Contribution of V.V. Radlov and N.F. Katanov to the study of the folklore of the Siberian Tatars

Abstract

This article is devoted to the study of the contribution to the Tatar folklore of the German scholar — the founder of the Russian Turkic science — Academician V. Radlov and his eminent student N. Katanov, who left major scientific works in the field of comparative study of numerous Turkic languages. The names of these scientists, who have devoted all their scientific activity to Turkology, are now widely known throughout the scientific world. The interest in exploring the peculiarities of the languages of the little known in the nineteenth century by numerous peoples of the Asian part of Russia led young scientists to write «lively» conversational speech from the mouths of the speakers of these languages themselves. However, they were also interested in life, ethnography, history, spiritual culture of these peoples. The result of many years of scientific expeditions organized by researchers studied over the course of decades has been the recordings of various genres of folklore. It is thanks to the timely records of V. Radlov and N. Katanov has preserved the genre
richness and unique samples of oral creativity of the Turkic peoples, which gives the right to call these scientists also the founders of the Turkic folkloristics