Ethnographic exhibits

The ethnographic collection of the museum can be classified as one of the best in this country related to the life-style of indigenous peoples in Siberia. The collection was compiled to a great extent through ethnographic expeditions carried out in the times when the majority of the indigenous population lived undisturbed by rapid oil and gas development.

One of the first regular studies of the ethnical culture was carried out by the chief regional forest warden Alexander Dunin-Gorcavitch (1854-1927). He subsidized means of his own into ethnographic expeditions to northern settlements in the Ob-Yirtysh basin and to the polar tundra. Detailed descriptions of what he had seen during the expeditions were published in his books and articles. During his last years Dunin-Gorcavitch did a lot to form the ethnographic exposition of the Tobolsk museum.

The exposition contains amazing patterns of ethnic clothing of the indigenous peoples of Siberia. National costumes, traditional for every people, can tell a lot about the life-style of those who made them. Winter clothing of the Khanty and Mansi peoples had no analogues in neither warmness and convenience, nor in aesthetic decorations compromising natural and cosmological motives. Accessories were made of beads and metal castling.

Ethnic dresses of Siberian tartars made of silk can demonstrate unique ornamental and embroidery patterns characteristic for the tartar culture alone. Of great interest are cult items of the Northern peoples – costumes of shamans, tambourines, wooden figures of idols. The ethnographic collection also contains amulets, decorative species, musical instruments, labour tools, and hunting devices, which in former times were an indispensable part of the life-style of Siberian peoples.