Old believers of Vitebsk province in the second half of the XIX and the beginning of the XX century: settlement and population dynamics

Abstract

The article analyzes the peculiarities of the settlement and traces the dynamics of the number of Old Believers in Vitebsk province in the second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. During this period the region was the leader in the number of Old Believers among the western provinces of the Russian Empire. The Vitebsk province covered the eastern territory of the modern Vitebsk region of Belarus, southeastern lands of Latvia, and districts of Pskov and Smolensk regions of Russia. This paper is the first to examine the region as a whole, and not in parts in accordance with the modern state borders. The analysis of statistical materials has highlighted the main regions where Old Believers live on the territory of the province (Rezhitsa, Dvinsk, Lyutsin, Sebezh, Nevel, Polotsk, Vitebsk and Gorodok districts). The paper traced the dynamics of the number of the Old Believers (in the province as well as in some districts and localities), analyzed the ratio of the urban and rural population, marked out the urban centres of Old Belief on the territory of the region. The results of the research will be useful to study the ethnic and confessional structure of the population of the Belarusian-Russian-Latvian borderland as well as to solve the problems of ethnic history of the region.