out of his waters. The difficult volcanic terrain and swift rivers of Kamchatka are thought to reflect Kutkh's capricious and willful nature. The bringing of light in the form of the sun and the moon is a common theme. Sometimes, he tricks an evil spirit which has captured the celestial bodies much in the style of analogous legends about the

Tlingit The Tlingit ( or ; also spelled Tlinkit) are indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. Their language is the Tlingit language (natively , pronounced ),

and Haida in the

Pacific Northwest The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Tho ...

. In others, it is he who must be tricked into releasing the sun and the moon from his bill. Kutkh's virility is emphasized in many legends. Many myths concern his children copulating with other animal spirits and creating the peoples that populate the world. In the animistic tradition of north-Eurasian peoples, Kutkh has a variety of interactions and altercations with

Wolf The wolf (''Canis lupus''; : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been recognized, and gray wolves, as popularly un ...

, Fox, Bear, Wolverine, Mouse,

Owl Owls are birds from the order Strigiformes (), which includes over 200 species of mostly solitary and nocturnal birds of prey typified by an upright stance, a large, broad head, binocular vision, binaural hearing, sharp talons, and feathers a ...

Dog The dog (''Canis familiaris'' or ''Canis lupus familiaris'') is a domesticated descendant of the wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it is derived from the extinct Pleistocene wolf, and the modern wolf is the dog's nearest living relative. Do ...

Seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to imp ...

Walrus The walrus (''Odobenus rosmarus'') is a large flippered marine mammal with a discontinuous distribution about the North Pole in the Arctic Ocean and subarctic seas of the Northern Hemisphere. The walrus is the only living species in the fami ...

and a host of other spirits. Many of these interactions involve some sort of trickery in which Kutkh comes out on top about as often as he is made a fool of. An example of these contradictions is given to the Chukchi legend of Kutkh and the Mice. The great and mighty raven Kutkh was flying through the cosmos. Tired from constant flight, he regurgitated the Earth from his gut, transformed into an old man, and alighted on the empty land to rest. Out of his first footsteps emerged the first Mice. Curious, playful and fearless, they entered the sleeping Kutkh's nose. The fury of the subsequent sneeze buckled the earth and created the mountains and the valleys. Attempts to stamp them out led to the formation of the ocean. Further harassments led to a great battle between the forces of snow and fire which created the seasons. Thus, the variable world recognizable to people emerged from the dynamic interaction between the mighty Kutkh and the small but numerous Mice.Menovschikov, G.A. (1974) ''Сказки и мифы народов Чукотки и Камчатки'' (''Tales and myths of the people of Chukotka and Kamchatka'') Nauka, Moscow. 636 pp. (in Russian)

Attitudes

Although Kutkh is supposed to have given mankind variously light, fire, language, fresh water and skills such as net-weaving and copulation, he is also often portrayed as a laughing-stock, hungry, thieving and selfish. In its contradictions, his character is similar that of other trickster gods, such as Coyote. The early Russian explorer and ethnographer of Kamchatka

Stepan Krasheninnikov Stepan Petrovich Krasheninnikov (russian: Степа́н Петро́вич Крашени́нников; – ) was a Russian explorer of Siberia, naturalist and geographer who gave the first full description of Kamchatka in the early 18th cent ...

(1711–1755) summarizes the Itelmen's relationship to Kutkh as follows: The image of Kutkh remains popular and iconic in Kamchatka, used often in advertising and promotional materials. Stylized carvings of Kutkh by Koryak artisans, often adorned with beads and lined with fur, are sold widely as souvenirs. The Chukchi creator-deity, roughly analogous to Bai-Ulgan of the Turkic pantheon. The Koryaks refer to him as ''Quikinna'qu'' ("Big Raven") and in Kamchadal (Itelmens) mythology he is called ''Kutkhu''.

Notes

References

* D. Koester (2002) "When the fat raven sings: mimesis and environmental alterity in Kamchatka's environmental age." in ''People and the Land, Pathways to Reform in Post-Soviet Siberia'', ed. E. Kasten. Berlin: Dietrich Reiner Verlag

* W. Jochelson (1908). ''The Koryak''. Leiden, E.J. Brill. * D.S. Worth (1961). ''Kamchadal Texts Collected by W. Jochelson'' 's Gravenhage: Mouton. {{refend

External links