bogatyr, one of a group of heroes of the Russian folk epics known as byliny. The duty of the bogatyrs was to protect the Russian land against foreign invaders, especially the Tatars. The most prominent of the bogatyrs was Ilya of Murom, about whom Nikolay Karamzin wrote the poem “Ilya Muromets” (1795). The word is from the Russian bogatyr, “hero or warrior.”