‘Our Muslims’ — The Lithuanian Tatars and the Russian imperial government

Abstract

In percent 1 897, of according the population to official of the figures, Russian Muslims Empire, made that up is to some say, eleven nearly p rcent of the pula i n o the Rus an E pir , tha is o say n arly double the percentage of the better known (both then and now) Jewish ( Obshchii svod 1: 250-1). In recent years scholarly and general interest in the minority (to use a convenient, though misleading and analytically unhelpful term) has grown significantly; the present paper aims to discuss one small and little-known segment of the Empire's Muslim population, that is, the so-called Lithuanian Tatars.1 As many recent studies have pointed out, the Empire's nationality policy did not follow any one consistent line. Certainly, anyone trying to find a single and integrated policy will seek in vain. But even given the diversity of Muslims living under Russian rule, the Lithuanian Tatars represent an exceptional group. Their small numbers, geographical location, language, culture, and political situation in a region dominated by Polish-Russian strife all contributed to make the Lithuanian Tatars a most unusual Muslim population, and one generally unknown outside of the region. The Lithuanian Tatars trace their ancestry back to the fourteenth century, when the Grand Dukes invited Tatar warriors and their families to settle in the Grand Duchy. Of particular significance here were the Grand Duchy's wars with Muscovy, during which Tatar and Lithuanian rulers allied against the Muscovites (Martin 207-19). In the late fourteenth century the Tatars were themselves riven by internal strife, making settlement in the distant Lithuanian lands seem attractive. In this context Grand Duke Vytautas (Witold) encouraged the first major settlement of Tatars on his lands in the 1380s. One Russian writer of the early twentieth century wrote that the first Tatar to voluntarily settle in Litva was the Khan of the Golden Order Tokhtamysh who fled here from the overlordship of Tamerlane in 1396 (Shimelevich 63). Tatars continued to migrate to Lithuania until the early sixteenth century, playing a significant military role within the Grand Duchy, rather like that of the Cossacks in the Russian Empire (Lasocki 372-5). While this military role would diminish over time, even in the eighteenth century Tatars served in military units in the Commonwealth and Lithuanian