SUMMARY:

In the first part of his article Dmitry Arapov provides an overview of the historical presence of Islam in the Russian Empire and state policies toward the Muslim population, which by the end of the nineteenth century composed the second largest confessional group after Russian Orthodoxy. Arapov distinguishes two sets of goals of government policies: one was connected with the technical task of governing, while the other aimed to integrate Russian Muslims into a “single state body.” In the second part of the article Arapov gives an overview of the collections pertaining to the imperial policies toward Muslims in the state archives of Moscow and St. Petersburg. He classifies documents by types (vidy) and provides their characteristics. Arapov concludes that the available documents allow for a comprehensive historical reconstruction of tsarist policy with regard to the “Muslim question.” Tsarist policy, he contends, was not ideal yet satisfied basic religious needs of the Empire’s Muslim population. The article is followed by an Appendix, which features two government documents discussing the “threat” of pan-Islamism.