Ganina Yama
Ganina Yama is located in the Urals. Along with Ipatiev House in Yekaterinburg, it is most often associated with the fate of the last Russian Emperor Nicholas II and his family in 1918. It is stated that on the night of July 16-17, the Russian Imperial Romanov family and their associates were shot by the Urals revolutionaries in the basement (ground-floor room) of the Ipatiev House. After the execution their bodies were secretly transported to Ganina Yama and thrown into the pit.
A week later, the anti-communist White Army drove the Red Army from the area and launched an investigation into the fate of the eleven victims. No bodies or charred bones were found in Ganina Yama to present them as the ultimate evidence of the crime. The proposed Romanovs remains found in the Porosyonkov log (Piglet’s ravine) in 1991 and 2007 are not recognized by the Russian Orthodox Church, disputing the authenticity of the remains.
Despite the opening of state archives in the post-Soviet years, there is up till now no court sanction found for the execution of the royal family and there is yet no written document found that indicates that Lenin (Head of the Soviet state) instigated the orders.
Either the real Romanovs remains have not been found yet or the family was not murdered in the Ipatiev House in 1918. Surely, it is a multilevel game. Therefore, it would be worth analyzing from different angles. One of them could be the deeper levels of history and toponymy (the study of place names and linguistic origins).
The Romanovs
Surname Romanov, most of the time pronounced in Russian as Ramanov sounds very similar to the Ramayana the second great Sanskrit epics after Mahabharata. The Ramayana contains the story of Rama and incidentally relates the legends of the Solar dynasty, whereas the Mahabharata includes the story of the Kurukshetra War and preserves the traditions of the Lunar dynasty. Interestingly, the red Hammer and Sickle (initially representing the Sun and the Moon) is a Communist symbol that was conceived during the Russian Revolution which dismantled the Romanovs autocracy and led to the rise of the Soviet Union. Red hammer and sickle was used as the emblem of the Soviet Union and of international communism.
Another root of the surname Romanov could be found in ancient Persia or Iran. Ramano was a Zoroastrian supreme deity of Peace and Quiet. The surname Romanov is also related to Rome. In Russian, Rome is Rim, an anagram of the word Mir that is Russian word for peace as the above mentioned Iranian word Ramano. Iran and India related with surname Romanov are the home to one of the world’s oldest civilizations. So is the Urals in Russia and Yekaterinburg being the biggest city of the Urals.
Ganina Yama is a pit of an abandoned mine in the northern outskirt of Yekaterinburg. Ganino is number of settlements in Russia. They are concentrated in the Russian regions which are noted for Sanskrit names of their rivers and places. In Russian, Ganino and Ganina mean the same, i.e. belonging to Ganin. In Sanskrit, “Gaṇin” means “teacher”, “one who has attendants”, etc. Ganin is a surname in Russia whereas in India Ganin is a boy (male) gender name.
In Vedic mythology, Yama is the lord of death. Yama’s farther is the solar deity Surya. In Sanskrit “surya” is the epithet of the gods. Russian has number of rivers and places called Sura. Moreover, Sura is a chapter of the Koran. The Russian Sura River is a major tributary of the Volga River, the traditional symbol of Russian identity. Among the principal confluents of the Sura River is Alatyr River. Alatyr is the legendary stone associated with the altar located in the center of the world. Alatyr Stone is the foundation of the world tree or throne of the world. The Stone is endowed with healing and magical properties. Surya’s wife and mother of Yama is a Hindu goddess Saranyu, whereas Saransk is the capital city of Mordovia in the Central Russia (the Volga basin) at the confluence of the Saranka and Insar Rivers. Moksha is one of the three official languages in Mordovia. The source of the Moksha River is just 110 km. from Saransk. Moska (or Moksha) is the Sanskrit word referring to freedom from ignorance, self-realization and self-knowledge. The distance between the source of the Moksha River and the above mentioned river Sura is about 30 km. Moreover, the Russian name of Moscow, i.e. Moskva is related to the above mentioned Sanskrit term Moska.
In the Rig Veda (one of the world’s oldest religious texts), Yama is mentioned as one who helped humankind find a place to dwell, and gave every individual the power to tread any path to which he or she wants. In Sanskrit, “path” is “gati”. Interestingly, Gat is a settlement and railway station located on the Iset River just 2,5 km. west from Ganina Yama. In Russian, “Gat” also means “path”. Other Russian word for “path” is “put” that is the root of surname Putin. In Sanskrit, “put” means “virtue”, whereas “puta” means “purifying”, “who purifies”, etc. The source of Russian river Yamuga is about 90 km. from the Kremlin. The river crosses twice the federal highway M-10 that connects two Russian capitals, Moscow and Saint-Petersburg. In Sanskrit, the word “gati” has many meanings, including: happiness, way, method of acting, numerous forms of life, course of the soul, etc.
Gani in Sanskrit means “one who is familiar with the sacred writings and the auxiliary sciences”. The notion of auxiliary sciences is closely linked to the history. An auxiliary science serves as a support for history science so that it can achieve its purposes and objectives. Etymology, toponymy, genealogy, law, archaeology, etc. are some auxiliary sciences that provide documentation or sources of analysis.
Gana in Sanskrit means “crowd”, “small body of troops”, “sect in philosophy or religion”, “foot or four instants” (basic metric unit of Vedic poetry). Remarkably, the Four Brothers is the historical name of the spot where pit Ganina Yama is located. Four instants form feet consisting the arya, a popular metre of Sanskrit poetry. The two greatest Sanskrit epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, both deal with the good and the evil within the individual. In Sanskrit, the word “Arya” means “worthy”, “honorable”, “wise”, etc. It refers to a good worthy family man who respects the traditions of his country, who is a good housekeeper and duly performs the rites Yajna, worship in front of a sacred fire.
In 1991 popular Russian poet and writer Vladimir Soloukhin (1924 – 1997) visited Ganina Yama. Soloukhin was a passionate monarchist and wore a finger ring with the image of Nicholas II of Russia. In 1988 Soloukhin initiated the restoration of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow, the main Russian Orthodox Church cathedral that was demolished in 1931 by the order of Stalin. By the way, in Sanskrit, “sthalin” means “possessing any vessel or receptacle”. In 1997 Soloukhin happened to be the first to receive a special burial praying in this new cathedral. He was buried in his birthplace, village Alepino (145 km. from Moscow) whose name fully correlates to the Syrian city Aleppo, one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. In Sanskrit, “alepa” means “alive”, “pure”.
Shuvakish is the name of lake and settlement located in the Yekaterinburg district, 4 km. from Ganina Yama. In Sanskrit, “suvaksas” means “savage”. Synonym of savage is Sanskrit word “ugra”. Ugra is the epithet of deity Shiva. In Sanskrit, Shiva is Siva. Siva is the name of few rivers in Russia in the Ural region. Part of the Northen Urals is also called Ugra (Yugra). The majority of the oil produced in Russia comes from Yugra (Ugra).
The highest point of the Ural Mountains is the Mount Narodnaya (or the People’s Mount) also known as Naroda and Narada. Its name is associated with Narada (Naroda) River at the foothills and the above mentioned sage Narada from early Hindu texts. Narada is the Vedic sage who carries enlightening wisdom and travels to distant worlds and realms of the Universe. Narada is considered the greatest of sages. According to the Indian epic, Narada lived in the north (that is the Urals if looking from India). The Mount Narodnaya related with Hindu sage Narada is the very northern spot on the 60th meridian, around which are located the most sacral places of the Urals. Ganina Yama and Yekaterinburg are also located on this 60th meridian.
The most southern sacral spot placed on the 60th meridian is Arkaim (the Southern Ural steppe) related to the early Aryan civilization as described in the Avesta and Vedas. Arkaim is generally dated to the II-III millennium BCE. It is considered to be an important center of the Indo-Aryan civilization and its consequent migration into India, Iran and Mesopotamia, etc. In Sanskrit, Arka has meanings related to the Sun and knowledge. Ark of the Covenant was given to Moses by God when the Israelites were encamped at the foot of biblical Mount Sinai. The top ocean is also called Arctic. Ancient Samarkand Dwarka have “arka” in their names. It is stated that with Arkaim was connected Zoroaster (Zarathustra), an ancient Iranian prophet whose teachings developed into Zoroastrianism, the dominant religion in Ancient Persia (or Iran, meaning “the land of Aryans”). Major features of Zoroastrianism greatly influenced Judaism, Christianity, and Islam that have shaped the modern world.
Another sacral meridian is the Nile Meridian (or 30th meridian) with Giza (the home of the great pyramids and the Sphinx), Akhetaton (capital of great reformer pharaoh Echnaton), Alexandria (capital of Alexsander the Great), Cairo (capital of Egypt), Constantinople (capital of Constantine the Great), Kiev (Oleg the Prophet made it capital of Rus), and Saint-Petersburg (capital of Peter the Great). Their foundation was always followed by a new loop of development of the civilization.
In the 1980s Shuvakish was known as the place of the largest in the USSR flea market. It was called “cloud” due to the colossal congestion of people. Interestingly, in Hindu mythology the goddess of clouds is the above mentioned Saranyu, wife of Surya and mother of Yama. The market was organized with the permission of Boris Yeltsin (First President of Russia, 1991 — 1999). At that time Ural-born Yeltsin was the Head of Communist Party in the Urals. Also, it was him who had the Ipatiev House (associated with the Russian Emperor Nicholas II and his family) demolished in September 1977.
The water from the lake Shuvakish used to be supplied to the nearby Uralmash (The Ural Heavy Machine Building Plant). The surrounding residential area where workers live is also called Uralmash. In the 1990s, the district was often called the “criminal capital of Russia” due to the emergence of a large organized criminal group ‘Uralmash’, which took control of almost the whole Yekaterinburg and its region.
Between the Lake Shuvakish (1,5 km.) and the settlement Shuvakish (1 km.) there is field known as Porosyonkov log (Piglet’s ravine). It is the place where the so-called remains of the Romanovs where found in 1991 and 2007. Despite the political pressure, the remains are not recognized by the Russian Orthodox Church, questioning the genuineness of the remains. They are unconvinced that the remains are really those of Nicholas II and his family. There are facts confirming that Piglet’s ravine is an attempt to mislead. Also, the very name of the place is associated with pigs and is rather offensive for the Imperial honor.
Strangely, the decision about the authenticity of the remains was taken in 1998 by the Russian government, not by court. The governmental session lasted for three hours and the final decision was unanimous. The meeting was unprecedented in that every member of the cabinet was invited to express an opinion. The cabinet meeting was chaired by First Deputy of the Prime Mistier Boris Nemtsov. It was a sign of the controversial nature of the issue that President of Russia Boris Yeltsin declined to make the decision himself or even to take part in it. Although, he was not normally renowned for indecision and it was him who demolished the Ipatiev House in 1977. Also, it was the same decision of the Russian government to bury the doubtful remains in the Romanov family vault in the Peter and Paul Cathedral in Saint-Petersburg, which is the first and oldest landmark in Saint-Petersburg.
Interestingly, one month after the burial (July 1998) of the controversial remains, happened a big financial crisis in Russia (August 1998). It resulted in the Russian government and the Russian Central Bank devaluing the ruble and defaulting on the domestic debt. A moratorium on repayment of foreign debt was imposed. The financial collapse resulted in a political crisis for Boris Yeltsin.
Interesting is the time of founding of the remains in 1991:
- It happened July 11-13, one month after Boris Yeltsin became the first Russian President (June 12). The official history states that the Romanovs were murdered in the Ipatev House on the night June 16-17, 1918. It was Boris Yeltsin who had the Ipatiev House demolished 1977, carrying out the order of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
- The collapsed Soviet coup in August 1991 in Moscow destabilized the Soviet Union and contributed to both the demise of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Devil’s Hillfort near Ganina Yama
The city of Yekaterinburg stands on the upper reaches of the river Iset. Its source is near the above mentioned Ganina Yama having Sanskrit originated name. Interestingly, Iset is an Ancient Egyptian name, meaning “(She) of the throne”. It was the name of the goddess better known by her Greek name Isis. Moreover, the analogy of the throne is also nearby. Chertovo gorodishche (or Devil’s Hillfort) is a cultish place of majestic cliffs on the mountain top, just 3 km. south of the village Iset and only 8 km. west of Ganina Yama. Devil’s Hillfort is a stone crest 20 meters high, made up of massive towers that rise on a pedestal of granite slabs, which have a volcanic origin and were formed about 300 million years ago. The Urals are the most ancient mountain range in the world, hiding numerous secrets and many traces of past civilizations.
Iset River has a tributary called Sinara River. In the Hebrew Bible, Sinar (Shinar, Sennaar) is the term used the general region of Mesopotamia. The source of the Sinara River is the Sinara Lake. On the shore of this beautiful lake is a closed town Snezhinsk, one of two centers of the Russian nuclear program (the other is Sarov). The most ancient state in Mesopotamia was Sumer. It is known from chronics that Sumer was destroyed by the deadly wind, which could have been the radioactive wind (nuclear fallout) from explosions on Sinai. The Iset River is itself a tributary of the Tobol River. City Tobolsk is a historic capital of Siberia, located at the confluence of the Tobol and Irtysh Rivers, flowing to the Arctic Ocean. From August 1917 to spring 1918, Tobolsk was the place of exile of Nicholas II and his family before their transportation to Yekaterinburg. They lived in Tobolsk in relative luxury in the former house of the Governor-General. The Iset River enters the Tobol River south-east of city Tyumen, also related to the Romanovs. During the World War II, Tyumen was also the place of evocation of the mummified corpse of Lenin, who was the main antagonist of the Romanovs. Tyumen stands on the banks of the Tura River. Like the Iset River, the Tura is a tributary of the Tobol River. The birthplace of Grigori Rasputin (1869 – 1916) is just 10 km. from the confluence of the Tura and Tobol rivers. The village is called Pokrovskoye sited between Tyumen and Tobolsk. Grigori Rasputin was a Russian mystic who befriended the family of Nicholas II and gained considerable influence in late imperial Russia.
The road from Ganina Yama to the nearby head of river Iset and Devil’s Hillfort is via the settlement called Koptyaki. The Koptyaki forest (Ganina Yama) and the Old Koptyaki Road (Porosyonkov log) are associated with alleged burial of the Romanovs corpses. Initially, Koptyaki was populated by the Old-believers, Russian Orthodox Christians who opposed reforming of the Russian Orthodox Church by Patriarch Nikon in the middle of 17th century. The village was founded in 1804 by a resident of Yekaterinburg, Nicholas Koptyaev, who organized here the production of charcoal for the local iron-making plant. Interestingly, the root of name of the settlement and the surname of its founder is Kopt (or Copt) and therefore it correlates to the ethno-religious group Copts in modern Egypt. They constitute the largest Christian community in the Middle East, as well as the largest religious minority in the region, accounting for up to 1/5 of the Egyptian population. The Copts are one of the oldest Christian communities in the Middle East. The Coptic language is the most recent stage of the Egyptian language, which was spoken in ancient Egypt. Its earliest known complete written sentence has been dated to the 3rd millennium BCE. The Coptic or Coptic Egyptian language was spoken in Egypt until at least the 17th century.
Interestingly, even the name of birthplace of Boris Yeltsin, Ural village Butka, bears striking similarity with Indian village Bhutnya (Butnya) in Uttarakhand state (the Himalayas). It is believed that the sage Vyasa scripted the greatest Hindu epic Mahabharata in the state. At that time, present-day Uttarakhand also served as a habitat for Rishis and Sadhus. Uttarakhand state is also the origin of two the most important rivers in Hinduism, the Ganges and the Yamuna, whereas Yamuga River flows in the Moscow region.
In Uttarakhand state is located ancient town Haridwar is a place of intense religious significance for the Hindus. The famous Kumbh Melas festival is held in Haridwar in every twelve years, when the planet Jupiter comes into the sign Aquarius (Kumbha). By the way, Boris Yeltsin was Aquarius. The 1998 Kumbh Mela saw over 80 million pilgrims visiting this holy city. Another famous place in Uttarakhand is Rishikesh, known as ‘Yoga Capital of the World’. The distance from Rishikesh to above mentioned village Bhutnya is ~45 km.
Jim Corbett National Park is the oldest national park of the Indian subcontinent. It includes the Sivalik hills. Siva is also the name of a river north of Ganina Yama. Village Bhutnya is less than 70 km. from the park. At the foothills of Sivalik Hills there is Sukhna Lake created in 1958 by damming the Sukhna Choe, a seasonal stream coming down from the Sivalik hills. Interestingly, Sukhona is the name of Russian river on which stands town Ustyug the Great (Veliky Ustyug), which is the place of spiritual deep of Saint Procopius the Blessed who was the ancestor of the Romanovs Imperial House. He came to Ustyug in the 12th century. On Procopius’ memory day (July 21) the first Romanov tsar Mikhail was crowned as the Russian king in 1613. Today Veliky Ustyug is known as the Russian capital of the Aquarius. Astrologically, the Aquarius is the heaven patron of Russia. The coming Aquarian Age will transform the planet. The only Russian city that has the Aquarius on its coat of arm is Veliky Ustyug.
Village Bhutnya is 1,5 km. from the Himalayan river Alaknanda, one of the two headstreams of the Ganga, the holy river of Hinduism. In hydrology, the Alaknanda is considered the source stream of the Ganges. At Indian village Mana, the Alaknanda meets its tributary the Saraswati River flowing from Mana Pass (Himalayan Mountains pass between India and Tibet).
Sanskrit name ‘Alaknanda’ literally means a young girl. Indian name Alak generally means ‘World’ or ‘Beautiful tresses’. Alakh Niranjan is a term used as a synonym for Creator, and to describe the characteristics of God and the Self, known as the Atman. Alakh means “sightless” and Niranjan means “spotfree”. Niranjan is another name of Lord Siva. The original Sanskrit term Alakhshya means “one that cannot be perceived”.
In Iran, Alak is also the name of a village in Kurdistan Province. In Egypt, Allaqi is the major dry river (250 km.) in the southeastern part of the Eastern Desert of Egypt, draining the area from the hills near the Red Sea to the valley of the Nile. In Russia, Allaki is a cultish place 100 km. south from Yekaterinburg. In Hinduism, Alaka is the splendid home of Kubera, the lord of wealth and half-brother of Ravana from the Ramayana, second greatest Hindu epic. Ramana was the supreme deity of peace in Zoroastrianism.