Bykhanov, Evgraf Vasilievich

Born in the family of the Lipetsk tradesman Vasily Vasilievich Bykhanov (1804 - 12.01.1878) and the merchant daughter of Maria Alekseevna Kotelnikova (1811-1873). In total, their family had seven children. The most famous are three. This is the eldest son - Vasily Vasilievich (04/03/1829 - 03/29/1896), who remained to live in Lipetsk and founded a nursery. In his memory named Bykhanov garden . The fourth son is Evgraf Vasilievich (12/05/1839 - 12/12/1915). And the fifth son - Mikhail Vasilievich (07/08/1848 - 11/24/1916), with whom Evgraf Vasilievich was engaged in gardening in the Yelets district ( Dolgorukovo village) ^[1] .

Since there were several full namesakes in a short historical segment in the Bykhanov dynasty , we note that the elder brother E. Bykhanov, Vasily, had his own son, Mikhail (10.27.1877 - 1921), who, in fact, headed the practical side of the activity of their family, Lipetsk enterprise "Gardening A. A. Bykhanova with Sons." With this Mikhail Vasilyevich Bykhanov, that is, with his nephew , Evgraf Vasilyevich at the beginning of the 20th century landscaped the Lipetsk Lower Park ^[1] .

Evgraf was born in Lipetsk, December 5, 1839 ^[1] . From the middle of the XIX century he lived in Livny , where he worked as a teacher of singing and music in the city of Real , and later in the Theological Schools .

Little is known about the private life of Evgraf Vasilievich. The search work of the Lebanese local historian S.P. Volkov made it possible to find and question E. Bykhanov’s granddaughter, O. G. Andreeva, his student, music teacher S. A. Pavlovskaya and two former students, who lived in Livny in the late 40s. P.N. Morozov and O.D. Zeller. According to them, Evgraf Vasilievich was a rather prominent figure in the city. He was the regent of the church choir. Lanky, athletic, was considered a good swimmer, since he sailed from Liven to the Adam mill , and even a climber , since he participated in the ascent to Kazbek . Occasionally composed music, at leisure he was engaged in painting , especially having succeeded in creating copies. His labors for the Theological School acquired a small telescope ^[2] .

Evgraf Vasilievich had three sons - Mitrofan, Konstantin, Mikhail (the eldest) and one daughter, the youngest of the children - Olga (05/13/1883 - 05/13/1974). There is a photograph in which E. Bykhanov was shot with his sons ^[3] . It is also known that Konstantin in 1893 turned out to be one of three students in the commercial department of the Lebanese real school who successfully passed final exams and received a certificate ^[4] .

The main hobby of Evgraf Vasilievich was astronomy . He meticulously monitored and carefully studied works published on this topic. Using his own telescope he watched the sky ^[5] .

In the mid-70s of the XIX century, E. Bykhanov was convinced of the discrepancy between the observed facts of the then dominant cosmogonic hypothesis of Kant - Laplace . In particular, there was a contradiction between Laplace’s statement about the unshakable constancy of the solar system and empirical evidence about the absence of such constancy. For example, the established deceleration of the speed of rotation of the Earth , and therefore of other planets ^[6] .

In 1876, Evgraf Vasilievich sets out his conclusions in a short article and sends a number of famous astronomers, but receives no answer ^[7] . The next year, 1877, he decided to publish his thoughts in the form of a book, modestly, without attribution, but with a very ambitious title: “Astronomical prejudices and materials for compiling a new theory of the formation of the planetary system” ^[6] . This book also had no particular resonance. But even a modest reaction strengthened the author in the realization of his innocence. A few years before retiring, in 1894, he published a second work, “Something from Celestial Mechanics. Feature article. Popular exposition of Ev. Bykhanova " ^[8] . But this book did not become a bestseller .

Having lived in Livny until his sixtieth birthday, Evgraf Vasilievich retired and in 1898 moved to Yelets , to his eldest son Mikhail. One of the reasons was the existence of direct railway communication with Dolgorukovo , where Yevgraf, on shares with his younger brother Mikhail (07/08/1848 - 11/24/1916) had a nursery of fruit, park, decorative and forest trees , and Lipetsk, a city where close relatives lived and had their own business.

The remaining seventeen years of life E. Bykhanov devotes to gardening. In Yelets, Dolgorukovo works with Mikhail Vasilievich, his younger brother, and in Lipetsk, with Mikhail Vasilievich, his nephew. The presence of such namesakes still introduces a considerable confusion in the description of the life of the Bykhanov families ^[1] .

Evgraf Vasilyevich’s own contribution and the contribution of his family to the gardening of Lipetsk to this day is marked by the name of one of the central parks - Bykhanov Sad and one of the alleys of the Lower Park - Bykhanova.

E. Bykhanov summarized the horticultural experience in a small brochure, “Cultivation of a fruit garden in Central Russia” ^[9] . According to him, the purpose of the publication was "to sow love for a noble and useful occupation," since "the very occupation of gardening is impeccably ethical ...". The publication took place in Lipetsk, in 1912, again without attribution. However, it became traditional for Evgraf Vasilievich ^[2] .

Toward the end of his life, E. Bykhanov was known as a heretic and Voltairean , to such an extent that, upon his death in 1915, the local clergy refused to bury him. And this, for those times, was not a frequent occurrence ^[7] .

The main works of Evgraf Vasilievich Bykhanov are two books written and published in Livny, dedicated to the solar system, its planets and, in particular, the Earth ^[2] .

In these books, Evgraf Vasilievich sharply criticized the then basic Nebular hypothesis of the formation of the Solar System , which, incidentally, was held by such authorities as Kant and Laplace . The thoughts expressed by Evgraf Bykhanov were significantly ahead of time and fully consistent with the modern system of views . In addition, E. V. Bykhanov drew attention to the significant pairwise similarity of the coastlines of Europe and North America , South America and Africa , Australia and South America, to explain which he proposed a hypothesis about their horizontal movement ^[10] ; later, Alfred Wegener would call her the Continental Drift Theory .

"Astronomical prejudices ..."

The first book was published anonymously, without attribution, in 1877. Its name is “Astronomical prejudices and materials for compiling a new theory of the formation of the planetary system” ^[6] .

The reason for writing was the desire to remove the contradiction between the observed astronomical facts and the view of the Kant-Laplace theory on them. Conflicts with the theory arose, for example, in the distribution of planets in density, in rotation speed, in the facts of the multidirectional rotation of the satellites of Uranus , in the change in the rotation speed of the Earth , in the existence of comets , etc. "The Laplace hypothesis of the formation of the world from a philosophical point of view is unsatisfactory, because she cannot explain anything without the assumption of unknown and unexplored causes ” ^[6] .

According to E. Bykhanov, prejudice does not correctly understand natural phenomena. Moreover, they “turn out to be all the more harmful for science, the more learned the people who had the recklessness to submit to the influence of some false idea and to scientifically develop one” ^[6] .

It should be noted that in the opinion of Professor N. I. Leonov, in the thoughts of E. Bykhanov regarding the horizontal movement of the continents and set out in his first book, “... striking similarity, almost textual” ^[2] with the main provisions of Wegener's theory published in Europe much later. On this fact and taking into account the fact that the Livny had stable trade relations with Germany , supplying food, mainly grain , N. Leonov admits the possibility of tacit borrowing of the work of Evgraf Bykhanov ^[2] .

The book consists of a Preface and ten chapters:

• Chapter I Reflection on the starry sky.
• Chapter II A critical analysis of the Kant-Laplace hypothesis: the formation of the world and the planetary system.
• Chapter III On the Development of Sciences.
• Chapter IV. The age-old inequality of lunar motion according to Laplace and the latest research.
• Chapter V The explanation of the tides of the seas according to Newtonian theory is not consistent with the law of gravity. The forms of celestial bodies in nature do not agree with the forms, whatever they should have according to calculations.
• Chapter VI. Calculation of the mass of the sun. The movement of the planets around the sun and the rise of the earth's waters due to solar attraction.
• Chapter VII The physical structure of the sun. The failure of the theory of sunspots.
• Chapter VIII. Gaseousness of the Sun by physical research. The predicament of the followers of Newtonian theory. Gaseousness of the Sun according to a mechanical law.
• Chapter IX. The theory of the daily rotational motion of the Earth. Reasons producing the ebb and flow of the seas. The dependence of the direction of the earth's axis on the location of land and water on the surface of the globe.
• Chapter X. The structure and position of earth layers. The failure of the theory, according to which the fiery state of the interior of the globe is supposed. Are mountains pushed out of the bowels of the earth?

Moreover, the book has two additional sections:

• Planetary system formation
• Additions to this hypothesis

“Something from celestial mechanics ...”

The second book was published in 1894, in Livny, in the same printing house of Ivan Afanasevich Savkov on Nikolskaya Street. Its name is “Something from celestial mechanics. Feature article. Popular exposition of Ev. Bykhanova. " The main theme is meteorites and their role in the formation of the Earth and the Moon. At the same time, Evgraf Vasilievich substantiates the complete interconnectedness of the observed phenomena , logically making a non-trivial conclusion for that time: “In all this, it has been sufficiently shown that heterogeneous forces can produce the same phenomena and that the structure of the globe, its orbital motion, rotation around its axis and even the motion of the moon around the Earth, contrary to established concepts, are in complete communication or dependence between themselves ” ^[8] .

The book consists of six chapters:

• Chapter I Rotational motion of planets and their satellites in comparison with each other.
• Chapter II The increase in the mass of the earth and the immutability of the earth year
• Chapter III Existing doctrine on the formation of tides. A new, more natural explanation of the same phenomenon.
• Chapter IV Daily rotation of the earth.
• Chapter V On the moon.
• Chapter VI Conclusion.

For the scientific community, the works of E. Bykhanov remained unknown until the second half of the 40s of the XX century. This period is characterized in the USSR by the upsurge in the propaganda of national self-awareness and, as a result, in the popularization of the acts of domestic significant personalities. As an example, we refer to some films that were released in those years: Michurin , Admiral Nakhimov , Alexander Popov , Academician Ivan Pavlov .

Of the deeds of E. Bykhanov, the anonymous book “Astronomical Prejudices ...” ^{[6] was the} first to attract attention. In 1946, her detailed analysis was published in Izvestia of the USSR Academy of Sciences by professors Georgy Glebovich Lemmlein and Boris Leonidovich Lichkov ^[11] . The next year, 1947, was followed by an article by academician Berg L. S. ^[12] , and in 1948, the ideas of E. Bykhanov were given noticeable attention in the republished great work of Professor N. N. Zubov - “In the Center of the Arctic ...” ^[13] .

The authors of publications highly and in detail appreciated the originality and novelty of the thoughts expressed in E. Bykhanov's book, which were significantly ahead of their time, but regretted the complete unknownness of the author's name.

Professor Leonov N.I. managed to establish this name. It was known that the book was allowed by censorship on November 5, 1877 in Moscow. Leonov N. discovered the relevant protocols of the censorship committee . From them it turned out that the author is Evgraf Bykhanov, a singing and music teacher from the city of Livny ^[7] .

In the spring of 1948, for good luck, with a request to look for traces of a Lebanese teacher, Leonov N. wrote to the Lebanese district department of public education. The letter was handed over to the local historian - S.P. Volkov . He managed to find E. Bykhanov’s granddaughter, O. G. Andreev, who, by the way, continued to live in the grandfather’s house in Lebanon. She spoke about the fate of Evgraf Vasilievich and even allowed a copy of his photo portrait to be made ^[5] .

The most complete version of the return of the works and the name of Evgraf Bykhanov was published in 1952 by Professor N. I. Leonov in the Works of the Institute of the History of Natural History ^[2] .

• E. V. Bykhanov believed that the missing mainland of Atlantis is the current America , which, due to the drift of the continents, simply moved away from Europe ^[6] .

• The main books of E. V. Bykhanov ^{[6] [8]} , having become rare books, are kept in the Russian State Library .
• The Lebanese house of E. V. Bykhanov has been preserved. His address is st. Ordzhonikidze, 23. Local authorities installed a memorial plaque on it in the second half of the 20th century. After the heirs sold the house to the new owners, the plaque was removed.
• Documents on the life of E. V. Bykhanov are stored in the Livensky and Lipetsk local history museums , in the museum-estate "Krai Dolgorukovsky" ^[14] .
• In the village of Dolgorukovo there is a regional monument of architecture on the site of the garden and the estate of the Bykhanov brothers.
• In memory of Evgraf Vasilievich in the Lipetsk city Lower Park there is Bykhanova Alley ^[15] .

• Bykhanov Garden

•   Wikimedia Commons has media files related to Evgraf Bykhanov
• Kuznetsova L. I. Where are the continents sailing? - M .: State. publishing house of geographical literature, 1962. - S. 116.
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