Nikita the Tanner

Estimated reading time: 1 minute, 29 seconds

Nikita the Tanner, Nikita Kozhemyaka (Russian: Никита Кожемяка) or Mykyta Kozhumyaka (Ukrainian: Мики́та Кожум’я́ка), is an East Slavic folk hero (bogatyr), a character from a legend. In some sources he is called Kyrylo the Tanner (Ukrainian: Кирило Кожум’я́ка) (Russian: Кирилл Кожемяка) or Elijah the Tailor (Russian: Илья Швец, Ukrainian: Ілля Швець). The oldest prototype on it could be found in Laurentian Chronicle.

The legend

A wood engraving of Nikita

The fairy tale of Nikita tells that a dragon, Zmey Gorynych, used to attack the lands of Rus and take beautiful girls as prisoners. One day he even kidnapped the daughter of the Kievan prince. To find out the dragon’s weakness, the woman pretended to fall in love him. Gorynych revealed her there’s only one person in the world that can defeat him: a tanner from Kiev, Nikita. The princess told these news to her pigeon, who alerted her father, the prince. The prince went to the tanner’s house to ask for help. It took the prince a while to persuade Nikita into fighting, and the bogatyr refused the wealth and power that the prince offered him. Eventually, the prince gathered hundreds of children in front of Nikita’s house, and they begged the bogatyr to save them from Gorynych’s attacks. Only then Nikita agreed to fight.

Nikita then went to Gorynych’s lair, and, after a long fight, had the dragon heavily beaten with his heavy wooden club. Frightened, the dragon offered Nikita to become allies and rule the world together. Nikita demanded that they plow the border of their halves of the world, then used the dragon instead of a plowing horse. After they plowed the furrow across the whole world, Nikita demanded that they plow further to divide the sea as well. The foolish Gorynych obeyed and drowned in the ocean.


He has been interested in the paranormal since he was 11yrs old. He has had many experiences with both ghosts and UFO's and it has just solidified his beliefs. He set up this site to catalogue as much information about the paranormal in one location. He is the oldest of three and moved from the UK to the USA in 2001.