Smoking is a real disaster for Russia. Although the number of smokers has been gradually falling in recent years, all the same, according to statistics, in 2017, 15% of Russian women and 45% of men were in captivity of addiction. A fair question arises: who brought tobacco to Russia, who distributed this narcotic potion and taught Russian people to use it?
Historical digression
But first you need to know how the smoking of this plant appeared in Europe. After all, it was the Europeans who brought tobacco to Russia. Columbus' discovery of the New World brought many exotic foods and treasures to the Old World. In addition to piles of gold and such amazing plants as potatoes, cocoa, pineapples, tomatoes, the Columbus expedition introduced Europe to tobacco leaves.
In the autumn of 1492, Europeans who reached the shores of San Salvador saw dried tobacco leaves and smoking natives. Soon, two Spaniards from the Columbus team became addicted to inhalationfragrant smoke, becoming the first smokers of the Old World. Within a few decades, the Spaniards grew tobacco on the Caribbean islands they discovered, and then the Europeans began to arrange tobacco plantations on their own continent.
Reasons for the popularity of tobacco
It didn't take long for smoking to become a fashionable activity in Europe. All segments of the population smoked, from kings and nobles to merchants and apprentices. Everyone who had enough money for it. The popularity of tobacco leaves was due to several factors, and those who brought tobacco to Russia will take advantage of them a little later, here are the main ones:
- Exotic. Many products, things and traditions brought from the New World attracted Europeans with novelty and unusualness, and smoking was no exception.
- Utility. At first, the inhabitants of Europe sincerely believed in the healing properties of tobacco, scientists and merchants declared it almost a panacea, relieving many ailments. In 1571, the Spaniard Nicholas Mondares even wrote a scientific work in which he claimed that smoking helps to cure 36 different diseases.
- Addictiveness. Being a drug, nicotine quickly developed a powerful addiction in smokers.
- Profitability. The high demand, the growing number of consumers and the relatively small volume of tobacco leaf imports and production have turned the tobacco trade into a very lucrative business. Merchants, as in all times, promoted their goods in every possible way in order to increase their own profits.
Who was the first to bring tobacco to Russia?
There are quite a fewa stable but erroneous conjecture that for the first time tobacco leaves appeared in Russia thanks to Peter the Great. In fact, this happened long before the reign of the reformer king. There is also some confusion about the country where the nicotine potion first came to the Russian state. According to different versions, tobacco was brought to Russia from the USA, Europe or Latin America.
Russian people got acquainted with smoking a little later than Western Europeans. This happened in the second half of the 16th century during the time of Ivan the Terrible. The history of the emergence of tobacco in Russia began with English merchants who presented the court with a new fun as a gift. But smoking did not become popular, in addition, tobacco was not available and very expensive, because it was practically imported into the country.
Prohibition
During the Time of Troubles, the number of people who brought tobacco to Russia increased. These were merchants, foreign travelers, hired soldiers. Little by little, tobacco smoking gained more and more admirers among Russians. By the beginning and middle of the seventeenth century, the attitude of the authorities towards this product changed from neutral to extremely negative. True, the royal bans on smoking were caused not by concern for the he alth of subjects, but by numerous fires that burned entire blocks of wooden cities and often occurred because of smokers.
Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich outlawed tobacco. At first, the prohibitions were rather mild: only merchants were fined and occasionally corporally punished, and the tobacco leaf found was destroyed. But these measures proved to be ineffective. smokersthere were more, and the merchants continued to sell tobacco, because the fear of a fearless punishment was incomparably weaker than the thirst for profit.
After a great fire in the capital in 1634, the laws became much tougher. For smoking and selling tobacco, the death pen alty was due, which in practice was usually replaced by cutting off the lips or nose and a reference to hard labor. However, these measures could not overcome the bad habit that had already taken root in Russia.
Therefore, the next Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich tried to streamline the use of tobacco through the state monopoly on its sale, but faced the irreconcilable displeasure of the Church, headed by the most authoritative Patriarch Nikon. Tobacco "blasphemous and demonic" potion was again totally banned.
Tsar Peter
Everything changed with the coming to power of Peter, in February 1697 he abolished the prohibitions and signed the law on the free trade in tobacco. Then the tsar went with the Great Embassy to Europe, from where he brought tobacco to Russia again and a passionate love for him. The young reformer decided to instill this passion in his people with the same vigor with which he imposed European traditions on the population.
Some historians believe that Peter became addicted to smoking in his youth, when he became a regular guest in Nemetskaya Sloboda, but finally decided that tobacco is good for Russia while visiting Holland, Venice, England. It was to the English merchants that the tsar gave the monopoly right to import tobacco into Russia for six years.
Soon, tobacco money began to regularly fill the treasury, helping Peter to carry outnumerous reforms and wage long wars. Smoking was promoted, the king himself did not part with his pipe and was very fond of smoking, which set a clear example for his subjects. To be less dependent on importers, the first domestic tobacco factories were built. It became clear that the appearance of tobacco in Russia is serious and for a long time.
Catherine the Great
Under Catherine, the policy of the ruling circles has not changed. Smoking replenished the treasury and was popular in all circles of society from the queen to the peasant. Specially for the empress, high-quality cigars were brought, wrapped in silk ribbons, which protected the queen's delicate skin from touching the coarse tobacco leaf. Catherine encouraged the tobacco business, both domestic and foreign merchants were actively involved in it. An interesting fact: in Catherine's time, snuff was more popular than smoking.
From Catherine to the present day
Nicotine finally entered the life of a Russian person. During the reign of Alexander I, the production of Russian smoking tobacco increased six or more times compared to the Catherine era. They smoked it, sniffed it, chewed it, used pipes, cigars, hand-rolled cigarettes, even hookahs. In the second half of the 19th century, factory cigarettes came into fashion. During the First World War, tobacco production experienced a real boom, as shag and cigarettes were always included in officer and soldier rations.
The Bolsheviks who came to power took the tobacco factories from the owners,nationalizing them, but there was no question of stopping production. During the Second World War, all factories were evacuated and continued to work properly, because tobacco became a strategic product, it was impossible to imagine the rations of Soviet soldiers without it.
After the great victory, the Soviet tobacco factories only increased their capacity. The collapse of the USSR was followed by a string of bankruptcies of enterprises producing such products. Without a government order, they could not survive and became part of larger companies, usually foreign ones. Today, Russians are provided with tobacco products by large multinational companies.
Sad statistics
For several years, the Russian authorities have been conducting an anti-tobacco campaign and spending a lot of money on it, there are fewer tobacco advertisements on TV and in the media, more and more often you can see anti-smoking advertising or promoting a he althy lifestyle. I would like to believe that the priorities of the state are changing, and now the he alth of the nation is becoming more important. After all, the damage that smoking causes to Russia is enormous and is difficult to comprehend and calculate. Here are just a few revealing facts:
- there are more than a billion smokers in the world, in Russia there are several tens of millions;
- annually about 5 million people die from causes caused by nicotine addiction, by 2030 this figure could rise to 10 million;
- according to statisticians, in the coming decades, tobacco will take the lives of 20 million Russians;
- there are over a hundred ways to quit smoking, but more oftenthe reason to give up addiction is a deadly disease that overtook the smoker;
- 60% of people who quit smoking were surprised how easy it was for them.
Now you know who brought tobacco to Russia.
