one of our Zakhchin informants was xuyagīn Bayarmagnai (1917–1992), a per-sonal friend of . Colō, who introduced us to him. He was interviewed by Colō and Birtalan during the first research trip of the Expedition in August 1991. He was interviewed earlier also by other researchers, such as Ch. Bawden,6 G. Cerenxand and G. Batnasan.7 He performed three epics (oir., Khal. tūl'), several folksongs (dūn, Khal. dū), aetiological myths (domg, Khal. domog), tales (ülgr, Khal. ülger), shared with us a lot information on the Zakhchin folk belief-system, customs, traditions in forms of short utterances on the prohibitions of the everyday life called “taboo” (oir. nügl/nǖl, Khal. cēr) and longer narratives (cf. Khal. xūč yaria).
While working on the texts recorded from him and preparing one of his epics (Ǖln Tiw) to be published I summarised the main events of his life as follows:8
“xuyagīn Bayarmagnai was born in mankhan in 1917 (the year of the horse) and was living in Khowd town when we met him in August and September 1991.
The next time we visited Khowd again in 1992, he had already passed away, so the materials we could record from him are the last ones… He and his elder brother xuyagīn Wangir were skilled bards among the Zakhchins in mankhan. Ch. Bawden also interviewed xuyagīn Waŋgir, whom he calls Gongor in his account, in 1967 in mankhan sum. Ch. Bawden introduced Wangir’s performing skills in his article dedicated to the performance of mongolian epics.9 xuyagīn Wangir was the per-former of the well-known allegoric heroic epic, Xorin dörwön salā ewertei uxā dönön buga [The four-year-old, light red deer, with antlers of twenty four branches].”10 Bayarmagnai was born in mankhan (at the beginning of the century the ter-ritory belonged to tögrög administrative unit) on the spring camp of his family, at the river tögrög in 1917. As he
explained to us, he used to be a very timid child, afraid of stran-gers and even of adults. When he was 18, he started his military services, and in the middle of
6 Bawden 1979.
7 Čulūn 2011: 152–154.
8 Fragments from my article with some additional notes, and to some extent modified transcription cf. Birtalan 2004.
9 Bawden 1979: 42–43.
10 Published by Katū 1991: 136–144. Bayarmagnai in Khowd, 1991 August (with . Colō) 93
the 1930s he served far from the oirad territory, in the contemporary Dornod dis-trict (Eastern mongolia). His military service lasted more than five years; meanwhile he could visit his homeland once, when he got married.
He took part also in the battle at Khalkhin gol (xalxīn gol) in 1939. After his final return, he worked as a party leader in his collective (Bayasgalant am'dralīn negdel “Collective named Joyful life”),11 although he was not a real member of the Revolutionary Party. This paradoxical situation caught someone’s eyes and he was sent to a vet-erinary hospital to work there. When his wife fell ill, and she needed continuous medical attendance, they moved to Khowd town, where he worked as a night-watchman. Six children were born to his wife, six sons, and three of them were alive at the beginning of the nineties. Besides his jobs, he lived on livestock herd-ing, and as he explained to us, also on cultivating land and sometimes hunting.
Bayarmagnai told us that he learned his epics from his father, who used to calm him reciting heroic epic. He was the youngest son (otgn xǖ bǟsn)12 in the family and his father recited to him epics (tūl' xǟlaǰ bǟsn) as a cradle-song.13 Bawden also remarked about Wangir (Bayarmagnai’s brother) that he learned the heroic epics from his parents “Like tsevēnaravdan, he had learned his epics, in his case from his parents though he claimed to have made his own melody. As for the practical use of his skill, he used his epics to rock his children to sleep, as his parents had done with him.”14 Bayarmagnai performed for us two heroic epics: besides the Ǖln Tiw, also a version of Ejn tengr xān [Lord Heaven khan]. … He knew fragments of the text of another oirad epic, the Carig cagān ing [The robust white camel cow], and performed to us his prosaic variant with some rhyming parts.15
11 on the activity of the Collective and its members, cf. in detail: Čulūn 2011: 62, 70, 146, passim.
12 If it is not indicated, the terms are quoted from Bayarmagnai’s Zakhchin dialect.
13 According to Katū (Katū calls him Bayarsaixan in his book) he learned the epics from a bard called
anǰā (Katū 1991: 25).
14 Bawden 1979: 43.
15 Birtalan 2004: 9–10.
Bayarmagnai in Khowd, 1991 August (with Ágnes Birtalan) 94
PECULIArItIES oF BAyArmAGNAI’S ZAkHCHIN DIALECt
Bayarmagnai’s language usage in folklore texts as well as in everyday conversation was characterised by the peculiarities of the mixed dialects (Khalkhaised oirad) and a strong tendency of talking in Zakhchin (i. e. using the Altai oirad phonetic forms, typical morphs and lexemes). Besides the Khalkhaisation process of Altai oirad dialects, his long stay in the Eastern-mongolian language environment (Dornod district while serving in the army) should be considered as an influen-tial factor upon his original Zakhchin dialect.
In my previous study on the epics Ǖln Tiw I have already summarised the pecu-liarities of Bayarmagnai’s language usage.16 Below the data extracted from that arti-cle are reissued predominantly with examples from the text-corpus of nügl-items.
Concerning phonology, the Dsakhchin palatal k-, -k- (versus Khal. x-, -x-) are well preserved in almost all cases, e. g.: kümün “man, person”, küküddǟn “for her sons”, erektǟ “man, male”, also in front of the i of back vowel words: dakād “again”, alǰ orkād “had killed”. Though the typical oirad spirant z-, -z- (versus Khal. j-, -j-) has been changed for the Khalkha affricate in the text of the epic, e. g.: jandaŋ
“sandal tree”, gajā “outside”, in the texts of the nügls it appeared in most cases, e. g.
zǖn “left, eastern”, zūdukguā “does not bite”. The palatal vowels ö, ü, ȫ, ǖ, are closer to the original oirad pronunciation in most cases, but sometimes he pronounced them more centralised, similarly to Khalkha. The original mongolian diphthongs became long vowels in oirad dialects, and this oirad feature is well preserved in Bayarmagnai’s speech, e. g. bǟdim “is, use to be” (Khal. baidag yum, mong.
bayidaγ yum), seterkǟ “broken” (Khal. seterxī; mong. seterkei), cǟ “tea”, (Khal.
cai, mong. čai). The originally velar vowels became palatalised in the surround-ings of i: bärǖltǟ “with handle” (Khal. bariultai, mong. bariγul-tu ← bari’ul-tu).
The original i in the first syllable preserved its features without breaking: čirlǟd
“shouted and …” (Khal. čarl-, čarlād, mong. čirla-), čidlǟn “his strength” (Khal.
čadlā, mong. čidal-yuγan), nislǟd “knuckled and …” (Khal. nyasla-, mong. nisla-).
The use of unrounded vowels in non-initial syllables after rounded vowels is not consequent, it shows oirad features: orād “entered and …” (Khal. orōd, mong.
oruγad), öwrǟr “with/from horn” (Khal. ewrēr, mong. eber-iyer), dolāγād “licked and …” (Khal. dolōgōd, mong. doliyaγad), nökärtǟn “to her husband” (Khal.
nörxörtȫ, mong. nöker-tegen) and Khal. characteristics as well: orōd “entered and …” (Khal. orōd, mong. oruγad). The mong. and Khal. -g- turns -x- occa-sionally in back vowel words: utxata “having the meaning” (Khal. utagtai, mong.
utqa-tu), asxarna “it flows” (Khal. asgarna, mong. asqaramui).
16 For the language of the epic Ǖln tiw, cf. Birtalan 2004: 13–15.
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morphologically, a typical oirad feature is the use of predicative personal end-ings. Bayarmagnai usually used them in his folklore texts, but in the Ǖln Tiw they only appeared in a few cases: emtǟw “I have remedy” (cf. mong. em-tei bi).
A typical Zakhchin form is the use of -dār as locativus tolxādār “on the hill” (Khal.
tolgoid), orandārān “in his bed” (Khal. orondō) and the adverbium conditionale -ǰim, bolǰim “if [you] are …” (cf. Khal. bolbol, mong. bolbasu).17
There appear some words in typical oirad phonetic forms: āγ “bowl” (Khal.
ayag), büšǖ “Is not [it]?” (cf. Khal. biš-ǖ), īgǟd “doing so and …” (Khal. inge-, ingēd), kokšaŋ “old” (Khal. xögšin), jarātrād “felt upset” (cf. Khal. jarailg-, jarailgād), yāγlāwči “What did you do?” (cf. Khal. yā-, yālā či), yowsār “[he] went for a long time”, yowγn “on foot” (Khal. yaw-, yawsār, yawgan), yūltguā, yūt kǖtguā “without anything” (cf. Khal. yū č ügei), nurγān “her back” (Khal. nurūgā), öwrǟr “with/
from horn”, (Khal. ewrēr), tolxādār “on the hill”, (Khal. tolgoid); and typical oirad words: γarāc “smoke-hole” (Khal. tōno), xǟs, “pot” (Khal. saw), teremtǟ “having walls” (cf. Khal. xanatai), etc.