Kutka

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Kutka is the name of a raven-shaped god of the Itelmen on Kamchatka . On the one hand, as a cultural hero, he is the creator of the world and all things it contains, on the other hand, a trickster figure of ambivalent character.

description

The constitution of the world created by Kutka was felt by the Itelmens to be extremely inadequate; the existence of diseases, volcanoes, floods and the like were considered to be an indication of the creator's restricted state of mind. This was therefore the constant target of curses and insults of all kinds.
Kutka's activities were kept within limits by his very sensible wife Chachy, who intervened in an emergency.

Kutka was first described by the German explorer Georg Wilhelm Steller .

literature

  • Doris Posselt (Ed.): The Great Nordic Expedition from 1733 to 1743. From reports by the explorers Johann Georg Gmelin and Georg Wilhelm Steller. Kiepenheuer, Leipzig and Weimar 1990.

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