Gift-exchange in the socio-political practices of the Trans-Baikal Buryats in the second half of the XVIII – the first half of the XIX century

Gift-exchange in the traditional culture of Buryats is less investigated the topic in Russian Ethnography. In this article the author on the basis of published and unpublished sources of trying to describe the traditions of gift-exchange in the socio-political practices of the Buryats in the period of the second half of the XVIII – first half of XIX century. Analysis of attracted for materials research testifies to a certain differentiation gift-exchangeable relations, on the one hand, between different social groups of the Buryat society, on the other, between the Buryat administrative elite and Russian officials. At the material time there is some transformation prescribed in the articles of customary law rules of gift-exchange in the direction of tightening the requirements for compliance with them as ordinary Buryats, as well as representatives of the clan aristocracy. Noted the transfer of tacit rules of gift-exchange, acting within the Buryat society, and on the relationships of the Buryat people with other ethnic (primarily Russian) population. Gift-exchangeable communication that occurred between the Buryat the founders and officials of different levels of Irkutsk province, developed in the context of the execution of the first functions guides the policy transfer in the pale of settlement in the Buryat environment. In addition, in these relations prevailed due to the unclean on the hand of the Russian bureaucracy, corruption, bribery and falsification. Under the guise of audits of the Buryat agencies or of awarding the distinguished founders, representatives of the provincial and County administrations were taken from the last significant gifts in a different form.