To populate and process

Fragment of the book Nancy Collmann "Russia and its Empire"

In the series “Modern Western Russiastry”, Nancy Collmann’s monograph “Russia and its Empire”, dedicated to the colonization policy, which was conducted by Russian rulers of the early New Age, is preparing to exit. We publish an excerpt from the chapter "Western outskirts in the XVIII century."

Starting from February 24, 2022, we were all in the face of the advancing barbarism, violence and lies. In this situation, it is extremely important to preserve at least the remnants of culture and support the values ​​of humanism - including for the sake of the future of Russia. Therefore, the editorial office of Gorky will continue to talk about books, reminding our readers that the world remains in the world and fiction.

Nancy Shields Collmann. Russia and its empire. 1450–1801. St. Petersburg: Academic Studies Press / Bibliors, 2023. Translation from English by Vladimir Petrov. Content

During the XVIII century, as Russia subordinated the Cossacks and nomadic peoples from the Black Sea to the Urals, it steadily settled the steppe by farmers. In the first half of the century, the settlers were headed mainly in the lower Volga, where the governors intensively encouraged landowners to write out serfs; The peasants, as always, sought to run away from serfdom. The peasant population of the Saratov province (Astrakhan province) almost tripled by the 1740s. In the second half of the century, the state began to attract here Russian and Ukrainian peasants from overpopulated areas with the help of various incentives - monetary subsidies, temporary exemption from taxes, distribution of land. However, the conditions for immigrants from abroad were invariably more profitable.

As already mentioned, in the 1750s, under Elizabeth, the authorities began to attract foreigners (Serbs, Bulgarians, Moldavan, Macedonians) to carry out military service, placing them in settlements along the northern border of the Zaporizhzhya Sich: in 1752 a new Serbia arose, in 1754-Slavic Serbia. Both acted tax benefits. Since 1764, during the reign of Catherine, these territories were transformed into Russian provinces. In 1776, local farmers were equated with Russian state peasants and serfs - they had the obligation to supply recruits and make a per capita to submit. At the same time, all new colonies for foreigners were created, which have retained their privileges for decades.

In the 1760s, Catherine II encouraged immigration from abroad in accordance with mercantilist ideas: the larger the population of the country, the more successful it is. In her “penalty” (1767), the Empress expressed concern: “Russia not only does not have quite inhabitants, but still has an excessive space of lands, which are neither inhabited, they have been treated lower.” In the middle of the century, rulers throughout Europe tried to attract immigrants to their countries, which often annoyed their neighbors. So, Friedrich the Great actively populated Prussian lands by Protestants and residents of other German states. The same was done by the Habsburgs. As for Britain and France, they tried to establish a tributary of Europeans in their overseas colonies. In this sense, Catherine II was no different from European monarchs. Since 1762, Russian representatives in Europe made generous promises: lands, freedom from taxes (for up to 30 years), freedom from recruitment, loans, guarantees of freedom of religion, and self -government. Those who intended to start manufactories were even allowed to buy serfs. Large European states sent Russian agents, refused to publish their manifestos, forbade their subjects to move to Russia. Therefore, the immigrants for the most part represented free cities and states of southern and West Germany. About 30 thousand Germans arrived in 1762-1775, settling in seven to eight colonies on the western coast of the Volga, near Saratov. Among them there were many Moravian brothers, who were called Hernguters in Russia. In the 1770s, several groups of Mennonites arrived in the Zaporizhzhya lands in the lower reaches of the Dnieper. Thanks to the unanimity (while among the Russian peasants, plots were shared between their sons), freedom from military service, permanent and direct taxation guaranteed for many years in advance, these German farmers quickly came to prosperity. Thousands of other foreigners also poured into the country - Bulgarians, Greeks, Romanians. At the beginning of the 19th century, the distribution of benefits to foreigners ceased - the authorities considered it expensive and unjustified. Subsidies have ceased to be issued since 1819. In the 1780s, when in the Saratov governorship (the former Saratov province), where most of the German colonists lived, and in the remaining territories of the southern borderlands, administrative reforms began, the rights of colonists related to language and customs were preserved in lower courts.

Between 1782 and 1795, 56 % of all who moved to the empire settled in the Black Sea steppes, which became especially attractive after the end of the war with Turkey (1792). Novorossia was divided into two provinces: Kherson (east of the Dniester, including lands behind the Bug) and Yekaterinoslav (east of the lands of the Don Cossacks). Settlers flocked from all sides. In the Ochakov steppe, in addition to the Mennonites, Moldovans settled. Peasants from the Left Bank and Slobozhansh, Russians who fled from serfdom or moved here by landowners from the overpopulated center, the Old Believers from abroad, who were offered to populate the steppe areas, arrived in Novorossia. Serfdom was an exception here, not a rule; Immigrants received privileges, becoming colonists or state peasants. All this, plus a constant influx of peasants from Ukraine, led to the rapid growth of the population of Novorossia, starting in the 1760s.

The largest acquisition of Russia in the steppe zone was the Crimean Khanate: of all the states formed on the ruins of the Mongol Horde, it was the most organized in political terms and the most successful. The Crimean Tatars, speaking one of the Turkic languages ​​and professed Islam, were descendants of the steppe-nomads, who had long formed the landowning elite of the Crimean peninsula and the Black Sea steppe. Like Chingizids, they had a rather high status: becoming the vassals of the Ottoman Empire, they nevertheless insisted on their suzerates over the Moscow and Polish-Lithuanian states, demanding tribute from them throughout the XVIII century and receiving it. The khans from the Gireye dynasty, the descendants of Genghis Khan, ruled, relying on a large elite, consisting of Rodid Mirz and Beyev. The population of the peninsula was multinational, a considerable part of it lived in cities (cafes and others), including Greek, Armenian and Jewish merchants. In the steppes north of Crimea and on the peninsula itself, cattle were bred, agriculture, including viticulture, and craft. In agriculture, among other things, slaves were used. It is often said that in 1769 the Crimean Tatars made the last major raid on the southern lands of Russia, but later the Crimean slave markets were replenished with captives from the Caucasus. After the Russian conquest, slavery was abolished, slave markets were closed. However, the slave trade near the southern borders of Russia continued in the 19th century for several decades.

In 1774, after a fierce military campaign, during which several cities were destroyed and thousands of people were killed, Russia established a protectorate over the Crimean Khanate. Initially, Shakhin, the last khan from the Girey dynasty, was allowed to preserve the throne, strictly observing it, but soon, because of his intrigues, Russia took Crimea under its direct control (1783). This happened in the midst of administrative reforms imbued with the spirit of standardization, but in Crimea Catherine II pursued a policy aimed at preserving local characteristics. In Tauris (as the peninsula began to be called), rights (including those related to the use of land) and tax benefits of the Tatar nobility and other groups (Greeks, Valakhov, Armenians) were confirmed. The Crimean Tatars were freed from the poll tax and recruitment service. Muslim confessional rights were assigned to the creation of a Tauride Mohammedan spiritual rule (1791). Similarly to the Orenburg, created in 1788 for the Middle Volga and Urals, it was conceived as an organ of supervision of religious institutions and a link between Muslims and the Russian authorities. In addition, a special task was assigned to him - observing the wandering mullahs suspected of inciting pro -Turkish sentiments. The Tauride rule, like Orenburg, was headed by a mufti, based on a religious hierarchy - newly created institutions, which were not before. Despite the numerous manifestations of pragmatism from Russia, the outflow of the population from Crimea began in the 1780s. Even before his annex in 1783, the Russian authorities relocated most of the Crimean Christians - Armenians and Greeks who lived in cities (more than 30 thousand people) - on the coast of the Sea of ​​Azov, and most of the Nogai Tatars in the Kuban steppes, where the Cossack army was created. At the same time, more than 200 thousand Tatars moved to the Ottoman Empire. New waves of emigration followed after the accession of Crimea to Russia and the Russo-Turkish war of 1787-1792, when thousands of people were left, alarmed by measures to disarm the Tatars undertaken during the war. According to Kelly O'Neill, the process of “integration” of Crimea did not go the same in other places, due to the close identification of Crimean Muslims with their co-religionists in the Ottoman Empire; Territorial proximity and cultural ties led to the fact that many simply did not seek to replenish the ranks of the Russian nobility, unlike Cossacks, Baltic Germans, Georgians, Poles and others. Those who remained were forced to fight for the preservation of their political predominance. In 1785, with the publication of a letter of complained to the nobility, the Tatar Murza were originally equal to the nobles, and their land rights were confirmed, regardless of the state. About 5,000 Murz were counted on the nobility at their local meetings. But then the Russian policy throughout the empire was tightened, it became necessary to present confirming documents. This was partly due to the fear that the non -Russian nobility (Ukrainian, German, Polish, Crimean) can numerically surpass the Russian nobility. After that, Crimean officials began to take inspections, and in the 1820s less than 100 Murz families remained, officially belonging to the nobility.

And yet the Tatars still dominated the peninsula. Initially, Russia created a Tauride regional rule in which the main role was assigned to the local nobility - Murzam; The general supervision of his activities was carried out by the Russian General General, who was in charge of the finances and issues related to security. Just a year later, in 1784, the board was dissolved, and administrative reforms of 1775 began to be implemented on the peninsula. Thanks to this system, in which administrative and judicial institutions were filled with a local nobility, many positions were occupied by tribal Tatars. O'Neill indicates that the Mirza occupied only about 15 % of the highest posts, but about 80 % of the posts at the counties and, thus, retained the power position in this multinational community. In the period until 1802, Russia limited access to administrative posts above the district guests to create more opportunities for Russian, Greek, Armenian and other elites. In addition, Russia tried to attract the Tatars to military service in the firm units, providing them with lands and salary: these irregular troops acted together with the Russian army, like the Cossacks. Russia used them in wars with Poland and Napoleon, but prudently tried not to send against the Turks.

Being a Tauride Governor-General, Potemkin tried to balance the influence of the Tatars, encouraging the relocation of state peasants and the Orthodox clergy from the regions with the Russian and Ukrainian-language population. Foreigners arrived - Moldovans, Valahs, Swedes, Poles, Germans, Greeks, Bulgarians, Corsicans; The Mennonite community was formed. Everyone enjoyed various rights and privileges. Russian agents in Europe even invited merchants and artisans to the Crimea to replace those who have left for the townspeople and help revive viticulture, silk farming, cattle breeding and other sectors of the economy. Most of them settled in the steppes north of the peninsula, and the dominance of the Tatars in Crimea continued. In absolute numbers, the Tatar population decreased half, but in 1795 it was still 75 % of the total; There were 4 %Russians, Greeks, Armenians, Ukrainians and Jews - about 2 %each. The Tatars had to take part in the activities of imperial power structures, multinational in their composition, but they retained dominance in their homeland.