Erzya

Is it true that the Erzya "worshipped trees"?

— Is it true that the Erzya "worshipped trees"?

— No: the Erzya had a fairly developed pantheon headed by the god Ineshkipaz.

The places of prayer were cemeteries and natural monuments. At the heart of the Erzya religion lies the concept of the harmony of all living things. The tree represents an "ideal model" of a free people leading a settled way of life, symmetrically and efficiently occupying equal shares of the sky and of the underworld with its crown and its roots, ensuring the circulation of nourishing sap and energy. A distinctive feature of Erzya towns, even after the population had completely lost its identity, long remained their beautiful gardens and greenery. The gardens of Arzamas stood out especially among them. In everyday life the Erzya are likewise marked by a tender attitude towards houseplants, one that often goes beyond a simple hobby (e.g. the Pavlovo lemon-growing tradition).

Did the lands of the Erzya really stretch from Ryazan to present-day Vasilsursk?

— Did the lands of the Erzya really stretch from Ryazan to present-day Vasilsursk?

— Yes, this information is confirmed both by archaeology and by travellers' accounts and by the geographical maps of that time.

Did an Erzya town really exist on the site of Nizhny Novgorod?

— Did an Erzya town really exist on the site of Nizhny Novgorod?

— These territories belonged directly to the Erzya lands. Trade along the Volga has existed since deep antiquity, and it would be hard to imagine that in this strategic area, where several trade routes converge and which is rich in fish, no large settlements existed. At the same time this does not mean that the kremlin as such was built in 1221 directly on the site of one of those settlements. It is possible that the founding of Nizhny Novgorod was nothing other than the seizure of a Bulgar trading post in the Erzya lands, one that bore the name Ibrahim Balyk. Chronologically this event fits well into the history of relations between the Bulgars and the Russian princes: 1220 — a major victory of the princely retinues of Rostov, Suzdal and Murom (Wikipedia) over the Bulgars.

According to the account of an Arab traveller, even earlier, on the site of the fortress of Ibrahim Balyk, there had been a trading post of the Khazar Khaganate (Abramov Town). The Erzya tradition calls the town on the site of the future Nizhny Novgorod by the name Obran Osh. A substantial part of the present-day population of Nizhny Novgorod is of Erzya and Mari origin.

What lay behind the confrontation between the Slavs and the Erzya?

— What lay behind the confrontation between the Slavs and the Erzya?

— In the lands of the East Slavic tribes the power of princes of Scandinavian origin took hold, princes who relied on retinues of Viking mercenaries ("ruotsi", or "rus" in Slavic pronunciation). When the Polovtsians began making regular raids on the lands of the inhabitants of the Chernigov and Pereyaslavl principalities, a migration of Slavs began from the basin of the river Dnieper into the basin of the Oka. In the upper reaches of the Oka, Chernigov completely seized the lands of the Meshchera tribe; next to the north-east lay the lands of the Erzya and Muroma tribes. Probably the Chernigov princes took advantage of the frictions between the neighbours — the Muroma and the Erzya.

An allegorical description of the tensions between the tribes is possibly contained in the legend of Ilya Muromlyanin and Solovei the Robber (the Erzya were noted for "bird" names and nicknames). The Muroma may have accepted the power of the princes in exchange for the defeat and subjugation of their long-standing opponent from the opposite bank of the Oka. Thus the Murom-Ryazan principality came into being. However, the conflict was not exhausted by this: the Suzdal prince Vsevolod the Big Nest twice laid waste to the country and burned Ryazan (Erzyan) to the ground. The problem was that here, unlike in the classic early feudal internecine wars, there was also a struggle between peoples practising different kinds of economy — one, the Erzya kind, based on maintaining harmony, the other, the Slavic kind, on the extensive exploitation of resources (slash-and-burn agriculture).

That is why what took place was not simply a change of feudal power in a town, as in other regions, but precisely "the devastation of the country", "the complete burning of the town". But unlike the Meshchera, who quickly passed into history, the Erzya, who lived on the edge of the Wild Field, had a solid economy, a logical and rational system of ideas about the surrounding world, experience of armed resistance, and could at times rely on the help of allies — the Volga Bulgars. The centre of the country moved from Ryazan to Arzamas, and its independence lasted until the 16th century (the so-called "founding of Arzamas by Ivan the Terrible" 333 years after the same sort of "founding" of Nizhny Novgorod by Yuri Vsevolodovich), while individual pockets of resistance persisted right up to the 18th century.

Criticism

The theory of a confrontation between the Slavs of the land between the Oka and the Volga and the Finno-Ugric peoples of the right bank of the Oka rests on the change in the landscape of that interfluve during the corresponding period — the slash-and-burn spread of opolye clearings and of arable farming. However, the claims that the burning of the forest was carried out precisely by people from "Slavic" lands have no serious evidential basis. The state doctrine of the Romanovs, who actively laid claim to the "Kievan inheritance", tied their state to a supposed mass migration of Slavs from the territory of present-day Ukraine into the interfluve. Yet there is no scientific evidence of such a process.

Possibly, as in other European lands, what took place in Eastern Europe was an expansion of Scandinavian princes that accelerated internal processes of opening up the landscape in the lands of the Merya tribes. And that means that the Erzya were resisting not "Slavdom" and still less the Russians (such an ethnonym simply did not exist at that time; "ruotsi" is the name used in the Finno-Ugric languages for Viking mercenary war bands). The Erzya, who occupied landscapes very convenient for resistance — sheltered by the rivers Oka, Volga and Sura, broken and forested — were, moreover, in a position to manoeuvre between the Viking princes and the Bulgars. The problem of the further confrontation between the Erzya and the Muscovite state is probably connected with the fact that the Erzya did, after the fall of a proto-state similar to the unions of the Merya and of Old Ryazan, manage to create a state — the "Purgas volost" with its centre in Arzamas, whose main task became the preservation of independence.

But the existence of this union, which created its own tradition of freedom-loving and of culture, was taken into account neither politically nor militarily. The "pagan" (i.e. adhering to the traditional faith) "Mordvin princes", in order to fight the Rurikids, turn to the help of the "Blue Horde" (the Siberian Khanate), which liberates Nizhny Novgorod and Ryazan. According to one version, it is with this episode that the appearance in the region of the Mishar Tatars and of the Kasimov Khanate on the territory of the present-day Ryazan region is connected. The fall of Kazan, brought about by the fading of the trade route along the Volga through Persia to India, contributed to the fact that, seeing no alternatives, the nobility of the region began to enter the service of Muscovy.

From this time onward a process of division of the local population also takes place — those more inclined to urban life are drawn into the assimilation processes of the empire, retaining a number of features that would later be interpreted as the characteristic traits of the region's population. In the end, only the most persistent part of those who resettled to the east of the lands of the Moksha, into other regions of the Volga area, the Urals and Siberia, managed to preserve the traditional way of life and self-awareness. According to eyewitness accounts, the assimilation of the Erzya in the Nizhny Novgorod region actively continued in later historical periods as well:

In Arzamas in Soviet times, when you applied to the Polytechnic, they would ask: "why does your nationality box say 'Mordvin'? (and registering as Erzya was not allowed in Soviet times) Do you know the language? Are your parents Mordvins? Both of them?" At the end they would ask, "why do you need this?" — and only after giving the appropriate answers did one manage to be registered as a Mordvin. Chairman of the board of the SPK "Pikshen" — Nikolai Yakovlevich Senyaev

On the whole, the fate of the country of the Erzya within the tsarist empire — a kind of "Russian Wales" — says nothing good about that empire. The destruction of Erzya statehood and the obliteration of the historical memory of the Erzya people, and of the memory about the Erzya people, is explained, though not excused, only by the fact that in that historical period the empire of course needed swift expansion and sweatshop technologies, not a tender attitude to every bush and a love of freedom.

A kind of answer by the Erzya to such a challenge was their active participation in the revolt of Razin, whom the Erzya count as one of their own people, and in the peasant war of Pugachev. Lenin and Chapaev, according to some accounts, may also have a connection to the Erzya.

However, despite all the problems, the number of the Erzya — even of that part of them which retained some historical memory of its past, already within the Russian superethnos — increased considerably. This is because objectively, leaving aside any assessment of the actions of the imperial authorities, the single economic space itself and the economic rise of the new lands in the east and south-east offered positively minded people good prospects.

The history of the Erzya people according to Melnikov-Pechersky

Pavel Melnikov-Pechersky collected an enormous body of ethnographic material in the Nizhny Novgorod region back at a time when, against the background of the unitarisation fairly typical of the 19th and early 20th centuries in the Russian Empire, the oral tradition of a population that knew no writing was still being preserved. Melnikov-Pechersky devoted a separate book to the historical fate of the Erzya — Essays on the Mordva. The reliability of the tradition set out in the book is established from linguistic evidence. Thus, a double verb is used that is characteristic only of the Finno-Ugric languages. In modern Russian it has probably survived from the Merya heritage, in a "translated" form — "zhili-byli" ("there lived and there were").

In Melnikov's day such linguistic evidence was not widespread in the research community, and it confirms that Melnikov did not falsify the fragments of oral legend he cites. At the same time it should be noted that, in drawing his own conclusions from the comparison of ethnographic, folkloric and chronicle material, Melnikov is not always accurate and is subject to the stereotypes of his era.

The Teryukhane and proto-Nizhny Novgorod

Melnikov devotes considerable attention to the area of present-day Nizhny Novgorod and its surroundings. Here, as well as along the southern bank of the Volga and the eastern bank of the Oka within the borders of the modern Nizhny Novgorod Region, live the Teryukhane - a sub-ethnic group of the Erzya, well acquainted with the cultures of their neighbours, multilingual - familiar with both Slavic colloquial speech and Bulgar. Directly in the area of the modern upper part of the city the Teryukhane had 6 villages and 1 town (a term denoting a fortress), with a permanent population of 500 people, capable of holding no fewer than 5,000 warriors - Abramov Gorod (Obran Osh in Erzya).

Melnikov recounts the history of how the Rurikids established their power in the town (1220). Arriving at its earth-and-timber fortifications with an army of 4,000-5,000 retainers, they present the head of the local administration (the office of "panka" - an elected post, combining the functions of police chief and mayor) with an ultimatum - a demand to hand over the fortress within 4 days. He replies that he is ready to surrender the town, since the forces are unequal, but cannot do so, since legally he must obtain the permission of the Erzya people (probably an assembly, a gathering of representatives in the capital town, a proto-parliament), and this will take more time than 4 days.

The Rurikids begin preparing an assault, while the panka gathers 5,000 warriors into the fortress within a day - probably a militia drawn from the inhabitants of the surrounding villages. In Erzya militias not only men took part, but women as well. The next day the Rurikids, with a professional army, seize the town, execute the men, and turn the women and small children into slaves. After the fall of the fortress the Teryukhane population, in its main body, is fairly quickly Russified. Several thousand people in the most remote villages continue to preserve the tradition of identifying themselves as Teryukhane, right up to the time when Melnikov wrote his book.

The origin of man according to the Teryukhane

A curious fact: the beliefs of the Teryukhane were identical to those of the Erzya, except on the following point: in the The Erzya Religion man is a creation of Champaz (the supreme god), whereas according to the beliefs of the Teryukhane, which were widespread on the territory of modern Nizhny Novgorod and the central districts of the region before colonisation, man was created by Shaitan (the devil), but he could not put him into operation, and even then it was the supreme god who breathed the spirit into him. The main acting figure of the entire Erzya religion, however, is the son of Champaz - Ineshkipaz.

Melnikov teaches: the Erzya believed that the life of every being or phenomenon of the material world is closely bound up with the activity of its own separate spirit. Such notions - of a "driver spirit" belonging to every phenomenon of the material world - are characteristic of most traditional beliefs of the pre-state era.

The Erzya under the rule of the white tsars

After the fall of the fortress at the mouth of the Oka in 1220 the Erzya authorities understand that such a situation will sooner or later lead to the loss of the independence secured by access to the Volga, which allowed them to conduct international trade on their own. By analogy with the Rurikids, the Erzya acquire a "strong executive power", embodied by the inyazor (ruler) Purgaz, upon whom the fullness of military power is conferred. However, compared with the Rurikids, who - like the Franks in Gaul - ruled over an "alien" population (initially the "Russian peoples" - peoples acknowledging the power of the Rurikids and the ideological monopoly of the Orthodox Church in their lands - the Merya, the Galindians, the Izhorians, the Veps, the Meshchera, the Muroma, gradually, under the influence of Orthodoxy, forged into "simply Russians") and when necessary fleeced them mercilessly, a ruler of "one's own" is limited in his actions by a mass of clan-and-tribal democratic traditions, which do not allow him to concentrate resources swiftly for waging wars, or to remove and appoint people in his own entourage. The Erzya repeatedly, including under the leadership of Purgaz, try to win back Nizhny Novgorod, which brings punitive retaliation from the Rurikids, who sought in this harsh way to break the Mordvins of the habit of considering this land their own.

The centre of the Erzya lands, Arzamas, was subjugated to the Muscovite tsardom during Ivan the Terrible's campaign against Kazan. The young Ivan pursued a policy typical of conquerors of vast continental territories - he sharply reduced or entirely abolished taxes in the annexed lands, admitted representatives of the nobility of the annexed peoples into his entourage, and built churches of his own religion. Here too the Erzya did not resist. First, an enormous army of conquest discouraged sensible people from "going head-on". Second, the survivals of clan-and-tribal relations - a rigid, ritualised social structure, clannishness - are objectively disliked by many people. For them, joining a great power at first meant no more than a "wind of change" that would sweep away everything old, obsolete and obstructive to talent.

The situation changes fundamentally with the beginning of the Romanovs' rule. Not so much to modernise their state as to maintain an enormous apparatus of officials in a tsardom stretching from Lake Peipus to Chukotka, they constantly increase the exactions on their subjects. The tax collectors (it should be noted - themselves descendants of the once "Russian peoples", and now simply "servants of the tsar") are especially vicious in the lands of the incompletely forged "aliens" (living on their own land, as hundreds of generations of their ancestors had). Even official documents testify that this was outright robbery. Fleeing the constant punitive expeditions, many Erzya hide in the forests, where they build dugouts in which many families, especially women and small children, freeze to death in the frosty winters, not so much from the cold as from malnutrition.

It came to the point that the mass of the Erzya population, not waiting for the next "grain requisition", in a good harvest year, in summer, abandons its fields and sets off by boat into voluntary exile down the Volga, settling across an immense territory from the Cossack Don and Astrakhan to the most remote corners of Siberia. Thus, without wishing it themselves, the Erzya were turned into an "imperial people", as were many before them and many after them. That year the fields were left unreaped; using hired men, the tsarist administration tried to gather the grain even from under the snow in late autumn, but did not succeed. Naturally, not everyone left; many tried to fight, hiding in the forests, joining the revolts, the most famous of which was Razin's war.

Having analysed the causes of the discontent that was driving matters to a revolt "dangerous to the state", the administrative apparatus somewhat reduces the exactions but at the same time sharply increases its efforts at the complete and final conversion to Orthodoxy. The Erzya resist, or accept Christianity only formally, continuing secretly to pray to their own gods. Official sources acknowledge that the most effective means for the "Russification" of the Erzya is the mixing of the already Russified population with those who have not yet managed to become so. Mass resettlements begin in the Nizhny Novgorod Governorate. In place of those who fled to the east and south, Christian peasants are settled into the villages alongside the remaining Erzya. Later, in the 19th century, ethnographers will note an interesting phenomenon: not only do the Erzya "become Russian", but the new settlers "become Mordvinised".

The historical legacy of the Erzya people

It should be noted that the conquest of the Volga lands by people from other regions in that historical epoch was conditioned by natural and geographical factors - there are no metal deposits here that would have allowed local rulers to raise quickly an army armed well enough to defend their lands, and the region is "open" on all sides. The trade route "from the Varangians to the Persians", thanks to which cities impressive for such northern lands grew and developed here, trading with the lands of the Hansa and with India, had economic justification and made it possible to maintain influential states such as Khazaria and Bulgaria, but it was doomed with the beginning of the Age of Discovery - with the appearance of the sea trade route to India.

Largely thanks to the stubborn resistance of the Erzya people to the military, religious and other pressures of the metropolitan bureaucracy, the Volga-Vyatka district and the Volga region took shape as a distinctive region, united on different foundations than the western provinces of Russia. If there the French model of unification proved workable, creating centralised unitary models of the population's self-organisation (perhaps the Merya people had lived that way before the arrival of the "ruotsi" Vikings), then the Volga is a polycentric region, inclined to federalism, similar to Germany or the USA - here ethnic groups have always lived interspersed, and every region or republic is a "small country" with its own set of diasporas, beliefs and shades of culture.

The Teryushevo uprising of the Erzya

The final impetus to the uprising (against the background of the state apparatus's constant efforts at Russification) was the decree of Dmitry Sechenov, Bishop of Nizhny Novgorod and Alatyr of the Russian Orthodox Church, of 18 May 1743 on the destruction and burning of the Erzya sacred groves and cemeteries.

The main driving force of the Teryushevo uprising was the Erzya population of this and the neighbouring volosts. The insurgent people were led by Nesmeyan Vasilyev, an inhabitant of the village of Poksh Seskevele (Bolshoye Seskino). His closest assistants were Pumraz Semyonov, Shatres Plakidin, Kotryan Andryushin and Druzhina Tsyanayev.

"On the 28th day of June of this year, His Grace Dmitry, Bishop of Nizhny Novgorod, submitted a report to the Most Holy Governing Synod: that in the discharge of his pastoral duty His Grace departed from Nizhny to visit his diocese (with a small number of servants of his household) on the 16th day of May of this year and, having been at the Oransky Monastery, travelled to the Zelenogorsky Monastery by the proper highway through the Teryushevskaya volost, in which resides the greater half of the old unbaptised Russian peoples (who, concealing their ancient idolatry and sorcery and being unwilling to come to the light of the Gospel preaching, falsely call themselves Mordvins, whereas they never were Mordvins and did not and do not know the Mordvin tongue, but speak just as the Suzdal and Yaroslavl peasants do), and passed by three villages on the same 18th day of May, in which villages they received him honourably and gave him guides as far as the Russian village of Sarley, in which he stopped and wished to perform the divine service for the candidates for ordination and, having noticed near the holy altar a cemetery of those unbaptised people, set up as if in mockery of the holy church in a Christian village in the vicinity of the church, in which the dead bodies of these unbaptised idolaters are laid, and, coming from all the near and distant places, such unbaptised people offer up foul sacrifices with shouting and dancing, which is exceedingly contrary to God and is forbidden both by the rules of the holy fathers and by decrees; which cemetery ought long ago to have been moved to their unbaptised dwellings, save for the negligence of unlearned Christians (who, together with those unbaptised people, come and consort at such devilish revels and partake of their foul sacrifices, drinking and eating with them as one), and still more for the extreme laxity of the Georgian stewards of the said village of Tergoshevo, who for the sake of their own foul profit notably permit them in that abomination, not knowing or not considering the difference between Christians and idolaters. And when His Grace, having come into the church, ordered food to be cooked by the said cemetery, and the firewood for the cooking to be taken from that cemetery, set... ? - and only by giving the appropriate answers could one manage to be registered as a Mordvin. From the Decree of the Synod to the Nizhny Novgorod Governorate Chancellery of 7 July 1743

Given the wide scope of the uprising, the Nizhny Novgorod governor Drutskoy dispatched several military detachments to suppress it. These forces proved insufficient; the uprising was engulfing ever more villages. The governorate's military detachments were reinforced by regular government troops sent to their support. The troops managed to achieve victory over the insurgents only after the battle near the village of Lapshikha on 26 November 1743. The leaders of the uprising were taken prisoner. Among those captured were Nesmeyan Vasilyev, Pumras Semyonov and Shatres Plakidin. To intimidate the Erzya people, the authorities staged the public burning of the organiser and leader of the Teryushevo uprising, Nesmeyan Vasilyev, in the Erzya village of Sarley. The repressions that followed, the burning of many Erzya villages, the numerous shootings and public executions of participants in the uprising halted the insurgents' actions for a time. The insurgent actions of the Erzya resumed in 1745.

After the final suppression of the uprising, the tsarina (Elizabeth Petrovna) granted the lands of the Teryushevo Erzya to Prince Bakar of Georgia.

The Erzya in the Nizhny Novgorod Region

The presence of an Erzya population in the Nizhny Novgorod Governorate which preserved its Erzya identity as of 1859.

The data are taken from the lists of "Populated Places" of the Nizhny Novgorod Province.

There are 166 Erzya settlements, with 15,501 households and 112,192 people, not counting the elderly and children.

Erzya who have preserved their language live in the Ardatov, Arzamas, Knyaginino, Lukoyanov and Sergach uyezds.

The heritage of the Erzya people was preserved, but the language was lost in the Gorbatovsky and Balakhninsky uyezds; there the ancient sacred groves of the Erzya survived, such as the old hillfort of Olenikha.

It is a notable circumstance that many Erzya villages bear Russian names, while those settlements that have already lost their language bear Erzya names.

The rivers, for the most part, have retained their Erzya names.

Settlements. Households. Inhabitants.

In Ardatovsky 29 1.954 6.617 m. 6.661 f. 13.278 both sexes

- Arzamassky 26 2.888 9.718 11.124 20.842

- Knyaginsky 25 1.991 6.776 7.459 14.225

- Lukoyanovsky 19 2.473 9.960 10.980 20.940

- Sergachsky 24 1.772 7.501 7.806 15.407

Total 123 11 078 40 560 44 030 84 692

Here we list the Erzya settlements with the numbers of households and inhabitants, not previously known in such detail.

From the list of populated places it can be seen that the Erzya settlements lie in the south-eastern half of the Ardatov Uyezd, on both sides of the Tambov highway, along the rivers: the Puza, the Sukhoy Satis, the Kudleyka, the Chuvarleyka, the Kevleyka, the Kanerga, the Vechkinza and others.

Ardatovsky Uyezd

No. households m. f.

Kremenets 290 221 702 831

Khozino 336 135 434 534

Balykovo 291 48 158 181

Yakovlevka 337 6 16 13

Onuchino 295 89 266 327

Lapsha 340 41 338 333

Likhachi Bolshiye 303 94 365 370

Tsyganovo 343 12 42 39

Likhachi Malye 304 9 34 26

Yekaterinovka 344 22 59 55

Kashino Novoye 306 19 74 86

Nikolayevka 345 30 109 119

Satis 312 10 40 42

Karamzinka 346 18 69 64

Dernovka 318 24 98 110

Kanalgushi 347 12 36 34

Khudoshino 313 38 167 141

Kudley 360 165 585 607

Fedotovo 320 33 126 140

Gari 361 135 415 472

Kosheleva 327 131 467 561

Kavlei 363 60 190 202

Sungulovo 329 41 149 141

Kanerga 384 113 317 323

Babino 330 130 389 449

Chelatma 386 52 151 166

Makatelem Maly 334 83 362 423

Kruttsy 387 30 96 104

Makatelem Bolshoy 335 153 393 460

Total 29 1954 6617 6661

Arzamassky Uyezd

No. households m. f.

Kostyanka 486 141 455 544

Volchikha 578 177 555 681

Alemasovo 496 153 394 445

Kriusha 579 48 176 164

Krapivka 497 50 161 167

Pologovka 580 20 40 61

Vechkusovo 498 118 465 563

Volochikhinsky Maydan 582 127 368 487

Veliky Vrag 499 288 986 1146

Vtoruskoye 589 116 360 492

Ivantsevo Staroye 500 140 549 629

Khirino 610 192 661 643

Ivantsevo Novoye 502 138 556 606

Klyuchishchi 611 82 296 337

Berezovka 503 45 158 163

Korino 612 156 536 528

Vad 553 148 538 709

Bestuzhevo 617 81 343 362

Zakharyevka 554 17 48 51

Kazanovo 625 127 526 538

Chuvakhlei 559 42 193 171

Ponetayevka 632 87 201 200

Vazyan 562 80 299 315

Kardavil 633 119 310 305

Ivashkino 564 58 161 174

Salaley 573 138 480 591

Total 26 2889 9718 1124

In this uyezd the Erzya settlements are populous ones, lying along the rivers: the Serezha, the Vadka, the Arat, the Sumarka, the Tesha, and they stand on the most ancient Erzya camps. Erzyamaz, as is known, was the centre of the Erzya land between the Oka and the Volga.

Knyagininsky Uyezd

No. households m. f.

Valgusy Malye 2243 17 49 36

Vergizai 3087 93 341 389

Valgusy Bolshiye 2244 38 130 137

Ichalki (village) 3090 300 909 125

Gremyachya Polyana 2246 19 65 69

Yakshen Bolshaya 3091 181 590 660

Polyana 2285 124 340 346

Revezen 3094 273 861 913

Selishchi 2288 63 178 173

Novaya Bykovka 3096 13 55 58

Kartmazovka 3028 101 295 302

Pelekshevo 3098 82 336 327

Tartaley 3057 36 140 184

Kozlovka 3099 33 136 133

Pergilei 3062 146 589 640

Balakhna 3102 56 191 197

Kemary Bolshiye 3072 150 649 761

Konoplyanka 3104 19 66 83

Kemary Malye 3073 78 282 329

Vyzhlei 3105 32 130 140

Novoaleksandrovka 3084 18 78 109

Chembasovo 3107 39 102 139

Nikolayevka 3085 12 56 65

Yakshen Malaya 3114 45 115 146

Vladimirovka 3086 13 53 63

Total 25 1991 6767 7459

Here the Erzya population is found along the banks of the Pyana, which crosses the uyezd twice.

Lukoyanovsky Uyezd

No. households m. f.

Ivantsovo 3150 131 554 609

Chirgushi 3207 65 202 191

Shandrovo 3131 95 446 488

Pichingushi Sredniye 3212 169 560 747

Soldamanovo 3138 128 643 729

Pichingushi Staryye 3213 129 409 523

Atingeyevo 3139 208 806 915

Raksazhon 3240 11 79 85

Messingovo 3142 22 107 116

Pikshen 3244 122 516 595

Durakovo 3152 147 557 649

Anikeyevo 3246 18 42 69

Novoaleksandrovka 3168 148 625 676

Kemlya 3264 174 646 698

Orlovka 3172 19 87 82

Lobaski 3267 331 1275 1324

Obukhova 3171 70 262 281

Ichalki (village) 3277 331 1541 1662

Novoselki 3206 139 513 546

Total 19 2473 9960 10980

The settlements lie mainly along the rivers: the Alatyr, the Irset, the Arka, the Irsa and others.

Sergachsky Uyezd

No. households m. f.

Uda Bolshaya 4304 102 342 408

Strelka 4392 23 97 105

Styazhkino (Larionovo Staroye) 4311 12 52 63

Berezovka Staraya 4411 153 525 547

Kanino 4324 220 1188 1252

Berezovka Novaya 4412 56 353 372

Milostna 4369 30 139 160

Vyazovka 4414 44 159 171

Sarga 4380 72 328 338

Akuzovo 4419 143 263 254

Apraksino 4384 211 776 814

Gari 4427 13 51 63

Pustoshka 4385 48 249 271

Kamenka 4428 68 262 273

Anastasovo 4386 36 217 233

Starinskoye 4446 100 415 426

Chupaly 4388 86 450 512

Sokolikha 4447 54 221 250

Selishchi 4389 92 500 488

Vladimirovka 4448 3 24 25

Petrova 4390 18 97 99

Andosovo 4449 110 461 511

Protasova 4391 32 189 167 Total 24 1774 7501 7806

Here the Erzya settlements have remained along the rivers: the Pyana, the Sal, the Sarga, the Cheka, the Yezhat and others.

Nizhny Novgorod Uyezd

No. households m. f.

Borisovo 96 172 668 761

Kasanikha 174 101 227 336

Kriusha 97 72 195 247

Lom 175 130 320 413

Vshivka 124 57 178 201

Siukha 179 121 338 396

Vyshka 127 53 164 217

Romanikha 181 169 437 497

Inyutino 129 141 442 505

Teploye 183 124 336 351

Mirsha 145 115 355 498

Vinny Maydan 184 65 181 207

Zubanikha 146 49 151 191

Shonikha 185 81 245 281

Lapshikha 166 136 326 391

Migalikha 188 138 382 424

Belaya Polyana 168 30 80 104

Nadezhino 189 25 76 92

Inelei 169 165 445 509

Arapikha 190 36 97 11

Bortsovo 170 141 358 471

Kazhleyka 192 95 276 299

Bersenikha 171 37 120 143

Muravyikha 193 111 292 299

Olgina 194 64 144 173

Kuzhadon 207 92 280 259

Surovatikha 195 148 343 426

Tatarskoye 218 144 366 416

Kurilovo 197 65 241 250

Seskino Maloye 219 100 286 345

Tepelevo 198 47 211 264

Baksheyevo 220 136 353 491

Polyana Malaya 199 48 166 176

Teryushevo 222 202 525 622

Saradon 200 67 212 264

Makrasha 229 122 290 407

Polyana 201 70 218 250

Teryushevo Maloye 230 124 368 454

Uchevatikha 202 33 80 84

Margushi 231 72 242 258

Lgotka 203 37 93 96

Berezniki 262 64 181 213

Seskino Bolshoye 205 118 243 306

Total 41 4133 11576 13741

Here the Erzya settlements are found throughout the uyezd, beginning from the The Kudma River along both its banks and its tributaries: the Pichest, the Mianga, the Tuneyevka, the Maydanka, the Puster, the Modana, the Sechuga, the Kazhleyka, the Kraga and others.

According to the data of 1859 published by the Central Statistical Committee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Saint Petersburg. 1863.

Notable Erzya

Erzyas included Patriarch Nikon, Stepan Razin, Olyona Erzyamasskaya, Kozma Minin, Nesmeyan Vasilyev, Lenin, Chaliapin, Chapayev, the writers Maxim Gorky, Yesenin, Fyodor Gladkov, Vasily Fyodorov, the singers Lidiya Ruslanova, Yelena Gribova and many other names. It was not by chance that the great Stepan Erzia took the name of his people, the Erzya, as his surname. The Erzya physicist Bazhutov named the elementary particle he discovered the erzion. Be attentive, treat the Census with the utmost seriousness! Reproduce this appeal however you can. Send it out by post, pass it on to your relatives, acquaintances and loved ones. Do not be indifferent! Veshnede erzyat! The Public Foundation for the Salvation of the Erzya Language, Council of Elders of the Erzya People Newspaper "Erzyan Mastor"

Interesting facts

• Surnames of the type Gundyayev, Sindyayev, Kildyayev and the like are of Mordvin origin — they are formed from the corresponding ancient Mordvin names and may end either in the traditional Mordvin -kin (Chindyaykin, Kenyaykin) or in -yev. In the latter case it becomes utterly impossible to tell the bearer of the surname from a Russian. The most striking example is Patriarch Kirill (Vladimir Gundyayev in secular life): no one would ever have guessed that he is Erzya had he not admitted it himself. The ancestors of the new Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus Kirill come from the environs of the town of Lukoyanov in the south of the Nizhny Novgorod Region. This is reported (archive) today by the central railway newspaper Gudok. The paper adds: the new patriarch's Lukoyanov roots are confirmed even by his surname, Vladimir Gundyayev in secular life. The best-known specialist on given names and surnames in the Volga region, Professor Semyon Chernykh of Yoshkar-Ola, holds that Gundyayev derives from an ancient traditional male name that among the Mari sounded like Kundey, and among their kin and neighbours the Mordvins — Gundyay. That name in turn comes from the root "kund", known in the Finno-Ugric languages of the Volga region, which is translated as "land, locality, native parts". So "gundyay" is practically the same as "fellow countryman".

See also

• Museum of Erzya Culture

• Erzyan Cultural and Educational Portal (archived)

• Erzya Cuisine

• The Erzya Religion

• Erzya Traditions

• Mordva

• Erzyan Mastor

• Arzamas

• Yuri Vsevolodovich

• Purgaz

• Nizhegorodsky Dyatel

• The Peoples of Nizhny Novgorod

• The Founding of Nizhny Novgorod