Solovyov, Dmitry Konstantinovich

Born November 3, 1886 in St. Petersburg. Father, Konstantin Matveevich, served as the ruler of affairs of the Committee on Technical Affairs at the Department of Industrial Institutions of the Ministry of Finance, a technologist by training; his mother, Vera Semyonovna, is a public figure, she graduated from the Higher Women's Courses , worked in free schools for workers ^[1] .

In 1901, Dmitry Solovyov moved from the Tenishevsky Real School to the fourth grade of the Karl May Real School , which he graduated in 1905. In the fall of the same year he entered the St. Petersburg University as a volunteer , and two years later, he was enrolled in the number of students in the natural sciences department of the Department of Physics and Mathematics in Biological Discharge ^{[1] [2]} .

From an early age, Solovyov was fond of hunting and spent all his free time in the forests of the Luga district of St. Petersburg province , where there was a family cottage. Love for hunting predetermined the young man's interest in studying biology and geography ^[3] .

In 1908, he took part in the scientific expedition of Professor V.V. Sapozhnikov in northwestern Mongolia , after which he transferred to a geographical group, and, having determined his research interests, listened to lectures and participated in seminars on comparative ethnography , methods of geographical research and geography of animals. The choice of a hunting specialist’s specialty was mainly influenced by acquaintance with the last two lecture courses by zoologist Alexei Andreevich Bialynitsky-Biruley . A year later, Solovyov, an assistant to the soil scientist, participated in the expedition of the Migration Directorate to the Eastern Zaangarye, about which he wrote a small hunting essay, “In the Taiga,” published in the tenth issue of the St. Petersburg magazine Our Hunt for 1911 ^[4] .

In 1910, he made an independent three-month ethnographic expedition to the Far East , visiting all foreign settlements along the way. He sailed through the Amur and Ussuri , visited many countries in Asia , Sakhalin and Manchuria , during which time he managed to collect more than a thousand household items of the Orocs , Udege , Ulchi and Nanai , the most valuable of which are objects of worship, shaman costumes, carved utensils from a bear holiday , funeral men's clothing. Such a large number of artifacts collected in a short time by one person was no longer received by the State Museum of Ethnography , including items that nobody before and after Solovyov managed to get. The essay Around Asia, written about this journey, was never published; only a short story, “In the Ceylon Jungle,” was published in 1911 in Our Hunt. The expedition was assisted by the traveler and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsenyev , helping to resolve a number of organizational issues ^{[5] [6]} .

The next ethnographic expedition of Soloviev took place a year later, from May to September. Studying the life of nomadic Sami , he crossed the entire Kola Peninsula , passing from Kandalaksha to Kildin Island ^[7] .

In May 1912, Dmitry Konstantinovich graduated from St. Petersburg University, the basis of his thesis“Golds” included materials from the Far Eastern expedition. Soon after, he joined the Department of Agriculture, and in 1913 went on the next long ethnographic expedition, this time to the upper reaches of the Amur River in order to study a special group of Evenks - maneuvers. He collected the world's only collection on the culture of this people ^{[6] [7]} .

At the beginning of 1914, as a great connoisseur of the hunting life of the small ethnic groups of the Russian Empire and the hunting industries of the European North, Siberia and the Far East, Soloviev was appointed a senior specialist in commercial hunting in the Hunting Department, established under the Department of Agriculture, and firmly decided to devote his life to scientific hunting ^{[ 8]} . A little later, he headed the expedition that started in July of that year to the Yenisei province to design the Sayan Sable Reserve , which, according to the results of research, began its work in 1915, becoming the first in Russia ^[9] . The Sayan expedition brought Solovyov fame and recognition, finally forming him a specialist in this field. He formulated the theoretical foundations of conservation in Russia and developed a classification of protected natural areas ^[10] .

After the February Revolution of 1917 and the October Revolution that followed it, instead of the deprived of funding and later abolished Hunting Department, a research subdivision was organized as part of the Scientific Committee of the People’s Commissariat for Agriculture, and the Department of Hunting, Harmful and Useful Animals and Birds was appointed, and Solovyov was appointed there senior assistant in commercial hunting. In 1918 he was invited to the post of editor of the journal “Hunting for All” ^{[# 2]} created at the Scientific and Educational Department of the Petrograd Union of Hunters (PSO) ^{[# 1 ]} , and at the same time he was elected to the Central Executive Committee of the PSO and participated in the development of the draft law on hunting. In the years 1918-1919. Soloviev was also a member of the board of the hunting section under the Petrograd National Economy Council, in which he headed the predator extermination department ^[14] .

In 1923, after the WPSO came under the control of the communist faction, and its Central Committee split in its views on the prospects for the development and activities of the Union, Dmitry Konstantinovich left the Central Committee and did not take more part in the public affairs of hunters, devoting himself to teaching and scientific work. The result was the fundamental work “Fundamentals of Hunting”, published in five parts, putting the author on a par with prominent Russian hunting experts ^[15] .

In this last major work, Dmitry Konstantinovich gathered together the results of both his and the printed works of a number of other persons, and thus presented for the first time a comprehensive picture of the hunting business in the USSR in one whole picture. This merit of the first complete formulation of the hunting business from the state point of view will forever remain with D.K. Soloviev.

- S. A. Buturlin , The Hunter. - 1931. - No. 9/10 ^[16]

For several years, Soloviev taught at the Moscow Hunting Courses, organized with his direct participation in the Moscow Forest Institute , lectured at the Forestry Department of the Leningrad Forest Institute , where in 1926 he was elected assistant professor in the department of hunting, and three years later - professor in this department . At the same time, he took part in organizing specialized courses at the Leningrad Eastern Institute and at the Higher Courses in Applied Zoology and Phytopathology ^[17] .

In the summer seasons of 1926 and 1928, he led the groups of hunting experts at the Pechora and Turukhan forest economic expeditions of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture for the study of the hunting industries of these places. Even then, he complained of a heart and was often forced to rest on the road. In 1928, on behalf of the People's Commissar of the USSR , in collaboration with Professor Generozov, he developed a draft five-year plan for the study and development of the hunting economy of the Soviet Union, becoming a member of the planning commission ^[18] .

At the end of August 1931, at the age of 45, Dmitry Konstantinovich Solovyov died of a serious illness and was buried in the Smolensk cemetery in Leningrad. After his death, the work of training hunting experts in Leningrad higher educational institutions gradually came to naught, and the departments of hunting studies were closed ^{[19] [20]} .

• Soloviev D.K. Types of organizations contributing to the protection of nature. - Petrograd, 1918 .-- 45 p.
• Solovyov D.K. Wolf and its extermination. - Petrograd, Moscow: Publishing house Nar. com land., 1919. - 72 p.
• Solovyov D.K. What is a hunting economy. - Petrograd, Moscow: Publishing house Nar. com land., 1919. - 20 p.
• Sayan hunting and hunting region and sable trade in it: report of the Sayan expedition of the Department of Agriculture, which worked in 1914-1916. under the command of a senior specialist in commercial hunting D.K. Soloviev // Series 2. Sayan expedition. - Petersburg: State Publishing House, 1920. - 458 p.
• The basics of hunting: a systematic guide to the study of Russian hunting // Part 1: Introduction. Historical background. Hunting animals and birds / Comp. D.K. Soloviev. - Petrograd: Ed. com Nar com Zem., 1922. - S. 1-159.
• The basics of hunting: a systematic guide to the study of Russian hunting // Part 2: Hunting weapons. Hunting dogs. Methods of hunting game animals / Comp. D.K. Soloviev. - Petrograd: Ed. com Nar com Zem., 1922. - S. 160—324.
• The basics of hunting: a systematic guide to the study of Russian hunting // Part 3: Hunting. Fur farming and game breeding. Hunting / Comp. D.K. Soloviev. - Petrograd: Ed. com Nar com Zem., 1925. - S. 325-580.
• The basics of hunting: a systematic guide to the study of Russian hunting // Part 4: The hunting population and its life. Hunting laws and hunting management. Hunting Economics / Comp. D.K. Soloviev. - Petrograd: Ed. com Nar com Zem., 1926. - S. 581-903.
• The basics of hunting: a systematic guide to the study of hunting in the USSR // Part 5: The study of hunting. Marine animal industries. Hunting abroad. Bibliography / Comp. D.K. Soloviev. - M. , L .: New Village, 1929 .-- S. 904-1062.
• Solovyov D.K. Hunting and the hunter: Collection of articles and stories. - L. , M .: New Village, 1925 .-- 200 p.
• Soloviev D.K. Hunter-researcher: A brief program-guide for collecting materials on the hunting business. - L .: ed. ed., 1926. - 79 p.
• Solovyov D.K. Hunting in the USSR: A Short Course on Hunting, Chit. to Leningrad. Forest Institute // Hunter: Journal. - 1926.

• Egorov O. A. Classic of domestic hunting // Hunting open spaces: literary and artistic almanac / Ch. ed. V.V. Korolev. - 2010. - No. 1 (63) . - S. 204—223 . Archived April 12, 2017.