Tales of Ukrainian Bigfoot and Other Hominids

The Carpathians, the oldest mountains on Earth, are considered the traditional habitat of strange animals in Ukraine. Covered with legends, from time immemorial they were considered nests of evil spirits. Some Ukrainian humanoid cryptids are of a more sinister, macabre variety than those in the West and Asia, except for Japan. That country has its own macabre cryptids and mythology. Let me introduce you to the setting, the background of where the Ukraine cryptids, those elusive relic hominids, roam.

The large-scale primeval and old-growth forests of the Ukrainian Carpathians are unique in Europe. These mountainous landscapes are of outstanding beauty. They represent functioning natural ecosystems that are inhabited by incredible wildlife and offer irreplaceable services to us humans. They provide fresh water, clean air, and many other ecosystem services. Carpathian Mountains are clipping the country's southwest corner, endowing Ukraine with a region of forested hills, spectacular mountain lakes, fast-flowing rivers and picturesque waterfalls. The Carpathian region in Western Ukraine contrasts hugely with the flatness of the steppes in the Southeast as well as urbanized territories of central and eastern Ukraine. Here rises mountain Hoverla, Ukraine's highest peak (2061 meters).

This is the land of the Gutsuls, Boykos, Lemkos and other native ethnic groups whose colorful folk culture is laced through thin villages stretching lazily along wide valley floors. My wife is also from Transcarpathia, while I am from Kyiv. She tells me how beautiful the mountains are.These are the highest and most picturesque mountain peaks of Ukraine. Carpathian Mountains are the epicenter of Ukraine’s rural folk culture as well as the number one holiday destination for numerous Ukrainians and international travelers. The local peaks are very popular with hikers and skiers, and I am sure, will be even more so after the war of 2022 is over. 

Carpathian Mountains are famous as the motherland of the Gutsul ethnos. These people keep their traditions and have a rich culture. The Gutsuls ethnos is an inseparable part of the Ukrainian ethnos. The fact they are able to live and survive so high in mountains shows the strength of their spirit. For centuries they have been taking the life energy from the wonderful nature, which is able to inspire, attract and enchant. Having seen the grandeur of the white mountain caps and colorful beauty of forests at least once in a life, you are not able to forget it. Here you can breathe freely, and the air is as clean as a crystal. The Gutsuls believe the everyone knows that they are particularly talented. Everything they do by hand is authentic and unusual. The painted eggs, wood and ceramics, embroidery, towels and blankets are famous as artworks. The dishes of the mountain cuisine are famous in Ukraine. Everything in the Carpathians is prepared from organic products according to ancient recipes.

The mountain folklore is an emerald among the gemstones of Ukrainian cultural heritage. Dances, songs, fairy-tales legends and myths are naturally embedded in the pattern of national imagery. And tourist guides in Carpathians will be glad to share a mysterious story with you: “Here the beautiful forest nymphs are attracting the young men in their mortal dance…”. The Gutsuls really know their cryptids. 

So, let us talk about local cryptozoology. I have collected materials from many sources, and want to thank my Ukrainian colleagues, such as the UFODOS organization, for their diligent research.  

It is noteworthy that the peoples inhabiting the Carpathians, in fairy tales and legends, have one common, very curious character, the “Doghead” -- a large shaggy humanoid creature with a dog's head. The character is not evil, but living by its own laws, sometimes very tough. If we add to this predation and the possession of supernatural abilities, in particular, the reincarnation... it is better for a person not to face such a creature. In the villages there are many tales and legends associated with the Doghead. Besides the stories, there are real witnesses who claim to have seen a creature or at least a footprint similar to a that of human or bear. There are dozens of such witnesses from Volhynia and Yaremche. Volhynia  is a historic region in Central and Eastern Europe, between Southeastern Poland, Southeastern Belarus, and Western Ukraine. Yaremche is a city in Nadvirna Raion, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast (province) of Western Ukraine. The city is located at the altitude of around 580 meters above mean sea level. The Doghead, as well as other varieties of humanoid creatures, is an integral attribute of folklore, legends, and beliefs of the Carpathians. 

Let us explore the varieties, then. The classic of Ukrainian literature Mikhail Kotsyubinsky (1864-1913) at one time lived in the Gutsul region (…he loved exotic places). In 1911, he wrote the novel "Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors", dedicating it to the Carpathian hinterland. At first glance, the story looks like a Gutsul fairy tale: about the tragic love story of Ivan and Marichka. At the same time, according to critics, realism and deep philosophical overtones are painted in bright romantic colors.

The writer repeatedly refers to the topic of local beliefs, folklore. Kotsyubinsky described a very interesting creature living in the legends and myths of the Gutsul people. At the same time, he referred to the stories of contemporaries - specific eyewitnesses who met humanoid, hairy creatures...the Chugaister. By all indications, Chugaister is a hominoid occupying a niche somewhere between humans and the rest of the animal world, the notorious Bigfoot.  And the proof of such an extravagant assumption can serve as a vast geography: a humanoid, overgrown with fur creature is known (or even seen) in the wilds of the Amazon, in the Northwest and Northeast of the USA, in Canada, in China, Alaska, the Urals, the Caucasus, Chukotka, Central Asia.

Finally, the Chugaister and the Doghead (there are other relic hominids roaming Ukraine, too) are clearly the same creature for some of the researchers. And yet, the Chugaister and the Doghead are not exactly the same creature.

We will start with the Chugaister. The image of the Chugaister, also known as Forest Man, is known only in the Ukrainian Carpathians; - it is unknown to other Slavs. In the Boyko region (the Boykos are a sub-group of Ukrainians and speak a dialect of Ukrainian language) the creature  is simply called grandfather, and in Transcarpathia ,  person of the night.  Later, I will tell you about his exploits in the Boyko region, where he is referred to as Dido, or Did.

The origin of the name Chugaister is not known for certain. Modern researchers associate this word with "Chuga", "chuganya" (outerwear that is woven so that it has the appearance of a large sheep skin with long hair), or even with the Cossack watchtowers, which were called chugas; and natural channels in the rocks, "chugil".

And the Ukrainian Bigfoot has not been a rare spectacle. In 2003, for example, in the ski resort of Slavsk, in the Carpathian Mountains, a frightened group of tourists ran out of the forest. Here is what one of them recalled, the 32-year-old Maria, who came to the mountains from Lviv.

They decided to take a walk among the fir trees at five o'clock. It was very beautiful and a little dark, just as the sun was setting.  Suddenly, at about a hundred meters, a stocky creature ran across the path. It was covered with thick dark-colored hair and had no clothing. It reached a height of two meters or even more. Maria’s husband and she were scared because they had a five-year-old daughter with them. They grabbed her and almost rolled down the mountain. The pair came to their senses already on the highway , dusty with snow, and happy that they survived. Well, nowadays the couple almost remembers this incident with pleasure: it was an encounter with an unknown being, after all.

The image of" Chugaister " in the imagination of our contemporaries can be discerned from occasional reports that come from the Carpathian Mountains.

"There is no Abominable snowman, because there is no snow," according to the locals, reluctant to discuss the relic hominids. Some of the mountain dwellers are also afraid of, but still speak of wild animals: "there are only wolves in the forest. If a person is alone, and even at night, they will definitely be eaten." This, of course, does not apply to their variety of Bigfoot; on the contrary, they are afraid to remember him, because this can bring trouble. This trait applies only to the Ukrainian version of the monster, the so-called Chugaister or as he is also called, the Guk. The Chugaister is a complicated creature.  From the available sources researched, different qualities are attributed to the cryptid being.

According to some legends, the Chugaister considers human beings as a  sworn enemy.  The cryptid can cast spells. The spell lasts a lifetime, and the victim will never be able to return to normal human existence , nay, he doomed to wander in deserted places, where, moreover, no animal can harm him. 

The Chugaister himself hunts, as mountain folk know, only the Nyavkas, because it feeds on their meat, especially actively, when the moon is full. He hunts the so-called Forest Maidens. Nyavka (also known as Mavka) is a female character from Ukrainian mythology, a soul of a drowned or died unbaptized girl who lives in the woods; the souls of girls who had died unnatural tragic or premature deaths.  According to some Carpathian beliefs and Ukrainian mythology, she looks like a beautiful young girl, but in her back there is a big hole and so her viscera are visible. The Mavkas often appeared in the form of beautiful young girls who enticed and lured young men into the woods, where they "tickled" them to death. Described as a long-haired person, sometimes naked in appaearance, who may be dangerous to young men. 

The Mavkas had no reflection in water, did not cast shadows, and had "no back", meaning that their insides could be seen. But those were more often called "Nyavka" and they were believed to live in Western Ukraine, which has more dangerous mountain rivers than Central Ukraine, while the Mavkas, who were believed to live in Central Ukraine, had their backs intact. And  they were the main food source for the Ukrainian bigfoot. But here is something to add to the complexity: the Chugaister cryptids according to some accounts, also helped farmers by looking after the cattle and driving out wild animals. But not all farmers, just the poor ones. 

And there is more. Occasionally, having accidentally encountered a person, the Chugaister invited him or her  to dance (he would offer  the invitation in the in human language); and  after the dance,  the cryptid would let the human go away without any problems.

Although a person would be exhausted after active dancing with the Ukrainian Bigfoot, the Chugaister is usually considered a good creature. So, you see, there are different attributes to the creature from different sources.  Reportedly, the creature is even attributed the ability to predict. The Chugaister, reportedly, also has hypnotic power: when meeting him, a person cannot move. What if there are several subspecies of the Ukrainian snowman Chugaister? 

As for the image of the "Chugaister " in the imagination of contemporaries, I will talk about it later.  Let me just add that the day after the adventure in the forest, Maria's husband, Arthur, returned to the place of the encounter with the strange creature. Not far from the path, he found a trail, a footpath probably made by the Chugaister. Since it was snowing at night, even such uncertain evidence can be considered a valuable find. "At least now I've learned from my own experience that the world isn't limited to what everyone has seen. There are some things that make us stronger, " said Arthur, embarking on a night mountain tour. 

There are almost no scientific publications about the shaggy forest Carpathian giant Chugaister except for two or three records of folklorists, which were published in various "ethnographic collections" and in the "The Gutsul region" book of V. Shukhevych. From here, the Chugaister migrated to the story of Mikhail Kotsyubinsky "Shadows of forgotten ancestors" and gained considerable popularity among Ukrainians.

Let’s continue with available descriptions of the cryptid. According to the Gutsul legends, the Chugaister is a whitehaired or black-haired giant, can be from two to seven meters in height, or "as tall as a fir tree and looks like a bear", but does not freeze and does not fall into hibernation, is not afraid of the cold, has a long beard, blue eyes, sleeps curled up in a ball somewhere in the thickets, or in dry leaves or brushwood.

As you can see, the image of Chugaister quite neatly coincides with the legendary myths about the "Abominable Snowman", which is found in the high-altitude and forest regions of the Earth. In the Himalayas, it is called "Yeti", in the North Caucasus the  "Almasti", in Siberia , "the Marked One", in India the "Rakshasi", in Greece the "Faun"; and more of such creatures in Eurasia, and in the Arctic Russia.

 In 1921, the existence of the" shaggy giant " was reported to the world by Charles Kenneth Howard-Bury, a famous mountaineer who led an expedition to Mount Everest. According to him, the size of the creature's foot seemed to be 37 centimeters in length and 16 centimeters in width (approximately the same "traces" are hollowed out on Pisany and other famous stones or rocks in the Carpathian Mountains ), and the height of the creature- about 220 centimeters. Later I will tell you about the Pysany stone. 

According to legend, the Chugaister, like the Yeti, is extremely fast, if running and on two legs can get ahead of the adult female horse. It is not surprising that some ethnographers associated him with the patron saint of the winds Stribog, as indicated by the very root "str". In folk demonology, a Chugaister is a guardian of a person far from home , whether the person is in the forest, or in the mountain valleys. He is the protector of shepherds and loggers. He monitors the forest maidens Nyavkas and Mavkas), previously mentioned, who distract the male mountain folk, lure them into the wilds and destroy them. When the Chugaister sees one of the forest maidens, he will grab it, tear it in two, and eat it. 

Loggers, when cooking food, always left a little of the local dishes for Chugaister, placing  the food on a high beam in their hut. They believed that he would be able to get the food  out of there, because the creature was tall. When in the evening they returned to the hut, and they did not find food, they were happy, they could sleep in peace: the Chugaister came, therefore, there were no more Nyavkas or Mavkas in that place. The Chugaister grazed his goats in the open areas, in the valleys, together with the goats of the impoverished local people. His power over the animals was so great that they would perform small  tasks for him: Chugaister even sent a fox or wolf  to fetch water. 

Let’s talk in more detail about another cryptid that the Chugaister had interactions with. The Povitrulyas differ from other female mythological characters (the Navkas and Myavkas, the  mermaids) because they can fly and have power over the winds. They presented an ambivalent image. It is believed that Povitrulyas treated young men of unclean conscience with contempt and tore them to pieces. In some mythological stories of Transcarpathia, the image of friendly Povitrulyas sometimes appears. They are projections of the light goddess; shepherds fall in love with them and stay with them in the mountains. In the following story, the Povitrulyas was depicted differently.

In the Boyko region, the name of the Chugaister was somewhat forgotten. Here it is simply called Dido or Did, grandfather in Ukrainian, a pleasant, melodic language. It is Dido in one of the Carpathian stories who saves the young man from the Povitrulya and takes him out of the thick forest. It began when the young man went to pick mushrooms and the night caught him in the wilds. So, he decided to build a fire and spend the night until morning. Then, at about twelve o'clock, the wind appeared, and a ball rolled before his eyes. He looked back and saw the Dido behind him. The Dido asked the young man something incomprehensible and ran on after that ball.  The Dido returned in a few minutes. The man noticed that it was  a Povitrulya in the grandfather's hands. And the Dido-the grandfather- put it on a spit, baked it over the fire, ate it and asked for tobacco. The young man gave him some of the 'tyutyun’ (Ukrainian for tobacco). The Dido began to ask him what and how he got into that forest. And  the Ukrainian Bigfoot added: "you are lucky that I saw you, otherwise you would not have lived to see the morning, as you'd been lured into the woods by the Povitrulya. Now get ready, I'll take you out on the road." The young man followed that Dido and found himself not far from home.

The town of Kozova is located in the Ternopil Oblast, which is in the western parts of the Ukraine. The area that Kozova is situated in part of a historical region called Galicia, which is divided between Ukraine and Poland. Kozova lies near to a river called Koropets, which later forms a lake. Verkhovyna is located in the Gutsul region of the Carpathian Mountains called Pokuttya, upon the Cheremosh River, a tributary of the Prut. Verkhovyna is currently an important tourist center in Ukraine. The town's name means "highland place."

From Kozova to Verkhovyna, there are still legends about a Forest Man, tall and covered with thick hair. He seems to graze wild animals, likes to "whistle through the forest", bask near the fire laid out by shepherds and woodcutters. It does not harm anyone, and on the contrary, it destroys all evil spirits. But there are other forest creatures in the mountains. Let’s look at the Doghead. Unlike the Chugaister, the dog-headed man is an ogre who lures reckless  humans into traps and subsequently prepares food from them. Collectors of ethnographic material claim that there is even an official document that says about the encounter of two brothers with a dog-headed man. The guys, although scared, were not at a loss: they cut off the monster's dog head and brought it to the village. The account of the story noted that  local authorities drew up an official report based on the interrogation of the brothers.

Now, let us  look at the mysterious stones. 

The Pysany Stone got its name from petroglyphs, the oldest of which dates back to the time of Kievan Rus. According to some assumptions, in the past there was a pagan temple on the rocks. The remains of the temple are considered to be nine round recesses-bowls, which are cut into the stone. On the inner walls of individual depressions, there are clear traces of hollowing out with some sharp object. The bottom of some of them has signs of burnt stone. Between and around the" bowls " there are more than 30 symbolic drawings, or petroglyphs.

The Legend Of The Painted Stone tells the following narrative: 

"For a very long time, the surrounding mountains were inhabited by the tribes of the Carpathians, who gave the name to the Carpathian Mountains. They were giant humans, like mythical Titans, endowed with extraordinary power. So, they rolled these stones here to perpetuate the memory of their stay here, buried their treasures and covered them with stones. Since then, people have been coming here to worship the powerful spirit of their ancestors, who from Verkhovyna spread all over the world and became the founders of famous families and tribes, royal dynasties."

And now let us see what the classic of Ukrainian literature Mikhail Kotsyubinsky who repeatedly refers to the topic of local beliefs, folklore, told us about the cryptids:

"... When Ivan was seven years old, he already looked at the world differently. He already knew a lot... He knew that evil spirits rule the world, that the Aridnyk (evil spirit) rules everything, that the forests are full of foresters who graze their margin there: deer, hares, fawn, that a cheerful Chugaister wanders there, who will immediately ask for a merry dance; that a vociferous tree lives in the forest. Higher up, on the waterless wild tops of the mountains, the Nyavkas breed their endless dances, and the Shcheznyk (evil forest spirit in Ukrainian mythology) hides in the rocks..."

A special place in Kotsyubinsky's story is occupied by Chugaister, a forester who protects people from evil spirits. It is described in detail in the ending:

"... A man came out of the forest. He was naked. Soft dark hair covered his entire body and the whole face with open round and kind eyes... He folded his furry hands on his huge stomach and approached Ivan. Then Ivan recognized him immediately. It was a cheerful Chugaister, a kind forester who protects people."

One day, as Kotsyubinsky narrates, he went out to Ivan's campfire. He sat down on a stump, shaking off dry leaves from it, and stretched out his legs to the fire. Both were silent. The forest man warmed his hands by the fire and rubbed his round belly with them, and Ivan stubbornly thought about how to make him stay longer. But the Chugaister himself helped. Winking at Ivan with a sly eye, he invited him to a competition dance. "And why not?" - Ivan got up happily. 

Throwing firewood into the fire, looked at the posts, straightened the shirt on himself and got ready for the dance. And the Chugaister had already put his hairy hands on his sides and was stirring wobbling. Ivan stamped on the spot, stuck out his foot, shook his whole body and swam in a light Gutsul dance... In front of him, the Chugaister was ridiculously dodging. He squinted, smacking his lips, shaking his stomach, his legs, overgrown like a bear's, clumsily stamped in one place, bent and unbent. The dance warmed him up.

But even when both felt tired, Ivan decided to continue and played the song he had overheard from Shcheznyk in the forest - and Chugaister, enlivened by the splashes of the song, threw his heels higher again, closed his eyes with pleasure, as if he had forgotten about fatigue. Soon his fur stuck to his body, as if he had just climbed out of the water, saliva trickled down from his mouth, open with the pleasure of movement, he glistened all over with fire, and Ivan continued to give in to the heat with a cheerful game and, as if in unconsciousness, exhaustion and oblivion, beat the trampled firmament of the clearing with his feet, from which they had already flown postols, the simple leather shareware  of the Slavic people.

"That's enough, I can't..." – the Chugaister fell on the grass. Ivan fell next to him.

And then, having pounded the contented round belly, he grunted, smoothed his hair on his chest, the Chugaister began to say goodbye and jumped into the forest.

There have been more recent cases of encounters, but they ended without dancing.  In 1997, in the Transcarpathian newspaper "Orbit", the former editor of the newspaper "Youth of Ukraine" Ilya Ilnitsky, published stories of the Gutsul , and loggers, hunters, tourists, geologists t about the  encounters  of shepherds with strange creatures; and they all give rise to a natural question: does a Yeti live in the Carpathians,  In the backwoods of the highlands?. Then, a notebook of memoirs of the teacher of the Cozy school Eva Guman, a ethnologist, and his former classmate, got into Ilnitsky’s possession. In it he also found mountain dwellers’ stories about their "rendezvous" with the forest monster. This prompted the journalist to "let people know" the account about the possible existence of the Yeti in the Carpathians. Of course, based on the testimony of specific people. There are many such stories of the Gutsul in the archive of Ilya Ilnitsky. "His journalistic mission was to draw the attention of scientists to these facts. Now it's up to them, said the journalist. Meanwhile, after the publication of such unusual stories in the press, these facts were received skeptically by the reader, as evidenced by a large and generous correspondence to the newspaper.

At the same time with critical reviews, new eyewitness stories about enocunters with the creature began to arrive ". Ilnitsky's account  of the possible residence of yeti in the Carpathians was supported by the Chernivtsi journalist Vasily Babukh, who gave his colleague a large archive of new evidence compiled largely from the stories of an old-timer from the village of Ust-Putila, whose name was Haryuk.

The Zaporozhye cryptozoologist Vladislav Kanyuka also heard about the Carpathian Yeti. In the 1980s, he visited Yaremche in order to collect reports about the local bigfoot. Yes, they documented a lot of such stories, but have not obtained any physical evidence of the existence of the Carpathian Bigfoot.

But if there are a lot of stories, they come from independent witnesses and are generally similar in terms of the description of the creature's appearance, then how should such stories be treated? And what if the legendary Doghead from legends and myths passes into the category of real ones?

An elderly teacher living in one of the villages to the north of Yaremche tells a story that happened to her in the late 1940s:

"At that time, after WW2, thr anti-Soviet Ukrainian military forces of Stepan Bandera were operating in the vicinity. The soldiers of the Red Army, together with the "hawks" (local militarized volunteer troops), combed the forests and meadows as best they could. But at night the authority over the area would change hands, people were intimidated and harassed by the bloodshed. And then there were rumors: a Doghead appeared in the mountains. He strangled two sheepdogs and almost scared them to death with the sullen hoarse roar of an old shepherd. The boy, shepherd’s assistant, who saw a huge black creature with an ugly muzzle raised to the sky, remained a stutterer for life.

That teacher was one of the first to join the Soviet rule in the area. She tried not to believe the stories, ridiculing them. Once, when she was riding in a horse-buggy to a neighboring village, she was captured by the Bandera troops. They took her to the mountains, promising terrible reprisals.

In the evening they stopped to rest. And then, out of the blue, the "Hawks" appeared. A firefight ensued; grenades flew. In the confusion, she freed herself and ran down the slope. Someone shouted, "Stop!" and ran after the teacher. Bullets whizzed past. She saw a dark hole of the grotto a little to the side, slipped in there. It was dark in the grotto and there was a pungent smell, as if from wet skins. The chase was rushing nearby. When the frantic pounding of her heart subsided a little, the teacher began to listen. Water was dripping somewhere. Suddenly, a vague shadow of rustling disturbed the dense darkness. Something moved, and she realized that she was not alone in the grotto. The smell became stronger, a pebble hit. Somewhere very close, there was a steady heavy breathing, smelling of rotten meat. Just above her head, two orange dim lights flashed: an unknown creature looked at her point-blank, without blinking. It was very close, a large carcass blacker than darkness loomed a step away from her.  She does not know who pulled her arm, but the teacher stretched out her palm to touch him. There was a hoarse "Boo-oo-oo!", from which the legs gave way. She sank to the floor of the grotto and squeezed her eyes shut.

The teacher did not know how long she sat there. The sounds of shooting were receding, there was no pursuit. Suddenly her sensitive neighbor stirred. Something crunched, a hot shapeless mass rustled past. The creature squeezed into the crevice. The moon was shining outside, and for a moment she saw him. The teacher would never want to see it again, but she will always regret that she would not see it again. The Doghead was both terrifying and otherworldly beautiful. The coat was rather multi-colored, with thick gray hair on a pointy-eared head; deep-set burning eyes and a huge ugly mouth. The upper limbs are long and more like arms than paws. The spirit of countless centuries and legends came from the mighty creature, as if it came from the distant past.

Only the next morning did the teacher venture outside, and soon came across the  armed “Hawks" collecting the wounded and trophies. No one paid attention to the dead "Hawk" with a twisted neck at the foot of a steep cliff. Conversations about the Doghead gradually faded away, he did not reveal himself in any way..."

In 1968, near Poltava, walking through the village on a moonlit starry night, one woman (initials of her name are N.M.) saw a human shape heading towards her from the other end of the village. N.M. stopped, as if wondering who it was coming? And, raising her head, she met the red eyes of a strange creature. His whole body was hairy. There was less hair on the face. Their color was grayish-dirty. The woman compared her hair to wild moss.

They stood there for a while, looking at each other. And the creature, without saying anything, just smacked lips, went on. With great difficulty, the 20-year-old woman tore off her feet rooted to the ground, barely moving them, got home. They already understood from her appearance that something terrible had happened to her.

In the 1980s, ten-year-old Matryona also became a participant in an extraordinary story, this time in the Dnipropetrovsk region. Her parents went to the fair overnight, leaving her at home with her younger siblings. By the evening, the children did not agree on something among themselves and she could not calm them down. And at that moment there was a creaking sound in the hall, as if someone had stumbled down the stairs from the attic. Then the door opened , and an unusual creature appeared in front of the children, like an "an adult man", an yet something "not like that". The face was ugly, but for some reason no one was afraid, everyone just fell silent. He was naked, covered with hair. In his hand he held a piece of dried meat that was hanging in the attic. He went up to each of the kids, tearing off a piece of meat and giving each one a hard time. Then he went out. And when the parents returned the next day, the children were mysteriously silent, but then they talked about what had happened. Parents had no choice but to talk about the household spirit, which should not be afraid.

On February 23,1991, A.S. Tkachuk from the city of Kremenchug, after a shift in a bakery, came home to her one-story house and was about to fall asleep when she felt that someone was squeezing her throat with her hands. Thirty centimeters away from her, she saw a creature with a face "like human, only all hairy”. On the face, near the black eyes, the hair was slightly shorter. She thought it was the devil, but he didn't have horns. She grabbed his hands with my hands. Their hands were short, with human fingers, they were more like hands than paws. They had hair like a monkey, they were warm. The coat color is dark chestnut. It was visible to her a little above the waist. The size of his shoulders corresponded to the size of a child of 5-6 years old. Tkachuk tried to tear his hands away from her throat, but the creature was stronger than the girl. She realized that it was a male being. She couldn't scream because her throat was still constricted. When Tkachuk realized that I would not be able to tear his hands off my throat, she stopped resisting. It immediately released her and disappeared. After that, paralyzed by fear, the young woman could not scream."

So, are there yetis in Ukraine? If the answer is yes, then it's time to make serious adjustments to our meager knowledge of the animal world. And although actual  physical evidence of the Yeti's existence in the Carpathians may not be received soon, the Ukrainian yeti (the Chugaister, the Doghead, the Dido…)  continues to fascinate our imagination and inquisitive minds for a long time.