The Russian‑Chinese Trade in Kyakhta, Its Organisation and Commodity Structure, 1727–1861

The Russian -Chinese Trade in Kyakhta, Its Organisation and Commodity Structure, 1727–1861 Michal Wanner This study is a follow ‑up to the article focused on the early Russian ‑Chinese diplo‑ matic and business relationships.1 Unlike this study that mostly exploring the gen‑ esis of diplomatic relationships and the early form of the Russian ‑Chinese caravan trade existing until 1727, it only deals with the Russian ‑Chinese trade in Kyakhta in 1727–1861 when the stable centres of trade exchange emerged in accord with the Treaty of Kyakhta, and the trade that had been rather random took more or less rou‑ tine form, anyhow large fluctuations would keep occurring. The extent, complexity and diverse range of the theme on one hand, and the lim‑ ited character of the contribution on the other hand, do not make it possible to cover the whole issue. Therefore, the author purposely omitted the quantification of the trade and single stages during the traced period as he intends to look at these aspects in another study. This article describes the organisation and practice of the Russian‑ ‑Chinese trade exchange in Kyakhta and May ‑ma ‑chen, state regimentation of the trade in Russia and China, the commodity structure of the Russian and Chinese ex‑ port; last not least, he also includes some fundamental problems of logistics that con‑ siderably impacted the character of the trade in Kyakhta. THE TREATY OF KYAKHTA AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF TROITSKOSAVSK AND KYAKHTA Signed by a Russian envoy, Sava Lukich Raguzinski ‑Vladislavich, and the Chinese government’s plenipotentiaries, Chabin, Tegut and Tulishen, as early as on 21st Octo‑ ber 1727 after long and complicated effort, the text of a new Russian ‑Chinese treaty was formally exchanged on the Kyakhta River on 14th June 1728. Therefore, this docu‑ ment has been known through the history as the Treaty of Kyakhta. This contracting document would be the sound fundamentals of the Russian ‑Chinese relationship for next 130 years. Article 4 of the Treaty had specified terms of the trade exchange. Russians were allowed to trade in the caravan form under the following: “… free merchants will be al‑ 1 M. WANNER, First Russian ‑Chinese Diplomatic Relations and Business Relationship 1689–1728, in: Prague Papers on the History of International Relations, Vol. 17, No. 2, 2013, pp. 66–76. 36 PRAGUE PAPERS ON THE HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 2/2014 lowed to come to Beijing once in three years, providing their number, as specified aforetime, does not exceed 200.” The Chinese party was obliged to move market places from Urga (today’s Ulan Bator) and Qiqihar (in Manchuria; called Tsitsikhar in Russian) to two sites at the Russian ‑Chinese border. One of them was situated on the Kyakhta River nearby Selenginsk, another in Tsurukhait (also Tsurukhaitui) on the Argun River (today’s Priargunsk) where “…to build houses and enclose them in fence or palisade” had been allowed. Merchants could conduct trade in a safer environment than had ex‑ isted until the day. The trade negotiated in the Treaty was not liable to duty.2 Related to the talks afoot on the Kyakhta River, 4.3 km outside Barsukovskiy winter residency, where Russian border patrols had resided, a new fortress and merchant’s out‑ skirts (sloboda) in Kyakhta began being built by a plan developed by Raguzinski. Three hundred and fifty Russian soldiers from Yakutsk regiment, and thirty Cossacks from Udinsk (today’s Ulan ‑Ude) would be engaged in building the fortress founded on the day of St. Trinity in 1727. Five Russian merchants had been first to arrive there in No‑ vember that year. In December 1727, Captain Fyodor Knyaginkin responsible for the fortress construction provided Raguzinski with information about the completing a mill ‑house and about the first ground crops (for one Mongolian officer of the Chinese Army); feeling satisfied he stated “…flour has been ground very well— it is extremely fine”.3 Other construction works on the site began early in the spring of the year 1728. However, first dwelling houses had appeared in Troitskosavsk as early as in the au‑ tumn of 1727, namely wooden barracks for officers and garrison, and stables, barns, storehouses. The north corner became home for St. Trinity and St. Sava Serbian Church. Three hundred and twenty ‑seven dwellers (186 men and 141 women) in fifty‑ ‑nine houses were reported to live in Kyakhta in 1758.4 Together with the border fortress construction also works on the merchants’ slo‑ boda had been carried out. Reported to be there at the end of 1728 by Captain I. I. Trens, who had been charged with the construction, were twenty ‑nine farmhouses (out of 32 planned in the instruction) and a market hall 33.6 m in length with twenty‑ ‑four shops. Later on, a governor’s house was built, too, so the number of houses would increase to sixty. The site first hosted a fair attended by ten Russian and four Chinese merchants on 25th August 1728.5 Four hundred and fifty ‑three traders with their goods on sixty hundred and thirty horses, and two camels went through the fortress in the period between 1st October 1729 and 1st January 1730. First, merchants did not have to pay any duty, but were pro‑ vided with no protection. Nevertheless, as early as in 1729 they paid 112 rubles and 97 kopeks for the market stands, and in 1730 it was as much as 232 rubles and 17 kopeks.6 2 V. S. MYASNIKOV (Ed.), Russko ‑kitayskiye dogovorno ‑pravovyye akty, (1689–1916), Moscow 2004, Doc. No. 5, pp. 43–44. 3 Quoted by A. N. KHOKHLOV, Kyachtinskaya torgovlya i yeyo mesto v politike Rosii i Kitaya (20– e gody XVIII v.–50–e gody XIX v.), in: Dokumenty oprovergayut protiv fal’sifikacii istorii russko‑ ‑kitayskikh otnosheniy, Moscow 1982, p. 104. 4 L. FILIPOVA, Osnovanie Kyachty, in: Kyakhtinskaya starina— Al’manakh, Kyakhta 2003, p. 5. 5 E. P. SILIN, Kyakhta v XVIII. veke, Irkutsk 1947, p. 41; E. P. SILIN, Predmety kyachtinskoj tor‑ govli v XVIII. veke, in: Kyakhtinskaya starina— Al’manakh, Kyakhta 2003, p. 18. 6 KHOKHLOV, p. 105. MIcHAL WANNER 37 In 1730, a new market town called May ‑ma ‑chen, today’s Altanbulag, began be‑ ing built on Chinese (today’s Mongolian) side of the border. Mostly merchants from the Province Shanxi would go there and be organised in one guild together with the locals. What shows the character of this settlement is a description of the town dat‑ ing from 1770s. “Half a verst outside this (Kyakhta) sloboda lie Chinese Naymatchins. They have been built alongside a wooden wall, and reinforced by a mound, with three broad streets called Upper, Central and Lower (that one situated close to the Kyakhta River), and one crosswise; there are, at a guess, three hundred and fifty Chinese yurts made of loam, three Chinese temples, five gates; the number of citizens, that is Chinese merchants, who serve or work, as well as Mongols, who are there to serve guard duty, differs, nevertheless, according to the notes there were more than a thousand people there.”7 THE TRADE ORGANISATION IN KYAKHTA AND MAY -MA -CHEN All imported Russian goods had been stored in a storehouse in Troitskosavsk. Before the transport to the Kyakhta’s sloboda, the goods were checked by customs officers, traders and commission merchants, who surveyed amount and quoted prices, how‑ ever, the price would be definitely set afterwards at a meeting in Kyakhta before opening the trading itself. The goods that had not been sold were subject to another negotiation over decrease in price. A Chinese merchant, who had been interested in the goods, first explored the pos‑ sibilities of trade. Then he would go to Kyakhta by himself, and view imported goods in a storehouse or elsewhere. Next, he would go to an owner’s house, and agree on price over a cup of tea. Providing the price had been set both buyer and seller went to the storehouse and wrapped up the goods, then left for May ‑ma ‑chen, where a Rus‑ sian merchant would pick the goods he needed. Finally, after agreeing on the goods and price, the Russian merchant would leave his assistant in May ‑ma ‑chen to arrange the goods transport, and went back to Kyakhta to give necessary instruction as to how to disribute and accept goods. Providing the Chinese merchant had reduced the price during that transaction, he had to pay a heavy penalty.8 Negotiations were conducted in a rather difficult ‑to ‑understand local Chinese language that included some Rus‑ sian words, which would be slowly developing into the so ‑called Kyakhta language.9 The trade was mostly in ‑kind exchange in form. Chinese merchants lacked enough capital, therefore would buy Russian goods on trust, and would be unlikely to pay it back. The Chinese party’s debt stood at 20,313 rubles, 58 kopeks only in 1746.10 7 Ibidem, p. 106. 8 Ibidem, p. 115. 9 “Kyakhta language” or “kyakhta pidgin” developed at the turn of the 19th and 20th centu‑ ries in Amur Region, Manchuria and Trans ‑Baikal. His lexical page was mostly of Russian origin, while the grammar mostly of Chinese origin. In China, this simple language was taught to officials involved in trade with Russia. This language virtually disappeared in the first half of the 20th century. Cf. A. Y. MUSORIN, Leksika kyakhtinskogo pidzhina, Novosi‑ birsk 2004, pp. 79–86. 10 KHOKHLOV, p. 106. 38 PRAGUE PAPERS ON THE HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 2/2014 The trade in Kyakhta had been growing permanently but rather slowly, partly due to the strict regulations imposed by the Chinese court against Chinese merchants, and the policy of isolation in international relationship. Influenced had also been by a shared idea about the primary role of farming and secondary role of craft and trade. Such a perspective was expressed very well by a Chinese, who had commented on the Russian ‑Chinese trade agreement of February 1792, penning about the trade in Kyakhta “purposeless for China”, and “the simple reason the Great Emperor tolerates the trade is he just loves the poor in both countries, and has been formally requested by the Russian Senate.“11 Thus the court of China would follow the policy of isolation and limit and regulate the trading activity. A merchant who had expressed interest in the trade with a for‑ eign country had to obtain a trading permit from the seat City’s local government in exchange for a fee. The permit included a trader’s name and surname, a list and amount of the received goods, the date and place of birth, and place he was planning to set out on his journey; the permit had to be produced by a merchant in the military administration in Zhangjiakou (Kalgan in Russian language) or another place on the route. These documents would be investigated by customs officers from the Ministry of Dependant Colonies (Li ‑fan jüan also called Great Tribunal) in Ugra and Kyakhta. Supposing a merchant had taken another route he was imposed a severe punishment: first, two months of carrying a wooden framework on the back, next forty ‑time beat‑ ing with a bamboo cane, finally deportation to his home province. The punishment also included confiscation of half of his goods.12 Using numerous granted permits, the Beijing (Peking) Government had been able to effectively control the amount of goods transported to the Russian border. The per‑ mits were checked by the local bodies every three years. To give an example, two hun‑ dred and sixty ‑eight permits were issued in 1850 for fifty ‑six business firms. Large companies got six permits, middle ‑sized four, and the smallest just one. Sixty trad‑ ing firms engaged in trade in Kyakhta existed in Zhangjiakou (Kalgan) in the period between 1851 and 1855, which would allocate four hundred to five hundred permits.13 It was a dzarguchi14 who was in charge of supervising Chinese merchants and the local Chinese ‑Mongolian population. He possessed vast business and judicial au‑ thority, and more often than not he would impose illegal levies on merchants’ goods to make some money for himself, and sued those who had complained about sharp practices. Merchants were obliged to inform the dzarguchi on prices, Russian goods, and the like, and obey his instructions on what it had been possible or impossible to buy in Russia. They were required to bargain, and quote as lowest purchase prices as possible. They were expected to refuse ordinary Russian goods and indicate that such goods might be imported into China by someone else. They were not allowed to show that any of the Russian products were essential for China. The Chinese were supposed to be friendly to Russian merchants, but also to gather maximum number of infor‑ mation on the Russian Government, to pass it on the dzarguchi, who was obliged to 11 Ibidem, pp. 117–118. 12 Ibidem, p. 118. 13 Ibidem, p. 119. 14 Dzarguchi or czarguchi (from Manchurian), officer of the Ministry of Dependant Provinc‑ es. MIcHAL WANNER 39 conduct disinformation activities against the Russians. The merchant who had kept back any piece of information gained from the Russians received punishment, like those who would have traded without a permit. This also applied to the goods import or export beyond the permitted amount, or revelations concerning any information economic in character relating to the national economy in China.15 As to the organisation, the Chinese import had been arranged by companies. The companies’ pensions were counted up every three or four years, and a depositor was paid for that period 3 to 4% of yearly ‑put capital, other members of a company got an equal share of the profit. One of the Russian authors had penned: “The Chinese trade with us using companies, or better expressed through firms consisting of several persons […] now more than a hundred and fifty, seventy of them run their own shops in May ‑ma ‑chen, Kyakhta, the other send their tea to the merchants’ commission settled in May ‑ma ‑chen or sell it in Kalgan.”16 The regimentation at the both sides of the border had been slowing the growth of the trade. The Chinese were not disposed to import huger amount of goods, therefore part of the imported goods would be always left over for Russian merchants. As stated by the director of the customs office in Kyakhta, I. O. Selifontov, on 3rd September 1805: “…Russian merchants always have some of the goods left […] since another party is not interested in them in such an amount, therefore increase is nearly impossible.”17 In pursuit of profit, some of the Chinese merchants would secretly buy also un‑ sold Russian goods, so would purposely break the governments decree. Usual were sharp practices in the trade. As stated in one account of the trade in Kyakhta written in 1744, or sometime later: “They are really harsh and tough at their business, negotia‑ tions are conducted in decent manner— in detail. Cheating they consider to be success and swiftness, so trickery is frequent in their trade, in foreign goods they shrink either size or weight, or deliver goods to out merchants different from what agreed; merchants are not experienced enough, they do not check the goods, and having absolute trust they accept de‑ livery separately, therefore bear costs and the Chinese take profits.”18 What were among favourite tricks were wrong contents of single packages. As follows from the letter of 1827 from twenty ‑six Kyakhta’s merchants to the Russian government: every cibic19 of fermented tea would contain fifty to fifty ‑nine pounds in‑ stead of sixty, contents of non ‑fermented tea was sixty to sixty ‑four instead of eighty pounds, et cetera. According to the Russian borderline administration office’s account of 1812, many Chinese merchants would secretly buy teas for Russian corn and dis‑ tribute to Mongolian towns in the region, or to Zhangjiakou (Kalgan) or Beijing.20 One effective barrier on the Russian side had been the state ‑organised trade and trading caravans dominating Russian ‑Chinese trade for long. Likewise elsewhere, it was mostly because of the state feared the loss of profit, which, however, had been 15 Cf. Chinese governmental instructions to dzarguchi— ibidem, pp. 119–123. 16 Ibidem, p. 115. 17 Ibidem, p. 123. 18 Ibidem, pp. 124–125. 19 Cibik or ustar. The box with the edge about 60 cm long, covered with skin. Designed for the land transport of tea weighing up to 35 kg. 20 KHOKHLOV, p. 126. 40 PRAGUE PAPERS ON THE HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 2/2014 hardly ever earned. The imposed restrictions naturally generated interest in smug‑ gling, whose dimensions seem to be difficult to estimate, but undoubtedly were as large as the state trade volume. The private trade had been penetrating the Russian‑ ‑Chinese trade only gradually. It was not until Catherine II’s reign when the most sig‑ nificant reforms were introduced. In 1762, the Tsarina abolished the existing practice of state caravans, and opened the Kyakhta’s trade to private capital. Also the state monopoly over trade in fur ended that year.21 Whereas traders from the Province Shanxi dominated on the Chinese side, trad‑ ers from central Russia were on the Russian. Likewise the trading companies estab‑ lished after the trade had passed into private ownership also in Russia dominated on the Chinese side. As early as in 1768, six companies for the trade with China arose on the Russian side (Moscow, Tula, Arkhangelsk, Vologda, Tobolsk, Irkutsk). It was a corporation of merchants from one town, who would go to Kyakhta with one type of goods. Their task was to transport goods to the Chinese border. These merchants did not share their capital but traded as individuals. The largest and the most power‑ ful was a Moscow company importing beaver and otter pelts, cloth and other sorts of manufactured products. The one from Tulsa imported mostly ram and cat pelts to Kyakhta, whereas the companies from Arkhangelsk and Vologda imported northern‑ ‑Russian fur (fox, otter and dog’s), and some of the Moscow goods. The companies from Tobolsk and Irkutsk imported Siberian hides, fur and Russian leather.22 These companies elected a superior out of their midst, who would put value on the Russian goods intended for exchange. Related to the new regulations of the Russian government in Kyakhta, a practice of companies (one from each of the companies) was officially introduced in 1800 with the aim to set uniform prices for both Russian and Chinese goods. However, the company establishment brought about squabbles between Russian and Chinese merchants that would begin to appear more often than not. Consequently, some of the merchants went away, and finally a company was al‑ lowed to have only four merchants trading in Kyakhta with their own capital.23 Engaged in the Kyakhta’s trade had been merchants from different towns in Rus‑ sia. Out of sixty merchants doing trade in Kyakhta either personally or through as‑ sistants or commission merchants in the period between 19th February 1806 to 1st April 1807 were: two merchants from Moscow, four from Kaluga, two from Tula, one from Kursk, two from Nezin, one from Totma, four from Veliky Ustyug, one from Sol ‑Vychegodsk, three from Vologda, one from Kholmogory, one from Kazan, three from Tobolsk, one from Tara, four from Tomsk, twenty from Irkutsk, nine from Ver‑ chneudinsk, and one from Selenginsk. In the mid ‑19th century merchants from more than twenty towns or cities were engaged in the trade in Kyakhta.24 The merchants from European Russia went to Kyakhta every now and again. They did trade there through their assistants or local commission merchants. To Kyakhta they imported woollen, cotton or hempen fabrics, partially also sheep, cat or squir‑ 21 KURTZ, pp. 108–110. 22 KHOKHLOV, p. 127. 23 I. BABET, Kyachtinskaya torgovlya, in: Kyakhtinskaya starina— Al’manakh, Kyakhta 2003, pp. 15–16. 24 KHOKHLOV, p. 128. MIcHAL WANNER 41 rel skins. Siberian merchants trading mostly in fur and Russian leather would go to Kyakhta by themselves, and did not use the service of assistants, who had to be paid, and supposed to speak Chinese. Nineteen merchants would arrange their business themselves, twenty through their assistants, the rest did their trade through the local commission merchants out of the sixty mentioned merchants doing trade in Kyakhta between 1806 and 1807. They asked four to eight kopeks per one earned ruble. In the early 1830s, ten merchants arranged their business themselves, nine through their assistants and the rest through commission merchants out of the sixty that had been engaged in the trade in Kyakhta. Four commission merchants conducted their own trade out of fourteen living in Kyakhta.25 The local commission merchants also set prices on goods. More often than not it was at the expense of Siberian merchants, mostly due to the delayed sales of goods. The Siberian merchants delivered goods there in September, however, the trade would not begin until January or February, as the goods from the central part of Russia would not arrive there until in winter. These all had been slashing the price of goods. Therefore, many Siberian merchants gave up trading in Kyakhta. The change did not come until the 1840s and the 1850s when Siberian merchants gained the abolish‑ ment of some of the measures, and their role in the Kyakhta’s trade would expand.26 Permits bound to guilds created another major barrier. In 1721, the population of Russian towns divided into “solid citizens”— divided into two guilds by their prop‑ erty, and “middle people”— the manually working and navvies. Burghers in the craft guilds separated from both of the guilds in 1722. The remaining category of citizens transformed into another guild in 1742. Bound to the guild membership derived from the amount of property and other criteria were privileges (mostly the right to con‑ duct home and foreign trade and business, having a passport, free travelling, own vehicles, and the like) but also duties (to register in towns) and special taxes. The system of guilds would be developing, re ‑reformed, but would not be abolished un‑ til 1863. From 1st January 1801 to 1855 only the first ‑guild merchants were allowed to take part in the trade irrespective where they had come from. The second ‑guild and third ‑guild merchants were allowed to take part only in small trade. Undoubtedly, it restricted Russian ‑Chinese trade exchange, but acted as stimulus to many Siberian merchants’ effort to get into the first guild at a time.27 Small trade was conducted all the year round, and consisted in selling poultry or cattle, building stuff and farming products to the Chinese. Also burghers from Troits‑ kosavsk and other Zabaikalsk’s towns, as well as Buryats, who would bring camels, horses and rams to Kyakhta, were engaged in the small trade. The trade was not large in extent, and earned just a minimum profit in the form of customs duties.28 The customs duties had been collected in the office in Kyakhta on the Russian side, however, in 1766, due to the corruption worries in the Chinese traders’ side, it moved 25 I. POPOV— L. FILIPOVA, Kyakhtinskoe kupechestvo, in: Kyakhtinskaya starina— Al’manakh, Kyakhta 2003, p. 45. 26 KHOKHLOV, p. 129. 27 Cf. V. I. RAZGON, Sibirskoe kupechestvo v XVIII— pervoy polovine XIX veka: Regional’nyy as‑ pekt predprinimatel’stva tradicionnogo tipa, Barnaul 1999. 28 KHOKHLOV, pp. 129–130. 42 PRAGUE PAPERS ON THE HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 2/2014 to Petropavlovsk lying further to the North. Founded later on in 1766 were also the Troitsk’s commercial expedition (in Troitsk fortress in Troitskosavsk) and the Ir‑ kutsk Commercial Police Headquarters.29 THE RUSSIAN EXPORT Mostly hides were exported from Russia to China. Sheep tanned hides or sheep raw hides were exchanged in large amount. In the 1770s and 1770s, sixty thousand to one million hides were exported via Kyakhta. The late 18th century saw annual increase in export by one 1,200,000 hides. Despite the drop in the 19th century, the import of hides would still have its own importance. Yet 600,000 hides were exported in 1850. In the 19th century, nearly half of sheep tanned hides were bought in Zabaikalsk. The tanned hide was partly used as consumer material for cibics— tea cases faced with leather. Eighty thousand hides for tea case facing were used every year in the early 1850s. The demand for hides needed for the tea trade resulted in increase in prices, which would trigger crisis in leather manufacturing in the Irkutsk’s Guber‑ nyia and Zabaikalsk region, since the growth in prices had caused inability of the production to compete. 7 to 16% of the Russian export was exploited for Russian leather in the first half of the 19th century. In 1850 to 1852, Siberian merchants in Kyakhta used 116.7 thousand pieces of Russian leather and tanned hides on average.30 Another important commodity was fur. Chinese houses were not heated therefore cold in winter, which would lead to demand for fur there. Fur was bought on Tu‑ rukhansk or Yenisei markets, and had come from Yakutsk, Kamchatka Pennisula, but also other regions in Siberia. The most popular with Chinese merchants were squirrel skins; their export varied between two and four million pieces yearly. Besides squir‑ rel skins, it was also sable, ermine, fox, otter, beaver and lynx pelts. Illegal fur trade was flourishing until the state monopoly on fur ended in the 1760s.31 Fur was Russia’s principal export into China in the late 18th century and the early 19th century, comprising 70% of the Russian export. The data collected by P. F. Gal‑ lyakhovski, the director of the customs office in Kyakhta, show that 208,699 kg of fur were exported in 1823, whereas in 1824 it was 226,228 kg;32 249,879 kg in 1825; 734,592 kg in 1826; and 1,341,339 kg in 1827.33 The Russian ‑American company established in 1799 as a tool of economic develop‑ ment ranked among the most important as to trade in fur. The trade between China and Alaska had been conducted since the 1760s. On 31st May 1810, the company estab‑ lished its own contor in Kyakhta.34 29 KURTZ, p. 102. 30 KHOKHLOV, p. 127. 31 E. P. SILIN, Predmety kjakhtinskoj torgovli v XVIII. veke, in: Kjakhtinskaya starina— Al’manakh, Kyachta 2003, p. 18. 32 KHOKHLOV, p. 112. 33 Ibidem. 34 N. EBINARKHOVA, Torgovlya rossiysko ‑amerikanskoy kompanii s Kitayem cherez Kyachtu, in: Zemlya Irkutskaya, No. 12, 2000, p. 18. MIcHAL WANNER 43 Russian merchants had been exporting sea beaver, sable, fox pelts, also sea ot‑ ters in smaller amount, from Alaska to Kyakhta where they exchanged it for Chinese goods. What is more, merchants from Irkutsk had been organising hunting expedi‑ tions to the Kuril Islands, or the Aleutian Islands. One of the major organisers of such trade was Ivan Shelekhov, the founder of the Russian ‑American company. The company establishment helped increase turnover of the business with these com‑ modities, and would positively reflect on Kyakhta’s trade.35 After the state monopoly in the fur external trade ended in 1762, there was a high growth in the trade volume: in Kyakhta it grew from 1.4 million rubles to 8.4 million rubles between 1760 and 1800. Between 1757 and 1784 fur comprised 85% of the Rus‑ sian export into China. Another period saw the decrease in amount, but the trade in fur would still far exceed the volume of the trade in metal, fabrics, cattle or other sorts of goods. Fur was the primary commodity of the Russian export into China until the 1840s, but would be displaced by woollen and cotton fabrics, partly because ani‑ mals for the marketed fur had been nearly killed off. It is best illustrated by the drop in the Russian ‑American company’s export into Kyakhta to one third nearly in all commodities. After the Opium Wars, China got glutted by western goods, therefore the interest in the Russian fur would be on the wane.36 In the 1850s, fabrics comprised 50% of the Russian export.37 The following Table shows the share of the Russian fur export into China between 1757 and 1840:38 Years 1757–1784 1790–1800 1824–1828 1836–1840 Share of fur 85% 70% 50.7% 34.5% table 1 Cattle had an important role to play mostly in the early stage of the Kyakhta’s trade. In 1699, four hundred and eighty ‑eight pieces of horned cattle and two hundred and thirty ‑six horses were transported from Irkutsk to Nerchinsk. After the trade had moved to Kyakhta, there was even increase in the cattle trade. It was horses to create high demand in China. Sixty hundred thousand horses intended for exchange were bought in Krasnoyarsk domain in 1758, which would result in increase in horse prices from five ‑seven rubles to fifteen rubles. Between 1759 and 1761 horse export comprised 2.5% of the Russian export. The trade in cattle sharply decreased, and amounted to only 0.23% of the Russian export in the period between 1847 and 1850.39 Also 2,100 m to 10,500 m of cloth, mostly coarse, as well as iron, tin, wax, saltpetre, mica, felt, coiners, grindstones, paints, mirrors, wagons, hemp, Tyumen carpets, bro‑ 35 E. P. SILIN, Rossiysko ‑amerikanskaya kompaniya, in: Kyakhtinskaya starina— Al’manakh, Kyak‑ h ta 2003, pp. 16–17. 36 EBINARKHOVA, p. 19. 37 KHOKHLOV, p. 136. 38 The table is prepared according data presented by KURTZ, p. 110. 39 KHOKHLOV, pp. 111–112.