Devilskins or Hypocritically Raging: Referring to the Pre-Revolutionary Experience

Abstract

Through an appeal to the experience of pre-revolutionary psychiatry, it is proposed to revise the well-established idea of klikushestvo as a false possession. The article is focused on the analysis of the most substantial of all prerevolutionary researches of the topic — monograph by n. V. Krainsky «Evil Eye, Klikushi and Possession as Phenomena of Russian Folk Life». Through the comparison of Krainsky’s work with the works of his contemporaries (A. A. Tokarsky, M. P. Nikitin, M. Y. Lakhtin, V. S. Yakovenko, A. D. Kotsovsky), the originality of his ideas is shown. The article examines Krainsky’s theory in a historical and cultural context, it is shown that the background for its development was the ideas about induced psychosis developed by S. I. Sternberg, V. I. Yakovenko, V. M. Bekhterev and the hysterical concept of neurosis by J.-M. Charcot. A detailed analysis of Krainsky’s research has been carried out and it is proved that he created the original concept of klikushestvo as a social disorder not related to epilepsy and hysteria, Krainsky explains klikushi’s seizures with extreme suggestibility of the psyche. Krainsky’s concept is compared with classical Western studies of possession (T. Osterreich, I. Lewis), it is shown that he managed to anticipate their ideas. It is concluded that if we follow Krainsky’s logic about the extreme force with which patterns of behavior of the possessed are fixed in people attending public exorcisms, then it is necessary to limit as much as possible the circle of whose who can participate in such events.