Features of pre-revolutionary recordings of the Yakut epic Olonkho

The article is devoted to the analysis of the initial stage of academic fixation of the Yakut epic art of olonkho in the period from the second half of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century. The study of their primary sources, methods and principles of work is not only of historical but also methodological importance, revealing the process of formation of a scholarly approach to the documentation of the oral tradition. The first steps in this direction were taken in the middle of the 19th century, when representatives of academic science and political exiles who found themselves in Yakutia began the process of translating the oral tradition into written format. This process was accompanied by numerous difficulties, and its effectiveness depended on the principles and methods of recording applied by the collectors. The accuracy and completeness of the fixation of the performed text determined the future scientific value of the Olonkho epic. The purpose of the research was to identify and characterize the methods and principles that were guided by the first folklore collectors in recording and publishing olonkho texts, as well as to evaluate their contribution to the preservation and study of this unique cultural heritage. The objectives of the work include: to determine the role of pioneers in this field (A. F. Middendorf, I. A. Khudyakov), to study the evolution of approaches to transcription and translation of epic texts by E. K. Pekarsky, S. V. Yastremsky and V. N. Vasiliev, as well as the analysis of the participation of literate representatives of the Yakut people (K. G. Orosin, A. P. Afanasiev) in the process of recording the oral tradition. Special attention is paid to the methodological principles that the researchers tried to observe: literal recording from the words of the olonkhohut narrator, preservation of dialectal and linguistic features, refusal of arbitrary literary corrections. The practical application of the research is that its results are of fundamental importance for modern folklore studies, textology. The analysis of early recordings allows to reconstruct the authentic features of the performance tradition of nineteenth-century olonkhohuts, to understand the evolution of the epic canon and serves as a reliable source base for further research.