Mermaid
Eastern Europe

Rusalkas are the Slavic counterpart of the Greek sirens and naiads, often seducing sailors to their doom. The nature of rusalkas varies among folk traditions, but according to ethnologist D.K. Zelenin they all share a common element: they are the restless spirits of the unclean dead. They are usually the ghosts of young women who died a violent or untimely death, either by murder or suicide, before their wedding, especially by drowning. Rusalkas are said to inhabit lakes and rivers. They appear as beautiful young women with long pale green hair and pale skin, suggesting a connection with floating weeds and days spent underwater in faint sunlight. They can be seen after dark, dancing together under the moon and calling out to young men by name, luring them to the water and drowning them. The characterization of rusalkas as both desirable and treacherous is prevalent in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, and was emphasized by nineteenth-century Russian authors. The best-known of the great Czech nationalist composer Antonín Dvořák 's operas is Rusalka.

In Sadko (Russian: Садко), an East Slavic epic, the title character—an adventurer, merchant, and gusli musician from Novgorod —lives for some time in the underwater court of the Sea Tsar and marries his daughter, Chernava, before finally returning home. The tale inspired such works as the poem Sadko by Alexei Tolstoy (1817–75), the opera Sadko composed by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and the painting Sadko by Ilya Repin.
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