Regions reviews of the Central Asian periphery of the Russian empire as a source of information about the population of the late XIX — beginning of XX centuries (the Akmola region case study)

Abstract

The aim of the article is to study the regions reviews as a source of statistical information on the socio-demographic characteristics of the population of the Central Asian national periphery of the Russian Empire. The chronological framework of the work covers the period 1870-1914. The main source of information for the study was the portal of the Electronic Library of the State Public Historical Library of Russia, which provides open access to a large collection of digitized versions of reviews of provinces and regions of the Russian Empire. The dynamics of the reviews is considered on the materials of the Akmola region — one of the brightest representatives of the studied macroregion.

The article analyzes the structure of reviews and the place in it of population sections, determines the presence and content of tabular statistical material, examines sets of indicators characterizing the population size and its distribution by sex, types of settlement, density, estates, religions, nationalities, as well as indicators of population movement. Conclusions are made about the significant and nonlinear evolution of the surveys of the Akmola region in terms of population information, about the possibilities of using this source in the reconstruction of the socio-demographic picture of the turn of the XIX-XX centuries.