Taming the Wild Field

Willard Sunderland is Associate Professor of History at the University of Cincinnati.

• Introduction: Steppe Building1. Frontier ColonizationThe Rus' Land and the FieldThe Wild Field and the TsardomThe Empire and the Steppe2. Enlightened ColonizationReason's TerritoryReason's Process3. Bureaucratic ColonizationThe Vastness and the NationThe Bureaucrats and the Settlers4. Reformist ColonizationThe System and the PeasantsThe Pioneers and the Public5. "Correct Colonization"Colonizing Capacities and the Russian ElementThe Dwindling Prairie and the Growing BorderlandConclusion: Steppe Building and Steppe DestroyingNote on Archival SourcesIndex

As Willard Sunderland points out in this pioneering study of the colonization of the Russian steppe, the 'wild field' in his title, historians have been largely as prone as Russian rulers to accept the vision of the eighteenth-century cartographers that the steppes were an empty space awaiting to be peopled.... Sunderland offers a fresh perspective from which to appreciate history's multiple experiences with decolonization.(Journal of World History) In this sweeping survey, Sunderland details processes of Russia's colonization of the steppe that highlight its particularities as well as place the country within a larger western imperial pattern of expansion.... He thoughtfully considers the complexity of steppe expansion, and what it tells us about educated society, the state, and empire in Russia, as well as fitting this expansion into a global pattern from the sixteenth to the end of the nineteenth century.(Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History) The 'wild field' was the name given by the early forest-dwelling Eastern Slavs to the immense grasslands (also known as the steppe) that stretched north of the Black Sea from the Danube River to the Ural Mountains.... In this excellent book, Sunderland examines the expansion of Russia into this area.... Using extensive local and national archives, the author shows that this colonization changed over time and established a multifaceted imperialism that involved empire building, state building, society building, and nation building. Sunderland makes frequent comparisons to the history of similar regions such as the North American Great Plains. Highly recommended.(Choice) This book provides an engaging and provocative account of the role of popular and state initiatives in Russian colonization of the Black Sea-Caspian steppe from the sixteenth century to the late nineteenth century.... Taming the Wild Field makes the case for reasserting the importance of late Muscovite and Imperial Russian history by placing them within the larger contexts of the history of Inner Eurasia and the comparative study of empire.(Russian Review)