MOSCOW, July 22. /TASS Correspondent Irina Skalina/. The Pomors, or coast-dwellers, always lived as if on boundaries between worlds - between the sea and the sky, between the river and the forest. The boundaries were expanding as people continued traveling further to the north to explore the unknown. For more information, see the TASS article below.

The Pomors cross

It's not just a navigation sign. Clearly, people used it to indicate a dangerous location, but the cross had several more functions. In case of an accident, where people miraculously escaped a tragedy - the Pomors used to put up a cross, at the same time marking the dangerous location.

"There used to be also a deeper meaning. The Pomors were traveling into the unknown, exploring new lands. They had the concept of the Ecumene - an inhabited, known earth. In that case, the cross became the border line: beyond it was the Russian space, or the Orthodox space as they said, and it was safe to reach that place, while on the other side of it there is the unknown, where evil spirits live: monsters and otherworld energies. Every new cross was pushing that border a little further to the north," said Evgeny Ermolov, managing the Historical and Cultural Heritage Preservation Department at the Russian Arctic National Park.

The missing expedition

The expedition led by Lieutenant Georgy Brusilov on the St. Anna schooner got lost in 1914. Its last confirmed coordinates are the Arctic Ocean, north of the Franz Josef Land Archipelago. Later on, some people said they met Brusilov and Erminia Zhdanko, the only woman on board, in Argentina or in a cafe in Paris or London, and others said that Zhdanko had visited her niece in Leningrad. These are rumors, but anyway this myth that someone from the missing expedition could have survived did exist for a very long time. Polar pilot Mikhail Vodopyanov said they found a woman's shoe during a survey of the Duke of the Abruzzi and the Fiala expeditions' base on the Rudolf Island.

"One day, back in Soviet times, as polar explorers were waiting for the weather to depart, they suddenly saw a sailboat in the sea. They look: a beautiful yacht is passing by, she's beautiful, icy, obviously old, battered, with dilapidated rigging. They rushed to start the engines to catch up with her, but the ship vanished into the fog. When the fog cleared, they couldn't see the yacht, she was gone. Planes took off, circling above the island, but could find nothing. Could it have been the St. Anne, or a mirage, or was it a common madness? Anyway, this is a true story, reflected in a few books," the expert said.

The world boundaries

Going back to the crosses, they even now still mark boundaries of a settlement, like it is in the village of Olema in the Leshukonsky District. Leshukonye is a most inaccessible mainland territory in the Arkhangelsk Region. Crosses near Olema are erected on the so-called cross streams. The locals would go to them even now to request something.

"The cross streams in Olema are located on both sides of the village, they, so to speak, are sacred boundaries of that village. Those are echoes of paganism, and the worship of forest and water under the influence of Christianity. The water in the streams is considered holy and healing. Nowadays, people bring to the crosses vows, depending on what hurts: if it is the head - then a handkerchief, if the foot - then socks, as well as gratitude to God for fulfilled requests - pieces of cloth and towels," Dmitry Fedotov, a native of Olema, told TASS.

On the Solovki Islands, Christian traditions are also mixed with old beliefs. Once, there used to be a cross, which pilgrims literally chewed off because they believed it could heal their toothache. The archipelago is home to the country's only working lighthouse temple. It is located on the Sekirnaya Mountain of the Bolshoy Solovetsky Island. The lighthouse is both a navigation sign and an Orthodox church.

The oldest stone lighthouse in the White Sea is on the Mudyug Island. It was built in 1837. It is called the White Tower, and it still ensures the safe passage of ships to Arkhangelsk. In 1918-1919, foreign invaders damaged the Mudyug's reputation, as back then on the island the foreigners organized a concentration camp, where about 200 people died. Since then, the Mudyug is known as the island of death, though before that, for centuries, it used to be the island of hope.

The White Tower Lighthouse

"In the era of sailing ships, there appeared the first rescue station on the White Sea, as quite often ships sank in the narrow channel of the Northern Dvina near the Mudyug Island due to strong tidal currents and winds. That place near the island is dubbed the White Sea Bermuda Triangle, where more than 60 ships are lying deep in the sand. One of them is the famous Varakhail 54-gun battleship, built in 1749 at the Solombal shipyard in Arkhangelsk," local historian Olga Kuznetsova told TASS.

Pinega witches

The Arkhangelsk Region keeps very many stories related to water. For example, water from the lake around which the village is built may suddenly disappear for no reason. Nowadays, we understand this is due to sinkholes, but previously people believed that was a curse. Arkhangelsk's Pinega is famous for its karst caves.

Psychiatry textbooks devote paragraphs to Pinega's ikotkas. Locals say that ikotka is an evil spirit that may be instilled into a person. During an ikotka attack, the person allegedly speaks in a strange voice, shouts incoherent words, uses dirty language, and nickers.

Not to get lost in labyrinths under northern lights

People are not allowed to walk through the Bolshoy Zayatsky Island labyrinths. They may be only viewed from a distance. In summer, they get covered with moss and grass cushions, and the spirals become fluffy green, is if they are not of stone. Wandering a stone maze is possible on the Bolshoy Solovetsky Island and even in Arkhangelsk. Those maze have been created after the classic Bolshoy Zayatsky labyrinth.

The Northern Lights is a year-round phenomenon. In Arkhangelsk, local fairy tales say, from autumn people start storing flashes for the coming winter, while the aurora is very high. A famous Arkhangelsk storyteller and artist Stepan Pisakhov wrote that heavenly lights were to be pulled off baths or fences to be dried up in bunches so that they could be used in the coming winter - be that for lighting, or to be plaited.

Sea mirages

In the White Sea, like it is in deserts, people can see mirages. Imagine, all of a sudden a forest, or a ship, or an island hangs over the water, at times - even upside down. This is a fata morgana optical phenomenon, where objects are repeatedly reflected in the atmosphere, get distorted and seem to be floating in the air.

"The reason is that several alternating air layers of different densities are developing above the water. These layers create the "atmospheric lenses" effect that bends, reflects and finishes real images," said Maxim Chervyakov, the Geography Department Dean at the Chernyshevsky Saratov State University, head of the of Meteorology and Climatology Department, a member of the Russian Geographical Society.

A ghost and a rainbow

The further to north, the whiter are rainbows in the Arctic. They are accompanied by the Brocken ghost, named after the Brocken Mountain (Germany), where this phenomenon was first described. To form a white rainbow, water droplets must be very tiny. To see the Brocken ghost, look right into the center of a white rainbow.

"This is the observer's shadow on the surface of clouds or fog in the direction opposite to the sun. In the mountains, it happens so when a traveler stands at the top, the sun is shining on his back, and there is fog below. When you move, the "ghost" repeats the movement," said Maxim Chervyakov, who had encountered these phenomena in the Arkhangelsk Region. "In the Arctic seas, lighthouses or the upper decks of a ship play the role of a mountain peak. In summer, when the polar sun is low, while on the ship, you can easily see the Brocken ghost in the fog, and even "dance" with it."