.fiiSSg^iSlSSHA / 33 Date Due 1 -rrp 1 q 19? jj3^f^JJ, *^ !^^- .^57^7^ V 1 The original of tliis book is in tlie Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028477531 Qs^\ A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE USE OF THE MICROSCOPE. Including the different methods of preparing and examining Animal, Tegetable, and Mineral Structures. BY PROrESSOB JOHN aUEKETT, ^ OF THE BOYAL COLLEGE OF 6UBGE0NS OF ENGLAKD. SECOND EDITION. Comprising 516 pages of letter-press, with 12 Plates and 270 Wood Engravings, £1 2s. SPECIMEN OF THE WOOD EHQKATINSS. THE ANATOMY OF THE EXTERNAL FORMS OF MAN. FOR ARTISTS, PAINTERS, AND SCULPTORS. BY DR. FAXr. Edited, with numerous Additions, by Eobekt Khox, M.D., Lecturer on Anatomy. In 1 vol., 8vo, and ATLAS, 4to, of 28 plates, after Nature, by Leveilu:, and lithographed by Lemekoiee. Price, plain, ^1 , 4s. ; and coloured, £2 2s. Kiliiio^iaphicaJ Library, Tiil. 2 FroQtispLcce MATLE SilEEMALlK IFIK1LAS3EIR LiUm^MirYi/rlfjn'.BiaUure. fSS£_ THE NATIYE RACES THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE. Ere." LATHAM, M.D., F.E.S., &c., ACTHOR OF "the VAKIETIES OP MAN," "THE ENOUSH LAHfiXTAOE," "iHE SEKMANIA OP TAOITDS WITH ETHNOLOGICAL NOTES," ETC. -WITH A LAROE COIiOtTBED HAP, Taken from tJtat of the Imperial Geographical Society of 3t Petersburg^ AUTD OTHEB rLIiTTSIHATIOITS, LONDON: HIPPOLYTE BAILLIERE, 219, EEGENT STREET; AND 290, BROADWAY, NEW TOEK, U.S. PAEIS: J. B. BAILLIERE, RUE HATJTBFEUILLE, r MADRID: BAILLT BAILLIERE, CALLE DEL PRINCIPE.'^ -^ ( '\ N' 1854 \3\^'^'^'^^ f -N' , p,-.--'-;,!: White,! \ ^ LiGrsry / V'^'f/VEO NOTICE. The small amount of real knowledge possessed by foreigners of the many various races which make up the population of Eussia, combined with the interest uni- versally felt at this moment in everything relating to that extensive Empire, has induced us to bring forward a descriptive account of the tribes occupying its surface, including all those nations who have been conquered by the dominant race, or absorbed into its body. This is accompanied by, and in some degree founded upon, the great Ethnological and Statistical Map of Eussia which was published by the Imperial Geographical Society of St. Petersburg in the year 1852. vi CONTENTS. , CHAPTER IV. The Ugrian Stock, continued — The Esthonians . . 59 CHAPTER V. The Ugrian Stock, continued — The Finlanders of the Grand Duchy of Finland — Tavastriana^Karelians — Quains — The Swedes of the Esthonian Islands ...... 67 CHAPTER VI. The Ugrian Stock, continued — The Sahme or Laps — Their Name, Habits, and Religion — Original Area . . . .77 CHAPTER VII. The Ugrian Stock, continued — Ugriansof the VolgOr-The Tsheremis — The Mordvins— The Tshuvash .... 85 CHAPTER VIII. The Voguls and Ostiaks . ... 96 CHAPTER IX. The Samoyeds — But lately recognized as Ugrian — The Northern and- Southern Branches — Their Paganism — The Teneseians of Klaproth — TheTukahiri . . ... 112 CHAPTER X. The Turk Stock— The Tartars' of the Kiptshak Khanates 128 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XI. The Turk Stock, continued — The ProTince of Orenburg with its Bashkir, Meshtsheriak, and Teptyar Populations . 150 CHAPTER XII. The Turk Stock, continued— The Kirghiz— The Trukhmen— The Kara- kalpaks— The Khivans — The Nogays . . .158 CHAPTER XIII. The Turk Stock, continued — Tartars (so called) of Siberia/ — Turks not described under the General Name of Tartar— The Tobol, TTfa, and Tomski Tartars — The Turali — The Tshnlim Turks — The Bara^ binski— The Yerkho-Tomski- The Tubintsi— The Teleut— The Sokhalar or Yakuts . . . . . .172 CHAPTER XIV. The Sarmatian Stock — Its Divisions and Sub-divisions — Points of Criticism . . . . . . .188 CHAPTER XV. The Russian (or Servian) Division of the Slavonians — Pre-Historic Period — Scythian — Gr^ek — Eoman, — German — Scandinavian Pe- riods ........ 207 CHAPTER XVI. The Lithuanian Branch of the Sarmatian Stock — The Prussians — The Jaczwings — The Lithuanians — The Lets — The Gothini — The In- dian and Scandinavian Conquests .... 229 viii CONTENTS. CHAPTEK XVII. The Sarmatian Stock, continued— The Servians, Bulgarians, and Poles 251 CHAPTER XVIII. The Rumanyos of Wallachia, Moldavia, Bessarabia, &c. . . 261 CHAPTER XIX. The Mongols and the Tungusians — The Aino, Koriak, and Kamska^ dales— The Indian? of Russian America . . . 273 CHAPTER XX The Dioscurian (Caucasian) — Armenian — and other Populations of the Russian Empire ...... 298 CHAPTER XXI. The Russians .Proper — Great, Little, White, Red — Diffusion, Ethnolo- gical and Political — Panslavonism .... 317 Numbers of the Non- Russian Population of Russia in Europe 335 THE 'UGRIAN, TURK, MD SARMATIAN STOCKS. CHAPTEE I. ■ PRELIMmARY EEMARKS. QEHEEAL VIEW OF THE THKEB OHIEr OOHSTITTTENT STOCKS OF THE KDSSIAN EMPIRE, THE TJGKIAH, THE TURK, THE SAEMATIAH OBSERVATIONS OS THE TERMS — GEOGRAPHICAL RELATIONS OF THE UGRIAHS — BIREOTIOH OF MOVEMENTS — BIMEKSIOHS OF THE UGRIAH STOCK — RECOGNITION OF THE BAMOTEBS AS tTGRIAN — OF THE TENISEIAN3 AKD YCKAHIRI — CONSPECTUS OF THE THREE STOCKS. The ethnology of the Russian Empire, is, for ninety- nine parts out of a hundred, the ethnology of three families, stocks, or varieties, call them, which we will ; of three vast families — neither more nor less. And none of 'hese are the families which have played the important irts in the history of the West and South ; none are Latin Grreek, like the great intellectual and conquering nations atiquity ; none are Keltic, like the older populations B 2 THE WORDS TURK of Gaiol, Britain, and Ireland; none are German, Kke the Dutch o£ Holland, and the Anglo-Saxons of England and America. None have spread themselves to any great extent in any of the countries west of the Rhine; indeed, in some cases the Elbe may have been their limit. On the other hand, the most eastern of them touch the fron- tiers of China, and stretch beyond them. Thus vast is the area covered by the three great stocks of (1) the TJgrians, (2) the Turks, and (3) the Sarmatians. TJGRiAif, Turk, and Saematiait — such is the nomen- clature of the Ethnologist. It is not exactly that of the- ordinary geographer, nor yet that of the civil historian. Nevertheless, it can not only be defended, but it can be shewn to be necessary. It is necessary on the same principle that certain comprehensive terms are necessary in zoology and botany. The names for the species are in- sufficient. There are genera, subgenera, and orders ; and names are wanted for them accordingly. They are not always easy to hit upon, nor jet are they always adopted with unanimity. It is rare, too, that they are absolutely unexceptionable, either in the way of correctness or con- venience. Thus, in the previous list, the word Turk in- volves something to learn and something to unlearn. It means, of course, the Turks of Turkey in the limited and ordinary sense of the word ; but it also means a vast num- ber of populations besides; populations closely and clearly allied to them. It means the Kirghiz of Independent Tartary, it means the Tartars of Kazan and Tobolsk, it means a tribe as distant from Constantinople as that of the Yakuts on theArctic Sea, at the mouth of the River Lena. It is, in short, a generic name. Many have sug- AND TARTAR. 3 gested a remedy to the inconvenierice arising from its being a specific name as well; and have used the term Tartar instead. Yet this word is exceptionable also. Many of the so-called Tartar tribes are Mongolian, and, coBtsequently, as different from the Turks as a Kalmuk is from an Osmanli — a Kalmuk of the steppes of As- trakhan from an Osmanli of Constantinople. Then, in the eyes of a Chinese, the Mantshus are Tartars, and the Mantshu dynasty, against which the present Chinese revolution is at work, is a Tartar dynasty, as opposed to a native Chinese one. And even here, the name is in- convenient, inasmuch as before the conquest by the Mantshus there was a Mongohan conquest — ^which was Tartar also. Yet the Mongolians and Mantshus require to be distinguished from each other. From China let us turn to India. When enterprising men like Lloyd, and Gerard, and Strachey, and Hooker, and those other observers who have laboured so success- fully at the elucidation of the geography of the vast Himalayan range, have got so far northwards and up- wards as to have left the Indian populations behind them, and to have come upon the tribes of Tibet, they design nate them as Tartars — Tartars as opposed to the Hindus. So that, laxly speaking, a Turk may be Tartar, a Mon- golian a Tartar, a Mantshu a Tartar, and a Tibetan a Tartar. This makes it necessary for the Ethnologist to eschew the term as much as possible. He must, however, use it occasionally: e.g., if he deal with the history and geogra- phy of China he must, to a certain extent, speak after the fashion of his authorities, and use the Chinese nomen- B 2 4 THE WORDS TURK clature. In Russia, too, it is hard to escape the term altogether, since the Russian calls all the Turks, both of his domain and his neighbourhood, Tartars,' when speaking of the Tartars of the Crimea, the Tartars of Kazan, the Tartars of Independent Tartary. At the same time he restricts the word to the tribes of Turk origin ; and does not, like the Chinese, apply it to any Mongolians. The Mong-olians he calls Kalmuks. A Chinese would call them Tartars. This term will be noticed again, and a convenient application of it be suggested. The present observations have one end only ; viz., the explanation of the power of the word Turk. Its import is very general. It means all the populations akin to the Tuiks of Europe ; the Turks of Europe being only a single branch of a vast stock; But how are we to avoid ambiguity ? The Turks in Europe must have a name ; and if the specific term be identical with the generic, there will be confusion. Be it so. For the purposes of ethnology it is best to use the names Ottoman or Osmanli, when we write about the Turks of Constantinople. Constantinople is the metro- polis of Rumelia, and the ConstantinopoHtan Mahometans are the Osmanli of Rumelia. A European Turk, then, is an OsmanU. A Turk of Asia Minor is an Osmanli — an Osmanli of Anatolia. The Turks that we are defending against Russia are the Osmanli of the Ottoman Empire — the mass, at least, are Osmanli Between the forms Osmanli and Ottom,an there is but little difference. Each comes from the name Othman, the founder of the dynasty. The terms suggested, although it has been considered AND, TAETAE. 5 that they require explanation, are by no means so new as they appear at first sight. . Common parlance uses the word Turk pretty widely. Besides the three Turkeys — in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa — of the maps, we have, pn the northern frontier of Persia, the country of the Turk- O^nans, or Turk-e&t&n. ; so that common parlance gives us Turks LQ the very interior of Asia. . Then there are reasons against such a name as Sarma- Uom. It occasionally confounds the classical geographer. Ugrian too, is a new word — new, or nearly so— rnew in England. Nevertheless, the two large and valuable, volmnes of Miiller upon the populations akin to the Fia- landers are upon the " Ugrian Stock" (Ugrische Volks starrwn). So that, upon the whole, the nomenclature is justifiable: at any rate, it is no easy matter to improve it. Hence the three important terms are (1) Ugrian, (2) Turk, (3) Sarmatian. The ethnology of the Eussian Empire is the ethnology of these three stocks, ia ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, at least. Other families have played some part ia it, hut only a subordinate one. The ethnology oi Russia is Ugrian, Tiu:k, and Sarmatian — Sarmatian, Turk, ' and Ugrian. How fer is the converse the case? How far is the area of these three families contained withia the limits of Russia? Have they always and only fought, fled, con- quered, migrated within the Russian boundaries ? Or have they occupied other parts of the world ? To this we answer, that they have each and all a history besides their history as Russians, or parts of Russia ; and each in his degree — that of the Ugrians being the least important. 6 THE WORD UGEIAN. Of this we shall find the illtastration in the sequel. Our present business is to give their due proxmnence to the tliree names. Ugrian means populations akin to the present in- habitants of Finland, wheresoever they may be found ; the chief characters being their language. Hence it is the name for the class that contains the Fin and its allied langUstges, and the men that speak such languages. ' A few years back, but little was known about thes6 tongues. They were, for the most part, unwritten, and, as such, considered barbarous. The few writers that studied them, studied them singly ; i.e., the language of Finland by itself, the language of Lapland by itself also. This retarded the general diffusion of the knowledge of their mutual affinities and of their relationships to each other, as members of one large class. It retarded the diffusion of any general information on the subject, but the more important facts were by no means uninvesti- gated. When Gibbon engaged, in the ethnology of the Majiar conquerors of Hungary, he found that Fin scholars had already applied themselves to the problem of their language, and that Ganander and Gyarmathi had detected undoubted affinities with the Laplandish. He hesitated at adopting their results ; and, considering the comparative philology of the time, he did right Yet he notified the researches. These were the first steps by which the Ugrian tongues were brought under notice. Then came the notice of the peculiarities of their structure. There were, for instance, some fifteen cases in the Finlandish noun — a fact that in- terested such classical scholars as knew of it. But these THE WOED UGEIAN. 7 were not very numerous. Hence, the full value of the class became apparent only when the populations of Siberia and central Asia — the tribes of the Volga, the Petshora, the Obi, and the Yenisey — got noticed. At the present moment there are Fin scholars, and Lap philologists, just as there are men learned in Arabic or Sanscrit. As to the word' Ugria/n itself, its immediate origin is Eussian ; and the populations to which it applies, generally, know nothing about it as a native name ; just as the Barbarians of the Greeks and Romans, knew no such name as Barbarus (or BapfBapog) — just, too, as such names as Negro and Red Indian are strange to the Blacks of Africa and the aborigines of America. Ugrian, in short, is a word all but foreign to the Ugrians them- selves. I imagine it means borderer ; being just such a term in Slavonic as Marchman is in German. It means a population on some Slavonic frontier. From this it has grown to mean certain norv- slavonic populations. It fiomes from the root -k-r, a boundary; a root which lies at the bottom of the words Ukraine, Carm-thia, Carn-iolsi,th.e Alpes Carn-isi, the syllables TJeker- in the word fJc/cer-mark, the name of the old Wagr-isiDS of Holstein, and (not im- possibly) in the words Hun, Hung-eivy, and (even) Finn. The justification of these latter etymologies will be given in the sequel. A notice, too, of a difficulty in respect to the doctrine of its exclusively Slavonic origin will be taken when we come to the sketch of the Sir- anians. The portion of the Ugrian history and Ugrian ethno- 8 POSITION OF THK TJGEUNS. logy, which is not iacluded in the histoiy and ethnology of the Russian Empire, is small I repeat the statement, for the sake of indicating its nature and extent. Two sections of the Ugrian stock — two sections, and no more — are at the present moment located beyond the domain of the Czar; two sections of very different degrees of social and political importance, but two sections which,' nevertheless, are undeniably reducible to the same class. The ferst of these is the Lap population of Sweden and Norway ; the second that of the.Majiars of Hungary — one Scandinavian, the other Austrian ; one rude, the other civilized; one undersized, the other weUgrown ; one insignificant, the other an object of interest and im- portance to the historian — ^both Ugrian, nevertheless; both Ugrian, though many of the Majiars ignore the relationship, or are ashamed of it. The Ugrian stock was, and is, the central stock of the, three; its original position being between that of the. Turk and the Saxmatian. Of these the former lay on its eastern, the latter on its wSstem side — west by south- west. And each pressed forwards from its own proper area, and ia its own definite direction — ^the Turk from east to west, the Sarmatian from west to east. So that the Ugrians were hke the iron between the hammer and the anvil. As the lateral stocks intruded and encroached, the central stock yielded and retired — sometimes wholly, sometimes partially; sometimes to be extinguished altoge- ther ; sometimes to amalgamate in the way of iatermixture ; sometimes to protract an existence in disrupted and iso- lated fragments. And then come the ways in which this separate existence shews itself — sometimes it is in the Ian- POSITION OF THE UGEIANS. 9 guage ; sometimes the physiognomy ; sometimes the super- stitions. , So that the evidence of an Ugrian occupancy varies, and the criteria of Ugrian blood are micertain. However, such was the original situs. The Ugrian in the centre ; theSarmatians and the Turks on the side — pres- sures lateral, converging in the direction of the Ugrians. But this is not all. The original situs of the Turks and Sarr matians, although east and west in respect to the Ugrians, was not absolutely so. Ugria lay in the north as well as in the centre. This gives the movement that effected the chief displacements a complex character. They were from south to north, as well as from east to west. No division of the Turk stock, no division of the Sarmatian, originally lay within the Arctic Circle, however much they may have moved northwards in after-times. The Ugrians, on the contrary, are eminently Circum-polar ; so that if we look to their older occupancies we shall find that they form the fringe to the Arctic Ocean along the whole (or nearly the whole) coast of Asia and Europe; plajring the same part as the Eskimo do in America. Indeed, in some respects, the Laps and Samoyeds may be called the Eskimo of the Old World just as the Es- kimo are the Laps and Samoyeds of the New. At the same time we must guard against making the Ugrians, too, exclusively Northrons. Some of them lie as far south as the latitude of London — ^the Majiars fur- ther south stilL But, as the Majiars are only immigrants into their present occupancies they are not looked upon as representatives of the original distribution. I will continue these preliminaries by giving what I believe to have been the geographical distribution of the three B 3 10 POSITION OF THE UGRIAUS. Stocks— say B. 0. 1000, 2000, or 3000; i. e., during some trndetermined portion of the pre-historic period. 1. There were Sarmatians in Lithuania, Volhynia, Gallicia, and Transylvania, these being (for the parts north of the Danube) their most eastern localities. 2. There were Turks in Independent Tartary, this being their most western locahty. 3. The whole intervening portion, surmounted on the north as far as the Arctic Sea by allied populations, was Ugrian — ^the Volga being Ugrian, the Dnieper being Ugrian, the most Eussian parts of modem Eussia being Ugrian. So that the Muscovites or Eussians are a new and intrusive population — i. e., comparatively new. In certain localities they may have been occupants 3,000 years; in some less than 300; in some not 30. They are the spreading and the encroaching population. They be- gan to be so early; though no earlier, perchance, than did the Turks. Whoever, however, it may have been who encroached the most, it was the Ugiians who were the most encroached upon. The Ugrians it was who were broken up betimes, and the Ugrians it is who,' at the present period, are found in some of their original localities — no- where. In some they occur as isolated patches of popu- lation; islands, so to say, in a Eussian and Turkish sea. In others they preponderate. It is not dijBficult to determine beforehand the different Ugrian locaHties. In the south and west they are likely to be the scarcest; nay, they are likely to be non-existent. How should it be otherwise? The south and west are the i^arts nearest the original Sarmatians; the areas whereon the encroachment first began ; the starting points POSITION OF THE UGEIANS. 11 for the displacement. Just what happened in England happened ia Eussia. In England the Welsh elements are at their minimum ia the eastern counties ; iudeed, in such regions as Norfolk, Suffolk, Lincolnshire, &c., they have long disappeared to all eyes but those of the minute ethnologist, who, with care and pains, just finds traces of them in the local dialects, local names, local super- stitions. In Devonshire and Herefordshire they become clearer. In Comwall they existed almost within the memory of man. In the PrincipaUty they live still, and axe likely to live longer, However, in England there are no isolated patches of Welshmen; no central moun- tain, no impenetrable wood, no impracticable swamp, that preserves the remnants of an earlier population whilst aU around has changed. Yet there were such patches once. When Cheshire and South Lancashire were English, Cumberland was Welsh: so that ia this case there was an analogue of what we find amongst the Ugrians of Russia. Had Robin Hood and the outlaws of Sherwood Forest — ^had Hereward and the heroes of the fens — been the descendants and representatives of the Ancient Britons, the parallel would have been closer still. However, it is close enough to say that the Ugrians are to Russia what the Kelts are to Great Britaia and France. The dimensions of the Ugrian class were always large, but, of late years, they have become larger. This is because certain uniavestigated populations, whereof the ethnological position was uncertain, have since been daimed as Ugrian-^and that upon reasonable grounds. Hence we have the word with its older, and the word with its newer, signification; the class with its earlier. 12 THE SAMOTEDS and the class with its later, dimensions ; the stock as it ■was when Miiller wrote his work on the Ugrische Folh- siamme, and the class as it has been left by Castren and other Fin inquirers. The TJgrian area always spread as far southwards as the Lower Volga, even into the Governments of Saratov, -Simbirsk, and Tambov. Then there are the Laps of ISTorwegian Fuimark, at the very northern extremity of Europe, the Laps of the North Cape. These occupy the coast both eastwards and westwards — ^in the direction of Bergen and in the direction of Archangel. They dip, too, inland. The western side of the White Sea is Russian Lapland. The northern part of Sweden is Swedish Lapland. Finmark is Wor- wegian Lapland. But the White Sea makes a break, and where the White Sea begins Lapland ends. On the other side of Archangel lies the coimtry of the Samoyeds. Now, it is only lately that the Samoyedshavebeen deemed Ugrian. Hence, they belong to the class in its modified form — with its extended import. But there are other populations ia the same category with the Samoyeds ; populations unclassed, or only classed provisionally. These carry us far eastward ; far eastward beyond the Yenisey ; beyond the river which, to theUgrians of the earlier classi- fication, was the eastern hmit. There it was where the Ostiak branch was found in its furthest locality ; succeed- ed, eastward, by the Yeniseians. The Yeniseians were so called for want of a better name, and because they lived on the river Yenisey. But the Yeniseians and Sa- moyeds are in the same category ; so that what makes the Samoyed XTgrian, naakes the Yeniseian Ugrian also. AND TENKKIANS. 13 Then there come a family not only heyond the Yenisey,but beyond the Lena — ^beyond the Lena, and on the Kolyma, Yana, and Indijerka — a family that carries the TJgrians well-nigh up to Behring's Straits, bringing them almost in contact with the Eskimo. This is the family of the Yukahiri — Ugrian because the Yeniseian is TJgrian, just as the Yeniseian was what the Samoyed was found to be. ^ere, in. the parts, near Behring's Straits, lies the eastern- most boundary of the tribes allied to the Finlanders and Laplanders of Europe. The original boundary (as aforesaid) was the Yenisey — the original boundary on the east. That on the west has yet to be considered. The west must be divided into the north-west and the south-west ; the difference between the two lying in the fact of the former limit being a matter easy of investiga-7 tion, patent, and transparent, the latter being a piece of miaute ethnography. This it is even now. 'But what is it when we make allowance for displacements and at- tempts to reconstruct the original Ugrian area? A harder problem still. I think, in my own mind, the original western limit lay in the Government of Minsk — so far west as that. However, this is a matter of specu- lation — ^induction, if we prefer the term. The question is, the present limit westwards. For the north, this is the westernmost point of Norwegian Lapland; for the centre, a tract in Courland; for the south, a spot in the Government of Tambov where the most western locality, of the most southern XJgrians, that of cer- tain Mordvins, is to be foimd All between this and Minsk is the Ugria of an extinct, an amalgamated 14 CHAKACTER OF THE XJGEIAN AKEA. Ugrian population; just as all between the German Ocean and the Welsh frontier is the Britawaia of an extinct or amalgamated family of Britons. 1. From the North Cape to the Governments of Penza and Tambov — 2. From the Indijerka to the Atlantic Ocean — 3. From the Indijerka to the Government of Tambov. Such is the extent of the Ugrian area, in its widest sense, as it at present exists. d. Instead of the Indijerka read Yenisey, and you have the area of the TJgria of Miiller and the writers of the beginning of the century. Instead of the Government of Tambov read Minsk, and you have the Ugria of the time anterior to the Turk and Sarmatian encroachments, as reconstructed by the ethnologist, upon the principles of ethnological ciiticism ; or, changing the expression, pal^ontologically. Such is the area, such the portion of the earth's sur- face, that is or has been Ugrian. It is a portion that, year by year, month by month, and day by day, decreases. It is an area of which the frontier recedes, I believe, in every direction — ^in every direction, or nearly so. At any rate, its diminution is the general rule, its increase the exception. Has this always been the case? It has been so generally. If it were not so, Russia would be Fin rather than Muscovite. History, however, supplies some instances to the contrary. Mr. Norris has committed himself to the doctrine that a population speaking a lan- guage with decidedly Ugrian analogies, once efifected per- manent settlements so far south as Persia; or (if not this) that the original area extended so much farther southwards. CHAEACTER OF THE UGEIAN AEEA. 15 The Majiar conquest of Hungary -was undoubtedly TJgrian. Upon the whole, however, the Ugrians have been a popu- lation of a receding rather than an encroaching frontier. Hence, we shall not be surprised if the whole of the Ugrian area be more or less broken up — ^if the Tungus- ians and Koriaks in Asia have effected displacements, and obliterated populations, just as the Turks and Sarmatians have done in Europe. The Ugrian is a population of a receding rather than an encroaching frontier. This it is as compared with the Turks, Sarmatians, Tungusians, and Koriaks. Some parts, however, of the family are stronger and more en- croaching than others; i.e., some branches have extended themselves at the expense of others. The Laps, for in- stance, stretched further southwards in the direction of St. Petersburgh than they do now. The Fins of Fin- land displaced them — just as the Franks of Germany displaced, in the parts about Hanover and Oldenburg, the Angles and Frisians, who were, nevertheless, just as German as themselves. The Ugrians are a pure rather than a mixed popiila- tion ; though this is a rather uncertain point, even for the nineteenth century. Upon the whole, however, they seem to intermarry amongst themselves ; e.g., the Estho- nian and Let in Esthonia and Livonia, keep separate. The Finlanders and Swedes, however, intermarried. The more isolated populations of the Volga keep more sepa- rate than not. What, however, took place in the times of their earUer history is problematical. Did the Turk, as he encroached, connect himself with the Ugrians he encroached on ? Did the Bussian ? If so, vast portions 16 THE SAEMATIiLN STOCK. of Russia may be Ugrian on the motliers side; as I think they are. The phenomena of iatermixture between the different divisions of the Ugrian family itself are neither numerous nor clear. The chief facts are to be found ia Lapland. Here there is a great deal of intermixture -with the Fin of Finland ; and that to the improvement of the Lap. I now attempt to give a kind of conspectus of the chief characteristics of the three divisions in hand: also a slight notice of the lvalue of each group as a class. To the learned ethnologist this is made clear in a few words. To the learned ethnologist it is, perhaps, unne- cessary. I venture, however, not only to presume, that, for the general reader, something of the sort is required, but also to excuse myself for making a temporary change in the arrangement We have hitherto given precedence of notice to the Ugrians. This is because they are the oldest inhabitants of Russia ; the most central also. But it is not convenient to take them first in order now. This is because they are transitional or iatermediate to the other two — the Sarmatians giving one extreme, the Turks the other. Between these lie the Ugrians. Now the points of character of the iatermediate group will be best understood when we have given those of the two extremes. The Sarkatians. — One of the two branches into which the great stock, which we find it convenient to desig- nate by the term Sarmatian, is divided, is callei Slavonic, the other Lithuanian. The exact relation of these two THE SAEMATIAN STOCK. 17 branches to each other has. yet tp he determined ; perhaps it can scarcely be made out. Some writers enlarge on the points of difference ; others on those of similarity. " The Slavonic and Lithuanic are alhed to each other as the Scandinavian is to the German.'' " The Slavonic and Lithuanic are allied to each other; as the' Gaehc is to the Welsh." ' " The Slavonic and Lithuanic are allied to each other as the Latin is to the Greek." "The Slavonic and Lithuanic are as Httle allied to, each other as the Slavonic and German, the German, and Keltic, the Lithuanian and the Latin." "The Slavonic constitutes one separate substantive division of the languages called Indo-European,, and. the Lithuanic, another." Such and such like statements and similes represent the conflicting opinions on this point. Those of the pre- sent .writer are decided against all the broader lines of, demarcation; and he consequently subordinates both to the class termed Sarmatian without the least hesita- tion — indeed, he would briag a still more important tongue, the Sanskrit,* under the same denomination; only he thinks that in doing so he would be in too small a mi- nority for the practical exposition of his subject. Even in the classification he proposes he is in a doubtful majority, if he be in a majority at all. The present teaching, how- ever, whatever it may have been hitherto, sets in the direction of a " Sarmatian Stock." Schleicher (for in- stance) in the " Languages of Europe "f speaks of the * For the reasoning, on this point see chapter on, the original Slavonic area. t Die Sprachen Europas. — Bonn, 1850. 18 THE SAHMATIAN STOCK. " Letto-Slavonic Family."* A monograpli of Daae'sf goes further botli in the expression of the opinion of the ■writer, and in the proof of the soundness of his view. Other authorities could be quoted ; but enough, perhaps, has been said to justify the use of the term, and to indi- cate the value of the class it applies to. The Slavonic languages have been differently classed Those, however, which exist at the present moment, as spoken and living languages are referrable to one of four central groups— (a) the Polish, (6) the Bohemian, (c) the Servian, and {d) the Kussian ; there being dialects and sub-dialects, and (what creates greater compHcations) transitional or intermediate forms besides. Taking cog- nizance of these latter, we get the addition of the (e) Lu- satian, (/) the Slovak, and {g) the Bulgarian. The mea- sure of the importance of the Slavonic tongues lies in the fact of their being spoken by not less (probably by more) than seventy-eight millions of human beings — Schaf- farik's numbers being as follows : — Poles 9,365,000 Bohemians 7,167,000| Lusatians 142,000 lUyrians, &c 7,246,000§ Bulgarians 3,587,000 Eussians 51,184,000 Total 78,691,000 * Lettiscli-Slawisclies Familien-paar. t Om denLithauiskeFoIkestammesrorlioldtildeiiSlavomake, — Christiana, 1851. X This includes the Slovak of Hungary. § This includes the Servian, Croatian, Dalmatian, Montenegro, and Carinthian. THE SAEMATIAK STOCK. 19 The Lithuanic, on the contrary, is spoken in its two forms — Lithuanian and Let — by only, Lithuanians 716,886 Lets 872,107 1,598,993 This means the Lithuanians and Lets of the Russian Empire. To these we may add a few from East Prussia. Having done this, we have the whole of the division. The geographical relations of the Sarmatians are essen- tially European — the European coimtries of Lusatia, Bo- hemia, Carinthia, Camiola, Hungary, lUyria, Poland, Russia, and East Prussia being their occupancies. In none of these do we find any extreme condition of cli- mate — as determined by either latitude or sea-leveL Except in the case of the more northern Russians the Arctic circle is never approached ; and it must be remem- bered that these northern Russians, the Russians of Archangel and Siberia, are by no means m situ. On the contrary, they are intruders of comparatively recent origin. The southern limit of the Sarmatians is in Ma- cedonia, and on the Albanian frontier — Ragusa beiag their last town in the direction of the tropics, from which it is far removed. So that they lie wholly withia the temperate zone. In respect to sea-level no Sarmatians ajre mountaineers in the way that the Swiss, the Tibetans, and the Peruvians are. The highest ranges they occupy are ia Bohemia, GaUicia, and Montenegro. No point here exceeds 10,000 feet. Of all the populations of Europe they have the least 20 THE SABMATIAN STOCK. amount of sea-board, in proportion to their mass; the Spaniards and Germans not excepted. No stock has so large a portion of its area spread out in level plains— witness the wide flats of Poland, and the wider ones of Russia. The mass, then, of the Sarmatians are agricultural. Before they were this they were herds- men — hunters, perhaps, in the forest districts. At the same time, we must guard against any imdue generality. Where there are mines, the Sarmatian is a miner — as in GaUicia, Hungary, Bohemia, and Carinthia; and where there is a sea-board he is a sailor, as in Dalmatia. So it is with their intellectual aptitudes and habits, ■with their creeds, and with their pohtical ideas. They vary with the conditions of their evolution. At the same time, the extremes lie within moderate limits. There is no approach to savage life in the way of their social economy, and no manifestation of incapacity for such exercises of the intellect as present themselves. Say that the flourishing period of Pohsh learning gives us the development of the Sarmatian mind in its brightest phase. Say that the most unfavourable aspect is presented by the Lithuanian serf Neverthe- less, the extremes lie within a small compass ; within a smaller compass than the extremes of several other large groups. Of these (for the sake of illustration) take the one which contains the populations whose lan- guages are derived from the Latin, and compare the Sar- dinian mountaineer, or the Wallachian, with the French- man of Paris. Or take the German stock. Though the difference between an American, of Ohio and a German of Hesse, be not exactly the difference between a Livo- THE SASMATIAN STOCK. '21 nian and (say) a Ragusan, it is, probably, the same in amount. So it is with their physical coniformation. No Sarma- tians differ from each other so much as the Laplander does from the Majiar of Hungary ; perhaps, not so much as an Alabama American differs from a Swede or a ■Frieslander. The sources of the Sarmatian civili^iation are two-fold; a fact in which it stands alone amongst the famUies of Northern Europe. None of these have taken their cultivation directly from Greece. Neither have they their Christian creed. The Kelts and the Germans were converted from Rome. Now, the Eastern portion of the Slavonians, belongs to the Greek Church. Then, in respect to Romanism and Protestantism, the Western Church is divided ; Po- land having, at one time, been all but a Protestant country. Livonia is so at the present moment. No other European stock, except the Slavonian and Albanian, con- tains any Mahometans. In Bosnia there are several-^so that there we have the creed of Mahomet combined with the language of one of the early bible-translations. As is the history of the creed, so is that of the alphabet. The Poles, Bohemians, Lusatians, and all the members of the Lithuanic stock, took their letters from Germany, these being Roman. The Servians and Russians founded their alphabet on the Greek Upon the whole, then, the Sarmatian is a stock of pretty uniform characteristics — characteristics, however, which are not more uniform than the physical and histo- rical conditions under which they are found — ^not more 22 THE SAJRMATIAN STOCK. tmifbim, probably not less. It is safe to say, that the one class bears much such a ratio to the other, as we should expect d priori. In all respects the Sarmatian is more European than Asiatic; more German, Keltic, Latin, or Greek, than Mongolian, Tibetan, or Chinese. The straight black hair, and black or hazel irides, characteristics of the Turks, Mongols, and almost aU the other Asiatics, are largely replaced amongst the Sarmatians by grey eyes and brown hair — brown in its lighter as well as its darker shades; brown, iacluding flaxen. Yet the face is flatter, .and the head broader, than is the case with the more ex- treme European types — e. g., the Italian, the Spanish, and some varieties of the German. As compared with any family of the whole world, except the German and the Kelt, the Sarmatian is light-haired. The general cha- racter of the more important parts of the skeleton, espe- cially that of the cranium, is less certain. According to tiie nomenclature of Pr. Eetzius, the Russian skuU, at least, is brakhy-kephalic,* and herein it approaches the Siberian forms of organization. The same is, probably, the case, with the Polish, Bohemian, and other divisions. The investigation, however, is difficult and incomplete. It is especially complicated by the doubtftd character of the early Sarmatian history. At the present J;ime the limits of the Sarmatian stock are, as near as may be * This means that, instead of the diameter of the cranium from the front to the back being (say) one-fourth longer than the di- ameter from side to side, as is the case with populations called dololikho-kephalic (long-headed), the side-to-side, or inter-parie,- tal, is nearly as long as the fore-and-aft diameter. THE SAEMATIAN STOCK. 23 co-extensiye with the diffusion of the Slavonic and Lithu- anian fonns of speech. In other words, it rests upon the test of Language. But this test, never absolute, is emi- nently insufficient here, inasmuch as two facts, undeni- able and undoubted, complicate and traverse it. a. There is a considerable amount of Ugrian blood amongst certain populations whose speech is Slavonic. h. There is a considerable amount of Slavonic blood amongst certain populations whose speech is German. In the time of Charlemagne the boundary between the Slavonians and Germans lay so far west as the Elbe ; for that river formed it. Now, the explanation of this lies in the fact of the Sarmatians haviag encroached on the Ugrians, whereas the Germans have encroached on the Sarmatians, If so, the Eastern parts of the Slavonic area are less Sarmatiam than their language makes them, and the Eastern parts of the German area less Teutonic ; facts which shew that we are now in the middle of a new question — the question of purity or mixture of blood. What if this carry us to the assertion that many of the German writers and thinkers may be — ^to a certain degree, Slavonic, i. e., Sla- vonic in the way that such Englishmen as Davy and Burke are Cornish Britons, or Irish Gaels? This is a question which will be enlarged upon hereafter, So wiH that of the original magnitude of the Sarmatian area. At pre- sent it is one of the large ones of the world — larger than any other in Europe, but not larger than the Turk in Asia, nor, perhaps, the Algonkin in America. This, however, applies only in respect to the surface of the country that it covers. The density of the -population, 24 THE TURK STbCK. or the relation of the number of the Sarmatian men and women to the tract of country which they cover, is another ■matter. In number the Sarmatians yield to the Chinese. It is safe to say, that, whatever may be the importance of certain other characteristics, the magnitude of the Sar- matian area, and the number of Sarmatian individuals, are amongst the most prominent The Turks. — The Turk group is simpler than the Sarmatian. It falls into no such divisions as the Sla- vonic and Lithuanian; in other words, the differences be- :tween its extreme members lie within a smaller compass. They are chiefly calculated upon the varieties of the dif- ferent forms of speech. Of these — ■ A. 1. The Central and Northern division is found in In- dependent Tartary and certain of the Turkish parts of of the Russian Empire to the north and west thereof Thus the Kirghiz, the Bashkirs of Orenburg, the No- gays ofthe Government of Caucasus, the Meshtsheriak of Siberia, belong to the group. 2. The Eastern division ■ contains the dialects of Chi- nese Tartary, of Bokhara, and also, according to Beresin, the Turkoman of Turkestan. 3. The Western division is that of the Osmanlis of EumeHa and AnatoKa. B. 4. The Arctic Turks, called by themselves Sokhalar, but by their neighbours Yakuts, are an outlying section whose occupancy is the banks of the Lena and the parts within the Arctic Circle. Sketch as this is, it suggests the idea of the enormous axea apportioned to the Turkish stock. It is, perhaps, the largest in the world, measured by the mere extent of sur- THE TUEK STOCK. 25 face ; not, however the largest in respect to the niunber of individuals it contains. In respect to its physical con- ditions, its range of difference is large. The bulk of its surface is a plateau — .the elevated table-land of Central Asia ; so that, though lying within the same parallels as a great part of Sarmatia, its climates are more extreme. But then its outlying portions are the very shores of the Icy Sea, whilst there are other Turks as far south as Egypt. In Eumelia and Anatolia they occupy some of the most favoured parts of the world. In Caucasus thfey are to be found as mountaineers. The Kirghiz of Pamer occupy one of the highest table-lands in the world. They are essentially the occupants of a Steppe — herdsmen, horsemen, in some cases camel-drivers. The Sokhalar use the reiadeer and the dog. The sea-board of the Turks is small ; neither can it be said that where they have had any, they have made any notable use of it. But it must be remembered, that they have had in such instances a population as essentially maritime as the Greeks by their side. Agriculture, under fitting circum- stances, has been less neglected. From the Crimea, from that part of Turkestan which is watered by the Jurjan, evidence may be collected that the Turk, simply by the fact of his belonging to the Turk stock, is by no means re- pugnant to agricultural industry. In Europe he is a conqueror, and, as such, gets his work done on easier terms than those that stimulate industry. In the way of city-building, few of the Turk tribes have ■exhibited any activity. The tent, rather than the house, is their natural home. Besides which, they have gene- rally conquered countries already civilized; soils already C 26 THE TURK STOCK. built upon. Constantinople shews this. So do the towns of Anatolia. The Sokhalar are either Pagans or imperfect Christians of the Greek Church, their conversion having been attempted by the Russians. In Chinese Tartary there may be Buddhists — though here I speak with imperfect informa,tion. In the sixth century a Turk tribe was con- verted, by Nestorian missionaries from Syria, to Chris- tianity. Saving these exceptional phenomena the whole Turk stock is Mahometan — ^next to the Arab, the most exclusively Mahometan in the world. The Turks are Sunnites rather than Shiites — the Persians beiag Shiite rather than Sunnite. Their intellectual development takes a favourable form only when contrasted with that of the ruder populations, such as the Mongohans, the Mantschus, and the TJgrians. The Indian civilization is foreign to them ; the Chinese civilization foreign also. The European has yet to be adopted. For their alpha- bet they have two sources — Christian Syria, Mahome- tan Arabia. The influence, however, of the former has been superseded by that of the latter; so that at the present moment the Turk, next to the Arab, is the great Mahometan family. The character of the original Pa- ganism is hard to be ascertained. The historical notices of the Turks under that naTne, anterior to the introduc- tion of the Koran, are few. They may be increased by resorting to the history of some of the barbarous tribes of antiquity ; e. g., the Huns and the Scythians. This, ho;svever, is the history of the stock under another name ; and it should be added that it is not every investigator who admits these affinities, however decidedly the present THE TURK STOCK. 27 ■writer may commit himself to the support of them. The best field, however, for the study of the Turk mythology in its unmodified form is the Yakut country, where (as already has been stated) the original Paganism is still retained. It is essentially Shamanistic (whatever may be the import of this word) in character ; i. e., it is akin, in its general features, to the superstitions of the Laps, the Samoyeds, the rude populations of the Kolyma and Indi- jerka. We may say (if we choose) that it is Sibericm. The physical appearance of the Turk family is scarcely susceptible of any very general expression. We may call it Mongol, and, in doing so, we should be strictly correct in respect to the northern and the eastern branches. The Uzbeks of Bokhara are described in terms that would suit a Kalmuk. The Turcomans of Turkestan have a similar physiognomy. So have the Kirghiz of Independent Tartary ; and, in a less degree, the Nogays of the Government of Caucasus. Still less favoured are the Turks of Siberia, of the Barabinski Steppe, and the colder parts of Tobolsk and Irkutsk. They faU. off in size, and degenerate in strength. Finally, we reach the Arctic Circle, where the figure of the Yakut approaches that of the Lap or Samoyed ; still, however, preserving a superiority. At any rate, his features are Mongol. Von Middendorf expressly states this, and contrasts their language with their physiognomy. The former connects them with the Osmanli of Constantinople, the latter with the Mongols of the wall of China. It is safe, then, to say, that for the northern and eastern Turks the state- ment that their physical organization is Mongol is justi- fiable. It is more than this. It is the best way of C2 28 THE TURK STOCK. expressing the fact. There are, of covirse, differences of detail ; but, on the whole, the word Mongol is the best single term we can adopt. The face is flat, the head is broad rather than long, the nose sunken, the skin tawny, the beard scanty, the hair strong, black, and straight, the eyes occasionally oblique. But turn from this picture to that of the Osmanli of Rumelia or Anatolia, whose nose is aquiline, whose chin is bearded, and who may often serve as a model of manly beauty. The term Mongol no longer has its application. The physiognomy approaches the Euro- pean type. It approaches it. More than this cannot be said. Even in the most European forms the cheek- bones continue to be prominent, the skin brown or brunette, and the suborbital portion of the face flattened. What are we to infer from this ? That the changes in the physical conditions of chmate and soil have effected other changes, or that the blood has become less Turk and more something else through intermixture with Anatolians, Georgians, Circassians, Europeans, &c. ? I give no opinion upon this point. I only raise the question as to which of the two Turk forms of physiognomy is the normal, and which the exceptional, one. A glance at the map gives the answer. The rule is with the Usbeks, the Kirghiz, and the Turcomans, the populations of the Mongol organi- zation. The exception \s with the Osmanli — ^the Turks of the smaller geographical area ; the Turks of a tract of country which was, originally, other than Turkish ; the Turks who have been most exposed to influences pre- viously imtried ; the Turks who have had the greatest opportunity for the introduction of foreign blood in the way THE TURK STOCK. 29 of intermixture ; and the Turks who, of the nations of the ■world, have made it a practice to avail themselves of it. The ordinary physiognomy, then, of the Turk tribes is Mongol — the Yakuts on one side, and the Osmanli on the other, presenting the extreme forms. This leads us to the notice of the physical conditions under which they live. The vast magnitude of their area has been indicated. It stretches from south to north, over more parallels of latitude than the whole of Europe, inasmuch as the Turks of Syria lie south of the most southern parts of Greece, and the Yakuts of the Lena approach the Pole as near as the most northern Laplanders. At the same time, a line passing midway through the Turk area would nearly coincide with one that bisected the Sarmatian. In the way of altitude, we have extremes equally important. The Kirghiz of Pamer seek for summer-pastures at the height of more than 10,000 feet The social organization of the Turk stock rests essen tially on the division into tribes, a constitution common to the Mongols and the Mantshus in Central Asia (pei'- haps, also, to some of the Bhot or Tibetan populations), and to the Brahtds, the Biluchis, and the Kurds of Persia. It is also Arab and Jewish; partially African, still more partially European. Other characteristics of greater or less importance and generality could be attributed to the Turk family, if we went into the early history of it. But the early history of all nations is beset with uncertainties, and de- mands, besides, too much criticism to be dealt with in the 30 THE UGRIiN STOCK. unconditional manner required in a sketch like the present. The TJoEiiNS. — "With the exception of the Majiars of Hungary, every division and sub-division of the Ugrian class is contaiaed -witlun the boundaries of the Russian Empire. Hence, they mU, each and aU, have a separate notice. For this reason, the present notice of them, is short ; and they wHl rather be compared and contrasted with the other two stocks, than come under any especial substantive description. Their physiognomy is so far Turk, that the writers who apply the term Mongol, as the designation for one of the primary varieties of the human species in the way of physical conformation — ^the writers, in short, who adopt the nomenclature of Blumenbach — ^place the Ugrians and Turks in the same class ; that class being the Mongol. So that, in the eyes of the anatomist, the Turks and Ugrians belong to the same great division of mankind. So they do in the eyes of the plulologues, who, having originally brought the languages represented by the Turkish, the Proper Mongohan and the Mantshu, under three divisions (respectively called Turk, Mongol, and Tungusian), eventually admitted a fourth — ^the Ugrian — the one before us. In the eyes of the ethnologist, who so far combines the two methods, as to apply the test of language as well as that of organization, and the test of organization as well as that of language, these special classifications still con- tinue to hold good ; in other words, the philological and anatomical classifications coincide. THE UGEIAN STOCK. 31 Neither are they impaired when we add to the charac- teristics, their habits, manners, customs, superstitions, and intellectual aptitudes. Under all aspects — The Tiu-ks and Ugrians are closely allied classes. On the other hand — : The Sarmatians belong to the so-called Caucasian class ; that is, if we take the anatomist's view, and use the no- menclature of Blumenbach — And their language is what is called Indo-European; that is, its relations are with Sanskrit, Latin, Greek, and German — ^and (more remotely) with the Keltic. Now, Caucasian is a term of equal generality with Mongolian; Indo-European being equally general as a term in philology. If so, the Turk and Sarmatian are widely separated from each other. They belong to two different orders ; and this, whether OUT classification be anatomical or philological. These orders, moreover, are each of the highest value. There is no group to which the Indo-European class has been subordiuated ; none to' which the Caucasiaa What does this imply? That somewhere between the Turks and Sarmatians there is a broad liae of demarcation — of which the Ugrians lie on the Turkish side. Now, if mankind fell into Species rather than Varieties; if the lines of demarcation between such varieties were of the broad and trenchant sort that the proper naturalist loves to deal with; and lastly, if ethnology were an old study whereof the facts and principles had long been criticized and ventilated, all this might be the case. But it is not the case as it is. 32 THE TERM TARTAR. In the mind of the present writer, the divisions and demarcations are overdrawn. The philologist finds Indo-European phenomena in the languages of Asia; the anatomist, a Mongolian osteology amongst the so-called Caucasians of Europe. Evidence of this will be given in the forthcomiug chapters. At present it is sufficient to guard against the exaggeration of differences, and to prepare ourselves for facts rather than names, classifications, and opinions; names, classifications, and opinions, embodied in such terms as Caucasian, Mon- golian (as applied to a primary division of the human species), and Indo-European. Common words, like Eu- ropean, and Asiatic, or Oriental, wiU help us more. We attach familiar meaniags to them, though, without perhaps, defining them. We know that the Pole is more European than the Tm:k, the Turk more Asiatic than the Pole; we know that as we move westwards we find the nearest approaches to our own type, and- that we recede from this type as we go eastwards. At present, this is sufficient. Now, it is safe to say, that where the Sarmatian re- cedes from the Ugrian he approaches the German, and it is equally safe to say, that where the Ugrian recedes from the Turk he approaches the Sarmatian. There are three terms — Tungusian, Turanian, and Tar- tar — that will help to explain this. a. Tungusian is the name of a class which comprises, along with the Mantshus who conquered China, a number of less important tribes situated in the north-eastern parts of Asia, in the Governments of Tobolsk and Irkutsk, on the upper and middle parts of the Elvers Yenesey and TARTAR CHARACTERISTICS. 33 Lena, and, more especially, on the drainage of the Amur, Saghalin, or Selinga Kiver. It is a word of equal value with Ugrian and Turk m the way of classification. ■MongoUan is a word, in the way of classification, of equal value with Tungusian, Turk, and Ugrian. It means the tribes to the north-west of the wall of China — the Mongolians of the Khalkas and the desert of Gobi ; the Mongolians, ia short, of Mongolia Proper — Mongolia in the limited sense of the term. b. The Mongolian, the Tungusian, the Turk, and the Ugrian (along with another division not necessary to be mentioned here), constitute an order called the Turaniatt. c. Two of our terms are thus explained. Now, in re- spect to Tartar it has been stated, some pages back, that, although the word was in many respects an inconvenient term, it could still be made applicable for ethnological purposes. Let it denote not the Tinrk stock alone — ^nor yet the Mongolians alone — ^nor yet alone the class to which the Mantshu conquerors of China belonged — but the three collectively. In ha,bits, the Turks, Mongohans, and Mantshus are certainly more like each other than even the Turks are to the Ugrian., They are aU eminently nomadic — so long, at least, as they are limited to their original area. This area was one of a uniform physical condition. It spread over the steppes of Northern and Central Asia. The Ugrian did so only partially. In physical conformation they are aUke, notwith- standing the extent to which some of the Turks are Ugrian, and even European, in physiognomy. The purest and most unmixed Turk tribes are essentially c3 34 TARTAR CHARACTERISTICS. Mongol in physiognomy ; so much so, that Mongol inter- mixture has been assumed, in order to account for it — most gratuitously, however. The general character of their histories is alike. Their social organization is based upon the division into tribes. It is tribual, so to say. Now, if we may be said to have, in these points, so many Tartar characteristics, the word becomes con- venient ; and it suggests itself as a term descriptive of the habits of the Turk, the Mongolian, and the Tun- gusian, as opposed to the Ugrian, Turanians. It denotes certain common characteristics in the way of habits, man- ner of life, and history. But it is a word like European or Asiatic, more convenient than strictly scientific. If we look to the language, the Turk is as much Ugrian as Mongolian. However, the word enables us to predicate of the Ugrians that, as a class, they are less Tartar-like than the others. I find no one who has called them Tartars. The Tibetans have been called so ; and that incon- veniently ; but no Ugrian tribe. There is a reason for this ; a reason that lies in their habits. The system of tribes has no prominence amongst the Ugrians. ' The forest rather than the steppe is their habitat — ^if not the forest, the tundra. In their physical conformation they exhibit this im- portant phenomenon. They are the first stock in the direction from East to West, whereof the hair is not al- most exclusively black and the eyes black, also. This may sound strange ; becatise the thoroughly exceptional THE UGEIAN STOCK. 35 character of white, brown, and red hair, with a,- fair com- plexion to match, is not sufficiently recognized. Yet it is only in Europe, and the Ugrian part of Asia, that they occur. What is there white, red, or even brown in Africa? What throughout the whole length and breadth of America ? What in any island of Polynesia ? What in Australia? What in Asia where it is other than Ugrian? There are no light-haired Turks; yet the Turk is the stock nearest to the Ugrian. Not that the Ugrians are blondes. Whole sections are dark rather than fair ; whole sections fair rather than dark — this being also a point of interest and importance. In all this the Ugrian approaches the Sarmatian. Few, if any, of the Ugrians are Mahometan; few, if any, Buddhist. Some are still Pagans. The majority are Chris- tians ; Lutherans, or Christians of the Greek Church, ac- cording to the nation that has converted them ; the former where the influence has been Swedish, the latter where it has been Russian. In Hungary there are Roman Catholics. Some of the Ugrian languages are unwritten, some written. Where the influences have been Russian, the alphabet is Russian also. Otherwise it is German or Swedish. The early history of the Ugrian stock is liable to the same complications as that of the Turks and Sarmatians. For this reason it finds no place amongst our present considerations. 36 THE DORIAN STOCK. CHAPTER II. TUE UGRIAN STOCK— nORIANS OS THE GOTERHMENT OP ST. PETERSBUEG — THE VOD — THE IZHOR — THE AURAM0I3ET — THE SATAKOT — THE TSHUD OP NOTOGOROD AND OLONETZ — THE TERM TSHUD — THE YAM. The Ugrians of the map, with its commentary, before us, are — 1. — The Samoyeds. 2. — The Laps. 3.— The Voguls. 4. — The Finns falling into — A. a. The Tshud. b. TheVod. c. The Esthonians. d. The Liefs. B. The Karehans — a. Auramoiset. b. Savakot. c. Izhor. d. Karelians Proper. THE UGEIAN STOCK. 37 5. — Permians. a. Siranians. h. Permians. c. Votiaks. d. Besermanians. 6. — Volga Finns, a. Tsheremis. 6. Mordvin, c. TshuTash. For these we have the statistics; i. e., the number of the different divisions as distributed over the different Governments. But the Duchy of Finland is not noticed in the table ; although it is in the map. Neither are the Ostiaks; though they occur in the map also. This gives us as additions to class 4 — a. The Quains. b. The Tavastrians. It also gives us as a division next to the Voguls — The Ostiaks. Add to these the recent additions to the class (the Sa- moyeds having already been enumerated), which are — 1. The Yeniseians, and 2. TheYukahiri; and we have the details of the great Ugrian class as re- presented by populations actually, and at the present moment, ia existence. The extinct, amalgamated, modi- fied, and disguised tribes are another matter. We are dealing with the ethnography of Eussia ; so let us begin with the parts that best represent Russia. These are the parts between one of its present capitals and one of its ancient- ones — St. Petersburgh and Novo- gorod. We may consider these words as the names of 38 THE UGRIAN STOCK. either the Government or the Metropolis, just as we may, in England, speak of either the town or the county of Lincoln, Leicester, Hertford, &c. St. Petersburg is a new city; and iV^cwogorod, as if in opposition to its name (New-towa), is an old one. It was for a long time the chief terminal point of settlement to the Russians from the South and West. It was also the starting point from which more than one fresh conquest was effected. The Government of Novogorod itself was once wholly Ugrian ; but not within the historical period. It is partially so now. From Novogorod the Slavonian (Russian) intrusion extended westwards, northwards, and eastwards — ^west- wards in the direction of the Gulf of Finland ; north- ward towards the Governments of Olonets and Archangel ; eastwards towards those of Vologda and Permia.- Its goals seem to have been the two ports of St. Petersburg and Archangel, and the mining districts of the XTral From Novogorod the Slavonic intrusion extended westwards — ^westward in the direction of the Gtdf of Fin- land and the present City of St. Petersburg. With what Ugrian obstacles did it meet ? How far did it annihilate them ? In case the annihilation was incomplete, what remains of the original population stUl exist ? The Ugrians of the Government of St. Petersburg fall into five divisions, the number of each being as foUows : — 1. Esthonians 7,736 2. KareHans 3,660 3. Auramoiset 29,344 4. Savakot 42,979 5. Izhor 17,800 6. Vod •. 5,148 THE VOD. 39 Of these the first are outlyers from the neighbouring Government of Esthonia, to which, ethnographically, they belong. The Karelians are also referable to another division ; i. e., the one yrhich attains its fullest develop- ment in Western Finland. The Auramoiset and Savakot are more or less I'ialandish in origin also. The Izhor are, probably, indigenbus — at least, in part. The Vod are almost certainly indigenous. The Vod (or Vof). — The Vod represent the aborigiaal Ugrians of the Government of St. Petersburg. The name in the form before us is Eussian. The Germans of Narva call their district Watland, and the people Watlanders. The native name — the name by which the people desig- nate themselves — is TFatt-ialaiset or Wadd-iaXaiset, the termination -Icdset being one that we shall meet with again. It means Tnen, population, tribe ; and, when attached to other words, so as to form a pliural, has much the same power as the er in our words — Highland-er, British-er, &c. It is truly Fin or TJgrian, and whenever we meet a Gentile name in -laiset we may be sure that we have a Fin or Ugrian gloss before us. So it is with -lainen, which is the same word in the singular number. The five thousand and odd Fadanders are limited to a small tract on the coast of the Gulf of Finland, between Cronstadt and Narva, so that they are the most western of the St. Petersburg Ugrians. Yet their original area was larger A.D. 1069. Wseslav, when Prince of Polotsk, fought a bloody battle against them under the walls of Novogorod, and defeated them with great carnage. Here the account stands with the name Vod, unequico- cally. Nestor, however, the earliest Russian annalist, 40 THE VOD. mentions only Tshud and Narova; but as his language for these parts is general, and as his information was not of the most precise kind, it is likely that we have in his pages the acts of the Watlanders under other names. At any rate, the Ugrians of these parts appear under the very earliest light of the dawn of Russian history. Then we have the divisions of the ancient Novogorod, which give the VotsJcaia Patina (i. e., the Vod Fifth), just as, in the eyes of the old Norsemen, Northumberland was " a fifth part of England," or, as in Yorkshire, we talk of the Trithi/ags (Ridings). The Swedes took up this name, Russian as it was, and in a document of King John III. (A.D. 1590) we find that he makes his son " Prince of Finland, Careha, Watzkij-Pethin, and Inger- manland, in Russia.'' Hence, at the time when the Wattialaiset were numerous, there were two ethnological divisions comprised in the present Government of St. Petersburg — TFai-land and /ji^er-mannland, Watskipe- tin and Ingria. It is in the parishes of KattUa and Soik- kina that the Wattialaiset (by those who would visit them m situ) are to be found. Their dialect is peculiar. Some writers make it more Esthonian than Fialandish, others more Finlandish than Esthonian. Sjogren con- nects them with the Tshud of the Bieloserk, and, through it, with the Yam and Tavastrian, a detail of which the fuUer illustration will be given in the sequel "Tunnet pajattaa Waiss" — ^this means "Speak you Vod ?" Observe the form the word takes when it appears (as it only does when it is applied to the language) without the terminations -laiset, &c. Something will, perhaps, come of this. THE IZHOE. 41 The Izhor. — North of the Vod, and in contact with them, lie The Izhor, as they are called by the Russians, Jw^ri-kot as they call themselves. Observe the termination kot. This is the population from which the Swedes and Germans get the name J-n-g'er-man-land ; in Latin, Ingaria and Ingria ; Ingria, also, in English geography. The Vod call the Izhor Karelians (Karja- laiset), a poiut upon which Sjogren lays much stress, inasmuch as it confirms his view of the difference between them. The Izhor are the next oldest occupants of St. Petersburg after the Vod. They are most numerous on the Vod frontier, decreasing as you move northwards ; decreasing, too, as time goes on. In the direction of the Lake of Ladoga they were once numerous. They were once numerous in the northern circles of the government. Their dialects are numerous; on the Vod frontier like the Vod, on the Auramoiset frontier like the Auramoiset. The following is a Vod wedding-song, a translation of a translation, and that a free one ; a free one in some- thing like metre.* Like that of the old German popula- tions, this consists in alUteration ; two- or more words within the same couplet beginning with the same letter. To shew this I have given the original text : — NeitsUeni ainagoni ! Menet kaiwolle, kanani ! Wesitielle, wierakkoni ! Ala waad warjoa wetee ! Single, dear daughter-in-law ! Thou goest to the spring chicken ! The water-way, dear stranger ! Give way to the reflection on the water, * By Sjogren, Memoires de 1' Aoademie de St. Petershourg. Serie vi., Tom. ii., p. 151. 42 THE AURAMOISET. Wesi wetab kaiuiu. Meill on naised nagrajad; Meill on cinainaad eliad. Ala mene kijrjosa kujalle ! Paapaikas parapi muita, Korja muita korkaapi. Neitsliaeni aniagoni ! Neitsut aianagoanoni ! Ala tuskaa tuloa, Kao katsche lahtego ! Emma pannu pakasialle, Emma wieniid wohkasuolle ; Panimma poisile uwalle. For the water takes away thy charms. We have fair wives ; We have fair meadows ; Keep aloof from the house of the flatterer ; Bright is the cap of thy head, Higher than that of all the rest. Single, dear daughter-ia-law ! Dear daughter-in-law, single only ! Never may thy coming rue thee, Never may thyjoumeytrouble ! 1 did not betrothe you to a deserter, Took you not over the mossy moor, But I gave you to the good youth. The Auramoiset. — The Auramoiset lie north of the Izhor, on both sides of the Neva. Some of them extend as far as the district of Viborg, in the Duchy of Fialand. Tiiris, Duderhof, Ropscha, Ingris, Liisila, Valkiasaari, Toksova, and Voles, are the parishes in which they must be sought. Keksholm is their northernmost point. Aura- moiset and Agramoiset are the other forms of their name. The Savakot. — The Savakot are closely allied to the Auramoiset, beiag somewhat less rude ; the women, too, wear a different sort of cap ; and this supplies the chief distinction between them. They are mixed with the Auramoiset ia some of their localities ; with the Izhor in the others ; the circles of St. Petersburg, Schliisselburg, Sophia, Oranienbaum, Yamburg, and Narva, beiag their chief seats. THE AUEAMOISET. iS In A.D. 1623, the district of Agrepaa, in the depart- ment of Viborg, the south-western province of Finland, was ceded by the Russians to the Swedes, and along with two others, namely Yeskis and Savolax. It is believed that when this took place the ancestors of the Savokot and Auramoiset migrated into their present localities. Sjogren considers the affinities of the Savakot and Auramoiset to be Karelian rather than Tavastrian. If we now ask what parts of the Government of St. Petersburg are the most Ugrian, we shall find them to be those districts which lie between the sea and Lake Ladoga; the parts nearest the capital itself. On the other hand, the northern and southern portions are Russian. The southern shore of the Lake Ladoga is Russian. The parts between Novogorod and the Lake Peipus are Russian. The parts between these two areas are Ugrian. So that the Slavonic encroachments fol- lowed the lines of the rivers Luga and Volkov, and the Ugrian strongholds are the low lands along the side of the sea. This is the distribution we expect. The Tshud. — The yellow colouring on the map de- notes the Izhor, the Auramoiset, and the Sawakot col- lectively. "Without distiaguishing them fi-om each other, it distinguishes them from the Vod. The yellow with a buff border — such is the colouring of the " Finns of the Government of St. Petersburg." In the governments of Novogorod and Olonets this yellow colouring re-appears, but with a difference. The bordering is red — the colour for the Vod. The name, too, is changed. The yellow and red Ugrians of the governments of Olonets and Novogorod are called Tshud, 44 THE TSHUD. an important word, and one that requires explanation and criticism. Now, the meaning of the marking is this. The Izhor, Auramoiset, and Savakot, are considered to be foreign to their present locaUties — ^to have come thither from the north, from Finland^— from Karehan Finland, rather than Tavastrian Finland, whereas the Vod are aboriginal. More than this, it is considered that the nearest affinities to these Yod are those of the Tshud, distant as they are in geographical position. The chief evidence upon this point Hes in the similarity of dialect, and in the fact of both bearing a relation to the same division of the Finlanders — the Tavastrians. Sjogren suggested it as early as A.D. '30 or '32, and it seems that the ethno- grapher of the map before us had adopted it. Now, Tshud is said to be the name by which the Slavonic nations designated such other nations as were, at one and the same time, other than Slavonic and Ugrian. They are not said to call the Germans so ; in- deed, the Germans they call Niemce. Nor yet do they call the Turks so; these are Tartars. ' Wherever, then, the word Tshud is used, it is used by a Slavonian, and ap- plied to an Ugrian. It is not known to the Ugrians them- selves, and is anyi;hing but a complimentary designation. It is much such a word as Barbarus in Greek and Latia, only not applied so generally. It is also such a word as Welsh in the English and German ; a word which is applied to the Welshman of Wales, to the Italians of Italy, and to the Walloons of Belgium, by the Germans of their respective frontiers, and which is as little Walloon as it is Welsh, and as little Welsh as it is Italian. THE TSHUD. 45 This is the usual statement ; but it must be taken with some reserve. I cannot find that all the Ugrians were called Tshud. The Esthonians are not so called. The Finlanders are not. It seems as if the name was given more especially by the Russians of Novogorod to the Ugrians of their immediate frontier; at any rate, the Ugrians under notice are pre-eminently Tshud, and as Sjogren connects them with the Vod, he occasionally allows himselfto speak of the one as the Northern Tshud, the other as the Southern Tshud. ^asf and West would, perhaps, have been the better adjectives. What are the relations between these Tshuds and a population called Yain ? A.D. 1042, Wladimir, son of Yaroslav, marched with a mighty army out of Novogorod, against a popula- tion called Tern, or Yam, and conquered them. He lost, however, his horses through a murrain. After this the Yam appear frequently in Russian history, and that as a sturdy, brave people. Two elaborate papers of Sjo- gren address themselves to the question — Who were the Yaffli ? The answer is, that they were the ancestors of the present Tshud of Olonets and Novogorod. The Tshud have suffered much from encroachment, more than the Ugrians of St. Petersburg. They lie, we see, ia patches, in islands. They have, too, other Ugrians in contact with them, just as was the case with the Vod. They lie, some on the banks of Lake Onega, others in the circle of Bielosersk (the circle of the White Lake). They he in Novogorod, as well as ia Olonets. When Sjogren described them, he carried their numbers as high as 21,000. The present tables give for 46 THE TSHUD. The Government of Novogorod ... 7,067 Olonets 8,560 Total 15,627 For themselves they have no special names ; they have one, however, for their language. This they call Luudin Kieli, the Luudin Speech. But Luudin is a word that has not yet been explained. Then we have in Nestor the name Vess, a name that has to be con- sidered. THE UGRIAN STOCK — THE SIEANIANS. 47 CHAPTER III. THE UGRIAH STOCK CONTINUED — THE SIEANIANS — THE PEEMIAKS — THE VOTIAKS — THE BESEKMANIANS. The Siranians. — The Government of Vologda is Si- ranian in the way that Olonetz and Novogorod are Tshud, and St. Petersburg Ingrian ; the Government of Vologda and the water-system of the Upper Dwina, — the eminently Siranian rivers being the Vytshegda, the Vym, and the Syssola. Sonie Siranians, however, lie on the south side of the watershed, on the Kama. Of this the River Syria is a feeder, and it is on this that we find vUlages named Syrianskoe, so that the name seems to have originated on the southern frontier and on the water-system of the Volga. In fact, the southern Siranian is a northern Permian, and vice versd; the differences in dialect, man- ners, and appearance, being but small. Originally, indeed, there was no distinction between the two branches — none indeed, between any of the North-eastern Ugrians. The same denomination expressed all. 48 THE SIRANUNS. The Siianian language falls into four dialects; three being pretty closely allied to each other, but the fourth being an outlyer, much mixed up Tvith the Samoyed; consequently, this outlying dialect is the northern one. Neverthele'ss, somewhat unfortunately for the phHologue, it was in the northern, outlying, and modified dialect of the Siranian that the first attempts at a grammar were made. This was Florow's, published in 1813, the dialect being the Udorian — i. e., that for the parts about Udorsk. Since then, the Gospel of St. Matthew has been trans- lated into the TJstsyssola dialect; probably the purest of the four. Yet, even here we have a great number of Russian words. The other two forms of speech, allied (as aforesaid) to each other and to the TJstsyssola, are the Siranian of the Upper Vytshegda, and the Siranian of the Yaren. The Siranians have long been converted to the Greek Church; being, along with the Permians, the first of the Eastern Ugrians to whom the Gospel was preached. Their apostle was St. Stephanus. The name by which they are here described is foreign to them and unknown. They call themselves, like the Permians, Komi-uter, or Komi-murt; so that Siranian is a Russian word. Their country is one of the thickest forest districts of Russia, and, in these, the Siranians live the lives of fo- resters and huntsmen — sufficiently hardworking and active, with a taste for making long rambles during the hunting season, and with an average aptitude for trade and industry. They nearly all speak Russian. THE PEEMIANS. 49 According to Schubert, their number was 30,000. The tables before us run, — Siranians of the Government of Archangel ... 6,958 Vologda 64,007 70,965 The Siranian Pater-noster is as follows : — Bate mijan, kodii em nebessajas wiiliin ; Med Bwatitsas nim tenad ; Med woas tsarstwo tenad; Med loas wola tenad, kUdsi nebessa wiUiin i mu wUliin. Nanj mijanlu potmon set mijanlu ta lun keshB ; I enowt mijanlu udshjesjass mijanlussj, Kiidsi i mi enowtalam asslaniim udshjesajaslU ; I en nubd mijanoss Ulodom wiilb ; a widsj mijanSss lukaw6ijissi ; Tenad w6d em tsarstwo i wiin i slawa wiek kesliS. — Aminj, The Permicms. — ^The Government of Permia, and the water-system of the Kama, give the area of the Permian group, which is separated from the Siranian more in con- formity with common language than on the strength of any essential differences. No such distinction occurs amongst the older notices — the name Perm,ian, being the only one they supply ; a name iacludiag the Ugrians of the Dwina and Petshora as well as those of the Kama or Upper Volga; and it is in the Scandinavian writings where it occurs most prominently. Biarmalomd, or the land of the Biarmas (Fermians), was a robbing-ground of the old Norse seamen. It was also an emporium for their trade. It was Biarmaland with which they came in contact on the White Sea; Biarmaland to which the D 50 THE PERMIAJ^S. parts about the present port of Archaiigel belonged. So that it was visited from the West by sailors who had to double the North Cape before they reached it. The history of the Biannaland trade is the commercial history of the White Sea; just as the history of Finland and Pomerania is that of the Baltic. The Beormas were known to the Anglo-Saxons, and mention of them occurs in Other and WuHstan's Voy- ages. No nation of the North exceeded them iu im- portance ; and when we observe, that it is a country so far south and so far inland as the present Government of Per- mia which preserves their name, we get a measiure of the magnitude of the original Permian area — an area which, as has been already stated, included the Siranians, and the populations of the Petshora, perhaps, also, the Votiaks. Nevertheless, no enquirer has detected, amongst the present Permians, any vestiges of their ancient importance in the way of traditions or nationality. They all seem unconscious of it. They know nothing of their ancient renown ; they know nothing also of the distitiGtion drawn by the Russians between themselves and the Siranians; as little of the two names — Permian (or Permiak) and Siranian. Like the latter people, they caU themselves Komi -murt or Komi -uter — muH meaning ina/n. Converted to the Greek Church in the latter half of the fourteenth century, by the same St. Stephanus who was the apostle to the Siranians, the Permians came be- times in contact with the Russians. Yet, as long as the mineral riches of their country remarried undeveloped) they preserved, to a great extent, their original character THE VOTIAKS. 51 of huntsmen, fishers, foresters, and peltry-men. Herher- Btein says, that they paid a tribute of skins and neglected agriculture. The Slavonic immigration, that arose out of the miues, began in the begianing of the last century, and it has been so encroaching and so influential that the Permian population is, at the present moment, one of the more fragmentary populations of Russia — fragmen- tary and decreasing, at least in proportion to the Sla- vonic. Schubert gives 35,000 as the number of the Permians. The tables before us run — Permians in the Government of Viatka. . . 4,599 Perm ... 47,605 52,204 The Votiaks. — The Siranians belong more especially to the Government of Vologda and the water-system of the Dwina; the Permians to Permiaand the Kama; the third member of the group, the Votiaks, to the Govern- ment of Viatka and the river of the same name. It is the Russians who caU them Votiahs, the last two syllables being derivative. So that the root is Vot. This brings it near to the native designation, which is Udi, the same as -^ter in the Penbian and Siranian names Komi-^fer. They compound this with the word Tnurd, meaning man (Permian and Siranian again), which gives us the form Udmurt. So that — The Votiaks are the Udi, or Ud-murt. The Permians and ") ^ ^^ . ^ _,, „. . f are the Jlomi-uter or Komi-mlirt. The Siramans J This element m,urt, or, to speak more generally, this root m -rt (or m -rd), is important, and will re-appear. D 2 52 THE VOTIAKS. Again, it must be remembered, that the name Vod or Vot has abready come before us in the ethnology of the Government of St. Petersburg, and that the term for the Vod language was Tess. The Tsheremis use the form Odd, in speaking of these same Votiaks, Ud-murt, or Udi — ^the same word. The Turks call them Ari. So that the name by which the Yotiaks are designated by themselves and oth^s is pretty constant. Not so the names they themselves give their neighbours. The Kus- sians they call Dzhiis, or Byutsh-mxxrt, a word curiously, though, perhaps, not accidentally, like the word Butch (Beutsch). The Turks are Viger — ^probably Bulga- rians ; the Tsheremis, Pohr; the Tshuvash and the Mordvins, Taulu. Their country they call Kaxa-kosip; a word like Boab in Indian; JEntre Rios in Portugueze; and Inter- aimna in Latin. It means the country between the two rivers — ^the Kama and the Viatka. Kaina, too, is a Votiak word. This word Kosip is remarkable. Admit the proba- bility of the TJgrians of Courland and Lithuania having originally extended as far westwards as Pomerania, and we have a probable explanation for the word Kassub (Kaszeb), the name of a Slavonic population of the Ru- genwalde district west of the Vistula; a name that has never been satisfactorily explained. Their language connects the Votiaks with the Per- mians rather than with any other section of the TJgrians ; yet there is a behef amongst some of them that they de- scended from the north-west, from Finland Proper.. THE VOTIAKS. 53 Their physiognomy is Fin. Their name is like that of the Ingrian Yod,. Perhaps, the origin of the doctrine lies herein. That they extended further southwards is both probable a priori, and confirmed by the name of a locality on the Kasanka. This is Aiskoi Prigorod, the Fortress of the Ari — i. e., of the Votiaks under their Turk denomination. It was one of their last strongholds against the Tartars; well defended, and exhibiting at the present momient remains of its ancient defences. No Ugrian isolates himself so much as the Votiak. The Permians and Siranians generally can speak Eussian, though they maintain their own tongue. The Tshuvash and Tsheremis, though they mix but little with the Turks (Tartars) of the neighbourhood, and less with the Slavonians, are not imsociable to each other. But the Votiak keeps exclusively to himself, mixing with the Tsheremis of the parts around him as little as with the Russian. The Votiak is liker the Finlander of Finland in personal appearance than is the case with the generahty of Ugrians ; and as the Finlander of Finland is the strongest and stoutest of his family, the Votiak form contrasts favourably with that of the Tshuvash and Tsheremis. From these they are said to be easily distinguished, as much, however, by the hair as aught else. The Votiaks are the most red- headed men in the world — fiery-red is the epithet. Light, flaxen, or yellow, is also frequent ; and after this, the darker shades of brown. The beard is reddish ; the skin light. In temper, also, the Votiak resembles the Fin- lander, being steady, sturdy, laborious, and agricultural. The Permian is a useful laborer in the mine; the Sira- 54 THE VOTIAKS. nian (if the eliase eau be called a form of useful industry) in the forest; the Votiak in the field. The Votiak accumulates property — saving, but hospitable. The women weave, spin, amd make felts. The Votiak country lies within the range of the Ume- tree, and the lime-tree feeds the bee. So that the Votiaks are great bee-herds, bee-breeders, or bee-masters — a term of this kind being necessary for these parts. The Bashkirs and other Siberian populations will be found with the same habits. A Votiak may own some fifty bee-hives. A Votiak village contains from twenty to forty houses, larger than that of the Tsheremis, smaller than that of the Tshuvash. It covers a clearance in the forest, the wood being left in its natural condition on the boundary. This isolates the Votiak villages, and they lie as the old Ger- man ones did — ^with wastes and woodlands between them. When the ground of a settlement has become exhausted by cropping, the occupants leave it and migrate else- where. Sometimes they make the old place over to other settlers. In these vestiges of their ancient noma- dism the Tsheremis agree with the Votiak. The house is of wood, scarcely different from that of the Eus- sian. Perhaps we should rather say that the Russian house is like the Votiak — ^the style of building being, in all probability, indigenous. The men dress like the Russians, the women only pre- serving the old Votiak costume. The material for their cap is the white bark of the birch-tree, with a band of blue linen bound round it, and adorned in the front with silver ornaments — often coins. This fashion we shall find amongst the Tshuvashes — ^the fashion, I mean, of using THE VOTIAKS. 55 pieces of money as decorations. Then there are streamers of white linen flowiag and floatiag over the back and shoulders, with red fringes and embroidery along the borders. This head-dress is the aishon. K a stranger deep ia the house, the aishon will be worn all night as well as all day, since it is decorous to keep the head covered, indecorous to let down the hair. The shirts and shifts, too, are more or less embroidered. The tribual organization, so characteristic of the Turk stock, appears in a modified form amongst the Votiaks, who are specially stated to "retain their original division into tribes and families, and to give the names of these to their villages. Their noble families, however, are, for the most part, extinct." How like this village organization is to that of the early Germans, maybe seen by comparing these notices with Kemble's account of the old English Mark, with its villages ending in -ing, like Mal- Vkig, Harling, &c. In these the -dng is a kind of patro- nymic, or, at least, a Gentile affix ; so that (e. g.) Mailing is the settlement of the MalUngs, or MalUngas — ^the population giving the name to the settlement, that name being more or less a family one. At the end of the last century the number of Votiaks was no more than about 40,000. The tables before us run — Votiaks ia the Government of Viatka 181,270 Kazan 6,500 Orenburg. . ? District of Samar ? 186,770 56 THE VOTIAKS. They pay a capitation-tax, either in money or peltry ; but beyond this, are left to themselves, having, like the Tsheremis and the Tshuvash, their own elders, arbi- trators, umpires, judges, or head men, for the settlement of disputes, and for the other details of tillage govern- ment. In the time of their independence this organi- zation must have been more complex. Instead of the Russian official — ^the Sodnick or head of a certain number of villages — there wotdd have been the native nobles. The Permians and Siranians were converted as early as the fourteenth century, so that their Christianity is as independent ia its growth as that of the Russians them- selves. That of the Votiaks is recent, inchoate, and imperfect; derived from that of the Russians of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In many cases it goes no further than the rite of baptism. We have seen the extent to which the Votiaks keep isolate. It tells on their religion as well as on their habits. In many localities we can find pure and unmodified cases of Paganism ; iu only a few, an equally unmodified Chris- tianity. The old religion shews through the new — ^and that generally. The parts about Glasov are the great Votiak localities. They are, also, the parts where Paganism is the rifest The chief deity is Jiunan (the Fiolandish Jiunala), whose dweUiag-place is the sun. Then come the Tasa- Buss and the Urom-Buss, the Good deity and the Bad deity ; the Bad residing in the water. To these they make solemn sacrifices at stated places — consecrated spots in the deeper parts of the forest — not seldomer than three times a-yeax ; first, when the sowing time THE VOTIAKS. 57 concludes ; next, when the hay-harvest is over ; thirdly, at the harvest home in autumn, when the com is got in. These last several days ; milk, honey, sheep, geese, and ducks, being the chief offerings. They pray a prayer, bum a portion of the offering, and spread a portion of it over the altar. - The priest is called Tona ; the conse- crated ground for the offering, Keremets (the name we shall find when we get to the Tsheremis _and Tshuvash) ; the festival, NundL Of these Nunals, the Keremet NwitMl is the greatest. Then it is that a horse is sacrificed, a- chestnut horse if possible, but never a black one. His fat is burnt, his hide taken home, his skull raised on a tree and left to bleach. In prayiag, the priest looks towards neither the risiag sun nor the setting, but towards the sun at noon. This consecration of the horse's skull re-appears on the shores of the Baltic. It is also Scandinavian, but not, on that account, necessarily Norse, i. e., Gierman. Then there is the worship of httle household gods, called Modor. A few of the Votiaks are Mahometans. The language of the Votiak varies with the locality. Next to Glasov, the chief Votiak circles are those of Malmysh, Yelabuga, and Sarapul. Now, the Gospel of St. Maitthew has been translated in'^o the Yelabuga ; that of St. Mark into the Glasov, Votiak. In the Glasov there is but little intermixture of Tartar ; in the Yelsr buga there- is much Many of the Votiak speak Turkish as well as their own language, chiefly those in Kazan, and on the Kazan frontier. In the Hbrary of the Bible Society at Viatka is a taranslation. of all. the four Gospels,, r» 3 58 THE VOTIAKS. except a portion of St Luke. It is only a portion, how- ever, that has been printed. The Votiak language is Permian, or Siranian, rather than Tsheremis. At the same time it has several Tsheremis characters. The BeserwAinians. — Number in the Government of Viatka, 4,545. I have seen no good account of this section of the Ugrians. They are, probably, but little different from the Votiaks. THE ESTHONIANS. 59 CHAPTEK IT. THE TJOEIAH STOCK OONTIKCEB — THE ESTHORIANS. We have taken Novogorod as a starting point and ob- served the lines in which the Slavonic poptilation ex- tended itself at the expense of the Ugrian. We have seen that it spread in all directions. Northwards, we have followed it in that of Olonetz and Archangel; East- wards, in that of Viatka and Perm. We are now about to follow it ayesfwards; westwards in the direction of Lithuania, Poland, Prussia, Esthonia, Livonia, and Courland — the Baltic Proviaces of Russia, the German Provinces of Russia, as they are also called. The Vod lead us towards the Esthonians. It is still the fate of the Ugrians to be compressed be- tween two forces — sometimes more than two. With the Esthonians and Liefs, the Germans take the place of the Tiirks. They it is who move eastwards, to meet, as it were, the Slavonic intruders from the East. So that Livonia and Esthonia are battle-fields between two stocks; the real occupants belonging to a third. 60 THE ESTHONIANS. But there are more than two parties to these conflicts. There is an encroachment from the South as welL More than this, there is an encroachment from the North. Let us look at the four frontiers of Esthonia and Livonia. There is Russia on the East — Slavonic. There is Germany on the West — Teutonic or German. There is Lithuania on the South ; and, although there is the Sea on the North, there is beyond the Sea — Scandinavia, i. e,, Sweden and Norway; Sweden more especially. Of Finland we take but Kttle cognizance. From every one of these four quarters were Esthonia and Livonia encroached upon ; sometimes within the his- torical period, sonietimes ia the darker days which pre- ceded it. At present, the most western locality of any of the Ugrians is ia Courland. In Livonia they are numerous; but in Courland they exist only as a fragment. Yet these same Ugrians of Courland are precisely those from which the province in which they are found does Tiot take its name, and those from which the province in which they are not found does. The Ugrians of Cour- land are not Cours, as the name of the duchy — the land of the Cours — suggests ; though a population so called once existed, the GuroTienses of Dusburg, the Gurones of Henry the Let, the Guri and Guretes of Saxo Gramma- ticus, the Kors of Nestor. As early as the tenth century these Co wrs fought against the Swedes, being "gens crude- lissuna quse propter nimium idololatnse cultum fagitur ab omnibus." (Adam of Bremen, De Situ Bomice, c. 223.) He continues— "divinis, auguribus, atque necromanticis THE LIEFS. 61 omnes domus sunt plense, qui etiam vestitu monachico in- duti stmt A toto orbe ibi responsa petuntur, maxime ab Hispani et Greecis (v. Zeuss on v Curones). No such a population under tbe name of Cour now exists. Next to tbe Curi came tbe Lami, or Lcemonvi, of the terra La/mabi/na. This is the name that does exist. The terra La/motina is Livonia; the Lami, the LivoTvicms. It is best to call them Liefs — since the German name Lief-land is far more convenient than our own Latin, or would-be Latin, designation. Nestor's form Lib' re- moves such doubts as may arise about the change from -7n- to -^j-. He places them next but one to the Kora or Ouri. Certaia Liefs exist, but only twenty-two of them in Liefland. The majority is found on the Livonian fron- tier of Courland, iu a strip of sea-coast. (See map.) But even this majority is a small one; inasmuch as the whole number of Liefs is — In Liefland (Livonia) 22 Courland 2,052 These are a poor and rude population of fishermen. Nevertheless, they are the descendants of men who gave a name to a province. They are also, I think, descen- dants of the Lemovii mentioned by Tacitus. Their language is Ugrian — a form of the Esthonian. I assume that they are in situ. If so, the whole southern half of Lief-la.nd, which is no longer the land of the Liefs, but of the Lets, (which is a ief-land so to say,) contains a language foreign to its soU. In the northern haJf of Lief-land the Ugrians re-appear. This 62 THE LIEFS. tells a tale of encroachment by the Lets ; for the Cour- landers as well as the southern lief-landers (or Livonians) are Let The foUowing tables, giving the proportions of the Ugrian and Lithuanic populations in three Govern- ments, shew the line in which the disturbing forces have operated, I. In Liefland there are 355,238 _, . fEsthonians 355,216 ^^'"MLiefs 22 Lithuanians — Lets 318,872 IL In Courland — Ugrians— Liefs 2,052 ,.^, . (Lets 401,939 Ijithuanians < -r.,-, (Lithuanians 7,434 408,373 III. In Lithuania — a. In Vilna — Lithuanians 138,320 Ugrians b. In Grodno- Lithuanians 2 338 Ugrians q c. In Kovno — Lithuanians I ^^'^"^^^^^ ^^^,794 ^Lets 6,341 575,135 Ugrians q THE ESTHONIANS. 63 The Litlnjaniaiis from Vilna, Grodno, and Kovno, have encroached upon the Ugrians of Lief-hnd, and part (at least) of Courland— chiefly, however, in the times ante- rior to history ; so that the fact is got at from induction rather than testimony. But the Lithuanians themselves are encroached on. By whom ? By the Russians. This, however, is from the east. What is their condition in the west ? They are pressed upon in this direction also. By whom? The Germans. This, however, belongs to the ethnology of the Sarmatians rather than the Ugrians. Then there are the Swedes. These, like the Germans, may stand over for a while. No wonder that the Liefs are isolated. There has been pressure ia four opposite directions. The Esthonians. — If Livonia be a term more inconve- nient than iie/-land, the equally would-be Latin word Esihonia is less manageable than ^asHand or ^siMand, the German and Scandinavian form. It means the Eastern land — ^neither more nor less; and the Esthen are its occupants. At the present moment this name is German, though the population to which it applies is Ugrian ; Courland and Lief-Iand being just as German ia name, and just as littie German in blood. So that the country of both a Lithuanian and Ugrian population is known to the rest of Europe by a name given by Germans. Facts of this sort are of the commonest ; and less would be said about the present instances did they not serve as a measure of the German influence — com- mercial, political, or both — ^in the Baltic. In this, however, 64 THE ANCIENT ^STYI. there is something irregular. The current name of the sea itself is other than German, inasmuch as Baltic is no Ger- man ■word. The names, too, of several of its divisions are other than German ; e. g., Sleeve, and Kattegat, and, I believe, Bdt. Yet the three most distant provinces of its southern side are known to the rest of Europe by Ger- man names exclusively. Even in. the map before us, Russian as it is, these German names are the ones ia use — Kurlamd, Li/land, Estlya/nd. Now, just as names for certain shores of the Baltic Sea are German ia the nineteenth century, they were also German in. the ninth. They were German earlier. They were German when Tacitus wrote, in the second centiuy of our era, and they were German in the third century B. C. The eastern parts were then, as now, named from their relations to the rising sun, and it was Germans who told the informants of Tacitus and Pytheas of Marseilles what the names were. The former of these writers speaks of the Osti iaei. (^OtxTaioi); the latter of the ^st -yiL But East may mean two things. It may mean the Gulph of Finland and the parts about St. Petersburg, or it may mean Courland and the parts about Memel ; these latter being as truly an Eastern boimdary as the- former. See how the coast turns suddenly, and how it changes, from west and east, to south and north. This was the East- land of the Osi-isei, or jEst-ja^ as is shewn by what is said of them. They were occupants of the amber- country, or East Prussia. They were not, then, the ancestors of the Esthonians THE SITONES. 65 of the present century, though many good writers de- scribe them as such; overlooking the fact that the country called the East has receded as our geogra- phical knowledge has advanced, — just as in England the name North-umherland has receded. It means the parts beyond the H umber; but pot all of them. It does not now include Yorkshire. It did in the times before the Conquest. Mutatis viutandis, this is the case with the EastA&ndi or Esthonia. It now denotes East Prussia, Courland, and Livonia, as little as the word Northwmher- land denotes the East, West, and North Ridings of the county most immediate to the North of the Humber. It was at some time between the ninth and twelfth centuries that this limitation of the word East, to the present Esthanisb, took place; a change of power that probably rose out of the growth of the name Curi and Curones. The East-laxiA of King Alfred lies as far west as the Vistula. The Est-lsnad of Adam of Bremen has East of Curland — an isla/rvd in. his eyes "maxima Ula in- sula quae Curland dicitur." — De Situ Danice, c. 223. The ancestors of the Esthonians were one of the "na- tions of the Sitones " (Sitonum gentes) so contemptuously spoken of by Tacitus: "Suionibus Sitonum gentes con tinuantm:. Cetera sinules, uno differunt, quod femina dominatur : in tantum non modo a libertate, sed etiam a servitute degenerant. Hie Suevise iinis." — Germ. 45. The name by which the Esthonia,n designates himself is Rahwas. His land is ifa-rahwas; ma meaning la/nd. And this is the case whichever of the two Governments of Xie/-land or Esthonia he belongs to. His numbers are — 66 THE ESTHONIANS. In Liefland 355,216 Esthonia 252,608 Vitepsk 9,936 Pskov 8,000 St. Petersburg 7,736 633,496 The Rahwas still retain so much of Liefland as to preponderate over the Let. Liefland, too, contains more Jtahwas than does Esthonia. Niunber of Lets in Livonia 311,872 Rahwas 355,216 The River Salis and the parts about Valk form the boundary; the Eahwas he north, the Lets south of it. Of the other TJgrian tongues the Vod and the Fin- landish of Finland nearest approach the Esthonian; which falls into two main dialects — that for the country- round Dorpt, and that for the country round Eeval. The political history of Esthonia is that of Livonia; with a few differences of detail Both, so far as they are neither Ugrian nor Lithuanian, are German ; after this, Swedish; after this, Russian. Of the two, Esthonia is the more Swedish, the more Russian also; Livonia, the more German. Both took their conquerors from Germany, their con- querors and lords of the soil; both, their Christianity. The influence of Sweden determined them both to the doctrine of the Reformation ; for we are now amongst the Lutheran Ugrians as opposed to the XJgrians of the Greek Church. A common form of feudalism oppresses both Esthonia and Livonia — Courland too. In short, the Ugrian here, and the Lithuanian everywhere, is a serf THE FINLANDEES. 67 CHAPTER V. the naeian stock oontintied — the finlanbebs of the qhanb svqby 0! finland — tavastbians — kaeeliahs — (juaihs — the swedes of the esteohiah islands. The chief distiirbuig influence that has acted upon the Rahwas of Esthonia and Livonia, within the historical period, has been German. In the Grand Duchy of Fin- land it has been Swedish. What the Blnights of the Teutonic Order — the Knights of the Sword— did for the Baltic Provinces, the Swedish King St. Eric and his suc- cessors did for the Finlanders. In the earhest Scandi- navian Sagas we hear of friendly and unfriendly inter- course between Sweden and Finland. We hear of Fins even earlier than this. Tacitus speaks of them. PUny speaks of them. Ptolemy speaks of them. Procopius and Jornandes speak of the Scrithifinni The Fins appear on the very limits of the northern world; the Scrithifinni in Scandinavia (Norway and Sweden), the Fenni ia the parts beyond Germania and Sarmatia. They appear to the east of the former area, to the north of the latter. I think that the views of the ancient geogra- phers about their Fenni must have been as follows : — 68 THE ANCIENT FENNI. By moving from west to east along the course of the Danube, they reached the country of the Peucini; i. e., the islands at the mouth of that river. By following the Baltic in the same direction, they came to the country of the Fenni Between these two extremes, north of the Peucini and south of the Feimi, lay the land of the Veneti, a vast country full of woods and movmtains, and occupied by predatory tribes. This was but imperfectly known, and its area was considerably underrated. At the same time the difference between the Fenni and the Veneti was known. So was that between the Yeneti and the Germans, and the Fenni and the Germans. It was also known that at either the northern or the eastern end of the Baltic were Fins. But it is by no means certain that this meant the Fin- landers of Finland, the ancestors of whom were probably Sitonicm ; i. e., one of the Sitonumgentes mentioned in the last chapter. If so, and if the old Rahwas belonged to the same class, the description of the Sitones is the description of the Ugrians of the Gulphs of Finland and Bothnia, and that of the Fermi the description of some other population. I imagiae this to have been the case, and hold the Fev/ni of Tacitus to have meant the Laps : — " Fennis mira feritas, foeda paupertas ; non arma, non equi, non Penates ; victui herba, vestitui pelles, cubUe humus. Sola in sagittis spes, quas, inopia ferri, ossibus asperant Idemque venatus viros pariter ac feminas alit. Passim enim comitantur, partemque prsedse petimt. Nee aliud ' infantibus ferarum imbriumque suffngium, quam ut in THE ANCIENT FENNI. 69 aliquo ramorum nexu contegantur ; hue redeunt juvenes, hoc senum receptaculum. Sed beatius arbitrantur, quam ingemere agris ; illaborare domibus ; suas alienasque fortunas spe metuque versare. Securi adversus homines, securi adversus Deos, rem difficillimam assecuti sunt, ut illis ne toto qmdem opus esset." — Germ. 46. The text of Tacitus separates these from the Sitones. But why should the Sitones be Finlanders ? Because they are said to have been ruled by a woman. Was this a fact ? No. Was it a misstatement ? Yes. Of what sort ? It was a misstatement that might easily arise out of the name of a portion of the population of Fin- land in the mouth of a Scandiuavian iaformant. The Fiolanders of East Bothnia call themselves Kai/rmr laiset, ia the singular number Kai/mvAwoB. The Latin form of the root Kain is Gajcmia ; the old Norse, Koenfiir and Kvcemir. As early as the time of Alfred the Norse name was sufficiently current to have found its way into the Anglo-Saxon writings of that royal geogra- pher, and Finland is the land of the CveTms, or Cvena- land. But qvvwna is Swedish for a woman, the same word as the English queen and queam, different in their degrees of courtesy as the two words are. Now, it is by no means improbable that when a nation of Cvenas was heard of, a nation of wcnnen (qvvivnas) would be suggested. Out of this would come a nation " mled by a woman" (queen or queom). This confusion is not merely a likelihood ; it is, in three parts out of four, a fact. The land of the Sitones, over which the informants of Tacitus are satisfied with making a woman a ruler, becomes, when we get to Adam 70 THE SITONES — THE TAVASTEIANS. of Bremen, a land of Amazons — " liaec quidem insula" (Estland) " terrse feminarum, proxima narratttr." Agaiin — "circa hsec littora Baltici maris ferunt esse AwMzonas, quod nunc terra femina/rwm dicitur, quas aquae gustu aHqUi dicunt concipere Hae simul viventes, spernunt consortia virorum, quos etiam, si adve- nerint, a se viriliter repeUunt/' c. 228. Such is the history of a bhmder ; of which there are many to mislead the ethnologist. At the present moment the Norwegians call the Lap- la/nders, Fins; the Finlanders, Quai/ns. The map before us recognizes the Quains. They are the Finlandefs of East Bothnia. Quain is one of the three divisions into which the population of the Grand Duchy of Finland is divided ; or, rather, is the name of a subdivision. The two primary divisions are foimded upon the diffe- rences of dialect. There are — 1. The Tavastrian, and 2. The Karelian. The QuaiQS are a branch of the Tavastrians; at any rate, they are more Tavastrian than Karelian. 1. The Tavastrians. — The drainage of the rivers that empty themselves into the Gulphs of Finland and Bothnia gives lis the area of the Tavastrians. But as all these rivers are short, and run from elevations by no means distant from the sea, the Tavastrian area (including that of the Quains) extends no great distance inland as compared with the Karelian. Tavaste-hus itself Hes in the south of Fin- land, on the range that rises north of the Gulph, just north of the Government of Viborg. Some, however, of the most THE KAEELIANS. 71 favoured parts of the Duchy are Tavastrian ; and as the Tavastrians of the parts about Tavaste-hus occupy a locality favourable for defence, it was one of the last parts of Finland to be conquered, and the first to rebel Both the conquest and reaction, however, are more than 800 years old. The Tavastrians call themselves HdTnalaiset, in the singular number Hamalaine; and as the first syllable of these words is nearly identical with the name of the Tain of Novogorod, it has been suggested that they originated in the parts about the Lake Onega. A difference of dialect is the chief characteristic of the Tavastrians, or Hamalaiset, as opposed to — 2. The Karelia/ns or Kirialmset. — The great block of land, more or less square in. outline, and coinciding in. respect to its physical geography with the table-land of the Duchy, is the' area of the Karelians. Here the sur- face of the earth lies high, and the rivers empty them- selves into innumerable lakes, rather than directly into the sea. The climate, too, is more continental than that of the sea-board. " Goralli " (Karelians) "gens paganorum ferocissima, camibus crudis utens pro cibo " live here. As the Tarn were Tavastrian rather than KafeHan, the Savakot and Auramoiset were Karelian rather than Tavastrian. Again, the isolate and sporadic Tghud of the Waldai range ra the Governments of Tver, Yaroslav, and Novogorod, are called Karffelane or Kardian. 1 presume because their real affinities are such. At the same time I do not profess to have seized very clearly the exact import of the distinction between the two branches. I only know that the best authorities seem to lay a good 72 THE FINLAJSTDEES. deal of stress upon it. Even so do some of our Englisli philosophers insist upon the difference between the Angle and the Saxon parts of our own island; whilst classical scholars do the same with the dialects of the Greek. Yet there is less in them than such phUologues imagine. The Finlanders are yellow-haired and brown-haired, rather than black-haired ; with grey eyes. In colour they are swarthy, rather than brunette; and light com- plexioned, rather than swarthy. The skull belongs to the brachy-cephalic (short-headed) class of Retzius, i. e., the class where the diameter from the forehead to the occiput is not so much longer than the diameter from side to side, as it is with the Swedes, the Africans, and the so-caUed dolicho-cephalic (long-headed) populations. Indeed, the FiQ organization has generally been recognized as Mon- gol — though Mongol of the modified kind. The stature is moderate ; the hmbs of average strength and vigour. These characters we have seen already amongst the other populations ; as we have the moral and mental ones. No great mobility of temper has been met with ; nor will it be. The Finlander is sturdy-tempered and churlish, rather than polite, in. manners ; not iahospitable, but not over-easy of access; no friend of new fashions. Steady, careful, and laborious, he is valuable ia the miue; valuable in the field; valuable aboard-ship; and, withal, a brave soldier on land. In the more than creditable— the glo- rious — ^wars of Gustavus Adolphus and Charles XII., the Fia regiments played a conspicuous part. The Finlanders and the Esthonians are the first Ugrians we have found in possession of a sea-board. For practical purposes, they wUl h& last; the Laps, Samoyeds, THE FINLANDEES. 73 and Ostiaks being in contact with the Arctic Ocean only. They are the first, too, who have come in contact with Europeans more civilized than the Muscovite ; with the Swede and the German. So that they represent the civili- zation of their stock. Herein, the Finlander has the prece- dence. He has lived a life of national freedom ; united with the Swede, rather than subject to him. His civili- zation is that of Western rather than Eastern Europe. His alphabet is Swedish and Eoman, not Kussian and Greek ; his creed, Lutheran ; though there are a few Roman Cathohcs, and a smaller number of the Greek Church Christians. In the way of intellectual development, Finland stands to Sweden much as Spain and Gaul did to Rome. It has contributed its fair share to the literary credit of the two united countries. On the other hand, the medium has been the Swedish. There is, however, a proper Fin literature as well ; but it bears the same relation to the Swedish that the Welsh does to the English. It will be noticed more at length hereafter. In more matters than one, the ancient Paganism shews itself through the newer Christianity with the Finlanders and Esthonians more than with any other people of Europe — in other words, their' Christianity is the least untinctured with the primitive Heathenism. But the mythology of the Fins will form the subject of a separate chapter. There is Heathenism, and plenty of it, in the Fin poems — the Runes, as they are called. There is Heathenism, too, and plenty of it, in their every-day life. So is there in that of the Esthonians. The E 7i THE FINLANDEES. Northern Finlander is a wizard in the eyes of the Southern ; the Laplander, a wizard in the eyes of both. There is also — and this is the case with the Laps and Swedes — an extraordinary susceptibility to the iafluences of reli- gious excitement. Finland alone contains about half of the whole Ugrian stock, its present Fin population beiag about a milUion and a half There are Finlanders out of Finland ; and there are Laps beyond the pale of Russian Lapland. With the exception of the Majiaxs of Hungary, this is the case with no other Ugrian populatioiL All lie withiu the realm of Muscovy. But there are Fias ia Sweden, and Fins {Quains as we must there call them) in Norway. Sometimes they have got thither as settled colonists. Such is the case "with the Quains of Finskogen (the Fins-sAaw or Fins-w;oo(?) in the parishes of Tiysild and Grue, in the districts of Soloers, between Norway and Sweden ; ofbener, however, there has been a mere extension of frontier. As this is from south to north, and as the more northern parts of Scandinavia are Lap, it is the Laplander that is thus encroached on. This is done in Russian Lapland — in Swedish Lapmark — in Norwe- gian Finmark. The cow goes with the Fin, the rein- deer with the Laplander ; and as the former displaces the latter, agriculture encroaches on nomadism. Then, there are intermixtures of blood, to the advantage of the Laps. But the Norwegian and the Swede find a rival in the Finlander, even as the Lap does — even as the Enghsh labourer finds one in the Irish. Quain labour is almost essential to the mining industry* in the north of Norway. SWEDES OF THE ESTHONIAN ISLANDS. 75 A taste for song and music, the use of the steam- bath, and a large amount of superstition, characterize the Finlander and the Esthonian. In respect to the ethnology, it is safe to say that the Es- thonian is in situ, i. e., that he is indigenous to Esthonia. No earlier population seems to have preceded him. Not so with the Finlander. For the northern portion of his area, at least, he is generally and reasonably considered to be an intruder — a population akin to the Lap has been the pri- mitive occupant. If so, his direction has been from south to north. The native name for the Tavastrians and Karehans, — Hamalaiset and Kirialaiset — collectively, is Suomalaiset ; from whence suoma, marsh or fen; Suomalaiset, the people of the m,arsh, swam^p. Swedes of the Esthonian Islamds. — Just as the towns in the Principahty of Wales are more or less English, the towns of Finland are more or less Swedish ; indeed, the sea-board altogether is in the same category. The whole o of the Aland Archipelago is also Swedish. Though, pohti- caUy, it was a part of Finland in 1819, it now belongs to Kussia. How long it may remain so is another question. o Aland, however, is as truly a part of Sweden as the Isle of Wight is of England. The Quainpopulation is represented in the census before me by a cipher. It is not, however, such Swede elements as these that I notice, but the Swedes of the Esthonian Islands-^the Island-Swedes {Osvens- har) the fi^e Swedish yeomen (Jria Svenska bandar), as they are called. In Odensholm they form the whole population. Here no Esthonian finds a resting-place to the sole of his foot, e2 76 SWEDES OF THE ESTHONIAN ISLANDS. and (what is better) no German lord rules over a popula- tion of serfs. The land and the industry are free. In the other isles this freedom is less perfect, and the Swedish blood less exclusively pure. In all, however, the Swedish language, in weU-marked dialects, is spoken, and Swedish manners prevaU. The date of these Swedish settlements is uncertain. They are earlier, however, than the 14th century. As the population is isolated, several old customs, missing in modem Sweden, live amongst them — old customs, old words, old superstitions. Fishing and pilotage are the chief employments. The Esthonian Islands are their chief localities. There are some, however, on the conti- nent, and a few in Liefland — e. g., Swedes in Esthonia 4,714 Liefland 425 Courland 7 5,146 To these add, from a distant locahty, 168 more. In the Government of Kherson are four small villages ; settle- ments made during the last century from these same Esthonian Swedish islands. There are 6,156 other Swedes in the Government of St. Petersburg, but I imagine that these are newer settlers than the Osvenskar or Fria SvensJcar bondar. Finland became Russian in 1809. The Government, however, of Viborg was lost to the Swedes, and won to the Russians, in the reign of Peter the Great. THE SABME. 77 CHAPTER VI. THE TJQKIAN STOCK OONTINUED — THE SABME OH lAPS — THE NAME, HABITS, AND KELlaiOK ORiaiKAIi ABEA. The best name, for tte ptirposes of steady investigation, by which we should denote the Lap, Laplandish, Lap- ponic, or Lapponian family, is Sabme or Sa/mi, inasmuch as it is the name by which they designate themselves. It is the native name ; it is the only native one. The other is foreign — Swedish or Eussian, as the case may be. When a Swede talks of a Sabme, he calls him a Lap; when a Russian does so, he says Lopari. Hence their country of Jj&Tp-land and the frontier of it that faces Sweden is Lap^mar/c, or the March of the Laps. There is nothing very inconvenient in this. That Sabme (and not Lap) is the native name, and that Lap or Lopari (and not Sabme) are Swedish and Russian designations, is no difficult matter to remember ; neither is it important if forgotten ox overlooked. But the Sabme of Sweden or Russia are not the only Sabme. There is a large proportion of the family in Norway ; in the most northern part of Norway, in Fin-mar/c, • or the March of the Fins; in Fin-^mark, a very different compound from Fin-land. What is the import of this name ? The population of 78 THE SABME, Finmark is not that of the Grand Duchy of Finland. It is Lwp or Sabme. Yet the name Lap, so familiar to the Swede and Russian, is unfamiliar to the Norwegian. In the eyes of the Norwegian a Sabme is a Fin, and his country ^iro-mark ; so that Finmark in Norway is the the same as Lapmark in Sweden. Throughout Norway, if you talk of Lapland you must say Finmark ; if you talk of a Lap you must make him a Fin. To do other- wise is to talk Swedish. But this tends to confusion, inasmuch as the Finlanders of Finland may have to be mentioned. Avoiding this, the Norwegian calls them Quains. Hence a Swedish Lap is a Norwegian Fin, and a Swedish Finlander is a Norwegian Quain, whilst the Lap populations distributed over Norway, Sweden, and Russia, are Fins, Laps, and Lopari. The conditions, however, under which they occur are much the same throughout. The most southern of them are found in Sweden ; the most northern, in Norway. The mountaineer branches of them are, also, more Scandinavian (Swedish or Norwe- gian) than Russian. For the most northern population of Europe their a^ea is favoured in respect to climate ; no part of the world equally arctic being so warm — or, rather, so Httle cold. It is only when we approach the North Cape that we get beyond the region of trees — the birch being found as high as N. L. 70-71 ; the Scotch fir up to 69-70; and the Spruce fir to 67. The elm, lime, oak, hazel, and alder have, however, long been passed ; so has the latitude at which fruit ripens. On the other hand,* as far north as 67, barley ripens at the level of 800 feet. Potatoes, too, pay for cultivation even fur- * Henfret's Vegetation of JSurope — The Scamdinavian Peninsula. OB LAPLANDERS. 79 ther north. So do cabbages, turnips, spinacb, and carrots. But then it is the Norwegian, the Swede, or the Eussian who cultivates them, not the Lap. The Lap, except so far as he has adopted the industry of his neighbours, is a nomad — essentially so. His country is that of the reiudeer-moss, and the reindeer that feeds on it; and, beyond this, it supplies but little in the way of natural vegetation. However, there are streams prolific with salmon; — but the main aliment is the flesh of the reindeer, itseK migratory. The hills of Scandinavian Lapland — the highest of which, Sulitehna, rises to 6,168 feet — decrease as we get into Russia, so that Eussian Lapland partakes of the cha- racter of Finland, being level and lacustrine — a land of lakes rather than running streams. The Sabme may fairly be looked upon as the least industrial, and the least civilized population of Christian Europe. They are herdsmen rather than agriculturists ; but as their domestic animal, the reindeer, is, still, more or less, migratory and unreclaimed, they are hunters almost as much as they are herdsmen. They are wan- dering herdsmen, at any rate. The Norwegian of their neighbourhood plants potatoes, the Finlander keeps cows, but the Lap attaches himself to the reindeer, and adapts himself to its habits. Essentially migratory as they are, the habits of the Sabme have been considerably modified by the influences of the populations with which they come in contact ; and it cannot be denied that, upon the whole, the attention bestowed upon them by the different governments under which they live, has been, as things go with the weaker 80 THE SABME, populations of the world in general, praiseworthy, even if insufficient. I state this with more confidence respecting the Norwegian than the Swedish, and with more confi- dence respecting the Swedish than the Russian, Laps. I believe, however, that they are not an Ul-used popula- tion. Their language has been reduced to writing, and that well. As the adapters of the Lap alphabet had no preconceived views La the way of etymology, they have spelt the language as they found it, created new let- ters when they were necessary, expelled old ones when superfluous, and limited the power of each sign to the expression of a siagle sound, each sound having also its appropriate sign. The effect of this is, that, other things being equal, a Lap child leams to read easier than another. There are two excellent grammars of their lan- guage, Rask's and Stockfleth's ; the author of the latter beiag, ia name, a parish priest, but, in reality, as true a missionary as if he had a location ia the South Seas, or in Africa. It is from his works that the best information respecting the present condition of the Laps of Fiamark is to be found. The civilization of the more civilized parts of their re- spective kingdoms has told on the Laps. Their summer dresses are now made up of cloth ; and their ornaments are purchased from the Norwegians. Neither is the blood of the Laplander so pure and unmixed as it used to be. Of intermarriage with the Norwegians there is but Httle, but a great deal with the Quains. It is betier to say Quain than Fin, because Fin is what the Laps themselves, so long as they belong to the kingdom of Norway and to the district of Finmark, are called. OR LAPLANDERS. 81 Hence, Quain is the more convenient word. It means a Finlander from the Grand Duchy of Finland ; numbers of whom come, in numerous localities, in contact with the Laps. For instance, they come in contact with them along the whole line of frontier. They come in contact with them La almost every spot where there is a copper- mine; and such spots are numerous. There is much Quain blood, then, among the Laps. The Christianity of the Laps is of the same imperfect character with their industry and culture. Nevertheless, they are Christians; though not all of the same denomi- nation. The Eussian Laps belong to the Greek Church, the Swedish and Norwegian are Lutheran Protestants. The Lutheran, however, is as Pagan as the Greek, and the Greek as the Lutheran; inasmuch as the original Heathenism of thfe country still tinges the better creed. In fact, the old creed shews itself through the new, and the Sabme superstitions of the time anterior to Christianity are seen almost as clearly and transparently now as they were seen in the days of their unmodified Paganism. There was not much to get rid of, and of that little more than a fair portion has been retained. There was not much to get rid of, for the Sabme superstitions were simple, and the mythology far from elaborate. Neither does it seem to have been wholly native; at least one of their objects of veneration has a Norwegian name. So has another — ^but this may be explained differently. The being who has the Norwegian name is the Stor- junker, pronounced Stor-yunker; a name which means great noble. A full-grown reindeer, with full-sized ant- lers, used to be the proper sacrifice to the Storjunker. A thread was put through his ear, and this thread had to E 3 i2 LAP SUPERSTITIONS. 36 a red one. No other colour would suit tlie Storjun- ker's reindeer. When the feast was over, and the flesh fiad been eaten by the feasters, the antlers were fixed in bhe ground so as to mark a certain space — a space which was thus made holy; women, most especially, being for- bidden to approach it. Next, amongst the Lap gods, to the Stoijunker, was Tiermes. The third was Baiwe. The rites of Tiermes ire much the same as those of the Storjunker, but those Df Baiwe exhibit a difference in some of their details. The string which is put through the ear of the victim is a white one. A red one would be out of place. The reindeer is a young one. An old one would be inappropriate. Then, as the young reindeer has no antlers, the sacred enclo- sures of deers' horn are wanting to the sacrificial grounds of Baiwe, or the/SWi,; for that is the object symbolized. But there was a deity higher than any of these, who seem to have been mere subordinates. This was Jubmel (pronounced Tubmel, and TumTnel). We are not acquainted with the details of the worship of Yubmel, nor yet with its exact relations to his inferior divinities. We only know that he was highest and holiest of all the Lap gods. We know, too, what is of considerable importance, that throughout the whole long list of populations akin to the Laps the worship of Yubmel was extended. The Finlanders worshipped him in Finland. He was wor- shipped by the allied poptdations of the Volga; he was worshipped by the allied tribes of the UraHan moimtains. There was, of course, a change in the form of the name, which became Yumula, Yumara, &c. ; and on the eastern side of the White Sea, Nwrn. Nevertheless, the deity was the same, and the existence of his worship is (next to LAP SUPERSTITIONS. 83 their language) the best characteristic of the class to which the populations alluded to belong. In one sense the old Lap religion was a reHgion with- out a priesthood. There were no roofed temples, no offi- ciating ministers. The head of the family performed his rites himseE His proceedings were as follows: about bow-shot from his tent he chose a convenient piece of ground and marked it out by rows of boughs — of the birch- tree in summer, of the fir in winter. The area withio was holy ground; pre-eminently holy, and, like most of the Lap's enclosures, forbidden to females. The path from this to the tent was also marked out by branches. In the centre stood the representative of the deity — of wood or stone, as the case might be ; of wood for Tiermes, who was thence called the ivooden, of stone for the Stor- junker, who was similarly known as the stone, god. Wood and stone were the materials ; to which the workmanship was scarcely equal. Indeed, there was none, or next to none. Instead of fashioning an image with his own hands, the Lap thought himself lucky if he found one ready-made, the workmanship of Chance or Nature. Hence, if a birch-tree grew crooked and contorted about the roots, if it were knobby and knotty on the stem, if its branches grew in abnormal clusters, it was looked upon as a deity abeady represented. The same with stones. Those that were water-worn, rubbed, or drilled into strange shapes, became divinities ; or rather, the divi- nity grew out of the shape of the symbol If it suggested a bird, the idea of the Storjunker became birdhke ; qua- drupedal if the likeness were that of a beast. He would, too, be a fish, as often birch-roots grew fish-shaped. The same with Tiermes. He might fly one year, swim the ^Ji LAP SUPERSTITIONS. lext, and go upon four legs the third; or, as the sacrifices ook place twice a year, he might he a pike at Midsummer, tnd an otter at Christmas. A piece of reindeer flesh was he offering to him — the heart or Uver by preference. When the worship took a more pubhc character, and ipproached the form of a festival, the drum, came in •equest — ^the drum being the most important of all the irticles in a Laplander's pontifical apparatus. This was I skin drawn across a frame of birch-wood; rudely painted ,vith figures of the chief deities. In the middle was fixed I ring with bobbins (much like those used in lace-making) ittached to it. The drum is beaten and the bobbin lances about. The beating leaves off and the bobbin ies quiet. The drummer then sees on whose figure it ies. If on that of Baiwe, Baiwe has to be honoTored ; if hat of Tiermes or the Storjunker, it is Tieimes or the Storjunker accordingly. These are the most specific of the Lap superstitions. That certain wizards have the power of selling favourable vinds to sailors is beheved not only amongst the Laps ;hemselves, but by the Norwegians, the Swedes, and the Russians of their neighbourhood. The most characteristic aerhaps, of their habits or accomplishments, is what we nay call by a name coined for the occasion — she-run- ning. The skide (pronounced she) is a snow-skate ipwards of six feet long. Up-hill the Lap toils with a stick : down-hill he drives with the rapidity of an arrow. UGKIAIJS OF THE VOLGA. 85 CHAPTER VII. THE CGEIAN STOCK OOHTINUED — nSRIANS OP THE VOLGA — THE TSHEREMIS — THE MOEDVINS — THE TSHUTASH. The three populations that -will . make the subject of the present chapter, are generally said to constitute the Volga division of the Ugrian stock. Nor is the term very exceptionable. The governments of Viatka, Kos- troma, Kazan, Nizhni-novogorod, Orenburg, Penza, Sara.; tov, Simbirsk, and Tambov, are their localities — all on the Volga, none on the Dwina ; none on the Dwiua like the Siranian habitats in Vologda. At the same time the term is not to be taken too exclusively ; the Permians and Votiaks, belonging to another division, are neverthe- less on the drainage of the Volga. As this river approaches Kazan, the Russian pop^ilation gives way to the Turk ; for Kazan is a great Turk centre. The three governments of Kazan, Simbirsk, and Saratov, are the occupancies of three well-marked famiUes — the Tsheremis, the Mordvin, and the Tshuvash. The Tsheremis. — On the left bank, rather than the right, and on the Middle rather than the Lower Volga, we find the Tsheremis — a population scattered and some- 86 UGRIANS OF THE VOLGA. what widely diffused ; a population which lies in contact with both the Eussians and the Turks, as well as with the Tshuvashes. Nevertheless it keeps itself pretty pure, intermarrying but little with the contiguous populations — rather, however, with the Tshuvash than with the two others. Its true habitat is the forest — ^the oak-tree forest — for we have reached a milder cHmate and a stronger vegetation — ^the oak-tree forest, with its under- wood of buck-thorn, spindle-tree, and hazel — the oak- tree forest in a strong soil — the oak-tree forest that invests the numerous ridges that form the water-sheds to the feeders of the Volga. Meanwhile, the clearance follows the valleys, the Russian being the pioneer. By this means the once continuous area of the Tsheremis has got broken up, and the Tsheremis occupancies have become separated from each other. Some of them, however, lie sufficiently near the main roads to be visited by the ordinary traveller; so that incidental notices of them are by no means uncommon. In the villages that Haxthausen visited on the River Sura, there was no doubt as to the Tsheremis complexion. It was dark, unequivocally dark ; so dark that, though he. looked carefully for a single instance of a light-haired individual, he failed to find one. A dark skin, and long lank dark hair, prevailed, to the exclusion of aught else. Other notices, however, are less simple ; and light hair is attributed to them by more than one competent autho- rity. Probably the phenomenon so common with the Ugrian populations repeats itself here, and we have both sorts of complexion and hair in hitherto undetermined proportions, and under conditions that have yet to be THE TSHEREMISS. 87 investigated. The stature is middle, the face flat, the beard scanty — the general Ugrian character being manifest. The Tsheremis have been more nomadic than they are at present ; hunters, perhaps, rather than herdsmen, during the earliest period of their history. At present, however, they are agricultural, settled, and more or less industrial. Their villages are said to be smaller than those of the Votiaks and Tshuvash, and perhaps they are more sequestered. At the same time they are regular villages, with the village organization of a head-man or elder for the settlement of disputes, and for their simple legislation. There are houses, too, which approach the Russian standard of comfort, with property on the part of the owners to match. With the Tsheremis of the Sura, the dress scarcely varied with the sex, and white was the prevailing colour, the leggings being black and white in stripes. The manners were reserved and shy, not to say timid. More frequently the dress of the women is charac- teristic, just as we have seen it to be among the Votiaks. Indeed, the details in the two divisions are not unlike ; the cap is made move or less of the birch-tree bark, and the cap is the most characteristia part of the whole costume. The great Votiak festival was that of the Keremetj and the Keremet is the great Tsheremis one. Then it is that there are meetings under the ordinance of a priest in the holier parts of the forest, when offerings of animals are made to the bad, of flowers to the good", demons. The following is a Tsheremis song : observe the name Yuma. 88 UGRIANS OF THE VOLGA. 1. May God give health and happmess to him who offers a sacrifice. 2. To the children who come into the world, give, O Yuma, plenty of good things, gold, bread, cattle, and hees. 3. During the new year make our bees to swarm and give much honey. 4. Bless our chase after birds and after beasts. 5. Give us our fill of gold and silver. 6. Make us, O Yuma, masters of all the treasures buried in the earth, all over the world. 7. Grant that in our bargains we may make three times the value of our goods. 8. Enable us to pay our tribute. 9. Grant that, at the beginning of the spring, our three sorts of cattle may find their ways back by three different paths, and that we may keep them from bears, from wolves, and from robbers. 10. Make our cows with calf. 11. Make our thin kine fatten for the good of our children. 12. Enable us with one hand to sell our barren cows, and with the other to take the money. ] 3. Send us, O Yuma, a true and trusty friend. 14. When we travel far, preserve us, O Yuma, from bad men, from sickness, from fools, from bad judges, and from lying tongues. 15. As the hop grows and throws out its scent, so, O Yuma, grant that we wax strong through goodness, and smell sweet from reason. 16. -As the wax sparkles in burning, so let us, O Yuma, live in joy and health. 17. Let our existence be as calm and regular as the cells of a honeycomb. 18. Grant, Yuma, that he who asks may obtain the object of his prayer. When this prayer is finished, the head, heart, lungs, and liver are offered up to the deity to whom it is THE TSHEBEMISS. 89 addressed ; another prayer being said by the officiating minister alone. Then they eat and pray again. This is kept on for three days. When all is over, the bones, entraUs, and such parts of the sacrifices as have not been consumed, are burnt, the fire having never been allowed to go out during the whole festival. Though he delights in the flesh of the horse, the Tsheremis abominates that of the hog ; and this even where his habits are unwarped by any influence from his Tartar neighbours. The price that a Tsheremis pays for his bride — and, as polygamy is allowed, he may pay it for several — is called Olon. The Votiak word was Yerdon. The Tsheremis Christianity is imperfect and inchoate. Schubert makes the Tsherimis population amount to 200,000. If so, they are on the (decrease; since the numbers of the map before us are — In the Government of Viatka 75,450 Kazan 71,375 Kostroma 3,357 Nizhni-Novogorod ... 4,330 Orenburg 2,626 Perm 7,938 165,076 Viatka is the government where the Tsheremis are the most numerous. Besides this they are found in both Perm and Kostroma, where there are no Tshuvashes and no Mordvins. Hence, they are the most northern of the Ugrians of the Volga. It is the Eussians who use the name Tsheremiss ; to the Tsheremis himself it is strange. He calls himself 90 UGRIANS OF THE VOLGA. ma/ri, a Tnan, as so many other populations do. The Tshuvash he calls Kurk-raaxi, Hill-m.a,n. There is no shadow of evidence that favotirs the notion of the Tsheremis being other than an old indigenous popu- lation — iadigenous and aborigiaal to the forests ia which it now occurs. It is the populations around that are recent, the Turk and the Russian, if not the Tshuvash. The Tsheremis area may have extended, at one time, further eastward; further northward also. It may have reached the XJralian mountains, and have been conterminous with the occupants of the gold districts. These occupants of the gold districts may have belonged to the more southern branches of the Ostiaks. What if they were? This will be considered ia the sequel, when these same Ostiaks have been noticed. At present I commit myself io the idea that, name for name, the modem word Tsheremis is the ancient word Arimaspi. This assumes two changes. First, The ejection of the final p. Secondly, The initial change from the simple vowel a to the compound sibilant tsh. Are these likely? They are not unlikely. The accounts that the old writers got of the Arimaspi were not got first hand. They were got from the Greeks of the Euxine, who got them from some iaterjacent population. Now, these were mmierous ; since Herodotus speaks of seven interpreters being required for the seven lan- guages of Scythia. Some change, then, in the form of a strange proper name passing through more than one medium, is eminently probable. Whether the exact change assumed be legitimate, is another question. Its fuller discussion is reserved. "THE MOEDVIN. 91 The Mordvin. — If we look only to the geographical relations of the Tsheremis and Tshuvash, we shall take the two populations in immediate order to each other, the Tsheremis first, and the Tshuvash next, or vice versa. This is because their areas join. In many cases their villages are intermixed, so that in certain districts there is a kind of joint occupancy. Upon the whole, however, the Tshuvash keep to the right rather than the left bank of the Volga. But the ethnological affinity is not so close (at any rate, not so clear) as the geographical. There are some important points of difference between their languages. For this reason the Mordvin will be treated first. They are more unequivocally Ugrian than the Tshuvash, and consequently, more undoubtedly akin to the Tsheremis ; although they lie further firom them than do the Tshuvash. The Mordvin are the most southern of aU the Ugrian tribes that lie in situ. By this I mean all who are old occupants of their present areas. The Majiars of Hungary are not in this predicament. The Mordvin, then, are the most Southern tribes that lie in situ. They fall into three divisions ; — a. The Ersad, on the R Oka. b. The Mokshad, on the R Sura. c. The Karatai, in the neighbourhood of Kazan. Their dialects are two — ^the Ersad and the Mokshad. I cannot say to which of these the Karatai belongs. The name Mordvin is native ; i. e., they call themselves so. It is the Tsheremis word Mari, under another form, but with the same meaning, i. e., Mem. It is the Permian and Siranian and Votiak m-^. 92 UGRIANS OF THE VOtGA. They are somewhat larger sized than the Tsheremis, or rather the Tsheremis are described as being smaller than the Mordvin; their' beards are thin; faces flat; hair brown rather than black ; often red — oftener, how- ever, with the Ersad than with the Mokshad. Schubert puts their numbers at 92,000. If so, they are greatly on the increase, since the numbers on the map before us are — For the Government of Astrakan 48 Kazan 14,867 Nizhni Novogorod... 53,383 Orenburg 5,200 Penza 106,025 Samar 74,910 Saratov 78,010 Simbirsk 98,968 Taurida 340 Tambov 48,491 480,242 The order, then, of the Governments in which the Mordvins are numerous, is Penza, Simbirsk, Saratov, Samar, Nizhni Novogorod, Tambov, Kazan, Orenburg; there being none in Viatka, and comparatively few in Kazan. Assuredly their occupancy is, at one and the same time, the most southern and the most western of all the Ugrians. In Taurida and Astrakhan they are, probably, recent settlers. The Mordvins are, for the most part, Christians. At the same time the old Paganism shews through the THE TSHUVASH. 93 newer creed. The name of their chief heathen deity is Paas amongst the Ersad ; Shkai amongst the Mokshad. The Tshuvash. — It has already been stated, that, in respect to their geographical position, the Tshuvash lie nearer to the Tsheremis than do the Mordvins. This, at least, is the evidence afforded by their distribution over the following six governments : — Kazan 300,091 Simbirsk 84,714 Samar 29,926 Orenburg 8,353 Saratov 6,863 Viatka 17* 429,954 There are none, then, in Perm, few in Viatka, the northern localities of the Tsheremis ; none in Kostroma, none in Nizhni Novogorod, their western occupancies. Then, as compared with the Mordvins, there are none in Penza, none in Tambov, comparatively few in Saratov. Their centre seems to be Kazan, in the direction of Sim- birsk ; just as the centre of the Tsheremis was Kazan, in the direction of Viatka; and the centre of the Mordvins, Penza. In Kazan they are nearly as munerous as the Tartars or Turks, whose numbers are 308,574. Schubert reckoned the Tshuvash at 370,000. If so, they have increased. I cannot account for the name. It is not native. Vereyal, Khirdiyal, and Vyres are the designations by which the Tshuvash denote themselves. According to 94 UGRIANS OF THE VOLGA. Miiller the Russians call them Vyress as well. Yet Tshuvash is the name of the map before me. The Tsheremis (as aforesaid) call them Kurk-Mari — hiU- men; and the Mordvins, Wiedke (TJdi). The language is the point wherein the Tshuvash and Tsheremis chiefly differ ; the language, which equally separates the Tshuvash and Mordvins. The language, too, raises the only difficulties that arise in the question as to the ethnological affinities of the Tshuvash. Their language has been considered Ugrian ; and, as far as the present writer can form an opinion, it is so. At the same time, it stands in Klaproth's Asia Polyglotta as Twrh, and many good works besides. Supposing it, however, to be Ugrian, it is more Turk than any other of the alhed forms of speech ; more Turk than the Tsherimis or Majiar. This is a statement which I take as I find ; and lay it before the reader without pre- tending to explain; without even saying in what the Turk affinities consist. They may be in the words rather than the grammar, or in the gram^mar rather than in' the words. They may be as the Norman elements are in English ; or they may lie in points essential to the structure of the language, and so resemble the Anglo-Saxon part of the Enghsh. One thing, however, is worth remembering ; viz., that if the Tshuvash be a language intermediate and transitional to the Turk stock on one side and the Ugrian on the other, — as much Ugrian as Turk, and as much Turk as Ugrian, — ^it presents a very unusual phenomenon in comparative philology. Such transitions, common as they may be under an a-priori point of view, are emi- nently rare. We should scarcely suppose that they would UGRIANS OF tHE VOLGA. 95 be so ; but so they axe. Forms of speech belonging to one and the same class often graduate into each other. StUl oftener do dialects of the same language. But with great classes, like the German (for instance) and the Sarmatian, or like the Sarmatian (for iustance) and the Latin, there are no truly transitional and intermediate forms of speech — no language of which the position is equivocal or ambiguous. Everything belongs to either one class or the other. Nothing remains unplaced or undistributed. The most that can be said is, that some outlying dialect of one group approaches some similar outlyer of the other ; that a certain form of speech is more (say) Sarmatian, than the other members of the German class — or vice versa. This is not uncommon. The really uncommon phenom- enon is the existence of a language so intermediate in character as to be equivocal in respect to its position. Yet this the Tshuvash is said, by competent judges, to be. If so, what follows 1 Even this — a reason for enlarging the class; for throwing the Turk and Ugrian groups under some common denomination. This is by no means unlikely. On the contrary, there are several phenomena that seem to demand it. 96 THE VOGULS. CHAPTER VIII. THE VOGULS AND OSTIASS. We pass now from the Ugrians of Europe to those of Asia; the TJralian range of mountains and the River Ural, or Dzhaik (Jaak), being the lines of demarcation which separate the two continents. This boundary is more natu- ral in its northern than its southern parts — and that in respect both to its physical geography and its ethnology. The ordinary names for the Ugrian populations of the northern Ural, and the lower parts of the great Asiatic river which waters the country on its eastern foot (the Obi), for a population which extends from the borders of the Siranian country to the Yenisey, are Vogul and Ostiak; Vogul for the mountain tribes of the West, Ostiak for the river-populations of the East ; Vogul for the men of the Ural, Ostiak for those of the Obi and Yenisey. Neither of these names, however, is native. It is the Russian who uses them ; the former being probably taken from the Siranians, the latter from the Bashkirs. But the Siranians called the Voguls Yograyess as well. Mcmsi is what they call themselves ; it is also the name which they extend to their Ostiak neighbotirs. THE VOQULS. 97 The Mansi or Voguls. — The Mansi or Vogul area, bounded on the north by the Sosva, a feeder of the Lower, and on the south, by the Tura and Tawda, feeders of the Upper j Obi, coincides pretty closely with the ridge of the northern Ural, or the watershed between the Irtish and Obi on the east, the Petshora and Dwina on the west, and the Kama on the south. The Permians and Siranians are conr terminous with the Voguls. Their country makes them, at one and the same time, hillmen and foresters ; for they lie within the northern limit of the fir and birch, in the country of the wolf, the bear, the sable, the glutton, the marten, the beaver, and the elk. Their country, too, makes them hunters; for there are no wide plains to encourage the breeding of flocks and herds, and no climate for the growth of the cereals. The conditions of the northern parts of Sirania and Permia have become more and more unfavourable for industry. Hence, the Voguls, Compared with any of the tribes that lie south of them, are a comfortless, undersized, Hi-developed population; who, if they contrast favourably with the Lap and Samoyed, shew to a disadvantage by the side of the Fia- lander or the Siranian. Their villages are smaller than those of the Tsheremis; and a little reflection will shew us, that the size of the village gives a fair measure of the •well-beiag of the population that occupies it. From four to eight cabins constitute a Vogul one, and these lie from ten to fifteen miles apart; the forest lying between — with- out roads, and with but few clearings. Game is the chief sustenance; and for the production of it the forest has to be kept wild. To this extent are the Voguls a hunter- population; for it is only in the southern parts of their F 98 THE UGEIAJif. STOCK. area that the signs of settled life appear. A little tillage and a little cattle appear as we approach the Bashkir fron- tier — the Bashkir habits being partially adopted. The Bashkir, however, is himself, -but half agricultural. The winter-hut of the Vogul — ^the Okon — is small, close, and smoky; the simimer-cabia is made of the boughs and rind of the birch-tree. These are raised or pulled down as the necessities of the chase require; as one locality must be exchanged for another. The Vogul hunts on foot. He has no pastures for horses ; and the boggy, woody tracts under his occupancy, are ill adapted for the use of them. Even the dog is a rare companion. On the other hand, a few cows may constitute the property of one of the wealthier proprietors. The elk, however, is the chief beast for sustenance, and the sable for trade. The reindeer is less abundant; and it is in the skin of the elks, amongst ruminants, that their tribute of peltry is paid. The«flesh is dried, not salted ; cut into strips and dried in the open air, so that a kind of pemmican is made of it. The Vogul uses the gun as well as the bow; and he is skUful in the contrivance of traps and pitfalls. He fishes, too, as well as hunts. For hunting, his best month is No- vember. This is when the animals have their full winter ftir about them. Obdorsk, at the mouth of the Obi, a factory rather than a town, is the Vogul trading-town. Thither he resorts with his skins, berries, and such-like small articles of barter. The Samoyeds and Ostiaks resort there ailso. Pallas (and I believe other observers) speaks to the fact of the Voguls wholly dispensing with the use of salt. Berries they have, but no vegetables; and they THE VOGULS. 99 chew tlie turpentine of tlie larcli; but they use no salt, and enjoy good health notwithstanding. They are said to be healthy, but neither long-lived nor strong ; and of all the Ugrians of the forest-districts (as contrasted with those of the txindras) they have a physiognomy that most approaches that of the typical Mongol The hair is black or brown — ^seldomer yellow, or red; the beard scanty, the fece feminine; the skin glabrous and pale. The cheekbones project, and, as the fece is generally de- scribed as flat and broad, the zygomata curve laterally outwards. From this, Maltebrun has allowed himself to draw the whoUy gratuitous inference of their being a Mongolian population, that has been conquered by the Hungarians and had a Ugrian form of speech thrust upon them: — "Les Wogouls ne sont probablement qu' une peuplade Kalmouque, aneiennement subjugu6e par les Hongrois, et k laquelle ceux-ci, auront impost de force leur langue. {Maltebrun, Freds de la GSographie Urwoersdle, torn, vi., p. 443.) As early as 1741, the Swedish traveller Schbnstrom remarked that their language was akin to the Fin. He also stated that he had heard from some of themselves that their original locality lay west of their present, i. e., on the Yug knd the Dwina ; so that their ancestors had moved from west to east This is likely. They are a population easily encroached upon ; and as the line of demarcation between them and their neighbours, is broader and more definite in the direction of Perm and Vologda than on that of the Obi ; as they are less like the Siranians than they are to the Ostiaks ; the natural F 2 lOjO THE TJGRIAN STOCK. probabilities of a displacement of some of tliem on the ■western side of the Ural is increased. It is not, however, to be imagined that the ancestors of the present moun- taineers were driven from the lower country into their; present area. On the contrary, they have every ap- pearance of beiag indigenous to the Uralian ranges. Their dialects are numerous and well niarked, and indicate a long lapse of time for their development Hence the criticism of the Vogul localities should be that of the Caucasian populations — that of the Welsh — -that of the Basks of the Pyrenees — that of the. Siaposh of Kaferistan — that of nine out of ten moun- taineer populations all over, the world ; and it should be held that they are the remains of a population which was once spread over the lower country, around and about ; but of which the more acoessible and iU-defended portions have been swept away — ^the remainder being preserved by the impracticable character of their country. This, I say, is the truer view of mountaineer populations in wild locaUties ; yet it is not the usual one. The far more prevalent doctrine assumes the bodily movement of a retreating population ; of a population receding, from the lower lands to the higher ; of a shelter-seeking in the mountains. It is in this way that the Welsh, are supposed to represent the Britons of (perhaps) some midland county that " retreated to the mountains," (as the saying is,) on the access of the Romans, in- stead of so many aborigines of Merioneth and Cardigan. It is in this way that the Basks of the Pyrenees are represented to be Spaniards who " retreated to the mountains." Now, such retreats are rare phenomena : in THE VOGULS. 501 most cases there has heen no populational locomotion whatever; no transfer from one level to another; no change of place at all. There has been merely the circumscription of a circumference ; the central parts being left untouched. The present Voguls, then, are in situ. At the same time their further extension westward is probable. So is their further extension southwards ; as will be seen , in the sequel. It is more, indeed, than probable. The prolongation in a southern direction of the area of a population more or less Vogul in its ethnological affinities is an ethnological necessity. But this (as afore- said) will be brought under notice hereafter. In Schubert's tables the number of the Voguls is about 100,000. The map before us gives only those of European Eussia ; ia other words, those of the Government of Perm, the only Eiu'opean one which contains any. None seem to belong to Vologda, none to Archangel. Now, the Voguls of European Eussia, the Voguls of the Government of Perm, amoimt to no more than 872. What proportion these bear to those of the Obi and the other Trans-uralian districts, I cannot say. In respect to the other populations of the Government of Permia, the Voguls stand at the botom of the list of Ugrians, which is as follows : — Permians 47,605 Tsheremis 7,935 Voguls 872 56,412 102 THE UGRIAN STOCK. The fiarther we move northwards, the wilder do we find the Voguls. In the southern part of their area they partake of the habits of the Bashkir and the Russian. Along the Tura and the Tawda they exercise an imperfect agrictdtnre, speak Russian as well as Vogul, and have been partially converted to Christianity, par- tially and indifferently. A measure of the exertions of the Vogul missionaries, we find in the fact of the Vogul language being the most imperfectly known of all the western tongues of Ugria. It is the only one for which we have no grammatical sketch. It may, however, resemble the Ostiak sufficiently to make this unnecessary ; though MiiUer states that the two languages are mutually vm- inteUigible. Of their success, we get the measure in the amount of the Vogul paganism still existent. In the south it may, possibly, be the exception. In the north it is the rula Its general character closely approaches that of the Laplanders. The priest is the head of the family ; success in hunting, the chief object of their prayers. To this end, the carven image of the god takes the form of the beast under pursuit, being sable-shaped, elk-shaped. Or bear-shaped, according as the bear, the elk, or the sable is the more especial object Near a hunting- lodge on the Sosva, is the rude image of an elk, carved by an unknown hand out of stone, an image of some antiquity. This the Voguls visit from considerable distances, and invoke its favour during their expeditions. I take the account firom MiiUer, who specially says that it is " rough-hewn out of stone." The analogy, however. THE VOGULS. 103 of the Lap mytliology, makes it probable that it is a natural piece of rock, whereof the shape is elk-like enough to suggest the comparison. However, offerings are made to it by its visitors. Other figures are in the human form ; and of these some are of metal, iron, or copper. It is in certain holy places where they are found ; fixed in the clefts of a rock or tree ; raised on poles stuck in the ground — the ground being the most elevated spot about. On one of the numerous streams called Shatanlca, is a holy cavern, on the floor of which are foimd bones, the remains of Vogul offerings — ^bones and rings of Russian workmanship, but of Vogul con- secration. Observe the name Shatanka. It comes from Satan, a name which we expect amongst Jews and Maho- metans rather than amongst Shamanistic Voguls. Amongst them, however, we find it, and that abun- dantly. So we do amongst the Tsheremis and Tshu- vash ; whilst amongst the Voguls of Perm, the southern members of the group, we find the Tsheremis and Tshuvash Keremets, and its accompanying ceremonies. These are called the Torom Salctadag ; the latter word being allied to the name for priest, which is SaktaAaih&. Torom, on the other hand, is the name of a god whose residence is in the sun or moon ; a god whose name appears in all, or nearly all, of the other Ugrian mythologies. Yelhola is the name of the feast of Torom ; probably the same word as the Finlandish Yumala, and the Lap Yuhmel — and with the feast of Yelbola the Vogul year begins. The Ostiaks. — It is, perhaps, safe to say that the 104 THE UGRIAN STOCK. Yogul is a European Ostiak, the Ostiak an Asiatic Vogul, the chief difiference being the mountaineer and fluviatile character of their respective areas ; for that of the Ostiak is the valley of the Obi, reaching, in some cases, across the water-shed, to the Yenisey. The Vogul was a hunter rather than a fisher;, the Ostiak is a fisher rather than a hunter — a fisher in fresh water rather than in the sea. This is a habit of which we have not seen much, the combination of an Arctic climate and a large river flowing northwards being one which has not yet been met with. There were fishers amongst the Laps ; but the Lap rivers were insig- nificant in point of size, and the country around supplied the reindeer in sufficient abundance to make it the chief means of sustenance. Besides which, the Lap domesti- cates the reindeer, which the Ostiak does but slightly. Like the fisher Lap, the Ostiak has a summer and a winter residence ; the former moveable, the latter fixed ; the former tent-Hke, the latter aspiring to the name of hut. In the Tshum — a Tungusian name adopted by the Russians for the summer dwelling of the Ostiak — a few poles are placed in the ground and slanted towards each other at the top, pyramid-fashion. Round this is made a sort of wall of boughs and birch-bark, much after the fashion of the Vogul and Lap huts. The winter cabin is made of timber — square in shape, and often half sunk in the soil, with sods of turf for the roofing-tUes. ■ But as these are of more elaborate workmanship, they are only joint occupancies ; and three, four, or half-a-dozen families may tenant them — with a sum total, of perhaps, thirty individuals, of all ages, both sexes, and an utter THE OSTIAKS. 105 'disregard, if not an absolute distaste, for cleanliness. The stench of the Ostiak winter cabin is described as in- supportable to any but the Ostiak, the Samoyed, or the Lap. Fish and smoke equally, along with tobacco, which the Ostiak loves to swallow rather than inhale, contribute' to it. The women are partially tattooed, a habit We meet with for the first time. I am not aware that any other of the western Ugrians practise such a custom, though a few Turks used to do, and more than one tribe of Tungusians do so now. Salt is scarce amongst them, so that the fish of the Ostiak, hke the flesh of the Vogul, is either dried or frozen. And summer is the time for fishing. There is, then, abundance, and over-aljundance ; enough for the Ostiak 's own consumption ; enough for dryiiig for winter's use ; enough for the numerous dogs that draw the sledges ; enough for use, and enough for barter. As the autumn advances, the river-bank is exchanged for the woods, and companies prepare themselves, at the first fall of snow,^ with long snow-skates, like those of the Laplander, and sledges, that their dogs will have to draw for long expeditions into the forests in search of bears, "foxes, sables, or squirrels. The whole clothing is now of reindeer-skin, doubled, so as to have the hair both inside and out. And this is the dress of many of the Eussians as well ; so protective is it against the sharp and piercmg blasts of a Siberian winter. Undersized, like the Lap and Vogul, the Ostiak is deficient ia muscular strength ; deficient, too, ia bodily activity ; though, at the same time, tolerant of f3 106 THE UGRIAN STOCK. cold, hunger, and hardship. In youth he suffers but little from disease ; though, as he grows older, he gets liable to scorbutic and cutaneous ailnients. He i% pro- bably, not long-lived. Thin in the arms and legs, flat in the suborbital part of the face, he is small-boned, red-haired, simple-miaded, good-tempered, and hospi- table; easily taken-in in his deaJings 'with the Russian traders of Beresov and Obdorsk Of these two towns — if the latter may be honoured Avith the appellation — Beresov is the great Ostiak emporium, and the whole neighbourhood of Beresov is Ostiak. In Obdorsk there is a business with the Voguls and Samoyeds as welL The frontier poptdations to the Ostiaks are the two populations last mentioned, certain populations of the Yenisey, and the northern Turks of Siberia. To one of these Turkish and Siberian Kianates (that of Isker), the Ostiaks were originally subject, though, also, under the rule of their own petty chieftains ; petty chieftains, but the representatives cff an Ostiak nobility. Of these, a few descendants stiU remain, mere or less respected by the plebeian families of their districts, but by no means in easy circumstances. They have to hunt, and fish, and work for their living, just like the others. The rule that appHed to the Vogul applies to the Ostiak. The farther they lie north, the lower Uieir civi- lization. The dialects, too, are said to run south and north, the former being more mixed with the Eussian and Bashkir, the latter with the Samoyed. Muller m9,kes them two in number, Gastrin, however, who THE OSTIAKS. 107 is a better authority, makes three divisions, one of which he sub-divides. The first is that of the river Irtish, the one which he has more especially represented in his grammar. The second and third are those of the neigh- bourhoods of Surgut and Obdorsk, the former varying for the .parts over and above the city. The Voguls, who call themselves Momsi, call the Ostiaks MoMsi also ; so that the Voguls, at least, draw no very broad distinction between their neighbours and themselves. Ostiah was first used by the Siberian Turks, from whom the Russians have adopted it. They have adopted and extended it ; since some of the ■ Samoyeds, as well as those tribes whom Klaproth calls Yeniseians, are similarly designated lyy the Russians. The Samoyeds called them Thahe. . We have not yet come to the native names. Three of these are found in Miiller, applied by different portions of the Ostiak popu- lation to themselves. So that, in aU probability, they have no general or collective denomination. The first of these names is Kondikho, the term for the Ostiaks of the Konda ; the second, Tyu-hwm (or morass-men) ; the third, As-jach (river-mm). The last of these is, probably, Ostiak in its native form ; in which case the name of a particular division has been extended to the whole group, just as, according to Tacitus, the name German, which brigiually designated the tribe of the Tungri, eventually meant all the populations, really or probably, closely or remotely, geographically or ethnologicaUy, politically or socially, allied to them. Schubert gives 100,000 as the number of the Ostiaks ; Koppen, 18,840 for the Government of Tobolsk only. T08 THE UGEIAN STOCK. But (as has been already stated) the district of Beresov is their chief area. Of this I have seen no census. The Ostiak country lies beyond the statistics of the tables before us, although, in the map, part of their country is marked out. The traditions as to their origin coincide with those of the Voguls, and point to the western side of the UraHans, to the parts about the Kama and its feeders ; whence, in the latter half of the fourteenth century, the ancestors of the present Ostiaks descended upon the banks of the Obi. I interpret this to mean that they were, at one time, extended so much further westwards ; the present Ostiaks, in my mind, lying in situ. The palmary and primary fact in their ethnology rests upon this view. Of all the Ugrian tribes the Majiars of Hungary are the most prominent in history ; and of all the undoubted Ugrian localities, the southern frontier of the Ostiak and Vog^ area is the nearest to the northern frontier of the Majiars — of the Majiars in the original Asiatic habitat. Again, of all the Ugrian languages, the Ostiak is Ukest the Majiar. The same applies to the mythologies. The Majiars are Christians, and have long been so ; but there is no Ugrian population in which the Christianity is suffi- ciently complete to have effaced all traces of the original paganism. It may be added that there is no population — Ugrian or non-Ugrian — where it is so. Hence, the old Majiar paganism shews through the later creed ; and (when this is the case) the existing paganism of the Ostiaks best illustrates it. Oerdik, the Majiar Devil, is THE OSTIAKa 109 the Ostiak Ortilc, an evU demon also. In respect to the ceremonies and offerings, the Lap forms of worship repeat themselves amongst the Ostiaks. There are the same household idols, the same holy rocks, the same consecrated spots of forest or woodland. In certain conspicuous places there are large-sized idols, famous amongst which are the Ortlonk and the Slataya haha. The name of the former is Ostiak, and means hi/ng of idols. He stood at Lonhpugl — the idol village, not fax from the junction of the Irtish and Obi. A male figure, of no great size, and roughly carved out of wood, was this same Ortlonk, with two female images near him. When the priest consulted him, offerings of skins or animals were laid before him. It was believed that he had been brought from Permia, but the belief was, probably, inferential. There were similar images in that coun^, and a hypothetical migration best accounted for the similarity in the minds of such rude speculators as first instituted comparisons upon those points, wherein the TJgrians of the two sides of' the Uralian range agreed. The inference then took the garb of a tradition ; most traditions being but inferences in disguise. The Slataya haha, or golden old woman, we only know from its Eussian name and the notice of Herber- stein. It stood on the Lower Obi — " Slata haha, i.e., aurea anus idolum est ad Obi ostia in provrncia Obdora in ulteriore ripa situm." {Rerwm Muscovitarum Com- vnent, p. 82.) This may be as much Samoyed as Ostiak. Another image, known to the Kosaks who conquered ]]0 THE UGEIAN STOCK. these parts, stood on the Konda. It was of gold or gilded, and was said to have come from Russia, where it was called Christ. This, too, was brought into the Ostiak country from the western side of the Ural, or said to be so brought. Upon a holy Ostiak locaHty, whether wood or clearing, rock or stream, whether hallowed because it had been the scene of a successful chase, or because an idol had stood there, or because an eagle had built many years successively on one of its trees, was placed a kind of tahu. Grass was not mown from it, nor wood cut, nor game nor fish taken. Even a draught of water to a thirsty hunter was forbidden. Erman's account is the same in substance, though with a confusion of names ; e.g., his Long is an idol or deity in general, rather than any one specially. The carved part of the image of Ortik is a bust, a bust only, a bust without a trunk ; as is usual with the other Ostiak deities. The body is a stuffed sack, the face is a plate of metal hammered over it. Two hnen sleeves are sewn on for arms. It is placed on a table, and a sword and spear laid beside it. J elan has an image like Ortik's, only his head is more peaked. This is the god in whose honour the war-dance is performed. Some- times his vestments are made of black dog-skin. Long is a sort of Mercury. The Russians call him the master. Every art is under his patronage, medicine most espe- cially. The characteristic of the offeriag to Long Hes in the fact of its never being in the shape of the raw material. There must be work in it of some sort. Furs are especially excluded. Long wears the girdle aforesaid, THE OSTIAKS. Ill which is kept as covered •wilJi omaments as it can be. Meik bears the blame when the Ostiak loses his way in the snow, or when anything equally untoward befalls him. His image is dressed in beaver-skioa. 1 1 2 TEE irUlUAN STOCK. CHAPTER IX. THK SAMOTEDS — BUT LATELY HEOOGHIZED AS UGBLAN — THE NOKTHESK AMD SOTTTHERS BEAHCHES— THEIB PAQAKI3M- THE YENESELiNS OF KLAPROTH THE TDKAHIRI. The Samoyeds of Russia in Europe are found only in the Government of Archangel, where their numbers, according to the map before us, amount to no more than 4,495. Small, however, as this population is, it is nearly double that of the Laps; the Laps of Archangel being 2,289. The Siranians of the Government amoimt to 6,9n8, and the Karelians to 11,228. The Karelians, in fact, are the chief Ugrian population; but they are not the oldest and most aboriginal. They have encroached from the South, their direction being north and north-west; so that the Laps have been dis- placed by them, rather than the Samoyeds. The Lap lies to the north of the Karelians, the Samoyed surmounts (so to say) the Siranians ; the area of the former being to the west, that of the latter to the east, of Arch- angel,. So that the Dwina and the White Sea form the lines of demarcation . Climate for climate, and soil for soil, THE SAMOTEDS. 113 the Lap is somewhat the more favoured of the two. As we m.ove eastward the tree-limit recedes southwards, until in the central parts of Siberia it reaches its southern extre- mity. The reindeer, too, is either more abundant or more easily domesticated, in the Lap districts — especially in those of Scandinavia. The Lap has more of the forest than the tundra, the Samoyed more of the tundra than the forest. On the other hand his rivers are larger, and probably more productive of fish. If the northern Samoyed have a worse country than the Lap, he has a better neighbourhood ;*.«., his frontagers on the south leave him more at liberty and encroach upon him less. The southern frontier of the Lap continually recedes. So does the eastern. The Norwegian presses on him ; the Russian presses on him ; the Finlander, whe- ther Quain or Karelian, presses on him. He is continu- ally getting straitened ; and for a nomade, whose wealth lies in his reindeer, the want of ample space is the want of sufficient sustenance. The Samoyed has the Vogul and the Ostiak for his neighbours, and further eastwards the Tungusian, who, by the way, presses upon him some- what closely. So do the Siberian Turks upon the Southern Samoyeds. But the Samoyed of Archangel and Beresov, the Samoyed of the Petshora and the Obi, has his area comparatively free and uncircumscribed. I cannot find that the Lap and Samoyed come in contact. The Russians and Karelians, who follow the course of the Dwina towards Archangel, separate them. Originally, the case was different; so that when each family occupied its whole area, the eastern boundary of the one was pro- bably the western of the other. But even this may not 114 THE UGEIAN STOCK. have been the earliest state of things. The Laps, instead of lying to the west of the Samoyeds, may at first have been their neighbours on the north — since reasons will be given for beheving that the last-named population, like the Finlanders and Karelians, lay originally in the south, and, from the south, moved northwards. The word Samoyed is one which has given rise to some astonishing etymologies, and to erroneous impressions in the way of ethnology not a few.. In the first place it has taken the form Samo-gedi, which is very like the name of the Lithuanian Samogitoe, or Scumogitians. There are the elements of confusion here. Then it gets a German comment upon it, based upon the notion that its meaning is to be sought in the German languages, where ged may be supposed to represent the English word eat, and where sam is the English word saTne* Then same is furthei\ supposed to mean self. So that Samogedi or Samoyeds are Self-eaters, or (by extension of the meaning of the word self) eaters of their kind, carvnibals. Hence, Herbersteia allows himself to write thus : — " Ultra Petzora fluvium ad montem Camenipojas, item mare insulasque vicinas, sunt varise et innumerse gentes, quae tmo ac communi nomine Samoged (quasi diceres se i/psos come- dentes) nuncupantur." {Rer. Muscovit. Gom/ment., p. 81.) The real history I believe to be as follows : — Its meaning is to be sought in the Ugrian toiigues, probably in the Karelian form of the Fin, or, perhaps, in the Siranian ; these two dialects being spoken between the * The Slavonic tongues give us the aame eleiflents; viz., samo, selfyS.Tidi. yea, eat. THE SAMOTEDS. 115 Samoyed frontier and the Russian. This is fen, marsh, tnorass, or svxxm/p — ^the latter being an English form of the same root, though how it came into our language is a difficult question. It was apphed by the KareHans or Siranians, to the country occupied by their Samoyed neighbours, and taken up from the Karelian or Siranian by the Russians, from whom it spread over the learned world of Europe at large. If this be true, it is the same root that appears in the name Suomelaisest, and Sabme, Fin, and Lap. More than this : it is the same word as Swmogitia, distant as the latter locality is from the So/may eds; since a case may be made out for beUeviag the word to be Lithuanic, only iu the way that such a name as Britain is English, i. e., not at aU. As Britain belonged to the language of a population, occupant of a given locality, anterior to the Angle conquest, so did Samogitia apply to a district which was either Ugrian or on the Ugrian fi-ontier, before it became Lithuanic. At present The Siranians call the Samoyeds Tarang. Ostiaks Yerya/n-^ahh. Voguls Yorran^kum. Tungusians Dyandcd. The Russians, as aforesaid, (and, after the Russians, the French, English, and Germansj) say Sa/mo^ed. But it is only the Khasovo, or northern branch, that they so denominate. The southern Samoyeds have been called Ostiaks ; which they are not. This shews the amount of confusion engendered by inaccurate names. One of the designations before us 116 THE TJGKIAN STOCK. conceals an affinity which actually exists ; the other (suggests an erroneous one, It illustrates, too, a method of criticism, which is too often misapplied. The ordinary interpretation of such a fact as two populations, so distant from each other as Herberstein's Samogedi and the Samogitse of Lithuania, bearing names so similar, is that they both belonged to the same class. The true inference is different from this ^very different. The synonymous tribes, no matter how many of them there be, need be in no ethnological relation at all to each other. They need only be in a certain relation to some third population — the popula- tion which lies between them, which touches their two frontiers, and which suppHes the name common to the two. This is the principle upon which the natives of Wales, of Italy, of the Valais in Switzerland, of the Walloon country in the Ardennes, are all We^sh {Weahl-as). They all lie in contact with populations sufficiently allied to each other to denote their neighbours by the same term. Hence — Identity of name, in distant localities, proves no ethnological connexion between the synonymous popu- lations. It only proves the mutual affinity of the interjacent populations. This is enlarged upon here, because it illustrates a line of criticism which will be appKed somewhat freely and boldly hereafter. The Samoyeds falls into two divisions, a southern and a northern. THE SAMOTEDS. 117 This Southern division — ^the division of the Soiot — will be noticed first. Part of its area lies within the limits of the Chinese empire, so that its neighbours are Turks, Mongolians, and Tungusians, rather than Laps, Voguls, and Ugrians ; and its latitude is one that, in Europe, would give us gardens, cornfields, and vineyards — the latitude of Paris, N. L. 49. This crosses the head-waters of the two great rivers Obi and Yenisey ; upon each of which we find branches of these Southern, or Soiot, Samoyeds. At Tunkinsk, on the south-western extremity of the Lake Baikal, in the Russian territory, and on a Turk frontier, lie the most eastern of them. At Abakansk, on the Upper Yenisey, and on the Uda, a feeder of the Yenisey, lie other tribes ; on the parts about Lake Ubsa, further south stUl, and within the Chinese territory, others; othei-s on the Bashkus, which expands in Lake Altun (or Teleakoi) and becomes one of the head-waters of the Obi. The names and forms of speech vary with the' area. There are the Motori, the Koibal, and the Ka- mash dialects, known more or less imperfectly, through the vocabularies of the Asia Polyglotta. And there are the tribes of Bagari, the Matlar, the Tozhiri, and the Ulek, divisions of the TJriangchai or Soiot Proper ; the tribes of the Karakash ; the tribes of the three dialects, just named (Motori Koibal, and Kamash) ; and the tribe of the Tubintsi. The pressure from the neighbouring tribes on these Southern Samoyeds is considerable ; the Motori being probably extinct. At least, in A.D. 1722, only ten families of them remained. Few populations are less known than these Southern 118 THE UGKIAN STOCK. Samoyeds, Ostiaks as they have loosely been called, Soiot (in the wider sense of the term) as they are proposed to be named. They are said to be im- poverished, distressed, and reduced -in numbers. What is their relation to their area ? Are they immigrants or aborigines ? Do they he in situ, or have they come from the north? We have nothing but the d, priori probabihties before us. Their occupancy lies on an elevated and probably broken surface ; an elevated and broken surface more likely to retain an old than to accept a new population. Add to this, that the Samoyeds of the north are not a nation of conquerors and invaders. As a general rule, the Hnes of immigration for these parts are from south to north, rather than vice versd. As a general rule, too, the lower country is easier conquered from the higher than the higher from the lower. Nevertheless, all such reasoning is essentially d priori and, as such, unsafe What if they were colonies of settlers, removed from the parts beyond them by the Mongol or other conquerors of Siberia, at a time when history was dark and silent ? They may be so. At the same time, their forms of speech, so far as we know them, from the vocabularies of the Asia Poly- glotta, collected by Strahlenberg and Messerschmidt, vary sufficiently to indicate long separation from the parent speech. Then there is a tradition amongst them to the effect that they came from the land of Suomi. We have seen this word before, and know what it implies, or rather what it does not imply. It does not imply that they came from the Sa/mogitia, the Suomalaiset country, the THE SAMOYEDS. 119 Sabme districts, or even from the land of the Batnoyed. It simply means that they came from some marshy, fenny, or swarwpy area. This might be near or distant ; inasmuch as, wherever there are swamps and Ugrians there are conditions for such a name as Suotti: just as, amongst the German populations, there are fens in Lin- colnshire, and veeTis m Friesland. Upon the whole, I think they lie m situ. If so, the Northern Samoyeds have followed the lines of the great rivers, and encroached on the more Arctic populations. The reindeer is one of the domestic animals of the Soiot Samoyeds ; perhaps the chief one. The character of their language was known to Strah- lenberg; this meaning its affinity with the dialects of the Khasovo. And it is this affinity of speech which links the Southern division with — The Northern. — Of these (as has been stated) IQiasovo is the native name, though some tribes call themselves Nyenehh, and others Molcasi. Khasovo, too, is a conve- nient name for the division; Samoyed being reserved for the whole group. The parts about Mezen, between Archangel and the Petshora, give us the western, the Eiver Khatunga, be- tween the Yenisey and Lena, the eastern frontier of the Khasovo. Their southernmost locality is the neighbour- hood of Tomsk ; and the neighbourhood of Tomsk is the northern frontier of the Soidt. So that the general Samoyed area is, probably, continuous and unbroken. At the same time the details are obscure. Neither is it certain that the division itself is strictly natm-aL I ^ive it, however, as I find it. 120 THE UGRIAN STOCK. As tlie Obi and Yenisey approach the sea the interve- ning area increases. Its steppe-like character (to judge from the rivers) racreases also. This gives us a TJgrian population imder the physical conditions of a Mongol or Turk of Tartary, who has but little to get from any forest, little from any fishery. Agaia, the division into tribes takes prominence among the Samoyeds. In other respects, they resemble the Laps of the more treeless dis- tricts; having, perhaps, a httle more bodily strength, and a little more energy. The physiognomy, too, is more Mongolian or Kalmuc, the stature being below the average. The dialects are numerous, and we have specimens of them from — 1. Pustosesk, at the mouth of the Petshora, the north- westernmost locality. 2. Obdorsk, at the mouth of the Obi. 3. The River Tym, on the right side of the Obi. 4. The River Ket, ibid. 5. Naiym, between the two. 6. Pumpokolsk, north of the Tym. 7. Tomsk, the southernmost locality. 8. The parts between the Obi and Yenesey, — ^the Yurass, the Tas, and Mangaseia vocabularies. 9. Turuchansk. 10. East of Turuchansk, — ^the Karass vocabulary. 11. The parts about tlie Chatunga, — the Tawgi voca- bulary. These are the most easterly specimens 12. The Laak vocabulary. A Samoyed grammar, ia the course of publication, is one of the last works of Gastrin — .a posthumous one. THE TENISEIANS. 121 It is Gastrin wlio, confirming a suggestion of Schott's and (I believe) also of Gabelentz's as well, definitely placed the Samoyeds amongst the Ugrians — the lan- guage being the guide. Until his grammar comes before the world, the details of the evidence will be incomplete. It may safely, however, be assumed that they will suffice. It is the present writer, who, ignorant of Gastrin's researches, and of the TJgrian character of the Samoyed language, predicated of two other populations that they were in the same category with the Samoyed, whatever that might be. The fact of the Samoyed being Ugrian by no means mo- difies his opinion. The first of these families is that of — a. The Yeniseians ; the second, that of — h. TheYukahiri. As Paganism increases as we move eastward and north- ward, the three families mider notice are the least modi- fied by either Christianity from the side of Eussia, or Buddhism from that of Mongolia. Neither are they Maho- riietans through any Turk iafluences. But the Yeni- seians and Yukahiri are small groups ; small and obscure. This leaves the Samoyeds as the chief specimen of the Siberian heathens of the Ugrian stock. The Yeniseians. — This is a name so clearly taken from that of the Yenisey as to make the statement, that the tribes to which it applies are occupants of the banks of that river, superfluous. .It is not unnecessary, how- ever, to say, how it arose and who gave it. In aU the works anterior to the publication of the Asixh Polyglotta (in 1823), a number of small tribes occupying the Middle Yenisey, were known imder the vague, and general, and G 122 THE TENISEIANS. inaccurate denomination of Ostiaks of the Yenisey, a term sufficiently precise to distinguish them from the Ostiaks of the ,Obi — provided that they were Ostiaks, which they were not; not, at least, in the ordinary sense of the term. They were less Ostiak than they were Samoyed. They were also less Ostiak than were the Voguls. This induced Klaproth to suggest the simple name Yeniseian. The Yeniseian area Hes on each side of the Yenisey, from Abakansk, to the parts about Mangaseia — ^both Abakansk and Mangaseia being Samoyed locaJities. The Uda, too, the Sym, and other Yeniseian feeders, are Yeniseian occupancies. The Ket, a feeder of the Obi, is the same. The fifty-sixth parallel cuts their area; Krasnoyarsk, Inbazk, and Pumpokolsk being the towns of their district — the towns of their district, but by no means the towns of the Yeniseians. They are as httle industrial and commercial as the Samoyeds, and as truly as the Samoyeds are they a country rather than a town population. One, at least, of their divisions (that of the Arini) is extinct. The others are inconsiderable. On the South they are bounded by the Soiot, and certain Turk tribes approaching them, and of mixed blood; on the North, by the Khasovo ; on the West, by the Ostiaks ; and on the East, by the Tungusians, of the Tunguska river. With moveable huts, consisting of a few poles, encircled by the rind of the birch, and with a few reindeers, the Ye- niseians live chiefly by fishing and hunting; skilfi.il in both pursuits; skilftd, too, as smiths and smelters of iron; still retentive of their original paganism. The Arini, (Arintsi or Ariner,) the tribe which we THE YENISEIANS. 123 suppose to have become extinct, amounted in 1721 to between 40 and 50 individuals, and in 1735 to no more than 10 ; of which only two spoke their native tongue. The rest had either died oif, or become assimilated to the Turks of the River Katsha. Their power was broken at the time of the Russian conquest of the parts about To- bolsk and Tomsk ; and it was broken by a blunder. The classical reader remembers what Gibbon calls the "tre- mendous allegory " of the Scythians — a frog, a mouse, a bird, and a bundle of arrows; which was explained to mean, that an enemy could escape the last only by being one of the three first ; by diving under the water like a frog, by burrowing under the earth like a mouse, or by flying in the air like a bird. Now, the Arini were simi- larly allegoric. When the Russians were fighting against the other Siberians, they sent to Tobolsk an arrow, some red earth, and a black fox, as a symbol of friendship. It was mistaken for the contrary, and the' nation was at- tacked accordingly. What if the Scythian symbols have been equally misinterpreted, and that by learned scholars, as well as by savage conquerors? The Kott and the Kongroitshi are closely allied tribes, called by the Arini, Assan, and by the Turks, Koibali — i. e., by the same name that is given to one of the Samoyed divisions. They He east of the Arintsi. • The Deng or Benha, as they call themselves, are called also the Sable Ostiaks, though less correctly. In 1723, Messerschmidt took a vocabulary of theu: language, and re- marked, that it carried its numerals no further than five. Their locaUty was on the Tunguska. G 2 124! THE YENISEIANS. The Konniyiing are tlie Yeniseians of the part about Inbazk, and Turikhansk. It is remarkable that they call the Russians Siryan (Svra/mcm). Of the Yesi/rti and Bzesvrti I can only say, that, along mth the Arini, they bury their dead as follows : — • The bow and arrows are placed in the grave of the de- ceased, over which his best horse is slaughtered and flayed. The skin is then stretched over a pole, set up on the grave, and the flesh is feasted on. The women, after their confinements, wash themselves three times within the first seven days, and then fumigate themselves with a herb named Irben. The first friend that visits them names the child. Their oaths are taken over a bear's head, of which the swearer fixes his teeth in the nose. When a sentence equivalent to banishment is pro- nounced against a culprit, he is placed between a dog and a reindeer. These are then set free. Whichever way they run must be taken by the man also, who is no longer allowed to remain where he was — even a draught of water from his old locality is forbidden. So is all fur- ther intercourse with any of his origiaal neighbours. Of no population throughout Siberia are our notices more scanty than they are for these Yeniseians; the Asia Polyglotta being the authority for the present notices ; the origiaal authority being Messerschmid1l)»who visited and described the country in 1723. The name Arini is probably Turk rather than native. It is said to mean wasps; the population to which it applies being so denominated from their warlike activity. But it most likely means nothing of the kind; being THE TENISEIANS. 125 neither more nor less than the Turk word Ari, a name which we have seen applied to the Votiaks. More important is the form Svrycm, which suggests the possibility of the Siranian and Yeniseian tongues having been once conterminous. Again, the word JDenki is a word belonging to the Tungusian famUy of languages ; indeed, it is the word Tv/ngus in its original form. More than one of the tribe akin to the Mantshus, call themselves Donki, Here it means mom; as it probably does ia Yeniseian also. Erman has given us a tradition, that when the horde to which the narrator belonged "came from the setting of the sun towards the river Tas, only four pairs remained alive. Even these expected to perish by hunger ; but one, being a Tshwotshibuikub," (compare this with the Sa^ moyed form Tadebzi,) "or wizard, wings sprang from his arms; he flew into the air, plunged into the Tas, and came up "with fish. Then the others began to support themselves by fishing." The Yukahiri. — Separated from the Yeniseians by the Turk Yakuts, as well as by the Tungusian Tshapojir, the Yukahiri occupy the very shores of the Arctic S&i, in the parts between the rivers Yana-and Omolon — the Yana west, and the Omolon east, with the Indijirka and Kolyma between. The family to which they belong was once powerful, containing, besides the Yukahiri, the tribes of the Omoki and Schelagi, now extinct. Nimierous tumuli on the Indijirka are referred to the Omoki, and on the Aniuy burial-places are seen which are little wooden buHdiags containing corpses armed with 126 THE YUKAHIEI. bows, arrows, and spears. Along with these lies the magic drum, of which we have seen so much in Lapland. There were, at one time, more hearths of the Omoki on the banks of the Kolyma, than there are stars in a clear sky. So, at least, runs the Yukahiri legend. The Shelagi gave their name to the promontory of Shelagskoi Nos. The Tshuvanzi were a Yukahiri tribe also. So were the Tsheltieri, Kudiasi, and Konghiui. They are all said to have been acquainted with the use of iron. The native name of the Yukahiri is Andon Domni. The Koriaks call them Atal. Their other neighbours are the Turk Yakuts. Hence it is probable that it is to the Yakut language that the term Yukahir (also Yu- kadzhir) is referrible. If so, its probable meaning is the same as the Koriak Atal, which means spotted. It applies to the Yukahiri from their spotted deerskin dresses. Now, south of these same Yakuts, who are supposed to call the Andon Domni by the name Yukahiri (or Yukad- zhiri), live a tribe of Tungusians. These are called Tsha- podzhir — ^but not by themselves. By whom? By no one so probably asJby the Yakuts. .Why? Because they tattoo themselves. If so, it is probable that Yukadzhir and Tshapodzhir are one and the same word — at any rate, a likely meaning in a likely language has been claimed for it. Let it, then, be considered as a Ttirk word, meaning spotted, tattooed, painted, — ^provisionally. It may appear in any part of the Turk area, provided only, that some THE TUKAHIEI, 127 nation to which one of the three preceding adjectives ap- pHes he found in its neighbourhood. It may appear, too, in any state of any Turk form of speech. But there are Turk forms of speech as far distant from the Lena and Tunguska as Syria or Constantinople; and there are Turk glosses as old as Herodotus. One of these the pre- sent writer beheves to be the word Agathyrsi, being pro- vided with special evidence to shew that the nation so called were either themselves Turk or on a Turk frontier Now, the Agathyrsi are called the picti Agathyrsi; and it is submitted to the reader that the one word is the translation of the other — ^the words Agathyrs (also Akat- zw), Yuhadzhir, and TslmpodzJdr, being one and the same. 128 THE TURKS OF THE KHANATES. CHAPTER X. THE TUKK STOCK — THE TAKTAKS OP THK KIFTSHAE KHAKATES. We have enumerated the members of the great Ugrian, and proceed to those of the Turk, stock. The subjects of the present chapter are the so-called Tartars of the — a. Governments of Permia, Viatka, Kazan, and Sim- birsk; b. Also those of Saratov, Astrakhan, and Caucasus; and — c. Thirdly, those of Taurida, or the Crim Tartars. These divisions have not been made gratuitously. If we go back into history, we shall find, that soon after the time of Timtir, when the Turks were more for- midable to the Russians, than the Russians of the present moment are to the Turks, the three divisions just given coincide with three Kingdoms, Empires, or (to use the nomenclature of the population with which we are dealing) Khanates; viz.. THE TURKS OF THE KHANATES, 129 a. The Khanate of Kazan, 6. The Khanate of Astrakhan. c. The Khanate of Crimea. Such are the terms that apply to the state of things subsequent to the time of Timur or Tamerlane — Timur or Tamerlane having been a Turk as opposed to a Mon- gol. So that the beginning of the three Khanates was, there or thereabouts, simultaneous, i. e., within the last quarter of the 14th century (between 1375 and 1400). The duration of them, however, was different. Kazan became Kussian in 1552, Astrakhan in 1554, and the Crimea no earlier than 1783. Such is the view we take of the Turkish period as op- posed to the Russian ; the Russian being the present, the Turkish being the penultimate, one. What was the state of things before the development of the Khanates, the Khanates of the Turkish period, the Khanates of the successors of Timur or Tamerlane? The Kiauates arose out of the Kiptshak; the Kipt- shak being the name for the state of things that origin- ated in the first third of the 13th century — say, A.D. 1230. For the Khcmates substitute the Kiptshak; for the Turks (as opposed to the Mongolians), the Mongolians (as opposed to the Turks) ; for Timur (or Tamerlane), Dzhi/ndzhiz-khan; and you have the difference between the Mongol period and the Turk — the Mongol period of the thirteenth and fourteenth, and the Turk of the fif- teenth and following centuries, the Mongol period with its population akin to the Kalmuks, and the Turk with its tribes allied to the Osmanlis. Whatever else we may G 3 130 THE TURKS OF THE KHANATES. confound, let us clearly distinguish between these two epochs ; and in order to do so, let us remember that there is much that may mislead us. In the first place, there is the term Tartar appUed, in nine cases out of ten, to Turks and Mongolians equally. Then, there is the Great Mogul of our Indian Empire, who, name for name, is neither more nor less than the Great Mongol. Yet he is no Mongol at all, but a potentate of Turk extraction. Then there is the word Turh, with its EngUsh sense, meaning a Turk of Constantinople; and, besides this, there is the term TaHar with its Kussian signification. This means a Turk of one of the Khanates under notice. It is this Eussian use of the word which hampers the ethnologist. He cannot, when writing of Russia, do other- wise than talk occasionally as the Russians do themselves. Hence he is tempted to write about Tartars. Were it not for this, he would eschew the word altogether. The present writer will use it as little as he can help. The population under notice he wiU call Turks; and the Turks of Constantinople, Osmanlis; the Mongolians, Mongols or Kahnuks. A great deal is occasionally said about the early sub- ordination of Russia to the Tartars. In many cases, these Tartars are Mongols. ■A. great deal is occasionally said about the early sub- ordination of Russia to the Mongols. In many cases, these Mongols are Turks. This shews the amount of care required for the minute ethnology of the parts under notice, care which will often go \mrewarded; inasmuch as, when all has been done that learning and criticism can do towards the disentanglement of the Turco-Mongo- THE TURKS OF THE KHANATES. 131 lian complexities, much that is wholly incapable of analysis and separation -will remain. We find this even in the Kiptshak period. The history of the Kiptshak is that of Dzhindzhiz-khan and his successors, of whom the current history is as fol- lows. The chief of a small and single tribe of the. part to the west of the Chinese Wall, a tribe which bore the specific name of Mongol, just as some particular tribe of ancient Germany bore the name of Angle, having been deprived in his youth of certain hereditary rights, de- voted his manhood to the recovery of them — to their recovery, and .something more. He subdued the tribes around him, and became the consoHdator of a vast con- federation. He added to this, populations other than Mongol, either ia the limited or its wider sense of the word. Members of the great Turk family, from the south and west, joiaed his standard. Possibly, Tungu- sians and Ugrians may have done so also. It is certain, however, that his armies were heterogeneous, and that the Turk elements therein were well-nigh as important as the proper Mongol. With these he went forth to con- quer, and struck on all sides with his double-edged sword — one of the most ruthless devastators that the world has seen. He struck in the direction of the Pa- cific, and conquered the northern half of China. He struck in the direction of India, and conquered the pre- sent Chinese Tartary. He struck in. the direction of Persia, crossed the Oxus, and ravaged Balk, Cabul, Eho- rasan, and Armenia : lastly, he struck in the direction of Europe and overran the countries between the Yaik and Volga, the countries between the Volga and the 132 THE KIPTSHAK. Dnieper, the countries between the Dnieper and the Elbe. He, or his successors, had overrun Russia, Bulgaria, Po- land, Bosnia, Dalmatia, Moravia, and part of Silesia, before a check given to the Germans and Slavonians at Liegnitz arrested the career of barbarism and conquest — conquests " which the cturent historian invests with an incredible amount of havock and cruelty. As they "advanced far- ther from home, and left their deserts behind, the course of their march through more populous regions was marked by the burnings of the cities, the devastation and ruin of the country, and the slaughter of all the inhabitants whom they did not carry off to seU as slaves. Their uni- form plan was to convert the fields into a desert, and to leave behind them no human being that could rise on their rear, that could offer a moment's annoyance, or oc- casion the slightest risk to the invaders. By the bar- barity of their massacres, ia which age, and sex, and condition were alike disregarded, they spread horror and dismay around them on every side, and to remote regions." This is language of the historian of India under the two first princes of the house of Timur. It is language that stimulates the imagination, and shocks the feeling. Gibbon's does the same. No sooner had Octal, the mi- nister, and one of the immediate successors of Dzhindzhiz, " subverted the northern empire of China than he re- solved to visit with his arms the most remote countries of the west. Fifteen hundred thousand Moguls and Tartars were inscribed on the military roll ; of these the great Khan selected a third, which he entrusted to the com- mand of his nephew, Baton, the son of Tuli, who reigned over his father's conquests to the north of the Caspian THE KIPTSHAK. 133 Sea. After a festival of forty days, Batou set forwards on this great expedition ; and such was the speed and ardour of his innumerable squadrons, that in less than six years they had measured a line of ninety degrees of longitude, a fourth part of the circumference of the globe. The great rivers of Asia and Europe, the Volga and Kama, the Don and Borysthenes, the Vistula and Danube, they either swam with their horses or passed on the ice, or traversed in leathern boats which followed the camp, and traiisported their waggons and artillery. By the first victories of Batou, the remaias of national freedom were eradicated in. the immense plains of Tmrkestan and Kipzak. In his rapid progress he overran the king- doms as they are now styled of Astracan and Cazan, and the troops which he detached towards Mount Caucasus explored the most secret recesses of Georgia and Circassia. The civil discord of the great dukes or princes of Russia betrayed their country to the Tartars. They spread from Livonia to the Black Sea, and both Moscow and Kiow, the modem and the ancient capitals, were reduced to ashes ; a temporary ruin, less fatal than the deep and perhaps indelible mark which a servitude of two hundred years has imprinted on the character of the Russians. The Tartars ravaged with equal fury the countries which they hoped to possess, and those which they were hastening to leave. From the permanent conquest of Russia, they made a deadly though transient inroad into the heart of Poland, and as far as the borders of Germany. The cities of Lublin and Cracow were obliterated ; they ap- proached the shores of the Baltic, and in the battle of Lignitz they defeated the dukes of Silesia, the Polish 134 THE KIPTSHAK. palatines, and the great master of tHe Teutonic order, and filled nine sacks with the right ears of the slain. From Lignitz, the extreme poiat of their westem march, they turned aside to the iavasion of Htingaiy ; and the presence or spirit of Batou inspired the host of five hun- dred thousand men. The Carpathian hills could not be long impervious to their divided columns, and their ap- proach had been fondly disbelieved till it was irresistibly felt. The King, Bela the Fourth, assembled the military force of his counts and bishops ; but he had alienated the nation by adopting a vagrant horde of forty thousand families of Cumans, and these savage guests were pro- voked to revolt by the suspicion of treachery and the murder of their prince. The whole coxmtry north of the Danube was lost in a day, and depopulated ha. a summer ; and the ruins of cities and chiu-ches were overspread with the bones of the natives, who expiated the sins of their Turkish ancestors. An ecclesiastic, who fled from the sack of Waradin, describes the calamities which he had seen or suffered ; and the sanguiaary rage of sieges and battles is far less atrocious than the treatment of the fugitives, who had been allured from the woods, xmder a promise of peace and pardon, and who were coolly slaugh- tered as soon as they had performed the labours of the harvest and vintage. In the winter the Tartars passed the Danube on the ice, and advanced to Gran or Strige- nium, a German colony, and the metropolis of the king- dom. Thirty engines were planted against the walls, the ditches were filled with sacks of earth and dead bodies, and after a promiscuous massacre three hundred noble matrons were slain in the presence of the Khan. Of all THE KIPTSHAK. 135 the cities and fortresses of Hungary, three alone sur- vived the Tartar invasion, and the unfortunate Bela hid his head among the islands of the Adriatic. " The Latin worid was darkened by this cloud of savage hostihty : a Russian fugitive carried the alarm to Sweden and the remote nations of the Baltic, and the ocean trembled at the approach of the Tartars ; whom their fear and ignorance were incUned to separate from the human species." {Gibbon's Beclvne and Fall.) No wonder, if these accounts be true, that whenever any nation beyond the confines of Mongolia presents a notable amount of flattened faces, glabrous skins, oblique eyes, or the like, the hypothesis of a MongoHan inter- mixture should be resorted to. Their armies were of inconceivably magnitude ; the opponents were reduced to fractions of their former selves. Again — ^and this is a fact with a similar bearing in ethnology — so good an authority as Mr. Erskine adopts the statement, that when Dzhiadzhiz " deputed his sons or generals to govern any of the conquered countries, and in this pohcy he was imitated by his successors, he sent along with them an ulus, or tuman, or some Moghul tribe, or division of a tribe, to overawe the conquered. The Moghul tribe so employed received an allotment of country, and placed themselves, with their families and flocks, ID. the pasture-range of the tribes amongst whom they were sent. By the iaevitable intercom-se that takes place between persons Hving under the same govern- ment, near to and in habits of intercourse with each — by intermarriages — by traffic, and in other ways, a con- siderable mixture- of the two races took place, which 136 THE KIPTSHAK. shewed itself both in their language, and in their features and bodily appearance." To return, however, to the special history of what is now the Kiptshak (or western division of the great Mongol Empire), but what will afterwards become the Khanates : the eldest of the sons of Dzhendzhiz was Dzhudzhi, who died prematurely, when his portion was transferred to his son Batu, or Batu-Khan. He it was who conquered Eussia, 'and made his way so far west- wards as Silesia. During this expedition his brother Sheibani, having distinguished himself, was rewarded by a grant of certain extensive provinces, conquered " from the Russians and other Christians, with a sufficient num- ber of the Kuris, Naiman, Karlik, and Oighur tribes, to keep them in subjection."* By A.D. 1375, all was confusion in the Kiptshak ; and when Timur had risen to power in the parts beyond the Oxus, he found that two rivals, TJrus and Toktamish, were quarrelling for the dignity of Khan of the Kiptshak. The latter being worsted, appealed to Timur for help, who gave it and seated him on the throne of Serai, on the Volga, and then proceeded to favour further discor,d, by raising successively, as Anti-Khans, Timur-Kutk, and Kaurtshik. Civil war, and such help as Timur's, soon broke the family of Baton and Dzhudzhi, and, though a Great Khan was nominally acknowledged, it was only in name that he was a Khan at all. The eastern third of the Kiptshak became divided between the Khan of Tura and the Uzbeks. Of this we have but little to say at present ' Erskiite — History of India, ^c, vol. i., p. 26. KHANATE OF KAZAN. 137 The western parts, to -which Russia, Poland, and Lithu- ania belonged, will he noticed when we come to the Sla- vonic stock. The central parts — ^the parts which now command our attention — feU into the three Khanates already indicated. The Tartars (so called) of the Khamate of Kazan. — . The Turks of this division are distributed not only over the Government of Kazan, but, in the following num- bers, over those of — Permia , 17,271 Viatka 57,944 Simbirsk 87,730 Orenburg 230,080 To which add in Kazan itself. 308,574 The present town of Kazan is either the most Asiatic of European or the most European of Asiatic cities. Of a population of more than 50,000, two-thirds are Rus- sian, one-third Turk — ^the latter being apart and in the so-called Tartar town. No longer the metropolis of a Khanate, it is still a town full (comparatively speaking) of trade, industry, and intelligence. Its University is the great seminary for missionaries and propaganda- agents, for the religious and political designs of Russia in the direction of the east. For hemp, flax, and com, it is a mart ; and for curriery and tanning, a manufacturing town. The province, too, is the centre of the oak-tree district of Russia ; the zone between 53 and 56 N.L. being the tract where that tree preponderates — prepon- derates to the exclusion of the firs and piaes of the north, the pines of the south, and the beeches of Caucasus. Kazan is the great imperial forest for the Russian navy. 13S KHANATE OF KAZAN. All travellers speak well of the Kazan Tartars — or Tv/rks, as the ethnologist loves to call them. In the towns they have wholly sunk their originally nomadic character, and are as truly industrial as so many Jews, Armenians, or Anglo-Saxons. In the country, some of the old cha- racteristics keep their ground. Yet, in the country, they are hard-working farmers — ^though shepherds and bee- masters also. In both they are zealous and sincere, though not intolerant, Mahometans; less sensual, be- cause less wealthy and dominant, than the Osmanh of Constantinople, circumspect in business, and, it may be, sharp in practice, and suspicious — though more so to Russians than to others. In dress, they are rapidly ac- commodating themselves to Russian habits, with whom, in their domestic architecture, and their ordinary mode of life, they are favourably contrasted ; and still more so when compared with the Ugrian Tshuvashes, Tsheremis, and Mordvins. If the memory of their former power be extinct — of which, it should be added, we have no evidence — ^the daily experience of the feeling of being a subordinate population irritates them ; so does the Russian-Greek ascendancy in matters ecclesiastic. In respect to their physical appearance, they fall into two divisions ; are referrible to two types. Of these the Osmanli of Constantinople, in his most European form, gives us one extreme ; the flat-faced Mongolian of the Wall of China, the other : the one with an oval contour of face, prominent features, not inexpressive eyes, and a fine manly beard ; the other with a broad and flattened nose, prominent cheek-bones, and glabrous skin. KHANATE OF KAZAN. 139 That eacli of these physiognomies is to be found amongst the Kazan Tartars, we learn from the e\ddence of most observers. Some praise the beauty of both the men and women, and put their physical good qua- lities on the creditable level of their moral ones. Others compare them -with the Mongols. A third line of criti- cism indicates the likehhood of a change for the better, having gone on since the time of the earlier observers, one of whom, Herberstein, writes — "Tartan simt homines statura mediocri, lata facie, obesa, oculis iutortis et con- calvis, sola barba horridi, cetera rasL Insigniores tantum viri crines contortos eosque nigerrimos secundum aures habent." {Rerum, Moscovitar. Comm, p. 89.) The general-doctriae respecting this double type in the Turk stock has been iadicated. It has been indicated that the Osmanli physiognomy is exceptional, the ordinary type being that of the Ugrians and Mongolians, or, rather, something iatermediate between them. But in the pre- sent case there is another series of facts to be borne in mind. However early the occupation of the Volga and Kama by Turk tribes may have taken place, it is nearly certain that the anterior population was Ugrian, intermix- ture with which was well-nigh unavoidable. If this took place to any extent, the blood of the more flat-faced famiUes of Turkish Kazan may be Ugrian on the mother's side. The Khanates are countries of which the antiquities, whether tumuli or the remains of towns, deserve atten- tion. Prominent amongst the latter are the ruins on the left bank of the Volga, near the town of Spask, about half way between Kazan and Simbirsk. The town that 140 EtriNS OF VRAKHmOV. stood here is called by the older Russian annalists Vrachvmov. But Vrachimov, as a town, is obliterated ; and a little. village, called Bolgary (mark the name), stands on its ruins. These consist of the remains of walls, and buildings, and (more important than either) tombstones with inscriptions. In the neighbourhood rises the convent of Uspenskoi, of modem origiii — of modern origin, and suggestive of the old story with its expected grievance. The archaeologist has been wronged, Ex-corruptione optmii Jit pessi/mum. The venerable remains of an ancient city get pulled down, and re- moved for the sake of the building materials that they supply, and old stones go to new places. It is cheaper to demolish than to quarry, and Uspenkoi gets buUt out of the ruins and remains of Vrachimov. This is why the old and new descriptions disagree. Ermann finds but a fraction of the remains that were admired and described by Pallas and Lepechen in 1768. Tur- narelh, the latest traveller in these parts, finds less still. However, enough remains to indicate the early existence of a large and flourishiag town — deserving, in its decay, more attention than it has met with; a town, with its Black House, its White House, and its Qreek House, still standing in their fragments, and with modem denominations given them by the villagers around — modem denominations equivalent to the House of Dio- med, the House of the Emperor, &c., of the Pompeian archaeologists. The number of these, however, as has been stated, decreases. More important than the walls and houses are the coins and inscriptions ; inasmuch as these give the date and RUINS OF VEAKHIMOV. 141 character of the civilization of ancient Vrachimov. The former are of silver or copper, with Arabic legends in the Cufic character, and belonging to the time of the Chalifate. The inscriptions claim a more detailed notice. Short and simple, they give us but an extract from the Koran (or a proverb) along with the name, descent, and condition of the individual deceased — and along with these the date ; the languages beiug the Turkish, the Arabic, and the Armenian — ^the latter the rarest of the three. Thus, out of fifty inscriptions, forty-seven are Turkish or Arab ; three, Armenian. This iadicates the exceptional character of the latter ; but as none are Greek, and none Slavomc,-it shews that, after the native occupants, the Armenians were the chief denizens — the Metoikoi, so to say, of Vrakhimov. So much for the date. Of the forty-seven Turk and Arab legends, no less than twenty-two are referrible to one and the same year — the 623 of the Hejra. That this is not accidental is evident, and, probably, Pallas's hypothesis that a plague raged during those twelve- months, is plausible. It may, however, have been a war, or a sedition. At any rate, the criticism iadicates the inductive character of the archaeology at work. Add to these, those of the year in. question, and they are dispersed over the 12th, 13th, and 14th centuries — the time before the Mongol conquest, and the time sub- sequent to it. Whatever other inferences may be drawn from all this, one fact is certain; viz., that anterior to the time of the Mongol invasion, the town in whose ruins they are found was a town with a trade within the range of the coinage 142 CONQUEST OF KAZAN. of the Califate, a town with Armenian traders, and a town with an Arabic, Turkish, and Armenian alphabet. As Vrakhimov fell oflF, Kazan rose into prominence. But there were two Kazans— an older and a newer. The date of the earlier is uncertain, it was anterior to the time of Timur. When the Eussian period began, it was the fate of the Tm"k to give way. No matter how formidable may have been the Kazan Khanate to the Czars of Moscow, the latter won the field; and A.D. 1552 saw the last of the battles that decided the supremacy. The anniversary of this day is one of the thousand-and-one glorious anniver- saries which the foUy of the nineteenth century keeps up' as chronic stores of national irritation, and it is stiU cele- brated — like the anniversary of the Boyne in Ireland — as a memorial of the final victory of the Russians. From A.D. 1552, Kazan ceased to be formidable to Russia; ceased to be formidable, and acknowledged its subordi- nation. In '54, the province was made an episcopate — after the fashion of the Protestant bishoprics in Ireland — of the Greek Church, and conversion began accordingly. There was plenty to do in this way. The Turks were Mahometans; the Tshuvashes, Mordvins, and Tsheremis, Pagan. What they were then, they are now. Who wonders at it? History repeats itself everywhere. The criticism that applies to Vrakhimov applies to other ruins aswell, with a difference only in detail. Re- mains of the same kind occur in more than a dozen known and recognized localities in this, comparatively, unknown and unrecognized government. There was an early civilization in Kazan — ^not because KHANATE OF ASTEAKHAN. 143 it was Kazan, but because, considering its parallel of lati- tude and continental climate, it was a favoured locality. The conflux of the Kama and Volga developed the earlier settlements into emporia in respect to Europe; the caravan-trade to Bokhara and Persia diffused the productions of India. The name of the little village of Bolghari, which we find in the neighbourhood of the ancient VraJcimov, sug- gests the name of either the population or the coxmtry under which this trade, with its concomitant civilization, arose. More than this will not be said at present. The governments of Kazan, Simbirsk, &c., were once the Khanate of Kazan ; earlier stUl, the Khanate of Kazan was a part of the Mongol Empire of the Kiptshak ; and before it was this, either a part or the whole of the ancient Bulgaria. The Ante-Mongol period of the Khanate of Kazan was Bulgarian. The Ante-Mongol period of — The Khanate of Astrakhan was Khazar. It was from the Khanate of Astrakhan that the Khazars poured themselves over eastern Europe in the 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th centuries ; and it was the Khazars who developed in the Khanate of Astrakhan a civilization of the same kind with that of the Bulgaria of the Volga — ^the Bul- garia of the Volga as opposed to the Bulgaria of the Danube. The same relation that the governments of Simbirsk, Viatka, &c., bear to Kazan, Saratov and Caucasus do to Astrakhan. The history of Vrakimov repeats itself in that of 144 KHANATE OF ASTRAKHAN. Okak; the history of Old Kazan, in that of Serai. There was a town of early importance, and its decay. There was a newer town that rose on its fall ; and there was the newest town of all, the Astrakhan (or Kazan) of the nineteenth century. The antiquities of Astrakhan are as remarkable as the import of them is obscure. There was a Turk period^ a Mongol period, a Khazar period, and, lq the mind of the present writer, a Ugrian period anterior to them all. A.D. 1554, is the date of the annexation, of Astrakhan to Russia — ^two years later than that of Kazan. The Cbm Tabtahs. — The history of the Crimea is that of Kazan and Astrakhan, with the difference that it became Osmanli before it was Eussian. Indeed, it was not iacorporated with the dominions of the Czar imtU the end of the last century. After the break-up of the Mongol dynasty it became a Khanate, the change being due to the conquest of the line of Timur. If so, the first century, at least, should be either a period of independence or one of vassalage, more or less close to some one of the Timurian empires — to some one of the Timurian empires as opposed to that of the Amuraths, Bajazets, and Mahomets, who ruled in Rumelia and Constantinople. It should, at any rate, have been other than Osmanli Perhaps; it was so at first. On the other hand, however, I find that the first notice that occurs of it ia so full and voluminous a writer as Von Hammer, in his history of the Ottoman (Osmanli) Turks, JB in the first third of the sixteenth century, under the reign of Selim I., who is made to speak of the Tar- tars of the Crimea as formidable enemies, but, at the KHANATE OF THE CEIMBA. 145 same time, as tribes, more or less, acknowledging Ids su- zerainty. At any rate, he nominates their Khan. The history of the times between the obliteration of the House of Dzhindzhiz and this notice of a state of sovereignty and vassalage between the Porte and the Crimea, I am unable to give, and woTild willingly see investigated. I can only say, that by the beginning of the 14!th century, the Crimea, or Crim Tartary, had ceased to be Mongol, and that by the middle of the 16th it was more or less OSmanli. The fragments of its history that I find, are the notices of so many murders, chiefly fratricides ; and its details are bloody and revolting even for those of an Oriental dynasty. The usurper, the pretender, the unscrupulous minister, the renegade, play more than their ordinary parts. The authority of the Porte is a see-saw — now up, now down — now strong enough to carry out its mandates with a high hand, now but nominal. As we approach our own times, the complications of modem state-craft set in — and there is diplomacy on the parts of Austria, of Poland, and (last and most effective) of Eussia; diplomacy not unbacked by military demon- strations ; diplomacy and menace, diplomacy and intrigue. The penultimate stage is one of Kussian protection ; the ultimate one, Russian domination. It was in 1778 that peace was concluded between Turkey and Russia, and the independence of the Khan of the Crimea of the Ottoman empire recognized. Upon this, no fewer than 30,000 Greeks and Armenians emi- grated to the country of the Don Kosaks, where they now occupy several villages between the Don and the Benda. H 146 KHANATE OF THE CRIMEA. In 1783 the second of the two changes took place, and the Khanate of the Crimea, from being independent of Turkey, became subject to Russia. On this event, such Tartars as chose were allowed to emigrate, and AnatoHa and Rumelia were the countries that vast numbers of them sought. During ten years lasted these emigrations ; and in 1784 alone no less than 80,000 Tartars left their country. It is not easy to take the exact value of these evictions, inasmuch as the calculations of the numbers of the Tar- tars before the peace of 1778 vary; Georgi making the number of both sexes between 330,000 and 400,000; whereas Pallas raises it to 500,000. But the census of 1796 was inaccurate, and had to be taken over again. The highest number, however, that it gave was 90,000. In 1800 it had increased to 120,000. At present it is (as seen from the figures) more than twice as much. These give (less the Slavonians) — Tartars 275,822 Germans 22,324 Gipsies 7,726 Greeks 5,426 Karaite Jews 4,198 Talmudic Jews 4,110 Armenians 3,960 Bulgarians 1,234 Mordvins 340 325,140 The Crimean Tartars on the hUls live as shepherds and KHANATE OF THE CEIMEA. 147 herdsmen, rather than as tillers of the ground. In the plains they exercise a moderate but not discreditable amount of agricultural industry, in a country where the soU is grateful and the climate mild, where tobacco thrives, and where the grape ripens into a vinous flavour. The representatives of some of these great families stUl retain their own lands, — lands held under feudal or quasi- feudal conditions; but the family of the Khan himself removed to Asia Minor on the conquest of his Khanate. There are a few unimportant points of difference between the Tartars of the hUl-comitry and the Tartars of the plains — ^the herdsmen and the cultivators. Upon the whole, however, the Crimean civilization, creed, and speech are those of the Kazan and Astrakhan Tartars. This is as much as will be said of them at present. The Khanate of Siberia. — Three Khanates have been mentioned as having been evolved at the break-up of the Kiptshak -jViz., those of Kazan, Astrakhan, and theCrimea ; and for the exhibition of the ethnology of the Turks on the European side of the Uralian range, this triple division is enough. But there are the parts between the Urals and the Yaik, the parts belonging to the trans-uralian portion of the Government of Permia, the parts, also, beyond the Yaik and iu the direction " of Independent Tartary. These helped to form a fomrth Khanate — ^that of Siberia ; to which, parts of Tobolsk, &c., have belonged. The notice of this Siberian division is necessary, be- cause, although -the three Khanates which took prece- dence in our notice contain, perhaps, ninety-nine hun- dredths of the so-called Tartars, they do not contain the whole. We must recognize the farther class of — H 2 148 TARTARS OF SIBERIA, ETC. The Tartars so called of Siberia. — We must recog- nize tlieir existence, and be reminded of the extent to ■which they are, more or less, in the same class with the Tartars of Kazan, Astrakhan, and the Crimea. But we cannot, at' present, quite conveniently go into their details. A complication attends their history, which places them along with a class of allied populations from which they are not always distinguishable, in a forth- coming chapter. If it were not for this complication, this would be their place. Tartars (so-called) of Esthonia, Lithuania, and Po- dolia. — In the central parts of European Russia we find no notice of any Tartar population whatever — no notice of any Tartars ia such Governments as Vladimir, Tula, Kaluga, &c., the Governments where the true and typical Russian population of Great Russia presents itself in its fullest and most exclusive development. So that we lose them as we go westwards. Not, however, for good. When we reach Esthonia they reappear, increasing in numbers in the Lithuanian provinces and Podolia. The so-called Tartar census runs as follows: for the Govern- ments of — Esthonia 12 Kovno 415 Grodno 849 VHna 1,874 Minsk 2,120 Podolia 46 5,316 TARTARS OF WESTERN RUSSIA, 149 It is probable that these western Tartars represent a recent colonization or settlement ; in which case they are as truly intrusive elements amidst the Ugrian, Lithuanic, and Slavonic populations in which they occur, as are the Germans of Saratov, or the Swedes of Cherson; but it is also possible that they are referrible to the Mongol or Tartar periods, iaasmuch as there is special evidence to the fact of the invaders (ia the Mongol sera, at least,) having penetrated so far westwards. Or their origin may be double — ^partly in the way of recent colonization, and partly due to the Mongol con- quest. As I have not seen any specific accounts of these Turks, I have put the question ia the shape of an alternative. It may, however, with the necessary information, be a very simple one. 150 THE TURK STOCK CONTINUED. CHAPTER XI. THE TTJKK STOCK OOKTINTJED — THE PKOTINOE OE 0KENBT7KQ WITH ITS BASHKIR, MESHTSHBKIAK, AHD TEMTAK POPULATIONS. Orenburg is the great Bashkir Government, just as Kazan and Taurida are Tartar (so-called); for it is in Orenburg where the Bashkirs are more numerous than they are elsewhere, and it is the Bashkir which is the pre- dominant population of Orenburg; each of these state- ments is conveyed by the following tables. Distribution of the Bashkir population over the Go- vertvments and districts of — Orenburg 332,358 Permia 40,746 Samar 15,351 Viatka 3,617 392,072 THE BASHKIRS. 151 Relative amount of the different populations in the Ooverrmient of Orenburg: I" Bashkirs 332,358 Turks J Tartars (so-called) 230,080 i Meshtsheriaks 71,578 634,016 f Tshuvash 8,352 XJgriansJ Mordvins 5,200 [Tsheremis .2,626 16,178 Germans 1,034 Gypsies 85 1,119 To these add some Votiaks, Teptyars, Kalmucks, and Poles, of which the numbers are undetermined. Orenburg, then, is the Bashkir Government, and next to Orenburg — ^though at a long interval — Perm. So that the direction of the Bashkir area is northward. The Bashkirs of the present century are as truly Turk both in language and feature as the Kirghiz, or the (so- called) Tartars themselves. They are Tartar, too, in their habits ; their industry and agriculture being of a very imperfect kind, and wholly subordinate to pastoral habits. They are breeders and feeders of cattle, rather than tillers of the soil, or occupants of towns ; but they are bee-mas- ters even more than they are shepherds and herdsmen. 152 THE BASHKIES. : In religion they are Mahometans, like so many of the other Turkish populations. Bashkir is the name by -which they designate them- selves, and Bashkir is what the Russians and (I beHeve) the so-called Tartars call them. The Kirghiz, however, call them Ishtaki — a form of the name Ostiak. During the period of the Khanates the Bashkirs were chiefly subject to that of Kazan. A.D. ]555, however, three years after the battle which broke the power of the Tartars of the Volga, the Bash- kirs submitted themselves to Russia and her victorious Czar, Ivan VasUievitsh. He is said to have ruled them gently, to have protected them well, and to have laid upon them a tribute of skins far hghter than the one they paid to their old masters the Khans — the Khan of Kazan (as aforesaid) most particularly ; but besides him, there was a joint possession of the Bashkir country by one of the Nogay Khans, as well as by the Khan of Siberia. Each of these kept up his claims on the Bashkirs after thefaU of Kazan, and harassed the eastern portion of their country. The Kirghiz harassed the south. The near- est city was Kazan, and thither the Bashkirs resorted, to pay their tribute of peltry, and to supply themselves with salt from Permia. At length, however, the city of Ufa was built in their own land, at once as a metropolis and a defence. The Kianate of Kazan and Astrakhan had fallen, but that of Siberia still remained ; destined to become Rus- sian sooner or later, but not destined to be conquered directly from Muscovy. It was previously overrun and broken-up by the Kirghiz, whose wars were first against THE BASHKIRS. 153 the nations of Siberia for conquest, and then against the Eussians for defence. The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries give us the epoch of these Kirghiz wars. Then - and afterwards the Bashkirs became malcontent, rebel- lious, unmanageable, formidable ; and the Bashkir insur- rections, three in number, between A.D. 1672, and A.D. 1735, threatened the integrity of the Moscovite empires. The first, the rebellion of '72, had at its head the Bashkir noble Seit, and it is known as Seit's rebellion. For three years the insurgents, along with their Kirghiz allies from Independent Tartary, ravaged the country beyond the Kama, requiring the whole force of the Don, Yaik, and Ukrain Kosaks, along with that of the Stelitzes of the empire, to coerce them. More formidable still was the one of A.D. 1707, coin- ciding iu time with the revolts of the Kosaks under Ma- zeppa and others, and with the Swedish iuvasion of Charles XII. But it was only in their dates that the movements coincided. They were cotemporaneous with- out bemg connected, — ^had they formed parts of a system of combiaed operations, the genius and energy of even Peter the Great might have been over-taxed. As it was, the excesses of the insurgents had to be covered by an amnesty. Of this, Aldar and Kusyum were the leaders, and they succeeded ia uniting not only the whole Bash- kir population, but also a large proportion of the Kazan Tartars. The towns of Ufa, Birsk, and Mensehnsk were ravaged, and it was not untU the insurgent army was withia thirty mUes of Kazan itself that it was repulsed. A.D. 1735, the Orenburg line was established, by which I mean a March or Border guarded by Kosaks, just as the H 3 154 THE BASHKIES. debateable districts on tlie Scottisli and "Welsh frontiers were guarded, in the middle ages, by the Lord Marches -and their companies. The danger to such independence as they still preserved was transparently visible to the twice irritated Bashkirs. A son of Kiisyum headed them, and their resistance lasted six years — 1741 being the last year of the last of the three great Bashkir rebel- lions. The affair of 1774 was a minor one. The Kosaks of the Yaik, under Pugatshev, rebelled, and the Bashkirs lent a hand. Since then they have been quiet. The leading men of the rebellion of '35 were banished, and a line of wooden fortresses was erected in their country. Since '41, too, the Bashkirs have themselves taken-on more or less of the character of the Kosak, and submitted to a military organization. Instead of paying the tribute of peltry, they serve as soldiers ; sending an annual re- lay of 1,500 men to act with the Kosaks to the Yaik. The ancient nobiUty is broken, so that the leading in- dividuals in the different volosts (lodges, enca/m/pments) are the Starshin (judges, captains). With these, the fountain of honour springs in B.ussia ; in other words, they are officials. They decide disputes ; they take the com- mand of the detachments sent on military service ; they promulgate the ukases. Russia appoints, and the Bash kirs pay. Each Starshin has his clerk or secretary, who is generally a Meshtsheriak. The great Bashkir locality is on the eastern side of the Urahan range, on the Upper Mias, in the neighbourhood of Tshelabinsk, to the north of Troisk. Here there are the three cantons ; the centres of a kind of Bashkir represen- tations. Each has its head, elected by the people of the THE BASHKIRS. 155 division at large. This liead resides in his canton, and, to make sure of his proper bearing towards Russia, sur- rounds himself -with a sort of Coimcil of Eussians — gene- rally (I quote from Miiller) " adventurers of the lowest kind." The other functionaries are, in like manner, Russian. The Bashkir is the settled occupant of a definite lo- cality only during the winter ; when he confines himself- to his Aut — ^a village, or encampment, of from ten to fifty huts of wood, bidlt after the Russian fashion. During the sunamer months he wanders from feeding-place to feeding-place with his cattle, of which the horses are the most important elements. Of these a Bashkir of ordinary means will own twenty or thirty ; the richer as many as 500 ; the wealthiest of all no fewer than 2,000. Camels are scarcer and more local. The extent to which they are bee-masters has been already mentioned. Their dress is that of the Tartars with a few differences of details — chiefly in the matter of the caps. The other customs are Turk (or Tartar) \ also their practice of the bridegroom purchasing his bride of her .parents, of his calling the price he has to pay for her the Kalym, of his paying it in cattle ; also the habit of fermenting the mUk of his mares, calling it kwrnis, and getting intoxicated thereon, &c. The MeshtsheriaJcs. — The distribution of the Meshts- heriaks is nearly that of the Bashkirs ; indeed, the former are often described as a population mixed up with the latter. Orenburg, therefore, and Perm, we expect to find as their chief districts. And this is what .they really are. MeshtsheriaJcs in — 156 THE MESHTSHERLA.KS. Orenburg 71,578 Permia 5,783 Saratov 2,580 Penza ? 79,941 They are Turk in speech, and Mahometan in creed, though considered to be Ugrian in blood. They are, probably, too, immigrants — ^their original locaUty being on the Oka, in the neighbourhood of the Mordvins and Tsherimis. In the rebellion of '35, the Meshtsheriaks kept on the side of Kussia, and were rewarded by being freed from their previous tribute, and having the privileges of the Kosaks extended to them. In 1770, the number of Meshtsheriak families was 2000, the individuals (say) 15 or 16,000. Unless these numbers apply to the Government of Orenburg alone, they have increased. The Teptyar. — "When the Khanate of Kazan became Russian, a mixed multitudes of Turks, Tsherimis, Votiaks, Tshuvash, and Mordvins, fled to the east of the Ural. Out of these has arisen a population which the Turks call Teptya/r — a population which, like the Meshts- heriaks, kept to the side of Russia during the Bashkir rebellion, and became a privileged population accord- ingly. They are Mahometan rather than Christian, and (probably) Pagan rather than Mahometan. Theix habits in general are those of the Bashkirs. Some of them are employed as carriers in the salt trade between Orenburg and Kazan. THE TEPTYARS. 157 I find no notice of any Teptyars (at least under that name) in the map and tables before me ; the present notice being taken solely from Muller (Ugrische Folks- tamm,l, pp. 160—162). 158 THE TURK STOCK. CHAPTEE XII. THE TCKK STOCK CONTINUED — THE KIKQHIZ— THE TKUKHMEN— THE KABA- KALPAKS — THE KHITANS — THE NOGAY.S. The Kirgliiz,, or Kirghiz-Kaisak, of the Govern- ment of Astrakhan, amount to 82,000 — a sum, probably, given in round numbers. It is not, however, on account of their prominence in the tables before us that they deserve notice. In the Asiatic parts of the Russian empire they are very im- portant indeed, however little they may be in the Euro- pean. It is through the Kirghiz country that the caravans go from Orenbiu'g to Bokhara, and from Bokhara to Oren- burg, by the way of Khiva ; so that the Kirghia country is one of the roads in the direction of India. Such a high-way as it is now, it has always been ; the high-way from the Oxus to the Volga, from the Paropamisus to the Ural Caravans have laboured across it from the be- ginning of time ; flying masses of cavalry have swept across it ; armies have attempted (and partially accom- plished) its transit. THE KIRGHIZ. 159 The momunents -with which the -whole area abounda indicate the antiquity of its history ; an antiquity which transcends the period of written records and coins ; an antiquity which goes up to the aeras of the great Irtoian and Turanian dichotomy of the nations of Asia^— the Iranian "family with its civilization represented by the magnitude and wealth of the Persian empire, and the Turanian hordes of nomade conquerors — fierce, barbarous, and marauding devastators. What Germany and Sar- matia were ia Europe, the Kirghiz country, along with Mongolia eastwards, and Turkestan on the south, was in Asia. It was the quarter whence Europe, India, Cluna, Persia, and Anatolia were equally assailed. It was the quarter to which one of the two great conquer- ing families can most especially and most directly be traced. Whether it was the very oldest occupancy of that family, is another question. The whole Kirghiz area abounds in monuments — even as the Khanates did. They fall into groups, and that in the eyes of the Kirghiz themselves as much as in those of the Russian traveller or the English archaeolo- gist. The Kirghiz, for instance, draw a clear and defi- nite distinction between those that belong to their own people, and those which go back to an older period of which he has no certain knowledge. The former they call Uba; the latter, Moly. The TJba, or the old graves, are elevated mounds, as varied in form as our own barrows. They stand chiefly on hills, and in groups — sometimes as mere tuTnuli of earth, sometimes with a cairn of stones or stone walling super-added. They abound on the north-east side of the Kirghiz area, and in the direction 160 THE KIRGHIZ. of the "Mongolian — also \rttlun the latter. The humbler and less conspicuous Moly are found iu the drier and more barren districts ; a fact, in the way of distribution, worth noticing. In the traditions of the Kirghiz them- selves, the Uha are the remaias of a people called Myk. The same origin is probably attributed to a ruin near the Mongolian frontier, described by Meyer as being built of granite, with walls enclosing a space twenty- eight feet square, and which is an object of superstitious reverence to the Kirghiz of its neighbourhood. The same, too, to other buildiags less definitely noticed ; but which are said to be spread widely over the vast area ilnder notice. We may be said to be in the middle of the Kirghiz area when we cross the water-shed between the drainage of the Caspian, the Aral, and the multitudinous minor lakes of the basias thereof on one side, and that of the Polar Sea on the other ; the drainage of the Yaik, although falling iuto the Caspian, beiug considered to be Kirghiz only for its eastern feeders — and that but par- tially. The Ishim, however, a considerable feeder of the Obi, is Kirghiz. What used to be, and ought to be, Independent Tar- tary, finds its northern natural boundaries in the Kirghiz firontier. South of the -W^ter^hed there are two great basias (those of the Caspian and the Aral), and there are unnumbered smaller ones. There are also two great rivers (the Oxus and the Jaxartes), and there are nume- rous smaller ones. There are no great mountains, how- ever ; for the western range of the Altai sinks into low hnis, no more than 400 or 500 feet high, long before we THE KIRGHIZ. 161 meet with the eastern and south-eastern spurs of the TJra- lians. As we approach these two ranges the face of the country improves, even as we expect it will do. The streams, instead of being but spring-torrents, filled by the melting of the winter s snow, run perennially, and the vegetation grows green and free. In the central parts of the waste, especially in the range between the two great lakes, the converse finds place, and the . soU is sandy and poverty-strickeiL The hUls and streams de- termine the lines of traffic. It is only the northern part of Tartary, no longer In- dependent, that is exclusively Kirghiz. The south or south-eastern parts are Uzbek. The valley of the Oxus (Amour) is Uzbek ; so is the valley of the Jaxartes {Sir- deria). The Khanate of Khiva — important for its re- lations to Bokhara, Persia, and India — is Uzbek. The western and south-western parts are Turkoman. On the east, the Kirghiz are in immediate contact with the Mongols of Dzungaria, subjects to China ; and as some portion of their area extends over the frontier, there is a section of their population under the rule of the Celestial empire. Others are under the Khan of Khiva ; some Independent ; the fourth division Russian. Except, perhaps, the Uzbeks and some of the Siberian Turks of the more extreme physiognomies, the Kirghiz are the most Mongol-like members of their stock. Their language, on the other hand, is eminently Turk. I merely repeat myself, in indicating the gratuitous nature of all assumptions which account for this Mongol cha- racter in a Turk population by the hypothesis of inter- mixture. The physical conditions of the Mongol and 162 THE KIRGHIZ. Turk areas attain, with the Kirghiz, their greatest amount of similarity. The suggested intermixture is hypothetic. The division of the Kirghiz is threefold ; and we have the Kirghiz of the Oreat, the Kirghiz of the Little, and the Kirghiz of the Middle, Herd. The adjectives, however, mislead us. The Great Horde is by no means so large as its name indicates; the Middle being the largest It comes, however, first in our notice. Its area lies beyond the boundary of the Russian em- pire, beyond even the range of Russian influence; being the most eastern of the three, on the frontier of the Uzbek Khanate of Kokend. Though not the most numerous, it contains the most dangerous and savage of the Kirghiz ; either plimderers .of every caravan that passes through their country, or levyers of black-mail as the price of passing it unpiUaged. The Little Hord lies between the Caspian and the Aral — ^wild and immanageable, though less so than the Kirghiz of the Great Hord. The drainage of the Ishim, the head-waters of the Irtish, the Dzimgarian frontier, the steppe to the east of Aral — ^these are the districts of the Middle (the largest and least savage) Hord ; of which the leading tribe of the Nai/man is under the dominion of China. Nai/ma/fi, too, is the name of one of the primary Uzbek divisions in the truly Uzbek Khanates of Khiva and Bokhara. Another name of a Kirghiz tribe of the Middle Hord is the one of which we have already heard so much — Ki/ptshak; a name which suggests the old and difficult question of the original relation between the Turk and Mon- gol stocks, and the analysis of the Tmrko-Mongo- THE KIEGHIZ. 163 lian (or Mongolo-Turk) conquests. Saving the details just indicated, so unfavourable towards the Great and Little Hordes, iu respect to manners and temper, the three divisions constitute but a single population ; the numbers of which may, upon the whole, amount to some- thiag under three millions ; the number of families, as given by Levshen, being — For the Great Horde 100,000 Little 190,000 Middle 500,000 Although, iQ general, the Kirghiz are of middling stature, individuals of what MiiUer (I presume after Levshen, who resided amongst them for some years offi- cially) calls "gigantic"' size, are to be found amongst them. The measurements would have been of greater value than the epithet. A good deal of evidence is re- quired to make the critical ethnologist believe in a tall Kirghiz. Their skui is a deep brown, heightened by dirt and smoke ; the colour being as much the effect of the heated atmosphere of their tents in winter, as of the dry heat of the summer sun. In habits they are idle ; in temper, fickle and uncertaio. Between Chiaa and Rus- sia, they have contrived to play a part which makes them distrusted on both sides ; and untU the strength of the latter kingdom was unmistakeably felt, the Kirghiz wars and the Kirghiz inroads were formidable. On the other hand, the men are temperate, hardy, and cleaner than their Mongol neighbours — ^though still very dirty. Add to this, that they are thoroughly hospitable. When they have come iu contact with the Russians, and applied themselves to smith's or carpenter's work, they have 164 THE KIRGHIZ. proved quick and docile. Their robberies are but little staiaed with blood ; and their cruelties but rare. The Kirghiz recognize three ranks — ^the nobles, the free, and the slaves ; and, as part of the system that gives them their nobility, they attach great importance to purity of blood and pedigree. The head of each family is the Sheik The Bahadur is the chief lq war — sometimes, however, called Beg, or Sulta/n. Sulta/n is the title for the kinsmen of the Khan — which is the highest title recognized. The Khan has power of life and death, checked, however, by the influence of the subordinate nobles. To these the ordinary Freeman stands ia the light of a Vassal Slavery, which is of the domestic kind, is light and easy. Sometimes it arises out of war and captivity ; almost as often, however, out of debi * In the latter case the condition of the Nexi of ancient Kome repeats itself, and the impoverished debtor lets himself out as a slave, for a limited time, to his creditor, payiag-up his arrears in the shape of personal service. Some of the Kirghiz own as many as 20,000 sheep — an important article of trade with the towns and villages in the southern parts of Siberia. Mahometans as the Kirghiz are, they retain much of their original Paganism ; indeed, they are Mahometans of the loosest and most imperfect kind. The older graves — ^the Uha, as they have been called — are objects of su- perstitious reverence; and when a Kirghiz dies, he is generally buried as near them as he can be. The organization that prevails among the Kirghiz of the Russian area is as follows : The divisions are the Aul, the Wolost, and the Ohrugi, THE KIRGHIZ. 165 or the encampment (lodge), the village, and the arcle. The Aul (a Turkish word) is under the jurisdiction of Elders; The Wolost (a Russian word), under that of Sultcms; The O/crug^i (Russian), under that oiskPrikas (Russian). The Prikas is a kind of Bivom or Council, consisting of two Kirghiz and two Russian assessors, with one of the oldest Sultans as its head, chairman, director, or president. In 1823, the great Kirghiz settlement of Kar Karaly, in the country of the Middle Hord, was, (I write from Miiller, who follows Mayer,) at the request of 'several of the Sultans, placed under Russian protection. At first it paid no tribute at all; afterwards, however, a certain amoimt of cattle was to be paid. The president of the Prikas, Kirghiz Khan, was to be chosen by the Kir- ghiz themselves, for a period of three years, but to be paid by Russia. For the defence of the Prikas, and for the support of its authority, a body of 200 Kosaks and 40 infantry, (with some pieces of artillery,) is settled on the spot. The locality is one of the most favoured in the whole area, well adapted both for com and cattle, and about 250 versts (a verst is three quarters of a mile) from Semijarsk, with which it is connected by means of five Kosak stations. This represents the later movements of Russia in these parts. The earlier began about the beg innin g of the 18th century, and on the side of the Caspian, with the Kirghiz of the Little Horde. The time was one of tur- bidence and confusion. On the east, the Dzungarian Mongols, the lords over a large portion of the eastern 166 THE KIRGHIZ. Kirghiz, exchanged their independence for submission to China. The movements thus effected extended over the whole area. Abulkhair, the Khan of a great part of the Little Horde, then called ia the protection of Russia, several tribes of the Middle Horde doiug the same. In 1732, Abulkhair and Shemyaka, another Khan, took the oath of allegiance to the Czar. Disturbances, however, Gontiuued. There were Kirghiz inroads upon the Bash- kir districts; and Kirghiz inroads upon the Kalmuks of the Volga; inroads which ended in the estabhshment of the Orenbiu-g line of Kosaks, the event of such importance ia Bashkir history. Then Abulkhair died, and factions arose about the succession. The Chiaese, too, now mas- ters of Dzungaria, intrigued. The caravans to Bokhara got plundered more than ever. The remedy to all this was Baron Igelstrom's plan, which was, to change the constitution by taking the power away from the Khan, and distributing it amongst the secondary Elders or Co- bles. Divisit et imperavit. The scene of this division was the Little rather than the Middle Horde, which now ran a risk of beiug broken-up. Some of its tribes joiaed the Middle, some went over to the Uzbek Khanate of Khiva; some, probably, joined the Turcomans on the South; finally, a division of 10,000 families, under the headship of Bakei, son of Narali, and grandson of Abulkhair, made its way into the Government of Astra- khan, settling itself on the left bank of the Danube. The return of a portion of the Kalmuk population, pre- viously occupant, to Dzungaria, had left room for them. In 1812, Bakei was declared their Khan, and has since been succeeded by his son. Such is the history of the THE KAHAKALPAKS. 167 Blirgliiz of the Govemment of Astrakhan, the only ones which appear in our map and tables. The present condition of the rest of the Horde is as foUows: The number of Khans is three. They are elected by the people at large, but take their investiture from Russia. Russia also limits their powers in respect to the life, freedom, and property of their subjects. Fi- nally, she has provided, since 1806, each of them with a body of paid councillors or assessors. The name Kirghiz cannot be said to be altogether strange to the population to which we apply it ; since it is appHed by the Little and Middle Hordes to the Great one. Neither is it qiiite unknown as a designation of the two others. The native name, however, is not Kirghiz, but Kasak, KaisaJa, or Kosah (Cossack), a word upon which further remarks will be made in the sequel. The Karakalpaks (Black Gaps). — Settlers in winter, but migratory during the summer, the Karakalpaks oc- cupy the east of the Lake Aral, and belong partly to Khiva, partly lie under the protection of Russia. They are in geographical contact with the Kirghiz; are said, however, to be no old occupants of their present area, but, on the contrary, immigrants from the parts on the Upper ObL . There are a few Kai-akalpaks (60) in the Govemment of .Astrakhan, and some more in Orenburg and Perm. Of the latter, however, the numbers are not given. In Asiatic Russia they are of somewhat greater im- portance ; and this is why they are noticed here. The same 'is the case with — 168 THE NOGATS. The Khivoms. — rTlie Khivans of European Eussia amount — In Astrakhan to 190 — Saratov 25 215 More will be said about them, as Uzbek Turks, in the concluding chapter. The Truhhnnen. — Word for word, Trukhmen is the same as Turkoman, except so far as it has come to us through a Eussian rather than a Persian channel. It applies, however, to a different locality, and to a some- what different population. The Turkmans occupy the parts due north of Persia, and harass the Persian frontier from the south-eastern extremity of the Caspian Sea to the confines of Caubul. The Trukhmen are distributed as follows : iu Astrakhan to the number of 1,600 Stavropol 6,271 Taurida 450 7,321 The Nogays. — Like the Kirghiz, the Nogays are more like the MongoHans in face than speech, and, like the Kirghiz, they have given rise to the hypothesis of an in- termixture. According to Klaproth, whom I follow in the present notice, they call themselves Ma/nkat — a name not unlike that of Mongol. In the beginning of the 17th century they occupied the country between the Tobol and Yaik. From these quarters they were pressed westwards THE NOGAYS. 169 by the Mongols. From the Govemment of Astrakhan, Peter the Great transplanted the majority of them to the banks of the Kmna and the Kuban, in the present Go- vernment of Caucasus. To the north of the upper part of these rivers, between Georgievsk and Stavropol, the Nogay tribes of the Kas- bulat, the Kiptshak (observe the name), the Mang-gut, the Yedi-san, the Dzham-bulat, the Yedi-kul, and the JSfavrus reside. The Mansur-ogli belong to the other side of the Kuban. The Zhukhan-Kangli and the Kabil-Kagli-Agakli lie to the north of the Black Sea. Thirdly, we have — The Budziaks in Bessarabia ; and fourthly, a tribe with a peculiar and separate histoiy; viz., The Kundur, on the Aktuba, one of the mouths of the Volga. These are called by the Eussians the Kun- dur Tartars. They change their residence with the season. In the winter they resort to the town of Krasnoyarsk on the Caspian (there is another Krasnoyarsk on the Yeni- sey), and dwell in houses : in the summer they occupy the ordinary felt-tent of so many Turk populations. These Kundur were the Nogays who remained behind in the Govemment of Astrakhan when Peter the Great effected the removal of the others. Of the Nogays from beyond the Yaik, it is only natural to expect traces in parts to the east of their pre- sent occupancies ; and this is what we find. The Bashkir Govemment of Orenburg is fuU of traces, real or accredited of the Nogays — ^the Gorodishtshes beiag attri- buted to them. This is a word which wants explaining : it is a derivative of the word Gorod, meaning town ; as in I 170 THE NOGAYS, Novo-goTod, or New-town ; and it is the technical name for such remains of old cities, fortresses, or villages as are found iQ the numerous archaeological localities of southern, eastern, and we may add northern, Kussia. The Ooto- dishtshe, then, is the remains of a town (or fortress), so that, iu the eyes of a Russian, Pompeii or Palmyra would be Gorodishtshes. Wherever, however, we find a Qorodishtshe, the occupancy of the living, we find, also, remains of the burial-memorials of the dead. This is what we expect. The converse is not so general. There are many places where tombs are found, but no Goro- dishtshes. Now, the burial-remains of Orenburg, the pre- sent Bashkir area, are as remarkable as those of the towns or fortresses. And these have their Russian names also. A turmdus of earth alone, or with only a few stones mixed up with it, caim-wise, is called a Kurgan; whereas — • A tumulus with brick or stone chambers, containing, over and above the skeleton of the deceased, arms or ornaments, is a Mayaki, or a Slants. ■In these Mayaki and Sla/nts the arms are of copper, the ornaments of gold ; so that the Scandinavian archaeologist would, at once, attribute them to the bronze period. The Bashkir refers them to the time of the Nogays. Again, the division of the Bashkir coimtry is into four streets, roads, or ways, according to the countries to which lines of traffic which pass through them lead. One of them is the 'Noga.j-street ; the others being the Siberian, the Kazan, and Osa — Osa being a town on the Kama. THE NOGAYS OF THE CEIMEA. 171 The Nogays of the Crimea read the hasty speculator, as to the permanency of nomade habits, a lesson of caution ; though it is only what numerous other tribes do. The Nogays of the Crimea are the descendants of a colony planted in the western part of the Government of Taurida from the Steppes between the Don and the Caspian ; where their brethren lead the life of the true nomade, with migratory flocks and herds, under black tents of felt. The ones under notice, however, are as truly stationary and as steadily fixed to their homes and farms as the Kussian himself, the German, or the Eng- lishman. So far from their being impracticable, migra- tory, and unsteady in their industry, — so far from their preferring the tent to the village, and showing a repug- nance to farming-work, the very converse is the fact. " The Nogais are, alas ! the least numerous Of the Tar- tars of the Crimea. They combiae the taste for a nomadic life with the cultivation of the soil. They are the best agriculturahsts in the Crimea, and they now begin to settle in villages and to deal in cattle. It is a pity that this laborious and agricultural population is too small for the cultivation of the Steppes." (MeTn/nres de I'Academie de St. Petersburg. Serie vi., torn, i., p. 36.) I 2 172 THE TARTARS CHAPTER Xni. THE TURK STOCK CONTINUED— TAKTAKS (sO CALLED) OF SIBEKIA — TtJKKS NOT DEaCBIBEB UNDER THE GENERAL NAME OP TARTAR — THE TOBOL, UFA, AND TOMSKI TARTARS — THE TORALI— THE TSHUIIM TURKS THE BARA- BINSKI THE TERKHO-TOMSKI — THE TUBINTSI — THE TELEUT — THE SOK- HALAR OR YAKUTS. We have yet to go farther, both east and north, before we have done with the Turk stock. We have to go beyond the Obi, beyond the Yenisey, beyond the Lena, beyond the Arctic Circle. We shall find them on the shores of the Arctic Sea ; we shall find them beyond the frozen ex- panse of the great Lake Baikal. They wUl require, too, some criticism ; inasmuch as they fall into two, if not more, classes ; classes that are by no means broadly and definitely distinguished from each other. We have hitherto found nothing but Mahometans. Our Siberian Turks will be Mahometan, Christian, and Pagan. We have hitherto made our comparisons, in the way of physical formation, with the Osmanli and the Mongol. We shall soon hear of Turks with a Samoyed, a Lap, or even an Eskimo, physiognomy. OF SIBERIA. 173 We have hitherto only alluded to the Khanate of Siberia, and notified its existence. It will now become an element of criticism of some promiEence and import;- ance. Some of the Turk tribes of Siberia will bear specific names, such as Teleut, Beltyr, &c. To others the general name of Tartar will be apphed ; so that we shall hear of the Tartars of Tiumen, the Tartars of Tomsk, &c. Each division, however, is Turk ; i. e., the one is, in reality, just as much, or just as little, Tartar as the other. Wherein, then, lies the difference ? I imagine it to have a real foundation in fact, and that the so-called Tartars are in one of two predicaments. Either — They are deducible from the most eastern members of the movement by which Kazan, Astrakhan, and the Crimea were Tartarized ; or they are emigrants from some of the European Governments iato which those Khanates have fallen — their essential character lying in their comparatively recent settlement in the parts of which they are the occupants. The others, it is imagined, are indigenous, not only to Asia, but to those particular areas in. which they are found, in the same way that the Turks of Independent Tartary are Asiatic ; i. e., they lie in situ, occupants of their respective locahties, if not from the earliest tunes, from the times anterior to history. For the sake of further Ulustratiag this distinction, let us suppose that there existed in Germany, at one and the same time, a population descended from those Angles who, instead of conquering Britain, stayed at home, and 174 THE TAETABS ako a series of English settlements from England. The difference and likeness between these two classes of English, would be that between the so called Siberian Tarta/rs and the Turk tribes.of Siberia. The parts between 52 and 58 N. L., on the water- system of the Obi are the chief Tartar (so called) dis- tricts; which begia when we get east of the Governments of Orenburg and Perm, and extend to the parts about the Yenisey. The Tobol, Ishim, Irtish, and Obi are the chief rivers; and Tobolsk, Omsk, and Tomsk, the leading towns; not that these latter are Tartar, but that they he in the Tartar districts. Tobolsk Tartars (so called). — These we find about Tiumen on the Tura, a feeder of the Tobol, where they are in contact with a Bokhara population settled in these parts. Also, about Tara, on the Irtish; the tribes being six in number — ^the Osta, the Ali. the Kundei, the Sarga, the Tav, and the Otus. The Ufa Tartars are those of the Governments of Orenburg, in its capital and the parts around it The Turks, with a specific appellation with which they come in contact, are the Bashkirs.. Tomsk Tartars (so called): — The chief tribes here are Tshazi, the Ayus, and the Tayan. These lie on the Eiver Tom, from Kusnezk to below Tomsk. N. L. 55, cuts their area. They are tillers of the soU, breeders of cattle and horses, and carriers in the trade with China. The Tartars afready enumerated are Mahometans of long sta/nding — i. e., Mahometans from a time ante- rior to the beginning of their history. Such being the OF SIBERIA. 175 case, they may fairly be presumed either to represent the Tartars of the Siberian Khanate, or to be colonists from those of the Crimea, Astrakhan, or Kazan — Kazan, most especially. With Mahometan poptilations of long sta/nding, the comparatively recent occupation of their present locali- ties is a fair inference. They are either descendants from the first Mahometan invaders, or they are descendants of colonists from the other side of the Ural, subse- quent to the Kussian conquest — oftener, perhaps, the latter. On the other hand, (or rather, at the other extremity,) with a population of Pagans, we have a widely different inference, though one of equal ease in the drawing. It is indigenous to Asia — probably, to its actual locality. The cases of recent conversion from Paganism to Ma- hometanism are in the same predicament. They may be dealt with as so much actual Paganism. So may cases of Christianity, when the converts are known, pre- vious to their conversion, to have been either Pagans or newly made Mahometans. This is primd facie evidence of old occupancy. The difficulties arise when we have either Mahomet- anism of an uncertain date, or Christianity which may as easUy have been preceded by Paganism as by Mahomet- anism. They also arise where there is a mixture of creed. The preceding populations created no great difficulty. What, however, is the case with the next section? The Turali (inEussian, Turalinzi,) have been occupants of the banks of the Tura since the 13th century at least 176 THE TUEAB. When Yermak, the conqueror of Siberia, first fell ia with them, their town was Tshingi or Tshiagi-tura. This he reduced. At his death, however, the Turali revolted and required a force of Kosaks from Moscow to coerce them. These founded in 1586 the oldest of all the Russian towns in Siberia — Tiumen. The parts about Tiumen are localities for both Kur- gans and Oorodishtshes. The habits of the Turali are those of the Kazan Tar- tars, only somewhat ruder. The so-called Mongol physi- ognomy is common amongst them. Their language is considerably mixed with both Eussian and Ugrian. The Turali are imperfect converts from Mahomet- anism to Christianity ; the Tobolsk Tartars, pure Maho- metans. What was the age or standing of this Maho- metanism from which the Turali were converted, I cannot say. If recent, they must be dealt with as a Pa- gan population, and, as Pagan, ancient. If of long standing, they are in. the category of the Tobolsk Tartars. The TshuliTn Turks. — These lie between the Upper Obi and the Yenisey. Their language is said to contain many Mongol (Biuiat) words. It is also said (an important fact, if verified,) to resemble that of the Yakut. The Tshulim physiognomy is also Mongoliform. Like the Bashkirs, they are half nomadic and half agricultural. Like the Turali, they are Christian rather than Maho- metan — ^more Pagan, perhaps, than either. Number, about 15,000. The Tartars of the Obi lie to the north of them — the Tartars of the Obi having the same rela- tion to these Tshulim Turks that the Tobol Tartars had to the TuraE THE BAEABINSKI TUEKS. 177 The Barahinski. — The Doab, Entre Eios, or Meso- potamia, bounded by the Kivers Obi and Irtish to the west and east, and by the parallels 52° and 60° N. L., is the Baraba, Barabin^,^ or Barabinski Steppe. This is the Russian form. The native name is Bara-ma. This in may be one of two things. It may be a change &om the sound of h, or it may be the ma in such words as -Ma-rahwas, the native name for Esthonia. In this latter case it means land; and Bara-ma may be the land of the Bar a; the Bar a (a suggestion rather than aught else) being Avar^. At the conquest of Siberia the Ba- raba were under the Khanate. From this the Eussians freed them. When, however, the Khirghiz and Dzun- garian movements began, the Baraba joined ia them. They were reduced at the begianing of the last century ; having been troublesome as robbers on the frontier. In 1 730 the Line (or March) of the Irtish was established. The cheerless country, wide as it is, contains but few Russians and not more than about 10,000 Baraba. They are Mongol-like in feature, with a marked form of speech, and an imperfect and recent Mahometanism ; they occupy (like the Turali and Tshuhm, the Tobol, and Obi, and Irtish Tartars) a region of Kurgans, and Gorodishtshes. The number of their tribes (in Russian Volosf) is seven, each with its Yauta or head — ^^-iz., the Langga; the Lubai; the Kulaba; the Barama; the Tsoi; the Terena; and the Kargala. The Virkho ToTnski. — The relations between the Tshu- lim Turks and the Tartars of the Obi, the relations between the Turali and the Tobolsk Tartars, reappear on the River Tom The Tartars of the Tom lie between Kusnezk I 3 178 THE VERKHO-TOMSKI TURKS. and the junction with the Obi; the Verkho-Tomski tribes lie above Kusnezk. Verkho means Upper, so that the Verkho Tomski tribes are the tribes of the Upper Tom. The Abintsi are a portion of the Verkho-Tomski. The Tsumush, the Kondoma^ and the Mrasa are their Rivers. The Kashta/r, KashJcala/r, or Katshintsi are, probablyj in a similar predicament, except that they lie beyond the ■unimportant watershed that separates the drainages of the Obi and the Yenisey, and occupy the Katsha (whence their name),, a feeder of that River. The Dzharm (Russian, Dzharkvtsi) lie east of the Yenisey, between Karaulnoi and Abakansk, their rivers being the Onash, the Kom, and the Syda. The Yastalar or Yastvntsi (the form in -lar is Turk, that in -tsi Russian) are mixed with the Kashlar. The Bokhtalar (Boktintsi) are on the Kom, to the east of the Yeiiisey, below Abakansk. The Kwid/m are on the same side, above Abakansk. The Tubalar (Tuhintsi) on the Tuba (the names of the tribes, it may have been observed, are chiefly those of the rivers), are said to be Samoyed (we are near the Soiot- area) iri blood, and Tiirk only ia speech. They are mixed with some of the Katshar tribes. One of the names by which they are known is Kyr- gyslar-Khirghiz. This gives us a measure of the exten- sion of that denomiaation. All these are more or less nomadic. The Beltyr. — On the right bank of the River Abakan (on which stands Abakamsk) dwell the Beltyr, a small THE YAKUTS. 179 tribe, possibly in the same category with the Tuhalar; i. e., more Samoyed than Turk. The Biryus. — On the river so called. The Teleut. — (In Mongolian, Telenggut.) These live on the Lake Altin (or Teleskoi), a Lake which has the same relation to the Obi that the Lake of Constance has to the Khine, or that of Geneva to the Khone. It is within (or on) the Mongol area, and the Teleuts are sup- posed to bear the same relation to the Turk and Mongol that the Tubar do to the Turk and Samoyed. Such are the minor tribes. We now proceed to a large one. — The Sakhalar or Yakuts. — Sokhalar is the native, Yakut the Russian name. The town of Yakutsk takes its name from being the metropolis of their area. The great Yakut River is the Lena. Turk populations thus far north, and thus far east, are what we scarcely expect — Turk populations on the shore of the Arctic Sea and in the latitude of the Sa moyeds and Yukahiri. "The Jakuhti," writes Strahlenberg, whose account I subjoin, are " a Pagan people — one of the most numerous Pagan tribes of Siberia, and [it] consists of the following tribes: — 1. Boro-Ganiska. 2. Baitungski. 3. Badys. 4. Jock-Soyon. 5. Menga. 6. Kangalas. 7. Namin. 8. Bathruski. 9. Lugoi. 10. Bolugur. AH which to- gether make about 30,000 men, who pay scot and lot. They call themselves Zacha, from the name of one of their ancient priaces. But the name of that prince, who headed them at the time when they separated from the Bratti, who Hve near the Baikallian Lake, with whom 180 THE YAKUTS. they were fonnerly united as one nation, was Deptzi Tar- cha/n tegin. They do not worship Bullwans, or idols carved ia wood, like the Ostiaks and Tungusii; but they offer sacrifices to an iavisible God ia heaven; yet they have a type or image of that Deity stuffed out, with a monstrous head, eyes of coral, and body hke a bag ; this image they hang upon a tree, and place round it the furs of sables and other animals. Each tribe has one of these images. Their priests, whom they caU Biuhn, make use of drums, like the Laplanders; they worship the Invisible God under three different denominations, Artoyon, Schugotoygon, and Tangara, which three names are called by them Sutnans {i. e., sacred). What Isbrand Ides (iQ his Travels, p. 132) relates, concerning these people, is all true ; excepting the custom of burying ahve, or kUling the oldest servants, or favourites of a prince, at his funeral, which is abolished ; but they still own, that formerly, before the Eussians were amongst them, they were used to do so. They have, besides, many supersti- tious customs, in common with other nations, which they celebrate about certain trees, thatflthey look upon to be sacred : when they meet with a fine tree, they presently hang all manner of nick-nacks about it, as iron, brass, copper, &c. Their priests, or biuhns, when they perform their superstitious rites, put on a garment trimmed with bits of iron, rattles, and bells. As soon as the fields begin to be green, each generation gathers together, at a place where there is a fine tree, and a pleasant spot of ground. There they sacrifice horses and oxen, (as a new year's offering, their new year beginning in April,) the heads of which they stick up round the trees, and on the THE YAKUTS. 181 heads of the former they leave the skin. They then take a certain liquor which they call cumises, sit down in a circle, and, after having lifted up the jug with both hands, they drink to one another : then they dip a brush in the cv/mises and sprinkle some ia the air, and some into the fire, which they hght up on that occasion. On this fes- tival they get wretchedly drunk, and gorge themselves to that degree with meat, that, it is said, four persons wiU commonly devour a whole horse. Nay, some will strip themselves stark naked, that nothing may confine or hinder them from extending their paunches ; this they continue so long, till some breathe, their last on the spot. These people are very nasty ; they seldom, or hardly ever, wash themselves ; they wUl eat the flesh of oxen, cows, or horses, but no pork, be they never so hungry : but then they never mind whether the cattle be' sick or sound; for they indifferently kill and eat it. If the meat has had but one boiling up, it is done enough for them; they never skim the pot, but look upon the skum to be the fattest and best part of all, and therefore distribute it about as a great dainty. The vessels in which they stamp their dried fish, roots, and berries, are made of dried oxen and cow's dung. Their cattle stand ia the same room or hut where they themselves dwell ; the floor of their huts is terrassed even, and smooth. They eat bread, when they can get it, but it is no usual part of their diet, because they neither plough, sow, nor plant. They eat but little salt, yet sometimes they take salt in exchange for other commodities. They are fond of smoking Chinese schaar or tobacco, for which they truck with the Russians. In February and March is their har- 182 THE YAKUTS. I vest, when the sap rises in the trees; for then they go into the woods, cut down young pine-trees, take off the inner bark or bast, which they carry home and dry for their winter's provision. They then beat it to a fine powder, boil it in milk, and eat it together with dried fish, also beat to powder. They shift their habitations in the same manner as the Tobolskian Tartars do. Their winter houses or huts are square, made of thin planks and beams : the roof is covered with earth, and a hole is left in. the middle, for the smoke to go out. Their sum- mer dwellings are round, and in the shape of a sugarloaf ; the outside shell of these huts is made of the bark of birch-trees, curiously joined together, and embroidered with horsehair dyed of many colours. A hole is also left at the top for the smoke to pass through. They make their chimneys or fire-places in the middle of their huts, where they also fix a pothook to hang their pots on, which they make themselves, as they also do their kettles, which have only an iron bottom, the sides being made of the bark of birch, which they have a way of joining to that iron bottom so tight and close, that it will not only hold water, but that the flame of the fire cannot bum it. They bury their dead divers ways: the most eminent among them pitch upon a fine tree, and declare that they will be buried there; and when the corpse is buried, they put some of the best movables of the deceased along with him into his grave. Some only put the corpse upon a board, which they fix upon four posts, in the wood, cover the dead body with an ox's or horse's hide, and so leave it. Some, again, put the body in the ground. But the greater part of them, when they die, THE YAKUTS. 183 are left in their huts, whence the relations take the most valuable things, make the huts up close, and then leave them. Those who die ia the city of Jakuhtskoi, are left lying in the streets, where they are frequently devoured by dogs. Each tribe of these people looks upon some particxilar creature as sacred, e. g., a swan, goose, raven, &c., and such is not eaten by that tribe, though the others may eat it."* In the Yakut country the ethnologist first finds signs of America. The name Yakut, unless we have re- course to the convenient doctrine of accident, cannot weU have been taken by those who first apphed it to the Sokhalar, from any language except either the Eskimo or some form of speech akin thereto. There was, at some time or other, someone on the parts about the Lena, who called someone Yakut. Now, the Ame- rican Eskimo on the Lower Kwikpak, have, as their name for Tnen or people, the word tshagut. In the Aleutian Archipelago this becomes tagut or yagut. I beheve this to be the root of the name yakut-at in Prince Wil- liam's Sound. So that yagut (yakut) is an Eskimo word ; and at the same time a name in use as far from both America and the Aleutian Islands as the River Lena. How came it there ? The name was not native. Nor yet Koriak. Nor yet Yukahiri — that we know of. In the present state of our knowledge, it is only the Eskimo tongues that supply this gloss. As far, then, as it goes, it is evidence in favour of a tongue allied to the Es- * Strahlenberg's "North and EEtstern parts of Europe and Asia," p. 380. 184 THE YAKUTS. kimo having once been spoken as far westwards in Asia as tlie Lena. For tlie encroaclinient wliicli must have displaced it, we have considerable evidence. The Yakut themselves are evidently recent; the Koriak traditions bring them from the south. The Yukahiri language is remarkable for its isolation, and isolation impUes dis- placement. Again — ^the Yukahiri gives us something American ; though it, by no means, Hes on the surface. In the Eskimo dialects the numeral two is denoted by some such forms as malhkhok, inaggok, malgok, rnxd- gukh, &c. . In several of the dialects of Western America, far south of the proper Eskimo area, this same word occurs. In the Koriak dialects, by which the Yukahiri is sepa- rated from the Eskimo, no such form occurs. Two is represented by a wholly different root. In Yukahiri, antachlon = two ; no. sign of the form in malg- being visible. For all this, malg is the Yukahiri for two. In that language yalon = 3, and yelakhlon — 4 ; whilst 6 (or 2 x 3) is denoted by maZgr-i-alon, and 8 (or 2 x 4) by malg- i-aUatshloiL This is one of the most instructive cases I have ever met with ; for it thoroughly shows the extent to which the niuneration of two languages may consist of the same elements differently combined. When the names for two were simply compared, nothing but difference was detected ; yet the difference ceases when we get to multi- ples of that number. Is this an accident ? It is cer- tainly no effect of intercourse, inasmuch as the languages wherein it occurs are not in contact. TUEKS OF CAUCASUS. 185 If we make a transition from the Arctic Sea to the parts about Caucasus^ we shall get near the end of the numerous details of the Great Turk stock. At present, however, we have to consider — a. The true Caucasian Turks of Caucasus. '&. The IVams-caucasian Turks of Erivan, &c. The true Caucasian Turks are not met with until we get south of the Rivers Terelc and Kuban ; for the words "true, Caucasian" mean, not a native of the Eussian Government of Caucasus, but an d,bsolute mountaineer of the great Caucasian range ; a man in the geographical condition of the Circassians, the Tshetshents, the Iron, the Lesghians, and their allied tribes. Indeed, they are not met with, at first, even on passing the Kuban. The southern bank of that river from its bend to near its head-waters, although Turk, is not "true Caucasia/n Turk'' It is Nogay — ^the Nogays beiag only the Turks of the Government of Caucasus. The tribes on the left bank of the Kuban are the Navrus and Mansur. A strip of Kosak occupancy on the opposite side divides them from their allied tribes of the Mangut, Kasbulat, Yedisan, &o. North of Derbend, there is a patch of Tiu-k popula- tion, the Kaitalc, or Kara-Kaitak, of recent origin, and, as such, not truly Caucasian. South of the mouths of the Terek, and along the shore of the Caspian, He the Kumuk. But the true district of the Mountaineer Turks of Cau- casus is foot of the Great Elbruz Mountain ; the water- shed between the Terek (east) and the Kuban (west). The valleys and mountain gorges of the former are the 186 THE TURKS OP occupancies of the Basia/n Turks ; those of the former, of the Karatshm. These two divisions are in contact ; but they are both separated from all other Turk populations. The Basian are in contact with the Iron ; the Karat- shai with the Circassians. The Turks of Transcaucasia.— The lower parts of the Rivers Kur and Aras are more or less Turk — Turk in con- tact, and in irregular mixture with Georgian, Arme- nian, and Persian; the Turk of Erivan, Karabaugh, Shirvan, &c. The introduction of this branch of the (3reat Turk family is, probably, referrible to the eleventh century. Speakiug roughly, we may say that it came iato the parts south of Caucasus, at the same time that the Norman-French came into England. The Seljuk Turks introduced it. These belong to a period anterior to the times both of Tamerlane and Dzhingiz. Gibbon's account of them is as follows : The same great game of conquest and iavasion that was practised by the Turks on the European side of their area, was practised by the Turks of the south and south-eastern frontiers ; the line being ia the direc- tion of India, Persia, and (from Persia) Asia Minor; the startiQg-poiats, Bokhara and the country of the Tur- komans. At the beginning of the eleventh century (say when Canute was reigning in England) Mahmud was sovereign over Cabul and part of India ; his capital beiag Ghazni ; his general designation, Mahmud the Ghaznevid. Mah- mud was of Bokharian rather than Turkoman blood ; TRANSCATTCASIA. 187 perhaps an Uzbek. Togrul, the grandson (real or imaginary) of Seldzhuk, was a Turkoman of Turkestan rather than a Bokharan. His allegiance to Mahmud's successor sat hghtly on him. He organized the preda- tory bands of the Turkomans, overran Khorasan, Syria, Asia Minor (Anatolia), Armenia. Out of one of the Khanates . that arose out of the conquests of the so-called Seldzhu- kian Turks, arose the Osmanli power ; also that of the present Turks of Asia Minor, and the Russo-Turk and Russo-Persian frontiers. The Turks that the conquests of the Seldzhukian liue, under Togrul (or Orthogrul), Shah Malek, Alp Arslan, and others of less note may have brought into Asia Miaor and Armenia, may be called the Seld- zhukian Turks. In like manner we may call those who were diffused (along with the true Mongols) by the victories of Dzhmdzhiz-Khan, the Temugvman ; Te- mudzhiu being the original name of that hero ; Dzhin- giz-Khan beiag a title rather than a name. The fol- lowers of Timur, and their descendants, we may call Timu- rian. The Turks of the Transcaucasian Provinces of Asia, belong to the same migration with the Turks of Asia Minor (AnatoUa), or the Anatolian Turks. The Ana- toUan Turks are Seldzhukian. Such, at least, is the current doctrine. 188 THE SAEMATIAN STOCK. CHAPTER XIV. THE SABMATIAN STOCK ITS DIVISIONS AHD SUB-IIIVISIONS — POIHTS OF OKITIOISM. The Ugrian stock has been investigated, and also the Turk. The latter has claimed much of our attention, but the former more. This is because, important as the Turks were as invaders, it was the Ugrians who were in- digenous to the soil, the Ugrians who were the older possessors, the Ugrians who formed the basis of the popu- lation. Unless we behave that the females of the nume- rous hosts that overran Muscovy were proportionate to the males, we must beheve that the blood of nine-tenths of the present Muscovite area is Ugrian on the mother's side. We believe this to be the case ia the more eastern parts, without hesitation. We believe it also, without hesitation, in the case of the more northern ones. With the centre we begin to doubt; and we doubt stUl more with the south-western districts. With these last our doubts are reasonable. They are no less so with the cen- tral Governments. Podolia, Volhynia, and the Bukho- vinian frontier of Bessarabia, are probably out and out Sarmatian — Sarmatianon the side of themales, Sarmatian THE SABJVLATIAN STOCK. 189 on the side of the females — Sannatian (as a Scandinavian would say) on the sworc^-side, Sannatian (as -the same Scandinavian would say) on the spindle-siie. But the centre was, almost certainly, Ugrian. That the class denoted by the word Sarmatian is of greater range and compass than the ordinary group to which the Russians, the Servians, the Poles, the Bohe- mians, and the allied populations are usually referred, has been already stated. This group bears the name Slavonic, or Slave. But, with the use made of the term (Sfarmctfrn-n., the Slavonians become a subordinate division, a siagle branch ; the Lithuanian populations consti- tuting the other. Sarmatia/n means Slavono-Lithuanio, or (if we prefer the expression) Lithuano-Slavonic. The present Sarmatian class (I repeat a portion of my first chapter) contains — A. The Lithuanians of Lithuania, along with the Lets of Livoma and Courland — ^to which may be added the Old Prussians, whose language was spoken so late as the 16th century, a language of which we have specimens. All Prussia was Lithuanic as opposed to Slavonic. B. On the other hand, the Slavonians as opposed to the Lithuanians are, or were — 1. a. The Bohemians, b. The Poles, c. The Ka- sub of the Rugenwalde district of Pomerania. d. The Sorabians of SUesia and Lusatia. e. The Slovaks of Hungary, who are, probably, transitional to the other branch ; and, /. The Liuones of Lunenberg, whose lan- guage has only become extinct within the last two cen- turies. 190 THE SAEMATIiN STOCK. 2. a. The Servians, Bosnians, Herzogovinians, Croa- tians, lUyrians, Carniolans, Carintliians, Dalmatians. 6. The Great and Little Russians, c. The Bulgarians (more or less mixed). A glance at the ordinary mass gives us the area occu- pied by this vast Sarmatian stock. The considerations suggested by the Prussian Kassub, Sorabian, and lino- nian forms of speech, add to it. Two of them have ceased to exist within a comparatively recent period — the Prus- sian and the Liuonian. The other two are spoken in isolated districts; districts wherewith no other aUied form of speech is in contact ; districts which lie like islands in the midst of a vast sea of foreign dialects — Slavonic themselves, but with everything around them German. The palpable inference from this is, that the Slavonic area, on the side of Germany at least, has been dimi- nished, has been encroached upon, has witnessed the phe- nomenon of displacement — sometimes complete, as in the case of the Prussians and Linonians; sometimes incom- plete, as in that of the Sorabians and Kasub, which remain as fragments of a previous population — a popu- lation once continuously and uninterruptedly Slavonic. But this inference is well-nigh superfluous; inasmuch as we get at the fact it gives us by a more direct, straight- forward way. History tells that in the time of Charle- magne, the Elbe was the western limit of the Slavonians, and the eastern one of the Germans. The inference, nevertheless, is worth the drawing. If we now move to the eastern side of this great Sar- matian area, we shall find, that, in proportion as we -ap- THE SAEMATIAN STOCK. 191 proach Asia, the Tiniformity of dialects increases, and the difference decreases — allowing for the admixture of foreign words on the side of the Ugrian and Tiirk areas. The Kussian is spoken by more than five times as many indi- viduals as all the other Slavonic tongues put together; yet it is spoken with less than half the variety of dialect. The inference from this is, that its extension is compara- tively recent. But this is an inference ex abumdcmti. History tells us, that in the time of the father of Eussian history — Nestor, the monk of Kiov, who Uved in the 12th century — a great deal of what is now Russian was then Ugrian. Nevertheless, we have improved our cri- ticism by drawing it. What has taken place within the last thousand years may have taken place a mUlenium earlier — ^two mU- lenia, three millenia earher, or more. And the history of these periods is open to investigation. History will not help us over-much here. Nine-tenths of our results must be inferential. I shall lay my own views before the reader, devoting the present chapter to a general view of the whole Sarmatian stock. Some portions of it, it is true, lie beyond the pale of Russia, and it is only the ethnologj'^ of Russia that the present volume illustrates. At the same time, to say nothing about the enormous magnitude and importance of the Russian element itself, no less than four of its divi- sions are absolutely Russian. With the exception of some Little Russians, Rusniaks, or Ruthenians, tmder Austria, and occupants of Gallicia, all the Russians belong to the territory of the Czar. A large third of the Poles do the same. 192 THE SAHMATIAN STOCK. So do many Bulgarians, and many Servians. So do nearly all the Lithuanians. The Bohemians, the Slovaks, the Sorabians, and the Kasub alone lie wholly beyond the Moscovite pale — ^the Croatians, Bosnians, Herzogovmians, Dalmatians, Illy- rians, Montenegriners, &c., being little more than modi- fications of the Servians. To exhibit in full either the details or the principles of the criticism, by which I attempt the re-construction of the original area of a stock which has not only changed its locaUties freely, but changed them in a very comph- cated manner — now encroaching on its neighbours, now itself encroached on — ^would be to write a bulky volrnne instead of a short chapter. It will not be attempted. I shall give Httle beyond the result of my inquiries ; fore- warning the reader that, in many very important points, they are widely at variance with the opinions of investi- gators with whom I differ with diffidence and hesitation. I shall give the results only — the results, with the excep- tion of a series of four prelimiiiary statements. These refer less to the line of criticism I adopt than to certain current doctrines, which are so incompatible vrith my deductions, as to make it necessary for me to ignore them-^to ignore them altogether, and to say that I do so ; to say that I do so, and to give a slight sketch of my reasons for doing it. 1. A great many of my inferences depend upon the fact of the present Slavonic popidations of Servia, Bosnia, Herzogovinia, and part of Dalmatia, being the oldest known occupants of their present area. A great many of the current doctrines depend upon the fact of their POINTS OF CEITICISM. 193 being compaxatively recent occupants. The evidence of this is taken from Constantiae Porphyrogeneta, who en- larges upon the origin of what he calls the Krobati of JDehnatia (Groatians of DaVmatia). They came, he says, from a district Ijdng beyond the Carpathians, near Bagibareia (Bavaria), and the land of the Franks. In this, their mother-country, was the residence of the Unbaptized, the Great, the White Groatians — ^the White Croatians, whom the Greeks called Aspri-KrohaAi, and the Slavonians Belo-Kxdhaii. The date of their descent was the 7th century — ^the time of Heraclius. No early author mentions this; the date of Constantine Porphyro- geneta being A.D. 940, or 300 years after the supposed events. This alone is an objection — but it is increased by (at least) two facts : a. The fact of there being populations named S'-rb, and localities named K-r-b-t, in both the parts about Dalmatia, and the parts north of the Carpathians; the reason for this being the case lying, not ia the fact of the one population being deduced from the other, but ia that of both the names being common to different parts of the Slavonic area. Constantino's doctrine was an inference only. b. The fact of there being special evidence to the exist- ence of Serbs, or Croatians, in the parts wherein Con- stantine places them as settlers of the 7th century, long before that date. 2. A great many of my inferences depend upon the fact of several populations, occupant of that part of Europe which is described under the name of Germarda K 19 4 POINTS OF CBITICISM. by Tacitus, being otber tban German ; notwithstanding the fact of Tacitus placing, them in Germany. A great many of the current doctrines depend upon the doctrine of everything that Tacitus places in Germa/nia being Ger- man. I admit that the term Germania is prima fade evidence of this being the case. But (to go no further in the way of special objections) it may safely be said, and it is generally admitted, that of all the populations east of the Elbe which Tacitus, in the second century, called German, no single vestige appears in the tenth. On the contiSiTj, eyerry thing is Sarmatiam,. How is this?' Was the original statement erroneous, or has subsequent change taken place ? No general answer can be given to the question. It depends upon the credibility of the author on the one side, and the Kkelihood of the changes assumed on the other. If the changes are probable, and the author unexceptionable, the decision is in favour of the change. If the author, however, be exceptionable, and the changes such as have never been previously known, the converse is the case. Between these extremes there is every intermediate degree. The changes may be of average magnitude, and the author of medium cre- dibility. AU this, however, merely shews that the balance between the conflicting difficulties is easily struck in some cases, that in some it is difficult, and in others almost impossible. A certain amount of migration and displacement is necessary. If Germans were the original occupants of the parts in question, the Sarmatians must have super- seded them therein. POINTS OF CRITICISM. 195 The likelihood or tmlikeliliood of this must be tested in several ways. To consider only the question of extent : the assumed migration must have been imsuipassed, perhaps im- equaled, by any other within the historical period. When the Germans of Charlemagne, and his successors, con- quered (or re-conquered) Transalbian Germany, there was neither trace nor record of any previous Germanic occupancy. Yet such previous occupancy rarely occurs without leaving signs of its existence. Sometimes there are fragments of the primitive population safe ia the protecting fastnesses of some mountaia, forest, or fen, whose 'savage iadependence testifies their original claim on the soil. There were no traditions. The supposed conquerors knew of no vndigencE which they replaced: no indigence complained of the stranger who dispossessed them. Saooon as is England, the oldest geographical terms are Keltic; some of the original names of the rivers and mountains remaining unchanged. The converse is the case in Transalbingian Germany. The older the name, the more surely is it Slavonic. The assumed displacement must have been the greatest and the most absolute of any recorded in history. Great part of a whole volume (the Gervnania of Ta- citus with ethnological dissertations and notes) has been devoted by the present writer to the consideration of th^ extent to which the assumptions necessaiy to reconcile the usual interpretations of Tacitus, in respect to the limits of the German stock with the known state of things in K 2 196 POINTS OF CEITIOISM. the ninth century, are legitimate ; the decision being in the negative. For this reason, he abstains from any further illustration of the principle upon which he has allowed himself to consider all that part of the OerTncmia of Tacitus which lies east of the Elbe, not German, but Sarmatian, 3. A great many of my inferences depend upon the fact of several populations whose names "consist of some modification of the word Goth, being, not necessarily, and for that reason, connected with the German Goths of Alaric, Theodoric, and the other Oskro-goth and Ym-goth kings ; and consequently not necessarily German. A great number of the current doctrines assume, tha* what- ever is Gothic is also German. Now, it is a fact, too often overlooked, that no German tribe so long as it occupies a portion of the soil of Germany bears the name Goth, or any modification of it. They only take it when they have settled in the cotmtry of the Getoe or GaudoB, a fact which makes the name just as foreign to the Teu- tonic dialects as Briton was to the Anglo-Saxon. From which it follows, that all other populations which were, in respect to their name, in the same predicament as the Goths of Alaric and Theodoric, were connected, not with the German invaders, but with the occupants of the country invaded ; just as the Bretons of Brittany are connected, not with such Englishmen as call themselves patriotically and poetically Britons, but with the Welsh representatives of the original occupants of the Keltic island Brita/nnia. In bringing within the same class all the populations POINTS OF CRITICISM. 197 denominated Gothini, Gothones, Guttones, Gothi, Gautae, Gaudae, Getae, Jute, and Vitse, I only do what nine out of ten of my predecessors have done before me. I difier, however, from them in making the Goths of Alaric and Theodoric Gothic, only in the way that the English are Britons, or the Spaniards Mexicans. 4. A great many of my inferences are incompatible with the current explanation of a remarkable but undoubted philological phenomenon ; vie., the similarity between the ancient language of India and the Sarmatian lan- guages. It has long been known that the ancient, sacred, and literary language of Northern India has its closest grammatical affinities in Europe. With none of the tongues of the neighbouring countries, with no form of the Tibetan of the Himalayas, of the Burmese dialects of the north-east, with no Tamul dialect of the southern part of the Peninsula itself, has it half such close resem- blances as it has with a distant and disconnected language spoken on the Baltic — the Lithuanian. As to the Lithuanian, it has, of course, its closest affi- nities with the Slavonic tongues of Russia, Bohemia, Po- land, and Servia, since the ' Slavonic and Lithuanic are two branches of the same Sarmatian stock. But when we go beyond the Sarmatian stock, and bring into the field of comparison the other tongues of Europe, the Latin, the Greek, the German, and the Keltic, we find that, though the Lithuanic is more or less connected with them all, it is far liker the old Indian. Now, the botanist who, finding in Asia, extended over a comparatively small area, a single species, belonging to a genus which covered two-thirds of Europe, except so 198 POINTS OF CRITICISM. far as he might urge that everything came from the east, and so convert the speci&c question into an hypothesis as to the origin of vegetation ia general, would pronoimce the genus to be European. The zoologist, ia a case of zoology, would do the same. Mutatis Tnutandis, the logic of the philologue should be that of the naturalist. Yet it is not. 1. The area of Asiatic languages ia Asia allied to the Sanskrit, is smaller than the area of European languages allied to the Lithuanic ; and — 2. The class or genus to -which the two tongues equally belong, is represented ia Asia by the Sanskrit division only ; whereas in Europe it falls into three divisions, each of, at least, equal value with the siagle Asiatic one — ^the Gothic, the Sarmatian, and the Classical (Latin and Greek). Nevertheless, the so-called Indo-European languages are deduced from Asia — ^La the mind of the present writer, wrongly. To recapitulate: the re-construction of the original Slavonic area, as it will appear in the present chapter, implies— 1. That the statement of Constantiae as to the Trans- carpathian and recent origin of the Dalmatian, Ser- vian, and Croatian Slaves, goes for nothing. 2. That the fact of certain populations, Kke the Lygii and others, finding place ia the Germomia of Tacitus, does the same. 3. That no inferences ia favour of populations called Ooth-, Gutt-, Jut-, Cfutton-, Gothim^, or Get-, being Ger- man, be drawn from the fact of the Ostrogoths and Visigoths having been German. POINTS OF CRITICISM. 199 4. That with two allied forms of speech, one spoken in European Kussia and the othet in Asiatic India, the original character of the Asiatic, and the derivative cha- racter of the European, are by no means to be assumed. Such are my postulates — postulates, however, only in the short and sketchy form they are obUged to take here. Each stands upon special grounds of its own, and by no means upon the assumption of the validity of the present results. These grounds may be sufficient or insufficient. The reader is only assured that the writer is guarding himself against arguing in a circle. Such points of criticism being indicated, we may noW attempt an exhibition of the original area of the Sarma- tians in general, to be followed by a similar indication of the earliest limits of the different divisions of the great stock they constitute. The period to which this attempt goes back is a geological rather than an historical one, and we get at it by that palaeontologic line of reasoning which characterizes geology and archaeology, rather than by means of any evidence on the part of writers. Indeed, such evidence is out of the question ; inasmuch as the epoch with which we deal is long anterior to the inven- tion of the alphabet, as well as to the existence of the ear- liest known monument, record, or tradition. Let us make our date 2,000 or 1,500 years B. C. ; not much less, because the amount of subsequent change which we have to account for must be supposed to begin early. Nor yet much earlier. This is upon the princi- ple of not unnecessarily miiltiplying our number of years. The other families or stocks occupant of Europe are lield to be those of the present moment ; the assumption 200 POINTS OF CRITICISM. that any one has become absolutely extinct, being con- sidered unnecessary. It is believed that even the Old Etruscans are more safely referred to some existing class, than dealt with as the representatives of some separate substantive class of equal value vnih those already re- cognized. If so, the primary divisions of the European populations are — (1) the Keltic, 2 the German, (3) the Latin and Greek, (4) the.Sarmatian, (5) the Ugrian, (6) the Iberian or Bask, (7) the Skipitar or Albanian. What we have now, we are assumed to have had 2,000 or 1,500 years B. C, m himd, hut not in degree. Some covered more ground than at present, some less ; so that there has been both increase and decrease of area. More than this; one and the same stock shall have enlarged its area in one direction, and have had it curtailed in another. The Sarmatians have done this. In the east and north, they have encroached ; in the south and west, they have retreated. Hence, their history is to be got at by the method of exclusion. If we know what ground has been lost by their right-hand, and what has been gained by their left-hand, neighbours, we get the origiaal Sar- matian area as the residue. The stocks that have lost the ground that the Sarma- tians have gained, are the seventh and fifth of our Ust— the Skipitar (or Albanian) and the Ugrian. These will be noticed first. A case may be made in favour of the original area of the preserved Albanians being carried somewhat farther northwards, and considerably further ea-stwards. I think it doubtful whether ancient Macedonia and ancient POINTS OF CRITICISM. 201 Thrace were, at the very earliest, Sarmatian. I think they were, more or less, Albanian or Skipitar. At the same time I think that a Sarmatian occupancy, both of those two countries and of the parts beyond, had taken placfe before history began. This view eliminates Mace- donia, and Thrace (the parts south of the Balkan), from the origiual area of the Sarmatians. The Ugrian area is not only more difficult in its re- construction than the Albanian, but it is one of greater importance. The denial of the Asiatic origin of the so- called Indo-Europeans (except so far as aU the varieties of the himian species may be believed to have originated in Asia) iavolves the denial of what is called the Fia hypothesis: this meaning, that anterior to the migration of the Sarmatians, Germans, Latins, Greeks, and TSelts from Asia, the whole of Europe was Fin (Ugrian), the Basks of the Pyrenees being so at the present moment ; the Basks of the Pyrenees being so at the present mo- ment, and, as such, the important, ancient, and interest- ing representatives of a population which was once spread continuously over France and Germany, to Scandinavia and Eussia, where the main body, though broken and divided, stiU exists in situ. Such is the Fin (or Ugrian) hypothesis; a great guessj. which I once admitted as a great fact. But, though, the Ugrian hypothesis, ia its fullest sense, may be unsafe, a vast extension of the Ugrian area, both southwards and eastwards, may be legitimate — ^this, being a matter of degree, a case of more or less. Ordinary criticism carries it in the south, as far as the Dnieper ; and I think that a not improbable amount, K 3 202 ORIGINAL SABMATIAN AEEA. of refinement upon this would give us a case for adding to it the valleys of the Bug, the Dneister, and the mouths of the Danube. I do not say that the Skipitar and the Ugrian stocks once met in Bulgaria, or on the Danube, or at the Balkan ; but I do beHeve that the Slavonians which now lie, and at the beginning of the historical period, lay between them, are intrusive. Turning from south to north, from the Ugrians of the Black Sea to those of the Baltic, we may repeat our doctrines. Ordinary criticism carries them to the Pregel ; re- finements upon it, to (I believe) the Elbe. At any rate, it is not absolutely necessary to make thfe Lithuanians of Prussia, and the Slavonians of Pomerania, the oldest occupaats of these localities. I can even see (though indistinctly) the way to the older populations of parts so far south and west as the Hartz, being, in the veryjvrst vnstance, Ugrian. The Sarmatian and German en- croachments of aftertimes, even with their assumed magnitude at its Tnaxmium, are, by no means, inor- dinate. The Ugrian and Albanian are the divisions that have lost ground to the Sarmatian. Those that have gained it are the German, the Latin, and (I think), the Keltic. In respect to the first, it is only necessary to repeat what has already been stated; viz., that iu the 9th century the Slavono-German frontier was the Lower and Middle Elbe, the Upper Elbe being whoUy Slavonic. The insuf- ficiency of the reasoning that makes these Slavonians a secondary population, immigrant and intrusive on a pre- vious population of Germans, has been indicated. OEIGINAI, SABMATUK AEEA. 203 Tlie Slavonians of Carinthia and Camiola, m, situ as these are considered to be, had, probably, at a time ante- rior to the spread of the Koman arms, some extension southwards— some extension, little or much. Th^ how- ever, is, in the present work, of no great importance. Of more importance is the question- — ^what extension west- wards had the Slavonians of Bohemia and Liisatia? I think, that before the displacements on the Upper Rhine and the Upper Danube, effected by the Kelts and Ger- mans, and before the Roman conquest of Rhaetia and the reduction of the Agri Decumates (Wurtemburg),the Keltic and Slavonic areas met — the Slavonic reaching as far as the Rhine westwards, the Mayne northwards, and the Lake of Constance (at least) southwards. Such our limitations — such our extensions. What do they leave as the original Sarmatian area? As a conve- nient central point, Bohemia? As parts between Bo- hemia and the circumference — Northwards — Saxony, Silesia, Lusatia, Brandenburg, Posen, parts of the Duchy of Warsaw, Bialystock, Grodno, Vihia. (?) Southwards — Upper Austria, Lower Austria, the Tyrol, Styria, Carinthia, Camiola, Croatia. Westwards — ^The drainage of the Regnitz, Altmuhl, and the southern feeders of the Mayne, parts of Bavaria Wurtemburg, the Vorarlberg, part of Switzerland. Eastwards and S. E. — Moravia, Hungary, Transyl- vania, GaUicia, Bukhovinia, parts of Podolia, Volhynia, Bosnia, Servia. This I submit to the reader as the original Sarmatian area; this being very nearly the only portion of Europe 204 ORIGINAL SARMATIAN AREA. for •vvhicli I have not found (little or much) some evi- dence of an earlier and i\^(m-Sarmatian population. It is submitted to the readey as being, at one and the same time, sufficient for the phenomena of migration and con- quest which are deduced from it, and also compatible ■with the areas necessary for the ethnology of all the other stocks. The area that has thus been mapped out, is that of tne Sarmatian stock ia general Which parts of it were Idthuanic, which Slavonic? Of the Slavonic parts, which were more Kussian than Polish, which more Polish than Russian, which intermediate? I believe that, with the allowance of a moderate margin for uncertain facts and uninvestigated details, these questions are capable of so- lution. The Bohemian division of the Slavonic branch of the Sarmatian stock hes beyond the pale of our present ia-< vestigations. Still more so do what we may call the Rhcdian and Vvndeliciwn groups; the groups to which the Slavonians of ancient Bavaria, ancient Wurtemburg, and part of ancient Switzerland, belonged. The Polish branch, on the other hand, commands our attention. The original area of such Slavonic Sarmatians as were more Polish, Lusatia,n, Kasub, and Linonian, than Rus- sian or Serviaji, I place in Silesia, Lusatia, Branden- burg, and Saxony — perhaps in some of the countries beyond, but not necessarily; we must remember the case that can be made out for the lower parts of the Oder being, in the very earliest times, Ugrian, and also be in- formed that the presence of Lithuanians in Gallicia is a probability. We must remember, too, that the present ORIGINAL SARMATIAN AEEA. 205 Poland is a country easily overrun, that the Poles who hold it have ever been an encroaching population, and that the uniformity with which the PoUsh language is spoken over a large area is prima, facie evidence of re- cency of dififiision. Let the Upper Oder be the nucleus of this family. The original area of such Slavonic Saxmatians as were more Servian or Russian than Polish, Lusitanian, Kasub, or Linonian, I place in Servia, Bosnia, and Croatia — in Hungary and, Transylvania — in some countries, perhaps, beyond ; but not necessarily. I should not like to say, that, early as certain Slavonic populations were occupants of the eastern parts of Moesia and Dacia (Bulgaria and the Danubian principalities), there may not have been Albanians, Ugrians, or Lithuanians (one or all) before them. The drainage of the Theiss and Save is a conve- nient nucleus for this section. To the Lithuanian branch I give, at least, the upper part of the drainage of the Vistula, and the watershed between that river, the Dnieper, and the Dneister. Some Lithuanians were, at one time, as far south as GaUicia. On the other hand, the traces of Ugrian occupancy are not found south and west of Grodno. Grodno, then, Vol- hynia, with .parts of PodoHa, Poland, and GaUicia, may be given as the nucleus of the Lithuanians — of course, pro- visionally and hypothetically; the conditions of the hy- pothesis being as before ; viz., that the suggested areas are sufficient .to explain all subsequent migrations and move- ments from them, and are compatible with those assumed for all the other populations both of Europe and Asia. Sufficiency without interference — ^this is the rule to go by. 206 ORIGINAL SARMATIAN AREA. It has given us the above-named centres, nuclei, or starting-points for the migrations, conquests, and diffusioia ■of our three allied sections of the Sarmatian stock; and that for the earliest period; a period anterior to history. If we lay this at 1000, 1500, or 2000 B.C., we only do so for the sake of fixing our ideas; the date being purely conventional. Let us choose the last, and carry back our imagiaation to the 20th century before the Christian aera. There is, as aforesaid, no history here — no history, but so much palaeontology iastead. Here we have our sub- ject in the form that, whilst it most recedes from that of the annalist, most approaches that of the geologist. By A.D. 1000, the converse will have taken place, and the special histories of Russia, Poland, and Lithuania will have either begun, or be about to begin. The eth- nological methods will then give way to those of the civil historian ; inference to testimony. The ethnological history of the Russian, Polish, and lithuanic areas for the 3,000 years that lie between our conventional date of B.C. 2000 to our real one of A.D. 1000, wiU form the subject of the next two' chapters — the first of which will be devoted to the branch to which the Russians belong, the other to the Lithuanians. THE RUSSIAN, OB SERVIAN, DIVISION. 207 CHAPTER XV. THE KUBSIAN (OE SEKTIAN) DIVISION OF THE SLATOHIANS — PEE-aiSTORIO PBWOD— SCTTHIAH — OKEBK — KOMAN— GEKMAH — SOAHDINATIAH PIEIOIia. In Servia, Bosnia, and Croatia, — in Transylvania and that part of Hungary which is drained by the Theiss, — was spoken, at the earUest period to which our inferences lead us up, a language of which the two extreme fonns are represented by tongues spoken at the present mo- ment, the third and intermediate one beiag extinct. By this I mean that, on the south, the modem Servian, with its allied dialects, is descended from the language of the aborigines; and I also mean that, on the north, the Eusniak of Gallicia, Bukhovinia, Little Eussia, repre- sent the original tongue of the oldest occupants of North- em Transylvania. These two forms of speech are, at the present moment, allied to each other; but the lan- guage of the intervening country is not, at the present , moment, alHed to either. It is, undeniably, of recent origin; the dialects it displaced having been, originally, more or less, Eussian, Servian, or intermediate to the two. 208 THE RUSSIAN, OR SERVIAN, DIVISION This continuity of the Slavonic area on the Middle Da- nube is an inference. It is also an inference that that ex- tended itself Before the time of Herodotus the Lower Danube must have been, more or less, Slavonic; so must Thrace, Macedonia, and parts of Greece; the Albanian being one of the stocks encroached on. But the encroachment was not simply Slavonic : the Getse of the Lower Danube I hold to have been Lithuanians rather than Slavonians. Offsets of these Danubian-Slavonians were settled in the present Russian Governments of Kherson and Taurida. (?) Besides which, there were Sarmatian off- sets on the Don and Volga, as well as in Asia Minor. Whether these were Slavonian or Lithuanic is un- decided. Sarmatians, too, had penetrated as far as India; though, here again, the Slavono-Lithuanic ana- lysis is difficult and doubtful. All that was neither Getic nor Turk, at the time of Herodotus, I consider to have been Slavonic; Servian Slavonic or Russian Sla- vonic, rather than Polish. But, as I also believe that the ancient name Dac-us, the Byzantine form T^Ex-ot (used by a writer AD. 1180), and the modem designation of the Bohemians (Tsheh), to be one and the same, we must be prepared, on the appearance of the names Dacia and Dacian, to admit some internal movements amongst the sub-divisions of the Danubian Slaves, and the probable intrusion of certain tribes which are Bohemian rather than Servian. There are some other difficulties and details for these parts and times. Still, upon the whole, it is safe to say, that the populations of the parts be- tween Servia, the Carpathians, and the sea, were more Russo-Servian than aught else. OF THE SLAVONIANS. 209 We have considered the directions in which the area of the Danubian Slavonians may have extended itseE Let us now ask how it was encroached on. The old and for- midable name of Scythian now presents itself. The Scythians of Herodotus called themselves Skoloti, being Scythians only in the eyes of their neighbours. Five centuries B.C. they were in the Crimea, m the steppes of of Taurida, and in the Governments of Kherson and Ekaterinoslav. They were intruders. Independent Tar- tary was their original area, and the Turk the stock to which they belonged. Ugrians of the Don and Volga may have joined them. In the main, however, they were Turks. To the north of the Carpathians it was the southern and western members of the Ugrian that they displaced ; and along with these the more eastern Lithua- nians; probably, also, some of those Slavonians of Tran- sylvania and Hungary, whom we may reasonably presume to have, by this time, crossed the Carpathians and become occupants of parts of Gallicia, Bukhovinia, and Bessa- rabia — ^rf they were not there originally. In the direc- tion of Caucasus, it is reasonable to suppose that tribes allied to the remote ancestors of the present Circassians, were displaced by this great Scythian or Skolotic inroad ; indeed, plausible traces of very early Caucasian occu- pancy can be found as far as the Danube. The Skoloti extended westwards as far as the drainage of the Maros, in Transylvania — so far, at least; possibly, farther. Their northern frontier is uncertain. I beHeve this Scythian period to have been of consi- derable duration; although the interval of nearly seven centuries between the time of Herodotus and the time of 210 THE SCYTHIANS. the next author who supplies us with any history for these parts, is preeminently obscure. The author in question is Ajnmianus Marcellinus, in the fourth century of the Christian sera. His area is that of Herodotus-^ there or thereabouts. His populations are the Alani and the Htins. They are allied, but different. The Alani are tall and good-looking, with yellow hair. The Huns, much the contrary. The Alani occupied the present Government of Cau- casus, and the frontier of Circassia: since they are spe- cially stated to have been conterminous with the Zaechi, and to have spread themselves in the direction of Media and Aj-menia The western parts of the Government of Caucasus, Taurida, and Kherson, formed the area of the Huns. Next came the Grutungi, conterminous with the Alani of ihe Don. How near the Grutungi came to the Tanais is uncertain. They spread, at least, to the valley of the Dneister. Here was the "vallis Gruthungorum." The Thervings lay between the Dneister and the Da- nube; and besides the Thervings, the Thaifalae on the River Gerasus (Kara-su). Now, the Grutungs and Thervings were German. The Huns drove the Grutungs and Thervings (the Goths, as they are mostly called) across the Danube-^ from Dacia into Moesia and Thrace, from the modem Moldavia or Bessarabia, into Bulgaria and Burifielia. But the quarrels between the Goths of Moesia and the Romans begin, and the Huns and Alani — no longer enemies, but allies — side with the former. Then come the times of AttUa, the son of Mundzuk. THE SCYTHIANS AND HUNS. 211 He began to reign A.D. 433 ; and, over and above the notices of his battles, we find in Priscus references to as many as five embassies, viz., in A.D. 433, 441, 448, 449, '450 — this last being abortive and iacomplete. In the one A.D. 448 Priscus took a part. Gibbon has abridged the account of it. A.D. 448 was the time; and the royal camp or court of Attila, between the Theiss and the Da- nube, the place. In A.D. 453 Attila died. What were his acts and what his power? Both have been much exaggerated — ^by Gibbon as much as by any one. He overran Italy, Greece, Thrace, the countries on the Lower Danube, and penetrated as far into Gaul aS Chalons. He claimed either a subsidy or a tribute from the Romans of the Eastern Empire. He seems to have entertained the plan of an incursion iato Persia — at least, the practicability of making one was one of the topics which Priscus heard discussed during the embassy. He spread his negotiations as far as Africa. In these we have the measure of his operations. They were imdoubtedly great ; though not greater than those of other conquerors of the time. His method was that of a politician, quite as much as that of a soldier. We hear of as many, or more, embas- sies than campaigns during the reign of AttUa. The nations that fought tmder his banner were nume- rous; but some fought as alHes, not as subjects. " Barbaries totas in te tranafaderat Arctos Gallia, pugnacem Eugum, comitante Gelono; Gepida trux sequitur, Scinim Burgundio cogit: Ghunus, Bellonotus, Neunis, Basterna, Toringua ; Bructerus ulvoaa vel quem Nicer abluit unda Prormnpit Francus." — Sidoniits Apohinaris, vii. 320. 212 THE HUNS. Between the Scythians or Skoloti of Herodotus, and the Alani and Huns of Ammianus, we get a vast amount of displacement ; displacement that refers sometimes to the Slavonians of the parts about the eastern Carpa- thians out of whom the conquerors of Russia originated, and sometimes to parts of what was afterwards Russia. What was the character of the movements by which this displacement was effected? Were they simple or complex, few or numerous ? Was there one for the Skoloti, one for the Alani, one for the Htms ? Did the Scythians come in early, and go out early ? And did the Huns come in late ? If SO5 there were two or more Turk migrations. Now, I state with as much confidence as a negative assertion will allow, that, whatever may be the actual details of the Hun history, there is no need of any migrations later than that of the Scythians to bring them into Europe, and there is no evidence of such. I also state, that, whatever may have been the actual details in the history of the Scythians, there is 710 evidence of their having either been ejected from thei/r Eur of earn occupancies, or extimguished as populations. The only definite fact is a change of the names by which the populations of a certain portion of Europe are known. Hence it is suggested, that the history of the populations akin to the Hun, from the fifth century forwards, is, in the mam, a continuance of the history of the Scythaj of the foTurth centtiry B.C. One of the populations of He- rodotus, a population reasonably considered Scythian, is the Agathyrsi. Their locality was in Transylvania. In the time of AttUa they appear as Acazziri. Now, if the Acazziri were Huns, and the Agathyrsi were Scythians, THE AGATHYRSI. 213 and if each occupied the same locality at times so distant as the ages of Herodotus and Attila, some member of the Hun name, at least, was in situ in Transylvania six centuries before AttUa's time, and some Scythians coin- cided with soTne Huos. Why may not even the Huns of AttUa be what the Acazziri were, or, at least, closely allied to them ? No evidence brings them from any point east of the Aluta. All that evidence does, is to say that certain Huns fought against certain Alani on the Maeotis ; that certaia Huns ejected certain Thervings from Bessarabia ; that certain Huns occupied the country between the Aluta and Theiss. All beyond is inference ; and the inference of the present writer is, that the Huns of Attila were no new comers in Hungary. Where was Attila's court or camp ? Not in Eoman Dacia, nor yet in Roman Pannonia : but just in that part between the two that was never Romanized ; a likely spot for the remains of such independence as the Scythian portion of Dacia might preserve, but not a Kkely spot for a new invader from the Don or Volga. Was part, then, of Dacia Scythian or Turk ? Certainly. No man can say how much. The subjects even of Decebalus may have been Scythian or Turk, descendants of the Agathyrsi, ancestors of the Acazziri, close kinsmen of the Huns of Attila. Such is the inference. If soldiers, why not captains ? why not Decebalus himself ? There are those who may think that the notion of Decebalus being a Turk supplies a reductio ad absurdum. Yet it is only our preconceived notions that are shocked. No facts are against it. Why should not the Agathyrsic part of Dacia have supplied a leader as well as any other ? De- 214 THE AVAES, ETC. cebalus is a word strange to Gothic, strange to Slavonic not strange to Turk history. When the proper and specific Turks first appear, in the field of history, as they do ia the reign of Justinian, the name of the first Turk khan is that of the last Dacian king, DizahvZus. If our reasons against disconnecting the Scythians, the Alani, and the Huns hold good, they are equally valid against separating the Avars, the Khazars,the Petshenegs (to which add the Uz), and the Cumanians. That after the death of AttUa, the pohtical power of his descendants was broken, is certain. The son of AttUa was not the king of the Huns ; for Hun seems to have been a collective name, and, perhaps, it was not a native one. But he was king of several of those populations in detail, out of which, along with others, the Hun power was made. Before this power was extinguished — ^probably before it was notably diminished — ^the closely allied Avars (Htms, under another name) had conquered Pannonia. They held it from the end of the sixth to that of the eighth century. It was under the Avars that the Turk power took its maximum extension westwards. The great name in the east — ^in the parts between the Volga and the Danube — ^was that of the Khazars ; who are unequivocally mentioned under that designation as early as A.D. 626, though not by a contemporary histo- rian. The evidence, however, of their power is sufficient The emperor, Leo IV., son of Constantino Copronymus, was the son of Irene, daughter of the Khan of the Khazars. He reigned from A.D. 775,to A.D. 780. THE CUMANIANS, ETC. 215 Much in the same way as the name Him is succeeded by that of Avar, the name Khazar is succeeded by that of PatzinaJcs or Petshinegs. The Kanzar are a section of the Petshinegues. Time from A.D. 900 (there or thereabouts), to A.D. 1050. Place — the parts between the Lower Danube and the Lower Don — Bes- sarabia, Cherson, and part of Taurida. Like the Kha- zars, they attack Eussia; pressing northwards and west- wards. The ?7^ireplace — or appear to replace — thePetshenegs; their time being the eleventh century. Lastly, come the Cumani, scarcely distinguishable from the Uzi. They occupied Volhynia — afterwards, a part of Hungary. The' last individual who spoke a language aUied to that of the Huns — a language of Asiatic origin — ^the last of the Cumanianlt-Varro, an old man of Karczag — died AD. 1770. From the death of Varro to the times anterior to He- rodotus, or (changiag the epoch) from the times anterior to Herodotus to AD. 1770, there was always a Turk population on the Lower Danube, and in the parts be- tween the Lower Danube and the Volga. How iax they extended northwards and inland is uncertain. It is only certain that Volhynia was at one time part of their area: so were parts of Hungary — ^Volhynia, however, more es- pecially. Volhynia is neither more nor less than the Low German word Velue, meaning a champagne country — Volhynia being the Turkish or Russian Cham- pagne. The different forms it takes are Falawa, Falon, Valui, Valewe, Valven, Waluwen, ValaTis, Valanie 2] 6 THE CUMANIAKS OF VOLHYNIA. — "c'etoitla" (writes Rubruquis) "que vivoient les Co- mans et qu'ils tenoient leur troupeaux; il s'appellent Capchat, et selon les Allemands Valans, et lenr pais Valanie." What the Germans (probably of Transyl- vania) called ValaTis, the Slavonians called Polovci; a word of the same meaning; a word, too, that should be noted, inasmuch as it is from the same root as otir name PolacJc (a Pole). Pole is no specific appellation of any definite population at all ; but only a name like High- la/nder or Lowlander. Here it applies to a division of the Turt stock; an application which will be alluded to in the sequel, as a proof that a nation might be called Polish without being so in the ordinary acceptation. The Volhynians of the 11th century were the same as the Polovci, who were Cumanians, who were Kipt- shak Tartars, who were ifl^rJcs. But the list of syno- nyms does not cease here; they were, occasionally, called Parthians — " fuerunt Tartari in terra Valuorum paga- norum, qtii Parthi a quibusdam dicuntur." Also, "ia- vaserunt Parthos, quibus Rutheni auxilium ferebant; commiseruntque cum Thataris prselium, et victi sirnt. Conciderunt itaque de Ruthenis et Parthis ad centum miUia hominum." This name is as important as curious. Did the old chro- niclers know about the fugaces Parthi of the classical writers? Did they tax their memories and talk in the metaphors when they had savage Ttirks to speak about? No. There was a population (I will not say exactly in Volhynia, but not far from the frontier of those Slavo- nians who knew the Cumanians) indigenous to the Sar- THE CUMANUNS. 217 vnatian soil, whose name in the Latin of the Chronicles comes out as Barthi, or Barthenses, and whose country was the Bartha (or Plica Bartha) "qua nunc major et minor Bartha appellatur." Leaving, however, the consideration of the names borne by these Cumanians, let us notice their truly Turk habit of eating horseflesh, and drinking mare's milk, poiats which all the chroniclers who mention them indi- cate with horror. Let us note, too, that their alliances are with the Petshenegs. These it was whose name takes as many aliases asth at of the Cumanians ; the Greeks call- ing them PatzinakitcB, the Slavonians Peczenyezi, the Hungarians Bisseni and Bessi; out of which last form we get the name of the great Petsheneg locality — jBess-arabia. Even iQ the Icelandic Heimskringla we find a notice of the country of the Petshenegs near Wallachia — "Pezina- viiUr vid 5tocA;o-mannaland." The Uz (OvZoi) were Turks also ; Turks in the neighbourhood of the Petshenegs and Cumanians; "nobler, however, than the Petshenegs." The last metamorphosis that this word Petsheneg undergoes is into the present name Budzhak or Bud- ziah. This, however, by no means makes the present Budziak Tartars of Bessarabia descendants of the Pet- shenegs. They may only be occupants of what was once the Petsheneg country. If, however, they be truly what their name suggests, Varro was not the last of what may be called the Trans-Danubian Turks. On the contrary, they stUl exist. The Petsheneg and Cumanian Tiu-ks are pre-eminently the Russian branches of that stock ; and next to those the Khazars ; eaxUer stUl, the Alans — the Alans ia the part L 218 THE HUNS. between the Don, the Volga, and the Caucasian range — the Khazars on the Volga — ^the Cumanians and Pet- shenegs on the drainage of the Dneister, or the parts be- tween the Dnieper and Danube. The Huns and Avars were Transylvanian and Hungarian, rather than Kussian. They were, however, equally Turk. The Bulgarians will be noticed in a separate chapter. There was a difference, then, in respect to the local distribution of these names. There was, also, a difference in time. The Alans, under that name, soon recede from the foreground of history. They are hard to find after the sixth century. The Huns, as the representatives of the supposed power and barbarism of AttUa, recede also — 'but the name continually reappears as the synonym of A var during the whole of the later Avar history. Indeed, with the German chroniclers, Hun means Avar, and Avars are called Huns. In all this I see only an irregular distribution, both in time and place, of the historical importance of certain members of the original Scythian migration, complicated by changes of name in respect to some of the leading po- pulations. The extinction of one population, and the introduction of another, I do not see. Whenever this has been assumed (and I have examined the evidence) it has been found wanting. The real fact has generally been that a different branch of the stock has developed itself at some fresh point of its area; or that the same has become known to us through a different hne of authori- ties, and, consequently, under a different name. To uii- critical writers all this looked like so many obhterations of an older population, and so many fresh immigrations THE HUNS. 219 of a younger one — to match and make good; and that such was actually the case, in a moderate degree, I by no means deny. As a rule, however, these migrations and replacements were inferential and hypothetic, rather than historic. That all the Turks of Europe — Scythian, Alan, Hun, Avar, Chazar, Uz, Petsheneg,. and Cumanian — came from Asia, was known. It was also known that the same names were largely found in the two con- tinents. The use that this knowledge would be put to, in the absence of real iaformation, is clear. It would supply some speculation in Ueu of it. And of real know- ledge there was an absence. What knew the Greeks of such parts of the Herodotean Scythia as lay in the direc- tion of Podolia, Volhynia, and Northern Transylvania? What knew the Romans of the Dacia and Sarmatia of the Greek period? What do the Byzantines tell us of the same Dacia when it becomes Wallachia? I have no hesitation in saying, that the evidence of the Huns of AttUa having come into Europe is as unsatisfactory as that of the Skoloti of Herodotus having ever got out of it. No good evidence brings the former from any poiut east of the Aluta. AU that evidence does, is to say that certain Hims fought against certain Alans on the Mseotis ; that certaiu Huns ejected certain Thervings from Bessa- rabia; that certain Huns occupied the country between the Aluta and Theiss. All beyond is inference; and the inference of the present writer is, that the Huns of Attda were no new-comers in Hungary. Where was AttUa's court or camp? Not in Roman Dacia, nor yet in Roman Pannonia; but just ia that part between the two tha was never Romanized, a likely spot for the remains of L 2 220 THE GERMAN PERIOD. such independence as the Scythian portion of Dacia might preserve, but not a lately spot for a new invader from the Don or Volga. Upon the whole I hold, that, allowing for certain minor details on the frontier of Europe and Asia, the history of the Scythians, Huns, Avars, Petshenegs, and Cumanians, is one; and that it is the history of a population, not in- deed indigenous to Europe, but European from the time of Herodotus downwards. With this suggestion I close the notice of the Trans-Danubian Turks; and go back to the times that come after its commencement. There was the Greek period, which was of more im- portance in the history of civilization than in ethnology. However, it gave us the colonies of the Black Sea; not always direct from Greece, but rather from Asia Minor. There was the Roman period, which began with the reduction of Pannonia, and ended with that of Dacia . There was the German period; important, but obscure. I imagine that, some time subsequent to the conquest of Pannonia, certain Germans from Thuringia found their way down the Danube, settled, either independent of any foreign persuasion or as Roman mercenaries, on certain Pannonian and Dacian frontiers, and stayed there until they were ejected by the Huns. The Thervings and Gru- timgs, whom we have seen in the valley of the Dneister, were in this predicament; probably, the Marcomanni of Moravia also. As these Trans-Danubian Germans passed the river and appeared in the country of the Getce, they got called Goths. Until then, they were as little Gothic as Egbert and Alfred were Bntish. I have stated this before ; I state it again. I draw all the attention I can THE TEEM EUS. 221 command to tlie doctrine. Nine-tenths of tte points whereon I disagree with the current doctrine, turn upon it. On the other hand, an equal amount of the ordinary teac^iing must fall when the assumption that any German tribes ever called itself Goth-, Oet-, Gott-, Gut-, or by any similar name, is shewn to be groundless. The two great displacements were the Turk and the Roman. The latter displaced the original Slavonic (not unmixed with Turkish) of Transylvania and the Da- nubian Principalities, and, by doing this, separated the Russian, Ruthenian, or Rusniak Slavonians of the Carpa- thians from the Servians of Servia. From the Upper Dneister, Lodomiria, Bukhovinia, and the north of Bessarabia, the Slavonian line of en- croachment moves northwards and eastwards, the area upon which it encroaches being Turk, with fragments (perhaps) of the original population iaterspersed. This was either Ugrian or Lithuanian — perhaps both. By AJD. 800, the Dnieper is Slavonic (this is the better term here), and Kiev is a Slavonic town — Slavonic in the way that the parts north of the Carpathians were Slavonic. By A.D. 800, too, the parts about the Ilmen-Lake, or the valley of the Volok, were Russian (this is the better term here) ; Novogorod being, for these parts, what Kiev was for the banks of the Dnieper. Novogorod was Russian, and Kiev Slavonic. Were they both in the same category — i. e., both Russian, or both Slavonic, the difference between the two being merely nominal? It was not nominal, but real. The Russians of Novogorod were not Slavonians, but Scandi- navians, probably from Sweden. A remarkable passage 222 THE TERM EUS in Canstantinus Porpliyrogeiuta, not only distinguishes the Rus tongue from the Slavonic, but gives the names of the differeTvt falls of the Dnieper in both languages. The Mus forms are Norse; being compounds of the Norse word /ors — force in provincial English — waterfall. Elf Tov irifvirTov ippajfibv tov iirovofiaZofievov PwcriaTl fisv ^apov^opoQ, SKXaSivtorl §£, ^ovkvrjTrpa\' (Con- stant, de Adm. Imp., c. ix.) Again, Etc TOV irspov (ppay/xbv tov iiriXeyonevov Fcoa-iari fi^v OvX^opa), 'SiKkd^ivKTTi Si, OorpoSovviTT/oaT^. (Ibid.) Translated — " At the fifth fall, the one called in Russ Varuforos, but in Slavonic Vulneprahh." " To the second fall, the one called in Rus, Ulvorsi — but in Slavonic, Ostrovuniprakh." If this Russ be (as it is) Scandinavian, and the two languages meet on the Dnieper, the movement by which the original character of Russia was changed iuto its present was complex ; i. e., there was the movement from north to south, of which Novogorod represents the civili- zation, in which the Scandiaavians were the agents, and for which the area was Ugrian rather than Turk ; and there was the movement from south to north, of which Kiev represents the civilization, in which the Slavonians were the agents, and for which the area was Tiirk rather than Ugrian ; Turk, indeed, which was originally either Ugrian or Lithuanic, but still, for the epoch under notice, Turk. The movement from the south preponderates; and when the powers represented by Kiev and Novogorod, coalesce and consoHdate, it is the Scandinavian element «vhich disappears. THE TEEM BUS. 223 By A.D. 1000 — say, for convemence, during the reign of Canute — ^the power that afterwards grew iuto that of the Muscovite empire had its area in Kiev and Novogorod, in the adjacent districts, and in the intermediate ones. Its Slavonic and Scandinavian elements had, more or less, become fused ; the Slavonic preponderating. The Greek civilization and the Greek Christianity of Con- stantinople had told on it. Active kings had arisen, and a career of conquest had been begun. The civil history now commences. For the present we pause upon, and conclude with, the investigation of the name Rus. Originally, it was any- thing but Slavonic ; it was rather Scandraavian. Does it appear elsewhere ? If so, when, and in what form ? It appears as early as the first century of our sera, and in a Ugrian form. Strabo uses it ; and his form is Rhox- olani. This has long been known. It has also long been known that -lainen is the regular Finlandish ter- mination for gentile nouns ; so that, as Strabo mentions the Rhoxolmii, there must have been, in his time, not only Ugrians in Eussia, but Ugrians so near the sea, or the parts within the area of the Greek iatercourse, as for words of their tongue to reach his informants. Tacitus mentions them also. "What follows from this ? One of two things. The root Ruots- may be as Ugrian as the termination -alan-, or it may not be Ugrian at all. With the first of these alternatives, our doctrine is, that modem Rv^sia has taken its name, not — a. From any dominant Norse conquerors, called Rus-; but — 224 THE TEEM ETJS. * b. From a portion of its area called Ruotsi, originally occupied by Ugrian Muotsolane, but afterwards by Norse- men, to whom the neighbouring nations extended the name of the territory. In this case, the Northmen of Ruotsi are called Rus, even as an Angle of Britannia might be called Britcm- nus. With the second, our hypothesis takes the following form; viz., That certain Scandinavian invaders named Rus had foimd their way into certain parts south of the Baltic as early as the time of Strabo, and that their name had be- come known to the Greeks only after it had passed through certain Ugrian districts between the Upper Dnieper and the Black Sea; during which passage it took the Ugrian form in -Ian- (lams- or -lainen). The fact of the present Finns calliag the Swedes of Sweden Ruotsi, favours this latter view. The question, however, is full of complications, and a third view is admissible. What if the original Ruotsi (Russ, or Rhoks-) were neither Scandinavians nor Ugrians, but members of the Lithuanic family, the Goths of Sweden (as wiU be suggested in the- next chapter) being Lithuanic also 1 In such a case, the hypothesis that would reconcile most facts would be to the effect that the Fins called the Lithuanians Ruots, and that they ex- tended the name, origiaally given to the Goths, of the Scandinavian Peninsula, to the Oermans thereof also. The populations which spoke the Russian glosses of Constantiae Porphyxogenita were German, rather than Slavonian, and they belonged to the Scandinavian, EMPIEE OF HEKMANEIC. 225 rather than to the Teutonic (or proper German) branch of the German stock. Their line of movement was from north to south. Their presence in the parts south of the Gulf of Finland impUes a previous voyage by sea. Let us remember, however, that they are not the first, but the second, group of Germans, that we have found in Russia. Let us remember the Grutungs and Thervings of the valley of the Dneister whom the Huns ejected in the reign of Valens. These were Teutons (or Germans Proper), rather than Scandinavians. Their direction was from south to north, and their presence on the Dneister is best accounted for by the supposition of a passage down the Danube — a fluviatUe rather than a maritime migration. At any rate, there are two lines to the Ger- man encroachments iu Sarmatia ; each in different direc- tions. Did they meet ? Yes — at least, according to the common accounts. They met — i. e., the Germans of the south reached the same point that was reached by the Scandinavians of the north ; this being the country of the Rhoxolani Whether they did so at the same time is another question. The great hero of the Northern, or Scandinavian, Germans, was Ruric. The great hero of the Southern Germans — the Grutungs and Thervings — the Ostrogoths and Visagoths, as they are incorrectly called — was Hermanric. The suppression or consolidation of the minor divisions and sub-divisions of the Grutung and Therviag names increased the military power of Her- manric, and "enlarged his ambitious designs. He in- vaded the adjacent countries of the north, and twelve considerable nations, whose names and limits cannot be accurately defined, successively yielded to the superiority L 3 226 EMPIRE OF HEEMANEIC. of the Gothic arms. The Heruli, who inhabited the marshy lands near the late Moeotis, were renowned for their strength and agility ; and the assistance of their light iafantry was eagerly solicited, and highly esteemed, in all the wars of the Barbarians. But the active spirit of the Heruli, was subdued by the slow and steady per- severance of the Goths ; and, after a bloody action, in which the king was slain, the remains of that warlike tribe became a useful accession to the camp of Herman- ric. He then marched against the Venedi ; unskilled" in the use of arms, and formidable only by their numbers, which filled the wide extent of the plains of modem Poland. The victorious Goths, who were not inferior in numbers, prevailed in contest, by the decisive advan- tages of exercise. and discipline. After the submission of the Venedi, the conqueror advanced, without resistance, as far as the confines of the .^stii, an ancient people, whose name is still preserved in the province of Esthonia. Those distant inhabitants of the Baltic coast were sup- ported by the labours of agriculture, enriched by the trade of amber, and consecrated by the peculiar worship of the mother of the gods. But the scarcity of iron obliged the ^stian warriors to content themselves with wooden clubs ; and the reduction of that wealthy country is ascribed to the prudence, rather than to the arms, of Hermanric. His dominions, which extended from the Danube to the Baltic, included the native seats, and the recent acquisitions, of the Goths ; and he reigned over the greatest part of Germany and Scythia with the authority of a conqueror, and sometimes with the cruelty of a tyrant. But he reigned over a part of the globe EMPIEE OF HEEMANRIC. 227 incapable of perpetuating and adorning the glory of its heroes. The name of Hermanric is almost buried in oblivion ; his exploits are imperfectly known ; and the Romans themselves appeared unconscious of the progress of an aspiring power, which threatened the hberty of the north and the peace of the empire." Such is the language of Gibbon ; based chiefly upon the statements of Jornandes, a very indifferent authority. T give it, however, because the name of Hermanric, like that of Euric is famous — famous, and, to a great extent, fabulous. I give it, too, because when we get to the death of Hermanric we find it connected with the history of the Rhoxolami; one of the chiefs of which nation had " for- merly deserted the standard of Hermanric, and the cruel tyrant had condemned the innocent wife of the traitor to be torn asunder by wild horses. The brothers of that unfortunate woman seized the favourable moment of revenge. The aged king of the Goths languished some time after the dangerous wound which he received from their daggers ; but the conduct of the war was retarded by his infirmities ; and the public coimcils of the nation were distracted by a spirit of jealousy and discord." (Gibbon, c. xxvi) Such is the proof that the Germans of the south, either touched, or were supposed to touch, Rhoxolania, Russia, or Rus-land. This is much to say about a name ; but, considering that, whether Ugrian or Scandinavian in its origin, the word Rus is now not only Slavonic, but the national denomi- nation of the most powerful branch of the Slavonians, the 228 THE TEEM BUS. extent to -which it is enlarged on is justifiable. In the time of Constantine PorphjTOgenita it is Scandinavian — whatever it may have been ia that of Strabo. At present it is Slavonic, so far as it is \ised by the Kussians themselves ; Ugrian, so far as it is appHed by the Fiolanders to the Swedes ; and Swedish, so far as the Swedes have it applied to Sweden. THE LITHUANIC SAEMATIANS. 229 CHAPTER XVI. THE LITHUANIAN BBANOH OF THE SAKMATIAN STOCK— THE PIH73SIANS— THE JAOZWINCIS THE LITHUANIANS — THE LETS — THE QOTHIHI — THB INDIAN AND SCfANDINATlAN OONQUEsTS. The first memliers of the Lithuanian branch of the Sarmatian stock that come under our notice are the Old Prussians, though they no longer exist in a separate and independent form, with their originally separate and independent language. This they lost in the sixteenth century; but untU that time it was spoken in East Prussia. More than this, it was partially written ; inas- much aa the Lord's Prayer and a catechism in it have come down to us. Their equally characteristic paganism died away earKer stiU ; i. e., in the thirteenth century. If we separate East and West Prussia from Pomerania on the west and Posen and Poland on the south, we have the area of the Prussian portion of the Lithuania Sarma- tians. Whether, in the very earliest period of their history, their original site touched the waves of the Baltic is uncertain ; inasmuch as it has been stated that a few unimportant details might be easiest explained by carry- 230 THE OLD PRUSSIANS. ing the Ugrian populations of Esthonia and Livonia as far westwards as tlxe Trave— cliiefly, however, along the sea-coast. This, however, is a refinement. For ordinary ethnology it may be held as a safe doctrine, that the coast of the Amher country in East Prussia was Prussian at the beginning of the historical period, and that West Prussia was in the same category. And this epoch — this beginning of the historical period — is an early one. In the third century B. C, Pytheas of Marseilles heard of the Ostiaioi (^styans) of the Amber country. These were the ancestors of the Old Prussians under the name by which they were designated by the Germans of the Lower Elbe — i. e., a name still meaning TYien of the east — say, Easterlmgs. Easterlings, too, they are in the pages of Tacitus, who calls them jEstyii; only, however, when he follows the line of the Baltic and uses German names. When he arrives at the same population from the south and by an overland line from the Middle Danube, they are no jEstii, but Gothones. Here the name is Slavonic. The Gothones are Mstii under a German, the JEstii Gothones xmder a Slavonic name. The fact that both are found on the Amber country suggests this, and dozens of minor facts, in the way of cumulative evidence, con- firm it. Their manners are like those of the Suevi — a somewhat indefinite term. They worshipped the Mother of the Gods (Prowa, I imagine), and carry as a mark of their superstition the figm-es of boars. Clubs were com- mon, instrmnents of iron rare. Tillage commanded more of their industry than was usual with the Ger- mans. Amber, however, was what they chiefly traded THE OLD PRUSSIANS. 231 in. Their language was like the British-^the text of Tacitus, being " li/ngucB Brita/anicce proprior." The German who told his informant (ia perhaps the fiftieth degree) this, must have said that the speech of the Easterlings (or Este) was Pryttisc — i. e., Prussian. A curious letter of Theodoric the Ostrogoth to these men of the Amber country, has come down to us ; import- ant, because it shews that the name Easterling was stUl apphed to them, even though the letter came from the south. It came, however, from a German. He calls them HcBsti, and, by enlarging upon their characteristic product, the Amber, makes the assurance that it is the Prussians, rather the ancestors of the present Esthonians, whom he addresses, doubly sure. Jomandes mentions them by the same name, But he also places in close contact with them the Yid-4varii. In German this would be Yit^wcere, and the country of the Yit-wcere would be Vit-land. Now, Vit-land was Prussia. We find the name in Alfred, who distinguishes between Vit-lskud and Veonod-l&nd (Terra Vitarum and Terra Venidorum), adding that Vit-land belonged to Este; out of which he gives the compound Hast -land. Now Vit-land and ^as^-land were Prussian and Lithuanic, as opposed to Veonod-land, which was Slavonic. This is sufficient to shew that the difference between the Lithuanian and the Slavonic Sarmatians was felt by the ancients. If we clear our mind of the preconceptions that arise out of the root Goth-, and the German asso- ciations which go along with it, and, if, ia addition to this, we adopt the suggested explanation of Tacitus's state- ment as to the British language being spoken by the 232 THE OLD PBTJSSIANS. Amber-gatherers, we shall find that the ethnology of few countries is more definite than that of ancient Prussia. Alfred mentions its town Truso, the Brusne, and the Drausen-see of later times. There were also (he adds) many other towns in it- — each with its king. Nestor gives us the name Prus ; and, except so far as it appears in the iadirect and conjectural form of Tacitus, he is one of the first writers who does so — " The Lekhs" (Slavonian Poles), " the Pruss" (Lithuanian), " and the Tshuds" (Ugrians), "lie on the Varangian" (Baltic) "Sea." Some of the early German notices may be as old as this of Nestor's. The reduction of Lithuanian and Pagan Prussia was undertaken by the Knights of the Teutonic Order in the twelfth century; when German influences set in from the west. At the same time the sword of the Poles was cutting its way northwards ; so that the line of encroach- ment was double. Another fact made it as much Slavo- nic as German, which was this : — As the Germans moved eastwards from the Elbe, they effected alliances with the Slavonians of Mecklenburg and Pomerania — alliances of more or less importance and durability. At any rate, the line of displacement that pressed upon the Old Prus- sians was Slavono-German, or Germano-Slavonic. The nomenclature of our authors now suffers a change. The term East is (as it were) thrown forwards, and becomes applied to the Esthonians of the Gulf of Finland. The name Goth- becomes obsolete ; that of Vit- appears chiefly m. compounds. Prussia is the generic name ; to which a whole host of specific ones is subordinated. The Prussians, whose paganism inflamed the zeal of the THE OLD PRUSSIANS. 233 Teutonic Knights, were, if we take them ia detail, (1) The GalindAtce, or the TaX^vSai f'(?aKTCc?oB_^ of Ptolemy; (2) The 8udo-mtcB, conterminous with the' Galind/itoB, both being in the neighbourhood of the Spirding-S§e ; (3) The Pomesani, on the right bank of the LowefTis- tula ; (4) Pogesani, on the Frisohe Haf ; (5) War- rn/ienses, Jarmenses, Hermi/ni, and the people of the OrmaAa/nd of the Old Norse Sagas, between the Po- gescmi and the — (6) Nattcmgi ; (7) the Barthi (a name already noticed), and (8) the Nadrovitce, for whom a case can be made out in favour of their being the Nahar- Tal, of Tacitus ; (9) The SamAAtadi and (10) the Scalo- vitae. It is this preponderance of forms in -mt-, that accounts for the name F-ii-land. Yet F^^-land, if trust can be put in the analogies that direct the philologist, is neither more nor less than Ooth-lamA. The Slavonic Hospodar and Oospodar become, ia Lithuanic, Vis- pat^ ; i. e., Lord or Master. The only populations who held to their paganism more tenaciously than the Old Prussians were the Old Lithu- anians, and the only Christian conquerors who rivalled the atrocity of the Teutonic Knights were the Albigensian Crusaders. There is probably some over-statement in the numbers both of the opposing forces, and of the killed and captive. Such numbers as 300,000 slaughtered or sold are, it is to be hoped, exaggerated. So is such an assertion as that every one of the eleven divisions of the Prussian name could bring into the field 2,000 horsemen, and many thousand foot. Nevertheless, there was an obstinate resistance and a cruel conquest. In the district of the Nadrovitae lay the chief seat of the Prus- 234 THE LITHUANIANS. sian superstitions. There was a holy place called Romov, aad a holy man named Criwe. This (as we may sup- pose) suggested a comparison with the Pope of Rome, and struck the imagination of the early German chroni- clers much as the stories about Prester John did the medieval writers on the east. This "Criwe," writes Dusburg, "was respected as a Pope ; because, even as our Lord, the Pope, rules the Universal Church of the faith- ful, ia like manner did the nations of Lithuania, and Livonia, as well as those of Prussia, obey his nod." If we turn to Tacitus and see what he says about the Nahar- vai, we shall find that theirs was the pre-eminent rehgious locahty of the group to which they belonged ; a group comprising the Arii, the Helveconae (the ' AiXovdiwvsg of Ptolemy), the Manimi, and the ElysiL In the Naharval country was a "grove hallowed by an ancient religion. In the Naharval country did a priest in the garb of a woman preside." In the Naharval country were two deities, who, " after the Roman inter- pretation, were Castor and Pollux. This was the import of the divinity. No images; no trace of any foreign super- stition. They worship them as brothers, as youths." This is too elliptic to be very explanatory. At the same time it takes light from one or more curious notices of the later writers. Thus, Adam of Bremen says that the priests ia Courland were dressed like monks — i. e., after the fashion nearest that of females. Then the Slavonic mythology has two associated gods. Lei and Polel. The possible explanation of the word Alcis is more remark- able stiU ; unfortxmately, however, it does not rest on an unexceptionable authority. Erasmus Stella writes that THE LITHUAOTANS. 235 the ancient Prussians worsliipped amongst beasts the MJc (Aids). The precision with which we can separate the Ancient Prussians from the other Lithuanians is increased by more statements than one. The divisions of their area, writes Dusburg, were twelve. Of these he gives the names ; out of which ten agree with those already enu- merated; viz., Pomesania, Pogesania, Warmia, Nattangia, Sambia, Nadrovia, Scalovia, Sudovia, Galindia, Bartha. Again — when the earUer speculators as to the origin of the Prussian nation exert their ingenuity, and go (after the fashion of aU such early speculators) upon the doc- trine that each division represents the family of some hero or eponymos, we find the story to run in this man- ner : There were two brothers — Brut and Wud-arwut ; Brut the king, and Wudawut the priest. Wudawut had twelve (eleven?) sons; viz., Litpho, Saimo, Sudo, Naidro, Scalawo, Bartho, Galindo, Warmo, Hoggo, Pomeso, and Chelmo. Here Sudo, Naidro, Scalawo, &c., are the epo-nymi to the Sudovit«, Madrovitae, Scalo- vitje, &C. One more remark, which is this; that traces of the name G^ttones (Gythones, Oothones, &c.), which we have found applied to the JEstyi or Prussians of the Amber coast, are to be found as late as the end of the 17th century. Praetorius, a Pole, writing A.D. 1688, in his "Orbis Gothicus," devotes two sections to the following ques- tions: — 1. Are there any remains of the Gothic name in Eu- ropean Sarmatia? 236 THE TERM GtTDDON. 2. Whence is the contempt of the name Gudd, at the present time, in Prussia? From these -we learn that the Samogitians, Russians, Lithuanians, Prussians, Zalavonians, Nadravians, Natan- gians, Sudovians, Mazovians, and the inhabitants of Ducal Prussia, were called Guddons by the people about Koningsberg* and that this name was a name of C(m- tempt, accounted for by the extent to which the popula- tions to which it applied had retained their paganism against the efforts of the propagators of the Prussian Christianity. " Guddarum infidelium nomen existit, adeo ut Gothus sive Guddus idem iis qui paganus et eth- nicus, hostisque Christianitatis audierit."* That it was also Slavonic is shewn by a line from an old Tshekh (Bohemian) poem. Ootsh^jja krasnyja diewy na brezje sinemii morju. Gott-ish fair maidens on bank of (the) blue sea. From the Ancient Prussians let us turn to a much more obscure population, though famous in its day ; i. e., in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. I have met with few names in history so seldom as that of the Jacz- wings. Pronounce this Tatsh-viag, and note the various forms under which it occurs. The letters cz represent the Sarmatian combination tsh, difficult to represent in Latin, and not easy in either German or Greek The J is the Enghsh y. The -ing is, perhaps, German — at any rate, it is not radical, as will be seen. In the Polish Chronicles the forms end thus: Jazw-m^i, 3ax,zw-ingi, JaaM-4ngi. The native Slavonic form (in the Russian * Lib. i., cap. i. THE TATSHVINGS. 237 Cliroiiicles and the Igor-lied) is Jikt-wyazi, or Jat-wyezi; in the Papal documents, Jentmsi(mes,Jentuosi, JacintioTies, In two instances, however, we have forms as like to Getse, Gothin-i, and Gothon-es, as Get^wezitw and Get-wi/nzitce. The Yatsh-YiagB lay to the south of the East Prussians, and to the east of the Poles, in the present province of Sierdec, and in the Podlachia of the older maps. They are said also to have extended as far as the marshes about Pinsk — at the headwaters of the Pripecz. At the begin- niag of the thirteenth century they were formidable to both Kussia and Poland. It was' Poland, however, that more especially coerced them. This population, "vast and warlike, greedy of honour, allied in language, rites, religion, and customs to the Lithuanians, the Samogi- tians, and the Prussians, dedicated too, like them, to the worship of idols, a population of which Drohyczyn was the metropolis, was so broken in a great battle against the Poles under their Duke, Boleslav, in the year of our Lord 1282, as to become well-nigh extinct, a few only remaining, some of which were attached to Poland, some to Lithuania. They never retreated, and never refused a battle, however unequal." This is the language of the chroniclers in speaking of the now unknown Tatsh-Yhxgs. The Poles were their chief conquerors — the Poles, in their movements from west to east, a movement which will be noticed in the sequel. At present, I remark that the Yatsh-ymig occupation of Podlachia, Sierdec, &c., throws the easternmost frontier of the Poles much further west- wards than is generally imagined. It also brings the Lithuanian area farther southwards. The radical parts of the forms Jat-wyazi (pronounced 238 THE TATSHVINGS. Fat-), and Getui7ir-zik3i,ha.\e been quoted with a purpose; 'i. e., because they suggest the names Gothones and Get-ie. The former we have seen applied to the Prus- sians, both ancient and modem. Who applied it? The Prussians themselves? I think not. There is no proof of its being native. The real applicants were the Slavo- nians of their neighbourhood. Who used the term Tatsh-ving, with its modifications? The Tatsh-vings themselves? There is no proof of this. The only populations who can be shewn to have used it were the Slavonians of their frontier. Is the identification of it with the word GetcB a mere fancy of mine? Far from it. So early an authority as Xadlubek writes, "Sunt autem Pollexiani; Getarwm seu Prussorum genus, gens atrocissima," &c. How far did the Yatsh-ving area originally extend? This is unknown. Were they the most southern of the Lithuanians? I thiak not. What was the early ethno- logy of Volhynia? The history of Volhynia begins late. It cannot be shewn, then, that the language was origiaally Lithuanic. But it can be shewn that the earliest lan- guage known to have been spoken ia Volhynia was an intrusive and recent one — ^viz., the Cumanian Turlc. Now, south of Volhynia, this root Got-, Get, Gut, Tatsh, &c., reappears; the author ia whom we find it being Ta- citus. The Gothvni of Tacitiis along with the Osi and some others, lie at the back of the Marcomanni and QuadL This means north of Moravia and Hungary. Their language separates them from the Germans. That of the Osi is the Pannonian ; that of the Gothini, the Gal- lic — "Gothiaos Gallica, Osos Pannonica Ungua arguit THE GOTHINI. 239 non esse Germanos." {Germania, -43.) He continues, " They pay tribute (partly to the Quadi, partly to the Sarmatians), as men of a different stock {alienigence). The Gothini -work in iron mines. The; smaller part oc- cupy the level ; the greater, the hilly and wooded districts. This fixes the Gothini in some part of the Carpathians — the GalUcian portion, For I argue here, as I did in the case of the Prussian (Pryttisc or Prytskaya) lan- guage when it was called British (Bryttisc or Britslcaya). Haviag no reason for believing that the name Halitsch, (the Slavonic form of Gallicia) is one whit less ancient than the names Gallia, Britannia, Italia, Hellas, &c., I translate Gallica by GalUcian; considering that the same similarity, with the same likelihood of creatiag error, between words as like as the form out of which Gallicia grew, and that out of which the Romans formed Gain and the Greeks TaXaTai, existed in the time of Tacitus as now. Who used the name Gothini? The Gothini them- selves ? There is no proof of this. The population through which it reached the Roman was most probably Sarma- tian, the population that lay between the Gothinian and the Roman frontier — the population that imposed the tribute and made the Gothini work for them in the mines of GaUicia. The Prussian, the Yatsh-ving, and the Gothinian di- visions of the Lithuanic branch have no longer a separate existence, characterized by the criterion of language or nationality. They cannot, indeed, be considered as extinct : inasmuch as much of their blood must be 240 THE LITHUAMTANS AND LETTS. mixed up with that of certain Prussians, Poles, and Gallicians. The tribes we next come to are Lithuanic in language as well as in blood. They fall into two divisions — the Lithuanicm and the Lett. 1. The distribution of the Lithuanians is as follows : InKovno 568,794 Vihia 138,320 Coiurland 7,434 Grodno 2,-338 716,886 2. The Lett population, on the other hand, runs thus : In Courland 401,939 Livonia 318,872 Vitepsk 142,497 Kovno 6,341 St Petersburg 2,000 Pskov 458 872,107 Total of Lithuanians 716,886 Letts 872,107 1,588,993 To these add some members of the same stock in East Prussia; who are, however, to be looked upon as Letts THE LETTS. 241 or Lithuanians lying beyond, to the western boundary of Russia, rather than as descendants of the true old Prussians. It should also be added that there is a great deal of Lithuania and Let blood beyond the area of the Lithuar nian and Let languages. Grodno, for instance, is essen- tially a Lithuania district — as are parts of MinsL I cannot find that any form of the name Qoth-, &a., has ever been apphed to any of these more eastern Lithuanians. It is only with those who can reasonably be considered as having been in contact with some part of the Slavonic area that we notice it. The distinction between the Lets and Lithuanians lies in the character of their political history, rather than in any material difference in their ethnology. The physical appearance and the original Pagan creed are much the same with each. The difference of language is notable — ^but still of no very great importance. The political development gives the characteristics. The Lets — i. e., the Courlanders and livonians — lay in the same line as the Old Prussians, and it was the stream of invasion from Germany that was forced upon them. It was an Order, too, by which they were converted to Christianity — ^the Order of the Knights of the Sword. This nomenclature assists our memory — since it points to the Crusades shewing the extent to which, whilst the rest of Europe was Christian, Prussia and Let-land were Pagan. It was a German Order that reduced Let-land ; and hence the difference between Courland and Livonia on the one side, and East and West Prussia on the other, is only M 242 THE LETTS. a matter of degree. Both are German, so far as they are other than Lithuanic — Prussia to the extent of nine points in ten, Let-land to (say) three in ninfe, or some such smaller proportion. The towns of Let-land (Cour- land and South Livonia or Lief-land) are German ; e. g., Revel, Riga, and Mittau. The Lords of the soil are German. The serfs, and this is a land of serfage, are Let. There is a second point that distinguishes Let-land. The creed is Protestant. There is a third. Livonia was, at one time, a part of the Swedish dominions ; so that certain Swede elements help to differentiate the two branches imder comparison. The Let history is German rather than Polish ; the Lithuaniam, Polish rather than German. In 1386 the great Lithuanian Prince YageUon married Hedvig, Queen of Poland, and united the crowns; from which time downwards the political histories of the two coun- tries have been united. Of the two elements, the latter predominated — so that what is neither Lithuanic nor Russian in Lithuania is Polish. The pre-historic period of the Lithuanians* (and this means nearly the whole of the time anterior to YageUon) was probably that of so many other rude populations ; i. e., a period of numerous tribes, internal feuds, and small chieftains. * When speaking of the particular Lithuan-MTW of Vilna, Kovno, and Grodno (i. e., Lithuania Proper), I use this form; i.e., the form in -ian.. When speaking of the branch of the Sarmatian Stock to which they belong, I use the form in -ic — Lithuan-ic. THE GOTHIC HYPOTHESIS. 243 Of these, some one with a greater power of political organization than his predecessors and cotemporaries, rises above the rest, and consoUdates a nationality. The extent to which the Lets and Lithuanians are, at the present moment, fragments of a larger, population, is seen from the history of the Prussians and the Yatsh- vings ; for the Prussians and the Yatsh-vings were popu- lations of comparative importance. I hold, however, as the result of a considerable amount of neither impatient nor one-sided investigation, that aU the acts of aU the Old Prussians, and all the acts of all the Yatsh-vings, put together, are as nothing to the pre-historic actions of certain earlier members of this important and interesting stock. I claim for certain branches of it all that comes under what I call the Gothic hypothesis in the first instance, and, in the second, all that is deducible from the Podolian. I give these names simply because they are convenient. Li a work like the present, where I am only ambitious of putting iQ an intelligible form the extent to which I differ from the generality of ethnologists and historians, I find this a compact way of expressing myself The Gothic Hypothesis. — If the reader will now bear iu mind the remarks of the 14th chapter, upon the absence of any evidence to the existence of any Ger- man tribe having called itself Goth so long as it remained within the limits of Germany, and the further statement that that (or any similar) name only attaches itself to any German population when that population becomes occupant of the country of the Getce, he will, to a great extent, anticipate my doctrine. He wiU not only see that the so-called Moeso-goths, Ostro-goths, and Visi- M 2 244 THE GOTHIC HYPOTHESIS. goths were Goths only in tte way that Alfred was a Briton, or Santa Anna a Mexican, but he will also see, that, saving and excepting such actions as are done by those particular Germans who can be traced to a Gothic (or Getic) occupancy, the whole history of the Gothic name must be transferred to some other family of man- kind. What was that family ? I answer, the Lithuanic, or (if we prefer the expression) the Prussian. It might, indeed, be called the Gothic, or Getic, the Gothonian, or Gothinian. This does not mean that Goth- (or Get-) was the name by which the Lithuanians designated themselves. It was rather the name by which they were designated by their neighbours, when those neighbours were Slavonic. The reader has been prepared for this by the remarks that I have made in the several cases of the Prussians, the Yatsh-vings, and the Gothini, which were to that effect. The Lets, on the other hand, and the Lithuanians who had no Slavonians on their frontier, are never so denomi- nated. If all this be true, the interpretation of the different forms of the root Q-t must be that of the root W-l, in Wales. This (as we all know) means a native of certaia counties west of Hereford and Shrewsbury ; the counties of Carmarthen, Eadnor, Merioneth, &c. But, it is not, for that reason, a native name. It is no Welsh word at alL It is German ; and in more countries than one, where a German and a non-German population come in contact, the German uses it to denote his opposite. It applies to Italy ; which, in the eyes of the Tyrolese, is Wales, He calls it Welsh-land. It applies to the Wal- THE GOTHIC HYPOTHESIS. 245 loon of the Forest of Ardennes who is a Welsh-man also. All these are Welsh. ; not because they are really so, but because the Germans so call them. Hence, the true inference from the remarkable distribution of this name, and its appearance at distant points, is the presence of a German population in the neighbourhood of its occurrence. The words before us can supply a further illustration. They are all forms of the root W-l, in Anglo-Saxon Wealh ( = stra/nger, ahorigmal Briton, &c.). Eut they differ in form. The same takes place with the root Q-t ; which is Goth-, Get-, Yatsh, and much more beside. What are limits to these changes ? To this I answer, that it is not I who bring under the same category the Goth, the Gete, the Gothonian, the Gothinian, the Jute of Jut-l&nd, the Yatsh-viag, the Vite* of Vit-hkd, and 8ven (occasionally) the Jut of India^ Current opinion identifies the maj ority of them. The most out-lying have some respectable name that guarantees their Gothicism. There is authority for all this, good or bad, as the case may be ; authority which I allude to for the sake of nar- rowing the limits of my new position; 'this position being — That wherever we have, at one and the same time, a probable form of the root G-t, and along with it a certain amount of evidence to the existence of a Slavonian po- pulation in the neighbourhood, and (along with that) signs of Lithuanic occupancy, which, taken by themselves, would be doubtful or insufficient, the conjunction of the three * Compare FiZhelmus with GMZielmus=TFiH-iam. 246 THE GOTHIC HTPOTHESIS. criteria determines the Lithuanic diaracter of the area or population to which they apply. The results of this line of criticism give us the details of the Gothic hypothesis; the cumulative character on which it rests being specially pointed out. Taken by itself the presumed form of the root G-t may be unsa- tisfactory. So may the evidence of the Slavonic area m the neighbourhood. So may the signs of Lithuanic oc- cupancy. But, taken conjointly, the evidence of the three criteria becomes sufficient. Before this doctrine takes its application, I will ex- plain what is meant by — The Fodoltan Hypothesis. The sketch of the cri- ticism which demurs to the doctrine of the Asiatic origin of the languages of Europe allied to the Sanskrit, is re- ferred to. It has its place in the 14th chapter, along with that on the word Ootk. It prepares us for the ne- cessity of pointing out some portion of Europe where such a language as that of the ancient literature of India, along with its cognate forms in Persia, is supposed to have originally developed itself This must fulfil certain conditions. It must lie in contact with the Slavono-Li- thuanic area, but it must lie beyond it It must lie on the south and east thereof, rather than on the west and north. But it must not lie so far south as to impinge upon the area that the reconstruction of the original situs of the tongues alUed to the Circassian and the other languages of Caucacus requires; nor yet so far east as to interfere with the western frontier of the Ugrian area. It must lie in a district in which a great amount of sub- sequent displacement has taken place. Lastly, it must THE PODOLIAJSr HYPOTHESIS. 247 lie where no other language can claim a priority of oc- cupancy. The Government of Podolia best satisfies these conditions — the conditions (mark the phrase) of a provi- eioTial and hypothetical localization. It does not profess to be historical. It merely satisfies certain conditions. Given, that the probability of the Sanskrit and its allied forms of speech having originated in Europe and having been propagated to Asia, is greater than that of the Sla- vonic, Lithuanic, German, Latin, and Greek languages having origiaated hx Asia and extended to Europe — given, also, the fact that the relations of the Sanskrit to the Sarmatian tongues are greater than to the German, Greek, and Latin — what is the likeliest spot for the San- skrit to have originally occupied? Podolia seems a strange answer : but any other name would (I imagiue) be equally so. It may be thought unnecessarily precise. Perhaps, it is. It is laid, however, before the reader on the principle that "truth comes easier out of error than confusion." I have no objection to any one substi- tuting for it Volhynia, or Minsk, or Kiev. Such a refinement would be a mere matter of detail. Let him only commit himself to some possible situs, and consider it simply in relation to the facts of the case before him. This, however, is not what is done. For reasons too lengthy to exhibit, it has come to be a generally received rule amongst investigators, that as long as we bring our migration from east to west we may let a very Httle evi- dence go a very long way ; whereas, as soon as we reverse the process, and suppose a Hne fi:om west to east, the con- verse becomes requisite, and a great deal of evidence is to go but a little way. The effect of this has been to 248 THE PODOLIAN HYPOTHESIS. create innumerable Asiatic hypotheses, and few or no European ones. Russia may have been peopled from Persia, or Lithuania from Hindostan, or Greece from Asia, or any place west of a given meridian from any place east of it — ^but the converse, never. No one asks for proofs in the former case ; or if he do, he is satisfied with a very scanty modicum : whereas, iu the latter, the best authenticated statements undergo stringent scrutiny. Inferences fare worse. They are hardly allowed at all. It is all "theory and hypothesis" if we resort to them in cases from west to east; but it is no "theory" and no "hy- pothesis" when we follow the sun and move westwards. The result of putting the two lines of migration on a level is the European origui of the Sanskrit language, and, as a means of its iutroduction iato Asia, a pre-histo- ric Slavono-Lithuanic conquest of India — a Mussia/n conquest if we like to call it so, a Russian conquest any number of centuries B.C. The words Fodoliom hypo- thesis express this briefly, and (so) conveniently. At any rate, they are measures of the extent to which the author who uses them eschews indefinitude, and puts his views, whether right or wrong, in an intelligible and tangible form. Turning from the east to the north, we now take cog- nizance of certaiu phenomena connected with the root G-t on the Baltic. In more than one of the North- German and Polish localities we have noticed it already. The Gfuddon of Prussia, and the Fate^vings to the south of the Guddon,hajYe been noticed — ^both, more or less, on the water-system of the Vistula. That these were not Ger- mans, and that they were Lithuanic, has been stated, per- GOTHS, ETC., OF SCANDINAVIA. 249 haps, more than sufEciently. But there are other Goths besides. There are those who gave their name to the island (roiMand; those who gave their name to the two Swedish Provinces of East and West Goth-\a.nd; those who gave their name to Jut-la.nd ; and those who gave the name to Vith-es-\ajid (or the land of the Vitce), to the Danish islands. The Geats belonged to some of these divisions. I claim all this as Lithuanic; and, if I do so without going far into the proof, I find my excuse in the nature of the reasoning employed. It is eminently simple. Deduce the legitimate consequences from the Non-German character of the Goths and all the rest follows as a matter of common sense. Not that there is any want of special facts. On the contrary, there they are very numerous — ^numerous enough to decide the question in the absence of any preconceived hypo- thesis. But a certain preconceived hypothesis has never yet been absent — ^that being the German origin of every- thing that had a name beginning with G and ending in T, with a vowel between them. More than one passage in the older Norse literature notifies the difference between the Swedes and the Goths. More than one deity is common to the Scandinavian and Lithuanic mythologies; e. g., PerJcunos and Fiorgyn, Prowa and Freya. More than one (or one hundred) words are at one and the same time Scandinavian, Lithuanic, and Non-Ger- man. Some of these are of no small interest; inasmuch as they occur in our own language ; having come in from a land sufficiently Lithuanic to be called Jut-\a,nd — womcm being one of these words; ale, another. M 3 250 GOTHS, ETC., OF SCANDINAVIA. Of course, all this, and the like of it, can be explained differently, and made compatible with the German hypo- thesis. It can ; but the German hypothesis is unfounded, inasmuch as its basic assumption has been cut away from under it. Pari passu with the Lithuanic movements from Prussia there went on certain Slavonic ones from Meck- lenberg, Pomerania, and Holstein. This is no mere as- sumption for the sake of accounting for the forms in g-t. In Holstein the evidence of a Slavonic occupancy is his- toric. It is all but historic in the island Laaland. It is an inference from more thail one local name (Wend- syssel and Sleeve) in North Jutland. What was Tiot Lithuanic is as remarkable as what was. Norway was not so — or, if it were, but slightly. In Nor- \ way, where the archEeologist finds no traces of what he calls his Bronze Period, the ethnologist finds no Goths — none of those tribes who, as early as the time of Ta- citus, are said to use clubs rather than iron — varus ferri frequens fustium usus. Such is the probable pre-historic history of a popu- lation now sunken and reduced, a population to which I refer the earliest navigators of the North as well as the earliest conquerors of the East. THE SERVIANS. 251 CHAPTER XVII. THE SAEMATIAK STOCK OOHTINnED — THE SEKTIAHS, BUIGAKIAKS, AND POLES. The Servians. — The early ethnology of Servia seems to have been simple. There were changes in certaia de- tails of the frontier; changes by which the Slavonic area may have encroached on the Albanian, changes by which the Albanian may have encroached on the Sla- vonic. There were also details in respect to the Greeks of Macedonia. None, however, are of great importance. Neither were the influences of the Eoman period. Of all the districts of the Danube, the reduction of Ser- via (or Upper Moesia) seems to have been the least complete. When the seat of government was changed, and By- zantium became Constantiaople, the influence of Rome increased — ^but then the Rome was only a nominal one. It was Greek and ^Christian, rather than Italian and Pagan; the Christianity being that of the Greek Church. This was extended to Bulgaria and Servia, and along with it the old Slavonic alphabet, founded upon 252 THE SEEVIAIJS. the Greek and called Cyrillic, from St. Cyril, the Apostle of the Slavonians. As Greek and Christian, Servia continued to be more or less Byzantine until the fourteenth century; when it took its place as a separate substantive kingdom imder Stephan Dushan, who died A.D. 1355. This is the brilliant period of Servian history; the dependence upon Constantinople having been shaken off, and the career of Turk conquest having, as yet, to develop itself By A.D. 1398, it had reached Servia ; and from the defeat of the Servians on the field of Kossova to the present time, the political history of Servia has gone along with that of Turkey ; though less since it was declared a separate though tributary principality, than before. The Servian of Servia, the typical or Ultra-Servian, must be a very pure and unmixed division of the Slavo- nic branch of the Sarmatian stock. The Servian nation- ality, too, is of a very definite kind. That of the Mon- tenegriners approaches it the closest. The name is, more or less, general as well as special ; as we have already seen. Within the PrincipaUty itself, the dialects are three — one, more or less, central ; a second spoken ia Northern Servia and Southern Hungary; the third m Western and Southern Servia. This latter ex- tends, with but slight variations, over Bosnia, Herzego- vinia, and Montenegro. On the Hungarian frontier a Servian is called Ratsh (Racz); and that by the Slovaks as well as the Majiars. This is important, because it shews that the word is Slavonic, and suggests a meaning to more forms than one like it — Bhcd-ia,, Eug-ii, Rug-ea, and JSuQ'-en-walde. THK BULGARUNS. 253 In Styria, Carinthia, and Camiola, Servian as is the language in its essentials, it changes its current denomi- nation and is called Slovenian. Here the creed is Ro- manist, and a common scienUfic name for the language is Illyria/n. Say that in Styria and on the frontier of Bulgaria we find the two extremes of the Servian form of Slavonism — the one Servian in the strict sense of the word, the other Slovenian — the one Greek in creed, the other Ro- man — ^the one Austrian, the other either national or Turk — and we get, in Croatia, the transitional or inter- mediate forms. This shews that two lines of ethnological influence fi.-om different directions meet in the Servian arear — one Greek and Turk from the East, the other Roman and German from the West. The Servians — whether we use the word in its gene- ral or its more special sense — are distinguished in many points from — The Bulgarians. — The early history of these is ob- scure. Some portion of the Bulgarian migration was Turk ; some, perhaps, Ugrian. That the Bulg-axiaas came from the Volga is suggested by the name : but that they are necessarily, and for that reason, of the same stock with the Bulgarians of Kazan is by no means the true inference. The Roman elements that were engrafted on the original population of Moesia were further modified by the German occupancy of the Thervings and Grutungs from the parts northof the Danube, who were driven south- wards by the Huns in the reign of Valens. After the breaking-up of the power of AttUa, arose the first Bulgarian 254 THE BULGARIANS. kingdom, which lasted somewhat under 400 years ; be- ginning about 640, and ending 1017. At the begumiag of this period it was, probably, more Tiurk than Slave, at the end more Slave than Turk. At the begianing of it the Bulgarians were Pagan, at the end. Christian ; the general history of their conversion, (the e£fedi of their proximity to Constantinople,) being much the same as that of the Servians. The second Bulgarian kingdom was WaUaehian as well as Bulgarian ; not that the Wallachians and Mol- davians reduced the Bulgarians, or that the Bulgarians conquered the Danubian Principalities ; but that there was a vast amount of immigration from the northern bank of the Danube to the southern. This extended itself even to Macedonia and Thessaly, and partially to Bosnia and Albania. Hence, we have even, at the present moment, over and above the Kumanyos of the Danubian Priacipalities, the Rumanyos, Wallachians, or Vlakhs of Bulgaria, of Macedonia, and of Thessaly. After this, the bonds that connected Bulgaria with Constantinople became looser and looser until the Os- manH conquest incorporated Bulgaria with Eumelia — Moesia with Thrace — ^the parts north with the parts south of the Balkan. Since then Bulgaria has been Osmanli in its pohtical history, Slavonic in respect to its ethnology. Not, however, without more than one notable characteristic, as is to be expected from the mixed character of the blood. Thus — the language, although closely allied to the Servian and Russian, is the only Slavonic form of speech whereia we find the same phenomenon that the Scandi- THE POLES. 255 navian tongues of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, and the Feroe Islands give us amongst the German class ; viz., the so-called post-positive article, — i. e., the article at the end of the word as an affix. Thus, if bord (in Danish) mean table, the compound bordret means the table. Sol = Swn ; Sol-en = the Sun, &c. Now, this is Bulgarian also — Bulgarian, but not Russian; Bulgar- rian but not Servian; Bulgarian, but not Slovak, Polish, Tshekh, or aught else. On the other hand, it is Walla- chian ; and it is, more or less, Albanian also. The Poles. — The chief fact in the ethnology of the Poles is its extreme character ; inasmuch as either they or the Bohemians are the types of the Western as opposed to the Eastern Slavonians. Like that of the Servians their blood is comparatively pure and unmixed ; at least, in the western parts of the area. Like the Carinthians, Camiolans, Styrians, and Slovaks, their line of ethnolo- gical and historical influences has run from west to east, being — ^poHtically and ecclesiastically — German and Ro- man, rather than Turk or Greek. Silesia, Lusatia, and Brandenburg seem to give us the ddest Polish occupancies. The reasons for going thus far westwards are common to the ethnology of both Poland and Lithuania. They have been already noticed. It can now be added, that I find no facts in the special ethnology of the early Poles, that complicate the view taken in respect to the southward and westward exten- sion of the early Prussians and Yatshvings. On the contrary, the special facts, such as they are, are confir- matory rather than aught else of the western origm, and the eastern dvredion, of a PoUsh line of encroachment, 256 THE POLES. migration, occupancy, displacement, invasion, or con- quest. Under the early kings of the blood of Piast (an individual, by the way, wholly unhistoric), the locality for their exploits and occupancies is no part of the coun- try about the present capital, Warsaw, but the district round Posen and Gnesen ; this being the area to which the earliest legends attach themselves; the parts east of the "Vistula coming-in later. Where this is not the case, where the Duchy of Posen or Prussian Poland does not give us the earliest signs of PoUsh occupancy, the parts about Cracow do. At any rate, the legends lie in thp west and south rather than in the east ; on the Saxon or the Bohemian frontier rather than the Lithuanic. The evidence of language points ia the same direction. Dialectual varieties increase as we go westwards, decrease as we go eastwards. But it is not from the parts about Posen alone that we deduce the whole of the pre-historic Polish movements. Both history and induction tell us that Brandenburg, Silesia, Lusatia, Saxony, Mecklenburg, Pomerania, and even Luneburg were (if not absolutely Polish) Slavonic of the Polish type. In all these coxmtries, the stream of German encroachment has enlarged itself, and effected displacements, obHterations, and amalgamations, at the expense of the original Slavonism. Nevertheless, in Upper and Lower Lusatia, and in the Circle of Cotbus in Brandenburg, the Slavonic of the Sorabians or Sorbs, still exists. So does the Kasub in Pomerania. So, imtil lately, did the Linonian in Luneburg. Hence the ethnology of the Poles is that of a popula- tion encroached upon in one direction, encroaching in THE POLES. 257 another. The Germans displaced or intermixed Tvith them; they — ^the Poles — displaced or intermixed with the Lithuanians. Where is the blood the purest? In the parts about Posen. In Brandenburg, &c., it is more Polish than the language, the language being German. In the Duchy of Warsaw, on the other hand, the blood is, more or less, Lithuanic, the language being Polish. In the pre-eminently Pohsh parts of Poland the blood must (as ia the UltrarServian parts of Servia) be as pure as any in Europe; the original population being in situ and with a minimv/m, of disturbance. Too far east for the German, too far west for the Russian and Tmrk occupancies, too far south for the Scandinavian, and too far north for the Roman, it lies beyond the pale of any known conquest ; and this is what we can say of few locahties besides. The Mongol iuroads can have done but little. Liegnitz in Silesia was their extreme point ; and although Liegnitz in Silesia be a poiut that lies far west for a wave of conquest from the Wall of Chiaa to have impiuged upon, it is, nevertheless, south of the Duchy of Posen. So that the Duchy of Posen is that part of Poland; in which I can find nothing but what is Pohsh. Of the Kasub fragment of the original Pohsh popu- lation of Pomerania I can give no good account. The SUesian and Brandenburg Poles are represented, however, by the present Sorbs, Serbs, Srbs, or Sora- bians, in the parts about Cotbus and Bautzen. The upper drainage of the River Spree gives us their geogra- phical area. There are two dialects of their tongue; spoken, according to Schaffarik by — 258 THE SORABIANS. Upper Lusatians 98,000 Lower Lusatians 44000 142,000 They are the descendants of the Milcieni and Lusici of the middle-age writers, Lusatia beiag said to take its name from the word Luzha — fen, or moor. Bautzen was the capital of the MUcieni — ^inthe Slavonic, ^itciitsm. The origiaal Lusatia coincided with the parts between the Black Elster and the Spree. It was a March or Border, and has since extended itself over part of the country of the Milcieni. Of the two Sorabian dialects, one uses g where the other uses h — ^just what the Poles and Bohemians do. This may be seen from the following table : — English. U.Lusatian.L.Ltjsatian. Bohemiait. Polish. Bum horicz gorSsch horeti gorec. Bending horbatfi garbaty hrbaty garbaty Goose husa guss husa ges Dove hoib golb holub golab Caterpillar huaancza gusaenza housenka gasienica Never nihd§ nigdy nihdy nigdy Foot noha noga noha noga Fire wohen wog6n oh6n ogien God boh bog buh b6g Bank broh brog breh brzez See Schneider's QramimMik der Wendischen (Sora- bian) Sprache — Bautzen, "1853. The fragments of the Sorabians He on the Spree ; those of the Polabingians, on the Lower Elbe — i. e., m Lune- burg. Their name fixes them to the Elbe ; since po = on, and Ldba = Mbe. The termination -ing is German. As this name may apply to more than one tribe pro- THE SOEABIANS. 259 vided it lie on the particular river that the name sug- gests, the exact Polabingian (or Polabisk) localities are un- certain. One was in Lauenburg; another in Luneburg, the tribe there settled being the Linones, Lini, or Linoges. Such are the members of the Polish divisioii of the Western Slavonians, whose languages either still exist or have become extinct but lately — the Luneburg Slaves, the Kasub or Pomeranian Slaves, and the Serb or Lusatian Slaves being but isolated fragments of a once continuous population. When this was in its fiill integrity, when Brandenburg and Mecklenburg, when Lauenburg and Holstein, when Saxony and Anhalt — ^indeed, when all the paxts east and many of the parts west of the Saale were Slavonic — ^the populations were as follows : — Beginning with the northern frontier of Saxony and the parts about Leipzig, we find between the Elbe and the Mxilde, the Baleminzi with their fourteen towns ; Dalmatians, as their name becomes in some authors. Close upon these, and along with them, the Chutizi, the GoUd/ici, and the SiusU, may be considered as the repre- sentatives of the older Seinnones. Safely, then, and truly may we say, that if the Polish area have extended itself eastwards it has receded on the west. Hence, as the Pole has been to the Lithuanian, so has the German been to the Pole. That Pole is a common rather than a 'proper name, has been already stated. It means an occupant of a level or champaigne country. This makes the term incon- venient, since a Pole in one sense may be anything but a Pole in another. In the particular case before us there is a second name in the field — Lehh. This is the more 260 POLE AND LEKH. native name of the two ; since the relationship between the Polish and Bohemian sections of the Western Slaves is expressed in the eponymic legend that " Tshek and Lekh were brothers." More important is the fact that, word for word, Lelch is the same as the Lyg-ii of Tacitus and Ptolemy — some of which, at' least, name for name, and place for place, were Poles. With the Semnones, then, and with the Lygii, the Slavonians of Saxony, Lu- satia, Brandenburg, and Poland make their appearance in the field of history, as the true owners of what the German conquest converted iato Saxony. The Sordbi, along with the Milci&nii and Lusici already mentioned, are, more or less, in this same category. Then, lying east of the Elbe and Oder, as occupants of what is now Brandenburg and Mecklenburg, came the Hevelli (on the Revel), the Smeldi/ngi, the Bethenici, the Brizcmi and Stodercmi, the Dosscmi, the Morizcmi, the Warnabi, the Liubuzzi, JJori, Luticzi, and several others — whQst Holstein gives us the Wagrians, Schwe- rin the Obotrites, and the Isle of Rugen the Rugicms. THE EUMANTOS. 261 CHAPTER XVIII. THE RUMANTOS OF WALLAOHIA, MOLDAVIA, EESSAEABIA, ETC. The name Wallachicm is by no means native. It is Slavonic and Eomaic (modem Greek) ; the forms being Olalch. It is also Turk ; for tbe Turks call Wallachia, Ak-iflak, or White — and Moldavia, Kara-i/?afc, or Black — Wallachia. The Majiar form is OhJi. It is also German ; and, perhaps, this is what it was originally. If so, it is the same word as Welsh, and Wal- loon, and the same as Valais in Switzerland ; in which case it means, in the mouth of a German, any population different from the one to which he himself belongs — i. e., any TMrn-German population. Who, however, were the Germans who gave this name, a name which the Slavo- nians, Greeks, and Turks have all adopted? Was it the Germans of Transylvania who entered that country in the latter half of the 12th century ? The name occurs in Byzantine history too early for this. Was it the Grutungs and Thervings who, after their expulsion by the Huns, settled in the Roman province of Moesia, 262 THE RUMANTOS. and played so prominent a part in the later Eoman his- tory under the inconvenient names of Ostrogoths and Visigoths ? Perhaps. At any rate, however, the name is not native. The name by which a Wallachian, a Moldavian, or a Bessarabian designates himself, is a name which we find, in some form or other, widely spread elsewhere, in a variety of forms, and with no slight latitude of meaning. It is the name the Gipsies give themselves ; which is Romracmi. It is the name of the Modem Greek language ; which is Romaic. It is the name of the language of the Grisons ; which is Rumonsch. It is the name of the old JJoTnowice language of France. It is the name of that part of European Turkey which corresponds with ancient Thrace, and of which Constan- tinople is the capital, — Rumelia. It is the name of a large portion of Asia Minor — Roum. It is a name as honourable as it is widely spread; for wherever we find it it reminds us of the old sovereignty of Eome. The Gipsies spread over Europe from one of the chief Roman localities — ^little in the way of anything ap- pertaining to Rome as they otherwise can boast of. The modem Greeks identify themselves with the Romans of the Eastern Empire ; so that the tongue of Homer and Pericles takes its modem denomination from the metropo- lis of Virgil and Cicero. This same connection with the Eastern Romans (RomMn here meaning Greek) gives us the names Roum and EmneHa. The ^(^risons and the THE RUALA.NYOS. 263 Romance country were not only Eoman provinces, but the languages were of Roman origin also. And this is the case with Wallachia and Moldavia, and also with a notable portion of Bukhovinia, Transylvania, Hungary, and Bulgaria. The populations of these parts, who are neither Slavonians nor Majiars (nor yet Germans), caU themselves Rv/mcmyo OTBoman; the claim to so honour- able a name being attested by their language, which is a descendant of the Latia; as truly as the Itahan, Spanish, Portuguese, and French. When Dacia was reduced by the Romans under Trajan, a Roman nationality along with the Latin language was introduced. If so, the Ru- manyos are no instances of a pinre stock ; and, although the blood they boast is good, it is far from unmixed. Their language, separating them from the Slavonians, connects them with the most civilized countries of West- em Europe; though it is nearly unintelligible beyond the boundaries of the ancient Dacia^ Then it is strangely disguised in the writing and printiag; inasmuch as the Rumanyo alphabet is Russian. This is as if Latin were written in. Greek characters. The creed is that of the Greek Church. Numbers within the limits of the Russian Empire — In the Government of Podolia 7,429 Ekaterinoslav . 9,858 Kherson 75,000 In the District of Bessarabia ... 406,182 498,469 Say, that in round numbers, there are half a million 264 SPECIMENS OF THE EUMANTO LANGUAGE. Eumanyos who are absolute subjects to the Czar, and we do it without taking cognizance of the Rumanyos of the Danubian Principalities, of the Rumanyos under Austria, of the Eumanyos of Bulgaria and Macedonia — for there are Rumanyos thus far beyond the proper Rumanyo area. In Transylvania the Rumanyos are to the Majiars as nine to seven ; the population for that province being — Rumanyos 900,000 Majiars 700,000 Germans 250,000 Slavonians — say Greeks, Armenians, I 206,000 Jews, Gipsies — say 2,056,000 The Wallachian statistics I am unable to supply. Probably, the population of the PrincipaHties is not less than 2,000,000. The following specimens of the language, from Schott's Walachische Mcerchen, shews the extent to which it re- sembles the Latin : 1. RUMAUTO. LATnr. Bela in larga valle ambll,, Puella in larga valle ambulabat, Erba verde lin calc^ ; Herbam viridem leniter calcabat, Canta, qui cantand plange^, Cantabat, et cantando plangebat. Quod t6ti munti resunL TTt omnes monies resonarent : Ea in genunchi se puneEk, Ilia in genua se ponebat, Ocbi in sus indLrepta ; Oculos sursum dirigebat ; Ecce, asi vorbe faoei : Ecce, sic verba feeiebat: Domne, domne,bunedomne. Domine, domine, bone domine. SPECIMENS OF THE BITMANTO LANGUAGE. 265 RUMANTO. Nucu, fagu, frassinu Mult se certs, intra s§ne. Nuce, dice frassinu, Quine vine, nuci cullege, Cullegend si ramuri frange: Yaide dar de pelle a tua! Dar tu fage, mi vecine. Que voi spune iu m§nte tene : Multe fere saturasi ; Qui-pr6b6ne nu amblasi; Quum se au geru apropiat La pament te au si culcat. Si in focu te au si aruncat, etc. LATIN. Nux, fagus, fraxinus, Multum certant inter se. Nux, dicit fraxinus Quisquis venit, nuces legit, CoUigendo ramos frangit : Vae itaque pelli tuse! At tu fege, mi vicine. Quae exponam mente tene 1 Multas feras saturasti, At baud bene ambulasti ; Quum gelu appropinquat Ad pavimentum te deculcant Ad focum projiciunt. The following words do the same : ENGLISH. EUMANTO. LATIN. Man (the) Omil. Homo, Heaven. Ceriu. Coelum. Moon. Luna. Luna. Mountain. Munte. Mont. Lake. Lacu. Lacus. Sea. Mare. Mare. Bank. Eipa. Eipa, River. Kiru. Bivus. Smoke. Fumu. Fumus. Spark. Schinte. Scintilla. Light. TnimiTifi. Lumen, Shadow. Umbra. Umbra. Wind. Ventu. Ventus. Lightning. Fulger. Fulgur. Water. Apa. Aqua. This list, taken from Schott, might be enlarged to any amount. I draw attention, however, to only the first N 266 SPECIMENS OF THE EUMANTO LANGTJAGK and last words in it. In the word ovtwd we have Aomo ille; i. e., a substantive with the postpositive article, already noticed. In apa, as contrasted with agua, we have a change of some interest, both on account of the regularity of its occurrence in Eumanyo, and its re-occur- rence in one of the I^on-laiin dialects of Italy. Thus — The Roman nox is in Eumanyo Tiopte = night. lac lapte = milk.' ■ pectus peptu = breast. In like manner, The Roman quis is in Oscan pis qui piei. quid pid. quod pud. quos pus, &c. In lite manner, too, and with equal regularity, in a still more distant class of languages, The Irish ceatha/r is the Welsh pedwa/r =four. kuig pump = Jive. Does this change — i. e., the one in Rumanyo — vindicate the Oscan character of the Legionaries (soldiers) who oc- cupied the Roman province of Dacia? This is a point I raise rather than answer. The early ethnology of Western Wallachia is that of Eastern Transylvania; the only difference being that the Majiar conquest of Hungary has effected certain recent modifications in the latter country. It was origiaally Slavonic; Slavonic after the manner of the ancestors of the Servians id the south; Slavonic after the manner of the ancestors of the Ruthenians ia the north; Slavonic of an intermediate and transitional character in the cen- THE RUMANTOS. 267 tre. In the east there was a certain" amount of early Getic modification; and in the west a probably Slovak influence from the area of the Western, as opposed to the Eastern, Slavonians. But the two important displace- ments were those effected by the Turks and the Romans ; the latter in. the time of Trajan (A.D. 106), the former at different times and in a complex manner. Thus — ^the old Agathyrsans must have occupied some portion of the present Rumanyo area. The H\ms and Avars were more or less similar occu- pants. Certain Bulgarians — Slavonic, Ugrian, Turk, Roman, and Goth, in imdefined proportions — were the same. So were the Petshenegs; one of the forms of which name (Bessi) is stiU preserved in the word Bess- arabia. On the other hand, the Grutungs and Thervings, some of whom must have occupied Rumanyo ground, were German, ■ Add to this, that Majiar elements can scarcely be wanting; inasmuch as the Principalities lie between the original Majiar area towards the south of the Uralian range and the present Majiar occupancy on the Danube. The early history (properly so-caUed, and as opposed to the ethnology) of the Rumanyo districts is obscure ; since they lay too far north of Constantinople to get much notice. It followed, however, that of the first Bulgarian kingdom, of which the Rumanyo country was a part; the Him period having immediately preceded. Then, in the tenth century, came the Majiar invasion; the current ac- count of this being to the effect, that the Majiars fled be- n2 268 THE RUMANTOS. fore the Petshenegs, a,nd that the Petshenegs ruled as far as the Aluta, until the Uz and Cumanians pressed upon them. But little of this rests upon satisfactory evidence. Three nations, however, each representing a different family of mankiad, seem to have taken part ia the Ru- manyo history of the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries — ^the Turk Petshenegs, the Ugrian Majiars, and the, more or less, Slavonic Bulgarians. Towards the end of the thirteenth century (say A.D. 1290) we find something like a Eumanyo nationality; for WaUachia, at least. The great Mongol inroads of the Temuginian period had passed over, when a Transylva- nian, Eadul the Black, consoUdated a WaJlachian Prin- cipality, extending from the Upper Aluta to the Sereth. Moldavia took form later. A.D. 1352, however, may be put down for the establishment of the preponderance of the Rumanyos over the Petsheneg Turks. Here, there is something like a period of power and independence — power more or less organized, and inde- pendence more or less perfect Bulgaria no longer en- croaches from the south, and the Petsheneg power is broken up. Hungary, however, is more powerful than ever, and Poland is stretching itself from the Dnieper towards the Danube. Each of these powers has some share, great or little, material or moral, in the Rumanyo history of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fiteenth cen- turies. In 1526, the great battle of Mohacz (Mohatsh) subordinated WaUachia and Moldavia to the power of the Osmanli Turks, then the occupants of Constanti- nople and the terror of Eastern Europe. The Rumanyo migration into and beyond Biilgaria, THE BUMANTOS. 269 during the Byzantine period, has been already mentioned. This gives us, over and above the Wallachians and Mol- davians Proper, whose speech is called, in scientific lan- guage, Daco-Wallachian — The Rumanyos of Macedonia, whose speech in similar scientific language is the Macedono-Wallachian. An- other name for this branch is. Kutzo-Wallachian. These fall into — a. The northern branch, occupying a portion of the tnountain-range between Macedonia and Albania. h. The central branch, between Thessaly and Albania; moimtaiaeers of the Piudus range. c. The southern branch, between Boeotia and South- em Albania. The Danubian Principalities took their Christianity from Bulgaria, and Bulgaria from Greece — the time of the Eumanyo conversion being the ninth and tenth cen- turies. Anterior to this, however, there may, or there may not, have been a slight infusion of Christian doc- trine ia the time of the Grutungs and Thervings. The most general characteristic of the Rumanyos is their language. This distinguishes them at once from all other populations — ^both near and distant. Next to this, comes their creed ; characteristic of a Eumanyo as opposed to a Majiar, but not distinctive of a Rumanyo as compared with a Bulgarian. Their dress, their domestic architecture (humble as it is), and their habits, supply other differentice. In respect to figure, thfey are dark and oval-faced, with prominent features and fairly-constructed frames — more tall than short Their resemblance to the Dacian figures on Trajan's pillar has been enlarged upon 270 THE EUMANYO SUPERSTITIONS. by several good observers. Their Christianity is still re- dolent of heathenism. I have before me a list of Wal- lachian deities, demons, gemi, or whatever else they may be called. At the head of it stand Smou and Smeone, mother and son. Smou, the son, is compared by Schott to the German Riibezahl. He can change his shape, and visit men in any form he likes. He does so some- times, and makes love to mortal maidens incognito. Hjs dweUing is underground. Here his mother, Smeone^ keeps house for him; upon the whole, being the better disposed being of the two; for Smou, though possibly more good than bad, is fickle and odd-tempered. It is his mother who keeps him steady and good-humoured. Smou is as much good as bad; but Baldurw is a being of unmodified evil The fens, the bogs, the rocks, the glens, and the caverns, are his residences; and when men pass by any of these more suspicious-looking than usual, they tremble lest Balduru should lay hold of them. Vilva is Wallachian, and Slavonic as weU; in name, wholly; in attributes, but partially. In Servia she is the dark-eyed maiden of the night, with hair black and flowing, and eyes black and bright. In Wallachia she is half-dragon and half-snake— fearful to look on. How- ever, each is the goddess of the sky ; presiding over the clouds, and air, and aU the skiey influences. Sina is the Goddess of Hunting; Sina, who is aJso called Dina and Diana. She may safely be identified with the Latin Diana. But it is by no means so safe to derive her from Italy. The Bohemians, far beyond the nfluehces of Rome, had also a Diana, of which the clas- THE EUMANYO StTPEESTITIONS. 271 sical mythologists take too little cognizance. In like manner the Indian scholar ignores the fact of the Poles, in the pagan period, having had a Veshna and Zhieva. Such, however, is the cSse. I believe that this is one of the many facts which the Podolian hypothesis requires to be read ba,ckwards ; i. e., to take a converse interpreta- tion to the usual one applied to it The Mwma padiiura, the Mother of the woods, is more gbod than bad, more kind than vicious, more old than young. When children lose themselves in a forest, she protects them. The water, like the wood, has its divinity. When the Wallachian maid fills her vessel, she pours out a spoonful or two for the goddess. Her name is not given. The Morvi are ghosts in generaL So are the Strigoi (Latin Strigoe). When a child is bom, the bystanders throw a stone behind them, saying, " This to the StrigoL" The Svnit (Scmctus), is the festival to the domestic genius, special to each hearth — ^the La/r of the Romans, with his feast-day under a Christian designation. The Murony is the Vampire, in which every Romanyo beUeves. PriccoUtsh is a Murony under a modification, being, like the Vampire, a bloodsucker. It is, however, horses, goats, pigs, and sheep, rather than men, that he drains of their vital fluid. And this he does only at night, and after changing himself from his usual form of a human being into a dog. A female Priccolitsh is a Pficco- Utshone. Name for name, though different in attributes, this Priccolitsh is the Sarmatian Pikullos. I say Sarmatian, 272 THE ETJMANTO SUPERSTITIONS. because he is Lithiianic as well as Slavonic; possibly, the more Lithuanic of the two. He and two others were the great Prussian divinities — Perkunos and Potrimpos. The Bishop of Warmeland in 1418, writes, "Expellendae erant, et expulsse sunt gentes servientes dsemonibus, co- lentes Pacullum, Potri/mpe et alia ignominiosa fantas- mata." But Pacullus was not expelled; not even when Prussia had got filled with bishops, not even when the old vernacular language died out Pacullus, even bx the year 1854, keeps his ground in Protestant Prussia as well as in Greek Wallachia. In a specimen of the Platt- deutsh of Nattangen I find the name PaJculls, just as we find iQ English that of Bogy or Old Scratch. As to Perkv/nos he re-appears in the Scandinavian mythology as Fiorgyn; the German explanation being, that the Lithuanians took him from the Goths — ^the Goths, of course, being German. Statzicot is the Rumanyo Tom Thumb. THE MONGOLS. 273 CHAPTER XIX. THE MONGOLS, AND THE TUHOCSIAtra — THE AIHO, KOEIAK; AHD KAMSKA- BALES — THE IHDIANS OP EOSBIAN AMERICA. THE MONGOLS of the Russian Empire faU into two divisions, convenient rather than natural ; viz., — the Mon- gols of the Chinese frontier, and the Mongols of the Don and Volga. The former are occupants of their origiaal and natural locality ; the latter are colonists or settlers separated from their brethren of the interior of Asia, and brought into contact with Europeans. The Mongolians of the Chinese frontier are either the Buriat, or the Olot; the Buriat to the east, the Olot to the west; the Buriat in contact with the Daourian Tungusians, the Olot in contact with the Kirghiz Turks. The Buriat. — South of the Great Lake Baikal, and on the River Selenga, lies the frontier town of Kiatka, the great bazaar, market, or depot for the trade between Russia and China. This is in the Buriat country, which extends along the frontier, eastward and westward. At the same time, the main body of the population belongs to China. This outer fringe (so to say) of Mongolism N 3 274 THE KALMTJKS. does not extend very far into Russia ; since the northern part of what we see in the maps marked as Daouria, is Timgusian. The Olot. — In contact not only with the Chiaese and Russian frontiers, but also with that of Independent Tartary, lie the Olot, on the drainage of the River Hi and the Lake Tenghiz or Balkash Nor. They fall into four tribes — the Dzungar, the Durbet, the Torgot, and the Khosot. From the first we get the names Dzungaria and Dzungarian for these parts ; from the Dur- bet and Torgot, the Kalmuks of the Volga. In 1662, a vast division from these two tribes crossed the Yaik, and made for the Lower Don and the Lower Volga, where they settled, and are to be found at this present time. In 1770, a great portion of the Torgot returned to their original locality. The remnant, however, (chiefly Durbet,) is distributed as follows : — In Astrakhan 87,656 — Don Kosaks 20,591 — Orenburg ? — Samar ? — Saratov 692 — Stavropol 10,223 119,162 Kalmuk is the name the Russians give them, a name which has found its way, though with a less definite signification, elsewhere. In Russia, however, the Kal- muk is always a Mongol ; the Tartar, always a Turk. THE KALMUKS. 275 The difference, however, between these two designations has, perhaps, been sufficiently enlarged upon already. The following description of the Kalmuks of the Don Kosak country is from Dr. Clarke.* We shall find in it a picture of the so-called Mongol physiognomy in one of its more extreme forms. " Of all the inhabitants of the Eussian empire, the Calmucks are the most distinguished by peculiarity of-" feature and manners. In their per- sonal appearance, they are athletic, and very forbidding. Their hair is coarse and black ; their language, harsh and guttural. They inhabit the countries lying to the north of Persia, India, and China ; but from their vagrant habits, they may be found in all -the southern parts of Russia, even to the banks of the Dnieper. The Cossacks alone esteem them, and intermarry with- them. This union sometimes produces women of very great beauty ; although nothing is more hideous than a Calmuck. High, prominent, and broad cheek-bones ; veiry little eyes, widely separated from each other ; a flat and broad nose ; coarse, greasy, jet-black hair ; scarcely any eye- brows ; and enormous prominent ears — compose no very inviting portrait. " Their women are uncommonly hardy, and on horse- back outstrip their male companions in the race. The stories related of their placing pieces of horse-flesh under the saddle, in order to prepare them for food, are perfectly true. They acknowledged that it was a common practice among them on a journey, and that a steak so dressed became tender and palatable. In their large camps, they have always cutlers, and other artificers in copper, brass, * Travels, vol. i., part i., p. 241. 276 THE KALMTJKS. and iron ; sometimes goldsmiths, who make trinkets fco: their women, idols of gold and silver, and vessels for their altars ; also persons expert at inlaid work, enamelling, and many arts which we vainly imagine pecuHar to nations in a state of refinement." Again — ^he writes,* " We afterwards observed a camp of Cahnucks, not far from the track we pursued, lying off in the plain to the right. As we much wished to visit that people, it was thought prudent to sejid a part of our Cossack escort before in order to apprize them of our inclination, and to ask their permission. The sight of our carriage, and of the party that was approaching with it, seemed to throw them into great confusion. We observed them running backwards and forwards from one tent to another, and moving several of tljeir goods. As we drew near on foot, about half a dozen gigantic figures came towards us, stark naked, except a cloth bound round the waist, with greasy, shining, and almost black skins, and black hair braided in a long cue behind. They began talking very fast, in so loud a tone, and so imcouth a language, that we were a little intimidated. I shook hands with the foremost, which seemed to pacify them, and we were invited to a large tent. Near its entrance hung a quantity of horse-flesh, with the limbs of dogs, cats, marmots, rats, &c., drying in the sun, and quite black. Within the tent, we found some women, though it was difficult to distinguish the sexes, so horrid and inhuman was their appearance. Two of them, covered with grease, were lousing each other ; and it surprised us that they did not discontinue their work, or even look * Vol. i., part i., p. 236. THE KALMUKS. 277 up as we entered. Through a grated lattice, in the side of the tent, we saw some younger women peeping, of more handsome features, but truly Calmuck, with long black hair hanging in thick braids on each side of the face, and fastened at the end with bits of lead or tin : in their ears they wore sheUS, and large pearls, of a very irregular shape, or some substance much resembling pearl. The old women were eating raw horse-flesh, tearing it off from large bones which they held in their hands. Others, squatted on the ground, in their tents, were smoking, with pipes not two inches in length, much after the m.anner of Laplanders. In other respects, the two people, although both of eastern origin, and both nomade tribes, bear little resemblance. The manner of living among the Calmucks is much superior to that of the Laplanders. The tents of the former are better con- structed, stronger, more spacious, and contain many of the luxuries of life ; such as warm and very good beds, handsome carpets and mats, domestic utensils, and ma- ' terials of art and science, painting and writing. The Calmuck is a giant : the Laplander, a dwarf. Both are filthy ia their persons ; but the Calmuck more so than perhaps any other nation." If our view of the Mongol stock is to become general and systematic, we must add to the Buriat and Olot divi- sions a third — ^viz., that of the Khalka-Mongolians or Khalkas. These are wholly subjected to China; their occupancy being to the north of the Great Wall, and (as such) lying on the draiaage of Hoang-ho rather than that of any of the rivers that empty themselves iuto the Arctic Sea. 278 THE MONGOLS. Of this Hoanglio River the Khalka-Mongolians occupy the head-waters. They also occupy the watershed north- wards — so that the Desert of Gobi is Khalka. The out- liue of this division is imperfectly known, it being only cer- tain that it is very irregular ; cutting into China, Chinese Tartary, and Tibet. The Mongolia of the maps is Khalka ; the Dzungaria, Olot ; the Daouria, BiuT.at and Tongus. Let us now contrast the Mongol with the Turk; hav- ing first noticed the points ia which they agree. The Mongol physiognomy is that of the ruder Turks ; only exaggerated. The Mongol habits are those of the Kirghiz — exag- gerated also in their extremely nomadic character. The languages belong to the same great Turanian famUy. The tenor of their histories has been alike ; Dzhingiz- khan on one side, Tamerlane on the other, being- the representatives of their respective heroes. Bul^ Though the languages belong to the same great Tura- nian family, they belong to different divisions of it. To this add, that the directions of the lines of conquest have been different. The Mongol sword has chiefly turned its edge towards Chiaa, the Turk towards Europe. Much follows from this. It is China to which nine-tenths of Mongolia belong pohtically. It is China whence Mon- goUa takes its religious creed — ^this being Buddhism. The Mongol is a Buddhist ; the Turk, a Mahometan. At present, the Mongols are a qixiet population, emi- nently amenable to the management of their priests. They must have been something very different in the Temu- THE MONGOLS. 279 ginian times. What they were then, or soon after, we learn best from Marco Polo, who visited the court (or camp) of Dzhiagiz-khan's grandson, in the fourteenth century. Their manner of warfare, and their mihtary organization, are thus described: — "When one of the great Tartar chiefs proceeds on an expedition, he, puts himself at the head of an army of a hundred thousand horse, and organizes them in the following manner : — He appoints an ofScer to the command of every ten men, and others to command a hundred, a thousand, and ten thousand men, respectively. Thus, ten of the officers commanding ten men take their orders from him who commands a hundred ; of these, each ten from him who commands a thousand; and each ten of these latter from him who commands ten thousand. By this arrangement, each officer has only to attend to the management of ten men, or ten bodies of men ; and when the commander of these hundred thousand men has occasion to make a detach- ment for any particular service, he issues his orders to the commanders of ten thousand to furnish him with a thou- sand men each ; and these, in like manner to the com- manders of a thousand, who give their orders to those commanding a hundred, until the order reaches those commanding ten, by whom the number required is im- mediately supplied to their superior officers. A hundred men are in this manner delivered to every officer com- manding a thousand, and a thousand men to every officer commanding ten thousand. The drafting takes place without delay, and all are implicitly obedient to their respective superiors. Every company of a hundred men is denominated a,tuc, and ten of these constitute a toma/a. 280 THE MONGOLS. " When the army proceeds on service, a body of men is sent two days' march in advance, and parties are sta- tioned upon each flank and in the rear, in order to pre- vent its being attacked by surprise. When the service is distant, they carry but little with them, and that, chiefly, what is requisite for their encampment, and uten- sils for cooking. They subsist for the most part upon milk, as has been said. Each man has, on an average, eighteen horses and mares, and when that which they ride is fatigued, they change it for another. They are provided with small tents made of felt, under which they shelter themselves against rain. Should circumstances render it necessary, in the execution of a duty that re- quires dispatch, they can march for ten days together without dressing victuals : during which time they sub- sist upon the blood drawn from their horses, each man opening a vein and drinking from his own cattle. They make provision also of milk, thickened and dried to the state of a hard paste (or curd), which is prepared in the following manner : — They boil the milk, and skimming off the rich or creamy part, as it rises to the top, put it into a separate vessel, as butter ; for so long as that re- mains in the mUk, it will not become hard. The latter is then exposed to the sun until it dries. ■ Upon going on service, they carry with them about ten pounds for each man, and of this, half a pound is put, every morn- ing, into a leathern bottle or small outre, with as much wa,ter as is thought necessary. By their motion in riding, the contents are violently shaken, and a thin porridge is produced, upon which they make their dinner. " When these Tartars come to engage in battle, they THE MONGOLS. 281 never mix with the enemy, but keep hovering about him, discharging their arrows first from one side and then from the other, occasionally pretending to fly, and during their flight, shooting arrows backwards at their pursuers, killing men and horses, as if they were combating face to face. In this sort of warfare the adversary imagines he has gained a victory, when in fact he has lost the battle ; for the Tartars, observing the mischief they have done him, wheel about, and, renewing the fight, overpower his remaiaiug troops, and make them prisoners in spite of their utmost exertions." ' It is not necessary to identify the Mongol with the " fugax Parthus" of antiquity, so formidable to Rome and Persia. At the same time, true Mongol conquests have taken place within the period of definite history, both in Persia and in India, and at the present moment the Mongolian language is spoken in the Hazara country — ia the north of Affghanistan. This gives us a fourth section — or sub-section — of the family. The Mongolian alphabet is peculiar, being neither Arabic nor Chinese. Its history is as follows : — The earliest Mongol conquerors understood the value of literature, and soon after the death of Zingiz-Khan the language was reduced to writiag ; the alphabet, which was subsequently extended to the language of the Mafitshu nation, having been adopted from that of the Uighur Turks. Amongst the Uighur Turks it was intro- duced by the Nestorian Christians, an influence of which the importance in these parts has yet to be duly appre- ciated. As such, its original source is the Syriac. Of the Syriac alphabets it is most like the Palmyrene. 282 THE TUNGUSIANS. It is -written vertically ; i. e., so as to he read from the top of the page to the bottom. The Mongols (Kalmuks) of Stavropol have been con- verted to Christianity. The TUNGT3SLA.NS. — The Turks and Mongols, with a certain amount of common characters, differ suf&ciently to be referred to separate divisions of the same stock. The same applies to the Turks and TJgrians. The same applies to the Tungus, or Tungusicms. This is a -word of equal value in the -way of classifica- tion -with the three just noticed. It is the name of a primary di-dsion of the great Turanian group of tribea and nations. It originates in the -word donki—m&n, the term by -which some of the populations included in the class designate themselves. The Chinese form is Twng-chu. This gives us the Russian Tungus. A more northern position, a greater range of climate, an approach in some cases to the hunter and fisher, rather than to the pastoral, states, a more partial abandonment of the original Shamanistic Paganism, and a later Hte- rature, are the chief poiuts -which dififerentiate the Tungus tribes from the Mongol. In the -way of conquest the Tungusian analogues of the Temuginian Mongols, and the Osmanli, Seljukian, and Timurian Turks are the Mantshu — the latest con- querors of China. If -we lay out of our account the unimportant tribes of the Southern or Soiot Samoyeds, and also some equally insignificant fractions of the Aino class on the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, we shall find that the populations common to the Russian and the Chinese Empires are THE TUNGUSIANS. 283 (a) the Turk, (6) the Mongol, and (c) the Tungiis — the Turk on the western, the Mongol in the middle, and the Tungiis on the eastern frontier. Chinese Tungusia Hes due north of Peking, coinciding pretty accurately with, the water-system of the Amur or Saghalin River — Mon- golia lying to the westward. The particular section of the stock here occupant, is the Mantshu; so that Chinese Tungusia is Malntshuria, and vice versd. The Mantshu Tungusians are the most civilized of the family, having adopted hoth the creed and alphabet of the Mongolians, to say nothing about the effects of the Chinese conquest. In Russian Siberia, on the other hand, we have the Tungusians in their more extreme character of rude no- JOades; still unlettered, still pagan, or but imperfectly Christian. And here they extend far and wide — from the Sea of Okhotsk to the Yenisey; from Daouria to the Arctic Sea. The Tshapodzhir on the Lena are Tungiis. The Lamut on the Sea of Okhotsk are Tungusian also. Daoiuia, when not Mongolian, is Tungiis. The two rivers that feed the Yenisey from the east— ^the two Tun- guskas — proclaim, by their name, the Tungiis character of their occupants. The Vitim Steppe and the parts about Nertshinsk and Barguzin are Tungiis. The Tungiis area, then, is wide — ^very wide. We may add that it is irregular in outline, because, in some instances, the stock has encroached on its neighbours; in others, its neighbours have encroached upon it. The latter has, probably, been the case with the Yakuts ; inas- much as all evidence shews that they have been a popu- lation whose movement has been from south to north. If so, some of the older and more northern occupants of 284 THE TUNGUSIAIIS. their present area must have been, more or less, Tungu- sian. Others, and perhaps the majority, were Yukahiri. Some, however, must have been Tungiis. On the other hand, to say nothing about the Mantshu conquest of China, the Tungusians must have intruded themselves into countries originally beyond the pale of their occupancy, in the parts about the Lower Tenisey ; the tribes that they either displaced or modified being Samoyed, Yukahiri, or something intermediate and tran- sitional to the two. Tor 'it must be remembered, that whilst the language last named is Ugrian, the inteijacent Tungusians are not so. It is also likely that, if we could reconstruct the ear- liest ethnology of the drainage of the Amur — of Mant- shuria — ^we should find it to be other than what it is at present. The Korean branch of the stock that will next be noticed, must have extended itself further northwards. In like manner, the Aino of the Kurilian Islands must have extended itself further westwards. Both these areas have been encroached on ; and upon both, the encroach- ment has been made by Tungusians — the Tungusians of Mantshuria, or the Mantshu. The Tungusian approaches the Mongolian, the Ostiak, or the Eskimo, according as his residence Ues north or south; within the limit of the growth of trees, or beyond it; on the Champagne, on the Steppe, or on the Tundra. On the latter, the horse ceases to be the domestic animal, and the reindeer or the dog replaces him. Hence, we hear of the three divisions of the family under notice of the Horse Tungusians, of the Reindeer Tungusians, and of the Dog Tungusians. THE PENINSULAR STOCK. 285 One of the most unexplored parts in all Siberia is in Tungusia — viz., the country between the Lena and the head waters of the Kolima, Yana, and Indidzhirka. Its exploration, however, is said to be in contemplation. The Peninsulae Stock. — "With the exception of the Namollos of the extreme north-east, and the .^eutian Islanders, (who are American, in respect to their geo- graphy, rather than Asiatic,) the remainder of the Sibe- rian subjects of Kussia belong to a stock which the present writer has named Peninsular, from the fact of either islands or peninsulas constituting its chief occu- pancies. The divisions of the Peninsular stock are — 1. The Koreans of the Peninsula of Korea j partly sub- ject to Japan, partly to China. 2. The Japanese of Japan and the Lutshu Isles. With both the Koreans and the Japanese the civilization of China has taken root. 3. The Aino of the Kurile Islands. 4. The Koriaks.- Of these Peninsulars it is only the last two that are, in any way, under Russia. Of the Aino, a small section occupies the continent. The Russian part of this lies just north of the Chinese or Mantshurian frontier. The Koriak division is more important. With the exception of a tract in the extreme comer of Asia, ex- tending along Behring's Straits, and at the mouth of the Lower Anadyr, all that portion of North-eastern Asia which is neither Yukahiri nor Tungusian, is Koriak or KoraiMi. This is' a general name. It is general, even 286 THE KORIAK. when used with Klaproth's limitations; when used in the sense with which it appears in the Asia Polyglotta. In that valuable repertorium of Siberian philology, the Kamskadale of the southern part of Kamskatka is raised to the level of a separate substantive class, contrasted with, and iadependent of, the Koriak. In the present volume the Kamskadale is connected -vyith the Koriak, and subordinated to it. Koriak is the name which Klaproth gave; neither is there any reason to refine upon it, siace it is much easier to shew a few points in which it is exceptionable, than to suggest a better one. The area covered by the nu- merous populations of this group is more remarkable for its northern position and its relations to the American contiaent, than for its magnitude. This is but moderate. It far falls short of the vast area of the Tungusian Mon- golian and other Siberian families. From north to south it extends from 70° to 60° north latitude, its longi- tude being less definitely marked. It is bounded on three sides by the sea, although, at the same time, it is more or less separated from Behring's Straits by the Asiatic Eskimo ; and it is conterminous on the west and south-west with the Yukahiri and the Lamut Tungu- sians. If Koriak (or Korseki) be a general term, it is also a specific one as well It applies to the whole family at. large ; but it also applies to a particular portion of it — the Korseki proper of the northern third of the Peninsula of Kamskatka, and the parts around the Gulf of Pen- dzhinsk. These are the central tribes of the group. On the south come the KamsJcadales Proper, a re- THE TSHUKTSHI. 287 duced and impoverished population ; on the north, the Tshuktshi. The Tshuktshi still keep iadependent of Russia ; so that their country can, with great difficulty, be visited. They seem to be a powerful people. They have en- croached on the Yukahiii west, and on the Kamskadales south. The Russians are unwilling or unable to inter- fere much with them. The chief soiu-ces of our informa- tion are a notice of Matiushkin's in Wrangell's Travels in Siberia, who visited their country from the west, and Lieutenant Hooper's work on the Tushi (as he calls the tribe with which he came in contact), descriptive of the populations to the. north of Behring's Straits: Their paganism, which extends in an unmodified form through the, whole length and breadth of their area, is of the Shamanist kind, so prevalent in Central Asia and Siberia; their social organization, complex j their frames and con- stitutions, vigorous. The political independence of the Tshuktshi sections of the Koriak division of the Peniasular stock is one of the more important points of their ethnography. Their relation to certain populations of America is another. A third point requiring notice is their name. Generally, when we meet a writer who, having visited both sides of Behring's Straits, has gone sufficiently far inland to leave behind him the Eskimo populations which, both in Asia and America, fringe the coast, we find that he enlargesuponthe physical Hkeness between the Koriaks and the American Indians, a likeness which we cannot but admit as real ; even if we remember the fact of 288 THE TSHUKTSHL their totli standing in contrast to the Eskimo tribes with ■which they are in contact, and the likelihood of such contrast misleading the observer ; inasmuch as two tribes, unlike a third, may easily pass for being liker each other than they reaUy are. Allowing, however, for this, the American physiognomy of the Tshuktshi Koriaks, or (changing the expression) the Tshuktshi physiognomy of the North American In- dians, must be admitted. Valeat quantuTn. The na/me next commands our notice. In the first place it takes a variety of forms. Lieutenant Hooper calls the tribes with which he came in contact Tuski, expressly stating that it is a name applied by the people theTnselves to themselves, rather than any foreign appella- tion,, and, also, suggesting an explanation ia respect to its meaning. The chief forms which are to be contrasted with Mr. Hooper's Tuski, are Tshutski, Tshuktshi, TshoAitsau, and Tshekto. The chief significations are as follows : — Tshekto is translated people, and Tshautshau is rendered " settled Tnen" (Ansassige in the Asia Polyglotta), Mr. Hooper's rendering of Tuski being " brothers or friends." There are difficulties here which it would take too long to in- vestigate. It is more important to guard against certain ambiguities connected with its application. It is applied to the popxdation with which we are deal- ing at the present moment ; viz., the Koriaks Tshuktshi But it is also applied to a population which we have, as yet, only cursorily mentioned ; viz., the Eskimos of the north-eastern extremity of Asia. INDIANS OF BUSSIAN AMERICA. 289 Wtat these ought to be called •will be seen in otir notice of — The TRIBES OP Kussian America.— The first of the three families into which the aborigines of Eussian America are divided, is — 1. The Eskimo, — Its area is as follows : the whole of the coast of the Artie Ocean, and the coast from Beh- ring's Straits to Cook's Inlet, along with the islands of St. Laurence, Nmiivock, and Kadiak, including the peninsula of Aliaska, and the lower parts of the rivers Kwichpak, Kuskokwim, and others of less importance ; tJm lower parts, hut not the head-waters. As we pro- ceed inland the type changes. The particular Eskimo tribes that have been enu- merated as the occupants of this area, when we get at their native names, modified as they are by passing through Russian and German media, are — ^the Agoleg- imeut,the Kiya.ta,ig-meut, the Magi-meui, the Agvl-msut, the 'Pash.tolig-meut, the Tatshig-mewf , the Mali-meui, the Anlyg-meiif, the Tshanag-meui, and the Kwichpak- me-ut, all ending in meut, and all bearing names of the same kind, with such words as Appennini-eoice, &c., in Latin. Kwichpack-mewf, for instance, is manifestly the occupants of river Kwichpak. Add to these the Inkalit, the Inkaleklait, and the Kus-kutshevak ; these last being the tribes of the river ^tts-kokwim, between the Kwichpak and the Aliaskan peninsula. At Cook's Inlet the origi/nal Eskimo area ends ; the occupancy now becomiag Athabaskgn. At Kiog (Prince ?) William's Sound, however, the Eskimos re- 290 THE INDIANS appear ; but not as the aborigines of the country. Here it is where we find the most southern members of the group — ^the Tshugatsi. The Tshugatsi (or " men of the sea," the name being Athabaskan) " state, that, in con- sequence of some domestic quarrels, they emigrated ia recent times from the island of Kadiak, and they claim, as their hereditary possessions, the coast lying between Bristol Bay and Behring's Straits. They are of middle stature, slender, but strong, with skins often brown, but in some individuals whiter than those of Europeans, and with black hair. The men are handsomer than the women. Their manners were similar to those of the Kushutshevak and other communities living more to ' the north ; but in later times they have carried off the women of the more southern tribes, and from their inter- marriages with their captives, combined with their long intercourse with the Russians, their customs, opinions, and features have undergone a change, so that they have now a greater resemblance to the inland Indians than to the northern Eskimos." * So much for the Eskimos of Russian America ; with whom, however, the list of Eskimo populations in general neither begins nor ends. The great extent of their area has always commanded the attention of ethnologista They fringe the whole coast of the Arctic Sea, and oc- cupy its islands and peninsulas. They lap round the shores of Hudson's Bay. Greenland is Eskimo; and Labrador is Eskimo, as well The Eskimo is the only population clearly and un- * Sir J. Eichardson's Arctic Searching Eipedition, vol. i,, p. 364. OF RUSSUN AMERICA. 291 doubtedly common to the two worlds — the Old and the Jf ew — Asia and America ; and hence it has an Asiatic isection, which still stands over for notice. This falls into two divisions ; a, the Aleutian, and, h, the Namollo. The Aleutians occupy the whole of that range of islands which run from Kamskatka to the Aliaskan Peninsula, Behring's Isle, Copper Isle, TJnalashka, the Eat Isles, the Prebiilowiini Isles, the Andreanowsky Isles, &c. The NamoUos belong to the continent ; Tshuktshj- noss and the mouth of the Anadyr being their occu- pancies. Such parts, in short, of the north-eastern extremity of Asia as are not Koriak are Eskimo — Eskimo- NamoUo, or NamoUo-Eskimo. 2. The Athabaskans. — The second section of the aborigines of Eussian America is th? Athabaskan, so denominated because the lake Athabaska is a convenient geographical centre for its numerous divisions and sub- divisions. To this belong the Athabaskans of Cook's Inlet, a population which has been already named. They call themselves TTmi, ox Aina='m,en ; so that it is their Eskimo neighbours from whom we get the name Kenay. Then there are the Atna of Copper Eiver, a closely aUied tribe ; so that, if we wish to speak very specifically, we may talk of the K^nay Atnas, and the Copper-river Atnas, distinguishing between the two. In the present state of our knowledge this is the safest language, inas- much as the name itself means but little. There are several Almxi populations ; some closely, some distantly connected. One lies as far south as New Caledonia, o2 292 THE KUTSHIN TBIBES. and belongs to a different division of the great North American group from that to which we refer the Atha- baskan Atnas ; though, at the same time, the present distinctions may give way to future investigations. Both the Atnas under notice reach the sea. On the other hand, the Koltsha/ni tribes lie inland. This is a word in the Copper-river dialect of the Atna, meaning strangers; the Kenay form being Goltscmi, with the slightly modified meaniQg of guests. Cannibahsm is laid to the charge of these Koltshani, though upon doubtful grounds. They extend as far inland as the water-shed between the Copper-river and the Yukon. The Ugalents, or (with their name in the Eskimo form) Ugalyach-meut, are a smaU tribe in the parts about Mount Elias, consisting of some forty families — no more. AU these Athabaskans have been described by the Russians, whose observations have been made from the side of the coast rather than from the interior. For the tribes in the direction of the British frontier, we must seek our information from British sources. The fur-agents of the parts about the Great Bear Lake supply us with our ethnology here. Some of the tribes are common to the two territories, and aU are closely (very closely) allied to that particular division of the Athabaskans, which are known imder the names oi Loucheux, Bigothi, and Kutshvn; this last being the designation under which they are fully and graphically described in the valuable work of Sir John Richardson already quoted and the authority for what is forthcoming. THE KUTSHIN TRIBES. 293 The particular Kutshin tribes which, on evidence more or less satisfactory, may be placed -within the Eussian frontier, are the following : — 1. The Artez-kutshi, or the tough (hard) people. The 62nd parallel cuts their country ; so that they lie between the head-waters of the Yukon and the Pacific. The evidence that they extend over the frontier is not quite conclusive. I infer, however, that they do. 2. The same applies to the Tshu-kutshi, or people of the water. The banks of Deep-river give us their occupancy; but Deep-river is common to both the Russian and British territory. Number, 100. 3. The Tathzey-kutahi, or people of the ramparts, the OeTis du Fou of the French Canadians, are spread from the upper parts of the Peel and Porcupine rivers, within the British territory, to the river of the Mountaia- men, m the Russian. The Upper Yukon is, therefore, their occupancy. They fall into four bands ; a, the Tratsl-hutahi, or people of the fork of the river ; b, the Kutsha/-kutshi ; c, the Zlkorthaka (Zi-wnka- kutshi), people on this side (or middle people); and, d, the Tanna-kutshi, or people of the hhiffs. Numbers of men of the Kutsha-kutshi, 90 Ziunka-kutshi, 20 Tannarkutshi, 100 4. The Teytsh-kwtshi (people of the shelter) number about 100 men, and dwell about the influx of Russian- river; whilst, nearer stiU to the mouth of the Yukon, and (probably) conterminous with the Eskimo Kwich- pak-meut, are — 5. The Tlaggasilla, or Uttle dogs. Of the — 294 THE KOLUTSH. 6, 7. Vanta-kutshi (p6ople of the lakes), with 80, and the Neyetse-kutshi (people of the open country),. ■with, 40 men, I only find that they belong to the Por- oUpine-rivep, a river partly British and partly Eussian, Sonth of Mouirt Elias, or the Ugalents district, the Eussian possessions lose their breadth, and take the form of a narrow strip of land, interposed between the British territory and the Pacific ; to which may be added the islands and archipelagoes as far as 55 N. L. Here the ethnology is generally considered to change,, and the popixLations to become — 3. KolMsh — I have but Uttle doubt as to the mean- ing and origin of this word, believing it to be the same word as the Atna, or Athabaskan, Koltshcmi (Goltsa/m) =strcmger (guest). Of the tribes belongiag to the Koliitsh division, the most important, and best known, are the populations around the Eussian port of Sitka, or Norfolk Sound. The Indians who speak the language of these parts, for which (by the way) we have several vocabularies, ate, according to Mr. Gfeen, an American missionary, 6,500. Next to the TJnalashkans of the Aleutian Islands, the Sitka Indians are the most modified by Eussian influ- ences. A short vocabulary, collected by Mr. Tolmie, and pub- lished by Dr. Scouler, of the Tungaaa, is sufficient to shew its Sitka affinities, and, consequently, to place it" in the Kolutsh class; whilst another, equally short,: collected by the late Lieutenant Hooper, from the Tshil-cot Indians about Lynn's -Canal, does the same,. THE KOLUTSH. 295 The Tungaas is spoken over the greater part of Prince (rf Wales' Archipelago, and: on the coast opposite. At the southern extremity, however, of the Archipelago, it is replaced by the Haidah tongue. Now, the Haidah (along with the Chenamesyan of Oh&ervatory Inlet) is the most northern of the dialects of British Oregon, and, consequently, is a form of speech (Tike the Kutshin and Jlgkimo) common to the two territories. Our details are now coming to a close ; the N'eha/ivni alone standing over. These, according to Mr. Ishister, ''range the country between the Eussian settlements on the Stikine River and the Eocky Mountains, where they are conterminous with the Carriers of New Caledonia on the south, and the Dahodinnies of M'Kenzie's Eiver on the west. They are a brave and warhke race ; the scourge and terror of the country round. It is a curious circumstance, and not the less remarkable from the contrast to the general rule in such cases, that this tur-r bulent and ungovernable horde were under the direction of a woman, who ruled them, too, with a rod of iron, and was obeyed with a readiness and unanimity truly marvellous. She was certainly a remarkable character, and possessed of no ordinary share of intelligence. From the fairness of her complexion and hair, and the general cast of her features, she was believed to have some European blood. Whether through her influence or not, the condition of the females among the Nehannies stands much higher than among the American Indians generally. The proper locality of the Nehanni tribe is the vicinity of the sea-coast, where they generally pass the summer. In the winter they range the country in 296 THll KOLUTSH. the interior for the purpose of bartering, or plundering, furs from the inland tribes ; acting as middlemen be- tween them and the Kussian traders. They agree in general character -with the Koloochians, having light complexions, long' and lank hair, fine eyes and teeth, and many of them strong beards and moustaches. They are not generally tall, but active and vigorous, bold and treacherous in disposition; fond of music and dancing, and ingenious and tasteful in their habits and decora- tions. They subsist principally on salmon, and evince a predilection for a fish diet, which indicates their mari- time origin. Like all the north-west tribes, they possess numerous slaves ; inhabitants, it is understood, of some of the numerous islands which stud the coast, and are either taken in war or bought of the neighbouring tribes."* Whether these Nehxmwi be Koltitsh or Athabaskan, I am unable to say, having seen no undoubted sample of their language. The description of them would almost serve for that of theKutshia ; and to the Kutshin I am most inclined to assimUate them. It is in the Kutshin language that their name has a meaning= Tnountcdneer ; and m the Kutshia country the name itself (as applied to the Indians of the Big Beaver Mountains) re-occurs. Such is the distribution of the aborigines of Eussian America over the three groups known under the deno- minations of (a) Eskimo, (b) Athabaskan, and (c) K.o- liitsh. The extent to which the groups run into each other, their consequently provisional character, and * Transactions of tlie British Association, &c., 1847, p. 121. THE KOLUTSH. 297 the relations between the north-western Americans and the north-eastern Asiatics, are exhibited in almost all the works of the present writer, wherein the subject is touched upon ; the fact of the Eskimo tribes graduating into the American Indians, and the Asiatic origin of the latter being points to which, after the due consi- deration of the numerous opposite doctrines, he has no hesitation in committing himseK 3 298 THE DIOSCUEIANS. CHAPTER XX. THE DIOSODRIAN (OAtTOASLiN) — AEMENIAN — AND OTHER POPULATIONS OP THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE. The Dioscurians of the mountain-range of Caucasus, must be distinguished from the Russian Government of Caucasus. This is absolutely necessary. It is almost as necessary that the adjective Caucasian, as a term in Ethnology, should be disused ; and that on account of the ambiguities it engenders. This has been the case ever since the word has borne that wide and general sense which was given it by Blumenbach, and which has prevailed from his time to the present day — a sense which makes it comprize nearly all the popula- tions of Europe, and some of those of Asia and Africa — Greeks, Italians, Slavonians, Germans, Indians, Arabs, and Jews. It is clear, that when we come to a subject so specific as the ethnology of particular tribes occu- pant of a particular moTmtain-range, any power so general as the one just indicated becomes inconvenient. The term by which I propose here, as I have already done elsewhere, to replace it, is Dioscurian — Bioscu- rias being one of those towns of the sea-coast which are not only mentioned by ancient writers, but mentioned THE DIOSCUEIANS. 299 with reference to one of the most remarkable character- . istics of modem, as it also was of ancient, Caucasus This is the multiplicity of languages and dialects. The business (says Pliny) of Dioscurias had to be trans- acted through the medium of thirty interpreters. The number of interpreters that would be requisite for a smiilar function in modern Caucasus, is imdoubtedly fewer — the Turkish being pretty generally understood, and serving as a kind of Ungua franca. Nevertheless, the actual number of separate substantive languages, dia- lects, and sub-dialects, is not much less than it was in the second century. Let us see what it amounts to. 1. There is the intrusive and foreign Russian, of such fortresses as Anape, such towns as Tiflis, and such fron- tiers as that between the OoverTi/ment of Caucasus, and the TTiountains of that name. 2. There is more than one form of the TurJc, spoken in patches more or less isolated ; spoken, too, along the frontier; spoken, too, on the Lower Kur. Along the fron- tier it is the Nogay ; in the chief patches, the Karatshai and Basian Turk. Practically speaking, these belong to one and the same language — all the varieties and sub- varieties being mutually intelligible. It is in the Turk that a greater number of the geographical names for the different rivers, mountains, and towns of Caucasus, have come to us — e. g., the words ending in su (river) and tau {tagh or dagh^mountoMt) ; Koi-su, £ov instance, and Kara-tow. 3. The Armenian lies too iax south to be dealt with as truly Dioscurian. It was, however, doubtless one of the tongues of Pliny's list. 300 THE DIOSCUBIAJIfS. 4 The Georgia/n is truly, and in every respect, Dios- curian. On the Lower Kur, it is replaced by the Turk of Shirvan and ShekL On the Middle and Upper Kur, for the parts about Tiflis, the particulaf dialect called Kartulinian prevails; this being the clas- sical, standard, or literary Georgian, its alphabet being peculiar, but, notwithstanding its peculiarities, capable, through the sacred or ecclesiastical form of writing, of being traced to and affihated with the Armenian. Another form of speech prevails in MingreUa and Imeretia; and a third (the Lazic) in that part of the PashaHk of Trebizond, which lies between Trebizond it- self and the Georgian frontier. The fourth form is the Suanic, spoken by the moun- taineers, north-west. It is clear, that in Georgia the dialectual varieties increase, the Suanic and Lazic being, for undoubted dialects, of one and the same language, outlying forms of speecL 5. After Georgia, comes Gircassia — such, at least, is the usual association. The dialects here are not less than three in number ; viz., one for the Tsherkes, who occupy the southern feeders of the Upper and Middle Kuban; one for the Abassians on the south and east ; and one for the Kabardinians of the Great and Little Kabardah, occupants of the Upper portion of the Terek. Of the Abassian, there is, at least, one sub-dia-^ lect, the Alte-kesek or Tapanta. 6. The Lesgian division of the Dioscurians is the third in point of area, the first in respect to the number and variety of its forms of speech — ^Avar, Anzukh, THE DIOSCURIANS. 301 Tshari, Audi, Dido (Unso), Khasi-khumukh, Akush, and Kura, being the names of the diEferent vocabularies representative of its dialects or subdialects. Even if these be reduced to four primary divisions (as Klaproth re- duces them), the number of Lesgian forms of speech is remarkable. 7. The next division vrants few things more than a pro- nounceable name ; the two current ones being Tshetshents and Mizhdzhedzhi (Chechehts and Mizhjeji). Let us call it Tshetsh. The Tshetsh, Ingush, and Tushi dialects of this division are known to us. 8. The list closes with the Ossein or IrSn language, with its two dialects, probably, not very distant from each other. With this sketch the reader may see his way to Pliny's thirty interpreters, some of which would be required, not so much for the tongues of Caucasus itseK, as for those of the opposite coast of the Black Sea, for the Crimea, for the parts (possibly) beyond the Caspian. The mountaineers themselves, however, would require — For the Georgian forms of speech (say) 2 Circassian 3 Lesgian ^i Tshetsh 2 Ir6n(0ss^t) 1, , Turk 1 Armenian 1 14 S02 THE DIOSCUEIANS. I give tMs' calculation more for the sake of fixing the reader's attention on an important feature in Dioscurian Ethnology than for the sake of solving a curious, rather than important, question of classical scholarship. I give it, too, with the secondary view of giving pro- roinence to the suggested term Dioscurian. The previous division and distribution of the Dioscu- rian populations into Georgians, Circassians, Lesgians, Mizhdzhedzhi (Tshetsh), and Osset (Ir6n) is Klaproth's; and I may state, once for aU, that nine-tenths of such scientific knowledge as we have about Caucasus are taken from the Asia Polyglotta, the Sprachatlas, and the Travels in Caucasus (Beise in KauJcasus) of that author. In several matters of detail he has. since been corrected. Upon the whole, however, his works are the basis of all subsequent investigations. The extent to which they have been (or ought to be) modified will be considered hereafter. The distribution of these numerous Dioscurians over their several localities is diflScult or easy, according to dis- tinctness or indistinctness of investigator's view of the , physical geography of the parts whereof they are the oc- cupants. Of primary importance in this matter is the direction of the axis of the Caucasian range, and next to this the river-system of the Caucasian drainage. The axis of the mountains runs from north-west to south-east, from the mouth of the Kuban and the parts opposite the Peninsula of Kertsh in the Crimea, to the Promontory of Baku on the Caspiaa The drainage, therefore, is double ; one portion of the rivers falling into the Black Sea, and one into the Caspian. THE DIOSC0EIANS. 303 The Black Sea influents are the Kuban, and the minor rivers Enguri, Rion, and Tshorok, running westward: The Caspian rivers are the Terek, and (of suhordinate importance) the Kmna and the Koisu. There is, then, the double drainage ; and there is, of necessity, the water-shed to match. Here the two great mountains of Elbruz and Kasbeck take prominence. — the former dividing the Kuban from the Terek; the latter, the Terek from the Kur * Applying these distinctions we find that-^ Cvrcassia goes with the Kuban; nine-tenths of its feeders being Tsherkes. Then comes the area between the mountains and the Black Sea. This is Circassian so long as its rivers flow from a water-shed common to them and the Kuban — there or thereabouts. Kabardinia, however, lies on the Terek; the upper part of it, of course. As the axis of the Caucasus runs eastwards (east by south-east) the length of the western, or Black Sea, rivers iQcreases. The drainage of these longer and more southern rivers is Georgian. ,0n the side, too, of the Caspian the upper half of the Km- is Georgian. It is the Kur, indeed, with which Georgia chiefly coincides; the Kur, the Ehion, and the Tshorok. Both the Georgian and Circassian areas touch the Euxine; neither one nor the other touchiag the Caspian. . The Lesgian alone does this; coincidiug with the drainage of the rivers that flow between the Terek and the Promontory of Baku and empty themselves into that * A good view of the physical geography of Caucasus is to be found in the fifth volume of theWestminster Eeview,pp=480— 519. 304 THE DIOSCUEIANS. sea. On the other hand, no portion of the Lesgian area reaches, or even approaches, the Euxine. The Tshetsh, the IrSn, and the Basiano-Karatshi areas are wholly inland — inland, central, and northern. We must look for them on the water-shed between the Kuban and the Tereli, with the great Elbruz as our startiag-poiat. The Ka/ratshaiiie to the east of it, and on the drain- age of the Kuban ; the Basian to the west, and on that of the Terek. East of the Basian, and equidistant between the two seas, lie the IrSn. A hne drawn from Gori to Yekaterino- grad would bisect their country; which is the water-shed between the Kur and the Terek — the water-shed be- tween the Kur and the Terek, and something more. The upper parts of the southern feeders of the middle Terek give us the Tshetsh country. That the Caucasus is only partially Eussian, that the independent Caucasians are brave warriors, that the Georgians are a handsome population, that the Circas- sians are the same, that they both trade in their good looks, and that there is a hero amongst the western tribes named Shamyl, is understood by even the imleamed portions of the public. And it is little more than this that is known to the special geographer, ethnologist, or pohticiaiv The more, characteristic parts of the country are inaccessible. Even Georgia is not wholly reduced, for the Suanic coxmtry, with parts of Imeretia, stiU pre- serves a rude independence. Ironistan (for so I call the Iron or Oss^t district) has a military road running through it; and along this, Russians, and those whom the THE DIOSCUEIiNS. 305 Russians permit, can travel with ease and safety. But the gorges and heights of Kasbek are still dangerous. In Circassia, the Kabardinian portion can be visited, and so can the reduced districts immediately to the south of the Lower Kuban, as weU as certain points on the coast. "Woe, however, to the traveller who attempts the mountaia-strongholds of the stUl unconquered Abassians. There is perilous travelling here, and there is perilous travelling still greater in Tshetshenia (the Tshetsh or Mizhdzhedzhi country) and amongst the Lesgians. The little that is known of Lesgistan is known from the ade of the Caspian, or from the Georgian and Shirvan frontiers. Besides the insufficient character of our knowledge, there is the fact of Caucasus beiug but imperfectly Eussian, to which it may be added that the most in- teresting parts are those which are the most independent; so that, strictly speaking, Lesgistan, Tshetshenia, and a great part of Circassia, lie beyond the domain of the ethnologist of the Russian empire. I limit myself, there- fore, to the general phenomena of the classification and geographical distribution of the members of theDioscurian class; superadding to this a short notice of the more im- portant characteristics which, notwithstanding a general ramilarity of character, differentiate (so to say) the chief divisions and sub-divisions. The Georgians under Russia are Christian, lettered, aad industrial, with a metropolis of the calibre and im- portance of Tiflis, and a country with a Tnaximum amount of land fitted for tUlage; but their Christianity is that of the Armenian, and not that of the Greek Church. 306 THE DIOSCTJEIANS. It is of long standing, and it brought "with it the use of the alphabet. This is Armenian in its immediate, Syrian in its remote, origin — Armenian, but disguised. In the ecclesiastical form the square character of the Armenian letters is preserved; in the ordinary alpha,bet the angles are all rounded off — and this it is which dis- guises it. The original government was kingly, i. e., that of a donsohdated monarchy as opposed to the feudal organization of Circassia. The Georgians under Russia are lettered and indus- trial; less hardy, too, and less brave than the moun- taineers. But the Suan are Tiot under Russia ; and they are unlettered, hardy, and pastoral. The Georgians under Russia are Christians after, the manner of the Armenian Church; but the Lazic branqh of the Georgian division is not under Russia, and is not Christian. It is Turk and Mahometan — with a different nationality and different traditions. Less rude and less independent than the Suan, the Miugrelians and Imeretians (some of whom are governed by their own princes) hold an intermediate place to the populations just named and the Kartulinian Georgians of the Middle Kur. The Colchians of old were, probably, members of the Georgian division. On the north-eastern frontier, either the Georgian type becomes modified by the Lesgian, or vice versd. This, at least, is what I infer from the term Grusisch-Caucasisch (Georgio-Caucasian) ia Koch's map. The IrSn (Ossit), under Russia, are Christians of recent (very recent) origin ; their conversion (such as it is) having come from Russia ; and their church (as THE DIOSCTJRIANS. S07 such) being Greek. The Russian alphabet' has been adapted to the sounds of their language. The Cireassicms, whether dependent or independent,. > are Mahometans ; their Mahometanism having, in many cases, been superinduced upon a previous Christianity,, introduced from Georgia, Armenia, Syria, or Byzantium, in the sixth or seventh century. Their constitution is feudal ; the Vork being the nobles, the Pshi the re- tainers. It is they who more especially export their daughters for sale amongst the Turks. Klaproth separates the Tshetsh and Lesgicms. I throw them both into a single group. They are Mar- hometans, with a patriarchal rather than a feudal con- stitution, independent and unreduced. Shamyl is no Circassian, but a Lesgian ; the language that gives him. to Circassia being inaccurate. The Lesgians and Tshetsk are, too, often called Western Circassians. This they are not. The true Western Circassians are the Kabar-. dinians. The ARMENIANS;— From the undoubted Dioscurians, who absolutely occupy Caucasus, I pass to the Arme- nians, whom I place in the same class, but whose ai'ea belongs to the parts south of the mountain-range, rather than to the mountain-range itself. , The Armenian subjects of Eussia fall into two divi- sions. The first includes what may b'e called the Armenians in situ, by which I mean the occupants of such districts as have been won from Persia and Turkey, by Russia. These are either indigenous to or old inha^ bitants of their several localities. They are found, of course, in the frontier provinces; these being on the 308 THE DIOSCTJEIANS, south and south-west coasts of the Caspian. The Armenian here is in the same relation to Russia as the Rumanyo of Bessarabia. He is an Armenian on Arme- nian ground ; but he is Russian, because a certain amount of this same Armenian ground has changed masters. In the second class I place such Armenians as have been removed from the soil of Armenia, and placed on that of Russia as colonists or settlers. These may be anywhere ; wherever, however, they are, they are recent occupants, and he in the midst of a foreign and strange population. The first may be called the Armenians m situ; the others, the Armenians extra situm. The localities and number of the latter may be collected from the tables. Erivan and Ganja are the chief localities of the former. The Armenians are Christians of the Armenian church, Mahometan Turkey being the empire from which their area was won. Russian Armenia, then, coiacides chiefly with the Russo-Turk frontier. The Peesians of the Russian empire, on the other hand, belong, chiefly, to the parts won from Persia, their frontier being the Russo-Persian. They fall into the same divisions as the Armenians ; viz., the Persians vn sUu, and the Persians extra- sitirni. Sbirvan, and the southern coast of the Caspian, give us the Persian area ; Shirvan being, more or less, Turk also. Some Kiurd popiiLations belong to this branch, as may be seen from either Garzoni's grammar of their language, or any of the ordinary vocabularies. THE TALISH. S09 The Talish (described by Fraser as follows) is pro- bably Lesgian ia blood, though Persian ia language. " The district of Talish, according to the information I obtained, includes that portion of the mountainous tract extending from the Suffeedrood, or, perhaps, only from •a pass a little further west, to the point where it is lost in the plains of Mogham, at Andina Bazar. I know not whether the name of Talish applies originally to the district itself, or to the tribes which occupy it, but it is now used iadifferently for both. These various tribes, or clans, are. probably descended from one stock ; they certainly have the same appearance, as well as the same manners and customs, and the same dispositions. What- ever may have been the nature or number of their sub- divisions, they all, but a few years ago, obeyed Mustapha Khan, a chief of so much power and authority, that he had the hardihood to oppose the arms of Aga Mahomed Khan, the late King of Persia, himself. " The power of that monarch, however, was too great for the Talish chief, who took the resolution of inviting the Kussians to his assistance, and gave them occupancy of Lankeroon; promising, at the same time, to yield them obedience as sovereigns of the country. In the year 1812, Mustapha Khan and the Russian garrison, donsistiag of three hundred men, were driven by the Persians out of Lankeroon, which after this time, was fortified and supplied with a garrison of two battalions of Persian infantry, a company of artillery, with five twelve-pounders, and one thousand five hundred Ghee- lanee irregular troops. " This force proved insufiBcient to protect it from the 310 THE TAUSH. efforts of the Russians, who attacked it on the ISth of January, 1813, with a force of two thousand infantry, one thousand Cossacks, and three vessels of war ; and who carried it by assault, after sustaining a loss, in killed and wounded, of one thousand two hundred men, among the latter of whom was their brave' commander, General Kutlerousky. " Mustapha Khan continued tUl his death in possession of Russian Talish, acknowledging a nomiual obedience to the authorities of that empire, who, indeed, never de- manded more ; and he has been succeeded by his seven sons, who have shared between them the whole country, from a little to the westward of Kergonrood all the way to Mogham. The present King of Persia, with a view of weakening the family of Mustapha Khan, distributed the whole of Persian Talish among the principal families that remained, confirming to each such portion of country as it had become possessed o£ He also created ihem khans, by way of increasing their importance, and giving them a motive for repressing the predatory in- cursions of Mustapha Khan's family. Of these chiefs, the principal are — 1st, Mahomed Khan Massaul, who occupies the eastern part of the district, and whose clan is very powerful. 2nd, Ibraham Khan, of whom I know nothing. 3rd, Mahomed Reza Khan, of Kiskar, or Geskar, further to the west, who is more powerful than the two preceding. 4th, Mahomed Khoolee Khan, who lives at the village Poonul, still further to the west These are all under the authority of the Princes of Gheelan. 6th, Mahomed Khan Asalumeh, whose yeilak is called Leomere, has a powerful clan ; butBaUa Khan, THE TALISH. 311 of Aghabler, the 7th, whose country extends westward to the Eussian boundary, though his family was not originally of great importance, is now considered chief of all. His brother, Meer Goonah Khan, has been joined in authority with him, by Abbas Meerza, to whose govern- ment of Azeibijan both these chiefs are attached. " These tribes, which have several features of character ui common with the Lesghais of Dagestan, unite many of the better qualities of highlanders with the barbarity of savages. Their country being more accessible, and their chiefs more under control than those of the Lesghais, they cannot be such systematic robbers, neither do they embark so regularly in the business of taking prisoners for sale or for ransom, which those formidable banditti practise ; but property and life are not at aU more sacred in their hands, for they are con- tinually marauding among themselves, and plundering their immediate neighbours whenever they can. Murder, I was assured it is an every-day crime with them, and no stranger would be safe for an hour in their country without the protection of their chiefs, or those whom their chiefs must obey. " These freebooters, however, are brave, and are devoted to their chiefs. They are active and patient of fatigue, but are treacherous, merciless, and rapacious towards all the world beside. I have heard of very few good qua- lities which they possess, and yet I think they are interesting, from the many points of resemblance in their patriarchal or feudal economy to the highlanders of our own coimtry, as they were in old times. There is amongst these tribes not only the same devoted 312 THE TALISH. attacliinent of clansmen to their chief, but among that chief's retainers one might discover the same description of attendants — gillies and henchmen — ^which constituted the followers of a highland laird. " The sword and the rude firelock of the chief were borne in charge by one young man, while another took care of his cloak, and a third of his pipe. Others, again, were ready to assist his steps, or stand by his horse's head, on occasions of danger or difficulty. Crowds of idle hangers-on stood before the window, or lounged lazily about the doors, awaiting their lord's appearance, and started into motion with the same springing activity whenever he gave the signal for marchiag. " But, as the highlands of Scotland .are far outdone ia height and difficulty by the rugged mountains of Talish, so does the Talish mountaineer surpass the Scottish Highlander in the strength, ease, and agility with which he springs up the longest and most precipitous passes; even the little boys dashing up the steep faces of the hills after the straying cattle, astonished me by the facility with which they moved along the most danger- ous places, as if upon the plainest ground ; and I re- member on a trying occasion, envying the wind and powerful muscles of a mountaineer, who, overtaking me after a much longer journey than I had performed, bounded from stump to stump, and from rock to rock, with the ease of a mountain goat, while I could hardly crawl along as we toUed up the steep ascent. " The nature of the country, and the active modes of life of these people, have a great effect upon then- general appearance. They are for the most part spare, raw- THE TALISH. 3] 3 boned men, of robust though not tall frames, with countenances not unlike the Highlanders of Scotland. Their dress consists of a large loose pair of trowsers, made' of coarse grey or dark brown stuff, reaching below the ancles, and generally tied into the charucks or shoes, which are nothing more than a leathern sock drawn round the instep, and tied on by a thong passing many times round the ancles. These are made to fit, or rather to draw very tight, and appear sufficient to guard the foot against the stones, while they ply so easily as to be very pleasant to the wearer, and enable him to move along at a great pace. The only vest they wear is a sort of ulcaluc or long-taUed vest, fitted tight to the body, the skirts of which are stuffed into the trowsers, so that the bulk of the nether man greatly exceeds that of the upper parts. The head is covered by a sheep-skia cap of red or black wool. About the waist these mountaineers wear a leathern girdle from which depends the formid- able commeh, or Gheelanee knife, and over their shoulders they carry their taffung, in the use of which they axe very expert. The ammunition is carried in numberless rows of loops for cartridges on the breast of his vest and .other parts of his person, or in small gourds called cuddoos, hollowed out to serve for powder-horn, &c. In his hand he carries a basket of plaited grass, in which he stows his provision or plunder. Such is the complete costume of a Talish Highlander."* This is the only description I have s^en of this re- markable population. * " Travels and Adventures in the Persian Provinces.'' By T. Praser. P 314 THE KUZZILBASH. Persian Settlements. — The Kuzzilhash. — In the governments of Astrakhan and Orenburg there are two Persian settlements, of unascertained (but of no very considerable) size. They consist of Persian captives, rescued and ransomed from the Kirghiz. The Turks call the Persians of Persia Proper, Kuzzilbash (Red- heads), and, as the colonies in question are within the Turk area, they may be distinguished as the Kuzzilhash colonies. The Sarts, or Bolcharians. — A Persian of Bokhara, as opposed to one of Persia Proper, is called a Sart. Of these Sarts there is a colony in the country of the Tobolsk Tartars, in the neighbomrhood of Tyiunen. With these Persian Sarts — Persian in language, and Bokharian in origin — ends the list of those populations whose country is either wholly contained within the limits of the Russian empire, or else cuts its frontier, so as partially to belong to it — the Swedes of Finland, the Germans of Courland, Livonia, Esthonia, and the colo- nies, and the Russians Proper, excepted. To the Russians Proper the concluding chapter will be devoted. The Germans and Swedes are only named. Their numbers may be got from the tables. The general character of their ethnology is supposed to be known. The other foreign elements, unattached to any par- ticular portion of their native area, are — Jews — Talmudic 1,054,407 Karait 5,725—1,060,132 Gypsies 48,247 Greeks 46,77,3 PIOSCUEIAN SPECIMENS. 315 To these may be added (all in inconsiderable num- bers) some' Amauts (Albanians or Skipitar), Indians, and Frenchmen; for all of which the tables give the num- ber — though only for Russia. This should be remembered: — The statistics of the Geographical Society take no cognizance of the Grand Duchy of Finland, nor yet of the Kingdom of Poland For these, then, I only give the General Ethnology — not the numerical details. > ' The following tables give us a short specimen of the chief Dioscurian forms of speech. Upon these I have abstained from enlarging. In more than one work I have stated both what their real affinities are, and what they are not. They are not with the so-called Indo- European tongues, and they are with the so-called mono-syllabic ones, especially those of Tibet and the Western* Himalayas. (A.) , ENGLISH. GBOBGIAN. AEMENIAN One erti mi Two ori yergu Three sami yeryek Fowr otkhi tshors Five khuti hink Sim mse ariekag Moon mtvare lusin Star varsklavi asdeg Fire zezkhli hur * Transactions of the British Association for the Advance- ment of Science (Cambridge, 1846) ; Varieties of Man ; Ethno- logical Article in Orr's Circle of Sciences. To this list add an elaborate paper of Mr. Hodgson's of Nepaul, in the Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. p2 316 DIOSCURIAN SPECIMENS. (A) continued. ENGHSH. GEORGIAN. ASMENIAir Water tskhali tshur Tooth kbili adaiiun Foot pekhi odn River mdinare kyed Momiain rata sar (I ^■} ENGLISH. AVAB. ANZDKH. TSHABI. AHBL DIDO. ■KHASl- KHUMAKH. One zo ZO hos se-D zis zarSa Two kl-go a-go ko-Tia ttshe-^ Tsi~no ku~va Three shal)-gro iarr-go khah-go aiYOi)-gu 80-nno sbam-&a Four Tikh-go ukh-fifo ukh-g-o boo-fir« ui-wtf mnk-5a Five Sim-go pho-gw shxL-go in-sta-gu se-Kno khe-tJO Sun bSk ite bak mitU but barkb Moon moots moots mools ports butsi bars Sim- za zoa zabi za za zuka Fire za za za za zi za Water Mlim Mlinl TrhiTii t!en htli sin Tooth sibi sibi sibi zita kizu kertshi Foot pog pog pog tshuka rori dzban Ewer hor or or gad-or ehu nikh Mountain mehr mehr meer pU thlad simtn One Two Three Fomr Five Sun Moon Star Fire Water Tooth Foot Rwer TSHET- SHENT3. tsa sM koe di pkhi maJkh but sid tse kH kok malar lam (C.) INGUSH. tsa shi koe di phki malkh but seta tse kbU TUSHI. tsa shi ko en pkhi matkh but teru tse khi _ tserka kog kog * dokha-khi khi lamartsh kmati This=5frea* waier. TSHEEKES. se tu shi ptle tkhu dgeh masah rhagoh mapfa psi dsheh tie psi bgi khni-o? ab-oZ ollv-a? khuy-al beri baz smi za sbin zulve kasli erklo dnbur ABAS. seke uk'fto ^ih-pa psi-ia khu-6o marra mis yatsha mza dzeh pits share adzi biikh THE EUSSUNS PROPER. 317 CHAPTER XXI. THE BUSSIANS PBOPEE — {3BBAT, IITTIE, WHITE, RED — DlfFtrSION, ETHKOLO- GIOAL AND POlITIOAl — PANSLATOKISM. The Russians Proper now remain to be noticed. As members of the Great Sarmatian Stock, they stand in contrast with all the populations already enumerated, save and except tbe Poles, the Servians, the BulgS-rians, the Lets, and the Lithuanians. As Slavonib, rather than Lithuanic, Sarmatians, they are contrasted with these last. To the Servians they are most nearly allied; indeed, if it were not for the displacement effected by the different Non-slavonic populations of Wallachia, Moldavia, and Transylvania, the most southern members of the Russian dimion — the Rusniaks, or Ruthenians of Bessarabia, Bukhovinia, and Gallicia — would, probably, graduate iato the northern Servians. Like the Servians, the Russians take their Christianity from Byzantium, and (so having done) belong to the Greek Church. For the same reason, their alphabet is of Greek origin ; its accredited history being as follows : In the ninth century, the Byzantine njonks, CyrUlus 318 THE RUSSIANS PEOPEE. and Methodius, preaclied to the Slavonians of the Middle Danube; some 'of whom were the ancestors of the pre- sent Servians; but others, the occupants of certain parts of Transylvania and Hungary, anterior to the Majiar invasion. Some, too, were Bjilgarians. I put the statement in this circumlocutory manner, because the exact Slavonic form of speech which the oldest Bible translation and the earhest Slavonic literature repre- sent, is not a matter of absolute certainty; and to call it simply Servian, simply Bulgarian, or simply Buthe- nia/n, might be inaccurate. The alphabet, however, in which it was embodied, is safely, as well as currently, called the CyriUic, or CyriUian. It was based (as has been stated) on the Greek, but was modified in its application. In this modification, the sound principle, which the alpha- bets of Roman origin take- such delight in violating, viz., that of coining new letters for such new sounds as demand them, was adopted, and sixteen new symbols were added. A further modification of this Cyrillic al- phabet, by Peter the Great, gives us the modern Russian alphabet — i. e., the old Slavonic, common to both Servia and Russia, modified. Since Russia herself has taken a part in the propagation of Christianity amongst the tribes in subjection to her, the Ziranian, Permian, Ostiak, and other Ugrian tongues have been reduced to writing — the alphabet being the Russian. The same is the case with the Ir6n or Osset, so far as it is written at all; and, to a slight extent, with the Circassian. At any rate, though the proper Circassian alphabet is the Turkish, I have before me a Russo-Circassian Lexicon in Russo-Circassian letters. The languages to which, THE RUSSIANS PROPER. §19 either tlie Russian alphabet itself, or an alphabet formed from the Greek, and (as such) akin to it, is applied, are as follows: — Slavonic. — Servian and Bulgarian — lUyrian for the old literature, but not for the new. On the other hand, the Polish, Bohemian, and modern Illyrian (of Dalmatia, &c.), are written with Roman letters. Non-Slavonic. — Ugricm. — Ziranian, Permian, Wotiak, Tsheremis, Tshuvash, Mordvin. The Fin of Finland is written in Roman letters. Eskimo. — The Aleutian of the ^yeutian Islands — UnalaShka, &c. I)ioscwrian.^lTt>Tii (Oss^t), Circassian (partially). Roman. — Rumanyo of the Danubian Principalities. The Russian alphabet indicates that the Christianity of the nation that uses it is Greek. No Romanist or Protestant country does so. Respecting the Bosnians, who are Mahometan, I am unable to say how far the few that write at all follow the letters of the Koran, the Servians, or the Dalmatians. Of the Greek church, generally, the alphabets are aU Greek — either Greek direct (or the Greek of Athens), or indirect Greek; indi- rect Greek meaning Cyrillic, old Illyrian, and Russian — Greek derivatives. The dialects of the Russian language demand notice from the very fact of their being so unimportant ; indeed, the Great Russian finds its proper analogue in the Eng- lish of the United States. Spread over Central Asia, Siberia, and North-western America, it is spoken with the mmimwrn amount of dialectical difference, and the 320 THE RUSSIANS PEOPEE. m/i/n/i/muTri amount of difference between it and the ■written language. All this indicates the recency of its diffusion, combined -with the homogeneous character of the form of speech diffused. At the same time it is not to be expected that mth Lithuanic, Ugrian, and Turk frontiers, with portions of its area once Turk, Ugrian, and Lithuanic, there is no change as we proceed from the centre of Muscovy to the circumference. The dialects of Olonets, Susdal, and similar (more or less) frontier locali- ties, have been noticed. There is a notable proportion of Ugrian in both; as there is said to be of Lithuanic in the White Kussian of Smolensk. The epithet white brings us to a fresh point of ethnology. There are Russians of three kinds — White Russians, Great Russians, and Little Russians. The White Russians are (as has just been stated) those of the Government of Smolensk, their frontier be- ing Lithuanic, their original political relations Lithuanic, and (as such) some of their differentiating characteristics Lithuanic also. Haxthausen states that they are weaklier in body, and worse-looking in face, than the others. The Little Russians coincide with the Polish frontier,- as it was originally; the Ukraine and the south-west governments being their chief area. They have the credit of being as much better-looking than the majority as the White Russians are worse. They extend into Austria, and in Hungary, Bukhovinia, and Gallicia, are known as Rusniaks (also as Ruthenians) ; Malorussian is their Muscovite name. The present writer, however, has called them Rusniak and Ruthenian, even when in Russia. A good deal more than I can either confirm or THE RUSSIANS PROPEK. 321 contradict, has been said about their separate nationality. It Hes, I imagine, much within the same limits as that of the English and the Scotch — Kiev (and neither Moscow nor St. Petersburg; being the Malorussian Edinburgh. The Girmt Russians are the true Muscovites of Novo gorod and Moscow, the reducers of Olonets, Archangel, Siberia, and North- Western America. Numbers (ia round numbers and according to Schaf- farik) : — " Great Russians 35,000,000 Little Russians 13,000,000 White Russians 2,700,000 Total 50,700,000 Red Russians are sometimes spoken about. This arises out of a blunder. A portion of Polish (Little) Russia had a city named Tsherven: now, Tsherven means Red. Hence the misnomer. Smolensk, Mohilev, Minsk, Vitepsk, Grodno, Vilna, and Bialystock are the White Russian ; Pultava, Kharkhov, Tshemigov, Kiev, Podolia, Yolhynia, Ekaterinoslav, Kher- son, Bessarabia, and Taurida are the Little Russian Governments ; the rest being Great Russian. It is a common statement that the Kosaks are Little, rather than Great, Russians — Malorussians, Rusniaks, or Ruthenians, rather than true Muscovites. Undoubtedly, there is a large amount of Rusniak blood amongst thenj. To argue, however, from this to the existence of a / se- parate nationality, or a distinction of pedigree, would be unsafe in practice as well as theory. Neither are the most Malorussian of the Kosaks other than Muscovite pa 322 THE EUSSIANS PROPER. in essentials, nor are all the Kosaks in the same cate- gory. There is, probably, some Dioscurian blood amongst them; there is undoubtedly some Polish — also some Mongolian (for the Kalmuks and the Kosaks are es- pecially stated to intermarry), and, besides the Mon- golian, Polish, and Dioscurian, no trifling amount of Tartar (Turk) elements. The word itself is Turk (meaning mov/niedrhorsema/n, and robber); and certain Turk tribes bear it as a national and" native designation, e. g., some of the Kirgiz, or Kirgiz Rasak. The Dnieper is the oldest Kosak river, and the Ukraine the original Kosak locality; the former of which terms half explains the latter. ZfJcraine means boundary, or March — so that the Kosaks were the military settlers of the frontier, endowed with certain privileges, and with a peculiar organization appropriate to their functions of vjardens, march/men, protectors of the boundary, &c. This character they still main- tain, however, far from their original Ma/rch. Their func- tion is to fight, and this function implies the possession of certain rights. It is the violation of these privileges, and the infringement of the independent character of their several organizations, which have evolved certain Kosak discontents, and (occasionally) certain Kosak re- beUiohs. Grievances of this kind, and not any separate substantive nationality, as has been vainly imagined, are to be found amongst them; and, when found, they may be noted, but not overvalued. The general rule as to their military capacity is what we expect a 'priori. It bears a definite ratio to their duties. On the newer frontiers they are hardier than in the older settlements. THE EUSSUNS PEOPEE. 323 and the stronger the resistance of the coterminous popu- lations, the sharper the spear of the opposition frontagers. Thus the Kosaks of the Kuhan and Terek (in other words, of the Ca,ucasian frontier) are believed to be more warlike than those of the Don. The other Kosaks are those of the Ural (or Yaik), the Terek, the Irtish, the Tobol, &c. In the previous sketch of the early history of the Slavonic population, notice was taken of the Eussia of the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries only ; the Eussia of the earliest converts to Christianity; the Eussig, of Olga, Sviatoslaf, and the early Eussian kings. The difficixlties, too, involved in the name Russ, and the imcertainties as to the early occupants of the parts about Novogorod, were indicated. I see nothing distinctly in respect to this northern city^ — the second of the two points to which we trace the early streams of Muscovite history ; indeed, the only facts of which I feel confident, require a very general expression. From Ej.ev north- wards and from Kiev eastwards, ran the lines of Slavonic occupancy; the valley of the Dnieper leading across the water-sheds to those of the Volkhov and the Volga. Hereby, the Ugrian populations were more displaced than the Lithuanic, and, probably, the Lithuanic more than the Turk. Of some of the special Slavonic popu- lations who thus extended themselves, Nestor gives the names. These were the Polycme, the Derevlycme, the Bregovitshi, the Polotshcme, the Syevera, and others. The Desna, the Sula, and the Polota, are the rivers upon which they are more especially located ; the present governments of Kiev, Orel, Kaluga, Smolensk (partly). 324! THE MONGOL CONQUEST. Novogorod (partly), being the eminently Russian locals ities. The Poles and Lithuanians pressed upon them on the west ; the Pripecz being a Polono-Lithuanic river, rather than a Eussian one. As to the southern govern- ments, they were Turk — Khazan and Petsheneg. So was the greater part of the Volga — Khazar for the parts about Kazan, Bulgarian for Astrakhan. The Ugrians, in Nestor's time, still predominated on the Oka and the parts beyond the Valdai hills. There were some Scan- dinavians in the north ; but how they became Slavonized is uncertain. Volhynia and Podolia were battle-fields between th6 Eussian and the Pole ; the valley of Don, a battle-field between the Eussian and the Turk. Of the Ugrian struggles in the north, the history is obscure ; though such struggles there were. Novogorod was the point ,from which the line of conquest in this direction origi- nated ; Olonets, Archangel, Vologda, and Viatka, the parts reduced. The Mongol conquest has already been noticed. It was certainly a notable event in Eussian history. Never- theless, I doubt whether its effects have been rightly appreciated, either ethnologicaUy or politically : ethno- logically, it has, most undoubtedly, been misunder- stood. It has been supposed to have stamped such physical and moral features as the Eussian may ■possess in common with the Northern Asiatic upon the Slavonians of the north and east — ^to have orien- talized them, so to say. Now, without saying what these features are, we may safely lay them to another account ; viz., the original Ugrian basis of the northern IVAN THE FOUETH. 325 and central areas, and the Turk and Tnrk-Ugrian basis of the southern. Of much direct Mongol inter- mixture — Mongol as opposed to Turk — there is no satisfactory evidence. Upon the political effects I speak with less confi- dence. I do not, however, find that it prevented the encroachment of the Slavonic area upon the Ugriaa, This seems to have proceeded in the Mongolian, the Prse- MongoUan, and the Post-Mongolian times equally. The Tiurk area of the south it probably did preserve from diminution. It also favoured the consolidation of the Polish and Lithuanian powers. In the latter half of the fifteenth century reigned Ivan the Fourth. He it was who began that career of foreign conquest which Peter the Great reduced to a policy. In. 1552 and 1554, Kazan and Astrakhan, with their Turk dynasties, and their Turk and XJgrian populations, became Eussian. The conquest of the Middle Don followed; a conquest which first carried the Russian frontier towards the Black Sea. The sea, however, had yet to be reached by it. To the east lay the steppes of the present Government of Caucasus ; to the west, those of Taurida and the Crimea — ^both Turk, neither Eus- , sian. The Ural, too, had yet to be crossed. Over the last quarter of the sixteenth and the whole of the seven- teenth centuries, we may spread the reduction of Siberia and North-western America. The history of this is the history of so much individual enterprize, rather than that of a nation or a government ; indeed, for the earlier portion, and for the conquests as far as the Irtish, it 326 SIBERIA, INGRIA, is the particular history of Yermak and his Kogaks — Yermak, the conqueror of Siberia, one of the hardiest and boldest of that hardy and bold class of adventurers who, Eussian, English, French, Spaniard, or Portuguese, have diffused European civilization over almost the whole of the New World, and over so much of the Non- European portion of the Old. Siberia was Eussian anterior to the accession of Peter the Great — Siberia, Tungusia, and Kamskatka. In A. D. 1690, that monarch mounted the throne. The additions that he himself made were but moderate. Fisst in importance was the province of Ingria, upon which his new capital had to be founded. At the ac- cession of Peter, the site of St Petersburg was a part of Sweden. Along with Ingria, went Esthonia and Livonia, as well as a part of Finland. Eecent* as is the reduction of the other parts of the Grand Duchy, Viborg was lost to Sweden as early as 1721. The peace of Nystadt con- firmed these accessions — accessions to Eussia, losses to Sweden ; won by Peter, lost by Charles ; German in their original politics, Swedish since the time of Gustavus Adolphus ; once, too, Polish, and once independent It is hard to say how their present nationality comports itself. The Lutheran creed, and the German language, are its chief tangible elements ; i. e., in Livonia and Esthonia. In Viborg, the affinities are more definitely Swedish — the language, where it is not Finn, being that of Sweden. Livonia is both Let and Ugrian; Esthonia, Ugrian only. Peter's was the second of the reigns under which AND KUELAND ANNEXED. 327 the great accessions to the political power of Russia were effected ; and, perhaps, it may be said that Peter's con- quests were the most important of alL The conquests from Sweden gave him St. Petersburg — to go no fur- ther; but they did more than this — they made the Grand Duchy of Kurland and certain parts of Lithu- ania doubly desirable. In the direction of the Black Sea heavy blows were hit also, and 'Azov was made into a naval arsenal, minitant to the Crimea and Caucasus. Astrakhan, too, was rendered effective against Persia ; and the Caspian fleet took form. Its function was to enable the Czar to interfere in the affairs both of Persia and Caucasus — eventually of Inde- pendent Tartary also. In Peter's reign Derbend was al- ready appropriated by Russia. From 1725 to 1762, was a period of comparative re- pose ; but in '62 began the eminently aggressive reign of Catherine — not the most unscrupulous monarch of her time — not the most unscrupulous, nor yet the most able ; for her cotemporary was Frederic the Great of Prussia — the appropriator of Silesia, and the joint mutilator of Poland. For this reign, Kurland requires notice as well as Poland ; whilst the Turkish frontier on the south, and the Polono-Turkish relations bring in Austria and the name of Maria Theresa. Kurland's relations to Poland, in the zenith of its power, were those of a fief to a sovereign state. Inter- nally, the Dukedom was elective, but hereditary; here- ditary to the line of Kettler. In this line a member of the last generation married the niece of Peter the Great, Anna, who survived him — 328 THE MUTILATIONS OF POLAOT). afterwards to become Empress of Russia. We know what this must lead to. There is candidate after can- didate for the Dukedom ; viz., a surviving brother of the last Duke, a natural son of the Bang of Poland, Menzikoff of Russian notoriety of power, and Biron more famous than even Menzikoff, who held the Duchy, visited Siberia as an exile, re-held it, and got displaced agaia. Meanwhile, anarchy increased iu Poland; and when this reached its climax, and the times of the second mutilation came on, Kurland transferred itself bodily to Russia by an act of the States. But the first mutilation of Poland preceded this ; the occasion being the anarchy into which the elective cha- racter of the Polish constitution plunged the State when- ever the Crown of the Republic (strange combiaation of words) became vacant, the extent to which StanUaus Poniatovski was a mere Russian nominee, the aggres- sive policy of the Kiug of Prussia, and the desire on the part of Russia to round off her frontier by the posses- sion of Mohilev and Vitebsk. MohUev, therefore, and Vitepsk went to Russia in A. D. 1772 ; when Prussia got Prussian Poland; and Austria, Gallicia and Lodo- miria. Pari passu, with this, war went on in the south ; i. e., in what is now the Governments of Kherson and Ekaterinoslav, but what was then a part of the Ottoman Empire ; and by the treaty of Kainardzhi, in which these wars ended, the Tartars of the Crimea, the Kuban (or the Government of Caucasus), and the Bessarabian fron- tier, were made wholly independent of the Porte ; that power having previously had the nomination of their Khan. The same independence was effected for the THE MUTILATIONS OF POLAND. 329 Danubian Principalities. Hence, the treaty of KainardzH is to Turkey what that of Nystad was to Sweden. A. D. 1783, saw the nominal independence of the Crimea converted into an absolute reduction under Russia, the last Khan being deposed and pensioned off. Nine years later the same became the fate of the Tartars of the Dneister — Kherson becoming Eussian even as the Crimea had done before it. The treaty of Yassi deter- mined this. In 1793 and 1795, Poland was again mutilated. I use the word mutilation rather than partition. Par- tition implies that the whole of an object is divided amongst a certain number of shareholders; mutilation, that a part is cut off; a part that may or may not un- dergo subsequent separation. Now, up to 1815 Poland was only mutilated. In the mutilation of 1793 and 1795, the miserable puppet Poniatovski still being the king, Suvarov is the agent of Russia, and Koskiusko the bright name i;i the history of the resistance. This is sadly ineffectual ; and Vilna and Grodno, Minsk, Volhynia, and Podolia, pass from the possession of Poland to that of Russia. The former of these empires has now transferred to the latter the whole of its Lithuanic portion — that, and something more. With Bessarabia, taken from the Turks in 1821, and the remains of the Kingdom of Poland, which were finally absorbed in ] 815, the list of the Russian conquests in Europe draws towards its end. The notice of Finland will complete it. The folly of the last of the legitimate kings of Sweden, Gustavus Adolphus IV., allowed Russia a pretext for a war against Sweden, a pretext 330 FINLAND which was only too sedulously sought for. Denmark was to make over her fleet to France, and Russia was to take possession of Finland. So ran a secret article in the treaty of Tilsit, the effect of it being a muti- lation of Scandinavia, arranged between Napoleon and Alexander, just as the mutilation of Poland had been arranged between Catherine and Frederic. A short campaign did the work so easily that the charge of ac- cessibility to Eussian bribes has been laid more than once against the Swedish officers. It is only certain that the nobles were divided, that they were factious, that there was a strong Russian party among them, and that the King (who was afterwards deposed) was unrea- sonable and impracticable. In the February of 1808, the first Russian divisions crossed the frontier, and in September, 1809, was signed the treaty of Frederics- hamn, by which Finland, along with the Aland Isles, became Russian. So did a portion of Lapland, a portion which inconveniently indents the Norwegian territory, and brings the Russian frontier within a few miles of the German Ocean. The present population of Finland is roughly put at 2,000,000. In a paper of Koeppen's, read before the Academy of St. Petersburg in 184!6, the exact numbers are — Fins (pure) 1,102,068 Swedes 1.3,6,612 Fins and Swedes (mixed) 129,520 Russians and Fins (mixed) 43,752 Germans. 363 1,412,315 PANSLAVONISM. 331 The Germans are all in the Province of Viborg; the Russians and Fins lying north and north-west of the Lake Ladoga. They are the KareUans of the Greek Church, and (as such) contrasted with the other popula- tions, who are all Lutheran Protestants. The Alanders are wholly Swedish, not Fin. In Ask the chief conquests lie within the present cen- tury, the order of annexation being as follows : — 1802, Georgia and Mingrelia; 1803, Gandzha; 1805, Sheki and Karabaugh; 1806, Shhrvan; 1812, the Talish country; 1828, Erivan; 1829, Akalzik, and parts of the Circassian coast. Such is a sketch of the material progress of Eussia, the details of which belong more properly to the civil historian than to the ethnologist. There is, however, another, and a more ideal, poiut of view which should be taken. The aggregate phenomena which this vjiew gives us are conveniently expressed by a word specially coined for the occasion, and, by this time, tolerably purrent — more so, perhaps, on the Continent than here. This term is Pan-slavonism. The fundamental fact upon which Pan-slavonism, rests, is the vast extent of area over which the different dialects of the Slavonic language are spoken, combiued with the small amount of difference they exhibit, even in their more extreme forms. Let us take it as certaiu savans of Bohemia took it, as a point of literary economy, as a question of international (or, rather, interlingual) copy- right. Out of the writings of a literary man, Pan-sla- vonism arose, and it is by the writings of literary men that it has chiefly been developed. It cannot, however, 332 PANSLA.VONISM. be denied that it lias a political aspect as well THs varies with the country. In Poland, it means absolute equality between the Pole and Kussian, the two separate nationalities being merged under the great generality of Slavonism. In Eussia, it means the propagation of the Greek creed, and the displacement of such languages as the Turk and Rumanyo by Eussian or Servian. In Servia and Montenegro, it means disUke to aU things Ottoman ; and in Hungary, the denial of the right of predominance to the Madzhiar miaority. It means, in short, different thiugs in different places. On the western side of the Slavonic area, it means the non- recognition of the assimaed superiority in literature and science on the part of the Germans, and the develop- ment of the Slavonic press, whose domaiii should be co- extensive with the language. I see no obstacles to this in the alleged inferiority of the Slavonic rutellect. Half Germany is more than half Slavonic, if it did but know it. I see no obstacles ia the lateness of the move- ment. Modem German literature itself is but two generations old. In the difference between the eastern and western alphabets, I do see a difficulty. Literary Pan-slavonism began ia Bohemia, where the Slavonic civilization is the highest, and where the Ger- man contact is the least satisfactory to the Slavonian ; Kollar, a Protestant clergyman of Pest, and a Slovak by birth, being its origiaator. Its importance, or unim- portance, may be well measured by the subjoiaed tables, which shew two things: — 1. The great area of the Slavonic tongue ; and — 2. The extent to which its pohtical and literary value PANSLAVONISM. 333 is traversed by the conflicting conditions of nationality and creed. (A.) POUTICAl DISTRIBUTION OF THE SLAVONIC STOCK. Great Russians-. Little Russians. . White Russians Bulgarians Servians and ) Bosnians.... ) Croatians Carinthians .1.. Poles Tsbekhs Slovaks Upper Sofabians Lower Sorabians 36,314, 10,370, 2,726, BUSSIA. 000 ,000 ,000 80,000 100,000 AUSTKIA. PRUSSIA, TUBKET. CRACOW. SAXONY. TOTAL. 35,314,000 13,144,000 2,726,000 3,687,000 7,000 1,694,000 801,000 1,161,000 2,341,000 1,370,000 2,763,000 Total 63,502,000 16,791,000 2,108,000j6,100,000 130,000 3,500,000 2,600,000 1,982,000 44,000 38,000 44,000 6,294,000 801,000 1,151,000 9,365,00Q 4,414,000 2,753,000 98,000 44,000 60,000178,691,000 (B.) EELIGIOUS DISTEIBUTION OF THE SLAVONIC STOCK. Great Russians Little Russians White Russians Bulgarians Servians and Bosnians. Croatians Carinthians ^ . . Poles Tshekhs Slovaks Upper Sorahians Lower Sorabians tTNTTED GREEK PROTEST- MAHO- CKUECH. CHUECH. CATHOLIC. ANT. METAN. 35,314,000 ,, 10,154,000 2,990,000 .. 2,370,000 .. 3.50,000 .. 3,287,000 50,000 250,000 2,880,000 1,864,000 801,000 1,138,000 8,923,000 4,270,000 1,953,000 10,000 13,000 442,000 144,000 800,000 88,000 44,000 550,000 64,011,000 2,9£ 0,000 19,369,000 1,631,000 800,000 Without either exactly exhibiting the classification which the present author would adopt, or exactly repre- senting the numbers and distribution of the Slavonians 334i PANSLAVONISM. of the present year, these tables give us the data upon which the idea of Panslavonian chiefly rests. They are from Schaffarik; the language beiag the characteristic, and the numbers which they supply being those which have been copied in aU ' (or nearly all) the works which have treated upon the actual condition, or the future destinies, of the great Slavonic stock. NUMBERS OF THE NON-RUSSIAN POPULATIONS OF RUSSIA IN EUROPE. I. UGEIANS. Samwyeds. Of Archangel 4,495 Laps. Of Archangel 2,289 Vogids. OfPeim 872 Tshud. Of Novogorod 7,067 Olonets 8,550 16,617 Vod. Of St. Petersburg 5,148 Eathonians, OfVitehsk 9,986 Livonia 355,2J6 Pskov 8,000 St. Petersburg 7,736 Esthonia 252,608 633,496 LUf. OfKurland 2,052 Livonia (Liefland) 22 2 074 Awramoiset. Of Novogorod 31 St. Petersburg 29,344 29,376 Savakat. Of St; Petersburg 42,979 Izhor. Of St. Petersburg 17,800 Karelians. Of Archangel 11,228 Novogorod 27,076 Olonets i 43,810 St. Petersburg 3,660 Tambov 'i Tver 84,638 Taroslav 1,283 171,699 Ziranians. Of Archangel 6,958 Tologda 64,007 70,965 Permiwns. OfViatka 4,699 Perm 47,605 62,204 Votidki. OfViatka 181,270 Kazan ^,500 Orenburg 2 Samar „„.,,,,.., ,. % 186,770 Besirmo/rdans. Of Viatka , 4,545 336 NXTMBEES OF THE NON-EUSSIAN POPULATIONS OfViatka 75,450 Kazan 71,375 Kostroma 3,357 Nizhnigorod 4,330 Orenburg 2,626 Perm 7,938 165,076 Mordvins. Of Astrakhan 48 Kazan 14,867 Nizhnigorod 53,382 Orenburg 5,200 Penza 106,025 Samar 74,910 Saratov 78,010 Simbirsk 98,968 Tauris „ 340 Tambov 48,491 480,241 Tshuvash. OfViatka 17 Kazan 300,091 Orenburg' 8,352 Samar 29,926 Saratov 6,852 Simbirsk 84,714 429,952 II. TUEKS* Tartars (so called by the Rxissians). OfAstrakhan 21,092 Vilna 1,874 Viatka 67,944 Grodno 849 DonKosaks 629 * This includes ,the Nogays. Kazan 308,674 Kovno 415 Kostroma 262 Minsk 2,120 Nizbriigorod 22,788 Orenburg 230,080 Penza 34,684 Perm 17,271 Podolia 46 Riazan 4,725 Samar 83,927 Saratov 46,713 Simbirsk 67,730 Staurbpol 96,037 Tauris 275,822 Tambov 10,640 Esthonia 12 1,284,234 OfAstrakhan 60 Orenberg 1 Perm ? 60 Trukhmen (Turcomans). OfAstrakhan 1,600 Stauropol 5,271 Tauris 450 7,321 Khivaiis. OfAstrakhan „ 190 Saratov 25 215 BaMdrs. OfViatka 3,617 Orenburg 332,358 Perm 40,746 Samar 15,351 392,072 OF RUSSIA IK EUROPE. 337 Meahtsheriaka, Of Orenburg 71,578 Penza 1 Perm 6,783 Saratov 2,680 79,941 Kirgiz, Of Astrakhan 82,000 III. SAEMATIANS. (UTHTJAHIO BKANOH.) Idihuanicms. OfVilna ~. 138,320 Grodno 2,338 KoTOO 668,794 Karland 7,434 716,886 Lets. Of Vitebsk „ 142,497 Kovno 6,341 Kurland 401,939 Livonia 318,872 Pskov 458 St. Petersburg 2,000 872,107 SAEMATIANS. (SLAVONIC BKAEOH.) Bulgiwians. Of Bessarabia 64,736 Tauris 1,234 Kherson 11,132 77,102 Servians. Of Bessarabia 89 Ekaterinoslav 858 Kherson 436 1,383 Poles. OfAstrakhan ? Bessarabia 733 Tolhynia 160,000 Grodno 82,689 Ekaterinoslav ...-. 8,000 Kiev 100,000 Kovno S Kurland 12,888 Livonia 3,213 Minsk 1 Mohilev ? Orenburg ? Podolia 100,000 St. Petersburg 19,149 Saratov ? Stauropol....; ? Kherson 850 Esthonia 13 477,635 IT. EUMAWTOS. (WALLAOHIAHS AND MOLDAVIANS.) Of Bessarabia 406,182 Ekaterinoslav 9,858 Podolia 7,429 Kherson 75,000 498.469 338 NUMBERS OP THE NON-RUSSIAN POPULATIONS MONGOLS, KAIMUKS. Of Astrakhan 87,656 Don Kosaks 20,591 Orenburg ? Samar ? Saratov 692 Stauropol 10,223 119,162 VI. GEEEES. Of Astrakhan 20 Bessarabia 3,363 Ekaterinoslav 32,633 Podolia 50 Tauris 5,426 Kherson 3,500 Tshemigov 1,791 46,773 Til. ARMENIANS. Of Astrakhan 5,272 Bessarabia 2,353 Ekaterinoslay 14,931 St. Petersburg 170 Stauropol 9,000 Tauris 3,960 Kherson 1,990 37,676 vni. GERMANS. Germans Proper (Deutsche). Of Archangel 450 Astrakhan 250 Bessarabia 10,200 Vilna 765 Vitebsk ..^ 1,300 Vladimir 100 Vologda 100 Volhynia 4,000 Voronezh 1,900 Viatka 120 Grodno 5,355 Don Kosaks 11 Ekaterinoslav 13,232 Kazan 550 Kaluga 132- Kiev 1,200 Kovuo ? Kostroma 50 Kurland 38,593 Kursk 400 Livonia 51,340 Minsk 330 Mohilev 200 Moskow 8,000 Nizhnigorod 204 Novogorod 1,100 Olonets 120 Orenburg 1,034 Orlov 200 Penza 250 Perm 300 Podolia 1,126 Poltava 800 Pskov .'. 657 Eiazan 227 Samar 46,900 St. Petersburg 50,800 Saratov 62,500 OF RUSSIA IN EUEOPE. 339 Of Simbirsk 158 Smolensk 229 Stauropol 1,036 Tauris 22,324 Tambov 227 Tver 200 Tula 180 Kharkhov 650 Kteraon 31,700 Tshemigov t. 1,500 Estlioiua 10,000 Yarcslav 100 373,000 Swedes. OfKurland 7 Livonia 425 St. Petersburg 6,156 Kherson 168 Estlionia 4,714 ■ x; PERSIANS. Kuz!,Ubash. Of Astrakhan 460 Samar 186 646 Smia (Bohharians). Of Astiqklian Orenburg 11,470 IX. DIOSCUEIANS. Georgians. Of Astrakhan 290 Stauropol 710 1,000 Ir6n(0sM). Of Stauropol 1,650 Circassians. OfDonKosaks 130 Samar f Simbirsk 451 175 XI. ' INDIANS. Of Astrakhan 10 XII. ALBANIANS. (abhaut, skipitar.) Of Bessarabia 1,328 XIII. FEENCH. Of Bessarabia 250 XIV. JEWS. Talmmdie, Of Bessarabia 42,380 Vilna 69,397 Vitebsk 47,649 Volhynia 195,030 Viatka 58 340 THE NON-EUSSIAN POPULATIONS, ETC. Of Grodno 99,592 Bkaterinoslav 6,139 Kiev 103,326 Kotho 82,664 Kurland 23,486 Livonia 532 Minsk 88,880 Mohilev 83,715 Podolia 150,485 Polteva 16,140 Tauris 4,110 Kherson 22,424 Tshemigov 18,400 1,054,407 Karait. OfVilua 424 Volhynia „ 320 Kovno • 337 Tauris 4,198 Kherson 446 5,725 XV. TSIGANI. (SIPSIES). Of Archangel 25 Bessarabia 18,738 Vilna 107 Vitebsk 607 Vladimir 130 Vologda 160 Volhynia 143 Voronezh 2,586 Viatka 338 Grodno ..\ 83 OfDonKosaks ... Ekaterinoslav.. , Kazan Kaluga Kiev Kovno Kostroma Kurland Kursk Livonia Minsk Mohilev Moskow Wizhgorod Novogorod Olonets Orenburg Orlov Penza Perm Podolia Poltava Pskov... ^iazan Samar St. Petersburg Saratov Simbirsk Smolensk Stauropol Tauris Tambov Tver Tula Karkhov Kherson Tshemigov Tarodav 408 425 188 659 880 169 264 60 1,200 6 257 424 1,200 369 S44 142 85 510 120 265 464 775 369 595 611 254 38S 171 808 42 7,726 147 160 315 1,166 2,516 458 493 48,247 Printed by W. H. Cox, 5, Great Queen Street, Lbicoln's Inn ilelda.