Motif of the transformations in Kalmyk fairy tales of the plot type AT 325 “The magician and his pupil”

The article considers the motif of transformation in Kalmyk fairy tales of the plot type «The Magician and His Pupil» (AT 325). In the oral tradition of the Kalmyks, this plot type is productively used as a «frame». In Kalmyk fairy tales, the figure of a pest is widely represented on this plot. Seven great magicians, seven wizard, Bakshi, gelyung and mus act as teachers pursuing a pupil in the fairy tales. In the texts considered, it is seven magicians who teach young men. This number in the Kalmyk mythological tradition is a signal of the borderline state between our and the «other» world. The pupil’s escape from the teacher is motivated: the hero flees from the antagonist-pursuer, trying to save his life by turning into various animals. Among the persecutors, the mus demonstrates his «direct connection with chthonic beings», turning into a golden-haired stallion of the lord of the masters of water - usun hadyn ezen, he reveals his belonging to an «alien» world. Kalmyk fairy tales of the plot type AT 325 “The Magician and his pupil” show a chain of transformations into different animals of the teacher and his pupil. These transformations show the hero’s return from the land of the dead to the land of the living. The locus at which transformations occur is the boundary of the worlds. Water as the boundary of two worlds (in particular, the river, the sea, the ocean) is reflected in the picture of the world of the ancestors of the Kalmyks. In all versions of fairy tales, the sale of a horse together with a bridle turns into trouble for the transformed hero, since the bridle with which the horse was tamed acquired magical power.