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The Cossacks were a special military class in Tsarist Russia (see Classes and Estates in Russia). The word “Cossack” is of Turkic origin and is translated as “free man.” In the XIV century. On the outskirts of Rus', people began to settle in the steppe regions who did not put up with the system of feudal subordination and exploitation in the Russian principalities. Bold, brave, united by military brotherhood, they successfully repelled the raids of warlike steppe nomads. In their communities that arose on the banks of the Don, Dnieper, and Yaik, the Cossacks (as they began to be called from the beginning of the 16th century) accepted those who were ready to live with them by the same interests, without attaching importance to either the class origin or the nationality of the newcomers. That is why among them there were many Tatars, Bashkirs and representatives of other peoples. This is how the Cossacks were formed - a special military service class in Tsarist Russia. Its history is closely connected with the development of the feudal state and the protest movement against serfdom (see Serfdom).
The life and way of life of the Cossacks were determined by the fact that they were in a hostile environment and armed struggle was the main condition of their existence. They attacked their neighbors, robbed merchants, and made long trips into Turkey and Persia. The Cossacks also caused a lot of trouble for the tsarist government, especially during the peasant wars, filling the ranks of the rebels (see Peasant wars in Russia in the 17th-18th centuries). During peaceful respites, they were engaged in cattle breeding, hunting, fishing and other seasonal crafts (agriculture developed among them in the 18th century).
There was a legend among the Cossacks that Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich granted them lands and there were royal letters that were allegedly kept in Cherkassk, but burned in a fire in the 18th century. This legend, widespread among the Don, Ural and Terek Cossacks, was not confirmed by anything, but was never refuted by the government. In fact, they owned their lands much earlier, but the reference to the grant was consistent with the official version of tsarism, that the Cossacks arose from the very beginning as a service class. The mention of Ivan IV emphasized the antiquity of the Cossack troops. The Cossacks were very proud of their “seniority”. The Don Army was considered the oldest, which in 1870 solemnly celebrated its 300th anniversary.
The Russian tsars quickly appreciated the military merits of the Cossacks and, using their independent position, more than once pushed the Cossacks to take military action against their eastern neighbors - Turkey and Persia, without openly declaring war on them. On the side of Russia, the Cossacks took part in many wars, but they began to receive the sovereign’s salary, often symbolic, only in 1570.
Until the beginning of the 18th century. The internal structure of the Cossacks and their service were free. All the most important matters were discussed by a general gathering of Cossacks - a circle. Here the military chieftain and other elders were elected. The Cossacks did not recognize official decrees from Moscow. In negotiations with the government, the elders always referred to the “depletion of people,” trying to field the smallest number of serving Cossacks.
In Ukraine in the first quarter of the 17th century. A special Cossack military-political organization was formed - the Zaporozhye Sich. It was a kind of Cossack republic with a supreme body - the Rada. All Cossacks were considered free and equal in rights, although the leading role belonged to the Cossack elite. The Zaporizhzhya Sich played an outstanding role in the national liberation struggle of the Ukrainian people against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
The Azov campaigns of the Cossacks became very famous. The Don Cossacks occupied the Turkish fortress of Azov for the first time in 1637. The “sit” in Azov lasted five years. In Moscow, the capture of Azov by the Cossacks was specifically discussed by the Zemsky Sobor, which, in order to avoid war with Turkey, addressed the Cossacks with a proposal to leave the fortress. In 1695 - 1696 Cossacks took part in the Azov campaigns under the command of Peter I, which ended with the next capture of the fortress (see Russian-Turkish wars of the 17th-19th centuries).
After its creation at the beginning of the 18th century. In the regular army, the importance of the Cossacks decreased somewhat. This was also facilitated by Peter I’s distrust of the former service classes. Cossacks were included in the army as irregular troops. They were supposed to perform primarily local guard duty. At the same time, step by step, the government limited the Cossack liberties, reducing the internal autonomy of the Cossacks. The establishment of new orders on the Don caused an uprising of the Cossacks under the leadership of K. Bulavin. The uprising was suppressed, and the Cossack freemen were dealt a crushing blow: now the military ataman was appointed by the government as an ordinary commander. It was finally liquidated by Catherine II, when in 1775 she destroyed the Zaporozhye Sich. This turned out to have unfavorable consequences for tsarism: as a sign of protest, a significant part of the Zaporozhye Cossacks went beyond the Danube, into the borders of Turkish possessions. A year later, the Cossacks were given an amnesty, calling for them to return to military service. They moved to the area between the Southern Bug and Dniester rivers, and later they were given lands along the eastern coast of the Sea of Azov. The formation of the Black Sea Cossack Army began, the management of which was completely subordinate to the government. The Black Sea Cossacks penetrated deeper and deeper into the Kuban steppes and the foothills of the Caucasus. In the middle of the 19th century. it was renamed the Kuban Army, which was almost equal in size and importance to the Don Army. By the 19th century The Cossacks, as a result of the deliberate policy of the authorities, turned into a closed, privileged military-service class, access to which was closed to foreigners.
At the beginning of the 20th century. there were 11 Cossack troops: Don, Kuban, Terek, Astrakhan, Ural, Orenburg, Semirechinsk, Siberian, Transbaikal, Amur and Ussuri. They were a powerful fighting force, with more than a quarter of a million men in their ranks.
At the end of the 18th - first half of the 19th centuries. each Cossack army had its own relatively independent administration, but at the same time clearly regulated by the state. The government, however, failed to completely overcome the traditions of the Cossacks. Thus, in the Ural Army, the elders were unable to achieve significant privileges for themselves; all management issues were resolved by general consent. The Cossacks served in their service not in turns, as elsewhere, but by “hiring.” The Cossack society paid the volunteer who was hired “help,” which amounted to an impressive sum of money at that time. In all other troops, a “regular” order of service was established, when all adult Cossacks served in turn. But here, too, communal orders were preserved: for example, all Cossacks began to serve as privates. During the campaign, there was the strictest discipline in the Cossack regiment, but upon returning home, any Cossack had the right to put forward demands to his commanders. Compared to the regular army, with its merciless suppression of the soldier’s personality and parade drill, the Cossack troops had more favorable conditions of service, which had a beneficial effect on their morale.
During the military reforms of the 60-70s. XIX century The order of service of the Cossacks changed. Now they were also subject to compulsory military service. The total service life was XX years, including 3 years in the preparatory category; 4 years - on active service; 8 years - “on benefits”, i.e. at home, with periodic camp training, and 5 years in reserve. The Cossack still showed up for duty with his horse, equipment and bladed weapons. Cossack regiments were formed separately and did not merge with the army.
The Cossacks were a privileged class, with good land provision and personal freedom. Taking advantage of the peculiar caste isolation of the Cossacks, tsarism more than once relied on it to solve punitive problems, as, for example, during the suppression of the revolution of 1905-1907. The traditional devotion of the Cossacks to the Tsar, the extremely difficult political situation at the end of 1917 - beginning of 1918, and the hostile attitude of the Soviet government towards the Cossacks pushed most of them to join the service in the White Guard units (see White Movement). The stubborn resistance of the Cossacks to the Red Army led to the fact that some of them were forced to leave Russia and join the ranks of emigration, while others, returning home, faced brutal repression: In 1920, by decree of the Soviet government, the Cossacks as a class were abolished. This measure in itself was justified, but the subsequent harsh policy of eliminating the Cossacks in the Don and Kuban, when tens of thousands of Cossack families were deprived of land, estates, property and exiled to the North and Siberia, gave rise to illusions among the descendants of the former Cossacks about the possibility of its complete revival Nowadays.
History remembers the names of Cossack explorers: Ermak, V.V. Atlasov, S.I. Dezhnev, V.D. Poyarkov, E.P. Khabarov and others, who laid the foundation for the development of the vast expanses of Siberia and the Far East (see Development of Siberia and Far East).
Why did the Cossacks oppose themselves to the Great Russians?
The turn of the end of the 20th - beginning of the 21st century was marked by an intense search by the Cossacks for their own, lost in the crucible of the revolution and the “meat grinder” of the Soviets, a truly Cossack path. What is a Cossack? Who is he - a social worker (warrior, guardsman, border guard, etc.) or is a Cossack first of all a Cossack, that is, a full-fledged, and therefore nationally obliged, representative of the original Cossack tribe?
The whole history of Russia was made by strange people?
“The ethnicity factor of the Cossacks” - that’s how we’ll call the above problem for brevity - throughout the history of Russia, it has caused irreconcilable ideological clashes between Russian intellectuals who genetically have nothing to do with the Cossacks.
Our review of the factor of Cossack ethnicity should begin with a mention of the scientific work of a famous historian, whose scientific reputation in the sense of apologetics of Cossack independence is absolutely blameless, because he deeply, consistently and in his own bright way did not love the Cossacks.
Nikolai Ivanovich Ulyanov, a famous historian of the Russian Abroad, created a truly anti-Cossack masterpiece - a thorough historiographical opus “The Origin of Ukrainian Separatism.” In this extremely ideological work there are many reflections on the “predatory nature of the Cossacks”, abundant quotes from Polish sources comparing the Cossacks with “wild beasts”. With particular voluptuousness, N. I. Ulyanov quotes the travel impressions of a certain Moscow priest Lukyanov about the lands of the Cossacks: “The earthen rampart, in appearance, is not strong, but strong as prisoners, but the people in it are like animals;... they are very scary, black, like araps and they are as daring as dogs: they tear from your hands. They stand in amazement at us, and we marvel at them three times over, because we have never seen such monsters in our lives. Here in Moscow and in Petrovsky Circle it won’t be long before you find even one like this.”
The priest Lukyanov “awarded” the Cossack town of Khvastov, the ataman headquarters of the famous Cossack leader Semyon Paley, with this description. It is logical to speculate (although this is not directly in the text of N.I. Ulyanov) - since in Khvastov, among Paley himself, all the Cossacks are completely “beasts and freaks,” then what can we say about the more ordinary, so to speak, representatives of the Cossacks who are closer to the people villages?
The opinion of N. I. Ulyanov and priest Lukyanov could be supported by a dozen more quotes of the same kind from the epistolary heritage of Russian intellectuals of both the pre-revolutionary and Soviet periods of Russian history (it is enough to recall, for example, in what style Leon Trotsky and Vladimir Ulyanov-Lenin spoke , who branded the Cossacks as a “zoological environment”). This is one pole of opinion.
The other pole was represented, for example, by the Russian generalissimo Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov, whose enthusiastic judgments about the Cossacks are well known.
It was Suvorov, together with Prince Potemkin, who managed to convince Catherine II to stop the policy of “silent genocide” towards the Zaporozhye Cossacks, relocating the Cossacks who remained after the defeat of the Zaporozhye and New Sich to the Kuban. Thus, forty Cossack villages arose in the Kuban, of which 38 received the traditional names of kurens of the Zaporozhye Sich.
Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy was undoubtedly a “Kazakophile”. This outstanding writer, ideologist and philosopher has repeatedly expressed the idea that Russia as a state owes a huge debt to the Cossacks.
I will cite only the most famous of Leo Tolstoy’s statements: “...The entire history of Russia was made by the Cossacks. It’s not for nothing that Europeans call us Cossacks. The people (obviously, this means the Russian people - N.L.) want to be Cossacks. Golitsyn under Sofia (Chancellor Golitsyn during the reign of Tsarina Sophia Romanova. - N.L.) went to the Crimea - he was disgraced, and from Paley (the same Cossack ataman Semyon Paliy from Khvastov. - N.L.) the Crimeans asked for forgiveness, and Azov was taken only 4000 Cossacks held it - the same Azov that Peter took with such difficulty and
lost..."
A positive or negative assessment of the Cossacks by one or another Russian intellectual apparently depended on how positively or negatively this intellectual assessed Russian life itself in the internal regions of the country.
Indicative in this sense is the psychological reaction to the stay among the Cossacks of the famous traveler in the Far East, Mikhail Ivanovich Venyukov, a native of a small noble family from the village of Nikitsky, Ryazan region. In his work “Description of the Ussuri River and the lands east of it to the sea,” M. I. Venyukov writes: “... Throughout my travels through Siberia and the Amur region, I consciously tried to avoid staying or even spending the night in the houses of the local Cossacks , preferring each time inns, government institutions or, if necessary, the huts of Russian settlers. Even though the Cossack houses are richer and cleaner, I have always been unbearable for this internal atmosphere that reigns in Cossack families - a strange, heavy mixture of barracks and monastery. The internal hostility that every Cossack feels towards a Russian official and officer, in general towards a Russian European, almost undisguised, heavy and caustic, was unbearable for me, especially with more or less close communication with this strange people.
It is noteworthy that these lines about the “heavy and strange” people were written by a very meticulous and objective researcher who made his journey through Ussuri surrounded by thirteen Cossacks and only one “Russian European” - non-commissioned officer Karmanov.
During the revolutionary events of 1917-1918, not a single case of extrajudicial reprisal of ordinary Cossacks against a Cossack officer occurred in Cossack military formations. In Russian regiments during these years, such incidents numbered in tens, if not hundreds. In the Russian fleet, where there were no Cossacks at all, officers were shot, drowned, and raised to the point of bayonet on an even larger scale than in the land army.
At one time, the remarkable ethnologist Lev Nikolaevich Gumilyov introduced into scientific use the concept of ethnic complementarity (two categories: positive and negative), which the researcher defined as a feeling of subconscious mutual sympathy (or antipathy) of ethnic individuals, defining the division into “us” and “strangers”.
If we use the scientific tools proposed by L.N. Gumilev, it turns out that M.I. Venyukov (as well as other “Russian Europeans”) and the Amur Cossacks are two different, and mutually negatively complementary (“alien”) ethnic groups. But why then are such indisputably ethnically pure Russians as A.V. Suvorov, L.N. Tolstoy, A.I. Solzhenitsyn positively complimentary to the Cossacks, absolutely “their own” for them?
The reason for such polarly different assessments of the Cossacks on the part of Russian intellectuals, which aroused both admiration and a desire to be with the Cossacks in some (remember, for example, Tolstoy’s first story “Cossacks”), and sincere rejection, rejection, even antagonism in others, was , as it seems to me, the ethnicity of the Cossacks was fully formed by the end of the 16th century.
Unlike the Cossacks, the national formation of the Great Russian people themselves, forcibly stopped, broken and largely distorted by the so-called reforms of Patriarch Nikon, and then by the paroxysmal activities of Peter I, could not give the Russian intelligentsia a single mental-ideological platform for assessing this or that social or national phenomena.
Against the background of the internal mental and ideological disunity of the Russians, the Cossacks amazed all outside observers (both benevolent and hostile) with the Cossack worldview firmly rooted in the national mentality, a complete, fully formed stereotype of behavior, recognized by all Cossacks as a national ideal, the absence of any internal rushing in favor of changing their ethnopolitical identity. It seems that it was precisely this integrity, self-worth and steadfastness of the Cossack mentality, the enviable monolithic nature of the Cossack social environment that gave rise to that sharp polarity in the assessment of the Cossacks by external, primarily Russian, observers.
From the point of view of compliance with the theory of ethnicity according to its classical version in the interpretation of Yu. A. Bromley, the Cossack society in Russia at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries had all the signs, features and social properties inherent only to it, which clearly indicated a full-fledged, completed in its formation of Cossack ethnicity.
“Oh, Sich! You are the cradle of the faithful Cossacks!”
In our thinking about the “ethnicity factor of the Cossacks,” we immediately started from the middle period of the history of the Cossacks. What about the period of ancient history? Maybe there we will find irrefutable evidence that the Cossacks represent some kind of organic, albeit very peculiar branch of the Russian or Ukrainian peoples?
Alas, there is no such evidence. Or rather, there is evidence, but completely opposite in sign: in the ancient and medieval sources of Eurasia there are many messages that can clearly be interpreted as clear indications of the gradually emerging distinctive ethnicity of the Cossacks, starting from the 13th century. In the well-known, and today, perhaps, the most detailed work by E. P. Savelyev, “The Ancient History of the Cossacks,” the texture and reliability of the vast majority of ancient and medieval sources about the process of formation of the Cossack ethnosociety is analyzed in detail.
Prefaced by my own, I emphasize once again, a very authoritative study from the point of view of scientific argumentation, E.P. Savelyev writes: “The Cossacks of previous centuries, strange as it may sound to historians, did not consider themselves Russians, that is, Great Russians or Muscovites; in turn, both the residents of the Moscow regions, and the government itself, looked at the Cossacks as a special nationality, although related to them in faith and language. That is why relations between the supreme government of Russia and the Cossacks in the 16th and 17th centuries took place through the Ambassadorial Prikaz, that is, according to modern times, through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, through which they generally communicate with other states. Cossack ambassadors or, as they were called then, “stanitsa” in Moscow were received with the same pomp and solemnity as foreign embassies...”
As a general context for all more or less ancient sources, we can cite, for example, information from the Grebenskaya Chronicle, compiled in Moscow in 1471. It says the following: “...There, in the upper reaches of the Don, the Christian people of the military rank called Cossacks, in joy met (those who met - N.L.) him (Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy - N.L.) with holy icons and from the cross congratulating him on his deliverance from his adversaries and bringing him gifts from his treasures..."
Not only in the majority, but, perhaps, in all sources without exception on the history of Rus'-Russia of the 14th-17th centuries, we will not find any mention of the Cossacks in the context of “Russianness”; Even noting that the “Cossacks” are a Christian and Orthodox people, Russian sources nevertheless never identify them with the actually Great Russian, Moscow people. Describing the deeds of the Cossacks, the Russian historical chronograph in dozens of details finds the opportunity to emphasize the existence of fundamental differences in the nature of indigenous Russianness, or rather, Great Russianness and the Cossacks.
The first Russian encyclopedist V.N. Tatishchev, who, unlike all other historiographers, possessed a unique collection of the oldest Russian manuscripts, which then perished in the fire of Moscow in 1812, confidently deduced the genealogy of the Don Cossacks from the Cossacks, who, led by Hetman Dmitry Vishnevetsky, fought together with the troops of Ivan the Terrible for Astrakhan. Tatishchev admitted, at the same time, that another component in the formation of the primary ethnosocial mass of the Don Cossacks were, perhaps, the so-called Meshchera Cossacks, that is, the Turkic-speaking Mangyts (“Tatars”) who converted to Orthodoxy, whom Ivan the Terrible transferred to the Don. It is important to emphasize that the undisputedly greatest historian of the 19th century on the problem of the Cossacks, V.D. Sukhorukov, generally agreed with the ethnogenetic concept of V.N. Tatishchev.
Thus, it becomes clear that at least the Don Cossacks - the alpha and omega of the Russian Cossacks - as direct descendants of the genetic alliance of the Cossacks and Meshchera Tatars, due to this fact, had very few common genetic roots with the Great Russian ethnos.
Equally insignificant was, apparently, the genetic connection of the Cossacks themselves with the Ukrainian people proper (or, as they wrote before 1917, Little Russian) people. The already mentioned consistent fighter against the Cossack idea, N.I. Ulyanov, reflected on this matter as follows:
“Here (in the Zaporozhye Sich. - N.L.) there were their own age-old traditions, customs and their own view of the world. A person who ended up here was digested and reheated, as if in a cauldron; from a Little Russian he became a Cossack, changed his ethnography, changed his soul. The figure of a Cossack is not identical with the type of a native Little Russian (that is, a Ukrainian - N.L.), they represent two different worlds. One is sedentary, agricultural, with culture, way of life, skills and traditions inherited from Kyiv times. The other is a wanderer, unemployed, leading a life of robbery, who has developed a completely different temperament and character under the influence of lifestyle and mixing with people from the steppe. The Cossacks were not generated by South Russian culture, but by a hostile element that had been at war with it for centuries.”
One could argue with the author of these lines about the degree of mutual influence between the Cossacks and the bearers of southern Russian culture, but he undoubtedly accurately noted the fact that the Cossacks had a very small genetic connection with the surrounding Ukrainian environment, which was genetically very distant from the Cossacks. This indication is all the more important because it was the ancestral Cossacks, who moved under the leadership of the atamans Zakhar Chepega and Anton Golovaty to the Kuban, who became the ethnic basis for both the Kuban and Terek Cossacks.
The mechanism of the rather rapid ethnic dissolution of Ukrainian immigrants into the Cossack environment was succinctly but reliably described by the same N. I. Ulyanov.
“In Zaporozhye, as in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth itself, the khlops (Ukrainian peasants - N.L.) were contemptuously called “rabble.” These are those who, having escaped from the master's yoke, were unable to overcome their grain-growing peasant nature and assimilate Cossack habits, Cossack morality and psychology. They were not denied asylum, but they were never merged with them; The Cossacks knew the accident of their appearance on Niza and the dubious qualities of the Cossacks. Only a small part of the Khlops, having gone through the steppe school, irrevocably changed their peasant lot to the profession of a dashing breadwinner. For the most part, the cotton element was scattered: some died, some went as workers to the farmsteads to the registered ones...”
So, we can admit, following V.N. Tatishchev, V.D. Sukhorukov, E.P. Savelyev, N.I. Ulyanov and other major historians of Russia and Ukraine, that the Cossack community from ancient times was formed as if from itself, through the gradual strong merging of small parts of heterogeneous ethnic elements, including Great Russians, Ukrainians, representatives of some Turkic peoples, which gradually and separately, in different historical periods, were layered on a certain very powerful genetically, anciently formed in the interfluve of the Dnieper and Don ethnic core.
Cossacks descended from Cossacks
The attitude of the Cossacks of the early twentieth century to the question of their origin is described with brilliant laconicism by Mikhail Sholokhov in “Quiet Don”. A truly textbook scene even for modern Cossacks is the scene where, in response to Commissar Shtokman’s remark that the Cossacks, they say, descended from the Russians, the Cossack dismissively, even defiantly throws out: “The Cossacks descended from the Cossacks!” This proud motto of the entire Cossacks - from the Zaporozhye army to the Semirechensk army - has remained unshakable to this day. Only this fundamental platform of the Cossack worldview ensured the physical survival of the Cossack ethnic community, despite many decades of Bolshevik persecution.
The Cossacks have keenly felt their ethnic separation, in a good sense - independence from anyone else, at all times. In relation to the Great Russians, this sense of independence was not dictated by the desire to oppose themselves to the Russian people as some kind of unattainable model for the latter. Since the time of the struggle against the Polish gentry, the Cossack was alien to ethnic arrogance, and his attitude towards the Russian people in general has always been benevolent and respectful. However, the feeling of independence always existed and was determined by only one thing: the desire to preserve their original Cossack island in the boundless Great Russian Sea, which was uncontrollably rolling from the north onto the lands of the Cossack people.
Recently, two Russian publishing houses republished an interesting collection of materials and reflections on the problems of the Cossacks, first published in 1928 in Paris on the initiative of Ataman A.P. Bogaevsky. This collection contains valuable observations on the ethnicity of the Cossacks, made both by the Cossacks themselves and by foreign observers who know this people closely.
“The Cossacks had, and still have, a pronounced consciousness of their unity, of the fact that they, and only they, constitute the Don Army, the Kuban Army, the Ural Army and other Cossack troops... We quite naturally contrasted ourselves - the Cossacks - with the Russians; however, not the Cossacks - Russia. We often said about some official sent from St. Petersburg: “He doesn’t understand anything in our life, he doesn’t know our needs, he’s Russian.” Or about a Cossack who married in the service, we said: “He is married to a Russian.” (I. N. Efremov, Don Cossack)
“I know that in the eyes of the common people an ideal warrior, a warrior primarily is always thought of as a Cossack. This was the case in the eyes of both Great Russians and Little Russians. The German influence on the system and popular concepts had the least impact on the morals of the Cossacks. At the beginning of the 20th century, when I asked one of the cadets of the Konstantinovsky School whether Cossack cadets participated in their nightly adventures, he answered: “Not without that, but the Cossacks never boast to each other about their debauchery and never blaspheme.” (Metropolitan Anthony [Khrapovitsky], Russian)
“We Russians have no need to talk about the Cossack virtues. We know the historical colonization and marginal defensive mission of the Cossacks, their skills for self-government and military merits for many centuries. Many of us, residents of the northern and central parts of Russia, became more familiar with the Cossack way of life, having found refuge together with the white movement in the Cossack regions of southeastern Russia. In emigration, we appreciated the solidarity and cohesion of the Cossacks, which distinguishes them favorably from the all-Russian “human dust.” (Prince P. D. Dolgorukov, Russian)
“always united, whole in resolving and understanding their internal Cossack issues. In opinions, views, attitudes towards an issue external to him - the Russian one, the Cossack intelligentsia is divided, scattered, forgetting about the main thing, the only unshakable one - the interests of their people, the Cossack people. The Russian intelligentsia here, abroad, and the Soviet authorities there, in the USSR, achieved amazing consistency in their aspirations to introduce into the consciousness of the Cossacks (the former in exile, the latter in our native lands) the conviction that the Cossacks are Russian (Great Russian) people, and “Cossack” and “peasant” are identical concepts. The concerns of the Soviet government about such “education” of the Cossacks are quite understandable: they pursue practical goals: by darkening the national self-awareness of the Cossacks, by introducing the psychology of the Great Russian, to weaken resistance to Soviet construction. However, the Cossacks never recognized themselves, did not feel and did not consider themselves Great Russians (Russians) - they considered them Russians, but exclusively in the state-political sense (as subjects of the Russian state).” (I. F. Bykadorov, Don Cossack)
The Cossacks recognized themselves as a separate, original people, not reducible to the status of a Russian subethnic group, and in a purely political sense: the sociopolitical interests of the Cossacks were recognized (and, if possible, defended) by the Cossack intelligentsia precisely as ethnic (national) interests, and not as the interests of some speculative military -service class.
As it became known, on May 9, the Kuban Cossacks will parade along Red Square (for the first time since the very first Victory Parade in June 1945).It should be noted that the Cossacks are playing an increasingly prominent role in the public life of the country. When the conversation comes about the Cossacks, everyone knows who they are talking about. But it is not so easy to explain what the Cossacks are. Disputes about whether this is a people or a class continue to this day. Different scientists - historians, ethnologists, anthropologists - have different opinions. We decided to find out what the Cossacks themselves think about this.
“My deep conviction is that the Cossacks are the fourth branch of the Russian people, along with the Great Russians, Little Russians and Belarusians. In the Russian Empire they tried to make us into an estate, but we are, of course, a people - with our own history, our own dialect, our own traditions. Moreover, the traditions of all Cossacks are very similar, be they Kuban Cossacks, Terek Cossacks, Zaporozhye Cossacks, Orenburg Cossacks or others,” says the ataman of the Caucasian Cossack line Yuri Churekov.
He emphasizes: Cossack lands were not always part of Russia. During the time of Ivan the Terrible, the Cossacks (Donets, Cossacks, Kuban, Terets) raided the Ottoman Empire, sometimes in entire flotillas - 200 chaikas (canoes) each. The captured Slavs were freed. They took tribute from Turkish merchants. Naturally, the Turkish Sultan did not like all this. He wrote a letter to Ivan the Terrible: they say, the people who call themselves Cossacks are behaving badly - take action. Grozny responded something like this: this people is not part of Russia, so take the measures yourself that you consider necessary. The Turks tried to take measures - they ended up with a siege and the capture of Azov by the Cossacks.
As a result of the inclusion of Cossack territories into Russia, the Cossacks were deprived of some of their freedoms, as a result of which uprisings broke out. If desired, they can be viewed as wars between Russia and the Cossacks. “We consider the campaign of Stepan Razin to be the only significant war between the Cossacks and Russia. He wanted to establish ataman power and Cossack order throughout the country, says the ataman. “We have a different attitude towards Pugachev’s uprising: they were bandits, rabble.”
By the beginning of the 19th century, the Cossacks served as a reliable force for the tsarist government, guarding state and internal ethnic borders. For this sovereign service they were entitled to social autonomy, vast fertile lands, and tax exemption. It is not surprising that during the Civil War, the Cossack regions became the main support of the White movement. It was worth a lot. No one can say how many Cossacks died during the Bolshevik policy of decossackization. The modern Kuban Cossack army keeps count of the dead on millions.
In 1992, a decree of Russian President Boris Yeltsin “On measures to implement the Law of the Russian Federation “On the rehabilitation of repressed peoples” in relation to the Cossacks” appeared. The President decided: “In order to restore historical justice in relation to the Cossacks, their rehabilitation as a historically established cultural and ethnic community... to condemn the ongoing party and state policy of repression, arbitrariness and lawlessness against the Cossacks and their individual representatives.”
During the parade of sovereignties in the early 90s, several Cossack republics were self-proclaimed, which formed the Union of Cossack Republics of Southern Russia with its capital in Novocherkassk. But the matter did not go further than statements. “Only a few of the Cossacks had fun like this,” says Ataman of the Caucasian Cossack Line Yu. Churekov. – The “independent Cossacks” project is an invention of the American intelligence services. They wanted to incite the Cossacks to fight against Russia, but it didn’t work out: the Cossacks figured out what was what. The revival of the Cossack people should not conflict with the integrity of Russia.”
Finally, the ataman notes: “In the word “Cossacks” the emphasis should be placed on the third syllable, and not on the second, as many do. We also don’t like it when people call us men. A man is a serf, a slave, and we are free people. Of course, now the Cossacks do not have the pre-revolutionary powers and are often just people in disguise. Perhaps the situation will change in the future."
In the development of any nation, moments arose when a certain ethnic group separated and thereby created a separate cultural layer. In some cases, such cultural elements coexisted peacefully with their nation and the world as a whole, in others they fought for an equal place in the sun. An example of such a warlike ethnic group can be considered such a stratum of society as the Cossacks. Representatives of this cultural group have always been distinguished by a special worldview and very intense religiosity. Today, scientists cannot figure out whether this ethnic layer of the Slavic people is a separate nation. The history of the Cossacks dates back to the distant 15th century, when the states of Europe were mired in internecine wars and dynastic coups.
Etymology of the word "Cossack"
Many modern people have a general idea that a Cossack is a warrior or a type of warrior who lived in a certain historical period and fought for their freedom. However, such an interpretation is quite dry and far from the truth, if we also take into account the etymology of the term “Cossack”. There are several main theories about the origin of this word, for example:
Turkic (“Cossack” is a free person);
The word comes from kosogs;
Turkish (“kaz”, “cossack” means “goose”);
The word comes from the term "kozars";
Mongolian theory;
The Turkestan theory is that this is the name of nomadic tribes;
In the Tatar language, “Cossack” is a vanguard warrior in the army.
There are other theories, each of which explains this word in completely different ways, but the most rational grain of all definitions can be identified. The most common theory says that a Cossack was a free man, but armed, ready for attack and battle.
Historical origin
The history of the Cossacks begins in the 15th century, namely in 1489 - the moment the term “Cossack” was first mentioned. The historical homeland of the Cossacks is Eastern Europe, or more precisely, the territory of the so-called Wild Field (modern Ukraine). It should be noted that in the 15th century the named territory was neutral and did not belong to either the Russian Kingdom or Poland.
Basically, the territory of the “Wild Field” was subject to constant raids. The gradual settlement of immigrants from both Poland and the Russian Kingdom into these lands influenced the development of a new class - the Cossacks. In fact, the history of the Cossacks begins from the moment when ordinary people, peasants, begin to settle in the lands of the Wild Field, while creating their own self-governing military formations in order to fend off the raids of the Tatars and other nationalities. By the beginning of the 16th century, the Cossack regiments had become a powerful military force, which created great difficulties for neighboring states.
Creation of the Zaporozhye Sich
According to historical data that are known today, the first attempt at self-organization by the Cossacks was made in 1552 by the Volyn prince Vishnevetsky, better known as Baida.
At his own expense, he created a military base, the Zaporozhye Sich, which was located on the Cossacks’ entire life. The location was strategically convenient, since the Sich blocked the passage of the Tatars from the Crimea, and was also located in close proximity to the Polish border. Moreover, the territorial location on the island created great difficulties for the assault on the Sich. The Khortytsia Sich did not last long, because it was destroyed in 1557, but until 1775, similar fortifications were built according to the same type - on river islands.
Attempts to subjugate the Cossacks
In 1569, a new Lithuanian-Polish state was formed - the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Naturally, this long-awaited union was very important for both Poland and Lithuania, and the free Cossacks on the borders of the new state acted contrary to the interests of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Of course, such fortifications served as an excellent shield against Tatar raids, but they were completely uncontrolled and did not take into account the authority of the crown. Thus, in 1572, the king of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth issued a universal, which regulated the hiring of 300 Cossacks for the service of the crown. They were recorded in a list, a register, which determined their name - registered Cossacks. Such units were always in full combat readiness in order to quickly repel Tatar raids on the borders of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, as well as suppress periodic uprisings of peasants.
Cossack uprisings for religious-national independence
From 1583 to 1657, some Cossack leaders raised uprisings in order to free themselves from the influence of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and other states that were trying to subjugate the lands of the yet unformed Ukraine.
The strongest desire for independence began to manifest itself among the Cossack class after 1620, when Hetman Sagaidachny, together with the entire Zaporozhye army, joined the Kiev Brotherhood. Such an action marked the cohesion of Cossack traditions with the Orthodox faith.
From that moment on, the battles of the Cossacks were not only liberating, but also religious in nature. Increasing tension between the Cossacks and Poland led to the famous national liberation war of 1648 - 1654, led by Bohdan Khmelnytsky. In addition, no less significant uprisings should be highlighted, namely: the uprising of Nalivaiko, Kosinsky, Sulima, Pavlyuk and others.
Decossackization during the Russian Empire
After the unsuccessful national liberation war in the 17th century, as well as the outbreak of unrest, the military power of the Cossacks was significantly undermined. In addition, the Cossacks lost support from the Russian Empire after going over to the side of Sweden in the battle of Poltava, in which the Cossack army was led by
As a result of this series of historical events, a dynamic process of decossackization began in the 18th century, which reached its peak during the time of Empress Catherine II. In 1775, the Zaporozhye Sich was liquidated. However, the Cossacks were given a choice: to go their own way (live an ordinary peasant life) or join the hussars, which many took advantage of. Nevertheless, there remained a significant part of the Cossack army (about 12,000 people) that did not accept the offer of the Russian Empire. To ensure the former safety of the borders, as well as to somehow legitimize the “Cossack remnants,” the Black Sea Cossack Army was created in 1790 on the initiative of Alexander Suvorov.
Kuban Cossacks
The Kuban Cossacks, or Russian Cossacks, appeared in 1860. It was formed from several military Cossack formations that existed at that time. After several periods of decossackization, these military formations became a professional part of the armed forces of the Russian Empire.
The Kuban Cossacks were based in the North Caucasus region (the territory of modern Krasnodar Territory). The basis of the Kuban Cossacks was the Black Sea Cossack Army and the Caucasian Cossack Army, which was abolished as a result of the end of the Caucasian War. This military formation was created as a border force to control the situation in the Caucasus.
The war in this territory was over, but stability was constantly under threat. Russian Cossacks became an excellent buffer between the Caucasus and the Russian Empire. In addition, representatives of this army were involved during the Great Patriotic War. Today, the life of the Kuban Cossacks, their traditions and culture have been preserved thanks to the formed Kuban Military Cossack Society.
Don Cossacks
The Don Cossacks are the most ancient Cossack culture, which arose in parallel with the Zaporozhye Cossacks in the middle of the 15th century. Don Cossacks were located in the Rostov, Volgograd, Lugansk and Donetsk regions. The name of the army is historically associated with the Don River. The main difference between the Don Cossacks and other Cossack formations is that it developed not just as a military unit, but as an ethnic group with its own cultural characteristics.
The Don Cossacks actively collaborated with the Zaporozhye Cossacks in many battles. During the October Revolution, the Don army founded its own state, but the centralization of the “White Movement” on its territory led to defeat and subsequent repressions. It follows that a Don Cossack is a person who belongs to a special social formation based on the ethnic factor. The culture of the Don Cossacks has been preserved in our time. On the territory of the modern Russian Federation there are about 140 thousand people who record their nationality as “Cossacks”.
The role of the Cossacks in world culture
Today, the history, life of the Cossacks, their military traditions and culture are actively studied by scientists all over the world. Undoubtedly, the Cossacks are not just military formations, but a separate ethnic group that has been building its own special culture for several centuries in a row. Modern historians are working to reconstruct the smallest fragments of the history of the Cossacks in order to perpetuate the memory of this great source of a special Eastern European culture.
Topic 3. Cossacks as a service class. Cossacks in the wars of the 19th century. (11 o'clock)
Domestic policy of Alexander I towards the Cossacks. Publication of “Regulations on the management of Cossack troops.” Introduction of a uniform uniform. Foundation of new villages in the Caucasus and the Black Sea region. Transformation of the Cossack troops.
Foreign policy at the beginning of the 19th century. International position of Russia at the beginning of the century. Main goals and directions of foreign policy. Russia in the third and fourth anti-French coalitions. Participation of the Cossacks in the wars with Napoleonic France. Cossacks in the wars with Turkey and Iran. Annexation of Finland to Russia. From Smolensk to Borodin. Cossacks in the Battle of Borodino. Cossack militia of General A.K. Denisov. Tarutino maneuver. Cossacks in partisan warfare. Liberation of Russia from invaders. Participation of the Cossacks in the foreign campaign of the Russian army. New Cossack units.
Vasily Vasilievich Orlov-Denisov. Matvey Ivanovich Platov.
Reforms of Nicholas I in the management of the Cossacks. Changes in the economy and life of the Cossacks. Reforms in the management system. New "Regulations" on Cossack troops. The final registration of the Cossack nobility and the creation of new Cossack troops.
Foreign policy of Russia in the second quarter of the 19th century. Cossacks in the wars with Iran and Turkey. Cossacks in the Russian-Iranian war 1826 – 1828. and the Russian-Turkish war of 1828 – 1829. Participation of Cossacks in the suppression of revolutionary movements in Poland and Hungary.
Caucasian War. National policy of autocracy. Caucasian line and Caucasian linear army. A.P. Ermolov, aggravation of relations in the Caucasus. Imamat. Shamil's movement. Cossacks in battles in the eastern Caucasus. Conquest of the Western Caucasus and the results of the war. Ya.P. Baklanov.
Crimean War 1853 – 1856 Exacerbation of the Eastern Question. Causes of the war. Main theaters of military operations. Cossack units in the Danube, Crimean, Don and Transcaucasian theaters of military operations. Results of the war.
“Great reforms” of the 60s – 70s. XIX century Military reform and the Cossacks. “Regulations on the military service of the Cossacks of the Don Army” 1874 “Charter on military service of the Don Army” 1875 “Regulations on the public administration of the villages of the Cossack troops” 1891 Changes in the life of the Cossacks. The Cossacks are a military class.
The main directions of Russian foreign policy in the 1860s – 1870s. Cossacks in the Russian-Turkish war of 1877 – 1878. Cossack regiments in battles in the Balkans and the Caucasian theater of military operations. Results of the war.
Participation of the Cossacks in the Central Asian and Far Eastern directions of Russian foreign policy: in the conquest of the Kokand Khanate, in the Khiva campaign and the suppression of the “Boxer” uprising in Northern China.
Service, organization, uniform, equipment of the Cossacks. Cossack military uniform. Stripes. Shoulder straps. Chevrons. Papakhas. Features of equipment. Cossack symbolism. Organization of service and powers of Cossack military ranks.
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By the end of the 19th century in Russia there were 11 Cossack troops (Don, Kuban, Orenburg, Tersk, Transbaikal Ural, (Yaitskoye), Siberian, Semirechenskoye, Amur, Ussuriysk and Astrakhan) and three city regiments (Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Yenisei). Cossacks also was listed as the Yakut regiment of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The total Cossack population of the country was about 4.5 million people.
The Don, Kuban and Terek Cossack troops were located in the South-East of the European part of the country. They accounted for 36.6% of the area of all Cossack territories and 70.3% of the number of Cossacks. The largest of the Cossack troops was the Don Army, which occupied 22% of all Cossack lands and numbered up to 34% of the Cossack population of Russia. The second largest Kuban army accounted for 13% and 31%, respectively, and the share of the Terek army, which occupied the fifth place among the Cossack troops, was 3.5% and 5%.
Administratively, the Cossack regions were divided into districts and departments. The territory of the Don Army was divided into nine districts (Cherkassy, 1st Don, 2nd Don, Ust-Medveditsky, Khopersky, Donetsk, Salsky, Taganrog and Rostov), Kuban - into seven
departments (Ekaterinodar, Batalpashinsky, Yeisk, Caucasian, Labinsky, Maykop, Tamansky), and Terek into four departments (Kizlyarsky, Sunzhensky, Pyatigorsky, Mozdoksky) and six districts (Vladikavkaz, Nazran, Khasavyurt, Nalchik, Grozny, Vedensky)
On May 26, 1835, after sixteen years of development, the “Regulations on the Don Army” were approved, legally formalizing the Don Cossacks into a special military service class. It established compulsory twenty-five years of service for the entire male Cossack population, starting at the age of 18. Each Cossack had to show up for service with his own combat horse, bladed weapons, and full sets of uniforms and equipment. At the same time, in a special annex “On Land Allowances,” the size of the Cossacks’ land allotment was determined in accordance with their rank. An administrative and legal ban was imposed on leaving the Cossack class and on settling within the army of persons of other classes. All these measures, in the opinion of the government, ensured the closed and stable nature of the new military service class.
On the basis of the “Regulations on the Don Army”, on July 1, 1842, the “Regulations on the Black Sea Cossack Army” were adopted, and on February 14, 1845, the “Regulations on the Caucasian Army” were published.
In the post-reform period, work continued to regulate the internal structure of the Cossack regions, land relations, and military service by the Cossacks. Thus, on April 21, 1869, the emperor approved the opinion of the State Council “On the land structure in the Cossack troops,” which legally formalized the existing order of land ownership and land use in the territories of the Cossack regions.
According to this law, all military lands were divided into three main categories:
1) for allotment to villages;
2) for the allotment of generals, staff and chief officers and class officials of the army;
3) for various military needs (the so-called military reserve).
The villages were allocated land areas (stanitsa yurts), providing plots of 30 dessiatines. for every male Cossack soul
estates. All stanitsa lands were assigned to communal ownership and could not be transferred to anyone else's ownership.
In the Cossack regions, a system of allotment land tenure was legally formalized, which existed in the form of communal property. And although the land was owned not only by Cossacks, but also by peasant communities, the sizes of the Cossacks’ and peasants’ plots differed markedly from each other.
During the so-called "Milyutin" military reforms of the 70s. XIX century New states were introduced into the Cossack troops and limited admission to and exit from the Cossack class was allowed. In 1874, the “Charter on conscription of the Don Cossack army” was adopted, and in 1882 its norms formed the basis of the “Regulations on conscription and military service of the Kuban and Terek troops.” According to these regulations, the Cossacks were obliged to serve in military service for 20 years. Of these, three years they were in the preparatory category, and the last - the third year - was spent in military camps. Then, for 12 years, the Cossacks were listed in combat rank. It was divided into 1st, 2nd and 3rd stages. The Cossacks performed active service for 4 years in the first line. For the next 4 years they were assigned to units of the second stage, which were in constant mobilization readiness. Secondary Cossacks were required to have combat horses, full military equipment and undergo annual 3-week camp training. Then they moved to the third line, did not have to hold combat horses, and were called up for training once. The Cossacks spent the last five years of their service in the reserve category, after which they received “benefits” and could be drafted into the militia during the war. Later, by reducing the time in the preparatory category to one year, the total service life of the Cossacks was reduced to 18 years. This procedure for military service remained unchanged until 1917.
The internal order of management of the Cossack troops was based on the “Regulations on the public administration of the villages of the Cossack troops” of 1891. It extensively interpreted and regulated in detail the entire way of life of the Cossack regions. The “Regulations” confirmed the ban on a Cossack leaving the community, the principle of mutual responsibility, and determined the functions of local representative bodies of Cossack self-government and the responsibilities of officials. The main administrative unit in the Cossack troops was the village. The administrative system of the stanitsa government included the stanitsa assembly (collection), the stanitsa ataman, the stanitsa board and the stanitsa court. The gathering of the Cossacks, which actually represented formally
the forbidden traditional Cossack circle elected farm, stanitsa and district (department) atamans. All internal affairs were in charge of the board, which included the ataman, his assistant, clerks and treasurer. The competence of two members of the court, elected for three years, included the consideration of local litigation, various quarrels and misdeeds of the Cossacks. The board and court were also elected at the Cossack gathering.