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Siberian Native Peoples After the February Revolution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2017

Elena Varneck
Elena Varneck*
Affiliation:
Stanford University
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Extract

The official count of all non-Russian natives of Siberia stood in 1911 at 2,212,100. They ranged all the way from roaming, hunting and fishing tribes having no written language and numbering less than a thousand individuals to the numerous Kirghiz, Yakuts, and Buriats who were ramified into sub-tribes, and possessed tribal self-government and codes of law even under the Empire.

The intentions of the Provisional Government with regard to all non-Russians in the country were, of course, thoroughly democratic and equalitarian. Beyond such intentions, however, the Provisional Government, harassed with life-and-death problems as it was, left the initiative and the work to others. The active championship of the non-Russian nationalities’ new rights was taken up by themselves, by Russian political parties and, in Siberia, largely by the Siberian autonomists — or, to use the Russian term, regionalists.

Type
Research Article
Information
Slavonic and East European Review American Series , Volume 2 , March 1943 , pp. 70 - 88
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1943

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References

1 Serebrennikov, I. I., Sibirevedenie (Harbin 1920), pp. 52–66 Google Scholar.

2 Volnaja Sibir, weekly organ of Siberian regionalists in Petrograd. The above questions and all issues regarding Siberian native tribes are reported and discussed in every issue through January–April, 1918, after which the newspaper was suppressed.

3 Volnaja Sibir, April 7, 1918, article on Yakutia.

4 Volnaja Sihir, March 27, 1918.

5 Volnaja Sibir, March 10, March 30, 1918.

6 I. I. Gapanovich, Rossija v severo-vosiočnoi Azii, part I, 37 ff; 149 ff.; Purin, A. A. “V dni revoljucii v Ochotsko-Kamčatskom i Čukotsko-Anadyrskom krae,” in Volnaja Sibir (Prague, 1927), no. 2 and 1928, no. 3.

7 Volnaja Sibir (Petrograd 1918), April 3 and 7.

8 Volnaja Sibir (Petrograd), March 23, 1918.

9 Serebrennikov, I.I., Moi Vospominanija (Tientsin, 1937), I, 250–251 Google Scholar.

10 Volnaja Sibir, 1918, April 7; I. I. Serebrennikov, Sibirevedenie (Harbin, 1920), pp. 23, 59, Bolšaja Sovetskaja Enciklopedija, LXV, 499.

11 Volnaja Sibir, 1918, April 7.

12 Volnaja Sibir, loc. cit.; Bolšaja Sovetskaja Enciklopedija, XLV; 507; XXIX, 107.

13 Date not given. Quoted in Volnaja Sibir, 1918, April 10.

14 D. Klemenz, “Naselenie Sibiri,” in Sibir, eë sovremettnoe sostojanie i ëe nuždy (St. Petersburg, 1908), pp. 58–60.

15 Mamet, L. P., Oirotija (Moscow, 1930), p. 43 Google Scholar. Those data concerning the Altaians, not specifically referred to other sources, are taken from this writer, apparently a native Altaian.

16 Volnaja Sibir, 1918, January 14.

17 These traits, along with other characteristics of the Siberian settlers, are described in many works on Siberia. Cf. D. Klemenz, op. cit.; p. 53; Yadrintsev, N. M., Sibir kak kolonija (St. Petersburg, 1882)Google Scholar; second edition entitled Sibir v geografičeskom, etnogrofičeskom i istonričeskom otnošenijaiii — a fundamental work by Siberia's outstanding scholar. Golovachev, P., Sibir: Priroda, ljudi, žizn (Moscow, 1902)Google Scholar.

18 I. I. Serebrennikov, Sibirevedenie, p. 57.

19 Several studies of great interest have been published by Castagné, Joseph: Le Turkestan depuis la revolution russe (1917–1921), Paris, 1922 Google Scholar; Les basmatchis (Paris, 1925); “Le bolchevisme et l'Islam,” Revue du monde musulman (Paris, 1922); LI. VII-XVII and 1–254; Les Musidmans el la politique des Soviets en Asie Centrale (Paris, 1925). They do not cover Siberia, and they speak of the destinies of the Kirghiz people mainly as part of the history of Turkestan and Central Asia and of the history of Moslem reactions to the advent of Communism as a world force. In this vast field Castagné's contribution is indispensable.

20 “Vosstanie 1916 goda v srednei Azii,” Krasny Archiv (1929), XXIV, 39–94. This contains excerpts from the diary of General Kuropatkin, who was sent to the revolted territory to take charge and gave a good account of the revolt and its implications; “Iz istorii borby za osvoboišdenie Vostoka,” by T. Ryskulov, a Soviet writer of Kirghiz origin, in Novy Vostok, 1924, no. 6; “K istorii vosstanija Kirghiz v 1916 g.,” Krasny Archiv (1926), XVI, 53–75.

21 Volnaja Sibir, 1918, January 14.

22 Ibid.

23 Volnaja Sibir, 1918, March 20.

24 Maksakov i Turunov, Ed., Chronika graždanskni voiny v Sibiri, p. 40.

25 Ibid.

26 Guins, G. K., Sibir sojuzniki i Kolčak, I, 209 Google Scholar.

27 Bolšaja sovetskaja enciklopedija, XXX, 595 -597.

28 Ibid., p. 598.

29 M. L. Murtazin, Baškirija i baškirskie voiska v graždanskuju voinu, p. 52. All of the material in this account of the Bashkir movement unless otherwise indicated, is taken from this account by a Soviet writer of Bashkir nationality.