Royal hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha (1861) Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha 1861
Belovezhskaya Pushcha - an area of 1076 sq. km, traditionally abounding with living creatures: bison, elks, wild boars, wolves, foxes, roe deer, capercaillie, hazel grouse, black grouse. It was annexed to the Russian Empire in 1794 after the third partition of Poland. In 1803 it received the status of a royal reserve. In 1831, the Svisloch dacha, confiscated from the Polish nobleman Tyshkevich for participating in the anti-Russian uprising, was attached to the forest.
However, the real big royal hunt came to Belovezhskaya Pushcha only in the autumn of 1860. It was timed to coincide with important negotiations for Russia with Austria and Prussia. Today, such an event would be called a "meeting without ties."
On the night of October 5-6, 1860, Emperor Alexander II, the Duke of Saxe-Weimar, Princes Karl and Albert of Prussia, August of Württemberg, Friedrich of Hesse-Kassel and a large retinue arrived in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. The highest persons were greeted with festive fireworks.
Long before this, thousands of beaters began to round up and drive bison, elk, chamois, wild boars, and foxes into a specially fenced menagerie. Twelve firing points-gallery, disguised with branches, were prepared for firing. One of them was intended for the Russian emperor, five for the Austro-German princes, and the rest for the retinue.
On October 6, at dawn, at the signal of Alexander II, the beaters drove the animals to the line of fire. The shots did not stop until 4 pm. On that day, 44 animals were killed, including 16 bison and 4 wild boars. The emperor's booty was 4 bison and 1 wild boar. In the evening, the host and guests dined to music performed by the orchestra of the Velikolutsky Infantry Regiment.
On October 7, the hunt continued. Another 52 animals were killed. The emperor got 6 bison.
The hunt took place without accidents and cost the treasury 18,000 silver rubles. Local ranks were presented to the emperor and awarded with diamond rings, some of the riders received gold watches, and the peasant beaters received cash bonuses.
The skins of animals killed by the princes were transferred to their property.
In 1861, by order of the Minister of State Property, a luxurious illustrated album was published, dedicated to the Bialowieza hunting season of the past season. The entire circulation - 50 copies - was intended for gifts to its participants. Several copies in French were printed for foreign guests.
The publication was illustrated by the honorary academician of the Russian Academy of Arts, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Zichy (1827-1906), who was present at the hunt. Hungarian by nationality, Zichy, then Mihaly, studied in Budapest and Vienna. In 1847 he came to Russia and was invited as an art teacher to Grand Duchess Ekaterina Mikhailovna. In 1859-1873 and 1883-1906 he was the court painter of the Russian emperors.
During his life, Zichy designed many books, but "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha" is one of his greatest successes. This is not surprising: after all, even in his youth, Mihai Zichy gained fame as a talented animal painter.
For more than 140 years "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha" has been a subject of desire for collectors.
Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. St. Petersburg, printing house of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, 1861.1 l. title - color illustration, 71 p. with color and tone illustrations. Capital l. and illustrations - chromolithographs based on drawings by M. Zichy. Full-leather bound in the second half of the 19th century with an embossed gold title on the top cover, with gold-embossed geometric frames and ornaments on the covers and spine. Triple gold trim. Light beige moire endpapers. 38.1x29.3 cm. Edition of 50 copies. The rarest edition, intended not for sale, but only for gifts to participants in the hunt.
Among Russian antique hunting books, there are not many publications that would be included in the annals of Russian culture and would be a source of special pride for any serious bibliophile who collects Russian illustrated books. “Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha” with drawings by Mihai Zichy belongs to such publications.
A lot of things come together in this book. A magnificent artist, excellent printing, a story about the Highest hunt for the royal beast in places that, without fear of exaggeration, can be safely called hunting grounds on the entire European continent. To top it all, the value of the publication is increased by the fact that the book was not published for sale, but was intended solely as a memorable gift for members of the Russian Imperial Family, members of other Sovereign Houses, the first persons from their retinues, as well as for the Ambassadors and Envoys of various states accredited in Russia. I would even say that this book was not so much intended to perpetuate a memorable and truly unique hunt, but to demonstrate to the world the wealth, power and potential of the Russian Empire, as well as the brilliance and valor of its worthy Monarch, who was just on the eve of the Great Reforms, which peacefully transformed the vast country and immortalized him in the memory of the people as the Tsar-Liberator. All these circumstances make this book an interesting phenomenon of national culture.
Due to the fact that the book was presented to the highest circle of people, before the revolution, it practically did not appear on the antiquarian second-hand book market. This circumstance has always allowed second-hand booksellers to declare in their sales catalogs that "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha" is an exceptional rarity, printed in just a few copies only for members of the Imperial Family and persons participating in the hunt. However, this was not a conscious deception by book dealers of gullible buyers. This was their conscientious delusion, since second-hand booksellers did not know the true circulation of the book, and the rarity of this or that antiquarian book was estimated by its occurrence. It must be said that this, at first glance, purely subjective criterion is quite accurate, but only in relation to books that are completely included in second-hand books. However, this book did not enter into circulation before the revolution, firmly settling in private libraries, from which it came out only in exceptional cases. After the revolution, the situation changed dramatically. The book began to constantly appear on sale, since in terms of its circulation (which will be discussed below), it has never been a true rarity in the classical bibliophile sense.
"Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha" is dedicated to the hunting of Emperor Alexander II, which took place on October 6-7, 1860. The reader learned about how this hunt was prepared and passed from the text of the book placed above, but I will continue my story about it. But first I would like to make a few remarks about hunting in menageries.
In the minds of most modern Russian hunters, the impression is that hunting in a menagerie is, at best, not a hunt, and at worst, a slaughter. This belief is very strong. In fact, hunting in a menagerie differs from ordinary raids only in that the hunter's meeting with the beast, which is by no means domestic and not tamed, as many believe for some reason, is guaranteed here. We agree that this is an important factor in the organization of hunting for the Highest Persons. Therefore, the very sensations of hunting in a menagerie in terms of the intensity of passion are in no way inferior to the sensations experienced by a hunter on an ordinary raid. The number of killed game and the fact that it was killed in the fence is not the absolute criterion that allows us to attribute this or that hunt to slaughter. The line here is much thinner and lies mainly in the aesthetic plane, i.e. is a matter of taste. Therefore, this has nothing to do with hunting passion. Just like a preference: whether to eat fried chicken now or a pork chop - to a feeling of hunger. It's a matter of personal taste and possibilities.
The fortified standard, which we can see in one of Zichy's drawings in this book, also always evoke sarcastic remarks, but this time about the Tsar's personal courage. However, for some reason, it is never taken into account here that risking one's own life for a head of state, especially an autocratic one, is an unforgivable luxury. Therefore, the necessary security measures for his life are certainly justified and not dictated by the cowardice of the Sovereign.
I made this digression in defense of hunting in menageries, not only so that the reader would look at the hunting of Alexander II in Belovezhskaya Pushcha precisely as a simple hunt, although somewhat different from other types of hunting. I also wanted the reader to see the other side of this hunt - hunting as a cultural phenomenon. The fact is that in the life of any Highest Court, hunting in a menagerie was a secular, protocol event. Exactly the same essential attribute of high society life, which, for example, is golf or tennis now. Therefore, everything here, down to the smallest details, was regulated and obeyed the time-honored rules and traditions. The Russian Imperial Court was no exception, whose national cultural basis was largely enriched by the European tradition. This gave us that hunting culture, which we call Russian. I would even say that in general the whole history of the Imperial Court hunting is our main cultural heritage. And if we want to remain within the framework of the national hunting culture, then this heritage must be carefully collected, stored and studied. Therefore, considering the hunt of Alexander II in Belovezhskaya Pushcha from this point of view, one cannot help but appreciate it as an outstanding event in the history of Russian hunting, which was of great importance for the further fate of Pushcha.
Belovezhskaya Pushcha became part of the Russian Empire in the reign of Catherine II in 1794. Let's pay tribute to the Russian Sovereigns. They were well aware of the historical and cultural significance of Pushcha. As well as the need to protect both the Pushcha itself and the relic of the European fauna - the bison. Already in 1803, by the Highest Decree, the bison was declared a reserved animal. His capture and shooting was allowed only with a nominal Imperial permission, mainly for natural science purposes: to replenish zoos, menageries, parks, collections of zoological and natural history museums in Russia and Europe. And since 1820, logging was also prohibited.
Prior to the transition in 1888 to the Specific Office, i.e. into the ownership of the Imperial Family in exchange for the same amount of land in the Oryol and Simbirsk provinces, Belovezhskaya Pushcha was in the State Administration. However, for many years the Treasury simply did not have the strength and energy to manage the huge Russian state property. Often she did not even imagine that she was really under her control. Only in the reign of Nicholas I, when a special Ministry of State Property was created in 1838, did the long and difficult process of bringing all state property to the notice, creating an effective system of its state administration, and training specialists begin. Belovezhskaya Pushcha did not go unnoticed either. In 1843-47, the first complete forest management was carried out here, and the Treasury finally got a real understanding of what this unique forest area of Europe really is. At the same time, a special detailed report of the scientist forester D.Ya. Dalmatov, who served in Pushcha, was submitted to the Ministry of State Property on its current state, historical significance and the creation of profitable forestry here. In the autumn of 1847, in connection with the completion of the construction, the Minister of State Property, Count P.D. Kiselev, visited Pushcha for inspection purposes in order to assess the possibilities and ways of further development of the Pushchino economy on the spot. The hunt was also not left without the attention of the Minister.
It should be noted that Emperor Nicholas I did not approve of the hobby of his son, the future Emperor Alexander II, winter hunting for bears and elks, reasonably fearing for the safety and health of the Heir. For several years, the Tsarevich could not get permission from his father to participate in winter animal hunts. The decisive role in obtaining his father's consent to these hunts was played by Count Kiselev, who enjoyed great authority and respect from Nicholas I, and guaranteed the complete safety of the Heir on the hunt in the Lisinsky Educational Forestry, subordinate to the Ministry of State Property and the Count's favorite brainchild. With a successful elk hunt on December 21, 1844 in this forestry, which by that time had already gained fame for its exemplary hunts, the countdown of the winter animal hunts of Alexander II begins. Apparently, it was the success of Lisin's bear and elk hunts that prompted Kiselev to pay attention to bison hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, in order to subsequently be able to offer it to Alexander. Therefore, during the inspection trip of 1847, a bison hunt was organized especially for the Minister. But either due to the complexity of organizing the hunt itself, or due to the insufficient level of security for the Tsesarevich, or, most likely, due to the failure to obtain the permission of the Emperor, the idea of organizing a hunt in Belovezhskaya Pushcha for the Heir was postponed. However, this idea itself, apparently, never disappeared from the minds of the ministerial authorities, eventually materializing in the hunt of 1860.
The initiative to organize the hunt itself, as well as the initiative to publish a book about this hunt, belonged to Alexander Alekseevich Zeleny. At that time, to the Comrade (i.e., assistant - O.E.) and Major General of the retinue of His Imperial Majesty. Zelenoy was a constant companion of Alexander II on winter animal hunts. The initiative could not but meet with full understanding on the part of the Emperor, who had already declared himself as a passionate hunter, and with whose accession the intensity and variety of imperial hunts reached an unprecedented scale. The organizational side of the matter could no longer raise doubts with the Ministry, since by 1860 Belovezhskaya Pushcha was fully organized and staffed with specialists who, over the past decade and a half, had studied Pushcha and its possibilities quite well. The desire of the Ministry to surprise the Sovereign with a unique and inimitable hunt was spurred on by the hunting that took place in 1858, organized by Count M. Tyshkevich for Alexander II, not far from. The slightly wounded Ministry of State Property hastened to organize its own hunt for the Sovereign. Moreover, the capabilities of the Ministry and the Belovezhskaya Pushcha under its control, with its main trump card - the bison, were immeasurably higher than the capabilities of some Polish Count, who so unceremoniously dared to seize the initiative to organize the first hunt of the Russian Emperor in the ancient Principality of Lithuania. Therefore, the main task set by Zeleny before his subordinates, together with the rangers of the Imperial Court hunting attached to them under the command of Unter-Jägermeister I.V. Ivanov, was not only to surpass the hunt organized by Count Tyszkiewicz, but also to surpass the hunt taken as a model in Belovezhskaya Pushcha 1752 year of the Polish King August III of Saxony. Let's give credit to the Ministry of State Property - it coped with the task brilliantly.
In memory of this hunt, also in imitation of August III, the Greens were asked to erect a monument in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. The Emperor liked the idea and a monument in the form was erected. By order of Alexander II, seven reduced gilded ones were cast from the model of this monument, which were donated to: - the organizers of the hunt: Zeleny and Count P.K. Ferzen (the latter at that time was the Jägermeister of the Imperial Court); and five to the German Princes participating in the hunt.
Shortly before the hunt in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, in 1859, Alexander II invited Mihai (or, as he was called in Russia, Mikhail Alexandrovich) Zichy, a Hungarian by nationality, who had been working in Russia for more than ten years and earned himself the fame of the best Russian watercolorist, for which he was awarded the title of Academician of watercolor painting by the Russian Academy of Arts. The main task for the artist in this position was to keep a picturesque chronicle of the life of the Supreme Court. Naturally, Zichy was invited by the Emperor to make sketches about hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha.
Probably already at the beginning of 1861, at one of the evening hunting meetings with the Sovereign, which was usually attended by all the constant hunting companions of the Emperor, Zichy presented a series of sheets devoted to hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. It was then, apparently, that the idea of the book was born in Zeleny.
With the beginning of the regular hunts of Alexander II in the Lisinsky Educational Forestry, Count Kiselev ordered that a special book be kept in the latter, where each hunt in the Highest Presence could be recorded, and also that a brief report about it be personally presented to him. This tradition in the Ministry was preserved under the next Minister. Similar reports were submitted to the Minister in the case of the Sovereign's hunts in other state estates.
Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha was no exception. The idea of linking the ministerial report with Zichy's watercolors and publishing it as a memento of this hunt was brilliant. To which Elena, apparently, immediately received the highest approval.
In the fund of the Ministry of State Property of the Russian State Historical Archive, I could not find any traces of the case for the publication of this book. And it certainly should have been. The only thing I found is a case with the following name: . Unfortunately, with the exception of a few pages, this case has nothing to do with hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha and the publication of the book. Of particular interest are only two pages - sheets 123 and 124. The first of them will be discussed further below. And sheet 124 is a list of cases compiled at the beginning of November 1860 that are transferred from the General Office of the Minister to. In this list, under number 9 is: “The case of the HIGHEST hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha on October 6 and 7, 1860. 48 pp." Against it is a pencil mark: "will be given separately." So, it was. But by belonging to the Forestry Department from the General Office of the Minister in November 1860, it was not transferred. With a fairly high degree of certainty, it can be assumed that later all the documents on the publication of the book "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha", including its draft text, should have been included in this file. These documents, despite all the imperfections of the then departmental archives, the absence of any clear understanding of what kind of files are still subject to eternal storage, should not have been destroyed, as they contained materials that told about one of the brightest episodes in history departments, moreover, associated with the Highest Name. And the fact that the file nevertheless turned out to be lost may mean that either it did not fall into the archive of the Ministry at all, remaining in the hands of Zeleny or the official who prepared its text; or, more likely, due to an oversight, it fell into the composition of other cases of the Minister's Office under the general cover, on which, due to bureaucratic forgetfulness, its name was not issued separately. And the fate of such cases was sad.
Due to the chronic lack of free space, departmental archives were periodically cleared of deposits of unnecessary files. Moreover, the need or uselessness of a particular case was determined only by the current interests of the department. There was no way to look at all the cases accumulated at a tremendous speed by the efforts of only archival officials on the subject of whether the given case was subject to destruction or not, not to mention genuine archeographic research, there was no way. Therefore, when selecting cases to be destroyed, they were guided only by the name, without looking.
That this case has been lost for a long time is also confirmed by the fact that the author of a huge work dedicated to G.P. Kartsov, who worked in the collection of materials for his work in the archive of the Ministry of State Property, reported about the hunt of Alexander II, in fact, only what had already been published in the book "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha", the text of which he reproduced in full in his work. And this means that already at the end of the 19th century, no materials about this hunt, as well as about the publication of a book about it, were preserved in the archives of the Ministry. Moreover, Kartsov even incorrectly indicated the year of publication of the book -. By the way, this year usually appears in all bibliographic data about this one.
About the author, Kartsov only said that he, apparently, was not a hunter, and that the historical essay about Pushcha in this book was taken last from the report submitted to the Ministry by Dalmatov. Based on this remark by Kartsov, who saw Dalmatov’s report, which has not been preserved to date in the fund of the Ministry of State Property, it can be assumed that an unknown author, apparently an official of the Ministry (more on that below), expanded the usual hunting report for the Minister, reworking and adding to it the material available in the Ministry on the history of hunting in Pushcha. Thus the text of the book was born.
The order for printing the book was placed by the Ministry of State Property in the printing house of the Academy of Sciences. The choice of this printing house was not accidental. And the point here was not even that it was completely natural for the state department to place its order in the state printing house. In this case, the Ministry could manage with its own departmental printing house. But the fact was that the oldest academic printing house in Russia was one of the best, possessed the richest body of fonts, which made it possible to publish a book in any language of the world and with the most pretentious formulas and tables; had in its staff highly qualified specialists capable of fulfilling the most complex orders, which, in fact, were all orders of the Academy of Sciences. And although this particular order was not particularly difficult for the academic printing house in technical terms, it was nevertheless completed at the highest level.
Considering "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha", it is impossible not to note, first of all, the highest artistic level of the publication. The book is not overloaded with illustrations or text. Everything in it is harmonious: format, volume, font and placement of text on the sheet; illustrations, their selection and placement in the book - you can feel the hand of the book's outstanding graphics in everything. But, most likely, the layout of the publication was completely developed by Zichi himself, who already had practical experience in illustrating and designing books. There is no such class of fiction publication in Russian hunting literature anymore. The cult four-volume book by Kutep in terms of artistic culture, and not in terms of the richness of the publication, does not even come close to the level of "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha", in which, along with a high artistic level, it is also striking how simple means this is achieved. It's really true that genuine aristocracy is always distinguished by good quality, elegance and simplicity. The book was printed on ordinary thick, well-bleached paper, although of high quality, but not related to any of its expensive varieties used at that time. It is typed in an inexpensive font of the simplest style, the so-called . The font is beautiful precisely in its simplicity, besides it is well readable. Thus, the high printing culture of the academic printing house, multiplied by the highest class of its specialists and the talent of an outstanding artist, created this masterpiece. In my opinion, in terms of collection value, only tray copies of hunting publications of the 18th century can be put on a par with The Hunt in Belovezhskaya Pushcha.
Zeleny's choice of an academic printing house as the executor of the ministerial order turned out to be not only successful, but also very far-sighted. Although the Comrade Minister did not even suspect about the latter. The fact is that the Russian Academy of Sciences, as it should be for a truly scientific institution, treated its archival fund very reverently. Thanks to this, the archive of the printing house of the Academy of Sciences has come down to us in its entirety since its foundation, i.e. even from the times of Peter the Great. If not for Zeleny's unexpected foresight, we would still be talking about the imprint of "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha" only in the subjunctive mood. And so, in the "Book of accounts for printing publications of third-party institutions" for 1862, we find an exhaustive one.
Here we read that "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha" began printing in the printing house in January 1862 and was completed in August 1862. Thus, 1862 should be considered the year of its publication. Consequently, the printing house received an order for its printing, most likely, in the second half of 1861. The book was printed in the amount of 210 copies in Russian and 60 in French. The total cost: for material, typesetting, printing, and an addition for incidental expenses, amounted to only 373 rubles. To this, however, it would be necessary to add the expenses of the Ministry for printing lithographs (5 in color and 4 in black and white), executed by the lithoprinting house “R. Gundrieser and Co., for which we do not have exact data. But such a number of high-quality lithographs should have increased the cost of the book by at least 2-3 times. The remuneration of the artist's labor was not included in the cost of the publication, because. Zichy received a salary from the Ministry of the Imperial Court and the work was done by him as part of, let's say, a service assignment. Thus, it can be assumed that on average one copy of the book cost the Ministry from 2.5 to 4 rubles. For a publication of this class, it was very, very inexpensive.
Zelenoy could be pleased with such a magnificent and quick implementation of his idea. The book has become an excellent gift for the Ministry for the right people. This is evidenced by the following fact. On the copy, located in the Library of the Academy of Sciences, in the upper right corner of the flyleaf there is a very remarkable entry: “Received this October 1st. 1878 (Due to an official requirement)." For 16 years, the Academy of Sciences could not obtain from the Ministry of State Property a copy of the book for its library, not only simply due to it by right, but also printed in its own printing house!
A few words must also be said about the format of the publication. The book has the size of a quarter of a sheet, the so-called. This format was usually used when it was necessary to emphasize the significance of the publication. He gave the book a certain solidity and solemnity. The form, in this case, perfectly matched the content, setting the reader up for the perception of the described hunt as an outstanding event. And indeed it is. I will not be afraid to repeat myself, and I will emphasize once again that the hunting of Alexander II in Belovezhskaya Pushcha was an outstanding event in the history of Russian hunting.
Who is the author of the text of the book? Undoubtedly, it could only be one of the officials of the Ministry. In one of the cases, I discovered a very curious fact. To one of the memorandums to the Minister of the Imperial Court from Zichy, the latter is accompanied by a list of his paintings. And here under number 72 we can read:. In the Address-Calendar of the Russian Empire for 1859-60, there are not so many Monsieur Fuchs. And one of them is ours. Consisting at the Ministry of State Property, Collegiate Assessor, Viktor Yakovlevich Fuchs. And here I will return to sheet 123 already mentioned by me above. It is an attitude from the Forest Department dated November 23, 1860. “To Mr. Officer for Special Assignments at the Department of Agriculture, Collegiate Assessor Fuchs. The Forest Department has the honor to notify Your Excellency that the documents listed in the attached list of papers dated November 10, No. 12, except for the case of the HIGHEST hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha on October 7, 1860, have been received in this Department. And this directly indicates that it was Fuchs who supervised this matter in the Ministry. Therefore, it indirectly confirms that this is the Fuchs to whom Zichy attributes the text.
In conclusion of my essay on this wonderful book, I can't resist telling the readers a curious episode connected with one of Zichi's watercolors, which served as an illustration for the book.
The watercolor "Local population and hunting participants are waiting for the arrival of Emperor Alexander II in Belovezh" until 1904 was in the collection of the Lisinsky Imperial Hunting Palace. Together with her, the palace had three more watercolors by Zichy, but already directly depicting scenes of winter hunting in the Lisinsky forestry. Unfortunately, I have not yet been able to establish exactly when and under what circumstances these watercolors by Zichy ended up in the Lisinsky Palace. Undoubtedly, only one thing is that this happened during the life of Alexander II and on his direct orders. Neither Alexander III nor Nicholas II loved Lisino. And under them, the palace was not replenished with a single work of art.
In August 1903, while on maneuvers near Pskov, Emperor Nicholas II suddenly remembered (!?) that at some postal station - either in Lisino, or in Lizcher, where he had once been on a winter bear hunt, he saw Zichy's watercolors. The emperor ordered to find them and present them to him for viewing in the Winter Palace. The highest order was carried out and in mid-September the watercolors from the Lisinsky Palace were delivered to the Winter Palace. In an accompanying note, the Head of the Territorial Administration of the Ministry of State Property wrote: “I have the honor to forward four watercolors by the artist Zichy, who were in the Lisinsky hunting palace, and add that there is no post station in Lisino, but there are watercolors of Zichy at the Yazchery station. It is wonderfully said: "and add". The highlight here is that there was no post station in the Lizard for a long time. Back in 1866, the latter was converted into the Imperial hunting house. But for the Lisinsky patriots, he remained “a postal station of the II class with a hotel for those passing by,” that is, an inn and nothing more. And there was a lot of truth in that.
It is not difficult to understand the poorly concealed annoyance of the departmental authorities. The magnificent hunting palace, a unique monument of Russian hunting culture, which has no equal in terms of class on the territory of Russia, was built and maintained with funds from the forest income of the Ministry of State Property, i.e., with the people's money. But in addition to the palace, the Ministry also maintained a special hunting staff of the forestry with all the property, up to the personal royal hunting sleigh and horse. The latter, for example, was kept only for hunting and was not used for any other work in the forestry. Bear, elk, capercaillie were intended exclusively for hunting the Sovereign and the Grand Dukes. Since the time of Alexander II, an effective system for organizing the protection of hunting grounds has been worked out in the Lisinsky forestry. And the latter, without any exaggeration, were rich. The hunting staff of the forestry, headed by Ober-Jäger, were professionals of the highest class. And all this mechanism, established over many years by the Ministry, after the death of Alexander II, was spinning idle. Alexander III, having become Emperor, was never in Lisino again. Nicholas II visited this place only once in his entire life - in 1892. It was possible to understand Alexander III, who preferred not the Lisinsky Palace, but the unsightly Lizard House during winter trips to bear and elk hunts. After all, the Emperor, even in his beloved residence in the Gatchina Palace, for his residence, chose the most unprepossessing small semi-dark rooms on the mezzanine floor, intended for servants. Tastes could not be discussed. But the fact that Nicholas II confused the palace with the station for the Ministry could only mean one thing: “Sic transit gloria mundi”. The star of Lisino, which shone so brightly under Alexander II, finally set. And as it turned out - forever.
For more than two months, the watercolors from the Lisinsky Palace were in the Winter Palace. And the Emperor never found time to examine them. On November 30, the Minister of the Imperial Court once again reminded the Emperor of them. But this time, Nicholas II did not have time. And the report was followed by a resolution: “The Highest ordered to return Zichy’s watercolors and store them in their original places”. But before the ink had dried, and the watercolors went home, another order followed: to present the watercolors for review to the Emperor “in view of the special interest that watercolors represent. On December 12, the Sovereign finally bothered to examine them. The result of the show was that in February 1904 only 3 watercolors returned to the Lisinsky Palace. A watercolor with a Belovezhskaya plot, by the Highest order, was sent to.
Turning off the highway, the navigator is confused and cannot understand where we are. But the sign is already visible - to us in the village of White Forest. It's right on the border. Borders between the world of people and the world of animals. Well, also Polish, of course. This is not the Belovezhka that is described in guidebooks. The white forest is the gate to the Wild Forest, to the real Forest, to the very jungle. So the hedgehog carelessly runs across the road to us - this is his home. And it is also a home for four hundred bison - the oldest inhabitants and rulers of these places. We came to hunt them. Telephoto lenses, of course. Although the usual hunting for them is officially allowed, and I also want to talk about this.
Sasha met us on a motorcycle at the entrance to the village. He lives in the forestry, where a large guest house has been built for everyone who wants to visit the reserved Pushcha. There we settled, occupying an entire floor of an empty hotel.
Alexander is not just a local resident. He was born in the very heart of Pushcha, in one of the farms that still exist on its territory. The forester and the son of the forester: he, like no one else, feels it, knows all its secrets, lives according to its rhythms. Sasha likes to remember his childhood, when right in front of the windows of his house, deer-stags met in a fierce battle. And perhaps that is why, having graduated from the forestry department of the Belarusian "polytechnic", he continued the family tradition. But not for long - Sasha's patience was only enough for a couple of years. The hunter in Belarus is rather a servant who arranges hunting for rich gentlemen from Russia, the Middle East and Europe: he leads through the forest, shows the beast, caches, sets the table.
Having disagreed with the leadership, Sasha left and now he does his favorite thing - he sets video traps and shoots material for European animal protection organizations, meets European scientists, helps them in researching the animal world of Pushcha. Sasha is a wonderful animal photographer. And there is something in it from the Stalker from the film of the same name by Tarkovsky.
It is strictly forbidden to enter Pushcha by car. Moreover, Bely Lesok is located on the border territory, for entry into which, according to Belarusian laws, it is necessary to obtain permission and pay a fee. If you are going to those parts, then carefully study this topic. The hour is uneven - thunder into the department with a fine, and the car can easily be evacuated if you leave it where it is impossible. You can enter Pushcha at this place only with Sasha and Sasha's car. Despite the fact that Alexander has not worked in the forestry for a long time, they do not have the right to prohibit him from entering the forest, since he was born there. And such attempts sometimes happen - at the previous job they can’t forgive him for that bold “leaving the system”.
Early morning and evening before sunset are the best times for photography. During the day, the beast lies in a cool forest and hides from two-legged enemies. In the evening, when the heat subsides (or in the morning, before the heat), bison and deer begin to come out of the thickets to the meadows. Therefore, our first departure took place the same evening, on the day of arrival. We wrapped ourselves up to the head from ticks, prepared telephoto lenses with teleconverters: there is simply nothing to do with less than 400mm, the frightened beast does not let even 100 meters.
The roads of Belovezhka are the first thing that causes a slight surprise. The entire Pushcha is riddled with hundreds of kilometers of ideal asphalt in one and a half lanes. But these roads can only be used by those who live in the farms of Pushcha and forestry workers. Oh yes, and of course the Old Man :) Do you remember where the USSR ended and the CIS began? Yes, it is in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, in the hunting estate "Viskuli", where the super-guarded residence of the President of Belarus is now located.
The entrance to it was closed one and a half kilometers before the gate, and the perimeter itself was equipped with new security systems after the events in Ukraine. A kilometer from the turn to Viskuli, guarded by two bison, there is a helipad in the middle of the forest.
On the first sortie, no one was found. The field was empty, there was no animal on it. At the second point, a little more luck. From a distance we noticed a small herd of bison, to which we had to walk about a kilometer through tall grass. This grass is the home of the native Bialowieza ticks, which we brought on ourselves 15 pieces at a time. Clothes, thank God. Each such sortie was followed by an immediate procedure for self-examination and clothing quarantine.
A few minutes later, the first success came - Sasha noticed the head of a roe deer with his keen eyes.
The head of the roe deer in response noticed us and asked the rattle in the direction of the forest. This time she was lucky - from May 15 to September 30, individual hunting is allowed for her. As a trophy, you will be allowed to pick up a skull with horns, for which you will need to pay from 300 to 1000 euros. And just to hurt an animal costs 300 euros.
Approaching the herd, turn on the mode of complete silence. Now you can’t talk, you can’t step on dry branches, you need to go quickly, along the edge of the forest. There is a small river between us and the herd, because of which we can no longer come closer than 300 meters.
The bison has a very sensitive sense of smell, almost like a dog's. They already know we're here, but they don't show it yet - it's too far. We stop under a tree by the river and take pictures. Then the whole herd lay down in the grass and on this they decided to finish with this place.
Pushcha is unpredictable and knows how to present surprises. You can run unsuccessfully through the thickets all day in search of bison and accidentally meet him on the road, returning home. This is what happened to us. The old bison-patriarch stood at the very roadside and looked at us with interest.
We didn't even have to get out of the car to take a picture of it!
At some point, the bison decided to retreat to a safe distance...
And lighten up just in case. Although, it seems to me, by this he simply showed his contempt for the human race.
The sun began to set, lengthening shadows from objects and bathing the trees in soft, velvety light. It's time to find the herd and try to shoot it in backlight. And again we were lucky - Sasha again saw the herd, to which we had to run, pushing through the bushes and climbing over the fallen trees. But we managed and caught luck by the tip of the tail!
Here it is, the ecstasy of a photohunter! The ecstasy did not last long - heated up by cross-country and excitement, we behaved too noisily, which the bison could not help but notice. They ran into the forest.
The program of the first day was fully completed and even overfulfilled. I will talk about the morning outing in another part, and in this one I will continue about bison. There's so much I want to say about them, but I can't figure out where to start.
Belovezhsky bison is the last representative of wild bulls in Europe. Bison is the largest land mammal in Europe (weight up to 1.2 tons). The closest relative of the bison is the American bison, with which it is able to interbreed without restrictions, giving fertile offspring - bison. In the 20s of the last century, the bison was under the threat of extinction. All today's bison come from only twelve individuals who were in zoos and reserves at the beginning of the 20th century.
According to the information of the management of the National Park "Belovezhskaya Pushcha", at the moment there are about 450 bison in the forest, while their optimal number for the reserve is 250-300 individuals.
Today, the bison is far from the threshold of extinction. However, one threat has been replaced by another - when small bison populations are created, they are threatened by inbreeding and genetic degeneration. The only way out is to settle bison on a large area, including the forests of Russia.
In the meantime, Belarus is struggling with the "overpopulation" of forests by bison with the help of hunting licenses. Killing a bison costs between 3,000 and 25,000 euros, depending on gender, age, and other characteristics. By law, the shooting of animals from the so-called reserve gene pool is allowed: females over 18 years old and males over 14 years old, young males expelled from the herds and not returning back within three months, as well as sick or injured animals.
Now tell me, how do you determine in the optical sight of a rifle, "xy from xy" in this, for example, herd? Which of them is sick or how old are they? Therefore, they shoot back everything in a row, indiscriminately. The question is the price.
On the last evening, I decided to play one game with the bison: how close I can get to them. We were separated only by a field with low grass, along which I walked and stopped, putting the camera on a tripod. The bison had noticed me for a long time and were staring at me intently.
Just amazingly big animals!
At the same time, they are so intimidated by a person that they pose absolutely no threat to him. A simple village bull is a hundred times more dangerous than a bison.
The game ended at the standard 100 meters, when the whole herd, as if on command, began to move. After running another 100, they stopped. I didn't pursue them anymore.
In the next part I will tell about other interesting animals of Belovezhskaya Pushcha.
Other posts from the trip to Belovezhskaya Pushcha:
Belovezhskaya Pushcha… This phrase has a special, symbolic meaning for many people. First of all, I remember the piercing melody of Pakhmutova's “reserved tune”, and after it, of course, the legend of the forest - bison.
For centuries, Pushcha belonged to different powers. From the end of the 18th century to the beginning of the 20th century, it was part of the Russian Empire. For 120 years, under the auspices of the Russian crown, it has experienced both a long period of relative oblivion and transformation into a brilliant hunting residence of the last Romanov tsar. By the time of the transition to Russia, Pushcha was already known as a unique habitat for a unique animal - bison. The history of bison and Belovezhskaya Pushcha is one: “the forest was preserved because bison lived in it, and bison were preserved because there was a forest” (S.A. Severtsov, zoologist). By the middle of the 18th century, the largest animal in Europe was exterminated almost everywhere, and Belovezhskaya Pushcha and the Caucasus became its last refuges.
How did the bison survive in Belovezhskaya Pushcha? The fact is that even in the Middle Ages it became a “reserved” hunting ground for the great princes of Lithuania and the kings of Poland. Only they had the right to hunt bison. Under King Sigismund I, the custom, according to which the death penalty was due for killing an animal in a reserved grove, became a law. And according to the forest charter of those times, it was forbidden to kill bison and other ungulates not only in protected areas, but even on the lands of the surrounding villages. But peasants on their lands could kill predators, as well as hares and birds.
Since the 15th century, for the upper classes of society, hunting has been not so much a way of obtaining meat provisions as fun and entertainment. Lush hunts of the Polish rulers were often driven. A fenced area stood out in the forest - a menagerie, where a large amount of game was driven, and banners were arranged for hunters. One of the most impressive hunts took place in September 1752. King August III was hunting with his wife and two sons. Queen Maria Josepha was a great lover of books and read even between editions of the beast, which did not stop her from shooting 20 bison. In memory of this hunt, an obelisk was erected, on which inscriptions were carved about the participants in the hunt and the number of the killed animal, indicating the weight of the largest specimens. By the end of the 18th century, economic activity intensified in Pushcha: timber rafting began, tar, turpentine, pottery and potash factories were created. All this had a negative impact on the well-being of bison and other animals.
In 1795, as a result of the third partition of Poland, Belovezhskaya Pushcha was annexed to the Russian Empire. Its main part became part of the state, i.e. state lands, and for many years Pushcha ceased to be the personal possession of the ruler of the country. In 1802, Alexander I declared the bison a reserved animal, however, the practice of issuing permits for its shooting was still preserved for high-ranking hunters, museums and zoological collections in Europe. As for the local residents of Pushcha, they did not bother to obtain the highest permission to shoot. Poaching flourished in the forest. Hans von Auer, who for many years served as a forester and head of a menagerie in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, wrote in his memoirs about the preferences of the local population for game dishes: “Shooting an elk had not yet become fashionable among the peasants. They, of course, highly valued elk meat, but at rural weddings, which fall according to an old custom in late autumn, it was customary to serve bison or, in extreme cases, wild boar on the wedding table ... At Christmas, it was the turn of roe deer, and on Easter - capercaillie, in the form of gifts for respected police officers of all ranks and officials of neighboring towns with whom the peasants had to deal.
In the reign of Nicholas I, a long and difficult process of streamlining all state property began. Belovezhskaya Pushcha did not go unnoticed either. In 1843-1847. the first complete forest inventory was carried out here. The Pushcha was divided by clearings into 541 quarters, each with an area of 2 sq. miles. Five forest areas were created, and areas where bison were more common were identified. The intensity of economic activity in them was reduced. Upon completion of the forest inventory, the Minister of State Property, Count P.D., visited the Pushcha with an inspection. Kiselev, for whom bison hunting was organized.
The first royal hunt took place in Pushcha only in 1860. It became a prologue to the Russian-Prussian-Austrian negotiations in Warsaw, and Alexander II invited Princes Charles and Albert of Prussia, August of Württemberg, Friedrich of Hesse-Kassel and Duke Karl-Alexander of Saxe-Weimar to participate in it.
It was decided to conduct the emperor's hunt in the same place where Augustus III's hunt took place - in the Gribovets tract. For three weeks, more than two thousand beaters conducted round-ups of animals in the forest, and also brought animals in cages from all the state forests of the Grodno province. Due to the inexperience and haste with which the corral was carried out, many animals died along the way. Twelve standards were lined up in the reconstructed menagerie: the first was intended for the king, the next five for the princes, and the rest for the emperor's retinue. In the village of Belovezh, for the residence of Alexander II, a small house was urgently completed, previously intended for the apartment of a local forester. Foreign princes were placed in the house of a German merchant.
Alexander II arrived in Belovezh on the night of October 5-6, 1860 (hereinafter, the dates are given according to the old style. - I.P.). The peasants greeted the king with cheers; the road was illuminated by bonfires and burning tar barrels, and when the emperor's crew approached the bridge over the Narevka River, the house prepared for him was lit up with sparklers. The result of two days of hunting overshadowed everyday inconveniences: 96 animals were killed, including 28 bison. When the latter appeared on the shooting line, they “captured the attention of the hunters: each shot his shot in order to have the pleasure of killing a beast unseen in other European hunts.” Hounds were used during round-ups, they were lowered when the animals approached the shooting line. But soon the dogs began to torment the killed game, not paying attention to the newly driven out animals, and therefore the hunt was stopped in order to remove the carcasses of the animals, and then the raid began again.
In memory of the first imperial hunt in Pushcha, Deputy Minister of State Property, Major-General of the retinue A.A. Zeleny suggested placing a monument near the exit from the menagerie. A life-size figure of a bison was cast at the plant of Lieutenant General N.A. Ogarev and installed on a marble pedestal, on the sides of which the inscription "In remembrance of the Hunt in Belovezhskaya Pushcha in the Highest Presence of the Emperor Alexander II on October 6 and 7, 1860" was engraved, as well as the names of the participants in the hunt and the amount of game they got. Later, Alexander II ordered to cast 7 reduced copies of the monument, and presented five of them to the German princes and the duke, and two to the organizers of the hunt A.A. Green and Jägermeister Count P.K. Ferzen.
Another monument to the imperial hunt was the book “Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha” published in 1862, exquisitely illustrated with drawings by M.A. Zichy. It seems that all this served as the birth of the myth that Alexander II liked to hunt in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. In fact, he visited here only once, and for the next 20 years of his reign he never visited Pushcha. True, when leaving, he ordered to make the menagerie permanent and to keep the house in which he stayed unchanged "under the name of the Imperial Hunting Pavilion."
G.P. Kartsov wrote about the hunt of 1860 as "little exciting for true lovers", because it was more like a slaughterhouse. Perhaps the emperor himself had the same opinion about the raids in the Gribovets tract.
The organizers of the royal hunt, despite its significant result, knew about the deplorable state of Belovezhskaya Pushcha and the plight of bison and other ungulates in it. The reason is the lack of food, caused by the wrong system of cutting trees, in which young and mature forests were often destroyed, and the old ones had time to rot before the arrival of lumberjacks. Attempts to change the situation rested on the difficulty of exporting timber from Pushcha: small rivers were used for rafting in small volumes. The riverside meadows belonged mainly to peasant farms and were intended for livestock feed, but bison from time to time "robbed" the haystacks. As early as the beginning of the 19th century, winter feeding of bison was introduced, but the funds allocated for it were scanty. After 1860, they were slightly enlarged, the mowing area was expanded, bison feeders were equipped. Bison guards were appointed to monitor the bison and their feeding. It was decided to expand the species composition of animals. So, in exchange for four bison, red deer were brought to the forest from the hunting estates of Prince Plese in Silesia, which settled down well in the new place. A systematic struggle was also carried out with the main predators of the forest - wolves, and with the use of strychnine pills. As a result, already in the 1880s, wolves practically disappeared.
In 1865-1885. Grand dukes, uncles and nephews of Alexander II, as well as his son Vladimir, came to the forest to hunt. They were repeatedly accompanied by the famous Jägermeister M.V. Andreevsky. For him, as a manager, the hunting of 1885, in which 12 people participated, of which four were grand dukes, was of particular difficulty. The emperor then gave permission to shoot only eight bison. “It’s a difficult thing to break up the hunt in such a way as to please everyone and that everyone really would have to hunt,” Andreevsky wrote in his diary. But his experience, as well as the tact of Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolayevich, made it possible to overcome these difficulties.
A decisive turn in the position of Belovezhskaya Pushcha took place during the reign of Alexander II's son Alexander III. In July 1886, the Minister of the Imperial Court
I.I. Vorontsov-Dashkov informed the Minister of State Property M.N. Ostrovsky about the emperor’s desire that “the state-owned forest dacha - Belovezhskaya Pushcha and the Svisloch dacha adjacent to it be transferred to the composition of specific estates”, i.e. belonging to the sovereign. And the transfer of Pushcha by exchange for the lands of the emperor in the Oryol and Simbirsk provinces took place on September 18, 1888. A new period began in the history of the oldest forest in Europe.
[The manuscript that formed the basis of the book "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha"] The history of the bison / comp. D.Ya. Dolmatov [Dalmatov]. 1847-1848 141 l. 27×21 cm. In velvet binding of the era. Tears of fabric, loss of fabric on the spine. On the front cover there is a yellow metal overlay with an engraving: “History of the Bison comp. Dolmatov". The back cover completely moves away from the block, the front cover partially. Triple gold trim, moire paper endpapers. Faults at the beginning and end of the block. Minor soiling on the pages. Loss of flyleaf 1b. On the last page, the signature of Captain D.Ya. Dolmatova. There are marks and corrections in the text.
The forester of the Grodno Chamber of the Ministry of State Property, scientist, captain (and later - colonel) Dmitry Yakovlevich Dolmatov (in other sources - Dalmatov; 1810-1877) was the initiator of research work in Belovezhskaya Pushcha. In the late 1840s, the captain submits to the Ministry a report lost in the second half of the 19th century, in which he describes the bison and hunting for him. Georgy Petrovich Kartsov referred to this report in his book "Belovezhskaya Pushcha" (1903). In turn, the historian of Russian hunting O.A. Egorov in his essay "Masterpiece of Russian hunting literature" (about the book "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha") wrote: “Kartsov only said that he, apparently, was not a hunter, and that the historical essay about Pushcha in this book was taken last from the report submitted to the Ministry by Dalmatov. Based on this remark by Kartsov, who saw Dalmatov’s report, which has not been preserved to date in the fund of the Ministry of State Property, it can be assumed that an unknown author, apparently an official of the Ministry, expanded the usual hunting report for the Minister, reworking and adding to it the one available in Ministry of material on the history of hunting in Pushcha. Thus the text of the book was born. The report contains 8 chapters: “Brief outline of the forests of Lithuania”, “Bison”, “Natural history of the bison”, “About the domestication of the bison”, “Hunting for the bison”, “History of Lithuanian legislation regarding the conservation of forests and game”, “On the protection of bison ”, “On the identity of the aurochs and bison”.
Dolmatov's research was studied by the great Russian zoologist, founder of the Siberian school of zoology M.D. Ruzsky in his work "Bison, as an endangered representative of our fauna" (1895). They are included in the "Materials for the geography and statistics of Russia collected by officers of the General Staff" (volume "Grodno province", 1863). The results of the scientific work of Dmitry Yakovlevich were published in 1846-1878 in the "Forest Journal" and other periodicals.
The book "Hunting in Belovezhskaya Pushcha" in 1861 was also was built in a small edition not for sale and only for hunting participants, among whom were directly Alexander II, the Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar, Prince Karl of Prussia, the Prince of Hesse-Kassel and many other high-ranking persons.
(N.B. No. 419, Solovyov "Catalog No. 105" No. 296, Vereshchagin No. 644, Klochkov No. 56 - 30 rubles, Gauthier No. 774 - 50 rubles).
For his work on the natural history of the bison in 1848, Dmitry Yakovlevich was elected a full member of the Russian Geographical Society. For compiling the "History of the Bison" in October 1849, he was declared gratitude by the Minister of State Property and was given 250 silver rubles. Later, the Emperor personally presented him with a diamond ring for his services to Russia.
Estimated: 480,000 - 500,000 rubles.
