Cossack slaves: how the Russians imposed female slavery in Siberia

Despite the fact that the Russian people suffered from slavery for most of their history, this did not discourage the desire to deprive other people of their will. Having discovered Siberia for Russia, the Cossacks, merchants, prospectors, hunters and settlers brought Christianity and captivity to the free indigenous peoples. Especially often, women became slaves, and there were special reasons for this.

The indigenous peoples of Siberia have always paid tribute, sometimes to the Mongol khans, then to the Tatar princes, then to the local tribal leaders. But slavery, as such, was not familiar to them. With the arrival of the Russians, everything changed and the first thing that felt it was the female part of the population of the colonized territories.

Going to a distant, dangerous and almost unexplored land, the Cossacks and merchants did not take women with them. In this regard, there was a great demand for Aboriginal women who were hardworking, hardy and easy-going. But no one was going to arrange relations on an equal footing with the women of Siberia, because there was no democracy in the relations of the sexes even in Russia.

Among the Russian pioneers of Siberia, only Yermak was known for his intolerance of violence against women. In the vatag, the famous ataman was severely punished for violent actions against local women, often with death. It is known that the guilty Cossack was filled with sand in his clothes and threw it into the river. The rapist instantly went to the bottom, for the edification of all who had sinful thoughts on their minds, not the sovereign's service.

But after Yermak's death, violent acts against the women of the Siberian peoples became commonplace and often they were treated as inanimate objects-given, sold, exchanged for weapons and horses, pawned in pubs.

No less disgusting custom, common in the Cossack prisons, was the delivery of the spouse for a while in rent. Going on a long march, which could last months, or even years, the Cossack left his wife to a friend, taking a certain fee from him for this. The money was used to prepare for the journey, that is, to purchase clothing, weapons, and food. After returning ,the "spouse" received his Siberian wife back, often with a replenishment in the form of children.

However, no one obliged him to take back the once rented girlfriend. He could throw her out the door or leave her as a present to a friend – there were no rights for Siberian women in those days and women were completely at the mercy of their Russian roommate. In general, the Cossacks in the 16-17 centuries had a rather peculiar attitude to women, even in their homeland, so they did not have to expect a reverent attitude towards "non-Christians" from them.

Serafim Shashkov, an ethnographer who lived in Irkutsk in the 19th century, wrote an article "Slavery in Siberia" in which he described, among other things, the terrible situation of female slaves. The author writes that the Cossacks often bought "Kachin, Tuvan and Kyrgyz beauties" as marching wives or for the purpose of subsequent resale.

A separate article was the captives taken during the fighting. Women from khan and princely families were considered a special chic in the Cossack circle. The specific names of the Cossacks who received noble captives as concubines are known. For example, ataman Galkin made his" wife " the wife of the prince of Ketov Telenekh, and another Cossack leader took his wife and daughters from the Kirghiz Prince Izheney.

The squad of the voivode of Dubensky became famous for taking Buryat girls and married women to their prisons in droves. Sometimes such liberties ended in bloody skirmishes – not everyone was ready to give their women to arrogant and cruel strangers, but on the side of the Russians there was always superiority in weapons and attempts to recapture their wives and daughters rarely ended successfully.

There was a capture of women after the conquest of Siberia, in the process of collecting yasak. Arriving in a camp or town, the Cossacks "invited" the beauties they liked, and often took them with them. Most often, after playing enough, the Cossacks abandoned their sex slaves in the forest or steppe, but sometimes they sold them. But there were also real connoisseurs of the female sex, who made up entire harems of slaves. This was the power of an influential and rich ataman, but even an ordinary Cossack could easily keep one or two slaves with him.

The owners of the largest harems were the voivodes, who had the opportunity to build entire towers for their concubines and even organize entire expeditions to replenish the "collection". There were scoundrels who rewarded subordinates with slaves or bribed young beauties to the sovereign's officials who arrived with the audit. Bored girls were simply driven out of the gate or given to ordinary Cossacks.

Information about what prices were for the girls of the Siberian peoples is quite scarce. It is known that a beautiful adult woman could cost from 10 to 20 rubles. But more often, the slaves were paid for with gold nuggets, gems, or furs. There is a record that Lavruk, the wife of a certain Cossack Alexey, who lived in Okhotsk, was sold after his death for a fabulous sum at that time – 10 sables and 10 red foxes.

But young slaves were not valued at all. A teenager could be bought for only 2-3 rubles or exchanged for one skin of a medium-quality arctic fox. Children were even cheaper – a seven-year-old ostyachka girl was once sold for just 20 kopecks. Sometimes the children were sold by the dozens, like chickens.

Among the Siberian slaves were not only women of local tribes, but also Russians. Often the Cossacks, leaving for a campaign, lured the girls with them, promising them marriage and a beautiful life in unknown rich lands. Some went with the army themselves, hoping to find a rich husband in Siberia.

More often than not, the outcome was a sad one – deception, frustration, and slavery. Many were raped and beaten on the road, but even when they reached the "promised land" safely, the poor people did not find happiness. Unable to feed themselves in the harsh Siberia and, moreover, to return home, Russian women found themselves at the complete mercy of the scoundrels who deceived them and replenished the harems of slave owners.

Russian women were valued above native Siberians and sold them dearly. Sometimes the Cossacks bought their compatriots to make their wives, but this was rather an exception and more often Russian girls and women repeated the fate of evenok, Tungusok and Buryatok, becoming a sex toy and the subject of resale and exchange.

When the pioneers of the Cossacks were replaced by peasants – Vologda, Ustyuzhan, Zyryan, Vyatichi, it practically did not change anything. The trafficking of women in the Siberian wilderness was for a long time a highly profitable business, which the authorities turned a blind eye to. Sometimes it came to the point that the peasants themselves sold their wives, daughters and sisters to the Cossacks and local princesses, or even exchanged them for cattle.

The powers that be had a completely different scope. The Yenisei voivode Vasily Golokhvastov, who lived in the 17th century, gathered a harem of 50 women of different nationalities and faiths, among whom were Russians. This influential scoundrel rented out his slaves monthly and had a good income from this business.

Such activity brought Golokhvastov a different kind of benefit – the "rented" wives spied on their cohabitants and reported for a small fee to the governor about all the points of interest to him. It also happened that women perjured themselves in court against the Cossacks, so that the voivode or his entourage could take away someone's property or demand a bribe for closing the case.

The most terrible thing was that such medieval horrors took place in Siberian cities and fortresses at the beginning of the 19th century, as the Irkutsk historian Shashkov impartially testifies. But the scientist was not the only one who described the customs of the Siberians. In 1754, the new bishop of Irkutsk and Nerchinsk, Sophrony, who came from St. Petersburg to Irkutsk, was amazed by what he saw.

The Monk Sophronius could not accept this state of affairs and for the rest of his life he fought for the improvement of the status of women, both Russian and foreign. Unfortunately, immediately after the death of the elder, everything returned to normal-the successors did not want to continue his God-pleasing work.