Buryat national intelligentsia: finding and loosing of the socio-political leadership in the early XXth century

The article is devoted to the problem of appearance of Buryat intelligentsia in the late XIX century, which was at the head of reformative and enlightening movement and promoted the placement of nation to a qualitavely new level of education and enlightenment. There is the analysis of political and cultural potential of the national movement, the article shows why the old intelligentsia lost its political leadership.