Everyone knows how far behind Belarusians lag from their neighbors in matters of defending their native language, preserving historical-cultural heritage, and national identity. Belarusians are extremely cautious, because we have no other choice: every time we raise a linguistic or territorial-ethnographic question, we think about the possible consequences.
In “Nashe Slova” of May 19, 2010, a response was published by Professor Ivan Lepeshau to Mr. Siarhei Artsiukh, who indignantly wrote about the need for Belarusian education in the Smolensk, Bryansk, and Pskov regions. It is hard to disagree with Professor Lepeshau’s conclusions: a Russified population would hardly approve of forced or voluntary “Belarusianization,” which even in Belarus is wanted by few. A mass Belarusian movement in the Smolensk, Bryansk, and Pskov regions does not exist and probably never will, although for a long time the indigenous population will still feel their difference from the Great Russians, and some of them may even identify as Belarusians. To learn how Belarusian consciousness is preserved in the Smolensk region, and what the Belarusian cultural-educational movement in the western parts of Russia lives on, we decided to ask Tver-based Belarusian Alexei Veremovsky, one of the creators of the internet page “Belarusian Smolensk Region.”
Alexei, please tell us how you became a Belarusian? Where does such a pull to your roots come from?
I became a Belarusian on July 29, 1978, when I was born into a family of people from the Belarusian Smolensk Region. My parents came to Tver from the Krasninsky district of Smolensk Oblast, so as a child I spent almost every summer in the Smolensk region. Although I didn’t understand much back then, the appearance and speech of my countrymen told me that by origin I was Belarusian. Moreover, a passion for history played its role. My grandfather told me a great deal about the Krivich antiquity, and also about the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Back then there was absolutely no information about this!
My grandfather once also told this story: in the 1930s, village children sang this ditty:
Let the rain fall
The road is slippery
Run away, bourgeois Denikin
Lenin is already near
A teacher heard them and said: “What kind of wretched language is this? You are Russian children, speak Russian.” So much for Belarusian schools! The policy was clear — to extinguish the seeds of Belarusian separatism. The destruction of the village through collectivization and industrialization also played its role. Numerous Belarusian Smolensk residents are scattered across the boundless expanses of Russia and rarely remember their Belarusian origins.
Do you know many conscious Belarusians in Tver and the Smolensk region?
There are few such individuals: mainly these are people with higher education who are interested in history. A village resident will more often call themselves Russian or Krivich than Belarusian. This phenomenon may also exist because among Smolensk Belarusians there is a negative stereotype toward their western neighbors — Belarusians are considered harmful and rude people. On the other hand, in Russia there is a lack of objective information about Belarusians and Belarus.
How does the local youth relate to their Belarusian roots?
The Tver youth for the most part knows nothing about them, but in the Smolensk region the youth is more informed on this question. Here the proximity of the border is clearly felt.
What are the local Belarusian organizations like?
I can’t say about the Smolensk region, but in Tver a Belarusian national-cultural autonomy was registered last year. By the way, the head of the Oleninsky district, where descendants of Tver Belarusians-Tudovlyans still live, Oleg Dubov, established twinning ties with the Shklov district. It was even announced that Belarusian language instruction was needed in local educational institutions.
However, the ideas about Belarusian culture and history held by some members of our autonomy are somehow utterly wild. One considers Karatkevich a “Polish writer,” another thinks “bulbashy” comes from Taras Bulba, a third thinks that before 1917 the territory of Belarus was entirely swampland, and then Komsomol members came and built cities. Even though these are smart and educated people who frequently travel to Belarus.
In the 1990s, we also had a Belarusian course at one of the Sunday schools. Now, unfortunately, it no longer exists.
Do secondary school and university curricula contain materials about the Belarusian past? Do any scholars work on Belarusian issues?
In Tver there is nothing of the sort, but in the Smolensk region, I know some work is being done.
How does Russian society and academic circles regard Belarusians and our national project?
It’s difficult to speak of any single opinion. Everything again depends on the specific person, their views and convictions. National-patriots deny the very existence of the Belarusian people; national-democrats, on the contrary, welcome Belarusian projects; communists and pensioners love Belarus for the red flag and socialism. Liberals hate Belarus for the same reasons. In general, the Russian person has long held an image of Belarusians as backward villagers. When I was on a tourist trip through Belarus, many Russians traveling with me were simply in shock. One woman said to the guide: “I can’t believe it, because before I thought you had only villages, but here is a European country, European culture, architecture like in France.”
Please tell us about the Belarusians-Tudovlyans. Do they still preserve their Belarusianness?
Gladly. The Tudovlyans are an ethnographic group of Belarusians in the west of the former Rzhev district of Tver province. In the narrow sense, they are the inhabitants of the ancient volosts of Stary Tud, Molody Tud, and Tud-Skovoratyn on both sides of the river of the same name, a right tributary of the Volga. In the broader sense, the name “Tudovlyans” was used by 19th-century ethnographers to designate the entire Belarusian-speaking population of the Upper Volga. From the 7th to 9th centuries, this region, known from the “Tale of Bygone Years” as Okovsky Forest, was settled by Smolensk Krivichs. In the 13th-14th centuries it was part of the Toropets and Rzhev principalities. From the first third of the 14th century, the border of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with the Muscovite and Tver principalities passed here, and “Lithuanian towns: Seluk, Osenech, Goryshin, Bogataya, Sizhka, Tud” were built, which frequently changed hands.
The Tudovlyans definitively remained outside the borders of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania after the border was clarified under the Polyanovka Peace of 1634, but due to the relative isolation of the region, they long preserved distinctly Belarusian features: language, rituals (“babina kasha” and others), games (“karalle,” “prosa”). They differed from the neighboring Russian population by characteristic outer garments of white homespun linen, from which came the nickname “belokaftanshchina” (white-caftan people). Other nicknames were also used — “Polshcha” (Poland), “shaplyaki” (because the Belarusian sounds “dz,” “ts,” soft “s” seemed lispy to the Russian population). The Tudovlyans had no self-designation, though they were aware of their difference from actual Russians.
In 1903, the Tudovlyans were studied by the well-known Belarusian ethnographer Yaukhim Karski, who determined their number at 45 thousand. In 1925-1926, they were studied in detail by N. Grynkova. In the 20th century, differences between the Tudovlyans and the local Russian population practically disappeared, although individual linguistic and other features characteristic of Belarusians were noted by Rzhev local historian I. Vishnyakov as late as the mid-1960s.
Recently an interesting book by Tver local historian Yuri Smirnov, “In the Land of the Tudovlyans,” was published. I recommend it to everyone. It’s hard to judge the future now, but as a student I visited those places on an archaeological expedition, and I can say that the Belarusian speech of local residents has been preserved to this day.
Are any connections established between the indigenous people and Belarus?
Many of my Belarusian acquaintances regularly travel to the homeland, bringing back interesting literature, so gradually Belarusian enlightenment is progressing.
In that case, which representatives of popular culture are popular among local Belarusians?
In music, the older generation favors “Pesnyary,” “Syabry,” “Verasy,” while among the youth, “Lyapis Trubetskoy,” “Stary Olsa,” and “Kryvakryizh” are known. In DVD shops you can find film adaptations of Karatkevich, “Occupation,” “Anastasia Slutskaya.” In bookstores you can buy the collected works of Vasil Bykov — the most popular Belarusian writer among Russians. Contemporary Belarusian authors are practically unknown in Russia.
I’d like to say a few words separately about Belarusian cinema. In my opinion, it has always lacked a romantic streak. A lady from Moscow cinematographic circles once asked me:
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Alexei, did the Belarusians have their own musketeers?
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They did, I replied — and hussars, and uhlans, and Polotsk musketeers who helped Suvorov take Izmail, and Minsk musketeers who distinguished themselves at the Battle of Borodino.
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Why then does Belarus have no masterpieces on the “cloak and sword” theme? The Romanians have them, the Russians do, even the Latvians and Estonians, but the Belarusians don’t?
I thought then: indeed, why do Belarusians have almost no vivid historical films? No communist regime prevented the Poles and Romanians from making beautiful films on historical themes. Belarus is losing on the propaganda front.
Please tell us about Tver. What does the city and the countryside live on?
Once the capital of the mighty Tver Principality, a rival of the Muscovite Principality and the Novgorod Republic, Tver today is a small town between two Russian capitals. By the way, Belarusians can see the portrait of the last Tver prince Mikhail Borisovich in the National Art Museum. After the fall of Tver, he went to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. But interestingly, the portrait was found in the Nesvizh Castle by Prince Radziwill with the help of the founder of the Tver museum, August Kazimirovich Zhyznevsky (1819-1896), a descendant of the Belarusian noble family of Bialynia-Zhyznevsky. Many figures of Belarusian origin left their mark in the history of the Tver region: boyar Yuri Lazynich, forefather of the Barazdin family, poet-Decembrist Fyodor Nikolaevich Glinka, hero of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78 Iosif Vladimirovich Romeyko-Gurko.
In 2003, at the gubernatorial elections, the chairman of the State Order Committee, the Belarusian Alexander Valeryanovich Anzhinovsky, nominated his candidacy. As for politics, in the last elections the communists did an excellent job pushing back the party of power. In my observations, the population here is conservative — during the revolution they supported the tsar, in anti-communist times — the communists. The same, I should note, is true in the Smolensk and Bryansk regions. On the other hand, this is not surprising. Production is in crisis, the countryside is dying out, crime is growing. I’ve heard many times: “Under Lukashenko there’s order, there’s real socialism!” Only why do Belarusians come to Russia to earn money? People don’t ask themselves this question. Though the Tver trolleybus fleet was planned to be renewed with Belarusian trolleybuses. So Tver and Belarus have long-standing close ties. Well then, let’s develop and strengthen them!
Frankly speaking, I’m very surprised that Smolensk Belarusians have not yet died out!
What can happen to us! We survived the cholera, we weathered the war.
“Nashe Slova,” No. 27(970), July 7, 2010