Čimarii Jüla

Čimarii Jüla is followed by the Mari, a Volga Finnic people. It is henotheistic: most deities are seen as manifestations of the supreme god Kugu Yumo, creator of the laws of the universe. Next to him stands Keremet, the ambiguous lord of the earth and of water, who records human misdeeds and punishes them.

Worship took place in sacred groves or at home, led by a family elder or a kart, a priest. In autumn a goose was sacrificed in thanks for the harvest.

In the sixteenth century their land lay between Russia and the Kazan Khanate, and passed under Russian control in the wars that ended with the fall of Kazan in 1552. The Mari were nominally baptised but kept their old rites, and some fled to Bashkiria to escape baptism.