Gumilyov Lev Nikolaevich: short biography

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

The son of two famous poets was Lev Gumilyov. The biography, personal life and legacy of this historian are of great interest to a wide range of people. He is remarkable both as a scientist and as the son of great poets. Here are two main reasons to get to know him better.

Gumilyov Lev - Russian historian, ethnologist, doctor of geographical and historical sciences. He is the author of the doctrine of ethnic groups and humanity as biosocial categories. Lev Nikolaevich studied ethnogenesis, its bioenergy dominant, which he called passionarity.

Origin and childhood

On October 14, 1912, Lev Nikolaevich Gumilyov was born in Tsarskoe Selo. His brief biography is notable for the fact that his parents were the great Russian poets A. A. Akhmatova and N. S. Gumilyov. The marriage of the Gumilyovs broke up in 1918, and after that the boy lived either with his mother or with his grandmother in Bezhetsk. It is known that his relationship with Anna Andreevna has always been difficult. In the photo below - Lev Gumilyov with his parents.

Training and arrests, participation in the war

Lev Nikolaevich in 1934 entered the Leningrad State University, the Faculty of History. However, already at the end of the first course, he was arrested for the first time. Soon Lev Gumilyov was released, but he never managed to graduate from the university. Already in the 4th year, in 1938, he was arrested again for participating in a student terrorist organization. Gumilyov was sentenced to 10 years in the camps. Later, his fate was mitigated. Lev Nikolaevich should have served a 5-year term in Norilsk. After this time, in 1943, he worked for hire in Turukhansk and near Norilsk. Then Gumilyov went to the front. He fought as an anti-aircraft gunner until victory. Gumilyov Lev Nikolaevich reached Berlin itself. The brief biography of this scientist, as you can see, is marked not only by achievements in the field of history.

First dissertation defense

Lev Nikolaevich in 1946 passed the exams at the university as an external student, and then continued his education at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences, where he studied in graduate school. His Ph. D. thesis was already ready, but in 1947 the scientist was expelled from the institute because of the decision on the journals Leningrad and Zvezda, adopted by the Central Committee of the CPSU (b). This resolution condemned the work of Anna Andreevna Akhmatova. Despite all the difficulties, Lev Nikolaevich still managed to defend his dissertation thanks to the support of the scientific community of Leningrad.

New arrest

In 1949, L. Gumilyov was arrested again. N. His brief biography, as you can see, is replete with arrests. He was released only in 1956 and then fully rehabilitated. It turned out that no corpus delicti were found in Gumilyov's actions. In total, Lev Nikolayevich was arrested 4 times. In total, he had to spend 15 years in Stalin's camps.

Gumilyov's doctoral dissertations and publications

Returning to Leningrad, Gumilyov got a temporary job at the Hermitage. In 1961, he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation on the topic "Ancient Turks of the 6th-8th centuries." Then the scientist was hired by the Institute of Geography, located at the Faculty of Geography of Leningrad State University. Here he worked until his retirement, which took place in 1986.

Gumilyov Lev defended his geographical doctoral dissertation in 1974. However, the attestation commission did not approve his degree. The manuscript of Gumilyov's work "Ethnogenesis and the Biosphere of the Earth" was forbidden to be published, but it was distributed in samizdat.

Only in 1959 did Lev Gumilyov begin to publish actively. It is no coincidence that his biography and work arouse great interest in scientific circles. He owns more than 220 works, including several monographs. In the post-Stalin era, the views of Lev Gumilyov were criticized in official publications, but there was no longer any persecution against him. Only in the early 1980s. the flow of his publications was briefly stopped. Lev Gumilyov had to address this issue to the Central Committee of the CPSU. He wrote a letter aboutprohibition of their publications. D. S. Likhachev and other historians of that time supported him.

Private life

Lev Gumilyov experienced several novels in his life. Biography, family and children - all this interests his fans. We will not dwell on the personal life of Lev Nikolaevich. However, we note the most important facts. In 1967, Gumilyov married N. V. Simonovskaya, an artist (years of life - 1920-2004). He met her in June 1966. The couple lived together for 24 years, until the death of Lev Nikolayevich. According to others, this marriage was ideal. The wife devoted her whole life to Gumilyov. She left her old circle of acquaintances and her job. The choice of Lev Nikolayevich was also influenced by his desire not to have children: at that time his chosen one was 46 years old, and he himself was 55.

Relations with Slavophiles and nationalists

Gumilyov's extraordinary rise in popularity took place in the post-Soviet era. His books were published in huge editions. The political views of this scientist, which he expressed in radio and television programs, in journalistic articles, were both anti-Western and anti-communist. This made his figure a symbol of anti-liberalism. Lev Nikolaevich's thesis about the "Slavic-Turkic symbiosis" was picked up by the Slavophiles at the turn of the 90s. These people had a negative attitude towards the views of the scientist on the Horde yoke, which, by the way, were very skeptical. The aforementioned thesis was taken up by the Slavophiles as a justification for the new ideology of the Russian state. The nationalists of the Turkic-speaking peoples who inhabited the USSR also referred to Lev Nikolaevich. For themGumilyov Lev was an indisputable authority.

"Theory of ethnogenesis" and natural sciences

Gumilyov considered himself "the last Eurasian". Nevertheless, the "theory of ethnogenesis" he created resembled Eurasianism only in general terms. From the point of view of such a science as history, the thoughts of a scientist cannot be considered a theory. However, Gumilev Lev turned primarily to the Soviet technical intelligentsia, and not to fellow historians. By that time, the technical intelligentsia had matured the conviction that in the Soviet Union history was a propaganda tool, not science, that it was falsified. The historical hypotheses of Lev Nikolaevich caused skepticism of scientists, since they were not confirmed. However, the "theory of ethnogenesis" in the eyes of Gumilyov's admirers did not lose at all from this. Lev Nikolayevich judged history from the standpoint of the natural sciences, and the scientific intelligentsia considered them less compromised than the humanities.

Main provisions of Gumilyov's theory

Lev Gumilyov built his theory on the assertion that "ethnic groups" are a kind of biological organisms. They have periods of youth, maturity and old age. Gumilyov included in the number of ethnic groups not only directly ethnic groups, but also political, confessional and even professional ones. He believed that about 1200-1500 years pass from their birth to death. According to the concept of the scientist, the emergence of new ethnic groups occurs as a result of a "passionary push", which is provokedradiation from space. There are those who are "complimentary" to each other, but there are also antagonistic ones. In addition to he althy ones, there are also "chimerical", insidious ethnic groups that parasitize on the organisms of others. He althy people, on the other hand, have different ways of interacting with the climatic environment and the "nursing landscape" and differ in these characteristics.

Gumilyov created his theory, trying to understand why in the era of the Middle Ages and antiquity, undulating and rapid ethnic processes were observed in the Great Steppe. Indeed, they were often, one way or another, associated with changes in climatic conditions. Therefore, to some extent, linking landscape and ethnos by scientists is justified. Nevertheless, the "ethnogenesis theory" lost its credibility as a result of Gumilyov's absolutization of the role of natural factors. The term "passionarity", which belongs to Lev Nikolaevich, began to take on a life of its own. The scholar used it to refer to the original ethnic activism. However, now this term has nothing in common with Gumilev's "theory of ethnogenesis".

On June 15, 1992, Lev Gumilyov died in St. Petersburg. The biography, family and heritage of the scientist were briefly reviewed by us. Now you know what made the son of two great Russian poets so popular.