Ilya Muromets and Nightingale the Robber

Wonderful stories about the deeds of the extraordinary heroes of epic poems — bogatyrs — were handed down from generation to generation for many centuries in ancient Russia. Russian bogatyrs are famous for their incredible strength and patriotism; they always seek to protect their native land and restore justice. These stories used to be so popular that they evolved into a new genre — bylina (a Russian epic). However, stories about bogatyrs are known to and understood by everyone to this day and sometimes they serve as a basis for new fiction.

Ilya Muromets is one of the most popular epic heroes. He is a symbol of an ideal warrior and bogatyr. Unlike most characters from similar stories, Ilya wasn’t born a hero. On the contrary, he was born in a typical village to a peasant family and was disabled from birth, spending thirty years on a Russian stove, unable to move. When he was healed, however, he also acquired enormous strength, typical of bogatyrs. From that very day, he always strived to use his strength for the benefit of the people. This was why he left his village and went to Kiev — he wanted to serve his country.

His encounter with Nightingale the Robber was his first challenge and his first heroic deed. Nightingale the Robber (Solovei-Razboinik) was a mythical forest-dwelling monster from Russian epic tales who lived on a tree and intimidated people and animals. However, he did not attack, nor did he rob them. He hid in dense wood off the beaten path. His weapon was a deafening and, quite literally, deathly whistle, which made mountains tremble and caused trees to fall. He was especially frightening because he was blocking off the road to Kiev, which used to be the most direct and convenient, but became overgrown and untrodden — until Ilya Muromets needed to travel to Kiev, that is.

Ilya was the only person who was not afraid of the Nightingale’s whistle and fearlessness was precisely what was required to defeat the villain. No fight took place, Ilya simply shot an arrow from his bow. The Nightingale was defeated, though not dead. Ilya took him as a trophy to Kiev, where he showed him to the Prince to prove his strength.

The antagonism between Ilya and Nightingale is emphasized in this three-dimensional mosaic by the choice of materials for the background: what seems like an artificial pile-upof bull quartz crystals in pegmatite, in fact, occurs naturally. The symbol of nature — Nightingale the Robber — is portrayed in a garish shirt made of the same pegmatite (also known as graphic granite).

If we have a closer look at the main protagonist, Ilya Muromets, his time-stained chainmail bearing the evidence of many battles is a showcase of exquisite workmanshipbecause of the hard but extremely fragile nature of hematite (whose name originates from the Greek word for ‘blood’), which in Russian is often referred to as ‘blood stone’.