Biography of Andrei Eshpai

In bookmarks Andrey Yakovlevich Eshpai is an outstanding son of his people. The Republic of Mari El Mari El Mari Territory is a small republic in the Volga region with original traditions, amazing nature, hardworking and hospitable people. Glory to our native land, bloom in happiness and work. We are always proud of you and sing, Mari El, about you! Mari El Mari Territory is a small republic in the Volga region with original traditions, amazing nature, hardworking and hospitable people.

The Mari, carefully store their traditions and pass them from generation to generation. The capital of Mari El Yoshkar-Ola is amazing travelers with large-scale stylization of ancient Russian architecture and European architecture. The nature of the Mari Territory is rich in forests and lakes. This is one of the most environmentally friendly regions of the European part of Russia.

The wealth of the land of the Mari El Republic of Mari El is almost entirely located on the Left Bank of the Volga in its middle reaches along the shores of the veterus and its tributaries, in the ceremony of the vast swampy Mari lowland, the Vyatka Ulvo - a chain of elevations in the east of the region. The total area is small - only 23 km2. Natural conditions are quite diverse: immense forests, karst rocks, an abundance of lakes and rivers.

This is due to the position of the republic at the junction of three physical and geographical provinces at once. In total, there are more rivers and streams, lakes, large ponds and swamps in the republic. On the southwestern slopes of the Vyatskoye, there is a whole string of karst lakes. The region belongs to a moderate climatic belt with frosty snow winter and warm summer, with clearly expressed spring and autumn.

Mari El is more than half covered with forests-pine, fir, broad-leaf-lip, lip-bottom, aspen-birch. In the floodplains of small rivers there are flood meadows, on the watersheds - Sukhodol. In total, the Mari Flora has plant species. The animal world is very rich, which is facilitated by the abundance of forests untouched by man and a combination of various natural zones.

The republics of ermines, caresses, wolves, hares, chipmunks, moose, wolverine and bears. The latter even became a heraldic symbol of the region. The State Emblem of the Republic of Mari El is a shield, in the silver field of which is depicted a rebellious wormhole bear with gold claws, teeth and black eyes with silver. In the right paw - a sword turned down, in an azure scabbard with gold fragments, and a gold hammer with a silver handle.

In the left paw - an anne -out -bearing shield with the image of a gold -mowed Mari Cross, a stamp shield is crowned with a land crown with teeth stylized under the Mari ornament with three separate rhombuses. Among the birds, Gagars, partridges, woodpeckers, Vyakhiri, capercaillie, chips, quail are common - of all kinds. In Mari waters, you can find pike perch, pike, roach, asp, perch, burbot, and silver carp.

In the ponds, carp, sterlet, trout are cultivated. Significant reserves of cement raw materials, glass sand, gypsum, peat, sapropel were explored in the republic, four deposits of healing mineral waters and five deposits of therapeutic mud were opened. Mari El is part of the Volga Federal District and borders on Chuvashia in the south, the Nizhny Novgorod region in the west, the Kirov region in the north and Tatarstan in the east.

The republic consists of three urban districts. In the national composition, Russians and Mari prevail. It is noteworthy that the third place in number is the urban -type settlement Medvedevo, in which about 22 people live. The origin and traditional life of the Mari Mari Ethnos Mari, Mari, Cheremis belongs to the group of Volga Finnes of the Finno-Ugric family of peoples. He began to form on the basis of the Azelin and Gorodets archaeological crops of the Iron Age.

On the territory of the current Mari El, the ancestors of the Mari settled around the VI century AD. Gradually, four main ethnographic groups stood out here-mountain, meadow, eastern and north-west Mari. The former lived on the right bank of the Volga and had close cultural contacts with Chuvash and Russians, the latter lived in the attire, in the pools of the Big and Malaya Kokshagi rivers, maintaining regular ties with Perm tribes and Bulgars, the third arose as a result of relocation in Zakamye and the Urals, experienced the effects Little, they lived in the Unveluga-Sveta interfluve.

The basis of the economy of the medieval Mari was agriculture-until the 17th century, subseral-ozny, then three-pound. Rozh, barley, oats, linen, buckwheat were cultivated, onions, turnips, cabbage, radish grew in the gardens, and potatoes from the 19th century. Livestock was of considerable importance - breeding of cattle and horses. Significant attention was paid to booty, hunting, fishing, among mountain Mari - gardening.

Among home crafts, spinning and weaving predominated, among the fishing - the harvesting and rafting of the forest, and smollerings.For a long time, the main dish of the Mari was considered fresh bread from oatmeal or barley flour, puffed pancakes, pies from all kinds of filling, boiled sausage, beer, strong honey drink was served on the holidays. Until the beginning of the 20th century, the Mari had a large patriarchal family, remnants of tribal relations, faith in healers and sorcerers.

A special place in the spiritual life of the Mari was occupied by religion. In the “Mari Vera”, the cult of the ancestors and the veneration of the whole pantheon of the gods were developed. The reflection of ancient beliefs is the Mari custom even in the summer to take the deceased in the cemetery in the sleigh and bury it in winter clothes, a hat and mittens. Despite the Christianization, the echoes of the Mari faith - such as sacred groves or folk holidays - still exist.

Despite the adoption of Christianity, the Mari still retained many pagan views, customs, rites. In the Mari mythological picture of the world, the sun, moon, heaven, stars, earth were revered. The tribal totems were moose, deer, bears, horses, swans, owls, bees. The Mari divided the world into heavenly, earthly and underground, inhabiting it with spirits and demons, represented a soul in the form of a lizard or butterfly.

Some hills, stones, groves, springs were endowed with special holiness. The spirits were crushed by sacrifices - a bird, a ram or a horse. An important place was occupied by the cult of veneration of the souls of the dead. The Mari considered the “great bright god” Kugu Yumo as the highest life substance. In total, in the Mari Vera it was to supernatural creatures. Holy groves, some of which still exist, were considered a divine inhabitant.

Prayers were pronounced there, arranged sacrificial bonfires. Almost every village had its own prayer grove and connected collective prayers with an agrarian cycle. By the beginning of the 20th century, about 90 pagan Mari, and the rest took the syncretic form of Orthodoxy with the strong influence of previous beliefs. At the end of the 20th century, a certain revival of pagan cults took place.

No less strong was the faith of the Mari in folk medicine. The Mari knew about the healing properties of many herbs, roots and decoctions, about the rules and time of their collection and preparation. Often, fat was used as a medicine, including snake. This knowledge was transmitted from century to century. It was believed that every adult woman had to know the main secrets of Mari healing.

The Mari language belongs to the Volga group of Finno-Ugric languages ​​of the Ural group. It is close to Mordovian and has common features with Perm. The first attempt to create Mari Writing was made by Archbishop Grigory Ruotin in the 16th century, the first grammar was published in the year. In the 19th century, the Mari alphabet improved, introducing several graphemes characteristic of local phonetics.

Interestingly, the Mari language is represented at once with two literary norms - Lugovo -Mary and Mountain Mary. The history of the Mari, unlike other Volga-Finnish tribes-Murom, Meshchera, Mary-the Mari did not disappear and were not assimilated despite the presence of such powerful neighbors as ancient Russian principalities, Khazaria, and Volga Bulgaria. Only an unfavorable geopolitical position surrounded by powerful powers prevented the creation of their own state.

The Mari lived in the neighborhood with Volga Bulgaria for a long time and depended on it, then entered into the subordination of the Golden Horde and the Kazan Khanate. The entry into the Russian kingdom was accompanied by three Cheremissan wars, stretching for 30 years. The first began a few months after the fall of Kazan. It can be said without exaggeration that all the foreign policy enterprises of Ivan the Terrible - the conquest of the Crimea, joining the Baltic states, the war with Poland and Sweden - were less successful precisely because each time they had to throw major forces to suppress the uprisings of Cheremis.

Karamzin about the Mari, - probably embittered by the cruelty of tsarist officials, were cut with Moscow warriors on the ashes of their dwellings, in forests and nativity scenes, in summer and winter; They wanted independence or death. ” After many defeats, in the winter, gg. In December, the successes of Crimeans near Moscow and outrage mobilization to the Livonian Front provoked Cheremis for a new performance, known as the Second Cheremis War.

The fighting covered the entire Middle Volga region. The Moscow government managed to restore order only by April. The third Cheremis war continued from the GG. This time, the Russian government decided to take Cheremisov under full control. On the territory of the Mari Territory, Russian fortresses Gorod-Kokshaysk, Kozmodemyansk, Tsarevokokshaysk, Tsarevosanchursk, Yaransk, Urzhum and Malmyzh arose, around which Russian palace, landowner and monastery villages began to appear.

In the XVII century, most of the Mari paid Yasak to monetary and bread fees to the treasury, and lived by natural economy. The main occupation was agriculture.In the year, Cheremisov distributed recruitment service, and from the year of yasak people they transferred to per capita taxation, which until the end of the century grew several times. In the year, active activities on the appeal of foreigners to Orthodoxy began the Novokreshchenskaya Office.

Dissatisfied with the prevailing position, the Mari fled the masses to the east - to Bashkiria, Zakamye, the Urals, participated in the Pugachev region. In the XIX century, mochal and flour crafts were widely spread in the villages of the region, in some areas, smollering and stone processing flourished. In the post -reform period, the region became a large supplier of the forest. The forest fair in Kozmodemyansk ranked second in the country after Arkhangelsk.

According to the census of the year in the Russian Empire, the Mari lived, of which only a little more Mari Autonomous Republic, the revolutionary year led to the surge of national self -awareness among the Mari. Already in the summer the first All -Russian Congress of the Mari people was held, the National newspaper Zarya began to be published, the National Union of Mari Ushch was created.