The emergence of the Cossacks in Russia. Where did the Don Cossacks come from

Probably not a single Russian ethnic group, there are so many fictions, legends, lies and fairy tales - as about the Cossacks.
Their very origin, existence, role in history - serves as an object of all kinds of political speculation and pseudo-historical machinations.

Let's try calmly, without emotions and cheap tricks, to figure out who the Cossacks are, where they came from, and what they are today ...

In the summer of 965, the Russian prince Svyatoslav Igorevich moved his troops to Khazaria.
The Khazar army (reinforced by detachments of various Caucasian tribes), together with their kagan, came out to meet him.

By that time, the Russians had already defeated the Khazars more than once - for example, under the command of the Prophetic Oleg.
But Svyatoslav put the question differently. He decided to eliminate Khazaria completely, without a trace.
This man was not like today's rulers of Russia. Svyatoslav set himself global tasks, acted decisively, quickly, without delay, hesitation and looking back at someone's opinion.

The troops of the Khazar Khaganate were defeated and the Russians approached the capital of Khazaria, Sharkil (known as Sarkel in Greek-Byzantine historical documents), located on the banks of the Don.
Sharkil was built under the guidance of Byzantine engineers and was a serious fortress. But apparently the Khazars did not expect that the Russians would move deep into the Khazars, and therefore they were poorly prepared for defense. Speed ​​and onslaught did their job - Sharkil was taken and defeated.
However, Svyatoslav appreciated the advantageous location of the city - therefore he ordered the foundation of a Russian fortress on this place.
The name Sharkil (or, in Greek pronunciation Sarkel), in translation means " White House". The Russians, without further ado, simply translated this name into their own language. This is how the Russian city of Belaya Vezha was born.

Aerial photograph of the former Belaya Vezha fortress, taken in 1951. Now this territory is flooded with the waters of the Tsimlyansk reservoir.

Having passed the entire North Caucasus with fire and sword, Prince Svyatoslav achieved his goal - the Khazar Khaganate was destroyed.
Having conquered Dagestan, Svyatoslav moved his troops to the Black Sea.
There, on a part of the Kuban and the Crimea, there was an ancient Bosporan kingdom, which fell into decay and fell under the rule of the Khazars. Among others, there was a city there, which the Greeks called Hermonassa, the Turkic nomadic tribes - Tumentarkhan, and the Khazars - Samkerts.
Having conquered these lands, Svyatoslav transferred a certain amount of the Russian population there.
In particular, Germonassa (Tumentarkhan, Samkerts), turned into the Russian city of Tmutarakan (modern Taman, in the Krasnodar Territory).

Modern excavations in Tmutarakan (Taman). 2008

At the same time, taking advantage of the fact that the Khazar danger had disappeared, Russian merchants founded the Oleshye fortress (modern Tsyurupinsk, Kherson region) at the mouth of the Dnieper.

So Russian settlers appeared on the Don, Kuban and in the lower reaches of the Dnieper.

Exclaves Oleshye, Belaya Vezha, and Tmutarakan on the map of the Old Russian state of the 11th century.

Subsequently, when Russia broke up into different principalities, the Tmutarakan principality became one of the strongest.
The princes of Tmutarakan took an active part in the inter-princely civil strife of Russia, and also pursued an active expansionist policy. For example, in alliance with the North Caucasian tribes dependent on Tmutarakan, they organized, one after the other, three campaigns against Shirvan (Azerbaijan).
That is, Tmutarakan was not just a remote fortress on the edge of the Russian world. It's been enough Big City, the capital of an independent, and sufficiently strong principality.

However, over time, the situation in the southern steppes began to change for the worse for the Russians.
In place of the defeated and destroyed Khazars (and their allies), in the deserted steppes, new nomads began to penetrate - the Pechenegs (ancestors of the modern Gagauz). At first little by little - then more and more actively (does this remind contemporaries of anything? ..). Year after year, step by step, Tmutarakan, Belaya Vezha and Oleshye were cut off from the main territory of Russia.
Their geopolitical situation has become more complicated.

And then, the Pechenegs were replaced by much more militant, numerous and wild nomads, who in Russia were called Polovtsy. In Europe they were called Cumans, or Comans. In the Caucasus - Kipchaks, or Kypchaks.
And these people have always called themselves and still call themselves - COSSACKS.

Take an interest in how the republic is CORRECTLY called today, which we, Russians, know as Kazakhstan.
For those who do not know, I explain - KAZAKHSTAN.
And the Kazakhs themselves are called - COSSACKS. We call them Kazakhs.

Here on the map - the territory of the Kazakh (Polovtsian, Kypchak) nomad camps, at the end of the XI - beginning of the XII centuries.

The territory of modern Kazakhstan (correctly - Kazakhstan)

Cut off by nomads from the main territory of Russia, Oleshye and Belaya Vezha began to gradually decline, and the Tmutarakan principality eventually recognized the sovereignty of Byzantium over itself.
It should be especially taken into account that in that era, no more than 10% of the total population lived in cities. The bulk of the population, even in the most developed states at that time, consisted of peasants. Therefore, the desolation of cities did not entail the death of the entire population, cleanly - especially since none of the nomadic peoples ever set a goal to arrange genocide for Russians.
Russians, as an ethnic group, on the Don, Kuban, Dnieper (especially in remote, secluded places) never completely disappeared - although of course they mixed with different nations and partly adopted their customs.

Plus, it should be borne in mind that the Pechenegs and Polovtsy sometimes drove into slavery the inhabitants of the border Russian lands - and mixed with them.
And later, having become relatively civilized, the Polovtsy began to slowly adopt Orthodoxy, concluded various agreements with the Russians. For example, Prince Igor (whom "The Tale of Igor's Campaign" tells about) was helped to escape from captivity by a baptized Polovtsian named Ovrul.

A certain number of Russian vagabonds, people with a dubious past - always flowed in thin streams into the Polovtsian steppes. There, the fugitives tried to settle in an area where a certain number of Russians were present.
Such an escape was facilitated by the fact that it did not require knowledge of the road - it was enough just to go along the Don, or Dnieper.

It certainly didn't happen in one day. But as they say, a drop wears away a stone.

Gradually, there were so many such marginal vagabonds that they began to allow themselves organized attacks on some areas. For example, In 1159 (note - it was still PRE-MONGOLIAN period) Oleshya was attacked by a strong detachment of such vagabonds (at that time they were called "berladniks", or "wanderers"; as they called themselves - it is not known) who captured the city and caused serious damage to merchant trade. Kyiv prince Rostislav Mstislavovich, as well as governors Georgy Nesterovich and Yakun, were forced to go down the Dnieper with a navy in order to return Oleshye to princely power ...

Of course, that part of the Polovtsians who roamed east of the Volga (in the region of modern Kazakhstan) had contact with the Russians to a much lesser extent, and therefore better preserved their national features ...

In 1222, on the eastern borders of the Polovtsian nomad camps, immeasurably wilder and more formidable conquerors appeared - the Mongols.
By that time, relations between the Polovtsy and the Russians were already such that the Polovtsy called the Russians for help.

On May 31, 1223, the Battle of the Kalka River (modern Donetsk region) took place between the Mongols and the combined Russian-Polovtsian forces. Due to disagreements and rivalry between the princes, the battle was lost.
However, then, the Mongols, tired of a long and difficult campaign, turned back. And for 13 years nothing was heard about them ...

And in 1237 they returned. And everything was remembered to the Polovtsy, who were staged a uniform genocide.
If on the territory of modern Kazakhstan, the Mongols treated the Polovtsy relatively tolerantly (and therefore the Polovtsy, they are Kazakhs, survived as a nation), then in the southern Russian steppes, between the Volga, Don and Dnieper, the Polovtsy underwent a total massacre.
At the same time, the events that took place had little to do with the Russians (all these vagrants-berladniks), because such vagrants lived mainly in hard-to-reach places, which were simply uninteresting to nomads - for example, in floodplains, on islands, among swamps, floodplain thickets ...

One more detail should be noted: after the invasion of Russia, the Mongols themselves sometimes resettled a certain number of Russian people in places where there were important roads and crossings. These people were given certain benefits - and the settlers, in turn, were required to maintain roads and crossings in good condition.
It happened that Russian peasants were resettled in some fertile area so that they would cultivate the land there. Or they didn’t even resettle, but simply gave benefits and protected them from harassment. In return, the peasants supplied a certain part of the harvest to the Mongol khans.

Below I give verbatim an excerpt from the 15th chapter, the book "Journey to the Eastern Countries of Wilhelm de Rubruck
in the summer of Goodness 1253. Message from William de Rubruck, Louis IX, King of France.

“So with great difficulty we wandered from camp to camp, so that not many days before the feast of the blessed Mary Magdalene we reached the great river Tanaida, which separates Asia from Europe, like the river of Egypt Asia from Africa. In the place where we landed, Batu and Sartach ordered to arrange on the eastern coast a village (sasale) of Russians who transport ambassadors and merchants in boats. They first transported us, and then carts, placing one wheel on one barge, and the other on another; they moved, tying the barges to each other and so rowing. There our guide acted very stupidly. It was he who thought that they should give us horses from the village and let go on the other side of the animals that we brought with us to return to their owners; and when we demanded animals from the inhabitants village, they replied that they had a privilege from Batu, namely: they were not obliged to do anything, but to transport those traveling back and forth. Even from merchants they receive a large tribute. So there, on the river bank, we stood for three days . On the first day they gave us a large fresh fish - chebak (borbotam), on the second day - rye bread and some meat, which the village manager collected, like a sacrifice, in various houses, on the third day - dried fish, which they had there in in large numbers. This river was there the same width as the Seine in Paris. And before reaching that place, we crossed many rivers, very beautiful and rich in fish, but the Tatars do not know how to catch it and do not care about fish if it is not so big that they can eat its meat, like sheep meat .. So, we were there in great difficulty, because we could not find either horses or bulls for money. Finally, when I proved to them that we were working for the common good of all Christians, they gave us bulls and men; we ourselves had to walk. At that time they were harvesting rye. Wheat was not born well there, but millet they have in abundance. Russian women remove their heads in the same way as ours, and decorate their dresses on the front side with squirrel or ermine furs from legs to knees. Men wear epanchi, like the Germans, and on their heads they have felt hats, pointed at the top with a long point. So we walked for three days, not finding people, and when we ourselves were very tired, as well as the bulls, and did not know in which direction we could find the Tatars, two horses suddenly ran up to us, which we took with great joy, and on them our guide and interpreter sat down to find out in which direction we could find the people. Finally, on the fourth day, having found people, we rejoiced, as if after a shipwreck we landed at the harbor. Then, taking horses and bulls, we rode from camp to camp, until, on July 31, we reached the seat of Sartakh.

As we can see, according to the testimony of European travelers, it was quite possible to meet completely legal Russian settlements in the southern steppes.

By the way, this same Rubruk testifies that those Russians whom the Mongols drove away from Russia were often forced to graze cattle in the steppes. It is understandable - the Mongols did not have such institutions as hard labor, prisons, or mines. Slaves did the same thing as their masters - grazing cattle.
And of course, such shepherds often ran away from their owners.
And sometimes they didn’t run away - they simply remained without owners when the Mongols began to cut each other during civil strife ...
And these strife occurred - the farther, the more often.
Companions of civil strife were often all kinds of epidemics. Medicine, of course, was in its infancy. The birth rate was high, but children often died.
As a result, there were fewer and fewer nomads in the steppe.
And the Russians kept coming. After all, the stream of fugitives from the Russian lands never dried up.

It is clear that the fugitives themselves, having looked around a little, began to navigate the local realities. Of course, they found a common language with the remnants of the surviving Polovtsians. They were related to them - after all, men predominated among the fugitives.
And they quickly learned that, in fact, there were no Polovtsians - there were COSSACKS.
Even those Russians who did not mix with the Cossacks (Polovtsy) still actively used such a word as a Cossack.
After all, this was still the land of the Cossacks, albeit subjected to genocide, albeit interfering with the Russians.
They went to the Cossacks, they lived among the Cossacks, they became related to the Cossacks, they themselves eventually, albeit not immediately, began to call themselves Cossacks (at first - in a figurative sense).

Gradually, over time, the Russian element in the basins of the Don and Dnieper began to prevail. The Russian language, which was already familiar to the Polovtsy in pre-Mongolian times, began to dominate (not without distortions and borrowings, of course).

It is pointless to argue today - where exactly the "Cossacks" originated: On the Dnieper, or on the Don. This is a pointless debate.
The process of development by the new ethnic group of the lower reaches of the Dnieper and Don took place almost simultaneously.

It is equally pointless to argue who the Cossacks are: Ukrainians or Russians.
The Cossacks are a separate ethnic group that was formed as a result of mixing people from the territory of Russia (however, people from other countries were also present) with those peoples with whom they neighbored (for example, through mutual abductions of women). At the same time, some groups of Cossacks could cross from the Dnieper to the Don, or from the Don to the Dnieper.

A little slower, but also almost simultaneously - the formation of such groups of Cossacks as the Terek and Yaik was going on. It was somewhat more difficult to get to the Terek and Yaik than to the lower reaches of the Don and the Dnieper. But slowly they got there. And there they mixed with the surrounding peoples: on the Terek - with the Chechens, on Yaik - with the Tatars and the same Polovtsians (Cossacks).

Thus, the Polovtsy, who were present in the vast expanses of the great steppe, from the Danube to the Tien Shan, gave their name to those settlers from among the Slavs who settled on the former Polovtsian lands, west of the Yaik River.
But to the east of Yaik, the Polovtsians as such survived.
Thus, two very different groups of people appeared who call themselves the same, COSSACKS: the Cossacks proper, or Polovtsy, whom we call Kazakhs today - and the Russian-speaking ethnic group, mixed with the surrounding peoples, called the Cossacks.

Of course, the Cossacks are not homogeneous. In different territories, mixing went on with different peoples and with varying degrees of intensity.
So the Cossacks are not so much an ethnic group as a group of related ethnic groups.

When modern Ukrainians try to call themselves Cossacks, it causes a smile.
Calling all Ukrainians Cossacks is the same as calling all Russians Cossacks.

At the same time, it is pointless to deny a certain relationship between Russians, Ukrainians and Cossacks.

So, gradually different groups of the mixed population of the outskirts (with a clear predominance of Russian blood and the Russian language), various hordes were formed, so to speak, partly copying the lifestyle of neighboring Asians and Caucasians. Zaporizhzhya horde, Don, Terek, Yaik ...

Meanwhile, Russia was recovering from Mongol invasion and began to expand its borders - which eventually came into contact with the borders of the Cossack hordes.
It happened in the reign of Ivan the Terrible - who came up with a simple idea like everything ingenious - to use the Cossacks as a barrier against Asian raids on Russian lands. That is, semi-Asians, close to Russia in language and faith, were used as an airbag against real Asians.

Thus began the gradual domestication of the Cossack freemen by the Russian state ...

After the Black Sea region was annexed and the danger of Crimean Tatar raids disappeared, the Zaporozhian Cossacks were resettled in the Kuban.

After the suppression of the Pugachev rebellion, the Yaik River was renamed the Urals - although, in general, it has almost nothing to do with the Urals as such (it only starts in the Ural Mountains).
And the Yaik Cossacks were renamed into the Ural Cossacks - although they live, for the most part, not in the Urals at all. Some confusion results from this - sometimes the inhabitants of the Urals, who have nothing to do with the Cossacks, are considered to be Cossacks.

When the Russian possessions expanded to the east, part of the Cossacks was resettled in Transbaikalia, on the Ussuri, on the Amur, in Yakutia, on Kamchatka. However, in those places, sometimes purely Russian people were enrolled in the category of Cossacks, who had nothing to do with the Cossacks. For example, the pioneers, associates of Semyon Dezhnev, people from the city of Veliky Ustyug (that is, from the Russian North) were dubbed Cossacks.

Sometimes representatives of some other peoples were enrolled in the category of Cossacks.
For example - Kalmyks ...

In Transbaikalia, the Cossacks pretty much mixed with the Chinese, Manchus and Buryats, learned some of the habits and customs of these peoples.

In the photo - a painting by E. Korneev "GREBENSKY COSSACKS" 1802. Grebensky is an "offshoot" of the Terek.

Painting by S. Vasilkovsky "ZAPORIZHIA ON PATROL".

"Enrollment in the Cossacks of the captured Poles of Napoleon's army, 1813" The drawing by N. N. Karazin depicts the moment the captured Poles arrived in Omsk after they, already deployed among the Cossack regiments, under the supervision of the Siberian army of the Cossack captain (esaul) Nabokov, one by one change into Cossack uniforms.

Officers of the Stavropol and Khoper Cossack regiments. 1845-55

"BLACK SEA COSSACK". Drawing by E. Korneev

S. Vasilkovsky: "HARMASH (COSSACK ARTILLERIST) IN THE TIMES OF HETMAN MAZEPA".

S. Vasilkovsky: "UMAN'S SENIOR IVAN GONTA".

Cossacks of the Life Guards of the Ural Cossack Hundred.

Kuban Cossacks in May 1916.

It must be said that gradually, with the development of progress, wars have become more and more man-made. In these wars, the Cossacks were assigned a purely secondary, and even a third-rate role.
But the Cossacks were increasingly involved in the dirtiest, "police" work - including for suppressing uprisings, dispersing demonstrations, for terror against potentially dissatisfied, even for repressive actions against the unfortunate Old Believers.

And the Cossacks-quite justified the expectations of the authorities.
The descendants of the fugitives from captivity - became royal lackeys. They zealously slashed with whips and slashed the dissatisfied with sabers.

Nothing can be done - mixing with Caucasians and Asians, the Cossacks also absorbed some features of the Asian-Caucasian mentality. Including such as cruelty, meanness, cunning, deceit, venality, hostility towards Russians (or, as the Cossacks say, "outsiders"), a passion for robbery and violence, hypocrisy, duplicity.
Genetics is a tricky thing...

As a result, the population of Russia (including Russians) began to look at the Cossacks as foreigners, bashi-bazouks in the service of the autocracy.
And the Jews (who do not know how to forgive at all and in terms of cruelty will surpass any Cossacks) - they hated the Cossacks to the point of trembling in the knees.

It is believed that after the October Revolution of 1917, the Cossacks resolutely sided with the autocracy and were the backbone of the white movement.
But here much is exaggerated.
In fact, the Cossacks were not at all eager to fight for the interests of the whites. There were strong separatist sentiments in the Cossack regions.
However, when the Bolsheviks came to the Cossack lands, they instantly set the Cossacks against themselves with the wildest repressions and extreme cruelty. It quickly became clear that the Cossacks did not have to wait for mercy from the Bolsheviks. Jewish commissars, who in other situations were afraid of Great Russian chauvinism like fire, in this case, on the contrary, actively fueled the hostility of Russian peasants to the Cossacks.
If the Bolsheviks willingly gave autonomy to other peoples (even those who did not ask for it at all), proclaiming a bunch of all sorts of national republics (however, as a rule, Jews were at the head of all these republics) - then no one with the Cossacks on this topic didn't even try to talk.
That is why, and only therefore, the Cossacks were FORCED to support the white movement. At the same time, they brought the White Guards - how much good, so much harm.
Cossack intrigues behind the backs of the Russian leaders of the white movement never stopped.

In the end, White was defeated.
Repressions fell upon the Cossacks. Up to the point that in other areas the entire male population over 16 years of age was shot.
Until 1936, the Cossacks were not drafted into the Red Army.
Cossack regions - were carefully renamed. No Transbaikalia - only the Chita region! No Kuban - only Krasnodar region. No Don region, or Don region - only the Rostov region. No Yenisei province - only the Krasnoyarsk Territory.
And the lands of the Semirechensky and Ural Cossacks - generally became part of other republics (Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan).
For some time, the very word "Cossack" was excluded from everyday life. Cossacks in the media and literature were called purely Kazakhs.
The attitude towards the Cossacks warmed up only after Stalin consolidated his power and firmly stood on his feet, defeating all his enemies ...

Later, under the late Soviet regime, the Cossacks were completely loyal to her and, along with the Ukrainians, were one of her most faithful lackeys.

Today it is generally accepted that the Cossacks are assimilated into the Russian environment.
In reality, nothing of the kind. If an ethnic group does not have national-political autonomy, this does not mean that there is no ethnic group.
Cossacks are clearly different from Russians - both in mentality and appearance.

Often some disguised clowns pretend to be Cossacks, who seriously think that the Cossacks are just such a military class. Therefore, they say, it is enough to put on a uniform, a bunch of orders (it is not clear why received) and take a certain oath - that's it, you have already become a Cossack.
Nonsense, of course. It is impossible to "become" a Cossack, just as it is impossible to "become" a Russian or an Englishman. You can only be born a Cossack...

The role of the Cossacks in Russian history is often exaggerated.
And sometimes the opposite is true - the misfortunes brought to our country by the Cossacks are exaggerated.
In fact, the Cossacks brought significant benefits to Russia, at a certain stage of its development. But even without them, Russia would not have perished at all.
There was harm from the Cossacks - but there was also a benefit.

Cossacks are not heroes and not monsters - they are just a separate ethnic group, with their own advantages and disadvantages. More precisely - a group of closely related ethnic groups.
And it would be nice if the Cossacks had their own state - for example, somewhere in Australia, in Africa, or in Latin America. If they all moved to this state, I would wish them happiness and prosperity in their new homeland.
Still, we are different. Really different...

P.S. At the top is I. Repin's painting "COSSACKS WRITE A LETTER TO THE TURKISH SULTAN". 1880 Stanitsa Pashkovskaya.

Who are the Cossacks? There is a version that they trace their lineage from fugitive serfs. However, some historians argue that the origins of the Cossacks go back to the 8th century BC.

The Byzantine emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus in 948 mentioned the territory in the North Caucasus as the country of Kasakhia. Historians attached particular importance to this fact only after Captain A. G. Tumansky in 1892 in Bukhara discovered the Persian geography Gudud al Alam, compiled in 982.

It turns out that “Kasak Land”, which was located in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, is also found there. It is interesting that the Arab historian, geographer and traveler Abu-l-Hasan Ali ibn al-Hussein (896-956), who received the nickname of the imam of all historians, reported in his writings that the Kasaks who lived beyond the Caucasus Range are not mountaineers.
A parsimonious description of a certain military people who lived in the Black Sea region and in the Transcaucasus is also found in the geographical work of the Greek Strabo, who worked under the “living Christ”. He called them cossacks. Modern ethnographers provide data on the Scythians from the Turanian tribes of Kos-Saka, the first mention of which dates back to about 720 BC. It is believed that it was then that a detachment of these nomads made their way from Western Turkestan to the Black Sea lands, where they stopped.

In addition to the Scythians, on the territory of the modern Cossacks, that is, between the Black and Azov Seas, as well as between the Don and Volga rivers, the Sarmatian tribes ruled, who created the Alanian state. The Huns (Bulgars) defeated it and exterminated almost all of its population. The surviving Alans hid in the north - between the Don and Donets, and in the south - in the foothills of the Caucasus. Basically, it was these two ethnic groups - the Scythians and Alans, who became related to the Azov Slavs - that formed the nationality, which was called the Cossacks. This version is considered one of the basic ones in the discussion about where the Cossacks came from.

Slavic-Turanian tribes

Don ethnographers also connect the roots of the Cossacks with the tribes of northwestern Scythia. This is evidenced by burial mounds of the III-II centuries BC. It was at this time that the Scythians began to lead a settled way of life, intersecting and merging with the southern Slavs who lived in Meotida - on the east coast Sea of ​​Azov.

This time is called the era of "the introduction of the Sarmatians into the Meotians", which resulted in the tribes of the Torets (Torkov, Udz, Berenger, Sirakov, Bradas-Brodnikov) of the Slavic-Turanian type. In the 5th century, the Huns invaded, as a result of which part of the Slavic-Turanian tribes went beyond the Volga and into the Upper Don forest-steppe. Those who remained submitted to the Huns, Khazars and Bulgars, receiving the name Kasaks. After 300 years they converted to Christianity (approximately in 860 after the apostolic sermon of St. Cyril), and then, by order of the Khazar Khagan, they drove out the Pechenegs. In 965, Kasak Land came under the control of Mctislav Rurikovich.

Darkness

It was Mctislav Rurikovich who defeated the Novgorod prince Yaroslav near Listven and founded his principality - Tmutarakan, which stretched far to the north. It is believed that this Cossack power was not at the peak of power for long, until about 1060, but after the arrival of the Polovtsian tribes, it began to gradually fade away.

Many residents of Tmutarakan fled to the north - to the forest-steppe, and together with Russia fought with the nomads. This is how the Black Hoods appeared, which in the Russian chronicles were called Cossacks and Cherkasy. Another part of the inhabitants of Tmutarakan was called the Podon wanderers.
Like the Russian principalities, the Cossack settlements ended up in the power of the Golden Horde, however, conditionally, enjoying wide autonomy. In the 14th-15th centuries, the Cossacks were talked about as a formed community, which began to accept fugitive people from the central part of Russia.

Not Khazars and not Goths

There is another, popular in the West, version that the Khazars were the ancestors of the Cossacks. Its supporters argue that the words "Khusar" and "Cossack" are synonyms, because in both the first and second cases we are talking about fighting horsemen. Moreover, both words have the same root “kaz”, meaning “strength”, “war” and “freedom”. However, there is another meaning - it is "goose". But even here, the champions of the Khazar trace speak of horsemen-hussars, whose military ideology was copied by almost all countries, even foggy Albion.

The Khazar ethnonym of the Cossacks is directly stated in the “Constitution of Pylyp Orlik”, “... the fighting old Cossack people, which used to be called the Kazar, was first raised by immortal glory, spacious possessions and knightly honors ...”. Moreover, it is said that the Cossacks adopted Orthodoxy from Constantinople (Constantinople) in the era of the Khazar Khaganate.

In Russia, this version in the Cossack environment causes fair abuse, especially against the background of studies of Cossack genealogies, whose roots are Russian origin. So, hereditary Kuban Cossack, academician Russian Academy Artists Dmitry Shmarin in this regard spoke with anger: “The author of one of these versions of the origin of the Cossacks is Hitler. He even has a separate speech on the subject. According to his theory, the Cossacks are the Goths. The West Goths are Germanic. And the Cossacks are the Ost-Goths, that is, the descendants of the Ost-Goths, allies of the Germans, close to them in blood and in a warlike spirit. By militancy, he compared them with the Teutons. Based on this, Hitler proclaimed the Cossacks the sons of great Germany. So why should we now consider ourselves descendants of the Germans?

The origin of the ethnonym "Cossack" is not fully understood. Versions of its etymology are based either on its ethnicity (Cossack is a derivative of the name of the descendants of the Kasogs or Torks and Berendeys, Cherkasy or Brodniks), or on social content (the word Cossack is of Turkic origin, they were called either a free, free, independent person, or a military guard on the border). On the various stages the existence of the Cossacks, it included Russians, Ukrainians, representatives of some steppe nomads, peoples of the North Caucasus, Siberia, Central Asia, Far East. By the beginning of the XX century. the Cossacks were completely dominated by the East Slavic ethnic basis. So, the Cossacks are a sub-ethnos of the Great Russian ethnos.

The Cossacks lived in the Don, the North Caucasus, the Urals, Far East, in Siberia.

Those or other Cossack communities were part of a particular Cossack army.

The language of the Cossacks is Russian. In the Cossack environment, a number of dialects are noted: Don, Kuban, Ural, Orenburg and others.

The Cossacks used Russian writing.

By 1917, there were 4 million 434 thousand Cossacks of both sexes.

Currently, there are practically no exact data on the number of Cossacks and their descendants. According to various estimates, approximately 5 million Cossacks live in 73 subjects of the Russian Federation. The number of Cossacks located in places of compact residence in Kazakhstan and Ukraine, as well as the number of their descendants in the far abroad, is unknown.

The term "Cossack" was first mentioned in the sources of the XIII century, in particular in the "Secret History of the Mongols" (1240), and, according to different versions, has a Turkic, Mongolian, Adyghe-Abkhazian or Indo-European origin. The meaning of the term, which later became an ethnonym, is also defined in different ways: a free man, a lightly armed rider, a fugitive, a lone man, and more.

The origin of the Cossacks and the time of its appearance on the historical arena has not been fully elucidated up to the present time. Disputes among researchers are even on the etymology (origin) of the very word-term "Cossack".

There are many scientific theories origin of the Cossacks (only the main ones - 18). All

theories of the origin of the Cossacks are divided into two large groups: theories of fugitive and migratory, that is, alien, and autochthonous, that is, local, indigenous origin of the Cossacks. Each of these theories has its own evidence base, various convincing or not fully convincing scientific arguments, advantages and disadvantages.

According to autochthonous theories, the ancestors of the Cossacks lived in Kabarda, they were the descendants of the Caucasian Circassians (Cherkas, Yases), a conglomerate of Kasags, Circassians (Yases), "black hoods" (Pechenegs, Torks, Berendeys), wanderers (yases and groups of Slavic-Russian and nomadic peoples) and others.

According to migration theories, the ancestors of the Cossacks were freedom-loving Russian people who fled beyond the borders of the Russian and Polish-Lithuanian states either due to natural historical reasons (the provisions of the theory of colonization) or under the influence of social antagonisms (the provisions of the theory of class struggle). The first reliable information about the Cossacks who lived in Chervleny Yar, in addition to scientifically unrecognized evidence in the notes Byzantine emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (X century), are contained in the annals of the Donskoy Monastery ("Grebenskaya Chronicle", 1471), "The famous word ... Archimandrite Anthony", "Brief Moscow Chronicle" - a mention of the participation of the Don Cossacks in the Battle of Kulikovo, are contained in the annals of 1444 d. Having arisen in the southern expanses of the so-called "Wild Field", the first communities of free Cossacks were truly democratic public entities. Fundamental Principles their internal organization was the personal freedom of all their members, social equality, mutual respect, the ability of each Cossack to openly express his opinion on the Cossack circle, which was the highest authority and management body of the Cossack community, to elect and be elected by the highest official, chieftain, who was first among equals. The bright principles of freedom, equality and fraternity in the early Cossack public formations were universal, traditional, self-evident phenomena.

The process of formation of the Cossacks was long and complex. In the course of it, representatives of different ethnic groups united. It is possible that in the original basis of the early groups of the Cossacks there were various ethnic elements. In ethnic terms, the "old" Cossacks were subsequently "overlapped" by Russian elements. The first mention of the Don Cossacks dates back to 1549.

Among those taking place in Rostov region events, the theme of the Cossacks does not lose its relevance. Opening of new Cossack educational institutions, the premiere of the new film adaptation" Quiet Don", the installation of a monument to Ataman Matvey Ivanovich Platov in the center of Rostov-on-Don - local news is full of events of a similar nature. I'm not talking about the upcoming World Congress of Cossacks in October, in which Patriarch Kirill will visit Novocherkassk.

In connection with such a volume of events related to the Don Cossacks, I decided to sort out in a series of publications what it is. Where did it come from, how did its history develop and what is happening to it today. And I decided to start from the very beginning - with the question of where the Cossacks came from in our country.

First, about the term itself. Most researchers are inclined to believe that the word "Cossack" has Turkic roots, however, there is no unambiguously accepted point of view on the translation of this term, since in various languages its meaning was different. There are options such as: "a lonely person, not connected with the hearth and family", "defender of the border", "advanced", etc.

The first mention of the Don Cossacks begins to be found in the XIV-XV centuries. In the diplomatic correspondence that was conducted between Moscow and the steppe states, this was the name of the free people who settled the border uninhabited lands after liberation from the Mongol-Tatar yoke. At the same time, gangs of robbers who hunted in no man's territories began to be called so.

From the second half of the 16th century, military servants of the executed poured into the Don from Russia. Ivan the Terrible boyars. Nobles who did not like the royal service, as well as free people, whom the state began to attach to the land and to the service, also went here.

The result was a typical military community that called itself "Don Army".

In the subsequent period, new interpretations of the term "Cossack" arose, where instead of social status, the ethnic approach was put in the foreground. Supporters of this approach began to declare the existence of a special people under this name. It is to the authors of these interpretations that they often appeal different kind separatists.

There are several examples of such interpretations in history:

1. Historian M.N. Karamzin mentions the notes of the Byzantine emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, who wrote in the middle of the 10th century about the people living in the Caucasus at that time - the "Cossacks" and their state - Kazakhia.

2. There is information in the literature that in the middle of the XII century in Central Asia Numerous and independent tribal associations lived, which called themselves "Cossack hordes". Their language contained many expressions and words that would later be used by the Don Cossacks.

3. At the end of the 18th century, a hypothesis arose about the autochthonous nature of the Cossacks, who allegedly descended from roamers (the local indigenous population). This theory found its broad followers in the 19th and 20th centuries. Works about the "wandering" origin of the Don Cossacks were actively published in the early 1990s.

4. Another theory of the origin of the Cossacks was proposed in 1989 L.N. Gumilyov in his work Ancient Russia and the Great Steppe. He traced the roots of the Don Cossacks through roamers to the Orthodox Khazars: “The descendants of the ancient Khazars in the Don valley took the name “roamers”. The descendants of the Brodniks subsequently changed their ethnonym: they began to be called Cossacks. Close ties with Chernihiv Principality, the Russian language, which has become everyday, and Orthodoxy allowed roamers to enter the Russian ethnos as one of the sub-ethnoses ".

Modern archaeological research, however, has not been able to reveal any monuments about the stay of roamers in the region. The first monuments of the material culture of the Cossacks, in turn, appear only from the 14th century, and become systematic by the 15th.

5. Five years later, in his work “From Russia to Russia: Essays on Economic History” L.N. Gumilyov proposed a new concept of the emergence of the Cossacks, which he derives from the famous theory of passionarity. The idea was put forward of a sharp increase in the role of passionaries in the creation of new ethnic groups and subethnoi.

According to Gumilyov, Moscow was able to absorb only part of the passionaries. And the rest, the most independent and ambitious of them, rushed to the outskirts of the Muscovite state, where there were opportunities for the realization of their excess energy. The borders were the vast expanses of the Wild Field, covering the steppes between the Don and the left tributaries of the Dnieper and Desna or Siberia. Simultaneously Russian state was interested in the protection of border areas. Thus, the aspirations of the passionaries and the state coincided.

It was to such passionaries that Gumilyov attributed the Don Cossacks. First, a Cossack sub-ethnos (nationality) was formed from them, which later, in his opinion, became an ethnos (people).

6. Another concept was expressed by an émigré historian. He believed that the formation of the Cossacks was based on the light cavalry units of the Mongols. They included the conquered local peoples of the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, as well as the Circassians and Kasagi exported from the North Caucasus. All this mixed with the remnants of the nomadic hordes of the Pechenegs, Torks and Berendeys. In general, they all began to be called "black hoods", and in Turkic - Karakalpaks. After the collapse of the Golden Horde, these detachments of light cavalry, located on the borders of the Russian principalities, gradually began to merge with the Russian people and received the name Cossacks.

7. Don explorers A.P. Skorik and A.A. Ozerov put forward their version of the emergence of the Cossacks, based on the "Eurasian" theory. According to this theory, the meaning of Russian history was the ethno-cultural and economic advancement to the South-East of Europe, further to Asia and the development of the vast expanses of Siberia.

In their opinion, “The Moscow kingdom, and after it the Russian Empire, to a greater extent were the heirs of not so much Byzantium and Kievan Rus how much of the Chinggisid empire". Highly important role during the period of movement to the South-East, peripheral zones and "disputed" border territories played. It was on such territories that communities and quasi-states of the Don, Zaporozhye, Terek and Yaik Cossacks were formed in the “post-Golden Horde” period. They arose, as a rule, in the conditions of mixing of various Slavic-Russian and Turkic elements.

According to these researchers, the Eurasian concept "opens wide opportunities for a new reading of the history of the Cossacks".

official authorities Russian Empire supported the theory of the migration and colonization origin of the Cossacks. One of the first to propose this theory was a military writer V.B. Bronevsky in 1834. Historians gave it a finished form CM. Solovyov and IN. Klyuchevsky.

The essence of the migration theory is that the Cossacks are the result of the development of the expanses of the Wild Field by the Russian people. The process of the flight of peasants to the Wild Field was not stopped, since the grand ducal power was to a certain extent interested in its development. The Russian state, which sharply increased its power in the 16th century, pursuing a far-sighted policy, not only looked through its fingers at the flight of dependent people, but also associated certain intentions with them. This opened up opportunities in the future to make claims to dependent dependent people and the territories of the Wild Field mastered by them.

Soviet historians, since G.V. Plekhanov, accepted the migration theory, subsuming the theory of class struggle under it. In Soviet historiography, the version dominated, according to which the ancestors of the Cossacks were freedom-loving Russian people, mostly peasants, who fled from the growing feudal serf oppression outside the Muscovite state.

The researcher offered his version A.I. Kozlov. In his opinion, supporters of the migration theory are only partly right. The wild field was indeed replenished mainly due to the influx of Russian people, but at the same time, the autochthonous ancestors of the Cossacks lived here, who were subjected to intensive Russification and Christianization.

In his opinion, local isolation and closeness created the conditions for the emergence, in the future, of a new ethnic group. However, the Russian state intervened in the process of its formation, interrupting the process at the stage of a sub-ethnos, turning the Cossacks into a military class.

Subsequently, completely radical theories of the origin of the Cossacks appeared, where their origins were sought among the Scythians, Sarmatians or Huns. A theory about the "Aryan Cossacks" was also developed, designed to justify the service of a number of Cossack collaborators in the armed formations of Nazi Germany (in this theory, the Cossacks were declared descendants of the Ostrogoths).

In more detail we will analyze all these theories and the question of their viability in the future. Here, for now, we simply outline the area of ​​our study. And in the next publications - we will follow the history of the Don Cossacks and its relationship with Russian state. After that, with new knowledge, we will return to the topic of the origin of the Cossacks.

We also remind you that the next meeting

Who are the Cossacks? There is a version that they trace their lineage from fugitive serfs. However, some historians argue that the origins of the Cossacks go back to the 8th century BC.

Where did the Cossacks come from?

Magazine: History from the "Russian Seven", Almanac No. 3, autumn 2017
Rubric: Mysteries of the Muscovite Kingdom
Text: Alexander Sitnikov

The Byzantine emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus in 948 mentioned the territory in the North Caucasus as the country of Kasakhia. Historians attached particular importance to this fact only after Captain A.G. Tumansky in 1892 in Bukhara discovered the Persian geography Gudud al Alem, compiled in 982.
It turns out that Kasak Land, which was located in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, is also found there. It is interesting that the Arab historian, geographer and traveler Abu-l-Hasan Ali ibn al-Hussein (896-956), who received the nickname of the Imam of all historians, reported in his writings that the Kasaks who lived beyond the Caucasus Range were not mountaineers.
A stingy description of a certain military people who lived in the Black Sea region and in the Transcaucasus is also found in the geographical work of the Greek Strabo, who worked under the “living Christ”. He called them cossacks. Modern ethnographers provide data on the Scythians from the Turanian tribes of Kos-Saka, the first mention of which dates back to about 720 BC. It is believed that it was then that a detachment of these nomads made their way from Western Turkestan to the Black Sea lands, where they stopped.
In addition to the Scythians, on the territory of the modern Cossacks, that is, between the Black and Azov Seas, as well as between the Don and Volga rivers, the Sarmatian tribes ruled, who created the Alanian state. The Huns (Bulgars) defeated it and exterminated almost all of its population. The surviving Alans hid in the north - between the Don and Donets and in the south - in the foothills: the Caucasus. Basically, it was these two ethnic groups - Scythians and Alans, who intermarried with the Azov Slavs, formed the nationality, which received the name "Cossacks". This version is considered one of the basic ones in the discussion about where the Cossacks came from.

Slavic-Turanian tribes

Don ethnographers also connect the roots of the Cossacks with the tribes of northwestern Scythia. This is evidenced by burial mounds of the III-II centuries BC.
It was at this time that the Scythians began to lead a sedentary lifestyle, intersecting and merging with the southern Slavs who lived in Meotida - on the eastern coast of the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov.
This time is called the era of "the introduction of the Sarmatians into the Meotians", which resulted in the tribes of the Torets (Torkov, Udz, Berenger, Sirakov, Bradas-Brodnikov) of the Slavic-Turanian type. In the 5th century, the Huns invaded, as a result of which part of the Slavic-Turanian tribes went beyond the Volga and into the Upper Don forest-steppe. Those who remained submitted to the Huns, Khazars and Bulgars, receiving the name "kasaks". After 300 years they converted to Christianity (approximately in 860 after the apostolic sermon of St. Cyril), and then, by order of the Khazar Khagan, they drove out the Pechenegs. In 965, Kasak Land came under the control of Mstislav Rurikovich.

Darkness

It was Mstislav Rurikovich who defeated the Novgorod prince Yaroslav near Listven and founded his principality - Tmutarakan, which extended far to the north. It is believed that this Cossack state was not at the peak of its power for long, until about 1060, and after the arrival of the Polovtsian tribes, it began to gradually fade away,
Many residents of Tmutarakan fled to the north - to the forest-steppe and, together with Russia, fought with the nomads. This is how the Black Hoods appeared, which in the Russian chronicles were called Cossacks and Cherkasy. Another part of the inhabitants of Tmutarakan was called Po-Don wanderers.
Like the Russian principalities, the Cossack settlements ended up in the power of the Golden Horde, however, conditionally, enjoying wide autonomy. In the XIV-XV centuries, the Cossacks were talked about as a formed community, which began to accept fugitive people from the central part of Russia.

Not Khazars and not Goths

There is another version, popular in the West, that the Khazars were the ancestors of the Cossacks. Its supporters argue that the words "Khusar" and "Cossack" are synonyms, because in both the first and second cases we are talking about fighting horsemen. Moreover, both words have the same root “kaz”, meaning “strength”, “war” and “freedom”. However, there is another meaning - it is "goose". But here, too, the champions of the Khazar trace speak of horsemen-hussars, whose military ideology was copied by almost all countries, even Foggy Albion
The Khazar ethnonym of the Cossacks is directly stated in the “Constitution of Pylyp Orlik”: “The ancient fighting Cossack people, who used to be called the Kazakhs, were first raised by immortal glory, spacious possessions and knightly honors ...” Moreover, it is said that the Cossacks adopted Orthodoxy from Constantinople (Constantinople) in the era of the Khazar Khaganate.
In Russia, this version in the Cossack environment causes fair abuse, especially against the background of studies of Cossack genealogies, whose roots are of Russian origin. So, the hereditary Kuban Cossack, academician of the Russian Academy of Arts Dmitry Shmarin, spoke out in this regard with anger: “The author of one of these versions of the origin of the Cossacks is Hitler. He even has a separate speech on the subject. According to his theory, the Cossacks are Goths. Visigoths are Germans. And the Cossacks are the Ostrogoths, that is, the descendants of the Ostrogoths, allies of the Germans, close to them in blood and in a warlike spirit. By militancy, he compared them with the Teutons. Based on this, Hitler proclaimed the Cossacks the sons of great Germany. So what, should we now consider ourselves descendants of the Germans?

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