Epics about sky hunter Huhedej Mergen in the epic tradition of the Western Buryats

   The Buryat epics about Huhedej Mergen stand out among other uligers with their hero known throughout Siberia and Central Asia, one of the ancient and senior heroes of the Buryat epic preceded Abaj Geser.

   The relevance and novelty of the study is in the detailed consideration of epic stories with this character previously unpublished and practically not mentioned in the works of researchers.

   The purpose of this work is to give an overview of the epic stories about Huhedej Mergen using the methods of comparative analysis to identify common features and specific plot-motif features.

   The mythological image of Huhedej Mergen among the Western Buryats concentrated the features of a hunter, an ancestor, a revered hunting and military deity and a thunder god. However, the mythological hypostasis of the Sky Hunter is not realized in epic stories. In the epic tradition Huhedei Mergen splits into two acting as a thunderer and a hero (sometimes in the same uliger plot) and according to researchers he is a prototype of a hero-deity containing the concept of the son of heaven characteristic of the Central Asian folklore and mythological tradition, the brightest representative of which is Geser. Uligers about Huhedej Mergen recorded among the Bokhan, Kuda and Unga Buryats indicate that this character was popular and widespread among all groups of Western Buryats. The main storylines of these uligers are not much different from each other but different background and ending give the narratives a different perception. Uliger Huheldej Mergen represents an early type of uligers about heroic matchmaking, retains the mythological lone hero in which the features of the first ancestor, the cultural hero and the idealized member of the patriarchal tribal team are concentrated. The plots of different versions of Huherdej Mergen and Huhosej Mergen retained their ancient “core” having become contaminated with stories about military exploits and it is on their basis that one can draw a conclusion about the transformation of mythological images, the change of heroes, the complication and cyclization of epic stories.

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