Yhyakh — Iakut Summer Festival
Traditional and popular parties · Yakutsk, Russia (Iakutia)
The festival
After seven months of winter, Iakutsk greets the sun that almost no longer sets. Yhyakh — also written Ysyakh — is the saka festival of summer solstice and the renewal of nature, the traditional New Year of the Iakut people. In Us Khatyn, near the capital of Iakutia, an elder in white opens the ceremony by nourishing the fire and spraying the soil of koumys, the fermented mare milk, to bless the assembly.
Then come the great circular osuokhai dance, traditional games and sports, national costumes and cooking competitions. It is the largest ethnic festival of the republic: the light recovered is celebrated together, in circle.
Good to know
Existence, place and period verified at UCLG Observatory Agenda 21 of culture (good practice written by the head of the Iakutsk Culture Department, open and read page): in June, at the summer solstice, Iakutsk holds the national festival "Ysyakh Tuymaady", in Us Khatyn, the largest ethnic festival of Iakutia, with rituals, osuokhai circular dance and rite of the Koumys. Graphies: the file writes "Yhyakh"; sources also write Ysyakh / Yhyakh / 的сыах — variants of transliteration of the same word sakha, reported here without changing the file name. Celebrated throughout the Sakha Republic, the anchor retained is Iakutsk as the file. No date announced 2027: "Ordinary period" end of June. Please note: 21 June is also included as a holiday of the Sakha Republic in the sources consulted in research.