• see map sketch „Indigenous people of Siberia“
  

• A. V Anokhin lived in the Altai from 1930 to 1931. During his activity as a musician in Ulala (Gorno-Altaisk) he studied folklore, music and religion of the Altai people. His work, Materialy po shamanism u Altaisev, was published in Leningrad in 1924, and remained a comprehensive and detailed description of the Altai shamanism. Anokhin studied also “Ak Jang” from 1910 to 1930 and was able to observe the developments thereof. The manuscript is a property of the Altaic Studies Institute Archive in Gorno-Altaisk. – “Ak Jang” had developed in order to replace or to supplement shamanism. He tried to link both traditions of the sun worship using different evolutionary theories of the religion studies in the 19th century.
• The work of A.G. Danilin is the only published source, which deals both with the theology and the praxis of “Ak Jang” in greater detail. Danilin mentioned manuscripts by A.V. Anokhin.
  

- Further information on Shamanism: Religion of the indigenous people of Siberia
- Further information on Shamanism: Schmanisums (Tengerismus) in Mongolia

In the Lamaist world was apparently quite widespread the expectation of a messianic appearance of the last ruler of “Shambhala” of the North (Altai region), a mythical land somewhere in the north of Tibet, a “land of peace and quiet”, which is especially closely connected with the Kalachakra tradition, which is influenced by Vishnuism. According to certain prophecies as a reincorporation of the Tashi-Lama (Pan-schen Lama), the Lamaist people will be led at a time, when Lamaism will be at a low point, into the final and decisive battle against the enemies of their belief. (In a very special prayer, the followers pray and ask for participation in a future life among the army of Shambhala, fighting against the enemies of the Dharma). The Shambhala myth is an adaptation of the early Hindu myth of Kalki of Sambhala (Shangri-La), which may be found in Mahabharata and Puranas, This is seen a pure land in terms of Buddhism, a fairy-tale-like kingdom, the reaction of which is visionary or spiritual, as well as physical and/or geographical. These Shambhala concepts differ greatly from the concepts and beliefs including the re-appearance of the heroic king Gesar Chan.
Gesar, according to scripts of more than 170 years also known as Gesser Chan, is an epic Tibetan king, whose heroic adventures are presented in songs, which are called the Gesar Epic in their entity. This epic is one of the biggest and most comprehensive epic cycles. These narrations include the fundamental motif of the war of the good Tibetan former ruler Gesar, also known as Kesar or Geser (Gesser-Chan), which had been born as a human being but nevertheless bore many divine talents and abilities, against the Evil in the world. His warrior and clever actions are presented throughout Central Asia from Ladkh as far as Mongolia and the region of Buryatia, especially, however, in Eastern Tibet, in the form of songs, which is why it is most frequently called Gesar Epic. It is a rather comprehensive epic and has its beginnings with the creation of the word; most probably it was planned for presentation lasting several days. It tells of the return of the heroic king with this army establishing peace throughout.

- Further information on Myths and legends of Geser

Today there are known some 6,000 to 7,000 spoken languages, which have about 400 to 500 separated lines or family. The Uralic language with its 30 to 40 language branches was somehow larger than an average family. Due to the number of people speaking an Uralic language, it was a relatively small unity in regard to its territorial expansion, but one of the larger families on our planet and an "old" family, this is, being developed a very long time ago.

One of the important unsolved questions regarding human language is its development in pre-historic time, in a society of hunters and gatherers within the Boreal eco-system in Central Asia and Eurasia. An essential factor for such a change seems to have been at least with many "old" language families that there has been existent a so-called evolution, this is a rapid development within the economy in combination with increasing affluence, especially agriculture and selective breeding, and, in connection therewith, a subsequent enormous increase in population as well as social changes. It is especially important to note that the development of today's big language families is not necessarily to be ascribed to migrations or catastrophies. Main processes were the consequence of language assimilation or language shifts, whereby the diversity of languages has become extinct in favour of an expansive family. This means, hence, that genetic diversity has become extinct, this is the number of branches of a language family, with the number of separate languages remaining relatively stable. For this reason, there were to be found many languages in pre-historic times, assuming that the population in total reached several millions in the Neolithic period, even many more. This seems to be a reasonable but rather unprecise estimation if we assume that the average language society consisted of about 500 people. There may have existed, though, more than 10,000 actively spoken languages in the period before the development of the language families that are known today. It is, however, difficult to estimate how many lines these pre-historic languages had; the number thereof, however, must have been by far larger than it is today, as the conditions for the expansion of language were rather unfavourable. All pre-historic languages more or less had the same chance in their lines from ancestors to present representatives, but only a few of these actually succeeded and survived. It could be said that all pre-historic languages were permanently threatened by extinction, just as it is the case nowadays. In this sense, Uralic had been an "endangered" language until it stated to expand and spread.

It is, however, without any doubt that Uralic languages with the so-called Altai languages, including Turkic, Mongolian, Tungusic, Korean and Japanese, belonged to a trans-Eurasian belt. In this case there are parallelities with their neighbouring ones, so that this area may be designated as a Uralic-Altaian language. Deviations may be found especially with the prototypcial Uralic-Altaian language, and these only in some branches, especially in the West with the Finnish, Sami and and in the North with the Samoyed languages; in the East with the Korean and Japanese languages; there may, however, still be observed a fundamental typological orientation within this trans-continental border area. The Uralic-Altaian border area is defined by clear areas which determine a language type against its neighbours, in the north with the Jukagyr, Chamchuck, in the south with the Indo-European, with the Sino-Tibetians as well as in the Far East with the Ghilyak languages of the Nivkh people and the Ainu. Along the fringe areas of the Uralic-Altaian border line there may be observed some examples of incremental assimilation and adaptation, such as in the case of the Northern Chinese or of several Turk and Mongolian tribes in the region Amdo Qinghai.
It is to be noted that there were further existent parallelities in area and typology, with reference to the Uralic and the non-Uralic-Altaian neighbours thereof, especially with the Indo-European language family. Uralic and Indo-European families are important, as well as Turk, Mongolian, Tungusic, Jukagyr, Amur (Ghilyak) and Chamchuck languages; they all belong to the so-called Mitian language, wherein there were contained the roots of the personal pronouns, which are used - as in may other languages - as personal markers.

This language community among the Uralic speaking population was associated with a variety of factors pertaining to other fields than language, it was connected with economic and population growth, influenced by cultural and political conditions. If only numerical proportions were considered, we could conclude that the original Uralic language was very similar to the modern Hungarian language. We do, however, know that the Hungarian pronunciation did constitute a local complex, by its physical contact with the Central European. These particularities are also existent in the neighbouring languages, including the Roman, Serbian and Slovak languages. There is not nearly a Uralic speaking population that is farther from this Proto-Uralic than the Hungarian language. Another similar example of another language family: the Turkish language is nowadays the "largest" Turkic language in regard to the number of people speaking. This could lead to the wrong implication that the modern Turks in Turkey represent a physically "original" type of the Turkic speaking people. Nothing, however, is less true, as in fact Turkish was only spoken in the second half of the first millenium B.C., and predominantly by the "Asian" population settling in the region of today's Mongolia. Due to demographic, cultural and political reasons, the Turk languages then spread in Central Asia and Eurasia as far as Turkey, while in Mongolia these languages were more or less extinguished by the expansion of the Mongolian language family. It could be said that the modern Mongols in Mongolia are more or less direct descendants of the old Turks, while the modern Turks in Turkey are more or less a direct continuation of an old local population in Anatolia, who have historically included a number of non-Turk languages, i.e. the Hattic of the Hattians or the Armenian and the Byzantine Greek languages.

We do not exactly know whether a first development of a Proto-Uralic language also included branches oriented towards the west, it is, however, still possible that a Proto-Samoyed family moved eastwards, while a Proto-Finnish-Ugric family remained in its original position.
It is, however, notable that in the Minusinsk Basin at the Upper Yenisei there could be developd a Proto-Samoyed language for the very first time. This area represents a compact region having an extraordinarily well documented sequence of archaeological cultures, starting in the Copper Age over the Bronze and the Early Iron Age with the cultures of the Afanassiewo (3500-2500. B.C.), Okunewo (2500-2000 B.C.), Andronowo (2000-1400 B.C.), Karasuk (1500-800 B.C.), Tagar (900-600 B.C.), Pazyrik (600-200 B.C.) and Tashtyk „Hunno-Sarmatian“ (100 v. Chr. - 200 B.C.) up to the Yenisei Kirghiz (from 400 A.D.) to the Mongols (from 1300 A.D.) on and later the conquests of the Russian Tsars (from the 17th century on).

Without turning to the question of a probable Proto-Uralic presence in the Minusinsk Basin, it is relatively safe to say that the ethnolinguistic history of the region is to be viewed backwards, leading to the invasion of the Turkic (later Yenisei Turk), which was terminated by a Tashtyk (or Hunnitic) period in this region. The historic distribution of the local ethno-linguistic groups strongly emphasizes that the dominant language in the Minusink Bais before the Turk lingua was the language of the Tashtyk culture, following the Tagar culture; wherein this is supposed to have had Samoyed elements (Proto-Samoyed language). There have been speculations on the possible language identity of the Karasuk, Andronowo, Okunewo and Afanassiewo culture, while nothing really can be documented for sure. Also Indo-German elements in the Samoyed may indiciate that an early form of an eastern Indo-European (Proto-Tocharic) language was present in the region, either in the advance of or concurrently with the Samoyed culture.

This nomadic culture, having developed in the Bronze Age, has a three thousand year old history. Livestock keeping with winter and summer pastures, wild animals hunting and religious practices in holy places have been maintained to the present day. Settlers constructed great, enduring monuments such as from the Bronze Age: Khirigsuurs (1), Deer stones (2), Stone men ('Balbal' - 3) and also stones with inscriptions. The modern nomads in Mongolia and their Central Asian and Siberian neighbours have ubiquitous Ovoo (4) – mass of stones (rocks) or tipis made from sticks or rods erected on mountain passes or crossroads, or at difficult passages and river springs to worship the spirit master (The Lord of the place). Ovoo change and grow with each visitor, stones, rods or other objects are added. It is a ritual performed, circling three times in a clockwise direction, to ask for luck for further traveling. It is still not known whether the local settlers have maintained today this Ovoo ritual in a spirit worship or continued to exist as superstition.
There are monuments or places, important and sometimes more ephemeral (temporal), where there is actively celebrated only on a specific day or situation, including as such ghost worship with Ongons or other sacred objects. Ongons; is symbolically meant as a house or place, where such spirits or souls of deceased live. The Ongon signs were regularly fastened to “untouched” or “uncut” manes at the withers of horses or of Mongolian ponies; such as bands as seters, stuffed towels or bone or stone figures made of carved wood, able to keep the spirits off; which were in fenced Asars (squares) and served for worshipping dead shamans, or in holy places or ceremonial sites that are selected by the community. Even deer stones or stones such of such Turkic men (Balbal) from the Bronze Age are today worshipped as Ongons. They are decorated with Buddhist prayer cloths, Khadags (ceremonial scarf of silk, usually blue) and with yellow anointing. Also remains of burnt incense or animal bones were placed at its base.

• (1) Khirigsuurs - The khirigsuurs were large and complex ritual sites that are major features in the landscape of the Bronze Age. A khirigsuur is a structure including a central mound and a round or square surrounding frame. The central mound is often marked by a large standing boulder. Modern studies question this - whether they are truly nomadic culture of the Bronze Age and their function remains uncertain - are they grave monuments, ritual places or places for other celebrations.
  
  
• (2) Deer stone (also known as reindeer stones).
  A number of ideas about deer stones differ from those in centrally-Mongolian species, which have very long body and legs in running motion and are not waved. They also have small eyes. There weren`t noticed any belts or tools and also any presentations of solar discs or moon shapes. The grooved ring is attached only at the top positions in such stones. Deer stones could be dated from the Afanassiewo culture 3,500 to 2,500 B.C. years ago.
  - see sketch - Hovsgol Aimag and Mongolia Altai
  
  
• (3) Turkic stone – human figure “Balbal” - Turkic grave stones before Mongolian time and similar egg-shaped stones could be presented as pagan monuments after the death of tribal princes. Such ideas were never used as grave stones, because the body of the deceased was burnt, and the ash was left to the wind. Stone sculptures should be remember on these faces or intellectual properties. Settlers from this period believed that the body of a man was made from dust and stone and that the body must be returned to earth and stone. In their opinion, after the death organs become stone, which are then erected and present a kind of storage of the memory and knowledge of their ancestors. In some way, this is considered a kind of tin god concept, but these balbal have never been used as tin god presentations or as idols of the deceased. They rather were the gateway to the spiritual approach of an ancestor cult. These balbal may be taken as a reminder on the deceased in consideration of the people who lived long time ago.
  
  
• (4) Ovoo – masses of stone or tipis made of poles and rods, which were found at mountain passes, at crossroads, on difficult passages and on river springs, worshiped a spirit-master (Sir, ruler) of such places. As a rule those landscape symbols were made of stone or wood. Ovoos were often found on the top of the mountains and in high places such as mountain passes. They served primarily as a religious site, in order to worship the mountains, the sky and the local spirit masters. They are currently also used in Buddhist ceremonies as sacred place.
  
  

These sacred places and objects mix religious practices and the worship of the fire, sky, earth, water, ancestor cult, shamanism and currently also include Buddhist concepts. Heavenly gods and spirits of the underworld were mixed along with numerous Buddhist animist gods with the three-world-cosmology for rituals. The religious traditions were celebrated by the clan elders and represented a form of an ancestor cult; Buddhist Lamas celebrated also the worship rituals. Shamans negotiated, struggled and tricked those underworld spirits in rituals. Sacred objects and their places represent separate but somehow associated traditions, which are handed over by way of ritual orders, in their practice - Buddhism, Shamanism. The worship of a spirit master of the place, ancestor at Ovoos or Ongons were called to appear at local stones, rods, built altars (stone slabs) or trees. The shaman trees in Darkhat Valley are big, lonely trees and also sacred, after they were marked by lightning. Like their neighbours, the Buryats, they put the ash of the burnt Shamans into the deep holes under those trees. Such sacred places permit communication with sacrificial offerings to spirit-master of the place – mountains, wood, or mountain`s passes, rivers, lakes, and with deceased. Help is asked for from the soul spirit, as well as their appeasement by way of rituals, for the protection of the herds, for health and prosperity of the community. Those traditions are still alive nowadays, and they are celebrated by the shamans and – at present times by the monks (lamas), too. Ceremonies for spirit masters of the region, of the sky at the ovoo thereof or ongons may be carried out only by the clan elders or priests.
In contrast to Buddhist traditions and the people living in the Darkhat Valley, with herds of sheep, goats and cows, and living on hunting and gathering, are the Dukha reindeer herders (also called Tsaatan - 1). They are strongly connected with the Uriankhai (Tuva tribes) and their shamanic practices. The first act of their ruler is, when they arrive at the holy places, to perform such cleanings and repositioning of rods that had fallen down. In rituals there were used milk and cheese, incense juniper or other aromatic herbs, combined strips of white cotton cloth on objects. Milk is thrown towards the sky with a tsatsal - a traditional wooden spoon - and concurrently, they call out the names of many cities, mountains and rivers and rotate clockwise. Several 5 cm long wide strips of cotton are then bound to each of the rods, and on the altars there are placed small pieces of cheese. As a final ritual, they blow incense on the altars, in order to perform a cleaning with the aid of smoke. The ceremonies were led by the clan elders or priests, which begged and prayed to the spirit of the master Kharmai to protect younger leaders and family members. Worship of the spirit master and the animals is also performed. Apart from the protection for the clan members, they also ask the Ovoos for protection and good luck while hunting.
Important Ongons, where such spirits, souls or dead shamans live, are objects, like a figure made of wood. These figures, in which the souls and spirits are resident, are decorated and treated with milk and fat. They get a place in the homes of people with the aim of asking for pacifying and taming other spirit souls. Certain souls are considered dangerous and can be held under control only with strong auxiliary spirits. They tried to lure their families, especially the children, into the underworld in order to create a parallel life. Unlocked spirits of deceased are ready for a rebirth under the control of a master spirit.
By way of Ongons families honour the souls of deceased ancestors and ask them for protection against the hostile spirits, also with shamanistic magic they keep these souls of family members in a good mood. Such Ongons were made by shamans and are also used in healing ceremonies, when the illness spreading spirits are burnt. Ovoos and Ongons serve for the worship and they are used in ceremonies, they are sacred sites and objects. They serve for the admiration of the spirit master of such places or hunted animals, or deceased ancestors (ancestor cult). They ask for happiness and protection from the spirits, who live in those objects. Special assistants (helping spirits) are called to appear, on special days or in daily activities. These practices with worship integrate various liturgical traditions – Buddhism, Shamanism of the Darkhat Valley or Dukha Shamanism, having many similarities to the old beliefs and the soul travels between the worlds: a present, earthly world, a heaven world, and an underworld. With the help of spirit masters their control is sought.

• (1) The Dukha, Dukhans or Duhalar (Mongolian: Tsaatan) are a small community of reindeer herders living in the woods near to the lake Khovsgol and on the spring of the Yenisei, north of Mongolia, on the borders of Russia and Tuva. “Tsaa” means “reindeer” in Tsaatan: “those living with reindeer herders”, the name has actually Mongolian origins, but they rather call themselves “people of the Taiga”. Today, they belong, like the Tuvans, to the Turk-speaking people in the Altai. The reindeer is a source of food, clothing and a monetary currency. They re-established their nomadic life-style in the 1990ies, and the most of them stayed loyal to animism and had their own shamans.
  

Wilhelm Radloff, who travelled from 1859 to 1870 in the Altai-Sayan region, reported in chronicles of 1861 of the Soyons (Soyon=Tuvans), of people, who settled at the Kara Kul, in today`s province Tajga Bay in the north-west of Tuva.

• L.P. Potapov (1905-2001) was born in the Altai and began his academic career as a protégée of Anokhin in 1924. In the late 1930s, he was one of the most influential figures in the Soviet anthropology and ethnography. He specialized in Siberia, especially the Turkic groups in southern Siberia, including the Altai. From 1948 on he was director of the Leningrad Institute of Anthropology and Ethnography, and de-facto expert on "Soviet Anthropology". Writings of L. P. Potapov also contain records of Anokhin.
  

In the Pazyryk culture from the 6th to the 2nd century B. C. the symbolism of a cross-shaped rosette was custom, which represented the universe or the sun. This culture is assigned to a Europoid people, to the Ugrians, who migrated from the Ural towards the north into the southern forest-steppe. This is also visible with Scythian tools made of bronze that were found, which served in sacrificial rites. Here the tribes had adopted Turkic features, or they were entrained by primitive peoples moving to the west. But one part of this forest Tatars continued holding on the Altai foothills. However, the western-Siberian population had largely Turkic origins and the Turkic – Ugric rulers had left their grave inscriptions in a runic script. Similar runes were found in Bulgaria, too.

Nomadic tribes moved in the 1st century B. C. from today`s Xingjian China to the Danube. In Central Asia, the Altai and Mongolia there was established a Khanate with a Turkic upper class. At that time there existed a contacts of Turkic tribes with the Mohe tribes at the Amur. They left ideas of petroglyphs from that period, as can be seen by way of some ritual objects and practices, as well as jewellery and clothing. The influence of these mixed Turkic-Mongolian peoples who settled in this Siberian area was larger than people previously thought.

The Telengits (Dwojedans) had long been Chinese subjects, and they paid charges to the Chinese in February. They remained independent under their administration for a long time. Their leaders, the Zaisans (Temitschi or Schülöngü), were still obliged to pay the Kalan to the Russians. In 1865 the Telengits (Dwojedans) had to choose between two alternatives, either to leave the country or to recognize Russian dominance. They settled mainly in the river areas of the Tshuja and their name - Dwojedans - has the meaning "twice subject to interests payment", because they had to pay taxes both to China and Russia. In addition, the Tscholyschman residents are also designated as the Tölös people and the Bashkaus River people residents as Ulan people. The first designation is very understandable, since they have established the oldest population of the Tölössen on the south of the Lake Teletskoye (Altyn Kol - Golden Lake) ever since and are descendants of the Dwojedans.
The Forest Tatars, also Black Forest Tartars, at the Kemtschik River and the Uriankhai of the Mongols were called Tschernevi-Tatari by the Russians, but they called themselves Tuva-Kizhi and Jisch-Kizhi – the peoples of the Forest. They also live in the forest mountains between the river Katun and the Lake Teletskoye (Altyn Kol - Golden Lake) as semi-nomads, farming is of lesser importance. They mostly hunt and gather cedar nuts. They traditionally come from the east and have mixed with their neighbours, the Altai people. The majority is of Shamanistic confession.
Shors (also called mountain Kuznetskie Tatars, Kondoma Tatars, Mras-Su Tatars) settle between the Altai and the Sayan mountains, along the banks of the Kondoma River, and live on hunting and fishing.

• Nicholas Roerich - a famous Russian occultist and artist, promoted the "Agni Yoga" - a mixture of Buddhist (mostly invented), "esoteric" Christian and spiritualist mixed elements that resembled theosophy (divine wisdom). The central point of this doctrine was the "Search for the Shambhala." He and his wife Elena Roerich, who was a celebrated medium, produced a series of "Shambhala prophecies" that became very popular in the late 1920s. They were travelling through the Altai, as it was recorded in Roerich's book, "The Heart of Asia ".
  
• A.V. Anokhin – lived in the Altai from 1910 to 1931. During his work as a music teacher in the Ulala (Gorno-Altaisk), he had actively studied folklore, music and religion. His work, Materialy po Shamanstvu u Altaitsev, which was published in Leningrad in 1924, and remained a comprehensive and detailed description of the Altai shamanism. Anokhin studied also “Ak Jang” from 1910 to 1930 and was able to observe the developments thereof. The manuscript is a property of the Altaic Studies Institute Archive in Gorno-Altaisk. – “Ak Jang” had developed in order to replace or to supplement shamanism. He tried to link both traditions of the sun worship using different evolutionary theories of the religion studies in the 19th century. remains a full and detailed presentation of the Altai shamanism. Anokhin also studied "Ak Jang" from 1910 to 1930 and was able to observe the developments thereof. The manuscript is in the property of the Archives of the Institute of Altaic Studies in Gorno-Altaisk. - "Ak Jang" has emerged to replace or supplement shamanism. He tried to combine both traditions of the sun worship towards evolutionary theories of the study of religion from 19th century.

The work of A. G. Danilin remains the only published source that deals in details with both the theology and practice of the "Ak Jang". Danilin mentioned manuscripts of A.V. Anokhin.