“The Ainu are a meek, modest, good-natured, trusting, sociable, polite people, respecting property; on the hunt he is brave and … even intelligent."
A. P. Chekhov
At the crossroads of civilizations. In the previous article dedicated to the Ainu, a mysterious people who are considered the indigenous population of the Japanese islands, we talked about its history based on materials from the Japanese Museum of the Ainu in Hokkaido. But not only the Japanese are involved in the Ainu, by no means. Materials related to their history and culture ended up, for example, in the Museum of the American Indian in Washington, although the Ainu themselves did not seem to appear in America. How did this happen? But how: when the Americans "discovered" Japan in the 19th century, they also visited Hokkaido. They took pictures of local residents, bought samples of clothing and weapons of labor. And then all this fell into the famous Smithsonian Institution, on the basis of which the Museum of the Indians was created. But our historians are also on the alert. So, Sakhalin archaeologists recently found two monuments at once, which indicate that the Ainu were in Russia, or rather, on the Kuril Islands. This is a burial on the island of Shikotan and traces of the ancient settlement of the Ainu on the island of Tanfiliev, which is part of the Small Kuril Ridge. Yes, actually, why shouldn't they swim here? After all, if they inhabited the Japanese islands back in the Neolithic era, then the ocean level was then lower than now, there is more land, the islands are closer. That is why it was easier for them to master them.
Ainu mostly live in Japan these days. The census showed that there are about 25,000 of them, but there is also unofficial data that say that there are actually more of them - about 200,000. Moreover, they differ from the native Japanese strikingly, they have either Australoid or Caucasoid features. Well, such a feature as a thick beard is completely atypical for Mongoloids. That is, when we see the faces of the Japanese in the photographs, which are not similar to the Japanese themselves, then the reason here may be many factors, including the presence of the Ainu among their ancestors. Which is not so incredible. There are known Japanese families with Ainu roots who were related to other families, so the presence of Ainu genes in many Japanese is possible.
For a long time it was believed that the Ainu were aliens from Micronesia, since in the summer they tried to walk in only one loincloth. And their language was not similar to either Japanese or other oriental languages. Now it seems to be established that the ancestors of the Ainu, before reaching the Japanese islands, visited Tibet, and, obviously, passed China, and only after that they settled here.
It is quite possible that on the territory of Russia the Ainu habitat zone was wide enough. This could be the lower reaches of the Amur, and the south of the Kamchatka Peninsula, the entire Sakhalin Island and the Kuril Islands. And yes, indeed, they also managed to be found in Russia, only there were very few of them, about a hundred people, mainly from Kamchatka. It is interesting that they believe that their distant ancestors lived on the islands of Iturup, Kunashir, Shikotan and Habomai.
Several dozen Ainu burials were found on Shikotan. It is quite possible that they came here in the 19th century from the Northern Kuriles, from where they were brought by the Japanese during the division of the island lands with Russia. It is known that the displaced Ainu usually had a very hard time. But they have quite good memories of life under the rule of the Russian Empire. Judging by their stories, they were satisfied above all by the fact that the Russians did not interfere in their affairs and turned out to be much more merciful towards them than the Japanese …
Apparently, this is why many Ainu were baptized and began to profess Orthodoxy. They willingly made contact with Russian travelers who were exploring the Kuril Islands. And those, in turn, noted in their diary entries the characteristic features of this people. For example, the Russian navigator and explorer Ivan Kruzenshtern, who sailed in these waters, wrote the following about the Ainu:
"Such truly rare qualities, which they owe not to an exalted education, but to nature alone, aroused in me the feeling that I regard this people as the best of all the others that are still known to me."
That's even how - and it's all thanks to nature!
For example, on Tanfiliev Island, perhaps the smallest of the Kuril Islands (its area is only 15 square kilometers), remains of ceramic vessels characteristic of the Ainu and a number of other artifacts were found. Pottery clearly belonged to the Jomon culture (as evidenced by the spiral patterns applied to it), it is very ancient, it is about eight thousand years old. And what is surprising is that it was the Ainu who somehow managed to preserve their primitive culture for thousands of years!
Other peoples also succeeded, but many of them lived in isolation, while the Ainu of ancient Yamato were in constant contact with the ancestors of today's Japanese. Yes, they learned how to drink sake, but … that's all, perhaps. Well, our archaeologists have work here, at the end of the earth, to find out how long ago people lived here and who they were.
It is interesting that the Ainu today are actively seeking to participate in the dialogue about the Kurils and to reconsider the issue of their belonging, taking into account their, the Ainu, interests. After all, Japan, they say, has appropriated our lands where we once lived. So, while carrying out excavations, we may well face an interesting paradox: do Japan and Russia have the right to divide all these lands among themselves? Indeed, back in the 19th century, the old-timers of Sakhalin Island used to say: “Sakhalin is the land of the Ainu, there is no Japanese land on Sakhalin”.
There is also a unique diorama in the museum's exposition - a model made by exiled convicts of the early 20th century, which depicts the famous bear festival of the Ainu. Moreover, its uniqueness lies primarily in the material from which it is made. This is our ordinary black bread, which, by the way, is an excellent material for modeling. It is both a historical monument and good information for small business organizers to think about. “Figurines made of bread according to the technology of Russian convicts from Sakhalin at the beginning of the 20th century” are advertising anywhere, isn't it? And here you can make whole sets of figures "Russian Fair," Russian Bath "and" Religious Procession ", and all the same Ainu -" An exact copy of the diorama of the early XX century … from a museum on Sakhalin "and much, much more in the best traditions of the primordial Russian culture!
And now, not only oral legends, but also material evidence confirm that the Ainu in the past, and not so long ago historically, lived both on Sakhalin and on many of the Kuril Islands.
