"Shamans are currently experiencing unemployment."
What the deputies of the First Native Congress talked about
Andrey Filimonov
Didn't you insist that the truth It will shine like the hot sun, Above the cold tundra of the North, What if we assemble pre-parliaments in the tundra?! Don Aminado "Smoke without a Fatherland"
One hundred years ago, on June 15, 1925, the First Indigenous Congress of the Peoples of the Far East opened in Khabarovsk. By today's standards, both the name and the agenda of this event are completely politically incorrect, smacking of rampant racism. Soviet officials, addressing the congress delegates, began their speeches with these words:
"Comrade natives! Here you are, the backward peoples living in the taiga, in the tundra, along the riverbanks..." Or, for example, like this: “While the imperialists strangle, plunder, and drown in blood every manifestation of national aspirations, we are trying to help backward peoples.”
The then-growing propaganda of friendship among peoples contrasted "bad" imperialist colonialism with the "good" socialist approach to the "native problem." In the mid-1920s, the Soviet government began to court the indigenous population, and it had its reasons.
"The delegates to the Congress are ceremoniously presented with Berdan rifles with cartridge pouches and cartridges, portraits of Comrade Lenin, literature, and badges bearing Comrade Lenin's portrait. The presentation of the gifts to the delegates is accompanied by loud applause and the sounds of the Internationale. Comrade Gamarnik, Chairman of the Congress, closing the meeting, says: 'Comrades, we have presented the natives with Berdan rifles to help them obtain food and also to fight against those who would encroach on the gains of our revolution. The natives are good marksmen. We know that if a struggle against Soviet power begins on the shores of the Pacific Ocean, the natives will be the best marksmen in the Red Army.'"(From the minutes of the congress)
In fact, the struggle against Soviet rule in the Far East began immediately after the first commissars arrived there and continued until the late 1920s. National uprisings erupted everywhere—from Chukotka to Lake Baikal. The "natives" had more than enough reasons for discontent. Never before in 300 years of Russian citizenship had they encountered such massive state extortion, bordering on outright robbery.
In May 1924, the Primorsky Tungus revolted.
“They (the Tungus) had always lived according to their tribal laws, but now the authorities had taxed their reindeer, dogs, and even every tree cut down to make a pole for the urasa or birch bark for the boat, which for the Tungus was about the same as if they were forced to pay for the air they breathed. The rules for registering furs had reached the point of complete absurdity: in the thousand-mile-long expanses of the taiga, a hunter was obliged to arrive in Ayan or Nelkan, find a government official (who might be drunk, or in a bad mood, or away on business), present a hunting permit along with a receipt for payment of the fee for such a permit and the skins he had collected… then, with the help of a person who knew the Tungus language and could write Russian, which was a rare combination, fill out a form with the exact location and day of the month each animal had been killed, and also pay a five percent fee on the hypothetical value of each skin.”— writes Leonid Yuzefovich in the documentary novel “Winter Road”.
Driven to despair by the predatory national policy of the young Soviet state, the Tungus and Yakuts took up arms. For a whole year, rebel units numbering approximately 600 operated in southern Yakutia and the Far East. In the summer of 1924, they seized the port of Ayan on the shores of the Sea of Okhotsk, overthrew the Soviet regime there, and held a national congress declaring the creation of the "Tunguska Republic." Via radio, the rebels appealed to the League of Nations to accept the new "state" into their fold. The League, however, remained silent. It is not even known whether the Tunguska radiogram ever reached them. Meanwhile, Red Army units slowly but surely advanced toward Ayan through winter blizzards and spring mud. Soon, the rebels found themselves caught between the Bolsheviks and the sea. Finally, on May 9, 1925, without having received recognition from the international community, the Tunguska Republic dissolved itself in exchange for amnesty for members of its “government.”
This happened just a month before the opening of the Native Congress in Khabarovsk, attended by Tungus delegates who learned of the uprising not from the Soviet press, but firsthand, from their relatives. They, too, received Berdan rifles as a sign that the Soviet government was kindly inviting them to put aside old misunderstandings and fight together against their common enemies—the Chinese.
Historically, the indigenous people who hunted and fished along the Amur River feared not the Russian/Soviet colonizers, but rather the visiting businessmen and bandits from China, who could wipe out the small peoples in one or two generations simply by buying their women.
Cherchez la femme in the taiga
Slavery was common in Siberia even before the arrival of the Russians. With their arrival, the demand for slaves, and especially for female slaves, increased dramatically. Official slave markets operated in Tobolsk, Tyumen, and Tomsk until the mid-19th century. The renowned Siberian historian Seraphim Shashkov wrote: "First and foremost, the Russians needed women, and so they enslaved foreign women, making them their concubine-wives and slave-mistresses."
Prices for "sold wives and concubines" varied according to local and temporal circumstances. In the 17th century, a foreign woman fetched quite a high price—from 10 to 20 rubles. But prices dropped as the market became saturated with human beings. Even under Catherine the Great, a woman in Siberia could be bought for 3–5 rubles. And children were sold for next to nothing. Ostyak girls, for example, were sold for 20 kopecks.
In the enlightened 19th century, Russian authorities attempted to limit slavery with a decree that permitted the purchase or exchange of foreign children and their use in the household only until the age of 25.
This idea caused discontent among Siberians, who bombarded the government with complaints that it was unprofitable to buy and keep slaves if they had to be released in the prime of their life and ability to work.
It's clear that such a "venerable" ancient tradition can't be abolished overnight by some decree. The Far East had its own slave markets and supply channels for "goods."
For example, the Chukchi-Pomors, who crossed the Bering Strait in canoes, engaged in coastal piracy along the Alaskan coast in the style of the Vikings. During their raids, they captured Eskimo and Indian women, as well as white and black American women, who became "cash in cash" in subsequent trade transactions. Cossack reports from the 18th century mention "a ten-year-old female captive of American descent, who was taken by islanders, then sold to reindeer Chukchi for an iron-tipped spear and two white deer, and then resold to an Anadyr Cossack for a copper cauldron."
But there were relatively few Cossacks and other service people from Russia in the Far East compared to the Chinese "pioneers" who came in their thousands from the south to exploit the riches of the Amur taiga. In Primorye, they harvested sea cucumbers. Sturgeon and salmon were drawn from the Amur, Zeya, Bira, and Bidzhan rivers. Tigers were caught in the taiga thickets—only males—whose penises were cut off to make an alcohol tincture that increased male potency—this "Far Eastern Viagra" has always been highly prized in China. And, incidentally, it still is.
Furthermore, in the borderlands, the Chinese (and Koreans) grew opium poppies, which brought in enormous profits. Drug dealers offered good prices for women. A local hunter couldn't offer the bride's parents a dowry of that size and, as a result, often remained unmarried. The congress delegates complained about the "Chinese threat" to the Commissioner for Native Affairs (called "upoltuzdel" in Soviet Newspeak):
"Marriages (with native girls) are arranged by Koreans and Chinese for the purpose of obtaining protection from their wives' clans. They usually need this protection for peaceful work, either in poppy seed farming or speculation," said one of the congress participants.
Goldi MP Ekaterina Udynkan said that her fellow tribesmen trade their daughters, selling them "like cattle":
"The fate of women remains the same: a father repeatedly sells his daughter, then takes her away, and sells her again. Therefore, the natives live worse than animals. An old man buys a young wife and only spoils her, but there are no children, and the population of the native tribes does not increase. If we stop selling women, the population will increase, the younger generation will be strong, healthy, smart, and agile. But if we leave things as they are, then only the rich will have wives. The Chinese will buy your women for themselves, and you will have no wives, and therefore the population will not increase, and children will be born weak and die soon," these are the words of Catherine the Great, recorded in the minutes of the congress.
Women's emancipation was one of the main trump cards of Bolshevik propaganda. The October Revolution of 1917 abolished not only private property but also the "sexual question." Soviet women gained equal rights with men at work, in bed, and in public life. The beautiful, athletic Komsomol member was a devilishly attractive symbol of the sexual revolution of the 1920s taking place in the Land of the Soviets.
"The romance of the revolution had a very specific gender nature: it usually enhanced the attractiveness of Russian women in the eyes of Western men," writes Alexander Etkind in his book, "Interpretation of Travel," which is devoted, among other things, to the journeys from the United States to the USSR undertaken by progressive American youths in search of "true freedom." "Already on the ship... Americans called each other comrades and dreamed of meeting Stalin or of falling in love with a Komsomol member." A. Etkind, "Interpretation of Travel. Russia and America in Travelogues and Intertexts"
The idea of women's liberation appealed not only to progressive Americans but also to young people of indigenous peoples. By 1925, Komsomol members had appeared in the Far Eastern taiga. As befits Komsomol members, they implemented the decisions of various congresses, organizing meetings among "backward peoples living in the taiga, the tundra, and along riverbanks." Here's a resolution from one of them, approved by open vote:
“The marriage of girls shall be considered legal no earlier than a year after the onset of menstruation” (Protocol No. 2 of the Kerbinsky Subdistrict Assembly of June 1, 1925, § 6. Section III).
And there are fewer deer
Beyond the fine words and catchy slogans about a new life, the minutes of the Native Congress record a truth unpleasant for the Soviet government, supported by statistics. In 1925, the "natives" were living significantly worse than before the Bolshevik Revolution, which "liberated oppressed peoples":
“If we take the statistical data of 1906, when there were 18,000 reindeer within the Amur province, and compare it with the data of the present time, when there are only 5035 pieces, then the decline in reindeer herding will be expressed by 68 percent. At the same time, the average farm previously had 30 reindeer, while at present there are no more than 8-10 pieces. Epizootics, deaths, and the use of reindeer for food, due to hunger, have become chronic” (From the report of the Amur Province Regional Directorate (Comrade Ivanov)
A 68 percent decline in reindeer herding effectively meant a famine. People had to not only feed themselves, but also feed their hunting dogs. Moreover, by late winter, when all food supplies ran out, there was no one left to hunt in the forest. Hunters and their relatives would finish off the last reindeer, after which their only option was to die of starvation. This happened regularly throughout the Far East. So, selling girls often became their families' last chance of survival.
In this regard, the new Soviet laws—on the marriage of girls at 18 or on compulsory schooling—did not contribute to the survival of those who led a traditional way of life, hunting and fishing. Boys typically began pulling nets and hunting at the age of 10 or 12. Now, instead of teaching these skills, parents were forced to send their children to boarding schools, where they were taught Russian and political literacy.
In the taiga, these items were completely useless. In fact, the new government, albeit with good intentions, in its struggle for all that was good, was destroying the traditional way of life and depriving the people of support—both economic and moral. The once independent, practically self-sufficient "yasak people," who supplied the state with precious furs as an export commodity, were now reduced to beggars on welfare, completely dependent on officials, and second-class citizens unaware of their rights. This was something that local Soviet authorities actively exploited:
"Almost every village council passed resolutions imposing a submarine service on the natives, in most cases free of charge. Such anomalies had to be immediately addressed, and the natives had to be made aware that they were not obligated to transport anyone for free," the Native Congress decided.
True, it was utterly impossible to convey the "congress decisions" to all representatives of the indigenous peoples living in remote and inaccessible areas. The congress minutes, printed in Khabarovsk in a small print run, were almost unreadable in the indigenous villages. Literate Russian was extremely rare there. Educational programs struggled to spread throughout the Far East. During the entire First Five-Year Plan (1928–1932), only 15 boarding schools for "native children" were established in the vast expanse from Chita to Vladivostok.
Overall, the situation was reminiscent of Ilf and Petrov's novel "The Golden Calf," where "silent cinema no longer worked due to the advent of the era of sound cinema, and sound cinema did not yet work due to organizational problems associated with the liquidation of the era of silent cinema."
Another traditional pillar of "native" life was shamanism. But shamans came under attack as "religious ministers." The confiscation of drums and the melting down of copper amulets for the national economy (which, obviously, could not survive without these few pounds of nonferrous metal) severely undermined the ritual practices that nourished the spiritual strength of small peoples. Now they felt lost in the brave new world of the dictatorship of the proletariat:
"Shamanism is declining among the natives, and shamans are now experiencing unemployment just like our priests. In the Kerbinsky district, there's only one shaman, but few people go to him now because furs and other things are scarce, and without them, it's best not to go to a shaman. There's no doctor, only a paramedic, who's always drunk and treats the Russian population poorly, and even worse, the natives. You go to him, and he'll stamp his feet, throw you out, and won't give you any medicine." (From the minutes of the congress)
The indigenous congress in Khabarovsk lasted five days and ended on a spiritually uplifting note—with the appearance of a pioneer detachment with drums, heralds of a new life. This symbolic replacement of shamanic drums signaled a cultural revolution, the blurring of the boundaries between city and village, the struggle of the good with the even better, and the promise of a communist paradise. Life was becoming more joyful. A young pioneer, Comrade Taratina, addressed the congress delegates with a call:
"Comrade natives! Send your children to our pioneer detachments, and they will lead their backward fathers."
After this (as the transcript says), to the sounds of fanfares and drums, the detachment of young pioneers left the Congress hall.