RU | EN
Submenu

Manyshev S. Soviet Caucasus Studies in the 1920s–1930s: From Local History Studies to Research Institutes

S. Manyshev
National Research University Higher School of Economics
Moscow, Russia
ORCID: 0000-0002-5276-7743
E-mail: msergey1990@gmail.com

 

 Download  |  Go to Issue #1. 2026

 

ABSTRACT. This article examines the institutionalization of Soviet Caucasian studies during the 1920s and 1930s, drawing on archival documents, published materials, and literary sources. It analyzes the transition from local history organizations that emerged in the early Soviet period to more formalized research institutes. The origins of the local history movement in the North Caucasus date back to the first half of the 1920s, when local history institutions began to appear en masse across a wide variety of fields. Their members included enthusiasts with varying levels of education, united by the belief that the national borderlands had received insufficient attention during the imperial period. During this time, the first periodicals consolidating regional expertise also emerged. Individual figures within the local history movement turned to pre-revolutionary traditions, seeking to revive publications such as Dagestan Collection and Collection of Materials for the Description of the Localities and Tribes of the Caucasus. The gradual decline of the local history movement, coupled with the increasing professionalization of scholarship, led to the establishment of a network of research institutes in the North Caucasus by the 1930s. These new institutions undertook the comprehensive task of studying various administrative-territorial units. Their work was significantly more systematic: efforts were made to locate archival materials outside the region, and the first scholarly essays on the history of the North Caucasian peoples were written during this period. Scholars from major university centers in Moscow and Leningrad also began to study the region at this time.

 

KEYWORDS: history of science, Caucasus studies, local history studies, research institute, North Caucasus

 

DOI 10.31250/2618-8600-2026-1(31)-6-29
UDC 39 (470.6)

 

REFERENCES

  • Aliroev I. Yu., Pavlov M. P. Checheno-Ingushskiy gosudarstvennyy universitet im. L. N. Tolstogo [Chechen-Ingush State University named after L. N. Tolstoy]. Rostov-on-Don: Izdatel’stvo Rostovskogo universiteta Publ., 1985, 168 p. (In Russian).
  • Bushuev S. K. Bor’ba gortsev za nezavisimost’ pod rukovodstvom Shamilya [The struggle of the highlanders for independence under the leadership of Shamil]. Moscow; Leningrad: Izdatel’stvo AN SSSR Publ., 1939, 184 p. (In Russian).
  • Dzhambulatova Z. K. Kul’turnoe stroitel’stvo v Sovetskoi Checheno-Ingushetii (1920– 1940 gody) [Cultural development in Soviet Checheno-Ingushetia (1920–1940)]. Groznyi: Checheno-Ingushskoye knizhnoye izdatel’stvo Publ., 1974, 233 p. (In Russian).
  • Genko A. [From the cultural past of the Ingush]. Zapiski Kollegii vostokovedov pri Aziatskom muzee Akademii nauk SSSR [Notes of the college of Orientalists at the Asian Museum of the USSR Academy of Sciences.]. Leningrad: Izdatel’stvo AN SSSR Publ., 1930, vol. 5, pp. 681–761. (In Russian).
  • Genko A. N. [An Arabic map of Chechnya during the Shamil era]. Zapiski Instituta vostokovedeniya Akademii nauk SSSR [Notes of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences.]. Leningrad: Izdatel’stvo AN SSSR Publ., 1933, vol. 2 (1), pp. 21–36. (In Russian).
  • Hirsch F. Empire of Nations: Ethnographic Knowledge and the Making of the Soviet Union. Ithaca; London: Cornell University Press, 2005, 367 p. (In English).
  • Kanukova Z. V. [Ossetian Historical and Philological Society]. Izvestiia SOIGSI [News of the North Ossetian Institute of Humanitarian and Social Research], 2007, no. 1 (4), pp. 143–192. (In Russian).
  • Lavrov L. I. [Caucasian department of the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography and the Caucasian sector of the Institute of Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences]. Sobraniya Muzeya antropologii i etnografii AN SSSR. K 100-letiyu obrazovaniya pervogo akademicheskogo etnograficheskogo tsentra [Collections of the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences. On the 100th anniversary of the founding of the first academic ethnographic center]. Leningrad: Nauka Publ., 1980, pp. 22–26. (Collection of MAE; vol. 35). (In Russian).
  • Lavrov L. I. Ubykhi: Istoriko-etnograficheskaya monografiya [Ubykhs: Historical and ethnographic monograph]. St. Petersburg: Nauka Publ., 2009, 238 p. (Series “Kunstkamera — Archive”; vol. 3). (In Russian).
  • Likhnitskiy N., Pokrovskiy N. [Against great-power chauvinism in the study of the history of the mountain national liberation movement]. Istorik-marksist [Historian-Marxist], 1934, no. 2 (36), pp. 99–105. (In Russian).
  • Marr N. Ya. Krayevedeniye [Local History]. Leningrad: Rossiyskaya gosudarstvennaya akademicheskaya tipografia Publ., 1925, 23 p. (In Russian).
  • Orbeli R. R. [Caucasian studies]. Aziatskiy muzey — Leningradskoye otdeleniye Instituta vostokovedeniya AN SSSR [Asian Museum — Leningrad Branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences]. Moscow: Nauka Publ., 1972, pp. 468–499. (In Russian).
  • Pavlov D. M. Znacheniye mestnykh lyudey v dele izucheniya Dagestana [The importance of local people in the study of Dagestan]. Makhachkala: Izdaniye Dagestanskogo muzeya, 1926, 24 p. (In Russian).
  • Sarakhan D. A. Bibliografiya Kabardy i Balkarii [Bibliography of Kabarda and Balkaria]. Nal’chik: Tipografiya imeni Revolyutsii 1905 g. Publ., 1930, 114 p. (In Russian).
  • Shmidt S. O. Puti istorika. Izbrannyye trudy po istochnikovedeniyu i istoriografii [The historian’s path: Selected works on source studies and historiography.]. Moscow: RGGU Publ., 1997, 612 p. (In Russian).
  • Stranitsy otechestvennogo kavkazovedeniya [Pages of Russian Caucasian studies]. Moscow: Nauka Publ., 1992, 221 p. (In Russian).
  • Temirbolatova A. I. Problemy yazykovoy politiki i yazykovogo stroitel’stva na Severnom Kavkaze (na materiale rukopisey arkhivnogo fonda R-1260 Gosudarstvennogo arkhiva Stavropol’skogo kraya — “Severo-Kavkazskiy gorskiy istoriko-lingvisticheskiy nauchno-issledovatel’skiy institut imeni S. M. Kirova” (1926–1937)) [Problems of language policy and language development in the North Caucasus (Based on manuscripts from the archive collection R-1260 of the State Archives of the Stavropol Territory — “North Caucasian Mountain Historical and Linguistic Research Institute named after S. M. Kirov” (1926–1937))]. Stavropol’: Izdatel’stvo SGU Publ., 2012, 314 p. (In Russian).
  • Tikhonov V. V. Istoriki, ideologiya, vlast’ v Rossii XX veka. Ocherki [Historians, ideology, and power in 20th century Russia. Essays]. Moscow: IRI RAN Publ., 2014, 217 p. (In Russian).
  • Volkova N. G. [Caucasian studies at the institute of ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences. (On the 50th anniversary of the Caucasus Peoples’ Ethnography Sector)]. Sovetskaya etnografiya [Soviet ethnography], 1986, no. 4, pp. 73–86. (In Russian).
  • Volkova N. G., Sergeeva G. A. [Tragic pages of Caucasian studies: A. N. Genko]. Repressirovannyye etnografy [Repressed ethnographers]. Moscow: Vostochnaya literatura Publ., 2003, iss. 1, pp. 101–133. (In Russian).
  • Yampol’skiy M. L. [Local history institutions in the North Caucasus]. Voprosy prosveshcheniya [Questions of Education], 1927, no. 3, pp. 62–73. (In Russian).
  • Zhurtova A. A., Maksimchik A. N. Istoriografiya rossiysko-kavkazskikh otnosheniy v XVI– XIX v.: dva podkhoda k osmysleniyu problem [Historiography of Russian-Caucasian relations in the 16th–19th century: Two approaches to understanding the problem]. Vladikavkaz: SOIGSI Publ., 2017, 440 p. (In Russian).