Musicology Annotation << Back The Birth of the Image of a Horse and the Cultural Complexes of the Myth: Overtext. Semantics. Symbolism. Space. Time. (on the Example of the Shapsug Song for the Treatment of Smallpox ShjorekI Ored «Bedzhaner Sekube …» (Badzhana Maned…)) Gucheva Andzhela V. The article discusses the music that voiced the myth as a specific way of seeing the world, with the help of which people realize themselves and the world around them, using a special system of linguistic means. Evidence is given that the archaic musical picture of the world expresses a system of knowledge and understanding about the world, nature and man. On the example of the Shapsug song for the treatment of smallpox smallpox «Bedzhaner sekube...» (Badzhana is maned), the problem of the presence of the image of the mighty horse of the lord of smallpox – Badzhana, which appears in the musical picture of the world as a symbol of the forces of Nature and the world of the deities of myth, is considered. As our study has shown, the archaic text of the song is notable for its integrity and is considered to be an interpolation of the earliest layers of the tradition dedicated to the presentation of mythological information of various kinds: the original melody illustrating various rhythmic and intonational lexemes, as well as a original poetic text that contains many «connections-systems» affecting such lexemes as «Earthly» – «Divine», «Horse» – «Plant symbolism», «Horse» – «Element», «Space» – «Time», «Sky» – «Earth» and etc. The content aspect of the performance of the song-plot during the ritual of treating a patient with smallpox chapsh is considered, we also found common motives and plots that can be interpreted differently based on the context. The difficulties in interpreting these contradictory versions are due to the lack of consensus among specialists, and in some cases the lack of principles of semantic and symbolic nomination of the basic concepts of myth and their semantic motivations in their works. In turn, we identified several incarnations of the song-conspiracy, which stimulated the constitution of the musical picture of the world: a) song – knowledge of the world and nature; b) the song is life; c) song – sacred death; d) song – physical death; e) song – an intermediate state of expectation; f) the song is a way to escape into the sacred; g) song – praising the power of deities; h) song – praising smallpox, etc. Songs-conspiracies for the treatment of smallpox is an immense world full of secrets and mysteries. Each sample of this genre opens up new facets in the musical and poetic lyrics of the song. Of course, there are also discoveries, which are an attempt to look at the musical and poetic texts of a song from a new perspective – from the point of view of musical semiotics, as one of the current areas of modern ethnomusicology. Keywords: Circassians, adyghes, smallpox song-plot, Badzhana, Ziuskhan, «connection-systems». DOI: 10.25791/musicology.9.2022.1272 Pp. 13-26.