The population of the European south is extremely diverse in both ethnic and religious composition. Thus, the North Caucasian Federal District is the only one in which Russians do not make up the majority of the population, occupying only the third place after the titular nation in some regions. In Dagestan, for example, Russians are in eighth place in terms of population. The situation in the Southern Federal District is somewhat different.
Southern Federal District
The Southern Federal District includes eight constituent entities of the Federation, including the Republic of Adygea, Volgograd, Astrakhan and Rostov Regions, as well as the Republic of Crimea, the city of Sevastopol, the Republic of Kalmykia and Krasnodar Territory.
The total population of the European south in this macro-region is 16,441,000. At the same time, the Krasnodar Territory with its 5,500,000 people is considered the most densely populated region, and the Republic of Kalmykia is recognized as the most sparsely populated, with a population of just over 275,000.
Creation of Federal Districts
The Southern Federal District, originally created in 2000, also included the North Caucasian national republics, but in 2010, they were removed from its composition by a special decree of President Medvedev, and a new North Caucasian Federal District was created on their basis. It is assumed that such a need arose due to the ethnic composition and characteristics of cultural development.
According to the latest census, the population of the European south of Russia is composed of more than forty different peoples, traditionally living in the Caucasus region and the Caucasus steppes.
North Caucasus Federal District
This district was formed by isolating it from the Southern Federal District. Obviously, the North Caucasus has different ethnographic and political conditions, different from the rest of Russia, even the southern one, based on a special historical path of development.
For a long time, the region was an arena of struggle between numerous empires, including the Persian, Russian, and Ottoman. During the Great Arab conquest, Islam was introduced to the North Caucasus, as a result of which a special environment was formed in which representatives of the same people could belong to different faiths.
Some modern peoples of the Caucasus, such as Ossetians and Circassians, are building their genealogy to the ancient Indo-Aryan tribes of Eurasia. Ossetians are considered descendants of the ancient Alans, Circassians belong to the descendants of the Hutts.
Located at the crossroads of cultures, the Caucasus also boasts linguistic diversity. The East Caucasus is especially noteworthy in this regard, since there are about forty-six languages in Dagestan, not counting Russian.
Ethnic history of the region
The peculiarity of the population of the European south is that it underwent a significant transformation in the XlX-XX centuries. A separate and rather difficult page in Caucasian history was the colonial war waged by the Russian Empire in this region.
The conquest of the North Caucasus, begun at the end of the XVlll century, led to a significant change in the composition of the population. As a result of the actions of the imperial authorities, many indigenous people were forced to leave their usual habitats and move from the mountains to the plain or even leave the country.
So the term “mujajirism” appeared in history, that is, the mass migration of Muslims from a non-Islamic country under the protection of the Turkish sultan, who also bore the title of caliph.
According to the controversial information of scientists, from four hundred thousand to a million people left the Russian Empire as part of a massive campaign to resettle the Circassians into the Ottoman Empire. Thanks to such a policy, as well as the forcible resettlement of Russians and Cossacks to the newly conquered territories, the Western Caucasus, whose territory is occupied by the modern Krasnodar Territory, was predominantly populated by Russians. Also, the Russian majority is in the Stavropol Territory, while in the national republics the majority is retained by the titular nations.
Density and population
Krasnodar Territory is distinguished by a special population density in the European south. By the number and density of population, Krasnodar Territory takes third place in the country after Moscow and the Moscow Region.
According to the Federal State Statistics Service, the population of the region exceeded 5.6 million people, and the population density reached 74.23 people per square kilometer. Another important feature is the low level of urbanization of the population of the European south. Residents of urban settlements are only 55% of the population. Thus, the unique ethnic, linguistic and religious diversity, as well as low urbanization values, can be mentioned as the characteristics of the population of the European south of Russia.