A postcard dedicated to the outstanding ethnographer, botanist, researcher of the Ainu people Alexander Grigoriev, whose 175th anniversary is celebrated this year, has been put into circulation. The postcard was issued in the series "Geographical Projects of Russia", produced by "Marka" JSC together with the RGS.
On the main illustration of the postcard there is a portrait of the scientist, on the background there are photos of him with the image of a person carrying some baggage and a temple in ancient Kamakura, as well as the logo of the RGS. The design was created by the artist-designer Sergey Kapranov. The circulation is 5,500 copies.
Alexander Vasilyevich Grigoriev (1848-1908) was a Russian ethnographer and botanist. Since 1883, for 20 years he was the secretary of the Imperial Russian Geographical Society.
Grigoriev contributed to the implementation of many expeditions: Gombozhab Tsybikov’s – to Tibet; Pyotr Kozlov’s – to Mongolia and Sichuan; Vaclav Seroshevsky and Bronislav Pilsudsky’s – to the Ainu of Hokkaido; and even Fridtjof Nansen – to the North Pole. All scientists and travelers certainly noted the widest erudition, the accuracy of advice and instructions, the perspicacity and scientific generosity of Grigoriev.
Alexander Vasilyevich himself participated in several significant expeditions, in particular, he explored the White Sea, the Novaya Zemlya archipelago, collected ethnographic material along the Dnieper River, engaged in archaeological research in the vicinity of Murom. Together with Pyotr Semenov-Tyan-Shansky, he conducted the first All-Russian population census.
Обед. Угощение лакомым. 1880 год. Фото: Научный архив РГО
His most famous expedition happened almost by accident. In 1879, the scientist went to help the expedition of the Swedish traveler Adolf Nordenskiöld, who tried to sail along the Northern Sea Route, but was captured by ice off the coast of Chukotka.
The schooner with Grigoriev on board also did not reach the goal, having run aground near the Japanese island of Hokkaido. The explorer, taking advantage of a forced stop in Japan, was able to extract the maximum scientific benefit from his one-year stay in this country.
Рисунок из рукописи "Свод материалов о восточных айнах". Изображение укар — сцены наказания за преступление (кражу, измену и т. д.) с помощью дубинки суту. Фото: Научный архив РГО
Grigoriev returned home in 1880, bringing with him an impressive ethnographic collection. It includes Ainu household items, manuscripts, vases, and paintings. Today it is kept at the Scientific Archive of the Russian Geographical Society and at the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences. And the scientist also brought a large number of pictures made in the technique of albumin photo printing with subsequent coloring in watercolor. He systematized the photographs and bound them into six thematic albums: costumes, everyday life, street life, rural crafts, temples, and clergy. You can see some of these unique illustrations at the online exhibition "Japan through the Eyes of Alexander Grigoriev".
And last year, the St. Petersburg publishing house "Arka" published a book by Vasily Shchepkin, a Japanese scholar, senior researcher at the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences, "Ainu through the Eyes of the Japanese: The Unknown Collection of A.V. Grigoriev." It is based on Japanese handwritten documents of the 18th-19th centuries translated into Russian, stored at the Scientific Archive of the Russian Geographical Society.