In the 6th issue of Russkaya Rech for 1998, V. G. Dolgushev's article "And the boys are bloody in the eyes..." is published - about the famous Pushkin line from the tragedy "Boris Godunov". The author writes that many people take these words of Pushkin literally, believing that this refers to Tsarevich Dimitri, who was killed on Godunov's orders. And asks a reasonable question: "But why boys and not a boy?" The answer is as follows: in the late XVIII - early XIX centuries, the phraseological unit boys in the eyes (run) was used in colloquial speech in the meaning "ripples, turns green" (here V. G. Dolgushev refers to the "Explanatory Dictionary of the living Great Russian Language" by V. I. Dahl). Then he points out that this phraseological turn (as well as another similar expression ulanch in the eyes run) is also given by M. I. Mikhelson in his collection of figurative words and allegories "Russian thought and Speech. Your own and someone else's. Experience of Russian phraseology".

V. G. Dolgushev also found another evidence of the wide popularity of this phraseological unit - an anecdote about the writer and homeric drunkard Ermil Kostrov (c. 1750-1796). They say that a drunken Kostrov was asked by a young man: "Well, Yermil Ivanovich, don't you have boys in your eyes? And V. G. Dolgushev concludes that this common phraseology in the past was often used in relation to the state of intoxication, but "it could also be used in a broader sense, when referring to the flickering of some obscure spots when a person is in a bad state in general" (cf.: blurred vision, green in the eyes, green in the eyes went).

Pushkin used this expression, giving it an additional meaning: "Since Boris Godunov thinks about his crime all the time, this flickering takes on an ominously bloody hue in his eyes." In addition, V. G. Dolgushev notes that in the " Dictionary of the language

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Pushkin" made an inaccuracy and did not highlight the phraseological construction of boys in the eyes.

In general, these observations are quite appropriate and convincing. I would just like to make a few additions.

And the main thing is this: researchers of Russian phraseology have repeatedly pointed out that in this case Pushkin used folk phraseology. It seems that the first person who noticed this was V. M. Mokienko. In his article "Variation of phraseology and the problem of individual author's phraseological units", among several concrete examples, such a Pushkin expression (Modern Russian lexicography. 1977. L., 1979). This is also discussed in his textbook "Slavic Phraseology "(Moscow, 1980). Soon, in the same yearbook where Mokienko's article was published earlier, the work of Yu. S. Sorokin "And the boys are bloody in the eyes..." (Phraseological and stylistic commentary on Pushkin's line / / Modern Russian lexicography. 1981. L., 1983) - however, without reference to the observations made by V. M. Mokienko. Finally, two thorough phraseological reference books have recently been published, which reflect the prehistory of Pushkin's winged expressions: V. M. Mokienko, K. P. Sidorenko " Dictionary of Pushkin's Winged Expressions "(St. Petersburg, 1999); A. K. Birikh, V. M. Mokienko, L. I. Stepanova " Dictionary of Russian Phraseology: Historical and Etymological Reference: (St. Petersburg, 1998).

In the Explanatory Dictionary of V. I. Dahl, the phraseological phrase boys in the eyes is really given - that is, " ripples, turns green "(Vol. II). And in the Explanatory dictionary you can find the following: "Ivanchiki chickens. mn. little men, boys in the eyes, reflection in the eye of the window and people, or flies. You have ivanchiki jumping, you imagined it" (Vol.II); "Ivanchiki in the eyes run, boys, flies; mottled, dark" (Vol. IV).

M. I. Mikhelson, preparing his handbook, as is known, was largely based on the materials of Dahl. Michelson's entry: "Boys' eyes (inos.) ripples, turns green" and the name of the litter: "See. Lancers run in the eyes" (Vol. 1. Here is used the 3rd, two-volume edition of the Michelson handbook, published in 1902-1903, it was reprinted again in Moscow in 1994 with a preface and comments by V. M. Mokienko). Further in Mikhelson: "Uglanchiki in the eyes run (inosk.) ripples, mottled (Vologda. Pyatsk. Perm. Kaz.)" (Vol. 2). This entry is also based on Dahl's materials, as evidenced by Michelson's information about the places where this expression is distributed. In Dahl we read: "Uglan... vlgd. vyat. prm. kaz. a boy, a boy, a teenager, a harrowwolf; a blockhead, a rake, a minx, a mischief-maker; a clumsy fat man? unsociable? sib. Uglanchiki in the eyes run, boys, flies; mottled, darkens "(vol. IV). In passing, we note an obvious typo in Michelson's edition, which was not noticed either by him or by the author.

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modern reprint: instead of the ridiculous "Pyatsk." it is necessary - " Vyatsk.". In addition, judging only by the text of Mikhelson, it turns out that the phraseological phrase uglanchiki in the eyes of begayut was found in the vast territory of the Russian North, the Urals and the Volga region. In fact, Dahl's corresponding litters referred only to the word uglan, and the phraseology about running uglanch met Dahl in Siberia. Apparently, the word lancers in Michelson is another typo (and then, it turns out, it was also not noticed by him and was not mentioned in the "List of Typos and Corrections"). After all, both in a separate dictionary entry and in the index to the reference book, Mikhelson gives the correct version of this word - uglanchiki. So it should not be assumed that Mikhelson was aware of this phraseology with the unintelligible ulanchiki (this is exactly what Sorokin and Dolgushev say).

The word uglanchik is found to be of Turkic origin and means "boy". Moreover, Mokienko noted that the expression of joy in the eyes is Pskov. It turns out that it was found just in Pushkin's places.

Both Mokienko and Sorokin, explaining these and other similar popular phraseological units, pointed out that in many languages the same word refers to the eye pupil and the little man, child, doll. In addition, according to both Mokienko and Sorokin, the word bloody in Pushkin's line can hardly be understood as "bloody", meaning red, the color of blood (although Pushkin also has a hint of the murdered tsarevich). Finally, both Mokienko and Sorokin noticed that the word boy was born in the sphere of folk speech, and only from the XVIII century it gradually began to penetrate into book usage, still retaining the "grassroots" style. So under Godunov, the tsarevich would have been called not a boy, but a boy. The inaccuracy of the "Dictionary of the Pushkin Language" in connection with this popular expression has also already been noted by Mokienko and Sorokin.

Interestingly, the theme of" bloody boys " in the eyes leads us into a somewhat unexpected area of long-standing popular beliefs. This is what will be discussed now.

According to popular belief, sorcerers and witches who practiced evil sorcery could be recognized by their eyes. Researcher-ethnographer N. A. Nikitina, summarizing folk ideas, concludes: the sorcerers have "unusual eyes" (Nikitina N. A. On the question of Russian sorcerers / / Collection of the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography, L., 1928. Vol. 7). Still, after all, these goatherds could jinx - that is cast a dangerous spell with your eyes. According to the writer and ethnographer S. V. Maksimov, "it is enough for a strong sorcerer to look with his evil sidelong glance to make him wither" (Maksimov S. V. Impure, unknown and Godly power, St. Petersburg, 1903). Another expert on folk life G. Popov wrote: "According to some Yegoryevsky peasants (Ryazan.

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G.), there are sorcerers who can dry up a person or drive him crazy with a single glance. The same opinion is shared by the Dorogobuzhsky peasants (Smolensk, g.), assuming that people lose weight and get sick from one glance of a sorcerer. "It is only necessary for a sorcerer to blink his eye at a person, and the latter will immediately feel ill," many Gryazovets-Vologda peasants also think so "(Popov G. Russian Folk Medicine, St. Petersburg, 1903).

The most dangerous sorcerers with a particularly venomous look in the Orel province were called viritniki: "According to popular opinion, if a virit-nik gets angry with an entire village and wants to kill it, he can exterminate the whole village, with all the cattle and all the creatures living in it, within one month. Even the birds that will fly through the village at this time, and they fall to the ground dead: this is the power of the viritnik's venomous gaze "(Ibid.). It was said that in the Vladimir province there lived a man named Ermak. Having decided to become a sorcerer, he sold his soul to the devil, writing a receipt in his own blood. And then the devil took out Yermak's eyes and put in other ones: "Now go and spoil who you know" (Novichkova T. A. Russian Demonological Dictionary. St. Petersburg, 1995).

Such is the inside-out plot of the biblical-Pushkin "Prophet". Perhaps that is why it is not uncommon for such villains to be punished by knocking out their eyes. This can be done, for example, like this: "Someone will come to my grandmother, she will throw an engagement ring into a glass of water, say something, and in the water you can see the person who caused the damage. Granny ta says: "Poke her in the eye if you want!" You will come, it will be without an eye" (Mythological stories and legends of the Russian North. St. Petersburg, 1996).

The peculiarity of the sorcerer's eyes is, for example, that they are either bulging, or on the contrary, deep-set, cautiously peeking out from under thick, often fused, eyebrows. Or the witch's eyes look somehow particularly piercing - as much goosebumps on the back. Often these are black eyes. The people said that sorcerers have "wild eyes", that they "burn with a predatory fire, like bloodthirsty animals" (Nikitin. Edict. op.). People noticed that sorcerers and witches, as a rule, try not to look the interlocutor directly in the face, turn their eyes away, look askance, from under their brows. They do not like to look directly into their own eyes: "... When arguing or quarreling with a sorcerer, you should spit in his face and look into his eyes: then he loses his power for a while "(Popov. Edict op. Note 1).

Maximov wrote that sorcerers, they say, "always walk around frowning, without raising their eyes and intimidating with that look from under the brow, which is called the "wolf's gaze"." Elsewhere in his book, Maksimov mentioned the "oblique bearish look" that the sorcerer uses to frighten people (Maksimov. Edict. op.).

According to Dahl, " to squint at someone, to look askance, with displeasure,

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hostile"; "sidelong glance, frown, as a sign of distrust, displeasure"; "to be on skew, nevladakh"; "braid, like a Nightingale-robber, who looked with one eye at Kiev, the other at Chernigov"; kosogorit - "to plot"; kosogorit - "to raise your nose, put on airs"; and kosoy is "hostile" and even (as a noun)- " enemy, devil "(Dal. Edict. soch. Vol. II). The negative semantics of the oblique view, which is the opposite of a clear, open, honest direct view, was also influenced by archaic ideas that a straight line is good and a crooked one is bad (cf. pravda and krivda).

By the way, one of the varieties of corruption sent by sorcerers and witches was called touch, and another touch or touch prayer was called a plot for the good luck of a hunter or fisherman. Scientists have long noticed that Saint Kasyan, whose calendar day-February 29-happens only in a leap year, judging by popular beliefs, was perceived as a sorcerer with an evil, oblique eye. It was this terrible saint that Voronezh peasants remembered with cautious respect even on Thursday at Trinity Week, so that he would not"distort" them (Distance. Edict. soch. Vol. I).

Sorcerers and witches are creatures that live among ordinary people, but are attached to the other world. And anyone who is connected with the "dark light" - both a dead person and an infernal mythological character (like Gogol's Viy) - has special vision. According to N. I. Tolstoy, who studied this issue, "the theme of vision and eyes of the dead is directly related to the theme of seeing and not seeing another world, seeing and not seeing representatives of this world..."(Tolstoy N. I. Language and Folk Culture, Moscow, 1995). B. A. Uspensky suggested that bozhba is a self-curse "Burst my eyes!"in ancient times, it was definitely associated with mythological characters related to the otherworldly, "lower" world, with the so - called opponents of the Thunderer-Volos or Mokos (Uspensky B. A. Philological research in the field of Slavic antiquities, Moscow, 1982). According to South Slavic beliefs, the eyes of the deceased burst in the grave on the 40th day (Slavic Antiquities: Ethnolinguistic Dictionary, vol. I. M., 1995). And the sorcerer Ermak, who had corrupted many people with his devilish eyes, died such an evil death: he mistook the red-hot coals in the furnace for gold, climbed into the furnace and was burned. They pulled him out-but it was too late: "he's black as coal, his eyes burst" (Novichkova. Edict. op.).

Sometimes people said that "the sorcerer has a muddy look" (Zabylin M. Russian people. His customs, rituals, traditions, superstitions and poetry. Moscow, 1880), that he has "some kind of muddy look" (Nikitina. Edict. op.). This mud usually glowed with a reddish tinge: "Belarusians recognize sorcerers by their red eyes" (Zelenin D. K. East Slavic Ethnography, Moscow, 1991); a witch, they say, " gives herself out to be unusual

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look: her eyes are reddened, inflamed ... " (Slavic Antiquities). In the reddened eyes of sorcerers and witches, superstitious people noticed the reflections of fire-it must be infernal: "the eyes often burn like fire" (Russian witchcraft, witchcraft, medicine).: Sbornik. SPb., 1994); "fiery streams" flash in their eyes (Novichkova. Edict. op.). "Who has trickles in his eyes, do not learn from Tovo," said the peasant I. A. Koptyaev. Say, a drunken man suggested it to him once:

"Do you want me to teach you the words?" [incantatory, witchcraft words. - V. K.}. "I looked: in the eyes of such jets. I know it myself, and then I asked him what kind of person he was...": that peasant is indeed, as he was told, a bad one and knows bad people, they are building "windmills" (Russian witchcraft...).

Sometimes it was said that "if you look into the eyes of a sorcerer, then people are reflected upside down in their pupils"; that in the eyes of a witch and a witcher, "angels give up upside down", that is, they seem (Russian witchcraft...). Perhaps this inversion of reflection in the witchcraft pupils is explained by the fact that sorcerers were considered communion to the other world, in which, in comparison with our white light, everything is the opposite, topsy - turvy, inside out, everything is changed, as in a mirror image. By the way, a common trick of sorcerers was to turn a person upside down and hold him there for a while. Yefim, the Vyatka farrier, was walking along with his partner during the haymaking season, and the peasant who was building a vegetable garden said to them reproachfully: "You see, what legostai! People are mowing hay, and you are wandering around." And what happened was this: "Yefim read something [that is, muttered-V. K.] - the peasant turned his feet up and stuck his back to the vegetable garden, shouted." Yefim then released him. Such" difficult"," knowledgeable " people are konovals (Vyatka folklore: Mythology. Kotelnich, 1996).

Sometimes, too, two sorcerers would have a contest of witchcraft. This usually happened at weddings. One was invited on purpose, so that he, cajoled by the food and general courtesy, would protect the young people and guests from the machinations of other sorcerers who sought to "spoil"the wedding. Then the one whose sorcery was "stronger" could "hang" the opponent. It happened, for example, like this:

"Well," says the other, " now you have a drink from me." He had just finished his drink when he was suspended from the window and ceiling by his feet. Hung from the ceiling with his feet, kicks and shouts like this: "It's hard for me, take me off, I can't take it anymore ""(Mythological stories...). And on the spring holiday of the Annunciation, one could (under certain special conditions) see how "evil spirits ventilate sorcerers hanging upside down in the air" (Sakharov I. P. Tales of the Russian people:

Russian folk warlocks. Russian folk games, riddles, proverbs and parables. St. Petersburg, 1885).

So, sorcerers have cloudy, inflamed, red eyes. Well, that's it.

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not surprising. Koptyaev's story was about a drunken sorcerer who had "such jets"in his eyes. The sorcerer really, according to popular belief, "always likes to drink" (Zabylin. Edict. op.), and usually builds his own intrigues only by taking a sip of hot water. Here are two recordings made in the Vyatka Region quite recently, but the connection of witchcraft (already quite curious) with drinking is also obvious in them.

"His grandfather had a bottle, and he said there were twelve devils in it. He used to say to his friends:"put on a quarter of the moonshine, and I'll show you the devils." And indeed, devils danced on the table "(Vyatka folklore); " Drunk men somehow gathered, got drunk, argued. One of them says: "Do you want me to show you a goblin?" I only had time to say, the windows, doors, golbets-everything was opened, and a whirlwind passed through the hut, everything turned upside down, fell down " (Ibid.).

In such unusual-looking, reddish eyes, either there was no reflection at all, or the reflection seemed to be double or inverted. Here is the opinion of the peasants of the Vladimir province: "In appearance, the sorcerer does not differ from ordinary people, only in the pupils he does not reflect objects of the outside world (women call the eyes of the sorcerer empty, "without boys")" (Life of Great Russian peasants-farmers). So, the eyes of sorcerers can be without boys.

The sorcerer had supernatural helpers in his evil deeds. They couldn't stay out of work, even if it was pointless. Otherwise, they began to torment the sorcerer himself. Tom had to constantly ask them work, which they did with lightning speed. Therefore, the sorcerer chose their cases with intent: to count sand, to measure reservoirs, to count stumps in the forest or branches on tall trees. If the branches are crossed, if the tree is cut down with a prayer , they will lose count and start all over again. Koptyaev's story, already quoted, dealt with windmills - this is also one of these tasks. The windmill has criss-cross wings: "if they put the top of the windmill, everything will fly apart" (Russian witchcraft...).

Outsiders, it happened, saw instead of the sorcerer's assistants some small animals or sticks and straws, and only to the sorcerer they appeared in their true form. M. Zabylin wrote about this as follows: "They say that the demons who serve a person and fall under his power do not have the appearance of satyrs, as they are painted on the lubochnye pictures, or black murins, terrible Ethiopians, but that they appear to the sorcerer in the form of small men "(Zabylin. Edict. op.). They were called differently. Ordinary peasants talked about devils, demons, and evil spirits. Sometimes in the Russian North they were called little ones, employees, soldiers, cones (Mythological stories...). And the sorcerers themselves called them this: they, boys, comrades, khokhliks (Nikitina. Edict. op.). Among these names, there are simply dialect names for devils and other evil spirits, and there are also

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words that indicate the small size of these helpers. It turns out that the sorcerers might not have boys in their eyes, but they swarmed and swarmed with such little imps - "little" or "boys".

According to Dolgushev's correct remark, the expression of joy in the eyes can be put in a synonym row with idioms to green emiya, to devils, to delirium tremens, to catch devils with a bag. The antonym for these phraseological units is the expression in no eye (eye). So the devils that a drunk sees and the devils-boys in his eyes-are clearly the same breed. Here is a typical example - from the story of Oleg Larin "Prodigal Summer": "I'm paying close attention to the old man. Maybe he's drunk. His eyes are hidden in the folds of wrinkles, in the thickets of thick eyebrows, and at the very bottom, in the faded blue slit, crazy devils jump." And he looks impressive: he has a long, well-groomed beard, "looks like Leo Tolstoy and a robber chieftain at the same time." He, however, is not a "knowledgeable" farrier, like the already mentioned hero of Vyatka bull, but also a rural specialist-inseminating technician. A minute later, everything opened up:"...He's drunk, he's drunk to death, he's drunk to the point of blue; I'm doused with a killer multi-day fume " (Novy Mir, 1998, No. 12). In modern speech, devils jump not only in drunken eyes, but also in the eyes of sly, laughing ones:

"Demons are hiding somewhere - in the corners of these trusting eyes" (Anninsky L. Askar / / Druzhba narodov. 1998. N 12).

Maximov in his book gave a detailed story about the sorcerer resident of the Penza province I. Kablukov. The narrator's father was robbed of money. People advised to seek help from a sorcerer from a nearby village. Came. "We prayed to God and said:' You are living well!" And he looked at us sideways like a timid horse..." The sorcerer was healing a boy, working magic over a pot of water, spitting and muttering. "...And it began to writhe and distort him. And the water in the pot just keeps going, just keeps splashing, and it just keeps mowing down his hair." Then my father begged the sorcerer to help him find the missing money. He first broke down, and then said: "Well, okay, we'll find it, but don't be stingy." "My father took a half-damask out of his pocket and put it on the table. The sorcerer took it, swallowed it right out of his throat three times...". He prepared everything that was needed for sorcery, clenched two wax candles with his teeth "and how he twisted - I almost ran away! "" And the sorcerer meanwhile began to hiss, roar, gnash his teeth like a wolf. And the snout is terrible. My eyes were bloodshot, and I started shouting: "bend him in a spasm, upside down, upside down! Turn it over!.."". Then he stuck his head into the oven - only his legs were left, and well, lowing there, like a cow roars "(Maximov. Edict op. Selected by me. - V. K.).

In this colorful description, many characteristic details are summarized: the sorcerer squints at the newcomers, and during sorcery he also turns his head; before divination, he drinks; his eyes fill up

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blood; his threat to turn the thief upside down; and even in his well-choreographed ecstasy, he climbs into the oven like another sorcerer, Ermak (except that his oven, presumably, is cold). And his eyes were bloodshot from the alcohol, from the frustration, from shouting. Similarly, the contemporary author A. M. Pokrovsky describes a somewhat similar situation in his book of short stories"...Shoot them! "(St. Petersburg, 1998). An old admiral and bitter drunkard nicknamed John-rip out the eye (otherwise-just Petrovich) gave a dressing down to the deputy political instructor, who decided to fight drunkenness on the ship: "The deputy came up and introduced himself. Petrovich looked up at him blearily (...)- So! - said Petrovich, and his eyes began to fill with bad blood (...) At the end of the conversation, Petrovich completely blushed, swelled up like a hose, and screamed ... "He shouted, among other things:" Look me in the eye!.. In the evening Petrovich was given a drink. Petrovich drank and became a soul-man."

These testimonies speak of the peculiarities of the eyes of sorcerers and witches, then of the same features of their pupils. In the 6th issue of Russkaya Rech in 1992, E. D. Golovina wrote: "Light, gray, green, blue... pupils". Golovina drew attention to the fact that in many literary works - from S. Aksakov to F. Gorenstein - the word pupil is found in an unusual and new meaning, which is not marked by explanatory dictionaries: "iris, iris" of the eye. A. F. Zhuravlev's reply was published in the same issue of the magazine. He reasonably remarked that it is unlikely that this meaning of the word "pupil" can be considered new. In general, the essence of his answer came down to the fact that the description of the semantics of a word in explanatory dictionaries is always necessarily simplified. Zhuravlev still agreed that dictionaries should define the word pupil as follows: eye " hole together with the iris bordering it." Golovina's observations and Zhuravlev's explanations were published under the general heading " Two Views on one problem." You can clarify: the picture opens up to these two views is the same, except that it is highlighted more deeply and stereoscopically. The conclusion, obviously, is:

the noun pupil, which is the same root as the words related to looking, looking (zrak, zret, vision), in living Russian speech has long meant the entire organ of vision, that is, the entire eye. Popular accounts of witchcraft eyes confirm this conclusion.

So, Boris Godunov in Pushkin talks about the sufferings of a person with a guilty conscience. The man looks like he's drunk or sick , and the blood-colored boys flash before his eyes. But red eyes or inverted boys in the eyes were, as it turns out, and wizards. In the XVI-XVII centuries, witchcraft and sorcery were very common in Russia. Moreover, sorcerers and witches were often found in the tsar's entourage. Accusations of witchcraft, reprisals against sorcerers

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and it happened to those they served all the time. Under Boris Godunov, several such cases are known. It was said that the rise of Godunov under Tsar Fyodor Ivanovich was ensured by the fact that he collected magi and magicians from different cities, and their "magic and charm create, as the tsar Fyodor Ivanovich velmi loved him". The magi, they say, also predicted to him that he, too, would reign - though only for seven years.

When Tsarevich Dimitri died in Uglich, and the investigation into this case began, among other testimonies, this was recorded: they say that a fool's wife went to Queen Mary, Dimitri's mother, "for fun". After the death of the tsarevich, Marya ordered that woman to find and kill - because she, they say, "spoiled" the tsarevich (that is, harmed him with her witchcraft). This wife lived under the deacon Bityagovsky, who on the day of the death of the tsarevich, relatives of Mary Nagy, inciting the rabble, killed (Afanasyev A. N. Poetic views of the Slavs on nature. Moscow, 1869. Vol. 3). Bityagovsky before his death said that he was dying because he prevented Mikhail Nagy from getting things and things " to the tsarevich To Dimitri". And also, they say, the witch doctor Mochalov lived with the Nagas, who, at their request, divined how much longer the sovereign and empress should live. This Mochalov was found and, chained up, sent to Moscow (Kobrin V. B. To whom are you dangerous, historian? Moscow, 1992). Such is the bizarre interweaving of the political and the magical.

Tsarevich Dimitri constantly had violent epileptic seizures with convulsions and convulsions, during which he raged, rolled on the floor, and bit the hands of people who were trying to stop him. His illness was called "falling sickness"or" black disease". Very reputable historians believe that there was no premeditated murder, and the tsarevich, during another strong fit, grazed himself by the throat with a sharp knife, which he was playing with in the courtyard at that time. It turns out that the tsarevich's illness could be perceived by his relatives as "sent" - that is, as the result of evil witchcraft. But, of course, it hardly follows from all this that Pushkin certainly knew the popular beliefs about witchcraft eyes and hinted at his witchcraft, diabolical machinations with words about bloody boys in the eyes of Boris Godunov.

Kirov

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