Thursday, July 26, 2018

Colorful postcard of Bogatyrs


I received this Postcrossing postcard this week from Russia. The sender, who says she's a fan of anthropomorphic animals and The Walking Dead, wrote:
"Greetings from Russia! My name is Natasha. I live in big city Novosibirsk. Postcard shows three of the most famous heroes (Bogatyrs): Ilya Muromets, Dobrynya Nikitich and Alyosha Popovich. +89° F"
Regarding Bogatyrs, Wikipedia has this to say: "A Bogatyr is a stock character in medieval East Slavic legends, akin to a Western European knight-errant. Bogatyrs are mainly found in Rus' epic poems called Bylinas and came into existence during Vladimir the Great's reign as part of his elite warriors, akin to Knights of the Round Table except, King Arthur accompanied his men on most of their adventures unlike Prince Vladimir. Bogatyrs are described as warriors of immense strength, courage and bravery, rarely using magic while fighting enemies in order to maintain the 'loosely based on historical fact' aspect of Bylinas."

Ilya Muromets, son of a farmer, was given super-human strength by a dying knight and battled Nightingale the Robber, who was also a monster.

Dobrynya Nikitich disobeyed his mother and spent his life battling dragons.

Alyosha Popovich was a bit of a rogue and joker who appears to have gotten into a lot of knife fights.

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