Russian Empire Census

For other uses, see Russian Census.

The Russian Imperial Census of 1897 was the first and the only census carried out in the Russian Empire (Finland was excluded). It recorded demographic data as of 28 January [O.S. 15 January] 1897.

Previously, the Central Statistical Bureau issued statistical tables based on fiscal lists (ревизские списки).

The second Russian Census was scheduled for December 1915, but was cancelled because of the outbreak of World War I one and a half years earlier (in July 1914).[1] It was not rescheduled before the Russian Revolution. The next census to take place in Russia only occurred at the end of 1926, almost three decades later.

Organization

The census project was suggested in 1877 by Pyotr Semenov-Tyan-Shansky, a famous Russian geographer and chief of the Central Statistical Bureau, and was approved by Tsar Nicholas II in 1895.

The census was performed in two stages. In the first stage (December 1896 — January 1897) the counters (135,000 persons: teachers, priests, and literate soldiers) visited all households and filled in the questionnaires, which were verified by local census managers. In the second stage. (9 January 1898 [O.S. 28 December 1897]) the counters simultaneously visited all households to verify and update the questionnaires. Despite this being the only census they ever took, Historians were able to find out the Russian Empires population in earlier periods of time still from collecting city censuses.

The data processing took 8 years using Hollerith card machines. Publication of the results started in 1898 and ended in 1905. In total, 119 volumes for 89 guberniyas, as well as a two-volume summary, were issued.

The questionnaire contained the following questions:

In the census summary tables, nationality was based on the declared mother language of respondents.

Census results

The results of the census are too broad to publish.

The total population of the Russian Empire was recorded to be 125,640,021 people (50.2% female, 49.8% male; urban 16,828,395 ).

By native tongue

The most spoken languages, from which nationality was determined were:[2]

Rank Language Speakers
1 Russian (as “Great Russian”) 55,667,469
2 Ukrainian (as “Little Russian”) 22,380,551
3 Turkic-Tatar 13,373,867
4 Polish 7,931,307
5 Belarusian 5,885,547
6 Yiddish 5,063,156
7 Finnic languages 3,502,147
8 German 1,790,489
9 Latvian 1,435,937
10 Kartvelian languages (Georgian, Mingrelian, Svan) 1,352,535
11 Lithuanian (excluding Samogitian) 1,210,510
12 Armenian 1,173,096
13 Moldavian and Romanian 1,121,669
14 Dagestani languages 1,091,782
Bulgarian 172,659
Zhmud (Samogitian) 448,022
Greek (mainly eastern Pontic Greek), spoken especially by Greeks in southern Russia and Georgia, and by Caucasus Greeks of Russian Caucasus province of Kars Oblast 186,925
Ossetian 171,716
Tajik 350,397
125,640,021

By religion

Rank Religion[3] Followers %
1 Eastern Orthodox 87,123,604 69.34%
2 Mohammedists (Muslims) 13,906,972 11.07%
3 Roman Catholics 11,467,994 9.13%
4 Jewish 5,215,805 4.15%
5 Lutherans 3,572,653 2.84%
6 Old Believers and others split from Pravoslavs 2,204,596 1.75%
7 Armenian Gregorians 1,179,241 0.94%
8 Buddhists, Lamaists 433,863 0.34%
9 Reformed 85,400 0.07%
10 Mennonites 66,564 0.05%
11 Armenian Catholics 38,840 0.03%
12 Baptists 38,139 0.03%
13 Karaites 12,894 0.01%
14 Anglicans 4,183 0.003%
15 Other Christian denominations 3,952 0.003%
16 Other non-Christians 285,321 0.23%
Total 125,640,021 100%

Population by modern day countries

Largest cities

Largest cities of the Empire according to the census:

Assessment

As in many other census in the era of nationalism, the results reflect the views on national policy of the authorities. In this case, the population of Russian ethnicity was inflated.[4] Thus for example, the number of Poles is underrepresented.[5][6] Imperial officials classified the Ukrainian and Belarusian languages as belonging to Russian group and labeled those nationalities as Little Russian for Ukrainians and White Russian for Belarusians.[4]

Notes

  1. ↑ http://www.gks.ru/free_doc/new_site/rosstat/smi/stat_2012-10-10.pdf
  2. ↑ Первая всеобщая перепись населения Российской Империи 1897 г. Распределение населения по родному языку, губерниям и областям (in Russian). Demoscope Weekly. Retrieved 26 October 2012.
  3. ↑ Демоскоп Weekly - Приложение. Справочник статистических показателей
  4. 1 2 Anna Geifman, Russia Under the Last Tsar: Opposition and Subversion, 1894-1917, Wiley-Blackwell, 1999, ISBN 1-55786-995-2, Google Print, p. 118-119
  5. ↑ Piotr Eberhardt, Jan Owsinski, Ethnic groups and population changes in twentieth-century Central-Eastern Europe, M.E. Sharpe, 2003, ISBN 0-7656-0665-8, Google Print, p.27
  6. ↑ Jerzy Borzęcki, The Soviet-Polish peace of 1921 and the creation of interwar Europe, Yale University Press, 2008, ISBN 0-300-12121-0, Google Print, p.10

References

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