Keywords
Foodscape
Food Practices
Three Stages of Local Foodscape Development
Cattle Breeding
Agriculture
Fishing
Local Specificity
How to Cite
Abstract
Various distant outskirts of Russia very often followed a specific path in their development, in no way resembling the culture of the Central Russia. One of such areas, where special cultural and natural environments existed, was the southern province located in the Delta of the Volga River – the Astrakhan province. Early in the Middle Ages this territory became a part of highly developed and powerful states – the Khazar Khaganate, the Golden Horde, and the Astrakhan Khanate were situated here. It was during this period that the main alimentary complex of the region was formed, which was a combination of the three main household types: cattle-breeding, fishing, and agriculture. This complex has survived to a large extent until the present day. The annexation of the Astrakhan Khanate by Russia in 1556 did little to change this configuration. The native inhabitants of these regions returned to their usual occupation, while the newly arrived peoples followed the same industries that had been familiar to them in their former homeland: gardening, fishing, or cattle breeding. The multinational character of the region's population led to a flexible system of economic relations and complementarity. As a result, there was an active cultural interchange between all the peoples of the region, which also influenced the alimentary landscape (foodscape).
The history of this foodscape can be divided into three major periods, which differ from each other in the specifics of their character. They are largely dependent on socio-political changes in Russia as a whole, which also stimulated serious cultural and social shifts in the region. This article is devoted mainly to the analysis of the formation of the first period of the alimentary landscape in the region. It lasted from the accession of the Astrakhan khanate to the First World War and the October Revolution of 1917.
References
Aksakov, I. S. (1888). Ivan Sergeyevich Aksakov in his Letters: Part 1: Study and Service Years: Vol. 1. Letters 1839-1848. Typography of M.G. Volchaninov. (In Russian).
Arutyunov, S. A. (2001). Basic food patterns and their local variants among the peoples of Russia. В S. A. Arutyunov & T. A. Voronina (Eds.), Traditional food as an expression of ethnic identity (pp. 10–17). Nauka. (In Russian).
Arutyunov, S. A. (Ed.). (1981). Ethnography of Nutrition of the Peoples of Foreign Asia. Nauka. (In Russian).
Bonnefons, N. (1654). Le jardinier françois: Qui enseigne a cultiver les arbres & herbes potageres. Avec la maniere de conserver les fruicts, & faire toutes sortes de confitures, conserves & massepans [The French gardener: who teaches how to cultivate trees & herbs. With the way to preserve fruits, and to make all kinds of jams, preserves and masspans]. Jean Blaeu. (In French).
Burke, P. (2009). Cultural hybridity. Polity Press.
Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire. Collection One. 1720-1722. (Vol. 6). (1830). Typography of the Second Department of His Imperial Majesty's Own Chancery. (In Russian).
Dahl, V. I. (2002). Explanatory Dictionary of the Living Great Russian Language (Vol. 2). OLMA-PRESS. (In Russian).
Danilkin, A. A. (2016). Hunting, Game Management and Biodiversity. KMK Scientific Publishers Association. (In Russian).
Davydov, A. V., Eskov, E. K., Rozhkov, Y. I., Kiryakulov, V. M., & Tsarev, S. A. (2011). Biology of game animal species. Parropods. KMK Scientific Publishers Association. (In Russian).
Dunlop, D. M. (1954). The History of the Jewish Khazars. Princeton University Press.
Eneroth, O. (1877). Handbok i Svensk pomologi (Vol. 1). P. A. Norstedt & Söner.
Fedorov-Davydov, G.A. (1969). The City and Region of Saksin in the Twelfth-14th Centuries.. Materials and Studies on the Archaeology of the USSR, 169, 253–261. (In Russian).
Foucault, M. (1986). Of Other Spaces. Diacritics, 16(1), 22–27. https://doi.org/10.2307/464648
Gladky, Y. N., & Kornekova, S. Yu. (2015). Geographical peculiarities of the evolution of gastronomic cultures in Russia. Scientific Notes of ZabGU. Series: Biological Sciences, 1, 80–85. (In Russian).
Gluschenko, I. V. (2012). Soviet Modernization and Culinary Policy as Factors in the Transformation of Household Culture in the USSR. Izvestiya PSU named after V.G. Belinsky, 27, 564–573. (In Russian).
Gmelin, S. G. (1777). Journey in Russia for the study of the three kingdoms of nature, Part 2. Journey from Cherkask to Astrakhan and stay in this city: From the beginning of August 1769 to the fifth of June 1770. Imperial Academy of Sciences. (In Russian).
Gmelin, S. G. (2012). Astrakhan Anno 1770: Its History, Geography, Population, Trade, Flora, Fauna and Fisheries. Mage Publishers.
Hasanov, M. R. (2017). On the Relationship between Dagestan and Astrakhan in the 17th – the first third of the 18th century. Scientific Thought of the Caucasus, 2, 59–63. https://doi.org/10.23683/2072-0181-2017-90-2-59-63 (In Russian).
Hell, A. H. (1847). Travels in the Steppes of the Caspian Sea, the Crimea, the Caucasus, etc. Chapman and Hall.
Jenkinson, A. (1886). Early Voyages and Travels to Russia and Persia, by Anthony Jenkinson and Other Englishmen. With Some Account of the First Intercourse of the English with Russia and Central Asia by Way of the Caspian Sea. Burt Franklin.
Kapkan, M. V., & Likhacheva, L. S. (2008). Gastronomic Culture: Concept, Functions, Factors of Formation. Proceedings of the Ural State University. Series 2: Humanities., 55(15), 34–43. (In Russian).
Kopytoff, I. (1987). The Afiican Frontier. Indiana University Press.
Leroy, A. (1873). Dictionnaire de pomologie [Dictionary of pomology] (Vols 3 – Pommes). Dans les principales libraires agricoles et horticoles. (In French).
Lozovskaya, M. V., & Matveev, A. V. (2011). Taxonomic composition of the osteological collection of fish from the Samosdel fort. Natural Sciences, 2, 58–61. (In Russian).
Lozovskaya, M. V., & Matveev, A. V. (2014). Fish consumption in the Lower Volga region in the Middle Ages: Results and prospects of research. Food and Processing Technologies of the Agroindustrial Complex - Healthy Food Products, 3, 24–27. (In Russian).
Magomedov, N. A., & Magaramov, Sh. A. (2014). Indian Merchants in the Development of Trade Contacts between Derbent and Astrakhan in the 17th Century. Historical, philosophical, political and legal sciences, culture and art history. Questions of theory and practice, 8–2, 105–108. (In Russian).
Mishchenko, D. F. (2013). Modern Trends in the Evolution of Food Practices of the Peoples of West Africa. Anthropology Forum, S18, 313–324. (In Russian).
Olearius, A. (1669). The Voyages and Travells of the Ambassadors Sent by Frederick Duke of Holstein, to the Great Duke of Muscovy, and the King of Persia: Begun in the Year M.DC.XXXIII, and Finish’d in M.DC.XXXIX: Containing a Compleat History of Muscovy, Tartary, Persia. J. Starkey and T. Basset.
Ozeretskovsky, N. (1804). Description of Kola and Astrakhan. Academy of Sciences. (In Russian).
Pallas, P. S. (1812). Travels Through the Southern Provinces of the Russian Empire, in the Years 1793 and 1794 (Vol. 1). John Stockdale, Piccadilly.
Popova, O. D. (2016). The Culinary Code of Holiday Culture in Soviet Society. Modern History of Russia, 2 (16), 252–267. https://doi.org/10.21638/11701/spbu24.2016.213 (In Russian).
Rosenmeyer, N. (Ed.). (1827). Astrakhan Flora. Pocketbook for 1827. A. Smirdin Printing House. (In Russian).
Shevchenko, T. G. (1956). Collected Works (Vol. 5). Khudozhestvennaya Literatura. (In Russian).
Smith, J. V. (1833). Natural History of the Fishes of Massachusetts: Embracing a Practical Essay on Angling. Allen and Ticknor.
Sohan, I. V. (2013). How to investigate the gastronomic? On the question of definitions and approaches. Bulletin of Tomsk State University. Culturology and Art History, 1, 99–109. (In Russian).
Sollogub, V. A. (1856). T-th (On her departure to Astrakhan). In V. A. Sollogub, Works of Count V.A. Sollogub (Vol. 4). Smirdina. (In Russian).
Taranov, N. A. (1899). The City of Astrakhan and Astrakhan Province. In Picturesque Russia: Our Fatherland in its land, historical, tribal, economic and everyday meaning: Vol. 7. The Central Black Earth and Don-Caspian Steppe Regions. Part 2. The Don-Caspian Steppe Region (pp. 112–126). The M. O. Wolf Partnership. (In Russian).
Vasiliev, D. V. (2015). New data on the city and region of Saxin. Volga Archaeology, 2, 189–267. (In Russian).
Vasiliev, D. V. (2020). Twenty Years of Research on the Samosdel Hillfort: Results, Problems, and Interpretation. Proceedings of the Kama Archaeological and Ethnographic Expedition, 16, 64–75. (In Russian).
Yakushenkov, S. N., & Palatkin, V. V. (2020). We will Feed Our and a New World : Several Cases of Food Ways of Frontier Regions. Part I. Journal of Frontier Studies, 5(4), 237–285. https://doi.org/10.46539/jfs.v5i4.241 (In Russian).
Zaitsev, I. V. (2006). Astrakhan Khanate. Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences. (In Russian).
Zarubina, N. N. (2014). Eating Practices as a Marker and Factor of Social Inequality in Russia: History and Modernity. Historical Psychology and the Sociology of History, 7(2), 46–62. (In Russian).
Zhilkin, A. A., Lunev, A. P., & Pyatnik V. A. (Eds.). (2008). Nature, past and present of the Astrakhan region. Nova. (In Russian).
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Copyright (c) 2021 Serguey Yakushenkov