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George Vernadsky, Eurasianism, the Mongols, and Russia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Charles J. Halperin
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Eurasianism, the theory that Russia was neither Europe nor Asia but a world unto itself, Eurasia, runs through much, if not all, of George Vernadsky's enormous scholarly output. Eurasianism was the fuel of his impressive productivity, the central, unifying theme of his varied investigations of Russian, Byzantine, and Inner Asian history. Despite the high esteem in which Vernadsky came to be held, there have been few examinations of his contributions to historical knowledge. Yet Vernadsky's career and his scholarship have much to tell us of the fate of the Imperial Russian historiographic tradition in the twentieth century.

Vernadsky is most often associated with the theme of the significance of the Mongols in Russian history. Vernadsky's observations on this topic over the course of his nearly sixty-year career provide an excellent medium for understanding the ambiguities of his adherence to Eurasianism and for tracing the evolution of his Eurasianism in response to the different political and cultural environments in which he worked. As we shall see, the assumption of his eulogists that Vernadsky's Eurasianism was static is too simplistic, while the equally facile conclusion that Vernadsky gradually tempered the extremist elements of Eurasianism is too imprecise to be satisfactory. Indeed, the development of Vernadsky's historical concepts is far more complex than has hitherto been appreciated.

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Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 41 , Issue 3 , Fall 1982 , pp. 477 - 493
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1982

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References

1. See the obituaries by Alan D. Ferguson in Russian Review, 32 (1973): 456-58, S. Pushkarev in Novyi zhurnal, 113 (1973): 266-70, Ralph T. Fisher Jr. in Slavic Review, 33, no. 1 (1974): 206-208, and Alfred Levin in American Historical Review, 79 (1974): 267-68.

2. The following bibliographies of Vernadsky's works are in print, although none is complete or free of inaccuracies: Ferguson, Alan D., “A Bibliography of the Works of George Vernadsky,” Oxford Slavonic Papers, 5 (1954): 32–40Google Scholar; idem, “Bibliography of the Works of George Vernadsky,” in Alan D. Ferguson and Alfred Levin, eds., Essays in Russian History: A Collection Dedicated to George Vernadsky (Hamden, Conn., 1964), pp. xi-xv; and Andreyev, Nikolay, “Spisok trudov G. V. Vernadskogo,” Zapiski russkoi akademicheskoi gruppy v SShA, 9 (1975): 168–81Google Scholar, translated and reprinted in Vernadsky, George, Russian Historiography: A History, trans. Lupinin, N. (Belmont, Mass., 1978), pp. 527–37Google Scholar. By my estimate Vernadsky published approximately 8,800 pages.

3. Treatments of the subject by Dimitri Obolensky and Nikolay Andreyev are too brief to be more than superficial (see Obolensky, Dimitri, “Professor Vernadsky's History of Ancient and Medieval Russia,” Oxford Slavonic Papers, 5 [1954]: 20–31Google Scholar, revised and expanded as “George Vernadsky as a Historian of Ancient and Medieval Russia,” in Ferguson and Levin, eds., Essays in Russian History, pp. 1-17 and Andreyev, Nikolay, “G. V. Vernadskii [20 avgusta 1887 g. —12 iunia 1973 g.],” Zapiski russkoi akademicheskoi gruppy v SShA, 9 [1975], pp. 182–93Google Scholar, translated and reprinted in Vernadsky, Russian Historiography, pp. 512-26).

4. See the obituaries cited in note 1, especially those by Ferguson and Levin. See also note 31 below.

5. V. V. Bartol'd, “Obzor deiatel'nosti fakul'teta vostochnykh iazykov” (of St. Petersburg University) and “Istoriia izucheniia Vostoka v Evrope i Rossii” in V. V. Bartol'd, Sochineniia, vol. 10: Raboty po istorii vostokovedeniia (Moscow, 1977), pp. 21-196, 197-482.

6. Donald Treadgold, The Great Siberian Migration. Government and Peasant in Resettlement from the Emancipation to the First World War (Princeton, 1957).

7. G. V. Vernadskii, “Odvizhenii russkikhna vostok,” Nauchnyiistoricheskii zhurnal, l,no. 2 (1913): 52-61; idem, “Protiv solntsa. Rasprostranenie russkogo gosudarstva k vostoku,” Russkaia mysl', 35, no. 1 (1914): 56-79; and idem, “Gosudarevye sluzhilye i promyshlennye liudi v Vostochnoi Sibiri XVII v.,” Ministerstvo Narodnago Prosveshcheniia, Zhurnal, 55, no. 4 (April 1915): 332-54.

8. G. V. Vernadskii, “Iz vospominanii. Gody ucheniia. S. F. Platonov,” Novyi zhurnal, 100 (1970): 196-221.

9. Nicholas V. Riasanovsky, “Russia and Asia: Two Nineteenth-Century Russian Views,” California Slavic Studies, 1 (1960): 170-81.

10. Nicholas V. Riasanovsky, “Prince N. S. Trubetskoy's ‘Europe and Mankind,'” Jahrbiicher fur Geschichte Osteuropas, 13 (1964): 207-20.

11. G. V. Vernadskii, Russkoe masonstvo v tsarstvovanii Ekateriny II. Istoriko-filologicheskii fakul'tet Sankt Peterburgskago universiteta, Zapiski, 137 (1917).

12. G. V. Vernadskii, Nikolai Ivanovich Novikov (Petrograd, 1918).

13. G. V. Vernadskii, “Perm'-Moskva-Kiev. Vospominaniia,” Novyi zhurnal, 104 (1971): 177-88; idem, “Krym. Vospominaniia,” Novyi zhurnal, 105 (1971): 203-24; idem, “Konstantinopol', 1920-1921. Vospominaniia, chast’ III,” Novyi zhurnal, 108 (1972): 202-17.

14. George and Nina Vernadsky Papers, Bakhmeteff Archive, Butler Library, Columbia University (hereafter cited by series and box number), Non-Correspondence Series, Box 31.8.3.2, “Avtobiograficheskie zametki.“

15. For two statements of the Eurasian view of Russian history see I. R. [ Trubetskoi, Prince N. S.], Nasledie Chingis khana. Vzgliad na russkuiu istoriiu ne s Zapada, a s Vostoka (Berlin, 1925 Google Scholar) and Savitskii, P. N., “Geopoliticheskie zametki po russkoi istorii,” in G. V. Vernadskii, Nachertanie russkoi istorii, vol. 1 (Prague, 1927), pp. 234-60Google Scholar. On Eurasianism consult Otto Boss, Die Lehre der Eurasier: Ein Beitrag zur russischen ldeengeschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts (Wiesbaden, 1961) and Orchard, G. E., “The Eurasian School of Russian Historiography,” Laurentian University Review, 10, no. 1 (November 1977): 97–206.Google Scholar

16. Riasanovsky, Nicholas V., “The Emergence of Eurasianism,” California Slavic Studies, 4 (1967): 39–72Google Scholar and idem, “Asia Through Russian Eyes,” in Vucinich, Wayne S., ed., Russia and Asia (Stanford, 1972), pp. 19–29.Google Scholar

17. George Vernadsky devoted a series of articles to this group as one of his last research projects. See Vernadsky, George, “The Prijutino Brotherhood (Preliminary communication),” in Orbis scriptus. Dm. Tschizevskij zum 70 Geburtstag (Munich, 1966), pp. 857–63Google Scholar, and Vernadskii, G. V., “Bratstvo ‘Priiutino,'” Novyi zhurnal, 93 (1968): 147–71; 95 (1969): 202-15; 96 (1969): 153-71; 97 (1969): 218-37.Google Scholar

18. G. Vernadskii, Pavel Nikolaevich Miliukov (Petrograd, 1917). The work is not listed in Andreyev, “Spisok trudov.“

19. A. A. Kizevetter, “Evraziistvo i nauka,” Slavia, 7 (1928-29): 426-30; Paul Miliukov, “Eurasianism and Europeanism in Russian History,” in Festschrift Th. G. Masaryk zum 80. Geburtstag, vol. 1: Der russische Gedanke (Bonn, 1930), pp. 225-36.

20. G. V. Vernadskii, “'Soedinenie tserkvei’ v istoricheskoi deistvitel'nosti,” in Rossiia i Latinstvo (Berlin, 1923), pp. 80-120.

21. See the text of a lecture, “Desnitsa i shuitsa Imperatorskogo perioda,” delivered in Prague in 1922, in Vernadsky Papers, Non-Correspondence Series, Box 32.1.9.2.

22. Vernadskii, “'Soedinenie tserkvei,'” p. 81.

23. G. V. Vernadskii, “Dva podviga sv. Aleksandra Nevskogo,” Evraziiskii Vremennik, 4 (1925): 318-37.

24. Ibid., p. 324.

25. Georgii Vernadskii, “O russkom pravopisanii, I,” Russkaia mysl', 6-8 (1923): 332-34. This article is not included in Andreyev, “Spisok trudov.“

26. G. V. Vernadskii, “O istorijskom jedinstvu ruske crkve,” HriSdanski iivot, 5, no. 7-9 (1926): 281-89. This is not included in Andreyev, “Spisok trudov.“

27. Vernadsky asserted that both Trubetskoi and his father held similarly balanced views of the Ukraine. See his unpublished article, “Kniaz’ Trubetskoi i ukrainskii vopros,” circa 1938, Vernadsky Papers, Noncorrespondence Series, Box 32.1.9.1, and a letter to the editor of the Toronto Ukrainian pedagogical journal Zhyttia i shkola, March 22, 1961, ibid., Box 30.4.2.2.

28. G. V. Vernadskii, “Mongol'skoe igo v russkoi istorii,” Evraziiskii Vremennik, 5 (1927): 153-64.

29. This interpretation reflects the influence of Vernadsky's St. Petersburg teacher and later colleague at Yale, Michael Rostovtseff, presented in his Iranians and Greeks in South Russia (Oxford, 1922), and N. P. Kondakov on the relations of Classical, Scythian, Byzantine, and Old Russian art. Vernadsky was associated with Kondakov and his students in Prague (see G. V. Vernadskii, O znachenii nauchnoi deiatel'nosti N. P. Kondakova. K vos'midesiatiletiiu so dnia rozhdeniia, 1944 — 1.XI — 1924 [Rech', proiznesennaia na III s“ezde russkikh uchenykh v Prage 25 sentiabria 1924 g.] [Prague, 1924]).

30. Volume 1 of Nachertanie russkoi istorii was devoted to “external” history. Volume 2 on “internal” history never appeared.

31. Vernadsky long remained committed to this whitewash of Russian relations with the nationalities of the Russian Empire. On the current Soviet version of a similar theory, see Lowell Tillett, The Great Friendship. Soviet Historians on the Non-Russian Nationalities (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1969).

32. Vernadskii, Nachertanie russkoi istorii, pp. 5-23, 229-31.

33. Ibid., pp. 67-111.

34. G. V. Vernadskii, Opyt istorii Evrazii s poloviny VI veka do nastoiashchego vremeni (Berlin, 1934), pp. 11-13, 108, 131-32.

35. G. V. Vernadskii, Zven'ia russkoi kul'tury, vol. 1, part 1: Drevniaia Rus’ (do poloviny XV v.) (Brussels, 1938), treats the economy, society, government and administration, law and the judiciary. Part 2 was to cover church and religion, science and technology, literature, art, education and ideas; it never appeared. Apparently two-volume sets were also planned for the rest of Muscovite and for Imperial Russian history, which would have produced a six-volume work.

36. Ibid., pp. 21, 126-29, 141-42, 170-71, 173-74, 208, and passim.

37. On the Russian Freemasons see Vernadskij, G., “Le c£sar£vitch Paul et les francsmagons de Moscou,” Revue des Etudes Slaves, 3 (1923): 268–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Vernadskii, G. V., “Zametki o literaturno-izdatel'skoi deiatel'nosti N. I. Novikova,” in Istoriko-literaturnyi sbornik posv. V. I. Sreznevskomu (Leningrad, 1924) [typeset 1916], pp. 85-91Google Scholar; and Vernadskij, G., “Beitrage zur Geschichte der Freimaurerei und des Mystizismus in Russland,” Zeitschrift fur Slavische Philologie IV (1927), pp. 162–78Google Scholar. In addition, see Vernadskii, G. V., Gosudarstvennaia ustavnaiagramota Rossiiskoi imperii 1820 goda. Istoriko-iuridicheskii ocherk (Prague, 1925)Google Scholar. This work was translated by Serge Oldenbourg as Vernadsky, G., La Charte constitutionelle de VEmpire Russe de I'An 1820 (Paris, 1933)Google Scholar. See also Vernadskij, J. V., “RisSka ustavni listina ruskeho cisarstvi,” Sbornik vid pravnich a statnich, 25 (1925): 394–425Google Scholar; Vernadsky, George, “Un projet de declaration des droits de 1'homme et du citoyen en Russie en 1801,” Revue historique de droit franqais et itranger, 4th ser., 4 (1925): 436–45Google Scholar; Vernadskij, G., “Alexander Ies et le problème slave pendant la premiére moitié de son règne,” Revue des Études Slaves, 7 (1927): 93-111CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Vernadsky, Georg, “Zur Geschichte des Entwurfs einer Konstitution fiir Russland v. Jahre 1819,” Historische Zeitschrift, 135 (1927): 423-27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38. George Vernadsky, A History of Russia, vol. 2: Kievan Russia (New Haven, 1948), pp. 1-18, 163-72, 209-13.

39. I. R., Nasledie Chingis khana, pp. 3-4, divorces Kievan Rus’ from “Russian history” because of its north-south, rather than east-west, axis.

40. Vernadsky, A History of Russia, vol. 3: The Mongols and Russia (New Haven, 1953). See the review by Marc Szeftel, Russian Review, 14 (1955): 65-67. Cf. Vernadsky, A History of Russia, vol. 4: Russia at the Dawn of the Modern Age (New Haven, 1959).

41. See the review by Nikolay Andreyev published in English in Slavonic and East European Review, 32, no. 109 (June 1954): 534-37 and in Russian in Novyi zhurnal, 36 (1954): 304-307.

42. Vernadsky, The Mongols and Russia, pp. v-vii.

43. See the reviews by the orientalists Denis Sinor in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1957, pp. 101-102 and Berthold Spuler in American Historical Review, 59 (1953-54): 617-19 in English and Oriens, 7 (1957): 117-18 in German.

44. Vernadsky, The Mongols and Russia, pp. 1-5, 244, 330-32, 333-35, 338-44, 344-66, 214-32, 366-67.

45. Ibid., pp. 233-34.

46. Ibid., pp. 143-44, 148-49.

47. Vernadsky softened his interpretation of the Union of Brest in Russia at the Dawn of the Modern Age, pp. 289-92.

48. Vernadsky, The Mongols and Russia, p. 333.

49. Ibid., pp. 335-38, 385-90.

50. Karl A. Wittfogel, Oriental Despotism. A Comparative Study of Total Power (New Haven, 1957), pp. 201-203, 219-25 and idem, “Russia and the East: A Comparison and Contrast” and “Reply,” Slavic Review, 22, no. 4 (December 1963): 627-43, 656-62. It might be interesting to compare the roots of Eurasianism and the theory of Russia as an oriental despotism.

51. The critical review of The Mongols and Russia by N. la. Merpert and V. T. Pashuto in Voprosy istorii, 1955, no. 8, pp. 180-86 is interesting in this respect, although other corrections have more validity. Soviet historians also attribute the overthrow of Mongol rule to the efforts of the patriotic Russian people (narod).

52. George Vernadsky, A History of Russia, vol. 5: The Tsardom of Muscovy, 1547-1682, 2 parts (New Haven, 1969), pp. 1-222, especially pp. 1-8, which continue to laud Trubetskoi and Savitskii.

53. George Vernadsky, “Teaching and Writing Russian History in America: A General Chronological Outline,” Russian Orthodox Journal, 33, no. 4 (August 1959): 26.