Ilya Muromets was from the village of Karacharova, near the city of Murom. At that time, the Finno-Ugrians, the Murom tribe, lived here (it is known that many local Finno-Ugrians still adhere to the faith of their ancestors, and their neighbors — meadow Mari — were never Christians and retained the priesthood).
His name — distorted Finnish Ilmarinen also speaks for the fact that Ilya Muromets was from the Murom tribe. Ilmarinen — is the Finnish Perun, a warrior and blacksmith god, a forger. However, people from Belogorye-Kavkaz could also live in this village — Karachais. For his exorbitant strength, for his military exploits, Ilya Muromets, who lived in the 12th century, was revered by both Slavs and Finno-Ugrians as the embodiment of the Thunderer (Finns — Ilmarinen, Slavs of the Vedic faith — Perun, or Ilm, Christians — of the Prophet Elijah).
In Russian epics about Ilya Muromets, the image of the hero merged with the image of Perun. In essence, these epics completely preserved the lyrics of ancient songs about Perun. People entrusted the person born on this day to conduct a fair and just trial, and they also said: If the first day of the year is cheerful (happy), then the year will be like this (and vice versa)«.
On this day they wondered: they cleaned 12 bulbs of the upper scales, poured a pile of salt on each bulb and put them on the oven overnight. On which onion the salt will moisten overnight, it will be a rainy month. Or they took 12 cups out of the bulbs, poured salt into them and placed them on the window on New Year's Eve. Whether the salt is wet or not, that month will be wet, rainy or dry.
On this day, the Russian Orthodox Church also remembers St. Ilya Muromets, whose relics rest in the catacombs of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra.