What is shamanism? The kam tradition from Siberia to Anatolia
The word “shaman” is used very broadly today, for everyone from healers in the Amazon to weekend workshops. Yet the word has an origin and the concept a particular geography. In this article we look at what shamanism is, at the “kam” tradition of the Turks and at the ties this tradition has with plants.
Origin and meaning of the word
Shamanism is a religious phenomenon centred on a person, the shaman, who is believed to gain power through trance or ecstasy. The shaman is believed to heal illness, to communicate with the spirit world and often to guide the souls of the dead to that world [1].
The word comes from the Tungusic languages of Siberia. A link with the Sanskrit “śramaṇa” (ascetic) has also been proposed, though some researchers reject it [2].
The kam among the Turks
In Altai and Tatar the shaman is called “kam”. The word appears in Old Uyghur texts, in the Kutadgu Bilig and in the Codex Cumanicus [2]. One of the most comprehensive Turkish-language studies of shamanism in the Turkic world is Abdülkadir İnan’s Tarihte ve Bugün Şamanizm (Shamanism in History and Today), published in 1954 [3].
In the shamanist world view the universe is usually divided into three layers: sky, earth and underworld. Among the Altai the benevolent sky being is Ülgen, and the evil ruler of the underworld is Erlik Khan [2].
Drum and tree: the road to the sky
The kam’s most important instrument is the drum. Among the Altai the drum, called “tüngür” or “çaluu”, is made after the call to become a kam has been received; its frame is of birch or cedar chosen from untouched forest. The sun, the moon, animals and trees are painted on its face; Altai drums also show the horse that carries the kam to the sky [2].
In this world the tree is not merely a material but a road. In the Altai horse sacrifice recorded by the linguist Wilhelm Radloff in 1884 and retold by Mircea Eliade, a young birch with nine steps cut into it is set up in the middle of a newly pitched tent. Climbing the steps one by one, the kam passes through the layers of the sky and reaches the realm of Bay Ülgen [4].
Among the early Turks some trees such as the birch were held sacred; shamanists believed that their ancestors came from trees and that their souls lived in trees [5].
Smoke and plants
In shamanic ceremonies plants are often bound up with smoke. In Kyrgyz, Kazakh and Mongolian shamanism juniper (archa) smoke drives away evil spirits; before ceremonies the place and the people are purified with archa. Mongolian and Siberian peoples also use wormwood (Artemisia) smoke for purification.
In north-eastern Siberia, Koryak, Chukchi and Evenk shamans are recorded as using dried fly agaric to enter trance and journey to the spirit world. This mushroom is poisonous; it appears here only as a cultural record.
Traces that survive in Anatolia
Many Turkic communities lived with shamanism before adopting Buddhism, Manichaeism or Islam. The language historian Zeynep Korkmaz examines how some elements of the old Turkic tree cult continued into the Islamic period [5].
According to Ülkü Gürsoy, tying cloth to the branches of a mulberry tree while making a wish is a custom rooted in old Turkic belief; in the Alevi-Bektashi tradition the mulberry has kept its sanctity and is considered “the soul of the house” [6]. The French Turkologist Irène Mélikoff also drew attention to the shamanic roots of the semah of the Forty in Anatolian Alevism [2].
The syrian rue hung at the door, the seeds burned on the hearth and the cloth tied to a tree mostly live on today as “custom”; their roots reach thousands of kilometres east, to the steppe and the taiga.
A note
Shamanism is not a single religion but a common name for many similar local traditions. On Bitki Tabanı these traditions are described as a cultural record, with the names of the communities that keep them alive and with sources; they are not recommendations for ritual use.
Plants in this article
Sources
- Encyclopaedia Britannica: Shamanism
- Harun Güngör, "Şamanizm", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, 2010
- Abdülkadir İnan, Tarihte ve Bugün Şamanizm, Ankara, 1954
- Mircea Eliade, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy (Radloff 1884'ten aktararak), s. 190-197
- Zeynep Korkmaz, "Eski Türklerdeki Ağaç Kültünün İslami Devirlerdeki Devamı", Türk Dili Araştırmaları Yıllığı Belleten 51(1), 2003
- Ülkü Gürsoy, "Türk Kültüründe Ağaç Kültü ve Dut Ağacı", Türk Kültürü ve Hacı Bektaş Veli Araştırma Dergisi 61, 2013
- İlker Türkmen, "Doğayla Özdeşleşen Şamanizm'de Şifacılık Kültürü", Lokman Hekim Dergisi Cilt 15 Sayı 2, Mayıs 2025