106 Chapter Three
been extended to Orthodox pilgrims, to encourage more of them to go to Jeru-
salem, and to make the journey legally, with the support of the IOPS. In the
case of the hajj, Pleve hoped it would put a stop to illegal pilgrimage. Both the
Baghdad and the Jeddah consuls had reported that most of Russia’s hajj pil-
grims traveled abroad without passports, mainly because it was inconvenient
and costly to get them.^58 Laws introduced in the 1840s, and still on the books,
required hajj pilgrims (as well as their Orthodox counterparts) to obtain pass-
ports only in Russia’s Black Sea ports. This was supposed to prevent them from
“wandering” aimlessly in the empire, under the aegis of pilgrimage. But it had
become a hardship for many, as it added layers of bureaucracy to the pilgrim-
age, complicated and slowed down their journey, and surely pushed many to
avoid the Black Sea routes altogether.
By authorizing Russian officials across the empire and at various levels (gov-
ernors, regional heads, city-governors, and district heads) to issue passports to
hajj pilgrims, Pleve hoped to end illegal pilgrimage and nudge pilgrims to the
Black Sea routes. Recent work has explored how Russia, like other modernizing
states, embraced passports in the nineteenth century as a tool for documenting
and policing populations, and controlling mobility.^59 Here we see how, and to
what ends, the state tried to use passports as an instrument for policing Muslim
pilgrims. Pleve proposed free passports largely to allow Russian officials to com-
pile more detailed data on patterns of Russia’s hajj traffic. The “Temporary
Rules” stipulated that Russian officials would keep detailed logbooks with lists
of Muslims who applied for passports, including information on their places of
origin, age, social estate, and intended route to Mecca. All of this information
would also be recorded on the passport itself; the third page of the passport
would provide space for the official to record the detailed itinerary, as well as a
list of places that the passport holder intended to visit along the way. At the
same time, Russian officials were to use the face-to-face encounter with Mus-
lims to influence their route. Together with passports, officials were supposed to
give pilgrims a copy of “Temporary Rules,” printed in both Russian and Turkic
languages, with instructions from the ministry regarding sanitary rules neces-
sary to observe during travel; the locations of Russian consular representatives
in Ottoman and Persian lands; and the penalties for violating quarantine laws.^60
Pleve also proposed the recruitment of Muslim leaders to help the govern-
ment organize the hajj. There was nothing new about Russia co-opting Muslim
intermediaries to help with the work of governing the empire’s Muslim popula-
tions.^61 In this case, Pleve was proposing that Russia’s Muslim clergy be asked
to appoint trusted leaders to organize large groups. The idea here was to