Editing Shamanism (section)

===Etymology===
[[File:Witsen's Shaman.JPG|thumb|The earliest known depiction of a Siberian shaman, by the Dutch explorer [[Nicolaes Witsen]], 17th century. Witsen called him a "priest of the Devil" and drew clawed feet for the supposed demonic qualities.{{sfn|Hutton|2001|p=32}}]]

The [[Modern English]] word ''shamanism'' derives from the [[Russian language|Russian]] word {{lang|ru|шаман}}, {{Transliteration|ru|ISO|šamán}}, which itself comes from the word {{lang|tuw|samān}} from a [[Tungusic language]]{{sfn|Hutton|2001}} – possibly from the southwestern dialect of the [[Evenki language|Evenki]] spoken by the Sym Evenki peoples,{{sfn|Janhunen|1986|p=97}} or from the [[Manchu language]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Crossley|first=Pamela Kyle|title=The Manchus|publisher=Blackwell Publishers|year=1996|isbn=978-1-55786-560-1|url=https://archive.org/details/manchus00cros}}</ref> The etymology of the word is sometimes connected to the Tungus root {{lang|tuw|sā-}}, meaning "to know".{{sfn|Hoppál|2005|p=15}}{{sfn|Diószegi|1962|p=13}} However, Finnish [[Ethnolinguistics|ethnolinguist]] [[Juha Janhunen]] questions this connection on linguistic grounds: "The possibility cannot be completely rejected, but neither should it be accepted without reservation since the assumed derivational relationship is phonologically irregular (note especially the vowel quantities)."{{sfn|Janhunen|1986|p=98}}

[[Mircea Eliade]] noted that the [[Sanskrit]] word {{lang|sa|श्रमण}}, {{Transliteration|sa|IAST|[[śramaṇa]]}}, designating a wandering monastic or holy figure, has spread to many Central Asian languages along with [[Buddhism]] and could be the ultimate origin of the word shaman.<ref>{{cite book |last=Eliade |first=Mircea |author-link=Mircea Eliade |year=1989 |title=Shamanism |publisher=Arkana Books |page =495}}</ref> The word has been reported in [[Gandhari language|Gandhari]] as {{lang|pgd|ṣamana}}, in [[Tocharian languages|Tocharian A]] as {{lang|xto|ṣāmaṃ}}, in Tocharian B as {{lang|txb|ṣamāne}} and in Chinese as {{lang|zh|沙門}}, {{Transliteration|zh|pinyin|shāmén}}.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Baums |first1=Stefan |last2=Glass |first2=Andrew |title=ṣamana |url=https://gandhari.org/dictionary/1ṣamana |website=gandhari.org |access-date=5 March 2024}}</ref>

The term was adopted by Russians interacting with the indigenous peoples in [[Siberia]]. It is found in the memoirs of the exiled Russian churchman [[Avvakum]].<ref>Written before 1676, first printed in 1861; see {{harvnb|Hutton|2001|p=vii}}.</ref> It was brought to Western Europe twenty years later by the Dutch statesman [[Nicolaes Witsen]], who reported his stay and journeys among the Tungusic- and [[Samoyedic languages|Samoyedic]]-speaking [[Indigenous peoples of Siberia]] in his book ''Noord en Oost Tataryen'' (1692).{{sfn|Hutton|2001|p=32}} [[Adam Brand (explorer)|Adam Brand]], a merchant from [[Lübeck]], published in 1698 his account of a Russian embassy to China; a translation of his book, published the same year, introduced the word ''shaman'' to English speakers.<ref>Adam Brand, ''Driejaarige Reize naar China'', Amsterdam 1698; transl. ''A Journal of an Ambassy'', London 1698; see Laufer B., "Origin of the Word Shaman," ''American Anthropologist,'' 19 (1917): 361–71 and Bremmer J., "Travelling souls? Greek shamanism reconsidered", in Bremmer J.N. (ed.), ''The Rise and Fall of the Afterlife,'' London: Routledge, 2002, pp. 7–40. ([http://theol.eldoc.ub.rug.nl/FILES/root/2002/594/c3.pdf PDF] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131202222218/http://theol.eldoc.ub.rug.nl/FILES/root/2002/594/c3.pdf |date=2013-12-02 }})</ref>

Anthropologist and archeologist Silvia Tomášková argued that by the mid-1600s, many Europeans applied the [[Arabic language|Arabic]] term ''[[shaitan]]'' (meaning "devil") to the non-Christian practices and beliefs of Indigenous peoples beyond the [[Ural Mountains]].{{sfn|Tomášková|2013|pp=76–78, 104–105}} She suggests that ''shaman'' may have entered the various Tungus dialects as a corruption of this term, and then been told to [[Christian missionaries]], explorers, soldiers and colonial administrators with whom the people had increasing contact for centuries.

A female shaman is sometimes called a ''{{vanchor|shamanka}}'', which is not an actual Tungus term but simply ''shaman'' plus the Russian suffix ''{{wikt-lang|ru|-ка|-ka}}'' (for [[Grammatical gender|feminine]] nouns).<ref>{{cite book|last1=Chadwick|first1=Hector Munro|last2=Chadwick|first2=Nora Kershaw|title=The Growth of Literature|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bgq0AAAAIAAJ|year=1968|publisher=The University Press|page=13|quote= The terms ''shaman'' and the [[Russian language|Russianized]] feminine form ''shamanka'', 'shamaness', '[[seeress]]', are in general use to denote any persons of the Native professional class among the heathen [[Siberians]] and [[Tatars]] generally, and there can be no doubt that they have come to be applied to a large number of different classes of people.}}</ref>