For the Russian bomber "Ilya Muromets", see Ilya Muromets.
Ilya Muromets (Ilya of Murom) is a Russianmythical hero. He is celebrated in numerous byliny (folk epic poems). Along with Dobrynya Nikitich and Alyosha Popovich he is regarded as the greatest of all the legendary bogatyrs (i.e., medieval Russian knights-errant).
According to legend, Ilya, the son of a Cossack farmer, was born in the village of Karacharovo, near Murom. He suffered serious illness in his youth and was unable to walk until the age of 33, when he was healed by a travelling minstrel. He was then given super-human strength by a dying knight, Svyatogor, and set out for the city of Kiev to serve Prince Vladimir the Beautiful Sun (Vladimir Krasnoye Solnyshko). Along the way he single-handedly defended the city of Chernigov from invasion by the Tatars and was offered knighthood by the local ruler, but Ilya declined to stay. He then killed the forest-dwelling monster Solovey-Razboynik, (literally Nightingale the Robber), who could murder travellers with his powerful whistle.
In Kiev, Ilya was made chief bogatyr by Prince Vladimir and he defended Russia from numerous attacks by the Tatars. Generous and simple-minded but also temperamental, Ilya once went on a rampage and destroyed all the church steeples in Kiev after Prince Vladimir had failed to invite him to a celebration. He was soon appeased when Vladimir sent for him.
Illya Muromets was officially canonized in 1643, one of 69 saints in the Kyivan Cave Monastery.
The otaman of the outpost was Illya Muromets...” These lines from the ancient Rus’ epic convey through the darkness of ages the contours of impregnable oak palisades and high fortified earthen walls, manned by knights, the bohatyrs, keenly gazing into the boundless steppe expanses.
During its long existence the image of Illya Muromets in the bylyna epos was expanded at the expense of other epic heroes, displacing them from other plots, and undoubtedly attracted a considerable number of migrating stories.
Feeds |
Contact