From Kalmykia in Russia’s past and present national policies and administrative system (Maksimov 2008: 131-132):
The broad Oirat faces and steppe-weathered garb on promenade must have sent a chill — some atavistic recollection of the 5th or 13th century — down the spines of their onlookers. So striking were these Bactrian-mounted cavalrymen that teen-aged witness Honoré de Balzac could not help but pen the short story “Kalmyks in Paris” (Vachnadze 1993), a piece that I’ve unfortunately not yet been able to locate.
In the following century, Kalmyk actor Iska Khan would make another Parisian entrance — albeit, like Valéry Inkijinoff before him, a little less dramatically.
Works Cited:
Maksimov, K. N. (2008). Kalmykia in Russia’s past and present national policies and administrative system. New York: Central European University Press.
Vachnadze, G. N. (1993). Russia’s hotbeds of tension. Commack N.Y.: Nova Science Publishers.
God help me if I can keep track of Russia’s ethnic groups.
Are these Kalymks really more “Mongol” than “European”?
must have sent a chill — some atavistic recollection of the 5th or 13th century — down the spines of [French] onlookers
Although the image you describe has a poetic quality, I don’t think there is any actual folk-memory in France — as there is in the European-Russia and perhaps elsewhere in Slavdom — of Mongols (who never went beyond Krakow?) or Huns (who only briefly campaigned one summer the 400s into France, fought the Roman-Germanic joint army to a standstill at Chalons, then withdrew, right? Followed by Attila’s death and the end of the Huns, more or less).
Not a lot of people know this, but Lenin was part Kalmyk.
It seems Lenin was part everything. I’ve read he is confirmed part Tatar, Jewish, and Russian.
In a “racial” sense, perhaps, he was an ideal New Soviet Man.
People of mixed backgrounds are often drawn to universalist ideologies. Backgrounds as utterly jumbled as Lenin’s were rarer then than they are now, so his alienation from most of society would have been especially acute. It’s easy to understand why people of mixed origins feel what they feel, but it’s also selfish of them to take it out on the rest of society, to undermine the solidity of a whole society’s foundation just because they were born without a foundation themselves.
Of course there must have been more for him in Communism than that, but it was likely a part of it.
Glossy: Backgrounds as utterly jumbled as Lenin’s were rarer then than they are now
What are your reasons for believing that ? Before backgrounds can be jumbled, they must be seen as clearly separated. The very idea of an “ethnic background” as a fairly modern one. One of the reasons why nation states arose was in order to simplify administration of large areas and large numbers of people.
To administer, you need to classify. To classify, you must define. But it’s not clear how to define what an “ethnic” entity is – unless of course you resort to administrative fiat.
The utility and implications of these political classification efforts were not always clear to the people affected, nor appreciated by them. There was discussion of this recently in the blogpost “The shimmering haze of vernacular” at languagehat.
“The very idea of an “ethnic background” as a fairly modern one.”
That is a myth. Regardless of what you’ve been told about this, neither nationalism not ethnic pride were invented by the French Revolution. Anyone who knows the least bit about history will tell you that no matter how far back you go into the written record, you find clear consciousness of ethnicity. The ancient Greeks, for example, considered themselves to be a nation in the traditional sense. They literally tried to trace their descent from a single man – Hellen. Obviously, that was a simplification on their part, but it was also a reflection of their mental conception of Greekness. Descent was central. Celtic and Germanic tribes also often had eponymous mythological progenitors. The idea, again and again, was that the entire tribe shared common descent. This would not have always been 100% true, but it was probably mostly true most of the time.
When Ostrogoths, Vandals, etc. settled in southern Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire, they instituted prohibitions on intermarriage with the locals. These prohibitions held for centuries. Why would they have been imposed if no one yet knew the concept of ethnic background?
Obviously, the ancient Hebrews thought of themselves as a nation. Same for the ancient Egyptians. I could give you dozens of other examples.
I remember reading about a letter from one Sumerian statesman to another in which a third individual who bore a Semitic name was said to have come from “foreign seed”. These sorts of ideas are timeless. The people who’ve told you that they’re recent are dishonest.
After I submitted the above comment I remembered the Genesis account of the peopling of mankind after the Flood. In it Noah had three sons – Shem, Ham and Yaphet. It quickly becomes apparent to any reader that Shem was conceived as the progenitor of Middle Easterners, Ham of Africans and Yaphet of Europeans. If the ancient Hebrews were aware of the existence of Mongoloids, they would have undoubtedly come up with a fourth son to account for them.
Each of Noah’s sons was supposed to have had descendants of his own. These were written up as progenitors of all the ethnicities known to the people who wrote Genesis. Here’s a map:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0e/Josephustable3.jpg
So yes, thinking of one’s own people, as well as of foreign peoples, as very large extended families bound by common descent was the default view of the ancient world. And of the medieval world. It is also the view of modern genetics, with the obvious caveat that stories that assigned a single progenitor for every group were simplifications.
That is a myth. Regardless of what you’ve been told about this … Anyone who knows the least bit about history will tell you … These sorts of ideas are timeless. The people who’ve told you that they’re recent are dishonest.
Why do you think that a myth is being propagated about this subject, and that people who disagree with you are dishonest, if not just plain ignernt ? It sounds as if you suspect them of having an axe to grind. However, your comments strongly suggest that you have an axe of your own – in particular the fact that you quote the bible as a reference work. Could you be more explicit about the nature of the belief-systems you see at work here – yours and those of people who have differing views ?
I did not cite the Bible as God’s word. In fact, I’m an atheist. I believe that Genesis is a work of men. Anyone who’s read it can see that it is a work of men for whom the idea of ethnicity was very real. They thought that everyone within each particular nation shared common descent. I cited this in order to show you that the idea of “ethnic background” is not new. I also cited a few other examples. The ancient Greeks believed that their nation, each individual part of it (Ionnians, Aeolians, Dorians), as well as other nations were set up in the same way. Commonality of descent was thought to be nationhood and nationhood was thought to be commonality of descent.
You’ve asked me why I think that those who maintain that nationalism was invented within the past few centuries are dishonest. It’s because I know a bit of history.
As for politics, those who represent nationalism as something new would usually be left-wing, those who disagree with them would usually be right-wing. And yes, I’m pretty right-wing. But on this point I believe what I believe because I’m familiar with the facts.