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The Buriat Intelligentsia
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 August 2016
Extract
One of the important keys to understanding twentieth-century developments in Central Asia—especially in Buriat Mongolia, Outer Mongolia, and Tibet—is an appreciation of the important role played by the Buriat Mongolian intelligentsia. The Buriats, in the words of one of them, " … constituted the cultural avant-garde among the Mongolian tribes, introducing and leading the revolutionary ideas of our time…”
Buriat Mongolia, now an Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic of the Soviet Union, includes in its population less than 300,000 Buriats, roughly one-tenth of the total Mongolian population of the world. From this small group, most of whom were illiterate before 1917, arose a group of intellectuals whose influence extended beyond the borders of their homeland to Outer Mongolia and Tibet, and to the smaller areas of Barga (in Manchuria) and Urianghai (incorporated in 1943 into the USSR as the Tannu Tuva Autonomous Oblast'). This Buriat intelligentsia was particularly influential from about 1900 to 1930; in the thirties most of them were purged—killed or sent to concentration camps.
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References
1 Arkhincheev, in Zhizn 'Natsional' nostei [Life of Nationalities], (1923).
Important sources of information throughout this article are the significant writings of N. N. Poppe in Vestnik instituta po izucheniyu istorii i kul'tury SSSR [Journal of the Institute for the Study of the History and Culture of the USSR]: “Mongol'skaya Narodnaya Respublika” [“Mongolian People's Republic”], XI (1954), 7-24; “Polozhenie buddiiskoi tserkvi v SSSR” [“Position of the Buddhist Church in the USSR”], XII (1954), 35-46; and “Mongolovedenie v SSSR” [“Mongolian Studies in the USSR“], XIV (1955), 25-43, and relevant articles on the various individuals in the Entsiklopedicheskii Slovar', Sibirskaya Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya, andBol'shaya Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya (1st ed.). The following two articles were unavailable to me: Galsan Tsirenov [Mikhail Bogdanov], “Rost' buryatskoi itellingentsii” [“Growth of the Buriat Intelligentsia”], Sibir', XXXI (1914), and Kozmin', “Tuzemnaya intelligentsiya Sibiri” [“Indigenous Intelligentsia of Siberia”], Sibirskaya Zhivaya Starina [Siberian Living Antiquity], (1923).
Much of the research on which this article is based was done while the author was at the Russian Research Center, Harvard University, 1954-55. Professor Poppe of the University of Washington supplied much of the information not otherwise documented herein. Any errors of fact or interpretation, however, are of course the author's.
2 Mongols are found principally: in Inner Mongolia (including the Barga area of Manchuria), an integral part of China—less than two million; in Outer Mongolia, the nominally independent but heavily sovietized “Mongolian People's Republic”—fewer than one million; in the Buriat Mongolian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic of the USSR—less than 300,000 Buriats; in addition there are perhaps 100,000 Oirat Mongols in Sinkiang. The 150,000 Kalmyk Mongols of European Russia have been dispersed, and many of them killed; the Kalmyk ASSR was dissolved December 27, 1943, because of alleged co-operation with the German invaders. More than five hundred Kalmyk refugees now live in Philadelphia and communities in nearby New Jersey.
3 The Buriats Garma Sanzheev and S. D. Dylykov, for example, both write extensively on Mongolian linguistics and affairs: see Poppe, , “Mongolovedenie v SSSR,” and Sanzheev's letter in HJAS, XVIII (June 1955), 239–244 Google Scholar. Dylykov wrote the recent Demokraticheskoe dvizhenie mongol'skogo naroda v Kitae [Democratic Movement of the Mongolian People in China] (Moscow, 1953), reviewed by Rupen, FEQ, XIV (Aug. 1955), 599-602.
4 Zhamtsarano, Tsyben, “O pravosoznanii buryat (k predstoyashchim obshchim reforman)” [“Concerning the Law Consciousness of the Buriats (on the Occasion of the Imminent General Reforms)”], Sibirskie Voprosy [Siberian Questions], II (St. Petersburg, 1906), 184 Google Scholar.
5 Alamzhi Mergen [El'bekdorji Rinchino], “Batu Dalai Ochirov,” Sibirskii torgovo—promyshlennyi ezhegodnik na 1914-15 gg. [Siberian Trade-Industrial Annual, 1914-15], pp. 340-349.
6 Oros gürün dotora albatu-dur čilüge-tei erke keregtei bolbaču oroi daγan uγ-un qaγan-lai-a bayiqu gegsen sanaltai bölgüm ulus-un ügülekü inu urid-iyar ügülekü inu [Preface to the Declaration of the Party which Promotes the Idea that the Subjects of the Russian Empire Should Have an Emperor at their Head Although Freedom and Liberty Are Necessary to Them].
7 Trudy aginskoi ekspeditsii. Materialy po izsledovaniyu Aginskoi stepi Zabaikal'skoi oblasti, proizvedennomu v 1908 g. Chitinskim Otdeleniem Imperatorskago Russkago Geograficheskago Obshchestva [Work of the Aga Expedition, Materials for the Study of the Aga Steppe of Transbaikal Oblast', Collected in 1908 by the Chita Branch of the Imperial Russian Geographic Society] (Chita, 1911).
8 For Bogdanov's biography, see Kozmin's Introduction to Ocherki istorii … (see n. 11). Not available to me was P. Danbinov [Solbone Tûya] “Biografiya M. N. Bogdanova” [“Biography of M. N. Bogdanov”], Golos Buryat-Mongolii [Voice of Buriat-Mongolia] (1920).
9 Zhamtsarano, , “O pravosoznanii buryat,” Sibirskie Voprosy, II (1906), 184 Google Scholar.
10 Usually employing pseudonyms (“B. M.,” “M. Bratskii,” or “Galsan Tsirenov”), most of Bogdanov's (and also most of Zhamtsarano's) political articles appeared in the journals Sibir' and Sibirskie voprosy [Siberian Questions]. Practically all such articles were published in the years 1905-15.
A bibliography of forty-eight items published from 1904 to 1918 appears in P. Khoroshikh, “Nauchno-literaturnoe nasledstvo M. N. Bogdanova” [“Scientific-Literary Heritage of M. N. Bogdanov”] along with a bibliography of twelve items about him, “Stat'i i zametki o M. N. Bogdanove” [“Articles and Notes about M. N. Bogdanov”]. These are both in the journal Buryatievedenie [Buriat Studies] (Verkhneudinsk), II (1926).
11 Ocherki istorii buryat-mongol'skogo naroda [Outline of the History of the Buriat-Mongolian People] (Verkhneudinsk, 1926).
12 A biography of Zhamtsarano which I have prepared is nearly ready for publication. See also Kolarz, Walter, The Peoples of the Soviet Far East (London, 1954), pp. 139–149 Google Scholar; Rupen, , “A Soviet Historical Novel about Mongolia,” FEQ, XIV (Aug. 1955), 553–557 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and “Zhamtsarano” (Bibliography), HJAS, XIX (1956).
13 For details of this period, see Rupen, “Outer Mongolian Nationalism, 1900-1919” (ms., Univ. of Wash., 1954), p. 399 (Microfilm A54-1832, Pub. No. 8363, Univ. Microfilms, Ann Arbor, Mich.).
14 E. D. Rinchino, “Buryat-mongoly vostochnoi Sibirii” [“The Buriat Mongols of Eastern Siberia”], Zhizn' Natsional'nostei [Life of Nationalities] (May 28 and June 11, 1921).
15 Full Russian text appears in Kallinikov, A., “U Istokov mongol'skoi revolyutsii,” Khozyaistvo Mongolii [Amidst the Sources of the Mongolian Revolution] [Economy of Mongolia], III , No. 10 (May-June 1928), 65–68 Google Scholar, and also (though here Zhamtsarano is not mentioned as author) in Kh. Choibalsan, Kratkii ocherk istorii mongol'skoi narodnoi revolyutsii [Short Sketch of the History of the Mongolian People's Revolution], trans, from Mongolian (Moscow, 1952), pp. 41-43.
16 “The Third Assembly of the Mongolian People's Party, Urga,” trans. F. Attree (unpub. MS.). All references to speeches at the Third Party Congress and First Khural of 1924 derive from Attree's translations at the Hoover Lib., of Stanford Univ.
17 Ischi-dorji, , “Die heutige Mongolei, II : Kulturelle Aufarbeit in der Mongolei,” Osteuropa, IV (1929), 408–409 Google Scholar.
About Ishi Dorji, see Wolff, , “Mongol Delegations in Western Europe,” Journal of the Royal Central Asian Society (Jan. 1946), pp. 80f, 86–87, 91Google Scholar.
18 R nchino, “K voprosu o natsional'nom samoopredelenii Mongolii v svyazi s zadachami kitaiskoi revolyutsii” [“On the Question of the National Self-Determination of Mongolia in Connection with the Tasks of the Chinese Revolution”], Revolyutsionnyi Vostok [The Revolutionary Orient], II (1927), 65-78.
The whole structure of Pan-Mongolism was severely attacked in an answer to Rinchino written by Zhambolon, another Buriat: “Kak ne sleduet stavit' vopros o natsional'nom samoopredelenii Mongolii po povodu stat'i tov. Rinchino” [“How the Question of the Self-Determination of Mongolia Should Not Be Put As It Is in the Article by Comrade Rinchino”] Revolyutsionnyi Vostok, III (1928), 235-240.
19 One important source of information about this outstanding Buriat is L. B-n [Berlin], “Khambo Agvan Dorzheev (k bor'be Tibeta za nezavisimost')” [“Khambo Agvan Dorjeev (in Relation to Tibet's Struggle for Independence)”], Novyi Vostok [New Orient], III (1923), 139-156. See also Poppe's writings (note 1), and Korostovets, Von Chinggis Khan zur Sowjetrepublik (Berlin, 1926), pp. 207-210.
20 Quite an amazing outcry swept the Russian capital about this: a Buddhist temple in a Christian city! But Dorjeev's influential University friends, and the strong support of Prince Ukhtomskii, prevailed over the temporary hysteria, and the temple was built. When later, in the 1930's, Dorjeev was exiled by the Communists to Leningrad, he spent most of his time at this temple. Concerning this temple, and other aspects of Buddhism in Russia, see Unkrig, W. A., “Aus den letzten Jahrzehnten des Lamaismus in Russland,” Zeitschrift für Buddhismus und verwandte Gebiete, VII (1926), 135–151 Google Scholar.
21 The whole affair ended ignominiously when the Chinese garrison at Kiakhta captured Semenov's “brigade” in Jan. 1920: Neisse Gegen and 12 troop commanders were immediately shot by the Chinese, and 200 other prisoners were sent to Urga to do forced labor there. Buriat intellectuals like Rinchino and Zhamtsarano did not take any part in the Neisse Gegen movement.
Consult Kallinikov, “U istokov … "; Korostovets, pp. 294-295; and anonymous, “K sobytiyam v Mongolii” [“About Events in Mongolia”], Russkoe obozrenie [Russian Review], (Peking), No. 1-2 (1921).
22 Heissig, Walther, Das Gelbe Vorfeld: Die Mobilisierung der chinesischen Aussenländer (Berlin, 1941)Google Scholar; Hyer, Paul V., “Japaner und Lamapriester,” Zeitschrift für Geopolitik, XXV (Aug. 1954), 474–479 Google Scholar; and Hyer, “Lamaist Buddhism and Japanese Policy in Mongolia” (unpubl. M.A. thesis, Univ. of Calif., Berkeley, 1953).
23 When, for example, Zhamtsarano traveled in Inner Mongolia in 1909 and 1910, the Mongols there took him to be a Russian: “ … a Russian who spoke perfect Mongolian, on a beautiful horse with a beautiful saddle of European manufacture … and he was extremely interested in everything that concerned the Chinggis Khan cult” (letter to the author from Father Antoine Mostaert).
24 I. Maiskii, Sovremennaya Mongoliya [Contemporary Mongolia] (Irkutsk, 1921), p. 94: “… the Mongols realize the cultural superiority of the Buriats, and know that they could not dispense with them, but they do not like the Buriats, considering them traitors to the historical heritage of the Mongolian race who have fallen under the power of alien influences. It is possible, and even likely, that in this dislike of the Buriats, the Mongolian church preaches a concealed hatred of them, instinctively sensing that European culture, of which the Buriats are conductors, bears with it the greatest peril to its own complete dominance.” Professor Poppe from his personal experience confirms the general dislike of the Khalkhas for the Buriats.
25 For Badmaev, see V. P. Semennikov, Za kulisami tsarizma. Arkhiv tibetskogo vracha Badmaeva [Behind the Scenes of Czarism: Archives of the Tibetan Doctor Badmaev] (1925): B. A. Romanov, Russia in Manchuria (1892-1906), trans, from the Russian by Susan W. Jones (Ann Arbor, 1952), p. 46; Korostovets, p. 186.
Martin Kilcoyne of the University of Washington has called to my attention the comments on Badmaev in René Fülüp-Miller, Rasputin, The Holy Devil (New York, 1928), pp. 125-129, and the bibliography of Badmaev's letters and reports, pp. 376-377.
26 Ts. Zham-tsarano Sharand [Zhamtsarano], “O torn, kak razvivalis' samosoznanie i pravosoznanie sibirskikh inorodtsev—buryat” [“How the Self-Consciousness and Legal Attitude of the Siberian Inorodtsy—the Buriats—Have Developed], Pravo [Law], XLVIII-XLIX (Dec. 4, 1905).
27 Korostovets, p. 158: “As director of my newspaper I named the Buriat Zhamtsarano, an educated and hard-working man, who above all understood the psyche of the Mongols.” On p. 244, Korostovets states: “I could not manage without the Buriats, since they have for a long time been the agents between us and the Mongols.”
28 The considerable literature about Banzarov includes: Savel'ev, G. S., O zhizni i trudakh Dorzhi Banzarova [Concerning the Life and Works of Dorji Banzarov] (St. Petersburg, 1855), p. 38 Google Scholar; F. A. Kudryavtsev, “Pervyi buryatskii uchenyi Dordzhi Banzarov (1822-1855 gg.)”
(“The First Buriat Scholar, Dorji Banzarov (1822-1855)”], Istoriya buryat-mongol'skogo naroda [History of the Buriat-Mongolian People], pp. 232-240; L. A. Petrov, “Dordzhi Banzarov—pervyi buryatskii uchenyi” [“Dorji Banzarov—First Buriat Scholar”], Istoricheskii zhurnal [Historical Journal], No. 10-11 (1944); Khadalov, P. I., Buryatskii uchenyi Dorzhi Banzarov [The Buriat Scholar Dorji Banzarov] (Moscow, 1952), p. 24 Google Scholar.
29 Concerning Gomboev, see Khoroshikh, P. P., “Buryatskii uchenyi Galsan Gomboev” [“The Buriat Scholar Galsan Gomboev”], Buryatievedenie, No. 3-4 (1927)Google Scholar.
30 Chernaya vera ili shamanstvo u mongolov i drugiya stat'i D. Banzarova [The Black Faith or Shamanism Among the Mongols, and Other Articles of D. Banzarov], ed. G. N. Potanin (St. Petersburg, 1891), p. 129. Potanin's Introduction includes (xxxviii-xl) a list of Banzarov's writings (15 items).
31 In 1918 Tsybikov published an excellent record of this journey, complete with very fine and unusual photographs; his Introduction includes an autobiographical sketch, from which much of my information is extracted: Tsybikov, G. S., Buddist palomnik u svyatyn' Tibeta (po dnevnikam, vedennym v 1899-1902 gg.) [Buddhist Pilgrim at the Holy Places of Tibet (According to the Diary Kept in 1899-1902)] (Petrograd, 1918), p. 472 Google Scholar.
32 See especially his Mongol'skaya pis'mennost', kak orudie natsional'noi kul'tury [Mongolian Writing as a Tool of National Culture] (Verkhneudinsk, 1928), p. 17.
33 Russkii komitet dlya izucheniya Srednei i vostochnoi Azii v istoricheskom, arkheologicheskom, lingvisticheskom i etnograficheskom otnosheniyakh (Russian Committee for the Study of Central and Eastern Asia in its Historical, Archaeological, Linguistic, and Ethnographic Aspects); its serial publications included Protokoly, and Izvestiya (in Russian), and Bulletin (in French).
34 Zhamtsarano, for instance, translated into Mongolian works of Tolstoy, Jules Verne, Robert Louis Stevenson, Jack London, and others.
35 Čeweng [Zhamtsarano], Darqad. Köbsügül naγur-un Uriyangqai. Dörbed. Qotong. Bayad. Ögöled. Mingγad. Jˇaqačn. Turγud. Qošud. Čaqar. Dariγangγa. AUai-yin Uriyangqai. Qasaq. Qamniγan-nar-un ami ündüsü bayidal-un ügü;lel [A Description of the Origins and Conditions of the Darqad, Uriyangqai of Lake Köbsügül … ] (Ulan Bator, 1934), p. 216.
Zhamtsarano also published a geography (in Mongolian) in 1926; Unkrig comments: “Concerning the extension of modern astronomical knowledge among the Mongols, Zhamtsarano … performed the first service in this regard through publication of an illustrated geography. About half of this book of about 100 pages, as I remember it … deals with astronomical phenomena.” W. A. Unkrig, “Das Programm des Gelehrten Comites der Mongolischen Volksrepublik,” MSOS, XXXII (1929), 93.