| Publication |
2010.
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article tells the story of a piece of land called Syrymbet, which was the patrimony of Middle Horde khans in the eighteenth century, but which had shrunk over the course of the nineteenth century until nothing was left of it but a small plot of privately claimed property. Over this period, which saw the erection of an imperial legal-administrative structure in the steppe, the nomadic political culture and the nature of nomadic land claims within it evolved, as Chinggisids, the traditional elite caste in Kazakh society, struggled to defend their land rights, social status and political power based in patronage. Based on a close reading of archival and published sources, this micro-history traces the actions of Syrymbet's Chinggisid claimants Aighanym and her son Chinggis, from the 1820s to the 1890s, and argues that their adaptation to Russian rule facilitated their downfall, while new elites emerged to play their roles in a transformed nomadic society.
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