This article introduces the Tai ethnic group in China, and then discusses the Tai epic in the context of dualistic beliefs. The Tai ethnic group is one of 55 minorities in China; its several branches reside in different areas, but mainly in Yunnan Province. According to historical documents, Tai groups have been developing for hundreds of years separately and as a result, there are four Tai dialect areas: the Sipsong Panna (Xishuangbanna) Tai dialect groups, the Daikong (Dehong) Tai dialect groups, the Hong-Jin Tai dialect groups, and Jinping Tai dialect groups. Most of them have adopted Theravada Buddhism from Thailand or Burma before the 14th century while maintaining primitive belief. However, some Tai groups kept only primitive belief without any influence of Buddhism all the time. As a result, Tai people practice a kind of dualistic beliefs, and this system influences the connotation and inheritance mode of Tai epics.

This article is based on the data of “Tai Origin Epic Study” project funded by the Young Scholars Funding of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). The study used theoretical material mainly from Chinese researchers. Through literature study and several field expeditions in Tai villages Southwestern China, the author found that there are dualistic styles of Tai epic, existing both as oral tradition and as written manuscript. Although there are various forms of epics in different Tai branches and whether are oral songs or written texts, all Tai poetries share the same rhyme rule. For one thing, the most popular rhythm is the Tail-Waist rhyme which functions just like a chain of rings; for another thing, the rhyme in oral tradition is more outstanding and beautiful than in written texts.

First of all Kyrgyz epic Manas is considered as a product of artistic creation according to the conditions of sovereignty which requires new comprehensive study in modernity. Activities related to the publications, researches, systematization, cataloging and translation of different versions of this epic into other languages are the important issues of the modern time. This article was prepared as a part of the project “Plot and thematic index of the epic Manas – I”, conducted at Kyrgyz-Turkish University Manas and National Academy of Sciences of the Kyrgyz Republic. The article provides general information about the meaning of the index being created, the methodology for performing the work, the principles of choosing a topic and the features of creating the index. In the article detailed information about the purpose and the structure of data processing on the epic Manas has been given for the first time in Kyrgyzstan and its difference from other data has been identified. In the first stage of data processing of the epic Manas versions by Sagymbai Orozbakov, Moldobasan Musulmankulov, Bagysh Sazanov and Shapak Rysmendeev who came from Naryn oblast have been analyzed, topics to be included in the data have been chosen by comparing different texts of the epic and published in this article. The aim of the article is to present the data being processed to wide sections of the population and inform them that they could facilitate their investigations on the epic conducted in various trends of science by using these data. To make people more aware of the effectiveness of the data, especially those who study versions by manaschys (improvisers) comparing. To highlight the role of the data in presenting the key idea and theme of the epic, and to emphasize the essence and necessity of such data for the scientific community in boosting and facilitating versatile study of voluminous series of the different versions of the epic. During the research scientific works exploring theoretical and practical aspects of data processing have been analyzed, peculiarities of the data have been introduced. Four versions of the epic Manas recited by manaschys (improvisers) coming from Naryn oblast have been analyzed and key topics to be included in the ideological thematic data have been identified.

In the study of folklore of great interest is folk heroic epic, as the bearer of traditional culture and national ideology.

In this case the object of research are the religious and mythological motifs of the Kyrgyz heroic epic Manas. In particular, the author focuses on the concept of kaiyp. The main purpose of this study is to determine the meaning of kaiyp materials versions S. Orozbakov, S. Karalaev, M. Chokmorov and S. Azizov. The scientific novelty of this article lies in the fact that it is one of the first works exploring the concept of kaiyp as religious and mythological motif of the epic Manas.

The author tries to reveal all the meanings of the concept of kaiyp in the epic Manas, and to determine their role in the epic tradition. Thus, he finds several meanings of the concept. In the first case, it is the world of the fairies, Cyclops, protective spirits, giants, is a special world “the world Kaiyps”, they can enter the world of the living and otherwise Express themselves. In the second case, is the name of the inhabitants of this world. In the third case, a cave which is the resting place between the living world and the world kajyps, in the epic it is called “black cave Kaiyps”. In addition, in the third part of the epic – Seitek, tells the story of how five people closest to Manas: the adviser and a cousin of Manas, Bakai, the wife of Manas – Kanikey, the son of Manas Semetey, wife of semetei of Aichurek, the son of a close associate of Manas – Gulchoro voluntarily leave the human world and go into the world Kaiyps. The author also examines the relation between the Kyrgyz epic performance of kaiyp with the Islamic religious view of a “latent condition”.

This material is just the beginning of a new research in the study of religious and mythological ideas about kaiyp. Hoping for further investigation of this matter, it intends to turn its attention to other Kyrgyz epics and folk genres, which will be able to expand the understanding of the concept of kaiyp.

The problem of compiling pointers to the genres of folklore is relevant, and therefore we set out to test our plot-thematic index of non-fairytale prose about the sacred sphere of the traditional beliefs of the Ossetian people on the Narts Ossetian epic. The index of non-fairytale prose means the sacred characters of the first type and is based on the classification, which is two blocks that were first proposed by us on the basis of the separation “sacred – not sacred” for Ossetian folklore; it contains 15 topics related to various aspects of the sacred space of Ossetians and allows you to study the features of the reflection of this sphere of worldview in the indicated genre. In turn, in the Narts Ossetian epic, we distinguished three types of sacred characters: these are sacred characters that are relevant at the moment; sacred characters of the Scythian, Sarmatian and Alanian times, turned into heroes; images of mythological creatures, which in the past were also sacred characters, but at the moment are preserved as their echoes. Using the method of comparison, we found out what topics indicated in the existing index appear in the Narts epic of Ossetians, led us to the conclusion that we can use the pointer only in relation to sacred images of the first type. The applied perspective of the study revealed a different angle of reflection of the sacred sphere in the genres of Ossetian folklore – non-fairytale prose and Narts legends of Ossetians – also in relation to reality. The index of non-fairytale prose also includes oral stories, in this regard, the gap between the vision of the past by the narrator of the Narts legend and the narrator of the work of non-fairytale prose is great. The study showed that the individual component of a non-fairytale narrative, as a rule, does not contribute to generalization, and the epic generalization in legends is the result of the existence of an image or plot in time. A prospective study is the inclusion of a sacred element in the text of any genre of Ossetian folklore. Indeed, despite the fact that the plots of the Narts epic of the Ossetians are archaic, the storyteller, fulfilling the legend here and now, undoubtedly brings his attitude to the sacred element of modern mythological, religious and ritual reality into his artistic structure. In comparing two genres of Ossetian folklore – fairy-tale prose and Narts epic – at the angle of reflection of the sacred sphere in them, the element “sacred sphere of the first type” appears as a constant.

The study examines chapshch – the Circassian (Adyghe) healing game, the archaic rite entertaining night gatherings arranged at the bedside of a sick or wounded person, including timed games, songs, dances, and poetic lists.

The purpose of the article is to identify the local terminological versions of the chapsh mythological ritual complex, its connection with the mytho-epic tradition, the pragmatic and semiotic features of the rite, to draw attention to the existence of the narrative reflective judgments regarding the text (the verbal or action one) of the now-defunct rite.

The relevance of the study is due to the demand for the new developments in the field of localistics and regional studies. The article contains the field materials of the author including the ones on the folk terminological lexicon, first introduced into the scientific circulation. This determines the relevance of the study.

The author considers a number of symbolic elements of the chapsh including subject symbols (a rod in the hands of the ritual master, skins of the sacrificial animals, the ritual food). It is noted that verbal-action texts (the spell – “blowing and whispering”, the apotropic actions, the chapsh games, etc.) must be considered in connection with the communicative context. The terminological variants of the chapsh rite vocabulary fixed in the different local traditions of the Circassians are compared.

The research methods: comparative, pragmatic, semiotic, functional approach. The stated observations are based on the author’s field materials collected both in the historical homeland of the Circassians (the republics of the North Caucasus) and in the diaspora (Turkey).

It is concluded that the destruction of the communicative context of the rite entails a certain “misunderstanding”, a denial associated with the transformation of the ethical ideas, in some cases – silence, and sometimes the refusal of informants to spread on the theme of the chapsh plays. In comparison, for example, with epic texts that informants refer to prestigious genres, chapsh folklore is pushed to the periphery of the collective memory.

A return to the study of the rite with the use of the new field and research methods is a promising task for studying the semiotics of folklore culture, the history of the poetic language of the verbal genres, and the identification of the local versions of ritual and the mythical epic texts.

The relevance of the study of the problem is due to a comprehensive study of the version of the living (authentic) performance of the epic Ural-Batyr preserved in the memory of the people. Until recently, it was believed that the oral performance, as well as the actual tunes of the great epic of the Bashkirs, were irretrievably lost. However, in 2011, the author was able to record an epic from A. M. Usmanova (1930-2015) in his song-recitative, alternating with prosaic texts. Records were made repeatedly with breaks of 8 and 5 months, which allowed the most objective reproduction of a cultural phenomenon of historical significance. The purpose of the article is to make a comparative analysis of the text we recorded with the main one published in 1968, 1972 and on the basis of the found poetic parts to reveal mythosemantics, semiotics of art, archetypal codes, to establish the differences and the first thoughts of the episodes.

The leading approach is the mythosemantic retrospection, which allows revealing artifacts and mental artifacts, archetypes of images and peculiarities of mythopoetic traditions that have not been recorded in studies before in the plot of a new text. The chosen approach allows us to make comparative-typological, component analyzes on the reconstruction of epic strata, the beginning of which, as you know, dates back to the Upper Paleolithic (III-II millennium BC).

The main results were the discovery of the absence of poetic lines in the published text that were especially informative in terms of deeply archaic projections of plot motifs and mythological codes. Records of the most complete artistic characteristics and descriptions of the horse of Akbuzat were made. Unlike the well-known published epic, the praise of the winged horse in the discovered text is 45 poetic lines; take place details of motives forbidden blood, of conduct Humai, Ural-Batyr, and others... Five proper epic melodies have been recorded, which have traditionally been common in the practice of performing the Ural-Batyr epic: these are praises of Akbuzat, praises of sword, the dialogue of Akbuzat and Khumai, the conversation between Khumai and the Ural-Batyr, and the final singing cuboire. Based on the reconstruction of the text and a new reading, new evidence was revealed on human anthropogenesis, motives about the strata of confrontation between Horse and Man, especially mythological images and musical traditions, which allow emphasizing the important place and status of the pra-epic (pratext) Ural-Batyr in the world epic.

The work is of interest to ethnographers, folklorists, humanities specialists, both for studying archaic strata of the epic, as well as processes of transformation, the revival of epic traditions in modern times. The live, chanting performance of the Bashkir cubair Ural-Batyr, representing the oldest among the Indo-European, Vedic and Turkic-Mongolian plots, is regarded as a phenomenal phenomenon.

The paper explores the presentation of realia in the translation of the heroic epics of the peoples of Siberia into Russian. Using the comparative and classification-typological methods, thematic groups of realities found in the heroic epic were identified, the types of comments to realia were described, the types of errors and inaccuracies in identifying and commenting realia were studied. The study is based on the texts of heroic epics published in the bilingual academic series “Monuments of Folklore of the Peoples of Siberia and the Far East” and the scholarly apparatus of these volumes.

The folklore text is always saturated with realia, in the heroic epics they carry a great meaning, defining the historical, ethnographic and cultural background on which the plot develops. Most of the realia that can be found in the heroic epic belong to three thematic groups: geographical (names of natural objects and various types of human settlements), ethnographic (household, economic, folk art, beliefs and cults) and socio-political (names of chiefs of tribal alliances, titles and ranks).

Often, due to insufficient acquaintance with the theory of translation, errors occur in the distinguishing of realia. Realia are not all words of void vocabulary: interjections, onomatopeia, although they have no translation, are not realia. Sometimes the obsolete words of the source language (archaisms) are mistakenly considered as realia, although they have a vocabulary translation into other languages. Finally, adjectives and verbs formed from the words of the source language according to word-formation models of the receiving language are not realia.

The types of commentary on realia are based on the same principles as the types of commentary on the translation of a folklore text in general. Comments are divided by function into historical-ethnographic, philological, folkloristic and textual. Often a full-fledged commentary on the realia is a combination of these types.

The disadvantages of the comments on the realia are the incompleteness, fragmentary character of the reported information and commenting on unimportant aspects of the meaning of realia to the detriment of more important ones.

In recent decades, folklore studies are particularly relevant research related to the problem of semiotic mechanisms of oral collective memory, and this topic is closely intertwined with the issue of understanding and interpretation of the meaning of the cultural text. The purpose of this article is to identify the deep semantic level of the folklore text based on the semiotic language of the ethnocultural tradition of the Yakuts and other Turkic peoples of Siberia. Her author uses a comprehensive technique, combining a linguistic analysis of the semantics of words with the structural-semiotic method of studying folklore and a hermeneutic approach to the text.

The author concludes that the traditional description of the nature of an epic country at a deep semantic level of the text carries a completely different kind of information: plant symbols inscribed in a four-membered horizontal scheme encode social structures. The fact that the folklore text contains an implicit meaning at a deep level is due, according to the author, to the peculiarities of storing and relaying culturally significant information in a non-written society. The reconstruction of the implicit meaning of the text takes place on the basis of the entire cultural presupposition of native speakers of language and folklore; linguistic metaphor, mythopoetic pathway, proper name, etymological meaning of a word, compositional structure of description – everything is used by oral memory to preserve and transmit cultural information. A special role in the transmission of folklore text from generation to generation belongs to the symbol, which has a high informative richness; it can be considered as a special tool in the language of culture, which expresses thoughts about the world and human being in it. Compression of meaning can be achieved by using ready-made, well-known schemes (matrices, stencils) that enclose the whole world as a “framework”. The function of such a “convenient scheme” is performed by the “four cardinal directions” structure, which is of a universal classification character. The article also defines the semantics of plant symbols, spatial directions, landscape terms, reveals relics of the female cult in the traditional culture of Turkic peoples.

The orally existing Yakut heroic epic has long preserved and transmitted established themes, the traditional composition of heroes, plot canons, compositions in content, and constant stylistic formulas in the language. However, how many olonkhos were, they were so different, and so they attracted listeners, experts in oral folk art, and researchers. Each olonkhosut could enrich the established olonkho content with various adventures of the warriors, the main traditional figurative composition with heroes with new names, decorate permanent language formulas with new artistic expressive means, or they could miss or simplify something. Studying the differences between the texts of the Yakut olonkho belonging to different regions, researchers of the Yakut folklore argue that olonkho, depending on the territory of existence, has regional features. So folklore recognized the existence of three territorial traditions: central, Vilyui and northern. The phenomenon of stability of regional features of the Yakut olonkho in science still remains relevant. The article provides a comparative analysis of the olonkho of the three regions using the example of the olonkho of the central region Elbet Bergen, the olonkho of the Vilyuy region Ker Buuray, the olonkho of the northern region Kyotor Mulgun with the aim of identifying their differences, features, and introducing additional assumptions to confirm the allegations previously identified by the researchers. The results of the analysis by comparison led to the conclusion that the olonkhosuts of all three regions follow the pattern of the plot and compositional structure of the Yakut epic olonkho, since their olonkho contain motives of the ancient olonkho, as descriptions of the heroic campaigns of the aiyy heroes in order to save the aiyy girls, their battles with the abaasy heroes, victory, matchmaking to a rescued woman, returning home with the glory of a winner, arranging a Uruu wedding in honor of the winners, etc. The lack of motives for the formation of three worlds, the establishment of the Middle World for tribal life Uraanghay Sakha purpose athlete aiyy protector deities aiyy aimaga makes it possible to assume that in all regions of existence olonkho is gradually simplifying some ancient olonkhosut motives of a later period.

Acknowledgments: The study was carried out with the financial support of the Russian Foundation of Basic Research in the framework of scientific project No. 16-06-00505 (a).

The article is devoted to the problem of genre nomination of the Yakut heroic epic and author's olonkho. It seems relevant to study the nomination of the olonkho genre in the diachronic aspect. The purpose of the study is to identify issues that arise during the genre nomination of the Yakut heroic epic. To achieve this goal, the author considers the names of the olonkho genre in pre-revolutionary times from the middle of the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century, when researchers, collectors used the terms “Yakut fairy tale”, “Yakut bylina” under the influence of Russian folklore and due to the lack of development of genres folklore in general. It is established that in the first half of the 20th century, during the formation of Yakut folklore, scientists begin to understand the genre and uniqueness of olonkho, characterize it as a heroic epic and use the word “olonkho” as a term, genre nomination. The article also considers the issue of literary olonkho written by Yakut authors P. A. Oyunsky, S. S. Yakovlev – Erilik Eristiin, V. M. Novikov – Kyunnyuk Uurastyyrap, S. S. Vasiliev – Borogonsky. The author of the article proposes to distinguish between the concepts “self-recording of olonkho” and “author's olonkho”, since the first means recording the original folklore olonkho by the olonkhosut who owns the letter, and the second refers to the author’s works (mainly in written form) composed by people who are not real olonkhosuts. In the book editions of such works in the headline complex the words “olonkho”, “for school-age children”, and “olonkho based on a fairy tale” are often used. It is determined that such author’s works based on or in the olonkho style should not be called as “olonkho”, since this creates a confusion of genres, resulting in falsifications, pseudo-folklore, etc. The author reveals that in addition to all this, there is a local peculiarity of the northern olonkho, which were strongly influenced by the fairy tale genre, and some folklore carriers define them as “olonho-ostuoruya” (olonkho-fairy tale), “olonkho-kepseen” (olonkho-story).

The article is devoted to the largest monument of ancient Japanese literature, one of the first written monuments of Japan to the epic Kojiki, structural and semantic characteristics of Japanese female names in the epic Kojiki. The Japanese epic and it’s rich onomastic material are the most important source of study, both the culture of the people and their language, history and worldview. In addition, there is a need for a comprehensive description of the semantic and structural features of female names in the Japanese epic due to their lack of research due to the relative novelty of the science of proper names, onomastics. In the framework of the scientific article, the authors set a goal to identify the structural and semantic features of Japanese female names on the material of the Japanese epic Kojiki. In the work the methods of continuous sampling, statistical, descriptive, contextual were used. The methodological basis of research served as the works of A. V. Superansky, V. D. Bondaletov, E. L. Frolova, N. I. Filippova. In the theoretical part of the study, the authors study the problem of onomastics in General linguistics and describe the peculiarities of the Japanese onomastics, isolated the specificity of naming in Japan. In the practical part, the authors propose a classification of Japanese women's epic names by structure and meaning on the material of the Japanese epic Kojiki. Thus, 50 Japanese women's names were selected and divided into semantic thematic groups and structural indicators. Researchers reasonably come to the conclusion that the Japanese female names in the epic consist of a name and an indicator. In addition, the women's epic name is a required presence in the name of increased social and tribal status, which indicates that Japan of that time was a society with pronounced social hierarchy. As for semantics, it is a large group of women's names formed from the names of natural phenomena, flora and fauna, indicating the proximity of the Japanese to nature and the gods of it.

The article presents the results of a comparative analysis of comparisons of two different Turkic epics. The purpose of this work is to establish commonality and differences in the use of comparison as an artistic-visual means on the material of the texts of the Yakut olonkho Mighty Er Sogotokh and the Altai epic Maaday-Kara. The relevance of the study is determined by the increasing interest in the comparative study of the language and poetics of the epics. Researchers of different years have always noted the considerable importance of studying national figurativeness, figurative means in comparative study: firstly, in establishing their similarities and differences, interconnections, interactions; secondly, in the study of the aesthetic views of peoples, their psychology, nature of thinking, worldview. The novelty of the research lies in the fact that the peculiarities of the use of comparison, objects and images of comparison in the Yakut olonkho were not studied in comparison with the Altai epic.

In the course of the work, a sample of comparative constructions, the derivation of statistical data on the frequency of use and repetition of comparisons in epic texts, the classification of comparisons by object and image, and a comparative analysis of the components of comparisons were carried out. As a result of the research, it was established that the comparison is widely used in the texts of both epic, and the frequency of comparison use in the Altai epic is higher than in the Yakut one. It is noted that 65-76% of the comparisons of the two epics are part of the parallelisms, and also confirmed the popularity of the design of two-term parallelism in the Turkic epics (90-92%). The “basic stable comparisons” of the epics that give a heroic tone in the style of epic works are defined. These comparisons reflect the main epic concepts of “hero”, “horse”, “people” and “cattle”, which turned out to be common to the Altai and Yakut epics. A comparative analysis of the composition of the components (objects and images) of the comparisons of the two epics revealed a commonality in the thematic content, the difference is observed in their percentage ratio. Comparisons of the Altai epic Maaday-Kara are characterized by archaism, stability and simplicity in design, and comparisons of the Yakut epic Mighty Er Sogotokh – improvisation, expansion, implicitness, complex structure.

Acknowledgements: This research has been conducted as part of the scientific-research project NEFU “Heroic Epics of the Turkic-Mongolian peoples of Eurasia: Problems and Perspectives of Comparative Study”.