Hiberno-Rossica: Knowledge in the Clouds in Old Irish and Old Russian (in Russian)

The present discussion aims to deal with one rare example of formulaic similarities in Old Irish and Old Russian poetic speech. In the past years several studies appeared devoted to Celto-Slavic isoglosses or correspondences in theonymics and mythopoeic language. The paper is devoted to two particular fragments in two Old Irish and Old Russian texts (the former is much less known than the latter) with a special emphasis on the semantics and poetic rules, which are common for both examples. An attempt is made to tackle the problem of common Indo-European ancestry for the formula discussed and cultural realities, which this formula reflects.The terms denoting the poetic creative art in IE languages are often borrowed from the vocabulary of different handicrafts. The poet may ‘weave’, ‘sew’, and ‘fashion’ a poem . In Old Irish a poetical craft might have been alluded by the verb fifgid ‘weaves’ as in f(a)ig feirb fithir ‘a teacher (of poetry) has woven a word’ (ACC, 52). The symbolism of binding evident in IDB can be interpreted by the shamanistic practice known throughout the world when the shaman binds a human soul (especially of a sick or dying person). This image is connected moreover with the magic of binding and bonds .