RGADA (Rosiiskii Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Drevnikh Aktov – Russian State Archive of Old Acts, Moscow), Hold. 192, Reg. 1 (II/i/Orenburg governorate), file 6: ‘Map of border areas of the Orenburg and Siberian governorates’ (Landkarta pogranichnykh mest Orenburgskoy i Sibirskoy Gubernii…).
Description:
A manuscript map, drawn with ink upon sturdy parchment, with but scant colouration (chiefly borders and bodies of water); folded in half – each part being smaller than A2 on one side and larger on the other (-3 cm and +10 cm; thus, the approximate size of the document is 1050*560). The usage list contains 13 people; an electronic copy was made for the “Design and Cartography” (Evgeny Rychalovsky) in 2006.
The limits of the cartographic image: from Volga river and Caspian Sea in the west to “part of the Pacific Sea” in the east; from Tobolsk in the north to Tibet, parts of Tangut and “the river Inda” in the south. Peking, the Great Wall of China, the Korean Peninsula, and islands near the mouth of Amur river are depicted too. The content of the map: political entities (with coloured borders), cities, elements of the nomadic cultural landscape (mainly through inscriptions), rivers, lakes, and mountains.
Other features. System of longitudes: the entire map from -10°E to 80°E, 0° being Astrakhan. Tobolsk (86°E according to modern system) at 17-18°E, the mouth of Amur river at 80°E; the scale has evidently been torn away. In the Olde Siberia: four cities – Yekaterinburg, Tyumen, Tobolsk, Tara; Uslaminskaya sloboda, Kartasheva sloboda and Chernolutskoy ostrog (between Tara and Omsk fortress); the fortresses of the New Ishim and Irtysh lines are shown (indeed, a chain of fortresses from Samara and Guryev to Ust-Kamenogorsk), “Steppe of the nomadic Kirghis Kaisaks” with division into three Hordes.
This electronic copy was made by Andrei Tyulpin in 2015.
The copy was ordered and now is published by Sergei Rasskasov, financed by Russian Foundation for Basic Research.
First publication of the same map (RAS Library copy): Erofeeva, I.V. Geograficheskie karty XVIII veka: kak istochnik po istorii, etnologii i istoricheskoy toponimike Kazakhstana [Geographical maps of the XVIII century: as a source on the history, ethnology and historical toponymy of Kazakhstan]. In: Istoriya Kazakhstana v dokumentakh i materialakh: Al’manakh [History of Kazakhstan in documents and materials: Almanac]. Almaty: LEM, 330–357 (In Russian).
This map is also shortly described and analyzed in the following publication: Sergei Rasskasov «The Steppe of Nomadic Kirghiz-Kaisaks»: the Qazaq Steppe on Russian maps of the 18th – 19th centuries and the Early Modern cartography as a source for studying the geographical imagination of the Central and North Asia. (2023). Qazaq Historical Review, 1 (1), 122-139. https://doi.org/10.69567/3007-0236.2023.1.122.138
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