Russians according to Lev Gumilev
Russians according to Lev Gumilev

Summary/Abstract: Lev Gumilev (1912–1922) was the son of the famous poets Anna Akhmatova and Nikolai Gumilev. Nikolai was executed by the Bolsheviks in 1921. As a child of an “enemy of the people,” Lev Gumilev was removed from the University of Leningrad and four times imprisoned or sent to Soviet concentration camps (1935–1956). After the XX Congress of the CPSU, Gumilev continued his academic career as a notable historian, geographer and ethnologist. His ideas qualify him as a leading Neo-Eurasianist. He believed that the Russians should be proud of the Tatar-Mongol heritage of their country. According to him, the “Tatar yoke” of Rus’ of the Middle Ages was nothing but an alliance against the influence of the West. Gumilev's main achievement was the rectification of "the black legend" surrounding the Hun, ancient Turk and Mongol civilizations.

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