Fungi in Khanty folk medicine
The fungal flora of the forest zone of West Siberia contains an average number of species. The Khanty living there consume only half a score of them. Several fungi are used for different purposes. The article presents data on the use of Amanita muscaria, Fomes fomentarius, Inonotus obliquus, Phellin...
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| Format: | Text |
| Language: | English |
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1991
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| Online Access: | http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.606.2962 http://www.mushroomhunter.net/chaga pdf/Fungi in Khanty Folk Medicine.pdf |
| Summary: | The fungal flora of the forest zone of West Siberia contains an average number of species. The Khanty living there consume only half a score of them. Several fungi are used for different purposes. The article presents data on the use of Amanita muscaria, Fomes fomentarius, Inonotus obliquus, Phellinus nigricans and the puff-ball in folk medicine. The Khanty (formerly called the Ostyakl are one of the peoples inhabiting West Siberia. They live on the banks of the Ob River and its tributaries, i.e., the Vasyugan, Vah, Agan, Trom-Agan, Pim, Great and Little Yugan, Kazym, Kunovat, Poluy and Synya. In older times their settlements reached farther south-east, to the Irtysh River. According to the census of 19’79, the number of the Khanty was 21,000. They speak a Ugric language belonging to the Finno-Ugrie family. Anthro-pologically they belong to the Ural race. For centuries they have lived scat-tered as single families or settlements consisting of a few families. Their primaeval occupations have been fishing, hunting and reindeer-raising. Part of the people have changed their way of life by the present time and they live in big settlements and towns with mixed population. The Khanty who lead the traditional way of life do not use fungi for food. Due to fatalism caused by the animist-shamanist world outlook of the Khanty, their folk medicine has developed poorly (Lukina, 19751. Illnesses arising without evident external reasons were thought to have been caused by supernatural beings. In order to free a person from an illness, it was nee-essary either to drive the strange evil being out of his body or to bring back the soul that had been taken away *. The psychic activities of the assisting specialist formed the basis of most stages in the treatment. There are no data whether the patient was given any drugs or not. Doctors were regarded incapable of curing such diseases. *According to the Khanty world-view a person has several souls (Kulemzin, 1984). |
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