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Türk ve Rus Mitolojisinde Hayvan Mitleri

2021, ANIMAL MYTHS IN TURKISH AND RUSSIAN MYTHOLOGY

Mythology is a mirror that reflects the past and essence of societies. It reflects the unique characteristics of each society's own culture, climate and geography. In this sense, it is seen that all nations have their own traditions, customs and belief systems. Turkish and Russian mythology, which succeeded in preserving the cultural heritage of their ancestors, are examples that have succeeded in preserving their original values as well as their richness in this context. On the other hand, it is seen that the legends circulating from language to language are influenced and complement each other, leading to common myths. As a matter of fact, the fact that the oldest Turkish myths were compiled and written down by some Russian scientists expresses the interaction between the Turkish and Russian nation.The fact that some animal terms in Turkish primarily affect Russian is another indicator of similar interaction. When evaluating the dimensions of the interaction between the two cultures in question, it seems difficult to come up with a clear view on which culture is more dominant or which culture affects the other more. For this reason, the aim of the study is to examine the animal myths in both mythologies within the framework of the comparative method, based on the judgment that the interaction should be mutual. In the study, the concept of mythology is discussed from a universal point of view in order to determine the similarities and differences in both mythologies. In this context, there are many mythological animals in the thousands of years of history of both Turks and Russians, but it is not possible to include all of them in this study, horse, wolf, dog, bear, eagle and snake are emphasized as they are the most encountered in the geography they live and directly affect their lives. In the context of the analysis, what kind of symbolic meanings the related animal myths have for the Turkish and Russian people, how they are perceived, what the common and different points are, have been tried to be revealed with examples.