Abstract

In this paper we discuss the use of historical archival records, including direct statistics, tax records and cloistral accounts, to analyse the population dynamics of cod, herring and salmon in the Barents and White seas from the seventeenth to the twentieth century. The basic aim is to estimate the effect of social (fishing effort) and biological (climate changes and fluctuations in numbers) factors on marine fish populations. This is the first attempt to organise such historical research in Russia, despite the availability of large volumes of relevant and accessible primary source material. We include a case study on the salmon fisheries in the region. The first available data on salmon fisheries are from the beginning of the seventeenth century, although more complete statistics are not available until the 1870s. The data reveal that fewer salmon were caught at the beginning of the seventeenth century in the Onega River than in more modern times, given comparable effort. We also examine the relationship between catches, fishing effort and prices.

Introduction

In the framework of the HMAP programme our group is responsible for collecting and analysing statistical data relating to the most important commercial fish species: cod, herring and salmon. The data relates to one of Russia's oldest fisheries, which operated in the White and Barents Seas. Reasonably reliable data from the seventeenth century exist for these fisheries. For the historical and proto-statistical periods, data that indirectly reflect catches and fishing effort could be used, such as tax records, customs records, trade figures, and consumption of fish in the larger trading towns and monasteries. This is the first attempt to organise such historical research in Russia, despite the availability of a large volume of relevant and accessible primary source material sufficient to shed light on the question of ecological change.

Among the members of HMAP-Russia group are scholars working in the seventeenth-century economic history of the Russian North (Zoya Dmitrieva and Alexei Kraikovsky), experts in nineteenth-century Russian history (Vladimir Lapin and Ruslan Davydov), an ethnographer who specialises in northern culture (Alexei Yurchenko), three environmental historians (Daniel Alexandrov, Yaroslava Alekseeva and Julia Lajus) and two ecologists (Dmitry Lajus and Vadim Mokievsky). The collaboration of historians and biologists in the project is very important, not only for the research effort but also in terms of its management.