Ilya Muromets

Ilya Muromets (Russian: Илья Муромец, Ukrainian: Ілля Муромець), or Ilya of Murom, sometimes Ilya Murometz, is a folk hero of Kievan Rus', a bogatyr (akin to knight-errant) and a character of many bylinas (East Slavic medieval epic poems). In the legends he is often featured alongside fellow bogatyrs Dobrynya Nikitich and Alyosha Popovich.

Although Ilya Muromets's adventures are mostly a matter of epic fiction, he is believed to have a historical prototype: a medieval warrior, and in later life a monk, named Ilya Pechersky. Venerable Ilya Pechersky is beatified as a monastic saint of the Orthodox Church. His relics are preserved in the Kiev Pechersk Lavra.

According to legends, Ilya Muromets, the son of a farmer, was born in a village near Murom. He suffered a serious illness in his youth and was unable to walk until the age of 33. He could only lie on a Russian oven, until he was miraculously healed by two pilgrims. He was then given super-human strength by a dying knight, Svyatogor, and set out to liberate the city of Kiev from Idolishche to serve Prince Vladimir the Fair Sun (Vladimir Krasnoye Solnyshko). Along the way he single-handedly defended the city of Chernihiv from nomadic invasion (possibly by the Polovtsi) and was offered knighthood by the local ruler, but Ilya declined to stay. In the forests of Bryansk he then killed the forest-dwelling monster Nightingale the Robber (Solovei-Razboinik), who murdered travellers with his powerful whistle.

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