The 1904 "Album of Russian Beauties" reveals a mult-iethnic, diverse Russian Empire
When I saw humus's scans of a photo album published by Russkiy Listok (Russian Sheet) newspaper in 1904, I thought it was going to be a curious novelty. I would send a link to tweelore, mysticowl, annanov and maybe kafka_chan and move on.
But as I looked through it, I realized that once you get past the aristocrats in the first few pages, you find something interesting. You see actresses, ballerinas - and ordinary Russian women. And while all of them were Russian imperial subjects, quite a few of them weren't ethnically Russian.
"Actress Mme. Mitkevich"
Some aristocrats, I think (left - Mme. Miliketti, right - Mme. Truhanova)
No captions on these ones
Performers (left to right - Mme Mme. Yachmeneva, Mne Hil'kova and Mme. Hrinnnikova)
And here's where it starts to get interesting. The photo on the right is captioned as "Mme. Dal'skaya," while the photo on the left is simply captioned as "Georgian woman."
Georgia as in the country. Just in case there's any confusion.
No caption
Counter-clockwise from the top - an Estonian, a Pole and a woman from Odessa (which is in modern Belarus Ukraine, but since her ethnicity isn't specified, I'm not going to assume she's Belarusian Ukrainian)
A Ukrianian (from Poltaskaya province) and a Pole (from Podol'skaya province)
Actress Mme Domasheva and ballerina Mme. Kyaksht'
A Belarusian woman and actress Mme. Polikova
A Crimean Tatar and a Ukrainian from the Kievskaya province
A Finn and a Jew
A Swede (from the Dutchy of Finland) and Actress Mme Nadimova.
An unnamed Russian actress and a Moldavian
Two Ukrainian women. The one on the left is from the POdool'skaya province, while the one on the right is from Chernigovskaya province.
A Donn Cossack and a Ukrianian
A Pole and a Jew
The woman in the middle isn't captioned. The woman on the left is captioned as a Romanian from Russia, while the one on the right is captioned as a Finnish Swede.
Actress A.H.V. and a Belarussian
A Russian Greek and a German
A Belarusian Jew and a woman from the Volgograd region
I actually had to look up the caption for the woman on the left. She is a Buryat, which is a major Siberian indigenous group. The caption for the woman on the right was easy enough - she lived in the Arhangelsk province, the northernmost province in Russian Empire (and even now, it's home to the northernmost city in the Russian Federation)
The back page, which is an ad for subscriptions to Russkiy Listok - which may be interesting to the journalists reading this but probably no one else.
In the end, what intrigued me isn't just that their catalog of Russian beauty didn't just include ethnic Russians. It's that, while we get to see women dressed up in traditional costumes, we also get to see women who don't look like stereotypical [insert ethnicity]. And it also shows that Russian was hoe to ethnic groups most Russians doesn't associate with Russia - Greeks and Germans. And that even the parts of Russian Empire that are now independent countries were more ethnically complex than we tend to assume.
That's something that people tend to overlook, even in this day and age
But as I looked through it, I realized that once you get past the aristocrats in the first few pages, you find something interesting. You see actresses, ballerinas - and ordinary Russian women. And while all of them were Russian imperial subjects, quite a few of them weren't ethnically Russian.
"Actress Mme. Mitkevich"
Some aristocrats, I think (left - Mme. Miliketti, right - Mme. Truhanova)
No captions on these ones
Performers (left to right - Mme Mme. Yachmeneva, Mne Hil'kova and Mme. Hrinnnikova)
And here's where it starts to get interesting. The photo on the right is captioned as "Mme. Dal'skaya," while the photo on the left is simply captioned as "Georgian woman."
Georgia as in the country. Just in case there's any confusion.
No caption
Counter-clockwise from the top - an Estonian, a Pole and a woman from Odessa (which is in modern Belarus Ukraine, but since her ethnicity isn't specified, I'm not going to assume she's Belarusian Ukrainian)
A Ukrianian (from Poltaskaya province) and a Pole (from Podol'skaya province)
Actress Mme Domasheva and ballerina Mme. Kyaksht'
A Belarusian woman and actress Mme. Polikova
A Crimean Tatar and a Ukrainian from the Kievskaya province
A Finn and a Jew
A Swede (from the Dutchy of Finland) and Actress Mme Nadimova.
An unnamed Russian actress and a Moldavian
Two Ukrainian women. The one on the left is from the POdool'skaya province, while the one on the right is from Chernigovskaya province.
A Donn Cossack and a Ukrianian
A Pole and a Jew
The woman in the middle isn't captioned. The woman on the left is captioned as a Romanian from Russia, while the one on the right is captioned as a Finnish Swede.
Actress A.H.V. and a Belarussian
A Russian Greek and a German
A Belarusian Jew and a woman from the Volgograd region
I actually had to look up the caption for the woman on the left. She is a Buryat, which is a major Siberian indigenous group. The caption for the woman on the right was easy enough - she lived in the Arhangelsk province, the northernmost province in Russian Empire (and even now, it's home to the northernmost city in the Russian Federation)
The back page, which is an ad for subscriptions to Russkiy Listok - which may be interesting to the journalists reading this but probably no one else.
In the end, what intrigued me isn't just that their catalog of Russian beauty didn't just include ethnic Russians. It's that, while we get to see women dressed up in traditional costumes, we also get to see women who don't look like stereotypical [insert ethnicity]. And it also shows that Russian was hoe to ethnic groups most Russians doesn't associate with Russia - Greeks and Germans. And that even the parts of Russian Empire that are now independent countries were more ethnically complex than we tend to assume.
That's something that people tend to overlook, even in this day and age