Last Old-believers on the Chikoi-river 

    The Chikoi administrative region is one of a special interest, because it’s the place where the small group of russian old-believers lives.

    In the middle of the 17th century there was a schism in the Russian church. As a result of the reforms in the services many believers separated from the official church, because they considered these formal changes to be a sign of the coming kingdom of the Antichrist and the beginning of the last time. At the end of the 17th century these first russian religious dissidents were exiled from the central part of Russia. Some of them emigrated to Poland. After the annexation of some polish lands to Russia in the 18th century the old-believers who lived there were deported to Zabaikalye and settled in the areas, which were very hard to get to.

    Living in compact, cloistered groups the Chikoi old-believers preserved their traditional way of life, russian national clothing of the 17th-18th centuries and also their original choir singing.

    The Chikoi old-believers belong mainly to the so called “bespopovtsy” (“the priestless”), which means that they do not acknowledge the sacrament of the priesthood and form christian communities of laymen, which are governed by the so called “nachyotchik”. This fact makes them similar to christian communities of the radical Protestants of the Reformation’s epoch. Like them the russian old-believers shared the fate of the religious exiles and founded prosperous settlements in the wildest places and countries.

    The expansion of the western civilization and mass culture managed to do what the russian government during three hundred years and even in the time of the communist atheism didn’t succeed in. The mentality of the old-believers is being destroyed and thier way of life is rapidly changing. All these promotes their quick assimilation and even their total disappearance as a special russian national type.