Permalaisten uskonto

Delving into the scarcely recorded faith of the ancient Perm peoples, this study opens a window on a world where forest spirits, ancestor rites and seasonal festivals shaped everyday life. The narrative begins with early encounters between Novgorod traders and the remote Finnic tribes, tracing how those contacts set the stage for the first written glimpses of a belief system that would soon be eclipsed by Christianity.

The book guides listeners through a series of thematic chapters—venerating the dead, honoring the formidable Kuala, venerating the Lud and the collective sacrifices of whole villages. It also explores the roles of humanoid and nature sprites, agricultural celebrations, healing deities and the wisdom‑keepers who mediated between humans and the unseen realm. All of this is woven together from a patchwork of medieval chronicles, the rare “apostle” biography of Saint Tapan and later ethnographic notes.

By piecing together fragmentary Russian records, 18th‑century travelogues and early 20th‑century scholarship, the author reconstructs a vivid portrait of a vanished pagan cosmos, offering listeners both scholarly insight and a sense of the mythic atmosphere that once filled the Permian wilderness.