Peoples living in Siberia. Small and large peoples of Siberia

The average number of peoples - West Siberian Tatars, Khakasses, Altaians. The rest of the peoples, due to their small number and similar features of their fishing life, are assigned to the group of “small peoples of the North”. Among them are the Nenets, Evenki, Khanty, noticeable in terms of numbers and the preservation of the traditional way of life of the Chukchi, Evens, Nanais, Mansi, Koryaks.

The peoples of Siberia belong to different language families and groups. In terms of the number of speakers of related languages, the peoples of the Altai are in the first place. language family, at least from the turn of our era, which began to spread from the Sayano-Altai and the Baikal region to the deep regions of Western and Eastern Siberia.

The Altaic language family within Siberia is divided into three branches: Turkic, Mongolian and Tungus. The first branch - Turkic - is very extensive. In Siberia, it includes: the Altai-Sayan peoples - Altaians, Tuvans, Khakasses, Shors, Chulyms, Karagas, or Tofalars; West Siberian (Tobolsk, Tara, Baraba, Tomsk, etc.) Tatars; on the Far North- Yakuts and Dolgans (the latter live in the east of Taimyr, in the basin of the Khatanga River). Only the Buryats, settled in groups in the western and eastern Baikal region, belong to the Mongolian peoples in Siberia.

The Tungus branch of the Altai peoples includes the Evenki (“Tungus”), who live in scattered groups over a vast territory from the right tributaries of the Upper Ob to the Okhotsk coast and from the Baikal region to the Arctic Ocean; Evens (Lamuts), settled in a number of regions of northern Yakutia, on the coast of Okhotsk and Kamchatka; also a number of small peoples of the Lower Amur - Nanais (Golds), Ulchis, or Olchis, Negidals; Ussuri region - Orochi and Ude (Udege); Sakhalin - Oroks.

In Western Siberia, ethnic communities of the Uralic language family have been formed since ancient times. These were Ugrian-speaking and Samoyedic-speaking tribes of the forest-steppe and taiga zone from the Urals to the Upper Ob. At present, the Ugric peoples - Khanty and Mansi - live in the Ob-Irtysh basin. The Selkups on the Middle Ob, the Enets in the lower reaches of the Yenisei, the Nganasans, or Tavgians, on Taimyr, the Nenets inhabiting the forest tundra and tundra of Eurasia from Taimyr to White Sea. Once upon a time, small Samoyedic peoples also lived in Southern Siberia, in the Altai-Sayan Highlands, but their remnants - Karagas, Koibals, Kamasins, etc. - were Turkified in the 18th - 19th centuries.

Indigenous peoples of Eastern Siberia and Far East Mongoloid in the main features of their anthropological types. The Mongoloid type of the Siberian population could genetically originate only in Central Asia. Archaeologists prove that the Paleolithic culture of Siberia developed in the same direction and in similar forms as the Paleolithic of Mongolia. Based on this, archaeologists believe that it was the Upper Paleolithic era with its highly developed hunting culture that was the most suitable historical time for the widespread settlement of Siberia and the Far East by “Asian” - Mongoloid in appearance - ancient man.

Mongoloid types of ancient “Baikal” origin are well represented among modern Tungus-speaking populations from the Yenisei to the Okhotsk coast, also among the Kolyma Yukaghirs, whose distant ancestors may have preceded the Evenks and Evens in a significant area of Eastern Siberia.

Among a significant part of the Altaic-speaking population of Siberia - Altaians, Tuvans, Yakuts, Buryats, etc. - the most Mongoloid Central Asian type is widespread, which is a complex racial-genetic formation, the origins of which date back to Mongoloid groups of early times mixed with each other (from ancient times until the late Middle Ages).

Sustainable economic and cultural types of the indigenous peoples of Siberia:

foot hunters and fishermen of the taiga zone;
hunters wild deer in the Subarctic;
sedentary fishermen in the lower reaches of large rivers (Ob, Amur, and also in Kamchatka);
taiga hunter-reindeer breeders of Eastern Siberia;
reindeer herders of the tundra from the Northern Urals to Chukotka;
sea animal hunters on the Pacific coast and islands;
pastoralists and farmers of Southern and Western Siberia, the Baikal region, etc.

Historical and ethnographic areas:

West Siberian (with the southern, approximately to the latitude of Tobolsk and the mouth of the Chulym on the Upper Ob, and the northern, taiga and subarctic regions);
Altai-Sayan (mountain-taiga and forest-steppe mixed zone);
East Siberian (with internal differentiation of commercial and agricultural types of tundra, taiga and forest-steppe);
Amur (or Amur-Sakhalin);
northeastern (Chukotka-Kamchatka).

The Altaic language family was initially formed among the highly mobile steppe population of Central Asia, outside the southern outskirts of Siberia. The demarcation of this community into proto-Turks and proto-Mongols occurred on the territory of Mongolia within the 1st millennium BC. Later, the ancient Turks (ancestors of the Sayano-Altai peoples and Yakuts) and the ancient Mongols (ancestors of the Buryats and Oirats-Kalmyks) settled in Siberia later. The area of origin of the primary Tungus-speaking tribes was also in Eastern Transbaikalia, from where, around the turn of our era, the movement of foot hunters of the Proto-Evenki began to the north, to the Yenisei-Lena interfluve, and later to the Lower Amur.

The era of early metal (2-1 millennium BC) in Siberia is characterized by many flows of southern cultural influences, reaching the lower reaches of the Ob and the Yamal Peninsula, to the lower reaches of the Yenisei and Lena, to Kamchatka and the Bering Sea coast of the Chukotka Peninsula. The most significant, accompanied by ethnic inclusions in the aboriginal environment, these phenomena were in Southern Siberia, the Amur Region and Primorye of the Far East. At the turn of 2-1 millennia BC. there was a penetration into southern Siberia, into the Minusinsk basin and the Tomsk Ob region by steppe pastoralists of Central Asian origin, who left monuments of the Karasuk-Irmen culture. According to a convincing hypothesis, these were the ancestors of the Kets, who later, under the pressure of the early Turks, moved further to the Middle Yenisei, and partially mixed with them. These Turks are the carriers of the Tashtyk culture of the 1st century. BC. - 5 in. AD - located in the Altai-Sayan Mountains, in the Mariinsky-Achinsk and Khakass-Minusinsk forest-steppe. They were engaged in semi-nomadic cattle breeding, knew agriculture, widely used iron tools, built rectangular log dwellings, had draft horses and riding domestic deer. It is possible that it was through them that domestic reindeer husbandry began to spread in Northern Siberia. But the time of the really wide distribution of the early Turks along the southern strip of Siberia, north of the Sayano-Altai and in the Western Baikal region, is, most likely, the 6th-10th centuries. AD Between the 10th and 13th centuries the movement of the Baikal Turks to the Upper and Middle Lena begins, which marked the beginning of the formation of an ethnic community of the northernmost Turks - the Yakuts and the obligated Dolgans.

The Iron Age, the most developed and expressive in Western and Eastern Siberia, in the Amur Region and Primorye in the Far East, was marked by a noticeable rise productive forces, population growth and an increase in the diversity of cultural means not only in the shores of large river communications (Ob, Yenisei, Lena, Amur), but also in deep taiga regions. Possession of good vehicles(boats, skis, hand sleds, draft dogs and deer), metal tools and weapons, fishing gear, good clothes and portable dwellings, as well as perfect methods of housekeeping and food preparation for the future, i.e. the most important economic and cultural inventions and work experience many generations allowed a number of aboriginal groups to settle widely in the hard-to-reach, but rich in animals and fish taiga areas of Northern Siberia, to master the forest-tundra and reach the coast of the Arctic Ocean.

The largest migrations with extensive development of the taiga and assimilation intrusion into the “Paleo-Asiatic-Yukaghir” population of Eastern Siberia were made by Tungus-speaking groups of foot and deer hunters of elk and wild deer. Moving in various directions between the Yenisei and the Okhotsk coast, penetrating from the northern taiga to the Amur and Primorye, making contacts and mixing with foreign-speaking inhabitants of these places, these “Tungus explorers” eventually formed numerous groups of Evenks and Evens and Amur-Primorye peoples . The medieval Tungus, who themselves mastered domestic deer, contributed to the spread of these useful transport animals among the Yukagirs, Koryaks and Chukchi, which had important consequences for the development of their economy, cultural communication and changes in the social system.

Development of socio-economic relations

By the time the Russians arrived in Siberia, the indigenous peoples, not only of the forest-steppe zone, but also of the taiga and tundra, were by no means at that stage of socio-historical development that could be considered deeply primitive. Socio-economic relations in the leading sphere of production of conditions and forms of social life among many peoples of Siberia reached a fairly high level of development already in the 17th-18th centuries. Ethnographic materials of the XIX century. state the predominance among the peoples of Siberia of relations of the patriarchal-communal system associated with subsistence farming, the simplest forms of neighborly kinship cooperation, the communal tradition of owning land, organizing internal affairs and relations with the outside world, with a fairly strict account of “blood” genealogical ties in marriage and family and everyday (primarily religious, ritual and direct communication) spheres. The main social and production (including all aspects and processes of production and reproduction of human life), a socially significant unit of social structure among the peoples of Siberia was a territorial-neighbor community, within which they reproduced, passed on from generation to generation and accumulated everything necessary for existence and production communication material means and skills, social and ideological relations and properties. As a territorial-economic association, it could be a separate settled settlement, a group of interconnected fishing camps, a local community of semi-nomads.

But ethnographers are also right in that in the everyday life of the peoples of Siberia, in their genealogical ideas and connections, for a long time, living remnants of the former relations of the patriarchal-clan system were preserved. Among such persistent phenomena should be attributed generic exogamy, extended to a fairly wide circle of relatives in several generations. There were many traditions emphasizing the holiness and inviolability of the tribal principle in the social self-determination of the individual, his behavior and attitude towards people around him. Kindred mutual assistance and solidarity, even to the detriment of personal interests and deeds, was considered the highest virtue. The focus of this tribal ideology was the overgrown paternal family and its lateral patronymic lines. A wider circle of relatives of the paternal “root” or “bone” was also taken into account, if, of course, they were known. Based on this, ethnographers believe that in the history of the peoples of Siberia, the paternal-clan system was an independent, very long stage in the development of primitive communal relations.

Industrial and domestic relations between men and women in the family and the local community were built on the basis of the division of labor by sex and age. The significant role of women in the household was reflected in the ideology of many Siberian peoples in the form of the cult of the mythological “mistress of the hearth” and the associated custom of “keeping fire” by the real mistress of the house.

The Siberian material of the past centuries, used by ethnographers, along with the archaic, also shows obvious signs of the ancient decline and decay of tribal relations. Even in those local societies where social class stratification did not receive any noticeable development, features were found that overcame tribal equality and democracy, namely: individualization of the methods of appropriation of material goods, private ownership of craft products and objects of exchange, property inequality between families , in some places patriarchal slavery and bondage, the separation and exaltation of the ruling tribal nobility, etc. These phenomena in one form or another are noted in documents of the 17th-18th centuries. among the Ob Ugrians and Nenets, the Sayano-Altai peoples and the Evenks.

The Turkic-speaking peoples of Southern Siberia, the Buryats and Yakuts at that time were characterized by a specific ulus-tribal organization that combined the orders and customary law of the patriarchal (neighborly-kindred) community with the dominant institutions of the military-hierarchical system and the despotic power of the tribal nobility. The tsarist government could not but take into account such a difficult socio-political situation, and, recognizing the influence and strength of the local ulus nobility, practically entrusted the fiscal and police administration to the ordinary mass of accomplices.

It is also necessary to take into account the fact that Russian tsarism was not limited only to the collection of tribute - from the indigenous population of Siberia. If this was the case in the 17th century, then in subsequent centuries the state-feudal system sought to maximize the use of the productive forces of this population, imposing on it ever greater payments and duties in kind and depriving it of the right to supreme ownership of all lands, lands and riches of the subsoil. Integral part economic policy autocracy in Siberia was to encourage the commercial and industrial activities of Russian capitalism and the treasury. In the post-reform period, the flow of agrarian resettlement to Siberia of peasants from European Russia. Centers of an economically active newcomer population began to quickly form along the most important transport routes, which entered into versatile economic and cultural contacts with the indigenous inhabitants of the newly developed areas of Siberia. Naturally, under this generally progressive influence, the peoples of Siberia lost their patriarchal identity (“the identity of backwardness”) and joined the new conditions of life, although before the revolution this happened in contradictory and not painless forms.

Economic and cultural types

By the time the Russians arrived, cattle breeding had developed much more than agriculture. But since the 18th century agriculture occupies all greater place among the West Siberian Tatars, it also spreads among the traditional pastoralists of the southern Altai, Tuva and Buryatia. Accordingly, material and everyday forms also changed: stable settled settlements arose, nomadic yurts and semi-dugouts were replaced by log houses. However, the Altaians, Buryats and Yakuts for a long time had polygonal log yurts with a conical roof, which in appearance imitated the felt yurt of nomads.

The traditional clothing of the cattle-breeding population of Siberia was similar to the Central Asian (for example, Mongolian) and belonged to the swing type (fur and cloth robe). The characteristic clothing of the South Altai pastoralists was a long-skinned sheepskin coat. Married Altai women (like the Buryats) put on a kind of long sleeveless jacket with a slit in front - “chegedek” over a fur coat.

The lower reaches of large rivers, as well as a number of small rivers of North-Eastern Siberia, are characterized by a complex of sedentary fishermen. In the vast taiga zone of Siberia, on the basis of the ancient hunting way, a specialized economic and cultural complex of hunters-reindeer herders was formed, which included Evenks, Evens, Yukaghirs, Oroks, and Negidals. The fishery of these peoples consisted in obtaining wild moose and deer, small ungulates and fur-bearing animals. Fishing was almost universally a subsidiary occupation. Unlike sedentary fishermen, the taiga reindeer hunters led a nomadic lifestyle. Taiga transport reindeer breeding is exclusively pack and riding.

The material culture of the hunting peoples of the taiga was fully adapted to constant movement. A typical example of this is the Evenks. Their dwelling was a conical tent, covered with deer skins and dressed skins (“rovduga”), also sewn into wide strips of birch bark boiled in boiling water. With frequent migrations, these tires were transported in packs on domestic deer. To move along the rivers, the Evenks used birch bark boats, so light that one person could easily carry them on their backs. Evenki skis are excellent: wide, long, but very light, glued with the skin from the legs of an elk. Evenki ancient clothing was adapted for frequent skiing and reindeer riding. This garment, made of thin but warm deer skins, was swinging, with floors that did not converge in front, the chest and stomach were covered with a kind of fur bib.

The general course of the historical process in various regions of Siberia was drastically changed by the events of the 16th-17th centuries, associated with the appearance of Russian explorers and, in the end, the inclusion of all of Siberia into the Russian state. The lively Russian trade and the progressive influence of Russian settlers made significant changes in the economy and life of not only the cattle-breeding and agricultural, but also the fishing indigenous population of Siberia. Already by the end of the XVIII century. Evenks, Evens, Yukaghirs and other fishing groups of the North began to widely use firearms. This facilitated and quantitatively increased the production of large animals (wild deer, elk) and fur-bearing animals, especially squirrels - the main object of fur trade in the 18th-early 20th centuries. New occupations began to be added to the original crafts - a more developed reindeer husbandry, the use of the draft power of horses, agricultural experiments, the beginnings of a craft in the local raw material base etc. As a result of all this, the material and everyday culture of the indigenous inhabitants of Siberia also changed.

Spiritual life

The area of religious and mythological ideas and various religious cults succumbed to progressive cultural influence least of all. The most common form of beliefs among the peoples of Siberia was.

A distinctive feature of shamanism is the belief that certain people - shamans - have the ability, having brought themselves into a frenzied state, to enter into direct communication with the spirits - patrons and assistants of the shaman in the fight against diseases, hunger, loss and other misfortunes. The shaman was obliged to take care of the success of the craft, the successful birth of a child, etc. Shamanism had several varieties corresponding to different stages community development the Siberian peoples themselves. Among the most backward peoples, for example, among the Itelmens, everyone could shaman, and especially old women. The remnants of such "universal" shamanism have been preserved among other peoples.

For some peoples, the functions of a shaman were already a specialty, but the shamans themselves served a tribal cult, in which all adult members of the clan took part. Such “tribal shamanism” was noted among the Yukagirs, Khanty and Mansi, among the Evenks and Buryats.

Professional shamanism flourishes during the period of the collapse of the patriarchal-tribal system. The shaman becomes a special person in the community, opposing himself to uninitiated relatives, lives on income from his profession, which becomes hereditary. It is this form of shamanism that has been observed in the recent past among many peoples of Siberia, especially among the Evenks and the Tungus-speaking population of the Amur, among the Nenets, Selkups, and Yakuts.

It acquired complicated forms from the Buryats under the influence, and from the end of the 17th century. generally began to be replaced by this religion.

The tsarist government, starting from the 18th century, diligently supported the missionary activity of the Orthodox Church in Siberia, and Christianization was often carried out by coercive measures. By the end of the XIX century. most of the Siberian peoples were formally baptized, but their own beliefs did not disappear and continued to have a significant impact on the worldview and behavior of the indigenous population.

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Literature

Ethnography: textbook / ed. Yu.V. Bromley, G.E. Markov. - M.: graduate School, 1982. - S. 320. Chapter 10. “Peoples of Siberia”.

On the ethnic map of Russia, Siberia occupies a special position, determined by the level of socio-economic development of the indigenous population, the policy of the state authorities in relation to it, the demographic situation and geography of the region.

From a geographical point of view, Siberia is a subregion of North Asia, within which it occupies an area of 13 million square kilometers. km, which is about 75% of the territory of Russia. The western border of Siberia corresponds to the geographical border between Europe and Asia (the Ural Mountains), the eastern border corresponds to the coast of the seas of the Pacific Ocean basin.

In natural terms, Western Siberia stands out ( West Siberian Plain), Eastern Siberia (the Central Siberian Plateau and the mountain systems of the North-East of Siberia), Southern Siberia, Primorye and the Amur Region form a separate region - the Far East. The climate is sharply continental, severe, with a negative balance of average annual temperatures. Up to b million sq. km of the surface of Siberia is occupied by permafrost.

Siberia is well watered. Most of the great rivers of Siberia belong to the basin of the seas of the Arctic (Ob, Yenisei, Lena, Yana, etc.) and Pacific (Amur, Kamchatka, Anadyr) oceans. Here, especially in the zone of forest-tundra and tundra, there are a large number of lakes, the largest of which are Baikal, Taimyr, Teletskoye.

The territory of Siberia is characterized by a rather diverse latitudinal zonality. With the dominance of the taiga zone - the main territory of the commercial economy, in high latitudes, the forest-tundra strip passes to the north into the tundra zone, in the south to the forest-steppe and further to the steppe and mountain-steppe areas. Zones south of the taiga are often defined as mostly plowed.

Features of the natural environment largely determined the nature of the settlement and the characteristics of the culture of the population who had mastered this region.

At the end of the XX century. The population of Siberia exceeded 32 million people, of which about 2 million were indigenous people of the region. These are 30 peoples, of which 25 with a total number of about 210 thousand, form a community of "indigenous small peoples North and Siberia". The latter are united by such signs as a small number (up to 50 thousand people), the preservation of special types of economic management of nature (hunting, fishing, reindeer herding, etc.), nomadic and semi-nomadic lifestyle, maintenance in public life traditional social norms and institutions.

The All-Russian population census of 2010 gives an idea of the size of the indigenous population of Siberia. Of the relatively large peoples, these are the Yakuts (478 thousand), Buryats (461 thousand), Tuvans (265 thousand), Khakasses (73 thousand), Altaians (81 thousand), Siberian Tatars (6.8 thousand). In fact, the small peoples are the Nenets, including European groups (44.6 thousand), Evenks (37.8 thousand), Khanty (30.9 thousand), Evens (22.4 thousand), Chukchi (15.9 thousand), Shors (12.9 thousand), Mansi (12.2 thousand), Nanais (12 thousand), Koryaks (7.9 thousand), Dolgans (7.8 thousand), Nivkhs (4 6 thousand), Selkups (3.6 thousand), Itelmens and Ulchis (about 3 thousand each), Kets, Yukagirs, Eskimos and Udeges (less than 2 thousand each), Nganasans, Tofalars, Enets, Aleuts, Orochi , Negidals and Uilta/Oroks (less than 1,000 each).

The peoples of Siberia differ from each other linguistically, anthropologically, as well as culturally. These differences are based on the relative independence of ethnogenetic and ethnocultural lines of development, demography, and the nature of settlement.

With a fairly certain dynamics of modern language processes in Siberia, which for small peoples demonstrate almost complete mastery of their native language in older age groups and the transition to Russian in younger ones, historically linguistic communities have formed here, most of which are of local origin.

Within the territory of Western Siberia, peoples who speak the languages of the Ural-Yukagir language family are settled. These are the Samoyeds - the Nenets (a zone of forest-tundra and tundra from the Polar Urals in the west to the Yenisei Bay in the east), the Enets (the right bank of the Yenisei Bay), in Taimyr - the Nganasans. In the West Siberian taiga on the Middle Ob and in the river basin. Taz - Selkups.

The Ugric group is represented by the Khanty languages, which are widely settled in the Ob basin and its tributaries from the forest-tundra to the forest-steppe. The ethnic territory of the Mansi extends from the Urals to the left bank of the Ob. Relatively recently, the Yukaghir language was included in the Uralic language family. Back in the 19th century linguists noted the uraloid substratum in the language of this people, that, despite the territorial remoteness, the Yukagirs live in Eastern Siberia in the basin of the river. Kolyma - allows, as a reflection of the ancient migrations of the Ural-speaking peoples, to single out the Yukaghir language group among the Urals.

The largest in terms of the number of native speakers in Siberia is the Altaic language family. It consists of three groups. The Turkic group includes the languages of the peoples of the Sayano-Altai. Altaians settled from the west to the east of Southern Siberia. They include a number of ethnoterritorial groups, which, according to the 2002 census, were for the first time recorded as independent ethnic groups (Teleuts, Tubalars, Telengits, Kumandins, etc.). Further to the east - Shors, Khakasses, Tuvans, Tofalars.

In the forest-steppe zone of Western Siberia, West Siberian Tatars are settled, which include groups of Baraba, Chulym, Tara and other Tatars.

A significant part of the territory of Eastern Siberia (the basins of the Lena, Anabara, Olenek, Yana, Indigirka) is inhabited by Yakuts. The northernmost Turkic-speaking people of the world, the Dolgans, live in the south of Taimyr. The Mongolian-speaking peoples of Siberia are Buryats and Soyots.

The Tungus-Manchurian languages are widely spoken in the taiga zone of Eastern Siberia from the Yenisei to Kamchatka and Sakhalin. These are the languages of the northern Tungus - Evenks and Evens. South, in the river basin. Amur, live peoples who speak languages belonging to the southern, Amur or Manchurian branch of the Tungus-Manchurian group. These are Nanai, Ulchi, Uilta (Oroks) of Sakhalin Island. Along the banks of the left tributary of the Amur, the river. The Amguns are settled by the Negidals. In Primorsky Krai, in the mountains of Sikhote-Alin and to the coast of the Sea of Japan, live the Udege and Orochi.

The northeast of Siberia, Chukotka and Kamchatka, is inhabited by Paleo-Asiatic peoples - the Chukchi, Koryaks and Itelmens. The concept of "Paleo-Asiatic" is quite consistent with the idea of antiquity and the autochthonous nature of the origin of their cultures. The fact of their genetic linguistic unity is not obvious. Until recently, without using the concept of "family", linguists united their languages into a "group of Paleoasiatic languages". Then, taking into account a number of signs of similarity, they were separated into the Chukchi-Kamchatka language family. Within its framework, a greater relationship is observed between the languages of the Chukchi and Koryaks. The Itelmen language, in relation to them, demonstrates not so much a genetic as an areal correspondence.

Native speakers of languages belonging to the Eskimo-Aleut family (Escaleut) are mainly settled outside of Russia (USA, Canada). In the North-East of Siberia live small groups of Asian Eskimos (the coast of the Gulf of Anadyr, the Chukchi Sea, Wrangel Islands) and Aleuts (Komandorsky Islands).

The languages of two Siberian peoples, the Nivkhs (the Amur Estuary and the north of Sakhalin Island) and the Kets (the Yenisei River basin), are classified as isolated. The Nivkh language, due to the fuzzy expression of the genealogical beginning in the Paleo-Asiatic languages, was previously assigned to this group. The Ket language represents a legacy that linguists trace back to the Yenisei language family. Speakers of the Yenisei languages (Asans, Arins, Yarintsy, etc.) in the past settled in the upper reaches of the Yenisei and its tributaries and during the 18th–19th centuries. were assimilated neighboring peoples.

The historical connection of linguistic communities with certain territories is confirmed by the facts of racial polytypy, which is established at the level of anthropological classification. The peoples of Siberia belong to the local population of northern Mongoloids, which is part of the great Mongoloid race. The taxonomic assessment of the variations of the Mongoloid complex makes it possible to single out several small races in the population of the region.

Carriers of complexes of the Ural and South Siberian races settle in Western Siberia and in the north-west of the Sayano-Altai. In the general classification, such taxa are defined by the concept of "contact". They are characterized by a combination of at least two complexes of signs of racial types adjoining geographically. Representatives of the Ural (Ugrians, Samoyeds, Shors) and South Siberian (Northern Altaians, Khakasses) races are characterized by a weakening of Monhaloid features in the structure of the face and eye area. Unlike the Urals, for whom lightening (depigmentation) of the skin, hair, eyes is typical, the South Siberian groups are more strongly pigmented.

The population of Eastern Siberia, including the areas of Primorye and the Amur region, demonstrates almost the maximum degree of expression of Mongoloid features, even at the level of the Mongoloid race as a whole. This concerns the degree of flattening of the face and nose, a significant proportion of the epicanthus ("Mongolian fold" that covers the lacrimal tubercle and is a continuation of the upper eyelid), the structure of the hairline, etc. These signs are characteristic of representatives of the North Asian race. It includes Baikal (Evenks, Evens, Dolgans, Nanais, and other peoples of the Amur region) and Central Asian (Southern Altaians, Tuvans, Buryats, Yakuts) anthropological types. The differences between them are manifested primarily in the increased pigmentation characteristic of the Central Asian Mongoloids.

In the north-east of Siberia, the Arctic race is widespread, whose representatives, relative to the anthropological features of the Baikal type, on the one hand, demonstrate a weakening of the Mongoloid complex in the structure of the face (more protruding nose, less flat face), on the other hand, increased pigmentation, protrusion of the lips. The last signs are associated with the participation in the formation of the Arctic race of the southern groups of the Pacific Mongoloids. The internal taxonomy of the Arctic race suggests the possibility of separating the continental (Chukchi, Eskimos, partly Koryaks and Itelmens) and insular (Aleuts) groups of populations.

The originality of the two Siberian peoples is fixed in special anthropological types. These are the Amur-Sakhalin (Nivkhs), most likely, mestizo, which arose on the basis of the interaction of the Baikal and Kuril (Ainu) populations, and the Yenisei (Kets), dating back to the anthropological features of the Paleo-Siberian population.

In many respects, the similar level of socio-economic development and geographical zoning of Siberia, as well as the historical and cultural interaction of northerners with neighboring peoples, determined the formation of a cultural landscape specific to the region, which is represented by the classification of the peoples of Siberia according to the KhKT.

In historical sequence, it is customary to distinguish the following complexes: hunters of the wild deer of the Arctic and Subarctic; foot taiga hunters and fishermen (in a later period this type was modified due to the introduction of transport reindeer herding into its composition); sedentary fishermen of the pools Siberian rivers(partly Ob, Amur, Kamchatka); hunters of the sea animal of the Pacific coast; South Siberian commercial and cattle-breeding forest complex; pastoralists of Siberia; nomadic reindeer herders in the tundra of Siberia.

Classification estimates demonstrate the regional correspondence of language features, anthropology, and economic and cultural characteristics, which makes it possible to single out territories within which the commonality of historical destinies gives rise to the stereotyping of a number of cultural phenomena of peoples with different ethno-genetic origins in the past. This state of ethnic cultures is described within the boundaries of the IEO. For Siberia, these are the West Siberian, Yamalo-Taimyr, Sayan-Altai, East Siberian, Amur-Sakhalin and North-Eastern IEOs.

Man began to explore Siberia quite early. On its territory there are archaeological sites dating back to different periods Stone Age in the range from 30 to 5 thousand years ago. This was the time of the formation of Paleo-Siberian cultures, in the final of which there is a territorial isolation of local cultural traditions, corresponding to the placement of the HCT noted above. On the one hand, it demonstrates the tendencies of "cultural radiation", the development of optimal, from the point of view of the ecological characteristics of the regions, adaptive strategies. In the history of the indigenous population of Siberia, it was rather a cultural and genetic period. On the other hand, there is a correspondence of local cultural dynamics to the location in Siberia of future large ethnolinguistic communities - Ural, Altai, including Tungus, Paleo-Asiatic.

The ethnogenesis and ethnic history of the peoples of Siberia is most often comprehended in the process of developing the so-called ethnogenetic problems.

For Western Siberia it is "Samoyed problem ", which was formulated at the beginning of the 18th century. Scientists of that time tried to establish the ancestral home of the Samoyeds. Some of them settled in the north (modern Nenets, Enets, Nganasans and Selkups), while others (Kamasins, Mators, etc.) in the foothills of Altai and Sayan. In the 18th-19th centuries, the South Siberian groups of the Samoyeds were either Turkified or Russified. Thus, mutually exclusive hypotheses were formulated about the Arctic (F. I. Stralenberg) and the Sayan (I. E. Fisher) ancestral home of the Samoyeds. The last hypothesis, in in the form of the formula "The Samoyeds came from Altai", owned by the Finnish researcher M.A. Kastren, has become dominant since the middle of the 19th century.

Domestic Siberian researchers during the 20th century. concretized the picture of the ethnogenesis of the North Samoyedic peoples. It is believed that this was not a simple migration, with the subsequent adaptation of the southern (pastoral) culture of the newcomers to natural environment high latitudes. Archaeological monuments in the north of Western Siberia indicate the existence of a pre-Samoyed (folklore "Siirtya") population here, which also took part in the formation of modern Samoyed peoples. Migration to the north covered a significant period of time, possibly the entire 1st millennium AD. and was determined by the ethnic processes of the formation and settlement of the Central Asian peoples - the Huns, Turks, Mongols.

There is currently a resurgence of interest in the concept of the northern ancestral home of the Samoyeds. The genesis of the archaeological cultures of the Pechora and Ob region, presumably proto-Samodian, starting from the Mesolithic, demonstrates their gradual movement to the south, to the Middle Ob (Kulai archaeological community, the middle of the 1st millennium BC - the middle of the 1st millennium AD) and further to the Sayano-Altai regions. In this case, the Kulays are considered as the ethno-cultural basis for the formation of both northern and southern Samoyeds.

"Ugric problem "is formulated in connection with the existence of two linguistic communities - the Danube (Hungarians) and Ob (Khanty and Mansi) - Ugrians, as well as the presence in the culture of the latter of the steppe pastoral layer. The general scheme of the ethnogenesis of the Ob Ugrians was developed by V. N. Chernetsov. He believed that natives of the West Siberian taiga - hunters-fishermen and newcomers from the more southern, steppe regions - nomadic herders - Ugrians-Savirs, took part in their formation. .e to the first half of the II millennium AD in the taiga zone of Western Siberia.On the one hand, it developed along the line of dominance of the taiga commercial economy and material culture, on the other hand, the preservation of certain phenomena dating back to the steppe in different spheres of the culture of the Ugrians. cattle-breeding tradition (bread oven, horse handling skills, ornamental plots, individual characters of the pantheon, etc.).

At present, it is believed that such a culture could be formed along the line of integration of traditions of different ethnic origin within the boundaries of the entire territory of the settlement of the Khanty and Mansi and flowing synchronously. The path of local adaptation and formation of the proper Ugric culture is possible in a relatively limited area of the forest Trans-Urals, Tobol, Irtysh in the south of the forest zone of Western Siberia. In this area, the continuity of archaeological cultures can be traced from the Late Bronze Age to the first centuries of the 2nd millennium AD. in the formation of an integrated commercial and livestock economy. The Ob Ugrians moved to the north from the end of the 1st millennium AD. under the pressure of the Turkic-speaking population. In the new territories, the ancestors of the Khanty and Mansi adapted to the new conditions in the direction of strengthening the taiga fishing complex and the loss of the skills of the cattle breeding component, which led to a change in their cultural appearance. Already in the conditions of high latitudes and in interaction with the Samoyedic-speaking neighbors, the process of formation of ethnographic and territorial groups of the Ob Ugrians took place.

"Ket problem". It is formulated in connection with the presence in the culture of the Kets of the so-called South Siberian elements, which allows us to consider modern Kets as descendants of one of the Yenisei peoples, or even a single Yenisei people who lived in South Siberia in the past. These are arins, asanas, yarintsy, baikogovtsy and kotty, which during the XVIII-XIX centuries. were assimilated by the peoples around them. Thus, the Yenisei components took part in the formation of separate groups of Khakasses (Kachins), Tuvans, Shors, and Buryats. Migration processes, which in Southern Siberia were associated with the ethnopolitical history of the Turks, also affected the Yenisei peoples. The beginning of the migration of the ancestors of the Kets is associated with the 9th-13th centuries, which led to the settlement of a few groups of the Ket-speaking population along the banks of the Yenisei and its tributaries. It was here, in contact with the Khanty, Selkups and Evenks, that the original Kst culture was formed.

The East Siberian and Amur regions are inhabited by peoples who speak the Tungus-Manchu languages. The vast territory, developed by relatively small peoples, the similarity of many elements of culture, including language and anthropological proximity, in the presence of ethnic and cultural local specifics, gave rise to Siberian studies "Tunguska problem".

It boils down to the search for the ancestral home of the Tungus-Manchurian peoples, within whose borders a marked unity was formed. It was localized by various researchers within "those countries that they occupy to this day" - the autochthonous hypothesis of G. F. Miller (XVIII century). Supporters of the migration hypothesis established the ancestral home locally - the left bank of the lower and middle reaches of the Amur and the adjacent regions of Manchuria, the forest-steppe regions of the Southern Baikal region, Transbaikalia and Northern Mongolia, and even in the interfluve of the Yellow River and Yangtze.

By the middle of the XX century. domestic researchers based on data from anthropology, archeology, linguistics, ethnography, etc. created a general scheme of the ethnogenesis of the Tungus-Manchurian peoples of Siberia. Their ancestral home, on the basis of archeological data, is associated with the genesis of the hunting Neolithic Baikal culture of the southern regions of Lake Baikal, and the process of formation of individual peoples of the Tungus-Manchu community, with the consistent differentiation of the Altai language community from the 3rd millennium BC. until the turn of our era.

The content of this process consisted in the primary separation in its composition of the ancestors of the Tungus (north) and the southern steppe population, on the basis of which the Turks and Mongols subsequently formed, and the subsequent isolation already within the boundaries of the Tungus-Manchu community of the speakers of the Manchu languages, who by the turn of our era had mastered the Amur basin and its tributaries. Around the same time, in connection with the advancement of the steppe, pastoral population to Baikal, the northern Tungus were divided into western and eastern, relative to the river. Lenas, communities. The Evens stand out in the eastern part, having mastered the eastern regions of Yakutia and the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, and in the 19th century. a small group of Evens moved to Kamchatka. An important moment in the history of the northern Tungus is their development, presumably in the 6th-7th centuries. AD, transport reindeer breeding. There is an opinion that it was the deer that "inspired the Tungus" and allowed them to master the vast expanses of Eastern Siberia. The breadth of settlement and constant contacts with neighboring peoples led to the formation of local features of the culture of the Tungus-speaking population of Siberia. This is clearly evidenced by the early Russian written sources, which mention "foot, deer, horse, cattle, seated Tungus".

"The Paleoasian Problem" stems from the territorial isolation of the Paleo-Asiatic peoples, the specific position of their languages (the group of Paleo-Asiatic languages), and many cultural features. These peoples are considered to be the natives of the region. In Kamchatka and Chukotka, archaeological sites of the Upper Paleolithic era have been discovered, indicating the formation in the region of the foundations of a culture of hunters of wild deer, which, in fairly stable natural and climatic conditions, existed here until the end of the 17th - beginning of the 18th centuries. There are several lines of ethnocultural development of Paleoasians.

So, the Chukchi and Koryaks are divided into ethnographic groups of coastal (sea St. John's wort) and deer, and therefore, there are numerous parallels in the culture of these peoples. Starting from the middle of the 1st millennium AD, the basis for the formation of the culture of the coastal Chukchi was determined by their contacts with the Eskimos. It was the interaction of two hunting traditions, continental and coastal. In the initial period, due to differences in almost all spheres of culture, it took place in the form of an exchange. Subsequently, part of the Chukchi, continental deer hunters, switched to a settled way of life and engaged in marine hunting.

The history of the coastal Koryaks is associated with the autochthonous basis for the formation of their culture. In the basin of the Sea of Okhotsk, archaeologists have discovered sites of the so-called Okhotsk culture (1st millennium AD), which is defined as "the ancient Koryak culture of the Okhotsk coast." This is the culture of marine hunters, fishermen, and wild deer hunters, in which, in relative chronological continuity up to the ancient Koryak settlements of the 16th–17th centuries, features of the Koryak cultural tradition can be traced.

The history of the formation of the deer groups of the Chukchi and Koryaks is not so obvious, since this problem is connected with the history of Siberian reindeer herding as a whole. According to one point of view, reindeer husbandry in Chukotka arises convergently with respect to other Siberian centers of reindeer domestication on the basis of the local culture of wild deer hunters. According to another position, it is assumed that Paleo-Asians borrowed reindeer husbandry from the Tungus, with its subsequent evolution from transport (Tungus) to large-herd (Paleo-Asians) already among the Chukchi and Koryaks.

A separate position among the Paleo-Asiatic peoples of the North-East of Siberia is occupied by the indigenous inhabitants of Kamchatka, the Itelmens, which is manifested in the language, anthropological and cultural features. The most ancient archaeological sites of the region were found in Central Kamchatka, which testify to the ties of its population with the American continent ( gun complex), here (Ushki I site) was found perhaps the oldest on Earth - about 14 thousand years ago - the burial of a domestic dog. These were cultures typologically similar to Chukotka and Kolyma, which probably influenced the correspondence between the culture of the Itelmens and their northern neighbors.

It includes a number of common elements characteristic of most of the Paleo-Asiatic peoples of the North-East of Siberia (the main types of economic activity, some types of residential and outbuildings, partly transport and winter clothing). Along with this, the direction and intensity of cultural contacts led to the interaction of neighboring peoples, or the adaptation by one of them of the cultural elements of another. Such connections of the Itelmen culture are established with the Ainu, Aleuts. The strongest links were between the Itelmens and their northern neighbors, the Koryaks. This is fixed anthropologically - the Koryaks and Itelmens oppose the Chukchi and Eskimos within the mainland group of populations of the Arctic race, the same is noted in the sphere of language. Interaction with the Russians, which began at the end of the 18th century. led to a radical transformation of their culture in the direction of syncretization. With sufficiently intensive marital contacts, a perceived ethnic group of Kamchadals was formed, which in ethnocultural terms differs from the Itelmens proper and gravitates towards the Russians.

"Escaleut problem". The history of the Eskimos and Aleuts, who mainly live outside the territory of Russia, is connected with the problem of the formation of the coastal cultures of Chukotka and Alaska. The relationship between the Eskimos and the Aleuts is recorded in the form of a proto-Esco-Aleutian community, which in ancient times was localized in the zone of the Bering Strait. Its division, according to various estimates, took place from 2.5 thousand to 6 thousand years ago at the stage of continental culture, since the vocabulary of the Eskimos and Aleuts associated with marine hunting is different. This was due to the process of development by the ancestors of the Eskimos and Aleuts of various territories of Beringia and the American North.

The initial stage of the formation of the Eskimos is associated with a change at the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. ecological situation in the regions of Beringia - increased coastal migrations of sea animals. Their further development can be traced in the evolution of local and chronological variants of ancient Eskimo cultures. The Okvik stage (1st millennium BC) reflects the process of interaction between the continental culture of wild deer hunters and the culture of marine hunters. The strengthening of the role of the latter is recorded in the monuments of the ancient Bering Sea culture (the first half of the 1st millennium AD). In the southeast of Chukotka, the Old Bering Sea culture passes into the Punuk culture (VI–VIII centuries). It was the heyday of whaling and, in general, the culture of marine hunters in Chukotka.

The subsequent ethno-cultural history of the Eskimos is closely connected with the formation of the community of the coastal Chukchi, who came into contact with them at the beginning of the 1st millennium AD. This process had a pronounced integration character, which found expression in the interpenetration of many elements of the traditional everyday culture of the coastal Chukchi and Eskimos.

At present, the point of view about the formation of the Aleuts in the Aleutian Islands is more preferable. The most ancient archaeological evidence found here (Anangula site, about 8 thousand years ago) indicates the genetic connection of the local population with Asian cultures. It was on this basis that the Aleuts themselves subsequently formed. The insular nature of their formation is also confirmed by the anthropological specificity (an insular group of populations within the Arctic race), which develops as a result of insular isolation and adaptation to local conditions.

The history of the Russian Aleuts inhabiting the Commander Islands (Bering and Medny Islands) begins no earlier than 1825, when 17 Aleut families were resettled to Bering Island. This resettlement was associated with the development of the commercial territories of Beringia by the Russian-American Company.

In the vast expanses of the Siberian tundra and taiga, forest-steppe and black earth expanses, a population settled, hardly exceeding 200 thousand people by the time the Russians arrived. In the regions of the Amur and Primorye by the middle of the XVII century. about 30 thousand people lived. The ethnic and linguistic composition of the population of Siberia was very diverse.

The very difficult living conditions in the tundra and taiga and the exceptional disunity of the population led to the extremely slow development of the productive forces among the peoples of Siberia. By the time the Russians arrived, most of them were still at various stages of the patriarchal-tribal system. Only the Siberian Tatars were at the stage of formation of feudal relations.

In the economy of the northern peoples of Siberia, the leading place belonged to hunting and fishing. A supporting role was played by the collection of wild edible plants. Mansi and Khanty, like the Buryats and Kuznetsk Tatars, mined iron. The more backward peoples still used stone tools. A large family (yurts) consisted of 2 - 3 men or more. Sometimes in numerous yurts lived several large families. In the conditions of the North, such yurts were independent settlements - rural communities.

The Ostyaks (Khanty) lived along the Ob. Their main occupation was fishing. Fish was eaten, clothes were made from fish skin. On the wooded slopes of the Urals lived the Voguls, who were mainly engaged in hunting. The Ostyaks and Voguls had principalities headed by tribal nobility. The princes owned fishing grounds, hunting grounds, and besides that, their fellow tribesmen also brought them “gifts”. Wars often broke out between the principalities. Captured prisoners were turned into slaves. In the northern tundra lived the Nenets, who were engaged in reindeer herding. With herds of deer, they constantly moved from pasture to pasture. The reindeer provided the Nenets with food, clothing, and shelter, which was made from reindeer skins. Fishing and hunting foxes and wild deer were common occupations. The Nenets lived in clans headed by princes. Further, to the east of the Yenisei, the Evenki (Tungus) lived. Their main occupation was hunting fur animal as well as fishing. In search of prey, the Evenks moved from place to place. They also dominated the tribal system. In the south of Siberia, in upstream Yenisei, lived Khakass cattle breeders. The Buryats lived near the Angara and Baikal. Their main occupation was cattle breeding. The Buryats were already on the way to becoming a class society.

In the Amur region lived the tribes of Daurs and Duchers, more economically developed.

The Yakuts occupied the territory formed by Lena, Aldan and Amgoyu. Separate groups were placed on the river. Yana, at the mouth of the Vilyui and the Zhigansk region. In total, according to Russian documents, the Yakuts at that time numbered about 25 - 26 thousand people. By the time the Russians appeared, the Yakuts were a single people with a single language, a common territory and a common culture. The Yakuts were at the stage of decomposition of the primitive communal system. The main large social groups were tribes and clans. In the economy of the Yakuts, the processing of iron was widely developed, from which weapons, blacksmith accessories and other tools were made. The blacksmith enjoyed great honor among the Yakuts (more than a shaman). The main wealth of the Yakuts was cattle. The Yakuts led a semi-sedentary life. In the summer they went to winter roads, they also had summer, spring and autumn pastures. In the economy of the Yakuts, much attention was paid to hunting and fishing. The Yakuts lived in yurts-balagans, insulated with turf and earth. winter time, and in summer - in birch bark dwellings (ursa) and in light huts. Great power belonged to the ancestor-toyon. He had from 300 to 900 heads of cattle. The Toyons were surrounded by servants - chakhardars - from slaves and domestic servants. But the Yakuts had few slaves, and they did not determine the mode of production. The poor rodovici were not yet the object of the birth of feudal exploitation. private property there were also no fishing and hunting lands, but hay lands were distributed among individual families.

Almost without resistance, the nomadic Buryats who lived along the Angara and around Lake Baikal recognized Russian power. Russian settlements appeared here - Irkutsk, Selenginsk, Bratsk Ostrog, Ilimsk. The advance to the Lena led the Russians to the country of the Yakut cattle breeders and Evenks, who were engaged in hunting and reindeer herding.

Buryats hunted in the 17th century using bows and arrows. The ban on firearms was lifted in the second half of the 17th century, when the tsarist government became convinced that any prohibitive measures could not force the Buryats to pay yasak to the treasury in furs. The Buryats were engaged in agriculture, raised cattle.

The hunting season began in autumn. Artels of hunters went to the taiga in autumn for one or two months, lived in huts in the camps. Returning from camp hunting, they told uligers (epic tales), because they believed that the “owner” of the taiga Khangai liked to listen to uligers; if he liked the uliger, as if in gratitude he would send a lot of booty to the hunters the next day.

In addition to cattle breeding, agriculture and hunting, the Buryats were engaged in carting, blacksmithing, and carpentry. In the records of travelers of the 17th century, it is noted that among the Buryats of the forest-steppe zone, the dwellings are felt yurts.

On the territory of the Baikal and Transbaikalia, depending on the climatic, geographical conditions the Buryats simultaneously had different types of dwellings, ranging from the hut-tent in the northern forest regions and ending with a lattice yurt in the southern steppes.

The yurt was heated by the fire of the hearth - gulamta. Ghulamta was an adobe platform in the center, in the middle of which three stones were installed - dule. Subsequently, instead of the dule, they began to use an iron tripod - tulga.

On the left side of the yurt there are items related to the kitchen, and since a woman is in charge of the household, this side is considered female. In the right part of the yurt there were chests (abdar) and cabinets (uheg), where saddles, guns and other belongings of men were stored. Here guests were received and treated.

Utensils were distinguished by their simplicity and remarkable adaptability to the semi-nomadic lifestyle of the Buryats; they were made from materials that they obtained and dressed themselves: skins, leather, furs, wool, wood, birch bark, etc.

As the Russian Cossack detachments and service people advanced beyond Baikal and the local indigenous peoples of Siberia were brought “under the high hand of the white king”, the Tungus population, like the Buryat, turned out to be assigned to certain tributaries, winter quarters, and volosts.

Khanty and Mansi: Number of 30 thousand people. They speak the languages of the Finno-Ugric group of the Ural family (Khanty, Mansi). Traditional occupations: hunting, fishing, for some peoples - agriculture and cattle breeding. Breed horses, cows, sheep, poultry. Recently, animal husbandry, animal husbandry, and vegetable growing have begun to develop. They moved on skis, sleds in dog and reindeer teams, in some areas - on sledges. The settlements were permanent (winter) and seasonal (spring, summer, autumn).

Traditional dwellings in winter: rectangular log houses, often with an earthen roof, in summer - conical birch bark tents or quadrangular frame buildings made of poles covered with birch bark, for reindeer breeders - tents covered with reindeer skins. The dwelling was heated and lit by an open hearth made of poles smeared with clay. Traditional women's clothing: a dress, a swinging robe and a double reindeer coat, a scarf on the head; men's clothing: shirt, pants, blind clothes with a hood made of cloth. Reindeer herders have clothes made of reindeer skins, shoes are fur, suede or leather. Khanty and Mansi wear a large number of jewelry (rings, beaded necklaces, etc.)

Traditional food - fish and meat in dried, dried, fried, frozen form, berries, bread, from drinks - tea. The traditional village was inhabited by several large or small, mostly related families. Marriage is patrilocal with elements of matrilocality matrilocality. In the XIX - early XX centuries. a territorial community is formed. Believers are Orthodox, but traditional beliefs and cults are also preserved, based on ideas related to totemism, animism, shamanism, the cult of ancestors, etc. The tattoo was known.

Nenets: Number 35 thousand people. They speak the Nenets language of the Ural family, which is divided into 2 dialects: tundra and forest, Russian is also common. Traditional occupations: hunting for fur-bearing animals, wild deer, upland and waterfowl, fishing, domestic reindeer breeding. Most of the Nenets led a nomadic lifestyle. The traditional dwelling is a collapsible pole tent covered with reindeer skins in winter and birch bark in summer. Outerwear and shoes were made from reindeer skins. They traveled on light wooden sleds. Food - deer meat, fish. The main social unit of the Nenets in late XIX centuries there was a patrilineal clan, 2 exogamous phratries also remained. Religious views were dominated by belief in spirits - the masters of heaven, earth, fire, rivers, natural phenomena; among a part of the Nenets, Orthodoxy became widespread.

Buryats: Total number 520 thousand people. They speak the Buryat language of the Mongolian group of the Altai family. Russian and Mongolian languages are also widespread. Beliefs: Shamanism, Buddhism, Christianity. The predominant branch of the traditional economy of the Buryats was cattle breeding. Later, more and more began to engage in arable farming. In Transbaikalia - a typical Mongolian nomadic economy. Cattle, horses, sheep, goats and camels were bred. Hunting and fishing were of secondary importance. There was a seal fishery. Of the crafts, blacksmithing, processing of leather and skins, dressing of felt, making harness, clothes and shoes, joinery and carpentry were developed.

The Buryats were engaged in iron smelting, mica and salt mining. Clothing: fur coats and hats, cloth robes, high fur boots, women's top sleeveless jackets, etc. Clothes, especially women's clothes, were decorated with multi-colored materials, silver and gold. The jewelry set included various kinds of earrings, bracelets, rings, corals and coins, chains and pendants. For men, silver belts, knives, pipes served as decorations. Food: meat and dairy products. The Buryats widely ate berries, plants and roots, and prepared them for the winter. In places of development of arable farming, bread and flour products, potatoes and garden crops came into use. Dwelling: wooden yurts. social organization: tribal relations were preserved. Exogamy and dowry played an important role in the family and marriage system.

The Samoyed tribes are considered to be the first indigenous inhabitants of Siberia. They inhabited the northern part. Their main occupation is reindeer herding and fishing. To the south lived the Mansi tribes, who lived by hunting. Their main trade was the extraction of furs, with which they paid for their future wives and bought goods necessary for life.

The upper reaches of the Ob were inhabited by Turkic tribes. Their main occupation was nomadic cattle breeding and blacksmithing. To the west of Lake Baikal lived the Buryats, who became famous for their ironworking craft. most large area from the Yenisei to the Sea of \u200b\u200bOkhotsk, the Tungus tribes inhabited. Among them were many hunters, fishermen, reindeer herders, some were engaged in crafts.

Along the coast of the Chukchi Sea, the Eskimos (about 4 thousand people) settled down. Compared to other peoples of that time, the Eskimos had the slowest social development. The tool was made of stone or wood. The main economic activities include gathering and hunting.

The main way of survival of the first settlers of the Siberian region was hunting, reindeer herding and fur extraction, which was the currency of that time.

By the end of the 17th century, the most developed peoples of Siberia were the Buryats and Yakuts. The Tatars were the only people who, before the arrival of the Russians, managed to organize state power.

The following peoples can be attributed to the largest peoples before Russian colonization: Itelmens (indigenous inhabitants of Kamchatka), Yukagirs (inhabited the main territory of the tundra), Nivkhs (residents of Sakhalin), Tuvans ( indigenous people Republic of Tuva), Siberian Tatars (located on the territory of Southern Siberia from the Urals to the Yenisei) and Selkups (inhabitants of Western Siberia).

Peoples of Siberia and the Far East.

More than 20 peoples live in Siberia. Since their main occupation is taiga and tundra hunting, sea hunting and reindeer herding, they are usually called the small fishing peoples of the North and Siberia. One of the largest peoples are the Yakuts (382 thousand). Many peoples of Siberia have historical names. For example, in Russian sources, Khanty and Mansi were called Yugra, and Nenets were called Samoyeds. And the Russians called the inhabitants of the eastern coast of the Yenisei Evenki Tungus. For the majority of the inhabitants of Siberia, the traditional type of dwelling is a portable tent. The life of hunters is also characterized by a winter coat-parka made of deer fur. From the first half of the 17th century. Russians, having passed the taiga camps of the Tungus, in the middle reaches of the river. Lena met with the Yakuts (self-name "Sakha").

These are the northernmost breeders in the world. The Yakuts assimilated some other peoples of the North, in particular, the Dolgans living in the north-west of Yakutia on the border with Taimyr. Their language is Yakut. The Dolgans are reindeer herders and also fishermen. In the north-east of Yakutia live Yukaghirs (basin of the Kolyma River), which number about 1100 people. This is the oldest people of Siberia. The Yukaghir language is Paleo-Asiatic and does not belong to any of the language families. Linguists find some connection with the languages of the Uralic family. The main occupation is hiking. The peoples of Kamchatka and Chukotka are also not numerous: Chukchi (about 15 thousand), Koryaks (about 9 thousand), Itelmens (2.4 thousand), Chuvans (1.4 thousand), Eskimos and Aleuts (1.7 and 0 .6 thousand respectively) Their traditional occupation is tundra large-herd reindeer breeding, as well as sea fishing.

Also interesting for ethnography are the small peoples of the Far East, living in the basin of the Amur and its tributaries, in the Ussuri taiga. These are: Nivkhs (4.7 thousand), Nanais (12 thousand), Ulchi (3.2 thousand), Orochi (900 people), Udege (2 thousand), Oroks (200 people), Negidals (600 people). The languages of these peoples, except for the Nivkh, belong to the Tungus-Manchurian group of the Altai language family. The most ancient and special language is Nivkh, one of the Paleo-Asiatic languages. In everyday life, in addition to hunting in the taiga, these peoples were engaged in fishing, collecting wild plants and sea hunting. Hiking in summer, skiing in winter. Quite large peoples live in the south of Siberia: Altaians (69 thousand), Khakasses (78 thousand), Tuvans (206 thousand), Buryats (417 thousand), etc. All of them speak the languages of the Altai language family. The main activity is domestic reindeer breeding.

Indigenous peoples of Siberia in the modern world.

According to the Constitution of the Russian Federation, every people of Russia received the right to national self-determination and identification. Since the collapse of the USSR, Russia has officially become multinational state and the preservation of the culture of small and disappearing peoples has become one of the state priorities. The Siberian indigenous peoples were also not ignored here: some of them received the right to self-government in autonomous regions, while others formed their own republics as part of the new Russia. Very small and disappearing nationalities enjoy the full support of the state, and the efforts of many people are aimed at preserving their culture and traditions.

Within the framework of this review, we will give a brief description of each Siberian people, the number of which is more than or close to 7 thousand people. Smaller peoples are difficult to characterize, so we will limit ourselves to their name and number. So, let's begin.

Yakuts- the most numerous of the Siberian peoples. According to the latest data, the number of Yakuts is 478,100 people. In modern Russia, the Yakuts are one of the few nationalities that have their own republic, and its area is comparable to the area of an average European state. The Republic of Yakutia (Sakha) is territorially located in the Far Eastern Federal District, but the ethnic group "Yakuts" has always been considered an indigenous Siberian people. Yakuts have interesting culture and traditions. This is one of the few peoples of Siberia that has its own epic.

Buryats- this is another Siberian people with its own republic. The capital of Buryatia is the city of Ulan-Ude, located to the east of Lake Baikal. The number of Buryats is 461,389 people. In Siberia, Buryat cuisine is widely known, rightfully considered one of the best among ethnic ones. The history of this people, its legends and traditions is quite interesting. By the way, the Republic of Buryatia is one of the main centers of Buddhism in Russia.

Tuvans. According to the latest census, 263,934 identified themselves as representatives of the Tuvan people. The Tyva Republic is one of the four ethnic republics of the Siberian Federal District. Its capital is the city of Kyzyl with a population of 110 thousand people. total population Republic is approaching 300 thousand. Buddhism also flourishes here, and the traditions of the Tuvans also speak of shamanism.

Khakasses- one of the indigenous peoples of Siberia, numbering 72,959 people. Today they have their own republic as part of the Siberian Federal District and with the capital in the city of Abakan. This ancient people has long lived on the lands to the west of the Great Lake (Baikal). It has never been numerous, which did not prevent it from carrying its identity, culture and traditions through the centuries.

Altaians. Their place of residence is quite compact - this is the Altai mountain system. Today Altaians live in two constituent entities of the Russian Federation - the Republic of Altai and the Altai Territory. The number of the ethnos "Altaians" is about 71 thousand people, which allows us to talk about them as a fairly large people. Religion - Shamanism and Buddhism. The Altaians have their own epic and a pronounced national identity, which does not allow them to be confused with other Siberian peoples. This mountain people has a long history and interesting legends.

Nenets- one of the small Siberian peoples living compactly in the area of the Kola Peninsula. Its number of 44,640 people makes it possible to attribute it to small nations, whose traditions and culture are protected by the state. The Nenets are nomadic reindeer herders. They belong to the so-called Samoyedic folk group. Over the years of the 20th century, the number of Nenets has approximately doubled, which indicates the effectiveness of state policy in the field of preserving the small peoples of the North. The Nenets have their own language and oral epic.

Evenki- the people predominantly living on the territory of the Republic of Sakha. The number of this people in Russia is 38,396 people, some of whom live in areas adjacent to Yakutia. It is worth saying that this is about half of the total ethnic group - about the same number of Evenks live in China and Mongolia. The Evenks are the people of the Manchu group, who do not have their own language and epic. Tungus is considered the native language of the Evenks. Evenks are born hunters and trackers.

Khanty- the indigenous people of Siberia, belonging to the Ugric group. Most of the Khanty live in the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug, which is part of the Ural Federal District of Russia. The total number of Khanty is 30,943 people. On the territory of the Siberian Federal District about 35% of the Khanty live, and their lion's share falls on the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug. The traditional occupations of the Khanty are fishing, hunting and reindeer herding. The religion of their ancestors is shamanism, but recently more and more Khanty consider themselves Orthodox Christians.

Evens- a people related to the Evenks. According to one version, they represent an Evenk group, which was cut off from the main halo of residence by the Yakuts moving south. Long time away from the main ethnic group made the Evens a separate people. Today their number is 21,830 people. The language is Tungus. Places of residence - Kamchatka, Magadan region, Republic of Sakha.

Chukchi- a nomadic Siberian people who are mainly engaged in reindeer herding and live on the territory of the Chukchi Peninsula. Their number is about 16 thousand people. The Chukchi belong to the Mongoloid race and, according to many anthropologists, are the indigenous aborigines of the Far North. The main religion is animism. Indigenous crafts are hunting and reindeer herding.

Shors- Turkic-speaking people living in the southeastern part of Western Siberia, mainly in the south of the Kemerovo region (in Tashtagol, Novokuznetsk, Mezhdurechensk, Myskovsky, Osinnikovsky and other areas). Their number is about 13 thousand people. The main religion is shamanism. The Shor epic is of scientific interest primarily for its originality and antiquity. The history of the people dates back to the VI century. Today, the traditions of the Shors have been preserved only in Sheregesh, since most of the ethnic group moved to the cities and largely assimilated.

Mansi. This people has been known to Russians since the foundation of Siberia. Even Ivan the Terrible sent an army against the Mansi, which suggests that they were quite numerous and strong. The self-name of this people is the Voguls. They have their own language, a fairly developed epic. Today, their place of residence is the territory of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug. According to the latest census, 12,269 people identified themselves as belonging to the Mansi ethnic group.

Nanais- a small people living along the banks of the Amur River in the Far East of Russia. Relating to the Baikal ethnotype, the Nanais are rightfully considered one of the most ancient indigenous peoples of Siberia and the Far East. To date, the number of Nanais in Russia is 12,160 people. The Nanais have their own language, rooted in Tungus. Writing exists only among the Russian Nanais and is based on the Cyrillic alphabet.

Koryaks- the indigenous people of the Kamchatka Territory. There are coastal and tundra Koryaks. The Koryaks are mainly reindeer herders and fishermen. The religion of this ethnic group is shamanism. Number - 8 743 people.

Dolgany- people living in the Dolgan-Nenets municipal area Krasnoyarsk Territory. Number - 7 885 people.

Siberian Tatars- perhaps the most famous, but today a few Siberian people. According to the latest population census, 6,779 people identified themselves as Siberian Tatars. However, scientists say that in fact their number is much larger - according to some estimates, up to 100,000 people.

soyots- the indigenous people of Siberia, which is a descendant of the Sayan Samoyeds. Compactly lives on the territory of modern Buryatia. The number of Soyots is 5,579 people.

Nivkhs- the indigenous people of Sakhalin Island. Now they also live on the continental part at the mouth of the Amur River. In 2010, the number of Nivkhs is 5,162 people.

Selkups live in the northern parts of the Tyumen, Tomsk regions and in the territory of the Krasnoyarsk Territory. The number of this ethnic group is about 4 thousand people.

Itelmens- This is another indigenous people of the Kamchatka Peninsula. Today, almost all representatives of the ethnic group live in the west of Kamchatka and in the Magadan Region. The number of Itelmens is 3,180 people.

Teleuts- Turkic-speaking small Siberian people living in the south Kemerovo Region. The ethnos is very closely connected with the Altaians. Its number is approaching 2 and a half thousand.

Among other small peoples of Siberia, such ethnic groups as the Kets, Chuvans, Nganasans, Tofalgars, Orochi, Negidals, Aleuts, Chulyms, Oroks, Tazy, "Enets", "Alyutors" and "Kereks". It is worth saying that the number of each of them is less than 1 thousand people, so their culture and traditions have practically not been preserved.

Sustainable economic and cultural types of the indigenous peoples of Siberia:

1. Foot hunters and fishermen of the taiga zone;

2. Wild deer hunters in the Subarctic;

3. Sedentary fishermen in the lower reaches of large rivers (Ob, Amur, and also in Kamchatka);

4. Taiga hunters-reindeer breeders of Eastern Siberia;

5. Reindeer herders of the tundra from the Northern Urals to Chukotka;

6. Hunters for sea animals on the Pacific coast and islands;

7. Cattle breeders and farmers of Southern and Western Siberia, Baikal region, etc.

Historical and ethnographic areas:

1. West Siberian (with the southern, approximately to the latitude of Tobolsk and the mouth of the Chulym on the Upper Ob, and the northern, taiga and subarctic regions);

2. Altai-Sayan (mountain-taiga and forest-steppe mixed zone);

3. East Siberian (with internal differentiation of commercial and agricultural types of tundra, taiga and forest-steppe);

4. Amur (or Amur-Sakhalin);

5. Northeastern (Chukotka-Kamchatka).

1. When and by whom did the development of Siberia begin?

It is traditionally considered that Yermak's campaign against the Siberian Khanate began in 1581. The process of conquest of Siberia included the gradual advance of the Russian Cossacks and servicemen to the East, up to their access to the Pacific Ocean and consolidation in Kamchatka.

2. What goals did the first conquerors of Siberia pursue?

The first Russian explorers, starting from 1581, went to Siberia for furs - a commodity that provided most of the foreign exchange earnings of the Russian state. That is why they walked along the tundra and taiga, founding the first fortified cities and fortresses (fortresses) on the rivers - the only transport routes: Tyumen (1586), Tobolsk (1587), Surgut (1594), Obdorsk (1595; now Salekhard).

4. What peoples live in Siberia? What are they doing?

Siberia is characterized by ethnic diversity, but the majority of the region's population is Russian. Among other peoples, the most numerous are the Buryats, who speak the language of the Mongolian group of the Altai family and mostly profess Buddhism. Tuvans speaking the language of the Turkic group of the Altaic families, second by number of non-Russian peoples of Siberia. The Khakases are a Turkic-speaking people inhabiting the Minusinsk Basin and the northern spurs of the Sayan Mountains. In the population of the Republic of Khakassia, the Khakass themselves make up only 12%, and Russians predominate - 80%. Altaians, who also speak one of the Turkic languages, make up 30% of the population of the Altai Republic (there are only about 70 thousand people), 56% are Russians, 12% are Kazakhs; also small peoples live in the republic, close to the Altaians and previously related to them - Telengits, Tubalars, Chelkans, Kumandins. Other Turkic peoples of Siberia are Shors (14 thousand) and Tatars (300 thousand). The most urbanized territories of Siberia are the areas inhabited by the peoples of the Finno-Ugric language group Ural family, close relatives of European Hungarians - Khanty (17 thousand people) and Mansi (10 thousand people). In the Far North of Siberia, the peoples of the Samoyedic language group of the Ural family of the Nenets (about 30 thousand people), Selkups (4 thousand people), Nganasans (1 thousand people), as well as Turkic-speaking Dolgans ( 7 thousand people). Evenki taiga hunters and reindeer herders are scattered over a vast area from the Yenisei to the Pacific Ocean - there are 35 thousand of them.

5. “You notice a noticeable difference,” writes one of the travelers in Siberia, “when you move from the middle of Russia beyond the Ural Range and find yourself somewhere on the plains of the Irtysh and Ob or on the hilly banks of the Tom: a different dialect, a different custom, a new character in everything that you can’t immediately identify, but nevertheless feel.” In your opinion, did the harsh natural conditions of Siberia leave an imprint on the character of its inhabitants?

Yes, they did. See point 7

6. Why since the end of the XVI century. an influx of immigrants rushed to Siberia?

Immediately after Yermak's campaign, from the end of the 16th century, a massive influx of migrants from the European part of the country began to Siberia. These were mainly peasants who fled here from the growing feudal oppression. These free settlers formed the main part of the Russian population of Siberia. In addition, from the 17th century Siberia becomes a place of exile for all "undesirable elements" - rebels, Decembrists, participants in popular uprisings and opposition movements (populists, socialist-revolutionaries, social democrats, anarchists), etc.

7. Compare the way of life of a Siberian and an inhabitant of the Central Russian zone. Prove that natural conditions affect the character of a person, his way of life, economic activity.

The inhabitants of Siberia live in harsh natural conditions, they have to work more because of the harsher climate than the resident of the middle lane. In this regard, the Siberian may be more hardworking, collected, accurate, more adapted to difficult situations, the character is likely to be serious.