The confessional structure of the population of the Tomsk province according to the first Russian census of 1897

The article presents an analysis of confessional structure of the population of the Tomsk province on the first general population census of 1897. Authors trace top trends of formation of the religious landscape of the region, which developed by the end of the 19th century. The research is based on a wide range of sources: normative legal acts (state-confessional legislation in general and rule-making on the organization of the first general census of the country). The second group - statistical materials of results of a census. The above-named category is supplemented significantly by regional official printing publications in which data on the religious list of residents of the Tomsk province and its cities were published. The separate group is represented by archive materials of the Russian state historical archive, the State archive of the Tomsk region, the State archive of Altai Krai. By the end of the 19th century at the legislative level the accurate hierarchy of faiths was built. The dominant position was held by orthodox christianity whose legal status was enshrined in the highest regulations. At the second step there were "tolerant" religions. The third place was taken by sects and "intolerant" confessions. Political-legal and social-economic development of the Russian Empire in the second half of the 19th century required the elimination of marginal isolation, unification of most aspects of public, including religious, life. The results of a census confirmed process of christianization of the population of the empire (orthodox - 69.3%, muslims -11.1%, rimo-catholic - 9.1%). The superiority of followers of Russian orthodox Church was shown by statistical data on the Tomsk province as well. Followers of official orthodoxy in the region made 90.4%. The superiority in strength of orthodox christians in comparison with the all-Russian statistics (69.3%) visually characterizes church state policy on the outskirts of the empire: use of the state traditional institutes of religion as the instrument of impact on processes of formation of religious identity of ethnic groups, christianization of the autochthonic population and regulation of difficult interreligious communications on places. Distinctive feature of the Tomsk province was accommodation of a large number of opponents of the reforms by Nikon (5.14%). Western Siberia became the place where from the first decades of existence of split (raskol), in search of the country of freedom of Belovodye his first follower began to be proved. On concentration of Old Believers of various branches (soglasiya) the region was high on the list in the 19th century in all Russia. The third place belonged to muslims (2.09%), presented by generally Turkic-speaking Kyrgyz and Tatars. Mass migrations of the 18-19th centuries, state policy on not orthodox and non-christian religions, amendments in the native policy of the state changed balance of an ethnoconfessional situation in the region where the vast majority made already orthodox population.

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