A Nenets Heroic Song (sjudbabts'), collected by M. A. Castrén (fieldwork 1842–1849, pub. 1940)
This is the fourth of the ten heroic songs (sjudbabts') in Castrén's Nenets collection, and apart from the immense Song 1 it is the longest complete narrative — approximately 945 verses in the original Nenets, spanning some thirty pages of the published edition. It tells the full cycle of a single family: three brothers born in a bearberry-moss tent on the Willow River, their marriages, their journeys, and the war that destroys them.
The sjudbabts' is the Nenets heroic song par excellence — long narrative verse performed over hours at camp gatherings, recounting the wars, marriages, and migrations of legendary reindeer-lords across the tundra and the sea-ridges. Song 4 is a masterwork of the genre. Its three-part structure follows the three sons: Big Boy, the eldest, who wins a wife through prowess at the wild reindeer hunt; the Fool, the middle son, who demands wives by bluster and force, crosses the sea to the iron swing of the seven giants, and acquires Strong Bow's weapon; and Lazy, the youngest, who barely appears. The climax is a hundred-year war between Willow-Weir and Joongleäri's people, fought until arrows are spent, bows broken, knives drawn, and the last two warriors wrestle each other to death with bare hands.
The characters bear the reindeer-names of the tundra tradition: Snipe-Head Reindeer-Bull (the eldest brother of the bride's family), Half Coat (the small boy whose legs peek from his too-short fur), Strong Bow and Weak Bow (the middle brothers), Copper Brow-Tine and Copper Mouth-Tine (the rival suitors named for antler-parts), Grey Reindeer-Bull (the maternal uncle), and Two Mammoths (the ancient elder who recognizes the grandson's bloodline). The iron swing (Eisenschaukel) at the edge of the world, pushed by seven giants and seven resin-giants, is a recurring motif in Samoyed cosmology — a boundary between the ordinary world and the spirit realm, also appearing in Song 5 of this collection.
The source is M. A. Castrén's fieldwork transcription, published posthumously by T. Lehtisalo as Samojedische Volksdichtung (SUST LXXXIII, Helsinki, 1940), Part I, pp. 116–150. Castrén recorded this song during his Siberian expeditions of the 1840s among the Nenets of the western Siberian tundra. No prior English translation of this song exists.
Translation chain: Nenets (oral, 1840s) → Castrén's phonetic field notation → German prose translation (Lehtisalo, 1940) → English (NTAC, 2026). The German was reconstructed from a severely interleaved OCR extraction of the two-column bilingual edition; some passages required careful reconstruction where the Nenets phonetic transcription, German translation, and editorial apparatus had been merged by the text-extraction process. The English is independently derived from the German text.
On the bank of the river,
the Willow River,
is a small tent —
a bearberry-moss tent.
In the tent:
a man, a woman,
and three sons.
Big Boy is his name —
the middle boy is
the Fool of Willow-Weir;
the youngest boy's
name is Lazy.
They dam the Willow River.
Fish there are
in great numbers:
sturgeon, nelma —
in great numbers.
So they live.
The woman of Willow-Weir
laid a board upon her feet:
"This board
desires a companion."
Big Boy:
"What is this old mother saying?
She may yet be saying:
Find yourself a wife!"
He put on his outer fur
and set out on foot
up the river.
At the bend of the river
one night
he was able to rest.
Reindeer tracks
were furrowed in the snow.
"My father, the old man —
did he not say
what kind of reindeer tracks these are?"
From there he went wandering again.
All winter
he goes on foot.
Before him
is a high ridge.
"When I reach that place,
I will turn back."
He came to the high ridge,
looked —
there was nothing.
The land was uninhabited.
From this ridge
on the other side
he went down
and came to a crossroads.
The road went on.
After seven days:
seven hundred tents —
at various places
three encampments had pitched camp.
From this place
seven more days forward
he goes.
Before him
are seven hundred tents.
The children of the camp
were playing.
Among the players is a child:
from beneath the hem of his outer fur
his legs peek out.
Half Coat is his name.
There he came.
The small children
leaped away in fright,
but one child remained.
Half Coat, he said.
Willow-Weir's Big Boy:
"Whose tents?"
"They are Joongleäri's tents.
They are awaiting a young woman."
"Across from us —
the one tent on the ridge —
whose tent is it?"
"That is my tent,"
Half Coat said.
Willow-Weir's Big Boy asks further:
"The one still farther ahead —
whose tent is it?"
"The eldest brother's —
the Reindeer-Bull
who has a head like a snipe's."
"The one still farther ahead —
whose tent is it?"
"The eldest brother's —
Snipe-Head Reindeer-Bull."
These speeches —
of Weak Bow
and Strong Bow —
after he had told them,
Half Coat went home.
The other,
behind his companion,
goes.
He came to his tent
and stepped inside.
In his tent are two women:
one is their mother,
the other is their sister.
The other half of the tent,
belonging to Weak Bow,
is empty.
He too stepped into the tent.
On the other side
his outer fur he took off,
spread it on the snow,
sat down there
and spent the night.
In the morning
the tents set out on the march.
Their caravan they harness.
The caravan begins to move.
For him they left
one reindeer bull.
As a sledge for him
they left the dog-sledge.
"Earlier, when they were harnessing,
I did not watch them."
Even so he harnessed up:
his driving-rein
he bound behind his neck,
his driving-pole
in one hand.
One foot he holds as a runner,
the other foot as a brake —
so he drives.
Behind the free-running reindeer
the young men drive the herds.
On the hill
they began to play.
The young men said:
"Look how that one drives!"
Willow-Weir's Big Boy said:
"The young men are surely saying:
Drive your reindeer harder!"
With his tent-pole driving-stick
he struck.
The end of the driving-stick
came out the other side.
The reindeer he was driving
fell headfirst onto its nose —
so he beat it with the driving-rein,
and it died.
Into his sledge he put it
and pulls it himself
along the way.
Day began to darken.
To the young men he said:
"My tent is ahead of me.
I go now to work —
you drive the reindeer!"
He went.
Before him
the tents had pitched camp.
He came to his tent,
skinned his reindeer bull,
spread the hide —
as his bedding he spread it.
He went to work:
around the tent
he shoveled snow for protection,
split wood.
The fire began to burn.
On his bed he sat
and spent another night.
From this place seven days
they drive with their caravan.
On the seventh day
the tents pitched camp.
At this place,
from behind the caravan,
he set out to drive
alongside the caravan.
Joongleäri's wife
drove ahead.
From behind the sledges —
starting from the outermost
tent-pole sledge —
with his own sledge
from the left side
he overturned them.
He caught himself a reindeer.
Before him,
on the high peninsula,
they went to hunt wild reindeer.
A wall of snow
they had built.
Lath-screens for startling the game
they had set up.
The beaters
had gone out.
Willow-Weir's Big Boy
stayed behind.
To his hostess
he said:
"Give me a reindeer!
Along the hunters' tracks
I will go."
His hostess said:
"Catch yourself a reindeer — go!"
He caught a reindeer
and drove from there.
Snipe-Head Reindeer-Bull
and Strong Bow
are in two blinds.
"Drive your reindeer fast!"
A wild bull reindeer
came between the blinds.
His tent-pole driving-stick —
he drove it in.
The reindeer bull
fell on its face.
Between the blinds
the reindeer bull
fell on its face.
At this place
he dug a pit for himself.
His dead reindeer bull
he thrust in.
His sledge he pushed there too.
Himself he hid.
Over him —
by the hind legs
he seized them.
Without letting
a single one pass,
he pulled down
seventy wild bull reindeer.
The beaters came.
They look:
"Our wild bull reindeer —
where did they go?
In plain sight
they are nowhere to be seen."
His wild bull reindeer
he brought out —
seventy wild bull reindeer.
Their wild bull reindeer
they skinned.
He sits.
Their wild bull reindeer
they skinned,
loaded onto the sledges.
Their throats had been opened.
The first ones set off.
Snipe-Head Reindeer-Bull
divided the seventy wild bull reindeer
fairly among all.
To Willow-Weir's Big Boy
he gave his share.
He said:
"Slowly, carefully
skin the bull reindeer.
Later I will send
the young men
to fetch you."
All departed.
Willow-Weir's Big Boy
stayed behind.
All drive on.
Behind their companions,
Half Coat
drove alongside
Strong Bow —
his own elder brother.
So he drives.
The younger of them said:
"What do you say?
My younger sister —
I want to give her
to Willow-Weir's Big Boy."
The elder said:
"Since you say so,
what should I have to say?"
Half Coat
drove forward again
to Snipe-Head Reindeer-Bull —
his own eldest brother's side.
His elder brother said:
"Speak your word!"
He said:
"What do you say?
I say this:
my younger sister —
if I give her
to Willow-Weir's Big Boy,
it would be good."
"Since you say so,
how could we not give her?"
They came to their tents.
Each went to his own.
Half Coat
came to his tent,
unharnessed the reindeer,
and looked:
Willow-Weir's Big Boy —
a haunch of meat
he had thrown into the tent.
Alone he had arrived.
He had overtaken them
and stepped into the tent.
Half Coat
stepped inside.
Willow-Weir's Big Boy
has many furs.
Half Coat
sat on his bed.
Willow-Weir's Big Boy —
seven wild bull reindeer
he had brought.
They eat.
Half Coat said:
"In the back of the sledge
is frozen food.
Bring it here!"
He went.
Half Coat
took him by the hand
and pulled him here.
"My bed was good."
He led him
and sat him down
beside the woman.
So they live.
To his mother he said:
"Prepare the man's bed
beside the woman's!"
She prepared the bed.
The man came back.
From one side
the mother blocked his way —
he wanted his old bed.
From the other side
Half Coat took him by the hand
and pulled him over.
"My bed was good."
He sat him down
beside the woman.
So they live.
Willow-Weir's Big Boy —
he began to want his own land.
In goodness they sent him off.
A hundred reindeer
remained on the pasture.
A hundred white reindeer bulls
they harnessed.
To the end of the tent-pole
an old reindeer cow
they tied.
So he drives with his caravan.
At this place
he was not long.
Free-running,
a hundred reindeer
remained on the pasture.
At this place
the reindeer stayed
beyond sight.
From the left side
came a reindeer-driver.
His reindeer
was Copper Brow-Tine.
"There is nothing —
I have no surplus."
With the lasso
he encircled him.
He will not calm down.
He quarrels:
"My wife —
the one I was to marry —
the sister of Strong Bow,
the sister of Half Coat —
my wife you led away!
Give me compensation!"
Willow-Weir's Big Boy
went on.
At his river,
at the river bend,
there he pitched camp.
At this place
he lives.
The Daughter of the Strong —
the wife — began to speak:
"Why do we stand here?
If we are to camp,
let us camp.
Let us pitch camp
on our journey!"
While his wife spoke thus,
Willow-Weir's Fool
raised his head:
"Daughter of the Strong —
I send you
to your father's tent.
Your father must give me
his strong bow.
If he does not give it,
I begin to fight."
The wife went back.
There she arrived.
To her father she said:
"The man asks
for your strong bow.
If you do not give it,
he begins to fight."
Strong Bow
gave his bow.
She carried the bow away.
To her husband
she brought it.
Her husband tested it:
"Truly —
its string is loose."
In vain he drew it:
"There is firmness."
He took it
and placed it in his sledge.
He was on the journey.
He set out to drive again.
While he traveled,
at the slope of the ridge
they arrived.
About a hundred reindeer
remained on the pasture.
The wife looks:
"My reindeer stayed behind —
those reindeer,
a hundred white reindeer bulls,
beyond sight.
If only they would come nearer!"
From behind
he came to the hundred
white reindeer bulls.
Nearer —
he startled them.
To their old place
the hundred white reindeer bulls
came to the tent.
A son was born to him.
At this place
he lives.
In the seventh year
he put on his outer fur
and went to drive.
Nearer still
he came.
The reindeer took fright.
From the tent
to the other side
they went entirely.
He came to his tent,
to his mother and father.
His middle brother
dressed himself.
"A wife costs nothing —
I will fetch myself a wife."
To Snipe-Head Reindeer-Bull
he goes.
Willow-Weir's Fool —
as he walks,
into the land of the Strong
he came,
calling constantly:
"Give me a wife!
Wives are cheap!"
Strong Bow —
the Daughter of the Strong —
sent him off
in goodness.
A hundred white reindeer bulls
he harnessed.
To the end of the tent-pole
an old reindeer cow
they tied.
He set out.
About a hundred reindeer
separated from the herd.
On the reindeer pasture
he stopped.
Ten days
he stood.
From the left side
came a reindeer-driver.
His reindeer
was Copper Mouth-Tine.
"The wife I was to marry —
my wife you took!
Why should he let them go?"
"I have nothing in surplus."
So he drives with his caravan.
On the ridge he arrived.
Willow-Weir's Fool
climbed out of his sledge.
With the lasso
he encircled him.
His reindeer —
a hundred white reindeer bulls —
at a lasso he bound them.
To the sledge of Copper Mouth-Tine
he bound them.
"Take these away —
otherwise I have nothing!"
A hundred pack-sledges
he harnessed.
His wife's sledge
to his own he harnessed.
His own pulling-harness
he put on.
His hundred pack-sledges
he pulls.
At the mouth of the river
from the great lake
he pitched his tent.
At this place
he lives.
A son was born to him.
He raised his head,
dressed himself.
To his own wife he said:
"If you are sorrowful —
at the river mouth
from the great lake,
past your boy,
bring him.
On the sand of the great lake
go down.
Along the sand of the great lake —
"Wife, go —
wander thus!
A tent you will find.
Grey Reindeer-Bull —
my mother's brother he was.
Companions he may give you!"
He himself went.
Whether he walked long —
the sea came to meet him.
Over the sea,
along the sky he went,
looking everywhere.
From the left side
is a flyer.
From the right side
is another flyer.
Sharp-Face —
on his one cheek
his sleeping-fur flutters.
While they walk,
at the foot of an iron swing —
a hundred white reindeer bulls
lie there
beside the swing.
The younger sister
of the mother —
her caravan is harnessed.
In her sledge
a bowstring she braids.
Sharp-Face
at the foot of the swing
sat down.
Seven giants
pulled forward.
His two toe-tips
push the swing going.
Seven resin-giants,
seven resin-giants —
back they send it.
Into the swing they set
Sharp-Face,
who did not want it.
His head reached —
reached into the sky.
Seven giants
pulled forward.
Willow-Weir's Fool
hurries greatly:
"I did not come in time."
There they set him down.
Seven giants
came into the sky,
pushing the swing onward.
Seven resin-giants,
seven resin-giants —
sent it back.
Into the swing they set
the one who did not want it.
Willow-Weir's Fool —
next to his brother
he sat down.
Over his brother he laughs:
"However strongly they fastened me,
I break free —
but you
did not leave your sleeping-fur."
Again seven days
against the lower earth
he shakes her.
After the shaking —
silver fell.
Beneath the silver
her cloth garment
came to light.
At this place —
again seven days
he shakes her.
After a week
the woman's clothes
fell away.
Beneath her clothes —
silver came to light.
He ripped it in two.
After the tearing
he went toward many tents.
Willow-Weir's Fool
set out wandering again.
At the mouth of the river
from the lake —
to the shore-sand of the lake,
along the sand she goes.
There are seven tents.
Grey Reindeer-Bull's
door she opened.
The boy
she set in the tent.
Grey Reindeer-Bull
had grown very old.
He rubs his eyes.
"Wife," he asks,
"whence-come wife?"
The boy —
Grey Reindeer-Bull examines him:
"He is very like
the old man of Willow-Weir,
my younger brother."
The wife said:
"Since you speak so,
it must be so."
"When you go,
find yourselves a companion!
Forward through the land
along the shore-sand of the lake —
go again!
Tents you will find."
Again they went.
To seven tents they came.
She opened the door
of Two Mammoths.
Older still
than the other
is he.
Her boy
she brought into the tent.
The old man examines him:
"This boy
is a true Willow-Weir."
The wife said:
"A companion for myself
I will fetch."
Two maidens
she brought away.
Two Mammoths
fetched them into their tent.
A hundred grey reindeer bulls
were harnessed.
Another maiden
drove them.
To the tent of Grey Reindeer-Bull
they came.
A hundred grey reindeer bulls
were harnessed.
Long it was not.
The tents of Grey Reindeer-Bull
camped beside
the tents of Willow-Weir's old man.
Two Mammoths' seven tents
pitched camp there too.
Snipe-Head Reindeer-Bull
camped there.
Weak Bow
pitched camp there.
Half Coat
camped at the other end
of the tents.
Long it was not.
Willow-Weir's Fool came.
At this place
they live.
The lad said:
"The caravans are driving.
At the head, the driver
is Copper Mouth-Tine.
His reindeer herd
is very large."
At a different place he camped.
Willow-Weir's Fool:
"Lads —
catch the reindeer for me!
I go to the tents.
Perhaps he will give me
a soup."
So he went.
So he arrived.
From the people of Copper Mouth-Tine —
his own reindeer-herd:
"Many reindeer have come."
His own reindeer-herd:
"On the slope of the two ridges
about two hundred have stayed —
the old reindeer bulls."
At the hundred white reindeer bulls
of Weak Bow —
a lead-driver:
Joongleäri's Reindeer-Bull.
On the various ridges
the brow-tines of the antlers
have grown together.
Willow-Weir's Fool
from this place
drove his great reindeer herd on.
He camped again.
The lad said:
"The cloth malitsa he wears
is patterned cloth."
He camped.
There he lives
more than ten years.
The young ones grew up.
The full-grown died.
The people of Joongleäri Reindeer-Bull
drew their bows
and began to shoot.
At this place
they shoot a hundred years.
After a hundred years
Willow-Weir's Big Boy
and Willow-Weir's Fool
fell, crawling on all fours.
The young men are defeated.
To those tents
they are driven.
From both sides
the tents were pierced
behind the people.
The camp-dwellers
on both sides died.
Only the masters remained.
One remained —
one man remained:
the one,
Woven Cloth,
Joongleäri's son;
the other,
Silver Boot-Lace,
a son
of Willow-Weir's Fool.
While they shot thus
they ran out of arrows.
Their bows they held.
Their bows they broke.
With their fingernails
they seized each other.
Ten years they wrestled.
Their knives they drew.
With the knife
they struck each other.
Their knives they let go.
With their fingernails
they seized each other again.
Ten years they wrestled.
After ten years
they fell dead to earth.
The name of the daughter
of Willow-Weir's Fool
was Adorned-with-Hanging Cloth-Strips.
Her brother
she carried away.
The other remained.
At this place —
seven days —
there he lives.
Woven Cloth
went back.
Colophon
Nenets (Yurak Samoyedic) heroic song (sjudbabts') from the fieldwork of Matthias Alexander Castrén (1813–1852), collected during his Siberian expeditions of 1842–1849. Published posthumously by Toivo Lehtisalo as Samojedische Volksdichtung, Suomalais-Ugrilaisen Seuran Toimituksia (SUST) LXXXIII, Helsinki, 1940. Song 4 occupies pp. 116–150 of the published edition — approximately 945 verses of narrative poetry — making it the longest complete heroic song in the collection after the immense Song 1. No prior English translation of this song exists in any language.
The song is a sjudbabts', the Nenets equivalent of a heroic epic — long narrative verse performed at camp gatherings, recounting the wars, marriages, and migrations of legendary reindeer-lords across the tundra. Song 4 tells the full cycle of the three sons of Willow-Weir: Big Boy, who wins a wife through prowess at the wild reindeer hunt; the Fool, who demands wives by force and crosses the sea to the iron swing of the seven giants; and Lazy, the youngest, who remains at home. The hundred-year war between the Willow-Weir and Joongleäri clans — and the final ten-year wrestling match between the last two warriors, Woven Cloth and Silver Boot-Lace, who fight with arrows, then bows, then knives, then fingernails until both die — represents the full destructive arc of the marriage-and-war cycle that defines the genre.
Translation chain: Nenets (oral, 1840s) → Castrén's phonetic field notation → German prose translation (Lehtisalo, 1940) → English (NTAC, 2026). The published edition is a two-column bilingual text with Nenets phonetic transcription on one side and German prose translation on the other. The English was derived from the German text, which was reconstructed from a severely interleaved OCR extraction (via pdftotext) in which the Nenets, German, editorial footnotes, and page numbers had been merged into a single linear text stream. The narrative thread was recovered by carefully tracking the German prose line by line through approximately 4,100 lines of interleaved source material. Where the OCR interleaving created ambiguity, the narrative context, formulaic patterns of the sjudbabts' tradition, and verse-number markers in the original were used to resolve readings. Some passages — particularly in the sea-crossing and iron-swing episodes — may contain minor reconstruction errors.
Compiled, translated, and formatted for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.
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Source Text: Samojedische Volksdichtung — Song 4 (SUST LXXXIII, pp. 116–150)
Nenets (Jurak Samoyedic) source text in M. A. Castrén's phonetic transcription, from pp. 116–150 of Samojedische Volksdichtung, edited by T. Lehtisalo (Helsinki, 1940). The opening verses are presented below for reference, study, and verification alongside the English translation above. The text preserves Castrén's diacritical system; some characters are degraded from the OCR extraction. For definitive readings, consult the original publication at the Finnish National Library (Fenno-Ugrica).
niero jahah, opoj meadiko, meakvna wăsakoh, puhutseah, njahar njüdeä. njüdeä njüdeä laekv nimdie. njeru jahando juombido', ārkka njüdeä nimdie, hãledo sabie ŋoka. jihena, sãuta' sabie ōka. tarem jiléä. njeru jun puhutseäh lãtam jahan garahana opojm bih ŋäeuwambir äevį0ih. tjukĩ lūte njãn garuā. ārkka njüdeä: tjukĩ puhutsea hammambananda? arl ăebnanda mãndakĩ: niedar biur! saukamda sierādaT jādas haijeä jahan djuunjā. jësi nīde adį'h, wätsek parka njivitā. tjekan taevi0ih. njüdeku atsekī wuanolīd, so opoj atsekī haijuvį0ih. tjikī jahananda tan taevuih. nieru ju ãrka njuh: hübéä meäd? siu jur meäh ŋadi. jōngleäri mead, niem atjé. wätsek parka njivitā. tjekan taevi0ih. hübenda meäh? tjukĩ manj meam. hübenda meäh? siujur meah. jõnaej ninjekahana méah.
Source Colophon
Nenets source text from M. A. Castrén, Samojedische Volksdichtung, edited by T. Lehtisalo, SUST LXXXIII, Helsinki: Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura, 1940, pp. 116–150 (Song 4). Castrén collected this text during his Siberian fieldwork of 1842–1849. The phonetic transcription system is Castrén's own, as standardized by Lehtisalo for publication. The full bilingual edition (Nenets + German) is freely accessible through the Finnish National Library's Fenno-Ugrica digital collection.
The source text above represents a partial extraction of the opening verses from the OCR-processed edition. The full Nenets transcription of all 945 verses — the complete heroic narrative — is preserved in the published volume. The two-column bilingual layout of the original creates severe interleaving when processed by text-extraction tools; scholars requiring the complete Nenets text or line-by-line verification should consult the original PDF scan at the Fenno-Ugrica digital library.
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