Известия Уральского федерального университета. Серия 2: Гуманитарные науки (Dec 2017)
On the Mapping of Local Ethnic Groups in Belozerye with Reference to Onomastic Data
Abstract
In this study, Belozerye is considered within the borders of the Principality of Beloozero in the 14th century. These borders were mostly natural and generally coincided with the internal micro-regional division of Belozerye, connected with the history of its colonisation and ethnic features. From the point of view of modern administrative and territorial division, the districts of Vologda Oblast, surrounding Lake Beloye, Kargopolsky and Konoshsky Districts of Arkhangelsk Oblast, and Poshekhonsky District of Yaroslavl Oblast all make part of the territory under study. The material for the research is mostly taken from the database of the Ural University Toponymic Expedition (Ural Federal University, Yekaterinburg). The subdatabase on Belozerye involves several thousands of place names. This article provides the results of the mapping of onomastic data. First and foremost, they are ethnotoponyms and collective nicknames, originating from ethnonyms (Zyr’, Kaybany, Finns, Swedes, Chud’, Chuhari and others), and toponymic legends connected with the aforementioned ethnonyms. The areas of all ethnonymic formations look similar: they stretch from the southwest to the northeast of Belozerye, pass along the banks of the large rivers (the Suda, the Andoga, the Kema) and large lakes (Beloye, Lache, Vozhe), which corresponds to the main direction of Russian expansion into Belozerye. An exception to this general trend is the onomastic facts associated with the Veps and the Lapps, which, apparently, give the most accurate information on the settlement of the respective ethnic groups.
Keywords
