Tsarevich, _Tsar's son_.
Tsarevna, _Tsar's daughter_.
Tsaritsa, _Tsar's wife_.
Korolyevna, _King's daughter, princess_.
In Chekh and Magyar the accent is always on the first syllable.
In the Magyar consonantal combinations _cs_ = _ch_, _gy_ = _dy_,
_s_ = _sh_. Examples are Csako, pronounced Chako,--one of the cows
sold by the poor man to the King of the Crows. This is a name given
in Hungary to a cow with horns grown outward. Kiss Miklos,
pronounced Kish Miklosh, means in English Nicholas Little. Magyar
is pronounced Modyor, the unaccented _a_ in Magyar being the
equivalent, or nearly so, of our _o_.
The Russian myth-tales in this volume are all taken from
Afanasyeff's[9] collection. At the end of each title are given, in
parentheses, the part and page of the tale in the original work.
[9] The Russian title of Afanasyeff's work is, "Naródniya
Rússkiya Skazki. A. N. Afanásieva, Moskvá." There are eight
parts, usually bound in three volumes, and dated 1860-61-63.
The Three Kingdoms,--The Copper, the Silver, and the Golden. Page 1.
(Part vii. p. 97.)
The first name, that of the Tsar Bail Bailyanyin, is best translated
as "White of White Land." There is in Russian mythology a lady of
unspeakable beauty, Nastasya or Anastasya of the sea, who causes the
sun to blush twice each day; she is perhaps the Nastasya, Golden
Tress, of this story. Bail Bailyanyin, "White of White Land," may well
be Bail Bog, the White God of pre-Christian Russians. And here a few
words touching the persistence of myth-conceptions may not be out of
place. In the tales of the Indians, and in fact of all men who have
retained firm traces of primitive thought, the people of the
myth-tellers are on the side of light and goodness, and their enemies
on that of darkness and harm. This is parallel with the antithesis of
day and night. The Russian phrases _baili dyen_, _baili svait_, "white
day," "white world," are good examples of the old-time idea with which
is connected, in all likelihood, the title Baili Tsar, "the White
Tsar," still existent in Russia.
Ivan Tsarevich, The Fire-Bird, and the Gray Wolf. Page 20. (Part vii.
p. 121.)
The variants of this tale among the Russians and other Slavs, as well
as in Germany, are many, and would fill a volume of good size if
collected and published. In some Russian variants Ivan Tsarevich
retains Yelena the Beautiful, not through the art and friendship of
the Wolf, but by his own craft and daring. When he has received the
golden-maned steed in exchange for Yelena, and is going, he asks to
take leave of the maiden; the request is granted. He raises the beauty
to the saddle-bow, puts spurs to the steed, rises in the air, shoots
on above the standing forest, below the moving cloud, vanishes, holds
on his way till he comes to the Tsar to whom he had promised to give
the steed for the Fire-Bird. When the time comes for parting he asks
to take a last ride on the steed, if only through the court-yard; the
Tsar agrees. Ivan mounts with the cage in his hand; the steed rises as
before, and he vanishes, comes to the place where he had left Yelena,
and fares homeward with her till he meets his evil brothers.
Ivan the Peasant's Son and the Little Man Himself One-finger Tall, his
Mustache Seven Versts in Length. Page 37. (Part viii. p. 109.)
[Written down in the government of Saratoff, by Guskóff.]
In this tale we have Freezer and Great Eater, with powers exhibited on
a smaller scale than those of the comrades of Kiss Miklos in the
Magyar myth. The picture of the boat serving for the reality has its
parallel quite frequently in Indian belief.