Reflection of the everyday life of the resorts of the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus at the turn of the 20th century in the collection of the Felitsyn Krasnodar State Historical and Archaeological Museum-Reserve

The aim of the study is to identify sources on the history of the everyday life of the resorts of the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus at the turn of the 20th century in the funds of the Felitsyn Krasnodar State Historical and Archaeological Museum-Reserve (the main historical museum of Krasnodar Krai) and to determine the degree of their representativeness. The research materials were sources identified in the course of the work: written (journalistic publications and periodicals), pictorial (postcards, candy labels) and material (urban household items, women’s accessories, money). The sources were identified during the author’s direct acquaintance with the museum’s collections in the State Catalog of the Museum Fund of the Russian Federation. In the process of research, methods of source analysis and synthesis, as well as typological and comparative methods, were applied. The author pays special attention to postcards with photographs of the coastal towns of the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus and their resort infrastructure. They are the most numerous and informative of the considered sources. The author considers in detail the principles of dating postal cards issued in the period under study in the Russian Empire and makes their detailed attribution: the quantitative characteristics of the analyzed postcards were revealed (in general, more than 200 postcards in the museum fund were studied), the time of creation, the publishing houses that issued them, the depicted places of the Black Sea coast were identified. In some cases, the authorship of photographic images is determined. The author emphasizes that the postcards in question were produced mainly by local publishers, who often, due to the lack of technical capabilities, collaborated with capital or foreign printing houses by ordering postcard printing. The author notes that the postcards that were used and went through post offices are especially interesting: they can be attributed to written ego sources as they contain personal texts that reveal various aspects of the daily life of holidaymakers. The analysis of illustrations placed on postcards shows their main thematic aspects to researchers. The author concludes that, on the basis of postcards, it is possible to study the features of the improvement of the resort area of the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus by comparing these features with the characteristics of other Russian and foreign sea resorts.