Arkhangelsk Cemetery of Kazan: Experience of Historical Research

• Published in: Historical Ethnology
• Main Author: Yelena V. Mironova
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English; Russian; Tatar
• Published: Tatarstan Academy of Sciences, Marjani Institute of History 2018
• Subjects: kazan; arkhangelsk cemetery; necropolises; arkhangelskoye village; mikhailo-arkhangelsk church; the repressed; Ethnology. Social and cultural anthropology; GN301-674; Folklore; GR1-950; Human ecology. Anthropogeography; GF1-900; Arkhangelsk
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.22378/he.2018-3-1.137-148; https://doaj.org/article/4a5c58c8479a43d798decc4f93f95997

The article describes the transformation of the Arkhangelsk cemetery from the graveyard of a suburban village into a large urban necropolis. The cemetery existed from the middle of the 18th century at least. Originally it served the village of Arkhangelsk and the nearby area villages, which belonged the parish of the local MichaelArkhangelsk church. However, starting from the 19th century it was used as a place where the dead of the urban Sukonnaya Sloboda had been buried after that it was included in the city territory. Until the middle of the 19th century, the state of the cemetery was hardly taken care of, and often funerals were committed without any regard for and compliance with sanitary regulations. Only upon the transition to the jurisdiction of the Kazan City Council, the affairs of the cemetery began to be put in order. In the Soviet years it becomes the last refuge for the repressed and dead Soviet servicemen during the Great Patriotic War. Its territory expands, but the terrain and the nearest buildings do not allow this process to move on. Currently the cemetery is one of the largest necropolises of Kazan. The author justifies such increased significance of the cemetery by its favorable location and by the fact that it became a memorial for the repressed and dead soldiers of the Great Patriotic War.