Grigory Potanin completed the study of Przhevalsky

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

At the end of the 19th century, the colonial interests of Russia and Great Britain clashed in Central Asia. And although the influence of Russia was less pronounced here, the Russians did not want to be just an observer in Central Asia. However, even for the tsarist government it was a great courage to send a former convict and Siberian separatist as the head of the research detachment.

The name of Grigory Potanin is not known in Russia as widely as the names of Nikolai Przhevalsky or Peter Semenov-Tyan-Shansky. However, his trips to Mongolia, Altai and Tibet enriched science with new discoveries and achievements.

Cossack orphan

The future traveler was born in the village of Yamyshevskaya fortress. His mother died early, and his father, a cornet of the Cossack army, was imprisoned for offense. And the orphaned eleven-year-old Grisha was sent to study at the Omsk Cadet Corps. It was there that during his studies Potanin became interested in geography.

After completing his studies in 1852, Potanin was sent to serve in the Cossack regiment of Semipalatinsk, from where a year later he set off on his first campaign to the Zailiysky Krai. In 1855, the young officer was transferred to Altai, and in 1856 - to the headquarters of the Cossack army in Omsk.

But service in the army was not to Gregory's liking. He finally decided to quit after meeting with Semyonov-Tyan-Shansky, who had returned to Omsk from another expedition. Potanin surprised the scientist with his knowledge of Asian flora, and he supported the officer in his desire to study at the university. Citing illness, Gregory resigned.

In 1859, having received a recommendation from the exiled Bakunin, Potanin entered the Physics and Mathematics Department of St. Petersburg University. But because of his participation in the unrest in 1861, he was arrested and sent back to Siberia.

Returning to Omsk in 1862, Grigory took an active part in the affairs of the Society for the Independence of Siberia, which aimed at separating Siberia from Russia. Although dreams of wandering and travel still lived in the soul of the rebel. In 1863, on the recommendation of Semyonov-Tyan-Shansky, Potanin joined the expedition of the astronomer Karl Struve to South Siberia. Struve aimed at topographic survey of the area and drawing up maps. Potanin was more interested in the nature and ethnography of those places. In the valley of the Black Irtysh, on Lake Zaisan-Nor and in the Tarbagatai mountains, Grigory collected an extensive herbarium and wrote a lot of notes about the life of Kazakhs, included in the monograph "A trip to the Eastern Tarbagatay in the summer of 1864 by Karl Struve and Grigory Potanin."

Chopped off Altai from the Tien Shan

Upon his return from the expedition, Potanin received the post of provincial secretary in Tomsk and continued his activities in the Society for the Independence of Siberia. The arrest followed with fatal inevitability. As "the main malefactor" he was sentenced by the Senate to 15 years of hard labor. But Emperor Alexander II commuted the sentence to 5 years with subsequent exile for life. After three years in the Omsk prison, in 1868 Potanin was subjected to civil execution and sent to Sveaborg penal servitude. Three years later he was sent to Tot-mu, and then to the city of Nikolsk, Vologda province. But even while in exile, Potanin did not stop his opposition activities, publishing in provincial newspapers.

Probably, the patrons from the Russian Geographical Society gave Potanin a choice - politics or science. Gregory chose the latter, and the scholars wrote a petition to pardon the traveler. In 1874, the emperor satisfied him.

In the spring of 1876, Potanin, as an expert in Southern Siberia, was sent on an expedition to Mongolia on the instructions of the Russian Geographical Society. Together with him, his wife Alexandra, who was engaged in ethnography and illustrated what she saw, went on a campaign.

Having reached Lake Zaisan, already familiar to him, Potanin crossed the border of the Mongolian Altai and came to the Mongolian city of Kobdo. From there, the detachment moved southeast along the northern slopes of the Mongolian Altai, opening the short ridges of Batar-Khair-khan and Sutai-Ula.

In July, the detachment approached the possessions of the Shara-Sume monastery on the southern slope of Altai. The monks who saw them immediately accused the guests of desecrating the holy land, disarmed them and threw them into prison. However, Potanin knew that Buddhists did not accept violence, and was calm. Indeed, the travelers were soon released. The monks even offered to return the weapons to the Russians, but on condition that they follow the path where they can be followed.

The Buddhists wanted to make sure the foreigners left their land. But the proposed route lay apart from the places for which the expedition was started. With a wave of his hand at his weapon, Potanin found a guide, and at night the detachment left the monastery without saying goodbye.

Overcoming the rocky versts of the Dzungar Gobi, the scientist discovered that it was not even a desert, but a steppe with ridges parallel to the Mongolian Altai, separated from the Tien Shan.

In the south of the Dzungar Gobi, travelers discovered two parallel ridges, Ma-chin-Ula and Karlyktag - the easternmost spurs of the Tien Shan. The main result of that expedition was the conclusion about the independence of the Altai and Tien Shan mountain systems. In fact, Potanin became the first to seriously study the ecosystem of the Mongolian Altai.

On the road to Tibet

In the summer of 1879 Potanin set off on a new expedition to Mongolia and Tuva. His detachment proceeded further to the region of Lake Ubsu-Hyp, where scientists and his associates began to study the unique lake groups of the region. As a result, it was proved that Lake Ubsu-Hyp is the largest body of water in Mongolia.

In September of the same year, the detachment reached the central part of the Tuva depression. Potanin mapped the outlines of the main ridge and its northern spurs, and also clarified the cartographic image of the upper reaches of the Yenisei. In 1880 the expedition returned to Irkutsk. All the information collected during these two expeditions was reflected by Potanin in his monograph "Sketches of North-West Mongolia".

On his third expedition in 1884, Potanin went to Tibet. For the most part, this was due to the increased Russian-English rivalry in the region. Funds for the expedition were allocated by the Russian Geographical Society and the mayor of Irkutsk. Officially, Potanin was ordered to supplement the work of Przhevalsky, the unofficial part was strictly classified.

The expedition went by sea to the port of Chi-fu, from where by the end of the year, having visited Beijing, reached the city of Gansu, which lay on the border with Tibet. In this region, travelers have been collecting information of both scientific and other nature for a whole year. In April 1886, the detachment reached the closed-drainage lake Kukunor, and then, turning north, reached the source of the Zho-shui River. After tracing the entire course of the river (900 kilometers), the detachment went to the endless lake Gashun-Nur, and the travelers mapped its location.

Based on the results of the Tibetan campaign, Potanin wrote an extensive work "Tangut-Tibetan outskirts of China and Central Mongolia." And although the article was replete with geographical information, another part of the collected information went to the military department.

In 1892 Potanin again went to study Eastern Tibet. However, this time the scientist chose a different route, laying it through the province of Sichuan, bordering Tibet south of Gansu. From there, the detachment planned to go straight to the Tibetan Plateau. However, already on the border with Tibet, Potanin's wife Alexander, who accompanied him on campaigns, lost consciousness and lost her speech. Potanin decided to interrupt the expedition and turned to Beijing. However, he did not manage to save his wife - Alexander died on the way. Potanin's comrades, geologists Berezovsky and Obruchev, continued their scientific assignment, while he himself, heartbroken, buried his wife in Kyakhta and returned to St. Petersburg.

The last expedition of Grigory Potanin to the Great Khingan mountain range in northeastern China took place in 1899 and pursued purely scientific goals. After that, the scientist focused on scientific and teaching activities.

Grigory Nikolaevich took the 1917 revolution with hostility and during the Civil War actively called for a fight against the Reds. However, his age did not allow him to be active in politics. On June 30, 1920, at the clinic of Tomsk University, Grigory Potanin died and was buried at the Preobrazhensky cemetery of the city.