The article is devoted to the description and attribution of six tin plaques found in the north of Western Siberia on the territory of the sacred site of Mansi. A version has been put forward that their plots are connected with the figure of the biblical King David. It is assumed that these items are of Russian origin and date back to the time of the initial advance of the Russian people to Western Siberia in the early 16th century.

Key words: Siberia, David, Russians, Voguls, tradition, sanctuaries, rites.

In the summer of 2013, while rafting in Northern Sosva, tourists found interesting objects that may date back to the time of the initial development of Siberia by Russian people. The site of their discovery is located on the right bank of the river approximately 2 km above the village of Manya (Berezovsky district of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug-Yugra). It is a wooded promontory with a height of approx. 70 m. Mansi call it Akhtys-us - "Stone city". Just down the river on the left bank is Vangrenel cliff - "Curved, crooked nose"; under the "nose" in the cliff is the legendary cave.

N. L. Gondatti recorded the Mansi legend about the cave at Vangrenel Rock: "The cave existing at Vangrenel owes its origin to the following circumstance: once a hero was fleeing from the pursuing enemies, he had a box with various things dear to him; when he saw that he was being overtaken, he threw it with terrible force into the rocks; the box broke a hole, and thus the beginning of the cave was laid; that is why, according to the foreigners, there were previously various objects in it. metal objects, especially mirrors. < ... > Between Vangrenel and Akhtys us there used to be a stone bridge connecting these two areas, on which there were often fights between the heroes who lived in Akhtys us and those who came from below; but then the local heroes left, because among the heroic customs there was one that did not allow them to live there where frequent fights took place" [1888, p.38].

Tourists on Vangrenel picked up a bronze mirror with graffiti, but the six round pewter plaques we are interested in were found on Kamenny Cape. It should be noted that, most likely, we are talking about the Iskar Old Settlement ("Stone Town"), located on the right bank of the Northern Sosva River: according to G. F. Miller (1740), it "in ancient times was inhabited by both Voguls and Zyryans, who at first traded here with these Voguls" [Sibir..., 1996, p.245]. The plaques were stacked in a pile, and next to them, in the same order, were bronze paw pendants and lunnits, and under them was a large spearhead. The plaques are cast from tin, their diameter is 4.4 cm, the reverse side is smooth.

The study was funded by a grant from the Russian Science Foundation (project N 14 - 28 - 00045).

The author is grateful to A. A. Bogordaeva, S. M. Novakovskaya-Bukhman, and D. I. Razhev for their assistance in preparing the article.

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1. A plaque with images of a man jumping on a lion and tearing its mouth, two birds, two animals and a fish (3 copies were found) (Fig. 1). The eye for hanging is decorated with relief vertical stripes, the rim of the plaque is decorated with round "pearls" and denticles. Below the lion figure is a framed rectangle with three objects in the center (you can assume a conditional image of a table with a bowl and two cups).

2. A plaque with images of the tsar, two men and a bird (2 copies were found) (Fig. 2). The eye for hanging is decorated with relief vertical stripes, the rim of the plaque is smooth. Three mesh triangles are used to form the plaque, one of which is bounded by a semicircle.

In the center, the king is depicted wearing a crown, sitting on a throne with a footstool; in his left hand he holds a cup, the right hand clutches a scepter, an attribute of power, at the upper end of which a bird sits. In front of the king is a trapezoid-shaped table with four legs. On it are two objects, the meaning of which is not clear; on the right corner of the table is a cup.

On the right hand of the king, a bearded man is depicted facing him; in his right hand he holds a cup, and the raised left is turned to the king. Behind the man is an oval shape*. On the left hand of the king is a second man; he also stands facing him, holding a cup in his right hand. Both of them are wearing boots and shoulder clothing made of fabric that belongs to the swing type, as evidenced by a cut in the form of a vertical line running along the middle of the front. The short horizontal stripes that cross this line can be a schematic representation of the buttonhole fastener. Features of the cut, length and closure of clothing allow you to identify it with a caftan. Kaftans were quite widespread in Moscow Russia in the XIV-XVIII centuries [Kireeva, 1970, p. 52].

3. A plaque with images of a double-headed eagle, a star of David and three birds (found 1 copy) (Fig. 3). The eye for hanging is decorated with a reticulated diamond, the rim of the plaque is decorated with denticles. Four mesh triangles and two semicircles were used to form the plaque.

Fragments of two similar pewter plaques (a feast scene, a hero and a lion) (Fig. 4) were found in 2006 in the village of Chuvashia. Voykara peak (Shuryshkarsky district of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District) in the ruins of the sacred granary of the Khanty in a pile of rotted ritual attributes. One of them (with a feast scene) was attached through a hole to some cloth product with a tendon thread (Baulo, 2011, cat. 170).

Figure 1. Plaque with images of a man jumping on a lion and tearing its mouth, two birds, two animals and a fish.

2. Plaque with images of the king, two men and a bird.

* The anthropologist D. I. Razhev pointed out to me the presence of a similar oval on the copper-cast icons of the 19th century depicting the martyrs Cyric and Iulita; these can be icons with these two saints, or with others in a common composition with them (Cyric and Iulita, Saints Gregory the Theologian and John Chrysostom, the martyrs Paraskeva, Catherine and Barbara); the oval is located at the bottom of the icon, next to the Iulita (see, for example: http://mednolit.ru).

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3. Plaque with images of a double-headed eagle, a star of David, and three birds.

4. Fragments of two plaques found in the sacred ambarchik of the Khanty.

The plaques from Kamenny Cape were cast simultaneously: the shape, size, ears, images of birds, clothing details, mesh triangles match; there are no traces of use.

I believe that the subjects of the plaques are united by the figure of the biblical King David: on the first - David breaks the lion's mouth, on the second-a feast at King David, on the third - the star of David and a two-headed eagle.

The plot of the first plaque. Presumably, it is connected with David, who jumped on a lion and tore its mouth. In literature, the relief with the hero tearing the lion's mouth is usually interpreted as an image of Samson with a lion. It is interesting that a similar scene with the hero jumping on a lion and tearing its mouth is found in the reliefs of St. Dmitry's Cathedral in Vladimir (late XII century), at the lower border of the central zakomara of the western facade, in the center of which there is a relief with the figure of King David: "The first relief of the cathedral shows a young man sitting on a lion. Wrapping his arms around the lion's head, he tears the beast's mouth open. Note that the hero's hair is short. This seemingly insignificant detail allows us to state that, contrary to the established opinion, the relief depicts not Samson, easily recognizable by his long hair, but David" (Novakovskaya-Bukhman, 2002, p.172). As examples of images of David and the Lion, S. M. Novakovskaya-Buchman cites miniatures of Psalms from the early Christian period, as well as a number of iconographic renditions of this scene in the Middle Byzantine period [Ibid.]. In 1902. In Cyprus, nine dishes with scenes of David's life were found on the site of the destroyed Byzantine city of Lambozy, in particular, "David kills the Lion". All of them belong to the period 613-630 and are now kept in the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Museum of Cyprus [Wealth..., 1977, p. 104-112]. On the plaque from the Stone Cape, the hero's hair is also short.

According to the text of the Book of Kings, the young shepherd David, when the lion attacked the flock, chased after it and took away the sheep, and if the beast rushed at it, then David "took it by the hair and smote it and killed it" (I Kings 17: 34, 35). The animals, birds, and fish that are depicted around the plaque may reflect the famous psalm "Let all living things praise the Lord!" (Psalm 150: 3-6). It is known that the fish is one of the symbols of Christ, and according to the Gospel of Matthew [1: 20-21], Jesus is a direct descendant of David.

Plot of the second plaque. Perhaps the scene of King David's feast is represented. The feast of a king or nobleman surrounded by servants and musicians is a traditional theme in the court art of the East. In the early Middle Ages, it was developed in Central Asian painting (Panjikent, VII-VIII centuries), in Sasanian and post-Sasanian toreutics (see, for example, [Darkevich, 1976, Tables 6, 4, 5]). In Umayyad art, there is a famous fresco with a ruler sitting on the throne and a servant on both sides (second quarter of the 8th century, Qusayr Amra) [Et-

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tinghausen, Grabar, 1987, p. 57]. A large silver dish of the VIII-IX centuries was found on one of the Khanty shrines. with the image of King David on the throne and two characters standing on each side (Baulo, 2000).

The unusual trapezoid shape of the table also attracts attention. We can cautiously assume that these are horizontal harps or Psalms. According to the Bible, David became famous for composing and performing psalms with musical accompaniment "on the eight-stringed instrument "(Psalm 6) or" on stringed instruments "(Psalm 55) or on the harp ("David was particularly distinguished for playing the harp" (1 Samuel 21: 17, 23)). In Western Europe in miniatures of the IX-XI centuries. The psalter is usually rectangular or square, but in Russia of the XVI-XVIII centuries. it had a trapezoidal shape with rounded sides (Darkevich, 1964, p. 47).

The plot of the third plaque. The meaning of the image of the double-headed eagle, which stands on the star of David, may be that the nascent Russian state power ( eagle) is from God. As you know, in the Middle Ages, David embodied the idea of the divine origin of secular power. The" Spirit of the Lord " resting on David finds a symbolic embodiment: doves fly to him - messengers of heaven [Ibid., p. 50].

The plot of the third plaque allows us to make two assumptions about its attribution: first, to indicate its Russian origin, and secondly, to indicate the time of casting-not earlier than the end of the XV century, when the eagle emblem was used by Moscow princes. In 1497, the double-headed eagle as a state symbol first appeared on the double-sided wax state seal of Russia: it is depicted on the reverse side, and on the front - the coat of arms of the Moscow Principality - a horseman striking a dragon. In modern Russian historiography, its appearance is usually explained by the marriage of Ivan III with the Byzantine Princess Sofia Palaiologos and, accordingly, the Byzantine succession of Moscow Rus.

Regarding the time of making tin plaques, it is necessary to highlight the product with the plot "David and the Lion". The fact is that there is a rather short period when the money of Moscow and the Moscow appanages, according to numismatists, depicted Samson struggling with a lion (Fig. 5). The plot appeared on Moscow coins in the last years of the reign of Grand Duke Vasily I, no later than the turn of 1423-1924. According to V. V. Zaitsev and O. P. Mamontova, the prevalence of images of Samson defeating the lion during this period was explained by the fact that the image on coins symbolized the young son and heir of Vasily Dmitrievich. Vasily I in the last years of his life tried to strengthen the hereditary rights of his son. The image of Samson on the reverse side of the Moscow coins was obviously intended to help form the image of the heir in the eyes of his contemporaries as a future hero capable of performing great feats and liberating his people from the yoke of non-believers (Zaitsev and Mamontova, 2003). It is also noteworthy that the obverse of the coins of this period depicted a falconer, and a round tin plaque with this character (Fig. 6) was also found last year on Kamenny Cape, not far from the six described above.

You can, of course, argue with numismatists about attributing the hero on coins as Samson, especially since the argument through the plot about the heir does not look unambiguous, rather, the falconer and the hero who kills the lion correspond to each other in terms of some kind of hunting prowess. The figure of David as the embodiment of the divine origin of secular power could be a great argument in the succession of Moscow princes. Then more understandable

5. Obverse and reverse of Moscow coins of the mid-15th century.

Fig. 6. Drawing a plaque with the image of Sokolnik.

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The two-headed eagle and the star of David, which would seem to be a little combined, becomes more difficult to reproduce on one subject, because the latter simply replaced the earlier image of David the hero.

In any case, it is necessary to pay attention to the fact that the plots on the plaques found on Kamenny Cape (Sokolnik, hero and lion) reflect the symbolism adopted in Russia in the middle of the XV century. Taking into account the "double - headed eagle-star of David" plot, these items can be dated to the beginning of the XVI century. I assume that the plaques were brought to the north of Western Siberia by Russian people and presented to the Voguls (or exchanged with them), who included them in the number of cult attributes of one of the shrines. A number of factors may have contributed to the adaptation of the plaques to the ritual sphere of the Ob Ugrians: the round shape, the white (sub - silver-sacred) color, the famous plot of the royal feast (previously found on imported eastern vessels), the image of an eagle (as one of the popular local deities in ornithomorphic form).

List of literature

A.V. Baulo Serebryannoe dish s Maloy Obi [Baulo's silver dish from the Malaya Ob River] / / Archeology, Ethnography and Anthropology of Eurasia. - 2000. - N 4. - p. 143-153.

Baulo A.V. Ancient bronze from ethnographic complexes and random collections. Novosibirsk, IAET SB RAS Publ., 2011, 260 p. (in Russian)

Gondatti, N. L., Traces of pagan beliefs among non-native peoples of North-Western Siberia, Moscow: [Tip. Potapova], 1888. - 91s.

Darkevich V. P. Obraz tsara Davida v Vladimiro-Suzdalskoj skul'pturu [The image of Tsar David in Vladimir-Suzdal sculpture]. KSIA, 1964, issue 99, pp. 46-53.

Darkevich V. P. Khudozhestvenny metal Vostoka: Produzheniya vostochnoy torevtiki na territorii evropeyskoy chasti SSSR i Zaural'ya [Artistic Metal of the East: Works of Oriental Toreutics on the territory of the European part of the USSR and the Trans-Urals].

Zaitsev V. V., Mamontova O. P. On the symbolism of the image of Samson on Moscow coins of the XV century. numismatist, conf. St. Petersburg, April 14-18, 2003: tez. dokl. i soobshch. St. Petersburg, 2003, pp. 182-183.

Kireeva E. V. History of costume: European costumes from antiquity to the XX century. Moscow: Prosveshchenie Publ., 1970, 167 p.

Novakovskaya-Bukhman S. M. Tsar David in the reliefs of the Dmitrievsky Cathedral in Vladimir / / Old Russian Art: Byzantium, Rus, Western Europe: Art and Culture. St. Petersburg: Dmitry Bulavin Publ., 2002, pp. 172-186.

Sibir ' XVIII veka v putevykh opisaniyakh G. F. Miller [Siberia of the XVIII century in the travel descriptions of G. F. Miller]. Novosibirsk: Siberian Chronograph Publ., 1996, issue VI, 310 p.

Grabar O. Ettinghausen R., The Art and Architecture of Islam 650 - 1250. - Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1987. -448 p. - (Pelican History of Art; N 51).

Wealth of the Roman world / eds. J.P.C. Kent, K.S. Painter. - L.: Published for the Trustees of the British Museum by British Museum Publications, 1977. - 192 p.: ill.

The article was submitted to the Editorial Board on 12.10.14.

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