Abashevo, Penza Oblast

Nikolay Dmitrievich Durnovo

Narovchat county, area of the village is 74 tithes, 180 peasant households belonging to landowners: Prince Yakov Alexandrovich Golitsyn. Alexey Danilovich Durnovo and Ivan Vasilievich Yavorsky, there was a wooden church of St. Nicholas. Records indicated that peasants worked on the serfdom.

One of the notable owners of the Abashevo was Durnovo family. Durnovo was a noble family of the same origin with Tolstoy. One of Tolstoy's was nicknamed Durnoy (Russian: Дурной) [could be translated as evil, the bad, joker]. Durnovos participated in the assentation to the throne of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov. Durnovos landed in various provinces, including Penza. After the death of Colonel Alexey Danilovich Durnovo land was owned by his cousin Nikolay Dmitrievich Durnovo (1725-1816), the general-in-chief, Senator, Commander of the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky and St. Vladimir of 1 degree. He served in the prestigious Semenov Life Guards regiment. In 1765 he was sent on a special mission into the small town of Yaitsky where he was severely beaten by rebellious Cossacks. On recovery, he was transferred into the supply division with the rank of a brigadier. By 1783 he has risen to the rank of lieutenant-general, and in 8 years he was managing the military commissariat department and obtained the title of 'senator' while becoming a member of the Military Collegium. Under his ownership Abashevo was 887 people strong. From Nikolay Dmitrievich Durnovo land passed to Alexei Mikhailovich Durnovo, grandson Alexei Danilovich Durnovo, who have eventually sold the village to Second-Major Sergey Andreevich Arapov (1765-1837).[1]

The village is owned by Second Major Sergey Andreevich Arapov.

• In 1837 the wooden church of St. Nicholas was rebuilt.
• In 1838 Arapov brought the estate staff captain Platon Ivanovich Pukalov to manage the estate.
• By 1840 Arapov transferred the management of Abashevo to his proxy Lieutenant Michael Andrianovich Lachinov.
• In 1877 parish center of Narovchat district counted 218 households, about half of the residents were Old Believers Beglopopovtsy.
• In 1883 a new St. Nicholas Church built.
• By 1892 the single-faith community was formed.

Abashevo is one of the centers of pottery in the Penza province. I the year of 1902 from a total number of 264 households 200 of them recorded as pottery makers. Since the mid-19th century in addition to utilitarian pottery, Abashevo began the production of clay toys and whistles that received wide acclaim. During the 1958 excavation on the southern outskirts of the village 20 graves of ancient Mordovians-Moksha were discovered.[2]