Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T23:14:16.020Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Barthold and Modern Oriental Studies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2009

Yuri Bregel
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

About the great Russian orientalist, Vasilii Viadimirovich Barthold (1869–1930) much has been written, but, at the same time, not enough. Listed in an annotated bibliography of Barthold's works, compiled by I. Umniakov, published in 1976, are 141 titles of works about Barthold (up to 1976) not including reviews of individual works. Most are short biographical and bibliographical notices, but also included are about thirty works in Russian and other European languages containing a biography of Barthold and a characterization of his scholarly works. To this one can add nine obituaries written by distinguished orientalists, and prefaces to the volumes of his collected works that were published between 1963 and 1977. Some of the publications contain a general survey of Barthold's works; others are devoted to different groups of works (on islamology, archaeology, epigraphy, and others); but no one has given a detailed analyysis of Barthold's works as a whole. I do not pretend to carry out this task, but aim simply to point out some features of Barthold's works which seem to me especially characteristic and to pinpoint the place of this scholar in the history of Russian and international oriental studies.

Type
Articles
Information
International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 12 , Issue 3 , November 1980 , pp. 385 - 403
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1980

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Notes

1 See I. I. Umniakov, Annotirovannaia bibliografiia trudov akademika V. V. Bartol'da and Tumanovich, N. N., Opisanie arkhiva akademika V. V. Bartol'da (Moscow, 1976), PP. 218–229.Google ScholarBregel, Cf. Y., “The Bibliography of Barthold's Works and the Soviet Censorship,” Survey, 24, 3 (1979), 91–107.Google Scholar

2 “An Autobiography by Barthold, V. V.,” in Collected Works, Vol. IX (Moscow, 1977), pp. 789–790.Google Scholar

3 A letter by Barthold to Rosen, V. (1892) cited by Krachkovskii, I., Selected Works, Vol. V (Moscow and Leningrad, 1958), P. 348.Google Scholar

4 Cited by Akramov, N. M., Vydaiushchiisia russkii vostokoved V. V. Bartol'd [A Prominent Russian Orientalist V. V. Barthold], (Dushanbe, 1963), p. 24.Google Scholar

5 At German universities Barthold completed his education after graduating from the University of St. Petersburg, and there he attended lectures not only by orientalists (Th. Nöldeke, A. Müller), but also by historians; a course on Roman history by E. Meyer, which he attended in Halle, considered as an example of “strictly scholarly course,” which should have been a model for course on the history of Central Asia (see Krachkovskii, , Selected Works, 5, 348).Google Scholar In Barthold's opinion, the progress of the West-European islamology was due to the work of “mainly German” scholars (see Barthold, , Collected Works, Vol. VI [Moscow, 1966], p. 366).Google Scholar Undoubtedly, it was under the influence of the works of German historians of the second half of the nineteenth century that Barthold developed his ideas about the importance of cultural influences in the history of mankind (cf. below, n. 17). Finally, by his mode of thinking and character and by the style of writings he was closer to German scholars than to any others; he spoke with scorn about “French rhetoric” (see Barthold, V. V., Four Studies on the History of Central Asia, Vol. III [Leiden, 1962], p. 2)Google Scholar and historians of the “French school” who allowed themselves “one-sided treatment of material” and “ample use of … historical anecdotes” (see his obituary on Dozy, P. in Collected Works, Vol. IX [Moscow, 1977]. pp. 711–712).Google Scholar

6 Thus, explicitly, he said in an unpublished article (1916) on the tasks of young Russian intelligentsia in the postwar period (Tumanovich, , Opisanie arkhiva, p. 329).Google Scholar

7 Akramov, N. M., Vydaiushchiisia russkii vostokoved, p. 72.Google Scholar

8 Foreword by the translator in Barthold, , Four Studies on the History of Central Asia, Vol. (Leiden, 1956), p. ix.Google Scholar

9 “An Autobiography,” in Collected Works, IX, 791.Google Scholar

10 The history of Central Asia, according to Barthold, is of special interest, because there Islam had to battle other cultural elements even more persistently than in the western part of the Muslim world; “it is also important, for the purpose of interpreting the course of world history, to give a scholarly interpretation of the course of history of those peoples, amongst whom a military organization had arisen, which afterward became a model for cultivated countries” (Barthold, , “The Speech before the Defence of a Thesis,” Collected Works, Vol. I [Moscow, 1963], p. 608).Google Scholar

11 By Turcology and Iranology I mean here history of Turkic and Iranian peoples, not philology. As Minorsky justly pointed out (Barthold, , Four Studies, 1, ix), Barthold's “fundamental characteristic was that he was not an ‘oriental philologist’ making inroads into history, but a ‘historian’ equipped with oriental languages.”Google Scholar

12 “Istoriia izucheniia vostoka v. Evrope, i Rossii,” in Collected Works, 9, 208;Google Scholar French trans. by Nikitine, B.; Barthold, V. V., La découverte de l'Asie (Paris, 1947), p. 18. This and the following chapter are omitted in the German edition.Google Scholar

13 Ibid., p. 234 (Fr. trans., p. 47).

14 Tumanovich, , Opisanie arkhiva, p. 270.Google Scholar

15 Barthold, , Collected Works, Vol. II (2) (Moscow, 1964), pp. 265–302;Google ScholarGerman, , Zur Geschichte des Christentums in Mittel-Asien (Tübingen and Leipzig, 1901).Google Scholar

16 E.g., “Caucasia, Turkestan, Volga”, in Collected Works, Vol. 11 (1) (Moscow, 1963), p. 789Google Scholar (“The content of history is determined mainly by the international cultural contacts, by the transfer of the elements of culture from one country to another”); “Islam,” in Collected Works, VI, 137 (“If the universal law of progress tells upon anything, it is on broadening of the geographical horizon and on drawing in to the common work of ever increasing number of peoples”).Google Scholar

17 It may be assumed that Barthold adopted the concept of “culture” which was generally accepted in the second half of the 19th century among the German historians, many of whom had been dealing with the problems of the so called “Kulturgeschichte” (cf. Kroeber, A. L. and Kluckhohn, C., Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions [New York, 1963], pp. 47–52).Google Scholar

18 “Mesto prikaspiiskikh oblastei v istorü musul'manskogo mira” [The Place of the Caspian Regions in the History of the Muslim world], in Collected Works, II (1), 653.Google Scholar Cf. also: “Kul'tura musul'manstva” [The Culture of Muhammadanism, in Collected Works, VI, 146;Google Scholar “Musul'manskii mir” [The Muslim World], in Ibid., p. 228. Barthold considered, apparently, as one of the most important results, and, at the same time, instruments of cultural intercourse, the development of geographical and historical knowledge; therefore, the level of the geographical and historical science of a given epoch plays so important part in his evaluation of the significance of this epoch in the world history. Not many ideas have been repeated by him so persistently as the idea that only in the Mongol period it became possible to compile such a work as “the historical encyclopaedia” of Rashid al-Din, which, by the breadth of its conception, remains unsurpassed “till the present time.” Cf. also, for instance, his words about the expansion of geographical knowledge after the Arab conquests (Collected Works, VI, 368–369).Google Scholar

19 “Istoriia izucheniia Vostoka,” in Collected Works, IX, 221 (Fr. trans., p. 33).Google Scholar

20 Ibid.

21 “Teokraticheskaia ideia i svetskaia vlast' v musul'manskom gosudarstve” [The Theocratic Idea and Secular Power in the Muslim State], in Collected Works, VI, 303.Google Scholar

22 “Kul'tura musul'manstva,” in Ibid., pp. 144–146. Sometimes Barthold even ventured to predict (not too successfully) the future of some regions according to possible future direction of international trade routes; thus, he repeatedly wrote that Chinese Turkestan would have no future, because it would never have any importance for international railroad system (e.g., Four Studies, I, 68).Google Scholar

23 Collected Works, II (1), 433.Google Scholar

24 This work was not published. The rough copy has been preserved at the Barthold Archives (Tumanovich, , Opisanie arkhiva, pp. 265 if.).Google Scholar

25 A letter to N. N. Ostroumov of 20 November 1918 (here and further on I cite Barthold's letters to Ostroumov now kept in the Central State Archives of Uzbekistan, Ostroumov Collection; an archival copy of the whole correspondence is in the same Archives, collection и-1009, inventory 1, file 27). The same ideas were expressed by Barthold in 1916 in the above-mentioned article on the tasks of the young Russian intelligentsia: “However just may be everything that has been written on the rights and merits of small peoples, on the harmfulness and crimes of imperialism, undeniable is the fact, that mankind had had no history before the great political movements called forth by the numerous peoples, that is, it had not had one of the most indispensable conditions for the progress; also undeniable is the importance that the historical world powers had – the Macedonian and Roman empires, the Arab caliphate, even the Mongol empire, – for the cultural rapprochement of the peoples and for approaching the goal, which is still unaccessible at present: creating a culture common to all mankind” (Tumanovich, , Opisanie arkhiva, p. 329).Google Scholar

26 Collected Works, IX, 533.Google ScholarCf., Barthold, Collected Works, Vol. III (Moscow, 1965), p. 306.Google Scholar Cf. also Barthold's speech before the defence of his thesis, already cited above (Collected Works, I, 610), and his article on the tasks of the young Russian intelligentsia (see preceding note), where he wrote, inter alia: “The establishing of the Russian power in the regions with the century-old cultural past, though for the last centuries isolated from the world progress, put before Russia quite definite tasks, which can not be fulfilled by the local cultural forces. Whatever the progress of the eastern peoples under the Russian rule may be, till they acquire completely the European scientific methods, especially the methods of humanities, a work of several generations is needed… In Asia [i.e., in Asiatic Russia], where there are no Europeans besides Russians … only Russian scholarly thought can originate scholarly constructions free from the influence of one-sided nationalism and religious dogmatics.”Google Scholar

27 “From the Editorial Board,” foreword to Mir Islama, I (1912), 4,Google Scholar written by Barthold, (Collected Works, 6, 367).Google Scholar Cf. also: “Istoriia izucheniia Vostoka,” in Collected Works, IX, 235 (Fr. trans., p. 48);Google Scholar“Musul'manskii mir” in in Collected Works, VI, 230.Google Scholar

28 Barthold, , 12 Vorlesungen über die Geschichte der Türken Mittelasiens (Berlin, 1935), pp. 71, 79Google Scholar (Collected Works, Vol. V [Moscow, 1968], pp. 68, 74).Google Scholar

29 Collected Works, VI, 368.Google Scholar See also “Musul'manskii mir” in Ibid., p. 219 (“Only the new religion and the statehood closely connected with it could … create better conditions for a political and especially cultural integration of a considerable part of mankind”); Ibid., pp. 217–218.

30 Collected Works, VI, 368;Google Scholar also Barthold, , “Die persische Ŝu'ūibīja und die moderne Wissenschaft,” in Festschrift für Ignaz Goldziher (1912), p. 254Google Scholar (Collected Works, Vol. VII [Moscow, 1971], p. 362).Google Scholar

31 “Istoriia izucheniia Vostoka,” in Collected Works, IX, 237 (Fr. trans., p. 50).Google ScholarCf., “Iran” in Collected Works, VII, 251, where in evaluating the causes of the progress of Iran in the Muslim period the influence of “religion” is called “a weightless factor.”Google Scholar

32 Barthold, , “Ob odnom istoncheskom voprose” [On One Historical Question], in SredneAziatskii Vestnik, (Tashkent), (11, 1896), 53.Google Scholar

33 “Musul'manskii miz” in Collected Works, VI, 282.Google Scholar

34 “lstoriia izucheniia Vostoka,” in Collected Works, IX, 235 (Fr, trans., p. 48).Google Scholar

35 “K istorii krest'ianskikh dvizhenii v Persii” [To the History of Peasants' Movements in Persia], in Collected Works, VII, 444–445, 447, 449;Google Scholar“Novyi stochnik Po istorii Timuridov” [A New Source for the History of the Timurids], in Collected Works, Vol. VIII (Moscow, 1973), p. 561Google Scholar (also the German trans. ZDMG, 90, [1936], 398);Google Scholar“Iran” in Collected Works, VII, 255.Google Scholar

36 In his “Autobiography” (Collected Works, IX, 792) he pointed out that “wherever the sources permitted, he paid attention to the importance of the economic factor in history and to the importance of class struggle based on economic reasons.”Google Scholar

37 “Ulugh-Beg, ,” in Four Studies, Vol. II (Leiden, 1958), pp. 114–115, 168–177.Google Scholar

38 Cf. “A Short History of Turkestan,” in Four Studies, 1, 62 (in Minorsky's translation: “over the highly civilized social life”).Google Scholar

39 This summary, of course, does not include all the main features of Barthold's historical views. The Soviet scholars, for instance, stressed the importance ascribed by him to class conflict (see n. 36) as well as some other points, which, as they claim, drew him closer to Marxism (see pp. 391 -392). More important to me, in the context of this article, are Barthold's main ideas which determined both his historical outlook and his attitude in life.

40 See above, n. 12.

41 “Istoriia izucheniia Vostoka,” in Collected Works, IX, 222 (Fr. trans,, pp. 33–34).Google Scholar

42 Zapiski Vostochnogo Oideleniia Russkogo Arkheologicheskogo Obshchestva, Vol. II (1888), p. 288.Google ScholarCf., Barthold. Mir Islama, 1 (1912),Google Scholar Forward, in Collected Works, VI 372Google Scholar (“… To solve … generally, all problems of historical science there is no other way than to take into account, in all possible completeness, all the sources pertaining to the given period, and to apply to them the methods of historical criticism”); “lstoriia izucheniia Vostoka,” in Collected Works, IX, 237 (Fr. trans., p. 50) (“Both in the study of the history of Europe and of Muslim countries there is no other way to establish the causal connection of events than by critical study, without preconceived ideas, of the facts themselves.”)Google Scholar

43 Ibid., p. 221 (Fr. trans., p. 42).

44 Ibid., p. 356 (Fr. trans., p. 188).

45 “K voprosu o feodalizme v Irane” [To the Question of Feudalism in Iran], in Collected Works, VII, 468.Google Scholar

46 Krachkovskii, , Selected Works, V, 429.Google Scholar

47 Barthold defines his task in just these terms both in “Ulugh Beg” and “Mir Ali-Shir” (see Collected Works, II (2), 200; cf. Four Studies, III, 2).Google Scholar There was the same significance in his works on the Amy-Darya question (see Collected Works, Vol. III) and in K istorii orosheniia Turkestana [To the History of Irrigation in Turkestan] (see Collected Works, III, preface, p. 8,Google Scholar where Barth- old's words have been cited as follows: “Apart from its practical purpose the work will probably also be useful in destroying fantastic ideas about a high culture of the region, which allegedly was destroyed by the Muslims…”) Similar motives guided Barthold in his studies of the intercourse between the Francs and the Muslims (see Collected Works, VI, 342 ff., 432ff.).Google Scholar

48 Well known, in particular, is his sharp polemic with Marquart (which did not prevent him from appreciating this scholar very highly) and with Russian geographer and traveler G. E. Grum-Grzimailo. He himself, however, considered as “a good fortune that seldom falls upon a scholar: to stand aloof from polemics” (see his obituary on Hirt, F. in Collected Works, IX, 772).Google Scholar

49 See Minorsky's, Foreword to Four Studies, I, viii.Google Scholar I know only one book that Barthold in his review called “a model work in the full sense of the word,” the subject of which was studied by the author “excellently in all respects”: this is Saladin and the Fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem by Stanley Lane-Poole, M. A. (see Collected Works, VI, 301); but even in this review he did not fail to mention “some unfortunate errors.”Google Scholar

50 Four Studies, I, viii.Google Scholar Cf. the words by N. Marr at the meeting dedicated to Barthold's memory: “The good-natured Vasilii Vladimirovich was feared like death: sincerity he would support, without spending many words, even in an adversary; falseness he would not pardon in anybody, be his own brother” (cited by I. P. Petrushevskii in his biographic notice on Barthold, in Collected Works, I, 20).Google Scholar

51 In his already cited speech (see preceding note) Marr (a friend and relative of Barthold) said: “…Vasilii Valdimirovich was a difficult person, by no means a pleasant one, socially lonely. without a circle of friends.” A Russian émigré writer Boris Filippov published in a Russian, newspaper Novoe Russkoe Slovo (New York, 13 05 1979) his recollections of Leningrad orientalists in the 1920S; he tells there, among other things, rather curious details about Barthold called by him “fierce historian-orientalist.” (I am indebted to Prof. M. Perlmann who pointed out this article to me.)Google Scholar

52 A letter of 4 June 1924. Barthold's estimation of the level of students at the university did not change later, to judge from his letter written not long before his death on 18 April 1930, where he, amongst other things, wrote: “… even the post-graduates of the modem type approached me asking for ‘guidance.’” He used the same expression for some newly made scholars: “a fictitious professor of new formation” (a letter of 27 March 1925).

53 I could not confirm that he had been shot by the communists.

54 His Soviet biographer Lunin, B. V. says euphemistically that “in 1932–1938 I. I. Umniakov worked outside Central Asia’ (see Isloriia material'noi kul 'tury Uzbekistana, Part 3 (Tashkent, 1962), p. 160).Google Scholar

55 Cf. a letter of 27 March 1925: “Among my pupils in [my] field … only I. I. Umniakov is engaged now in scholarly work; I lost all the others during the events of the revolution, so that I am very glad to acquire a new pupil” [Barthold means Iakubovskii].

56 Iakubovskii, A. lu., “Problema sotsial'noi istonii narodov Vostoka v trudakh akademika V. V. Bartol'da” [The Problem of Social History of the Peoples of the East in the Works of Academician V. V. Bartol'd], in Vestnik Leningradskogo Universiteta, 1947, no. 12, pp. 78–79.Google Scholar

57 See Petrushevskii, I. P. in Barthold's, Collected Works, 1, 28–29, preface.Google Scholar

58 Cf., Akramov, Vydaiushchiisia russkii vostokoved, p. 67.Google Scholar

59 This was pointed out by some of the Russian authors; cf. Smirnov, N. A., Ocherki istorii izucheniia islama v SSSR [An Outline of the Study of Islam in the U.S.S.R] (Moscow, 1954), pp. 120–121;Google Scholar and esp. Lunin, B. V., Iz islorii russkogo vostokovedeniia i arkheologii v Turkestane [From the History of Russian Oriental Studies and Archaeology in Turkestan] (Tashkent, 1960), pp. 210, 223.Google Scholar

60 Four Studies, III, 75.Google Scholar

61 These words hit the mark. One of his Party critics, a certain Karakumov, wrote in an obituary on Barthold: “Here one can see his total misunderstanding of the spirit of modern historical science; he imagines that we ostensibly believe [!] that it is possible, without checking the facts, to fit everything to pre-established principles of modern historical science” (Novyi Vostok [New Orient, a periodical], 29 [1930], 265).Google Scholar

62 This is his expression used on some other occasion in his letter of November 1927 (“Generally, every abstract doctrine becomes unacceptable for me as soon as one begins to fit the facts forcibly to it”).

63 Akramov, , Vydaiushchiisia russkii vostokoved, p. 71.Google Scholar

64 Ibid., pp. 74, 68. The latest attempt of this kind has been made by B. V. Lunin in a paper devoted to Barthold's correspondence with Ostroumov (‘Iz epistoliarnogo naslediia V. V. Bartol'da” [From the Epistolary Heritage of Barthold, V. V.], in Formyfeodal'noizemel'noisobstvennosti i vladeniia na Blizhnem i Srednem Vostoke [Coil, papers] [Moscow, 1979], pp. 183–198). In this paper the author tries to prove, unscrupulously suppressing all evidence to the contrary, that, though “ideological re-education [sic!]” of Barthold “was difficult, protracted and was not finished until the end of his life”, “in socio-political [!] aspect Barthold, to his credit, placed himself at the service of the new, Soviet oriental studie”Google Scholar (Ibid., p. 187). Similar statements are found in another paper in the same book: B. I. Pak, “O pomoshchi V. V. Bartoi'da stanovleniiu nauki v sovetskoi Srednei Azii” [About Barthold's Help to the Formation of Science in Soviet Central Asia], in Ibid., pp. 214–215.

65 “To part, at least for a time being, with Petrograd and, if possible, with Soviet Russia at all would be worthwhile both for me and, especially, for my wife,” he wrote ma letter to Ostroumov of 15 May 1920.

66 Minorsky in his translation (Four Studies II, 115) inserted the word “Medieval” before the word “Europe” in Barthold's sentence “As consistent communists in Europe…” in square brackets, thus changing arbitrarily the idea of Barthold.Google Scholar

67 See Collected Works, II (2), 167, footnote.Google Scholar

68 Cited by Lunin, , Iz istorii russkogo vostokovedeniia, p. 221.Google Scholar

69 Cited Ibid., p. 220.

70 When a First Turkological Congress was to be convened in Baku in 1926, Barthold wrote to Ostroumov in a letter of 8 November 1925: “The congress, because it was usurped by the Scholarly Association of Oriental Studies, acquired such a character that scholarship has been pushed to the background, and there if no place for scholars.” Despite this opposition he decided after all, for some reason, to go to the congress, and afterward he wrote: “You have formed an idea about the congress in Baku, probably, from accounts and newspapers; there was much noise and publicity and I fear that in this respect the next congress, in Samarkand, will not be able to take into account the experience of that of Baku; the same propagandists will be present in Samarkand. I shall hardly conceive a wish to go to the Samarkand congress, even if I shall be safe and sound by that time; I do not wish to give my name to the twaddle and boasting of others” (a letter of 13 March 1926). About the attitude of old Leningrad orientalists to the Association see also Filippov's recollections mentioned above, note 51.

71 Barthold, means Zapiski Kollegii Vostokovedov published, under his editorship, in 1925–1930.Google Scholar

72 In reply to an invitation from the editorial board of the journal Kommunisticheskaia mysl' [Communist Thought] to contribute to this journal, Barthold replied curtly: “Not being a communist I do not see it possible for myself to be a contributor” (see Bregel, , “The bibliography of Barth- old's works,” p. 104).Google Scholar

73 The numerous official duties of Barthold in Soviet time seemed to be very burdensome to him; in a letter of 18 March 1929 he wrote: “… I would with pleasure give up half of my appointments, if only they would let me.”

74 A letter to Ostroumov of 25 November 1918.

75 See Four Studies, III, 69. Cf.Google ScholarIbid., I, xi (it was Minorsky, who pointed out that these words had a connection with Barthold's own time).

76 A letter of 2 December 1928.

77 See now Collected Works. VI, 604–608.Google Scholar

78 Cf. Ibid., VII, 20. In a letter of 18 April 1930 Barthold wrote: “They asked me several times to write such an article for Novyi Vostok, and each time I refused, at long last I agreed – and it proved to be wrong. To ask to give an article at any cost and then, in the same issue, to give an abusive critique of it – this is, of course, a peculiar method.”

79 In Sotsialisticheskaia nauka i tekhnika, I (1933), 51–61.Google Scholar

80 Cf. about this Tillet, L., The Great Friendship: Soviet Historians on the Non-Russian Nationalities (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1969), esp. pp. 31–57.Google Scholar

81 The “joining” of Central Asia to Russia has been declared a positive fact by the Soviet historians, because in the long run it brought the communist revolution to those countries, which is considered as an absolute boon. Barthold himself saw positive consequences (although he never used that expression) stemming from the Russian conquest because it led to the expansion in Central Asia of a higher culture; this idea does not coincide (to say the least) with the Soviet standpoint.

82 Barthold was not the main target at this session, which had to deal first of all with live scapegoats; this role was assigned to A. Semenov, A. Freiman and especially E. Berthels, who “was trying by all means to protect Barthold from the severe and just criticism by the Soviet people“ instead of denouncing his faulty views (see O marksistsko-leninskom osveshchenii istorii i istorii kul'tury narodov Uzbekistana [On a Marxist-Leninist Interpretation of the History and the History of Culture of the Peoples of Uzbekistan] [Tashkent, 1951], esp. pp. 16–17, 42–47). Among all those present at the session only Umniakov had the courage to speak in defense of Barthold.Google Scholar

83 The last rude attack upon Barthold known to me was made at a conference in Alma-Ata in 1957 by one of his old diehard Party critics, P. Galuzo (who, when Barthold was still alive, demanded that Barthold “be taken down from the pedestal” “He just does not know how to do it,” commented Barthold in a letter of 2 June 1930). But even the organizers of the conference dissociated themselves from his statements (see Materialy ob “edinennoi nauchnoi sessii. posviashchennoi istoni Srednei Azii i Kazakhstana epokhi sotsializma [Alma-Ata, 1958], pp. 193–194, 217–219).Google Scholar

84 Krachkovskii, , Selected Works, V, 430.Google Scholar

85 A hostile attitude toward Barthold, however, sometimes made itself felt, if not directly, as C. E. Bosworth noted in his Preface to the third edition of Turkestan (1968), mainly in the fact that “the results of his researches were only cited in a selective and often tendentious way.” Cf. also the story of the publishing of Umniakov's Bibliography in my review mentioned above (n. i).Google Scholar

86 There are nine volumes, but the second one is published in two separate parts.

87 “In V. V. Barthold's opinion, no theoretical generalizations and conceptions have any scholarly meaning if they are not based on the firm ground of the analysis of the facts, brought to light as a result of a thorough comparative study of sources. This valuable feature of V. V. Barthold's scholarly method was acquired also by the continuators of his research – the Soviet histori ans…” (Collected Works, I, 31).Google Scholar

88 There remains, of course, the usual reservation that he was not able to become a Marxist.

89 See the very curious letter by Ch. Snouck-Hurgronje to V. Rosen of 1898, cited by Krachkovskii where the Dutch scholar wrote, meaning one of the Russian pupils of Rosen: “Ihr Schüler wird zweifelsohne die jetzt mehr und mehr überhandnehmende Sitte verfolgen, seine wissenschaftlichen Ergebnisse dem Begierigen Publikum in einer nicht aligemein verstandenen Sprache vorzulegen” (Selected Works, V, 393–394).Google Scholar

90 To that one may add synopses of his works, which Barthold himself published in Mitteilungen des Seminars für orientalische Sprachen from 1897 to 1902 (incorporated in the surveys of Russian publications in oriental studies, which Barthold compiled for this journal). Later on, synopses of some of his works (compiled by W. Ebermann and E. Berthels) were published in Islamica. Only a few of his Russian publications were reviewed in the West, his regular reviewer being M. Hart- mann.

91 Three earlier translations have been omitted in Umniakov's bibliography (and not mentioned in my review of it); a Japanese translation of History of the Study of the East (1939),Google Scholar an Arabic translation of 12 Lectures on the History of Turks of Central Asia (Cairo, 1958), and an English translation of Iran: A Historical Survey (Barthold's Iran, tr. from Russian by G. K. Nariman, [Bombay, (1939?)] v + 137 pp.; this seems to be a rather rare publication).Google Scholar

92 A History of the Cultural Life in Turkestan; To the History of irrigation in Turkestan; The Kirgizs: A Historico-Geographical Survey of Iran (there is a Persian translation of the latter, not easily available); islam; and The Muslim World.

93 Cf., Pearson, J. D. in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1 (1975), 69.Google Scholar

94 It seems that scholars who know Russian are primarily the Turcologists who now can hardly work without being at least familiar with the Cyrillic alphabet; next are the Iranologists who know Russian much less; and in the last place, to the best of my knowledge, are the Arabists and the Islamologists.

95 For instance, in 1961 there was published in Nashrīya-i Dānishkada-i Adabīyat-i Tabrīz (Vol. XIII, nos. 1, 3, 4, ) a long article on J¯mi' al-tawārīkh of Rashīd al-Dīn, by M. Murtadawi, who apparently did not know of a brilliant article on the same subject by Barthold, in Mir Islama. 1 (1912).Google Scholar Still more regrettable is the fact that quite recently an article appeared in The International Journal of Middle East Studies. 6, (1975), 228–236; “Les rapports entre calife et sultân à l'époque Saljüqide” by G. Makdisi, who was, apparently, unaware of the existence of Barthold's work, Caliph and Sultan, despite the availability of a German translation and a partial English translation.Google Scholar

96 Cf., Akramov, Vydaiushchiisia russkii vostokoved, p. 10; “Most of V. V. Barthold's works have not lost their importance up to the present, with regard to the description of historical events (setting aside their theoretical interpretation).”Google Scholar