Tolstov, Sergei Pavlovich

Tolstov, Sergei Pavlovich 

Born Jan. 12 (25), 1907, in St. Petersburg; died Dec. 28,1976, in Moscow. Soviet ethnographer, archaeologist, historian, and Orientalist. Corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1953). Member of the CPSU since 1944.

From 1939 to 1951, Tolstov was a professor and head of the ethnography subdepartment of the history department at Moscow State University. From 1942 to 1966 he served as director of the Institute of Ethnography of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Tolstov’s main works deal with the archaeology and the primitive, ancient, and medieval history of the peoples of Middle Asia; the history of religion and social systems; and ethnogeny. He edited the multivolume Peoples of the World. In 1937 he organized the Khorezm Archaeological and Ethnographic Expedition, which he directed until 1969.

Tolstov received the State Prize of the USSR in 1949 for his work Ancient Khorezm (1948). He has been awarded three orders and various medals.

WORKS

Po sledam drevnekhorezmiiskoi tsivilizatsii, Moscow-Leningrad, 1948.
Po drevnim del’tam Oksa i laksarta, Moscow, 1962.

REFERENCE

Zhdanko, T. A., Iu. A. Rapoport, and N. N. Cheboksarov. “S. P. Tolstov (k60-letiiu so dnia rozhdeniia).” Sovetskaia etnografiia, 1967, no. 1.