FolkCostume&Embroidery: Overview of the Folk Costumes of the Indigenous Peoples of Siberia and Manchuria; part 1 Ob and Taymyr region.

Hello all,

Today I would like to start to talk about the indigenous peoples of Siberia, which tend to not be well known.

Siberia lies east of the Urals, south of the Arctic Ocean, west of the Pacific, but its southern borders are not well defined. For convenience, often the current border of the Russian Empire is taken as the southern limit, or the southern edge of the Taiga. I will be following cultural regions and I will cover the Amur region, as well as Manchuria, as the same peoples live over the border in the current Chinese Empire.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siberia

The word Siberia is taken from the Russian Sibir, who took it from the Tatars. The etymology of the word is not well understood. Muscovy began its conquest and colonization of Siberia by taking the Khanate of Sibir in 1581. The subjugation of Siberia was complete by 1778. The horrors of colonization are well known, and all apply here. Disease, genocide, assimilation, the problems of introduced tobacco and alcohol, etc. Muscovy's treatment of the indigenous peoples is on a par with that of any of the Colonial Powers. Those indigenous people who are left have suffered great loss, and are now outnumbered by Russian Colonists.

The names of the various indigenous peoples of the Russian Empire were as unfortunate as that used by The United States for theirs. They were generally not those used by the people themselves. In the mid 20th cent, however the Soviets made an attempt to start using endonyms. This is to be lauded, but it was not applied consistently, and is still imperfect. It also means that the same people will be referred to by two or more different names, depending on the year of publication. I will indicate these as I go.

The main material for outer clothing in most of Siberia is reindeer skins. Ornamentation is achieved by juxtaposing regions of brown fur with areas of white fur. I lack information as to undergarments, but there clearly had to be some.

A particular type of tent is found among many of these people, from the Saami in the west to the Chukchi in the east. This seems to be very old technology.

I will be dividing Siberia into 5 large cultural regions.

1. Ob and Taymyr

2. Central Siberia

3. Chukotka and Kamchatka

4 Amur

5 South Siberia

Ob and Taymyr

This covers northwestern Siberia, Specifically the Ob and Yenisei river basins, and the Arctic coast from the Urals to the Taymyr peninsula. This region is populated mostly by speakers of the Uralic language Family.

Ob Ugrians

These people form a distinct branch of the Uralic language family together with the Hungarians. They speak several dialects, some of which are mutually unintelligible, but are generally divided into two ethnicities. These are the Khanty, formerly called Ostyak, and Mansi, formerly called Vogul.

The southern branches of these two peoples have incurred much assimilation from more numerous peoples further south, namely the Siberian Tatars and Russian colonists, and some of these dialects are extinct.

Khanty

Formerly called by the exonym 'Ostyak', the Khanty today number some 31,000 people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khanty

In the past, some southern branches of the Khanty wove cloth from nettles, and heavily embroidered their chemises and shirts.

I have already done an article on this embroidery tradition.

https://folkcostume.blogspot.com/2016/09/south-khanty-costume-and-embroidery.html

Today these have been replaced by clothing made from bought cloth.

The Khanty have developed a technique called 'fur inlay' in which brown and white reindeer or other fur or leather are cut and pieced together. Here is a pair of womans dress outer boots showing this technique.

This now is a major feature of their traditional outer wear, which is often worn because it is warmer and more practical than commercially available outerwear. And also, of course, as a mark of identity. Women wear a separate hat or kerchief.

Men's outer wear tend to have hoods, and be unadorned, or minimally adorned.

In this last photo, notice how the men are wearing traditional boots, held up by straps attached to a belt or looped over the shoulders.

I will have to do a more in depth article on these people.

Mansi

Formerly known as the Vogul, these people live west of the Khanty, but their clothing is similar.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mansi_people

Samoyedic Peoples

This term is unfortunate and obsolete, but has been retained for this branch of the Uralic language family. Samoyed is a Russian word meaning 'eater of self', often interpreted to mean Cannibal.

This group includes the Nenets, Enets, Selkup, and Nganasan. The Mator have been completely assimilated, and their language is extinct.

Nenets

These people were formerly called Samoyed or Yamal. They call themselves Nenəj Nenəče, in Russian and English Nenets. Note that this is NOT a plural. 'Nenet' is not a word. They are found along the coast of the Arctic ocean from the Kanin Peninsula west of the Urals to the mouth of the Yenisey River. There are currently about 50,000 of them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nenets

The various garments used are similar to those of the Khanty, their neighbors to the south. As in most Siberian peoples, boots and parkas are often layered at need. The ubiquitous tent is here called a chum.

Women wear highly decorated coats and hats for dress occasions. They include colored broadcloth and fur of various animals as well as reindeer skin. Many narrow lines of fur are often included as testimony to the sewing skills of the maker. Triangles and zigzags are also popular with the Nenets.

In recent years it has become popular to wear fur inlayed overcoats in the Khanty style, as we can see here on the left and right. This has made it difficult to distinguish Nenets from Khanty in photographs.

This technique is also on bags and other accessories.

In most of this region, mens and womens boots may be distinguished by a rectanglular ornament in front for men, and a small triangular gusset for women. Here is a mans boot on the left, and a womans boot on the right.

Enets

These people were previously called Yenisey or Yenisey Samoyed. They live on the east bank of the Yenisey River, near its mouth. Today there are slightly over 200 of them left. Their clothing is greatly influenced by that of the Khanty and Nenets.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enets

A video about the Tundra Enets.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2peUqjmpLdo

Selkup

These people live south of the Enets and somewhat inland, west of the Yenisey River. They were formerly known in Russian as Ostyak Samoyeds. There are somewhat over 4,000 of them today.

Their clothing today is again similar to that of the Khanty and Nenets.

The dress of this man indicates that he is a shaman.

Nganasan

These people live just to the east of the others mentioned above, on the Taymyr Peninsula. They were formerly called the Tavgi or Tavgi Samoyed. Their language is divergent from the other Samoyedic languages, and there is speculation that they have a Paleo Siberian substrate. There are somewhere around 1,000 Nganasan today.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nganasan_people

Nganasan clothing is characterized by rectilinear patchwork. The mens coats have hoods, and the boots do not have much of a notch at the ankle, making them look somewhat columnar.

These specially decorated boots are for use by a shaman.

This person is clearly a shaman by their dress.

Ket

The Ket are a people who live somewhat to the south along the Yenisey River. They were formerly called Yenisei Ostyaks. They are the last of a language family that existed along the Yenisei. All the other groups have been assimilated and the Ket language is now related to no others. Some believe that the Ket are the closest relatives of Native Americans now left in Asia. There are a little over 1000 Ket alive today.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ket_people