The purpose of this work is to study the life of Russian workers at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries. Peasant life of the late XIX - early XX century Peasant life of the late XIX - early XX century
The fates of many peasant families were similar to each other. From year to year they lived in the same village, performed the same work and duties. The modest rural church did not impress with either its size or architecture, but made the village the center of the entire neighborhood. Even as an infant, a few days old, each person fell under its vaults during christenings and visited here many times throughout his life. Here, who had departed into another world, they brought him before being buried. The church was almost the only public building in the area. The priest was, if not the only, then one of the few literate people. No matter how the parishioners treated him, he was the official spiritual father, to whom the Law of God obliged everyone to come to confession.
Three main events in human life: birth, marriage and death. So, in three parts, the records in the church registers were divided. At that time, in many families, children were born almost every year. The birth of a child was perceived as the will of God, which rarely occurred to anyone to oppose. More children - more workers in the family, and hence more prosperity. On this basis, the appearance of boys was preferable. You raise a girl - you raise, and she goes to someone else's family. But this, in the end, is not a problem: brides from other households replaced the working hands of the daughters given to the side. That is why the birth of a child has always been a holiday in the family, and therefore it was illuminated by one of the main Christian sacraments - baptism. The parents carried the baptized child with the godfather and mother. Father, together with the godfather, read a prayer, then immersed the baby in the font, put on a cross. Returning home, they arranged a christening - a dinner for which they gathered relatives. Children were usually baptized on their birthday or the next three days. The priest gave the name most often, using the calendar in honor of the saint, on whose day the baby was born. However, the rule to give names according to the calendar was not obligatory. The godparents were usually peasants from their parish.
The peasants got married and got married mainly only in their own community. If in the 18th century peasants were married at the age of 13-14, then from the middle of the 19th century the legal age for marriage was 18 for a man and 16 for a woman. Early peasant marriages were encouraged by the landowners, as this contributed to an increase in the number of peasant souls and, accordingly, the income of the landowners. During serfdom, peasant girls were often given in marriage without their consent. After the abolition of serfdom, the custom of marrying with the consent of the bride was gradually established. Tough measures were also applied to young grooms. If someone did not want to marry, then dad forced the shaft. The oversized grooms and brides were dishonored.
Among the Ukrainian peasantry, it was a wedding, not a wedding, that was considered a legal guarantee of marriage: married couples could live apart for 2-3 weeks, waiting for the wedding. It was preceded by “loaf” - this was the name in Ukraine for the main ritual wedding bread and the ritual of its preparation, which most often took place on Friday. On Saturday evening, rural youth said goodbye to the young. At the girls' evening, a wedding tree was made - "giltse", "viltse", "rizka", "troichetka". This dense flowering tree is a symbol of youth and beauty of the young, with which bread or roll was decorated. It was on the table throughout the wedding. Sunday was coming. In the morning, the girlfriends dressed the bride for the crown: the best shirt, an embroidered skirt, namisto, a beautiful wreath with ribbons. The women cherished the wedding dress as a relic until their death. The son took his mother's wedding shirt with him when he went to war. The groom also came in an embroidered shirt (it was supposed to be embroidered by the bride). The young people went to church to get married. After that, they came to the courtyard of the bride, where they were greeted with bread and salt, sprinkled with rye, and the young woman invited guests to the table. The wedding was preceded by matchmaking. There was a custom: for the success of the business, people who went on a match were whipped with rods or thrown with women's headdresses in order to quickly snatch the girl. Interesting was the morning of the wedding day, when the bride washed. She did not go to the bath alone. When the bride is washed and steamed properly, the sorceress collects sweat from the bride's handkerchief and squeezes it into a bottle. This sweat was then poured into the groom's beer to tie the young with indissoluble bonds.
Peasant weddings were usually played in the fall or winter when the main agricultural work was over. Repeated marriages were not uncommon due to the difficult peasant life and early death. The number of remarriages has increased dramatically after epidemics.
Death overtook a person at any time of the year, but in the cold winter months of work it noticeably increased. The dead were buried until the beginning of the 19th century at the churchyard. However, due to the risk of infection infectious diseases, by a special decree, the cemeteries were ordered to be arranged outside the settlements. People prepared for death in advance. Before death, they tried to call a priest for confession and communion. After the death of the deceased, the women washed them and put them on in mortal clothes. The men hammered up a coffin and dug a grave. When the body was taken out, the lamentations of the weeping women began. There was no talk of any autopsy or death certificate. All formalities were limited to an entry in the birth register, where the cause of death was indicated by the local priest from the words of the relatives of the deceased. The coffin with the deceased was carried to the church on a stretcher-chair. The church watchman, already knowing about the deceased, rang the bell. 40 days after the funeral, a commemoration with a dinner was celebrated, to which a priest was brought for the service.
Almost no log huts or dugouts were built in the Poltava district, so the hut should be recognized as a model of the local hut. It was based on several oak plows, buried in the ground. Poles were cut into the plows, straw or vine or cherry branches were tied to them. The resulting hut was covered with clay, removing the gaps and leveling the walls, and a year later covered with special, white clay.
The hostess and her daughters repaired the walls of the hut after each downpour and whitewashed the outside three times during the year: to the Trinity, the covers, and when the hut was furnished with straw for the winter from the cold. The houses were fenced partly by a moat with a lushly overgrown tree, ash or white acacia, partly by a fence (tynom) at the gate, usually single-winged, consisting of several longitudinal poles. A cattle shed was built near the street. In the yard, usually near the hut, a chopped square clod with 3-4 notches or bins for bread was built. Also, not a single courtyard could do without a clooney, which usually towered at a distance from the hut behind the threshing floor (current). The height of the entrance doors to the hut was usually 2 arshins 6 vershoks, and the height of the internal doors was 2 vershoks higher. The door width has always been the standard - 5 quarters 2 inches. The door was locked with a wooden hook and painted with some dark paint. Sometimes shutters were attached to the windows of the hut, painted in red or green.
The outer door led into a dark hallway, where a piece of clothing, harness, utensils, and a wicker bread box were usually placed. There was also a light staircase leading to the attic. A spacious outlet also exited here, conducting smoke from the stove up through a chimney to the roof. In front of the entrance was set up another, warm section, "khatyna" - a shelter for old people from dust, women and children. Large huts also included a special front room (the parlor). The extreme corner from the door was all occupied by a stove, sometimes making up a quarter of a small hut. The oven consisted of raw materials. It was decorated with clinics, circles, crosses and flowers painted with blue or ordinary ocher. The stove was anointed at the same time as the hut before the holidays. Between the stove and the so-called cold corner, several boards were laid along the wall for the family to sleep in. A shelf for women's things was nailed on top: a shit, a sliver, a spindle and a rail for clothes and yarn was hung. The cradle was also hung here. Outerwear, pillows, and bedding were left in a cold corner. Thus, this corner was considered a family one. The next corner (kut), located between the two corner windows and the side window, was called the pokutam. It corresponded to the red corner of the Great Russians. Here, icons of the father and mother, then the eldest son, the middle and the youngest, were placed on special tablets. They were decorated with paper or natural dried flowers. Bottles with holy water were sometimes placed near the images, and money and documents were hidden behind them. There was also a table or a hidden (chest). There were benches (benches) and benches at the table along the walls. In the opposite room, there was a blind corner located at the blind end of the door. It had only economic value. Here were the dishes on the shelf, spoons and knives. The narrow space between the doors and the stove was called "kocherizhnik" because it was occupied by pokers and shovels.
The common food of the peasants is bread, which they themselves baked, borscht, which is "healthy, use the head" and porridge, most often millet. The food was prepared in the morning and for the whole day. They used it as follows: at 7-8 o'clock in the morning - breakfast consisting of cabbage, cakes, kulish or lokshina with bacon. On a fast day, lard was replaced with butter, which served as a seasoning for cucumbers, cabbage, potatoes, or hemp seed milk, which was seasoned with egg kuta, boiled barley, crushed millet, or hemp seed with buckwheat cakes.
We sat down for lunch from 11 o'clock and later, if threshing or other work delayed. Lunch consisted of borscht with bacon and porridge with butter, rarely with milk, and on a fast day, borscht with beans, beets, butter and porridge, sometimes boiled beans and peas, dumplings with potatoes, pea cakes anointed with honey.
For dinner, they were content with the leftovers from lunch, or soup (yushka) and dumplings. Chicken or chicken meat was on the menu only on major holidays. By the end of summer, when most vegetables and fruits were ripe, the table improved slightly. Instead of porridge, they often boiled pumpkin, peas, beans, corn. For an afternoon snack, cucumbers, plums, melons, watermelons, and forest pears were added to the bread. From September 1, when the days got shorter, the afternoon snack was canceled. From drinks they drank mainly kvass and uzvar. From alcohol - vodka (vodka).
The clothes of the Little Russians, protecting from the climate, at the same time emphasized, set off, increased the beauty, especially the female one. Concerns about the appearance of a local woman were expressed in the following customs: on the first day of the bright holiday, women washed themselves with water, in which they placed a painted and ordinary egg, and rubbed their cheeks with these eggs to preserve the freshness of their faces. In order for the cheeks to be ruddy, they were rubbed with various red things: a belt, block, flower dust of rye, pepper and others. The eyebrows were sometimes lined with soot. By folk beliefs One could wash oneself only in the morning. Only on Saturday evenings and on the eve of big holidays, the girls washed their heads and necks and, willy-nilly, washed their faces.
They washed their heads off with lye, beet kvass or hot water, in which they put a branch of a consecrated pussy willow and something from fragrant herbs. The washed head was usually combed with a large horny comb or comb. While combing, the girls braided their hair both in one braid, in 3-6 strands, and in two smaller braids. Occasionally, hairpieces were made, but with any hairstyle, the girl's forehead was open. The natural decoration of the hairstyle was both field flowers and flowers plucked from their flower garden. Multi-colored thin ribbons were also woven into the braid.
The main headdress of a woman is a point. It was considered a sin for young women under 30 not to wear earrings, so girls' ears from the second year of life were pierced with thin, sharp wire earrings, which were left in the ear until the wound healed. Later, the girls wore copper earrings, at a price of 3-5 kopecks, the girls already wore earrings made of Polish and ordinary silver, occasionally gold, at a price of 45 kopecks to 3 rubles 50 kopecks. The girls had few earrings: 1 - 2 pairs. Around the girl's neck, they wore a multi-colored namisto up to 25 threads, more or less lowered to the chest. Also, a cross was always worn around the neck. The crosses were wooden, costing 5 kopecks; glass, white and colored, from 1 kopeck; copper 3-5 kopecks and silver (sometimes enameled). Rings were also adornments.
Shirt - the main part of the linen was called a chemise. In all seasons they wore a "kersetka", short, a little more than an arshin clothing, black, less often colored, woolen or paper, which opened the entire neck and top of the chest and tightly wrapped around the waist. Women put on shoes in the summer in shoes on high heels(shanks), made of black leather, shod with nails or horseshoes, and in winter in black boots. The boys had their hair cut smoothly. Middle-aged men cut their hair "pid forelock, in a circle", that is, round, exactly over the entire head, cutting more on the forehead, above the eyebrows and behind. Almost no one shaved their beards, but only trimmed them. The peasant's head was protected from the cold by a lamb's cap, round cylindrical or somewhat narrowed upwards. The hat was lined with black, blue or red calico, sometimes with sheepskin fur. The generally accepted color of the cap was black, occasionally gray. In the summer, caps were also often worn. The men's shirt was different from the women's short.
Trousers were always worn along with the shirt. Wearing pants was considered a sign of maturity. Above the shirt, a gray woolen or paper vest was worn, single-breasted, with a narrow stand-up collar, without a cutout and with two pockets. Over the vest they wore a black cloth or gray woolen chumarka, knee-length, single-breasted, fastened with hooks, with a waist. The chumarka was lined with cotton wool and served as outerwear. She, like other outer clothing, was tied with belts. For the most part, men's shoes consisted only of boots (chobots). Chobots were made of yukhta, sometimes of a thin belt and "shkapyna" (horse leather), on wooden hairpins. The sole of the boots was made of a thick belt, the heels were lined with nails or horseshoes. The price of boots is from 2 to 12 rubles. In addition to boots, they also wore trolleys, like women's, "postols" - leather bast shoes or ordinary bast shoes made of linden or elm bark.
Service in the army did not pass the peasant share. These were the sayings about recruits and their wives. "In recruitment - that in the grave", "In our volost there are three pains: lack of brutality, taxes and zemshchina", "Merry grief - soldier's life", "Young fought, and let go home in old age", "The soldier is a wretch, worse than a bast shoe "," The soldier is neither a widow, nor a husband's wife "," For the soldiers of the village, the whole village is a father. " The term of service as a recruit was 25 years. Without documentary evidence of the death of her husband, a soldier, the woman could not get married a second time. At the same time, the soldiers continued to live in her husband's families, completely dependent on the head of the family. The order of allocation of recruits was determined by the volost gathering of householders, at which a list of conscripts was drawn up. On November 8, 1868, a manifesto was issued, according to which it was ordered to nominate 4 recruits from 1000 souls. After military reform In 1874, the service life was limited to four years. Now all young people who had reached the age of 21, fit for service for health reasons, had to serve. However, the law provided for benefits on marital status.
The ideas of our ancestors about comfort and hygiene are somewhat unusual for us. There were no baths until the 1920s. They were replaced by ovens, much more spacious than modern ones. Ash was scooped out of the heated furnace. The floor was covered with straw, climbed in and steamed with a broom. The hair was washed outside the oven. Instead of soap, they used lye - a decoction of ash. From our point of view, the peasants lived in terrible mud. A general cleaning of the house was arranged before Easter: they washed and cleaned not only the floors and walls, but also all the dishes - smoked pots, grips, pokers. Sennik mattresses filled with hay or straw were knocked out, on which they slept, and from which there was also a lot of dust. They washed beddings and sackcloths with liners, with which they covered themselves instead of blankets. In normal times, such care was not shown. It is good if the hut had a wooden floor that could be washed, and the adobe floor was just swept. There were no needies. The smoke from the black-sweated stoves covered the walls with soot. In winter, dust from fires and other spinning waste stood in the huts. In winter, everyone suffered from the cold. Firewood for future use, as now, was not prepared. Usually they will bring a cart of dead wood from the forest, burn it, then go for the next cart. We warmed ourselves on the stoves and on the couches. Nobody had double frames, so the windows were covered with a thick layer of ice. All these inconveniences were a familiar daily routine for the peasants, and there was no thought of changing it.
Saints - list of saints Orthodox Church, arranged in the order of the months and days of the year in which the saint is honored. The saints are included in the liturgical books. Separately published saints are called months.
When writing this article, the following materials were used:
Miloradovich V. Life of the Lubensky peasant // magazine "Kievskaya starina", 1902, No. 4, p. 110-135, No. 6, p. 392-434, No. 10, p. 62-91.
Alekseev V.P. Granny oak // Bryansk, 1994, pp. 92-123.
At the beginning of the XIX century. the cultural rapprochement between Russia and Western Europe continued, but only the upper classes of society took part in this process.
Life and everyday life of a noble family
The life of a noble family had its own characteristics. Since the time of Peter I, the structure and relationships in the noble family have been built on an ideology that linked service and dignity. At the head of the family hierarchy was the father, who was responsible for representing the family in society and society in the family. According to etiquette, he kept aloof, had separate rooms in the house. IN literary works of this time, it is shown with what trepidation the children secretly entered their father's office, which, even in adulthood, remained inaccessible to them. The responsibilities of the head of the family included the arrangement of marriages of offspring and the careers of sons. The attitude towards children in a noble family was strict. The high level of exactingness to the child was explained by the fact that his upbringing was built within the framework of the noble code of honor.
The family could consist of relatives by blood and kinship. It often included household members (people who lived under a single roof) with the exception of servants and serfs.
V.A.Tropinin. Family portrait of Counts Morkov
There was a clear gender distinction in the family. Housekeeping was considered a specific feminine duty, while doing business outside the home was $ - $ masculine. Sex differences manifested themselves in social activities: according to etiquette, men met in the evening, and women visited each other during the day. The gender of the teacher always matched the gender of the child. A widower could only raise a son, but he had to give his daughter to the upbringing of a relative.
Pushkin with his uncle
Due to the high infant mortality rate, childhood under 7 was considered a time of purely biological existence. Childcare up to this age was entrusted to a nanny. From the age of 7, the child was viewed as a small adult, as it was believed that he had a mind. The training and education of boys was focused on serving the Fatherland. The girl was brought up the ability to sacrifice herself as a wife and mother. After 7 years, adult behavior became the standard of behavior for the child. Children could attend and take part in the conversations of adults, read their books.
K. Gampeln. Portrait of the Konovnitsyn brothers
From the age of 7, the girl fell under the care of her mother, who, until her marriage, was fully responsible for her. Education and moral education the girls were entrusted to the governesses. For the first time, girls appeared as potential brides. Since the marriage was mainly arranged by the head of the family, its advantage was that the girl escaped from maternal care.
In marriage, the spouse's task was to serve the husband. Legally, the couple were quite independent. Common property did not exist, the spouses did not inherit each other. In society, they had a different circle of acquaintances, led an independent lifestyle and were perceived as independent individuals.
The most important role for women was motherhood. However, after the birth of the child, the care of him was entrusted to the nurse and the nanny. The mother was not supposed to feed the child. The boy was brought up by a nanny until the age of 7, the mother retained general supervision.
From the document (A.S. Pushkin. Nyane):
A friend of my harsh days
My decrepit dove!
Alone in the wilderness of pine forests
For a long, long time you have been waiting for me.
You are under the window of your room
You grieve as if on a clock
And the needles hesitate every minute
In your wrinkled hands
You look into the forgotten gates
To the black distant path:
Longing, premonitions, worries
They are crowding your chest all the time.
It seems to you ...
Evgeny's fate kept:
At first Madame followed him,
Then Monsieur changed her;
The child was cut, but sweet.
Pushkin in Mikhailovsky with his nanny Arina Rodionovna
The father was engaged in the selection of an uncle and a teacher for his son, and later was responsible for the choice of his career. There was no close connection between father and son. The father remained unattainable, his decisions were not challenged. Often the uncle was the closest person in the family to the child.
From the document (Memories of Admiral Nikolai Semenovich Mordvinov and his family. Notes of his daughter):
Our parents led us in such a way that not only did they not punish us, they didn’t even scold us, but their will was always sacred to us. Our father did not like children to quarrel, and when he hears some kind of dispute between us, then, without distracting from his occupation, he will only say: "Le plus sage sede" (The smartest gives way) $ - $ and everything will be silent with us ...
An educator was involved in teaching the child, whose responsibilities also included the education of manners and stereotypes of behavior. The teacher accompanied the pupil everywhere. However, an emotionally close relationship with the teacher, as a rule, did not arise, since the teacher in the family hierarchy occupied the position of a servant.
R. Redgrave. Governess
From the document (V. A. Sologub. Big World):
Hardly in the summer, at the dacha, I can breathe freely and cheerfully, and even here Madame Point is now bothering me: everyone follows me and says: “Keep your back straight. Don't speak loudly. Don't go soon. Don't walk quietly. Lower your eyes ... ". But what is it for? .. If only to be very big as soon as possible!
The noble ideology was based on the conviction that the high position of a nobleman in society obliges him to be an example of high moral qualities: "To whom much is given, much will be demanded from him." The child was oriented not towards success, but towards the ideal. As a nobleman, he had to be brave, honest, educated.
Courage was developed through volitional efforts and training. A boy of 10–12 years old had to ride on a horse along with adults. To develop endurance in the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum, where Pushkin studied, "gymnastic exercises" were held every day: the lyceum students learned horse riding, fencing, swimming and rowing. They got up at 7 am, walked in any weather, ate simple food.
The attitude to appearance and clothing was of an aesthetic nature. Sharpened sharpness and polished nails, exquisite compliments and carefully styled hair complemented each other. According to the rules of good taste. even the most expensive and sophisticated outfit looked simple.
If a virgin After marriage, the shka automatically became an adult, then the young man was made an adult and independent by studying or serving in the army. Here the young man for the first time found himself in a society of people equal to him in position and age. The question of career and marriage was decided by the father. After marriage, the man usually left the service. Love marriage was rare. The last step in a man's acquisition of the status of head of the family and servant of society was the death of his father.
As Russia moves closer to Europe, changes are taking place in the relationship and structure of the noble family. The family, as in the West, is beginning to be seen as a place of special purity and moral refuge of a person from society.
Unknown artist. Portrait of E. I. Novosiltseva with children
The nobility spent their days not only in the service, but also in constant communication. In the houses of the capital's nobility, daily meals were served for 100 people. A ball or an evening party could cost the owner a significant amount. The city houses of the nobility resembled palaces: they were built mainly of stone, decorated with columns, sculptures, stucco bas-reliefs.
G.G. Gagarin. Ball at Princess M.F.Baryatinskaya. 2nd floor 1830s
Traditionally, at the beginning of summer, landowners moved to country palaces and houses. After spending the summer months and even part of autumn in the bosom of nature, they returned to the cities in November. Then the city began Savor with balls, masquerades, theatrical premieres.
In the first half of the 19th century. noble estates were real cultural centers. They embodied the owners' dream of creating their own world with special traditions, rituals, morals, a specific type of housekeeping, a schedule of weekdays and holidays. The main events in the life of the nobleman were associated with the estate, so its arrangement was thought out to the smallest detail. During this period, the building of manor houses was dominated by classicism. Often the estate had a theater, library, temple, serf schools, and an orchestra. The central position in the manor house was occupied by the ceremonial hall, where balls and receptions were held.
The Yusupovs' estate in Arkhangelskoye
The second floor was the main one, where light rooms were located, richly decorated with furniture, paintings, sculptures. The rooms were walk-through, sequentially adjacent to each other. By the middle of the century, in new buildings, all the main rooms opened onto a corridor. The service rooms were on the ground floor. Huge halls and living rooms were illuminated with chandeliers, candelabra, girandoles. The walls were decorated with expensive foreign wallpaper. They used traditional dishes made of gold and silver and foreign ones made of expensive Saxon or Sevres porcelain. Oriental furniture, decoration of halls with carpets and weapons were popular. To work on the decoration of the premises, representatives of the nobility invited domestic and foreign masters. In addition to the ceremonial elements (the manor house and parks), the noble estates had economic buildings: horse and cattle yards, barns, greenhouses and greenhouses, which were built in the same style as the house and the park. Practical owners began to build distilleries, brick, soap-making, cloth, glass, paper and other enterprises in the estates. The ancient hobbies of the nobles were hunting and horse riding.
Park in the Yusupov estate in Arkhangelskoye
The estate reflected the soul of the owner and revealed the peculiarities of his personality. She occupied a special place in the formation of the cultural traditions of landlord Russia. As a natural and cultural space, created for centuries, the estate has become a symbol of a noble family. A. Pushkin, N. V. Gogol, M. Yu. Lermontov, and especially I. S. Turgenev (the novel "Noble Nest") contributed to the formation of her poetics.
Since the beginning of the XIX century. there were changes in the clothes of the nobles. The costume becomes European and secular, it expresses the psychological appearance of a person. The standard of civilian clothing was a tailcoat, a top hat, gloves, walking sticks and colored vests, a military $ - $ uniform. “Antique” dresses prevailed in women's fashion: dresses made of fine fabrics, with a high waist, short sleeves and a straight skirt with trimming bordering the hem. Scarves and shawls were an important addition to the toilet.
The diet of the Russian nobility in the middle of the 19th century. consisted of more than 300 different dishes and drinks, including dishes of foreign cuisines. The products of everyday consumption are coffee, oriental sweets, biscuits, French, German and Spanish wines.
V. Pervuninsky. In the manor
life and everyday life of a peasant family
The cultural gap between the upper and lower classes in Russia was enormous. The peasants, unlike the nobles, remained faithful to the old customs. Traditional Russian culture prevailed in the village.
Easter card
Life and dwellings of the peasantry in the first half of the 19th century. retained the features of the past. The main building material was wood, from which the peasants' huts were built. At the base of the dwelling there was a basement, that is, a room for livestock, tools, and many things. Above the basement ("on the mountain") there was an upper room. The well-to-do peasants had a bright front room above the upper room. Depending on the wealth of the owners, the houses were decorated with carvings. Instead of glass, a bull bubble was used in the peasants' huts. The houses of wealthy villagers had mica windows.
The main place in the hut was near the stove. In the red corner hung icons dear to their owners. Stools and chairs constituted the basis of the decoration of the house. Near the stove, the hostess cooked food in clay pots and put it in the stove to keep warm. Near the front door was workplace men, where they played with some saddlery, weaved sandals, repaired tools. A loom stood by the windows. Light and torch were indispensable companions on winter evenings. The peasants slept on the stove or on the beds (boardwalk under the ceiling).
The staple food was rye bread. From millet, peas, buckwheat, oats, cereals and jelly were prepared. There were a lot of vegetables in the diet: cabbage, turnips, beets, carrots, garlic, cucumbers, radishes, onions. Potatoes were used. Meat was rarely eaten, usually on holidays. Its deficiency was made up for by fish. Popular drinks included beet kvass, beer, sbiten, liqueurs and liqueurs. In the first half of the 19th century. tea became widespread.
I. A. Ermenev. Lunch (Peasants at Lunch)
The peasants wore shirts and pants. With the development of weaving production, homespun cloth for outerwear (zipuns, sermyag) was replaced by factory fabrics. In winter they wore sheepskin coats and sheepskin coats, long sheepskin coats, belted with sashes. Hats ("sinners") were made by artisans. The main type of peasant footwear was bast bast shoes, which were worn with cloth or canvas onuchs tied with a braid. On holidays, men wore leather boots, women $ - $ "cats" (heavy leather galoshes). In winter, felt boots were worn.
Holidays associated with cultural and religious traditions played an important role in the life of the peasants. On the eve of Christmas and before Epiphany, they used to guess. The main rite for Epiphany was the procession of the cross to the ice hole for the holy water. The first spring holiday was Maslenitsa, before Lent they ate tasty and fatty food, baked pancakes. The favorite fun of the population these days was sledding, sledding, and logs from the mountains. On Easter, they played grandmas, rounders, rode on a swing. On Trinity they walked in the meadows and forests, on the holiday of Ivan Kupala they swam in the rivers and collected medicinal herbs.
V. Perov. Rural procession at Easter
The peasant family united representatives of two generations of $ - $ parents and their children. As a rule, there were many children. The main family rites were baptism, wedding, and funeral. Boys usually got married at the age of 24-25, girls $ - $ at the age of 18-22. A marriage entered into at a church wedding was considered legal. After the son's marriage, his parents and close relatives helped him build his own house. When giving a daughter in marriage, the parents passed the dowry to the husband. Among other things, it included things sewn by the girl before the wedding.
A.P. Ryabushkin. Peasant wedding in the Tambov province
life and everyday life of townspeople
In the first half of the 19th century. industrial growth is observed in St. Petersburg, Riga, Moscow, Kharkov, Yekaterinoslav. The growth of the population of cities is 2-2.5 times higher than the total growth of the population of the empire. The appearance of cities is gradually changing. Their streets, especially in Moscow that burned down in 1812, were built up with large stone houses.
Moscow. Nikolskaya street
With the development of urban trade and transport, the area of individual outbuildings is rapidly decreasing: barns, sheds, baths. The streets are getting more lively. Among the residents of St. Petersburg, Sennaya Square, Tsaritsyn Lug, and Yekateringof were popular recreation places. Inns, tea houses, buffets are opening for those who could not dine at home.
V. Pervuninsky. Morning in Neskuchny Garden
Summer festivities of Muscovites took place along the main Moscow streets, around the Kremlin, in Sokolniki and in Maryina Roshcha, as well as in Tsaritsyno, Kuntsevo, Kuskovo, on Vorobyovy Gory, in Kuzminki, Ostankino, Kolomenskoye, Arkhangelskoye, which were then the outskirts of the city. In winter, the townspeople walked in the Kremlin Garden, on Tverskoy Boulevard, along the embankment of the Moskva River and Novinsky Val. In the summer, mainly merchants and other city people took part in the festivities, while the nobles left for their estates outside Moscow. Regimental music played in gardens or parks, gypsies sang and danced, city residents rode boats.
By the middle of the XIX century. most of Russian cities were transformed from agrarian and administrative to craft, industrial and trade centers. In the cities, the transition from a composite family to a small one, from absolutism to democracy in intrafamily relations was carried out, and social relations were rationalized.
The bulk of the merchants in the first half of the 19th century. adhered to the traditional way of life and methods of doing business. The houses retained a strict subordination according to the "Domostroi". Merchants were the most religious part of the urban population. Charity was considered a good deed among the merchants. The place of residence of the merchants in Moscow was mainly Zamoskvorechye. The houses of the merchants were built of stone. In the first half of the 19th century. in most merchant houses, the ceremonial rooms were richly decorated, but not always tastefully. The ceilings were painted with birds of paradise, sirens, cupids. Of the furniture, sofas were obligatory. In the front rooms, the owners hung their portraits and portraits of their ancestors, in glass cases there were beautiful and expensive trinkets.
V.G. Perov. Arrival of the governess to the merchant house
The merchant environment has become one of the guardians of Russian culinary culture. The recipes were traditional, with simple ingredients. The merchant's love for tea and tea drinking is known.
B. M. Kustodiev. Merchant's wife at tea
In the first half of the 19th century. the older generation of merchants wore "Russian dress", and the younger one wore European clothing. The clothes of the merchants had traditional features brought from Europe. "Golden merchant youth" dressed in French fashion.
B. M. Kustodiev. A merchant with a merchant's wife
At leisure, merchants with their families attended the theater, guests, festivities, fairs. Moreover, the fair was a traditional place of entertainment, and theaters were just becoming fashionable among merchants.
The life of the working people was hard. The workers of the first factories and plants lived in multi-storey barracks, damp, semi-dark, with plank bunks teeming with insects. Lack of clean water, lack of light and air had a detrimental effect on the body. The mortality rate among them was twice the national average.
Interior view of the barracks for factory workers Barracks for family workers
The workers' table was poor, mostly cereals and bread. The only entertainment available to the workers was a visit to a tavern or tavern.
Thus, only the upper classes of society took part in the process of cultural rapprochement between Russia and Europe. The chasm between " high "culture of the aristocracy and noble merchants and the traditional culture of the lower estates was preserved.
A.A. Zakirova
Introduction
Relevance of the topic. The radical changes taking place in our country have generated contradictions between the need for positive social and cultural transformations in society and the lack of highly spiritual people who are ready to implement them. Today, as never before, the crisis of spiritual and moral life, rooted in past centuries, is obvious. And now there are rapid and significant socio-economic, spiritual and moral changes in Russian society and the state. At such times, the need to study the turning points of Russian history increases.
To restore a fuller and deeper historical picture of the events of the end XIX beginning XX centuries, it is necessary to study the spiritual and moral state of Russian society, since these events had not only socio-economic, but also spiritual and moral characteristics, previously not sufficiently analyzed by historians. Complement the learned historical events facts of a deeper spiritual and moral order formed a special direction of this historical research, the problem of which is relevant for modern historians, political scientists, sociologists and theologians.
In the late 19th - early 20th centuries, despite the accelerating industrial development, the peasantry remained the main estate in Russia. According to the 1897 census, its population was 84.1% of the total population of European Russia and 77.1% for the empire as a whole. On average, the material situation of the peasantry improved.
The object of the research is the organization of everyday life during the period of the late 19th - early 20th centuries.
The subject of the research is the organization and living conditions of Russian workers.
The purpose of this work is to study the life of Russian workers at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries.
Objectives of the abstract research:
- Study the living conditions and household items of Russian workers;
- Get acquainted with the social and everyday life of the Russian population of the XIX-XX centuries.
- Consider the working conditions of the Russian population.
1. Life of Russian workers at the end of the XIX - beginning of the XX century
1.1 Living conditions
In the 19th century, peasants lived in large patriarchal families, which began to disintegrate only towards the end of the century. Large families, hard and varied work, a harsh climate forced the northerners to build houses-complexes combining housing and outbuildings. On the village streets there were usually several dozen monumental houses, in each of which one peasant family lived. Barns were built next to the houses; closer to the river, lake - baths; beyond the outskirts - barns with threshing floors.
When building a house, any man did all the rough work, wielding an ax, and craftsmen were invited to perform more subtle work. The huge house is nice on the outside, although it has almost no carved decorations, but it is especially disturbingly beautiful on the inside. A living, warm tree, everything is made with love by the hands of the owner, thoughtfully, proportionally, large.
Ahead is the residential half, behind is the household, between them there is a canopy. The house turns out to be long, the living and utility half - the same height. The main floor is raised by two meters. Under the dwelling half - underground, used as a storeroom. The first Russian stoves were without a chimney, they were fired in black, and in our region too. There was a wooden chimney to escape the smoke from the hut, which spread all over the ceiling. With the settlement of Karelia by Novgorodians, master stove-makers appeared who had the experience of building stoves in boyar's chambers, which were heated in white, that is, the smoke from the stove went out into the chimney. The residential half is divided by a Russian stove, a door and a fence (wardrobe partition) into two independent parts, which explains the presence of two red corners.
1.2 Household items
Crockery is represented by medium and large vessels, bowls, pots, round-bottomed jugs, made of well elutriated clay with an admixture of sand, crushed quartz. The firing is strong but uneven. Apparently, the items were burned in open fires.
Wooden dishes were an integral part of everyday life. When making it, the craftsmen paid more attention to the shape of the thing, and not to its decoration. Massive carved-and-dug ladles, bowls of various sizes, bowls, salt shakers, spoons - in all these products there is a desire to successfully select proportions and shapes. The material was pine, spruce, birch, strong birch outgrowths - burls.
A significant part of the household utensils consisted of birch bark products. They made tuesa, baskets, purses, salt licks, beetroots (baskets) from it. Birch bark tuesa - cylindrical vessels made of a single piece of birch bark for milk or water served up to 25 years. Household utensils were also made from willow rods and bast. Bast boxes, sieves, etc. were made from thin pieces of wood (aspen, linden). Rakes, rollers, hoops, parts of looms, hunting skis were made from wood.
Metal products, in particular locks, forged chests, were of aesthetic value, since the artisans gave them an elegant shape. The skill of a blacksmith has been passed down from generation to generation, along a kindred line. The material of iron products was local ore: swamp, lake, mountain.
Household and household accessories ornamented with painted patterns were varied and beautiful. They attracted the attention of pre-revolutionary researchers who noted that "the love of painting in the village is undeniable, it was not uncommon to meet a hut in which many household items, cupboards, chests, doors were decorated with curious paintings, strange, fantastic, but satisfying the tastes of the village." In our villages, fences, doors, lockers were covered with brush painting, close to the style of Vygoretsky workshops. Characterizing household items, tools of labor, we can say that all of them are works of folk art, although the main principle was the expediency of manufactured items, practicality, and necessity.
2. Social life of the Russian city of the XIX - early XX centuries.
2.1 Culture of the people
Since the 1890s, other professional-class clubs have been spreading in Russian cities, uniting wider strata of the townspeople. There were so-called clerks', or commercial, clubs, around which were grouped employees of state institutions and private firms, lower-ranking officials, traders from the bourgeoisie and part of the merchants - the middle strata of the townspeople, guided in their aspirations by the bourgeois-noble elite. They spent their free evenings here, having fun. There were clubs for small membership fees and voluntary donations. The main emphasis was on decency, decency and good manners.
An attempt to create clubs for the people was the organization in cities at the beginning of the 20th century. People's houses. They differed from the caste-professional clubs by their openness and by the fact that, in addition to entertainment (games, dances), cultural and educational work was carried out in them by the forces of the local democratic intelligentsia (performances were staged, lectures were given, "vague pictures" (transparencies) on general educational topics were shown) ... The People's Houses were visited by workers striving for education. The Sunday schools were of the same importance, which were organized on a voluntary basis by individual representatives of the intelligentsia, most often teachers. Schools were attended by workers, artisans and all those who wanted to get or supplement their education. They were dominated by young men. Very often such schools were used by politicians for revolutionary propaganda.
Another type of associations in the cities were various societies of interest, amateur or professional (local history, agronomic, horse breeding, sports, etc.). They all had their own charter, a cash desk, and sometimes a library. Societies of doctors and local historians at their meetings heard reports on professional topics, which were sometimes published; agricultural societies, which consisted mainly of landowners and strong owners - peasants from farms - organized exhibitions of fruits, productive livestock, and horses. There were also widespread amateur circles - theatrical, literary and artistic. This entire sphere of social activity was not extensive, but it had a wide public resonance, since it brought education and culture to the masses of the townspeople and the population of the nearest rural area.
Street games were widespread among the petty bourgeoisie, artisans and artisans. Children, teenagers and adult boys and girls played almost before the wedding. These games were characterized by a noticeable division into male and female - male games demanded greater strength and dexterity from the participants. The guys played in small towns, in grandmas, in leapfrog, walked on stilts, launched a kite. More guys also played rounders. The girls ran to catch up, played with stones, beads ("layouts"). Young people from "decent" families did not take part in street games. They amused themselves in their environment when leaving the city or gathering in a company of friends and relatives in their garden or in the yard. Skittles and a ball were in use, less often croquet, golf; children swung on a swing, drove a hoop.
In winter, a skating rink was poured into the city garden. In the evenings, lanterns were lit here, sometimes an orchestra played. The entrance was paid. The youth skated in pairs or small groups. The favorite winter activity of young people from ordinary families is skiing down the mountains on sleds, benches, and ice sleds. Such entertainment went on from the onset of winter until the snow melted.
In the 1900s, sports activities began to develop: cycling, playing football. This concerned most of all young people from officials, employees and the commercial circle. The representatives of the officer-landlord milieu were more interested in equestrian sports; however, all the townspeople loved to admire the spectacle of equestrian competitions, especially races. Many people of different ranks and states gathered for the race.
Among the common people in men's companies there were various competitions in strength and dexterity - for example, in lifting weights for a bet. A special place was occupied by the brave amusement that has survived since antiquity - fistfights, which took place from Thursday Maslenitsa week to the end of September-October, including the period of autumn fairs. This fun was most widespread among artisans, small traders, some of the workers, especially in provincial cities.
The social life of the village and the city was greatly influenced by the church, for the overwhelming majority of the population - the Orthodox. Religious and household regulations, concerning the most diverse aspects of life, were a kind of law of social and personal behavior of people. The alternation of work and rest, the forms and nature of leisure activities were largely determined by the dates of the religious calendar, obligatory for everyone. The fulfillment of religious precepts in domestic life was conditioned not only by the feeling of the believer, "the fear of God", but also by the control of the family, especially the older generation, who monitored the observance of the proper attitude to icons, fasts, prayers, etc. Every peasant and city dweller, as a member of the church community, took part in public activities related to worship. The basis of religious public life were visits to the church, the reception of the priest with the clergy, making a round of his parish with prayer times 4 a year, large processions of the cross, regular or episodic, rituals associated with the most important points in people's lives. The worship itself was a public matter.
A significant place in the life of a Russian person was occupied by regular church attendance. On Saturdays, Sundays, and especially on the days of major holidays, not only adults, but also children went to church. During large fasts, it was supposed to fast, confess and receive communion. All this was observed by the clergy and society itself through various groups exercising social control (in the city - through individual social groups, in the village - through the rural community, with which the church community often coincided). Of those who shared atheistic views or hesitated in faith, few could afford to neglect Christian "responsibilities." Such behavior was condemned and, at best, if a person had weight in society, qualified as eccentricity. Attending church itself was seen not only as religious, but also as a secular act that provided an opportunity for fellowship. At Mass, Vespers, Matins, people regularly met with each other. The church gave the opportunity to "see" relatives, friends, acquaintances. We talked, learned the news, looked after grooms and brides. Being "in front of" the society made people pay special attention to their clothes and manners. They came long before the service and then did not leave immediately. During the holidays, the church square became a kind of center of social life. Street trade in delicacies, trifles, and children's toys was often developed here.
On the days of major religious holidays and patronal days, many people gathered to numerous monasteries, to holy places, to churches with a miraculous icon. Pilgrims arrived not only from the immediate surroundings, but also from distant places. They were located in taverns, peasant, bourgeois houses and lived for several days. Here its own specific social life took shape, a mystical atmosphere was created.
A special place in religious public life was occupied by large processions of the cross, which were established for various reasons related to the history of a given area or the entire country (getting rid of the epidemic, death of livestock, in honor of the victory in Patriotic War 1812), or were episodic (praying for rain during a drought). The processions were long and crowded; almost the entire population of church parishes took part in them, and the common people especially willingly took part in them. The procession as a religious and everyday rite has developed long ago and has hardly changed over time. In the 1900s, during religious processions in cities, there was a kind of street life with tray trade and some entertainment.
A large role in the life of the urban population was played by rituals and customs dated to the dates of the Christian calendar. Back at the beginning of the XX century. the ritual calendar, containing many layers of distant times, in most of the territory of the settlement of Russians retained its traditional specifics, although many archaic rituals had passed away by that time, and the meaning of others was forgotten, and they, mixed with non-ritual everyday forms, were perceived as festive fun ...
Social life associated with folk calendar rituals manifested itself mainly in joint festivities and festive entertainment, which had many local differences. The Christmas and New Year cycle of customs and rituals associated with the winter solstice and aimed at ensuring fertility and all kinds of well-being in the coming year was called Christmastide. Christmastide was the busiest and most fun time of the year, especially for young people. According to unwritten laws, the responsibility of youth groups (territorial or social) included the organization and conduct of Christmas and New Year carols, which are widespread in Russia. Young people in a cheerful crowd went around the houses with wishes to the owners of every prosperity and received a reward for this, most often with food. On New Year's morning, boys went to their homes. They congratulated the owners, performed the festive troparion and "sowed" - scattered seeds. Children were usually presented with little change. Everything that the carollers received from the owners went to the organization of festive parties and conversations, which, as already noted, were distinguished by a special revelry and crowds.
2.2 Labor conditions for the work of the Russian population in the late 19th - early 20th centuries
Extremely complex and multifaceted problems are united by the concept of the "work question" in Russia. These include the formation of the working class, the size and structure, composition, working conditions and living standards of workers, legal and political situation, etc. Taking into account the research objectives of the monograph, the author of the essay posed a triune task: to study the relationship between government - entrepreneurs - workers, because politics carried out state power, was one of the essential levers regulating the relationship between entrepreneurs and workers (mainly through factory and labor legislation). Social politics, carried out by the owners of enterprises, was not only a regulator of their relationship with workers, but also an important area of entrepreneurial activity.
Power, entrepreneurs and workers in the 1860-1870s 60-70s of the XIX century - the beginning of great changes in the country. It was also a time of intensive start in attempts to resolve the "labor question". The fall of serfdom was one of the greatest events in history Russia XIX century. The reform of 1861 was associated with fundamental changes in the political and socio-economic life of the country. One of its most important results was the formation of a free market for hired labor for people deprived of the means of production and living exclusively by selling their labor power. The system of wage labor became the basis for the development of the national economy of Russia. The rapid development of capitalism in the post-reform period multiplied the ranks of hired workers, turning them into a class Russian society... The latter was inextricably linked with the industrial revolution that took place in the country in the 50-90s of the 19th century.
During the industrial revolution in Russia, a large machine industry was created and established, and a new social type permanent workers, concentrated in large enterprises in the leading industrial centers of the country. The formation of the working class was underway, the basis of which was made up of permanent workers, deprived of the means of production, severing ties with the land and their own economy and working all year in factories and plants.
However, by the end of the 1850s, in government circles among their most liberal representatives, an understanding was ripening that with the emancipation of the peasants it was no longer possible to preserve the old laws on workers, that the need to develop factory legislation was obvious. Since that time, various Russian departments began to create one after another special commissions. The first of them was formed in 1859 in St. Petersburg under the governor-general of the capital. Petersburg entrepreneurs took an active part in its work. The commission was entrusted with the task of inspecting the factories and plants of St. Petersburg (and its district) - the largest commercial and industrial center, where the largest number of the working population was concentrated.
The result of the commission's work was the preparation of the "Draft rules for factories and plants in St. Petersburg and the district", regulating the working conditions of workers and the responsibility of entrepreneurs.
In the 60-70s of the XIX century. the position of the workers remained powerless and characterized by cruel forms of labor. Often at the factory enterprises there were internal regulations drawn up by the owners themselves and introduced without any explanation to the workers. In the Moscow province, the most typical was a 12-hour working day, but in a number of enterprises it lasted 14, 15, 16 hours or more. Most factories had a large number of working days per year, and Sunday work was common. The workers were subjected to extreme arbitrariness on the part of the owners. The latter included in the work contract such clauses that deprived the worker of all freedom. The system of penalties was developed to virtuosity. Often, the amount of fines was not determined in advance at all. Fines from workers, levied on a wide variety of reasons and for no reason, without giving a reason, went to the full disposal of the entrepreneur. They sometimes reached half of their earnings, i.e. the worker from the earned ruble gave the owner 50 kopecks. There were cases when, in addition to the fines, a penalty was imposed, for example, 10 rubles for leaving the factory. The total amount of fines in some factories reached several thousand rubles a year and was an important source of income.
The manufacturers considered themselves entitled, contrary to the law, which forbade them to arbitrarily lower wages, before the expiration of the contract, to reduce it at any time at their discretion.
The workers had to beg the money they earned from the manufacturer as a special favor. In some factories, the following procedure was also practiced: they were not given to the worker at all for a year (until the end of the term of employment). The end of the 1860s - the beginning of the 1870s were marked by the growing discontent of the workers and the strengthening of the labor movement. Relations between workers and entrepreneurs are especially aggravated in the textile, primarily cotton, industry - the leading industry in the country.
During the strike movement of the 1870s, the government and its local bodies, the police and the gendarmerie took all measures to suppress the workers' protests, persecuting their active participants, mainly in an administrative manner on the basis of the circulars of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of 1870, 1878-1879, and then the Regulations on the reinforced and emergency protection of 1881, which allowed the expulsion of strikers to their places of registration.
Already in the 1870s, it became more and more obvious that the working class and the labor question existed precisely in the Western European sense in Russia.
Conclusion
The life of a worker at the turn of the century was difficult to envy even for a land-poor peasant. The concept of "economic situation" of workers includes factors such as employment in production, sanitary and other working conditions, occupational diseases, injuries. In turn, the concept of "standard of living" is made up of assessments of the provision of proletarians with work, their life expectancy, wages, quality of food, housing conditions, medical care, the ratio of work and free time.
According to statistics, at the turn of the century, workers ranked last in terms of savings per depositor. In most cases, the wages of the father of the family were not enough, so more than half of the wives of the workers also worked. And this is almost 3 times more than the number of employees married women in the more industrially developed Germany and England. In the period of the formation of domestic industrial capitalism, fate faced great challenges for women workers and adolescents, who by the beginning of the 20th century constituted a little less than half of the working people. Discontent among the common people gradually became widespread.
Among factory and factory workers, artificially landless nobles and landless peasants, who joined the ranks of the "world homeless proletariat", malice and social hatred developed as a challenge to God.
List of used literature
- Kopyatkevich. Olonets Artistic Antiquity // News of the Society for the Study of Olonets Governorate. - Petrozavodsk, 1914. - No. 5.
- Muller G.P. Essays on the history of the XVI-XVIII centuries. - Petrozavodsk, 1947.
- Labor movement in Russia in the 19th century. T. II. Ch. 1.1861-1874. - M., 1950.
- Russians: family and social life / Otv. ed. M.M. Gromyko , T.A. Listov. - M., 1989.
- Tikhomirov L.A. Christianity and politics. The labor question and Russian ideals. http://apocalypse.orthodoxy.ru/
Notes (edit)
The working class of Russia from inception to the beginning of the XX century. - M. 1998 .-- 367 p.
During the implementation of the project, state support funds were used, allocated as a grant in accordance with the order of the President Russian Federation No. 11-rp dated January 17, 2014 and on the basis of a competition held by the All-Russian public organization "Russian Union of Youth"
10 July 2013, 10:11The Russian peasantry, the Russian countryside - this is the biggest loss of Russia in the twentieth century. As a class, as a stratum of the country's population, a bearer of a unique culture, the Russian peasant disappeared, and the Russian countryside also disappeared.
Many different speculations and myths have arisen on this topic.
Here is one of them. Before the revolution, peasants were without exception beggars, barefoot and naked. They were mercilessly robbed by landowners who, for the sake of a French vase, exported bread by steamers to the West, and the people were starving. But if you look closely at it, you will find out that the landowners in Russia by the seventeenth year were not the main landowners. The nobles, with their love for the burning of life, lost and sold their estates. Remember at least the play " The Cherry Orchard"Chekhov. All this is clearly shown there. The land was most often bought by those who were called kulaks, the new rural bourgeoisie from the rich peasants. It was this stratum that became the main landowner in Russian Empire... The land was also owned by the peasant community. So it is somehow difficult to imagine that the peasants were robbed by the landlords.
The second myth. If you ask anyone now - where did the peasants live better at that time than in Russia? Then all will unanimously point to the West. There and only there peasants, or rather farmers, lived and live very prosperously. Was it so?
In general, the work of a peasant in any country is hard, and not so highly paid. Therefore, it is interesting to compare, with the help of a photo, the life of Russian peasants and their foreign colleagues.
Here are the German peasants of the late nineteenth century:
But the Russians at the beginning of the 20th century.
But American farmers are harvesting crops, also the beginning of the 20th century.
Ms. Bizi and her family (Polish immigrants). They all work in the fields near Baltimore. Baltimore, Maryland. July 1909:
But Polish peasant women are harvesting, 1925
Irish peasants at their home:
Irish villagers, 1913:
Polish peasant women at the market in Krakow:
House of German peasants. The thatched roof seems to indicate the owner's wealth:
The house is richer. Also Germany:
A typical view of the Spanish province at the beginning of the 20th century:
And this is how farmers lived in Ireland at the beginning of the twentieth century:
Residents of the Polish town of Lowicz dressed up for Sunday service in church, but all the attention is on the house:
Austrian town of Wagrain, 1929
Lithuanian village, late 19th century (Lithuania was then part of the Russian Empire)
But this is Russia. End of the nineteenth century.
The photo is modern, but the house was just at the beginning of the twentieth century in Russia.
But what cannot be seen abroad. Only Russians do this:
A typical peasant hut in the Novgorod open-air museum of wooden architecture in the village of Vitoslavitsy:
Peasant household items:
The interior of a peasant hut of the early 20th century:
And this is Norway. Typical Norwegian farmer's dwelling from the open-air ethnographic museum. Such are the simple cute huts with no frills:
and interior decoration:
Photo of a Norwegian village, dated 1910:
And this is the extreme West of Ukraine, although, perhaps, the present southeastern outskirts of Poland, 1920.
Well, American "rich" farmers lived something like this:
The whole family at work:
Often a sign of poverty in the Russian countryside is considered the lack of shoes in the summer among peasants. Which is not entirely true.
And if you look closely at the footwear of farmers?
Farm children. England twenties:
Russian barefoot children. Photo by Prokudin-Gorsky, 1909:
Girls in casual clothes. Yaroslavl province. v. Ovinchischi 1915:
The explanation for this is simple. Of course, there were also poor people who could not afford shoes, but there were no sneakers and sneakers then. The shoes were leather, oak. For experiment, put on these shoes, and walk on rough terrain in the summer for a week. See what happens to your feet and shoes. For completeness of the experiment, move the arable land across the furrow a couple of times. You will immediately understand why in those dense times in the summer they went barefoot.
Children then worked everywhere and from the age of three they already tried to feed themselves and help the family.
Rosa Bayodo, 10 years old. Batrachit has been here for the 3rd summer. White Marshes, Browns Mill, New Jersey. September 28, 1910:
Arnao family. The whole family is working. Joe is 3 years old. The boy is 6 years old, the girl is 9 years old. Cannon, Delaware, USA, May 28, 1910:
Another family gathers berries, USA
Boy picking cotton, Oklahoma, USA, 1916
July 1915. Harvesting sugar beets near Sugar City, Colorado: Mary, 6, Lucy, 8, and Ethan, 10.
Sugar beet harvest in Wisconsin, July 1915:
And these are Russian children. Ryazan province, 1913
Girls lacemaker weaving patterns. Moscow province. the village of Kulikovo 1913
And at the end of the post, representatives of different peoples of Europe, as well as Russian peasants in national costumes and in festive clothes. Photos also reflect well the life of that time:
Russia, late 19th century.
Baden, Germany, early 20th century
In the same place
Young Irish woman in vintage dress, village (Claddah) in County Galway, May 26, 1913
Another Irish woman, 20s of the 20th century
Hungarians
Welshkee, Wales, early 20th century.
Norwegian, 1913
Spanish woman in national costume
Dutch, 1910
Vendian woman (i.e. Lusatian Serb) in traditional dress, Germany
A group of Polish peasants on a cart.
A young Polish villager dressed up for a Sunday church service
Ukrainian villager, 1909
Breton couple in traditional dress, France, 1920
Sisters from Alsace, France, 1918
Russian women in traditional dress, between 1908 and 1917
And a few more photos of the Russian village and life of the late nineteenth, early twentieth century:
Shrovetide in the Yenisei province
Peasants of the Kostroma province, 1907
A young peasant woman in everyday clothes. Vologda province. Ust Topsa 1911
Wealthy peasant in casual clothes. Moscow province. from. Kulikovo 1913
The old man and the old woman. Ryazan province, Kasimovsky district 1910
Sisters in festive clothes. Yaroslavl province. village Ovinchischi 1915
A young peasant woman in a festive costume. Kostroma lips. Galich 1907
Father and son before the hunt. Vyatka lips. 1907 g.
Ukrainian displaced person, Yenisei province, 1910
Transportation of the bride's dowry to the groom's house. Vladimirskaya lips. 1914
Grandmother with her grandson's cradle, 1914
A peasant woman crumples flax, Perm province, 1910
Girl with strawberries, 1909.
About how the Russian peasants lived in pre-revolutionary Russia, a huge number of sources have reached - documentary information, statistical data, and personal impressions. Contemporaries did not express enthusiasm about the reality that surrounded them, finding the situation desperate and terrible. In our review there are 20 photos that were taken between 1900 and 1910. The pictures are, of course, staged, but you can see the peasant life of that time on them.
In an attempt to understand how Russian peasants lived at the beginning of the last century, let us turn to the classics. Let us cite the testimony of a person who is difficult to blame for non-Russianness, inadequacy or dishonesty. This is how the classic of Russian literature Tolstoy described his trip to Russian villages in various counties at the very end of the 19th century:
« In all these villages, although there is no admixture to bread, as was the case in 1891, bread, although pure, is not given in plenty. Welding - millet, cabbage, potatoes, even the majority, do not have any. The food consists of herbal cabbage soup, whitened if there is a cow, and unbleached if there is no cow, and only bread. In all these villages, the majority have sold and pledged everything that can be sold and pledged».
« From Gushchino I went to the village of Gnevyshevo, from which peasants came two days ago asking for help. This village, like Gubarevka, consists of 10 courtyards. There are four horses and four cows for ten households; there are almost no sheep; all the houses are so old and bad they barely stand. Everyone is poor and everyone begs for help. “If only the guys were resting in the slightest degree,” the women say. "And then they ask for folders (bread), but there is nothing to give, and they will fall asleep without having dinner"- continues Tolstoy.
According to Tolstoy, the problems of the Russian peasants are quite understandable. Lev Nikolaevich believed that all the problems
- from the lack of land, because half of the land belongs to landowners and merchants who sell both land and grain;
- from vodka, which is the main income of the state and to which people have been accustomed for centuries;
- from the soldiers who take away from him the best people at the best time and corrupting them;
- from officials who oppress the people;
- from taxes;
- from ignorance, in which he is deliberately supported by government and church schools.
Another classic of Russian literature V.G.Korolenko, who lived in the countryside for many years, organized the distribution of food loans and canteens for the hungry, wrote: “You are a fresh person, you stumble upon a village with dozens of typhoid patients, you see a sick mother bending over the cradle of a sick child to feed him, losing consciousness and lying over him, and there is no one to help, because the husband is muttering on the floor in incoherent delirium. And you are horrified. And the "old campaigner" is used to it. He had already experienced this, he was already horrified twenty years ago, had been ill, boiled over, calmed down ... Typhus? Why, this is always with us! Quinoa? Yes, we have this every year! "
Of course, we can assume that Vladimir Galaktionovich Korolenko and Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy are creative people, and therefore are overly emotional and sensitive. But foreigners who in those years lived in Russia give approximately the same description of peasant life: constant hunger, which periodically alternated with severe hunger plagues, was a terrible commonplace for Russia.
Professor of Medicine and Doctor Emil Dillon, who lived and worked in Russia from 1877 to 1914, traveled extensively across all regions of Russia. He knew well the situation at different social levels and there was hardly any sense to distort reality for him. " A Russian peasant ... goes to bed at six or five o'clock in the evening in winter, because he cannot spend money on buying kerosene for the lamp. He has no meat, eggs, butter, milk, often no cabbage, he lives mainly on black bread and potatoes. Lives? He is starving to death due to insufficient supply."- wrote Dillon.
Even fanatical and ardent supporters of the tsarist regime admitted that the life of the average peasant was very difficult. In 1909, Mikhail Osipovich Menshikov, one of the initiators of the creation of the monarchist organization All-Russian National Union, wrote: Every year the Russian army is becoming more and more ailing and physically incapable ... It is difficult to choose one out of three guys who is quite fit for service ... - these are the reasons for physical exhaustion ... It's scary to say what hardships a recruit sometimes undergoes before service. About 40 percent For the first time, recruits ate meat when they entered military service. In the service, the soldier eats, in addition to good bread, excellent meat soup and porridge, i.e. something that many people in the village have no idea about ...»
