In 1906, the book “The Life of“Ivan”by Olga Semyonova-Tyan-Shanskaya, the daughter of a famous traveler, was published, which contains interesting, sometimes shocking facts about the life and life of women in the Russian countryside at the end of the 19th century. At that time, the book did not become widely known, and after the revolution, it was completely forgotten. Only today it has been republished, the most interesting fragments - further in the review …
In some villages to this day (1890s) there is a custom of "enlightening" girls 12-14 years old for boys of the same age.
Now, such collusion is often upset when the bride and groom become adults. And if not, then the bride 14-15 years old and the groom 16 years old begin to cohabit together until they come of age.
Wedding. Kansk district, Karymova village.
Earlier (in the 1860-70s) they got married at the age of 16-19, married at 18-20. Much less often they gave away girls 15 years old.
Although it was considered dangerous to sit up in girls, the family looked at the girl as a labor force, and therefore did not rush to get away with it.
They were in a hurry to marry the little guy (that is, the guy), because in this way they acquired extra labor for the family. Now (1890s) they get married for 16-25 years, and they marry 18-27.
Country girls.
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Girls on the street love funny ones, those who know how to dance and won't go into their pockets for a word. Usually on such "streets" extramarital affairs were struck up, which often ended in marriage.
Although it is not uncommon for people to abandon the one they "loved." The elders often scold and beat their daughters for such connections; the small ones get nothing for it.
Young peasant women.
With "dissolute" girls or women, sometimes reprisals are made. "Rasputin" is a girl or woman who has several lovers.
These lovers sometimes conspire to teach her and, if she is a girl, they smear her gate with tar, and if she is a woman, they beat her. They will beat her, then lift her shirt over her head, tie her (so that the woman’s head is in a sack, and she’s naked to the waist) and let her go through the village.
A girl who has only one lover is no longer considered "slutty", and her gates are not smeared with tar.
A family of Russian peasants at the end of the 19th century.
A pregnant wife does everything: does all the housework, knits in the field, flies, threshes, takes hemp, plants or digs potatoes, right up to the birth.
Another woman, when labor pains have begun, runs home, "like a sheepskin": she will lie down on the ground during labor pains, and when the pain is released, she runs again.
Mothers on the third and fourth days after giving birth get up and start doing their homework. Sometimes, even the next day after giving birth, the mother is already flooding the stove herself. The mother goes to work in the field 5-7 days after giving birth.
Peasant family.
After the first child, the husband sometimes takes care of his wife, and after the second and third, of course, not. If he drinks, then a week after giving birth begins to live with his wife, but no, so in 2-3 weeks.
The wife, of course, is not asked about her desires: "Aksinya, come here," and that's it.
Peasant family.
While sober, the husband rarely beat his wife, while drunk - often and with anything. They beat with a stick, and a stag, and with boots, fists, and a kick.
If a husband beats his wife and at the same time breaks the object from his simple inventory with which he repaired the reprisal, then he is much more sorry for this item than for the beaten wife.
The peasants of the Oryol province.
Professional debauchery does not exist, but it is very easy to buy any woman with money and a gift. One woman very naively confessed: “I took a son on the mountain and just for a trifle, for ten apples!”.
Cases of the murder of illegitimate babies are very common. A woman or a girl will give birth somewhere in a cage alone, then she will strangle the little one with her hands and throw it either into the water with a stone around her neck, or in thick hemp, or somewhere in a pig's roll it will bury …