Abstract: The article develops a database of archival sources covering Buryat family trees. Genealogic data were traditionally very important for Buryat society as they were linked to such aspects as administrative arrangement, economic activity and marital relations. Special importance of family relations in social organization was seen in spiritual life as it actualized the cult of ancestors. In the context of ethnocultural revival observed in the recent decades, the social significance of information resources on Buryat genealogies is increasing. The funds of the Center for Oriental Manuscripts and Xylographs of the IMBT SB RAS store a large number of materials on this topic. They were the basis the discussed database was developed on. To form a meta-collection of archival materials on this topic the authors used corpus analysis methods processing the general index formed on the basis of electronic archival cases titles of the Center for Oriental Manuscripts and Xylographs. To organize the data the methodology of authority control is applied. The ontology scheme of a family tree includes descriptive categories "Family", "Place", "Person". This makes it possible to implement user-friendly methods of data aggregation and visualization - GIS, hierarchical trees, social graphs, etc. which are integrated into a web application. Digitalization of archival and rare book funds contributes to the identification and formation of thematic meta-collections similar to the corpus of archival sources on Buryat genealogies considered in this article. This opens up new opportunities for a comprehensive disclosure of historical and cultural heritage.

Keywords: social network analysis, GIS, authority data, Buryat lineage records, meta collection, archival documents, outline, database, kinship, traditional beliefs

Abstract: The article studies historical appearance of Russian servicemen of the Far East in the 17th century as well as their traditional opponents – soldiers of the eight-banner army of Qing China. The study sets a goal to practically model and print 3D models of the people understudy. To form basic sketches of the models the authors use historical images as well as modern reconstructions of uniforms and weapons. Computer modeling was carried out using open software. The approach is to develop a utilitarian technique for high-quality modeling of three-dimensional models of historical characters without professional art education. As a result, the authors have got unique three-dimensional models made according to a single algorithm. The use of three-dimensional modeling technologies provides for a fairly simple creation of both a character model itself and his uniform and weapons. Also, three-dimensional modeling allows one to create copies of individual objects thus forming a library that can significantly reduce the time spent on creating similar models. 3D printing technologies make it easy to replicate physical copies of a 3D model which in this case makes it possible to fulfill orders for small-scale production of souvenirs. The models can be applied in industrial production such as casting and milling.

Keywords: acrylic paint, 3D-printing, three-dimensional modeling, computer historical reconstruction, armament and uniforms, Eight banner army, manchus, filament, Albazin fortress, Amur cossacks

Abstract: The article discusses the creation of a thematic resource on the history of the Trans-Siberian Railway using modern Web-GIS tools which will provide for accumulating source information collected during research and presenting it in a form accessible for researchers. The online GIS allows one to work with the materials named in several modes:  interactive, tabular (with a description of the source base) as well as modes of editing information in the cloud storage database or in a limited mode of data input and data loading. The GIS project is represented by a set of vector and raster data transformed to work in a modern coordinate system: historical maps and diagrams, satellite images in the form of mosaics and image fragments obtained through available geoservices (Google, Yandex, Bing). Digital layers are also available which are generated and edited based on the digitization of historical and modern maps of different scales. Simultaneously with the work on the web-resource, the authors are creating the Transsib desktop GIS. The development and launch of the web-GIS "Trans-Siberian Railway" gives its users a number of new opportunities including the availability of generalized information and cartographic database on the history of the construction and operation of the Transsib as well as an opportunity for several users to work with project materials simultaneously, search for the necessary metadata information in the GIS, etc.

Keywords: spatial historical data, web-GIS technology, history of construction, GIS technologies, The Great Siberian Way, Transsib, historical maps, data, resource, analysis

Abstract: The article contains a critical analysis of two theses presented in a recently published monograph on historical information systems. The book contains a lot of useful information, including a description of the author's experience in developing such systems. Both theses discussed are related to the authors' assessment of the evolution of an interdisciplinary field focused on the use of information/digital technologies and data analysis methods in historical research. We are talking about historical computer science, which has passed a 30-year path in our country. The first controversial thesis of the authors of the book boils down to the statement that "historical informatics has not found sufficient and deserved recognition among traditional historians." В  The first controversial thesis of the authors of the book boils down to the statement that "historical informatics has not found sufficient and deserved recognition among traditional historians." In the second thesis, we are talking about the fact that in many ways the field of research and development, previously related to historical computer science, is now being considered in line with digital history. Both theses are disputed in the article, the corresponding arguments are given. The specificity of the Russian model of historical informatics, which distinguishes it from the relatively recent versions of digital history, is shown. This specificity is determined by the balance of the structure of historical informatics, combining its "resource" component with an analytical one aimed at obtaining meaningful meaningful results (and with an emphasis on the second component).

Keywords: digital technologies, information systems, quantitative history, digital history, Historical informatics, historical-oriented resources, databases, data science, information technology, historical computing

Abstract: The article presents the structure of source-oriented electronic databases created on the basis of personified mass sources that contain information about the population of Tambov in 1896-1917. The features and possibilities of using mass primary sources for the study of social stratification and mobility of the propertied strata of the population of the provincial center in the late 19th - early 20th centuries are analyzed. Methods of complex processing of electronic databases on social stratification and mobility of the population of a Russian provincial city in the late 19th - early 20th centuries are characterized. The scientific novelty of the study consists of the use of information technologies to implement the method of social identification of the elite and middle layers of the provincial Russian city in the late 19th - early 20th centuries, the basis of which is the approaches and methods of theories of multidimensional stratification and social mobility. The information potential of the bases made it possible to conduct social ranking, analyze the social mobility of the elite and the middle strata of the provincial center in the late 19th - early 20th centuries. The presented methods and technologies for the creation and complex processing of source-oriented databases on the problems of social stratification and mobility of the elite and middle strata of Tambov in the late 19th - early 20th centuries can be used to study social processes in relation to other settlements, chronological periods, class-social and professional groups of the population.

Keywords: social stratification, social mobility, databases, Tambov, urban elite, urban middle strata, urban population, provincial city, mass historical sources, information technologies

Abstract: The article compares the author's work on modeling historical processes, completed 30 years ago, with the publication of a similar model devoted to some hypotheses of the penetration of the “steppe heritage” into the gene pool of European farmers of the Bronze Age. The changes that have occurred in the computer modeling of historical processes, which significantly increase their research potential, are characterized. On the example of the models under consideration, it is discussed in what aspects they help to clarify and develop knowledge about the past. The features of spatially explicit models, which are a subset of imitation models (simulations), are demonstrated, including the possibility of taking into account the genetic parameters of the modeled populations and subsequent comparison with aDNA. The degree of novelty of the results obtained in the two compared models is estimated. It is noted which results of the latest research and additional considerations should be taken into account in order to further bring the behavior of the model closer to reality. It is suggested that the modeling results make it possible to associate the origin of the “steppe heritage” not so much with the population of the Yamnaya culture, but with the contact zone in the south of Ukraine, where interaction with the late Trypillian and other agricultural cultures took place. The necessity of supporting with models any assumptions about historical processes that does not follow directly from empirical material in order to confirm the fundamental reproducibility of the proposed scenario is substantiated.

Keywords: simulation, spatially explicit model, bronze age, Europe, corded ware, Yamnaya culture, Trypillian culture, aDNA, migration, plague

Abstract: In the process of studying the systems of historical settlement, researchers are increasingly drawing on ideas and methods of mathematical modeling. The most popular - the probabilistic approach - is based on the idea that a random factor plays a predominant role in the process of spatial distribution of the population. In particular, according to the widely used Poisson model, events involving the emergence of new (and the disappearance of old) settlements on disjoint sites and time intervals are independent of each other, and the probability of two or more such events at one site is extremely small (the corresponding random variable is distributed according to Poisson's law). The purpose of this article is to familiarize the reader with the basic traditional principles of this approach, with the features of its methodology, current limits and possible new horizons for probabilistic modeling of historical settlement systems. To do this, our paper examines two studies, foreign and domestic, devoted to modeling the systems of historical settlement of different eras. In particular, it is pointed to the critical dependence of the approach, presented in these studies, on the scale and uniformity of the conditions of the territory under consideration. The way out of this situation is presented to the author of this paper by involving new types of data from historical sources for modeling, revising and rejecting unnecessary assumptions about the specific nature of the settlement process.

Keywords: probabilistic modelling, bronze age, quadrat analysis, random variable, Poisson distribution, chi-squared test, rural settlement system, pyatina, pogost, cadastral book

Abstract: The article discusses the experience of online publication of the scribe book of the Tver half of the Bezhetskaya Pyatina of the Novgorod land in 1545 on the NextGIS Web platform. The scribe's Book of 1545 is the most complete source describing the territory of the Tver half of the Bezhetskaya Pyatina of the XVI century. The book reflects the composition of landowners not only of the XVI century, but also of the period of independence of Veliky Novgorod. The paper describes methods of working with the geographical information of the book, creating geodata based on it and ways of presenting them in a web format. Attention is paid to various technical solutions, their strengths and weaknesses are considered. В  The novelty of the research lies in a new look at the auxiliary element of the NextGIS Web web map, which is the Description displayed on the functional panel of its interface. The proposed approach turns the interactive geographical pointer accompanying the map into a platform for full-text publication of the source, in which the map performs the function of a container, always ready to display exactly the spatial context in which the geographical object selected by the user exists from the text of the historical source of the source. The main conclusion of the work is the conclusion that the proposed method allows you to combine the transmission of the main elements of the paper publication of the source with the advantages of a modern digital format, expanded due to the cartographic component.

Keywords: churchyard, XVI century, Novgorod land, scribal books, publication of a historical source, web technologies, GIS, historical geography, parish, Moscow State

Abstract: The article examines the financial system of the Russian Empire in the form of money flows between the largest centers, implying that these flows were opposite to the flows of goods and services. The resource allocation pattern is thus revealed in aspects of the markets’ geography and hierarchy, which clarifies the capacity of the financial system to support economic growth. The source for this study is the statistics of the commercial transfers of the State Bank of the Russian Empire for 1898 (excluding treasury transfers), processed through network and geoinformation analysis. The study results show that the highest level of the payment network in the financial system topology of the Russian Empire was located around St. Petersburg and Moscow, which indicates a strong centralization of national money flows. To a great degree, Moscow was a nationwide wholesale center for the sale of goods and services, while St. Petersburg developed into the principal center for resource allocation throughout the country, implying various forms of investment in the economy. In such a centralized system, there was no great need for second-level interregional ties. For regional payment networks (the third level, around Odessa, Warsaw, Kiev, Riga, Baku, Nizhniy Novgorod, Kharkov, and Rostov-on-Don), closer and more intensive financial ties are revealed in the west, in the Odessa-Kiev-Warsaw “triangle”, which indicates a greater saturation of the western and southwestern regions with financial resources.

Keywords: commercial banking, bank transfers, interregional payments, interregional money flows, historical statistics, financial centers, regional financial markets, network analysis, geoinformation analysis, Russian Empire

Abstract: This review is devoted to the monograph by Yu.Yu.Yumasheva, published in DirectMedia publishing house in 2020. The monograph is the result of a comprehensive study, within the framework of which the author carried out a source and historiographical analysis of the problems of audiovisual documentation and its digital transformation based on open data sets over the past 15 years. The 600-page book was announced as a textbook for students, employees of government bodies and specialists in the field of archival affairs. A detailed acquaintance with the text makes it possible to come to a conclusion as to how fully the claimed research has been completed, and whether the proposed form corresponds to its purpose. Starting with the formal characteristics of the book: the cover design, the quality of the illustrations and the structure of the publication, the reviewer proceeds to discuss the content of the published materials. The monograph is devoted to the problems of digital transformation of traditional audiovisual archives, the translation of audio, photo, and film documents into digital form, the creation of electronic resources based on created copies and their presentation on the Internet. The author has accumulated a knowledge bank, which presents information resources available on the world Wide Web, based on digitized bibliographic catalogs, scientific reference apparatus of archives and museum records, as well as electronic copies of objects of historical and cultural heritage. In total, the monograph mentions more than 2.5 thousand such resources created by 29 international organizations and 68 countries. The issues of traditional source criticism of audiovisual sources, methods of their digitization and description of the received electronic copies are analyzed by the author along with computer methods of studying audiovisual documentation converted into digital format. Despite the limited circulation, the monograph should be recommended not as a textbook, but as a reference guide and to a wider range of specialties.

Keywords: source analysis, historiography, online film archives, online photo archives, online audio archives, digital humanities, source studies, online resources, audiovisual archives, system analysis