Umsiedlungen als Instrument der russischen Mission im Wolgaraum 1740-1748

• Published in: Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas 1997-01, Vol.45 (2), p.199-209
• Main Author: Nolte, Hans-Heinrich
• Format: Article
• Language: ger
• Subjects: ABHANDLUNGEN
• ISSN: 0021-4019

The Russian Orthodox Mission in the Volga region was initiated by the Empress Anna. She was well acquainted with a German model which provided for religious uniformity within local regions, but for the full toleration of differing religious confessions throughout the empire. The Mission was surprisingly successful, probably because payments to those newly baptized were not only promised, but actually paid - although there were so many baptisms that there was not enough money to honor all promises. The conversions to Christianity and the influx of money from St. Petersburg so disturbed the traditional order in the villages that crime soared, not only between different religious groups, but also among Christians. The government attempted to channel the religious movements by organizing a resettlement program that had as its goal the creation of purely Christian and purely Muslim villages. A commission was to enforce it. In the process, almost 230 Christian and Muslim villages were newly established. One Bashkir Muslim proposed that this system of strict spatial separation of believers of different creeds be transferred to Bashkiria, but the government restricted its efforts to Kazan' guberniia. The Archive of the Synod in St. Petersburg contains a collection of enactments relevant to the history of ethno-religious policies in the Volga region.