The road which has created Russia

Roman Fedorov

Translated by Enrico Sartori (Paris)

The presence of reliable overland routes was one of the necessary conditions for fixing the Siberian land to Russia as a result of Ermak’s campaign. Vishero-Lozvinsk’s overland route which had become official by that time had appeared very unsuitable to cope with the increased stream of people and cargoes. Beginning at the center of Perm Great Cherdyn’, it passed on the river Vishera and its affluent Velsu. Then travelers had to leave the vessels and go to the Ural Mountains by foot or on horse, then another part on water on the river Lozva. The route reached the small town Lozvinsk which played at that time a role of a reloading point, before further going deep into Siberia on the rivers Tavda, Tura, Tobol, Irtysh and Ob. In 1595 tsar Feodor Ivanovich published the decree to the "hunting people " to find a more direct and convenient way to Siberia. Artemiy Sofronovich Babinov was one of such people. We do not know a lot about his life. It is known, that Artemiy Babinov was a peasant by origin, was born between the 60s or 70s of the XVI century and lived in the village Verkh-Usloka located near Solikamsk (1). According to the legend, once he met Voguls (Mansi) near the Chan’vinsk caves, Where they were celebrating their pagan rites. Babinov unobserved proceeded behind them on a secret way, which went through the woods to the riverhead Tura. "He broke branches of trees, in order not to lose the way. So Artemiy Babinov found the way through the Ural mountains, and he reported to Moscow that he could lead directy on a land road which would reduce the way between Sol’-Kamskaya and Tobolsk, the capital city of Siberia. The highest consent was received." (13, 19).

Construction of the road began in 1595 and continued during two years. Under the imperial decree, Artemiy Babinov was given two Tselovalniks and forty peasants whose duties were to clear the road, and to build bridges over rivers encountered on their way. The road was about 260 versts (280 km) that was approximately eight times shorter than the former Vishero-Lozvinsk route. In 1597 the road reached the Voguls’ settlement Nerom-Kar located at the riverhead Tura. One year later on this place began the construction of the town Verkhoturye.

For Artemiy Babinov investigation and construction of new roads became the issue of his life, subsequently continued by his descendants. Shortly, the new "tsar’s road" was built up to Tyumen and Tobolsk. During the XVII –and the first half of the XVIII century it was the only officially resolved route between the European part of the state and Siberia. First of all it was so because Verkhoturye’s customs opened in 1600, and all people going to Siberia and back were obliged to pass through it without any exception. During almost 150 years, the road named by the people "Babinov’s road", after its founder, played a main role in the development of the Siberian land. " Babinov’s road was as important as the world famous trading Great Silk Road from Varyag to Greece. It becomes clear if you imagine, as in the XVII century during the Russian development of the huge Siberian subcontinent, significant human carried weights, let alone immense volumes of cargoes, which arrived in Siberia through the narrow neck of Babinov’s road which had only a few meters in width... "(7, 147). Babinov’s road became one of the main links of the complex of the first Trans Siberian road laid by trailblazers to new, east boundaries of the Russian state.

Today, the majority of these routes cannot be seen on modern geographical maps. Many cities and jails that were basic centers for a long time have lost their former value, and some of them seem even to have disappeared. However, today as part of the cultural-historical heritage of Russia, these ways continue to carry out a role similar to the original geographical routes with some traces of bygone epoch life. On these routes they are presented by monuments of material culture, a historical memory in the form of print and oral legends, as well as original features of outlook and the vital way of people living here. All together these components form a unique interconnected environment which can be grouped under the term "a cultural landscape".

To understand the sense of separate historical phenomena or originality of the cultural traditions which still exist, it is first of all important to know about the inner world of the people who mastered east boundaries of Russia.

One of the major roles in the early stages of Siberian development was played by the inhabitants of the Russian North. The well-known historian of Siberia P.A. Slovtsov, wrote: "Siberia is searched, extracted, occupied, and formed all by Ustyug’s people. They are farmers, coachmen, they have built us temples and bell towers, they began fairs." (23, 140). Even by quick look on a map of the Ural Mountains and Siberia, you can see an abundance of names the same as the names of settlements, which modern Vologda and Arkhangelsk areas have. So, the village Pinyagino in the Verkhotursk district, was founded by the idle people who moved to these lands in the XVII century from the area of the river Pinegi. The Povarennoe and Usolye villages, situated near Pinyagino, were originally populated by natives from Sol’vuchegodsk (16, 126). Near to the Ust’-Nitsunsk large villages during the XVII - XVIII centuries, among others, the villages Kaygorodova and Dvinka appeared whose names lead to the assumption, that their founders were natives of Kaygorodov and Podvinye (9, 141). In the second half of the XVII century the village Arkhangelskoye appeared in the territory of the modern Isetskoye of the Tyumen region. It was named so as its founders were from the Michael-Arkhangelsk male monastery located in the Great Ustyug. At that time, in connection with colonization of Siberia, the monastery was obliged to deliver food and bread in Zauralye. Its delivery, carried out on the Siberian route, took a long time and faced considerable difficulties and deprivations. Some of Ustyug’s people left their homes, did not come back any more and stayed to live in Siberia. The prior of Michael-Arkhangelsk male monastery addressed to the Tsar with the request to give the monks some land beyond the Ural Mountains, specially intended to produce food. In 1667 the ancestral lands of 280 desyatins (1 desyatin = 2.9 acres = 1.1 hectare) on the river Iset’ were given to the monastery. A.L. Yemelyanov, in his book "History of the Arkhangelskoye settlement " (6), analyzed the data from the population censuses recorded in the patrol book of Tobolsk Sofia House, and found out that many surnames of the first generations of inhabitants of the village who moved to Zauralye from Ustyug, Sol’vuchegodsk and Belozersky districts, are often found in the modern area of the Isetskoye district. The actual data in Yemelyanov’s book is evidence that certificates not only toponymic, but also a patrimonial trace which was left by people who moved from the Russian North into the cultural landscape of Siberia.

Why did the inhabitants of Northern Russia become the main trailblazers of new, east boundaries of the country? What were the reasons? One of them is that during that time, Pomors-peasants, who were not serfs, had a freedom of movement and the right of an independent choice of residence (8, 136). The second reason was the high tension on the southern borders of the Siberian lands that is why a basic effort was devoted on developing the northern trading routes. And, lastly, it is important to consider that remoteness of Pomorze from Central Russia, with a small population and a severe environment of these places, which have predetermined their extensiveness of the development, the basic role which was played by the distant trading communications interfaced with a structure of new transport routes and the development of adjacent territories. "How would the people of Ustyug feel, entering into strange taiga’s depth! What qualities were required for people to survive and resist in such a place, where obviously there was no other support, than their own forces. What characters could be shaped here! And today several hours of dialogue with native Ustyug’s people is enough to understand that they are Russians of a special breed. They are quiet and self-confident. Ustyug’s people do not express readiness to agree to any change to a life imposed on them without ceremony. They can accept it, but will not reconcile themselves to their fate." (20).

Specific conditions of existence promoted the development of a special mentality, an original c outlook on life and a vital way of the inhabitants of the Russian North whose distinctive features were: independence, propensity to human mutual assistance and search of harmonious forms of coexistence with the surrounding environment. During many centuries the European North of Russia played a role of important "catalyst" of many original forms of national culture. In the involuntary image, their prototypes were transferred to the open spaces of the Ural Mountains and Siberia, mastered by numerous natives of Great Ustyug, Sol’vuchegodsk, Kargopol, Totma and others Pomorze towns. Many samples of culture of the Russian North have appeared to be the most comprehensible and durable in specific conditions of Siberia. You can just recollect the valenoks (felt boots) that are first of all associated with Siberia, but whose native land is considered to be Great Ustyug (27). As a matter of fact, the first waves of purposeful development of Siberia were the basis to form the new original "northern branch" of the Russian culture. Today it still exists in small historical cities and the rural settlements far bypassed by modern transit ways (Great Ustyug, Kargopol, Totma, Cherdyn’, Verkhoturye, etc.). It is much more difficult to distinguish its traces in regions, where the external shape and vital way have been considerably changed by the subsequent stages of economic development connected with new waves of migration to their territory. Finishing this theme, it would be desirable to mention a word about writer V. Rasputin who once told: " It would be fair to state and confirm somewhere on the open spaces of Siberia the grateful memory of Siberians to Great Ustyug ". (27)

A lot of the people who have become outstanding characters of domestic history have passed along Babinov’s road and other parts of the Siberian route. Among them - rebellious Abbakum, disgraced prince Menshikov, A.S. Pushkin's ancestor - Hannibal, outstanding scientists - members of expeditions of Vitus Bering, the first Siberian governors and metropolitans. In some cases, these historical figures have not simply passed on the Siberian route, but also have left their trace on it. In 1731 in the village Krasnoye, located in the vicinity of Solikamsk, Grigory Demidov established one of the first botanical gardens in Russia. In severe climatic conditions of the Northern Ural Mountains, in the greenhouses located in the grounds of a manor, strange cactuses and pineapples started to grow. "Owing to the unique position of Solikamsk on the Siberian path in an initial stage of opening and development of the Asian part of Russia, Grigory Demidov's botanical garden has helped a concentration of a scientific idea of that time not only with studying the vegetative riches of Russia that time, but also in defining the status of the most significant establishments of a science essentially advancing the time and cultures". (22, 27). Considerable aid was given to Grigory Demidov in forming this garden with members of the Second Kamchatka expedition of Bering - botanist I.Gmelin, S.Krasheninnikov and Steller. The life of the last of them came to the end on this road. In 1746 during a stop in Tyumen on his way to St.-Petersburg, George Steller caught a cold and died.

Neither Demidov’s botanical garden (now it is a place in the modern micro district) nor Steller’s tomb (nobody knows Steller’s exact burial place) have been saved. Despite this the destiny of the people connected with the Siberian route has become an important achy-typical components of the cultural landscape of those places through which it passed (see for example: 4, 19, and 22). In 1719, in the second part of the book issued about Robinson Crusoe, the route of adventures passed along the Siberian route. Under the assumption made by the historian Verevkin (4), the reference that inspired Daniel Defoe, was one of the first descriptions of the Siberian route – notes made by an unknown military foreigner who had proceeded with forty six officers from Moscow to Siberia in 1666 (14, 264). These notes written in German, long time remained unpublished ad were stored in Copenhagen. They were published in our country in 1936 in the magazine "Historical archive" by M.P. Alekseev - the author of books "Siberia in news of the West-European writers", "Siberia in Defoe's novel", etc. Other important documents about the Siberian route from the end of the XVII century are traveling diaries of Russian ambassadors to China Izbrant Idess and Adam Brandt who traveled in 1692 - 1695.

The Siberian route has left the bright trace on architecture and landscapes of cities through which it ran. One of the paramount goals of the "tsar’s road" of Solikamsk, Verkhoturye, Tyumen and Tobolsk was to leave on new, uninhabited lands the major attributes of Russian statehood and spiritual culture. In these cities at the end the XVII - the beginning of the XVIII centuries many outstanding samples of temple and civil architecture were constructed, the largest monasteries were founded which are seen today as original spiritual items of this historical-geographical phenomena.

The beginning of Babinov’s road was in the Cathedral area of Solikamsk that has become the heart of an architectural ensemble of the city and the "pearls" of it constructed mainly from the 80s of the XVII till the 20s of the XVIII centuries are: Trinity and Cross-Erection Сathedrals, Epiphanies and Resurrection Churches, the Cathedral Belltower and the House of Commander. One of the most impressive architecture monuments connected with the Siberian route is considered to be John Predtechi's Church founded in 1715 in the village of Krasnoye, near Solikamsk. Not only the symbolical lay-out of this church, but also its external shape brings to mind a tall sailing ship symbolizing the movement of Orthodoxy to the East. Most likely, John Predtechi's Church was the first temple with such an appearance. Later, in the second half of the XVIII century, similar architectural styles were widely applied by the masters of Totma whose inhabitants have played a significant role in the development of Russian America.

The so-called "Moscow baroque" influenced greatly the external shape of the majority of Solikamsk’s temples. This architectural style, extending from the center of the country to its remote boundaries, alongside other architectural tendencies, arts and crafts, underwent the change, adapted some spiritual and aesthetic research, quite often being enriched by the original traditions, and developed in local schools of architecture. As a result, in different regions you can meet different definitions of this style, such as "Northern", "Ural" or "Siberian" baroque. The influence of traditional architecture of Great Ustyug, Kargopol, and Totma is clearly seen in the architectural ensemble of Solikamsk. In fact, the first artels (cooperative associations) that erected stone temples arrived precisely from these cities. At the same time, the original stylistic features of the Solikamsk ensemble are distinguished. They have become typical for Solikamsk’s craftsmen who subsequently have taken part in the construction of many temples not only in the homeland, but also in a number of other cities of the Ural Mountains and Siberia. One such masterpiece of local temple architecture is the Trinity Cathedral in Verkhoturye, which was included amongst the most outstanding architectural monuments of the world in 1959 at the international conference in The Hague. The Trinity Cathedral, for which the construction began in 1703 with the blessing of the Siberian metropolitan Filofey Leschinsky, became the main dominant feature of Verkhoturye’s stone Kremlin, being erected at that time. By all means this architectural complex symbolized the main administrative and spiritual attributes of the Russian state. Besides the Trinity Cathedral, there were the House of the Commander, the Decrees chambers, the Granary barns, the exchequer and a number of other buildings in its territory.

Besides the administrative and trading functions which solved the problems of the Siberian colonization, Babinov’s road had also an important missionary function. First clerics and monks used that route to the East. In 1604 the priest Iona, who became the founder of the Saint-Nikolaev monastery arrived in Verkhoturye. Some decades later, on this road the future heavenly patrons of the Ural Mountains and Siberia - Sacred Just Simeon of Verkhoturye moved to the village of Merkushino which was situated 60 versts from Verkhoturye. After Simeon’s relics were transferred to the Saint-Nikolaev monastery of Verkhoturye in 1704 Babinov’s road in the minds of many people took on a new, sacral sense of a pilgrim’s route. Consideration of the spiritual value of the Siberian route is important in understanding how self-sacrifice and beliefs of separated people have changed these lands.

In Tyumen the Siberian route passed close to the Trinity monastery. It should be mentioned, that unlike most other cathedrals often found in Siberia with Moscow and North Russian architectural elements, this cathedral had typical Ukrainian features. It can be easily explained by the fact that the Siberian metropolitan Filofey Leschinsky who took part in the construction of stone temples of the monastery was of Ukrainian origin. Unlike Verkhoturye and Tobolsk, there was no stone Kremlin in Tyumen. However, in the historical part of the town, which was the place of the first wooden jail, during the XVIII century the original architectural ensemble was built. In 1700, on the bank of the river Tura, stone barns for the storage of treasury were founded, above which the Annunciation church was built. Later, on the opposite bank of the river the church of Ascension-George was erected and was sanctified in 1789. In the 70s - 90s of the XVIII century was constructed the Nikolskaya (Cross-Erection) church which has become one of the most important dominant features of the historical Tyumen center. Owing to its placement on the «tsar’s road ", in Tyumen, as well as in Verkhoturye, a Coachmen’s village developed near the Trinity monastery.

The Tobolsk Kremlin became one of the most outstanding architectural complexes - symbols of power of the Tobolsk province during that time covering the huge territory from the Ural Mountains to the east suburbs of Siberia. In 1697 the architect and mapmaker Simeon Remezov received the commission to make the project of the stone Kremlin and make calculations of its costs. One of most difficult problems he faced was to unite the various buildings of the Troitsk cape in one architectural and military-defensive system. The Kremlin complex included: the house of the Bishop, a consistory, the monastic buildings, the Sofia cathedral, the Covering church, the Cathedral Belltower, the Chambers of Orders, the largest in Siberia, a court yard in which greater caravans with the overseas goods quite often stopped, and a number of other economic and administrative constructions. In Tobolsk the main architectural frame of the Siberian route was the Dmitriy Gate of Renteriya. The Tobolsk regional specialist Boris Eristov wrote about it: "Many Siberian cities (Verkhoturye, Tyumen, Tobolsk) were called symbolically "the gate of Siberia", however there is such a gate in Tobolsk. The matter is that in the past the well-known route to Siberia went through Tobolsk. The Moscow path directly approached the "Dmitriy Gate» of the Tobolsk Kremlin, passed through it and then on the hilly part of the city went further to the east, to Omsk, Irkutsk, Kazakhstan and China. Here they are, real «Gates of Asia ". Through this gate passed the ambassadors of eastern lords, who did not manage to reach St. Petersburg, as Tobolsk played the major role in eastern policy of the state « (26, 196).

During the XVII and XVIII centuries Tobolsk was not only the largest administrative, spiritual and trading center of Siberia, but also one of the main transport units of the Siberian route. It was also the beginning of the overland Irkutsk route. Owing to the connection with the Ob-Irtysh basin, Tobolsk was given the key role in the development of Western Siberia. Probably, that is why Tobolsk is often called «the father of the Siberian cities ".

As for the region of the Ural Mountains, similar definitions are often applied to Solikamsk and Verkhoturye. These cities played an important role in the development of the land, situated to the south of the basic direction of the Siberian route. In the XVIII century the main agrarian and trading centers of this region became such cities as Kungur, Krasnoufimsk, Irbit, Kamyshlov, Yalutorovsk, Ishim, etc. In 1699 Peter the Great issued the decree concerning «The Establishment of the Verkhoturye iron factories ". During this period Verkhoturye became the important center, which was the beginning of the future «mining civilization «of Ural Mountains region. The mining era of the Ural region began with the construction of the Nevyansk factory in 1700 where one year later the first cast iron was produced. In 1720 the Nizhniy-Tagil factory was founded, soon to become one of the largest industrial centers of the Ural Mountains Region, and in 1723 the construction of Ekaterinburg began. In 1781 on the place of settlement of the Egoshihinsk factory the city of Perm was founded which later became the center of Perm Region. In the XVIII century these new economic centers of the Ural Mountains Region and Western Siberia more and more actively defined the character of the further development of this land, so that the first advanced posts of its development were involuntarily pushed aside into the background. The given process predetermined the displacement of the basic transport ways. So, in 1735 the new post route which went through Kungur and Ekaterinburg was opened. Despite its existence, all basic streams of cargoes continued to use Babinov’s road, because at that time it was forbidden to use other routes for trading purposes. However, in 1753 after the abolishing of collecting taxes for the goods transportation to Siberia and the closing of the Verkhoturye customs, artificial restraint of the development of new transport routes lost its meaning. For a very short period of time, Babinov’s road conceded its role to the Big Siberian route; its official opening took place in 1783.

The process of «displacement of accents« in the economic life of the Ural Mountains and Siberia during the XVIII century caused the loss of former transit value of the cities situated on the Siberian route, that finally predetermined the decrease of their administrative status. In 1781 the Perm Delegation was founded, which was transformed in 1796 into the Perm Region, with district cities of Solikamsk and Verkhoturye. The period of time, from the end of the XVIII till the beginning of the XX century was characterized by the gradual loss for Tobolsk of its former status of the «capital of Siberia ". At the beginning there was the division of Siberia into two Delegations: Tobolsk and Irkutsk in 1782. In 1838 Omsk became the administrative center of Western Siberia, and in 1918 the regional capital was moved from Tobolsk to Tyumen. This could be explained by the fact that, by that time Tyumen, through which passed the Trans Siberian route, began to play a more important role in the economic and political life of the region.

Despite the loss of the former administrative, economic and transport value, such cities as Great Ustyug, Cherdyn(?), Solikamsk, Verkhoturye and Tobolsk continue to play today the important role in the life of regions of the territory in which they are situated. These cities are the unique spiritual and cultural centers whose uniqueness cannot be defined only by the existence of outstanding monuments of architecture and fragments of historical architectural design in their territory. In some areas of the Russian North, far away from the large transit routes, it is still possible to meet certain norms of behavior and elements of daily culture linked to the vital things of people, typical for Old Russian people who since the olden days developed these lands. As was noted by the authors of "Sketches of history and culture of Verkhoturye city and Verkhoturye region", prepared by employees of the Ural State University: «last decades Verkhoturye is often called an open-air museum. It is absolutely incorrect: Verkhoturye is not a museum, this is a city and today the alive organism living by the rules, a little bit different from ours vain and momentary ". (16, 259).

Being cities played an important role in the first purposeful stage of development of Siberia, carried out during the end of the XVI up to the middle of the XVIII century and joined by the road not existing nowadays. Today they form the original historical and geographical route which stands out through a cultural landscape of modern Russia.

Reconstruction of similar historical and geographical routes opens a lot of new opportunities for a wide range of cultural-historical researches. In this case their object becomes not the space limited by administrative frameworks of separate regions, and an existential area of socio-cultural processes which are taken place in its territory. Their complex consideration allows more deep insight into the nature and essence of many historical phenomena.



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