Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District - historical native land of thin peoples of ultima Thule: Nentsy, Khanty, Selkupy.

The percentage of aboriginal people from the total number of population is 7 percent (36,000 people); over 13,000 people live a roving life (which is 40 percent of the total aboriginal population). To support thin aboriginal peoples of the north in autonomous district there are special social programs working and considerable funds in the district budget are provided.

For example, for the program 'Culture, language, traditional lifestyle of thin aboriginal peoples of the north of Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District for 2003-2007' about 30mln rubles is spent annually. It should be noted that the funds committed go, in the first place, to solve social problems of the northern people: providing facilities in sanatoria and health resorts for aborigines of autonomous district, paying scholarships in higher education establishments and academies for children of people living in tundra. Besides, separate district budget items provide funds to give assistance to the Institute of Traditional Trades and Russian State Pedagogical University named after Gertsen (Saint-Petersburg), which educate aborigines of Yamal.

Basically, children of people living in tundra are educated in boarding schools. Now in the district there are 23 boarding schools, educating about 9,000 children of aborigines. Getting education by children is regulated by standard acts of Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District, which, in particular, guarantee full social security in educating such children. For example, the district budget covers maintenance of boarding schools, education of children, their catering, providing them with clothes, transferring from their camps to schools and etc. The tailored system of boarding schools education helps keep the uniqueness of northern peoples. According to the overall results of census of 2002, in Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District more than 80 percent of aborigines speak their native language. This is a very impressive figure, considering the fact that in average only 70 percent of aborigines of other Russian regions speak their mother tongues.

Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District Law about Budget for 2006 included suggestions on district target programs concerning social-economic development of district aboriginal peoples. Among them - extension of reindeer farming and traditional trades of the north inhabitants, integrated processing of output of these industries, creation of trading stations and spread of commerce through them, growth of barter, development of market infrastructure in tundra areas. As a decent representative of the tundra locals in their relationship with authorities and mutually beneficial partnership with gas-extracting companies working in the regions traditionally inhabited by the Nentsy and the Khanty appears the District Association of Aborigines "Yamal - to descendants!"

Nentsy

The Nentsy is one of the largest Samoyed peoples. The very word 'nenets' means 'a person', 'neney nenets' - 'a real person' - was introduced to official use in 1930. Initially the Nentsy were called 'samoyedy', or 'samoyedy-yuraki'. An allusion to this fact we can find in the oldest Russian chronicles "The Tale of Chrono Years" dated early XII-th century. The origins of the term 'samoyed' are interpreted differently. The most probable seems to be its rise from 'saam-jedna' - 'the land of the Saams". They differ the name 'Khasava' for the Nentsy of the western part of Yamal, 'Neney Nenets' for the Nentsy of the eastern part of Yamal and Gydy, and 'Nenets' - for different groups.

According to their types of economy and culture, the Nentsy can be divided into three groups. The first, and the basic, group of 90 percent is represented by the tundra Nentsy, whose main activity is product reindeer farming. They have developed the northern areas. The second group - the forest Nentsy - inhabit taiga part of Ob-Yenissey divide, mainly along the rivers Pur, Taz, and Agan, and are basically involved in transport reindeer farming, hunting, fishing. They turn to be the link between Samoyed tribes of Sayan plateau and tundra Nentsy; they also speak a particular dialect of the Nenets language. The third group - the Kolvintsy - arose on the European north in the area of the river Kolva in XIX-th century owing to marriages between Nenets men and Komi women. People speak Izhemsky dialect of the Komi language.

According to the most convincing theory, Samoyed community formed in South Siberia. In the early centuries a.d. a part of the Samoyeds moved north and another part joined Turkic peoples of South Siberia. During the first thousand years a.d. a big group of the Samoyed people moved along the Ob, Yenissey and their interfluve up to the north taiga, and later tundra, assimilating aboriginal population. Later, the ancestors of the modern Nentsy spread from the lower course of the Ob to the west as far as the White Sea; by the XVII-th century they could be found in the east along the Yenissey.

Traditional activity of the Nentsy is reindeer farming. There are some national peculiarities to this industry, such as year-round pasture of animals herded by shepherds and pasturing dogs, sledge deer riding. There are two types of sledges used: passenger and cargo ones. A straight-poppet Nenets sledge consists of a vehicle body fixed to skid bent up at the front. For better firmness poppets are slightly pulled apart at the bottom, which makes the distance between the skid wider than the width of the seat. Male passenger sledge seat only has the back to lean on, female - front and side walls as well to make it more convenient for them to go with children. In the passenger sledge, three to seven reindeers are hitched fan-like. They are usually climbed on from the left and driven with the help of a rein fixed to a halter (a bridle without a bit, but a rein) of the reindeer on the left, and a khorey-pole with a bone button at the tip. Sometimes they fix a metal spear-shaped tip to the other tip of khorey (in the past it used to be a weapon as well as a bow). A harness is made from reindeer or bearded seal skin. In a cargo sledge two reindeers are hatched; five to six cargo sledges together produce a caravan (arguish) as reindeers are tied with chains or straps to the sledge ahead. Every arguish is driven by a rider on a passenger sledge, very often a teenager girl; men on passenger sledges whip up the herd nearby. To noose the animals wanted, a special corral is constructed with the help of sledges. Reindeer eats moss - reindeer moss. As the food supplies run low, pastures have to be changed. Shepherds and their families move together with their herds.

A very suitable and convenient collapsible lodging for a roving life is a chum - a cone-shaped construction with a body consisting of 25 - 30 poles. In winter it is covered with two layers of nyuk-covers from reindeer skin, in summer - with specially elaborated birch bark. In the center of chum there used to be a bonfire, now a metal furnace is fired there. Above the fire they used to fix a bar with a hook for the kettle or a boiler, on both sides of it there is some space for sleeping, opposite the entrance there used to be objects of pagan worship, later - icons, as well as clean dishes. Every time the shepherds relocate, chum is taken to pieces; covers, beds, poles, and dishes are transported on a special sledge.

Women are in charge of reindeer and fur-bearing skin dressing, clothes tailoring, making bags and covers for chum. Clothes and household gear were sumptuously decorated with fur patchwork (from the bits of white and black colors); women did beads decorations and woodcarving, embroidered with reindeer neck hair.

Traditional male clothes consist of a jumper (malitsa) with a hood (buttoned-up loose shirt from reindeer leg skins, camus, pelt-in), pants, shoes-pims from camus pelt-out, and pelt-in stockings. To keep the hide cuttings, on top of malitsa they put on a cotton shirt and gird with a rawhide belt decorated with copper open-work metal plate or buttons. To the belt they fix a knife in sheath on chainlets, a knife-grinder; behind, as an amulet, there is a bear tooth. In cold weather on top of malitsa men wear sovik - a shirt with a hood, reminiscent to malitsa but tailored pelt-out.

Women's clothes, unlike men's, are unbuttoned. They used to be made from skins of forest animals with dog fur trimming along the hen. Later they started sowing clothes from reindeer skins, with polar fox or red fox collar. The flaps of the clothes are not wrapped up, but tied up with straps from suede or laces and decorated with ornamental insets of white and dark fur. To a bag for sewing gear, cut out of skins from reindeer foreheads and abundantly decorated with ornament, they fix a needle cushion and a small sack for a thimble. Belts, woven from colored woolen yarn, supplement round buckles up to 20 cm diameter. Women's hats differ from each other. The most widespread are hoods from reindeer fur with polar fox tails edging, to the back of which copper open-work metal plates are suspended with chainlets. Women's shoes are different from men's in cut. For little children they use soft reindeer skins to sew clothes similar to overalls.

The basic food is venison (raw or boiled), fish, and bread. The favorite drink is tea. As well as metal kitchen utensils, it used to be bartered from Russian traders. Wooden dishes - bowls, cups, spoons - were produced locally.

Religious beliefs of the Nentsy were based on animistic ideas, according to which the supreme High God - demiurge Num - ruled the world with the help of other deities and spirits, and his wife Ya-Nebya - 'Mother Earth' - creaker-patroness, giving birth to and keeping all flesh, guarded house, family, and hearth. Num's antagonist is Nga - world evil incarnate, a spirit of Erebus, a God sending illness and death. Every lake, every trade area had its master spirits. They were offered reindeers in sacrifice, given gifts (pieces of cloth, coins, tobacco, etc.), to get good health, luck in reindeer farming and trading. On holy places, such as rocks, cliffs, in forests, they erected humanlike idol statues. The holy tree used to be a larch.

Khanty

On Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District terrain the Khanty mainly live in Shuryshkarsky and Priuralsky areas. The ethnicon 'Khanty' was originated from self-name 'khante'. As an official name, it was accepted after 1917; in old literature and papers of tsar administration the Khanty were referred to as 'Ostyaks'.

G.S.Dunin-Gorkavitch - an explorer of the early century, who happened to visit these lands, gives the following description of the aborigines: "The Ostyaks are mainly open-hearted, helpful, and of strict honesty. They are not hostile and live peacefully. They don't know poverty: every poor has a right to come to a better-off and eat their food, especially after their fruitful hunting or fishing. Among them there is even a kind of public charity, according to which every elderly and disabled Ostyak, unless he or she has relatives, is fed by the community.'

To refer to the Khanty, there is another term used by scientific literature - 'Ob Ugry'. Its first part points out the basic habitation area, the second arose from the word 'Yugra', 'Yugoria'. This was the name used in Russian chronicles of XI-XV-th centuries to describe the terrain of Polar Ural, West Siberia, and their residents.

The language of the Khanty is classified by linguists as Ugric; the same group includes the kindred Hungarian language. The Ugric languages are included into Finno-Ugric group of Ural family of languages.

Due to the fact that the Khanty language refers to Finno-Ugric group, it is supposed that long ago there used to be a community speaking this parent language. The question concerning where this community used to live is extremely difficult to answer. In spite of vagueness and inconsistence of theories of the Khanty origins, explorers are unanimous in the opinion of binary nature of their culture, which has absorbed the traditions of local taiga tribes and the Yugry who came from the south. Linguists say there is a probability of old links between the Ural, Indo-European, and Turkic language families. There are also connections with the Yukaghir, Chukotko-Kamchatkan, and Eskimo-Aleut languages; some relations with the old Iranian languages have also been discovered.

The Khanty are traditionally hunters and fishermen leading half-settled lifestyle. Besides, they have always been into reindeer farming in the north and cattle-breeding in the south. Hunters and fishermen had seasonal settlements and dwellings. There used to be a lot of types of lodgings, some of them were temporary and collapsible, others - permanent. Household outbuildings were various, cult constructions were usual. Household gear were made of local materials: wood, birch bark, cedar roots, etc.

Clothes of the Khanty were different depending on their groups: the northern Khants mostly preferred buttoned-up clothes (without vents, slip-on), the northern and eastern Khanty wore unbuttoned clothes. Ornaments were assorted and abundant.

Selkupy

The Selkupy are the people of Samoyed language group. They inhabit Krasnoselcupsky, Kargassoksky, Parabelsky, Verkhne-Ketsky districts of Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District, and they can also be found in the countryside of Kolpashevo town, Tomsk region. The total population of the Selkupy is around 4,000 people. Historically, two territorially isolated groups are distinguished among the Selkupy - the northern and the south ones. The self-name of the north Selkupy is 'solkup' or 'sholkup' (taiga man). Before 1917 ethnographic literature referred to them as to 'Ostyaki' or 'Ostyaki-Samoyedy'. The modern ethnicon was introduced in the 30-s of the twentieth century and originally was accepted by the northern group only. The southern Selkupy accepted it within the last two decades. The Selkup language belongs to Samoyed branch of the Ural family of languages. It is subdivided into six dialects and two unsteady subdialects.

The Russians settled in the area of mid-Ob late in the 16-th century. By that time, there had been Selkup community, known as 'Pegaya Orda' with a princeling Vonya as a leader, who refused to acknowledge the power of Russian tsar for a long time. It wasn't until the construction of Narynsky burg in 1596 that the Russians managed to lay a render on the Selkupy. In the early XVIII-th century the Tomsk Selkupy were turned to Christianity through baptizing. In the mid-to-late XIX-th century Russian migration flow to the regions inhabited by the Selkupy increased. Under the influence of the Russians they started settling in villages, taking up domestic cattle and gardening. Economical-cultural links between the Selkupy and the Russians came to be tightened by marriage bonds. In the late XIX-th century all Selkupy took up a neighborly commune as a basic social unit. It included representatives of different ethno-territorial groups, not linked with each other by blood kinship.

The Selkupy had complex economy, the main industries of which were hunting and fishing. Transport reindeer farming was only familiar to the northern Selcupy. Selkup economic regress by the beginning of the XVII-th century can be explained by the abundance of furry animals that West Siberia was notable for. Thus, it came to be one of the basic centers of fur-skins traders from all civilized countries of the time. Sable in the mid-Ob area was exterminated at the end of the XVII-th century, therefore the major hunting trophy for the Selkupy used to be squirrel. The fact that in the XIX-th century the Selkupy had a special exchange unit 'sarum' - a bunch of ten squirrel skins - can be a proof that squirrel trade really flourished. The Narym Selkupy gave big importance to hunting for upland fowl - wood grouse, black grouse, hazel grouse, which were the major source of meat. The second most important trade in Selkup economy was fishing. The main types of fish caught used to be sturgeon, white salmon, omul, whitefish, and sterlet. Among the traditional fishing equipment the most commonplace was a set net; cut-out fishing style was also known. Reindeer farming was dealt with by the northern Selkupy. Selkup reindeer farming is of taiga type. Sizes of herds and routes of seasonal migrations are moderate. The Selkups, unlike the Nentsy, did not use pasture dogs. Reindeer pasture was rare, even in winter.

The Selkupy were noted for animistic views on the world surrounding them. Their demiurge was Nom, personifying heaven. The master of evil Kyzy had a habitation under ground. Selkup art is presented by ornamentation of birch bark dishes, bone parts of reindeer harness, sheaths, knifes, and other household gear.

Decorating of clothes, so typical of many Siberia peoples, was not widely spread among the Selkupy. Traditional folklore features various adventures of a hero, his collisions with evil spirits, who are always beaten. A popular musical instrument used to be a seven-stringed jew's harp - antler lips plate with vibrant tongue. The only musical instrument of the northern Selkupy used to be a shamanistic tambourine.

So, who are the Selkupy? They might be the inhabitants of ancient Ecumene of Samoyed world, who refused to migrate when their lands were passed through by later incomers - the Samoyed reindeer farmers, who had arrived from the south and went to tundra together with their herds? Or, they could be the very that part of ancient people that did not divide distinctly into the Samoyeds and the Ugry? The third guess is - the Selkupy might have appeared as a result of mixture between the Samoyeds and the Ugry? These questions are still waiting to be answered. It is tremendously difficult to apprehend the Selkupy, as their cultural habits trace down to both the Ugry and the Samoyeds.