By contrast the Solons (ancestors of the Evenkis in China) and the Khamnigans (Ewenkis of Transbaikalia) had picked up horse breeding and the Mongolian deel from the Mongols.

The ancestors of the south-eastern Evenki most likely lived in the Baikal region of Southern Siberia (near the modern-day Mongolian border) since the Neolithic era.

Elements of more modern Evenki culture, including conical tent dwellings, bone fish-lures, and birch-bark boats, were all present in sites that are believed to be Neolithic.

Cossacks, who served as a kind of "border-guard" for the tsarist government, imposed a fur tax on the Siberian tribes.

The Cossacks exploited the Evenki clan hierarchy, taking hostages from the highest members to ensure payment of the tax.

[8] The Russians and their constant demands for fur taxes pushed the Evenki east all the way to Sakhalin island, where some still live today.

Russian invasion of the Evenki caused them (and other indigenous peoples) language erosion, a decline in traditions, and identity loss, among others.

Soviet policies of collectivization, forced sedentarization (sometimes referred to as sedentism), "unpromising villages", and Russification of the education system compromised social, cultural, and mental well-being of the Evenki.

The Evenki are spread over a huge territory of the Siberian taiga from the River Ob in the west to the Okhotsk Sea in the east, and from the Arctic Ocean in the north to Manchuria and Sakhalin in the south.

In 1763, the Qing government moved 500 Solon Evenki and 500 Daur families to the Tacheng and Ghulja areas of Xinjiang, in order to strengthen the empire's western border.

[17] Traditionally they were a mixture of pastoralists and hunter-gatherers—they relied on their domesticated reindeer for milk and transport and hunted other large game for meat.

During winter, the hunting season, most camps consisted of one or two tents while spring encampments had up to 10 households [20] Their skill at riding their domesticated reindeer allowed the Evenki to "colonize vast areas of the eastern taiga which had previously been impenetrable" [21] The Evenki used a saddle unique to their culture, placed on the shoulders of the reindeer to lessen the strain on the animal, and used a stick rather than stirrups to balance.

Several households pastured their animals together throughout the summer, being careful to keep "[s]pecial areas ... fenced off ... to guard the newborn calves against being trampled on in a large herd" [27] The Evenki wore a characteristic garb "adapted to the cold but rather dry climate of the Central Siberia and to a life of mobility ... they wore brief garments of soft reindeer or elk skin around their hips, along with leggings and moccasins, or else long supple boots reaching to the thigh" (49).

The Evenki traditional costume always consisted of these elements: a loincloth made of animal hide, leggings, and boots of varying lengths [28] Facial tattooing was also very common.

The Evenki who lived near the Okhotsk Sea hunted seal, but for most of the taiga-dwellers, elk, wild reindeer, and fowl were the most important game animals.

Other animals included "roe deer, bear, wolverine, lynx, wolf, Siberian marmot, fox, and sable" [29] Trapping did not become important until the imposition of the fur tax by the tsarist government.

[4][5][6] The Evenki, like most nomadic, pastoral, and subsistence agrarian peoples, spend most of their lives in very close contact with nature.

This idea, "[t]he embodiment, animation, and personification of nature—what is still called the animistic worldview—is the key component of the traditional worldview of hunter-gatherers" [32] Although most of the Evenkis have been "sedentarized"—that is, made to live in settled communities instead of following their traditional nomadic way of life [33]—"[m]any scholars think that the worldview characteristic of hunter-gatherer societies is preserved, even if they make the transition to new economic models.

[34] Although nominally Christianized in the 18th century, the Evenki people maintain many of their historical beliefs—especially shamanism [35] The Christian traditions were "confined to the formal performance of Orthodox rites which were usually timed for the arrival of the priest in the taiga" [36] The religious beliefs and practices of the Evenki are of great historical interest since they retain some archaic forms of belief.

[38] She was born in 1920 and was living in the village of Yiming Gatsa in the Evenki Banner (county) of the Hulunbuir Prefecture, in the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region.

She hid her prize possession—an Abagaldi (bear spirit) shaman mask, which has also been documented among the Mongols and Dauer peoples in the region.

[39] Olga Kudrina (c. 1890–1944) was a shaman among the Reindeer Evenki of northern Inner Mongolia along the Amur River's Great Bend (today under the jurisdiction of Genhe, Hulunbuir).