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Frazer, James George, Sir, 1854-1941

"The Golden Bough"


In a Tartar poem two heroes named Ak Molot and Bulat engage in
mortal combat. Ak Molot pierces his foe through and through with an
arrow, grapples with him, and dashes him to the ground, but all in
vain, Bulat could not die. At last when the combat has lasted three
years, a friend of Ak Molot sees a golden casket hanging by a white
thread from the sky, and bethinks him that perhaps this casket
contains Bulat's soul. So he shot through the white thread with an
arrow, and down fell the casket. He opened it, and in the casket sat
ten white birds, and one of the birds was Bulat's soul. Bulat wept
when he saw that his soul was found in the casket. But one after the
other the birds were killed, and then Ak Molot easily slew his foe.
In another Tartar poem, two brothers going to fight two other
brothers take out their souls and hide them in the form of a white
herb with six stalks in a deep pit. But one of their foes sees them
doing so and digs up their souls, which he puts into a golden ram's
horn, and then sticks the ram's horn in his quiver.


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