Photodocumenting of Expeditionary Activity in Orenburg Until Beginning of the XX Century

Abstract

The use of a photo in scientific purposes for documentation of events and facts began almost with the moment of its invention. In Orenburg this technical innovation of the XIX century came into widespread acceptance since 1870. But the first pictures which were taken in Orenburg can be dated 1858. These are pictures of a photographer A.S. Murenko who as a member of a diplomatic mission under the N. P. Ignatyev's command passed a way from Orenburg to Khiva and Bukhara. Further the local photographers saw in it not only a way to capture the city architecture of a province and images of its inhabitants, but also applied it as a method of visual documentation of events, a variety of landscapes and so on. The Orenburg scientific organizations, including the Orenburg scientific archival commission, allocate in the photo a way of documentation of edge’s historical heritage. Without having an opportunity by society members’ forces to travel all over the region, the Commission involved topographers both to map barrows and ancient constructions and to take photos of these historical objects. The Orenburg amateur researchers, using the photo in the scientific purposes, at the very beginning of the XX century applied it to copy rare documents. But scarcity of the financial means of the local scientific organizations which had rich collections of documentary photographs, but not having an opportunity not only to publish, but even to present them widely to public stirred its wider application. Technically poorly equipped city printing base slowed down the illustrated numbers. Till our time only the insignificant array of the Orenburg documentary photographs dispersed on various archives, museums, libraries remained. The subject of use of the photo in scientific work of the Orenburg researchers of XIX - the beginning of the XX century slightly drew scientists’ attention. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n6s1p307