Novorossiya. Facts you didn't know about. Putin's lies or the history of “Novorossiya” and its ethnic composition in the 19th century

"Primarily Russian" Novorossiya in figures and facts.

Many large states are characterized by very significant regional differences, in other words, they consist of a number of historical and cultural regions that have their own specifics. Ukraine is often conventionally divided into 3 large regions, which in turn include a number of smaller regions. This is the so-called Western Ukraine, Central Ukraine and South-Eastern Ukraine.

The difference between South-Eastern Ukraine and the first two regions is visible to the naked eye: here they speak differently and vote differently. Many even wonder if this region did not become part of Ukraine by mistake, and others are even sure that this land was “gifted” to the Ukrainians by the Soviet Union, and in general they (the lands) have nothing to do with Ukraine.

Here I will allow myself to quote the words of one author, which well illustrate the view of the Southeast as “original Russian lands.” Here it is:

“Meanwhile, for a normal person, terms such as Novorossiya are unifying for Russia and Ukraine. These lands were inhabited by people who spoke Russian and only Russian.[…] What is Novorossiya? This territory of the Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, Kherson, Nikolaev and Odessa regions, colonized by Empress Catherine the Great and called Novorossiya, was annexed to Ukraine by the Bolshevik regime in a voluntaristic way.[...] In the 1920s, the Bolsheviks carried out the first forced Ukrainization, which became the genocide of the Russian majority of these territories."

I propose to figure out who actually populated Novorossiya, what language they spoke and what the majority was here.

Novorossiya - general information and a brief background

When we are dealing with historical-geographical regions, we need to understand two things: any zoning is conditional, historical-geographical regions in different time could have different boundaries.

Localization

Let's start with localization - where Novorossiya is located, what it includes, and how it relates to other regions, in particular to the modern Southeast.

The southeast of Ukraine, on the one hand, is its entire territory below the so-called. Voeikov axis, in other words - steppe zone and Crimea. This is based, as it were, on the physical-geographical situation. And with reference to a modern administrative map, these are: Odessa, Nikolaev, Kherson, Zaporozhye, Dnepropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kharkov, Lugansk regions and the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.

What is Novorossiya? Its territorial boundaries according to version different authors are different. In a broad sense, it includes the southern lands of Ukraine and southwestern Russia, which were secured by the Russian Empire at the end of the 18th century. In a narrow sense, and this is what interests us, since Russian lands do not interest us, this is the territory of the Yekaterinoslav and Kherson provinces (sometimes it also includes the northern (mainland) part of the Tavria province). In general, Novorossiya, neither in a narrow nor in a broad sense, does not completely coincide with the modern region of South-Eastern Ukraine, since in a broad sense it includes Russian territories, and also does not include the northern parts of the South-East (Kharkov, northern part Luhansk region is the historical Slobozhanshchina, the far north of Dnepropetrovsk.)

So, in our article, Novorossiya is territorially the Ekaterinoslav and Kherson provinces. (the map below shows the borders of Novorossiya in this sense).

Background of settlement

If you believe Maria Gimbutas with her kurgan hypothesis, then the southeast of Ukraine is part of the ancestral homeland of the Proto-Indo-Europeans. Proto-Indo-Europeans are speakers of a language from which almost all modern languages Europe, and many Asian languages ​​(they are spoken by 2.5 billion people). The Indo-European population (Scythians, Sarmatians) lived here before the Great Migration. Then the Turks come here. Various Turkic peoples replaced each other (Huns, Avars, Khazars, Pechenegs, Cumans, Mongol-Tatars). For a thousand years, no one has passed through these lands, which are the outskirts of the large Eurasian steppes. However, the Indo-Europeans (“already a part” of the Slavs) did not simply cede these lands to the Turkic world and periodically populated these territories. During the times of Rus', for example, Tivertsy and Ulichi settled the right bank Dnieper steppes. Already in the 14th-15th centuries, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania decided to take away the steppes from the Turks, and not without success. In the 15th and 16th centuries, the almost uninhabited steppe was periodically visited by “khodniks”, who were attracted by the wealth of these lands. By the 16th century, the Zaporozhye Cossacks formed here. It was the Cossacks who mastered the northern lands of the future Novorossiya; the main role was played by the territory of the modern Dnepropetrovsk region, on the territory of which most of the sections were located. Below is a map of the lands of the Zaporozhian Army at the beginning of the 18th century.

As we see, a significant part of Novorossiya, long before Catherine, was already part of Russia and was inhabited by Zaporozhye Cossacks. Under Catherine, following the results of the Russian-Turkish wars, in which the Cossacks took an active part, the remaining lands were included in Russia. Catherine thanked the Cossacks for their faithful service - they liquidated them, and the Cossacks and newly annexed lands began to be gradually developed.

And now we will actually figure out who populated and developed Novorossiysk lands and what language they spoke.

National composition of New Russia 1719-1897

We will not reinvent the wheel; the national composition of the population according to the documents of the Russian Empire has long been studied in detail by historians, and we can only briefly acquaint the reader with the results.

We will present the results compactly - in tablets, and then comment on them. We will take the tablets directly from the original source - the monograph by V. M. Kabuzan.(“Settlement of Novorossiya (Ekaterinoslav and Kherson provinces) in the 18th - first half of the 19th centuries (1719-1858)”, 1976 (doctoral dissertation)).

For reference:

Vladimir Kabuzan

born 1932 Doctor of Historical Sciences. Chief researcher at the Institute of Russian History. Author of 15 monographs, including: “Russians in the World” (1996); “The population of the North Caucasus in the 19th-20th centuries.” (1996); “The serf population of Russia in the 18th - 50s of the 19th century” (2003)

So, the share of the Ukrainian population of Novorossiya 1719-1850:

National composition by county:

As can be seen from the tables presented above, the population of Novorossiya in the 19th century was multinational. Ukrainians, Russians, Greeks, Jews, Germans, Moldovans and others lived here. However, the region as a whole has always been dominated by Ukrainians. Moreover, in such a multinational region there were territories almost entirely inhabited by Ukrainians. Before the active settlement of the region by settlers, in most of the territory of the region there was no one except Ukrainians. But by the middle of the 19th century, when the region was already very densely populated, and total population reached a million, there were territories with an almost monoethnic Ukrainian composition, so in the 1850s Ukrainians made up 94.77% of the population of Novomoskovsky, 91.07% of Alexandria and 98.85% of Verkhnedneprovsky district.

Think about the number 98.85%! Even the modern Ternopil region would envy such a percentage. And what’s interesting is that there were no Russians (Great Russians) here at all in 1857, not a single person.

Thus, in Novorossiya of the 18th and 19th centuries there were lands that were almost entirely or completely populated only by Ukrainians. The majority of the population (>50%) has always been Ukrainians in the region as a whole, and in specific counties almost always. As can be seen from the table, in 1779 Ukrainians did not constitute a majority in 3 districts: Rostov, Aleksandrovsk and Slavyanoserbsk. In the Rostov district (this is now Russia), the Armenians took first place, in the Alexandria district the Greeks who moved from Crimea came in first place, in the Slavyanoserbsky district the Ukrainians came in first place, but there were more Russians along with the Moldovans. However, this was a temporary phenomenon; after a few years the situation changed. In the first half of the 19th century, Ukrainians made up more than 50% in all counties. The 1897 census also recorded the predominance of Ukrainians in almost all counties. They no longer constituted the majority in Odessa, where Russians came in first place, and Jews came in second.

The Russians played an important, but in comparison with the Ukrainians, a very modest role in the settlement of New Russia. Their share in the 18th century was significant in the extreme eastern Bakhmut and Slavyanoserbian districts, in the rest they either did not exist at all or were very few, for example, in the territory of the future Kherson province there were about 8% of them - this is the third place after the Ukrainians and Moldovans . Subsequently, the share of Russians grew, but even in 1857 the share of Russians in the Ekaterinoslav province was only 8%.

Thus, Ukrainians in Novorossiya:

1)They began to develop these lands before the Russians (Great Russians)

2)They have always constituted the majority in the region as a whole, and in all, with rare exceptions, counties in particular. They had the maximum share of the entire population of the region in 1745 - 96.86%, the minimum from 1719 to 1858 - in 1779 (64.76%).

Russians in Novorossiya:

1)They began to develop these lands later than the Ukrainians

2) They never constituted a majority (>50%) in any district (in Odessa in 1897 they were the most numerous ethnic group, but did not make up 50%)

3)In many districts they were not even the 2nd largest ethnic group, for example in the mid-19th century in the Tiraspol district they occupied only 5th place, in Aleksandrovsky - third.

4)Absent in some counties altogether!

Following the Russian Empire, the name Novorossiya also disappeared into history for a long time. Now this name is again on everyone’s lips; it is now known not only in Russia and neighboring countries, but throughout the world. Let's try to delve into history and consider what this region was like, how it was developed, what names are associated with it.

These places were, of course, inhabited many centuries ago, but they began to be actively developed after the time of Peter the Great. There are exits to the Black and Azov Seas, which means the development of trade with European and maybe other countries. Once upon a time, in the 13th - 16th centuries, the Crimean Tatars ruled here. In the steppe for many miles there was not a single tree or village. All that was needed were robbers from among the Tatars.

There were few infertile soils and they were located closer to the sea. The most abundant rivers were the Dnieper, Dniester and Bug, while other small rivers disappeared during frequent droughts. There was an abundance of fish in the rivers, on land - deer, fallow deer, saigas, wild boars and horses, foxes, badgers, many species of birds. “Wild horses were found here in herds of 50-60 heads, and it was extremely difficult to tame them; they were hunted, and horse meat was sold on a par with beef.” The climate of the region is warmer than in many other places in Russia. All together this created favorable conditions for attracting Russian settlers.

However, the paths of history are not simple. Life in the steppe was associated with many inconveniences, and for a person of the 17th century. was extremely difficult. Thus, due to the dry continental climate, winters were harsh, with winds and blizzards, and droughts often occurred in the summer. The steppes were open to the action of winds on all sides, the northern wind brought with it cold, and the eastern wind brought terrible dryness and heat. The insufficient amount of river water and the rapid absorption of evaporation by the atmosphere due to dry winds led to the fact that in the summer all the rich vegetation dried out.

Springs and wells in the southeastern part of the Novorossiysk Territory were located only along the banks of rivers, and there were none in the steppe on the mountain, so roads were laid near rivers. In addition to drought, swarms of locusts, as well as clouds of midges and mosquitoes, were a real scourge. All this represented a serious obstacle to the full-fledged pursuit of cattle breeding and agriculture, not to mention the constant danger of attack by the Tatars. Thus, the first colonists were forced to fight both nature and the Crimean Tatars, performing a defensive function.

The beginning of the settlement of the Novorossiysk steppes in the first half. 18th century

The first settlers of the Novorossiysk steppes were the Zaporozhye Cossacks, who founded their Sich beyond the Dnieper rapids on the island of Khortitsa in the second half of the 16th century. From that time on, the places of the Sich changed - now on Tomakovka Island, now on Mikitin Rog, now on Chertomlytsky Rechishche, now on the river. Kamenka, then in the Oleshki tract, then above the Podpolnaya river. Relocation from one place to another was due to many reasons; natural conditions played a major role.

In the first time of its historical existence in the XVI - beginning. XVII centuries The Zaporozhye Sich was a military brotherhood hiding from the Tatars on the Dnieper islands, which, of necessity, abandoned many forms of proper civil life - family, personal property, agriculture, etc. The second goal of the brotherhood was the colonization of the steppe. Over time, the borders of Zaporozhye expanded more and more to include the Wild Field and the Tatar steppe. In the 18th century The Zaporozhye Sich was a small “fenced city, containing one church, 38 so-called kurens and up to 500 kuren Cossack, trading and craftsman’s houses.”

It was the capital of the army, destroyed in 1775. The Zaporozhye lands occupied the territory on which the Ekaterinoslav and Kherson provinces were subsequently formed, with the exception of the Ochakov region, that is, the area lying between the Bug and the Dniester. They stretched mainly along the river. Dnieper.

Zaporozhye villages were scattered over a vast area, the population was engaged in cattle breeding, agriculture and other peaceful crafts. Exact data on the number of inhabitants is unknown. “According to the official statement compiled by Tevelius at the time of the destruction of the Zaporozhye Sich, there were (except for the Sich in the narrow sense of the word) 45 villages and 1601 winter houses, all inhabitants were 59637 of both sexes.” The historian of the Novorossiysk region Skalkovsky counted 12,250 people based on authentic documents from the Sich archive. The land of the Zaporozhian Army, which makes up most of Novorossiya, became part of Russia in 1686 under the “eternal peace” with Poland.

Russian state colonization of Novorossiya in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Atlas of the Russian Empire. 1800 Sheet 38. Novorossiysk province of 12 districts

At the beginning of the reign of Catherine II, in 1770, the so-called Dnieper line was built, which was the result of victories in the Turkish war (the capture of Azov and Taganrog). This line was supposed to separate the entire Novorossiysk province, together with the Zaporozhye lands, from the Tatar possessions; from the Dnieper it went to the Sea of ​​Azov, passing along the Berda and Konskie Vody rivers, and crossed the entire Crimean steppe. Her last fortress is St. Petra was located right by the sea near modern Berdyansk. There were a total of 8 fortresses in this line.

In 1774, Prince Potemkin was appointed governor-general of the Novorossiysk region, who remained in this position until his death in 1791. He dreamed of turning wild steppes into fertile fields, building cities, plants, factories, and creating a fleet on the Black and Azov Seas. The Zaporozhye Sich prevented the full implementation of the plans. After the Russian-Turkish wars, it found itself inside Russian possessions, and the Cossacks no longer had anyone to fight with. However, they owned a vast territory and were unfriendly to new settlers.

Then Potemkin decided to destroy the Sich. In 1775, General Tekeli was ordered to occupy the Sich and destroy the Zaporozhye army. When the general approached the Zaporozhye capital, at the insistence of the archimandrite, the Koshevoy ataman surrendered, and Russian troops occupied the Sich without a fight. Most of the Cossacks went to Turkey, others scattered throughout the cities of Little Russia and New Russia. Thus ended the history of one city and began the history of many.

The lands of the Cossacks began to be distributed to private individuals, who took upon themselves the obligation to populate them with free or serf people. These lands could be received by officials, headquarters and chief officers and foreigners; Only single-lords, peasants and landowners were excluded. Thus, large landholdings were artificially created in that region, which until now had almost no landowner and serf element. The minimum plot was 1,500 acres of convenient land. The conditions for obtaining land were very favorable: an exemption from all duties was given for 10 years; During this time, the owners had to populate their plots in such a way that for every 1,500 acres there would be 13 households. The size of the plots ranged from 1,500 to 12 thousand dessiatines, but there were individuals who managed to obtain several tens of thousands of dessiatines.

These lands, after 10 years, could become the property of these persons. After the destruction of the Sich, its entire military and senior treasury was confiscated and the so-called city capital (more than 120 thousand rubles) was formed from it to issue loans to residents of Novorossiysk province.

The annexation of Crimea in 1783 had a huge impact on the successful settlement of the Black Sea steppes. Together with the coasts of the Black and Azov Seas, Russia gained access to the sea, and the value of the Novorossiysk region increased significantly. Thus, from the 2nd half. 18th century active colonization of the region begins, which is divided into two types: state and foreign.

On Potemkin’s initiative, all military fortified lines were built, except for the last one, the Dniester. His main merit lies in the construction of new cities: Kherson, Ekaterinoslav and Nikolaev.

Construction of cities in the Novorossiysk region

Kherson. The first city built on the initiative of Prince Potemkin was Kherson. The Empress's decree on its construction dates back to 1778 and was caused by the desire to have a new harbor and shipyard closer to the Black Sea, since the previous ones, for example Taganrog, presented significant inconvenience due to shallow water. In 1778, the Empress ordered the final location for the harbor and shipyard on the Dnieper to be chosen and named Kherson. Potemkin chose the Alexander-Shantz tract.

The production of the work was entrusted to the descendant of the famous black man and godson of Peter V. Hannibal, and 12 companies of craftsmen were given to him. A fairly large territory was allocated for the future city, and 220 guns were sent to the fortress. The leadership of this matter was entrusted to Potemkin, who wanted to make the city as prosperous and famous as the ancient Tauride Chersonese. He hoped to set up an admiralty and warehouse in it - as Peter I did in St. Petersburg. Construction did not cause any difficulties: the quarry was located almost in the city itself, timber, iron and all the necessary materials were brought along the Dnieper. Potemkin distributed the lands lying around the city for the construction of country houses, gardens, etc. Two years later, ships with cargo under the Russian flag were already arriving in Kherson.

Industrialists rushed here from all directions. Foreigners opened commercial houses and offices in Kherson: French trading firms (Baron Antoine and others), as well as Polish (Zablotsky), Austrian (Fabry), Russian (merchant Maslyannikov). Baron Antoine played a very important role in expanding trade relations between the city of Kherson and France. He sent Russian grain bread to Corsica, to various ports of Provence, to Nice, Genoa and Barcelona.

Baron Antoine also compiled a historical outline of trade and maritime relations between the ports of the Black and Mediterranean Seas. Many Marseille and Kherson merchants began to compete with Baron Antoine in trade with southern Russia and Poland via the Black Sea: within a year, 20 ships arrived from Kherson to Marseille. Trade was carried out with Smyrna, Livorno, Messina, Marseille and Alexandria.

Faleev was an energetic collaborator of Potemkin. He suggested that the prince, at his own expense, clear the Dnieper bed at the rapids in order to make the river route from the internal regions of the state to Kherson convenient. The goal was not achieved, but, according to Samoilov, already in 1783, barges with iron and cast iron passed directly to Kherson from Bryansk, and ships with provisions also passed safely. For this, Faleev received a gold medal and a diploma for noble dignity.

Many soldiers worked in Kherson, and shipbuilding also attracted many free workers, so the city grew rapidly. Food supplies were brought from Polish and suburban Ukraine. At the same time, foreign trade began in Kherson. In 1787, Empress Catherine II, together with the Austrian emperor and the Polish king, visited Kherson and was pleased with the newly acquired region. They carefully prepared for her arrival: they laid new roads, built palaces and even entire villages.

The city was built very quickly, since Potemkin did not lack material resources. He was granted extraordinary powers, and the prince managed large sums almost without control. In 1784, by imperial order, an extraordinary sum for that time in the amount of 1,533,000 rubles was released for the Kherson Admiralty. in excess of the amount that was issued earlier and was released by the state annually.

In 9 years, Potemkin achieved a lot, but the hopes placed on the new city were not justified: with the capture of Ochakov and the construction of Nikolaev, the importance of Kherson as a fortress and admiralty fell, and meanwhile enormous sums were spent on the construction of its fortifications and shipyard . The former Admiralty buildings, made of wood, were sold for demolition. The location turned out to be not very successful, trade developed poorly, and soon Kherson lost in this regard to Taganrog and Ochakov. The hope of making the Dnieper navigable at the rapids also did not materialize, and the plague, which broke out at the beginning of the settlement of the city, almost ruined the whole thing: immigrants from the central provinces of Russia were sick from the unusual climate and swamp air.

Ekaterinoslav(now Dnepropetrovsk). Ekaterinoslav was initially built in 1777 on the left bank of the Dnieper, but in 1786 Potemkin issued an order to move the city upstream, since it often suffered from floods in its previous location. It was renamed Novomoskovsk, and the new provincial city of Yekaterinoslav was founded on the right bank of the Dnieper on the site of the Zaporozhye village of Polovitsy. According to Potemkin's project, the new city was supposed to serve the glory of the empress, and its size was supposed to be significant. So, the prince decided to build a magnificent temple, similar to the temple of St. Peter in Rome, and dedicate it to the Transfiguration of the Lord, as a sign of how this region was transformed from barren steppes into a favorable human abode.

The project also included government buildings, a university with a music academy and an art academy, and a court, made in the Roman style. Large amounts(340 thousand rubles) were allocated for the establishment of a state-owned factory with cloth and hosiery departments. But of all these grandiose projects, very few came to fruition. The cathedral, university and academies were never built, and the factory was soon closed.
Paul I, by decree of July 20, 1797, ordered the rename of Ekaterinoslav to Novorossiysk. In 1802 the city was returned to its previous name.

Nikolaev. Back in 1784, it was ordered to build a fortress at the confluence of the Ingul and the Bug. In 1787, the Turks of the Ochakov garrison, according to legend, ruined the village located on the river. Bug not far from the confluence of the river. Ingul the dacha of the foreigner Fabri. He asked the treasury to reward him for the losses. To calculate the amount of losses, an officer was sent, who reported that there was a place near Fabri's dacha that was convenient for a shipyard. In 1788, by order of Potemkin, barracks and a hospital were built in the small village of Vitovka, and on the river. A shipyard has been opened in Ingula.

The very foundation of the city of Nikolaev dates back to August 27, 1789, since it was this date that Potemkin’s order in the name of Faleev was dated. The city got its name from the first ship of St. Nicholas, built at the shipyard. In 1790, the Imperial Order was issued to establish an admiralty and shipyard in Nikolaev. The Kherson shipyard, despite its convenience, was shallow for ships of high rank, and gradually the board of the Black Sea Fleet was transferred to Nikolaev.

Odessa. The Empress's decree on the construction of a military and merchant harbor and the city of Khadzhibey dates back to 1794, after Potemkin's death. The construction was entrusted to de Ribas. More than 30 thousand were allocated for the new city. dessiatines of land, about 2 million rubles were allocated for the construction of the port, admiralty, barracks, etc. An important point in the original history of Odessa there was a settlement of Greek immigrants both in the city itself and in its environs.

In 1796, there were 2,349 inhabitants in Odessa. On September 1, 1798, the city was given a coat of arms. Foreign trade in Odessa was encouraged, and soon the city received the status of a free port - a duty-free port. It did not exist for long and was destroyed by decree of December 21, 1799. By decree of December 26, 1796, Paul I ordered “We command that the Commission for the Construction of Southern Fortresses and the Odessa Port, located in the former Voznesensk province, be abolished; stop the very buildings.” After this decree at the beginning. 1797, the founder of Odessa and the main producer of the southern fortresses, Vice Admiral de Ribas left the city, and handed over his leadership to Rear Admiral Pavel Pustoshkin, former commander Nikolaev port.

In 1800, construction was allowed to continue. To rebuild the harbor, the monarch ordered a loan of 250 thousand rubles to be given to Odessa, sent a special engineer, and gave the city a exemption from duties and a drink sale for 14 years. As a result, trade in Odessa greatly revived. In 1800, trade turnover barely amounted to 1 million rubles, and in 1802 – already 2,254,000 rubles. .

With the accession of Alexander I, the residents of Odessa received many important privileges. By a decree of January 24, 1802, Odessa was granted tax relief for 25 years, freedom from troop billets, a large amount of land was allocated for distribution to residents for gardens and even agricultural dachas, and finally, for the completion of the harbor and other useful institutions, it was ceded to the city 10- I part of the customs duties of it. From now on Odessa becomes important trading market and the main port for the sale of works of the southwestern part of the empire.

In 1802, in Odessa there were already more than 9 thousand people, 39 factories, factories and mills, 171 shops, 43 cellars. Further progress in population and trade in Odessa is associated with the activities of de Richelieu, who took the post of mayor here in 1803. He established a port, quarantine, customs, theater, hospital, completed the construction of churches that had begun, established an educational institution, and increased the population of the city up to 25 thousand people. Also, thanks to de Richelieu, trade turnover increased significantly. Being a passionate lover of gardening and tree growing in general, he patronized the owners of dachas and gardens in every possible way, and was the first to order from Italy the seeds of white acacia, which grew luxuriously on Odessa soil. Under Richelieu, Odessa became the center of trade relations between the Novorossiysk region and European coastal cities: its trade turnover in 1814 amounted to more than 20 million rubles. The main item of the holiday trade was wheat.

Further settlement of Novorossiya

In addition to Kherson, Ekaterinoslav, Nikolaev and Odessa, several other important cities in the Novorossiysk region can be mentioned, which also arose through colonization: these are Mariupol (1780), Rostov, Taganrog, Dubossary. Taganrog (formerly the Trinity Fortress) was built under Peter I, but was abandoned for a long time and was restored only in 1769. In the early 80s. it had a harbor, customs, stock exchange, and fortress. Although its harbor had many inconveniences, foreign trade still flourished there. With the emergence of Odessa, Taganrog lost its former significance as the most important trading point. An important role in the economic growth of the cities of the Novorossiysk Territory was played by the benefits provided by the government to the population.

In addition to the construction of fortified lines and cities, the colonization activities of the Russian state and people were also expressed in the founding of a number of different settlements - hamlets, hamlets, settlements, towns, and hamlets. Their inhabitants belonged to the Little Russian and Russian people (not counting foreigners). Little Russian colonization is divided into three elements - Zaporozhye settlers, immigrants from the Trans-Dnieper (right bank) Little Russia and settlers from the left bank and partly suburban Ukraine.

Russian villages were mixed with Little Russian ones. All lands intended for settlement were also divided into state lands, or state lands, and private lands, or landowners' lands. Therefore, the entire Russian population of the Novorossiysk Territory can be divided into two large groups - free peasants who lived on state lands, and proprietary, landowner peasants who settled on the lands of private individuals and became dependent on them. Many people from the Hetmanate came to the villages founded by the former Cossacks.

As for the Russian colonists, these were state-owned and economic peasants, peasants, Cossacks, retired soldiers, sailors, sextons and schismatics. State-owned peasants who knew any skill were called from the Yaroslavl, Kostroma, and Vladimir provinces. At the beginning of the 19th century. state settlements were already quite numerous and very crowded.

By decree of 1781, it was ordered to resettle up to 20 thousand economic peasants to Novorossiya and select up to 24 thousand voluntary migrants from among them. However, the first place among Russian settlers was occupied by schismatics. They began to settle in Novorossiya during the reign of Anna Ioannovna and even earlier in the Kherson province, near the later Ananyev and Novomirgorod, but their number was small. Much more schismatics appeared in the 50s of the 18th century, when the government itself summoned them from Poland and Moldova with manifestos. They were given land in the fortress of St. Elisaveta (Elisavetgrad) and its environs, where they founded a number of villages that were notable for their populousness and prosperity.

A special and extremely numerous group among the colonists were fugitives, both Russians and Little Russians. In order to quickly populate the Novorossiysk region, the government, one might say, sanctioned the right of asylum here. The local authorities did not disdain criminals. Prisoners from the Moscow, Kazan, Voronezh and Nizhny Novgorod provinces were sent to Taganrog for settlement.

After the war with Turkey 1787-1791. Russia received the Ochakov region between the Bug and the Dniester, which later became the Kherson province. It also needed to be fenced with a line of border fortifications. In the Ochakov region, before joining Russia, there were 4 cities - Ochakov, Adzhider (later Ovidiopol), Hadzhibey (Odessa) and Dubossary, about 150 villages inhabited by Tatars and Moldovans and Khan settlements inhabited by fugitive Little Russians. According to a map drawn up around 1790, there were about 20 thousand males there.

The first measures taken by the government to populate the Ochakov region, newly acquired from Turkey, were as follows. First of all, Catherine II instructed Governor Kakhovsky to inspect the new territory, divide it into districts, designate places for cities and present a plan for all this. Then he had to distribute the lands both for state-owned settlements and for landowners, with the obligation to populate these lands and ensure that state-owned settlements did not mix with landowners.

When establishing new fortresses in the Novorossiysk region, the government had to take care of contingents in case of hostilities. For this purpose, it used ethnographically diverse elements - Russians and foreigners; These were the Cossack regiments located along the fortresses of the Dnieper line, the descendants of the Cossacks - the Black Sea Cossack troops, the Serbs who formed the hussar regiments and other foreign colonists. In the middle of the 18th century. Significant measures were taken to defend the region, but gradually they lost their significance, especially after the annexation of Crimea.

Foreign colonization in the XVIII-XIX centuries.

A characteristic feature of the settlement of the Novorossiysk region was the use of foreign colonists, who played an extremely important role. Since in Russia itself at that time the population was not very large, it was decided to resort to the help of foreigners to populate the Novorossiysk region. This decision also relied on the fact that among the foreigners there might be people who had knowledge and skills that the Russian settlers did not have. Apparently this is why the German BEER holiday is so popular in the city of Odessa, and there are plenty of Odessa cities in the world.

The resettlement began with a decree of December 24, 1751, then a number of decrees were issued on the placement of foreigners in the “Trans-Dnieper places” and on the creation of New Serbia there. Two regiments under the command of Horvat and Pandurski were stationed on the territory of New Serbia. In 1753, Slavic-Serbia was formed next to this settlement, between the Bakhmut and Lugan rivers, where colonists settled under the command of Šević and Preradovich. Among them were not only Serbs, but also Moldovans and Croats. By that time, Tatar raids had almost ceased.

Anna Ioannovna also built a whole series of fortresses on the northern borders of New Russia, the so-called Ukrainian Line, where since 1731 almost only soldiers and Cossacks lived. The central points of the new settlements were Novomirgorod and the fortress of St. Elizabeth in Novoserbia, Bakhmut and the Belevskaya fortress in Slavyanoserbia. New settlers were given comfortable lands for eternal and hereditary possession, were assigned a monetary salary and were provided with duty-free trades and trade. However, the Serbian settlements did not live up to the hopes placed on them for the colonization of the region.

“Over 10 years, about 2.5 million rubles of government money were spent on the Serbs, and for food they had to take everything they needed from other residents. Serbian settlements were poorly organized, and almost daily quarrels and fights occurred between the Serbs themselves, and knives were often used. The Serbs immediately began to have bad relations with their Cossack neighbors.”

With the beginning of the reign of Catherine II, it opens new era in the history of foreign colonization of the Novorossiysk region. In the manifesto of 1763, she called on foreigners to settle mainly to develop our industries and trade. The most important benefits provided to new settlers were the following:

• they could receive money for travel expenses from Russian residents abroad and then settle in Russia or in cities, or in separate colonies;
• they were granted freedom of religion;
• they were freed from all taxes and duties for a certain number of years;
• they were given free apartments for six months;
• an interest-free loan was issued with repayment after 10 years within 3 years;
• those who settled were given their own jurisdiction by the colonies;
• Everyone pray to bring your property with you duty-free and for 300 rubles. goods;
• everyone was exempt from military and civil service, and if anyone wished to become a soldier, he had to receive 30 rubles in addition to the usual salary;
• if someone started a factory that did not exist in Russia before, he could sell the goods he produced duty-free for 10 years;
• Duty-free fairs and trades could be established in the colonies.

Lands for settlement were indicated in Tobolsk, Astrakhan, Orenburg and Belgorod provinces. Although this decree does not say anything about Novorossiya, on its basis foreigners settled there until the beginning of the reign of Emperor Alexander I.

After Catherine's death in 1796, Pavel Petrovich ascended the throne. This is an important era in the history of the Novorossiysk region, a time important events in all parts of management. By decree of November 14, Emperor Paul I ordered the Novorossiysk province to be divided into 12 districts:

1. Ekaterinoslavsky district was established from the former Ekaterinoslavsky district and part of Alexandrovsky district.
2. Elisavetgradsky - from Elisavetgradsky and part of Novomirgorod and Alexandria districts.
3. Olviopolsky - from parts of Voznesensky, Novomirgorodsky and the region of Bogopolsky district, which was located on the Ochakovo steppe.
4. Tiraspol - from Tiraspol and part of Elensky (located on the Ochakov steppe) districts.
5. Kherskonsky - from part of Kherson and Voznesensky.
6. Perekopsky - from Perekopsky and Dnieper (i.e., the northern part of Crimea) counties.
7. Simferopol - from Simferopol, Evpatoria and Feodosia.
8. Mariupol - from parts of Mariupol, Pavlograd, Novomoskovsk and Melitopol districts.
9. Rostov - from the Rostov district and the land of the Black Sea army.
10. Pavlogradsky - from Pavlogradsky and parts of Novomoskovsky and Slavyansky.
11. Konstantinogradsky - from Konstantinogradsky and parts of Aleksopolsky and Slavyansky.
12. Bakhmutsky - from parts of Donetsk, Bakhmutsky and Pavlograd districts

The decree of October 8, 1802 put an end to the Novorossiysk province, again dividing it into three: Nikolaev, Ekaterinoslav and Tauride. This decree also stated that the port cities of Odessa, Kherson, Feodosia and Taganrog would be provided with special advantages for the benefit of trade and, moreover, in each of them, for the protection of traders, a special chief would be appointed from the highest government officials, who would depend only from The highest power and the ministers of justice and internal affairs.

Under Alexander I, foreign colonization within the Novorossiysk region began to be carried out under different conditions. Decree of February 4, 1803: “Military officers who do not have a fortune and wish to establish property in the empty lands of the Novorossiysk steppe will be given into eternal possession: to headquarters officers 1000, and chief officers 500 acres of land.” The location of the main Novorossiysk commander was moved from Nikolaev to Kherson, and the Nikolaev province itself was renamed Kherson.

In the manifesto dated February 20. 1804 it is said that only such foreigners should be accepted for resettlement who, by their occupations, can serve as a good example for the peasants. Special lands must be allocated for them - state-owned or purchased from landowners; these should be family and wealthy owners engaged in agriculture, cultivation of grapes or silkworms, cattle breeding and rural crafts (shoemaking, blacksmithing, weaving, tailoring, etc.); do not accept other artisans.

The immigrants were given freedom of religion and exemption from all taxes and duties for 10 years; after this period, they will be required to bear the same duties as Russian subjects, with the exception of permanent service, military and civil service, from which they were exempted forever. All colonists are allocated 60 acres of land per family without any money. On these grounds, it was proposed to settle foreigners in different places in New Russia and in Crimea. First of all, they decided to give them lands near harbors and ports so that they would be able to sell their products abroad.

At the beginning of 1804, they began to actively organize the life of the nomadic Nogai hordes. By decree of April 16, 1804, Alexander I ordered the organization of hordes and the establishment of a special administration among the Nogais, with the removal of Bayazet Bey. Soon a special department was established, called the Expedition of the Nogai Hordes. In place of Bayazet Bey, Rosenberg appointed Colonel Trevogin as head of the Nogai hordes.

By decree of February 25, 1804, Sevastopol was designated the main military port on the Black Sea and the residence of the main part of the fleet. For this purpose, customs was removed from the city and merchant ships could no longer trade in this port. To facilitate overland trade with Western Europe, especially with Austria and other German manufacturing states, transit trade was established in Odessa (decree of March 3, 1804).

Thanks to the strong support of the Russian government, the German colonies managed to gain a foothold on new and not always favorable soil. In 1845, all German settlers in Novorossiya numbered 95,700 people. Roman colonization was very small: one village of Swiss, a few Italians and a few French merchants. Much more important were the Greek settlements. After Crimea gained independence from Ottoman Empire, in 1779 many Greek and Armenian families moved out of it (Greeks - 20 thousand).

On the basis of a charter, they were allocated land for settlement in the Azov province, along the coast Sea of ​​Azov. The charter granted them significant benefits - the exclusive right to fish, state-owned houses, freedom from military service. Some of them died on the way from illness and hardship, and the rest founded the city of Mariupol and 20 villages in its vicinity. In Odessa, the Greeks also enjoyed significant benefits and were in charge of local trade. Albanians settled in Taganrog, Krechi and Yenikol, who were also distinguished by their prosperity.

Together with the Greeks, Armenians began to move to Novorossiya, and in 1780 they founded the city of Nakhichevan. The beginning of the resettlement of Moldovans dates back to the reign of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna; they became part of Novoserbia in large numbers. Another party of Moldovans in the end. XVIII - beginning XIX centuries founded cities and villages along the river. Dniester - Ovidiopol, New Dubossary, Tiraspol, etc. 75,092 rubles were spent on transferring Greeks and Armenians from Crimea. and, in addition, 100 thousand rubles. the Crimean Khan, his brothers, beys and murzas received compensation “for the loss of their subjects”.

During 1779 - 1780 144 horses, 33 cows, 612 pairs of oxen, 483 carts, 102 plows, 1570 quarters of bread were distributed to the Greek and Armenian settlers and 5294 houses and barns were built. In total, 24,501 people out of a total of 30,156 migrants were dependent on the state.

In 1769, the resettlement of Talmudic Jews from western Russia and Poland to the Novorossiysk region began on the basis of formal permission with the following conditions: they had to build their own homes and schools, but had the right to keep distilleries; benefits from billets and other duties were given to them for only a year, they were allowed to hire Russian workers, freely practice their faith, etc. Despite minor benefits, their resettlement in the cities was successful.

The situation was completely different with the establishment of Jewish agricultural colonies. They began only in 1807, when the first batch of Jewish settlers formed colonies in the Kherson district. The government spent huge sums on their improvement, but the results were disastrous: agriculture among the Jews developed very poorly, and they themselves gravitated to the cities and wanted to engage in small trade, crafts, and brokerage. Due to the unusual climate and poor water, widespread diseases spread among them. Finally, the gypsies completed the picture of the population of New Russia. In 1768, the total number of inhabitants in Novorossiya was 100 thousand people, and in 1823 - 1.5 million people.

Thus, in 1776-1782. exceptionally high rates of population growth in Novorossiya were observed. Over a short period (about 7 years), the population of the region (within the borders of the early 19th century) almost doubled (increased by 79.82%). Main role immigrants from neighboring Left Bank Ukraine played a role in this. The influx of new settlers from Right Bank Ukraine and the Central Black Earth region of Russia was not great. Relocations from abroad were important only for certain local territories (Alexandrovsky, Rostov and Kherson districts).

In the 70s, the northern and central regions of Novorossiya were still predominantly populated, and since 1777, the privately owned resettlement movement came to the fore. During this period, the tsarist authorities did not take effective measures to transfer large groups of immigrants from abroad and other regions of the country to Novorossiya. They distributed huge tracts of land into the hands of private owners, giving them the right to take care of their settlement themselves. This right was widely used by the landowners of Novorossiya. By hook or by crook, they lured peasants from neighboring Left-Bank and Right-Bank Ukraine to their lands.

By the manifesto of June 24, 1811, 4 customs districts were created in the Novorossiysk region: Odessa, Dubossary, Feodosia and Taganrog. In 1812, the region consisted of Kherson, Ekaterinoslav and Tauride provinces, Odessa, Feodosia and Taganrog city administrations. He also owned the Bug and Black Sea Cossack troops and the Odessa and Balaklava Greek battalions.

Settlement of the developed areas of the country in the 30s of the 19th century. was carried out on the basis of a decree of March 22, 1824. Only on April 8, 1843 were new rules on relocations approved. Lack of land was recognized as a legitimate reason for the resettlement of peasants, when a peasant family had less than 5 acres of convenient land per revision person. For settlement, provinces and districts were designated, where there were more than 8 dessiatines per revision per capita, and 15 dessiatines per revision per capita in the steppe zone.

The rules somewhat simplified, in comparison with the provisions of 1824, the conditions for the resettlement of settlers. In new places, food was prepared for them for the first time, part of the fields were sown, hay was accumulated to feed livestock in the first winter, tools and draft animals were prepared. For all these purposes, 20 rubles were allocated for each family. The settlers were exempt from paying money for transportation across rivers and from other similar fees.

They were to be released from their old places of residence at a convenient time of year. The rules prohibited the return of settlers back from their route or place of new settlement. To build houses, peasants received wood in new places (100 roots per yard). In addition, they were given 25 rubles per family irrevocably, and in the absence of forests - 35 rubles. New settlers received a number of benefits: 6 years from military registration, 8 years from paying taxes and other duties (instead of the previous 3 years), and 3 years from conscription.

Simultaneously with these benefits, the regulation of 1843 abolished the right of the peasants themselves, which existed before that year, to choose suitable places for settlement. On the basis of these rules, the development of all regions of Russia was carried out in the 40s and 50s of the 19th century. Until the reform of 1861, the government tried to introduce Jews to agriculture and spent a lot of money on this.

In the second half of the 30-40s of the XIX century. Kherson province lost its position as the leading populated region of Russia. The bulk of the settlers were foreign settlers, Jews and urban tax-paying classes. The role of the landowner resettlement movement is sharply reduced. As in earlier periods, predominantly the southern counties were populated: Tiraspol (with Odessa separated from it) and Kherson.

In the second half of the 30s and 40s of the 19th century. the pace of settlement of the Ekaterinoslav province is increasing (due to the sparsely populated Aleksandrovsky district) and it is significantly ahead of the Kherson province. Thus, the Ekaterinoslav province is temporarily turning into the leading populated region of Novorossiya, although the importance of the latter as the main populated territory of Russia is falling. The settlement of the province is carried out, as before, mainly by legal immigrants. Mainly state peasants and non-taxable categories of the population arrive in the province. The importance of landowner resettlement of peasants is decreasing. Mostly Alexandrovsky district was populated, where in 1841 -1845. More than 20 thousand male souls arrived.

Odessa remained the largest city in Russia, second only to St. Petersburg and Moscow in terms of the number of inhabitants. Among other Russian cities, only Riga had approximately the same population (60 thousand inhabitants). Nikolaev was also a major city in the country. In addition to the cities mentioned above, it was second in population only to Kyiv, Saratov, Voronezh, Astrakhan, Kazan and Tula.

In the second half of the 30s and 40s of the 19th century. The pace of economic development of Novorossiya increased, but the inhabitants of this region were under the influence of the forces of nature. Profitable years alternated with lean ones, drought alternated with locust attacks. The number of livestock either increased or sharply decreased as a result of lack of food or epidemics. The population of the region in these years was mainly engaged in cattle breeding.

Thus, in the 40s, both agriculture and livestock farming in New Russia were on the rise, but in 1848-1849. they suffered a heavy blow. Farmers were unable to collect even the sown seeds, and livestock farmers suffered greatly from extremely disastrous livestock deaths. And yet, the economy of the region developed, overcoming the influences of climate. Industry in the 1830-1840s had not yet developed, so agriculture remained the main occupation of the region's population.
In the 50s of the XIX century. The resettlement of the peasantry was carried out on the basis of the provisions of April 8, 1843.

In 1850, an audit was carried out in Russia, which counted 916,353 souls in Novorossiya (435,798 souls in Ekaterinoslav and 462,555 in Kherson province).

Thus, throughout its history, the Novorossiysk region was distinguished by the unique policy that was pursued in relation to it Russian government. It can be summarized as follows:
1. Serfdom did not apply to these areas. The fugitive serfs did not return from there.
2. Freedom of religion.
3. Liberation of the indigenous population from conscription.
4. The Tatar Murzas were equated with the Russian nobility (“Charter of Grant to the Nobility”). Thus, Russia did not interfere in the conflict between the local aristocracy and the common people.
5. The right to buy and sell land.
6. Benefits for the clergy.
7. Freedom of movement.
8. Foreign immigrants did not pay taxes for 5 years.
9. A city construction program was planned, the population was transferred to a sedentary lifestyle.
10. The Russian political elite and nobility were given lands with a period of development.
11. Resettlement of Old Believers.
The Novorossiysk-Bessarabian General Government was disbanded in 1873, and the term no longer corresponded to any territorial unit. After the revolution of 1917, Ukraine laid claim to Novorossiya. During Civil War Certain regions of Novorossiya more than once passed from white to red; Nestor Makhno’s troops operated here. When the Ukrainian SSR was created, most of Novorossiya became part of it.

territory, which included XX century historical Russian provinces: Kherson, Ekaterinoslav and Tauride (except Crimea) - cut through by the lower reaches of the Dnieper, Dniester and Bug. This flat steppe space imperceptibly merges with the steppes of eastern Russia, turning into the Asian steppes, and therefore has long served as the home of tribes moving from Asia to the West. In ancient times, a number of Greek colonies were founded on the same Black Sea coast. Constant shift population lasted until Tatar invasion . In the XIII-XVI centuries. the Tatars dominated here, making the peaceful colonization of the country by neighboring peoples impossible, but in the middle. XVI century Military colonization began. Below the rapids on the Dnieper island of Khortitsa, the Cossacks founded the Sich. All R. XVIII century new settlers appear here - people from Slavic lands, Bulgarians, Serbs, Volokhs. The government, intending to create a military border population, gave them benefits and various privileges. In 1752 two districts were formed: New Serbia and Slavyanoserbia. At the same time, fortification lines were created. After the 1st Turkish War, fortified lines captured new spaces. The annexation of Crimea in 1783, making Novorossiya unsafe from the Tatars, gave a new impetus to the colonization of the region. The 2nd Turkish War gave the Ochakov region into the hands of Russia. (i.e. the western part of the Kherson province). From 1774, the prince was placed at the head of the administration of the Novorossiysk region. G.A. Potemkin, who remained in this position until his death (1791). He divided the country into provinces: Azov to the east of the Dnieper and Novorossiysk to the west. Potemkin's concern was the settlement and comprehensive development of the region. In terms of colonization, benefits were given to foreigners - immigrants from Slavic lands, Greeks, Germans and schismatics; huge land holdings were distributed to dignitaries and officials with an obligation to populate them. Simultaneously with government colonization there was free colonization from Great Russia and Little Russia. Russian colonists did not, like foreigners, benefit from help from the treasury, but they did not encounter any obstacles to settling in new places; there was a lot of land, and its owners willingly allowed people to settle on it. They also looked condescendingly at the settlement of runaway peasants in the region, the number of whom, with the development of serfdom in the 18th century and AD. XIX centuries everything increased. Under Potemkin, a number of cities were founded in Novorossiya - Ekaterinoslav, Kherson, Nikolaev, etc. Later Odessa was founded. Administratively, Novorossiya was reshaped several times. In 1783 it was named the Ekaterinoslav governorship. In 1784 the Taurida region was formed, in 1795 - Voznesensk province. Under Paul I, part of the Ekaterinoslav governorship was separated, and the Novorossiysk province was formed from the rest. Under Alexander I, the provinces of Ekaterinoslav, Kherson and Tauride were established here, which, together with the Bessarabian region annexed from Turkey, formed the Novorossiysk Governor-General. The administrative center of Novorossiya, as well as industrial and cultural, in the 19th century. Odessa became.

The southeast of Ukraine is traditionally contrasted with the West of this republic. And this is no coincidence: history, language, the ethnic composition of the population, and the nature of the economy - everything here is decisively opposed to “Ukrainianism” with its farmhouse nationalism, Russian-Polish jargon (“Move”), the cult of traitorous losers, and finally, the impenetrable Western mentality of the “Selyuks”. Another thing is that eastern Ukraine itself is also heterogeneous, which is reflected in the specifics political struggle in Ukraine. And among the least “Ukrainian” regions of Ukraine, it is necessary to highlight Novorossiya.

These days, this geographical concept is unknown to most Russians. In the mass literature, and even in scientific literature, the concept of “Novorossiya” is practically not used, which is why this concept has been forgotten. Even the most educated people can usually only say that Novorossiya once, from the middle of the 18th century (more precisely, from 1764, when the province of the same name was created) and until 1917, meant the territory along the northern shore of the Black and Azov Seas. Due to this name of the region, one can recall that the city of Yekaterinoslav (now Dnepropetrovsk) under Emperor Paul was called Novorossiysk, and the university in Odessa before the revolution was officially called Novorossiysk. During the Soviet era, this region was called the Northern Black Sea Coast, and now it is usually called Southern Ukraine. However, due to its ethnic history, this region deserves special consideration. Novorossiya is not a part of “Ukraine”, but a completely special part of historical Russia, different from all other regions of the country. The history of the region differs sharply from the history of all regions of Russia, including the history of Ukraine.

It seems that the time has come to rehabilitate the good old name of the region.

Geographically, the territory of Novorossiya changed quite often. In the 18th century, when the very concept of “Novorossiya” appeared, it meant steppe territories with undefined boundaries in the south of the Russian Empire, the development of which was just beginning. During the reign of Catherine II, when the Black Sea steppes and Crimea were annexed to Russia, these territories began to be called Novorossiya. In the first half of the 19th century, Bessarabia was also included in Novorossiya. For quite a long time, lands in the North Caucasus were also included in Novorossiya (this explains the name of the city of Novorossiysk on the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus).

Pre-revolutionary scientists usually referred to Novorossiya in the broad sense as all the lands in the south of the empire annexed since the reign of Catherine II, but in a more common sense, Novorossiya meant the territories of the three Black Sea provinces - Kherson, Ekaterinoslav and Taurida, the Bessarabian province, which had a special status, and the region of the Don Army. Nowadays, the territories of these provinces correspond to the Odessa, Nikolaev, Kherson, Dnepropetrovsk, Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye, Kirovograd regions and the Autonomous Republic of Crimea in Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova, Transnistria, the Rostov region with the cities of Rostov-on-Don and Taganrog in the Russian Federation.

The natural conditions of the region are very favorable. The grain-growing steppe stretches to the Black Sea. It was this steppe, plowed up in the 19th century, that was the breadbasket of all of Russia, supplying grain to Europe as well. Wheat, soybeans, cotton, sunflowers, watermelons, melons, grapes and other exotic products for most of Russia were grown here. Coal, manganese, limestone, and iron ore are mined in the region. Novorossiya had serious economic importance in both the Russian Empire and the USSR.

Such significant rivers as the Dnieper, Dniester, Southern Bug, and Danube flow into the Black Sea. Convenient transport routes, favorable climate, abundant steppe, rich mineral resources - all this made Novorossia a desirable prey for many peoples in history. And it is no coincidence that the ethnic history of Novorossiya is perhaps the most complex among all regions of Russia. At the same time, individual parts of Novorossiya, such as Crimea, Bessarabia, and Donbass, are distinguished by their originality.

1. Ancient ethnic history

The Black Sea has been familiar to our ancestors since ancient times. Already during the times of the Cimmerians and Scythians, the Proto-Slavs, as can be judged from archaeological data, were among the original inhabitants of the northern coast of the Black Sea. This sea was very close to the East Slavic ancestral home. According to B. A. Rybakov, “here they fish, sail on ships, here is the maiden kingdom (of the Sarmatians) with stone cities; from here, from the sea shores, the Serpent Gorynych, the personification of the steppe inhabitants, goes on his raids on Holy Rus'. This is the real historical Black Sea-Azov Sea, which has long been known to the Slavs and even at times bore the name “Russian Sea”. From the forest-steppe outskirts of the Slavs... you can get to this sea by a “quick ride,” as they used to say in the 16th century, in just three days. In this sea there is the fabulous island of Buyan, in which one can easily guess the island of Berezan (Borisfen), which lay on the well-trodden path to the Greek lands; Russian merchant ships were equipped on this island in the 10th century. As we see, the Black Sea is not associated with cosmological ideas about the end of the earth; on the contrary, beyond this sea began everything “overseas,” attractive and only half unknown.”

However, a feature of the Black Sea was that the northern shore of the sea is a steppe, part of the Eurasian Great Steppe. The relationship between Russia and the steppe, as mentioned above, was directly reflected in the position of the sea, which periodically became either the truly Russian Sea or the lair of the Serpent Gorynych. Several times the pressure of the steppe inhabitants pushed the Slavs back from the shores of the sea to the protection of the forest. But every time, gathering strength, Rus' again and again sought to return to the Russian Sea. This has been repeated too often, under a variety of rulers, regimes, economic and social conditions to be an accident. There is some kind of mysticism in that majestic struggle between the Russian people and their desire for the sea.

However, the modern name of the sea, Black, was also given, apparently, by our ancestors. Among the many hypotheses about the origin of the name of the sea, the most convincing is the version of Corresponding Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences O. N. Trubachev and Professor Yu. Karpenko. Back in the III-II millennium BC. On the northern shores of the Sea of ​​Azov, lived the Aryan (Indo-European) tribes of the Sinds and Meotians, who called the sea “Temarun”, which literally means “Black”. The origin of this name is associated with a purely visual perception of the color of the surface of two neighboring seas, now called the Black and Azov. From the mountainous shores of the Caucasus, the Black Sea actually seems much darker than the Sea of ​​Azov. In other words, among the Aryans who lived in the Trans-Kuban and Don steppes before they left for India, accustomed to the light surface of “their” sea, the contemplation of the neighboring one could not cause any other exclamation than “The Black Sea”. But it was at this time that the Proto-Slavs branched off from the pan-Aryan (Indo-European) ethno-linguistic family, so the Sindians and Meotians, in a certain sense, are also the ancestors of the Russian ethnos. The Sinds and Meotians were replaced by the Iranian-speaking Scythians, who also called the sea the word “Akhshaena”, that is, the “black or dark” sea. This name, as we see, has survived thousands of years and has survived to this day.

In ancient times, Cimmerians, Scythians, Sarmatians, Goths, Huns, and Alans replaced each other on these steppes. The Tauri lived in the mountainous Crimea. Since the 7th century BC. Greek colonization took place. The Greeks founded many cities, some of which (albeit with a different ethnic population) still exist today.

But let's start in order. Ancient authors wrote that the vast steppe space from the Danube to the Volga was originally inhabited by nomadic Cimmerian tribes. The Cimmerians are mentioned by Assyrian authors under 714 BC, when these tribes penetrated into Asia Minor. In the next century, the Cimmerians also took part in wars in Western Asia. The Cimmerians probably belonged to the group of Iranian peoples. They wore pants, fitted shirts, and a hood on their heads. Russian Cossacks wore something similar even at the beginning of the twentieth century. As you can see, the steppe fashion turned out to be very conservative.

However, the Cimmerians disappeared from the Black Sea region in the 7th century. The Greeks no longer found them, but the nomadic Scythians who replaced the Cimmerians retained legends about their predecessors. According to the “father of history” Herodotus, the Cimmerians left the Black Sea region in fear of the Scythians. Be that as it may, the Cimmerians left behind geographical concepts such as the Cimmerian Bosporus (now the Kerch Strait), the so-called. “Cimmerian crossings” across this strait, the city of Chimeric on the shore of this strait. The Scythians, by which the Greeks meant all the “barbarian” tribes of various ethnic origins who lived along the northern shores of the Black Sea, came to replace the Cimmerians for a long time. In a narrow sense, Scythians are understood as Iranian-speaking nomadic tribes who lived in the steppes from the Danube to Altai, including the steppe Crimea. The nomadic Scythians ruled the region for more than five centuries (VIII - III centuries BC). The Scythians were known in antiquity as a nomadic pastoral people who lived in tents, ate milk and meat from cattle, and had cruel warlike morals, which allowed them to gain the glory of invincibility. The Scythians scalped their defeated enemies, made covers for their quivers from the skin torn off along with the nails from the right hand of enemy corpses, and made cups for wine from the skulls of the most worthy of their defeated enemies.

In the 7th century BC. The Scythians made long campaigns in Western Asia, and dominated the east for 28 years, until the Median king killed the Scythian leaders at a feast, and then the Scythian army that was left without commanders. But, having stopped long-distance campaigns, the Scythians still remained the masters of the Black Sea region. In 512 BC. The Scythians destroyed the huge Persian army of King Darius, which invaded their possessions.

The Scythians were tall (up to 172 cm) Caucasians. The Scythians, by the way, were carriers of haplogroup R1a, that is, very close relatives of the Slavs.

As Western researcher T. Rice notes, “from the images on vessels from Kul-Oba, Chertomlyk and Voronezh, it can be assumed that the Scythians had a stunning resemblance to the peasants of pre-revolutionary Russia... The external similarity of the Scythians, as can be seen from the works of Greek metal craftsmen, with the peasant population of pre-revolutionary central Russia may to a certain extent be coincidental, resulting from the fact that both preferred to wear the same hairstyles and long beards. But there are other similarities that are much more difficult to explain. Thus, a stocky build and large rounded noses were characteristic of both, and in addition, similar features are noticeable in the temperaments of both peoples. Both of them loved music and dancing; both were so passionate about art that they could admire, adopt and remake completely foreign styles into something completely new, national; both peoples had a talent for graphic arts, and they can also note an almost universal love for the color red. Again, both peoples demonstrated a willingness to resort to a scorched earth policy in the event of an invasion. Mixed marriages could well have played a role in preserving Scythian features in Russia, which to this day continue to find expression in the national image.”

Russian anthropologist V.P. Alekseev, back in 1985, pointed out the significant similarity of the anthropological type of the Eastern Slavs, including Russians, “... with the anthropological variant that was recorded in the Scythian burial grounds of the Black Sea region,” adding: “there is no doubt that most of the population living in southern Russian steppes in the middle of the 1st millennium BC, is the physical ancestor of the East Slavic tribes of the Middle Ages.” At the same time, V.P. Aleksev also noted a change in the anthropological type Eastern Slavs, which occurred in the first centuries of the 2nd millennium AD. in favor of the West Slavic and connected this with the migrations of “new newcomers from the Carpathian regions - the ancestral homeland of the Slavs, and their marriage contacts with local populations.”

The ancient Greeks began to settle on the northern shore of the Black Sea, starting in the 7th century BC. In eastern Crimea, around the Cimmerian Bosporus, in the 5th century BC. The Bosporan kingdom was formed. For its time it was a fairly large and rich kingdom. The capital of Bosporus, the city of Panticapaeum, had an area of ​​about 100 hectares. At least 60 thousand city dwellers and approximately twice as many villagers lived in the kingdom. A considerable part of the population were Scythians, Sindians and Taurians.

Another significant center of Greek colonization was founded in 422 BC. Chersonesos, which had up to 100 thousand inhabitants.

To the east of the Scythians lived the Sauromatians related to them (later, from the 3rd century BC, the name changed to “Sarmatians”). They ousted the Scythians from the northern Black Sea region. However, most of the Scythians dissolved among the Sarmatians, who were related and had a similar way of life.

However, some of the Scythians remained in Crimea until the 3rd century, creating their own kingdom there. The Scythian state in Crimea turned into an agricultural country. Military defeats and the capture of most of the steppe nomads by the Sarmatians forced the Scythians to change their way of life. Most of the Crimean Scythians now lived sedentary lives, and only the aristocracy preserved nomadic traditions. Large agricultural settlements grew on the sites of old winter roads. The Scythians now sowed wheat, barley, millet, were engaged in viticulture and winemaking, and raised horses, small and cattle. Scythian kings built cities and fortresses. The capital of the kingdom was Scythian Naples, its ancient settlement is located next to modern Simferopol. The city was protected by a stone defensive wall with square towers. It stood at the intersection of trade routes that went from the Crimean steppes to the Black Sea coast. The main source of state income was the grain trade. The Scythian kings minted coins, fought against piracy and sought to subjugate their trading rivals - the Greek colonies - to their power.

The Taurians lived in the mountains and on the southern coast of Crimea. It is no coincidence that the Greeks called Crimea Taurida or Tavrika. Unlike the mobile Scythians and Sarmatians, the Tauri were sedentary inhabitants. However, they did not disdain piracy, sacrificing captives to their goddess the Virgin.

The origin of the Tauri is unknown. Their self-name is also unknown; in Greek “taurus” means “bull”. Whether this name came from the cult of the bull, widespread among many ancient peoples, or simply from the consonance of words, or from the transfer by the Greeks of the name of the Taurus mountain range in Asia Minor, we will apparently never know. Living together with Greek colonists and Scythians, the Tauri were assimilated by the 2nd-3rd centuries. Archaeologists have excavated family burials in which a man was buried with Scythian weapons, and a woman with Taurus jewelry. In the 1st century, historians and geographers began to use the term “Tauro-Scythians” to designate the mixed non-Greek population of Crimea.

However, along with the Hellenization of barbarians in the Northern Black Sea region, the barbarization of Greek colonists also took place. Dion Chrysostom, who visited the Black Sea region around the year 100, noted that the inhabitants of Olbia already spoke unclean Greek, living among the barbarians, although they had not lost their Hellenic sense and knew almost the entire Iliad by heart, idolizing its heroes, most of all Achilles. They dressed in Scythian style, wearing trousers and black cloaks.

The Sauromatians, who became the masters of the Scythian steppes, were typical nomads. A feature of the Sauromats was the high position of women, their active participation in public life and military operations. Ancient writers often call the Sauromatians a woman-ruled people. Herodotus retold the legend about their origin from the marriages of Scythian youths with the Amazons, a legendary tribe of female warriors. This legend was intended to explain why Sauromatian women ride horses, own weapons, hunt and go to war, wear the same clothes as men and do not even get married until they kill the enemy in battle.

Among the Sarmatians, the tribes of the Roxolans, Aorses, Iazygs, Siracs, and Alans stood out. Over time, the Alans became the strongest of them, subjugating the rest of the Sarmatians. Together with the Goths, in the middle of the 3rd century, the Alans invaded Crimea. This blow finally crushed the ancient cities of the Black Sea region. True, city life does not stop here. Cities with a Greek population, which is replenished by Byzantine Greeks, Armenians, and various tribes from the steppes, continue to exist.

Iranian-speaking Alans and Germanic Goths settled in the southwestern part of Crimea, which became known as Dori. Crimea itself was called Gothia for a long time. Orthodoxy spread among the Goths and Alans, and they gradually began to switch to a sedentary lifestyle. Since the Goths and Alans lived mixedly, had a common religion, culture and way of life, and used Greek as a written language, it is not surprising that in the 15th century the Italian Joseph Barbaro wrote about the people of the “Gotalans”.

However, in the steppes north of the Crimean Mountains, the ethnic picture changed endlessly. In the 4th century, the Huns dominated here, however, they quickly went west in search of the booty that the collapsing Roman Empire promised them. Then wave after wave of Avars, Bulgars, Khazars, Pechenegs, and Polovtsians are replaced here.

2. From Tmutarakan to Wild Field

Gradually, the Slavs began to stand out more and more in the region. They lived on the Black Sea shores long before our era. Even in ancient times, the Slavs were known as wonderful sailors who dominated the Black Sea. In 626, thousands of Slavs, allies of the Avar Kagan, besieged Constantinople, not only from land, but also blockading the royal city from the sea. Only with great difficulty did the Byzantines manage to fight back.

With the emergence of Kievan Rus, the period of Russian hegemony on this sea begins. Their maritime skills were significantly developed. The main vessel of the Russians was a sea boat, which was a single-tree deck with boards on its sides. The boat could row and sail. There was no regular permanent navy in Ancient Rus'. For sea voyages, a boat fleet was created as needed. Each boat represented an independent combat unit, its personnel (40 people) were divided into dozens. The carrying capacity of these ships ranged from 4 to 16 tons, they had a length of at least 16, a width of at least 3, and a draft of about 1.2 m. The boats were united into detachments that made up the fleet led by the prince. However, there were ships that could accommodate up to 100 people.

It was precisely these Russian squadrons that carried out the famous campaigns against Byzantium in 860, under Askold and Dir. In 907, Oleg the Prophet, with a fleet of 2 thousand ships, not only won a victory and gained fame and booty, but also achieved the signing of the first written Russian-Byzantine treaty in history. Prince Igor made two sea voyages - 941 and 944. Just in the 940s, the Arab scientist al-Masudi, mentioning the Black Sea, wrote: “... which is the Russian Sea; no one except them (Russians) swims on it, and they live on one of its banks.” The sea voyages of the Russians continued in later times. Thus, another Arab scientist, Muhammad Aufi, wrote about the Russians at the beginning of the 13th century: “They make trips to distant lands, constantly travel the sea on ships, attack every ship they come across and rob it.”

After the victories of Svyatoslav over the Khazars and Vladimir over the Pechenegs, which gave Rus' a temporary advantage over the steppe, the Tmutarakan principality was formed in the northern Black Sea region. Tmutarakan as a fortress city arose on the site of an ancient settlement around 965, after Svyatoslav Igorevich’s campaigns to the south, the defeat of the Khazars and the annexation of this region to the ancient Russian state. In these places lived the Greeks (descendants of ancient colonists and Hellenized Taurians and Scythians), Kasogs (Circassians), Iranian-speaking Yasses (Alans), Turkic-speaking Khazars and Bulgars, Ugrians, Germanic Goths, and over time the Russian population gradually began to penetrate here. It is difficult to say exactly when the first Slavs appeared in Crimea. But, as academician B. A. Rybakov noted, “we can trace the penetration of the Slavs into Crimea and Taman almost a thousand years before the formation of the Tmutarakan principality.” On one of the Greek inscriptions in the Bosporus, dating back to the 3rd century, the name Ant is mentioned. In the 8th-10th centuries, eastern Crimea and the Azov coast of the North Caucasus were under the rule of the Khazars. It was probably during the Khazar era that the Slavic population of the northern Black Sea region increased significantly, since many Slavs, being dependent on the Khazar Kagan, could freely settle in his possessions. As Khazaria weakened, the Slavs themselves began to organize invasions of Crimea. Thus, from one Byzantine life it is known that a certain Novgorod prince Bravlin (about whom, however, there is no mention in Russian chronicles) at the beginning of the 9th century plundered the entire coast of Crimea. By the end of the 10th century, at the time of the fall of the Khazar Kaganate, the Slavs were already noticeably distinguished by their numbers among the multi-ethnic population of the shores of the Kerch Strait. The appearance of the Slavic Tmutarakan principality along the shores of the Kerch Strait after the defeat of the Khazars becomes completely understandable.

The name Tmutarakan was formed from the distorted Khazar word “tumen-tarkhan”, which meant the name of the headquarters of Tarkhan - a Khazar military leader who had an army of 10 thousand soldiers (“tumen”). For the first time this name is mentioned in the “Tale of Bygone Years” in 988, when Vladimir Svyatoslavich formed a principality there and installed his son Mstislav in it.

The very fact of the emergence of the Tmutarakan principality, cut off from Kiev by the steppe expanses, testifies not only to the power of Rus', but also to the fact that a significant Slavic population lived in the Crimea and the North Caucasus, and long before the creation of the state in Rus' (since there is no historical evidence of organization by the Kiev princes of the mass resettlement of Russians in the Black Sea region). As the famous historian V.V. Mavrodin wrote: “Rus of the Black Sea-Azov coast before the time of Svyatoslav, these were Slavic merchants and warriors who appeared in the cities and villages of Khazaria, Crimea, the Caucasus, the Lower Don, and individual colonies of settlers, and nests of Russified ethnic groups reincarnated from the tribes of the Sarmatian world, socially and culturally-linguistically close to other tribes interbreeding in the northern and forest-steppe zones with genuine Slavs.” After the annexation of the region under Svyatoslav in 965, the ethnic composition of the population of Tmutarakan did not change.

The importance of Tmutarakan is evidenced by the following data: it was based on these lands that Prince Mstislav entered into the struggle for his father’s inheritance with his brother Yaroslav the Wise, and was able to conquer from him all the Russian lands along the left bank of the Dnieper. According to the researcher, “Tmutarakan was not a small principality remote from Rus', but a large political center that had the forces of almost the entire southeast of the European part of our country, relying on which Mstislav could not only defeat Yaroslav with his Varangians, but and take possession of the entire left-bank part of Dnieper Rus'.”

The Tmutarakan principality experienced rapid economic growth in the 10th-11th centuries. IN capital city Principality under Prince Vladimir Krasno Solnyshko (980-1015), the walls of a powerful fortress were built. As archaeologists noted, the construction techniques used in Tmutarakan were also used in the construction of fortresses on the Stugna River near Kiev. Tmutarakan Prince Oleg (1083-1094) issued his own silver coin with his portrait and the inscription “Lord, help.” His wife, Feofania Muzalon from Byzantium, had a seal where she was called "Archontess (Princess) of Rus'."

The fact that the Russian and Russified population predominated among the Tmutarakan residents is evidenced by numerous graffiti (wall inscriptions) in the Old Russian language, icons, and seals of the local mayor Ratibor. It is also significant that, although the majority of local settled residents have been Christians since the 4th century, since the time of the Roman Emperor Constantine, Tmutarakan became independent in church terms from the Byzantine clergy.

In addition to Tmutarakan and Korchev (Kerch), located in the same principality, other Russian cities are known on the Russian Sea or close to it: Oleshye (Aleshki, now Tsyurupinsk) in the lower reaches of the Dnieper, Belgorod-Dnestrovsky in the Dniester estuary, founded on the ruins of a city destroyed by the Goths. the ancient city of Tire, Small Galich (now Galati in Romania).

However, Rus''s dominant position on the Black Sea was short-lived. Between the main territory of Rus' and Russian settlements on the Black Sea lay hundreds of kilometers of sun-scorched steppe, which was impossible to plow with the agricultural technology of that time. When the Polovtsian onslaught began in the second half of the 11th century, coinciding with the time of the collapse of Kievan Rus into appanages, the connections between the Dnieper region and Tmutarakan were interrupted. Under the Polovtsian attacks, the Russian population of the Black Sea lands was mostly pushed to the north, and some died.

After 1094, Russian chronicles do not report anything about Tmutarakan, and the Tmutarakan chronicles have not survived to this day. Tmutarakan probably entered into vassal relations with Byzantium, since communicating with Constantinople by sea was easier and more convenient than going through the Polovtsian steppes to Rus'. However, dependence on Byzantium had the character of a military alliance, since Tmutarakan was ruled by local princes whose names are unknown. In addition, Tmutarakan paid tribute to one of the Polovtsian khans, who owned the steppe Crimea. The Russian population of Crimea and Taman continued to live here later. In any case, the Arab geographer Idrisi around 1154 called Tamatarkha (that is, Tmutarakan) a densely populated city, and called the Don River the Russian River. The treaties between Byzantium and Genoa in 1169 and 1192 stated that north of the Kerch Strait there was a market place with the name “Russia” (with one “s”)! Archaeologists have excavated a Slavic settlement on Tepsel Hill (Planernoe village), dating from the 12th to the beginning of the 13th centuries.

But still Rus' was cut off from the Russian Sea.

Of course, Rus' has not forgotten about the Black Sea lands. It is no coincidence that in “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” Prince Igor was going to “look for the city of Tmutarakan” when setting off on a campaign against the Polovtsians. But Rus', divided into appanages, was not able to return to the shores of the Black Sea. The return occurred only after seven centuries!

About Tmutarakan, the Russians soon had nothing left in their memory except vague memories of something very far away. Even the location of Tmutarakan was completely forgotten, so in the 16th century Moscow chroniclers considered Tmutarakan to be the city of Astrakhan.

The Cuman invasions, the first of which occurred back in 1061, took on the character of a massive invasion three decades later. In the 90s In the 11th century, the Polovtsians almost continuously invaded Rus'. The Russian princes, busy with strife, were not only unable to repel the Polovtsian onslaught, but often themselves invited the Polovtsians to plunder the possessions of their rivals. Among the Polovtsians, major commanders emerged: Tugorkan (in Russian epics he was called Tugarin Zmeevich) and Bonyak Sheludivy. In 1093, the Polovtsians defeated the squads of Russian princes near Trepol (on the Stugna River), and three years later they plundered the outskirts of Kyiv and burned the Pechersky Monastery.

The steppe border of Rus' now ran in an unstable broken line from Mezhibozhya to the lower reaches of the Rosi River, from where it turned sharply to the northeast to the upper reaches of the Sula, Psla, Worksla, Seversky Donets, Don and Pronya rivers.

The Russian princes, under pressure from the Polovtsian danger, began to unite. Already in 1096, Vladimir Monomakh defeated the Polovtsians on the Trubezh River. Under the leadership of Vladimir Monomakh, the united Russian squads made a number of successful campaigns against the Polovtsians in 1103, 1107, 1111. During the last campaign, the Polovtsians suffered a particularly severe defeat on the Salnitsa River. Monomakh managed to stop the Polovtsian invasions, thanks to which the authority of this prince rose very high. In 1113 he became the Grand Duke of Rus'. Vladimir Monomakh became the last prince to rule all of Russia. Paradoxically, it was precisely as a result of Monomakh’s victories and the weakening of the Polovtsian threat that the appanage princes no longer needed the single central power of the Grand Duke, and therefore, according to the chronicler, “the Russian land was torn.” Polovtsian raids on Russian lands continued, but not as large-scale as under Tugorkan and Bonyak. The Russian princes continued to “bring” the Polovtsians to the lands of their rivals.

Due to the Polovtsian invasions, the Slavic population from Transnistria and the Bug region (the middle and lower reaches of the Southern Bug River), where the Ulichs and Tivertsy once lived, was significantly pushed to the forest north. But in the 12th century, their fertile lands began to resemble a desert steppe. On the middle Dnieper, the “Polovtsian Field” was already approaching Kyiv itself. On the Don, the Slavic population remained only at the very sources of the river. In the steppes on the lower Don, there were still small towns where Slavs, Yasses (Alans), and remnants of the Khazars professing Orthodoxy lived. The chronicler described the town of Sharukan, whose residents came out to meet the Russian squads with an Orthodox spiritual procession.

You can accurately name the date when the Russians left the steppe territories. In 1117, the “Belovezhians”, that is, the inhabitants of Belaya Vezha, the former Khazar Sarkel, inhabited by Russians, came to Rus'. This is how the evacuation of the settled Christian Slavic population from the steppe zone took place.

True, there were still very numerous and warlike Slavs in the steppes. They were called wanderers. They are mentioned quite often in Russian chronicles, participating in civil strife between Russian princes, as well as in wars with the Polovtsians. Our chronicles first mention the Brodniks in 1146. During the fight between Svyatoslav Olgovich and Izyaslav Mstislavovich, Svyatoslav’s ally, Yuri Dolgoruky, sends him a detachment of “wanderers”. In 1147, “Brodniki and Polovtsi came (to the Chernigov prince) in large numbers.”

In 1190, the Byzantine chronicler Niketas Acominatus described how the Brodniki, a branch of the Russians, he said, participated in the attack on Byzantium. “People who despise death,” the Byzantine calls them. In 1216, the Brodniks took part in the battle on the Lipitsa River during the period of strife between the Suzdal princes.

The wanderers became “exiles,” that is, runaway slaves who preferred to “wander” the steppes rather than be in boyar bondage. “Exiles” from Rus' were attracted to the steppes by their rich “landscapes” - animal, fish and bee grounds. The wanderers were led by their chosen governors. Both the origin and lifestyle of the Brodniks are strikingly reminiscent of the later Cossacks.

Brodniki became so numerous that in one of the documents of Pope Honorius III, dated 1227, the southern Russian steppes are called brodnic terra - “land of brodniks”

However, wanderers played a not very plausible role in history. In 1223, during the Battle of Kalka, the Brodniki, led by Ploskina, found themselves on the side of the Mongol-Tatars. The Brodniki also took part in the Mongol-Tatar invasions of the southern lands of Rus' and Hungary. In any case, the Hungarian monks complained that there were many “most wicked Christians” in the Mongol army. In 1227, a papal archbishop was appointed to the “land of wanderers”. However, we do not know any information about the conversion of wanderers to Catholicism. In 1254, the Hungarian king Béla IV complained to the pope that he was being pushed out from the east, i.e. from the Carpathian-Dniester lands, Russians and Brodniks. As we see, the Hungarian monarchs distinguished the Brodniks from the bulk of the Russians. But, on the other hand, we were not talking about the wanderers as a separate people.

After the 13th century, information about wanderers disappeared from chronicles.

Almost simultaneously with the brodniks, chroniclers report about certain berladniks. Actually, the Berladniks were part of the Brodniks, who had their own center - the city of Berlad (now Barlad in Romania). The lands between the lower reaches of the Danube, the Carpathians and the Dnieper, which were previously inhabited by the Ulich and Tivertsi tribes, suffered greatly from the Polovtsian invasions at the turn of the 11th-12th centuries. The population decreased many times, some died, some fled to the north, under the protection of forests and the Carpathian Mountains. However, these lands were not completely deserted. There are still cities here - Berlad (which became the capital of the region), Tekuch, Maly Galich, Dichin, Derst, and a number of others. In 1116, Vladimir Monomakh sent Ivan Vojtisich here as a governor, who was supposed to collect tribute from cities on the Danube. After the collapse of Kievan Rus, these lands recognized the supreme power of the Galician prince, but on the whole they were quite independent. The Byzantine princess Anna Komnenos, in a poem dedicated to the life of her father, who ruled in 1081-1118, mentioned independent princes who ruled on the lower Danube. In particular, a certain Vseslav ruled in the city of Dichin. But then Berlad became the center of the region.

In fact, Berlad was a veche republic. Berlady was ruled by governors chosen by local residents, but sometimes Berladniks hosted individual Galician princes. One of these princes went down in history under the name of Ivan Berladnik.

The exact boundaries of Berlady are indefinable. Most likely, Berlad occupied the territory between the Carpathians, the lower Danube and the Dniester. Now this is the northeastern part of Romania, Moldova and Transnistria.

The population of Berladi was very mixed, including both Russians (apparently the predominant ones), and people from various tribes of the steppe, and Romance-speaking Vlachs (on the basis of which modern Romanian historians consider Berladi to be a “national Romanian state”). However, the Russian language and loyalty to the house of the Galician princes mean that Berlad was still a Russian political entity, combining the features of the Tmutarakan principality, just as cut off from the main territory and multilingual, as free as Mister Veliky Novgorod, who had “liberty in the princes,” and the structure of the future Cossack troops.

Berladniks also had a reputation as brave warriors. They captured the port of Oleshye in the South Bug Estuary, causing heavy losses to Kyiv merchants. The large number of Berladniks is evidenced by the fact that in 1159, while fighting with his own uncle, Prince Ivan Berladnik gathered 6 thousand soldiers from Berladnik. (For that era when the most powerful monarchs gathered several hundred warriors, the number of berladniks looks impressive).

The further history of Berlady is unknown to us.

However, in the same region at the turn of the XII-XIII centuries. chroniclers mention certain “Pondanubians”. Coming from the “vygontsy” (this ancient Russian term meant expelled or voluntarily left from their community), people from the southern Russian principalities who settled in the lower reaches of the Danube and Dniester, these “Podunaytsy” had their own cities - standing on the right bank of the Dniester Tismyanitsa (first mentioned under 1144) and Kuchelmin first mentioned in 1159. Probably, the “Podunaytsy” and the Berladniki are one and the same. The well-known governors of the Podunays are Yuri Domazhirovich and Derzhikrai Volodislavovich, who came from noble boyar Galician families. In 1223, the Danubian people made up the entire regiment of Mstislav the Udal in the Battle of Kalka. It is interesting that the “Galich expulsions” in the amount of 1 thousand lodiyas went along the Dniester to the Black Sea, and from there entered the Dnieper.

The Brodniki, of which the Berladniki were part, according to some historians (V. T. Pashuto), were actually on the path to becoming a separate nomadic people of Slavic origin. However, most scientists do not agree with this, believing that the Brodniks were about the same part of the Russian ethnic group as the Cossacks were later.

On the southern steppe border of Rus', a very militarized life of local residents developed. Most of the border residents owned weapons and could fend for themselves during individual raids, not as large-scale as during the times of Tugorkan and Bonyak. The life of the inhabitants of the steppe borderland was reminiscent of the life of the Cossacks of the following centuries.

In “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign,” Prince Igor proudly says: “And my Kuryans are a seasoned squad: they are wooed under the trumpets, nurtured under their helmets, nourished from the end of the spear; their paths are well-trodden, their ravines are known, their bows are drawn, their quivers are open, their sabers are sharpened; they themselves gallop like gray wolves in a field, seeking honor for themselves and glory for the prince.” The inhabitants of Kursk (Kursk people) really were, having grown up in the eternal steppe war, as if they were fed from the end of a spear.

It is interesting that among the border warriors there were also women who were called Polenitsa, or Polenitsa. They fought bravely alongside the heroes and participated as equals in princely feasts.

One of the ancient Russian epics about Prince Vladimir the Red Sun says:

And Vladimir is the prince of Stolnya-Kyiv

He started a feast of honors and a feast

For many princes and all the boyars,

For all the strong Russians, for the mighty heroes,

Ay to the glorious glades and to the daring ones.

Polyanitsy are also mentioned in one of the epics about Ilya Muromets. According to one of the epics, in the duel Ilya almost lost to the Polenica.

The princes of the border territories began to widely use other, “their” steppe inhabitants in the fight against the steppe inhabitants. In the middle of the 12th century, around 1146, on the steppe border, along the Ros River, a tribal union was formed from Turkic nomadic tribes dependent on Rus'. Kyiv chroniclers called the steppe allies of Rus' “black hoods” (that is, black hats). This union included the remnants of the Pechenegs (in fact, the last time the Pechenegs appear on the pages of the chronicle was in 1168 precisely as “black hoods”), as well as the Berendeys, Torks, Kovuis, Turpeis, and other small Polovtsian tribes. Many of them maintained paganism for a long time, which is why the chroniclers called them “their filthy ones.” The cavalry of the “black hoods” faithfully served the Russian princes both in their confrontation with the steppe and in their civil strife. The center of the “black hoods” was the city of Torchesk, which stood on the Ros River, and was apparently inhabited by a tribe of Torks. The Torci themselves, who came from the Aral region, were first mentioned in chronicles back in 985, as allies of Rus', who fought with her against the Khazars and Volga Bulgarians. Under the blows of the Polovtsians, the Torci found themselves on the Russian border. In 1055 they were defeated by the son of Yaroslav the Wise, Vsevolod. Subsequently, some of the Torci submitted to the Polovtsians, others entered the service of old acquaintances of the Russian princes.

“Black Klobuks” not only defended the southern borders of Rus', but were also used as elite cavalry units in other Russian lands where they were needed. Names such as the Berendeevo swamp, where Evpatiy Kolovrat fought with the Mongol-Tatars, and a number of other names with the adjective “berendeevo” still exist in Vladimir and Yaroslavl regions. In Ukraine, in the Zhitomir region, there is the city of Berdichev, which two centuries ago was called Berendichev.

So, the Russians were significantly pushed back from the Black Sea steppes, and were forced to stubbornly defend themselves against Polovtsian raids.

3. The era of the Crimean Khanate

The Mongol-Tatar invasion particularly devastated southern steppes. The small Russian population that remained by the 13th century was partly destroyed, partly pushed even further from the sea to the north. A new ethnic group began to dominate in the Black Sea region - the Crimean Tatars, which included the Cumans, and the remnants of other steppe peoples. This blessed land was completely deserted, and only isolated fires of shepherds and traces of their herds testified that the human race still lives here. Only in Crimea, thanks to the mountains, were cities, crafts, and international trade still preserved, and even there the decline was noticeable.

In the 1260s, the cities on the southern coast of Crimea were captured by the Genoese, who obtained the right of the Golden Horde Khan to have his own trading posts. Gradually, by the middle of the 14th century, the Genoese became masters of the entire southern coast. This suited the Horde khans quite well, because the Genoese colonies became the main buyer of slaves stolen from Rus'.

In the mountains around the beginning of the 13th century, a small Christian principality of Theodoro arose, the main population of which were Greeks and descendants of the Hellenized Scythians, Goths and Alans. There were several other small feudal formations in the mountains, in particular, the Kyrk-Or and Eski-Kermen principalities with a mixed population.

This was a very strong enemy. Back in 1482, the Tatars burned and plundered Kyiv, which then belonged to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

It is known that in the first half of the 16th century alone there were 50 “Crimean armies” in Moscow Rus', that is, military predatory incursions. A major invasion occurred in 1507. Five years later, two Crimean princes devastated the environs of Aleksin, Belev, Bryansk, and Kolomna, besieged Ryazan, capturing “full of many.” In 1521, the Crimeans, together with the Kazan people, besieged Moscow.

In the second half of the 16th century, the Moscow-Crimean wars assumed a grandiose scale. Almost the entire adult male population of the Khanate took part in major Crimean raids; tens of thousands of soldiers fought on the Moscow army’s side.

So, in 1555, near Tula at Sudbischi, the Crimeans suffered a setback from Russian troops. In 1564, the Tatars burned Ryazan. In 1571, Khan Devlet-Girey burns Moscow, and the following year a united army of zemstvo and oprichnina governors defeats the Crimeans at Molodi, halfway between Moscow and Serpukhov. But the raids did not stop. In 1591, a new Crimean army led by Khan Kazy-Girey was repulsed near the village of Vorobyovo (now within Moscow). The Donskoy Monastery was erected at the site of the battle. During the 16th century there is no information about raids for only 8 years, but eight times the Tatars made two raids a year, and once - three raids! Twice they came near Moscow and once they burned it, burned Ryazan, and reached Serpukhov and Kolomna.

In the 17th century, not a year goes by without a Crimean raid. The Tula serif line was destroyed in 1607-17. Especially during the Time of Troubles, when “the Tatars went to Rus' until they were tired,” and the Shah of Iran, familiar with the state of the eastern slave markets, expressed surprise that there were still inhabitants in Russia. Only in 1607-1617. The Crimeans drove away at least 100 thousand people from Russia, and in total in the first half of the 17th century - at least 150-200 thousand. The losses of the Russian population in the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were no less, where 76 raids were carried out during the same time (1606-1649). Taking advantage of the lack of fortifications in the steppe “ukrainas” of the Moscow state, the Crimean Tatars again entered the interior of the country. In 1632, Crimean raids contributed to Russia's failure in the Smolensk War of 1632-34. In 1633, the Crimeans robbed in the vicinity of Serpukhov, Tula and Ryazan.

Only the construction of the Belgorod abatis line led to relative calm in the vicinity of Moscow. However, in 1644 the Tatars devastated the Tambov, Kursk and Seversk lands. The following year, a new invasion from Crimea was defeated, but the Tatars still took more than 6 thousand captives with them. The Crimean Tatars continued to systematically ravage the Russian lands, again sometimes reaching Serpukhov and Kashira. Total number those taken captive by the Tatars for sale at slave markets in the first half of the 17th century amounted to approximately 200 thousand people. Russia had to pay tribute (“wake”) to the Crimean Khan in the second half of the 17th century. - over 26 thousand rubles. annually.

In Ukraine, engulfed in civil strife between various hetmans who succeeded each other after the death of Bohdan Khmelnytsky, it was very easy for the Tatars to capture prisoners. In just 3 years, 1654-1657, over 50 thousand people were driven into slavery from Ukraine.

In the 18th century, it became more difficult for the Tatars to invade Russia, since they would have to overcome the fortifications of the Izyum Line. Nevertheless, the raids continued. So, in 1735-36. in the Bakhmut province, “a large number of ordinary men and women were rounded up and beaten, and the standing and milked bread was burned without a trace, and the cattle were driven away.” The “trans-Dnieper places” (along the right tributary of the Dnieper Tyasmin) were also devastated.

In the first half of the 18th century, according to the testimony of the Catholic missionary K. Dubay, 20 thousand slaves were exported annually from Crimea. About 60 thousand slaves were used in the Khanate itself, mainly for agricultural work.

The last raid of the Crimean Khan occurred in the winter of 1768-69. In the Elisavetgrad province, as one eyewitness reported, the Tatars burned 150 villages, “a huge smoky cloud spread 20 miles into Poland,” and 20 thousand people were taken captive.

But all these grandiose invasions had only one goal - the capture of prisoners. Since hunting for live goods was the main branch of the Khanate's economy, and slaves were its main export product, it is not surprising that the organization of raids was worked out to perfection.

According to the number of participants, the raids were divided into three types: large (seferi) was carried out under the leadership of the khan himself, over 100 thousand people took part in it. Such a raid brought at least 5 thousand captives. A medium-scale campaign (chapula) involved up to 50 thousand soldiers under the command of one of the beys, and usually up to 3 thousand prisoners were captured. Small raids (“besh-bash”, literally “five heads”) were carried out by a murza, or a free fishing artel led by its own elected commander. Such a raid brought several hundred captives.

It is interesting that the Tatars usually did not take weapons on a campaign, limiting themselves to a saber, a bow and several dozen arrows, but they certainly stocked up on belts to tie up prisoners. The Tatars tried not to engage in battle with the Russian military detachments, moving deeper into foreign territory extremely carefully, confusing their tracks like an animal. Having taken a village or city by surprise, the Tatars captured prisoners, killing those who resisted, after which they quickly retreated into the steppe. In case of persecution, the Tatars dispersed into small groups, then gathered in an appointed place. Only in case of their overwhelming numerical superiority did the Crimeans enter into battle

Slaves captured in raids were mostly immediately bought by merchants, predominantly of Jewish origin, who subsequently resold their “goods” at a large profit to everyone in need of slaves who were willing to pay generously for them.

The buyer of slaves was mainly the Ottoman Empire, which widely used slave labor in economic spheres. However, in the XIV and XV centuries. Slavic slaves were bought by merchants of the Italian urban republics that were experiencing the Renaissance, which did not in any way affect the fate of Russian slaves. Slaves of Slavic origin are noted as something common in the 14th century in the notarial deeds of some Italian and southern French cities. In particular, one of the main buyers of Russian slaves was the Roussillon region in the south of France. The famous poet Petrarch mentions the “Scythian” slaves in his letter to the Archbishop of Genoa Guido Setta. As the modern Ukrainian author Oles Buzina sarcastically reminds, “I hope it is now clear to everyone where so many blondes appeared on the canvases of Italian artists of that time. Given their chronic deficit among native women of Italy...”

Later, France became one of the most important buyers of “live goods” delivered from Crimea. During the reign of the “Sun King” Louis XIV, Russian slaves were widely used as rowers on galleys. Neither the “most Christian” monarchs, nor the pious bourgeoisie, nor the humanists of the Renaissance saw anything wrong with buying Christian slaves from Muslim rulers through Jewish intermediaries.

It is characteristic that the Crimean Khanate itself, located in the fertile Crimea with its most fertile soils and favorable geographical position, was a completely primitive state structure. Even such an author as V. E. Vozgrin, the author of the book “Historical Fates of the Crimean Tatars,” having devoted his entire work of 450 pages to “evidence” that the innocent Crimean Tatars became victims of tsarism’s aggression, nevertheless admitted: “the fact of a completely unique (if not on a global scale, then at least for Europe) stagnation of the entire economy of Crimea in the 13th-18th centuries.” . Indeed, by the end of its history, fewer people lived in the Crimean Khanate than at its inception, and the economy remained at the level of 500 years ago.

The reason for the stagnation is clear: the Crimean Tatars themselves considered any work other than robbery to be a disgrace, so crafts, trade, gardening and other types of economic activity in the Khanate were carried out by Greeks, Armenians, Karaites, as well as slaves captured in raids. When Catherine II decided to completely undermine the economy of the Crimean Khanate, she ordered the eviction of the Greeks and Armenians living on the peninsula. This was enough to make the Khanate defenseless and the Russians were able to take it with their bare hands in 1783

In the fight against Turkish aggressors and Tatar predators, the free Cossacks glorified themselves. The Zaporozhye Sich stood as a powerful barrier to the invasion of the Tatar hordes. In response to the Tatar raids, the Cossacks and Donets organized retaliatory campaigns against the Crimea and Turkish fortresses on the Black Sea, freeing prisoners. On their light boats “seagulls” the Cossacks crossed the Black Sea, even attacking the outskirts of Istanbul. The Cossacks sometimes interrupted Turkish voyages in the Black Sea for years, sinking or boarding even large Turkish ships. Only from 1575 to 1637. The Cossacks made up to twenty trips across the Black Sea, often engaging in naval battles with the Turkish fleet. In 1675, the Zaporozhye ataman Ivan Serko invaded Crimea, devastating the peninsula and freeing 7 thousand captives. Finally, during the Russian-Turkish War of 1735-40, Russian troops under the command of Field Marshal I.Kh. Minikha invaded Crimea, defeating the capital of the Khanate, Bakhchisarai.

Mavrodin V.V. Slavic-Russian population of the Lower Don and the North Caucasus in the X-XIV centuries // Scientific notes of the Leningrad State Pedagogical Institute named after. A. I. Herzen. T. 11.1938, p. 23

There, p. 106

Vozgrin V. E. Historical destinies of the Crimean Tatars. M., 1992, p. 164

What was Novorossiya like a century ago? In 1910, a 14-volume publication edited by V.P. Semenov-Tien-Shansky “Russia. A complete geographical description of our society." We have collected unique facts from the volume “Crimea and Novorossiya”, the re-release of which we are preparing.

"New Byzantium"

1. It was decided to call the lands liberated from the Turks and Crimean Tatars in the 18th century Novorossiya, by analogy with Little Russia and Great Russia. The annexation of these lands during the era of Catherine was part of the “Greek Project”: the advance to the south and the revival of Byzantium with its center in New Rome (Constantinople).

2. At the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, Novorossiya included modern Moldova, Stavropol, Donbass, Rostov, Odessa, Kherson, Nikolaev, Kirovograd and Dnepropetrovsk regions.

3. A lot of cities in New Russia bore Greek names - Stavropol, Simferopol, Sevastpol, Nikopol, Olviopol, Kherson, Balaklava, Alexandria, Tiraspol, etc. This indirectly reflected the “Byzantine idea” of Russian rulers.

Novorossiya and Novorossiysk

4. The modern city of Novorossiysk in the Krasnodar Territory, despite its name, was located slightly south of the provinces, which at the end of the 19th century were commonly associated with Novorossiya.

5. From 1796 to 1802, Novorossiysk was called Dnepropetrovsk, a city on the Dnieper with a rich history. In 1776, the city of Yekaterinoslav (as it was called in 1776-1796 and 1802-1926) became the center of Novorossiya - the then Azov province.

It was planned in 1784 to make it the “third capital” of the Russian Empire, after Moscow and St. Petersburg. The city changed many names, even managing to be Samara (or rather Samar, a Cossack town on the Samara River, which flows into the Dnieper).

Living conditions

6. At the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, about 12.5 million people lived in Novorossiya:

32% - Great Russians, 42% - Little Russians (lived mainly on the right bank of the Dnieper and Konka);

91% Christians (84.7% Orthodox), 6% Jews, 2% Mohammedans.

7. Novorossiya was a multinational territory. Greeks, Armenians, Jews, Germans, Serbs, Bulgarians, Moldovans, Crimean Tatars, Rusyns, Great and Little Russians lived here. In the Stavropol region there are Kalmyks, Nogais and Turkmens.

8. The warmest winters are in Crimea, where the temperature is above zero. The least hot summer by the sea is in Taganrog and Mariupol.

9. The population was mainly rural (more than 80%). The fewest peasants are in the Kherson and Bessarabia provinces, the most townspeople are in the Kherson and Tauride provinces.

10. The largest number of schools and students was observed in Crimea and the southwestern regions.

11. Half of the land was in private hands. The most expensive land was in the Bessarabian province - 90 rubles per hectare.

12. Kherson province surpassed many others in terms of productivity, provision of bread and arable land

13. Novorossiya was not only a new agricultural, but also an industrial region of Russia. The main labor market was located in Kakhovka, a city in the lower reaches of the Dnieper. Women, teenagers and children worked in industry.

14. The number of teenagers in the sleeve production was about 80% and about 13% children. Children were widely involved in the tobacco industry, and teenagers in the rope and tin industry.

River routes and land roads

15. Before the end of the 15th century, there were no permanent land roads. Temporary steppe roads, portages between rivers and horse trails are known.

16. Some of the most ancient routes of New Russia were: the caravan route from Kiev to Kafa (Feodosia) (XV century), the Muravsky Way (from Perekop through the Konka and Samara rivers to Orel and Tula), the Mikitinsky, Kizekermen and Kryukovsky Ways (along the Dnieper) , Black Way (from Ochakov into the depths of Poland).

17. The first one was built under Nicholas I highway– from Simferopol to Sevastopol.

18. First Railway in Novorossiya it was supposed to replace the never-built Volga-Don Canal and went from the Volga settlement of Dubovka to the Kachalinskaya village on the Don.

19. The most important Russian rivers were located in Novorossiya - the Dniester, the Dnieper and the Don. At the same time, river navigation was poorly developed.

20. Shipping was best developed on the Don, but shallow waters prevented the widespread use of the river fleet. The Don fleet was one of the most expensive.

21. The Dnieper was torn into two parts by rapids, which were extremely dangerous to overcome. Attempts to deepen the bottom in these areas did not bring any serious effect.

22. The Dniester suffered from shallow water and slight rapids and riffles. In addition, cargo traffic along it fell by the end of the 19th century.

Cities of Novorossiya

23. Stavropol, but not Kharkov, belonged to Novorossiya.

24. Most big city New Russia was Odessa. Rostov and Ekaterinoslav (Dnepropetrovsk) competed for second and third place at the turn of the century. Krivoy Rog, one of the largest modern cities in Ukraine, was a small town at a postal station.

25. Odessa and Rostov were the main trading cities that enjoyed a certain freedom. Where there is trade, there are scammers. That is why the cities became the most famous “thieves’ capitals.” Since those times there has been a saying “Odessa is mother, Rostov is father.”

26. Only Warsaw, St. Petersburg and Moscow were larger than Odessa in the Russian Empire. Rostov is already in 14th place, and Ekaterinoslav is in 17th place (1,2 and 3rd place in Novorossiya, respectively).

27. Odessa was the largest seaport and a railway junction. The convenient location on the Black Sea and between the mouths of two major European rivers (Dnieper and Dniester) ensured the wealth of the city. From her to European capitals(Vienna and Rome) was closer to travel than to Moscow and St. Petersburg.

28. The Armenians founded several cities in Novorossiya - Nakhichevan-on-Don (now the Rostov region), Grigoriopol (on the banks of the Dniester) and the Holy Cross (modern Budyonnovsk in Stavropol). Contemporaries noted that Nakhichevan, thanks to its gardens, was superior in beauty to neighboring Rostov. By the end of the 19th century they had merged into a single city.

29. The most important cities of the Greeks were Balaklava (in Crimea) and Mariupol (formerly called Kalmius in Greek). Near Mariupol on the Kalka River (modern Kalmius or Kalchik, which flows into it), a tragic battle between the troops of the ancient Russian princes and the Mongol conquerors took place.

30.Bendery is not only a colloquial name for Ukrainian radical nationalists, but also the oldest city in Transnistria. The name most likely comes from the Persian “harbour, port”. The Moldavian rulers called the city Tyagyankyachya, Tigina or Tungata. The Turks renamed it Bendery.

31. The modern city of Zaporozhye did not arise out of nowhere. Numerous Dnieper rapids ended here. Even before the appearance of the Zaporozhye Sich, a Scythian town existed on the island of Khortitsa (the largest on the Dnieper). The island is mentioned in ancient Russian chronicles as a place of battles and gatherings of princes; the “capital” of the chronicle fords, Protolcha, a trade and craft settlement named after the famous ford, may have been located here.

32. In 1552, the Volyn prince Dmitry Vishnevetsky built the first Cossack town here, in 1756 the Zaporozhye shipyard was founded here, and later the Alexander Fortress. Aleksandrovsk became the most important transport hub of Novorossia.

Excursion into history

33. The ancient Greek names of the Don, Dnieper, Southern Bug and Dniester are Tanais, Borysthenes, Hypanis and Tiras.

34. The Scythians roamed the steppe and along the lower reaches of the great rivers; the Tauri, after whom the peninsula was named, lived in the Crimea from ancient times, as well as the remnants of the Cimmerians. To the west of Borysthenes lived farmers - the Allazons and Callipids, beyond the Tanais - the Sarmatians. The Allazons and Callipids were involved in trade with the ancient Greeks, who had a rich colony at the mouth of the Borysthenes - Olbia. The Greeks called them Helleno-Scythians.

35. In Bessarabia lived the Thracian tribes - Getae and Dacians, from whom, together with the Roman colonists, the Romanians and Moldavians trace their origins.

36. There are still many ancient ramparts left in Novorossiya, the origin of which is still a matter of debate. Obviously only them ancient origin. These are the Serpentine Shafts, the Trajan Shafts and the Perekop Shaft.

37. On the territory of New Russia there were: the Scythian kingdom, the Bosporan kingdom, colonies of the Greeks, Italians, Byzantine lands, the Hunnic Empire, the state of the Goths Oium, the Avar Khanate, Great Bulgaria, the Khazar Khaganate, Kievan Rus, the Golden Horde, the Crimean Khanate, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, lands of the Ottoman Empire, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Zaporozhye Army (Hetmanate).

38. South part Bessarabia - the interfluve of the lower Dniester and Prut rivers was called the Angle. From it came the name of the Slavic tribe of the Streets.

39. The word Bessarabia comes from the name of the Wallachian prince Basarab I (1319 - 1352).

40. “List of Russian cities near and far” (beginning of the 15th century) mentions old Russian cities in Bessarabia: Belgorod, Yassky Torg on the Prut, Khoten on the Dniester, and Peresechen (according to another version, it was located on the Dnieper near modern Dnepropetrovsk).

41. The coastal cities of Novorossiya also have a long history. On the site of Odessa there was a city of Istrian sailors - Istrion (VI century AD). Nearby there was a whole constellation of ancient Greek colonies: Odessos, Olvia, Thira, Nikonion, Isakion, Skopelos, Alectos.

42. New Russia was chosen by the Greeks and Scythians even before our era. Large trading cities were located here. In place of Azov - Tanais, Taganrog - Kremny, Kerch - Mirmekiy, Tiritaka and Panticapaeum, Theodosia retained the name, in place of Sevastopol - Chersonesus, Evpatoria - Kerkintis, Simferopol - Scythian Naples, the ancient capital of the Scythian kingdom.

43. Another oldest city of the Scythians was located near the modern city of Zaporozhye (until 1921 - Alexandrovsk).

44. From the Greek colonies and settlers we got the word “estuary” (translated as harbor, bay).

45. The cities of Crimea and the Black Sea coast, lost by Byzantium, were quickly reclaimed by the Italians (Venetians and Genoese), Turks and Crimean Tatars. The Crimean Khanate and Gazaria (Genoese colonies) owned the cities of Crimea. The chronicle Surozh (Pike perch) became the Italian Soldaya, Balaklava was called in Italian Chembalo, Yalta - Dzhialita, Alushta - Alusta, Feodosia - Kaffa. Ak-mosque, Akkerman, Achi-Kale are Turkish cities on the site of Simferopol, Belgorod-Dnestrovsky and Ochakov.

46. ​​In Crimea, descendants of the Goths are still found among the Greeks and Crimean Tatars. These are mostly people with blue eyes and blond hair, who have completely switched to a foreign language. However, according to the surviving descriptions of medieval historians, the Crimean Gothic language existed until the end of the 18th century.

47. B Southern Crimea There was the legendary Gothia, which later became the Orthodox principality of Theodoro with a Greek-Gothic-Alanian population and was captured by the Turks in 1475. The capital of Theodoro - Mangup, was deserted and completely disappeared as a settlement today.

48. The city of Old Crimea has changed about 22 names throughout its history. The most famous: Taz, Kareya, Trakana, Solkhat, Levkopol.

49. The Perekop Isthmus, separating Crimea from the mainland, has been the most important place since ancient times, the “gateway” to mainland. According to Ptolemy and Pliny the Elder, there was even a canal here for some time connecting the Azov and Black Seas. On the site of Perekop there was an ancient Greek trading city called Taphros. Here is the Perekop shaft, which is about 2 thousand years old.

50. Russian cities existed in New Russia back in the 10th century (Belgorod at the mouth of the Dniester and Oleshye at the mouth of the Dnieper). With the weakening of the Golden Horde, new cities appear. They belonged to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, in which, as is known, the official language and the language of the majority of the population was Russian.

After the death of Vytautas in 1430, a list of castles was given: Sokolets (now Voznesensk, Nikolaev region), Black City (Ochakov, Nikolaev region), Kachuklenov (Odessa).

Cossacks and border guards

51. Border Serbs (Austrian “Cossacks”) asked the Russian government to settle them in Russia. This is how a whole region was born - New Serbia on the territory of the modern Kirovograd region. Its capital became the city of Novomirgorod. More than ten years later, New Serbia became part of the Novorossiysk province.

52. Another area where Serbs and other Balkan settlers lived was Slavyanoserbia (in the territory of Lugansk and Donetsk regions), the center of which was the city of Bakhmut (modern Artyomovsk).

53. The Cossacks in New Russia were mostly part of the Don Army and the Zaporozhye Army. The Cossacks settled “beyond the rapids” in the lower reaches of the Dnieper on numerous islands and capes. History remembers successive battles: Khortitsa (on Khortitsa Island), Tokmakovskaya (on Tokmakovka Island), Nikitinskaya (at the Nikitinsky Horn), Chertomlykskaya (along the river), Bazavalukskaya (on Bazavluk Island), Pidpilnyanskaya, Kamenskaya and Aleshkovskaya ( by the name of the rivers that fell).

54. Don Cossacks had towns along the Don and Medveditsa. The most famous are Cherkasy, Monastyrsky, Tsimlyansky.