The Hantis is a people who live
in Western Siberia in the Ob River Basin. The Hantis are sometimes (especially
in earlier literature) also called the Ostyaks just as their close relatives
the Mansis are sometimes called the Voguls. Hungarian linguist P.Hajdu
has divided the Hantis according to their dialects into northern, eastern
and southern Hantis. The dialects differ from each other in such a great
degree that the mutual communication between the speakers of each dialect
is very difficult. 
The
Hantis themselves group themselves after the rivers along which they live.
According to the 1989 census there were 22 521 Hantis and 8 474 Mansis,
of whom only one third spoke their mother tongue. By today, only the northern
and the eastern Hantis have survived. As K.F.Karjalainen once predicted
(Karjalainen 1983: 1a), the southern Hantis have merged with other nations,
especially due to the intrusion of Russians.
The Hantis are traditional hunters
and fishermen. The northern and the eastern Hantis who live along the tributaries
of the Ob are reindeer herders, as much as it is still possible today.
Reindeer are mainly used as draught animals although in the northern regions
they are also grown for meat.
Formerly also dogs were grown for
the same purposes (Lukina 1985: 128-129). In the South, were the oil industry
has established itself, there are almost no reindeer left. Snowmobiles
have taken the place of the reindeer, just as the dugouts are being replaced
by motorboats.
The Hantis who once inhabited the
banks of the Ob, lived in small villages. The inhabitants of each village
were almost all relatives to each other. Earlier (in some places also now),
living in big family groupings that comprised several smaller families
was common. (Lukina 1990:13). 
By
today, the typical Hanti villages have become extinct and Russian type
villages have taken their place. Under the Soviet administration, the reformation,
in the course of which these changes occurred, was carried out more or
less by force.
Living in separate families is still
common among the eastern Hantis. Their dwelling houses are of two types:
conical tents and wooden huts. The earth lodges constructed of sods of
peat are no longer being built, although only a generation ago they were
still in use as dwelling houses in the Pim and Ljamin River Basins. Regardless
of what kind is the dwelling house, every Hanti household definitely includes
a storehouse built on piles for the storage of food, clothes and holy dolls.
Such special storehouses for the storage of sacred things are still sometimes
being built either to the west or north-west of the dwelling house. Families
living in tents have for the same purpose reindeer sledges which are situated
again to the north or the north-west of their dwelling place.
Formerly, every Hanti family had
summer, autumn and winter houses. Depending on the season, the family moved
from one home to another. Today, chiefly only summer and winter houses
are used. The Hantis living on the upper course of the rivers Tremjugan,
Pim, Kazim and Ljamin move several times during winter, depending on the
supply of reindeermoss in their dwelling places.
According to their world view the Hantis' are counted to
be observers of the shamanistic tradition. Shamans are the mediums
between the world of spirits and the world of human beings. At the
same time the world of spirits and the world of humans are not
completely separate from each other, but tightly connected. The
Hantis' world is divided by completely another principle.