The Conception of the Overland Trade Held by the Golovkin Embassy : Focusing on Bukhtarma Trade in the Early 19th Century

After the Kyakhta Treaty in 1727, the Russian Empire and the Qing Dynasty maintained relations based on trade, and the trade in the sole border town of Kyakhta increased. At the end of the 18th century, however, Russia attempted to increase its profits by expanding trade, and this request came to the fore when the Golovkin Embassy was dispatched to the Qing in 1805-06. In this paper I consider the Russian government's conception of trade in Asia in the early 19th century, focusing on the issue of the overland trade route between Russian Siberia and Sinkiang of the Qing. Firstly, I illustrate howand why the Russian government dispatched the embassy to the Qing. I then analyze the instructions and the documents written by top Russian government officials in order to grasp Russian policy toward Asia. Finally, I examine research on the overland trade route and Yu. A. Golovkin's position on the matter. The conclusions of this paper are as follows. (1) The purpose of the instructions given the embassay was to set up commercial centers for free trade along the border between Russia and the Qing, and if it was impossible, it was to open new trading routes, that for overland trade at Bukhtarma and that for seaborne trade in Guangzhou, while maintaining the Kyakhta Treaty. (2) The reason why Commerce Minister, N. P. Rumyantsev, who played a leading role in drafting the concept for trade in Asia, emphasized the importance of Bukhtarma as a commercial center was that he felt merchants who came and went in this area would spread the market to extend beyond Sinkiang, to Mongolia, Tibet, Central Asia and India as well as China. (3) As a result of his research, Golovkin decided that legalization of Bukhtarma trade enabled Russian merchants to enter the market directly and it did not cause damage to Kyakhta trade, but he could get no information about economic activities of Chinese merchants and commercial traffic in China, so he could not take specific measures to open the route