View source for Tofalar

{{Infobox ethnic group
| group            = Tofalar<br>Тоъфа
| image            = [[File:Група оленярів Тофалари Іркутська губ. Нижньоудінський повіт поч XX ст РЕМ.jpg|200px|A group of Tofalars]]
| population       = 762 (2010)
| popplace         = [[Irkutsk Oblast]] ([[Siberia]], [[Russia]])
| region1          = {{flag|Russia}}
* {{flag|Irkutsk Oblast}}
| pop1             = 719 (2021)
| ref1             = <ref>{{cite web|title=Оценка численности постоянного населения по субъектам Российской Федерации|url=https://rosstat.gov.ru/storage/mediabank/tab-5_VPN-2020.xlsx|publisher=[[Federal State Statistics Service (Russia)|Federal State Statistics Service]]|access-date=31 August 2024}}</ref>
| region2          = {{flag|Ukraine}}
| pop2             = 18 (2001)
| ref2             = <ref>[http://2001.ukrcensus.gov.ua/results/nationality_population/nationality_popul1/select_5/?botton=cens_db&box=5.1W&k_t=00&p=100&rz=1_1&rz_b=2_1%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20&n_page=5 State statistics committee of Ukraine - National composition of population, 2001 census] (Ukrainian)</ref>
| rels             = [[Shamanism]], [[Russian Orthodox Christianity]], [[Animism]]
| langs            = [[Tofa language|Tofalar]], [[Russian language|Russian]]
| related          = [[Tozhu Tuvans]], [[Dukha]]ns, [[Soyot]]
| native_name      =
| native_name_lang =
}}
The '''Tofalar''' (also '''Karagas''' or '''Tofa'''; Тофалары, тофа (tofa) in [[Russian language|Russian]]) '''people''' are a [[Turkic peoples|Turkic]] people who live in [[Tofalariya]], in the southwestern part of [[Nizhneudinsky District]], [[Irkutsk Oblast]] of [[Russia]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Akiner |first=Shirin |title=Islamic Peoples of the Soviet Union (with an appendix on the non-Muslim Turkic peoples of the Soviet Union) |publisher=Routledge |year=1986 |isbn=0-7103-0025-5 |location=London |pages=428–431}}</ref> The Tofalar population is highly mixed with Russians due to the presence of Russian settlers and high rates of intermarriage.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Кривоногов |first=Виктор Павлович |date=2016-09-03 |title=Современные тофалары (опыт интервальных исследований) |url=https://nit.tuva.asia/nit/article/view/469 |journal=Новые исследования Тувы |language=ru |issue=3 |issn=2079-8482}}</ref><ref name=":2">{{Cite journal |last=Krivonogov |first=Victor P. |date=August 16, 2018 |title=People of the Deer Living near Lake Baikal: Dynamics of Ethno-Cultural Identity of Modern Tofalars |url=https://elib.sfu-kras.ru/bitstream/handle/2311/71918/Krivonogov+.pdf;jsessionid=695E9C09B93735913E096AD4C6098D29?sequence=4 |journal=Journal of Siberian Federal University |volume=11 |issue=8 |pages=1274–1300}}</ref>
Prior to [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] rule, the Tofalar led a [[nomad]]ic lifestyle in the [[taiga]], engaging in [[reindeer husbandry]] and [[hunting]]. Afterwards, they were resettled by the Soviet government and forced to adopt [[Sedentary lifestyle|sedentarism]] and were discouraged from practicing hunting and [[shamanism]]. According to the [[Russian Census (2010)|2010 census]], there were 762 Tofalar in Russia.
== Etymology ==
Tofalar is an [[Endonym and exonym|endonym]] and contains the Turkic plural suffix -lar, thus translating to "Tofas"; Tofalar means "people of the deer."<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":3" /> The Tofalar were formerly known as 'Karagas,' which was derived from the name of one particular Tofalar clan, the Kara-Kash or Karahaash.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":3" />
== History ==
=== Origins ===
The ancestors of the Tofalar (and the closely related Soyots, Tozhu Tuvans, and Dukha) were proto-[[Samoyedic languages|Samoyedic]] [[Hunter-gatherer|hunters-gatherers]] who arrived in the Eastern [[Sayan Mountains|Sayan region]] by the end of the end of third millennium BCE and beginning of the second millennium BCE.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2022-09-23 |title=Reindeer Herding in the Eastern Sayan- A Story of the Soyot |url=https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/reindeer-herding-eastern-sayan-story-soyot |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=www.culturalsurvival.org |language=en}}</ref> During the Old Turkic period, the ancestors of the Tofalars underwent [[Turkification]], adopting a Turkic language<ref name=":3" /> and abandoning the [[Mator language]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Janhunen |first=Juha |last2=Salminen |first2=Tapani |date= |title=Endangered languages in Northeast Asia: report |url=http://www.helsinki.fi/~tasalmin/nasia_report.html#Tofa |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190211093750/http://www.helsinki.fi/~tasalmin/nasia_report.html#Chuvan |archive-date=2019-02-11 |access-date=2024-07-22 |website=helsinki.fi}}</ref>
[[Peter Simon Pallas|P. S. Pallas]] and J. G. Georgi initially regarded the Tofalar as a Samoyedic people, and that they had only adopted their Turkic language from the [[Tuvans]] in the 19th century.<ref name=":3" /> However, the Russian linguist [[Valentin Rassadin]] instead argued that the Tofolar were a Ket (Yeniseian)-speaking tribe who adopted a Turkic language in the 6th-8th centuries and adapted for their own phonological system; they would go on to take on other influences, including the Samoyeds, among others.<ref name=":3" /> The Tofalar culture is generally believed to be a combination of [[Ket people|Ket]] ([[Yeniseian people|Yeniseian]]), Samoyedic, Turkic, and [[Mongols|Mongol]] influences.<ref name=":0" />
In the [[Middle Ages]], they were subject to the Mongol khans and paid tribute to them; later, they were subjugated by the western [[Buryats|Buryat]] princes.<ref name=":5">{{Cite web |title=Tofalar {{!}} Encyclopedia.com |url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/tofalar |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=www.encyclopedia.com}}</ref> The Tofalar eventually moved from their homeland on the slopes of the Sayan Mountains up north to their current location during the 17th century.<ref name=":0" />  Historically, they have had extensive contact with the Tozhu Tuvans, sharing many similarities in culture and language.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}}
=== Russian imperial expansion ===
In 1648, the Russians built the fortified settlement of [[Udinsk, Republic of Buryatia|Udinsk]], bringing the Tofalars under Russian influence.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|title=The Tofalars|url=https://www.eki.ee/books/redbook/tofalars.shtml|access-date=2020-09-05|website=www.eki.ee|publisher=[[The Red Book of the Peoples of the Russian Empire]]}}</ref> The Tofalar were required to pay the [[Yasak|yasaq]], and every gunbearer had to pay a fixed number of [[sable]] furs, though this amount was often arbitrarily increased.<ref name=":3" /> As a result of this close contact, the Tofalar adopted many aspects of Russian culture, religion, and language.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book|last1=Olson|first1=James Stuart|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CquTz6ps5YgC&q=tofalars&pg=PA635|title=An Ethnohistorical Dictionary of the Russian and Soviet Empires|last2=Pappas|first2=Lee Brigance|last3=Pappas|first3=Nicholas Charles|last4=Pappas|first4=Nicholas C. J.|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|year=1994|isbn=978-0-313-27497-8|pages=635}}</ref> They were converted to [[Russian Orthodoxy|Christianity]] early on but continued to adhere to shamanism.<ref name=":6">{{Cite web |title=Tofalars and Soyots - the Peoples Lost around Baikal |url=https://1baikal.ru/en/istoriya/tofalars-and-soyots-the-peoples-lost-around-baikal |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=1baikal.ru |language=en}}</ref>
Before the Soviet takeover, Tofalar mainly bartered with Russians, Buryats, and Mongol traders, acquiring saddles of Buryat and Mongol manufacture, hunting knives, axes, felt saddlecloths, harnesses, treated sheepskin, and diverse textiles and ornaments.<ref name=":5" />
=== Soviet collectivization ===
The Soviets abolished the yasaq in 1926; in 1927, they enacted new hunting regulations and declared part of the former hunting grounds reservations., thus requiring Tofalar to get a permit to hunt in their native forests.<ref name=":3" /> Under new regulations, the moose the Tofalar used to eat now belonged to the state and were not allowed to be killed for food.<ref name=":3" /> The Soviets next enacted a campaign to force the Tofalar into adopting sedentarism and resettled them onto the sites of [[Alygdzher]], Utkum, Nerkha and Gutara.<ref name=":3" /> By 1932, all of the Tofalar had been resettled and their reindeer and hunting grounds were collectivized.<ref name=":3" /><ref name=":5" />
In 1929, the first co-operative farms were formed, and from 1930 to 1931, the Tofalar were collectivized into three [[kolkhoz]]es: Krasnyi Okhotnik, Kirov and Kyzyl-Tofa. In 1930, a Tofalar national district with Alygdzher as its centre, was formed in the Irkutsk region.<ref name=":3" /> Several Russian speaking schools founded in the 1930s, where Tofalar children were taught Russian, displacing the Tofa language.<ref name=":6" />
In 1948, industrial gold mining was developed in Tofalaria; after its termination, the region became completely subsidized by the state.<ref name=":2" />
=== Post Soviet collapse ===
The Tofalar today continue to fight for their rights to the land of their ancestors; of particular concern are non-native business men cutting down local cedar forests, the traditional hunting grounds of the Tofalar.<ref name=":2" />
In 2017, the Nizhneudinsky District administration cancelled all benefits for air transport between Nizhneudinsk and Tofalaria settlements; previously, a helicopter ticket to Nizhneudinsk cost 750 rubles while beneficiaries flew for free. Afterwards, the government established a new fixed cost: it would cost 1500 rubles to fly to Alygdzher and Upper Gutara, and 1300 rubles to Nerkha.<ref name=":2" /> This decision was widely unpopular among the Tofalar, as they believed the small-numbered indigenous peoples should have the right to move freely on their territory.<ref name=":2" />
== Language ==
{{Main|Tofa language}}
The [[Tofa language]] belongs to a branch of Turkic languages and is very close to the language of [[Tuvans-Todzhins|Tozhu Tuvans]] and [[Soyot]]s.<ref name=":3" /> There are two dialects of the Tofa language: Alygdzher and Gutar.<ref name=":3" /> There are hundreds of [[loanword]]s from medieval [[Mongolian language|Mongolian]] and [[Russian language|Russian]], and dozens of loan words from [[Buryat language|Buryat]].<ref name=":3" /> The Tofa language did not have a written form until 1989, when the linguist Valentin Rassadin created a writing system based on the Cyrillic alphabet; in the 1990s, Tofalar activists successfully campaigned for their local schools to teach the children in the Tofa language.<ref name=":3" /><ref name=":5" /><ref>{{Cite web |last=hecksinductionhour |date=2018-01-10 |title=Valentin Rassadin |url=https://therussianreader.com/tag/valentin-rassadin/ |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=The Russian Reader |language=en}}</ref>
== Culture ==
=== Subsistence ===
The Tofalar were traditionally nomadic, and their economy centered around reindeer husbandry, trapping, and hunting.<ref name=":0" /> On average, one household kept anywhere from 20 to 30 reindeer, which they used for transportation, clothing, shelter, and food.<ref name=":5" /> Reindeer milk was used for drinking and making cheese and curdled milk.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Tofalar - International Centre for Reindeer Husbandry - ICR |url=https://reindeerherding.org/tofalar |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=reindeerherding.org}}</ref> They lived in traditional conical tents (''chum''), which were made of animal hide in the winter and [[birch]] bark (''polotnishch'') in the summer.<ref name=":6" /> The Tofalar also hunt and eat deer, bear, waterfowl, and fish in autumn ponds during the spawning season; additionally, they hunted sables, [[Stoat|ermine]], [[Polecat|Siberian polecats]], and [[squirrel]]s for their fur, using rifles and accompanied by dogs.<ref name=":6" /> Alongside the curing of meat and the drying of reindeer milk for winter provisions, the Tofalar supplemented their diet with dried tubers (''saran''), wild onions, and pine and cedar nuts.<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":6" /> Historically, products such as flour, groats, salt, sugar, tea, tobacco, and alcohol were purchased from traders in exchange for furs.<ref name=":5" />
During the Soviet era, most Tofalar made their living working on state farms, even after the collapse of the Soviet Union.<ref name=":5" /> The Tofalar today are sedentary and primarily live in modern timber houses but still use traditional tents as storage.<ref name=":0" /> Hunting and fishing are the primary economic activities, and deer continue to be used as a means of transport.<ref name=":2" /> Men leave their villages during winter to go hunting in the cedar forests.<ref name=":2" />
=== Entertainment ===
Additionally, the Tofalar practice wrestling, archery, and horse racing.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Gruzdeva |first=Anna |date=2016-07-19 |title=Tofalaria: How people and deer coexist in the Siberian taiga |url=https://www.rbth.com/travel/tours/away/2016/07/19/tofalaria-how-people-and-deer-coexist-in-the-siberian-taiga_612649 |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=Russia Beyond |language=en-US}}</ref> Traditional Tofalar music instruments include the ''chadygan'', a stringed instrument like the [[gusli]], and the ''charty-hobus'', which is similar to [[balalaika]]; music was played to accompany songs and dances at festivals.<ref name=":5" />
=== Traditional medicine ===
The Tofalar mostly used [[Traditional medicine|folk medicine]], but sometimes sought out healing from Buryat healers.<ref name=":5" />
=== Death ===
The Tofalar believed that the dead would go live in the Kingdom of [[Erlik]] following their death; the deceased were buried with their personal belongings under the belief that they would need them in the next life.<ref name=":5" /> Notably, they believed that in Erlik, everything was the 'wrong way around,' so the objects accompanying the dead had to be damaged.<ref name=":5" /> The Tofalar death ritual has been greatly influenced by Christianity, and the Tofalar, like Russian Christians, mark the ninth day, fortieth day, sixth month, and first year after the death of a relative.<ref name=":5" />
== Society ==
Prior to Soviet collectivization, the Tofalar were organized into five [[Patrilineality|patrilineal]] clans (''nyon''), though there used to be seven.<ref name=":3" /> Each clan consisted of a group of closely related families descended from one ancestor (''aal''), led by an elder called the ''ulug-bash'', and had its own territory (''aimak'') and migration routes.<ref name=":5" />
Tofalar territory used to be divided into three parts-
# '''Burungu aallar''': The eastern group of nomadic camps (''aallar''), which included the territory of the Chogdu, Akchugdu, and Kara-Chogdu clans on the Yda, Kara-Burn, Ytkum, and [[Iya (river)|Iya]] rivers.<ref name=":5" />
# '''Ortaa aallar''': The middle group of nomadic camps, which included the territory of the Cheptai clan on the Little Birius, Nerkha, Erma, and Iaga rivers.<ref name=":5" />
# '''Songy aallar''': The western group of nomadic camps, which included the territory of the Kara-Kash and Saryt-Haash clans on the Agul, Tagul, Gutara, Big Birius, and Iuglym rivers.<ref name=":5" />
Marriage was [[Exogamy|exogamous]], and was concluded after a preliminary courtship, an agreement between the parents, and the payment of bride-price to the father of the bride.<ref name=":5" /> The wedding typically lasted three days, and was accompanied by a feast where special rituals, songs, and dances were performed.<ref name=":5" /> Following the wedding, the new groom took his wife to his nomad camp, separate from his family's, where they set up their own tent and began to live as an independent family unit.<ref name=":5" /> If the bride had premarital children, they remained with her father and were considered his children.<ref name=":5" /> Mixed Russian-Tofalar marriages are common today.<ref name=":5" />
Men were charged with hunting, fishing, pasturing reindeer, and creating various tools and objects from wood.<ref name=":5" /> Women ran the household, cared for children, prepared food, and preserved and stored food; it was also women who charted out the nomadic routes of the household, gathering the reindeer and taking down the tents before reassembling the camp upon moving.<ref name=":5" />
Customarily, it was the youngest son who remained in the paternal tent and inherited the familial home.<ref name=":5" /> On the death of her husband, the widow inherited all the property of her deceased husband.<ref name=":5" />
== Religion ==
The conversion of the Tofalar to Christianity was largely in name only; there were [[Shamanism|shamans]] among the Tofalar until their 1930 suppression by the Soviet state.<ref name=":5" />
==See also==
* [[Alygdzher]]
==References==
{{Reflist}}
==External links==
* {{commons category-inline|Tofalar people}}
* [http://www.eki.ee/books/redbook/tofalars.shtml The Red Book of the Peoples of the Russian Empire]
{{Turkic peoples}}
{{Indigenous peoples of Russia}}
{{authority control}}
[[Category:Turkic peoples of Asia]]
[[Category:Ethnic groups in Russia]]
[[Category:Indigenous peoples of Siberia]]
[[Category:Indigenous small-numbered peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East]]
[[Category:Irkutsk Oblast]]