# Ashgabat Collection

*Exported from [Holy-Writings.com](https://www.holy-writings.com/) on 2026-06-19 — 1 clipping.*

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Olga Mehti, Ashgabat Collection, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> Ashgabat Collection
> by Olga Mehti, 2019
> 
> Let us recall that when the Asian Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia in connection with the
> colonization of Central Asia and Transcaucasia opened a special Training Department – officer classes of Oriental languages, the
> first graduate student Alexander Tumansky, instead of summer camps near St. Petersburg, asked for the new Russian city of
> Ashgabat in order to practice Persian, since he learned that many speakers of this language from Iran appeared there. And the
> director of the academic department, Matvey Avelyevich Gamazov, agreed and allowed the promising graduate to go at his own
> expense to distant Ashgabat to train in Persian, as he wanted to learn more about the followers of the new religion, already known
> to the whole world as a Baha'i Faith, and at that time new to foreigners.
> 
> Bahá'u'lláh ordered his subjects to go from Iran to Ashgabat, because there they were subjected to persecution, they were
> tried to be exterminated. Bahá'u'lláh foreshadowed the glorious future of the Turkmen land, where there will be no wars, where
> the seeds of peace will sprout. Indeed, in Ashgabat, displaced people felt protected by local laws of hospitality and religious
> tolerance. Governor-General A.V. Komarov at the trial with Shiites defended the laws of the adherents of the new religion,
> defining its independent character. An orientalist Alexander Grigoryevich Tumansky actively assisted migrants from Iran as well.
> He described his first impressions in this way: “Arriving in Askhabad on June 29, 1890, I easily got acquainted with the most
> interesting of the Babis. Thanks to their decent lifestyle, they are accepted by the Russians as well as possible. For that reason,
> acquaintance with them did not present the slightest difficulty”. The community of people who believe in the oneness of the
> Creator and the soonest unity of all mankind has won authority among the local residents; their representatives were even elected
> to the city government and actively participated in cultural life. For example, they were in the commission for the construction of
> a monument to Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin. “...That is why acquaintance with them was not difficult at all. Seeing my desire
> to learn about their religious education deeply, three of them eagerly competed with each other to help me in it”. (“The Last Two
> Babid Revelations”. Notes of the Eastern Branch of the Imperial Russian Archaeological Society, No. 6, 1891).
> Tumansky had many new friends in Ashgabat; among them is Aboul Fazil Golpaygoni, a former Muslim teacher from
> Tehran who has become an outstanding Baha'i scholar. With him the Russian officer “delved into the dark meaning of the Kitabe
> Akdas and other writings of Bahá'u'lláh”. From the article “The Newly Discovered Persian Geographer of the 10th Century and
> News of the Slavs and Russes”: “Our conversations repeatedly turned into historical topics as well, and I listened with pleasure to
> the Persian scholar. But no matter how learned was my unforgettable colleague on translation of Kitabe Akdas, I was able to tell
> him something new, namely, to acquaint him with an Arab geographer, whose discovery is associated with the name of
> Mukhlinsky (Professor of St. Petersburg University). In these same conversations, I urged Mirza to search for ancient
> manuscripts and, among other things, to study the history of the four Uluk-Bek uluses in Bukhara where he was soon to go. (The
> author’s spelling of proper names characteristic of that time has been preserved everywhere). These conversations took place in
> the spring of 1892... The summer with a memorable Ashgabat cholera passed, and in the autumn I was happy to know that Mirza
> was alive and well and lives in Samarkand. Soon I received a letter from him as of October 13 (25), 1892, i.e. “During (my) stay
> in Bukhara, no matter how much I searched for, the book Four Ulus did not come across, however, one copy of an ancient book,
> very good one, containing four works, has been found...”. This was the first news about our geographer, obviously too insufficient
> to understand the meaning thereof. However, in the spring of 1893, I managed to arrange a trip to Bukhara, and I was happy to
> know that Mirza Aboul Fazil was coming there too. Arriving in Bukhara, I ... went to the native city where I stayed with the Babis
> in the same room with Mirza Aboul Fazil. There was no limit to my delight when I saw this manuscript, and especially when I
> was gaven it provided that it should be published and not permanently lost for science.
> 
> (This manuscript was published in St. Petersburg and in London: in 1930 a facsimile edition was published in the original
> language edited by academician V. V. Barthold, who translated a fragment devoted to the Eastern Europe into Russian. In 1937,
> Oxford University published full English translation made by a friend of Tumansky, an orientalist and diplomat V. F. Minorsky.
> And the invaluable manuscript, which was hunted by many experts and amateurs, had a very difficult fate, passing after
> Tumansky’s death into their hands, till it got to its proper place – the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of
> Sciences) ...Then I, certainly, informed baron V. R. Rosen about this finding, who guided me for the entire visit to the East. I take
> this most appropriate occasion to express my heartfelt gratitude to him...”.
> A Russian orientalist, an Arabist, academician of the Petersburg Academy of Sciences, baron V. R. Rosen was a teacher at
> the Oriental courses, a mentor and a friend of Tumansky. They were united, first of all, by the understanding of the new spiritual
> teaching emerging as a new world religion.
> 
> The Ashgabat book of Tumansky The Military Art of the Ancient Arabs draws attention as well. His translation of the book
> The Genealogy of the Turkmen (The Genealogical Tree of the Turkmen People) by Abulgazi Bakhador Khan was also published
> in Ashgabat. A well-known orientalist I. Yu. Krachkovsky recalled the following: “Tumansky was one of the rare orientalists not
> by profession, but by calling”. Shortly after the death of the founder of the Baha'i Faith, Tumansky expressed his attitude towards
> Him in an article by the Kavkaz newspaper dated July 9, 1892: “This is a wonderful person who managed to attract about a
> million followers in different parts of Persia, gave Babism the peace-loving character which followers of this religion differ with.
> Out of the proud Shiite Persian recognizing friendship only with his co-religionists and complete alienation from the followers of
> other religions (Teberra and Tevella), this doctrine made a humble man who considered all people brothers, Babid”. Among other
> publications of Baha’i letters in the original, accompanied by his Russian translation, there was the Testament of Bahá'u'lláh, in
> which Tumansky in 1893 calls Bahá'u'lláh a “prophet”. In letters from Ashgabat, the copies of which we received in the Russian
> National Library, the orientalist corrects his friends that the followers of the new religion should not be called Babits, but Baha’is.
> Unfortunately, the habit is strongest, and in Ashgabat some used the word “babi” until the 80s of the last century (however, they
> were strangers).
> 
> Two years after the first summer trip, Tumansky again returned to Ashgabat and spent there up to seven years in military
> service. However, he points out the following in letters: “P. S. my address is Transcaspian Region, Alexandrovsk Fort”. This is far
> from Ashgabat, it is the place of exile of Taras Shevchenko, and there Alexander Grigoryevich was an assistant to the Head of
> Mangishlak district for some time. Officer Tumansky was very busy with studies on the topography and communication of the
> new territories of the Russian possessions in the Pre-Caspian region; however, he did not leave the job of translating the
> Scriptures of the founders of the new religion. This can be judged again from the letters of A. G. Tumansky, which are stored in
> the St. Petersburg Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Russian National Library and the National Archive of
> Georgia, and now copies of these important documents of a bygone era are kept in the Archives of the House of Justice on
> Carmel in Haifa. Among them are letters to baron Rosen and letters to Edward Grenville Brown, the senior researcher of the
> history and teachings of the Bahá’ís. Note that before arriving in Ashgabat, Tumansky did not know his works, but he became
> acquainted with the Babi movement in Iran only by means of the book Bab and Babits by A. Kazembek, but he made friends with
> the British scholar during his studies of the Babite movement through baron V. R. Rosen. From the Ashgabat letter dated
> December 20, 1893: “Dear Viktor Romanovich! I hasten to thank you for sending Brown’s book, which I received in full
> prosperity. I kindly ask you not to refuse, on occasion, to convey my sincere appreciation to E. G. Brown, whose assessment of
> very modest work strongly embarrasses me ... ”. The orientalists have become friends due to the fascination by a new religion and
> a great desire to see the Bahá’ís.
> 
> On December 9, 1893, Alexander Grigoryevich reports that he is “again in his Askhabad shelter, again the Babies, and,
> thank God, I do not receive any special assignments, so I can do the previous work again. I certainly began with the Kitabe
> Akdas; I compare the canonical edition with the manuscript, and note the variants that are interesting to me in what the
> fluctuations of the grammatical views of the editors of this book show. I am going to finish this work along with the final version
> of the translation this or next week... ”. Tumansky was the first to open for Russian-speaking researchers and readers the
> information about the Babit movement in Persia in the middle of the 19th century and about the first Bahá’ís, found and
> translated into Russian the Scripture of Baha'u'llah Kitabe Akdas, which contains the basic laws for the new spiritual age of
> humanity. This fundamental study of the orientalist was published in the “Notes of the Imperial Academy of Sciences”. I will note
> that in 1899, the Russian orientalist read excerpts from his translation of the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh for the first time before his
> fellow officers in an officers’ meeting in Red Village (Dudergof) near St. Petersburg. This building is preserved on 79 Lenin
> Avenue, and may in the future have a memorial significance to the history of Bahá’ís in St. Petersburg, like many other buildings
> in the city on the Neva River, where events connected with Faith took place.
> 
> Among the active working correspondence of A. G. Tumansky on the research of the Babid movement, I suddenly read a
> completely non-business letter that filled me with a premonition of the novel, the Ashgabat novel. Alexander Grigoryevich writes
> the following to Baron Rosen “...Viktor Romanovich, now please allow me to share with you my personal joy as well. I met the
> one whom I will soon call my wife. My bride, without any fear, decides to go with me to Persia, but you can’t imagine what kind
> of the moral responsibility I have to take ... by going with my wife to the places where Kurds and semi-independent Turkmen can
> be expected to attack. (Author’s orthography). In addition, the journey through Khorosan presents great difficulties for a woman.
> Perhaps, having familiarized and got used to the conditions of traveling around Persia at first in a lighter situation, we, if
> necessary, will dare to go this way”. And then, on February 17, 1894, he writes the following: “Now, regarding the wife and
> marriage: my wedding is on Sunday, the 20th. After the wedding, my wife and I will go to Bukhara for a few days, and then
> return to Askhabad and go to Persia on March 7th. Further, if it turns out to be impossible to travel with my wife (which I suppose
> is very possible), I will leave her in Tehran and go the rest of the way alone. I propose to go on the following route: from
> Uzungan I am going to Astrabad, from Astrabad to Shahrud to Tehran. In Tehran, I will make a small stop and go to Yazd,
> Kirman, Shiraz and via Isfahan back to Tehran, where I think to stay for about a month, and then return to Askhabad…”.
> 
> They started the journey together on the steamship “Caucasus and Mercury”. However, Tumansky returned to Ashgabat
> alone, and his wife, because of her ill health, had to be sent from Tehran to her parents. It is a pity that the personal
> correspondence of the family of Tumansky couple has not been preserved in the scientific archives, but I am sure that letters flew
> from Ashgabat to Russia and back on the wings of love. The young, of course, recalled the church, where they got married.
> Perhaps it was in the officers’ church of the Taman regiment, where there was a garden near — a favorite resting place for
> officers, where there was a lot of greenery in the winter, because exotic evergreen and early flowering plants were specially
> collected there; their remains are still preserved in the old neighboring courtyards.
> 
> The era of multinational Ashgabat, which is now legendary, began at those times. These are special traditions of common
> neighbours, streets, districts. In Russia, they recalled Ashgabat, the generosity of its long summer not only because of fruit and
> vegetables, but also for the special atmosphere of friendliness. In the gloomy Petersburg evenings, memories of the Ashgabat
> grape arbors, where they lingered after midnight, warmed them up. There unmanned grape leaves soared in the quiet autumn,
> circling the ground with a yellow carpet in the morning. And the mistresses tried to clean their yards and sidewalks before dawn,
> and pour water on them, because everyone, regardless of nationalities, loved their city, even if they were simply sent for work
> from Russia. It certainly was like that. I judge this by the statements of even those generals who came with arms to seize the
> Turkmen land, and then, in several years, they admitted in their memoirs that they loved our land. For, it is impossible not to fell
> in love with Ashgabat.
> 
> However, let us return to the description of Tumansky’s future activities in Ashgabat. In January 1895, Alexander
> Grigoryevich was fully engaged in the preparation of a trip report, which was arranged by a Bahá’í, but, of course, sanctioned by
> the Russian authorities. They always kept abreast of the new religious movement in Persia. The Russian officer wrote: “I intend
> to divide my report into two. One will be of a purely military nature, which will include topographical and ethnographic
> information, as well as surveying the paths; I consider that the other report on babism should be presented only after the end of
> the printing of the Kitabe Akdas translation. The material for this report will be my personal impressions from the acquaintance
> with the Babids in Rasht, Qazvin, Tehran, Hamadan, Isfahan, Shiraz, Neyriz, Yazd, Kashan. In addition to these points, I met
> Babids in some intermediate points, namely in Melair (Doulet Abad) on the way from Hamadan to Burujird. There are many of
> them in the vicinity of Isfagani, namely in Najaf Abad, in Sideh, in Abadekh as well. In Fars they are grouped in Zergan,
> Servistan and Neyriz. In the southeastern Fars they do not live at all, neither they do in Bender Abbas. I noticed the complete
> absence of them in Borujird as well. They are few in Kirman, but there are several of them in Sirjan and in Rafsindjan. There are
> also quite a lot of them in Yazd and its surroundings... Babids are currently especially numerous in Tehran, among which there are
> very high-ranking and influential people. In addition, Babism serves as a banner around which the elements dissatisfied with the
> existing regime are grouped. Among those are very influential khans and leaders of nomadic tribes...”.
> 
> From 1900 to 1905, Tumansky served as Vice-Consul in Turkish Van. These reliable facts of his service refute the
> information by some publications that Tumansky helped Bahá’ís during the construction of Mashriqul-Azkar, which earlier
> provoked me to look for an orientalist in a famous group photo among the participants of the significant event of the foundation
> of the Bahá’í Ashgabat temple on September 10, 1902. Memories of Haji Mirza Haydar Ali Asqui, one of the famous Bahá’ís of
> the times of Abdul Bakh and Shoghi Effendi, the author of The History of Faith in Azerbaijan, about the meeting with Tumansky
> in the consulate of Tabriz are also confirmed. Then they, Ashgabat friends, embraced. The narrator showed him a picture of the
> Ashgabat temple. Tumansky said that he really wanted to visit Ashgabat once again to see the temple, to visit friends. But he
> could not.
> 
> And from 1908 to 1909, Alexander Grigoryevich was again in Persia.
> 
> Judging by the documents from Georgia as of 1911, Madame Tumanskaya, already with three children, arrived with her
> husband in Tbilisi, where, at the Headquarters of the Caucasian Military Command, he headed a school of oriental languages,
> similar to the one in which he studied in St. Petersburg. And in March 1917, Tumansky resigned from military service with the
> rank of Major General of the tsarist army. They would finally have a calm and measured family life in glorious Tbilisi, where
> they again gained many friends, and the tireless Tumansky also engaged in Caucasian studies. However, the tragedy of all of
> Russia – October 17, crushed the already established life of a huge empire and their personal lives, too.
> 
> From the Bolshevik Revolution, the family fled to Constantinople, where in 1920 A. G. Tumansky passed away. His widow
> and children emigrated to the Belgian Liege. The Russian Bahá’ís from Belgium, Tatiana, helped me to learn the details. She was
> so imbued with my research idea that with great difficulty, she still managed to get information about Tumansky’s descendants
> and his wife in the local archive. The Belgian archivist mentioned in a certificate that Elena (so, finally, she knew the name of my
> heroine) was a countess. (This was also a news for me, although it is not surprising, for Mr. Tumansky himself was from a very
> ancient noble family). It also became known that the widow was a “teacher of linguistics”, but in Liege she worked as a maid in a
> hotel. Probably, there was no other way out. As stated in the certificate, she and the children arrived in Liege as refugees...
> The search continues
> 
> We will tell you that Alexander Grigoryevich Tumansky collected in Ashgabat and then in Persia the manuscripts in Persian,
> Arabic, and Turkish. He conducted extensive correspondence with many Orientalists of the Russian and foreign academies. Most
> of Tumansky’s letters remained, but the answers of those scholars with the Ashgabat postmark are still unknown, but they could
> clarify a lot in Oriental studies. No one knows where the writings of Bahá'u'lláh are now, from which Tumansky has been
> translating, and which were his personal acquisitions. The orientalist did not part with this collection; it was his constant scientific
> bag, despite the fact that he had to visit different countries and cities due to the military profession. Information on the sale of
> manuscripts from such an important collection always immediately becomes known to the learned world, but there is still nothing
> heard about the sale of letters by academicians-orientalists or Bahá'í Writings. It is only known that at the request of the
> orientalist V. V. Barthold, she transferred from her husband’s archive through F. Minorsky the earliest specimen of a geographic
> treatise in Persian, the manuscript “Hudud al-Alam” – “The Frontiers of the World from East to West” to the Institute of Oriental
> Manuscripts. The treatise of 982 by an unknown author, which was hunted by many experts and amateurs, had a very difficult
> fate, passing from a person to person after the death of Tumansky, until it got into the proper place – the Institute of Oriental
> Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Besides, we also think that at that time very few people in Europe were
> interested in the Bahá’í topic, and therefore much of the Tumansky collection should have remained somewhere.
> 
> It was the idea to find this collection that recently held me in Germany near the border with the Netherlands for a long time.
> I already knew from archival data collected by friends from Belgium and the Netherlands: Tania Genco, Jelle de Vries, Lilia
> Plooij, Joop Kiefte, J. P. Laperches that the granddaughter of Alexander Grigoryevich Tumansky and the daughter of his son, also
> Alexander, still live in Liege. Marie Tumanskaya was born in the same Liege in 1930, and after marriage with the Dutch citizen
> Francois Henry Joseph, left Liege and moved to Kerkrade in the Netherlands. I was waiting for a response from Marie
> Tumanskaya to the constant calls of my friends. But she was silent... At my request, they also wrote a letter to her, but there was
> no answer either. But at first it didn’t upset me. A month ago, I didn’t know about Madame, such an important link in my research
> on Alexander Grigoryevich Tumansky, a Russian orientalist who left a noticeable mark on Bahá’í history.
> 
> My friends have already found her address in Kerkrade: Anjelierstraat 1, 6466 Kerkrade VX, the Netherlands. Phone:
> 0031-45-5411470. But the active Bahá’ís found her only at a new address: Spireastraat 56, Kerkrade at 6466, the Netherlands.
> Neighbours told that she lived a very isolated life, did not want to meet guests and always kept her door closed. They confirmed
> that Ms. Tumanskaya came from Belgium, but no one had ever heard her speak Russian, though they noticed her “difficult” name
> (she called herself Marusya, but wrote her name as: M. De Tumansky M ).
> 
> On December 1, Ms. Tumanskaya’s nurse reported to my friends from Belgium that her patient had passed away. The
> apartment was photographed and sealed. They were unable to contact any of the relatives of the deceased, and the apartment
> owners began a professional search for heirs. My friends, the Belgian Bahá’ís, informed the lady who was responsible for this
> procedure about our great interest in the archive, books, letters and photographs and asked to report contacts with any relatives
> who could be found.
> 
> I, who had so many questions for Alexander Grigoryevich’s granddaughter, sat in Germany, disappointed with this outcome.
> But the friends still managed to visit the apartment of the deceased Ms. Marie Tumanskaya at Kerkrade and even, since the
> relatives of the deceased were not found, they were allowed to collect and take with them all the books, papers, letters and
> photographs in that apartment. It turned out that Ms. Tumanskaya had only a few books in Dutch, and the interior of the
> apartment had no references to her Russian roots, despite her portrait in an elegant Russian costume. But the costume is so
> stylized that it can be taken for Polish, and the genus of Tumansky was precisely these roots. Photos might be important to search
> for: among them is a portrait of a man at a table with a typewriter. A.G. Tumansky?
> Portrait of a woman without a hat. Marie? Portrait of two women and a child. Judging by the fashion, the photo was taken in
> the 1930s. Most likely, this is Marie (as a child) with her mother and grandmother. Portrait of Marie and her mother in 1947.
> Portrait of Marie’s uncle - Kirill Alexandrovich Tumansky, 1948. USA. Portrait of Inna Tumanskaya - von Keller, Kirill’s wife.
> 1949. No letters or other papers concerning Mrs. Tumanskaya’s grandfather were found.
> 
> Perhaps, the archives of their father were taken by the sons Alexander and Kirill after their mother’s death, who emigrated to
> New York, the USA before World War II. And then the search should be transferred there, that is what the orientalist Loni
> Bramson recommended to me.
> 
> However, there is still a front line of work in Europe, because we still have a thread, however, a very thin thread, this is
> Katya, the daughter of Lydia, the aunt of the deceased Marusya. We learned that Lydia Tumanskaya lived until 2010 at the
> Elderly House in Brussels (Fleurs d 'aubepine Uccle, tel 023730272). One of my friends found an archival newspaper, which said
> that when Lily was 96 years old, her daughter Katya scolded local employees for not caring for her mother. In that nursing home,
> my friends were given a photo of Lydia, but flatly refused to give Katya’s phone, since this is strictly prohibited for them. There
> they learned that Lydia was then transferred to another nursing home (Nazareth tel: 023736411). There they did not give any
> information either – the European laws are very strict.
> 
> In the telephone directory of Brussels, there are more than 40 people named Katya Tumanskaya, but these were not our
> Katya. After all, our Katya is not Tumanskaya... She probably has her father’s name..... Yes, that’s it! The most important thing is
> that Katya does exist...
> 
> I, as a foreigner, cannot find Katya, but I clearly see new search paths in the Netherlands. Marie was divorced, and her ex-
> husband Francois died on September 28, 1976 in Kerkrade, the Netherlands. The couple did not have children, but one can search
> for his relatives, who may know something about Marie’s relatives – about Lydia and her daughter Katya. And also it is worth
> asking the names of the owners of the studio, where photos of members of the Tumansky family were taken. A large photograph
> of the portrait of Mr. Kirill Alexandrovich Tumansky was taken at the Shelburne Studio in New York in 1948. The photographs of
> the other portraits have no information about the producer, and such would have been useful for our investigations. The
> University of Liege would be well positioned to look for information on the linguistics teacher Elena Mitarevskaya, who had
> valuable manuscripts. I can’t do this anymore, but maybe special services can do it either through participation in TV programs
> where they search for people. Unfortunately, some previously published manuscripts or those used for publications in pre-
> revolutionary Russia were not found.
>
> — *Ashgabat Collection (Used by permission of the curator)*