The famous treatise "Ethnogenesis and the Biosphere of the Earth" is the fundamental work of the outstanding Russian historian, geographer and philosopher Lev Nikolaevich Gumilyov, devoted to the problem of the emergence and relationships of ethnic groups on Earth. Exploring the dynamics of the movement of peoples, in search of their historical identity, entering into conflicts with the environment, Gumilyov collected and processed a huge amount of scientific and cultural data. In this unique book translated into many languages, which the author considered his main work, the main provisions of the theory of ethnogenesis developed by LN Gumilyov and the doctrine of passionarity are formulated and developed in detail.
Part one
Of the visible and the invisible,
Where it is proved that superficial observations lead the researcher to the wrong path, and ways of self-control and self-testing are proposed
I. On the Usefulness of Ethnography
Dissimilarity of ethnic groups
When a people lives long and quietly in its homeland, it seems to its representatives that their way of life, manners, behavior, tastes, views and social relationships, that is, everything that is now called the "stereotype of behavior", is the only possible and correct. And if there are any deviations somewhere, then this is from “ignorance”, which is simply understood as being different from oneself. I remember when I was a child and was fond of Mine Reed, one very cultured lady told me: "Negroes are the same men as ours, only black." It could not have crossed her mind that a Melanesian witch from the coast of Malaita could say with the same reason: "The English are the same bounty hunters as we are, only white in color." Philistine judgments sometimes seem internally logical, although they are based on ignoring reality. But they are immediately broken upon contact with it.
For the medieval science of Western Europe, ethnography was not relevant. Communication of Europeans with other cultures was limited to the Mediterranean basin, on the shores of which the descendants of the subjects of the Roman Empire, partially converted to Islam, lived. This, of course, separated them from the "Franks" and "Latins", that is, the French and Italians, but the presence of common cultural roots made the difference not so big as to exclude mutual understanding. But in the era of the great geographical discoveries the situation has changed radically. Even if it was possible to call Negroes, Papuans and North American Indians "savages", then this could not be said either about the Chinese, or about the Indians, or about the Aztecs and Incas. We had to look for other explanations.
In the XVI century. European travelers, having discovered distant countries, involuntarily began to look for analogies in them with their usual forms of life. The Spanish conquistadors began to give the baptized caciques the title "don", considering them Indian nobles. The heads of the Negro tribes were called "kings". Tungus shamans were considered priests, although they were simply doctors who saw the cause of the disease in the influence of evil "spirits", which, however, were considered as material as animals or foreigners. Mutual misunderstanding was aggravated by the certainty that there was nothing to understand, and then collisions arose that led to the murders of Europeans who offended the feelings of the natives, in response to which the British and French organized cruel punitive expeditions. The civilized Australian aborigine Vaipuldanya, or Philip Roberts, conveys tales of tragedies all the more terrible because they arise for no apparent reason. So, the natives killed a white man who lit a cigarette, considering him to be a spirit with fire in his body. Another was speared for taking a watch out of his pocket and looking at the sun. The natives decided that he was carrying the sun in his pocket. And such misunderstandings were followed by punitive expeditions, leading to the extermination of entire tribes. And not only with the whites, but also with the Malays, the Australian aborigines and the Papuans of New Guinea often had tragic collisions, especially complicated by the transmission of the infection.
On October 30, 1968, on the banks of the Manaus River, a tributary of the Amazon, the Atroari Indians killed the missionary of Cagliari and eight of his companions, purely for tactlessness, from their point of view. So, having arrived on the territory of the atroari, the padre announced himself with shots that; according to their customs, indecent; entered the hut-maloka, despite the protest of the owners; tore a child by the ear; forbade taking a pot with his soup. Of the entire detachment, only the forester survived, who knew the customs of the Indians and left Padre Cagliari, who did not heed his advice and forgot that the people on the banks of the Po are not at all like those who live on the banks of the Amazon.
A lot of time passed before the question was raised: is it not better to apply to the natives than to exterminate them? But for this it turned out to be necessary to recognize that the peoples of other cultures differ from European ones, and from each other, not only in languages and beliefs, but also in the whole “stereotype of behavior”, which is advisable to study in order to avoid unnecessary quarrels. Thus arose ethnography, the science of the differences between peoples.
Colonialism is leaving under the blows of the national liberation movement, but interethnic contacts remain and are expanding. Consequently, the problem of establishing mutual understanding is becoming more and more urgent both on the global scale of world politics, and on the microscopic, personal, when meeting people who are nice, but not like us. And then a new question arises, theoretical, despite its practical significance: why are we, people, so different from each other that we have to “apply” to each other, study other people's manners and customs, look for acceptable ways of communication instead of those that seem natural to us and which are quite sufficient for intra-ethnic communication and satisfactory for contacts with our neighbors? In some cases, ethnic dissimilarity can be explained by a variety of geographical conditions, but it is also observed where the climate and landscapes are close to each other. Obviously, history is indispensable.
In fact, different peoples arose in different eras and had different historical destinies, which left traces as indelible as personal biographies that shape the character of individuals. Of course, ethnic groups are influenced by the geographical environment through the daily communication of a person with the nature that feeds him, but that's not all. Traditions inherited from ancestors play their role, habitual enmity or friendship with neighbors (ethnic environment) - their own, cultural influences, religion - have their own meaning, but, besides all this, there is a law of development that applies to ethnic groups, as to any phenomena nature. We call its manifestation in the diverse processes of the emergence and disappearance of peoples ethnogenesis. Without taking into account the peculiarities of this form of the movement of matter, we will not be able to find the key to unraveling ethnopsychology, either in practical or theoretical terms. We need both, but there are unexpected difficulties along the path we have chosen.
Confusing terminology
The excess of primary information and the weak development of the principles of systematization have a particularly painful effect on history and ethnography. After all, the bibliography alone occupies volumes, which are sometimes no easier to understand than the scientific problems themselves. The reader has a need to see at the same time the totality of events (the principle of actualism) or all the ways of their formation (the principle of evolutionism), and not a multi-volume list of article titles, for the most part outdated. The works of the founders of Marxism contain a program of a systematic approach to understanding historical processes, but it has not yet been applied to ethnogenesis.
True, in ancient and partly forgotten historiography, there are several attempts to introduce into this area system method, but unlike representatives of the natural sciences, their authors did not meet with either understanding or sympathy. The concept of Polybius is now regarded as an elegant rarity; Ibn Khaldun (XIV century) - as a curiosity; Giambattista Vico is mentioned only in the history of science, and the grandiose, although perhaps unsuccessful, designs by N. Ya. Danilevsky, O. Spengler, A. Toynbee became an excuse to completely abandon the construction of historical models. The result of this process is unambiguous. Since it is impossible to remember the whole set of historical events, and since in the absence of a system there is and cannot be terminology, even communication between historians becomes more difficult from year to year.
Giving terms different shades and putting different content into them, historians turn them into polysemantic words. At the first stages of this process, it is still possible to understand the interlocutor based on the context, intonation, the situation in which the dispute takes place, but in subsequent phrases this (unsatisfactory) degree of understanding disappears. So, the word "clan" is usually applied to the concept of "clan system", but "clan of the Shuisky boyars" clearly does not apply here. Even worse when translating: if the clan is a Celtic clan, then it is impossible to call any Kazakh branch of the Middle and Younger Zhus (ru) or the Altai “bone” (seok) because they are different in function and genesis. And all these by no means similar phenomena are named the same and, moreover, on this basis they are equated to each other. Willy-nilly, the historian does not study the subject, but words that have already lost their meaning, while real phenomena elude him. And now let's assume that three historians are discussing the problem, and one puts in the concept of "clan" - a clan, the second - a seok, the third - a boyar surname. It is obvious that they simply will not understand not only each other, but also what is at stake.
Of course, it may be objected to us that it is possible to agree on terms, but the number of concepts is growing in direct proportion to the accumulation of information, more and more new terms appear, which, in the absence of a system, become polysemantic (polysemantic) and, therefore, unsuitable for the purposes of analysis and synthesis. But even here you can find a way out.
So far, we have been talking about the conditions of research, let's say about its prospects. The study of any subject is of practical importance only when it is possible to survey the subject as a whole. So, for example, an electrical engineer must imagine, albeit not to the same extent, the effect of ionization and heat transfer, an electromagnetic field, etc.; the physical geographer, speaking of the shells of the earth, remembers the troposphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere, and even the biosphere. In the same way, the historian can draw conclusions that are more weighty and interesting for the reader only when he covers in a single argument a wide range of interrelated events, while at the same time agreeing on terminology. It's difficult, but not impossible. It is only important that the conclusion is consistent with all the facts taken into account. If anyone proposes a more elegant and more convincing concept to explain the facts listed in this book, then I bow my head with respect to him. Conversely, if someone declared my conclusions final, not subject to revision and further development, then I would not agree with him. Many books, alas, live no longer than people, and the development of science is an immanent law of the formation of mankind. And therefore, I see my task in bringing all possible benefits to the Beautiful Lady of History and her Wise Sister - Geography, which makes people related to their foremother - the Biosphere of the planet Earth Biosphere - the term introduced into science by V. I. Vernadsky, means one of the shells Earth, which includes, in addition to the totality of living organisms, all the fruits of their former life: soils, sedimentary rocks, free oxygen of the atmosphere. Thus, the establishment of a connection between ethnogenesis and the biochemical processes of the biosphere is not "biologism", as some of my opponents believe, but rather "geographism", although such a "label" is hardly appropriate; after all, everything that is on the surface of the Earth, one way or another, enters the sphere of geography - either physical, or economic, or historical.
Generalizations and Scrupulus
The species Homo sapiens, which spread over the entire land and a significant part of the sea surface of the planet, made such significant changes in its configuration that they can be equated with small-scale geological upheavals ... But it follows from this that we distinguish a special category of patterns - historical and geographical, requiring to consider and study a special methodology that combines historical and geographical methods of research. This in itself is not new, but the approach to the problem has so far been eclectic. For example, applying C analysis<^>14 for dating archaeological sites, electrical prospecting (a matter too laborious for practical application), cybernetics techniques in the study of "stone women" (which gave the same results as visual counting), etc. And the most important thing was overlooked! This “most important”, in our opinion, is the ability to extract information from the silence of sources. The path of induction limits the possibilities of the historian to a simple or critical retelling of other people's words, and the limit of the study is distrust of the source data. But this result is negative and therefore not final. Only the establishment of a certain number of indisputable facts will be positive, which, being detached from the source, can be summarized in a chronological table or placed according to historical map. In order to interpret them, one needs a philosopheme, a postulate, and this violates the accepted principle of inductive research. Dead end!
So! But the geographer, geologist, zoologist, soil scientist never have more data, and their sciences develop. This happens because, instead of a philosophical postulate, natural scientists use an “empirical generalization”, which, according to V. I. Vernadsky, has a reliability equal to the observed fact. In other words, the natural sciences have overcome the silence of historians and have even benefited from it for science, since they got rid of the lies that are always contained in the source or introduced by ourselves through inadequate perception. So why refuse historians? In drawing on nature as a source, we must also draw on the appropriate methodology of study, and this gives us magnificent perspectives that allow us to lift the veil of Isis.
One of the tasks of science is to obtain the most information from the least amount of facts in order to make it possible to single out precise patterns that make it possible to understand a variety of phenomena from a single point of view, and in the future to learn how to navigate them. These patterns are invisible, but not invented: they are discovered by generalization. Here is an example borrowed from biology: “Stars and planets move across the sky. The balloon rises, and the stone, falling off the cliff, falls into the abyss. Rivers flow into the sea, and precipitation falls in the oceans, forming layers of sedimentary rocks. The mouse has very thin legs, and the elephant has huge limbs. Terrestrial animals do not reach the size of whales and giant squids. What do these facts have in common? All of them are based on the laws of universal gravitation, which is intertwined with other laws, just as real, invisible, but intelligible.
Earth's gravity has always existed, but for people to know about its existence, it took the insight of Newton, who watched the fall of an apple from a branch. And how many more powerful forces of nature that surround us and control our destiny lie beyond our understanding. We live in an under-discovered world and often move by feel, which sometimes leads to tragic consequences. That is why the magic glasses of science, by which I mean the insight of brilliant scientists, are needed in order to understand the world around us and our place in it, to learn to foresee at least the immediate consequences of our actions.
Studies devoted to the establishment of a functional relationship between the phenomena of physical geography and paleoethnology on the material of the history of Central Asia and the archeology of the lower reaches of the Volga led to three conclusions: 1. The historical fate of the ethnos, which is the result of its activity, is directly related to the dynamic state of the enclosing landscape. 2. The archaeological culture of this ethnic group, which is a crystallized trace of its historical fate, reflects the paleogeographic state of the landscape in an era that can be absolutely dated. 3. The combination of historical and archaeological materials makes it possible to judge the nature of a given enclosing landscape in a particular era, and therefore, the nature of its changes.
Of course, here the accuracy is relative, but the tolerance of plus or minus 50 years with blurred boundaries does not affect the conclusions and, therefore, is harmless. Much more dangerous is the desire for scrupulousness in the truest sense of the word. Scrupulus (lat.) - a pebble that fell into sandals and pricked the feet of the ancient Romans. They considered it pointless to study the location of these stones in sandals, believing that you just need to take off your shoes and shake out your shoes. Therefore, the word "scrupulousness" meant unnecessary consideration of trifles. Now this word is used in the sense of "ultra-precise".
Unfortunately, the requirement of "scrupulousness" is not always harmless, in particular, when comparing natural phenomena with historical events, because the legal tolerance reaches 50-60 years and cannot be reduced, since the desired connection is mediated by the economic system of ancient countries. The system of economy, agricultural, cattle-breeding and even hunting, has its own inertia. If, for example, it is shaken by droughts, then the weakening of the state based on it will occur only when supplies run out and constant malnutrition (and not short-term famine) undermines the strength of the emerging generation. This process can be uncovered only through a broad integration of the series of historical events, and not by any means through a scrupulous correlation of natural and historical phenomena. In this regard, we should recall the remarkable words of the naturalist: “You will never know what a mouse looks like if you carefully study its individual cells under a microscope, just as you will not understand the charms of a Gothic cathedral by exposing each of its stones chemical analysis". Of course, considering one or even two facts in isolation from the others, we remain captive to the ancient authors, who know how to impose their assessments on the reader with intelligence and talent. But if we detach direct information from sources and take two thousand instead of two facts, we will get several cause-and-effect chains that correlate not only with each other, but also with the model we proposed. This is not a simple functional dependence, which was sought in the 18th century. advocates of geographical determinism, such as C. Montesquieu. Here we find a systemic connection, which has become the basis of the science of the relationship between mankind and nature.
The universality and specificity of the interaction noted by us make it possible to distinguish its study into an independent, borderline field of science and, as a combination of history with geography, call it ethnology. But here a new painful question arises: is it possible to find a tangible definition of an ethnos?
What exactly do we know about ethnic groups? Very much and very little. We have no grounds to assert that ethnos as a phenomenon took place in the Lower Paleolithic. Behind the high brow ridges, inside the huge skull of the Neanderthal, thoughts and feelings apparently nested. But what they were, we do not yet have the right to even guess if we want to remain on the platform of scientific certainty. We know more about the people of the Upper Paleolithic. They perfectly knew how to hunt, made spears and darts, dressed in clothes from animal skins and painted no worse than the Parisian Impressionists. Apparently, the form of their collective existence was similar to those that are known to us, but this is only an assumption, on which one cannot even build a scientific hypothesis. It is possible that in ancient times there were some features that have not been preserved to our time.
On the other hand, we can consider the peoples of the late Neolithic and Bronze Age (III-II millennium BC) more likely to be similar to the historical ones. Unfortunately, our knowledge of ethnic differences at that time is fragmentary and so meager that, based on them, we run the risk of not distinguishing the patterns that interest us at the moment from local features and, taking the particular for the general, fall into error.
Reliable material for analysis is provided by the so-called historical epoch, when written sources cover the history of ethnic groups and their relationships. Having studied this section of the topic, we have the right to apply the observations obtained to earlier epochs and, by extrapolation, fill in the gaps in our knowledge that arise at the first stage of study. In this way we will avoid the aberration of distance, one of the most frequent errors of historical criticism.
It is advisable to take the beginning of the 19th century as the upper date, because in order to establish a pattern, we need only completed processes. We can talk about unfinished processes only in the order of forecasting, and for the latter we need to have in our hands a regularity formula, the very one that we are looking for. In addition, in the study of the phenomena of the XX century. Proximity aberration is possible, in which phenomena lose their scale, as with aberration of distance. Therefore, in order to formulate the problem, we will confine ourselves to an epoch of 3 thousand years, from the XII century. BC e. by the 19th century n. e., or, for clarity, from the fall of Troy to the deposition of Napoleon.
To begin with, we will examine our abundant material by a synchronistic method, based on a comparison of information, the reliability of which is not in doubt. The new thing we are going to introduce will be a combination of facts in the aspect we are proposing. This is necessary because the kaleidoscope of dates in various chronological tables does not give the reader any idea of what happened to the peoples during their historical life. The proposed methodology is typical not so much for the humanities as for the natural sciences, where establishing links between facts based on statistical probability and the internal logic of phenomena is considered the only way to build an empirical generalization that is as reliable as an observed fact. An empirical generalization is neither a hypothesis nor a popularization, although it is not based on primary material (experience, observation, reading the original source), but on already collected and verified facts. The reduction of the material into a system and the construction of a concept is the middle stage of understanding the problem, preceding the philosophical generalization. For our purposes, this is the middle step.
It seems that the more detailed and numerous the information concerning a particular subject, the easier it is to form an exhaustive idea of it. But is it really so? Most likely no. Excessive, too small information that does not change the picture as a whole creates what is called "noise" or "interference" in cybernetics and systemology. However, for other purposes, it is precisely the nuances of moods that are needed. In short, in order to understand the nature of phenomena, one should cover the entire set of facts related to the issue under consideration, and not the information available in the arsenal of science.
But what is meant by "relevant"? Apparently, the answer in different cases will be different. The history of mankind and the biography of a remarkable person are not equal phenomena, and the patterns of development in both cases will be different, and between them there are as many gradations as you like. The matter is complicated by the fact that any historical phenomenon - a war, the issuance of a law, the construction of an architectural monument, the creation of a principality or a republic, etc. - should be considered in several degrees of approximation, and a comparison of these degrees gives, at first glance, contradictory results. Let us give an example from the well-known history of Europe. After the Reformation, a struggle arose between the Protestant Union and the Catholic League (approximation A). Consequently, all Protestants in Western Europe would have to fight against all Catholics. However, Catholic France was a member of the Protestant Union, and Protestant Denmark in 1643 hit the rear of Protestant Sweden, i.e., political interests were put above ideological ones (approximation b). Does this mean that the first statement was wrong? Far from it. It was only more generalized. In addition, mercenaries fought in the troops of both sides, the vast majority of them indifferent to religion, but greedy for robbery; so, in the next approximation ( With) it would be possible to characterize the Thirty Years' War as rampant banditry, and this would also be correct to some extent. Finally, behind the religious slogans and gold diadems of the kings, real class interests were hidden, which it would be wrong not to take into account (approximation d). To this we can add the separatist tendencies of certain regions (approximation e) discovered by paleoethnography, etc.
As can be seen from the above example, the system of successive approximations is a complex matter even when analyzing one localized episode. Nevertheless, there is no need to lose hope for success, because we are left with the path of scientific deduction. Just as the movement of the Earth is a complex compound of many regular movements (rotation around the axis, rotation around the Sun, displacement of the pole, movement with the entire planetary system around the galaxy, and many others), so humanity, the anthroposphere, while developing, experiences not one, but a number of influences studied by individual sciences. Spontaneous movement, reflected in social development, is studied by historical materialism; human physiology - a field of biology; the relationship of man with the landscape - historical geography - is in the field of geographical sciences; the study of wars, laws and institutions is political history, and opinions and thoughts are cultural history; the study of languages is linguistics, and literary creativity is philosophy, and so on. Where does our problem lie?
Let's start with the fact that an ethnos (one or another), like, for example, a language, is not a social phenomenon, because it can exist in several formations. The influence of spontaneous social development on the formation of ethnic groups is exogenous. community development can have an impact on the formation or disintegration of ethnic groups only if it is embodied in history, both political and cultural. Therefore, we can say that the problem of ethnogenesis lies on the verge of historical science, where its social aspects smoothly turn into natural ones.
Since all the phenomena of ethnogenesis occur on the surface of the Earth in certain geographic conditions, the question inevitably arises about the role of the landscape as a factor representing economic opportunities for naturally formed human groups - ethnic groups. But the combination of history and geography is not enough for our problem, because we are talking about living organisms, which, as you know, are always in a state of either evolution, or involution, or monomorphism (stability within a species) and interact with other living organisms, forming communities - geobiocenoses.
Thus, our problem should be placed at the intersection of three sciences: history, geography (landscape science) and biology (ecology and genetics). And if so, then we can give a second approximation of the definition of the term "ethnos": ethnos is a specific form of existence of the species Homo sapiens, and ethnogenesis is a local variant of intraspecific morphogenesis, determined by a combination of historical and choronomic (landscape) factors.
It may seem extravagant that one of the driving forces of human development are passions and impulses, but this type of research was initiated by Charles Darwin and F. Engels. Following the scientific tradition, we pay attention to that side of human activity, which fell out of sight of most of our predecessors.
A historian without geography has a "stumble"
The dependence of a person on the nature around him, more precisely, on the geographical environment, has never been disputed, although the degree of this dependence was assessed differently by various scientists. But in any case, the economic life of the peoples inhabiting and inhabiting the Earth is closely connected with the landscapes and climate of the inhabited territories. The rise and fall of the economy of ancient eras is rather difficult to trace, again because of the inferiority of information obtained from primary sources. But there is an indicator - military power. As for the new time, no one doubts this, but for two thousand years the situation has been exactly the same, and not only among settled peoples, but also among nomads. For a hike, you need to have not only well-fed, strong and untired people who are able to pull a tight bow “to the ear” (which made it possible to throw arrows at 700 m, while when pulling “to the eye” the range of the arrow is 350-400 m) and fencing with heavy with a sword or, even more difficult, with a curved saber. It was also necessary to have horses, about 4-5 per person, taking into account the convoy or packs. A supply of arrows was required, and making them is a laborious task. Provisions were needed, for example, for nomads - a flock of sheep, and therefore, shepherds with her. We need reserve guards to protect women and children ... In short, the war cost money even then, and a lot of it. It is possible to wage war at the expense of the enemy only after the first, and no small, victory, and in order to win it, a strong rear, a flourishing economy, and, accordingly, optimal natural conditions are required.
The significance of geographic conditions, such as relief for military history, has been discussed for a long time, even, one might say, always. Suffice it to recall a few examples from ancient history: Hannibal won the Battle of Trasimene Lake by using several deep valleys located to the shore of the lake and the road along which the Roman troops marched at an angle of 90 °. Thanks to this disposition, he attacked the Roman army in three places at once and won the battle. Under Cynoscephalae, the Macedonian phalanx crumbled on rough terrain, and the Romans easily killed heavily armed enemies who had lost their formation. These and similar examples have always been in the field of view of historians and gave rise to I. Boldin to make the famous remark: "A historian who does not have geography in his hands stumbles." However, dwelling on such a clear problem in the 20th century inappropriate, because history now poses much deeper tasks than before, and geography has moved away from a simple description of the curiosities of our planet and has gained opportunities that were not available to our ancestors.
Therefore, we put the question differently: not only how the geographical environment affects people, but also to what extent people themselves are an integral part of that shell of the Earth, which is now called the biosphere? Which patterns of human life are influenced by the geographic environment and which ones are not affected? This formulation of the question requires analysis, i.e., an artificial division of the problem for the convenience of research. Consequently, it has only an auxiliary value for understanding history, since the goal of our work is synthesis. But, alas, just as it is impossible to build a house without a foundation, so it is impossible to give a generalization without a preliminary dissection. We limit ourselves to the minimum. Speaking of the history of mankind, we usually have in mind the social form of the movement of history, that is, the progressive development of mankind as a whole in a spiral. This movement is spontaneous and for this reason alone cannot be a function of any external causes whatsoever. On this side of history, neither geographical nor biological effects cannot influence. So what do they affect? on organisms, including humans. This conclusion was already made in 1922 by L. S. Berg for all organisms, including humans: “The geographical landscape acts on the organism forcibly, forcing all individuals to vary in a certain direction, as far as the organization of the species allows. Tundra, forest, steppe, desert, mountains, aquatic environment, life on islands, etc. - all this leaves a special imprint on organisms. Those species that are able to adapt must move to another geographical landscape or die out. And by "landscape" is meant "a section of the earth's surface, qualitatively different from other areas, bordered by natural boundaries and representing a special integral and mutually determined regular set of objects and phenomena, which is typically expressed over a significant space and is inextricably linked in all respects with the landscape shell." In combination, this can be called "place development". L. S. Berg called the thesis formulated here the choronomic (from the Greek “horos” - place) principle of evolution, thus linking geography with biology. In the aspect we have adopted, history has been added to the two named sciences, and yet the principle remains unshakable. Moreover, it received a new unexpected confirmation, and this obliges us to continue considering the patterns of development of an ethnos, but already taking into account the dynamic moment, the emergence of new ethnoi, i.e., ethnogenesis based on the characteristics of the phases of ethnogenesis. However, this is the topic of another chapter.
II. Nature and history
Combination of natural history and history
In ancient times, when the world seemed to man to be integral, despite the apparent diversity, and interconnected despite the seeming disunity, the problem of conjugation of natural science and history could not even arise. All events deemed worthy of perpetuation were entered into the annals. Wars and floods, coups and epidemics, the birth of a genius and the flight of a comet - all this was considered phenomena of equal importance and interest for posterity. At that time, the principle of magic dominated in scientific thought: “similar gives rise to similar”, which made it possible, through broad associations, to capture the connections between natural phenomena and the fate of peoples or individuals. This principle was developed in astrology and mantic (the science of divination), but with the development of individual sciences, as knowledge was accumulated, it was discarded as untenable and not justified in practical application.
In the XVIII-XIX centuries. thanks to the differentiation of sciences, a huge amount of information was accumulated, by the beginning of the 20th century. become unimaginable. Figuratively speaking, the mighty river of Science was launched into irrigation ditches. Life-giving moisture irrigated a wide area, but the lake, which was previously fed by it, that is, the integral worldview, dried up. And now the autumn wind raises the bottom sediments and sows the loosened soil of the fields with salty dust. Soon, in place of the steppe, albeit dry, but feeding the herds, solonchaks will appear, and the biosphere will give way to inert matter, of course, not forever, but for a long time. After all, when people leave the doomed land, ditches will silt up, and the river will again lay a channel and fill the natural depression. The wind will sweep the salt marshes with a thin layer of fresh dust; grass will break through on it and fall, not eaten by ungulates. After several centuries, a humus layer forms on the plain, and plankton in the lake; it means that herbivores will come, and waterfowl on their legs will bring fish eggs into the lake ... And life will again triumph in its diversity.
So it is in science: narrow specialization is useful only as a means of accumulating knowledge: the differentiation of disciplines was a stage, necessary and inevitable, which will become disastrous if dragged on for a long time. The accumulation of information without systematizing it for a broad generalization is a rather meaningless exercise. And were the principles of ancient science so false? Perhaps its failure was not in the postulates, but in their inept application? After all, there is an interaction between “the history of nature and the history of people”, which can be caught using the amount of accumulated knowledge and the research methodology that is developing before our eyes. Let us try to follow this path and formulate the problem as follows: can the study of history be useful in the interpretation of natural phenomena?
It is obvious that social and natural phenomena are not identical, but they have a point of contact somewhere. It is something that must be found, because it cannot be the anthroposphere as a whole. Even if we understand the anthroposphere as a biomass, it is necessary to note two aspects of the phenomenon: a) mosaic, for different groups of people interact differently with the environment; if we take into account the well-known history of the last five thousand years, then this diversity and the elucidation of its causes will turn out to be the key to the problem posed; b) versatility the subject of study - humanity. This must be understood in the sense that each person (or humanity as a whole) is both a physical body, and an organism, and the upper link of any biocenosis, and a member of society, and a representative of a nationality, etc. In each of the listed examples the subject (in this case, a person) is studied by the relevant scientific discipline, which does not negate other aspects of the study. For our problem, it is the ethnic side of humanity as a whole that is important.
Let's make a small digression into epistemology. Let us ask ourselves: what is directly observable? It turns out that this is not an object, but the boundaries of objects. We see the water of the sea, the sky above the earth, because they border on the shores, air, mountains. But pelagic fish could guess the existence of water only by being caught and pulled into the air. Thus, we know that time exists as a category, but, not seeing its boundaries, we are unable to give a generally accepted definition of time. And the stronger the contrast, the clearer for us the objects that we do not see, but think out, that is, we imagine.
History, like a chain of events, we observe constantly. Therefore, history is a boundary... fortunately, we know what - the social form of the movement of matter and the four natural ones. And if so, then along with the sociosphere and the technosphere generated by it, there is a certain living entity that is not only around people, but also in them. And these elements are so contrasting that they are captured by the human consciousness without the slightest difficulty. That is why humanitarian concepts turned out to be unnecessary, or rather insufficient - they raised the question of the influence of geographical, biological, social or (in idealistic systems) spiritual factors on the historical process or processes, and not about the conjugation of both, due to which they become accessible to empirical generalization the process itself and its components. The approach proposed here is nothing more than an analysis, i.e., a "dissection" necessary to "unravel" obscure places in history and then proceed to a synthesis, when the results of different research methods are taken into account.
In the historiography of the XIX century. the interaction of the social with the natural was not always taken into account. But now the dynamics of natural processes has been studied to such an extent that their comparability with historical events is obvious. Biocenology has shown that a person enters the biocenosis of the landscape as the upper final link, because he is a large predator and as such is subject to the evolution of nature, which by no means excludes the presence of an additional moment - the development of productive forces that create a technosphere that is devoid of self-development and can only collapse.
Formations and ethnic groups
However, if we look at the entire world history, we will notice that the coincidences of the change of formations and the emergence of new peoples are just rare exceptions, while within the same formation, ethnic groups constantly arise and develop, very different from each other.
Take for example the 12th century, when feudalism flourished from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Did the French barons look like the free peasants of Scandinavia, the warrior slaves - the Mamluks of Egypt, the violent population of Russian veche cities, the impoverished conquerors of the half world - the Mongol nukhurs, or the Chinese landowners of the Song empire? They all had the same feudal mode of production, but otherwise there was little in common between them. The attitude to nature does not coincide between the farmer and the nomad; susceptibility to foreignness or the ability to borrow culturally in Europe was greater than in China, as well as the desire for territorial conquest, which stimulated the crusades; Russian slash-and-burn agriculture was simpler and more primitive than viticulture in Syria and the Peloponnese, but with less labor input it brought fabulous harvests; languages, religion, art, education - everything was different, but there was no disorder in this diversity: each way of life was the property of a certain people. This is especially noticeable in relation to the landscapes in which ethnic groups were created and lived.
But one should not think that only nature determines the degree of ethnic originality. Centuries passed, and the ratio of ethnic groups changed: some of them disappeared, others appeared; and this process in Soviet science is usually called ethnogenesis. In a unified world history, the rhythms of ethnogenesis are associated with the pulse of social development, but conjugation does not mean coincidence, much less unity. The factors of the process of history are different, and our task - analysis - is to single out in it the phenomena that are directly inherent in ethnogenesis, and thereby clarify for ourselves what an ethnos is and what its role is in the life of mankind.
To begin with, it is necessary to agree on the purpose of the terms and the boundaries of the study. The Greek word "ethnos" has many meanings in the dictionary, of which we have chosen one: "kind, breed", meaning - people. For our setting of the topic, it does not make sense to single out such concepts as “tribe” or “nation”, because we are interested in the term that can be taken out of brackets, in other words, the common thing that both the British and the Maasai have, and among the ancient Greeks, and among modern gypsies. This is the property of the species Homo sapiens to group in such a way that it is possible to oppose oneself and "one's own" (sometimes close, but often quite distant) to the rest of the world. The opposition "we - they" (conditio sine qua non est!) is characteristic of all eras and countries: Greeks and barbarians, Jews and uncircumcised, Chinese (people of the Middle State) and Hu (barbarian periphery, including Russians), Arabs- Muslims during the first caliphs and "infidels"; Catholic Europeans in the Middle Ages (a unity called "Christendom") and the wicked, including Greeks and Russians; "Orthodox" (in the same era) and "non-Christians", including Catholics; Tuareg and non-Tuareg, gypsies and everyone else, etc. The phenomenon of such opposition is universal, which indicates its deep underlying foundation, but in itself it is only foam on a deep river, and we have to reveal its essence. However, the observation already made is sufficient to state the complexity of the effect, which can be called ethnic (in the sense of "pedigree") and which can become an aspect for building the ethnic history of mankind, just as social, cultural, political, religious and many others are built. Therefore, our task is primarily to capture principle process.
The connection of ethnic culture with geography is undoubted, but it cannot exhaust the complexity of the relationship between diverse natural phenomena and the zigzags of the history of ethnic groups. Moreover, the thesis according to which any feature underlying the classification of ethnic groups is adaptive to a particular environment reflects only one side of the process of ethnogenesis. Even Hegel wrote that "it is unacceptable to point to the climate of Ionia as the cause of Homer's creations." However, having formed in a certain region, where adaptation to the landscape was maximum, the ethnos during migration retains many of the original features that distinguish it from the aboriginal ethnoi. So, the Spaniards who moved to Mexico did not become Aztec or Mayan Indians. They created an artificial micro-landscape for themselves - cities and fortified haciendas, preserved their culture, both material and spiritual, despite the fact that the humid tropics of Yucatan and the semi-deserts of Anahuac were very different from Andalusia and Castile. And after all, the separation of Mexico (New Spain, as it was then called) from Spain in the 19th century. was largely the work of descendants of Indian tribes who adopted Spanish and Catholicism, but supported by free Comanche tribes roaming north of the Rio Grande.
Let us now make the first conclusion, which will be the initial one in what follows. The mosaic anthroposphere, constantly changing in historical time and interacting with the landscapes of planet Earth, is nothing but ethnosphere. Since mankind is spread over the surface of the earth everywhere, but unevenly and interacts with the natural environment of the Earth always, but in different ways, it is advisable to consider it as one of the shells of the Earth, but with a mandatory adjustment for ethnic differences. Thus, we introduce the term "ethnosphere". The ethnosphere, like other geographical phenomena, must have its own patterns of development, different from biological and social ones. Ethnic patterns are visible in space (ethnography) and in time (ethnogenesis and paleogeography of anthropogenic landscapes).
Can historical sources be trusted?
V. K. Yatsunsky, the author of excellent surveys of the geographical thought of the XV-XVIII centuries, rightly notes: “Historical geography does not study the geographical ideas of people of the past, but the specific geography of past centuries.” The initial data for this search, obviously, should be sought in the historical writings of past eras. But how? Unfortunately, there are no indications of a possible research methodology. And that's why.
Historical materials, as a source for the restoration of ancient climatic conditions, have been and are being used very widely. In this regard, the famous controversy between L. S. Berg developed. and G. E. Grumm-Grzhimailo on the drying up of Central Asia in the historical period. The related problem of fluctuations in the level of the Caspian Sea in the 1st millennium AD. e. they also tried to solve it by selecting quotes from the writings of ancient authors. Special collections of information from Russian chronicles were made in order to draw a conclusion about climate change in Eastern Europe. But the results of numerous and time-consuming studies did not live up to expectations. Sometimes the information of the sources was confirmed, and sometimes verification by another way refuted them. Obviously, the coincidence of the data obtained with the truth was a matter of chance, and this indicates the imperfection of the methodology. Indeed, the path of simply referring to the evidence of an ancient or medieval author will lead to a false or, at best, inaccurate conclusion. That's the way it should be. The chroniclers mentioned the phenomena of nature, either incidentally or based on the ideas of the science of their time, interpreted thunderstorms, floods and droughts as omens or punishment for sins. In both cases, natural phenomena were described selectively when they were in the author's field of vision, and we cannot even guess how many of them were omitted. One writer paid attention to nature, and another, in the next century, did not, and it may turn out that rains are mentioned more often in dry times than in wet ones. Historical criticism is not able to help here, because in relation to the omissions of events that are not connected by a causal relationship, it is powerless.
Ancient authors always wrote their writings for certain purposes and, as a rule, exaggerated the significance of the events that interested them. The degree of exaggeration or understatement is very difficult and not always possible to determine. So, L. S. Berg, on the basis of historical writings, concluded that the transformation of cultivated lands into deserts is a consequence of wars. Now this concept is accepted without criticism, and the find of P.K. Kozlov is most often cited as an example - the dead Tangut city of Idzin-ai, known as Khara-Khoto. This moment is so revealing that we will focus our attention on one problem - the geographical location of this city and the conditions of its death.
The Tangut kingdom was located in Ordos and Alashan, in those places where sandy deserts are now located. It would seem that this state should be poor and sparsely populated, but in fact it maintained an army of 150 thousand horsemen, had a university, an academy, schools, legal proceedings and even a scarce trade, because it imported more than it exported. The deficit was partly covered by the golden sand from the Tibetan possessions, and most importantly, by the withdrawal of live cattle, which constituted the wealth of the Tangut kingdom.
The city, discovered by P.K. Kozlov, is located in the lower reaches of the Etsin-gol, in an area that is now waterless. Two oxbow lakes surrounding it from the east and from the west show that there was water there, but the river has shifted its course to the west and now flows into lakes in two branches: salty - Gashun-nor and fresh - Sogo-nor. P.K. Kozlov describes the Sogo-nor valley as a charming oasis in the desert surrounding it, but at the same time notes that large population unable to feed here. But only the citadel of the city of Ijin-ai is a square, the side of which is 400 m. All around, there are traces of less capital buildings and fragments of ceramics, showing the presence of settlements. The destruction of the city is often attributed to the Mongols. Indeed, in 1227, Genghis Khan took the Tangut capital, and the Mongols brutally dealt with its population. But the city, discovered by P.K. Kozlov, continued to live as early as the 14th century, as evidenced by the dates of numerous documents found by the workers of the expedition he led. In addition, the death of the city is associated with a change in the course of the river, which, according to the folk legends of the Torgouts, was diverted by the besiegers by means of a dam made of bags of earth. This dam has survived to this day in the form of a rampart. So it, apparently, was, but the Mongols had nothing to do with it. There is no such information in the descriptions of the capture of the city of Urakhaya (Mong.), or Hechuychen (Chinese). Yes, it would be simply impossible, since the Mongol cavalry did not have the necessary trench tool in service. The death of the city is attributed to the Mongols according to the bad tradition, which began in the Middle Ages, to attribute everything bad to them. In fact, the Tangut city perished in 1372. It was taken by the Chinese troops of the Ming dynasty, which at that time was at war with the last Genghisids, and devastated as a stronghold of the Mongols, who threatened China from the west.
But why didn't he resurrect then? A change in the course of the river is not the reason, since the city could migrate to another channel of the Etsing-gol. And this question can be answered in the book by P.K. Kozlov. With his characteristic observance, he notes that the amount of water in Etsin-gol is decreasing, Lake Sogo-nor is becoming shallow and overgrown with reeds. The movement of the riverbed to the west plays a certain role here, but this alone cannot explain why the country in the 13th century. fed a huge population, and by the beginning of the 20th century. turned into a sandy desert?
So, the blame for the desolation of the cultural lands of Asia lies not with the Mongols, but with climate change, a phenomenon described by us in special works.
Can monuments be trusted?
But why was the devastation of Asia attributed to Genghis and his children, while other events of a much larger scale, for example, the defeat of the Uighurs by the Kyrgyz in 841-846. or the wholesale extermination of the Kalmyks by the Manchu emperor Qian Long in 1756-1758 remained out of sight of historians?
The answer to this question must be sought not in the history of peoples, but in historiography. Talented history books are written infrequently, not for every occasion, and besides, not all of them have come down to us. The era of the XIV-XV centuries. was the heyday of literature in the Middle East, and the fight against the Mongol yoke in both Persia and Russia during this period was the most urgent problem, and therefore many works that have survived to our time are devoted to it. Among them were talented, brilliant works, some of which we know. They caused imitation and repetition, which increased the total number of works on this issue. The extermination of the Oirats did not find a historian, or he died in the massacre. Thus, it turned out that events are illuminated unevenly and their meaning is distorted, since they are presented, as it were, on different scales. Hence the hypothesis arose that attributed to the soldiers of Genghis Khan the almost total destruction of the population of the countries he conquered and the complete change in their landscape, which is by no means true. It should be noted that it was not the countries destroyed by the war that suffered the most withering, but Uighuria, where there was no war at all, and Dzungaria, where no one was going to destroy the grassy steppes. Consequently, the historical and geographical information of the sources is unreliable.
And, finally, there is a temptation to consider grandiose historical events as migrations, for example, the campaigns of the Mongols of the 13th century. Prominent scientists E. Huntington and E. Brooks succumbed to it, but the Mongol campaigns were not connected with migrations. Victories were won not by crowds of nomads, but by small, well-organized mobile detachments, after campaigns returning to their native steppes. The number of migrants was negligible even for the 13th century. So, the khans of the Jochid branch: Batu, Horde and Sheiban received, according to the will of Genghis, only 4 thousand horsemen, that is, about 20 thousand people who settled in the territory from the Carpathians to Altai. And vice versa, the true migration of the Kalmyks of the 17th century. remained unnoticed by most historians due to the fact that it did not receive much resonance in the writings on world history. Therefore, to solve the problem posed, a more solid knowledge of history is required than that which is easily gleaned from consolidated works, and a knowledge of geography more detailed than that usually limited to historians or agricultural economists. And most importantly, it is necessary to detach reliable information from the subjective perceptions characteristic of many authors of written sources from Herodotus to the present day.
We call reliable information information from sources that have passed through the crucible of historical criticism and received an interpretation that does not cause doubts. There are a lot of them, but the vast majority relates to political history. We know well the dates and details of battles, peace treaties, palace coups, great discoveries, but how can we use these data to explain natural phenomena? The method of comparing the facts of history with changes in nature began to be developed only in the 20th century.
Climate historian E. Leroy Ladurie noted that the desire to reduce the ups and downs of the economy in different European countries to periods of increased or decreased moisture, cooling or warming is based on ignoring the economy and social crises, the role of which is beyond doubt. Thus, the increase in the import of Baltic (i.e., Russian) grain to the Mediterranean and the decrease in the number of sheep in Spain in the 16th and especially the 17th centuries. it is easier to compare with the destruction caused by the European countries of the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation than with minor changes in annual temperatures. He is right! Suffice it to note that not only Germany, on whose territory the devastating Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) took place, but also a country that was not devastated, Spain in these centuries had a negative population growth: in 1600 - 8.0 million , and in 1700 - 7.3 million. This is simply due to the fact that most of the young men were mobilized to America or to the Netherlands, as a result of which the country did not have enough labor to support the economy and family.
What would you think of a historian who economic development Europe, starting from 1850, would be explained by the retreat of glaciers, certainly established for the Alps ... ”, writes E. Leroy Ladurie, and it is impossible to disagree with him. Therefore, according to our author, it is necessary simply to accumulate facts, carefully and accurately dated and freed from arbitrary interpretations. In other words, we must be sure that the explanation of the factor of interest to us due to economic, social, ethnographic factors and mere chances is excluded. In geography, there is no exact method for determining absolute dates. An error of a thousand years is considered quite acceptable there. It is easy to establish, for example, that in such and such a region, sediments of silt blocked a layer of loam, and, therefore, to note the presence of flooding, but it is impossible to say when it happened - 500 or 5 thousand years ago. Pollen analysis shows the presence, for example, of dry-loving plants in the place where moisture-loving plants now grow, but there is no guarantee that the swamping of the valley did not occur from a displacement of the bed of a nearby river, and not at all from climate change. In the steppes of Mongolia and Kazakhstan, the remains of groves have been discovered, in respect of which it is impossible to say whether they died from drying out or were cut down by people, and even if the latter is proved, the era of human reprisals against the landscape still remains unknown.
Maybe archeology can help? Monuments of material culture clearly mark the periods of prosperity and decline of peoples and lend themselves to fairly clear dating. Things found in the ground or ancient graves do not seek to mislead the researcher or distort facts. But things are silent, leaving full play to the imagination of the archaeologist. And our contemporaries are also not averse to dreaming, and although their way of thinking is very different from the medieval one, there is no certainty that it is much closer to reality. In the XX century. we sometimes meet with blind faith in the power of archaeological excavations, based on really successful finds in Egypt, Babylonia, India and even in the Altai Mountains, thanks to which we managed to discover and explore the forgotten pages of our history. But this is an exception, and for the most part, the archaeologist must be content with sherds raised from the dry dust of hot steppes, fragments of bones in plundered graves and the remains of walls, one brick imprint high. And at the same time, one must also remember that what was found is an insignificant part of what was lost. In most regions of the Earth, almost all unstable materials are not preserved: wood, furs, fabrics, paper (or birch bark that replaced it), etc. It is never known what exactly was lost, and it is a mistake to consider the missing non-existent and not to amend it, leading to wrong conclusions. In short, archeology without history can mislead the researcher. Let's try to approach the problem in a different way.
III. Is there an ethnos?
There is no sign to determine the ethnic group
According to our definition, the form of existence of the species Homo sapiens is a collective of individuals, which opposes itself to all other collectives. It is more or less stable, although it appears and disappears in historical time, which is the problem of ethnogenesis. All such collectives differ more or less from each other, sometimes in language, sometimes in customs, sometimes in system of ideology, sometimes in origin, but always in historical destiny. Consequently, on the one hand, the ethnos is a derivative of the historical process, and on the other hand, through production activity, the economy is associated with the biocenosis of the landscape in which it was formed. Subsequently, the nationality can change this ratio, but at the same time it changes beyond recognition, and continuity can be traced only with the help of historical methods and the most severe criticism of sources, because words are deceptive.
Before moving on, we should at least agree on the concept of "ethnos", which has not yet been defined. We do not have a single real sign to define any ethnic group as such, although there was not and is not a human being in the world who would be extra-ethnic. All of the listed features define the ethnos "sometimes", and their totality does not define anything at all. Let's check this thesis negatively.
In the theory of historical materialism, the basis of society is the mode of production, which is realized in socio-economic formations. Precisely because self-development plays a decisive role here, the influence of exogenous factors, including natural ones, cannot be the main factor in the genesis of social progress. The concept of "society" means a set of people united by the specific historical conditions of material life common to them. The main force in this system of conditions is the mode of production of material goods. People unite in the process of production, and the result of this association is social relations, which take shape in one of the known five formations: primitive communal, slaveholding, feudal, capitalist and communist.
It is impossible to “unite into an ethnic group”, since belonging to one or another ethnic group is perceived directly by the subject himself, and those around him state it as a fact beyond doubt. Therefore, sensation is the basis of ethnic diagnostics. A person belongs to his ethnic group from infancy. Sometimes the incorporation of foreigners is possible, but, applied on a large scale, it decomposes the ethnos. Concrete historical conditions change more than once during the life of an ethnos, and vice versa, the divergence of ethnoi is often observed under the dominance of one mode of production. Based on the idea of K. Marx about the historical process as the interaction of the history of nature and the history of people, we can propose the first, most general division - into social incentives that arise in the technosphere, and natural incentives, constantly coming from the geographical environment. Each person is not only a member of this or that society, at an age determined by the influence of hormones. The same can be said about long-lived collectives, which in the social aspect form diverse class states or tribal unions (social organisms), and in the natural aspect - ethnic groups (peoples, nations). The discrepancy between the two is obvious.
Ethnos is not a society
But there is another point of view, according to which "ethnos ... is a socio-historical category, and its genesis and development are determined not by the biological laws of nature, but by the specific laws of the development of society." How to understand it? According to the theory of historical materialism, the spontaneous development of productive forces causes a change in production relations, which gives rise to a dialectical process of class formation, which is replaced by processes of class destruction. This is a global phenomenon inherent in the social form of the development of matter. But what about ethnogenesis? Does the appearance of such well-known ethnic groups as the French or the British coincide chronologically or territorially with the formation of the feudal formation? Or did these ethnic groups disappear with its collapse and transition to capitalism? And after all, in the same France, the “socio-historical” category - the French kingdom already covered in the XIV century. except the French Celts-Bretons, Basques, Provencals and Burgundians. So were they not ethnic groups? Doesn't this fact, one of very many, show that V. I. Kozlov's definition is one-sided? And if so, then this is a reason for a scientific dispute.
Dialectical materialism distinguishes between different forms of motion of matter: mechanical, physical, chemical and biological, referring them to the section of natural. The social form of the movement of matter stands out because of its inherent specificity - it is characteristic only of humanity with all its manifestations. Each person and collective of people with technology and domestics (tame animals and cultivated plants) is exposed to both social and natural forms of the movement of matter, constantly correlated in time (history) and space (geography). When summarizing the material into a single complex accessible to observation and study (historical geography), we must consider it from two angles - from the social side and from the natural side. From the first angle we will see public organizations: tribal unions, states, theocracies, political parties, philosophical schools, etc.; in the second - ethnic groups, i.e., groups of people that arise and crumble in a relatively short time, but in each case have an original structure, a unique stereotype of behavior and a peculiar rhythm that has homeostasis in the limit.
As you know, classes are socio-historical categories. In a pre-class society, their analogues are tribal or tribal unions, for example, clans among the Celts. In a broad sense, the concept of "social category" can be extended to stable institutions, such as the state, church organization, policy (in Hellas) or feud. But to everyone who knows history it is known that such categories coincide with the boundaries of ethnic groups only in the rarest cases, that is, there is no direct connection here. Indeed, is it right to say that workers, employees and Tatars live in Moscow? From our point of view, this is absurd, but according to the logic of V.I. Kozlov, this is the only way. So the error lies in the postulate. But not only that, the economy, which is entirely related to the social form of the movement of matter, breaks the national framework. It would seem that in the presence of a common European market, homogeneous technology, the similarity of education in different countries and the easy learning of neighboring languages, in Europe of the 20th century. ethnic differences must be erased. And in fact? The Irish have already fallen away from Great Britain, sparing no effort to learn their ancient and almost forgotten language. Scotland and Catalonia claim autonomy, although over the past 300 years they have not considered themselves oppressed. In Belgium, the Flemings and Walloons, who had hitherto lived in harmony, began a furious struggle, amounting to street fights between students of both ethnic groups. And since in antiquity, too, only a random coincidence of socio-political and ethnic peaks (or recessions) is observed, it is obvious that we are observing the interference of two lines of development, or, speaking in the language of mathematics, two independent variables. You can not notice this only with a very strong desire.
Let's try to reveal the nature of the visible manifestation of the presence of ethnic groups - opposing oneself to everyone else: "we" and "not-we". What gives rise to and nourishes this opposition? Not the unity of the language, because there are many bilingual and trilingual ethnic groups and, conversely, different ethnic groups speaking the same language. So, the French speak four languages: French, Celtic, Basque and Provencal, and this does not interfere with their current ethnic unity, despite the fact that the history of unification, more precisely, the conquest of France from the Rhine to the Pyrenees by the Parisian kings, was long and bloody. However, Mexicans, Peruvians, Argentines speak Spanish, but they are not Spaniards. No wonder they spilled at the beginning of the 19th century. blood streams only to ensure that the war-torn Latin America fell into the hands of the trading companies of England and the United States. The English of Northumberland speak a language close to Norwegian, because they are the descendants of the Vikings who settled in England, and the Irish until recently knew only English, but did not become English. Arabic is spoken by several different nations, and for many Uzbeks, the native language is Tajik, etc. In addition, there are estate languages, for example, French in England in the 12th–13th centuries, Greek in Parthia in the 2nd–1st centuries. BC e., Arabic - in Persia from the 7th-11th centuries. etc. Since the integrity of the nationality was not violated, we must conclude that the point is not in the language.
Moreover, often linguistic diversity finds practical application, and this practice brings together peoples with different languages. For example, during the US-Japanese War in the Pacific, the Japanese learned so much to decipher American radio transmissions that the Americans lost the ability to transmit secret information over the radio. But they found a witty and unexpected way out by teaching the Morse code to the Indians mobilized for military service. The Apache transmitted information to the Navajos in Athabas, the Assiniboine to the Sius in Dakota, and the one who received it translated the text into English. The Japanese opened the ciphers, but before the open texts they retreated in impotence. Since military service often brings people together, the Indians returned home with "pale-faced" comrades. But after all, the assimilation of the Indians did not happen at the same time, because the command valued precisely their ethnic characteristics, including bilingualism. So, although in some cases language can serve as an indicator of an ethnic community, it is not its cause.
Note that the Veps, Udmurts, Karelians, Chuvashs still speak their own languages at home, and study in Russian in schools, and in the future, when they leave their villages, they are practically indistinguishable from Russians. Knowledge mother tongue doesn't bother them at all.
Finally, the Ottoman Turks! In the XIII century. The Turkmen leader Ertogrul, fleeing from the Mongols, brought about 500 riders with their families to Asia Minor. The Iconian sultan settled those who arrived on the border with Nicoya, in Broussa, for a border war with the "infidel" Greeks. Under the first sultans, volunteers flocked to Broussa - "gazii" from all over the Middle East for the sake of booty and land for settlement. They made up the cavalry - "spagi". The conquest of Bulgaria and Macedonia in the XIV century. allowed the Turkish sultans to organize infantry from Christian boys who were torn from their families, taught Islam and military affairs and put in the position of the guard - the "new army", the Janissaries. In the XV century. a fleet was created, manned by adventurers from all the shores of the Mediterranean. In the XVI century. light cavalry was added - "akindzhi" from the conquered Diyarbekr, Iraq and Kurdistan. French renegades became diplomats, while Greeks, Armenians and Jews became financiers and economists. And these people bought their wives at slave bazaars. There were Poles, Ukrainians, Germans, Italians, Georgians, Greeks, Berbers, Negro women, etc. These women in the 17th-18th centuries. turned out to be mothers and grandmothers of Turkish soldiers. The Turks were an ethnic group, but the young soldier listened to the command in Turkish, talked with his mother in Polish, and with his grandmother in Italian, bargained in Greek at the market, read Persian poetry, and Arabic prayers. But he was an Ottoman, for he behaved like an Ottoman, a brave and pious warrior of Islam.
This ethnic integrity was destroyed in the 19th century. numerous European renegades and Young Turks trained in Paris. In the XX century. The Ottoman Empire fell, and the ethnic group crumbled: people became part of other ethnic groups. New Turkey was raised by the descendants of the Seljuks from the depths of Asia Minor, and the remnants of the Ottomans lived out their lives in the lanes of Istanbul. This means that for 600 years the ethnic group of the Ottomans was united not by a linguistic, but by a religious community.
Ideology and culture
Ideology and culture are also sometimes a sign, but not a must. For example, only an Orthodox Christian could be a Byzantine, and all Orthodox were considered subjects of the Emperor of Constantinople and “their own”. However, this was violated as soon as the baptized Bulgarians started a war with the Greeks, and Rus', which had converted to Orthodoxy, did not even think of submitting to Tsargrad. The same principle of unanimity was proclaimed by the caliphs, Muhammad's successors, and could not withstand the competition with living life: within the unity of Islam, ethnic groups arose again. As we have already mentioned, sometimes a sermon unites a group of people, which becomes an ethnic group: for example, the Ottoman Turks or the Sikhs in Northwest India. By the way, in the Ottoman Empire there were Sunni Muslims who were subject to the Sultan, but did not consider themselves Turks - Arabs and Crimean Tatars. For the latter, even linguistic proximity to the Ottomans did not play a role. This means that religion is not a common feature of ethnic diagnostics.
The third example of confessional self-assertion of an ethnic group is the Sikhs, sectarians of Indian origin. The system of castes established in India was considered obligatory for all Hindus. It was a special structure of the ethnic group. To be a Hindu meant to be a member of a caste, even the lowest, from the category of untouchables, and all others were placed below animals, including the captured British. There was no political unity, but the stereotype of behavior was maintained firmly, even too cruelly. Each caste had the right to a certain occupation, and those who were allowed military service were few. This made it possible for the Afghan Muslims to take over India and torment the defenseless population, with the inhabitants of the Punjab suffering the most. In the XVI century. there appeared a doctrine that first proclaimed non-resistance to evil, and then set the goal of war with Muslims. The caste system was annulled, and the Sikhs (the name of the adherents of the new faith) separated themselves from the Hindus. They separated themselves from the Indian integrity by endogamy, developed their own stereotype of behavior and established the structure of their community. According to the principle adopted by us, the Sikhs should be considered as an emerging ethnic group that opposed itself to the Hindus. This is how they perceive themselves. The religious concept has become a symbol for them, and for us an indicator of ethnic divergence.
It is impossible to consider the teachings of the Sikhs only as a doctrine, because if someone in Moscow fully accepted this religion, he would not become a Sikh, and the Sikhs would not consider him “one of their own”. The Sikhs became an ethnic group based on religion, the Mongols - on the basis of kinship, the Swiss - as a result of a successful war with the Austrian feudal lords, which soldered the population of a country where they speak four languages. Ethnic groups are formed in different ways, and our task is to catch the general pattern.
Most large peoples have several ethnographic types that make up a harmonious system, but are very different from each other both in time and in social structure. Compare at least Moscow of the 17th century. with its boyar hats and beards, when women spun behind mica windows, with Moscow in the 18th century, when nobles in wigs and camisoles took their wives to balls, with Moscow in the 19th century, when bearded nihilist students enlightened young ladies from all classes, already who began to mix with each other, let's add here the decadents of the 20th century. Comparing them all with our era and knowing that they are one and the same ethnic group, we will see that without knowledge of history, ethnography would mislead the researcher. And no less indicative is a spatial cut one by one, for example, in 1869. Pomors, St. Petersburg workers, Old Believers in the Trans-Volga region, Siberian gold diggers, peasants of the forest and peasants of the steppe provinces, Don Cossacks and Ural Cossacks were outwardly completely different from each other, but this did not destroy national unity, and the closeness in life, say, of the Grebensky Cossacks with Chechens did not unite them.
Oddly enough, but the proposed point of view met with active resistance exactly where it should have been understood. Some ethnographers countered the author with their point of view on the relationship of ethnography with geography, and on the history of the issue, that is, historiography. Without seeking to enter into controversy, I nevertheless cannot ignore a concept that claims (without sufficient grounds) to be canonical. It would be academically incorrect.
The formation of ethnography as a science is presented to V. I. Kozlov and V. V. Pokshishevsky as follows. Until the middle of the XIX century. geography and ethnography developed together, and then ethnography was divided into socio-historical and geographical directions. L. G. Morgan, I. Ya. Bakhofen, E. Taylor, J. Fraser, L. Ya. Ratzel, L. D. Sinitsky and A. A. Kuber, as well as the French school of "human geography". There is a significant defect in the proposed classification, which practically reduces it to nothing. Representatives of the “directions” were interested in different subjects and paid their attention to different topics. And if so, then their opposition is unjustified. After all, when F. Ratzel tried to substantiate the geographic nature of ethnographic zoning, he did not at all dispute the concept of animism, sympathetic magic, or the ritual murder of a priest, i.e., objects to which J. Fraser dedicated his famous “ golden branch". However, the authors attribute the separation of ethnography from geography and its rebirth as a social science to the presence of diverse interests of versatile scientists. There is some confusion here, fraught with sad consequences. Any science develops by expanding the range of research, and not by simply changing topics. Consequently, if historical aspects are added to the achievements of geographical ethnography, this is the progress of science, and if some plots are replaced by others, then this is marking time, always extremely flawed.
This, obviously, is clear to the scientists themselves, who devoted another passage to the geography of the population, which is at the junction of both sciences, but does not include ethnic geography. The difference, in their opinion, is that “for economic geographers, a person ... is the most important subject of production and consumption, while for ethnographers it is ... the bearer of certain ethnic characteristics (cultural, linguistic, etc.)” (p. 7). Here it is impossible to agree with the authors of the mentioned article. Well, is it possible to study the Eskimos without noticing their hunting for a sea animal, but limiting grammatical forms verb or ideas about the evil spirits of the sea and tundra? Or describe the Hindus without mentioning their labor in the rice fields, but expounding in detail the theory of karma and the reincarnation of souls? No, the nature of labor processes, consumption, wars, the creation of a state or its fall are the same objects of ethnographic research as are wedding rites or ritual ceremonies. And the study of peoples in the phases of their development and in opposing themselves to their neighbors is unthinkable without taking into account the geographical environment.
Similarly, ethnography should not be replaced by the doctrine of “economic and cultural types characteristic of peoples that are approximately at the same level of socio-economic development and living in similar natural and geographical conditions (for example, the types of “Arctic sea animal hunters”, “dry pastoralists steppes”, etc.)”. This direction is fruitful for economic geography, but has nothing to do with ethnography and cannot have. For example, deer Chukchi (i.e. shepherds) and Chukchi hunters of sea animals (what do they do when their deer disappear), according to the proposed classification, should be separated into different sections, although they are a single ethnic group. Are the Russian peasants of the Moscow region, Pomors and Siberian sable hunters not one ethnic group? Well, the examples are countless. V. I. Kozlov's proposal boils down to the abolition of ethnography and its replacement by demography, taking into account the occupations of the population. However, this topic is not of interest to us.
It is equally wrong to equate ethnos with biological taxonomic units: race and population. Races differ from each other in physical characteristics that are not essential for human life. A population is a collection of individuals inhabiting a certain territory, where they freely interbreed, being separated from neighboring populations by one degree or another of isolation. An ethnos, according to our understanding, is a collective of individuals that has a unique internal structure and an original stereotype of behavior, both of which are dynamic. Consequently, ethnos is an elementary phenomenon, not reducible to sociological, biological, or geographical phenomena.
The reduction of ethnogenesis to “linguistic and cultural processes” distorts reality, belittling the degree of complexity of ethnic history, as pointed out by Yu. V. Bromley, who proposed to introduce additional terms to clarify the issue: ethnikos and eso (ethnosocial organization). I admit that one may not be satisfied with his decision, but it is incorrect to completely ignore it. In conclusion, let us check the thesis of V. I. Kozlov by applying it consistently to well-known phenomena. According to the logic of his postulate, people capable of learning languages must belong to several ethnic groups at the same time. This is nonsense! Although there are many bilingual and even trilingual ethnic groups, they do not merge on the basis of linguistic qualifications. After all, A. S. Pushkin and his friends did not become French! Conversely, Mexicans and Peruvians speak Spanish, profess Catholicism, read Cervantes, but do not consider themselves Spaniards. Moreover, they destroyed a million human lives in the war, which was called "liberation". At the same time, the Indians of Upper Peru and the Chaco desert fought for Spain, with which they had nothing in common either in culture, or in economy, or in language. But this is quite understandable, given that the enemies of the Indians were not distant Spaniards, but local residents - mestizos, partly shabby, but opposing themselves to their former fellow tribesmen, since by the beginning of the 19th century they. formed into independent ethnic groups. From the standpoint of V. I. Kozlov, such a late ethnogenesis is inexplicable.
Descent from one ancestor
In ancient times, this was considered mandatory for the ethnic group. Often, in the absence of a real figure, an animal, which was not always a totem, acted as an ancestor. For the Turks and Romans, it was a wolf-nurse, for the Uighurs, a wolf that impregnated the princess, for the Tibetans, a monkey and a female rakshasa (forest demon). But more often it was a person whose appearance the legend distorted beyond recognition. Abraham is the forefather of the Jews, his son Ismail is the ancestor of the Arabs, Cadmus is the founder of Thebes and the initiator of the Boeotians, etc.
Oddly enough, these archaic views have not died, only in the place of a person in our time they are trying to put some ancient tribe- as the ancestor of the current ethnic group. But this is just as false. Just as there is no person who would have only a father or only a mother, so there is no ethnic group that would not have descended from different ancestors. And one should not confuse ethnic groups with races, which is often done, but without reason. The basis for the temptation is a preconceived notion according to which the processes of racial genesis probably developed in certain regions of the world and were due to the specifics of the natural environment of these regions, i.e., the climate, flora and fauna of geographical zones. Here there is an unacceptable substitution of the object, i.e., the primary race is arbitrarily equated with an ethnos. Let's figure it out.
In the era of the Upper Paleolithic, when subarctic conditions dominated in Europe, with a high aridity of the climate, the Rhone Valley was inhabited by the Negroids of the Grimaldi race, and the Khoisan race, combining Mongoloid and Negroid features, lived in the tropical forests of Africa. This race is ancient, its genesis is unclear, but there is no reason to consider it a hybrid. The Bantu Negroids ousted the Khoisanians to the southern outskirts of Africa in a completely historical era - around the 1st century BC. n. e., and later the process continued until the 19th century, when the Bechuans drove the Bushmen into the Kalahari Desert. At the same time, Negroidity did not arise in Equatorial America, although its natural conditions are close to those of Africa.
The arid zone of Eurasia was inhabited by Caucasoids of the Cro-Magnon type and Mongoloids, but this did not lead to the similarity of racial characteristics. In Tibet, Mongoloid bots were neighbors with Caucasoid gifts and Pamirs, and in the Himalayas, Gurkhas with Pathans. But the similarity of the natural environment did not affect the racial appearance. In short, it should be recognized that the functional relationship of anthropological features between different populations and the geographical conditions of the regions inhabited by them is not clear. Moreover, there is no certainty that it exists at all in nature, especially since this opinion runs counter to the achievements of modern paleoanthropology, which builds a racial classification not according to latitudinal zones, but according to meridional regions: the Atlantic, which includes Caucasoids and African Negroids, and the Pacific , which includes the Mongoloids of East Asia and America. This point of view excludes the influence of natural conditions on racegenesis, because both groups were formed in different climatic zones.
Ethnic groups, on the contrary, are always connected with the natural environment through vigorous economic activity. The latter manifests itself in two directions: adapting oneself to the landscape and the landscape to oneself. However, in both cases, we are confronted with an ethnos as a real-life phenomenon, although the reason for its emergence is clear.
And it is not necessary to reduce all the diversity of the topic under study to one thing. It is better to simply establish the role of certain factors. For example, the landscape determines the possibilities of an ethnic group when it arises, and a newborn ethnos changes the landscape in relation to its requirements. Such mutual adaptation is possible only when the emerging ethnos is full of strength and seeks to use them. And then comes the habit of the created stop, which for posterity becomes close and dear. The denial of this inevitably leads to the conclusion that the peoples do not have a homeland, understood here as a combination of landscape elements beloved by the whole heart. Hardly anyone will agree with this.
This alone shows that ethnogenesis is not a social process, because the spontaneous development of the sociosphere only interacts with natural phenomena, and is not their product.
But precisely the fact that ethnogenesis is a process, and the directly observed ethnos is a phase of ethnogenesis, and, consequently, an unstable system, rules out any comparison of ethnoi with anthropological races, and thus with any racial theories. Indeed, the principle of anthropological classification is similarity. And the people that make up the ethnic group are diverse. The process of ethnogenesis always involves two or more components. The crossing of different ethnic groups sometimes gives a new stable form, and sometimes leads to degeneration. Thus, from a mixture of Slavs, Ugrians, Alans and Turks, the Great Russian nationality developed, and the formations, which included the Mongol-Chinese and Manchu-Chinese mestizos, which often appeared along the line of the Great Wall of China in the last two thousand years, turned out to be unstable and disappeared as independent ethnic units.
In Central Asia in the 7th century. Sogdians lived, and the term "Tajik" in the VIII century. meant "Arab", that is, the warrior of the caliph. Nasr ibn Seiyar in 733, suppressing the uprising of the Sogdians, was forced to replenish his thinning troops with the Khorasan Persians, who had already converted to Islam. He scored a lot of them, and therefore the Persian language began to dominate in his Arab army. After the victory, when Sogdian men were killed, children were sold into slavery, and beautiful women and flowering gardens were divided among the winners, a Persian-speaking population appeared in Sogdiana and Bukhara, similar to the Khorasans. But in 1510 the fates of Iran and Central Asia diverged. Iran was taken over by the Turkic Ishmael Safavi, a zealous Shiite, and converted the Persians to Shiism. And Central Asia went to the Sunni Uzbeks, and the Persian-speaking population living there retained the old name "Tajik", which was not given any importance until the fall of the Bukhara Mangyt dynasty in 1918. When the Uzbek and Tajik republics were formed in the former Turkestan region, the descendants of the Khorasan Persians, the conquerors of the 8th century, who lived in Bukhara and Samarkand, were recorded as Uzbeks during the census, and the descendants of the Turks, the conquerors of the 11th and 16th centuries, who lived in Dushanbe and Shakhrisyabz , - Tajiks. They knew both languages from childhood, were Muslims, and they did not care how they were written down. Over the past 40 years, the situation has changed: Tajiks and Uzbeks took shape in socialist nations, but how to consider them before the 20s, when religious affiliation determined ethnicity (Muslims and Kafirs), and Tajiks did not have births? And after all, both ethnic substrata: Turks and Iranians were "imported" ethnic groups in Central Asia a thousand years ago - a period sufficient for adaptation. Apparently, a certain regularity operates here, which should be revealed and described. But it is clear that a common origin cannot be an indicator for determining an ethnos, because this is a myth inherited by our consciousness from the primitive science of primitive times.
Ethnos as an illusion
But, perhaps, "ethnos" is simply a social category that is formed during the formation of this or that society? Then "ethnos" is an imaginary value, and ethnography is a meaningless pastime, since it is easier to study social conditions. This point of view is erroneous, which becomes obvious if speculation is replaced by observations of natural processes that are accessible to a thoughtful person. Let's explain this with real examples. France is inhabited by Breton Celts and Gascon Iberians. In the woods of the Vendée and on the slopes of the Pyrenees they dress in their own costumes, speak their own language, and in their homeland clearly distinguish themselves from the French. But is it possible to say about the marshals of France, Murat or Lannes, that they are Basques, and not French? Or about d "Artagnan, a historical character and hero of Dumas' novel? Is it possible not to consider the French the Breton nobleman Chateaubriand and Gilles de Retz, an associate of Joan of Arc? Isn't the Irishman Oscar Wilde an English writer? The famous orientalist Chokan Valikhanov himself said about himself that he considers himself equally Russian and Kazakh. Such examples are innumerable, but they all indicate that ethnicity, found in the minds of people, is not a product of consciousness itself. Obviously, it reflects some side of human nature, much deeper, external in relation to consciousness and psychology, by which we understand the form of higher nervous activity. Indeed, in other cases, ethnic groups for some reason show great resistance to the influences of the environment and do not assimilate.
Gypsies have been separated from their society and India for a thousand years, have lost contact with their native land, and yet have not merged with either the Spaniards or the French, or the Czechs or the Mongols. They did not accept the feudal institutions of the societies of Europe, remaining a foreign group in all countries, wherever they went. The Iroquois still live as a small ethnic group (there are only 20 thousand of them), surrounded by hypertrophied capitalism, but do not take part in the "American way of life". The Turkic ethnic groups live in the Mongolian People's Republic: Soyots (Urankhians), Kazakhs and others, but, despite the similarity of the "material and spiritual development of society", they do not merge with the Mongols, constituting independent ethnic groups. But "the level of development of society, the state of its productive forces" are the same. Conversely, the French settled in Canada in the 18th century. and still have retained their ethnic identity, although the development of their forest villages and industrial cities of France is very different. The Jews of Thessaloniki live as an endogamous group for more than 400 years after their expulsion from Spain, but according to 1918 they are more like Arabs than their Greek neighbors. In the same way, the Germans from Hungary look like their compatriots in Germany, and the gypsies look like the Indians. Selection changes the ratio of traits slowly, and mutations are known to be rare. Therefore, any ethnic group living in its usual landscape is almost in a state of equilibrium.
One should not think that a change in the conditions of existence never affects ethnic groups. Sometimes it influences so strongly that new signs are formed and new ethnic variants are created, more or less stable. We need to understand how these processes work and why they give different results.
The well-known Soviet researcher S. A. Tokarev put forward a sociological concept, where instead of defining the concept of ethnic community, it was about “four historical types of nationality in four formations: family ties; demos - under slaveholding - only the free population, not including slaves; nationality - under feudalism - the entire working population of the country, not including the ruling class; nation - in the capitalist and socialist - all sections of the population, split into antagonistic classes. The above excerpt shows that a completely different meaning was put into the concept of "ethnic community", which, perhaps, helps in some way, but lies outside the field of view of historical geography and the natural sciences in general. Therefore, a dispute with this concept would be fruitless, since it would come down to what to call an ethnos. What's the use of arguing about words?
Between west and east
While we were getting acquainted with the cultures of the Mediterranean, we were in an environment of familiar concepts and assessments. Religion meant faith in God, the state meant a territory with a certain order and power, countries and lakes were located in certain places.
Here are just the usual names "West" and "East" did not behave quite geographically: Morocco was considered the "East", and Hungary and Poland - the "West". But everyone managed to apply this convention, and there was no confusion of concepts. This was greatly facilitated by the knowledge of the subject, familiar even to non-specialists, thanks to reading fiction and the presence of a living tradition.
But as soon as we cross the mountain passes separating Central and East Asia, we will find ourselves in a world of a different frame of reference. Here we will meet religions that deny the existence of not only a deity, but also the world around us. Orders and social arrangements will be contrary to the principles of the state and power. In nameless countries, we will find ethnic groups without a common language and economy, and sometimes even territory, and rivers and lakes will roam like shepherds-cattle breeders. Those tribes that we used to consider nomadic will turn out to be sedentary, and the strength of the troops will not depend on their numbers. Only the regularities of ethnogenesis will remain unchanged.
Different material requires a different approach to itself, and, consequently, a different scale of research. Otherwise, it will remain incomprehensible, and the book will become unnecessary for the reader. The reader is accustomed to European terms. He knows what "king" or "count", "chancellor" or "bourgeois commune" means. But in the east of the Oikoumene there were no equivalent terms. “Khagan” is not a king or emperor, but a military leader chosen for life, concurrently performing rituals of honoring ancestors. Can you imagine Richard Lion Heart, serving a funeral mass for Henry II, whom he brought to a heart attack? Moreover, that representatives of the Gascon and English nobility should be present at this mass? After all, this is nonsense! And in the east of the Great Steppe, he would have been obliged to do this, otherwise he would have been killed right there.
Names such as “Chinese” or “Indians” are not equivalent to “French” or “Germans”, but to Western Europeans in general, because they are systems of ethnic groups, but united on other principles of culture: the Indians were connected by a system of castes, and the Chinese were connected by hieroglyphic writing and humanitarian education. As soon as a native of Hindustan converted to Islam, he ceased to be a Hindu, for for his compatriots he became a renegade and fell into the category of untouchables. According to Confucius, a Chinese living among barbarians was regarded as a barbarian. But a foreigner, observing Chinese etiquette, was quoted as a Chinese.
To compare the ethnic groups of the East and the West, we need to find the correct correspondences, with an equal division price. For the sake of this, we study the properties of an ethnos as a natural phenomenon inherent in all countries and centuries.
To achieve this goal, it is necessary to be very attentive to the ancient traditional information about the world, not rejecting them in advance just because they do not correspond to our modern ideas. We constantly forget that people who lived several thousand years ago had the same consciousness, abilities and desire for truth and knowledge as our contemporaries. This is evidenced by the treatises that have come down to us from different peoples of different times. That is why ethnology is a practically necessary discipline, because without its methodology a significant part of the cultural heritage of antiquity remains inaccessible to us.
To understand the history and culture of East Asia, the usual approach is not suitable. When studying the history of Europe, we can distinguish sections: the history of France, Germany, England, etc. or the history of ancient, middle, new. Then, studying the history of, say, Rome, we touch on neighboring peoples only insofar as Rome encountered them. For Western countries, this approach is justified by the results obtained, but when studying Central Asia in this way, we will not obtain satisfactory results. The reason for this is deep: it is that the Asian concepts of the term "people" and the European understanding of it are different. In Asia itself, ethnic unity is perceived differently, and even if we discard the Levant and India and Indo-China as not directly related to our topic, there will still be three different understandings: Chinese, Iranian and nomadic. Moreover, the latter varies especially strongly depending on the era. In the Xiongnu time, it is not the same as in the Uighur or Mongolian.
In Europe, the ethnonym is a stable concept, in Central Asia it is more or less fluid, in China it is absorbing, in Iran it is exclusive. In other words, in China, in order to be considered a Chinese, a person had to accept the basics of Chinese morality, education and rules of conduct; origin was not taken into account, language too, since in ancient times the Chinese spoke different languages. Therefore, it is clear that China inevitably expanded, absorbing small peoples and tribes. In Iran, on the contrary, one had to be born a Persian, but, moreover, it was necessary to honor Aguramazda and hate Ahriman. Without this, it was impossible to become an "Aryan". Medieval (Sasanian) Persians did not even think of the possibility of including anyone in their ranks, since they called themselves “noble” (nomdoron), and did not include others among them. As a result, the number of people fell steadily. It is difficult to judge the Parthian understanding, but, apparently, it did not differ fundamentally from the Persian one, only it was somewhat wider.
To be considered a Xiongnu, one had to become a member of the clan either through marriage or by command of the chanyu, then the person became one of his own. The successors of the Huns, the Turks, began to incorporate entire tribes. On the basis of perception, mixed tribal unions arose, for example, Kazakhs, Yakuts, etc. Among the Mongols, generally very close to the Turks and Huns, the horde prevailed, that is, a group of people united by discipline and leadership. It did not require any origin, no language, no religion, but only courage and willingness to obey. It is clear that the names of the hordes are not ethnonyms, but in the presence of hordes, ethnonyms generally disappear, since there is no need for them - the concept of “people” coincides with the concept of “state”.
In this regard, we must firmly remember that the concept of "state" in all these cases is different and indispensable in translation. The Chinese "go" is represented by a hieroglyph: a fence and a man with a spear. This does not at all correspond to the English "state", or the French "etat", or even the Latin "imperium" and "respublicae". The Iranian “shahr” or the above term “horde” are also far in content. The nuances of difference are sometimes more significant than the elements of similarity, and this determines the behavior of the participants in history: what seems monstrous to a European is natural to a Mongol, and vice versa. The reason is not in different ethics, but in the fact that the subject, in this case the state, is not identical. Therefore, we will record not only similarities, but also differences, so as not to drive the peoples we study into the Procrustean bed of the scheme.
Of course, we cannot but be saddened by the very widespread opinion that everything state forms, social institutions, ethnic norms and even manners of presentation that are not similar to European ones are simply backward, imperfect and inferior. Banal Eurocentrism is sufficient for philistine perception, but not suitable for scientific understanding of the diversity of observed phenomena. After all, from the point of view of a Chinese or an Arab, Western Europeans seem inferior. And this is equally untrue, and futile for science. Obviously, we should find such a frame of reference in which all observations will be made with an equal degree of accuracy. Only such an approach makes it possible to compare dissimilar phenomena and thereby draw reliable conclusions. All the research conditions listed here are obligatory not only for history, but also for geography, since it is connected with a person and geographical names. In the West, countries are distinguished by names, but in the East?
Country and people without a name
Between the eastern border of the Muslim world and the northwestern edge of the Middle Empire, which we call China, lies a country that has no definite name. This is all the more strange because the geographical boundaries of this country are very clearly marked, its physical and climatic conditions are original and unique, the population is numerous and has long been involved in culture. This country was well known to Chinese, Greek, and Arab geographers; it was visited by Russian and Western European travelers; archeological excavations were carried out in it several times ... and everyone called it something descriptive, but it did not start a self-name. Therefore, we simply indicate where the country is located.
Two mountain ranges stretch from the Pamirs to the east: the Kunlun, to the south of which Tibet is located, and the Tien Shan. Between these ridges lies a sandy desert - Takla-Makan, cut through by the high-water Tarim River. This river has neither source nor mouth. Its beginning is considered to be the "Aral" - that is, the "island" between the branches of three rivers: Yarkenddarya, Aksudarya and Khotandarya. Its end is sometimes lost in the sands, sometimes it reaches Lake Karaburankel, and sometimes it fills Lop Nor, a lake that constantly changes its place. In this strange country, rivers and lakes roam, and people huddle at the foot of the mountains. Fresh streams flow from the mountains, but immediately disappear under piles of talus and come to the surface at a fair distance from the ridges. There are oases, and then the rivers are lost again, this time in the sands. In this extra-arid country, the deepest depression is located, the bottom of which lies 154 m below sea level. In this depression is an ancient cultural center - the Turfan oasis. How did they do the sciences and arts in the summer heat, reaching up to +48 ° C, and winter frosts up to -37 °C, incredible dryness of autumn air and strong spring winds?! But they did, and with considerable success.
The ancient population of this country did not have a self-name. Now it is customary to call these people Tokhars, but this is not an ethnonym, but a Tibetan nickname tha gar, which means "white head" (blonds). The inhabitants of different oases spoke various languages of the Indo-European group, among which was even Western Aryan, which was not similar to those known in Europe. In the south-west of the country, at the foot of the Kunlun, Tibetan tribes roamed, who were in close contact with the inhabitants of Khotan and Yarkent, but did not mix with them.
In the first centuries A.D. e. Sakas, who settled south of Kashgar to Khotan, penetrated into this country from the west, Chinese emigrants who fled from the horrors of civil wars at home. The Chinese set up a colony in the Turfan oasis - Gaochang. It lasted until the ninth century. and disappeared without a trace.
As you can see, it is impossible to choose a name for the country by ethnonym, but it was a cultural population that established an economy that should be considered the best in the ancient world.
The nature of the oases of Central Asia has long been brought into harmony with human needs. Turfans mastered the Iranian system of underground water supply - kyarizes, thanks to which the irrigated area fed a large population. Harvested twice a year. Turfan grapes can rightfully be considered the best in the world: melons, watermelons, apricots - from spring to late autumn; crops of long-staple cotton are protected from the winds by pyramidal poplars and mulberry trees. And all around is a stone desert of fragments of cracked rocks, rubble and boulders, through which neither a tree nor a bush will break through. This is a reliable defense of the oasis from large armies. It is very difficult to move a foot army across the desert, because it is necessary to carry with you not only food, but also water, which excessively increases the convoy. And the raids of the light cavalry of the nomads are not terrible for the fortress walls. The second major center of this country - Karashar lies in the mountains near the freshwater lake Bagrash-Kul. This city "has fat lands ... abounds in fish ... It is well fortified by nature itself and it is easy to defend itself in it." The Konchedarya flows out of the Bagrash-Kul and feeds the Lob-nor. Along its coast it is possible, without suffering from thirst, to get to the high-water Tarim, bordered by thickets of poplars, tamarisk, sea buckthorn and high reeds, hiding herds of red deer and wild boars.
The ancient ideology of the settled inhabitants of this country was Buddhism in the form of Hinayana (“small crossing” or “small vehicle”, that is, the most orthodox teaching of the Buddha without impurities), which cannot be called a religion. The Hinayanaists deny God, putting in its place the moral law of karma (causal sequence). Buddha is a person who has reached perfection and is an example for any other person who wants to be free from suffering and rebirth by achieving nirvana - a state of absolute peace. Only a purposeful person, an arhat (saint), who does not depend on either divine mercy or outside help, can achieve nirvana. “Be a lamp to yourself,” say the Hinayana.
It goes without saying that "setting on the path of cultivation" is the work of a few. But what about the rest? They simply went about their daily business, respected the arhats, listened to teachings in their free time and hoped that in future rebirths they themselves would be able to become holy ascetics. But after all, we have already seen from other examples how little dogma influences the ethnic stereotype of behavior. Arhats, merchants, warriors and farmers of Turfan, Karashahr and Kucha formed a single system, for which Buddhism was only a coloring.
However, the color of the object plays its role, sometimes essential. The Hinayana community survived until the 15th century, and the Mahayana - a vague, diverse and complex doctrine - in Yarkend and Khotan, obviously, not by chance gave way to Islam already in the 11th century.
The nomadic Uighurs who came to Turfan professed Manichaeism, but, apparently, just as formally as the Turfans practiced Buddhism. As an independent confession, Manichaeism disappeared even before the 12th century, but Manichaean ideas entered into some Buddhist philosophical trends and into Nestorianism, which in the 11th century. made a victorious march throughout Central Asia. During these centuries, the inhabitants of Turfan, Karashahr and Kucha began to call themselves Uighurs.
The Nestorians in Uighuria got along with the Buddhists, despite their intolerance. Obviously, Christianity was desirable for people of a religious make-up, far from the atheistic abstractions of the Hinayana. Merchants also became Christians, for the Buddhist teaching forbids those who “took the path” to touch gold, silver, and women. Therefore, religious people, but who took an active part in economic life, were forced to look for a creed that would not interfere with living and working. Therefore, we can conclude that suitable ecological niches were found for both ideological systems.
The wealth of this country was based mainly on its favorable geographical location: two caravan routes passed through it: one to the north and the other to the south of the Tien Shan. Along these routes, Chinese silk flowed to Provence, and the luxury goods of France and Byzantium to China. In the oases, caravaners rested from the hard passages through the desert and fattened their camels and horses. In this regard, the “first oldest profession” developed among local women, and husbands allowed their wives these earnings, some of which went into their pockets. And the Uighurs got so used to this business that even when, thanks to an alliance with the Mongols, Uighuria became fabulously rich, its inhabitants asked the Mongol Khan Ogedei not to forbid their wives to entertain travelers.
This custom, or rather, an element of an ethnic stereotype of behavior, turned out to be more persistent than language, religion, political structure and self-name. The stereotype of behavior is formed as an adaptive trait, that is, as a way of adapting an ethnos to the geographical environment. The names here changed more often than the ethnic groups that bore them, and the change of ethnonyms was explained by the political situation.
The rich and numerous population of these fertile oases could easily feed the warlike nomads, especially since first the Uyghurs and then the Mongols took upon themselves the protection of their subjects from external enemies. For three hundred years, the Uyghurs dissolved among the natives, but forced them to change the Tocharian language to Turkic. However, it did not cost them the effort, because in the XI century. all peoples spoke the dialects of the Turkic language - from the azure waves of the Sea of Marmara and the wooded slopes of the Carpathians to the jungles of Bengal and the Great Wall of China. Such a wide distribution of the Turkic language made this language convenient for the oases of trading operations, and the inhabitants of both halves of Central Asia were equally fond of trading. Therefore, the change of the native, but little-used language to a commonly understood one took place without difficulty not only in the northeastern part of the Tarim Basin, but also in the southwestern part, where the role of the Uyghurs was assumed by the Turkic tribes: the Yagma and the Karluks. However, the difference between them and the Uighurs was huge. The Uighurs did not affect the life, religion, or culture of their subjects, while the Karluks, who converted to Islam in 960, turned the oases of Kashgar, Yarkand, and Khotan into a semblance of Samarkand and Bukhara.
Thus, a geographically monolithic region turned out to be divided into two ethno-cultural regions that were by no means friendly towards each other. But the forces were equal, and the distances between the oases were huge and difficult to pass. Therefore, the situation has stabilized for a long time.
This situation explains why the country was left without a single name. In ancient times, the Chinese called it Xiyu, i.e. "Western Territory", and considered its end to be the "Onion Mountains" - Pamir and Alai. The Hellenes called this country "Serika", and the precious goods obtained from it - "serikum" (silk). I do not undertake to explain the etymology of this word.
In modern times, conditional names were also used: Kashgaria, East Turkestan, or Xinjiang, that is, literally the “new border”, established by the Manchus in the 18th century. All these names are not suitable for our era. What for the ancient Chinese was the "West" in the XII-XIII centuries. became the middle. To call "Turkestan" a country inhabited by Indo-Europeans who have learned to understand Turkic speech is absurd. Kashgar had not yet become the capital, and the "new frontier" did not even appear on the horizon. It is better to leave the geographical code name - the Tarim Basin. The river is a reliable landmark, at least neutral and durable. In addition, the term "Xinjiang" includes Dzungaria (also a conditional and later name), located north of the Tien Shan and which had completely different historical destinies.
The eastern border of Uyguria is difficult to determine. It has changed considerably over the past centuries, and many of the changes are undated. One might think that the Uighurs owned the oasis of Hami and, perhaps, the cave city of Dunhuang, a treasury of Buddhist art. But the more eastern lands - the oases of the foothills of Nanshan, were taken away from the Uighurs by the Tanguts. This is a people who, like the Uyghurs, do not exist now, although there are people who call themselves that. But this is also a mirage. Calling themselves Uighurs, they are the Fergana Turks who settled to the east in the 15th-8th centuries. And those who were mistaken for the Tanguts are nomadic Tibetans, a relic ethnic group, once the worst enemies of the Tanguts.
So, historical criticism has shown that in Asia the meaning of names and their sound do not always coincide. To avoid unfortunate and, alas, frequent mistakes, it is necessary to develop a reference system that would be valid for Europe, and for Asia, and for America, Oceania, Africa and Australia. But in this system, meaning is preferred to phonetics, that is, it is based not on linguistics, but on history.
"Ethnos" - a composition by S. M. Shirokogorov
First general concept ethnos as an independent, not secondary phenomenon belongs to S. M. Shirokogorov. He considered ethnos "a form in which the process of creation, development and death of elements that enable humanity as a species to exist" takes place. At the same time, an ethnos is defined "as a group of people united by the unity of origin, customs, language and way of life." Both these theses signify the state of science at the beginning of the 20th century. In the aspect of geography, "the environment to which the ethnos adapts and which it obeys, becoming part of this environment, its derivative" is recognized. This concept was resurrected by V. Anuchin under the name of "unified geography", but it did not receive recognition. The social structure is considered as a biological category - a new form of adaptation, the development of which is due to the ethnic environment: "An ethnos receives impulses of change from its neighbors, raising, so to speak, its specific gravity and imparting to it the properties of resistance." Here, the concept of S. M. Shirokogorov echoes the view of A. Toynbee on “challenge and response”, where the creative act is interpreted as a reaction to the “challenge” of the environment.
Cause less resistance general conclusions» S. M. Shirokogorova: «1. The development of the ethnos takes place… along the path of adaptation of the whole complex… and along with the complication of some phenomena, the simplification of others is possible. 2. Ethnic groups themselves adapt to the environment and adapt it to themselves. 3. The movement of ethnic groups proceeds along the line of least resistance.” This is not new now. And there is nothing surprising in the fact that Shirokogorov's views have become outdated in half a century. Worse than the other is the mechanical transfer of zoological regularities to history, which is the source material for ethnology. Therefore, the application of Shirokogorov's principles immediately encounters insurmountable difficulties. For example, the thesis “for an ethnos, any form of existence is acceptable if it ensures its existence - the goal of its life as a species” is simply incorrect. The Indians of North America and the nomads of Dzungaria could survive under the rule of the United States or China at the cost of abandoning their identity, but both preferred an unequal struggle without hope of success. Not every ethnic group agrees to submit to the enemy - just to survive. This is clear and without additional arguments. The fact that “the desire to seize territory, develop culture and population is the basis of the movement of each ethnic group” is not true, because relic ethnic groups are by no means aggressive. The statement that “less cultured ethnic groups survive” is only partly correct, since in a number of cases their death in the face of a more cultured neighbor is observed, and the position is completely unacceptable: “The more complex the organization and the higher the form of special adaptation, the shorter the life of the species” (t ie ethnos). On the contrary, the disappearance of ethnic groups is associated with a simplification of the structure, which will be discussed below. Nevertheless, Shirokogorov's book was a step forward for its time, for it expanded the perspective of the development of ethnography into ethnology. And what I write will probably be rethought in half a century, but this is the development of science.
Unlike S. M. Shirokogorov, we have systematic approach, the concept of ecosystems, the doctrine of the biosphere and the energy of living matter (biochemical), as well as material on the emergence of anthropogenic landscapes on a global scale. All this makes it possible to offer a more perfect solution to the problem than was possible half a century ago.
"States" and "Processes"
The totality of the above facts shows that the system of categories underlying the concept of formations is fundamentally inapplicable to ethnogenesis. This system captures the "states" of society, determined by the mode of production, which, in turn, depends on the level of productive forces, in other words, on the technosphere. This frame of reference is very convenient when studying the history of material culture, state institutions, styles in art, philosophical schools, in short - everything that was created by human hands. Over the past century, it has become so familiar that they began to mechanically transfer it to the analysis of ethnogenesis, declaring, for example, such theses: 1) “ethnos is a social community of people”; 2) "an ethnos, like a class, is not a social organization, but an amorphous state that takes any social form - a tribe, a union of tribes, a state, a church, a party, etc., and not one, but several at the same time."
In addition, it is recommended "not to confuse ethnos with biological categories, such as races, and with various types of social organization ...". If the first definition immediately breaks down into the above examples, then the second deserves careful analysis, since on the basis of this, albeit unconscious opinion, empires were built and disintegrated, which, of course, was reflected in the fate of the peoples subordinate to them.
The concept of "state" takes place both in nature and in society. There are four states in nature: solid, liquid, gaseous and plasma. The transition of a molecule of an inert substance from one state to another requires an additional expenditure of energy equal to the latent heat of fusion or vaporization. This transition occurs in a small jerk, and the process is reversible. In the living matter of the biosphere, such a transition is associated with the death of the organism and is irreversible. This could mean that there are only two states for an organism: life and death, but since death is the destruction of the organism as a whole, it is absurd to call this moment of transition a “state”. As for the life of an organism, this is also not a “state”, but a process: from birth through maturity and old age to death. An analogue of the process of life in inert matter is the crystallization of minerals and their subsequent metamorphization into amorphous masses.
Exploring "states" and "processes", we always use a different methodology. For a "state" - a classification, according to any arbitrarily accepted principle, convenient for reviewing the phenomenon as a whole. For "processes", especially those associated with evolution or shaping, a systematics based on a hierarchical principle is needed - the subordination of similar, although not identical, groups of different ranks. Such is the systematics of Linnaeus, improved by C. Darwin. The hierarchical nature of the system of the organic world is due to the course and nature of evolutionary processes, inseparable from life and mandatory for it. But as soon as life stops, a “state” arises that is more or less quickly corroded by the influence of the environment, even if the latter consists of other dead “states” that are also subject to irreversible deformation. This means that for an organism, including a human one, there is only one way to get into the "state" - to become a mummy, and for an ethnos - an archaeological culture.
Another thing is the technosphere and the relations of production connected with it. There are "states" here. It is easy to make scrap out of a tractor, and a tractor out of scrap. You just need to spend some (alas, considerable) energy. There are "states" in social life. Now they are called civil status and are registered by the registry office. Previously, they were called estates (etat). In a figurative sense, class affiliation can be called a “state”, but we must remember that it is a product of production relations and productive forces, i.e., also of the technosphere. This state is extremely unstable. A warrior who was captured became a slave, and having escaped, he could turn into a feudal lord. For the hierarchical principle in the fate of such a person there is neither place nor need; a simple fix is enough here. So, changes in social states are similar (although not identical) to changes in natural states:
they are reversible and require an investment of additional energy to go from one to the other. But is it ethnicity? Is it possible, by making an effort, to change one's ethnicity? Apparently not! But this alone shows that the ethnos is not a "state" (especially civil), but a process.
The aberration that feeds the concept of "state" is related to the observer's lack of historical perspective. The complete attenuation of the process of ethnogenesis without extraneous disturbances fits into 1200–1500 years, while a researcher devotes two years to the planned topic, three at the most. Therefore, the past appears to him as a kaleidoscope, without a system and regularity, and having fixed several changes in a limited region and one era, he sees only a cluster of “states” that are not related to each other, but only coincide in place and time. So, before the advent of geomorphology, people did not associate the presence of terraces with the erosional activity of rivers flowing somewhere below, and the mountains were considered eternal, almost the original landforms. Alas, all evidence in science is effective only with a certain degree of erudition of the opponent. Even the heliocentric system of Copernicus - Kepler convinced only those who in the 17th century. knew enough astronomy, and G. Mendel's discovery was repeated by De Vries.
The second argument against the concept of "state" is the blurring of the boundaries between ethnic groups in the zones of ethnic contacts. If the civil (i.e. social) status can be changed immediately, for example, by granting nobility, degrading to soldiers, selling into slavery, liberation from captivity, etc., then ethnic contacts in the Yellow River Valley, Constantinople or North America are always the process is painful, long and highly variable in the sense that the results of miscegenation are often unexpected and always uncontrollable. The latter is explained mainly by the lack of a developed ethnological theory that would allow one to act not blindly, but taking into account the consequences of ethnic processes.
I took up this book twice, but read it only on the third attempt in 3 (!) months. Lev Nikolayevich effortlessly sprinkles with special terms, names of ethnic groups and examples from the history of mankind in the intervals from the 10th century to the 10th century. BC to the 19th century AD It takes a lot of effort to get it all right. Lev Nikolaevich, not without humor, addresses the reader at the very beginning of the book:
"Well, if there is a fastidious reviewer who demands to give a clear definition of the concept of "ethnos" at the beginning of the book, then we can say this: ethnos is a phenomenon of the biosphere, or a systemic integrity of a discrete type, working on the geobiochemical energy of living matter, in accordance with the principle of the second the beginning of thermodynamics, which is confirmed by the diachronic sequence of historical events. If this is enough for understanding, then the book can be read no further. "
Very accurately, all claims to this work are described in the article. "
The bitter thoughts of the "finicky reviewer" about the teachings of L.N. Gumilyov ".
Lev Nikolaevich Gumilyov(1912-1992) - Russian scientist, historian-ethnologist (Doctor of historical and geographical sciences), poet, translator from Farsi. Founder of the passionate theory of ethnogenesis.
Born in Tsarskoye Selo on October 1, 1912. The son of poets Nikolai Gumilyov and Anna Akhmatova. In 1930, he tried to enter Leningrad University, but was not allowed to take exams as "the son of an enemy of the people." Participated in several geological expeditions to the Sayan Mountains and the Pamirs.In 1934, he nevertheless managed to enter the university in the eastern department, but a year later he was arrested for "failure to report" - and was released from prison only after repeated appeals by A. A. Akhmatova to various authorities.Gumilyov was reinstated at the university in 1937, and a year later he was arrested again, given five years in a strict regime colony and sent to build the White Sea-Baltic Canal, from where he was soon transferred to the Norilsk Gulag.
In 1943, after the expiration of the term, Gumilyov tried to go to the front, but he got into the army only in 1944 and ended up in the penal battalion, which included Berlin. In 1946 he defended his diploma and entered graduate school, and in 1948 he was again arrested for "subversion" and sentenced to ten years in prison; in 1956, the case was closed "due to lack of evidence," Gumilyov returned to Leningrad and a few years later defended his doctoral dissertation, which was published in 1967 under the title "Ancient Turks."From 1956 until his retirement (1986) he lectured at the Faculty of Geography of the University.In 1974 he defended his second doctoral thesis ("Ethnogenesis and the biosphere of the Earth").
Gumilyov's ideas were rejected by official Soviet science, his books were banned for publication. Recognition came only with "perestroika", the fruits of which Gumilyov no longer saw.
He died in 1992 and was buried in the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.
Annotation:
The famous treatise "Ethnogenesis and the Biosphere of the Earth" is the fundamental work of the outstanding Russian historian, geographer and philosopher Lev Nikolaevich Gumilyov, devoted to the problem of the emergence and relationship of ethnic groups on Earth. Exploring the dynamics of the movement of peoples, in search of their historical identity, entering into conflicts with the environment, Gumilyov collected and processed a huge amount of scientific and cultural data. In this unique book translated into many languages, which the author considered his main work, the main provisions of the theory of ethnogenesis developed by LN Gumilyov and the doctrine of passionarity are formulated and developed in detail.
“However, with all the achievements of the 20th century, each of us carries within himself nature, which is the content of life, both individual and species. And none of the people, other things being equal, will refuse to breathe and eat, to avoid death and protect their offspring. Man has remained within the limits of the species, within the limits of the biosphere - one of the shells of the planet Earth. Man combines the laws of life inherent in him with the specific phenomena of technology and culture, which, having enriched him, did not deprive him of the complicity of the elements that gave birth to him. "
"Unlike most mammals, Homo sapiens can be called neither a herd animal nor an individual animal. A person exists in a collective, which, depending on the angle of view, is considered either as a society or as an ethnos. To be more precise, each person is at the same time a member of society, and a representative of the nationality, but both of these concepts are incommensurable and lie in different planes, such as length and weight, or the degree of heating and electric charge.
"But at the same time, man differs from other animals in that he makes tools, creating a qualitatively different layer - the technosphere. The works of human hands, both from inert and living matter (tools, works of art, domestic animals, cultivated plants) fall out of the cycle conversions of the biocenosis. They can only either be preserved or, if not mothballed, destroyed. In the latter case, they return to the bosom of nature. A sword thrown into the field, having rusted, turns into iron oxide. A ruined castle becomes a mound. A feral dog becomes a wild animal dingo, and the horse is a mustang. This is the death of things (the technosphere) and the recapture by nature of the material stolen from it. The history of ancient civilizations shows that although nature suffers damage from technology, it ultimately takes its toll, of course, with the exception of those objects that are transformed so much so that they became irreversible.Such are the Paleolithic flint tools, polished slabs in Baalbek, e platforms and plastic products. These are corpses, even mummies, which the biosphere is unable to return to its womb, but the processes of inert matter - chemical and thermal - can return them to their original state in the event that a cosmic catastrophe befalls our planet. Until then, they will be called monuments of civilization, because our technology will someday become a monument."
"Let's imagine that a Russian, a German, a Tatar and a Georgian, all belonging to the Caucasian race, are entering the tram, identically dressed, having dined in the dining room and with the same newspaper under their arms. It is obvious to everyone that they are not identical, even behind subtracting individual characteristics. "So what? one of my opponents once objected to me. - If there is no acute national incident in this tram, all four will calmly move on, being an example of people who have become detached from their ethnic groups.
No, in our opinion, any change in the situation will cause different reactions among these people, even if they act together. Suppose a young man appears on a tram and begins to behave incorrectly towards a lady. How will our characters act? The Georgian, most likely, will grab the offender by the chest and try to throw him out of the tram. The German will frown in disgust and start calling the police. The Russian will say a few sacramental words, and the Tatar will prefer to evade participation in the conflict. A change in the situation, which also requires a change in behavior, makes the difference in stereotypes of behavior among representatives of different ethnic groups especially noticeable."
"But if so, then nature and culture are ruined by free communication and free love!The conclusion is unexpected and frightening, but it is Newton's second law paraphrased: what is gained in public freedom is lost in contact with nature, more precisely, with the geographical environment and one's own physiology, because nature is also inside our bodies."
"WITH The force of the ethnic stereotype of behavior is enormous because the members of the ethnic group perceive it as the only worthy one, and all the others - as "savagery"."
" The answer is simple: racial differences are not decisive, and in general, as a rule, of great importance, while ethnic differences lie in the sphere of behavior. The behavioral stereotype of Christian communities was strictly regulated. The neophyte was obliged to observe it or leave the community. Consequently, already in the second generation, on the basis of Christian consortia, a sub-ethnos was forged, heterozygous, but monolithic, just like in a pagan, or rather, non-religious, empire, the psychological refining of subjects was not carried out. Members of different ethnic groups coexisted within a single society, which collapsed from its own gravity, for even Roman law was powerless before the laws of nature."
" And if so, then the emergence of a new ethnic group is the creation of a new stereotype of behavior that is different from the previous one."
" However, in any case, the settlers are looking for conditions similar to those they are accustomed to in their homeland. The British willingly moved to a country with a temperate climate, especially in the steppes of North America, South Africa and Australia, where you can breed sheep. The tropical regions did not attract them; there they acted mainly in the role of colonial officials and merchants, i.e. people living not at the expense of nature, but at the expense of the local population. This is also migration, but of a completely different nature. The Spaniards colonized areas with a dry and hot climate, leaving tropical forests unattended. They took root well on the Mexican plateau, where they broke the power of the Aztecs, but the Maya in the Yucatan survived in the tropical jungle, having defended their independence in the "war of races" against the government of Mexico. Yakuts of the 11th century. penetrated into the valley of the Lena River and bred horses there, imitating the former life on the banks of Lake Baikal, but they did not encroach on the watershed taiga massifs, leaving them to the Evenks. Russian explorers in the 17th century. passed through the whole of Siberia, but inhabited only the forest-steppe outskirts of the taiga and the banks of the rivers, i.e. landscapes similar to those where their ancestors formed into an ethnos. Similarly, the expanses of the former "Wild Field" in the XVIII-XIX centuries. mastered by the Ukrainians. Even in our time, the Tibetans who left their homeland preferred Norway to flourishing Bengal; they established a colony in Oslo."
" And the beginning of this has already been laid: the concept of "ethnos" as a stable group of individuals, opposing itself to all other similar groups, having an internal structure, in each case unique, and a dynamic stereotype of behavior, has been introduced into the problem of the relationship of a person as a carrier of civilization with the natural environment. It is through ethnic groups that humanity is connected with the natural environment, since the ethnos itself is a natural phenomenon."
" Let's think about whether people need an eternity of vegetation, "without a deity, without inspiration, without tears, without life, without love"?Isn't the best thing about people is the ability to be creative? But after all, it entails an irreplaceable expenditure of the vital energy of the human body."
" Firstly, the monotony of a dull existence reduces the vitality of people so much that there is a tendency to drugs and sexual perversions in order to fill the formed spiritual emptiness."
" For those who have died, be it a microbe or a baobab, a person or a fetus, time disappears, but all the organisms of the biosphere are connected to each other. And the departure of one is a loss for many, because this is the victory of the eternal enemy of life - Chronos. To come to terms with the loss means to give up positions, and against Death rises the Memory - the barrier to the entropy of not being, but consciousness. It is memory that divides time into past, present and future, of which only the past is real.
In fact, the present is only a moment that instantly becomes the past. There is no future, because actions that determine certain consequences have not been committed, and it is not known whether they will be committed. The future can only be calculated statistically, with a margin of no practical value. And the past exists; and everything that exists is the past, since any accomplishment immediately becomes the past. That is why the science of history studies the only reality that exists outside of us and apart from us.".
" Passionarity can manifest itself in a variety of character traits, with equal ease giving rise to feats and crimes, creation, good and evil, but leaving no room for inaction and calm indifference."
" Passionarity has an important property: it is contagious. This means that people who are harmonious (and to an even greater extent, impulsive), being in close proximity to passionaries, begin to behave as if they were passionate."
" No matter how great the role of passionaries in ethnogenesis, their number in the composition of an ethnos is always negligible. After all, we call passionaries in the full sense of the word people in whom this impulse is stronger than the instinct for self-preservation, both individual and species. In the vast majority of normal individuals, both of these impulses are balanced, which creates a harmonious personality, intellectually complete, efficient, accommodating, but not overactive. Moreover, the unrestrained burning of another person, unthinkable without passionary self-sacrifice, is alien and antipathetic to such people. To this it must be added that in the developing ethnic groups, the majority of individuals have the same weak passionarity as in the relic ethnic groups. The only difference is that in the dynamic ethnoi there are and are passionate people who invest their excess energy in the development of their system.
However, it should be noted that the intensity of development is not always beneficial to the ethnos. "Overheating" is possible, when passionarity gets out of control of rational expediency and turns from a creative force into a destructive one. Then harmonious individuals turn out to be the saviors of their ethnic groups, but also to a certain limit."
" The layman, as a rule, is devoid of imagination.He cannot and does not want to imagine that there are people who are not like him, driven by other ideals and not striving for other goals than money. The concept of immediate benefit has never been precisely formulated, because then its absurdity would become obvious, but as a matter of course it appears in reasoning on any occasion and even in scientific constructions, which is why it requires attention."
" The percentage of people who are harmonious and subpassionate is growing, reducing or even nullifying the efforts of creative and patriotic people, who are beginning to be called "fanatics". It is the lack of internal support of "ours" that determines the death of ethnic groups from a few, but passionate opponents. "Be afraid of the indifferent," said the writer of the 20th century before his death."
"Conventional designations: 1 - ordinary people, 2 - vagrant soldiers; 3 - criminals; 4 - ambitious people; 5 - business people; 6 - adventurers; 7 - learned people; 8 - creative people; 9 - prophets; 10 - non-possessors; 11 - contemplatives: 12 - tempters."
"All people have a strange attraction to truth (the desire to make an adequate representation of the subject), beauty (what one likes without prejudice) and justice (corresponding to morality and ethics). This attraction varies greatly in the strength of its impulse and is always limited by the constantly acting "reasonable egoism", but in a number of cases it turns out to be more powerful and leads the individual to death no less steadily than passionarity. It is, as it were, an analogue of passionarity in the sphere of consciousness and, therefore, has the same sign. Let's call it "attractiveness" (from Latin attractio, ionis, f. - attraction).
The nature of attractiveness is unclear, as well as the nature of consciousness, but its correspondence with the instinctive impulses of self-preservation and with passionarity is the same as in a boat the ratio of the engine (oar or motor) and rudder. Equally correlated with them is "reasonable egoism" - the antipode of attractiveness."
"" DUSK " ETHNOS
A distinctive feature of "civilization" is the reduction of the active element and the complete contentment of the emotionally passive and industrious population. However, one should not omit the third option - the presence of people who are both uncreative and unhardworking, emotionally and mentally handicapped, but with increased demands on life. In heroic epochs of growth and self-manifestation, these individuals have little chance of surviving. They are bad soldiers, no workers, and the path of crime in severe times quickly led to the scaffold. But in the mild time of civilization, with the general material abundance, there is an extra piece of bread and a woman for everyone. "Cheerful" (may the neologism be forgiven the author) begin to multiply without restrictions and, since they are individuals of a new warehouse, create their own imperative: "Be like us," i.e. do not strive for anything that cannot be eaten or drunk. Any growth becomes an odious phenomenon, diligence is ridiculed, intellectual joys cause rage. In art there is a decline in style, in science original works are supplanted by compilations, in public life corruption is legalized, in the army soldiers keep officers and generals in submission, threatening them with rebellions. Everything is corrupt, no one can be trusted, no one can be relied upon, and in order to rule, the ruler must use the tactics of a robber chieftain: suspect, hunt down and kill his associates.
In fact, even for the preservation of the family and the upbringing of children, quite different qualities are needed than those that have been so carefully cultivated; otherwise, children will deal with their parents as soon as it suits them. So, after the onset of the triumph of obscuration, its carriers disappear like smoke, and the descendants of the original carriers of the static state that have survived from all the troubles remain, who, in the ruins, again begin to teach their children to live quietly, avoiding conflicts with neighbors and with each other. Anatomically and physiologically, they are full-fledged people who have adapted to the landscape, but they have so little passionary tension that the process of development of ethnic groups does not go on. Even when a passionate individual is accidentally born among them, she seeks employment not in her homeland, but among her neighbors (for example, the Albanians made a career either in Venice or in Constantinople). Two possibilities arise here: either the survivors eke out a miserable existence as a relic ethnic group, or they fall into the furnace of remelting and, under certain favorable conditions, a new ethnic group is melted out of several fragments, only vaguely remembering its origin, because for it the date of its new birth is much more important. . And again, the process goes through the same stages, if it is not accidentally interrupted by an outside influence.
There are fewer illustrative examples to illustrate the obscuration phase than for other stages. The peoples of Europe, both Western and Eastern, are not so old as to fall into a state of insanity. We must therefore turn to antiquity for examples."
"We are not alone in the world! Close Cosmos takes part in the protection of nature, and our business is not to spoil it. She is not only our home, she is ourselves.
For the sake of this thesis, a treatise was written, which is now completed. I dedicate it to the great cause of protecting the natural environment from anti-systems."
In which the necessity of ethnology is substantiated and the author's view of ethnogenesis is stated, without the argumentation to which the rest of the treatise is devoted, where the author will lead the reader through a labyrinth of contradictions
Fear of disappointment
When a reader of our time buys and opens a new book on history or ethnography, he is not sure that he will read it even to the middle. The book may seem boring, meaningless, or simply not to his taste. But the reader is still good: he just lost two or three rubles, but what about the author? Collections of information. Formulation of the problem. Decades of searching for a solution. Years at the desk. Explanations with reviewers. Fight with the editor. And suddenly all for nothing - the book is uninteresting! It lies in libraries ... and no one takes it. So life has been wasted.
It is so terrible that it is necessary to take all measures to avoid such a result. But what? During his studies at the university and in graduate school, the future author is often inspired with the idea that his task is to write out as many quotations from sources as possible, put them in any order and conclude: in ancient times there were slave owners and slaves. The slave owners were bad, but they were good; the slaves were good, but they were bad. And the peasants fared worse.
All this, of course, is correct, but the trouble is that no one wants to read about it, even the author himself. Firstly, because it is already known, and secondly, because it does not explain, for example, why some armies won victories while others suffered defeat, and why some countries strengthened while others weakened. And, finally, why mighty ethnic groups arose and where did they disappear, although there was certainly no complete extinction of their members.
All of the above questions are entirely related to the topic we have chosen - the sudden strengthening of a particular people and its subsequent disappearance. A vivid example of this is the Mongols of the 12th-17th centuries, but other peoples also obeyed the same pattern. The late academician B. Ya. Vladimirtsov clearly formulated the problem: “I want to understand how and why all this happened?”, but he did not give an answer, like other researchers. But we return to this plot again and again, firmly believing that the reader will not close the book on the second page.
It is quite clear that in order to solve the set problem, we must first of all investigate the research methodology itself. Otherwise, this task would have been solved long ago, because the number of facts is so numerous that we are not talking about their replenishment, but about the selection of those that are relevant to the case. Even contemporary chroniclers were drowning in a sea of information that did not bring them closer to understanding the problem. Over the past centuries, archaeologists have obtained a lot of information, chronicles have been collected, published and accompanied by comments, and Orientalists have further increased their stock of knowledge by codifying various sources: Chinese, Persian, Latin, Greek, Armenian and Arabic. The amount of information grew, but did not pass into a new quality. It still remained unclear how a small tribe sometimes became the hegemon of half the world, then increased in number, and then disappeared.
The author of this book raised the question of the degree of our knowledge, or rather, ignorance of the subject to which the study is devoted. What at first glance is simple and easy, when trying to master the plots that interest the reader, turns into a riddle. Therefore, a detailed book needs to be written. Unfortunately, we cannot immediately offer precise definitions (which, generally speaking, greatly facilitate research), but at least we are in a position to make initial generalizations. Even if they do not exhaust the whole complexity of the problem, but in the first approximation they will make it possible to obtain results that are quite suitable for interpreting the ethnic history that has yet to be written. Well, if there is a fastidious reviewer who demands to give a clear definition of the concept of “ethnos” at the beginning of the book, then we can say this: ethnos is a phenomenon of the biosphere, or a system integrity of a discrete type, working on the geobiochemical energy of living matter, in accordance with the principle of the second law of thermodynamics , which is confirmed by the diachronic sequence of historical events. If this is enough for understanding, then you can not read the book further.
Ethnoi as a form of existence of the species homo sapiens
For more than a hundred years, discussions have been going on: is the biological species of Homo sapiens changing, or have social patterns completely replaced the mechanism of action of species-forming factors? Common to man and all other living beings is the need to exchange matter and energy with the environment, but he differs from them in that he has to obtain almost all the means of subsistence necessary for him by labor, interacting with nature not only as a biological, but above all as a social being. . The conditions and means, the productive forces and the relations of production corresponding to them are constantly developing. The patterns of this development are studied by Marxist political economy and sociology.
However, the social laws of human development do not “cancel” the action of biological laws, in particular mutations, and it is necessary to study them in order to avoid theoretical one-sidedness and practical harm that we inflict on ourselves by ignoring or deliberately denying our subordination not only to social, but also to more general patterns of development.
Methodologically, such a study can be started on the basis of a deliberate abstraction from specific methods of production. Such an abstraction seems justified, in particular, because the nature of ethnogenesis differs significantly from the rhythms of the development of the social history of mankind. With this method of consideration, we hope, the contours of the mechanism of interaction between mankind and nature will become clearer.
No matter how advanced technology is, people get everything they need to sustain life from nature. This means that they enter the trophic chain as the upper, final link in the biocenosis of the region inhabited by them. And if so, then they are elements of structural and systemic integrity, which include, along with people, domestic animals (domestic animals and cultivated plants), landscapes, both transformed by man and virgin, subsoil wealth, relationships with neighbors - or friendly or hostile, this or that dynamics of social development, as well as this or that combination of languages (from one to several) and elements of material and spiritual culture. This dynamic system can be called an ethnocenosis. It arises and crumbles in historical time, leaving behind monuments of human activity, devoid of self-development and capable of only collapsing, and ethnic relics that have reached the phase of homeostasis. But each process of ethnogenesis leaves indelible traces on the body of the earth's surface, thanks to which it is possible to establish the general nature of the patterns of ethnic history. And now, when the salvation of nature from destructive anthropogenic impacts has become the main problem of science, it is necessary to understand which aspects of human activity were detrimental to landscapes containing ethnic groups. After all, the destruction of nature with disastrous consequences for people is not only a misfortune of our time, and it is not always associated with the development of culture, as well as with population growth.
Raising the question of the interaction of two forms of regular development, it is necessary to agree on an aspect. We can talk about either the development of the biosphere in connection with human activity, or the development of mankind in connection with the formation of the natural environment: the biosphere and the bone substance that makes up the other shells of the Earth: the lithosphere and troposphere. The interaction of mankind with nature is constant, but extremely variable both in space and in time. However, behind the apparent diversity lies a single principle that is characteristic of all observed phenomena. So let's put the question this way!
Lev Gumilyov
Ethnogenesis and biosphere of the Earth
Dedicated to my wife Natalia Viktorovna
Introduction
What will be discussed and why this is important,
In which the necessity of ethnology is substantiated and the author's view of ethnogenesis is stated, without the argumentation to which the rest of the treatise is devoted, where the author will lead the reader through a labyrinth of contradictions
Fear of disappointment
When a reader of our time buys and opens a new book on history or ethnography, he is not sure that he will read it even to the middle. The book may seem boring, meaningless, or simply not to his taste. But the reader is still good: he just lost two or three rubles, but what about the author? Collections of information. Formulation of the problem. Decades of searching for a solution. Years at the desk. Explanations with reviewers. Fight with the editor. And suddenly all for nothing - the book is uninteresting! It lies in libraries ... and no one takes it. So life has been wasted.
It is so terrible that it is necessary to take all measures to avoid such a result. But what? During his studies at the university and in graduate school, the future author is often inspired with the idea that his task is to write out as many quotations from sources as possible, put them in any order and conclude: in ancient times there were slave owners and slaves. The slave owners were bad, but they were good; the slaves were good, but they were bad. And the peasants fared worse.
All this, of course, is correct, but the trouble is that no one wants to read about it, even the author himself. Firstly, because it is already known, and secondly, because it does not explain, for example, why some armies won victories while others suffered defeat, and why some countries strengthened while others weakened. And, finally, why mighty ethnic groups arose and where did they disappear, although there was certainly no complete extinction of their members.
All of the above questions are entirely related to the topic we have chosen - the sudden strengthening of a particular people and its subsequent disappearance. A vivid example of this is the Mongols of the 12th-17th centuries, but other peoples also obeyed the same pattern. The late academician B. Ya. Vladimirtsov clearly formulated the problem: “I want to understand how and why all this happened?”, but he did not give an answer, like other researchers. But we return to this plot again and again, firmly believing that the reader will not close the book on the second page.
It is quite clear that in order to solve the set problem, we must first of all investigate the research methodology itself. Otherwise, this task would have been solved long ago, because the number of facts is so numerous that we are not talking about their replenishment, but about the selection of those that are relevant to the case. Even contemporary chroniclers were drowning in a sea of information that did not bring them closer to understanding the problem. Over the past centuries, archaeologists have obtained a lot of information, chronicles have been collected, published and accompanied by comments, and Orientalists have further increased their stock of knowledge by codifying various sources: Chinese, Persian, Latin, Greek, Armenian and Arabic. The amount of information grew, but did not pass into a new quality. It still remained unclear how a small tribe sometimes became the hegemon of half the world, then increased in number, and then disappeared.
The author of this book raised the question of the degree of our knowledge, or rather, ignorance of the subject to which the study is devoted. What at first glance is simple and easy, when trying to master the plots that interest the reader, turns into a riddle. Therefore, a detailed book needs to be written. Unfortunately, we cannot immediately offer precise definitions (which, generally speaking, greatly facilitate research), but at least we are in a position to make initial generalizations. Even if they do not exhaust the whole complexity of the problem, but in the first approximation they will make it possible to obtain results that are quite suitable for interpreting the ethnic history that has yet to be written. Well, if there is a fastidious reviewer who demands to give a clear definition of the concept of “ethnos” at the beginning of the book, then we can say this: ethnos is a phenomenon of the biosphere, or a systemic integrity of a discrete type, working on the geobiochemical energy of living matter, in accordance with the principle of the second law of thermodynamics , which is confirmed by the diachronic sequence of historical events. If this is enough for understanding, then you can not read the book further.
Ethnoi as a form of existence of the species homo sapiens
For more than a hundred years, discussions have been going on: is the biological species of Homo sapiens changing, or have social patterns completely replaced the mechanism of action of species-forming factors? Common to man and all other living beings is the need to exchange matter and energy with the environment, but he differs from them in that he has to obtain almost all the means of subsistence necessary for him by labor, interacting with nature not only as a biological, but above all as a social being. . The conditions and means, the productive forces and the relations of production corresponding to them are constantly developing. The patterns of this development are studied by Marxist political economy and sociology.
However, the social laws of human development do not “cancel” the action of biological laws, in particular mutations, and it is necessary to study them in order to avoid theoretical one-sidedness and practical harm that we inflict on ourselves by ignoring or deliberately denying our subordination not only to social, but also to more general patterns of development.
Methodologically, such a study can be started on the basis of a deliberate abstraction from specific methods of production. Such an abstraction seems justified, in particular, because the nature of ethnogenesis differs significantly from the rhythms of the development of the social history of mankind. With this method of consideration, we hope, the contours of the mechanism of interaction between mankind and nature will become clearer.
No matter how advanced technology is, people get everything they need to sustain life from nature. This means that they enter the trophic chain as the upper, final link in the biocenosis of the region inhabited by them. And if so, then they are elements of structural and systemic integrity, which include, along with people, domestic animals (domestic animals and cultivated plants), landscapes, both transformed by man and virgin, subsoil wealth, relationships with neighbors - or friendly or hostile, this or that dynamics of social development, as well as this or that combination of languages (from one to several) and elements of material and spiritual culture. This dynamic system can be called an ethnocenosis. It arises and crumbles in historical time, leaving behind monuments of human activity, devoid of self-development and capable of only collapsing, and ethnic relics that have reached the phase of homeostasis. But each process of ethnogenesis leaves indelible traces on the body of the earth's surface, thanks to which it is possible to establish the general nature of the patterns of ethnic history. And now, when the salvation of nature from the destructive
"Eksmo"
"Ethnogenesis and biosphere of the Earth": Eksmo; Moscow; 2007
ISBN 5-699-20331-1
annotation
The famous treatise "Ethnogenesis and the Biosphere of the Earth" is the fundamental work of the outstanding Russian historian, geographer and philosopher Lev Nikolaevich Gumilyov, devoted to the problem of the emergence and relationships of ethnic groups on Earth. Exploring the dynamics of the movement of peoples, in search of their historical identity, entering into conflicts with the environment, Gumilyov collected and processed a huge amount of scientific and cultural data. In this unique book translated into many languages, which the author considered his main work, the main provisions of the theory of ethnogenesis developed by LN Gumilyov and the doctrine of passionarity are formulated and developed in detail.
Lev Gumilyov
Ethnogenesis and biosphere of the Earth
Dedicated to my wife Natalia Viktorovna
Introduction
What will be discussed and why this is important,
In which the necessity of ethnology is substantiated and the author's view of ethnogenesis is stated, without the argumentation to which the rest of the treatise is devoted, where the author will lead the reader through a labyrinth of contradictions
Fear of disappointment
When a reader of our time buys and opens a new book on history or ethnography, he is not sure that he will read it even to the middle. The book may seem boring, meaningless, or simply not to his taste. But the reader is still good: he just lost two or three rubles, but what about the author? Collections of information. Formulation of the problem. Decades of searching for a solution. Years at the desk. Explanations with reviewers. Fight with the editor. And suddenly all for nothing - the book is uninteresting! It lies in libraries ... and no one takes it. So life has been wasted.
It is so terrible that it is necessary to take all measures to avoid such a result. But what? During his studies at the university and in graduate school, the future author is often inspired with the idea that his task is to write out as many quotations from sources as possible, put them in any order and conclude: in ancient times there were slave owners and slaves. The slave owners were bad, but they were good; the slaves were good, but they were bad. And the peasants fared worse.
All this, of course, is correct, but the trouble is that no one wants to read about it, even the author himself. Firstly, because it is already known, and secondly, because it does not explain, for example, why some armies won victories while others suffered defeat, and why some countries strengthened while others weakened. And, finally, why mighty ethnic groups arose and where did they disappear, although there was certainly no complete extinction of their members.
All of the above questions are entirely related to the topic we have chosen - the sudden strengthening of a particular people and its subsequent disappearance. A vivid example of this is the Mongols of the 12th-17th centuries, but other peoples also obeyed the same pattern. The late academician B. Ya. Vladimirtsov clearly formulated the problem: “I want to understand how and why all this happened?”, but he did not give an answer, like other researchers. But we return to this plot again and again, firmly believing that the reader will not close the book on the second page.
It is quite clear that in order to solve the set problem, we must first of all investigate the research methodology itself. Otherwise, this task would have been solved long ago, because the number of facts is so numerous that we are not talking about their replenishment, but about the selection of those that are relevant to the case. Even contemporary chroniclers were drowning in a sea of information that did not bring them closer to understanding the problem. Over the past centuries, archaeologists have obtained a lot of information, chronicles have been collected, published and accompanied by comments, and Orientalists have further increased their stock of knowledge by codifying various sources: Chinese, Persian, Latin, Greek, Armenian and Arabic. The amount of information grew, but did not pass into a new quality. It still remained unclear how a small tribe sometimes became the hegemon of half the world, then increased in number, and then disappeared.
The author of this book raised the question of the degree of our knowledge, or rather, ignorance of the subject to which the study is devoted. What at first glance is simple and easy, when trying to master the plots that interest the reader, turns into a riddle. Therefore, a detailed book needs to be written. Unfortunately, we cannot immediately offer precise definitions (which, generally speaking, greatly facilitate research), but at least we are in a position to make initial generalizations. Even if they do not exhaust the whole complexity of the problem, but in the first approximation they will make it possible to obtain results that are quite suitable for interpreting the ethnic history that has yet to be written. Well, if there is a fastidious reviewer who demands to give a clear definition of the concept of “ethnos” at the beginning of the book, then we can say this: ethnos is a phenomenon of the biosphere, or a system integrity of a discrete type, working on the geobiochemical energy of living matter, in accordance with the principle of the second law of thermodynamics , which is confirmed by the diachronic sequence of historical events. If this is enough for understanding, then you can not read the book further.
Ethnoi as a form of existence of the species homo sapiens
For more than a hundred years, discussions have been going on: is the biological species of Homo sapiens changing, or have social patterns completely replaced the mechanism of action of species-forming factors? Common to man and all other living beings is the need to exchange matter and energy with the environment, but he differs from them in that he has to obtain almost all the means of subsistence necessary for him by labor, interacting with nature not only as a biological, but above all as a social being. . The conditions and means, the productive forces and the relations of production corresponding to them are constantly developing. The patterns of this development are studied by Marxist political economy and sociology.
However, the social laws of human development do not “cancel” the action of biological laws, in particular mutations, and it is necessary to study them in order to avoid theoretical one-sidedness and practical harm that we inflict on ourselves by ignoring or deliberately denying our subordination not only to social, but also to more general patterns of development.
Methodologically, such a study can be started on the basis of a deliberate abstraction from specific methods of production. Such an abstraction seems justified, in particular, because the nature of ethnogenesis differs significantly from the rhythms of the development of the social history of mankind. With this method of consideration, we hope, the contours of the mechanism of interaction between mankind and nature will become clearer.
No matter how advanced technology is, people get everything they need to sustain life from nature. This means that they enter the trophic chain as the upper, final link in the biocenosis of the region inhabited by them. And if so, then they are elements of structural and systemic integrity, which include, along with people, domestic animals (domestic animals and cultivated plants), landscapes, both transformed by man and virgin, subsoil wealth, relationships with neighbors - or friendly or hostile, this or that dynamics of social development, as well as this or that combination of languages (from one to several) and elements of material and spiritual culture. This dynamic system can be called an ethnocenosis. It arises and crumbles in historical time, leaving behind monuments of human activity, devoid of self-development and capable of only collapsing, and ethnic relics that have reached the phase of homeostasis. But each process of ethnogenesis leaves indelible traces on the body of the earth's surface, thanks to which it is possible to establish the general nature of the patterns of ethnic history. And now, when the salvation of nature from destructive anthropogenic impacts has become the main problem of science, it is necessary to understand which aspects of human activity were detrimental to landscapes containing ethnic groups. After all, the destruction of nature with disastrous consequences for people is not only a misfortune of our time, and it is not always associated with the development of culture, as well as with population growth.
Raising the question of the interaction of two forms of regular development, it is necessary to agree on an aspect. We can talk about either the development of the biosphere in connection with human activity, or the development of mankind in connection with the formation of the natural environment: the biosphere and the bone substance that makes up the other shells of the Earth: the lithosphere and troposphere. The interaction of mankind with nature is constant, but extremely variable both in space and in time. However, behind the apparent diversity lies a single principle that is characteristic of all observed phenomena. So let's put the question this way!
The nature of the Earth is very diverse; humanity, unlike other species of mammals, is also diverse, because a person does not have a natural range, but is distributed, starting from the Upper Paleolithic, throughout the land of the planet. The adaptive abilities of humans are an order of magnitude greater than those of other animals. This means that in different geographical regions and in different eras, people and natural complexes (landscapes and geobiocenoses) interact differently. By itself, this conclusion is unpromising, since the kaleidoscope is not amenable to research, but let's try to introduce a classification into the problem ... and everything will be different. There is a constant correlation between the laws of nature and the social form of the movement of matter. But what is its mechanism and where is the point of contact between nature and society? But this point exists, otherwise the question of protecting nature from man would not arise.
S. V. Kalesnik proposed to divide geography into: 1) economic, studying the creations of people, and 2) physical, studying the natural shells of the Earth, including the biosphere. A very reasonable division. Nature creates what we cannot create: mountains and rivers, forests and steppes, new species of animals and plants. And people build houses, build cars, sculpt statues and write treatises. Nature cannot do this.
Is there a fundamental difference between the creations of nature and man? Yes! Elements of nature pass into each other ... "This stone roared once, this ivy soared in the clouds." Nature lives forever, swelling with the energy that it receives from the Sun and the stars of our Galaxy and radio decay in the depths of our planet. The biosphere of the planet Earth overcomes the world entropy by means of the biogenic migration of atoms seeking to expand. Conversely, objects created by man can either be preserved or destroyed. Pyramids stand for a long time, the Eiffel Tower will not stand for so long. But neither one nor the other is eternal. This is the fundamental difference between the biosphere and the technosphere, no matter how grandiose the latter may have acquired.
Subject of study
A review of the current state of the science of ethnos should plunge the reader into bewilderment. All who write to. this topic, the authors, including ethnographers, essentially replace the true ethnological characteristics with professional, class, etc., which, in fact, is tantamount to denying the ethnos as a reality. The only thing that speaks about the existence of an ethnos is that it is directly felt by people as a phenomenon (phenomenon), but this is not proof. The poet said: "Both day and night the sun walks before us, but the stubborn Galileo is right." Indeed, the ethnologist has some grounds for pessimism, which at first glance seem insurmountable.
Ethnology is an emerging science. The need for it arose only in the second half of the 20th century, when it became clear that the simple accumulation of ethnographic collections and observations threatens that science, which does not pose problems, will turn into meaningless collecting. And so social science and ethnology arose before our eyes - two disciplines that are interested in one, at first glance, subject - humanity, but in completely different aspects. And this is natural. Each person is simultaneously a member of society and a member of an ethnic group, and this is far from the same thing. Similarly, ethnology as a science requires a definition. Let's say for now that ethnology is the science of the impulses of the behavior of ethnic groups, similar to ethology, the science of the behavior of animals. Impulses can be conscious and emotional, dictated by the personal will of the individual, tradition, the coercive influence of the collective, the influence of the external environment, the geographical environment, and even spontaneous development, the progressive course of history. In order to understand such a complex issue, an appropriate methodology is needed. The methodology can be either the traditional methodology of the humanities or the natural sciences. Which one should be chosen to successfully overcome the difficulties that arise before a scientist who has taken on an entirely new field of science?
First of all, let's clarify the concept humanitarian sciences". In the Middle Ages in Christendom, the only absolutely authoritative source scientific information There were two books: the Bible and the writings of Aristotle. Science was reduced to commenting on quotations, which had to be quoted exactly, because illiterate heresiarchs often invented supposedly quoted sayings of the prophets, Christ and Aristotle. From this arose a system of references to the text, which has survived to this day. This stage of science was called scholasticism, and by the 15th century. it ceased to satisfy scientists. Then the range of sources was expanded - the works of other ancient authors were involved, the texts of which needed verification. This is how the humanitarian (that is, human, not divine) science arose - philology, which differs from scholasticism in its critical approach to texts. But the source was still the same - other people's words. After the Renaissance, major naturalists opposed natural science, based on observation of nature and experiment, to the humanitarian methods of obtaining information. The formulation of the question has changed: instead of “what did the ancient authors say?” trying to find out "what is really there?". As you can see, not the subject of study has changed, but the approach and, accordingly, the methodology.
The new technique won recognition slowly and unevenly. Back in 1633, Galileo had to renounce that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and his opponents appealed to the fact that there was no such information in the literature known to them. In the XVIII century. Lavoisier, at a meeting of the French Academy of Sciences, declared “anti-scientific” the message about the fall of a meteorite: “Stones from the sky cannot fall, because there are no stones in the sky!”. Geography in the 19th century got rid of legends about Amazons, hairy people, giant octopuses sinking ships, and other fiction that readers, who were on a philistine level, took literally. It was hardest of all for historians, who could neither experiment nor repeat the observation. But here the monistic approach came to the rescue, which made it possible to carry out criticism of the source, both comparative and internal. Thanks to many painstaking studies, codes of indisputable facts with chronological references were compiled, and part of the dubious information was rejected. This huge wealth of knowledge can be useful only when it is applied to a specific object, whether it be social communities - classes, or political entities - states, or ethnic groups that interest us.
