Orenburg downy shawl history. Russian folk crafts. Orenburg downy shawl. Subtleties and nuances of manufacturing

22.09.2019

In this blizzard unkind evening,
When the snow haze along the roads,
Throw it on, dear, on your shoulders
Orenburg downy shawl.

According to one of the legends, the first Russian settlers who arrived in the Urals were surprised at the light attire of the Kalmyk and Kazakh jigits, galloping across the endless steppes of the former Kirghiz - Kaisak Horde.

The secret of resisting the severe Ural frosts turned out to be unusual: as a lining for their light clothes, they used scarves knitted from goat down. The scarves were sewn without any patterns, performing only a utilitarian function: to keep the owner warm.

This approach to knitting downy shawls changed when Russian Cossack women got down to business, who began to apply patterns on downy products. Quite quickly, such an innovation became more and more widespread, and Orenburg shawls became known even outside the region. The extraordinary fluff of the Orenburg goats, together with amazing patterns, won new admirers.

The real fame for the Orenburg shawl came in the 19th century. Village needlewomen began to receive international awards. Interest in the region grew so much that overseas merchants came to a distant Russian province for the fluff of famous goats.

The down of Orenburg goats is unsurpassed in quality: it is elastic, soft, extremely light, has little thermal conductivity, is perfectly spun and has a high felling capacity. In terms of fineness, it is not inferior to the silk and fluff of the angora rabbit. It surpasses merino wool in strength and extensibility; Orenburg goat down differs from the latter also in that it goes into production with almost full weight

Foreign companies tried to establish production in Europe and even South America. Goats were taken away for thousands of kilometers, but it was surprising that already 2-3 years after the resettlement, the goats lost their best properties and brought fluff, not much different from the fluff of ordinary goats. Only the frosty Ural climate was good for the Orenburg goats.

Desperate to get Orenburg goats, foreigners began to buy down from Orenburg. The products were so famous that one of the British companies that produced downy shawls marked them as "imitation of Orenburg".

In the 20th century, wars and the Iron Curtain of the Soviet era meant the end of the era of world fame for the Orenburg region. However, this did not mean the end of the development of down-knitting craft. One of the innovations was the use of down from both Orenburg and Volgograd goats. The down of Volgograd goats was well suited for knitting white scarves, which was appreciated by local needlewomen.

Another change was the foundation of the Orenburg downy shawls factory. The craftsmen of the famous down-knitting regions became the masters of the workshop. Saraktash craftswomen rightfully took a prominent place at the Factory.

The use of machines opened up wide opportunities for experimentation: the ability to apply virtually any patterns to down products in a short time opened up scope for imagination. The middle of the scarf knitted even better than by hand.

Despite the fact that real Orenburg duvets work in strict accordance with the canons that distinguish the Orenburg downy shawl from any other, each locality of the Orenburg region has its own characteristics both in the technique of patterns and in the technique of knitting downy shawls and cobwebs.

For example, the Saraktash downy gossamer is very close to the old works of the 50s. The web is simple in composition. In terms of artistic design, she may lose, but her individual style remains.

Upper Chebenki and the village of Zheltoye are located not far from Saraktash, and the patterns on the downy cobwebs are very different. Verkhneozerny also has its own drawings, which are not found anywhere else. The Orenburg downy gossamer can be distinguished from others by accuracy, rigor and imagination. There are more classics and canons in the countryside.

The teeth on the downy cobwebs look like a fortress wall around the ancient city, then the border is knitted, after that the "lattice", then the middle. And, of course, holes are knitted in a downy gossamer - ordinary, round, everted.

The entire downy web consists of them, and the process of creativity is built on them: how to arrange these holes first into simple drawings - "flower", "kosoryadka", "chain", and then more complex ones - "snowflake", "honeycombs".

Even more complex ones are built from the latter - "circles", "snakes". Depending on the level of the duvet, downy shawls are obtained - either simple, or mediocre, or works of art.

Despite the great difficulties in knitting, Orenburg downy shawls were of high artistic quality. Down knitters worked with inspiration, putting a lot of work, love, initiative, artistic ideas and taste into their work. In this regard, the names of the patterns are also characteristic: "cat's paws", "cobweb", "oblique row", "herringbone", "checkers", "lattices", "windows", "mouse footprint", "triple berry", "patterned berry", "large raspberry", "reversible pattern".

How are Orenburg downy shawls knitted? First, down is selected, combed, and spun. One craftswoman loves hard fluff, the other works with soft fluff. A person adapts the knitting of downy scarves for himself. Knitting needles, spindle - everything is also selected individually. It turns out that in order to knit a classic downy gossamer or a downy shawl, you must meet about twenty requirements: from down processing to knitting methods.

Orenburg duvets create extraordinary samples of downy shawls. An openwork downy gossamer is especially weightless and tender, which, with dimensions of 2.5 by 2.5 meters, weighs no more than 80 grams, but can freely pass through a wedding ring and fit in a goose egg shell.

The work of down knitters is very laborious and painstaking. To make a handkerchief by hand, it is necessary to perform a series of successive operations: clean the fluff from the hair, comb it three times on the combs, straighten the thread on the spindle, build the down thread with a thread of natural silk for an openwork scarf, wind it into balls, tie and, finally, clean finished scarf. On average, a knitter spent about 257 hours on knitting one warm scarf, and 195 hours on making an openwork scarf.

But the ornament of a scarf often depends on the prevailing and rural nationality. Ukrainian culture gravitates toward the flower; Tatar, Kazakh, Bashkir - to a geometric pattern; and in the villages, where the population is mixed, their own special motifs of a scarf arise. Yes, and knitting scarves is individual. One down jacket is capable of fine work, different patterns are born in her head, while the other knits only one pattern all her life, having mastered it to perfection.

Again, as in the 19th century, the Orenburg shawl was in the spotlight, this time within the USSR. Arriving from Orenburg without a down scarf was considered disrespectful. Those leaving for Orenburg invariably received the same task: to bring the famous product home.

The factory received a large number of letters with the same request, but almost always had to be refused with regret: the Factory was not able to meet the demand even in the Orenburg region, there could be no talk of other regions. The Orenburg shawl has become a luxury.

Changes in the political and economic course of the country in the early 90s brought changes to the down knitting industry. The shortage of Orenburg products in other areas led to the fact that entrepreneurs began to carry down shawls to remote regions of Russia, where the demand of the population for Orenburg products was high even during the economic downturn.

If the new scarf is warm, soft and fluffy, and the fluff seems to hang from the product, you most likely have a downy scarf in your hands of not the highest quality: the fluff may soon come out all over, only cotton threads will remain, since the scarf is combed comb.

A real Orenburg downy shawl - at first unfluffy. It is like a bud of a beautiful flower, it only becomes more beautiful when it opens. Its best properties appear only after a while, and not when it just came off the spokes.

It is often believed that Orenburg scarves are worn only by the elderly who need warmth. In fact, this is not true: if downy shawls are really worn mainly by women in adulthood and old age, then Orenburg downy cobwebs and stoles are actually worn only by young girls.

Amazingly delicate, light and beautiful stoles and cobwebs emphasize feminine beauty. As a rule, white products are chosen, which look especially good.

It happens that people who bought a downy scarf and found viscose, silk or cotton threads in it are indignant, they begin to claim that this is a fake, consisting of synthetics. However, the peculiarity of a downy scarf is that it cannot be knitted 100% of down: in this case, the product “rolls down” and lasts a very short time.

To prevent this from happening, the yarn should consist not only of downy threads, but also of the “warp”, that is, cotton, silk or viscose threads - in this case, the scarf will last a long time: the warp gives the product strength, down - warmth and elegance. However, the proportion of the base should be relatively small.

Types of Orenburg downy shawls

Orenburg downy shawl - a square product of dense knitting with openwork teeth or without teeth along the edges
Downy shawl - Orenburg downy shawl of large size, with embroidery or fringe along the edges
Downy scarf - a triangular downy product with cloves or tassels along the edges, tightly knit
Downy cobweb - a square product, openwork, with teeth, very light, finely knitted cobwebs easily pass through the wedding ring
Downy stole - a rectangular openwork scarf with teeth, has the properties of a gossamer.

Down care

Before washing, a scarf, cobweb, stole must be typed in the teeth on a nylon thread. Wash such products only in warm water at a temperature of no more than 40 degrees. Very often, in the absence of special products and at home, downy things are washed with soft powders for woolen things or just shampoos for washing hair.

Products when washing just gently “rinse” and do not rub, do not twist, do not iron! Down products should not be “soaked” or kept in water for more than 15 minutes. They "sit down" from this. After washing, products knitted from fluff should be gently squeezed out, passing them between the fingers. Rinse in warm water with the addition of vinegar (1 tablespoon per 5 liters of water).

Dry flat on an open surface on a cotton cloth. Orenburg downy shawls should be stored in linen or paper bags so that the down "breathes".

In the coldest time, when large flakes of snow swirl in the sky shrouded in dark clouds, when the trees bend under the weight of crunchy white caps, when the frost, sparing no one, begins to pinch your cheeks - Orenburg downy shawl will reliably warm you.

Sudarushka's blog

The path from Orenburg to the regional center of Saraktash, the ancient “nesting” of down knitters, and from there to the village of Zheltoe, where famous masters of this craft live and work, is not close. The winter steppe, like a downy shawl, spreads outside the bus window, suggesting reflections on the origins of the Orenburg craft and its history.

One of the first scientists who told about the Orenburg region and its riches was Pyotr Ivanovich Rychkov. In 1762, his article "Topography of the Orenburg province" appeared in the journal "Monthly Works for the Benefit and Amusement of Employees". Rychkov was also one of the first to become seriously interested in goats, which are “near Yaik; and especially on the Zayaitskaya steppe they happen in herds and are so frisky that it is impossible for any dog to steal. The scientist visited the shepherds, saw samples of products made of fluff and suggested setting up a down-knitting industry in the region.

The Ural Cossacks, who once settled on Yaik, also could not help but be attracted by the clothes of the local population - Kalmyks and Kazakhs. In a bitter cold, when even a Russian fur coat did not keep warm well, the cattle breeders prancing on their undersized horses in light-looking clothes made of goat skins and felt. How can they endure such cold? wondered the Cossacks. They marveled until they found out that under their light jackets, the cattle breeders wore warm undershirts and scarves knitted from silky down combed from goats. The Cossacks began to exchange down and products from it for tea and tobacco. Among the Kalmyks and Kazakhs, the knitting of down products was “deaf”. The Ural Cossacks, who knew lace and embroidery, began to use floral ornaments in knitting - living motifs of nature. Under the quiet crackle of the torch, they knitted delicate shawls and snow-white openwork shawls, thin as cobwebs, on long winter evenings.

Perhaps on the same clear December day as today, in 1861, a sleigh cart rolled towards Orenburg. Only the ringing of a bell and the occasional snoring of snarled horses broke the dead silence of the boundless steppe. Every now and then, families of young oaks and birches with a thin openwork pattern of naked peaks ran into the narrow road, intricate stitches of hare and fox tracks stretched along the roadsides. Such winter trips were very fond of Maria Nikolaevna Uskova. She slowly considered winter patterns and plots, so that later her soul and hands would ripen for marvelous creativity, so that she, a simple Cossack girl, could create a miracle! ..

In Orenburg, Uskova submitted a written request to the governor to accept and send downy shawls she brought to the world exhibition in England. When she found out that her request was granted, she was delighted and frightened: her needlework would be sent to London, as far away as the end of the world! Six of her scarves with a brief description that "products of this kind are handmade everywhere in the Orenburg Territory" graced the world exhibition. Before the closing of the exposition, all the scarves were sold out, and a few months later, a representative of the Cossack army delivered to the farm near the village of Orenburgskaya, where Maria Uskova lived, and handed over to her, against receipt, the medal “For goat down shawls”, a diploma and 125 silver rubles. This receipt and Uskova's petition are stored in the archives of the Orenburg Governor-General. On a yellowed piece of paper, it is written in a sweeping and ornate manner: “For lack of a letter from Maria Uskova, at her personal request, her police officer Fyodor Guryev laid his hand.”

After the closing of the world exhibition in London, the English company Lipner organized a large enterprise for the development of products "Imitation near Orenburg".

The village of Yellow met me with frost and sunshine. Bluish snowdrifts on the sides of wide parallel streets, neatly painted huts with blue shutters, brown spurs of the Ural Mountains in the distance... An old strong village, built on a grand scale. Back in 1825, an outpost of the Cossacks was created here.

On one of the streets, Pochtovaya, there is a freshly whitewashed hut of Shamsuri Abdrafikovna Abdullina, one of the best local knitters. The mistress of the house, plump, round-faced, in a flannel dressing-gown, sits me down for a cup of tea, asking first if I would drink with milk or "city-style."

After tea, Shamsuri invites me into the room, sits down at the table and, taking out a bundle of fluff, says:

- First of all, you need to select hair and other impurities that are visible to the eye from the fluff. - Untying the knot, she separates a small piece and invites me to do this operation. I examine the tiny ball of fluff carefully. Long and hard I try to clean it from small grass seeds. Slow and tedious work, which a hundred and two hundred years ago was carried out in exactly the same way.

- Now you need to make the first comb on a two-row comb. Now I will show it to you. Our comb will be a hundred years old. And my mother scratched on it, and my grandmother.

Shamsuri adjusts a wooden square with a sharp steel comb on his knee and, putting a little fluff on the comb, pulls the finest threads through the teeth.

— During the first combing, short fibers are separated. Then the fluff is washed in soapy water and dried in the air. Dry, clean fluff is combed two or three more times until a shine appears. Now you can start spinning. - The craftswoman takes the spindle in her right hand, and in her left - a handful of ready-made fluff. With a quick movement of his fingers, he rotates the spindle, and now a mound of the most delicate, thinner hair, downy thread is growing on it.

“The fluff is spun, but it’s still impossible to knit,” the craftswoman explains. - The downy thread is wound with a thin thread of natural silk, while twisting for strength. Now the yarn is ready. — Shamsuri unfolds a bundle with knitting. An almost finished openwork white "cobweb" falls on his knees.

- I start knitting with a braid of forty-five cloves, then I pick up four hundred loops along the length of the braid, it is important not to make a mistake, otherwise the pattern will not come out. Yes, see for yourself.

Shamsuri puts on glasses, habitually pins knitting with a pin to her dress - for the evenness of the loop, she explains. Thin, short and sharp as needles, the needles only flicker in flexible fingers. Whether she knits a simple garter loop or double crochets is impossible to tell.

Where do you get patterns from? I'm interested.

- There are many patterns - honeycombs, deafness, cat's paws ... Every knitter knows them, they have been passed from hand to hand for a long time. Look: these small holes are called millet, and these larger ones are kings, and chain holes are mouse trails, and here are kosoryadki. My circle consists of squares, millet, fish and skewers, and the border consists of snowflakes and deafness. - Shamsuri straightens the knitting and shows four identical rectangles and in the center a rhombus unlike them.

- This is a five-round scarf. While working, I mentally divide the scarf into four identical parts. I do the calculation at the very beginning of work, and then the fingers themselves feel which loops to knit and how many of them need to be done in each row. I've been knitting since I was seven years old. At first she helped her mother, then she herself began to knit “cobwebs”. I trained all my nieces, and I have seven of them. And how to calculate new patterns, and how to knit each loop, and so that the knitting needles are not held close to the eyes and the thread is not twisted when spinning. This is our craft. It is very homely. From offspring to offspring, all the best is passed on. From mother to daughter, from grandmother to granddaughter. We have two hundred knitters in Zhelty, and they all share their art.

It has long been believed that true mastery comes only to a good person. Greed has settled in your soul - true beauty will not be revealed to you, do not knit you a good scarf. How many parables, legends about this in the Ural steppes!

It is impossible to look away from the quick and dexterous movements of the hands of the craftswoman. On the index finger of her left hand is a small, cartilage-like callus. A downy thread has flowed over this place for many years.

No wonder they say: for a knitter, fluff and patterns, that for an artist, brushes and a palette are “one material, but different talent.” And craftsmanship counts here. It is not for nothing that every down jacket in the Orenburg region dreams of knitting a scarf of the famous craftswoman Nastasya Yakovlevna Shelkova in the past: five arshins in length and five in width, so that it not only fits into a golden ring, but also fits into the shell of a goose egg.

Having knitted the last teeth, Shamsuri tightens the loop. Now the scarf must be washed, bleached, sheathed along the teeth with cotton braid and carefully pulled onto a wooden frame.

- How many hours did you knit this "cobweb"?

- Hard to say. When it knits faster, when it slows down. According to the plan, the workers of the Orenburg plant must hand over one "spider web" per month - one and a half meters by one and a half, and one stole. But sometimes I get two stoles.

I already know that Shamsuri Abdullina's gossamer webs visited world exhibitions in Canada and Japan, that she is a participant in many All-Russian and All-Union exhibitions.

For the last time I look around the clean room with a high bed, lots of lush pillows, red-blue rugs and colorful rugs on a light, yellow-scraped floor ... True, they say that a good craftswoman does not know how to do anything bad.

All the way back to Saraktash, while the "jeep" is jumping over the icy hillocks of the country road, I keep looking at the even and flat steppe, at the rare, gray, elm and honeysuckle bushes that have not shed frost, at the flocks of velvet panicles of reeds not covered with snow. On the side of the road there are traces of hare raids: two larger holes together and two smaller ones apart, and here the fox ran through, as if she had stitched with a typewriter. It can be seen that these snowy plains, severe frosts and expanse steppe songs helped the Orenburg knitters to find the ornament of their needlework, its language and rhythm.

But the Orenburg downy shawl owes its fame to the laborious art of goat breeders.

There are five goat-breeding state farms in the Orenburg region. My path lies in the "Southern" in the Sol-Iletsk district.

Orenburg downy goat ... There are many breeds of goats on earth living in almost all latitudes. White hornless Swiss; small slate-black African; large graceful, with white wool Angora; hook-nosed coarse-haired Nile, bringing up to five kids in one lamb and giving up to eight liters of milk per day; hornless, with white long hair alpine; dairy German ... But all these goats do not have such fluff as the Orenburg goat.

The French doctor Bernier, who traveled in 1664 in Tibet, saw there beautiful fabrics and headdresses, the very ones that sometimes found their way to the West and delighted merchants and buyers. Bernier became interested in where the raw materials for these warm and elegant products come from, and learned that this was the down of cashmere goats. The doctor was eager to breed such goats in France. But many years passed before the French began to implement his idea.

In 1818, Orientalist Professor Joubert set off for Kashmir goats. On the way to Tibet, he stopped in Odessa and learned from local entrepreneurs that between Astrakhan and Orenburg shepherds graze downy goats - descendants of Kashmir. Professor Joubert examined the down of the Orenburg goat and found it much better than that of the purebred Tibetan. He bought 1300 goats. This huge flock was driven to the Black Sea coast and sent by ship to Marseille. Only four hundred goats and only a few goats survived the long voyage in cramped and stuffy holds. The remaining animals were groomed and protected as protected animals, but, alas, the goats began to hopelessly lose their outstanding "downy" qualities and within a few years turned into coarse-haired ones. They did not take root in the beautiful meadows of England and Latin America, where they were also brought from Russia. It became clear that for the maturation of down, special climatic conditions are needed, such as in the Orenburg steppes.

Having given the necessary orders, the chief livestock specialist of the state farm offered to see the barns where the goats spend the winter.

“A goat is an affectionate and very affectionate animal,” Mikhail Pavlovich Kutyrev told along the way. - Previously, there was an apt expression "a goat is a poor man's cow." In fact, a comfortable and profitable animal. The goat is resistant to epidemics, picky about food. We are faced with two main tasks: the first is to give more excellent fluff; the second is to conduct breeding work more seriously, grow and multiply flocks of Orenburg goats. The number of livestock in our state farm has doubled in recent years. And the increase in purchase prices for down strengthened the economy of the state farm. Our business has been profitable for a long time. From the main industry, we receive up to three hundred thousand rubles of annual profit.

From the village street we turned onto a straight and wide highway. On either side are long sheds under a slate roof, neatly whitewashed. The yard of each barn is fenced off from the road and neighboring barns.

“This is our goat-breeding winter town. Here the goats live for three or four months, the coldest.

We enter one of the yards, filled with brownish and gray tan goats. It smelled of fresh hay and the steppe wind. The yard is covered with wheat straw, and against the golden background, the brown goats look like watercolors.

A red-faced man walks towards us. Let's get acquainted. This is the owner of the "residence" shepherd Ivan Grigoryevich Yakubenko. I ask him to tell me about his work.

“The goat, of course, grazes in the steppe for most of the year, but this does not mean at all that it can not be fed,” Ivan Grigorievich begins his story. - Our shepherds say so: from a thin goat and thin fluff. Feed is the number one concern. The state farm spares no expense for this. My wife and I now feed our goats with hay, grain, and concentrates. They also eat branches of willow, linden, willow. The fluff on a goat grows and matures on its own, of course, but the shepherd's watch is constantly needed. Leave the goat without salt - the fluff is not the same, it has eaten protein - the fluff is completely sick, the ticks have stuck to the goat - the fluff has disappeared, it was too late to scratch the goat - the fluff is overripe.

- Look, - Ivan Grigorievich catches the nearest goat by the horn, which is closely watching a new person in the flock, - down is laid in September - November. See how he has grown?

I touch the smoky chocolate, soft and warm "clothes" of the goat and immediately pull my hand away - the animal shuddered sharply. The shepherd released the goat, and it immediately mixed with the flock. After a minute, I can no longer distinguish her from the others. All have small, curved horns, a tiny beard and bangs. The back is straight, slightly raised behind, the legs are strong, low.

Our next visit is to the shepherd Zhumabay Karazhanov. Thin, mobile, with a face dark from an indestructible tan, he is trying to make us comfortable on the bench.

“Rain is needed, wind is needed, strong frost is needed so that the fluff on the goat is good,” he says in a voice hoarse from a cold, “and honesty in work is also needed, very great honesty. Why did Karazhanov hand over 145 kilograms of down in excess of the plan? I'll return the valushka two, or even three times to the comber - here, I'll show you, I didn't finish it and left it here - and I'll make it comb out everything to the gram.

Fluff scratching is a difficult task. They tried to replace the manual comb with a machine here - it didn’t work out yet. And now they scratch by hand. The norm is ten to twelve goats per shift. There are thousands of goats on the state farm, they must be processed quickly, within two weeks, otherwise the fluff will overripe. Goats are scratched twice - in February and March. The down of the first chesky is the most valuable. The down of the Orenburg goat is elastic, light, gentle, fluffy, it has low thermal conductivity. By fineness (fineness) and. silkiness, it is not inferior to Angora down.

It must be that, in protection from the severe winter cold and the merciless summer heat, the undercoat grows on goats - fluff - that fabulous, fleece from which the famous Orenburg shawl is knitted.

“I’ll stroke the goat’s back, if the fluff remains in my hand, it’s urgent to scratch it,” continues Zhumabay Karazhanovich. - Yes, and she herself gives a sign, rubs, itches on stones or bushes. In a warm winter, molting occurs earlier than in a cold one. Down matures faster in goats with good fatness, in adult animals earlier than in young animals, in goats later than in queens. You can’t keep goats in warm sheds for a long time - the fluff stops growing ...

Downy rivers flow from goat-breeding state farms to Orenburg, to the combine and the downy shawl factory. There, young workers on computer-controlled machines weave solid gray shawls and white "cobwebs", and in the villages of the Orenburg region, in twenty departments of the plant, the handmade Orenburg shawl is born, the glory of which does not age.

Ekaterina Frolova
1979

The Orenburg downy shawl, along with the Tula samovar, matryoshka, Khokhloma painting, Gzhel, Palekh, Vologda lace, Dymkovo toy, Rostov enamel, Ural malachite, is one of the symbols of Russia. Down-knitting craft originated in the Orenburg region about 250 years ago, back in the 18th century. According to other sources, the knitting of downy shawls from goat down was already knitted by the indigenous population of these places before the formation of the Orenburg province. Its origins were not only needlewomen, but also scientists, researchers, art enthusiasts. The first who turned his attention to the Orenburg downy shawls was P.I. Rychkov. In 1766 P.I. Rychkov published a study "Experience on goat hair", proposing to organize down-knitting craft in the region. Subsequently, Academician P.P. Pekarsky, compiled a description of Rychkov’s life and called him “the creator of that handicraft in the Orenburg Cossack army, which feeds more than one thousand people for the second century.”

Outside of Orenburg, downy shawls became widely known after the meeting of the Free Economic Society on January 20, 1770. At this meeting, A.D. Rychkova was awarded a gold medal "in gratitude for the diligence shown to society by collecting goat down products."

Orenburg downy shawls were first presented abroad at the Paris International Exhibition of 1857. Thus, the Orenburg shawl entered the international level and received recognition there. In 1862, at the London Exhibition, the Orenburg Cossack M. N. Uskova received the medal "For goat down shawls."

The down of Orenburg goats is the thinnest in the world: the thickness of the down of Orenburg goats is 16-18 microns, that of Angora goats (mohair) is 22-24 microns. Therefore, products made from Orenburg down - shawls and cobwebs - are especially tender and soft. Severe frosty winters with snow and Orenburg snowstorms - snowstorms, as well as the feeding habits of Orenburg goats - the vegetation of the mountain steppes of the Urals - these are the main reasons why the breed of Orenburg goats has such a thin fluff. However, this fluff is very durable - stronger than wool. The most surprising thing is that Orenburg goats are bred only in the Orenburg region. The attempts of the French in the 19th century to take the Orenburg goat out of the Volga region failed: goats need thin fluff to keep warm, and the mild climate of France did not contribute to this. Orenburg goats in France degenerated, turning into ordinary goats with coarse thick down. In the XVIII-XIX centuries, France exported tens of thousands of pounds of Orenburg down, which was valued higher than Kashmir. Western Europe still buys a lot of Orenburg down.

Orenburg cobwebs reached their peak of popularity at the sunset of the development of the Russian Empire. At this time, products marked "Imitation near Orenburg" began to be made in England. But in our time, abroad, not only many notes and articles are published in foreign media, but also entire books are published about the history of fishing and knitting of Orenburg downy products.

Orenburg shawls come in several types:

simple downy shawl (shawl) - gray (rarely white) thick warm downy shawls. It was with the manufacture of shawls that the Orenburg down-knitting craft began. The warmest type of scarf. These scarves are used for everyday wear.

cobweb - an openwork product made of finely spun goat down and silk. Not used for everyday wear. It is used in solemn, festive occasions, since knitting patterns and techniques are much more complicated than a simple downy scarf. Usually, purer and softer wool is used, which increases the cost of the product.

stole - a thin scarf / cape, according to the method of knitting and application, it is similar to a gossamer.

The cobweb and stole are very thin, like cobwebs, scarves. Thin cobwebs, as a rule, have a complex pattern and are used as decoration. The best thin cobwebs are knitted in the villages of Zheltoye and Shishma of the Saraktash region. Such a cobweb will decorate any dress, regardless of style. The thinness of the product is often determined by 2 parameters: whether the product passes through the ring and whether it fits in a goose egg. However, not every good product necessarily meets these conditions, since each craftswoman spins a thread of different thicknesses, sometimes preferring a thicker thread to a thin one. Silk (rarely viscose or cotton) thread is used as the basis for cobwebs, cotton (rarely lavsan) thread is used for shawls. Spider webs are usually two-thirds down and one-third silk.

A good handmade scarf is knitted from twisted yarn: the craftswoman first spins a dense goat down thread, and then spins it onto a silk (cotton) warp thread. Such a scarf - a gossamer or a shawl - does not initially look fluffy. Products begin to fluff in the process of wearing. This scarf is worn for a very long time.

A good craftswoman can knit two medium-sized cobwebs or three stoles in a month. It takes a month or more to make a large scarf or a scarf with a picture or an inscription. Each scarf is an original work of art, in which a lot of creative work and patience of downy knitters have been invested.

In the Orenburg region, knitting is done not only by hand, but also by machines. Machine-made products are beautiful and less expensive, but cannot be compared with handmade shawls. When knitting, the machine “chops” fluff, and the product becomes coarser. Such a scarf is more like a scarf made of very soft wool. However, the middle of the scarf is knitted by some craftswomen on a typewriter, since in this case the middle of the product turns out to be more even, however, manual work is also valued higher in this case.

The largest collection of scarves is presented in the museum of the history of the Orenburg downy scarf, which is a branch of the Orenburg Regional Museum of Fine Arts.

According to one of the legends, the first Russian settlers who arrived in the Urals were surprised at the light attire of the Kalmyk and Kazakh horsemen galloping across the endless steppes of the former Kirghiz-Kaisatsky Horde. The secret of resisting the severe Ural frosts turned out to be unusual: as a lining for their light clothes, they used scarves knitted from goat down.

The scarves were sewn without any patterns, performing only a utilitarian function: to keep the owner warm.

This approach to knitting downy shawls changed when Russian Cossack women got down to business, who began to apply patterns on downy products. Quite quickly, such an innovation became more and more widespread, and Orenburg downy shawls became known even outside the region. The extraordinary fluff of the Orenburg goats, together with amazing patterns, won new admirers.

The real fame for the Orenburg downy shawl came in the 19th century. Village needlewomen began to receive international awards. Interest in the region grew so much that overseas merchants came to a distant Russian province for the fluff of famous goats.

Another change was the foundation of the Orenburg downy shawls factory. The craftsmen of the famous down-knitting regions became the masters of the workshop.

Saraktash craftswomen rightfully took a prominent place at the Factory. The use of machines opened up wide opportunities for experimentation: the ability to apply virtually any patterns to down products in a short time opened up scope for imagination. The middle of the scarf knitted even better than by hand.

Again, as in the 19th century, the Orenburg downy shawl was in the spotlight, this time within the USSR. Arriving from Orenburg without a down scarf was considered disrespectful. Those leaving for Orenburg invariably received the same task: to bring the famous product home.

However, it would be wrong to talk about the development of the fishery in the last 15 years. In addition to the deteriorating economic situation of the fishery, a new problem has appeared: fakes that have flooded Russian markets. "A real Orenburg downy shawl", from which only cotton threads remain after a month, conquered the markets much faster than real products, spoiling the name of Orenburg.

On "real products from the Orenburg factory" the same "real" labels are pasted. There is no need to talk about manual work: even in Orenburg, it is difficult for a non-specialist to distinguish high-quality knitting.

The hope for the development of the fishery is the sale to other regions and countries, because the products continue to amaze. One such opportunity is online shopping.

It's nice when there is confidence that any resident of the country can find a place where he can buy downy products, the origin of which is beyond doubt. Palantin.ru has become such an online store, presenting products of the famous Orenburg downy shawls Factory and high-quality handmade Orenburg downy shawls and gossamer.

What was considered until recently a luxury has become available to everyone. We hope that the Orenburg downy shawl has a great future ahead - a future based on centuries-old traditions.

It has been a symbol of the Orenburg region and Russia for more than a century. It is customary to bring it as a souvenir from our steppe region, as well as give it to guests. A downy shawl is a work of folk art, in which the soul and all the skill are invested, perhaps that is also why it is so warm and affectionate. Do you want to know how it all began? How did the processes of origin, formation and development of the down-knitting trade go? What is the state of affairs in down knitting today? We are happy to share all the information with you!

Who and when invented to scratch goats and knit down products from their fluff?

And it all started over two centuries ago.

There are several references to this. The first is that shepherds grazed their flocks of goats, raised and fed them for the sake of milk, meat and wool. They didn't know anything about fluff. Cossacks - settlers, communicating with shepherds, casually noticed that the goats were dirty and unkempt. And they offered their help. “We’ll scratch your goats, and we’ll even take everything we scratch with us.” The shepherds marveled at such readiness to help, and they gave the goats to scratch. But this trick only worked once. The next year, in the spring, the Cossacks were already forced to change the combed fluff for food, because the shepherds saw through the “disinterestedness” of the Cossacks. Since then, shepherds began to comb goats every spring and exchange fluff for money and food. And the Cossacks brought their goats.

According to the second giving, far-sighted pastoralists themselves guessed to use goat down. And the Cossacks were amazed - how Kalmyks and Kazakhs do not freeze in such a severe frost, they ride on their black ones, dressed lightly. Then we took a closer look at the horsemen and realized that it was all about the padded jackets and scarves that they wore under their outerwear. These same robes carried only one function - to keep warm, to warm their owner. They were far from the current beautiful openwork shawls. They warmed severe men, and did not decorate fragile female shoulders. Again, the Cossacks found out that goat down was used, and bred their goats in subsidiary farms.

And already the Cossacks, not burdened by farming and special subsidiary farming, began to knit the first openwork scarves from goat down. The properties of the down of the Orenburg goats prompted the Cossack women to think about creating a purely feminine item of clothing. After all, the fluff during spinning was incredibly thin and soft, flax and wool could not be compared with it. Also softly, easily, a downy thread fell into patterns of incredible beauty.

How did the down trade originate?

Geographically, the birthplace of down-knitting craft is the village of Zheltoye, Saraktashsky district of the Orenburg region. It was there, for the first time, that the first openwork cobweb came out from under the knitting needles of the Cossacks!

The Cossacks were resettled to the Southern Urals to protect the state border. And families - wives, children, old people - were relocated with them. And while the Cossacks carried out military service, the rest of the family remained on the farm. They were not trained in agriculture. And the Cossacks owned needlework, they knew lace and embroidery. Then they began to breed those same goats, and knit scarves from their fluff. The patterns of the first downy shawls were based on the motifs of nature. The boundless Orenburg steppe, frosty patterns on the windows, bunches of mountain ash.

On winter evenings, sitting by the torch, women knitted shawls of stunning beauty. At first it was a source of additional income, and then, when scarves became in demand, it turned into a source of the main income.

The experience of the first down knitters was passed down from daughter to mother. Craftsmanship honed and improved. Did they know that they were at the origins of the legend? That scarves will shine at exhibitions in Paris and London? What will become known to the whole world? It is unlikely, they just had to feed their children, and therefore knitted.

Downy scarf conquers the world

Visiting the Orenburg lands in the 60s of the 17th century, Pyotr Ivanovich Rychkov, an explorer and discoverer of the Orenburg region, was the first to pay attention to goats, their down, and its features. Pyotr Ivanovich was among the first to become interested in goats “near Yaik; and especially on the Zayaitskaya steppe they happen in herds and are so frisky that it is impossible for any dog to steal. He talked with the shepherds, appreciated the samples of downy products and offered to open a downy knitting business!

And Rychkov's wife, Alena Denisovna, was so imbued with the idea of creating a down-knitting craft that she herself began to work on this issue. Many Cossack women gathered in the Rychkovs' house, mastered new skills, honed their skills. Once Alena Denisovna took a white downy scarf with her to the capital. And he conquered the capital. The down knitters of the Orenburg province were thanked, and Alena Denisovna was given a medal.

This state of affairs encouraged the Cossacks, they began to comprehend the skill even more than before, and invent new patterns and knitting techniques.

In 1851, at the first World Exhibition in London, the first acquaintance of Europeans with Orenburg down products took place. Of course, the shawls received attention and received awards.

Already at the beginning of the 19th century, the French, trendsetters, declared a downy shawl a fashion accessory, an addition to an outfit. In 1857, at the Paris International Exhibition, everyone was amazed and delighted by the Orenburg downy shawls.

In 1858, the Orenburg craftswomen were rewarded with a large silver medal for scarves at an exhibition in Brussels.

And in 1862, handkerchiefs from the Russian outback shone at the second World Exhibition in London! Bound by the Cossack Maria Nikolaevna Uskova, they won the hearts of the stiff English and not only. Maria Nikolaevna's request to participate in an exhibition in England was granted by the governor, and the craftswoman sent six of her scarves to the exhibition. All of them were instantly sold out as soon as the exhibition ended. The craftswoman received a medal "For", a diploma and 125 pieces of silver!

In 1897, at an exhibition in Chicago, Orenburg downy shawls earned well-deserved medals.

At the Moscow exhibition of the art industry in 1882, 6 scarves from the Orenburg region were also presented. 2 of them were awarded special attention and monetary rewards - scarves by Uskova M.N. and Vladimirova N.R. - 100 rubles for each. Ordinary scarves then cost from 18 to 35 rubles! The Penza shawls, it would seem, also goat down, could not be compared with the Orenburg shawls, but the craftsmanship fell short.

Further, Orenburg downy shawls become regular participants and favorites of international exhibitions: World exhibitions in Canada in 1967 and in Japan in 1968, international fairs in Algeria in 1969, in Syria in 1975, in Greece in 1976, in France in 1977 ., in England in 1979, in Spain in 1981, in India in 1982, in Germany in 1985.

It should be noted that the leading world powers were sometimes interested not in downy shawls, but in goat down itself. Enterprising Americans tried to breed Orenburg goats. They bought them in the Orenburg province and brought them to their homeland in England, Australia, France, South America. But half of the goats died on the way, and the other half did not give in the new climatic conditions that valuable undercoat for which they were transported. It turned out that weather conditions are a decisive factor in the formation of goat down with its unique properties.

Then the British and French decided to export raw materials. In 1824, the French company "Bodier" knitted shawls with the name "porridge". The English company "Lipner and Cohn" from Birmingham at their enterprise produced scarves "imitation of Orenburg".

But still, the most worthy and high-quality scarves were knitted on the Orenburg land. And yes, they are knitting now!

Orenburg province - the cradle of down knitting

In the 70s of the 19th century, no more than 300 women were engaged in down knitting. But the scarf gained such popularity that it was stupid not to knit it skillfully! Demand creates supply, as they say. And in 1900 there were already 4,000 knitters. In 1913, 21,000 men and women knitted scarves for sale. In 1915, the first Cossack downy artel appeared!

The second half of the 20s of the 20th century was marked by an important step for down knitting - the need to mechanize the work of down knitters became acute. And in 1930, on the outskirts of Orenburg, the first down-knitting factory named after the First of May started working in the Union! The creation of the factory, mainly, was to solve the issue of reducing the cost of produced scarves. Because the softness and fluffiness of handmade products could not be recreated by any machines! Down at the factory was still combed and spun by hand, craftswomen also knitted an openwork border. The knitting of the middle of the scarf was mechanized. Every month, the factory gave the country 288 scarves, 80 openwork, the rest - warm. A quality standard for a factory product appeared - down thread should be of the same thickness, the color of the down should be uniform.

However, the mechanization of down knitting did not take place on the basis of this factory. And on the basis of a small, but very ambitious "artel named after the Paris Commune." It was from this artel that the current Downy Scarf Factory grew. The girls started by knitting socks and mittens from fluff waste. We switched to scarves. They mastered the machines, figured out how to knit a border on them. In a word, we have increased the number of down products at times! In 1955, the artel produced as many as 20,800 scarves! The Orenburg downy shawl has become an unsurpassed work of all-Russian significance! In 1960, the artel was renamed the Factory. The new building of the factory was rebuilt in 1966, on this place, on Raskova Street, it is still located.

Today, all processes in the factory are automated. And if a craftswoman knits one scarf by hand for 250 hours, then the factory produces more than 20 pieces in one shift! In 2004, the 50 millionth scarf was knitted

Of course, with the advent of down knitting machines, there were fewer down knitters. Because machine production has reduced the cost of products, and significantly. Downy handmade items both knitted longer and cost more. But how beautiful and good handmade scarves are, how much love and warmth are invested in them! Shawls for true connoisseurs and today are knitted only by hand.

Down knitting today

Of course, not everything is so smooth in the history of down knitting. After the colossal rise of the down industry, in the dashing 90s, its decline began, and even a crisis. Demand for down products has fallen. However, in recent years, the Government of the Orenburg Region has been doing a lot to revive the centuries-old traditions of down knitting! Funds have been created, events are being held, funds are being allocated, and counterfeiting is being fought.

So, for six years now, since 2009, in October it is customary to celebrate the Days of the Orenburg Downy Shawl. Events, as a rule, include exhibitions, flash mobs, festive and competitive programs.

This is a regional holiday, the need for its holding is fixed by the Governor's Decree. The purpose of the festival is to revive national traditions, support the Orenburg puffers and instill such a necessary love for the history of their native land among the younger generation.

The most beautiful event is the action held on Pokrov Day, it is called “Put on a headscarf on Pokrov Day”. On this day, men are encouraged to give, and women to wear snow-white scarves.

On October 13, 2013, as part of the festival, a world record for down knitting was set - 699 knitters (women, men and even children) took up the knitting needles at the same time. Knitters who came from all over the region, so different, but united by one common idea and favorite thing, knitted each of their own from goat down for 5 minutes at the same time!

On November 12, 2015, the identical opening of the Center for Folk Art Crafts in Orenburg took place. This is a new, ultra-fashionable house of the Orenburg downy shawl. Everything related to down knitting is collected under one roof - history and modernity, production technology, the secrets of craftswomen, yarn, patterns, down knitters themselves, both experienced and beginners, museums and galleries on an area of 23,000 m²!

The emergence and development of online stores, of course, contributes to the distribution and development of the Orenburg downy shawl around the world, the development and support of downy knitters. Every day, with their work, proving that fishing on the Orenburg land has not stopped, and the scarf is only getting more beautiful every year!

It remains only to choose - a reliable online store and a product in it! And to become the owner of a handkerchief really from Orenburg, with excellent quality.

April 16th, 2018 03:05 pm

Just like another famous Russian brand - Vologda oil- has its own specific inventor (Nikolai Vasilievich Vereshchagin), in the same way Orenburg downy shawl was in a sense invented by Pyotr Ivanovich Rychkov (1712-1777), who, by the way, also came from the Vologda region. In 1766, Pyotr Ivanovich, a retired Orenburg official, published an article entitled "Experiment on goat down", where he theoretically substantiated the possibility of arranging a down-knitting trade on the then border of Europe and Asia. Quote: “In Russia, almost all goat wool is revered as worthless. Hunting and liking for such things and deeds that can be turned to the benefit of the state prompted me to examine this wool with my own eyes, whether there is at least something suitable for yarn from it Goats under their hair or under their outer coat have another, soft, which is called fluff or dewlap, which is why at the very present time, in December 1765, I ordered, taking one goat, to scratch it with me with a comb with which hair is scratched In this way, they got out of it fluff so thin and soft that it is almost similar to cotton paper ".

If Rychkov himself was a theorist of the use of goat down for knitting needs, then his wife, Elena Denisievna, can be called a real practitioner. She was not just a housewife, but a skillful down knitter, and she experimented not only with goat down, but also with fireweed, for which she even received a gold medal from Catherine II in 1770. Fireweed down knitting did not take root in the Orenburg region, but its goat analogue had a great future. By the beginning of the XIX century. in the steppe settlements near the Ural and Sakmara rivers, an exemplary breed of downy goats with the finest 16-micron down was experimentally grown. In 1835, in his article "On Goat Down", an official for special assignments under the Orenburg military governor and the future author of the "Explanatory Dictionary" V.I. Dahl wrote about the local goat thus: "While spending a strict winter in the snowy steppe on pasture, it is covered for the winter by the omnipotence of beneficent mother nature: a thin, thick and warm undercoat, known to us under the name of goat's down."

Let's finally define Orenburg downy shawl. So, OPP- This is a knitted product from the down of Orenburg goats and a warp thread (silk, cotton). The concept of a scarf is interpreted here broadly. It can be: 1. A warm scarf, also known as a shawl; 2. Gossamer - a small openwork cape; 3. Stole - also an openwork cape, but larger than that of a cobweb. It is to the last two varieties OPP we apply the well-known criterion with threading the product through the wedding ring.

The Orenburg downy shawl is the main visiting card of the Orenburg region, and therefore there is no doubt that the competition between manufacturers in this niche is serious. I believe that the consumer needs to make a choice from the very beginning whether he wants to purchase an authentic handmade product (in my opinion, this is the real OPP), or is ready to be satisfied with products based on the same material, but created by knitting machines. In the second case, there is no problem, once in Orenburg, to buy in one of the stores with the appropriate "brand" sign a scarf, gossamer or stole in the price range of 3000 - 6000 rubles. Most likely it will be the products of a local company known under the legal names CJSC Orenburg Downy Shawls Factory, OJSC Orenshal and LLC Shima. At times, this manufacturer tries to behave like an aggressive monopoly (read