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Updated: May 14, 2025
To keep food out of their way, the Ostyaks build store-houses, on the tops of very high poles. The dogs are always on the watch to slip into their master's houses.
There is nothing which the Ostyaks are so eager to obtain, as this dangerous drink. On one occasion, a traveller was surrounded by a troop of Ostyaks, all begging for brandy, and when they could get none, they brought a large heap of frozen fish, and laid it at the travellers feet, saying, "Noble sir, we present you with this." They did get some brandy in return.
With screaming, with dancing, with swinging their swords, by making offerings of fur, of silver and gold, and of reindeer. These reindeer they kill very cruelly, by stabbing them in various parts of their bodies, to please the cruel gods, or rather cruel devils whom they worship. Has no one tried to convert the Ostyaks to God?
But when a priest dies, his wooden image is worshipped more than three years; sometimes it is never buried; for the priests who are alive, encourage the people to go on worshipping dead priests' images, that they may get the offerings which are made to them. But what do you think of men worshipping DEAD BEASTS? Yet this is what the Ostyaks do.
The emperor of Russia will not allow protestant missionaries to teach in Siberia. He wishes the Ostyaks to belong to the Greek church, and he has tried to bribe them with presents of cloth to be baptized; and a good many have been baptized. But what good can such baptisms do to the soul? The Russians do much harm to their subjects, by tempting them to buy brandy.
This tribe lives so far to the north, that they see very little of the Russians, though they belong to the emperor of Russia. They live close by the Northern Sea. Imagine how very cold it must be. The Samoyedes inhabit tents made of reindeer skins, such as the Ostyaks used to live in. They are a much wilder people than the Ostyaks.
These very same words have been applied to the Ostyaks, the Samoyedes, the Eskimos, the Dyaks, the Aleuts, the Papuans, and so on, by the highest authorities. I also remember having read them applied to the Tunguses, the Tchuktchis, the Sioux, and several others. The very frequency of that high commendation already speaks volumes in itself." P. Kropotkin, Mutual Aid, p. 90. Ibid, p. 91.
These very same words have been applied to the Ostyaks, the Samoyedes, the Eskimos, the Dayaks, the Aleoutes, the Papuas, and so on, by the highest authorities. I also remember having read them applied to the Tunguses, the Tchuktchis, the Sioux, and several others. The very frequency of that high commendation already speaks volumes in itself.
The women dress in a strange fantastic manner; not contented with a reindeer dress, as the Ostyaks are, they join furs and skins of various sorts together; and instead of veiling their faces, they wear a gay fur hat, with lappets; and at the back of their necks a glutton's tail hangs down, as well as long tails of their own hair, with brass rings jingling together at the end.
INHABITANTS. The Russians are the masters of Siberia, and they have built several large towns there. But these towns are very far apart, and there are many wild tribes wandering about the country. One of these tribes is the Ostyaks. Their houses are in the shape of boxes, for they are square with flat roofs.
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