Abstract

The article examines dacha construction on the South coast of the Crimea in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a socio-economic and socio-cultural phenomenon. Tis is the case study of the dacha settlement Novy-Simeiz (1902-1920), which was practically unafected by the 20th and 21st-century restructuring. Tus, the entire village is still a space of historical memory, and its buildings and objects of landscape architecture are material historical sources. Until recently, the history of the South coast of the Crimea in the period of modernization of Imperial Russia in 1861-1917 did not attract due attention of historians and remained the domain of local and art historians. Te phenomenon of “dacha” on the South coast of the Crimea in the early 20th century as a special out-of-town institution of accelerated formation of “middleclass” identity has hardly been studied. Of the numerous dacha settlements on the South coast of the Crimea, Novy-Simeiz has been chosen as the most organized and comfortable. Almost 200 land plots were sold in it and 66 dachas were built in less than 20 years. Te article analyzes the social (estate, professional) profle of dacha buyers in Novy-Simeiz, wealthy residents of Saint Petersburg, Moscow and Central Russia, the features of the new everyday life culture in Novy-Simeiz, as well as the reasons of the sale of family estates by the former owners of Simeiz, the heirs of the industrialist S.I. Maltsov. Te paradigms of “history of leisure” and “leisure class” are used to explain the data. Te source study aspect of the research is also important: the author carries out the systematization of various (written, visual, monumental) sources, including those newly identifed due to digitalization and updating of online databases. He attempts at their analysis in terms of value and cognitive potential, and also refects on the experience in creating an electronic database, “Simeiz Dachas”, and its presentation as a history-oriented thematic site on the Internet.