Ethnography of Mountain Jews Based on Materials from the 1994 Expedition

Abstract

Almost thirty years ago, a joint Russian-Israeli expedition took place, working in the places where Mountain Jews lived in Azerbaijan and Dagestan. The ethnographic materials collected during this event remained unclaimed for a long time. The article fills this gap. In contrast to the existing descriptions (Judas Chernyi, Mikhail Bezhanov, Ilya Anisimov, Mikhail Ikhilov, etc.), data from about a dozen interviews with informants conducted by the team members allow us to take a fresh look at ethnography of Mountain Jews. Previously, researchers sought to solve for themselves the question of the origin of this group and, willy-nilly, paid primary attention to the preservation of the “common Jewish” component in its culture. The 1994 material shows many micro-traditions among various local communities of Mountain Jews, which helps to clarify how they coexisted with adherents of other religions for centuries.