Everyone knows that Americans are not the indigenous population of the United States, just like the current population of South America.

Did you know that the Japanese are also not the indigenous population of Japan? Who then lived on these islands before them?...

Japanese are not native to Japan

Before them, the Ainu lived here, a mysterious people whose origins still have many mysteries.

The Ainu lived next to the Japanese for some time, until the latter managed to push them north.

About what the Ainu are ancient masters The Japanese archipelago, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands are evidenced by written sources and numerous names of geographical objects, the origin of which is associated with the Ainu language.

And even the symbol of Japan - the great Mount Fuji - has in its name the Ainu word “fuji”, which means “deity of the hearth”. According to scientists, the Ainu settled the Japanese islands around 13,000 years BC and formed the Neolithic Jomon culture there.

Settlement of the Ainu in late XIX century

The Ainu did not engage in agriculture; they obtained food by hunting, gathering and fishing. They lived in small settlements, quite distant from each other. Therefore, their habitat was quite extensive: the Japanese islands, Sakhalin, Primorye, the Kuril Islands and the south of Kamchatka.

Around the 3rd millennium BC, Mongoloid tribes arrived on the Japanese islands, who later became ancestors of the Japanese. The new settlers brought with them the rice crop, which allowed them to feed a large population in a relatively small area.

Thus began difficult times in the life of the Ainu. They were forced to move to the north, leaving their ancestral lands to the colonialists.

But the Ainu were skilled warriors, fluent with bows and swords, and the Japanese were unable to defeat them for a long time. A very long time, almost 1500 years. The Ainu knew how to wield two swords, and on their right hip they carried two daggers. One of them (cheyki-makiri) served as a knife for committing ritual suicide - hara-kiri.

The Japanese were able to defeat the Ainu only after the invention of guns, having by this time learned a lot from them regarding the art of war. Code honor samurai, the ability to wield two swords and the mentioned hara-kiri ritual - these would seem to be characteristic attributes Japanese culture were actually borrowed from the Ainu.

Scientists are still arguing about the origin of the Ainu.

But the fact that these people are not related to other indigenous peoples Far East and Siberia, an already proven fact. Characteristic their appearance is very thick hair and beard in men, which representatives of the Mongoloid race lack.

It has long been believed that they may have common roots with the peoples of Indonesia and the Pacific Aborigines, as they have similar facial features. But genetic studies ruled out this option as well.

And the first Russian Cossacks who arrived on Sakhalin Island even mistook the Ainu for Russians, they were so unlike the Siberian tribes, but rather resembled Europeans. The only group of people from all the analyzed variants with whom they have a genetic relationship were the people of the Jomon era, who presumably were the ancestors of the Ainu.

The Ainu language is also very different from the modern linguistic picture of the world, and a suitable place has not yet been found for it. It turns out that during their long isolation the Ainu lost contact with all other peoples of the Earth, and some researchers even distinguish them into a special Ainu race.

Ainu in Russia

The Kamchatka Ainu first came into contact with Russian merchants at the end of the 17th century. Relations with the Amur and North Kuril Ainu were established in the 18th century. The Ainu considered the Russians, who were racially different from their Japanese enemies, as friends, and by the middle of the 18th century, more than one and a half thousand Ainu accepted Russian citizenship.

Even the Japanese could not distinguish the Ainu from the Russians because of their external similarity(white skin and Australoid facial features, which are similar to Caucasoid in a number of features). Compiled under the Russian Empress Catherine II, “Spatial Land Description Russian state", included part Russian Empire not only all the Kuril Islands, but also the island of Hokkaido.

The reason is that ethnic Japanese did not even populate it at that time. The indigenous population - the Ainu - were recorded as Russian subjects following the expedition of Antipin and Shabalin.

The Ainu fought with the Japanese not only in the south of Hokkaido, but also in the northern part of the island of Honshu. The Cossacks themselves explored and taxed the Kuril Islands back in the 17th century. So Russia may demand Hokkaido from the Japanese.

The fact of Russian citizenship of the inhabitants of Hokkaido was noted in a letter from Alexander I to the Japanese Emperor in 1803. Moreover, this did not cause any objections from the Japanese side, much less official protest. Hokkaido was foreign territory for Tokyo like Korea. When the first Japanese arrived on the island in 1786, they were met by Ainu with Russian names and surnames.

And what’s more, they are true Christians! Japan's first claims to Sakhalin date back to 1845. Then Emperor Nicholas I immediately gave a diplomatic rebuff. Only the weakening of Russia in subsequent decades led to the occupation of the southern part of Sakhalin by the Japanese.

It is interesting that in 1925 the Bolsheviks condemned the previous government, which gave Russian lands to Japan.

So in 1945, historical justice was only restored. The army and navy of the USSR resolved the Russian-Japanese territorial issue by force. Khrushchev signed the Joint Declaration of the USSR and Japan in 1956, Article 9 of which stated:

“The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, meeting the wishes of Japan and taking into account the interests of the Japanese state, agrees to the transfer to Japan of the islands of Habomai and the island of Shikotan, however, that the actual transfer of these islands to Japan will be made after the conclusion of the Peace Treaty between the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and Japan” .

Khrushchev's goal was the demilitarization of Japan. He was willing to sacrifice a couple of small islands in order to remove American military bases from the Soviet Far East. Now, obviously, we are no longer talking about demilitarization. Washington clung to its “unsinkable aircraft carrier” with a death grip.

Moreover, Tokyo’s dependence on the United States even intensified after the accident at the Fukushima nuclear power plant. Well, if this is so, then the gratuitous transfer of the islands as a “gesture of goodwill” loses its attractiveness. It is reasonable not to follow Khrushchev’s declaration, but to put forward symmetrical claims based on known historical facts. Shaking ancient scrolls and manuscripts, which is normal practice in such matters.

An insistence on giving up Hokkaido would be a cold shower for Tokyo. It would be necessary to argue at the negotiations not about Sakhalin or even about the Kuril Islands, but about our own territory at the moment.

I would have to defend myself, make excuses, prove my right. Russia would thus go from diplomatic defense to offensive. Moreover, China’s military activity, nuclear ambitions and readiness for military action by the DPRK and other security problems in the Asia-Pacific region will give another reason for Japan to sign a peace treaty with Russia.

But let's go back to the Ainu

When the Japanese first came into contact with the Russians, they called them Red Ainu(Ainu with blond hair). Only in early XIX centuries, the Japanese realized that Russians and Ainu are two different people. However, to the Russians the Ainu were "hairy", "swarthy", "dark-eyed" and "dark-haired". The first Russian researchers described the Ainu looking like Russian peasants with dark skin or more like gypsies.

The Ainu sided with the Russians during the Russo-Japanese Wars of the 19th century. However, after defeat in the Russo-Japanese War of 1905, the Russians abandoned them to their fate. Hundreds of Ainu were killed and their families were forcibly transported to Hokkaido by the Japanese. As a result, the Russians failed to recapture the Ainu during World War II. Only a few Ainu representatives decided to stay in Russia after the war. More than 90% went to Japan.

Under the terms of the St. Petersburg Treaty of 1875, the Kuril Islands were ceded to Japan, along with the Ainu living there. 83 Northern Kuril Ainu arrived in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky on September 18, 1877, deciding to remain under Russian control. They refused to move to reservations on the Commander Islands, as the Russian government suggested to them. After which, from March 1881, for four months they traveled on foot to the village of Yavino, where they later settled.

Later the village of Golygino was founded. Another 9 Ainu arrived from Japan in 1884. The 1897 census indicates 57 people in Golygino (all Ainu) and 39 people in Yavino (33 Ainu and 6 Russians). Both villages were destroyed by Soviet authorities, and the residents were resettled to Zaporozhye, Ust-Bolsheretsk region. As a result, three ethnic groups assimilated with the Kamchadals.

The Northern Kuril Ainu are currently the largest Ainu subgroup in Russia. The Nakamura family (South Kuril on the paternal side) is the smallest and has only 6 people living in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. There are a few on Sakhalin who identify themselves as Ainu, but many more Ainu do not recognize themselves as such.

Most of the 888 Japanese living in Russia (2010 census) are of Ainu origin, although they do not recognize it (pure-blooded Japanese are allowed to enter Japan without a visa). The situation is similar with the Amur Ainu living in Khabarovsk. And it is believed that none of the Kamchatka Ainu are left alive.

Epilogue

In 1979, the USSR deleted the ethnonym “Ainu” from the list of “living” ethnic groups in Russia, thereby declaring that this people had become extinct on the territory of the USSR. Judging by the 2002 census, no one entered the ethnonym “Ainu” in fields 7 or 9.2 of the K-1 census form.

There is information that the Ainu have the most direct genetic connections through the male line, oddly enough, with the Tibetans - half of them are carriers of the close haplogroup D1 (the D2 group itself is practically not found outside the Japanese archipelago) and the Miao-Yao peoples in southern China and in Indochina.

As for female (Mt-DNA) haplogroups, the Ainu group is dominated by group U, which is also found among other peoples East Asia, but in small quantities.

During the 2010 census, about 100 people tried to register themselves as Ainu, but the government of the Kamchatka Territory rejected their claims and recorded them as Kamchadals.

In 2011, the head of the Ainu community of Kamchatka Alexey Vladimirovich Nakamura sent a letter to the Governor of Kamchatka Vladimir Ilyukhin and the Chairman of the local Duma Boris Nevzorov with a request to include the Ainu in the List of indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East of the Russian Federation.

The request was also rejected. Alexey Nakamura reports that in 2012 there were 205 Ainu registered in Russia (compared to 12 people registered in 2008), and they, like the Kuril Kamchadals, are fighting for official recognition. The Ainu language became extinct many decades ago.

In 1979, only three people on Sakhalin could speak Ainu fluently, and the language became completely extinct there by the 1980s. Although Keizo Nakamura He spoke fluent Sakhalin-Ainu and even translated several documents into Russian for the NKVD; he did not pass on the language to his son. Take Asai, the last person who knew the Sakhalin Ainu language, died in Japan in 1994.

Until the Ainu are recognized, they are noted as people without nationality, like ethnic Russians or Kamchadals. Therefore, in 2016, both the Kuril Ainu and the Kuril Kamchadals were deprived of the rights to hunting and fishing, which the small peoples of the Far North have.

Ainuamazing

Today there are very few Ainu left, about 25,000 people. They live mainly in the north of Japan and are almost completely assimilated by the population of this country.

The Ainu lived on the territory of Japan for thousands of years, before the first settlers of the Altai language group appeared there, who later became known as the Japanese. The war with the invaders lasted one and a half thousand years.

There are now 3,000 Ainu in Japan and 2,500 live in Hokkaido, their ancient homeland.

The Russian Ainu are also not lost in the common ethnic sea. At the moment there are 205 of them in Russia. As National Accent reports through the mouth of Alexei Nakamura, the head of the Ainu community, “the Ainu or Kamchadal Kurils did not disappear anywhere, they just recognize us long years didn't want to. The self-name "Ainu" comes from our word for "man" or "worthy man" and is associated with military activities. We fought against the Japanese for hundreds of years.”

Hokkaido is, in fact, the historical territory of residence of the Ainu, with whom the Japanese waged bloody wars, trying to conquer this courageous people. When the state of Yamato takes shape, an era of constant war begins between the state of Yamato and the Ainu. “Among the eastern savages, the strongest are the Emishi,” according to Japanese chronicles, where the Ainu appear under the name “Emisi.”

And the Japanese were unable to defeat the Ainu for a long time. Only many centuries later the cult of samurai arose, the origins of which were in martial art Ainu, not Japanese. Moreover, individual samurai clans are of Ainu origin. Moreover, the Ainu themselves are not a people related to the Japanese. Unlike the Japanese, the Ainu have abundant hair (the so-called “Ainu passport”) and lighter skin. They look more like Europeans with some Asian blood than Asians. Scientists have not fully figured out the origins of this people.

Alexander Nakamura talks about the “theft” of Ainu traditions by the Japanese: “The Japanese samurai sword is called “katano.” In Ainu this word means “settlement”, “village” or “clan”. The sword was called that because it was passed down from father to son, from son to grandson. Harakiri - so-called. Japanese ritual murder - actually invented by the Ainu! According to our beliefs, the soul lives in the stomach. And she hangs there on a thin rope. To die and release the soul - otherwise a person will not be reborn later - you need to open the stomach and cut this thread. Where did the deep “Japanese” bow come from? In our mythology there is a water spirit called Kapa Kozu. Taking the form of a man, he goes out onto land to drag someone under the water. He has a hole in his head. There is water in it. If it suddenly leaks out, the spirit will die. But the trouble is that this spirit is very polite. For example, I am walking through the forest and meet a man. What if this is Kapa Kozu? I begin to bow to him. He answered me. The deeper the bow, the more respectful the response. And the more water flows out of the spirit. So, in fact, this is a check for lice - are you not a merman...".

The Japanese not only subjected the Ainu to harsh assimilation and appropriated their traditions, but also ruthlessly suppressed their resistance. Alexander Nakamura: “My ancestor came from the southern Kuril Islands, from the island of Shikotan (Yashikotan in Ainu). During the last Ainu uprising, around 1725, he and his family, pursued by Japanese troops, left the chase on canoes all the way to Kamchatka. Donkey in Russia on Kuril Lake. By the way, it is wrong to think that the names of the Kuril Islands, Kuril Lake, etc. originated from hot springs or volcanic activity. It’s just that the Kurils or Kurils live here, and “kuru” in Ainu means people.”

Thus, the history of the Ainu destroys Japanese ideologies about the original belonging of the Kuril Islands to Japan. Alexander Nakamura: “I am a member of the expedition to the island of Matua. There is Ainu Bay there. During the 12th expedition, we discovered the oldest Ainu site. From artifacts it is clear from about 1600 that these were the Ainu. This is evidenced by the remains of dishes, an obsidian tip with a groove for poison, and other household items characteristic of the Ainu. Therefore, it is very strange to say that the Ainu have never been in the Kuril Islands, Sakhalin, Kamchatka, as the Japanese are doing now, assuring everyone that the Ainu live only in Hokkaido and only in Japan, therefore, supposedly, the Kuril Islands should be given to them. It's a lie. In Russia there are the Ainu - an indigenous people who also have the right to these islands. It is very strange that the Russian Foreign Ministry does not use this argument to remind that the islands cannot belong only to the Japanese Ainu, but rather to all the Ainu.”

Unlike Moscow, Tokyo does not forget about the Ainu. “In Hokkaido there is a corporation called Utari, which means partnership. They have 55 branches throughout the Japanese islands,” says Alexander Nakamura. — These are educational cultural centers. There they study not only the Ainu language, but also culture. We tried to establish through Utari cultural connections with other Ainu. But the corporation was only interested in politics, and definitely anti-Russian ones. I asked one of their managers why this was being done. He answered honestly: we need to live on something, and politicians allocate funds for what interests them. That’s why now Utari and I hardly communicate. We will revive the culture of the Kamchadal Kurils - the Ainu - on our own."

But textbooks and dictionaries of the Ainu language are so far only in English or Japanese. Alexander Nakamura emphasizes the need for publication educational literature for the Ainu in Russian.

I remember that the famous Russo-eater Jozef Pilsudski in 1905, at the height of the Russo-Japanese War, tried to negotiate with Tokyo on joint actions against Russia. And he even called on soldiers of the tsarist army of Polish origin to desert and join the Pilsudski legions. Jozef's brother, Bronislaw Pilsudski, during his exile to Sakhalin, was engaged in research into the Ainu language and traditions, leaving a number of articles and essays on this topic.

Western propaganda, including through the mouth of Poland, broadcasts the myth of the conquest of all the peoples of Russia by the bloodthirsty Russians - from Karelia to the Kuril Islands, from the Caucasus to Yamal. But Political Views Russian Ainu do not fit into this framework. And therefore no one in the West will hear about them.

There is only one on earth ancient people, which has been simply ignored for more than one century, and has been subjected to persecution and genocide in Japan more than once due to the fact that by its existence it simply breaks the established official false history of both Japan and Russia.

Now, there is reason to believe that not only in Japan, but also on the territory of Russia there is a part of this ancient indigenous people. According to preliminary data from the latest population census, held in October 2010, there are more than 100 Ainov in our country. The fact itself is unusual, because until recently it was believed that the Ainu live only in Japan. They guessed about this, but on the eve of the population census, employees of the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences noticed that, despite the absence of Russian peoples, some of our fellow citizens stubbornly continue to consider themselves Ain and have good reason for this.

As research has shown, the Ainu, or KAMCHADAL SMOKIANS, did not disappear anywhere, they just did not want to recognize them for many years. But Stepan Krasheninnikov, a researcher of Siberia and Kamchatka (XVIII century), described them as Kamchadal Kurils. The name "Ainu" itself comes from their word for "man", or "worthy man", and is associated with military operations. And as one of the representatives of this nationality claims in a conversation with famous journalist M. Dolgikh, the Ainu fought with the Japanese for 650 years. It turns out that this is the only people remaining to this day who, from ancient times, restrained the occupation, resisted the aggressor - now the Japanese, who were, in fact, Koreans with perhaps a certain percentage of the Chinese population, who moved to the islands and formed another state.

It has been scientifically established that the Ainu already inhabited the north of the Japanese archipelago, the Kuril Islands and part of Sakhalin and, according to some data, part of Kamchatka and even the lower reaches of the Amur about 7 thousand years ago. The Japanese who came from the south gradually assimilated and pushed the Ainu to the north of the archipelago - to Hokkaido and the southern Kuril Islands.

The largest concentrations of Ainu families are now located in Hokaido.
According to experts, in Japan the Ainu were considered “barbarians”, “savages” and social outcasts. The hieroglyph used to designate the Ainu means “barbarian”, “savage”, now the Japanese also call them “hairy Ainu”, for which the Japanese do not like the Ainu.

And here the Japanese policy against the Ainu is very clearly visible, since the Ainu lived on the islands even before the Japanese and had a culture many times, or even orders of magnitude, higher than that of the ancient Mongoloid settlers.
But the topic of the Ainu’s hostility towards the Japanese probably exists not only because of the ridiculous nicknames addressed to them, but also probably because the Ainu, let me remind you, were subjected to genocide and persecution by the Japanese for centuries.

At the end of the 19th century. About one and a half thousand Ainu lived in Russia. After World War II, they were partly evicted, partly they left along with the Japanese population, others remained, returning, so to speak, from their difficult and centuries-long service. This part mixed with the Russian population of the Far East.

In appearance, representatives of the Ainu people very little resemble their closest neighbors - the Japanese, Nivkhs and Itelmens.
The Ainu are the White Race.

According to the Kamchadal Kurils themselves, all the names of the islands of the southern ridge were given by the Ainu tribes who once inhabited these territories. By the way, it is wrong to think that the names of the Kuril Islands, Kuril Lake, etc. originated from hot springs or volcanic activity.
It’s just that the Kuril Islands, or Kurilians, live here, and “Kuru” in Ainsk means the People.

It should be noted that this version destroys the already flimsy basis of the Japanese claims to our Kuril Islands. Even if the name of the ridge comes from our Ainu. This was confirmed during the expedition to the island. Matua. There is Ainu Bay, where the oldest Ainu site was discovered.
Therefore, according to experts, it is very strange to say that the Ainu have never been in the Kuril Islands, Sakhalin, Kamchatka, as the Japanese are doing now, assuring everyone that the Ainu live only in Japan (after all, archeology says the opposite), so they, the Japanese, supposedly the Kuril Islands need to be given back. This is completely untrue. In Russia there are the Ainu - the indigenous White People who have the direct right to consider these islands their ancestral lands.
American anthropologist S. Lorin Brace, from Michigan State University in the journal Science Horizons, No. 65, September-October 1989. writes: “a typical Ainu is easy to distinguish from the Japanese: he has lighter skin, thicker body hair, beards, which is unusual for the Mongoloids, and a more protruding nose.”

Brace studied about 1,100 crypts of Japanese, Ainu and other ethnic groups and came to the conclusion that members of the privileged samurai class in Japan are in fact descendants of the Ainu, and not the Yayoi (Mongoloids), the ancestors of most modern Japanese.
The story of the Ainu classes is reminiscent of the story of the upper castes in India, where the highest percentage of the haplogroup White man R1a1.
Brace further writes: “.. this explains why the facial features of representatives of the ruling class are so often different from modern Japanese. The real Samurai - the descendants of Ainu warriors - gained such influence and prestige in medieval Japan that they intermarried with the rest of the ruling circles and introduced Ainu blood into them, while the rest of the Japanese population were mainly descendants of Yayoi.
It should also be noted that in addition to archaeological and other features, the language has been partially preserved. There is a dictionary of the Kuril language in “Description of the Land of Kamchatka” by S. Krasheninnikov.

In Hokkaido, the dialect spoken by the Ainu is called saru, but in SAKHALIN it is called reichishka.
As it is not difficult to understand, the Ainu language differs from Japanese language and on syntax, phonology, morphology and vocabulary, etc. Although there have been attempts to prove that they are related, the vast majority of modern scientists reject the assumption that the relationship between the languages ​​goes beyond contact relations, involving the mutual borrowing of words in both languages. In fact, no attempt to link the Ainu language to any other language has gained widespread acceptance.

In principle, according to the famous Russian political scientist and journalist P. Alekseev, the problem of the Kuril Islands can be solved politically and economically. To do this, it is necessary to allow the Ainu (partially evicted to Japan in 1945) to return from Japan to the land of their ancestors (including their ancestral habitat - the Amur region, Kamchatka, Sakhalin and all the Kuril Islands, creating at least following the example of the Japanese (it is known that the Japanese Parliament only in 2008 did it recognize the Ainov as an independent national minority), the Russian dispersed autonomy of an “independent national minority” with the participation of the Ainov from the islands and the Ainov of Russia.

We have neither the people nor the funds for the development of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands, but the Ainu do. The Ainu who migrated from Japan, according to experts, can give impetus to the economy of the Russian Far East by forming national autonomy not only in the Kuril Islands, but also within Russia and reviving their clan and traditions in the land of their ancestors.

Japan, according to P. Alekseev, will be out of business, because there the displaced Ainu will disappear, but here they can settle not only in the southern part of the Kuril Islands, but throughout their entire original range, our Far East, eliminating the emphasis on the southern Kuril Islands. Since many of the Ainu deported to Japan were our citizens, it is possible to use the Ainu as allies against the Japanese, restoring the dying Ainu language.
The Ainu were not allies of Japan and never will be, but they can become allies of Russia. But unfortunately, we still ignore this ancient People.
With our pro-Western government, which feeds Chechnya for free, which deliberately filled Russia with people of Caucasian nationality, opened unhindered entry for emigrants from China, and those who are clearly not interested in preserving the Peoples of Russia should not think that they will pay attention to the Ainu, only a CIVIL INITIATIVE will help here.

As the leading researcher of the Institute notes: Russian history RAS, doctor historical sciences, Academician K. Cherevko, Japan exploited these islands. Their law includes such a concept as “development through trade exchange.” And all the Ainu - both conquered and unconquered - were considered Japanese and were subject to their emperor. But it is known that even before that the Ainu gave taxes to Russia. True, this was irregular.
Thus, we can say with confidence that the Kuril Islands belong to the Ainu, but, one way or another, Russia must proceed from international law. According to him, i.e. According to the San Francisco Peace Treaty, Japan renounced the islands. Today there are simply no legal grounds for revising the documents signed in 1951 and other agreements. But such matters are resolved only in the interests of big politics, and I repeat that only its Brotherly people, that is, We, can help this people.

Few people know, but the Japanese are not the indigenous population of Japan. Before them, people lived on the islands Ainu, mysterious people, the origin of which still has many mysteries. The Ainu lived alongside the Japanese for some time until they were pushed north.

That the Ainu are the ancient masters of the Japanese archipelago, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands, written sources indicate and numerous names of geographical objects, the origin of which is associated with Ainu language.

Scientists still argue about the origin of the Ainu. Ainu territory was quite extensive: Japanese islands, Sakhalin, Primorye, Kuril Islands and southern Kamchatka. The fact that the Ainu are not related to other indigenous peoples of the Far East and Siberia is already a proven fact.

It is known for certain that The Ainu came to the islands of the Sea of ​​Japan and founded the Neolithic Jomon culture there (13,000 BC - 300 BC).

The Ainu did not engage in agriculture, they got food hunting, gathering and fishing. They lived along the rivers on the islands of the archipelago, in small settlements quite distant from each other.

Hunting weapons The Ainu consisted of a bow, a long knife and a spear. Various traps and snares were widely used. In fishing, the Ainu have long used a “marek” - a spear with a movable rotating hook that catches fish. Fish were often caught at night, attracted by the light of torches.

As the island of Hokkaido became increasingly populated by the Japanese, hunting lost its dominant role in the life of the Ainu. At the same time, the share of agriculture and livestock raising increased. The Ainu began to cultivate millet, barley, and potatoes.

Hunters and fishermen, the Ainu created an unusual and rich Jomon culture , characteristic of peoples with a very high level of development. For example, they have wooden products with unusual spiral ornaments and carvings, amazing in beauty and invention.

The ancient Ainu created an extraordinary ceramics without a potter's wheel, decorating it with fancy rope patterns. The Ainu amaze with their talented folklore heritage: songs, dances and stories.

The legend of the origin of the Ainu.

That was a long time ago. There was a village among the hills. An ordinary village in which ordinary people lived. Among them is a very kind family. The family had a daughter, Aina, who was the kindest of all. The village lived its usual life, but one day at dawn a black cart appeared on the village road. The black horses were driven by a man dressed all in black. He was very happy about something, smiled widely, and sometimes laughed. There was a black cage on the cart, and a small fluffy Teddy Bear was sitting in it on a chain. He sucked his paw, and tears flowed from his eyes. All the people of the village looked out the windows, went out into the street and were indignant: how shameful is it not for a black man to be kept on a chain and tormented? white bear cub. People were only indignant and said words, but did nothing. Only a kind family stopped the black man's cart, and Aina began to ask him to released the unfortunate Little Bear. The stranger smiled and said that he would release the beast if someone gave up his eyes. Everyone was silent. Then Aina stepped forward and said that she was ready for this. The black man laughed loudly and opened the black cage. The white fluffy Teddy Bear came out of the cage. And kind Aina lost her sight. While the villagers looked at the Little Bear and spoke sympathetic words to Aina, the black man on the black cart disappeared to no one knows where. The little bear didn't cry anymore, but Aina cried. Then the white Bear cub took the string in his paws and began to lead Aina everywhere: around the village, along the hills and meadows. This didn't last very long. And then one day the people of the village looked up and saw that The white fluffy Teddy Bear leads Aina straight into the sky,

and leads Aina across the sky. The Big Dipper leads the Little Dipper and is always visible in the sky, so that people remember about good and evil... The Ainu have a cult of the bear. differed sharply from similar cults in Europe and Asia. Only

The Ainu fed a sacrificial bear cub at the breast of a female nurse! The main celebration of the Ainu is the bear festival, on which Relatives and invitees from many villages gathered. For four years, one of the Ainu families raised a bear cub. The best food was given to him, and the bear cub was prepared for ritual sacrifice. In the morning, on the day of the sacrifice of the bear cub, After which the animal was taken out of the cage and decorated with shavings, and ritual jewelry was put on. Then he was led through the village, and while those present distracted the animal’s attention with noise and shouts, the young hunters, one after another, jumped on the bear, pressing against it for a moment, trying to touch its head, and immediately jumped away: a peculiar ritual of “kissing” the beast. They tied the bear in a special place and tried to feed it festive food. The elder pronounced a farewell word in front of him, described the works and merits of the village residents who raised the divine beast, and outlined the wishes of the Ainu, which the bear had to convey to his father - the mountain taiga god. It is an honor to “send” the beast to the forefather, i.e. killing a bear with a bow Any hunter could be awarded, at the request of the animal’s owner, but he must have been a visitor. Had hit right in the heart. The meat of the animal was placed on spruce paws and distributed taking into account seniority and birth. The bones were carefully collected and taken into the forest. Silence reigned in the village. It was believed that the bear was already on the way, and the noise could lead him off the road.

The genetic relationship of the Ainu with the people of the Neolithic Jomon culture, who were the ancestors of the Ainu, has been proven.

It has long been believed that the Ainu may have common roots with the peoples of Indonesia and the Pacific Aborigines, as they have similar facial features. But genetic research This option was also excluded.

The Japanese are sure that the Ainu are related to Paleo-Asian (?) peoples and came to the Japanese islands from Siberia. Recently there have been suggestions that The Ainu are relatives of the Miao-Yao, living in Southern China.

Appearance of the Ainu

The appearance of the Ainu is quite unusual: they have Caucasian features, they have unusually thick hair, wide eyes, and fair skin. A characteristic feature of the appearance of the Ainu is very thick hair and beard in men, what representatives of the Mongoloid race are deprived of. Thick long hair, matted into tangles, replaced helmets for the Ainam warriors.

Russian and Dutch travelers left many stories about the Ainu. According to their testimony, The Ainu are very kind, friendly and open people. Even Europeans who visited the islands over the years noted the characteristic Ainu gallantry of manners, simplicity and sincerity.

Russian explorers - Cossacks, conquering Siberia, reached the Far East. Arrived On the island of Sakhalin, the first Russian Cossacks even mistook the Ainu for Russians, they were so unlike the Siberian tribes, but rather resembled Europeans.

This is what I wrote Cossack captain Ivan Kozyrev about the first meeting: “About fifty people dressed in skins poured out. They looked without fear and had an extraordinary appearance - hairy, long-bearded, but with white faces and not slanted, like the Yakuts and Kamchadals.”

It can be said that The Ainu looked like anyone: the peasants of the south of Russia, the inhabitants of the Caucasus, Persia or India, even the gypsies - just not the Mongoloids. These unusual people called themselves Ainami, which means " real man», but the Cossacks dubbed them “Kurils”, adding an epithet - "shaggy". Subsequently Cossacks met Kurils throughout the Far East - on Sakhalin, southern Kamchatka, and the Amur region.

The Ainu pay a lot of attention education and training of children. First of all, they believe, a child must learn to obey his elders! In the child's unquestioning obedience to his parents, older brothers and sisters, adults in general, a future warrior was being raised. The obedience of a child, from the Ainu point of view, is expressed, in particular, in the fact that a child speaks to adults only when asked when he is addressed. The child must be in sight of adults at all times, but at the same time do not make noise, do not bother them with your presence.

The Ainu do not give names to children immediately after birth, as Europeans do, but at the age of one to ten years, or even later. Most often, the name Aina reflects a distinctive property of his character, an individual trait inherent in him, for example: Selfish, Dirty, Fair, Good Orator, Stutterer, etc. Ainu have no nicknames, these are their names.

Ainu boys are raised by the father of the family. He teaches them to hunt, navigate the terrain, choose the shortest road in the forest, hunting techniques and use of weapons. The upbringing of girls is entrusted to the mother. In cases where children violate established behavior rules, commit mistakes or misdeeds, parents tell them various instructive legends and stories, preferring this means of influencing the child’s psyche to physical punishment.

War of the Ainu with the Japanese

IN Soon the idealistic life of the Ainu on the Japanese archipelago was interrupted by migrants from Southeast Asia and China - Mongoloid tribes who later became the ancestors of the Japanese. New settlers brought culture with them rice , which made it possible to feed a large population in a relatively small area. Having formed Yamato State, they began to threaten the peaceful life of the Ainu, so some of them moved to Sakhalin, the lower Amur, Primorye and the Kuril Islands. The remaining Ainu began an era of constant wars with the state of Yamato, which lasted about a thousand years.

The first samurai were not Japanese at all.

The Ainu were skilled warriors, fluent in their use of bows and swords, and the Japanese were unable to defeat them for a long time. A very long time, almost 1500 years .

The new state of Yamato, which arose in the 3rd-4th centuries, begins an era of constant war with the Ainu. IN 670 Yamoto renamed Nippon (Japan). "Among the Eastern Savages the strongest are emisi", - testify to Japanese chronicles, where the Ainu appear under the name “Emisi”.

The Japanese demonized the rebellious people, calling the Ainu savages, but the Japanese for quite a long time were inferior to the savages - the Ainu - militarily. A recording by a Japanese chronicler made in 712 : « When our exalted ancestors descended from the sky on a ship, on this island (Honshu) they found several savage peoples, among them the most savage were the Ainu.”

Ainu. 1904

The Japanese were afraid of an open battle with the Ainu and recognized that one warrior is worth a hundred Japanese . There was a belief that particularly skilled Ainu warriors could create fog in order to hide unnoticed by their enemies.

The Ainu knew how to deal with two swords, and on the right hip they wore two daggers . One of them (cheyki-makiri) served as a knife for committing ritual suicide - hara-kiri.

The origins of the cult of samurai are in the martial art of the Ainu, not the Japanese. As a result of thousands of years of war with the Ainu, the Japanese adopted a special military style from the Ainu culture - samurai, originating from the thousand-year-old military traditions of the Atsni. And some of the samurai clans, by their origin, are still considered Ainu.

Even the symbol of Japan - the great Mount Fuji - has in its name The Ainu word is "fuji", which means "hearth deity".

The Japanese were able to defeat the Ainu only after the invention of guns, having managed to adopt many techniques of military art from the Ainu. The samurai code of honor, the ability to wield two swords and the mentioned hara-kiri ritual - considered by many to be characteristic attributes of Japanese culture, but in fact these military traditions were borrowed by the Japanese from the Ainu.

In ancient times, the Ainu had the tradition of drawing mustaches on women, so they looked like young warriors. This tradition suggests that Ainu women were also warriors, along with men they fought like Despite all the bans from the Japanese government, even in the 20th century, Ainu got tattoos, it is believed that the latter the tattooed woman died in 1998.

Tattoos in the form of a lush mustache above the upper lip were applied exclusively by women , it was believed that this ritual was taught to the ancestors of the Ainu gods, the mother-progenitor of all living things - Oki-kurumi Turesh Mahi (Okikurumi Turesh Machi) younger sister of the Creator God Okikurumi .

The tradition of tattooing was passed down through the female line; the design was applied to the daughter’s body by her mother or grandmother.

In the process of “Japanization” of the Ainu people in 1799, a strict ban on tattooing Ainu girls was introduced , and in 1871 In Hokkaido, a second strict ban was proclaimed because it was believed that the procedure was too painful and inhumane.

The Ainu language is also a mystery; it has Sanskrit, Slavic, Latin, and Anglo-Germanic roots. Ainu language strongly stands out from the modern linguistic picture of the world, and a suitable place has not yet been found for it. During prolonged isolation the Ainu lost contact with all other peoples of the Earth, and some researchers even identify them as a special Ainu race.

Ethnographers struggling with the question - where in these harsh lands did people wearing loose (southern) type of clothing come from? Their national everyday clothing - dressing gowns , decorated with traditional ornaments, festive - white.

National clothes of the Ainu - robe decorated bright ornament, fur hat or wreath. Previously, clothing material was woven from strips of bast and nettle fibers. Now the Ainu national clothes are sewn from purchased fabrics, but they are decorated with rich embroidery. Almost Each Ainu village has its own special embroidery pattern. When you meet an Ainu in national clothes, you can unmistakably determine which village he is from. Embroidery on men's and women's clothing differ. A man would never wear clothes with “feminine” embroidery, and vice versa.

Russian travelers were also amazed that In summer, the Ainu wore a loincloth.

Today there are very few Ainu left, about 30,000 people, and they live mainly in the north of Japan, in the south and southeast of Hokkaido. Other sources voice a figure of 50 thousand people, but this includes first-generation mestizos with an admixture of Ainu blood - there are 150,000 of them, they are almost completely assimilated with the population of Japan. The Ainu culture is fading into oblivion along with its secrets.

Decree of Empress Catherine II of 1779: “...leave the shaggy Kuril residents free and not demand any tax from them, and in the future do not force the peoples living there to do so, but try with friendly treatment and affection... to continue the acquaintance already established with them.”

The empress's decree was not fully observed, and yasak was collected from the Ainu until the 19th century. The trusting Ainu took their word for it, and if the Russians somehow held him in relation to them, then There was a war with the Japanese until the last breath...

In 1884, the Japanese resettled all the Northern Kuril Ainu to the island of Shikotan, where the last of them died in 1941.The last Ainu man on Sakhalin died in 1961, when he buried his wife. he, as befits a warrior and the ancient laws of his amazing people, made himself “erythokpa”, ripping open the belly and releasing the soul to the divine ancestors...

It is believed that there are no Ainu in Russia. This small people who once inhabited lower reaches of the Amur, Kamchatka, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands , completely assimilated. It turned out that the Russian Ainu were not lost in the common ethnic sea. At the moment they are in Russia – 205 people .

As reported by “National Accent” through the mouth of Alexey Nakamura, leader of the Ainu community, « the Ainu or Kamchadal Kurils never disappeared, They just didn’t want to recognize us for many years. The self-name "Ainu" comes from our word for "man" or "worthy man" and is associated with military activities. We fought the Japanese for 650 years.”

In The indigenous people of Japan are the Ainu!

Original taken from masterok The Japanese are not native to Japan

Everyone knows that Americans are not indigenous people of the USA, exactly the same as now South American population. Did you know that the Japanese are not the indigenous population of Japan?

Who then lived in these places before them?


Before them, the Ainu lived here, a mysterious people whose origins still have many mysteries. The Ainu lived next to the Japanese for some time, until the latter managed to push them north.

The fact that the Ainu are the ancient masters of the Japanese archipelago, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands is evidenced by written sources and numerous names of geographical objects, the origin of which is associated with the Ainu language. And even the symbol of Japan - the great Mount Fuji - has in its name the Ainu word “fuji”, which means “deity of the hearth”. According to scientists, the Ainu settled the Japanese islands around 13,000 BC and formed the Neolithic Jomon culture there.

The Ainu did not engage in agriculture; they obtained food by hunting, gathering and fishing. They lived in small settlements, quite distant from each other. Therefore, their habitat was quite extensive: the Japanese islands, Sakhalin, Primorye, the Kuril Islands and the south of Kamchatka. Around the 3rd millennium BC, Mongoloid tribes arrived on the Japanese islands, who later became the ancestors of the Japanese. The new settlers brought with them the rice crop, which allowed them to feed a large population in a relatively small area. Thus began difficult times in the life of the Ainu. They were forced to move to the north, leaving their ancestral lands to the colonialists.

But the Ainu were skilled warriors, fluent with bows and swords, and the Japanese were unable to defeat them for a long time. A very long time, almost 1500 years. The Ainu knew how to wield two swords, and on their right hip they carried two daggers. One of them (cheyki-makiri) served as a knife for committing ritual suicide - hara-kiri. The Japanese were able to defeat the Ainu only after the invention of cannons, by which time they had learned a lot from them in terms of military art. The samurai code of honor, the ability to wield two swords and the mentioned hara-kiri ritual - these seemingly characteristic attributes of Japanese culture were actually borrowed from the Ainu.

Scientists are still arguing about the origin of the Ainu. But the fact that this people is not related to other indigenous peoples of the Far East and Siberia is already a proven fact. A characteristic feature of their appearance is very thick hair and a beard in men, which representatives of the Mongoloid race lack. It has long been believed that they may have common roots with the peoples of Indonesia and the Pacific Aborigines, as they have similar facial features. But genetic studies ruled out this option as well. And the first Russian Cossacks who arrived on the island of Sakhalin even mistook the Ainu for Russians, they were so unlike the Siberian tribes, but rather resembled Europeans. The only group of people from all the analyzed variants with whom they have a genetic relationship were the people of the Jomon era, who presumably were the ancestors of the Ainu. The Ainu language is also very different from the modern linguistic picture of the world, and a suitable place has not yet been found for it. It turns out that during their long isolation the Ainu lost contact with all other peoples of the Earth, and some researchers even distinguish them into a special Ainu race.


Today there are very few Ainu left, about 25,000 people. They live mainly in the north of Japan and are almost completely assimilated by the population of this country.

Ainu in Russia

The Kamchatka Ainu first came into contact with Russian merchants at the end of the 17th century. Relations with the Amur and North Kuril Ainu were established in the 18th century. The Ainu considered the Russians, who were racially different from their Japanese enemies, as friends, and by the middle of the 18th century, more than one and a half thousand Ainu accepted Russian citizenship. Even the Japanese could not distinguish the Ainu from the Russians because of their external similarity (white skin and Australoid facial features, which are similar to Caucasoid ones in a number of ways). When the Japanese first came into contact with the Russians, they called them the Red Ainu (Ainu with blond hair). Only at the beginning of the 19th century did the Japanese realize that the Russians and the Ainu were two different peoples. However, to the Russians the Ainu were "hairy", "swarthy", "dark-eyed" and "dark-haired". The first Russian researchers described the Ainu as looking like Russian peasants with dark skin or more like gypsies.

The Ainu sided with the Russians during the Russo-Japanese Wars of the 19th century. However, after defeat in the Russo-Japanese War of 1905, the Russians abandoned them to their fate. Hundreds of Ainu were killed and their families were forcibly transported to Hokkaido by the Japanese. As a result, the Russians failed to recapture the Ainu during World War II. Only a few Ainu representatives decided to stay in Russia after the war. More than 90% went to Japan.


Under the terms of the St. Petersburg Treaty of 1875, the Kuril Islands were ceded to Japan, along with the Ainu living there. 83 Northern Kuril Ainu arrived in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky on September 18, 1877, deciding to remain under Russian control. They refused to move to reservations on the Commander Islands, as the Russian government suggested to them. After which, from March 1881, for four months they traveled on foot to the village of Yavino, where they later settled. Later the village of Golygino was founded. Another 9 Ainu arrived from Japan in 1884. The 1897 census indicates 57 people in Golygino (all Ainu) and 39 people in Yavino (33 Ainu and 6 Russians). Both villages were destroyed by Soviet authorities, and the residents were resettled to Zaporozhye, Ust-Bolsheretsk region. As a result, three ethnic groups assimilated with the Kamchadals.

The Northern Kuril Ainu are currently the largest Ainu subgroup in Russia. The Nakamura family (South Kuril on the paternal side) is the smallest and has only 6 people living in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. There are a few on Sakhalin who identify themselves as Ainu, but many more Ainu do not recognize themselves as such. Most of the 888 Japanese living in Russia (2010 census) are of Ainu origin, although they do not recognize it (pure-blooded Japanese are allowed to enter Japan without a visa). The situation is similar with the Amur Ainu living in Khabarovsk. And it is believed that none of the Kamchatka Ainu are left alive.


In 1979, the USSR deleted the ethnonym “Ainu” from the list of “living” ethnic groups in Russia, thereby declaring that this people had become extinct on the territory of the USSR. Judging by the 2002 census, no one entered the ethnonym “Ainu” in fields 7 or 9.2 of the K-1 census form

There is information that the Ainu have the most direct genetic connections through the male line, oddly enough, with the Tibetans - half of them are carriers of the close haplogroup D1 (the D2 group itself is practically not found outside the Japanese archipelago) and the Miao-Yao peoples in southern China and in Indochina. As for female (Mt-DNA) haplogroups, the Ainu group is dominated by group U, which is also found among other peoples of East Asia, but in small numbers.

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