The economic literature of past centuries is a kind of archive rarely used by Orientalists, not only of factual information about the economies of Eastern countries, but also of serious reflections of European intellectuals on the model of development of Eastern societies. In general, the most fascinating reading for a scientist.

How can the Russian economic literature of the 18th century be useful for a modern Orientalist researcher? What kind of information about the East was published in it? In addition to finding answers to these questions, the article attempts to trace the process of understanding the most important problems of Russian-Asian trade by domestic authors of the XVIII century.

The conversation about Russian economic thought should begin with an introduction to European translated literature, since these books stimulated the thoughts of Domestic authors about Russia and its relations with the East. A significant influence on the formation of their vision of the East was exerted by European literature, which reflected the views of mercantilists.

Peter I paid considerable attention to the ideological justification of his political activities, and among the books translated at his behest was the work of the German philosopher and historian S. Pufendorf "Introduction to European History "(original edition-1688; first Russian edition-1718). To a certain extent, the book was close to the views of Peter I himself: Pufendorf was very critical of the state of the Russian state and society as a whole. As a role model for domestic readers of his work, European powers that grew richer due to economic ties with the East, in particular Holland, were presented. "Friendship of the East Indies (Netherlands East India Company - S. S.) bestows wealth on society... multiplies with great profits", making profitable trade in the space "from Bazora [Basra]... even to the last Iapponia of countries...", - the author claimed [Pufendorf, 1723, pp. 536-537] 1. The diligence of the Dutch and their skillful resale of Eastern goods to other European countries contributed to the fact that Holland managed to achieve a positive trade balance: "more goods come out of it than they come in" (Pufendorf, 1723, p. 539). This work only in the most general terms introduced domestic readers to the problems of European-Asian trade, but over time, translations of specialized publications became available to educated Russians.

The work was carried out within the framework of the RFBR research project 05 - 06 - 80041-a.

1 Under Catherine II, this work of Pufendorf was reprinted in a new translation (1767-177).

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In 1747. The Academy of Sciences published an Extract of Savariev's Lexicon on Commerce with a significant circulation of 1,225 copies at that time [Consolidated Catalog..., 1966, N 6254, p. 82]. The author of the paper is French economist Jacques Savary de Brulon. His father, Jacques Savary, an associate of Colbert, took part in the drafting of the code of commercial law (1673) and wrote the economic treatise "The Perfect Merchant". Savary de Brulon himself served as an inspector of the Paris Customs from 1686, and his work on the "General Commercial Dictionary" was supported by the royal authority [Extract..., 1747, historical preface, p.43].

Secretary of the Academy of Sciences Sergey Volchkov, who made a partial translation of the Dictionary into Russian, noted that the reader, thanks to acquaintance with Savary's work, will be able to" ... see the commerce of the entire earthly circle, with a description of peoples and other states in the world, "and also find out" what goods are where... we need to know what is where, what is lacking in which state, and where what goods come from...". The compiler of the "Dictionary" pursued purely practical goals: the information collected and systematized by him was supposed to help implement the ideas of mercantilists in practice.

By royal decree, Savary de Brulon received valuable information from the French consuls and customs officers. In addition, he studied the notes of travelers and missionaries. The volume of information was large, and the work lasted for many years. Savary de Brulon died in 1716, and the Dictionary was completed by his brother, Abbot Louis Savary, a canon of the court church. The French edition of the book was published in 1723 (an additional volume in 1730). The translation into Russian was carried out by order of the Commercial Board, and the text of the translation was verified by V. K. Trediakovsky, and a significant monetary reward of 500 rubles was granted to Volchkov by a senate decree [Chulkov, 1788, p. 175], i.e. the publication of the book was perceived as as a matter of national importance.

The reason for the interest in this encyclopedia of world trade of the late 17th and early 18th centuries on the part of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Board of Commerce was not only the information content of the book (it was one of the first publications of its kind in Europe), but also the fact that Savary de Brulon did not skimp on since his economic policy corresponded to the ideas of the mercantilists: the Russian emperor " ... zealously took care of bringing all commerce... in a blooming state" [Extract..., 1747, p. 200] 2. Thus, the book combined the usefulness of the information with its correspondence to the official Russian ideology, and this made it possible to place at the beginning of the "Savariev Lexicon Extract" (note that the extract took up more than 900 pages) a dedication to the Empress Elizabeth Petrovna and, accordingly, count on her favor in one form or another.

A whole section of the work was devoted to the East - "Asian Commerce" [Extract..., 1747, p. 325-483; p. 905-937]. It included such articles as "The Commerce of Arabia", "On the Persian Gulf and the commerce occurring in it", "Internal commerce of the Persian State and its subjects 'lands", "Project of commerce between the Crown of France and Persia through the Russian state", " East India, or all East India general commerce", "China" with the subsection "Foreign Commerce of the Chinese State" devoted to inter-Asian trade. There were separate articles about Japan, Korea, Java, Sumatra, the Moluccas, Ceylon, about the activities of European East India and Levantine companies [Extract..., 1747, pp. 646-681], about the Levantine and Black Sea trade, etc.

2 Peter I might have known about this encyclopedic work: Prince I. A. Shcherbatov's note "Introduction to Russian Trade" (1724), which Peter I may have read, contained references to Savary de Brulon's "General Commercial Dictionary" (Pekarsky, 1862, pp. 564-567).

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As a rule, the articles of the Lexicon listed the main ports and cities-centers of trade and handicraft production in a particular country, exported and imported goods, prices for them, indicated the amount of duties, and provided information about local monetary systems, as well as systems of weights and measures. Naturally, the information provided was not equivalent. The volume of information about Istanbul, Cairo, and Alexandria "inhabited" by European merchants far exceeded articles about Siam, Korea, and Cambodia.

"Lexicon" provided readers with an opportunity to reflect on the development model of Eastern societies. Since the Savary brothers compiled the text of the book from various sources, the vision of the East presented here was also contradictory.

The first trend in understanding Eastern societies had its roots in the Middle Ages, when a strict and just Eastern ruler who established a relative order in his state was perceived as an acceptable alternative to European feudal feuds (such as the Ottoman sultans in the works of Philippe de Commines, Machiavelli and Ivan Peresvetov) [Yegorov, 1907, p. 9 - 13; Krymsky, 1910, p. 151-164; Commin, 1987, p. 262-264]. The mercantilist works introduced new features to this idealization scheme. In the 17th and 18th centuries, precious metals continued to flow from Europe to Asia, and many European authors see the reason for this state of affairs in the successful policies of enlightened Eastern rulers, acting in accordance with the theory of trade balance, wisely using the natural resources of their countries and the talents of their subjects.

For example, about the Ottoman Empire in the "Lexicon" it was reported :" Although the Christians of the Turks count as barbarians, but for the Turkish people the main policy is to sell their factories and manufactories goods, as well as things born at home, as possible, and receive money to the state, from which every land becomes rich, and moreover they look at it so that they can have fun as much as possible without chuzhov" [Extract..., 1747, p. 245]. Similar features were also noted in the policy of the "Chinese Government", in Persia [Extract..., 1747, p. 421, 338-339] and in the Mughal Empire. It "...is so abundant in all the necessities of human life that it can stay without commerce with strangers and enjoy its own contentment, " so "European commerce in the Mughal lands consists most of all in gold and silver money, which is brought there from Europe, and there is almost no way for them to get out" [Extract..., 1747, p. 370].

At the same time, the encyclopedia also contained another layer of information that reflected the state of affairs that European merchants faced in practice. In the article "Constantinople" there was a sharp attack on Eastern despotism: "A fair situation... this city, with the beauty and safety of the port there, might have made Constantinople the first and most mercantile city in the whole world, if the inhabitants of it had dared to become rich in merchants; but they are subject to great servility and such captivity that they cannot call their own estates their own, and they cannot permanently own them. Also, if the Turks, for the sake of commerce, did not receive strangers who came there so proudly and did not treat them with such cruelty..."[Extract..., 1747, p. 236]. It turned out that in Smyrna "all foreign merchants are subject to many and great attacks... by Pashas, Governors and other lower ranks of Turkish Officers", and Venice allocates a certain amount of money to its ambassador for "gifts" to Turkish officials [Extract..., 1747, p. 226, 243] (naturally, the Russian reader understood and understands what kind of gifts we are talking about). The Dutch in the second half of the 17th century spent considerable money "on gifts to the Persian court" [ibid., p. 344]. Later, S. - L. Montesquieu, in his essay On the Spirit of Laws (1748), even devoted a separate chapter to this question (Book V, chapter 17), highlighting the following:-

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he considers the bribery of those in power as a characteristic feature of eastern despotic states.

When Lexicon talked about economic ties with European countries, the question of" gifts " was not raised at all. Although the French could scold the high duties levied on foreign merchants in Britain, and also call the English a "rude people" [Extract..., 1747, p. 146-147], the fact that the East is a special world, fundamentally different from the European one, was obvious to the compilers of the "Universal Commercial Dictionary". However, the Savary brothers failed to fully comprehend the collected information and explain how the wise economic policy of the Eastern sovereigns could be combined with the "slavery" of their subjects, the lack of security of property, and usury on the part of state officials (and they did not set such a goal for themselves). The actual information published by them, for example, is placed in the form of an appendix " General staff for all and every title of goods of Marseille commerce..."(1688) with an indication of the annual trade volumes and prices of various goods, including eastern ones [Extract..., 1747, pp. 750-844], retain the value of a historical source for modern historical and economic research.

The benefit of the Russian merchants should also have been served by the book published by the Moscow University by Jean-Pierre Ricard "Trading in Amsterdam, containing everything that merchants and bankers should know, both living in Amsterdam and foreign... "(original edition-1723; Russian edition-1762-1763). Like the work of Savary de Brulon, it "entered" Russia into the system of world trade relations (which is why these books were important for domestic readers). One of its chapters was devoted to "the commerce of the Russian state" (Rikar, 1763, pp. 109-117).

Ricard cited the systems of weights and measures of European states, as well as Russia, in comparison with the Dutch one, described in detail the Dutch monetary system, the lending and trading procedures that operated in Amsterdam. In the chapter " About the East India Company..."Rikar published a document entitled' General cargo of 26 ships arriving from India... to Holland... in 1720, namely: 20 from Batavia and 6 from Ceylon, with the price for which the goods brought by Ottol were sold...", illustrating the activities of the East India Company [Ricard, 1763, pp. 57-68]. Ricard's work contained information on trade in Istanbul, Smyrna, Aleppo, Alexandria, Rosetta, and Cairo (monetary settlement systems, weights and measures, and the range of trade), but not too detailed.

The books of Savary de Brulon and Ricard served not so much the Russian merchants as domestic economists-as examples when writing works on the problems of Russian-Asian trade. The ideas of mercantilism were popular among Russian statesmen and scientists, so the Russian economic literature was searching for an answer to the question: how should Russia trade with the East? In order to find it, the structure of Russian exports and imports was studied, assumptions were made about the most promising areas of trade relations, whether Russia could become an intermediary in trade between Europe and the East, and attempts were made to understand the psychology of Eastern merchants.

Russian researchers had relatively little information about the economy of Eastern countries at their disposal. It was often extracted from European economic literature and travel notes. In 1790, F. V. Karzhavin, in the preface to the book by B. Plaisted and J. R. R. Tolkien, wrote: Eliot's "Description of the course of merchant and other caravans in steppe Arabia..." was sarcastic about the domestic " hypocrites "(meaning the authors of "trips" to the East),"...who in their travels do not understand anything except churches, vestments, vessels and panikadilas" (for pilgrims, the journey to the East was primarily a spiritual experience of communion with Christian traditions).

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shrines), pointing out the need to collect information about " ... customs... laws, plants" [Plaisted, Eliot, 1790, preface, p. omitted], i.e. about the social structure and economies of the eastern countries visited.

The gates of the East for Russians were fairs where eastern merchants arrived with goods: Makaryevskaya (later Nizhny Novgorod), Irbit, Orenburg. Therefore, Russian economic thinking about the East at that time almost did not go beyond purely applied issues: the attention of domestic researchers was focused primarily on the study of Russian-Asian land trade. Its results were unsatisfactory against the background of the successes of the European colonial powers by the middle of the XVIII century. Thus, V. N. Tatishchev, while in retirement, compiled in 1748 a note "An idea of merchants and crafts", where he stated:"...our merchants and their associates are causing damage to the state and ruin to the merchants by stealing and forgery in their goods... by the theft of merchants, the lucrative foreign trades, Chinese and Persian, are so spoiled that we now receive very worthless goods from them...What a great variety of tea is brought, but everything is rotten and worthless, and it is hardly possible... to find a good one, the states are forced to buy goods from England, Holland, and Sweden to their detriment... "[Tatishchev, 1996, vol. VII and VIII, p. 397].

It was certainly not the" theft " (or, more precisely, not so much the theft) of merchants and clerks. The reasons why Tatishchev received unsatisfactory quality tea from Kyakhta were fundamental, and Russian authors who wrote on economic issues were slow to understand them over the following decades.

In 1756, the Academy of Sciences published a book by G. - F. Miller "Description of the Siberian trades". On the first pages, the author informed readers "that the Siberian trades from ancient times in Russia were in glory...", and in the modern era " ... merchants go from Moscow and from other noble cities of Russia to Siberia, exchange their goods for local ones, or buy for money, and not only inside Siberia, but also in the middle of Siberia. and with border guards... For example, with the Chinese, Mungal, Kalmyks, and Bukharans, they do not send trades without a considerable profit, which is all the more famous the cheaper grub, as they call it, in Siberia, and the more capable the Siberian rivers are at such a distance, which makes the passage of goods much easier, and the price is always moderate, so that no one knows about the price of food. the high cost of Siberian goods in Russia, as well as Russian goods in Siberia... he can't complain" [Miller, 1756, pp. 2-3].

This proposal contained a reasonable idea: the transportation of goods by water is much more profitable than by land, and, as already noted in the scientific literature, under Peter I the Russian government took a number of steps (which did not bring significant results) in order to make Russia an intermediary in trade between Europe and the East. In particular, "a continuous waterway formed by the Vyshnevolotsky Canal, the Ilmen Lake-river system, and the Volga River connected St. Petersburg with Astrakhan, and the Baltic Sea with the Caspian Sea" [Essays..., 1954, p. 600]3 (from beginning to end, vessels could pass along this route only in the direction of St. Petersburg) [Nebolsin, 1835, pp. 37-38]. Miller, trying to illustrate ideas that are popular with the Russian authorities, was getting closer to understanding the fundamental problems of Russian-Asian trade.

The fact is that since the Middle Ages, inter-Asian and European-Asian trade was carried out mainly by sea, since sea transportation was much more profitable than land. In addition, for a number of reasons, the economically developed regions of Asian countries were shifted to the south, to the coasts, so Russia

3 For the reasons for the failure of Peter I's plans, see [Petrov, 2000, pp. 17-18].

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It bordered on the" economic backwater " of the East [Petrov, 2000, pp. 11-20], and the development of commercial shipping could contribute to the success of its foreign trade.

However, as the reader may have noticed, there was also a pseudo-patriotic slyness of the academician in the quoted sentence of Miller. After all, a quick glance at the map is enough to make sure that the phrase about the delivery of goods to the European part of Russia along the Siberian rivers was mostly a juggling of words. Indeed, when transporting goods, for example, from Kyakhta, waterways were used, but a significant part of the route had to be done overland, which affected the time spent on the road and the price of goods. Even a century later, in the 1930s and 1940s, the journey from Kyakhta to Nizhny Novgorod took about six months [Nebolsin, 1850, p. 362], so the goods could spoil on the way, which caused Tatishchev's legitimate discontent.

The unfounded statements made by Miller at the beginning of the work became all the more obvious because the author conscientiously recorded the prices of basic goods and even traced their changes in the regions of Siberia: "As for the price at which all ... both Russian and foreign goods are sold in Siberia, it is easy to judge that for the far East transportation and other expenses that occur to the merchant on the way become much more expensive against the Russian price, and that the price is necessarily multiplied in terms of the distance from one city to another... For example, simple white sugar, which is bought from the city of Arkhangelsk for a pood of 5 rubles, is usually sold in Irbit and Tobolsk for 7 rubles, in Yeniseysk for 10 rubles, in Irkutsk for 14, 16 and 20 rubles, and in Yakutsk sometimes for 40 rubles" [Miller, 1756, p. 68]. It wasn't hard to guess what was going to happen to the prices of Eastern goods when they were transported through Siberia to European Russia, and Miller certainly noticed this. He noted:" ...Chinese porcelain dishes, although they are sold very cheaply in China, but at the border at Kyakhta they are bought even more expensive than the dishes that are brought to St. Petersburg on ships from Holland and Copenhagen, " so from the Russian-Chinese border "...very little of it comes to St. Petersburg and other Pomeranian cities, which... they can be supplied much cheaper from Holland" [Miller, 1756, p. 148-149]. Russian small goods (dishes, mirrors, knives, needles, etc.), which " ... used to come a lot in China before," were much less in demand at the time of writing, since" ... ..Charmingly (presumably - S. S.) other European peoples put such things cheaper to the Chinese " [Miller, 1756, p. 67], delivering goods by sea.

These thoughts were scattered throughout the text of Miller's work, and the author could not bring them together and explain the complexity of Russia's position in relation to its eastern neighbors and, accordingly, what real prospects for the development of trade relations with them can be counted on.

At that time, economic relations with China were complicated by the fact that only state-owned caravans could conduct official trade in valuable furs (this commodity was in the greatest demand among Chinese merchants) [Sladkovsky, 1974, p.112]. And this significantly narrowed the trade range of private merchants. In the preface, Miller wisely stipulated: about "caravan and rhubarb trading", which constituted a state monopoly, in his book " ... mentioned in passing... "[Miller, 1756, predyzvestie, p. not specified]. Thus, the economic interests of the state were taken out of the discussion. However, he mentioned in passing the obstacles to the development of trade created by state caravans [Miller, 1756, p. 92, 106]. Despite this, when explaining the problems of Russian-Chinese trade, Miller, who apparently saw their true roots, evaded the answer and blamed all the blame on the" dark kingdom " of the Russian merchant class. He complained that contrary to the theory of trade balance, Russian merchants exchange silver and gold for "perishable" Chinese fabrics and tea,

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and also " ... they show the Chinese merchants excessive fervor by carrying so many goods to the Yacht that the Chinese do not want to make out all of them. And for this reason they are forced to live there for a whole year or more" (Miller, 1756, p. 42).

The current situation in Russo-Chinese trade was related to the relationship between sea and land trade with the East, and the nature of relations between Russia and China, as well as between the Russian state and merchants. When he reached the edge of understanding these problems, Miller left the reader puzzled about the mutually exclusive declarations at the beginning of the book and the facts he collected.

As a source, Miller's work was actively used in modern scientific literature, in particular in M. I. Sladkovsky's monograph on Russian-Chinese trade. Miller has preserved information about the product range of Russian exports and imports, the proportions of exchange of goods (the measure of value in the XVIII century, as a rule, were pieces of Chinese cloth) [Miller, 1756, pp. 137-138]. The value of Miller's work also lies in the description of the" outgoing nature " of Russian-Chinese trade: various varieties of Chinese fabrics, the behavior of Russian and Chinese merchants. These pages of his book, which recreate "almost tangible sensations" from contact with goods [Petrov, 1996, p.6], help to understand the realities of trading in Kyakhta and Tsuruhaitu. What is the price of such a picture: "A knowledgeable merchant looks at sables in clear weather, when the sky is clear from clouds, and... in a small room in front of the window, through which the sun does not shine. The sun's brilliance gives sables a gloss more than what they have from nature, and besides, it takes away some of their blackness" [Miller, 1756, pp. 74-75, 141].

In 1773, the Geographical Lexicon of the Russian State, edited and supplemented by Miller, was published (it was compiled from various sources, including the works of Miller himself, by the Verey voivode F. A. Polunin). The publication of the book was financed by H.-L. Wever, who had previously translated the Torg of Amsterdam.... Information about economic relations with the East was contained in a number of articles of the Geographical Lexicon... [see, for example, Polunin, 1773, p. 108-109 (article "Irkutsk"), p. 172-173 (article "Mangazeya"), pp. 258-259 (article "Kyakhta")], including in the article about Orenburg. As reported in the preface, the information for it was taken by the compilers from the work of corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences, member of the Free Economic Society P. I. Rychkov "Topography of Orenburg" (1762).

Let's follow the process of understanding this information.

In Rychkov's book, topography was understood as the widest range of information on the geography, history, economy, and ethnography of the Orenburg Region. Relying on official documents, Rychkov described the history of the development of local trade with Eastern peoples, tried to characterize its volumes. For example, he gave information about the number of shops and barns in the Orenburg "menovny dvor","...on which trade and exchange are made with the Asiatic peoples through the whole summer until the fall..." [Rychkov, 1762, part 2, pp. 18-19]. It was this information that interested the compilers of the Geographical Lexicon... and was included in the article on Orenburg [Polunin, 1773, p. 232-233]. Note that in the 10 years that have passed since the publication of Rychkov's work, the picture may have changed somewhat.

Rychkov published a list of state and customs duties in Orenburg from 1738 to 1754 with an indication of the size of duties and their changes [Rychkov, 1762, part 1, pp. 320-321], which allows us to estimate the volume of Orenburg trade with Eastern peoples (adjusted for the fact that part of the trade was of a small exchange nature and therefore did not change). recorded in documents). The author listed the goods purchased and sold in Orenburg by eastern merchants, gave brief characteristics of the levels of economic development of Turkmens, Khiva, Tashkent, and Dzungaria [Rychkov, 1762, part 1, pp. 10-48].

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The Orenburg governor, I. I. Neplyuev, under whom he served for a long time as Governor, tried in 1750 to convince the Russian government of the need to start trading with India through Orenburg [Neplyuev, 1998, p.429]. These ideas are also reflected in Rychkov's work. So, he argued about the neighboring "Asian regions": "... if the passage to and fro was safe from the robberies of the steppe peoples, it would be possible to keep up... a quiet caravan trip to Khiva in 20, to Bukhara in 30 days, and to India itself... traveling on pack horses and camels for more than three months would not be in demand" [Rynkov, 1762, part 2, p. 13]. (This information was also included in the Geographical Lexicon...) [Polunin, 1773, p. 229]. Accordingly, the prospects for the development of land trade relations between Russia and India were drawn by Rychkov in optimistic tones: the "Bukharians" trading in Orenburg (as Central Asian merchants in general were called) " ... Indian goods have already begun to appear... which gives great hope to the restoration and multiplication of commerce with the peoples living in Eastern India ... Because... in the whole of Eastern India, the inhabiting peoples cannot get the Russian and other European goods they need from anywhere directly and cheaply, except from Orenburg through Bukharia, where merchant caravans go... a direct and capable path from the Bukhara merchants themselves has recently been laid " [Rynkov, 1762, part 1, pp. 326-327]. Similar opinions have been expressed in other works. In particular, F. I. Soimonov's book "On Bidding for the Caspian Sea..." was devoted to the prospects of "resuming" economic ties with India [see: Soimonov, 1765]. Miller himself in the magazine article " News of pesoshny gold in Bukharin..."(1760) assured readers that if Peter I's plans for the Russian presence in Central Asia had been realized,"...it would have been easy to establish merchants with India... " [Miller, 1760, p.6].

In 1788-1789 N. I. Novikov published a reprint of Polunin's Geographical Lexicon..., revised by L. M. Maksimovich, a student of Moscow University and a member of Novikov's circle ("Friendly Scientific Society"), under the title"New and Complete Geographical Dictionary of the Russian State...".

Interesting additions were made to the Orenburg article. In 1788, the reader (though with apologies in the preface) continued to be "fed" information from more than a quarter of a century ago about the state of trade in the Orenburg "exchange yard". However, this was followed by fundamentally new information. It was reported that " silk is still brought only in small quantities, and there are also very few good Indian goods, and it may be because Russian merchants buy little, or that the Bukharans, as they themselves say, do not have a profit from these goods, and for this reason double sales and long-distance transportation can not put them at a reasonable price. Moreover, in the reasoning of the Indian trader, it should be thought that in the northern part of India there may not be such factories where precious goods are made,but they are located... to the Indian Sea, the nearest country from which the best goods come; and ... even if the merchants of Bukhara zealously tried to buy them up and bring them to Orenburg for sale: however, there will be no hope that the European sea trade in the price and goodness of goods exported from India will surpass or even even compare with it... " [New... , 1788, p. 33].

Making such an insertion, the editor of course realized the importance of this information. The sources of information were not disclosed by Maksimovich, so it is rather difficult to determine the author of the quoted fragment, but the fact that such an understanding of the problems of Russian-Asian trade has crystallized in domestic economic thought is important. Comparing data on prices for eastern goods in Russia and Western European countries, the author came to a clear understanding of the reasons for the difficulties of overland trade. He realized that the dreams that are characteristic not only of Russian, but also of European economic literature of the XVIII century. about growing up-

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These projects are destined to become an intermediary in trade between the East and Europe [Extract..., 1747, pp. 348-352], and most likely will remain unrealized. The subsequent course of history confirmed this.

An article about Orenburg, despite the fact that "A new and complete geographical dictionary..." It was reprinted in 1809, but did not attract the attention of domestic authors who studied the issues of trade with the East. Maksimovich's publication did not have a specialized character, and a fundamentally important conclusion about the prospects of Russian-Asian trade, if not buried in the pages of the encyclopedia, was not widely known.

This is unfortunate, as the process of understanding economic issues was rather difficult. Brief, clear, factual conclusions were rarely heard. Widely known in the second half of the XVIII century. acquired solid, weighty (in the literal sense of the word) works, such as" Historical description of Russian commerce... " M. D. Chulkov, published in 1781-1788.

Chulkov, a pupil of the raznochinnaya gymnasium at Moscow University, went from an actor of the St. Petersburg Theater and a footman under Tsarevich Pavel Petrovich to an official of the Commercial College and Chief Magistrate. By the nature of his service, Chulkov was able to control the activities of the St. Petersburg Stock Exchange, i.e. he was familiar with the practical side of trading [see: Bondareva, 1982 (2), pp. 45-49, 67-70]. His" benefactor " Chulkov calls the vice-president of the Commercial College N. I. Neplyuev, the son of the above-mentioned Orenburg governor. Working on the " Historical description of Russian Commerce..."the president of the Commercial College A. R. Vorontsov and Catherine II were patronized, thanks to which the researcher received not only access to the archives of the Commercial College and the Senate, but also funds for publication [Chulkov, 1781, vol. 1, book 1, forewarning, pp. 16-19]. The creation turned out to be very voluminous - seven volumes, divided into 21 books. What could the reader find here?

In the preface, Chulkov noted: "until the publication of his work."..Russian merchants, those who wanted to learn about overseas and foreign trade... to exercise, they had only a single extract from the Savariev lexicon as a guide to this intention of theirs... " [Chulkov, 1781, vol. 1, book 1, forewarning, p. 15]4. Naturally, this book also became one of the most important sources of information and a model for Chulkov. Rychkov's Topography Orenburg also had a certain influence. Probably, the very form of presentation of the material by Rychkov, when the narrative began from the time of Kievan Rus (of course, it was not about Orenburg, but about the territory where it was located), and official decrees and orders of the Russian authorities served as milestones in the development of economic ties, guided Chulkov when compiling a " Historical Description...".

Ricard's book also influenced his views. In the preface, Chulkov drew the attention of readers: "... anyone who wants to know the trade of Amsterdam alone in subtlety, he must learn the trade of almost all the universe, and even Aglin... such is the life that demands attention " [Chulkov, 1781, vol. 1, book 1, preface, p. 56]. World trade was presented to them as a single interconnected system, in which Russia also plays a certain role.

Moreover, the "Forewarning" noted that Russia's economic policy " ... is sometimes applied (adapted) to the political rules of thoroughly trading Europeans, and sometimes lenient to them ...to the ignorance and unpolished nature of Asiatics... "[Chulkov, 1781, vol. 1, book 1, pre-notification, p. 16]. Chulkov declared his desire to show,"...what the merchant should use and beware of, if possible

4 The influence of the books of Savary de Brulon and Ricard on the concept of Chulkov's work has already been noted [Bondareva, 1982(1), p. 101].

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the state of the Asiatic people" [Chulkov, 1781, vol. 1, book 1, pre-notification, p. 17]. This was based on the understanding of the East as a special cultural space, where economic activity and the very behavior of a merchant should be subject to fundamentally different rules from Europe.

Most of these good intentions have not been realized. Chulkov made a bet on publishing information on the history of trade, and not on understanding them.

When compiling the text of his work, Chulkov used more than 100 printed works, and articles on the economic problems of Miller, Rychkov, Soymonov, and the German economist I. G. Yusty, published in the Monthly Essays published by the Academy of Sciences, for the Benefit and Entertainment of Employees (the name was changed several times), were included in the "Historical Edition". description... " in full, without specifying the names of the authors [Bondareva, 1982 (2), p. 179]. Chulkovs were not always given references to sources of information [Firsov, 1902, p. 34] 5.

A significant and most valuable part of the work consists of documents from the archives of the Commerce Board and the Senate. In order to give his work the appearance of a coherent narrative, Chulkov, as a rule, omitted the output data of published documents (names and dates), while trying to observe the chronological sequence of their appearance (probably based on the order of the sheets in the archive files). They published not only officially approved documents, but also draft versions, drafts, etc., so approximately the same text on the pages of the " Historical Description..." It was repeated in some places (Bondareva, 1982 (2), pp. 180-181). Thus, the reader was immersed in an ocean of information poorly understood by Chulkov himself, the perception of which was complicated by the fact that mixed fragments of books, magazine articles, archival documents were printed, as a rule, in solid text.

Naturally, the" Historical Description... " also reflects the issues of Russian-Asian trade: with the Ottoman Empire, Persia, the states of Central Asia, the Kyrgyz-Kaysaks (Kazakhs), the Dzungarian Khanate, and China. The presentation was organized based on existing trade routes. For example, trade relations with Central Asia were covered in two books: "On trade from Astrakhan to Persia through the Caspian Sea, and on the left side of it with the Bukharians, Khiva and Trukhmen... "(vol. 2, book 2) and " On trade to Khiva, Bukharia, India, with the Kirghiz-Kaysaks and others. other Steppe peoples through Orenburg... "(vol. 2, book 3). Duplication of information was therefore unavoidable.

As for the depth of knowledge about the East, in the " Historical Description...", as in Savary de Brulon, the published material was very heterogeneous. To explain the text, Chulkov used expanded page-by-page notes, and in the note "Asia" it was reported, for example, that "Asians are generally voluptuous and lazy, and have less agility and sharpness of mind than Europeans" [Chulkov, 1781, vol. 1, book 1, p.2]. About Khiva, the reader, along with reliable information borrowed from Rychkov [Chulkov, 1785, vol. 2, book 3, p. 15], learned that it is located."..from the Caspian Sea for two or three days 'drive to the East" [Chulkov, 1785, vol. 2, book 3, p. 10] (needless to say, this distance was, to put it mildly, understated, and the starting point itself was determined very conditionally).

Information about the Ottoman Empire, Persia, and China, which was reprinted verbatim with all its contradictions from the "Extract of the Savary Lexicon" and had its roots in the European economic literature of the 17th century, was juxtaposed with relatively recent data from the documents of the Commerce Board and the Senate.

5 N. N. Firsov characterized Chulkov as a "collector", i.e. a collector of information.

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Thus, the chronological gap between information about the same country could be more than a century. For example, the note "Turkey" reproduced the above-mentioned fragment from the encyclopedia of Savary de Brulon that subjects of the Ottoman Empire " ... are subject to great servility and ... captivity...", and foreign merchants - "many and frequent attacks" [Chulkov, 1785, vol. 2, book 1, half 1, p. 4 - 5]. However, just a page later in the text of the same note, it was reported that at the beginning of the XVIII century, "the board of the Porte showed merchants all mercy and did not impose heavy duties on goods" [Chulkov, 1785, vol. 2, book 1, part 1, p.6].

Information from official Russian documents portrayed the realities faced by Russian merchants in the territories subject to the Ottoman Empire in a slightly different light. In a document dated before the Russo-Turkish war of 1768-1774, it was reported that Turkish officials extorted "gifts" from Russian merchants in the Crimean port of Yenikale (Yanikale), as well as that " ... Turks, Greeks and other Turkish subjects can never resist their agreement..."(they do not fulfill the terms of contracts), "...and through this, many Russian merchants suffered not a small loss from illegal payments" [Chulkov, 1786, vol. 2, book 1, part 2, pp. 512,511]. It was extremely difficult for a contemporary reader of Chulkov to understand how economic ties between Russia and the Ottoman Empire were developing at the time of the book's publication.

"Historical description..." in general provides an opportunity to assess the nature of the information available to the Russian government about trade with the Eastern peoples and the level of reasoning that was voiced in the Senate and the Commerce Board regarding the development of economic ties with the East. These were mainly thoughts on how to achieve a positive trade balance, i.e. to implement the ideas of mercantilists and make Russia a transit trade route between Europe and the East. The digital data published by Chulkov are also of interest to modern researchers.6 However, when referring to Chulkov's monumental compilation as a source, one should keep in mind both the difficulties in determining the authorship of a particular fragment, and the need to specify the time period to which the information contained on a particular page belongs. A certain amount of caution is required from the researcher, since a significant number of materials were published without proper elaboration. Thus, the final work of Chulkov "Painting all and every title to goods of Russian commerce" was executed by him on the model of the already mentioned bulletin of 1688 on the Marseille trade [Chulkov, 1781, vol. I, book I, preface, p. 42], attached to the Savary de Brulon encyclopedia, but there is no information about the volume of trade, the Russian author could not collect any information about the price of goods and left these columns of the list empty.

Probably realizing how difficult it was for readers to navigate his work, Chulkov published A Brief History of Russian Trade in 1788. The book contained an overview of legislative acts, decisions of the Senate and the Commercial Board on Economic Issues. The material was presented not by trade areas, but in chronological order, with the exact dates indicated. Thus, Chulkov provided the reader with a kind of "key" to the text of the " Historical description of Russian Commerce..."

6 See: "Bulletin of commerce beginning in Tsar Grad..." with an indication of the prices of Russian goods in Istanbul, the cost of cargo transportation from Taganrog and unloading upon arrival in Istanbul (presumably the information refers to the time after the conclusion of the Kuchuk-Kainardzhi peace) [Chulkov, 1785, vol. 2, book 1, part 2, p. 485-486, pasting]. See also: "Statement of how much from 1768 to 1773... from across the Chinese border, goods were imported to Russia and sold abroad at a reasonable price" [Chulkov, 1785, vol. 3, book 2, p. 341, pasting]. Information about the Russian-Chinese trade published by Chulkov was used in [Korsak, 1857, pp. 45-48].

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The author's merits in the development of Russian economic thought are obvious, but the flaws he made were also obvious to his contemporaries, so Chulkov's activities and works were already at the beginning of the XIX century. they were perceived with a certain degree of skepticism. M. M. Speransky in one of the notes of 1802 mentions Chulkov's "Dictionary of Law..." (the book was published after the death of the compiler), "...in which there are ten meaningless errors on each page " [Speransky, 1961, p. 19].

A. N. Radishchev's "Letter on the Chinese Trade" was written at a high level for its time. This work has already been studied many times, but to create a more complete picture of the development of domestic economic thought, it is necessary to focus on its main ideas.

Radishchev served in the Commercial Board, was familiar with Chulkov, and was interested in political economy literature. In a letter dated May 2, 1791, sent from exile to the President of the Board of Commerce A. R. Vorontsov, Radishchev notes:: "I confess that I would very much like to read the works of Condorcet, as well as his commentaries on the book of the Englishman Smith "(we are talking about the French edition of 1791. "Studies on the nature and causes of the wealth of nations") [Radishchev, 1952, p. 370]. Among the books acquired after Radishchev's death by the Commission on the Drafting of Laws of the Russian Empire were a French translation of Smith's work, as well as a number of works on political economy in French (the names of the authors are not listed in the register). [Barskov, 1920, p. 400, N 64].

In 1792, Radishchev sent Vorontsov a letter on trade with China (in 1785-1792, at the behest of the Qing authorities, it was interrupted). Radishchev assessed its scale and significance for Russia in general rather cautiously. Mercantilist theories in the light of new economic doctrines seemed to him untenable: "... in a State that abounds in its own works... foreign trade, although it has to be unified from the sources of its wealth, cannot... be honored with the necessary support of State strength and power... This is exactly how the trade on the Kyakhta made with the Chinese should be considered; it is not the basis for the welfare of vast Siberia... "[Radishchev, 1941, pp. 5-6]. According to Radishchev, the" beginning of prosperity " is agriculture [Radishchev, p. 7; cf.: Melon, 1768, p. 240]. In these words, one can see the influence of the views of the physiocrats. Most likely, at least in general terms, Radishchev was already familiar with the ideas of A. Smith. The fact is that as early as 1786, Sr. Vorontsov, the Russian Ambassador to Great Britain, sent his brother, the president of the Board of Commerce, a copy of "Research on the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations" with a request to evaluate this work [Alexeev, 1937, p. 428]. A. R. Vorontsov, who was Radishchev's patron [Dashkova, 1985, pp. 171-172], could have drawn Radishchev's attention to certain aspects of the Scottish thinker's views. In this regard, Radishchev's arguments reflect a higher stage of development of economic thought in comparison with the works of Miller, Rychkov and Chulkov.

Radishchev realized that long lists of exported or imported goods (without specifying the volume of trade), which are traditional for the works of domestic followers of mercantilism, do not give an idea of the real situation in foreign economic relations between Russia and other countries. Using figures gleaned from the customs list, Radishchev concluded that the basis of Russian exports consists of only three types of goods - "soft junk", leather, merlushki. The remaining Russian goods (dozens of items) are purchased for small amounts [Radishchev, 1941, p. 9-10.]. Cotton and silk fabrics, as well as tea, are imported [Radishchev, 1941, p. 12]. Having traced the directions of commodity flows, Radishchev argued: after the termination of trading in Kyakhta, Russian goods either find other sales markets or become more accessible to the domestic consumer [Radishchev, 1941, pp. 11-12, 25]. In turn, "the longed - for drink is tea..."[Radishchev, 1941, p. 35]

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It is successfully delivered to Russia by the British, Dutch and Danes [Radishchev, 1941, p. 27]. Chinese fabrics can be replaced by domestic ones [Radishchev, 1941, p. 19, 28, 33]. Thus, the termination of trade with China practically does not affect the fundamentally important economic interests of Russia [Radishchev, 1941, p.15].

Naturally, he believed that the resumption of trade would be beneficial for the economic development of Siberia. However, Radishchev's arguments were devoid of official pathos and favorably differed from the works of other domestic authors of that era. Emphasizing the inconsistency of the ideas expressed by Miller and reprinted by Chulkov, that the transportation of goods from Siberia to the European part of Russia is "much easier" thanks to the Siberian rivers, Radishchev described in detail the complex route of transporting goods from Kyakhta across Siberia and came to the conclusion: "Natural and irresistible reasons will always prevent the waterway from becoming ordinary the great expanse prevents ships from sailing in one summer, while winter lasts for seven months in Siberia, and the waters are covered with ice" [Radishchev, 1941, p. 15].

Accordingly, the most popular ideas among Russian economists received a different, more realistic interpretation from Radishchev. In his reasoning, Radishchev used categories of political economy (for example, "the surplus price of goods"). and I was able to understand quite clearly the fundamental problems of Russian-Chinese trade. In particular, the possibility of Russian participation in transit trade between China and Europe seemed very unlikely to him. He pointed out that the goods purchased in China are consumed in Russia itself and are not of interest to Europeans due to their high cost [Radishchev, 1941, p.14, 18-19]. The advantages of the European "sea trade" with the East over the Russian land market were not formulated as clearly as in Maksimovich's encyclopedia, but the text of his letter made it clear: Russia cannot claim to be an intermediary in trade between Europe and China. In Smith's Study of the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Book 1, ch. 3) there are arguments about the profitability of sea cargo transportation from Asia in comparison with land ones, and the difficulty of using river trade routes in "modern Tataria and Siberia" is noted [Smith, 1962, pp. 31-32]. One can only assume whether Radishchev had time to read Smith's work in detail by 1792, but his assessment of the prospects for the development of Russian land trade with the East was at the level of European economics at that time.

"Letter on the Chinese trade" was published only in 1811, when the trade in Kyakhta was already resumed, so the work lost its relevance for readers of that era, and there is no need to talk about Radishchev's noticeable influence on modern economic thought: in the first decades of the XIX century, domestic economists, politicians and journalists, referring to the grandiose events in the history of the the ideas of Peter I continued not even to develop, but to repeat the thoughts expressed by Neplyuev, Rychkov and Miller. The writings of the eighteenth century seem to have been forgotten, and the discussion of the problem of Russian mediation in trade between Europe and Asia has taken a second turn. Therefore, instructions were drawn up and highly approved for the heads of missions to Central Asia and China with instructions on the need to find ways to develop land trade with India through Central Asia. Admiral N. S. Mordvinov assured the Committee of Ministers in 1816 that this trade would open up a "golden path to Asia" for Russia; a journalist, an employee of the Bulgarin "Northern Archive", imagined the image of a cabman "with a cart" of Kashmiri shawls, famously delivering goods from India to Taganrog [for more information, see: Soplenkov, 2000, pp. 30-48]. The futility of such reasoning, thanks to familiarity

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In the last decades of the 18th century, the connection with European economic literature became apparent to Maximovich, a Moscow University student and an exiled Radishchev. In contrast, the Russian authorities chose to indulge in illusions, and significant funds, efforts, and even human lives were spent on a fruitless search for a nonexistent "golden path to Asia."

list of literature

Barskov Ya. Books from the collection of A. N. Radishchev // Business and days. Historical Journal, Pg., 1920, book 1.

Bondareva E. A. (1). Sources of" Historical description of Russian commerce " by M. D. Chulkov // Istoriya SSSR [History of the USSR], Moscow, 1982, No. 2.

Bondareva E. A. (2). Socio-economic views and educational activities of M. D. Chulkov (On the problem of the contribution of the democratic intelligentsia to the culture of the Russian Enlightenment). - Dissertation for the degree of Candidate of Historical Sciences, Moscow, 1982.
Dashkova E. Notes. 1743-1810. L.: Nauka Publ., 1985.

Egorov D. Ideya "turk'skoy reformatsii" v XVI v. [The idea of the "Turkish Reformation" in the XVI century].
Commin Philippe de. Memoirs, Moscow: Nauka Publ., 1987.
[Korsak A.] Historical and statistical review of trade relations between Russia and China. Essay by A. Korsak. Kazan, 1857.

Krymsky A. O "turkofilstvo" Evropy i Moskovskoi Rusi XVI v. [On the "Turkophilism" of Europe and Moscow Rus of the XVI century]. Appendix " A ". Moscow, 1910.

[Melon J.-F.] Political experience on commerce. Translated from French. St. Petersburg, 1768.

[Miller G. - F.] Izvestiye o pesoshnom zolote v Bukharin, o mended dlya onago posylakh i o stroenie serfosty pri reke Irtysh... // Sochineniye i perevody, k polzee i poveseleniyu sluzhashhii [News about the sand gold in Bukharin, about the departures made for it, and about the structure of fortresses near the Irtysh River]. SPb., 1760, genvar.

G. - F. Miller. Description of Siberian auctions. SPb., 1756.

[Nebolsin G. P.] Statistical notes on foreign trade of Russia. Compiled by Grigory Nebolsin, Part I. St. Petersburg, 1835.
[Nebolsin G. P.] Statistical description of foreign trade of Russia by Grigory Nebolsin, awarded the Full Zhukovsky Prize by the Russian Geographical Society. Part I. St. Petersburg, 1850.

Neplyuev I. I. Zapiski [Notes] / / Empire after Peter. 1725-1765. Moscow: Sergey Dubov Foundation, 1998.

A new and complete geographical dictionary of the Russian State, or Lexicon... collected from memorable and reliable ancient and new sources. Part IV. Moscow, 1788.

Essays on the history of the USSR. The period of feudalism. Russia in the first quarter of the 18th century Peter I's Transformations Edited by B. B. Kafengauz and N. I. Pavlenko, Moscow: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1954.

Pekarsky P. Nauka i literatura v Rossii pri Petre Velikom [Science and Literature in Russia under Peter the Great]. T. I. Introduction to the history of Enlightenment in Russia of the XVIII century. St. Petersburg, 1862.

Petrov A.M. Zapad-Vostok [West-East]. From the history of ideas and Things, Moscow: Vostochnaya literatura Publ., 1996.
Petrov A. M. the Russian Empire and foreign trade foreign Asia // Foreign East: a history of trade with Russia. M.: Vostochnaya Literatura, 2000.

[Plaisted B., Eliot J.] Description of the course of merchant and other caravans in steppe Arabia; with an indication of the order that Turkish, Armenian and Greek merchants, Jewish industrialists, and many Christian, mostly English, merchants observe in moving through the great and small steppe on the way from Basora to Alen. St. Petersburg, 1790.

[Polunin F. A.] Geographical lexicon of the Russian state... from memorable news collected by the collegiate assessor and the city of Vereya voivode Fyodor Polunin, and with corrections and additions for the benefit of society in the press published works and with a preface... Gerard Friederik Miller, Moscow, 1773.

[Pufendorf S.] Introduction to European Histology. Through Samuel Pufendorfiy, in German folded ... St. Petersburg .. 1723.

Radishchev A. N.-Vorontsov A. R. from May 2, 1791 / / Radishchev A. N. Polnoe sobranie sochineniy, Vol. 3. Moscow: Izdatelstvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1952.

Radishchev A. N. Pis'mo o kitaiskom torge [Letter about the Chinese trade] / / Radishchev A. N. Polnoe sobranie sochineniy, Vol. 2. Moscow-L.: Izdatelstvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1941.

[Ricard J. - P.] Torg Amsterdam, containing all that merchants and bankers should know, both living in Amsterdam and foreign; torg and factories of the most famous cities in the world, their correspondence and comparison of weights, measures and coins with Amsterdam...; with a complete description of the Eastern and Western Indian companies, and what contracts are used to sell their products.? 2. Moscow, 1763.

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[P. I. Rynkov] Topography of Orenburg, that is: detailed description of the Orenburg Province, written by the collegiate adviser and corresponding member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, Pyotr Rychkov, Part 1-2. St. Petersburg, 1762.

Consolidated catalog of the Russian Civil Press Book of the XVIII century. 1725-1800. Vol. III. Moscow: Kniga Publ., 1966.

Sladkovsky M. I. Istoriya torgovno-ekonomicheskikh otnosheniy narodov Rossii s Kitayem (do 1917 g.) [History of trade and economic relations between the peoples of Russia and China (before 1917)].

Smith A. Issledovanie o prirode i prichinakh bogatstva narodov [Research on the nature and causes of the wealth of peoples], Moscow: Publishing House of Socio-Economic Literature, 1962.

[Soymonov F. I.] On bidding for the Caspian Sea of ancient, middle and modern times; excerpted from the journal of His Excellency Mr. Privy Councilor, Senator and Order of St. Alexander Cavalier, Fyodor Ivanovich Soymanov, and from the additions made to it by the Academy of Sciences Conference Secretary, Professor of History and Historiographer G. F. Miller. Moscow, 1765.

Soplenkov S. V. Doroga v Arzrum [The Road to Arzrum]. Moscow: Vostochnaya literatura, 2000.

Speransky M. M. Proekty i zapiski [Projects and Notes], Moscow: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1961.

Tatishchev V. N. Representation of merchants and crafts //Tatishchev V. N. Collected Works, Vol. VII and VIII. Moscow: Ladomir Publ., 1996.

Firsov N. N. Government and society in their Relations to Foreign Trade of Russia during the reign of Empress Catherine II. Essays from the history of trade policy. Kazan, 1902.

[Chulkov M. D.] Short History of Russian Trade, Moscow, 1788.
[Chulkov M. D.] Historical description of Russian commerce at all ports and borders from ancient times to the present and all the pre-emptive legalizations according to it of the Sovereign Emperor Peter the Great and now safely reigning Empress Catherine the Great, written by Mikhail Chulkov. Vol. 1-7. SPb. - M., 1781-1788.

An extract of Savariev's Lexicon on Commerce was translated from French into Russian by the Secretary of the Academy of Sciences Sergey Volchkov at the request of the State Board of Commerce, and through the efforts of the Full State Councilor, Her Imperial Majesty the Full Chamberlain, the Order of St. Alexander the Knight, the State Board of Commerce of the President and the Ladoga Canal of the Chief Director Prince Boris Grigoryevich Yusupov, at the Imperial Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, 1747.
Alexeev Michael. Adam Smith and his Russian Admirers of the Eighteenth Century // Scott W.R. Adam Smith as Student and Professor. Glasgow, 1937.

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