Honoring the departed: the reverence for exceptional deceased among the Yakuts (insights from the 18th-century burial site of Buut Aiyyta)

Abstract

The article delves into an above-ground burial discovered in the Nyurba district of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), wherein the remains of an elderly woman were interred. Based on the complexity of the construction and the prestigious grave goods, it is assumed that the buried woman belonged to the Vilyui Yakut clan nobility. According to oral tradition, the monument is associated with the female shaman Buut Aiyyta, who lived during the 17th-18th centuries.

A considerable number of modern artifacts found in the burial area, which are offerings to the spirit of the deceased, indicate that the burial serves as an object of worship for the local population. The cult linked to Buut Aiyyta is believed to be a vestige of a broader tradition that involved the deification of extraordinary deceased, including shamans and people who died prematurely. This deification was expressed through ritual actions that begged for their patronage, veneration of their burial places and remains. Today, the objects of worship are burial sites that stand out for their representativeness and originality of the grave structure or are located in prominent places. In other words, these are tombs where individuals who were considered “not ordinary”, such as shamans or members of the nobility, were buried.