In this article, based on the analysis of Russian literature, memoirs of participants and published materials, documents from the archives of the Russian Federation, the author reconstructed the history of expeditions organized by the Russian authorities to the eastern (Turkmen) shore of the Caspian Sea in the first quarter of the 19th century. The purpose of the expeditions was to find and organize a place for the foundation of the Russian commercial and naval fortifications. Military, officials, scientists, merchants were involved in the expeditions, which were of an intelligence and economic nature. The program of the expeditions was formulated by representatives of the highest authorities of the Russian Empire, the treasury also paid for all the costs of their organization and implementation. The expeditions were equipped and sent to the Turkmen coast from the Astrakhan port, the main Russian point on the Volga-Caspian route. During the expeditions, extremely important scientific data were obtained: on ethnography, socio-economic and cultural life of Turkmen tribes and cartography. It was possible to enlist the support of the heads of the Turkmen coastal tribes, to form a list of goods that was interesting for the local population. The results of the expeditions eventually allowed the Russian authorities to decide on a place to establish their trading post (and port) and begin building the Novo-Petrovsky fortification on Mangyshlak in the 1840s.

Научная статьяУДК 297(091)(47).

The author analyzes the memoirs of Ibrahim Makhmudovich Makhmudov (1893-1970), an Astrakhan Yurt Tatar, one of the active builders of the Soviet system in the Tatar villages of the Astrakhan region. Shortly before his death, in 1969, I.M. Makhmudov completed a handwritten version of his memoirs, in which he reflected aspects of the daily life of the Muslim community of the Yurt-Tatar village of Zatsarevo in 1900-14. Based on the personal observations, Makhmudov compiled memories of the last decade and a half of the quiet life of the Tatar-Muslim community of a provincial Russian town before the turbulent events of wars and revolutions that ended with the establishment of Soviet power. The author of the memoirs, as an eyewitness and bearer of cultural tradition, comprehensively and deeply, sometimes scrupulously, covers the events of the early 20th century in a closed Muslim community - the mahalla. However, his assessments to these events and lifestyle area also assessments of a Soviet party leader, who both was an atheist and a person with a huge life experience in the struggle for the ideals of Soviet power as well as a convinced supporter.