Peoples of Belarus: culture and traditions. Gene pool of Belarusians People of Belarus

Russians and Belarusians admit: we differ little from each other. But still we are different. How was Belarus formed and what is its uniqueness? We'll figure out.

History of White Rus'

The ethnonym "Belarusians" was finally adopted by the Russian Empire in the 18th - 19th centuries. Together with the Great Russians and Little Russians, the Belarusians, in the eyes of autocratic ideologists, constituted a triune all-Russian nationality. In Russia itself, the term began to be used under Catherine II: after the third partition of Poland in 1796, the empress ordered the establishment of the Belarusian province on the newly acquired lands.

Historians do not have a consensus on the origin of the toronyms Belarus, Belaya Rus. Some believed that White Russia was the name given to lands independent of the Mongol-Tatars (white is the color of freedom), others attributed the name to the white color of clothing and hair of the local residents. Still others contrasted white Christian Rus' with black pagan Russia. The most popular version was about Black, Red and White Rus', where the color was compared with a certain side of the world: black with the north, white with the west and red with the south.

The territory of White Rus' extended far beyond the borders of present-day Belarus. Since the 13th century, foreigners-Latins called North-Eastern Rus' White Russia (Ruthenia Alba). Western European medieval geographers almost never visited it and had a vague idea of ​​its boundaries. The term was also used in relation to the Western Russian principalities, for example, Polotsk. In the 16th – 17th centuries, the term White Rus' was assigned to the Russian-speaking lands in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and the northeastern lands, on the contrary, began to be opposed to White Rus'. The annexation of Ukraine-Little Russia to Russia in 1654 (do not forget that, along with the Little Russian lands, part of the Belarusian ones were also annexed to Moscow) provided state ideologists with an excellent opportunity to put forward the concept of the brotherhood of three peoples - Great Russian, Little Russian and Belarusian.

Ethnography and potato pancakes

However, despite the official ideology, Belarusians had no place in science for a long time. The study of their rituals and folk customs was just beginning, and the Belarusian literary language was taking its first steps. Stronger neighboring peoples who were experiencing a period of national revival, primarily the Poles and Russians, laid claim to White Rus' as their ancestral homeland. The main argument was that scientists did not perceive the Belarusian language as an independent language, calling it a dialect of either Russian or Polish.

Only in the 20th century was it possible to identify that the ethnogenesis of the Belarusians took place on the territory of the Upper Dnieper, Middle Podvinia and Upper Ponemania, that is, on the territory of modern Belarus. Gradually, ethnographers identified the original aspects of the Belarusian ethnic group and, in particular, Belarusian cuisine. Potatoes took root in the Belarusian lands back in the 18th century (unlike the rest of Russia, which knew the potato reforms and riots of the 1840s) and by the end of the 19th century, Belarusian cuisine was replete with an assortment of potato dishes. Draniki, for example.

Belarusians in science

Interest in the history of Belarusians, the emergence of the first scientifically based concepts of the origin of the ethnic group is a matter of the beginning of the 20th century. One of the first to take on it was Vladimir Ivanovich Picheta, a student of the famous Russian historian Vasily Osipovich Klyuchevsky. Based on the settlement of the Slavs according to the Tale of Bygone Years, he suggested that the ancestors of the Belarusians were the Krivichi, as well as the neighboring tribes of the Radimichi and Dregovichi. As a result of their consolidation, the Belarusian people emerged. The time of its origin was determined by the separation of the Belarusian language from Old Russian in the 14th century.

The weak side of the hypothesis was that the chronicled tribes have been disappearing from the pages of the chronicles since the middle of the 12th century and it is difficult to explain the two-century silence of the sources. But the beginning of the Belarusian nation had been laid, and not least because of the systematic study of the Belarusian language that had begun. In 1918, a teacher at Petrograd University, Bronislav Tarashkevich, prepared his first grammar, normalizing spelling for the first time. This is how the so-called Tarashkevitsa arose - a language norm later adopted in the Belarusian emigration. Tarashkevitz was contrasted with the 1933 grammar of the Belarusian language, created as a result of the language reforms of the 1930s. There was a lot of Russian in it, but it gained a foothold and was used in Belarus until 2005, when it was partially unified with the Tarashkevitsa. As a noteworthy fact, it is worth noting that in the 1920s, on the official flag of the BSSR, the phrase “Workers of all countries unite!” was written in as many as four languages: Russian, Polish, Yiddish and Tarashkevich. Tarashkevitsa should not be confused with Tarasyanka. The latter is a mixture of Russian and Belarusian languages, found everywhere in Belarus even now, more often in cities.

Belarusians from Old Russian people

After the Great Patriotic War, the national question in the USSR became greatly aggravated and on this basis, to prevent interethnic conflicts in the ideology of the Union, a new supranational concept began to be widely used - “Soviet people”. Shortly before this, in the 40s, researchers of Ancient Rus' substantiated the theory of the “Old Russian nationality” - a single cradle of the Belarusian, Ukrainian and Russian peoples. There were few similarities between these two concepts, but their active use by the USSR during this period is striking. Such features of the Old Russian people as “common territory, economy, law, military organization and, especially, a common struggle against external enemies with an awareness of their unity” can be safely attributed to Soviet society of the late 40s - 60s. Of course, ideology did not subordinate history, but the structures with which scientists-historians and political ideologists thought were very similar. The origin of the Belarusians from the Old Russian people removed the weaknesses of the “tribal” concept of ethnogenesis and emphasized the gradual isolation of the three peoples in the 12th – 14th centuries. However, some scientists extend the period of formation of the nationality until the end of the 16th century.

This theory is still accepted: in 2011, at the celebration of the 1150th anniversary of the Old Russian State, its provisions were confirmed by historians of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. During this time, it was supplemented by archeological data that showed active connections between the ancestors of Belarusians and the Balts and Finno-Ugric peoples (from which the versions of the Baltic and Finno-Ugric origins of the Belarusians were born), as well as a DNA study conducted in Belarus in 2005 - 2010, which proved the closeness of the three East Slavic peoples and large genetic differences between the Slavs and the Balts in the male line.

How Belarusians became Belarusians

In the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which included almost the entire territory of modern Belarus in the 13th – 16th centuries, the Old Belarusian language (that is, Western Russian) was the first state language - all office work was conducted in it, literary works and laws were written down. Developing in a separate state, it was strongly influenced by Polish and Church Slavonic, but remained a book language. In contrast, spoken Belarusian, experiencing the same influences, developed mainly in rural areas and has survived to the present day. The territory where the Belarusians were formed did not suffer so much from the Mongol-Tatars. The population constantly had to fight for their faith - Orthodoxy and against foreign culture. At the same time, much of Western European culture took root in Belarus faster and easier than in Russia. For example, book printing, started by Francis Skaryna almost 50 years earlier than in Muscovy. Finally, another important factor in the formation of the Belarusian nation was the climate, milder and more fertile than in central Russia. That is why potatoes took root in Belarus 75–90 years earlier. The Belarusian national idea was formed later than that of other peoples and sought to resolve issues without conflicts. And this is her strength.

Andrey Grigoriev

Vladimir LOBACH, Alexander SHISHKOV

Where do Belarusians come from?

A new look at the origins of the people

Questions of the origin of peoples have invariably aroused burning interest throughout modern times. It is at the national level of development that the answers to the questions “when?”, “where?” and "from whom?" the origin of this or that people, provide the ethnic group with “legitimate” rights to exist, play the role of an “irrefutable” argument in the eternal competition with neighbors and strengthen national identity. In the case of “small” peoples (“small” not in terms of quantity, but in terms of their own statehood), issues of ethnogenesis acquire special significance, allowing one to maintain a safe distance from “big” peoples (“big brothers”), without dissolving into them. Therefore, every study in this area (even if it is at least a hundred times impartial) has its own distinct ideological and political implications. The origins of the Slavic peoples have often become a fertile topic for conscious speculation.

The concepts of ethnic development of Belarusians are no exception. The divisions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the annexation of the territory of Belarus to the Russian Empire did not initially disrupt the predominance of Polish culture (literature, printing, education) in these lands. Polish influence was recognized as historically conditioned, which could not but affect the understanding of the ethnic history of the local population. Belarus and Belarusians were considered by the majority of Polish scientists (A. Dambovsky, A. Narushevich, S. Linde) as a Polish province and, accordingly, an ethnographic group of Poles, “spoiled” by Russian (Orthodox) influence and speaking a dialect of the Polish language. As an independent ethnic unit of the Slavs, the Belarusians, according to the Poles, allegedly never existed (1).

However, after the defeat of the uprisings of 1830-1831 and 1863-1864, the tsarist government began to actively implement the policy of “establishing the Russian cause in the region” under the slogan of “de-Polishing”. From the point of view of official St. Petersburg, Belarusians were represented as part of the Great Russian tribe, speaking “the Belarusian sublanguage, as a branch of the Russian language” (2). Representatives of this approach were not only the “Western Russians” (M. Govorsky, M. Koyalovich, I. Solonevich), who carried out “de-Polishing” directly on the Belarusian lands, but also a number of famous Russian scientists. For example, academician A. Sobolevsky considered the Belarusian language as a “sub-dialect” of the Russian language (3).

However, the keen interest in ethnography, folklore, language and history of the population of the “North-Western Territory” in the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries finally confirmed the researchers (E.R. Romanov, M. Federovsky, E.F. Karsky, M.V. Dovnar-Zapolsky and others) in their opinion about the independence of Belarusians as a separate East Slavic ethnic group, the originality of its language and history.

The concepts of the origin of the Belarusians, widespread in the Russian Empire, if we do not take into account the “Great Poland” and “Great Russian”, suggested two main options for the formation of the Belarusian ethnic group: on the one hand, on the basis of the chronicle tribes of the Eastern Slavs - Krivichi, Radimichi and Dregovichi (V. Antonovich, I. Belyaev, A. Sapunov), and, on the other hand, with the active participation of the Baltic and Finno-Ugric ethnic component (N. Kostomarov, M. Lyubavsky, P. Golubovsky). Chronologically, the education of Belarusians, as a rule, was attributed to the 13th-14th centuries - the time of the collapse of Kievan Rus and the inclusion of the East Slavic lands into other state-political entities (4).

A different point of view regarding chronology was expressed by N.I. Kostomarov, believing that already during the period of Kievan Rus, Belarusians, Ukrainians and Russians were finally formed as a nationality, and the most important ethnographic features of these peoples arose in an even earlier era.

During the Soviet period, the central place in the problem of the origin of Belarusians, Ukrainians and Russians was given to the “Old Russian nationality - the cradle of three fraternal peoples.” It is significant that it was after the publication of J.V. Stalin’s work “Marxism and Questions of Linguistics” in 1950 that the term “Old Russian Nationality” was recognized as legitimate, and soon textbook. The concept itself, as a derivative of formational Marxist theory, proposed the following scheme:

During the era of the great migration of peoples, the Slavic community and pan-Slavic linguistic unity disintegrated;

In the 8th-9th centuries, the language of the Eastern Slavs5 was formed, who at that time mastered the East European Plain and created tribal principalities;

In the 9th-10th centuries, “the linguistic unity of the Eastern Slavs is complemented by the unity of political and state life” (Old Russian State), the Polan tribe becomes the center of ethnocultural and political consolidation;

The 10th - first half of the 13th centuries are characterized by the flourishing of the Old Russian state and the maximum unity of the corresponding nationality, which is manifested "literally in everything - from architecture to epic, from jewelry and wood carvings - to wedding rituals, songs and sayings... At the same time" the ancient Russian people were one of the first in Europe to stand on the path to consolidation into a single nation"(7) (!);

The second half of the 13th century is the time of the collapse of Kievan Rus and the Old Russian people (usually depicted in apocalyptic tones): “certain territories of its lands were torn off from North-Eastern Rus' and torn apart; they became the prey of Polish, Lithuanian, then Turkish and Tatar invaders” .

Thus, from the point of view of Soviet historiography, the formation of individual East Slavic peoples (in particular, Ukrainians and Belarusians) took place already within the framework of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL) (later - the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) and was accompanied by cruel tyranny and national oppression on the part of the Polish-Lithuanian the feudal elite, which, in turn, caused a constant desire of the “oppressed” to reunite with the fraternal Russian people (8).

The extreme bias of the “Old Russian” concept was manifested in a whole complex of inconsistencies and contradictions, but adherence to these views became a kind of sign of the researcher’s trustworthiness. Even small deviations from it were harshly criticized. An example is the study of ethnographer M. Ya. Grinblat “Belarusians. Essays on the origin and ethnic history” (Minsk, 1968). The author, having formally recognized the existence of the period of Old Russian nationality, nevertheless came to the conclusion about the primary role of the Krivichi, Dregovichi, and Radimichi in this process. Such “betrayal” of Greenblat in relation to the ancient Russian people is still sharply criticized by Belarusian academic ethnography (9).

The turning point in the study of the ethnogenesis of the Belarusians was the concept of archaeologist V.V. Sedov, which dealt a crushing blow to the main postulates of the “Old Russian” theory. The researcher pointed out the obvious insufficiency of facts of socio-economic and political history when considering ethno-cultural problems: “It is impossible to imagine that the East Slavic population began to pronounce soft “d” and “t” as “dz” and “ts” sound “r” is hard, and the pronunciation of stressed and unstressed “a”, “o”, “e”, “ya” begins to differ... only because it became subject to the Lithuanian prince” (10).

Despite the fact that the idea of ​​the influence of the Balts on the formation of the Belarusian ethnic group was expressed by S. Pleshcheev back in 1790, for the first time it received such serious argumentation only in recent decades. Using data from archaeology, linguistics, ethnography and related disciplines, V.V. Sedov convincingly proved that the ethnic characteristics of the Belarusians were formed as a result of the assimilation of the East Baltic tribes by the newcomer Slavs. This happened in the period from the 9th to the 13th centuries and led to the emergence of a number of substrate (adopted from the Balts) phenomena in language ("dzekanye", hard "r", akanye), material (pillar construction technique, elements of traditional costume) and spiritual culture ( cult of stone, veneration of snakes (11).

Thus, the idea of ​​the ethnogenesis of not only Belarusians, but also Russians and Ukrainians, whose formation was based on Finno-Ugric and Indo-Iranian substrates, respectively, has qualitatively changed. Sedov's "encroachment" on East Slavic unity, personified by the "Old Russian people", caused fierce criticism. Some of the opponents directly connected these scientist’s conclusions with the “historical concepts of bourgeois nationalists” (12), because, recognizing it, a significant part of Belarusian history, in particular the period of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, would have to be subjected to a significant revision. Indicative is the banning of the conference “Ethnogenesis of Belarusians” scheduled for 1973 in Minsk (a collection of abstracts published in advance has become a great rarity).

Unfortunately, there is still a kind of split in the Belarusian scientific community in relation to the “Baltic concept”. While anthropologists, linguists and archaeologists mostly recognize the significant role of the Balts in the origin of the Belarusians (the latter are considered as Slavicized Balts (13)), official Belarusian ethnography still considers Sedov’s concept “built on inaccurate sources or their falsification”, putting forward as an axiom “the fact that in Kievan Rus there was East Slavic unity and the capital city of all Eastern Slavs was Kyiv” (14). In this sense, only with a large degree of convention can the research of the Belarusian academician M.F. Pilipenko be called “new”. According to this author, the Balts played a role only in the formation of such “proto-nationalities” as the Krivichi, Dregovichi and Radimichi, and the latter, in turn, became an integral part of the “Old Russian people”. The immediate ancestors of the modern Belarusian ethnos, according to Pilipenko, were two groups of the ancient Russian ethnic community common to the Eastern Slavs (Russians, Rusichs) - the “Polesskaya” (“Poleshukov”), on the one hand, and the “Podvina-Dnieper”, “Belarusian” "("Belarusians"), on the other"(15).

This scientist dates the formation of the Belarusian language and traditional culture, the common ethnonym (Belarusians) and the name of the ethnic territory (White Rus') to the end of the 16th - beginning of the 17th century. But how can we explain then that even at the end of the 19th century, the peasants of the Grodno province, for example, defined themselves as follows: “We are Tutais, our country is neither Russian nor Polish, but the land has been taken away”? (16)

The answer to this question lies in the fundamentally different models of life of ethnic groups located at the traditional and industrial levels of development. In the first case, folk life develops mainly within the framework of the family and peasant community, the main form of existence of folk culture is folklore and various levels of rituals, pagan in essence and practically nothing connected with the “high”, bookish (urban) culture, represented by an insignificant minority of society .

For example, the absence of Belarusian linguistic features in the literary monuments of the 11th-12th centuries does not at all mean that they were not present in colloquial speech. Otherwise, turning to the literature of Belarus of the 18th century, in which Belarusian-language works are practically absent, we would have to come to the conclusion about the degeneration of the Belarusian language in that era and the disappearance of the Belarusian ethnic group.

Without a doubt, Belarusian traditional culture was formed much earlier than the end of the 16th century. The main feature of a traditional society is its focus on the constant reproduction of those norms that have existed “from time immemorial” and were established by our ancestors. It is difficult to imagine that the Kupala ritual and the characters of Belarusian demonology ("bagniks", "lyasuns", "karachuns", etc.) appear only in the 17th century. Unfortunately, scientists have practically not turned to the experience of folk (folklore) self-understanding of history. Meanwhile, Belarusians are one of the few European peoples who have preserved the myth of their own origin. This legend was recorded in the 1820-1840s on the territory of the Belarusian Podvinia:

“Once upon a time the world was just beginning, there was nothing anywhere. There was dead water everywhere, and in the middle of the water there was either a stone or something else sticking out. One day Perun got crazy and let’s throw arrows at this stone. From his arrows they jumped out three sparks: white, yellow and red. Those sparks fell on the water; from this all the water became cloudy, and the world became cloudy like clouds. But after a while, as everything cleared up, it became clear where the water was, where the earth was. And a little later it started and all life - both in water and on earth. And forests, and grass, and animals, and fish, and then man started: either he came from somewhere or grew up here. Then he began to establish his own human order. How long did he stay like this? lived, or briefly, but he already had his own estate, had many wives, and even more children. His name was Bai. And when the hour of his death came, then he called his sons and divided all his property. He forgot only one son. He This time he was hunting and with him were his father's favorite dogs, Stavra and Gavra. This son's name was Belopol. Soon after his father's death, Belopol returned from hunting. And his brothers say to him: “Here, my father divided all his property among us, and he bequeathed his dogs to you, and also told you to let them go free: one to the right, and the second to the left; As far as they cover the land in a day, this whole land will be yours. So Belopol went and caught two birds, one arriving from the southern sea, the other from the western. He let one bird go south, and said to one dog: - Take it! He sent the second one to the west and said to the second one: - Grab it!

How these birds flew: one in one direction, the other in the other... As the dogs ran after the birds, even the ground began to smoke... As those dogs went, they still have not returned, and in their tracks two rivers stretched, The Dvina went in one direction, the Dnieper in the other direction. It was in these expanses that Belopol began to settle and establish its own order. This Belopol had different tribes called Belarusians divorced from his different wives. They still walk there, plow the land and sow crops" (17).

The archaic nature of this legend is indicated by the story of the creation of the world, widely known in the Indo-European tradition. Bai and his son Belopol act as mythical ancestors who acted in the “times of first causes.” It is no coincidence that in the 19th century, on the territory of the Podvina region, “Stavrovsky Grandfathers” were held, dedicated to the Trinity. At the beginning of the funeral ceremony, the owner, bending under the table, had to pronounce the following spell: “Stairs, Gaurs, din! Hadzitse to us!”(18)

The territory through which the mythical dogs raced is remarkable in at least three dimensions. On the lands of the Upper Podvina and the Dnieper region there were settlements of the Baltic cultures of the Iron Age: Dnieper-Dvina (8th century BC - IV-V centuries AD) and Bantserovsko-Tushemlinskaya (VI-VIII centuries). The territory of the early settlement of the Polotsk-Smolensk Krivichi corresponds exactly to the same area. Such coincidences cannot be accidental and, most likely, indicate the ethnocultural continuity of the population. In particular, archaeological data allow us to speak not only “about the significant place of the Baltic substrate in the formation of the Smolensk-Polotsk Krivichi,” but also about the existence of small purely Baltic enclaves in the designated territory until the 12th century (19).

Of undoubted interest is the ethnonym “Krivichi”, which has caused the greatest number of interpretations among historians. According to S. M. Solovyov, the name “Krivichi” comes from the Lithuanian “kirba” (swamp, quagmire) and reflects the nature of the area where the tribe was formed. The landscape version is also proposed by M.F. Pilipenko, believing that the area where the Krivichi settled was “crooked,” that is, hilly (20). However, most researchers derive the ethnonym either on behalf of the ancestor of the Kriv tribe, or on behalf of the high priest of the Balts, Kriv-Kriveyte.

Here is what the chronicler of the early 14th century, Peter of Dusburg, writes about the high Baltic priest: “... there lives a certain Krive, whom they [the Prussians] revered as the [Roman] pope, for just as the lord pope ruled the universal church of Christians, so by his will or not only the above-mentioned pagans, but also the Lithuanians and other peoples of the land of Livonia were ruled by command. Such was his power that not only he himself or one of his relatives, but even a messenger with his staff or other distinctive sign, passing through the borders the above-mentioned pagans, was held in great esteem by kings, nobles and common people" (21).

If we take into account that the territory of the Podvina region was inhabited for a long time by the Balts, closely associated with the Prussians, and the settlement of some of the Slavs occurred precisely from the West, where they had the opportunity of close contact with the Baltic priests, it seems quite likely that the newcomers were led by one of the priests. This hypothesis is also supported by the sacred meaning of the root itself - kriv, which is revealed even in ethnographic materials of the 19th century from the territory of settlement of the Polotsk-Smolensk Krivichi. For example, Rusal Week in the Smolensk region was called a curve. In the Polotsk Podvina, carol evenings were called crooked or holy. There are also direct indications of the connection of this root with pre-Christian magic: “... the owner was a great serpent enchanter, more roofs... the witch and the witch Abavyazkova may have roofs.”

Indicative in terms of curvature, that is, chosenness, is the image of the Polotsk prince Vseslav the Magician, sung by the “Tale of Igor’s Campaign.” Even his birth is closely connected with magical actions and certain signs (“curvature”): “His mother gave birth to him through sorcery. Having given birth to him, his mother had a wound on his head.” “The Tale of Igor’s Host” and the epic about Volkh Vseslavich clearly point to the priestly functions of Vseslav, who could cast lots, turn into a wolf, a clear falcon and “tura - golden horns,” and had a prophetic soul.

We find direct mention of the Krev-priests in the Krivichi (Belarusian) lands in the charter of Grand Duke Olgerd in 1359. The last high priest died at the beginning of the 15th century. Reporting this, the anonymous chronicle of that time “Church History” once again emphasizes the close spiritual, cultural and legal connection of the Baltic and Krivichi lands: “On July 28, 1414, in the village of Ankaim, Krewe-Krewayto, named Gintovt, died, 74- th high priest; with him fell a rank that was once very important in the affairs of saints and judges throughout the land of Lithuania, Prussia, Lithuania, Samogitia, Kuronia, Zemgale, Livonia, Latgale and even in the lands of the Krivichi Russes (Creviczensivim Russorum)" (22).

The originality of the spiritual appearance of the Krivichi territories was manifested in the legends about the mythical heroes Volots, and in the fact that most of the cult stones are located on these lands (V.V. Sedov considers them a manifestation of Baltic influence). It was in the lands of the Krivichi that sorcery was traditionally developed, and the most authoritative sorcerers, known throughout the area, were always men. From an expedition to the Vitebsk region in 1998, we received information that the deceased enchanter should be buried with his head facing east, which corresponds to the Baltic funeral custom.

The powerful pagan traditions of the Krivichy lands make it possible to explain in their own way the name Belaya Rus, which from the 13th to the beginning of the 20th century mainly correlates with the territory of the Upper Podvinia and the Dnieper region. Thus, in the Irish manuscript “The Beginning of the Description of the World,” dating from the mid-13th century, Irish missionaries talk about their activities in the lands of Zhmudi, Lithuania and White Rus' (Alba Russia), which indicates the strong position of paganism in the territory of the latter (23). It is significant that the Byzantine emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus, describing the Slavs, reports about “unbaptized Croats, who are also called whites.” In turn, the Indo-European symbolism of flowers is determined by the correlation of the highest (priestly) rank with the color white. There is a curious ancient Roman legend about a lake associated with the sacred forest of Alba. Research by J. Dumézil showed that the legend goes back to a common Indo-European legend about a lake in which a shining treasure is hidden; All the rivers of the world flow from this lake. Thus, according to V.V. Ivanov, it is possible to assume the pagan origins of the name Belaya Rus, which is supported by the geography of the settlement of the Krivichi (the sources of the three largest rivers), the legend about the ancestor Belopol and a huge number of legends about the miraculous origin of the lakes (24).

Much later, in the first half of the 17th century, when the primary meaning of the term White Rus' was lost, it began to be actively used under Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich as a designation of a “consanguineous, Orthodox” region as opposed to the name of an “enemy” state (Lithuania).

In the early history of any people there is always a lot that is unsaid and difficult to reconstruct. There should be no unambiguous interpretations here, especially those that, according to the old Soviet habit, correspond to the modern political situation. Belarusians are an independent East Slavic ethnic group with their own history, and all attempts to prove the opposite have absolutely nothing to do with science.

Notes

1. Golembiowski L. Lud polski, jego zwyczaje i zababony. - Warzszawa, 1830. S. 80-91.

2. Tsvikevich A. “Western Russianism”: Narys from the history of grammatical thought in Belarus in the 19th - mid-20th centuries. Mn. 1993. P. 57.

3. Sobolevsky A.I. Lectures on the history of the Russian language. Vol. 1. Kyiv. 1888. P. 275.

4. Ethnography of Belarus. Historiagraphy, ethnagenesis, ethnic history. Mn. 1985. pp. 29-30.

5. Filin F. P. Origin of the Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian languages. L. 1972. P. 28.

6. Mavrodin V.V. The formation of the Old Russian state and the formation of the Old Russian nationality. M. 1972. P. 159.

7. Kazachenko A.I. Old Russian nationality - the common ethnic base of the Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian peoples // Soviet ethnography. 1954. No. 2. P. 18.

8. History of the BSSR. T. 1. Mn. 1954. P. 81-8.; see also Abetsedarski L. S. Baratsba of the Ukrainian and Belarusian peoples for the use of the Race in the Syaredzine of the 17th century. Mn. 1954.

9. Pilipenko M. F. The emergence of Belarus: A new concept. Mn. 1991. pp. 124-126.

10. Sedov V.V. On the origin of Belarusians // Soviet ethnography. 1967. No. 2. P. 115.

11. Sedov V.V. Once again about the origin of the Belarusians // Soviet ethnography. 1969. No. 1. P. 106-119.

12. Grinblat M. Ya. On the origin of the Belarusian people//Soviet ethnography. 1968. No. 5. P. 89.

13. Isaenka U. F. Etnas//Archaeology and Numismatics of Belarus. Encyclopedia. Mn. 1993. pp. 667-668.

14. Belarusians: U 8th t. T. 3. Historic ethnic learning. Mn. 1999. pp. 305-307.

15. Pilipenko M. F. Decree. op. P. 128.

16. Shein P.V. Materials for studying the life and language of the Russian population of the North-West Territory. T. 3. St. Petersburg. 1902. P. 98.

17. Legends and downfalls. Mn. 1983. pp. 78-79.

18. Tyszkiewicz E. Opisanie powiatu Borisowskiego. Wilno. 1847. S. 377.

19. Pivavarchyk S., Semyanchuk G. Archaeology of Belarus. Part 2. The era of Syarednyavech. Grodna. 1997. P. 34.

20. Pilipenko M. F. Decree. op. pp. 37-38.

21. Kulakov V.I. The forgotten history of the Prussians. Kaliningrad. 1992. P. 23.

22. Narbutt D. Dzeje starozytne narodu Litewskiego. T. 1. Wilno. 1835. S. 438.

23. Vyachorka V. What a neighbor it seems // Your name is Belaya Rus. Mn. 1991. pp. 142-143.

24. Ivanov Vyach. Color symbolism in geographical names in the light of typology data (to the name of Belarus) // Ibid. pp. 120-121.

The question of the origin of the Belarusian people is one of the main issues in the history of Belarus. It has been repeatedly studied not only by historians, but also by linguists, ethnographers and even partially by archaeologists. Nevertheless, there is still an urgent need to deal with this issue, since the coverage of a number of other problems in the history of Belarus depends on its correct solution.
As some works published in recent years show, the question of the origin of the Belarusian people is still being resolved by individual historians from the positions that were once defended by Belarusian nationalists.
By falsifying the historical past of Belarus, Belarusian nationalists completely incorrectly portrayed the process of formation of the Belarusian people: they separated its origin from the history of its brotherly peoples - Russian and Ukrainian. Meanwhile, the study of the history of the USSR shows that the entire history of the Belarusian people is organically, closely connected with the history of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples, that all these peoples have a common origin and common paths of historical development.
The immediate ancestors of the Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian peoples were the East Slavic tribes - the most ancient inhabitants of Eastern Europe. They did not move to its territory ready-made from other places, as supporters of the migration theory claimed, but like other peoples, they were a product of complex crossing of various earlier tribes.
Materials from archaeological excavations irrefutably prove the continuity of historical development on the territory of Belarus, from the Upper Paleolithic era to the Iron Age, when, according to written sources, the Slavs already lived here. Archaeological finds indicate that there were no breaks in the development of human culture on the territory of Belarus, indicating the replacement of one people by another. In this regard, the first news about the Slavs in Eastern Europe, including on the territory of modern Belarus, cannot be considered as evidence of the emergence of new tribes instead of the old ones.
The formation of the Slavs involved peoples who lived, according to the Greek historian and geographer of the 5th century BC Herodotus, within Scythia. This name was used by Herodotus and other ancient writers to call the lands located north of the Black Sea, that is, Eastern Europe. According to Herodotus, this country was inhabited by many peoples. Among the latter, Herodotus mentions the “Scolotes,” whom the Greeks called “Scythians.”
There is an opinion (academician N. Ya. Marr) that the name “scolot” was the basis for the later term “Slav”. According to Herodotus, fully supported by archaeological data, the Scythians were engaged in both agriculture and cattle breeding. Agriculture was the main occupation of the Skolots who lived along the middle reaches of the Dnieper. The Skolys of the middle Dnieper region were not yet Slavs, but they were part of that diverse mass of the population from which the Slavs began to form somewhat later.
To the north and north-west of the skolotes of the middle Dnieper region, within modern Polesie, during the time of Herodotus lived “neurs”. The largest Czech Slavist Safarik, more than a hundred years ago, considered it possible to discern the ancestors of the Slavs in the nerves.
Among the inhabitants of Scythia, Herodotus mentions the “Enets”. There is reason to think that the “Eneti”, known by later ancient authors under the name “Venedi” or “Veneti”, lived in the north.
The Greek scientist of the 2nd century AD Ptolemy reports that the “Wends” lived “along the entire Gulf of Vendes,” that is, off the coast of the Baltic Sea. This evidence is consistent with the news of Herodotus about the “enetas” who mined amber, which, as is known, ancient countries received from tribes living on the shores of the Baltic Sea.
According to the Roman writers of the 1st century AD, Pliny the Elder and Tacitus, the settlements of the “Vendi” in the west bordered with the ancient Germans: “some,” notes Pliny, “report that these areas (in Eastern Europe) up to the Vistula River were inhabited by Sarmatians, Wends and Scythians." Tacitus wrote somewhat more about the Wends than others. He considered them neighbors of the Germanic tribe of Suevi. Living between the Sarmatians and the Germans, the Wends, according to Tacitus, “borrowed much of the customs of the Sarmatians.” “However, the writer further notes,... the Wends build houses, carry shields and love to walk, which is completely unusual for the Sarmagians, who live in wagons and on horseback.” Thus, Tacitus emphasized the sedentary lifestyle of the Wends. Taking into account that the Sarmatians lived off the coast of the Black Sea, in the steppes of modern Ukraine, the residence of the Wends can be confined to the forest-steppe and forest belt of Eastern Europe.
If the Skolos of the middle Dnieper region were the southern ancestors of the Eastern Slavs, then the Wends and Neuros were the ancestors of the East Slavic tribes who lived to the north. More precisely, the Wends were the common ancestors of not only the Slavs, but also the Baltic and Lithuanian tribes - Lets, Livs, Lithuanians, Zhmudins, Prussians, etc. The connection of the Wends with the Eastern Slavs and with the peoples of the Eastern Baltic was reflected in ethnic and geographical names ( Slavic tribe “Vyatichi” on the Oka River, Venedau in Estonia, Venden in Latvia, Penzyagola in Lithuania) and in the naming of Russians by Estonians: the latter call them “Pape”. Part of the Wends, who lived at a distance from the southeastern shores of the Baltic Sea, merged with the Neuramn and Skolots of the middle Dnieper region and entered the tribal complex of the Eastern Slavs.
Under the name “Slavs” our ancestors become known for the first time in the literary monuments of the 6th century. e. By this time, the Slavs lived not only in Eastern, but also in Central Europe. In the West, Slavic settlements then extended far beyond the Vistula to the Laba (Elbe) River - the Western Slavs lived here. In the south, the Slavs lived not only on the shores of the Black Sea, but beyond the Danube within the Balkan Peninsula.
After Ptolemy, for four centuries there was no news of the Wends-Slavs. In the 6th century a number of authors wrote about them. The name “Slavs” was first mentioned at the beginning of the 6th century in a poem by Bishop Martin, which listed the names of “peoples who knew the true God,” that is, those who accepted Christianity. Most likely, Martin was talking about some part of the Western Slavs.
Somewhat later, in the middle of the 6th century, the Gothic historian Jordan wrote about the Wendish Slavs: “Beyond the Danube lies Dacia, fenced like a crown by high mountains (the Carpathians), on the left side of which from the upper reaches of the Vistula the Wendish people live in an immeasurable space. Although their name now changes depending on the tribes and places, their main name is Sklavins and Ants.”
A contemporary of Jordan, the Byzantine writer Procopius (died in 562) reports a lot of information about the life and religion of our ancestors. By the way, he notes that the Ants and Sklavins speak the same language and occupy a vast area on the other side of the Istra River, that is, north of the Danube. According to Procopius, “countless tribes of Antes” also occupied lands north of the Black Sea. Writers of the 6th century called the Eastern Slavs “Antami,” that is, “opposing.”
During the time of Procopius, the country inhabited by the Eastern Slavs was called “Rus” in some literary monuments. Thus, the Byzantine writer pseudo-Zachary, writing in 555, mentions the people “Rus” (ros), who lived northwest of the Lower Don, i.e. approximately within the Dnieper region, where the Kievan state subsequently began to take shape. The origin of this name has not yet been clarified, but it was assigned to the Eastern Slavs during the so-called pre-feudal period.
In the historical development of the Eastern Slavs - “Rus”, the pre-feudal period occupies a number of centuries, during which, in place of the previous primitive communal system, feudal-serf relations began to emerge on the basis of the development of “primitive forms of slavery”. For that part of Rus' where the Belarusian people subsequently emerged, the pre-feudal period spans approximately from the 7th to the mid-11th centuries.
With the development of productive forces, agriculture became the main occupation of the East Slavic population of Rus'. By the 9th century, a number of cities had emerged in Rus', including Kyiv, Novgorod, Polotsk, Smolensk and some others. The emergence of cities, where the population was engaged not only in agriculture, but also in crafts and trade, indicates that by the 9th century, Rus' had long since taken the path of disintegration of the primitive communal system. In the western regions of Rus', where the Belarusian people subsequently emerged, the process of decomposition of the primitive communal system took place already in the 7th - 8th centuries.
Detailed indications about the location of the Eastern Slavs date back to the pre-feudal period. They are given in the “Tale of Bygone Years,” which was compiled in Kyiv at the beginning of the 12th century, based on earlier chronicle sources of the 19th century. “The Tale of Bygone Years” classifies the Polans, Drevlyans, Volynians, Severians, Vyatichi, Krivichi, etc. among the East Slavic tribes. The Tale of Bygone Years talks about individual tribes of the Eastern Slavs, which the “Tale of Bygone Years” talks about in his essay “On State Administration” author of the 10th century Byzantine Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus. He mentions the Vervians (Drevlyans), Druguvits (Dregovichs), Krivichi and Severians (Northerners).
A number of East Slavic tribes lived on the territory of modern Belarus; The Tale of Bygone Years speaks quite clearly about them. Along the upper reaches of the Dnieper and along the upper and middle reaches of the Western Dvina lived the Krivichi, to the south of them along the Berezina and Pripyat, extending west to the Bug, as well as along the upper reaches of the Neman and Viliya lived the Dregovichi. Along the Sozha River - Radimichi. The Krivichi, who lived along the middle reaches of the Dvina, were called Polotsk. The lands between the middle reaches of the Neman and the Western Bug were inhabited by the Yotvingians. Although the Yatvingians were one of the Lithuanian tribes, having neighboring tribes of the Eastern Slavs, they were subject to cultural influence from them.
The above-mentioned East Slavic tribes and the Yatvingians inhabited the territory on which the Belarusian people subsequently emerged.
In the 9th century, the tribes of the Eastern Slavs formed the mighty Kyiv state. It extended from Kyiv in the south to Novgorod in the north, from the Carpathian region in the southwest to the Upper Volga region in the northeast. The existence of the Kyiv state was the most important stage in the early history of the Eastern Slavs. The Kiev power united the scattered forces of the Eastern Slavs and provided them with a prominent place among other peoples of Europe.
The country of the Eastern Slavs - Rus', already in the 9th century, according to contemporaries, “reached a brilliant height,” and during the time of Prince Yaroslav Vladimirovich it became “visible and audible to all ends of the earth.”
In epics, the Russian people for many centuries have remembered the Kiev period of their history as a time of strength and glory. At this time, the Eastern Slavs created solid foundations for their culture, which they preserved and developed over the following centuries.
Belarusian nationalists, falsifying the history of Belarus, singled out “Belarusian tribes” from the general mass of the Eastern Slavs - Krivichi, Polotsk, Dregovich and Radimichi, who supposedly already lived a separate life in ancient times. In this regard, the ancient principalities of the Krivichi and Dregovichi were considered by Belarusian nationalists to be the beginning of “Belarusian statehood”, and the subordination of the latter to Kiev was considered by them as a process of enslavement of previously free “Belarusian tribes”.
In fact, the East Slavic tribes that inhabited Rus' were the common ancestors of the three fraternal ones. peoples - Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian. The time of formation of these peoples should be attributed not to distant times before the formation of the Kyiv state, as Belarusian and Ukrainian nationalists argued, but to a later time - the period of feudal fragmentation and the centuries following it.
The Kievan state was not created by the Varangian conquerors, but emerged in the process of long historical development of the entire Eastern Slavs. Those tribes from which the Belarusian people were subsequently formed also took part in this development. Therefore, the pre-feudal principalities of Polotsk and Dregovichi, mentioned in chronicles even before the emergence of the Kyiv state, cannot be considered as the beginning of Belarusian statehood. It could not have existed in those times when the Belarusian people themselves had not yet been formed.
As part of the Kyiv state, all the Eastern Slavs lived a common historical life. The economic, socio-political and cultural development of individual parts of Rus' in the 9th and 10th centuries followed one general channel, along the line of transition of society from primitive forms of slavery to serfdom, i.e. to feudalism. Feudal relations began to emerge in Rus' during the time of the Kievan state. V.I. Lenin attributed their origin to the 9th century. Already in those days, the ruling class of Rus' began to allocate land to slaves. Along with the development of private ownership of land, some of the impoverished free community members began to fall into a dependent position on the ruling class. It should be noted, however, that during the time of the Kyiv state the bulk of the peasants still lived on communal lands and were not subject to feudal exploitation. Feudal relations were emerging, but ancient Russian society of the 9th - 10th centuries was not yet feudal, since the main source of income for princes, warriors, and boyars was not feudal rent, but tribute collected from the population, which for the most part had not yet fallen into personal dependence from landowners.
In the 9th - 10th centuries, the territory of modern Belarus - lands inhabited by the Krivichi, Polotsk, Radimichi and Dregovichi tribes - was part of the Kyiv state. The population of this part of Rus' was obliged to pay tribute to the Kyiv prince. The most significant cities in this part of Rus' were Polotsk and Turov, where local princes sat, who were in vassal dependence on the Kyiv Grand Duke.
Over the course of several centuries, based on the development of productive forces, the process of consolidation of the East Slavic tribes took place. Om began long before the formation of the Kyiv state. During the time of the Kievan state, the process of consolidation of the East Slavic tribes was accelerated. It is characteristic that during this period most of the ethnic names of the East Slavic tribes disappeared from the monuments of ancient Russian writing. Instead, to designate individual parts of Rus', the names of “lands” began to be used - feudal principalities, which over time began to separate from the Kyiv state. During the period of feudal fragmentation that began in Rus' from the 11th century, the process of ethnic consolidation of the Eastern Slavs continued, but it proceeded at a slower pace, since it was hampered by the political fragmentation of Rus' in the 11th - 13th centuries.
With the development of feudal relations, individual parts of Rus' became increasingly politically isolated from Kyiv. While maintaining their cultural unity, they found themselves in different historical conditions.
In the process of feudal fragmentation on the territory of the western regions of Rus' in the 11th - 12th centuries, a number of feudal principalities emerged, including Polotsk, Vitebsk, Minsk, Turov, Pinsk and some others. Polotsk and Turov began to separate themselves politically from Kyiv back in the 11th century.
Feudal fragmentation intensified throughout the 11th - 12th centuries. Along with it, feudal wars - princely strife - became commonplace. They enriched the princes, warriors and boyars and at the same time ruined the townspeople and peasants, accelerating the latter's subordination to the feudal landowners. Some Kyiv princes tried to delay the political collapse of Rus'. For a long time they fought against the Polotsk princes, seeking to retain supreme power over the Polotsk land. However, attempts by the Kyiv princes to restore their dominance over Polotsk and other cities in the western regions of Rus' ended in failure.
Falsifying the history of Belarus, Belarusian nationalists portrayed the feudal wars of the 11th - 12th centuries as a struggle of the “Belarusian (Kriv) tribes” for their independence from the rule of the Kyiv princes. According to Belarusian nationalists, Polotsk already in the 11th century rose up against Kyiv and began the struggle for the independence of Belarusian lands. Considering the Principality of Polotsk as a “Belarusian state,” nationalists tried to invent imaginary national contradictions between Polotsk and Kiev.
All these fabrications of Belarusian nationalists are false from beginning to end. The Kiev state collapsed not due to some national contradictions, which in fact did not exist then, but due to the development of feudal relations in Rus'. With the onset of feudal fragmentation, feudal wars began. The latter should also include the struggle between the Polotsk and Kyiv princes, which went on throughout the 11th - 12th centuries. Undermining the unity of Rus', this struggle against Kyiv did not have any liberation significance for the Polotsk land.
Feudal fragmentation with its characteristic “princely troubles” weakened Rus' militarily. Taking advantage of the collapse of the Kyiv state, the Lithuanian princes began to seize the neighboring lands of Polotsk and Dregovichi.
Already in the 12th century, Lithuanian princes carried out frequent attacks on the western outskirts of Rus'. From the beginning of the 13th century, the Principality of Polotsk fought not only with the Lithuanian princes, but also with the German feudal lords - the “dog knights” who then established themselves in the lower reaches of the Dvina, where they conquered the Latvian tribes living there.
In 1237 - 1241, Rus' was invaded by the Tatar-Mongols. Batu's hordes fell mainly on the northeastern and southern regions of Rus'. The population of these very regions bore the brunt of the fight against the Tatar invasion. At the cost of enormous efforts and sacrifices, it strategically exhausted the Tatar-Mongols and stopped their further movement to the west. By this, Rus' then saved European civilization from the invasion of Asian barbarians. The fight against the Tatar-Mongols for a long time required enormous effort from all the forces of northeastern Rus', where the great Russian people were formed in the heroic struggle for their independence.
Taking advantage of the diversion of the forces of the Russian people to fight the Tatar-Mongols in the east and the German-Swedish aggressors in the west, the Lithuanian feudal lords, led by their princes, began to seize the small and weak feudal principalities of the western regions of Rus'. The Lithuanian princes finally established their dominance in them at the beginning of the 14th century, when Gediminas, which had formed by that time, was at the head of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
The assertion of Belarusian nationalists that the population of the western regions of Rus' allegedly voluntarily recognized the power of the Lithuanian princes over themselves and saw them as protectors from Tatar bondage is false and does not stand up to any criticism. Belarusian nationalists smuggled this situation into historical literature in order to show, by falsifying the past, the alleged separation of the Belarusian people from their brotherly Russian people. In fact, the Lithuanian princes acted in the territory of the western regions of Rus' (i.e. in Belarus) as conquerors.
Portraying the Lithuanian princes as deliverers of the Belarusian people from the Tatar yoke, Belarusian nationalists: created a legend that during the time of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Belarus experienced its “golden age”, that its historical development had never been in such
favorable conditions, as it was in the XIV - XVI centuries.
Denying the class nature of the state, Belarusian nationalists idealized the political system of the feudal (or as they called them “Belarusian”) principalities of the 11th - 13th centuries and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania that captured them. The nationalists did not want to understand that the Lithuanian “lords”, and earlier the princes of Polotsk, Turav and others, expressed the interests not of the masses, but of the feudal lords.
In fact, the economic situation of Belarus as part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was difficult. In the 13th century, the western regions of Rus' were subjected to repeated attacks by the Lithuanians, Germans, and at times the Tatars. The establishment of the rule of the Lithuanian princes in the Belarusian lands did not save them from the devastating invasions of the Germans and Tatars. True, feudal relations of the 14th - 16th centuries still contributed to the development of productive forces, however, the foreign rule of the Lithuanian feudal lords delayed this development. The economic life of Belarus in the 15th - 16th centuries progressed very slowly. At the same time, the economic development of the country was carried out through the further strengthening of feudal exploitation of the peasant masses and the urban poor.
During the time of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (especially from the 15th century), peasants of Belarus settled in previously undeveloped areas. In agriculture, the three-field farming system has become more widespread. As it developed, crafts were separated from agriculture and concentrated in cities, the population of which increased in connection with this. With the growth of the urban population, the market developed, and trade, both internal and external, became more vibrant. However, the development of agriculture, crafts and trade took place in Belarus in the 15th - 16th centuries on the basis of the then dominant natural economy. Therefore, the fabrications of Belarusian nationalists are completely false, as if Belarus during the time of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania experienced some kind of prosperity in its economic development. Its economic development, like that of the entire Grand Duchy of Lithuania, noticeably lagged behind the economic development of northeastern Rus', where the process of formation of the Russian people was then underway.
Nevertheless, the economic development of the XIV - XVI centuries was a significant factor accelerating the formation
Belarusian people. It was formed on the basis of strengthening economic ties, when, with the growth of cities, with the development of the internal market and foreign trade, relations between individual parts of the country became increasingly stronger. In this regard, the linguistic, cultural and everyday characteristics of the population of certain localities in the western regions of Rus' gradually began to be erased. The Krivichi, Polochans, Dregovichs and Radimichi, who lived here for a long time, continued to form into one Belarusian nation. Some non-Slavic - Lithuanian elements also took part in its formation, for example the Yatvingians, onto whose lands many East Slavic settlers penetrated over time.
If the population of the western regions of Rus' had a strong cultural influence on the Lithuanians, then, in turn, Lithuanian rule in this part of Rus' could not help but leave its mark on the language of the Belarusian people.
First and foremost, and faster, the linguistic and cultural leveling of the population of different areas of Belarus occurred in cities, especially in the most significant ones. There, more than in rural areas, the growing and increasingly strong communication between the individual parts of the country made itself felt.
The formation of the Belarusian people took place during the times of feudalism-serfdom, when the basis of social relations was the dominance of “agricultural life and subsistence farming”*. As is known, Marx was not inclined to exaggerate the importance of medieval Western European trade; as for the trade of medieval Rus', he categorically emphasized that it “leaves the economic basis of Asian production unaffected,” i.e., subsistence farming. This remark of Marx is quite applicable to Belarus during the time of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Under feudalism, when subsistence farming dominated, only a nationality, and not a nation, could emerge, because in those days that stable community of “language, territory, economic life and mental makeup, manifested in a community of culture,” which is typical of a nation, could not yet be formed.
The economic disunity of individual parts of Belarus began to disappear in the 14th - 15th centuries as the market, cities and trade developed, but under the dominance of natural economy it could not disappear completely. Townspeople and feudal lords were more drawn into the growing commodity circulation than peasants, and the latter made up the absolute majority of the population. Therefore, under feudalism, while maintaining some isolation of individual parts of the country, a completely stable community of language could not emerge. In cities it was more pronounced than in rural areas. For the same reason, under feudalism a stable community of culture could not arise. The economic development noted above was the basis for some development of the culture of the Belarusian people, but it should be noted that this development was extremely uneven, it affected the feudal lords and part of the urban population, as for the broad masses, they were almost not affected by the cultural upsurge of the 15th - 16th centuries . The political subordination of the Belarusian lands to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania created for them a certain territorial unity, which was absent in the 11th - 13th centuries, but this unity was very relative. For a number of reasons, the Lithuanian state, under whose authority the territory where the Belarusian people formed was located, was not as centralized as the Moscow state, which was formed in North-East Rus'.
Thus, in the XIV - XVI centuries. in the western regions of Rus', under the then dominance of subsistence farming, on the basis of feudal relations, the process of formation of the Belarusian nationality, and not the Belarusian nation, took place. Nations in the east of Europe began to emerge later than in the west, where they took shape “during the period of the liquidation of feudalism and the victory of capitalism.” In Belarus XIV - XV centuries. the abolition of feudalism was still far away. In those days, only primary forms of capital existed here on the basis of feudal relations - commercial and usurious capital. There was no trace of capitalist production here yet.
The Grand Duchy of Lithuania, under whose rule Belarus was, was not ethnically homogeneous. Its population, like other mixed states of that time located in eastern Europe, consisted of “
several peoples, not yet formed into a nation, but already united into a common state.” The historical conditions under which such “mixed states” were formed (Stalin) are known: in the countries of Eastern Europe where they arose, “there was no capitalist development yet..., while the interests of defense... demanded the immediate formation of centralized states, capable of holding back the pressure of the invasion"2. The Grand Duchy of Lithuania took shape in a long and stubborn struggle with the German aggressors, who were attacking Lithuania from two sides - from the west and from the north. It took shape when the Lithuanian nobility, organizing to fight the Germans, itself set out to conquer the western regions of Rus'.
In the XIV - XV centuries, the formation of the Belarusian people took place in special historical conditions, different from those in which the formation of the Russian people then took place. The formation of the latter coincided with the formation of an independent Russian state, which grew out of the Moscow principality, which already in the second half of the 14th century took the path of active struggle against Tatar-Mongol rule. The fight against the Tatars accelerated the formation of a unified Russian state with its center in Moscow.
The conditions in which the formation of the Belarusian and Ukrainian peoples took place were different. The feudal lords of Belarus and Ukraine, subjugating the masses of the people, took the path of class cooperation with the Lithuanian and then the Polish feudal lords. Instead of organizing the struggle for the liberation of the Belarusian and Ukrainian lands, they contributed to the strengthening of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Thus, the Belarusian and Ukrainian feudal lords, betraying the interests of their peoples, became minions of foreign enslavers.
This betrayal is explained by the fact that the class interests of the Belarusian and Ukrainian feudal lords largely coincided with the interests of the Lithuanian feudal lords who captured the western and southern regions of Rus'. Both were interested in strengthening the exploitation of the popular masses and, fearing popular anger and indignation, united their forces in the fight against popular unrest.
In the Lithuanian princes, and then in the Polish kings, the Belarusian and Ukrainian feudal lords saw the defenders of their class interests.
The formation of the Belarusian people was inextricably linked with the formation of its language. With the strengthening of economic ties in the western regions of Rus', the linguistic features of tribal dialects were gradually erased. On this basis, the Belarusian language began to take shape, which had a number of local features. In parallel with the formation of the national Belarusian language, its phonetic and morphological elements began to penetrate into the monuments of the then written language. This is how the literary Belarusian language of the feudal era gradually began to take shape, which was originally the literary language of the Belarusian feudal lords. From the end of the 15th century, as literacy spread among the townspeople, elements of living folk speech began to penetrate more and more into the book Belarusian language.
During the reign of Lithuanian feudal lords, the western regions of Rus', where the Belarusian people were then formed, received the name “White Rus'”. This term is found already in the second half of the 14th and early 15th centuries among German and Polish authors, but it is very possible that it was known in earlier times. Lithuanians and Latvians did not use it. The population of the western regions of Rus' called themselves “Russians” during the time of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, thereby emphasizing their kinship and closeness to the population of other parts of Rus', closeness to the Russian and Ukrainian peoples.
The origin and meaning of the term "White Rus'" still remains unclear. There are a number of different opinions on this matter, but they are all just guesses. Some scientists interpreted the term “White Rus'” in the sense of the independence of the Belarusian people from the Tatars. But this explanation encounters serious and completely legitimate objections, since during the time of Lithuanian rule, Belarus was no freer from foreign domination than northeastern Rus', subject to the Golden Horde. Others attributed the origin of the term "White Rus'" to the color of clothing, blond hair color and blue eyes of Belarusians. However, this explanation cannot be considered convincing. It seems more likely to put the term “White Rus'” in connection with another term - “Black Rus'”. In the 13th century, it designated that part of Belarus that directly bordered the Lithuanian lands and was previously captured by the Lithuanian princes. If the word "Black" means
meant at that time a state of dependence and subordination, the word “White” meant the opposite state. It may very well be that the name “White Rus'” began to be assigned to the northeastern parts of Belarus in the 13th century, when they, without being conquered by the Tatars, were not yet captured by the Lithuanian conquerors.
Throughout the XIV - XVI centuries, the Belarusian lands, being under the rule of the Lithuanian princes, maintained economic, political and cultural ties with the lands of northeastern Rus', where the Russian people were formed. Thus, the Belarusian cities of that time conducted trade relations with such Russian cities as Veliky Novgorod, Pskov, Tver and Moscow. The population of Belarus, in their struggle against the Lithuanian princes, sought support in Moscow. The Orthodox Church of Belarus has long been subordinate to the Moscow metropolitans, despite repeated attempts by the Lithuanian princes to create a special Orthodox metropolitan see in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. At the end of the 14th and beginning of the 15th centuries, Smolensk, closely connected with the Belarusian lands, sought support in the Ryazan principality in the fight against the Lithuanian prince Vitovt. Russian chronicle writing had a noticeable influence on Belarusian chronicle writing. Belarusian chronicles express a sympathetic attitude towards Moscow. The sympathies and attraction of the people of Belarus to the Moscow state in the 15th - 16th centuries are well known, especially clearly revealed from the time when Ivan III began the struggle for the liberation of Belarusian lands from foreign (Lithuanian) rule.
The struggle of the Belarusian people against the rule of Lithuanian feudal lords was of great historical significance. She delayed the aggression of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania against Moscow at the very time when it was fighting against the Tatar yoke (Battle of Kulikovo). This contributed to the strengthening of the Moscow Principality. Its transformation into the Moscow state and the strengthening of the latter in the 16th century gave the Belarusian people a powerful and reliable stronghold in their further struggle against foreign rule.

Due to a number of historical conditions in the 15th - 16th centuries, the Belarusian people failed to free themselves from foreign rule. Strengthening their dominance in Belarus and Ukraine, Lithuanian feudal lords began collaborating with Polish feudal lords as early as 1386. This cooperation prepared the Union of Lublin in 1569, according to which the Polish lords included the entire Grand Duchy of Lithuania into their state - the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Thus, after 1569, the Belarusian people found themselves under even more difficult foreign rule - under the rule of Polish feudal lords. Belarus was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth until the end of the 18th century, that is, until its partitions, as a result of which the Belarusian lands were reunited with the Russian state. The annexation of Belarus to Russia had enormous progressive significance for the entire subsequent history of the Belarusian people. The inclusion of Belarus into the Russian state accelerated its economic and cultural development. In Belarus, as in the entire Russian state, the process of disintegration of the feudal-serf system began. The era of “the liquidation of feudalism and the victory of capitalism” has arrived (Stalin). Under these conditions, the Belarusian people began to emerge as a nation. The struggle of the peasant masses of Belarus against the serf owners began to flow into the common mainstream of the struggle against feudal-serf oppression with the Russian people. After the abolition of serfdom (1861), the period of capitalism began in Belarus, as in Russia. Along with the development of capitalism, the working class was formed - the gravedigger of capitalism, the class to which the future belonged.
The great genius of mankind, V.I. Lenin, created a new type of party, the Bolshevik party, which led and organized the revolutionary movement throughout the whole of Great Britain. Russian Empire.
The working and peasant masses of Belarus took an active part, together with the workers and peasants of all Russia, in the first bourgeois-democratic revolution of 1905-1907, and then in the February bourgeois-democratic revolution of 1917. But only the Great October Socialist Revolution brought complete liberation to the Belarusian people from all oppression, freed them from capitalists, landowners and other exploiters, and allowed them to build life on new - socialist principles. For the first time in history, thanks to the socialist revolution, the Belarusian people received their statehood.
The BSSR is an equal member of the great, fraternal community of Soviet peoples. The Belarusian people, together with other peoples of the USSR, under the leadership of the great party of Lenin-Stalin, with constant help from the great Russian people and other peoples of our socialist Motherland, are confidently moving forward towards the complete victory of communism.

The second (considered outdated) name is Litviny (Russian), Litviny, Litviny (Belarusian). The total number of Belarusians is about 9.4 million people.
They live compactly in Eastern Europe, mainly on the territory of the Republic of Belarus (area 207.6 thousand km2), where they make up 83.7%

population (about 8 million people). The rest of the Belarusians are dispersed throughout the countries of the former USSR (mainly in Russia and Ukraine), Poland,

USA, Australia, Canada and other countries of the world.

Belarusians: 200 years of destruction of the nation, name and history

The preservation of Belarusians as a people, and the existence of their own state, can be called a miracle against the backdrop of the disappearance of dozens of European nations and nationalities under the pressure of stronger neighbors. But if in Western Europe, when conquering territory, the invader did not destroy the national characteristics of the local population, then the lands of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (hereinafter referred to as the Grand Duchy of Lithuania - the old name of Belarus) underwent two centuries of continuous destruction of the nation, name and history.

Background

Our Grand Duchy in the era of the XIII-XVIII centuries, perhaps, was not fundamentally different from other European states. A country of castles, a vast empire of Eastern Europe, Magdeburg law, a variety of religious denominations, interstate unions with Poland and Sweden, numerous Lithuanian gentry as the basis of the state, entertainment for the aristocracy, printing houses, its own constitution in the form of three Statutes, the Lithuanian state language (the prototype of Belarusian), courts , army, numerous external wars.

There was everything - victories, defeats, pressure from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and conflicts with the Germans - the usual vicissitudes of European life of that era. Sometimes those times are called the golden age of our people, but let’s not idealize them - rather, it was a stage of normal development of Belarusians.

Destruction of culture and assimilation of Belarusians

The catastrophe (this is the most appropriate word) began immediately after the divisions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the entry of the territory of our state of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Litvin-Belarusian people into Russia. Russia decided to simply wipe out the former enemy and competitor from the face of the earth, erase everything that would remind of its former greatness and, first of all, the memory, that is, ultimately, gradually turn the Litvins into Russians.

Destruction of the Lithuanian (Belarusian) gentry

To fulfill these plans, it was necessary to act gradually, first to destroy the numerous small and medium-sized Lithuanian gentry - the main bearer of the state and national idea of ​​​​the Grand Duchy. The first blow was dealt to the rights of the nobility; almost thousands of noble families were deprived of all titles and privileges (often property). To retain the rank of gentry (now under the Russian name dvorianin), it was necessary to go through a difficult path of evidence, including humiliating trips to St. Petersburg to see officials from the new occupation administration.

The vast majority of the gentry were unable to do this; as a result, vast land holdings were transferred from the hands of the Litvins to the Russian ruling class - by right of the conqueror. Only a few wealthy families were able to confirm their nobility, which, due to their small numbers, no longer posed a threat from the point of view of maintaining the Lithuanian (Belarusian) national identity.

Due to the fact that the entire gentry, who had lost their rights and property, at that time played the role of the national intelligentsia, this was an irreparable loss for the people. The beheaded nation lost its memory - the goal was achieved.

Destruction of the self-name of Belarusians – “Litvins”

The second blow fell on the name of the people and their land. After all, even if the peasants continued to call their homeland Lithuania (as it had been for 600 years), then sooner or later the people's memory could lead to independence. But Lithuania was just beginning in Vilna; the conditional center was rather Minsk-Litovsk (the official name of the city during the reign of the Russian Empire). The planting of the Russian version of the name, which had never been used before, began - western Russia, northwestern region, etc.

Even a new ideological movement arose - Western Russianism, designed to promote the idea that the former lands of the Grand Duchy are Western Russia. At the same time, among the peasantry, not without the help and propaganda of the remaining Lithuanian gentry, an alternative name was established, which was more regional and less damaging than Western Russia - this is Belarus (Belarus). Many Lithuanians, fearing complete national destruction and transformation into Russians, adopted precisely this self-name - Belarusians. A certain compromise was reached between the occupiers and the population in the names and the inculcation of the ideology of “Western Russia” for the Grand Duchy was temporarily suspended. For the sake of preserving at least some kind of originality, the majority of Litvins became Belarusians - this preserved our ethnic characteristics.

Litvin-Belarusian uprisings

At the beginning and middle of the 19th century, the Lithuanians made three armed attempts to restore their independence, an alliance with Napoleon and two gentry uprisings. During the last uprising, led by Kalinowski, the rebels began to use a new name for their people in their ideological tactics - Belarusians. After the suppression of the uprising and the reprisal of the remnants of the gentry of the Grand Duchy, the Russian authorities were afraid that the name “Belarusians” contained hidden potential for independence, so a second attempt was made to inculcate Western Russianism - but, fortunately, it ended unsuccessfully.
There were also funny incidents in this story; censors began to correct the names of Litvins into Belarusians in many books, because no one knew that Belarus would one day gain independence, the Internet would emerge and all the fakes would come to light.

Ban of the Belarusian Church

A separate black page is the ban on the Uniate Church on our lands - the national church of the Litvins. Thousands of Uniate churches were transferred to the Russian Orthodox Church, and the invasion of chauvinistic and great-power priests began, whose goal was the Russification of the new flock. From that time on, the Russian Orthodox Church in Belarus became the conductor of the tsarist ideology of autocracy, and Orthodoxy for Belarusians began to mean belonging to the Russian world.

At the end of the 19th century, when the Russian authorities realized that it was impossible to completely Russify the lands of the Grand Duchy, and when the Belarusians began to be recognized as a separate nationality, the question of Belarusian history arose. This was an important element in consolidating the achieved successes in the assimilation of Belarusians. The main task of the Russian version of Belarusian history was to turn the concept of Belarusian statehood upside down, that is, to say that this statehood simply never existed and that the Grand Duchy of Lithuania is not the Homeland of the Belarusians, but their invader. Considering that our intelligentsia (gentry) practically no longer existed, and there was no one to oppose such a historical libel from Russian historians, this humiliating version of our history existed until recently.

The main idea and goal of such a story is to prevent Belarus and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Belarusians and Litvinians - the names of one people - from being linked together. And this was the correct calculation of Russia: after all, as soon as any information or relationship between Belarus and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania arises, the danger of the revival of Belarusians and the independence of Belarus immediately arises.

Attempts at a retaliatory strike by the Belarusians in a new capacity were not long in coming. The former Lithuanian nobleman Grenivitsky kills the Russian Tsar, the former Lithuanian rebel Bogushevich creates a new independent Belarusian ideology directly related to the Grand Duchy. This gives rise to the Belarusian political parties of the early 20th century, thanks to which both the BPR and the BSSR emerged.

The rise of Belarusian national consciousness in the first half of the 20th century

In 1918, the Belarusians managed to restore their statehood for only a few months in the form of the Belarusian People's Republic, and in 1919, the prototype of the BSSR, a semi-state formation within the USSR, arose.

Taking advantage of the temporary romanticism of communist ideology in the 1920s, the descendants of the Litvins managed to take leading positions in cultural and educational institutions, with an eye on the Bolsheviks and self-censorship, they launched a broad Belarusization that reached all levels of society. At the same time, in western Belarus (Western part of the Grand Duchy), which became part of Poland, Belarusization also began, albeit on a smaller scale, but based on the history of the Grand Duchy and without the ideology of the Bolsheviks.
The period of Belarusization did not last long. Seeing the danger of self-determination of Belarusians, both Poland and the USSR began a policy of anti-Belarusization. And if in Poland everything ended with the closure of our schools and the so-called “sanitation” policy, then in the USSR the Belarusian national intelligentsia and administration were physically destroyed - prisons, camps, executions.

Belarusians and the Second World War
During the Second World War, the role of occupiers was taken over by the Nazis, who used not only the stick, but also the carrot - they allowed limited Belarusianization with the condition that the ideas of German Nazism were mentioned. Many Belarusians, who experienced national oppression both from nationalist Poland and from the USSR, willingly agreed to the cynical conditions of the German administration and in this short period, in 3-4 years, along with the henchmen of Nazism, thousands of young Belarusians were raised in the spirit of the history of the Grand Duchy Litovsky, many of whom died either in the meat grinder of military operations or in Stalin’s camps.

The results of the disappearance of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania for Belarusians

Let us summarize without touching on recent history and modernity. It is now clear on what basis and on what prerequisites the emergence of the Republic of Belarus became possible. However, after the destruction of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and to this day, our people and our national idea have suffered colossal losses. Let's list some of them:
1. Destruction of our country - the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
2. Destruction of the Lithuanian gentry as a class. Confiscation of all property, titles and privileges.
3. Destruction of the name of our land and an attempt to impose “Western Rus'”.
4. Physical destruction or reference to certain death of our rebels with confiscation of their property.
5. Destruction of the Belarusian Uniate Church.
6. An attempt to ban our second self-name “Belarusians”.
7. Repressions against Belarusians in interwar Poland.
8. Physical destruction or exile to camps of representatives of the Belarusian national intelligentsia and administration in the USSR.
9. Massive losses of Belarusians in the Second World War.

But for each of these losses we had our own victory, as a result of which a unique European people was preserved - the Belarusians, and we will gradually figure out the names ourselves.

One last thing worth noting. There is not an ounce of guilt of the neighboring peoples in the destruction of the Litvins and, later, the Belarusians. Genocide is carried out by authorities, ideologists, and political groups under the influence of extreme nationalist ideas. The Russian people have always felt oppression from their own people in power, and blaming them in general for all troubles means inciting interethnic hatred. We must forgive but remember.

Population of Belarus - nationalities, languages, crafts, etc.

Population of Belarus

People in Belarus are friendly and good-natured. The patience and peacefulness of Belarusians are largely determined by history, overshadowed by countless wars. Moreover, the Belarusians themselves never started them. Belarus is always happy to have guests and is interested in them getting to know the culture and traditions of the country better.

Belarusians make up more than 80% of the population. By virtue of historical past Many other nationalities live in Belarus, some of them for several generations:

Russians(8.2%) have lived on the territory of Belarus for a long time. Large influx recorded after World War II

Poles(3.1%) have lived in the western part of the country for centuries

Ukrainians(1.7%) – the largest influx was recorded in the 18th–19th centuries

Jews(0.13%): the first Jews settled in Belarus in the 15th century. Since the early 1980s, due to emigration to Israel and other countries, the Jewish population of Belarus has decreased and amounted to less than 30 thousand people.

Also live in Belarus Tatars, Gypsies, Lithuanians And Latvians.

Languages ​​of Belarus

Belorussian And Russian are the official languages ​​of Belarus.

Other languages ​​such as Polish, Ukrainian And Hebrew, used at the local community level.

Traditional crafts in Belarus

Belarus has a long, rich history of traditional arts and crafts, many of which still exist today.

Among the main crafts.