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URUNG AIYY TOYON AS A KEY MALE IMAGE OF PATRIARCHAL YAKUTS MYTHOLOGY // Tomsk Journal of Linguistics and Anthropology. 2020. Issue 2 (28). P. 141-148

The article considers the development of social attitudes including gender imperatives in Yakut mythology and epic. The analysis of the role of the character of Urung Aiyy Toyon in the formation of the patriarchal organization of the Yakut society is carried out. The character of Urung Aiyy Toyon was a patron of the new social order and a tool for supplanting the matrilineal community cult and its leading character the mistress of the Earth. The work highlights the stages of the historical development of the character of Urung Aiyy Toyon, associated with structural changes in the Yakut society during the process of transition from matrilineality to patrilineality, as well as the ideological function of this cult. The character of Urung Aiyy Toyon acted as a bearer of typical features of the social group of toyons, and myths about him turned out to be an active element of the structures of domination in the Yakut society. The cult of Urung Aiyy Toyon was formed and maintained as an ideological rationale for the power of the toyons, heads of individual patronymias. It was necessary in order to bring and strengthen the idea of a patriarchal organization in Yakut mythology. The character of Urung Aiyy Toyon is self-sufficient and does not need magical qualities and heroic deeds. For creators and consumers of mythology its social status as the head of the agnationalcommunitythe was most important. In the myth and the heroic epic of Olonkho, Urung Aiyy Toyon reinforces the patriarchal genealogy. In the cult of Urung Aiyy Toyon, the idea of male dominance is vividly represented and the tendencies that lead to the formation of a gender hierarchy in Yakut society are manifested. The mythology of Urung Aiyy Toyon was the rationale for the system of agnatic kinship, sanctifying the norms of customary law, reinforcing male dominance and women's subordinate position. The myth of Urung Aiyy Toyon appears as an active element of the structures of domination in Yakut society, which functioned as a tool for consolidating gender inequality and establishing the power of the Yakut toyons.

Keywords: Yakuts, mythology, epos, olonkho, male images, female images, patriarchy, Urung Aiyy Toyon