The Organisers and the Preparation: Balancing between Authenticity and Design of the Exhibit

An abundance and richness of the artefacts collected for the 1867 exhibition served its main political, scientific and educational goals – to demonstrate both the diversity and the unity of the peoples of the immense Russian Empire and foreign Slavic regions – the diversity that would subsequently be referred to by Ivan Il'yin as the ‘burden of narodnost’ (the burden of ethnicity) (Kogat'ko and Tkhakakhov 2010: 43). While the political and cultural aspects had been previously well-documented by other authors, this article attempts to underscore the academic approach as a basis for initiating the exhibit and making sure its legacy lives on in the form of museums.

It took an energetic young professor from Moscow University, Anatoly Petrovich Bogdanov (1834–1896) already a renowned anthropologist and zoologist at that time (Figure 1), to make the exhibit happen. He became the ideological inspirer, organiser and author of the original plan and programme of the 1867 Moscow Ethnographic Exhibition. Judging by the well-known materials from the archives and the new archival documents that we analysed, the idea to hold an exhibition in Russia came to Bogdanov in 1862 or even earlier (Krivosheina 2014: 278), after the second visit to the World Exhibition of 1851 in the suburbs of London held in the beautiful Crystal Palace of Sydenham. It is of no surprise that Bogdanov was impressed. The effect of the London exhibition (subsequently followed by a whole series of others: in Paris in 1867, 1878 and 1889; in Philadelphia and Chicago in 1876 and 1893; in Moscow in 1867, 1872 and 1879) was influential. Bogdanov's dream was in a way a reflection of the international trend. The awareness that Russia had been left behind in terms of public displays of academic knowledge was perhaps one of the main driving forces behind the creation of the exposition. What is interesting is Bogdanov’ s grasp of Russia's particular needs and specific context is his interpretation of the fundamental organisational and educational support for the exhibition to become successful. He saw it in the creation in May 1864 of a new scientific Society of Devotees of Natural Sciences (also translated as the Imperial Society of Friends of Natural Sciences) (Krivosheina 2014: 276), with a wide membership, at the Imperial Moscow University. This was a voluntary association that brought science into the public sphere. Its Imperial title was supposed to be granted at the opening of the exhibition.

The next important step was the acquisition of the location for the exposition. Previously unknown and unpublished documents in the Central State Archives of Moscow (CSAM) that we discovered help to more fully illuminate the history of the exhibition as a key part of Bogdanov's persistent effort to establish a solid base for advancing the new field of science. The archive contains a document of 1865, signed by G. E. Shchurovsky, the president of the Society of Devotees of Natural Science, requesting permission to hold an ethnographic exhibition in Moscow's Exzierzirgauz (meaning the Manege building in the centre of Moscow) (Figure 1). The letter was addressed directly to the Head Director of Moscow Educational District requesting the emperor's consent to follow the prospective exhibit's programme.

Several letters addressed to the emperor and a number of leading Russian officials (including Count D. A. Tolstoy, the Minister of Education and Count P. A. Valuyev, the Minister of Domestic Affairs) had been sent in the period of 1865–1867. Ultimately the society was granted the Imperial title. The academic emphasis Bogdanov deemed so important can be noted in crucial organisational details: the collection of the future exhibit was to be transferred to Moscow Public Museum (where it was to be always available for the members of the society) – and Moscow University.

A programme plan was developed. Bogdanov felt the need to provide strong arguments for what would be the most appropriate and favourable way of setting up the exhibit. Bogdanov clearly played a major role in drafting this synopsis, which provides a preliminary outline of his ‘exhibition method’, that is, the use of large-scale exhibitions as a means of dissemination of scientific knowledge. In this Bogdanov kept abreast of the times (Krivosheina 2014: 286). While clearly following the examples of other exhibits favouring the geographic display, his vision combined his original global plan to present the world (which as we mentioned did not work out) and emphasised the vastness and richness of Russia – something he thought had not been represented in London. A. P. Bogdanov attached the text of this programme to the request to hold the exhibition: ‘Each group of tribes represented at the exhibition must be placed in a geographical sequence’. This geographical method of arranging the items was subsequently applied at similar exhibitions in other countries. The exhibits often became part of newly established museums. That was the case during the creation of the Ethnographic Museum of the Trocadero after Paris 1878 World Exhibition, the Belgian Museum of Congo following the 1897 Brussels exhibition and Field Museum after Chicago exhibition of 1983 (Matos 2013). Reflecting on such an experience Bogdanov writes:

Visitors to the exhibition, who began their inspection with the inhabitants of the polar countries, gradually move to the tropics. . . . Groups of different tribes can be surrounded by typical plants and animals of a particular area. . . . To organize such an exhibition, according to rough estimates, you need to collect twenty thousand rubles in silver. This amount was necessary because expeditions of specialists and artists to the North and South of Russia will be required, who will have to make original mannequins (full-length figures) from representatives of different tribes, fix folk costumes and various household items (CSAM).

What strikes us here is the specific estimate and a very clear understanding of the amount of means and work needed.

As a result of Bogdanov making his point so clear and operating in a very short period of time – from 1865 to the spring of 1867, colossal work was done to collect and decorate the entire grandiose exhibition. One of the ways of meeting the deadline was to attract gubernia (provincial) statistical committees. The famous philanthropist Vasily Andreevich Dashkov (1819–1896), deputy director of the Rumyantsev Museum in Moscow was appointed as the head of the organising committee of the exhibition. He donated eighteen thousand silver rubles for the organisation of the exhibition (interestingly this amount was fully returned to him after the closing of the exhibition).

In the summer of 1865 the issues of the placement of the exhibition in the Manege, the date of its opening in the spring of 1867, and the provision of assistance to its organisers and curators were finally resolved. The speed and the effectiveness with which this gigantic scope of work had been done in just two years was astounding. Under the leadership of Dashkov and with the help of Bogdanov, forty-five meetings of the organising committee took place. They approved the additions and adjustments made to the plan and resulted in creating five special commissions. One of them was the expeditionary commission for the selection of typical elements of different ethnic groups, samples of the natural environment and special artistic designs that were all put together to assemble the exhibition. A special fund was set up for collecting decorative and architectural accessories; a photographic department was established to compile collections of portraits and photographs for sculptors; botanical collections were meant to portray the natural background of the territories and, finally, financial department had to oversee the development of rules for the contribution of money by legal entities and individuals (All-Russian Ethnographic Exhibition and Slavic Congress 1867: 259–294). Dashkov made sure local statistical committees received the letters requesting assistance in preparing the exhibit. It appears that a whole network, itself a manifestation of modern possibilities offered by Russia's entering the age of modernity (Mironov 2019: 15–21), had been set up and put into motion.

Yet science and culture did side with politics: to implement the ideological discourse of celebrating a Pan-Slavic identity so prominent at the time, N. A. Popov (1833–1891), the famous historian, Slavist, archivist, and professor at Moscow University, initiated the creation of a special Slavic department at the exhibition. He managed to establish contact with foreign scholars and track the collection, production and delivery to Moscow of numerous exhibits from the lands of the Western and Southern Slavs of Central and South-Eastern Europe (Churkina 2018: 53). In addition, he was one of the initiators of a series of celebrations for Slavic guests in Moscow and St. Petersburg, called the Slavic Congress (Lapteva 1994: 19; Nikitin 1960) and also managed to receive private donations.

The recognition of the need to promote the coming event and its academic premise are also clear from the documents describing how the Society of Devotees of Natural Science at Moscow University organised charitable event to raise additional funds. The professors gave public lectures on various historical, ethnographic and anthropological issues, and concerts were held. Famous scientists took part in the lectures. To name a few – A.P. Bogdanov, I. D. Belyaev, I. K. Babst, N. A. Popov, S. M. Soloviev, M. P. Pogodin and others. Some of the funds raised were used to support the chair (department) of physical anthropology at Moscow University and its craniological collection the OLE (the Russian acronym for the Society – M. K.) exhibitions started from nothing, which meant that there was a lot of time-consuming and laborious preparatory work. Although the exhibitions were held in Moscow, the society managed to recruit and instruct people from far-off regions of the country, who joined in the collecting activities. Moreover, to attract more visitors, the exhibition itself was preceded and accompanied by high-level lectures on the topic for the educated public and free scientific demonstrations and readings for people with lower educational status. Bogdanov tried to sidestep the manifestation of ‘Pan-Slavism’ (Krivosheina 2014: 286) – embodied in the never ending pompous and extravagant dinners and feasts that the congress essentially turned into.

The preparation of the exhibition of 1867 did follow a carefully designed academic plan. In addition to collecting objects and recording information about various items and their original owners, watercolour and pencil sketches and photographs were made. The instruction by the Russian Imperial Geographic Society (drawn by N. I. Nadezhdin) was used when collecting the items of the exhibition. It listed all the everyday objects they were looking for. It was sent to different guberniyas (provinces); however, it turned out to be not so easy to get the full response as some regions failed to supply the items. Some of them were purchased using the funds given by the members of the Imperial family and state officials. A large part of the collection to represent the Russian Empire was given as a gift by members of the Society of Devotees, those who were collectors of antiques among the nobility, the entrepreneurs (merchant) and the intelligentsia. The committee invited sculptors (Professor N. A. Ramazanov, academician S. I. Ivanov) to make mannequins and artists to create folk costumes: M. L. Sevryugin, Ya. M. Yakovlev, S. P. Zakrevsky, A. M. Lyubimov. They worked on the basis of photographs (and in some cases – drawings) obtained from different regions of Russia and foreign Slavic countries, reflecting people and natural settings. (Bodrova and Suleymanova 2017: 78–79) (Figures 2 and 3). The success story of the ethnographic photograph seemed unstoppable – the all-Russian ethnographic exposition in Moscow in 1867 already showed more than two thousand pictures (Cvetkovski 2012: 14).

The Opening of the Exhibition and its Main Departments: The Scope and The Colourfulness

The first all-Russian ethnographic exhibition opened on April 23, 1867. According to S. V. Maksimov, an ethnographer, it was an ‘unusual, unprecedented, surreal’ sight. For two months the exhibition was visited by about ninety thousand people (83,048).¹ This caused a great public outcry not only in Russia but also in various countries of Western Europe. Among the visitors were people of different social categories and professions. The number of foreign guests (eight-one in total) whose identity was perceived as Slavic was impressive. They represented Slavic countries, which were under the rule of Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire. The list of guests included famous fighters for freedom and independence, prominent historians, linguists, writers, translators and journalists, lawyers, biologists, doctors, as well as representatives of the clergy and entrepreneurs (merchants), and even students.

The solemnness of the opening underscored the importance of the event only to be further intensified by a prayer service. Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich was declared the honorary chairman of the exhibition. On April 24, the exhibition was visited by Emperor Alexander II with his retinue, the heir to the Tsarevich and his wife Maria Feodorovna. For almost three hours they got acquainted with the exposition ‘with interest’; Alexander II thanked the organisers of the exhibition and approved the idea of its holding.

The style of exhibition was intended to make it seem a colourful theatrical performance. About three hundred skilfully made mannequins in traditional folk costumes were placed on special sites. The main area/space of the exhibition (first department) consisted of three sections (All-Russian Ethnographic Exhibition 1867: 30). The first one presented dummies of aboriginal peoples stressing the vast expanses of Russia – from Alaska, Siberia and the outskirts of the European part of the Russian North to the Caucasus and Crimea, the Baltic States, Central Asia (thirty groups and one hundred sixteen dummies) (Figures 4 and 5). The Eastern Slavs (Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians (ten groups and 118 dummies) made up the second section and Western and Southern Slavs of Central and South-Eastern Europe constituted the third section (Figures 6 and 7).

Despite a strictly academic approach to collecting the items, the very idea of exhibiting the diverse nature of the ethnic groups, covering a large geographical area, was also conveyed via the colourful, festive, and celebratory flavour. Sixty-two full-size dummies with wax heads representing different ethnic types introduced the public of the Western and South Slavs. Often taken from plaster casts of faces or photographs of real people, they produced a lasting impression of authenticity with their variety and originality. Appropriate clothing accessories, hats and jewellery were carefully selected to represent the ethnic and cultural demarcation lines. They conveyed both the individual character of any specific figure and the main types of tribal groups, local ethnic communities and already established nationalities as they had been categorised at that point. We find that it appeals to two of the discourses of modernity – that of an individual with his or her particular features worthy of being (re)presented and that of constructed nationalities within or across established state borders.

Visitors were meant to be impressed by the decorative background as well. The mannequins were surrounded by a variety of plants, carefully selected for the corresponding climatic zones. Models of snow-capped mountain peaks, authentic homes, clay huts, yurts, caravans, tools of artisans, hunters, fishermen and even stuffed animals, deer, horses and dogs.²

The second general ethnographic department displayed four hundred sets of everyday and festive men's and women's clothing; 1,200 household items, models of buildings and tools, two hundred drawings and photographs; and more than five hundred different musical instruments, including a harp, a tambourine, a shaman's tambourine, clay and wooden whistles and even Aleutian castanets made from bird beaks, shaman tambourines.

One more argument in favour of the academic nature of Bogdanov's original plan in the are the elements of the third department of the 1867 exhibit – that of physical anthropology with an archaeological collection created with his personal funds of. It consisted of 1,500 exhibits, including six hundred skulls, three hundred anatomical drawings, twenty-three anthropological instruments, among which there were such craniological devices as Anselm's cephalometer and Broca's craniometer. The archaeological collection included artefacts extracted from the burial mounds (kernels, coins and other archaeological artefacts – three hundred items), old manuscripts. This part was mainly intended for specialists, and yet its presence was significant for the general public as well.

Bogdanov, keeping abreast of the times (Krivosheina 2014: 284), played a major role in drafting a preliminary outline of his ‘exhibition method’, that is, the use of large-scale exhibitions as a means of dissemination of scientific knowledge. M. Mogilner (2013: 82) points to the dynamic coexistence and interaction of racial-biological and cultural models of groupness (exemplified by anthropology and ethnography, respectively) in late imperial Russia (Elfimov 2013: 55).

As previously stated, the main political idea of the exposition was to accentuate the Pan-Slavic identity of Russians (Great Russians), Ukrainians, Belarusians, Western and Southern Slavs. The Great Russian part of the exposition was designed as the most sophisticated and the most impressive – a demonstration of the diversity in economic activity of the peasant and urban population of several central provinces of Russia. To achieve this effect signifying the new ‘modern’ times, three staged expositions were created: an example of making goods (a form of production), a fair and a home of a well-off peasant. The hut with three windows of the prosperous peasant-artisan and merchant was designed in its natural size. It was richly adorned with interior decoration: popular prints of the seventeenth century, an icon placed in the corner, a bed covered with a blanket of colourful patchwork. All of these items were donated by N. S. Tikhonravov, professor at Moscow University and historian of Russian literature. The yard of the hut was packed with carts, wheels, brooms, stools, and next to the house there was a shop with all kinds of products made of wood, leather, copper, tin and glass. It was full of goods that satisfy the daily needs of the peasants: weaving products, crosses of various configurations, decorated with copper and enamel; toys, mirrors, enamel earrings and even glasses for ten rubles a dozen – a sign of urban life entering the rural areas.

The fair scene was especially picturesque. One could walk around the fair and look at folk costumes of the mannequins depicting people of different professions: a blacksmith, a coachman, a bookseller, popular prints and spoons, a boy selling kvass, an old man driving a bear, and so on. Interestingly, Alexander II and the Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna visited this particular part of the exhibit.

Such an homage to modernity, in terms of the diversification of jobs and new professions and the difference between the city and the rural area, was comparable to the ways in which other global exhibits demonstrated change (Inozemtseva 2009; Zaitzev 2001). In contrast to the 1855 Exposition, dominated by the category of race to match British industrialisation, in 1867 the empire's ‘social’ doctrine, embodied by the exposition's organisers, staged industry and labour not only as economic values but as cultural facts, envisioned in socio-ethnographic terms if not as forms of spectacle. The World's Fair in France (1867) brought together approximately fifty thousand exhibitors from thirty-two countries and attracted an estimated eleven million visitors over eight months. It appears that the Russian case showed signs of change in all these directions (Barth 2008; Brunet and Talley 2008).

The Russians were followed by an exposition of Ukrainians (Malorussians) and Belarusians. The Ukrainians were represented by sixteen mannequins in folk costumes from the Kharkov, Voronezh, Kiev, Podolsk, Chernigov provinces, again offering in plot scenes from the life of peasants, and a life-size model of a hut. Belarusians were represented by six figures involved in genre scenes representing domestic life and the main occupations of the peasants of the Mogilev province. The specific layout of the exhibition emphasises the richness of the Russian part of the imperial collection with the clear emphasis on the Great Russians and underscores Pan-Slavic unity and common identity.

Visitors were attracted by a collection of popular prints, albums of old clothes of ethnic groups of Czech Hanaks, Dalmatians and Danube Bulgarians; lithographs of Austrian Slavs (Czechs, Slovaks, Croats and Slovenes), Serbs and Rusyns of southern Hungary, numerous photographs of residents of the Triune Kingdom of Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia; a photo of Czech deputies of the Prague Sejm, expelled from it at the very beginning of the formation of the dualist empire of Austria-Hungary. 2,000 items were purchased and donated by M. F. Raevsky (1811–1884), the priest of the Russian Church in Vienna, as well as other figures of the Slavic national revival who brought in a huge contribution to the creation of the exposition of the Southern and Western Slavs.

Donors and collectors from among the foreign guests of the exhibition did their best to make it as complete and varied as possible: some of the exhibits represented local ethnic groups, differing in clothing, rituals and dialect features.

For the first time, questions about the existence of various types of ethnic communities, about “local” names and dialects were raised by P.-Yu. Shafarik, the author of the outstanding works ‘Slavic antiquities’ (1837) and ‘Slavic description of peoples’ (1842), translated into Russian by O. M. Bodyansky in 1841 and 1848. The works of the first Russian university Slavists: I. I. Sreznevsky, O. M. Bodyansky, P. I. Preis and V. I. Grigorovich for the study of the Southern and Western Slavs became an important milestone in the history of ethnographic Slavic studies (Kerimova 1997: 60–102). Based on the previous world by V. Ganka, V. Karadjic, and F. Palatsy, a very detailed and carefully thought through representation of the Slavic peoples and their small ethnic communities found its material implementation at the exhibit. Until the middle of the nineteenth century little, if any attention had been drawn to such comprehensive categorisation. For instance, the Czechs and Slovaks, who settled in the nineteenth century in Bohemia, Moravia, Slovakia, Slavonia, Austria, Hungary and partly in Prussia and Galicia, were presented at the exhibition in folk festive costumes collected by the famous Czech poet and translator K.-J. Erben, the Slavonian manufacturer F. Lay and the priest of the Russian embassy church in Vienna. M. F. Raevsky. The figures of Czech peasants from the Domažlice district represented the local ethnic group of the Hodos (or Bulaks) – they were settled along the border, protecting the Czech lands from the Bavarian Germans – something the exhibit intended to emphasise as the cultural barrier against the non-Slavic neighbours. Their costumes were more echoes of old clothes and reflected the influence of the new urban culture (leather and suede trousers, fur coats and hats). The second scene represented male and female costumes from the vicinity of Pilsen, drawing special attention to the characteristic features in costumes of this particular region. The third group were Czechs-Ganaks and Slovaks from Moravia (from the vicinity of Kromeriz and Podivin). Seven figures demonstrated the Slovak costume of South Moravia and Hungary.

The Polish exposition consisted of four groups: Velikopolyans from the borderland with East Prussia and Poznan, Poles-Krakowians from Kieleck province, Poles-Mazurs – inhabitants of Warsaw district, Poles-Kurpiks of Lomzha province. Traditional clothes, household items and photographs from the Kingdom of Poland were donated by the Prince V.A. Cherkassky, generals A. I. Rozhnov and N.A. Butskovsky, Baron N. V. Medem, by collegiate adviser A. A. Gervais.

In the Croatian exposition, spectators could find themselves most attracted by the group of border guards again stressing the border character of the settlement (southern borders of Austria) and the difference with the Other. That was made possible thanks to the acquisition of their folk costumes. The exposition, four dummies in military ammunition, Slavonian folk costumes, a collection of photographs, musical instruments were mainly purchased with the money of the guest of the exhibition, the manufacturer F. Lay as well as the forementioned priest of the Russian embassy church in Vienna M. F. Raevsky who asked the editor of Slawische blattes newspaper in Vienna. A. Lukshich, a Croatian, in May 1866 visited Pesht, Novy-Sad, Vukovar, Zagreb, and Ljubliana to hold talks with the outstanding leaders of national movements to send the ethnographic items to the exhibition. Lukshitch not only contacted the leaders directly but also published this information in his newspaper – asking people to send whatever ethnographic objects they deemed appropriate (Raevsky Archive 1975: 273). Many Slavic activists responded to his call – whether because of them sympathising with Russia or due to the political situation in Habsburg's monarchy.

In the nineteenth century, Croats lived in the Triune Kingdom of Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia, which was at first under the rule of the Habsburg monarchy, and from 1867 under the rule of the dualistic Austro-Hungarian empire; they were settled partially in Istria, on the military border and in the west of Herzegovina. There were many local ethnic groups of Croats: Morlaks, Zagors, Bunyevats, Chichi, Lichans, Bezyaks and others. Among them were the Zagors people (Zagoryan and Zagoryanka), the border guards of the Sluinsky regiment and the Croats of the Central Zagreb region (the vicinity of the town of Karlovac). The Yugoslav Society for History and Language in Zagreb played an important role in the acquisition of folk costume.

Slovenes were meant to look rather exotic and colourful. Scattered across the lands of Carinthia, Styria and Krajina, which were part of Austria-Hungary, they did their best to protect and reproduce their distinctive ethnic culture. A Catholic priest Matija Mayar (1809–1892) (Index to the Ethnographic Exhibition 1867: 70–76), an outstanding Slovenian public figure, philologist and ethnographer, provided items for a festive scene of rural wedding of local ethnic group of Slovenes zilyan (four men and two women from the Ziel Valley) bordering with Italy. The bishop denied him a trip to Moscow, but he managed to send photographs and drawings depicting the main characters of the Slovenian wedding to the preparatory committee of the exhibition in 1866 (Figure 8). Mayar accompanied the exhibits with descriptions of all the details of the wedding ceremony presenting more as a treatise, which outlined Mayar's views on the history and customs of Slovenes (Churkina 1986: 75–76). The composition attracted the attention of the ancient rite of “breaking the barrel” (a symbol of a happy marriage and loss of virginity by the bride and groom on their wedding night). The hut, decorated with picturesque wood carvings, was meant to attract the visitors as they entered. The wedding scene was set up so that the audience could personally participate in the action. Despite all the obstacles, Mayar managed to visit the exhibition in Moscow (Jezernik 2011).

The next ethnic group, although originally non-Russian, already had their small enclave within the boundaries of the empire: Serbs were settled in the Serbian principality, vassal of the Ottoman Empire, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Some of them lived in Austria and southern Hungary. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the Serbs moved to Russia from Austria, where the Slavic Serb district of the Ekaterinoslav province was formed. In the Serbian exposition (fourteen figures), a group depicting a blind guslar surrounded by fourteen peasants from different regions of the principality against the background of the monastery wall was especially picturesque. The singer's dummy was made from a cast and a photograph of one minister of a village church. The donors of costumes and some items were Prince Mikhail Obrenovich, Priest J. Milutinovich, and Archpriest B. Petranovich. The idea for this scene belonged to N. A. Popov, who from 1862 to 1864, on his own initiative, travelled to many Slavic lands. It is possible that drawing special attention to an emotional aspect of the scene was meant to evoke compassion and solidarity.

Montenegro brought about different sentiments and attracted the Russian public as practically the only unconquered corner in the Balkans – a stronghold of freedom and independence for all southern Slavs who had fought against the Ottoman and Austrian invaders for centuries. The original Montenegrin lands (Boka-Kotorska or Kotor region), which were of great importance for Montenegrins as an outlet to the sea, since 1815, together with Dalmatia, were part of the Habsburg monarchy. Being in a state of constant confrontation between the Ottoman Empire and Austria, Montenegro in the nineteenth century remained a predominantly peasant country with elements of tribal relations.

The strive to remain independent could be traced to deep historical roots: the local ethnic group of Bokez was attributed to the Montenegrins who continued to live in the Kotor district (there were other groups: Dobroits, Parastans, Risans). Therefore, in the Montenegrin exposition there were figures of two Bokez residents, in whose clothes the Italian influence was felt. There were also three Montenegrins in ancient festive clothes (men with daggers and pistols; women with a characteristic massive folk belt decorated with three rows of carnelian and silver scissors). Their figures looked stern and majestic against the background of high mountain peaks. Folk costumes were donated by Prince Nikolai of Montenegro, Princess Darinka and Archimandrite N. Ducic. At the same time a more modern, Italian influence was felt in the two Bokez residents, in whose clothes the Italian influence was felt.

Bulgarians were represented by mannequins in women's and men's clothing from the Tarnovo District, the Macedonians – twelve sets of clothing from the Bitolsky District and the left bank of the Struma River (Kerimova 2009: 120).

The arrival of the Slavic guests in Russia left a deep and vivid impression both for them and for the Russian public. According to contemporary interpretations, the exhibition was designed to awaken a deep awareness of common interests, cultural unity and brotherhood of Slavic peoples, and it helped them to get closer and help each other (Zhakova 2009: 23). The closing ceremony of the ethnographic exhibition in Moscow on 19 June 1867 turned into a grand event with the representatives of all European countries and all social strata of the population of Moscow present thus symbolising a common identity – be it the historical roots, everyday practices, the preparedness to invest in education and enlightenment, and common religion and political unity.

Together with other members of the Imperial Society of the Devotees of Science, Bogdanov was persistent in emphasising the academic character of the exhibit. Even though the representation of the ethnic groups forming the non-Slavic and Slavic territories of Russia and beyond drew the most attention it was the third – anthropology – section of the exhibition that once again underscores the academic nature of Bogdanov's personal quest to promote science in Russia. In his understanding, the exhibit was meant to be a tool for studying and popularising ethnographic and anthropological knowledge.

It is A. Hofmeister's comparative analysis of British and Russian imperial-scientific cultures that reminds of the need to view knowledge as a technique and cultural resource. Especially for the late Tsarist period, alongside distinctions such as religious confession, economic stage, degree of civilization, or infrastructural relevance, ethnicity was largely used as a political instrument for branding intra-imperial difference (Cvetkovski 2014: 4). Its use in this case implied a sophisticated academic level.

The Origins of the Big Ideas: The Intersection of Politics, Science, and Culture

The historiography of the First Russian Ethnographic Exhibit of 1867 often emphasises its political goals, which included demonstrating imperial ambitions of Russia and bringing together the foreign (non-Russian) Slavic peoples: ‘originally thought of as a world exhibit it soon turned into a Pan-Slavist congress similar to those seen in other countries according to some prominent politicians of the time’ (Jezernik 2011: 47). Some connect the political and the academic: the history of the ethnographic exhibition is then discussed (Knight, 2001) in terms of Russian ethnic identity and transition from ‘Official Nationality’ to Great Russian nationalism.

The archives and sources we analysed from that time demonstrate that the core idea of the exhibit – both at the stage of its preparation and the execution – exemplified new approaches to presenting and comparing historical and ethnographic data. It intended to cover everyday life, rituals, religion and customs of both the peoples in Russia and outside the state borders (namely, Southern and Western Slavs). The exhibition not only emphasised the similarities (as well as distinctions) between the ethnic groups but actually promoted intercultural interaction in the form of expanding knowledge and attempting to contrast the traditions of different peoples. The detailed character of the exhibition, its colourfulness and authenticity all played a part in making these efforts successful. Looking at what had been going on during various stages of the exhibit allows us to make arguments in favour of viewing the event as an academic endeavour.

According to some interpretations, Russian ethnography originated as first and foremost an empirical and practical knowledge-based field; the accumulation of data about the peoples of Russia started as early as the twelfth century Povest vremennykh let – The Tale of Bygone Years – and gradually continued throughout the seventeenth century. It intensified considerably in the eighteenth to the first half of the nineteenth century and was finally formed as a field with the establishment of the Ethnographic department (therefore, ethnography was the term until much later – the beginning of the twentieth century) Russian Imperial Geographic Society. Large-scale expeditions were organised by the Academy of Sciences covering a wide territory throughout Russia (Tokarev 1951).

The growing interest towards ‘Others’ – different peoples and ethnic groups/communities in the nineteenth century appear to be closely related to the development of self-knowledge, self-reflection and the striving for national identity. Given what modernity called for – politically and culturally – ethnography in Russia contributed both to the cultural consolidation of the peoples of the Russian Empire and to the perception of the existing hierarchy of the Russian Orthodox and non-Russian Orthodox ethnic groups. One of the new effective means of presenting this knowledge could be found in displaying the imperial gallery of peoples (ethnic groups) that inhabited the territory of Russia in the eighteenth and first half of the nineteenth century. In fact, beyond the political context, the presentation of Western and Southern Slavs can be interpreted as a means of deepening and expanding ethnographic knowledge. The exhibition's most popular sites – namely the Russian fair and the Slovenian wedding – testify to the fact that such an approach was successful, bridging the old and the new by the use of a scene of a fair and displaying diversity of the Slav brothers while also stressing the closeness of their ethnic traditions: the main idea of pan-Slavism was to show the unity and the coming together of Slavs under the auspices of Russia (something that caused great concern in the foreign press).

At the same time, one cannot help but see another consequence of the new times: the exhibition offered the chance to pay close ethnographic attention to the actual people as individuals (mannequins representing a person – somehow signifying the shift to modernity and its emphasis on the individual). Categorisation and classification went hand in hand with an attempt to see a person in specific life settings. Given this duality, Russian ethnography in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries followed its route in a manner somewhat similar to Western ethnological and anthropological studies. However, the latter tended to synthesise the general course of human evolution from fragments of different cultures, while the Western evolutionist paradigm looked more closely at the development of the cultural stages the peoples of the world had attained and less so to the individual ethnic groups (Golovnev 2018: 13). This slight difference in approaches to examining and presenting the complexity of the world in its everyday manifestations was accentuated at the exhibition.

We argue that that in the second half of the nineteenth century the ethnographic academic field was firmly established not only in Western Europe and America, but also in Russia. The 1867 exhibition serves as a good example of what an enormous amount of factual material had been accumulated, in part, thanks to the foundation of the Russian Geographical Society in 1846. The very search for this material throughout Russia reflected a growing interest in the field on the part of the developing academic community: the collecting contributed to the emergence of generalising analytical works, to elaborating theoretical concepts (K. M. Baer, N.I. Nadezhdin and K. D. Kavelin formulated the main principles of the Russian ethnography), the establishment of ethnographic societies and special periodicals (‘Russian Imperial Geographical Society Notes’, ‘Ethnographic Collections of the RIGS’, ‘RIGS Notes on Ethnography’, ‘RIGS Bulletin’, ‘Works of the Russian Imperial Academy of Sciences’, etc.).

The Russian Empire, being the only Slavic independent state, supported the Slavic countries in terms of maintaining cultural ties, publications, subsidies etc. It now strived to come up with a very materialistic implementation of that support – something that could actually be displayed and demonstrated on a level that would appear credible in its everyday and scientific way. The reason for the congress of scholars from foreign Slavic regions to coincide with the exhibit stemmed from the idea of the unity of the languages and cultures of the Slavic peoples – across the then-existing borders.

The scope of such demonstration reflected a strong belief in a common fate in the past (now embodied in colourful similar traditions) and hope for the future. Moreover, on a political and ideological level such tendencies were associated with new outbursts of resistance of the Western and Southern Slavs to ‘Germanisation’, ‘Magyarisation’ and ‘Ottomanisation’. The exhibition not only signified a keen interest in Slavic identity but also offered the interpretation of what it meant to be Slavic, through colourful visual imagery.

As Hoffenberg writes: ‘Empire and nation could be envisioned, illustrated, and imagined according to common ethnographic terms and visual modes at the exhibitions. The envisioning of the material and social worlds at the exhibitions made public and visible much that was generally private and invisible’ (2001: 18). He continues: ‘exhibitions offered the objects and activities of mass education and entertainment, providing the public culture necessary for the participatory remaking of history, memory, and identities’ (Hoffenberg 2001: 273). The exact proportions of science behind these other elements can be conditionally measured given the context of what ‘scientific’ meant at the time (generally speaking and depending on a specific country) and what is the way of interpreting it now.

Conclusion

The all-Russian ethnographic exhibition opened a new stage in the development of ethnographic science in Russia by carrying out its goal – to demonstrate both the power of Tsarist Russia and the diversity of its ethnic groups and peoples, while rallying the Southern and Western Slavs around Russia. Its characteristic feature was that of reflecting a modernising society by choosing the means of interpreting and representing reality and sending a powerful message (Jezernik 2011).

The exhibit – possible in its entirety thanks to the unlimited efforts by Bogdanov and others and their truly visionary qualities and approaches – signifies a turn to a culturally distinct and novel Russia as it combines the following key features. One is the emergence of interest and sufficient agency on the part of a scholar to promote such a grandiose event. Another is the presence and simultaneous development of the infrastructure to execute the plan. The third point is the cultural demand for an ethnic/political identity being constructed on an intra-nation level beyond the Russian borders. The latter was achieved through representing as detailed and thoroughly categorised array of ethnic communities – the ones that had not been previously recognised on such scale. That alone suggested a new stage in the development of ethnography. Finally, the exhibit reflected a new demarcation line and another type of ‘othering’ – that of exorcising the peasants and the rural areas for the eyes of the city public.

On the basis of the collected exhibits, the first ethnographic museum in Moscow was created. The exhibition contributed to the founding (in 1868) of the Ethnographic Department of the Imperial Society of Devotees of Natural Science, Anthropology and Ethnography at Moscow University. Thus, Russian ethnology loudly proclaimed itself a separate independent science in a voice that could now be heard way beyond the academic community. The precious collection of the exhibition is still kept in the Russian Ethnographic Museum in St. Petersburg.

The main purpose of the exhibition was to create the first ethnographic museum in Moscow and the Ethnographic Department of the Imperial Society of Devotees of Natural Science, Anthropology and Ethnography at Moscow University. These important developments support our argument in favour of emphasising the academic and cultural nature of the efforts that brought about the exhibition. At the same time events surrounding the exhibition (i.e., the Slavic Congress) clearly had a political subtext to them.