The Astrakhan Stage of S. G. Gmelin’s Expedition according to Materials of Russian and Foreign Archives

Abstract

Introduction. The second half of the 18th century is an important stage in the development of expeditionary activities by the Russian Academy of Sciences. Between 1768 and 1774, several expeditions across Russia were equipped, each being designated its special route and program. The majority of leaders the research teams were of German origin. Professor Samuel Gottlieb Gmelin was in charge of the expedition which headed towards the Caspian Sea. His instructions prescribed to collect and investigate various aspects of national economies, issues of culture, religion and language of local populations, natural resources, flora and fauna, etc. From a political perspective, the most important point was to study the Kalmyk ethnos, especially the organization of power (administrative) relations, genealogical tables of the Kalmyk nobility, their history and causes of the mass exodus of Kalmyks to Dzungaria in 1771 after the abolition of the autonomy of Khans. The sources to characterize S. G. Gmelin’s research activities in Astrakhan Governorate have been dispersed throughout various Russian and foreign archives. Goals. The paper aims to systematize the data and provide an objective historical overview. Methods. The research applied the methods of semantic analysis and translation of 18th-century handwritten sources, methods of microhistorical analysis and methods of prosopography. Conclusions. The conducted analysis of archival sources results in a number of conclusions as follows. Firstly, the range of tasks and areas of work of S. G. Gmelin’s research expedition in Astrakhan Governorate was extremely wide and required the involvement of a large team of specialists from different fields of knowledge. That is why the professor would often turn to locals, most of the latter being members of Sarepta community. Secondly, under the pretext of scientific work, the academic detachment pursued, in particular, intelligence goals. This is confirmed by the widest range of tasks and the nature of data members of S. G. Gmelin’s party were looking for in the Kalmyk Steppe and uluses. Thirdly, the materials collected during the expeditionary work are of great interest for modern ethnographic studies, since they contain unique information about culture, language, national economy, and everyday life of the Kalmyks in the mid-to-late 18th century. But the fate of the last S. G. Gmelin’s works is still in question – he compiled the latter in 1773–1774 — as some part of the materials came into the possession of the Astrakhan merchant Nikolai Rentel, and a certain part was submitted to the Russian Academy of Sciences.