COMMENTS on Richard Kaufmann’s  ‘The Mongolian Miracle’  by Natalia Bolsokhoeva, Vladimir Badmaev Jr. and Tatiana I. Grekova

The following comments on Richard Kaufmann’s two chapters derive from three different sources. The comments by Dr. Natalia Bolsokhoeva from Ulan-Ude, are based on the Russian version of Doctor Badmaev:Tibetan Medicine, The Tsar’s Court, The Soviet Rule, (Moscow, 1995). The author, Boris Gusev, is a grandson of Pyotr A. Badmaev and works as a journalist in St. Petersburg. Dr. Vladimir Badmaev Jr., the grandson of Dr. Vladimir Badmaev of Poland, who now lives in the U.S., added comments based on personal research on his family tradition of Tibetan medical practice. Dr. Tatiana Grekova from St. Petersburg, who has done a great deal of research on the Badmaevs for her book Tibetan Medicine in Russia (see book presentation), has contributed further details.

We thank all three commentators for their efforts to comment on Kaufmann’s chapters. Their contribution throws further light on the subject of the Badmaevs. The comments have been arranged according to the various topics they deal with and are open to further discussion and research.
 

Kaufmann mentions that the Badmaevs belonged to the race of Zasogols or hereditary princes (AyurVijnana, Vol. 7, [from now onwards AV], p. 7) and were raised “in an estate not far from the city of Csyta [Chita] in the Buryat province of Russia” (AV, 9).

Natalia Bolsokhoeva: It is not clear whether the Badmaevs belonged to the race of the Zasogols. Actually, Zasogol Badma is the name of the father of the two Badmaev brothers but not their family name (Gusev, 1995, p. 5-6). In the Buryat tradition, the children receive their family name from the personal name of their father. But the Buryat tradition does not have princes. The Aginsky district, where the Badmaevs were born, is situated in the Chita region, which does not belong to the Buryat Republic of Russia.

Vladimir Badmaev Jr.: In his book on Tibetan medicine, P. A. Badmaev (1889, p. 27) presents the family tree which indicates that Buddha (my grandfather’s father), Sultim (A. A. Badmaev) and Zham-Saran (P. A. Badmaev) were sons of Zasogol Badma. Peter the Great was the Tsar who bestowed nobility to the predecessor of the Badmaevs, Zasogol Shulengie-Basutu, in 1692 (Badmaev, 1898, p. 27, note 1). The Zasogol family visited Moscow in 1703 (Badmaev, 1898, p. 27), but there are no clear details on the purpose of this visit. They may have met Peter the Great or received a confirmation of the title.

Tatiana Grekova: Chita is situated East of the Buryat Republic in Oriental Siberia (Vostochnaya Siberia), also known as Zabaikalye.
 
 

Kaufmann states that Sultim Badmaev was invited by N. N. Muravyev-Amursky to St. Petersburg because he successfully cured his wife (AV, pp. 4-5).

Bolsokhoeva: Sultim Badmaev had been a physician of the Steppe Duma, the electoral government body under district rules. He enjoyed a great reputation as a skilled traditional Tibetan doctor (Emchi) all over Transbaikalia. At the beginning of the 1850s, a typhoid epidemic had spread in Transbaikalia, killing a large number of the population. At that time, the Russian Governor General of East Siberia was Earl N. N. Muravyev-Amursky. According to Kaufmann, he was conferred the rank of Earl only around 1860 (AV, 5), but following the Russian tradition prior to the October Revolution of 1917, such a rank could only be inherited but not conferred. Muravyev-Amursky had heard about the Tibetan medical science. He received an order to find the most skilled Emchi who would be able to treat the masses suffering from typhoid fever and stop the epidemic.

The most eminent Buryats had attended the special council to solve the immediate problem. Everybody advised the officials to invite Sultim Badmaev. Sultim Badmaev spoke only a little Russian, thus the Earl conversed with him through an interpreter. Sultim Badmaev and his helpers were able to stop the epidemic within a short period of time through their great efforts. Sultim himself entered the typhoid barracks fumigating with incense containing tightly rolled special dry grass. Smoking this grass protected him from any infections (Gusev, 1995, pp. 5-6). It was because of this medical success that N. N. Muravyev-Amursky invited Sultim Badmaev to come with him to St. Petersburg.

When Sultim arrived in St. Petersburg in 1857, he was given a post as assistant physician at the Nikolayevsky Military Hospital located at Suvorovsky Prospect. By 1860, he had established a pharmacy of Tibetan medicines and had started his private medical practice (Gusev, 1995, p. 8). As far as I know, Sultim (A. A. Badmaev) did not teach Mongolian, as mentioned by Kaufmann (AV, 7), but Oirat (Kalmyk) language at St. Petersburg University.

Badmaev: To the best of my knowledge, Sultim Badmaev saved the life of N. N. Muravyev-Amursky’s wife by treating her case of typhoid fever.

Grekova: In Siberia, Sultim Badmaev was famous for successful treatments which were attested to by the references of the civil service and the Orthodox Church officials as well as by qualified physicians. For example, the military physician Potapov mentions that Sultim successfully treated cases of “burning ache, inflammation of different organs, consumptive affections of the chest, eruptions, tumours, diarrhoea, laxations of the stomach, etc.” (Kolodeinikov, 1890).

In fact, it was because of the high credit he enjoyed that he was requested by Earl N. N. Muravyev-Amursky to stop the epidemic. Besides, Sultim was honoured with a membership in the Emperor’s Geographical Society. He wrote a work entitled Long Live the Russian Emperor’s House (Badmaev, A. A., 1890).

In the autumn of 1860, Sultim (A. A. Badmaev) was directed to the Nikolayevsky Military Hospital to prove his medical expertise. In 1861, he successfully passed the examination and qualified as assistant physician. He was also granted the right of wearing the military uniform (see photo on page 21), and he was nominated ‘a medical practitioner for Buryats’. Consequently, he was sent for service to Zabaikalye to be at the disposal of the military Governor. In 1864, he was called back to St. Petersburg, and was sent to the Military Surgical Academy to study surgery. The Academy was renamed Imperial Military Medical Academy in 1887.

From 1864, while studying at the Academy, A. A. Badmaev was teaching Mongolian language at the University as a visiting professor. For the first three years he taught for free. His request to be nominated extraordinary physician of the Court Medical Department was refused on the ground that he did not hold any scholarly degree, and was not educated in European medicine. Although he studied Western medicine at the Academy, he neither passed his final exams nor did he submit his dissertation. Thus he was not considered a qualified doctor.
 
 

Kaufmann mentions that Alexander A. Badmaev reached St. Petersburg in 1857, nearing the age of 65 (AV, 5), and died in 1882 (AV, 7). Other sources below state that he passed away in 1873 most probably at the age of 42.

Bolsokhoeva: According to Gusev, Alexander A. Badmaev died in 1873. He lived in St. Petersburg for sixteen years. Unfortunately, the year of his birth is not known. If, according to Kaufmann, he was “nearly 65 years old” in 1857 (AV, 5), he must have died at the old age of 80, being born around 1793. But, there is no confirmation of these dates.
 Grekova: According to The Biographical Reference Book of the  Professors and Academics of the last three Quarters of the Existence of the Emperor’s St. Petersburg University (1896), Sultim (A. A. Badmaev) died at the age of 42, on September 27, 1873. Probably, like Tsultim Tseden he could not adjust to the change of social environment (he spoke poor Russian); besides, his health suffered from the high humidity of the St. Petersburg climate.
 
 

According to Kaufmann, N. N. Muravyev-Amursky had established a residence and clinic for Sultim Badmaev on Poklonnaya Hill (AV, 6).

 Bolsokhoeva: The dacha (a country house) on the Poklonnaya Mountain (Russian: Poklonnaya Gora), was apparently not established by N. N. Muravyev-Amursky, but was built by Zham-Saran himself, by then known as Pyotr Alexandrovich Badmaev (Gusev, 1995, p. 10). Later he established his Tibetan pharmacy at the dacha. His clinic, however, was established on the Liteinyi Prospect No. 16, where Pyotr Alexandrovich had rented the third floor (Gusev, 1995, pp. 11-12).

 Grekova: Sultim, who was baptised as Alexander Alexandrovich, lived at Suvorovsky Prospect, where he maintained a Tibetan drugstore and practised privately. The house and sanatorium on Poklonnaya Gora were built by his brother Zham-Saran (baptised as Pyotr Alexandrovich), who, on Liteinyi Prospect 16, ran an out-patient clinic.
 
 

According to Kaufmann, Pyotr A. Badmaev was baptised in St. Petersburg somewhere around 1870 (AV, 7).

Bolsokhoeva: Pyotr chose his Christian name after Peter the Great, who was his idol.

Badmaev: Felix Brodowski writes that, “Zham-Saran Badma ... was baptised and was given the name Pyotr, while (Tsar) Alexander III 1 was attending as his godfather.” (Brodowski, 1932, p. 59).  Subsequently, Pyotr’s full name was Pyotr Alexandrovich Badmaev. However, the name Pyotr had a special meaning to him personally, and to the Badmaevs, since Tsar Peter (the Great) was the one who bestowed nobility on the predecessor of the Badmaevs. 2

 All three Badmaevs (i.e. Alexander, Pyotr and Vladimir) had Tsars (or future Tsars) as godfathers, i.e. Alexander II, Alexander III and Nicholas II respectively.

 My grandfather, Jamjan Badma, was baptised on April 5, 1897, although he was born on December 10, 1884. He was baptised with the name Vladimir, although Saint Vladimir’s day has been celebrated in the Orthodox Church (Cerkov) on July 15. This is uncommon in the Orthodox Church where the baptismal name is usually given according to the calendar. Vladimir’s godfather was Tsar Nicholas II, and therefore his full name was Vladimir Nikolayevich Badmaev (Brodowski, 1932, p. 177).
 
 

Kaufmann mentions that the translation of the ‘Four Medical Tantras’ or ‘Gyushi’ (Tib. rgyud bzhi) was assigned to A. A. Badmaev, and that Pyotr was allowed to join him (AV, 7).

Badmaev: According P. A. Badmaev (Zham-Saran), the Gyushi  3  were translated from Tibetan into Mongolian by the middle of the 17th century (Badmaev, P. A., 1898, p. 15). Both Sultim and Zham-Saran were educated and fluent in Mongolian, but not in the Tibetan language. P. A. Badmaev (Zham-Saran) writes that on June 1, 1860, A. A. Badmaev (Sultim) was given an assignment to translate the Gyushi into Russian (Badmaev, P. A., 1898, p. 28), (I assume from the Mongolian language). The cost of this work had been charged to the Ministry of War (voyennogo ministerstva).

Grekova: The question of translating Tibetan medical works from Tibetan into Russian arose as early as the beginning of the 19th century when Doctor Reman, who accompanied the delegation of the Earl Golovkin into China, brought one Buryat Emchi, Tsultim Tseden, to St. Petersburg. N. N. Muravyev-Amursky had anticipated that there would be experts to help Sultim with the translation of the Gyushi from Mongolian into Russian. But Dr. Tsultim Tseden died soon after arrival in the capital.

At the request of Earl N. N. Muravyev-Amursky, Alexander A. Badmaev (Sultim) started translating the Four Medical Tantras from Mongolian into Russian. Professor K. F. Golstunsky and lecturer Gomboyev were assigned to assist him in the translation. As they apparently lacked the necessary medical expertise, the work was moving slowly. In order to help the philologists, a military physician, Malich, was assigned as well. But this measure did not help much. The translation of  the Gyushi was finally completed by Pyotr A. Badmaev after his brother’s death and was first published in 1898.

It is possible that Pyotr A. Badmaev (Zham-Saran) did not know Tibetan, although he could have studied it at the Oriental Department. But Sultim was educated in Aga Datsan, so he must have been taught Tibetan. Two sources mention that he even translated the Four Medical Tantras from Tibetan into Mongolian (Biographical Reference Book, 1896, Vol. 1, p. 33; Kolodeznikov, 1890, Vol. 1).
 
 

Kaufmann writes that Pyotr, whom he erroneously mentions as being a monk who studied at Aga monastery, was nine years younger than his brother Alexander A. Badmaev, who was 70 years old when Pyotr arrived in St. Petersburg (AV, 7). He also mentions that Pyotr was 85 years old when Vladimir N. Badmaev came to St. Petersburg in 1894 (AV, 9), and that Pyotr died at the age of 112 (AV,10). Controversies about Pyotr’s dates are discussed below.

Bolsokhoeva: I have strong doubts that Pyotr was nine years younger than his brother Alexander A. Badmaev. If Kaufmann is correct in stating that A. A. Badmaev was 70 years old when his brother arrived in St. Petersburg, this would mean that Pyotr was around 61 when he came to the capital, starting his year-long university studies. If Pyotr’s year of birth was 1849,  then he passed away at the age of 71. Unfortunately, the exact date of his birth is not known. But it is certain that Pyotr was not a monk and did not study in Aga (Gusev, 1995, p. 10).

Badmaev: According to various Russian sources, Pyotr A. Badmaev (Zham-Saran) was born either in the year 1849, 1851 or 1852 (month and day not given). 4

According to my brother Nicholas, the date of birth was 1852.  However, if the date is correct, that would make Pyotr 60 years younger than his brother Alexander! According to Grekova’s source, Sultim’s dates are 1831-1873. If Pyotr was really born in 1852, we would be 21 years younger than his brother and was only 18 when he arrived in St. Petersburg. The exact dates of the birth and death of Pyotr should be further researched, because he could well have been over 100 years old when he died. According to my grandfather (Vladimir N. Badmaev) and later my father (Peter Badmaev), Pyotr was 112 years old when he died.

Grekova: Pyotr Badmaev was born in 1849 or 1851; he died in 1920. Arrested and imprisoned by the Bolsheviks in 1919, he wrote a request for his release in which he states his age as 108 years old. He must have been aiming at underlining and emphasising the efficiency of Tibetan medicine and might have entertained a naive thought that mentioning his old age would make the Bolsheviks treat him with more respect.
 
 

Kaufmann briefly touches upon the subject of Pyotr’s education in St. Petersburg mentioning his studies in Western medicine at the Academy and his associate and advisory work at the Asian Department at the Ministry of External Affairs (AV, 7).

Bolsokhoeva: Kaufmann talks about the Imperial Military Medical Academy, presently known as Military Medical Academy. Gusev mentions that Pyotr Alexandrovich graduated from this Academy. He also guided a special group of students who had studied the subject of Tibetan medicine. He did not obtain his diploma from the Academy, as according to the official rules a candidate who, after his graduation, does not practise Western medicine has to keep his diploma with the Academy.

Pyotr graduated from the Irkutsk Russian Classical Gymnasium honoured with the Golden Medal. He studied theoretical and practical aspects of Tibetan medicine under the guidance of his elder brother Alexander in St. Petersburg. He had also entered the Oriental Faculty (or Faculty of Oriental Studies) at St. Petersburg University and graduated in 1875 with excellent marks. At the same time he studied at the Imperial Military Medical Academy (Gusev, 1995, p. 10). The Asian Department mentioned by Kaufmann was called the Asian Department of the Russian Empire, not of the Ministry of External Affairs.

Grekova: P. A. Badmaev did not study at the monastery school but graduated from Irkutsk Gymnasium. He came to St. Petersburg in 1870 to pursue his education. He studied Tibetan medicine under his brother’s guidance. Later he solidified his knowledge with the help of Buryat and Mongolian Lamas during his travels to the East. The Lamas also used to come and stay with him in St. Petersburg for longer periods of time.

In September 1870, Pyotr entered the Imperial Military Medical Academy in St. Petersburg. After a year of study he was signed off for non-payment. Thereafter, he entered the Faculty of Oriental Studies at St. Petersburg University and completed the course in 1875 leading to the Candidate Degree equivalent to a Masters Degree. At that time he also became a casual student at the Academy. He completed the course, but he was not awarded the Diploma since, because of a conflict with one of the academics who made efforts to prevent him from passing, Pyotr was requested to hold all the examinations anew, which he refused to do. Probably the situation resulted from the fact that by that time his method of healing had become very popular, and consequently he had a much larger practice than the Academy professors. Besides, they could not bear the fact that a stranger stood in high favour in the Tsar’s family.
 
 

Grekova: From 1880 to 1890, after he had completed his education, Pyotr A. Badmaev was officially visiting professor to St. Petersburg University.
 
 

The subject of Pyotr’s political work is full of controversy. Kaufmann states that Pyotr favoured a policy of occupying Tibet, Mongolia and neighbouring Chinese regions as well as of encircling Korea (AV, 8).

Bolsokhoeva:  In 1883, the last year of his work at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Pyotr Alexandrovich Badmaev introduced his profound proposal, which was written in the form of a philosophical and historical treatise, to Tsar Alexander III. The proposal contained many chapters on the peaceful annexation of Mongolia, Tibet and China to the Russian Empire. Based on historical facts, his proposal was written from a Russian point of view, keeping in mind the interests and policies of the Russian Empire. Pyotr A. Badmaev never talked about a conquest of those countries or about an occupation policy (Gusev, 1995, pp. 13-14).

Badmaev: Pyotr’s plan to annex Mongolia and China to Russia was not based on military intervention but on cultural ties among the territories (reference is made to a Tibetan Empire of the 8th century AD). I recall a remark that a doctrine of Pyotr has, in fact, been used for rationalisation for the ‘cultural’ acquisition of China and Mongolia by the communist regime of Russia. If this is remotely true, Pyotr, who was a royalist, must feel very unhappy in his other World.

Grekova:  Later in his life, due to his knowledge of the Orient and Oriental medicine, Pyotr felt confident to exert cultural and political influence in favour of Russia in the East and undertook some activities in this direction. From 1876-83, he worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. At the end of his tenure at the Ministry, he offered a proposal to Tsar Alexander III concerning the aims and ambitions of the Russian policy in the East. In his proposal he foresaw the imminent fall of the Manchu Dynasty in China and explained his ambitions to incorporate China, Mongolia and Tibet into Russia. His project was well received by Count Sergey Y. Witte, an out-standing personality of the Russian Government, but the Emperor seems to have been more realistic.

However, Badmaev received financial support to carry out his plans in the form of two million roubles. Thereafter he became very active and organised a trade house, ‘Badmaev and Co.’, with its base in Chita. He focused on trade, economical and educational development of the Eastern regions and carried out some diplomatic activities as well.
 
 

Kaufmann mentions that Tsar Nicholas II appointed Pyotr Badmaev as his court physician (AV, 9).

Bolsokhoeva: The Badmaevs  were never appointed as court physicians. (This was reiterated by Grekova.)

Badmaev: The role of A. A. Badmaev and P. A. Badmaev as physicians attending to Tsar Alexander III, Tsar Nicholas II and their families should be researched further. Obviously, the privileged doctor-patient relationship prevented Alexander A. and Pyotr A. Badmaev from boasting about who their patients were and what they were suffering from. There are, however, direct and indirect sources supporting the fact that at least some members of the Imperial family and several members of the Imperial cabinet were patients of Alexander A. and Pyotr A. Badmaev.

For example, I have transcripts of brief letters written by the Minister of Finance (under Alexander III), Count Sergey Witte, to Pyotr A. Badmaev concerning medical treatment that he received from Pyotr. Similarly, I am in the possession of transcripts of letters to Pyotr written by the Minister of Internal Affairs (under Tsar Nicholas II), Alexander Protopopow, concerning his health after treatment received from Pyotr. I also have transcripts of letters from Pyotr to Tsarina Alexandra urging her to administer certain prescriptions to her ailing son.

The gossip spread by the adversaries and enemies of both Badmaevs could serve as indirect evidence that Pyotr A. was seeing Tsar Nicholas II as his patient. In his book The Romanoffs - Autocrats of All the Russians, W. Bruce Lincoln writes, “... Although hardly a reliable witness, the Princess Cantacuzene reported rumours that Nicholas was being drugged at Alexandra’s command by Badmaev, the notorious Tibetan herbalist and medical quack.” (Lincoln, 1981, p. 712).

Grekova: The source of the rumours which claim that P. A. Badmaev was drugging Tsar Nicholas II served the memoirs of F. F. Iusupov, which are biased and contain a lot of inaccuracies. For example, he would call Pyotr Badmaev a ‘benighted (ignorant) Tibetan’ (Iusupov, 1990, p. 412-463), although, ‘the ignorant Tibetan’ had graduated with distinction and held a university degree.
 
 

Kaufmann describes how Pyotr Badmaev treated Prince Alexey, who was then officially ‘cured’ by Rasputin. According to him one cannot speak of a friendship between Pyotr and Rasputin (AV, 10).

Bolsokhoeva: It does not seem that the friendship between Rasputin and Pyotr A. Badmaev was strange. Rasputin was one of Pyotr’s patients and in this connection had visited his dacha on the Poklonnaya Gora several times (Gusev, 1995, p. 35).

Grigory Rasputin was considered a spiritual person and was brought from Tobolsk (Siberia) to St. Petersburg. He was gifted with the power of hypnosis by which he was able to stop the bleeding of Prince Alexey. Rasputin is described by Gusev as a simple Russian, a deceiver, liar and a great friend of alcohol. In spite of his scandalous behaviour, Rasputin was held in great respect by the Tsar’s family, as he was able to help the Prince, who suffered from a blood disease (Gusev, 1995, pp. 35, 38, 39).

Badmaev: Rasputin was not a friend of Pyotr. Because of Rasputin’s destructive influence on the Tsarina and indirectly also on the Tsar, Pyotr saw no other way to avert the disaster than by ‘befriending’ Rasputin and ‘reprogramming’ him. To quote his words ‘If I can not save him (the Tsar) without Rasputin, I will save him with Rasputin’ (Brodowski, 1932, p. 98).

Interestingly, Rasputin was indeed a patient of P. A. Badmaev. Based on published data, and considering that at that time Rasputin was approaching his mid ‘40s, he most likely was treated for a mid-life crisis. Lincoln writes, “... Rasputin also told Iusupov that the herbalist Badmaev could provide a variety of herbal infusions to induce an especially pleasant state of euphoria. ‘When your soul is troubled’, he reportedly said in recommending Badmaev’s preparations, ‘he’ll give you a tiny little cup of liquid made of herbs, you drink it, and, instantly, everything will seem like petty trifles, and you will become genial, so-o ge-nial, and so-o si-lly that you won’t worry about anything.’ “ (Lincoln, 1981, p. 713). This description tells me that Rasputin, who must have felt his outcast position, began suffering from social anxiety disorder compounded by his middle-age status. Further in his book, Lincoln states that “Hallucinogens from Badmaev, morphine from military hospitals, opium from family medicine chest, cocaine for colds - all of these singly or in combination, could produce the disorientation ... “ (Lincoln, 1981, p. 713). I can confirm that this latter comment by Lincoln is totally baseless, since none of the family prescriptions has utilised hallucinogens or drugs producing dependency like narcotics. I have recently introduced to the U.S. market the formula which Rasputin was using, especially in view of the needs expressed by ageing baby-boomers.

Grekova: The relationship between Pyotr A. Badmaev and Rasputin was rather complicated. It is known that Rasputin was treated by Pyotr. A kind of covert struggle is sure to have been happening between them. It is quite possible that after the attempts to get rid of Rasputin, Pyotr decided to make friends with him. A few sources 5 say that Badmaev collected data against Rasputin and sent it through M. V. Rodzyanko, the Chair-Person of the State Duma, to the Tsar. However, the report did not have the expected effect, since the accusations were not supported by the Holy Synod, the governing body of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Many sources confirm that Rasputin was suffering from impotence. Also he was a bisexual. 6 A. P. Kotsubinsky and D. A. Kotsubinsky claim that Rasputin was treated for temporal impotence. Pyotr Badmaev was treating Rasputin for strengthening his attraction to women. But Rasputin was not the sexual monster as which he is usually depicted. 7

At his dacha at Poklonnaya Gora, Pyotr Badmaev kept a monk named Iliodor, who had received order by the Tsar to leave the capital because of his actions against Rasputin. Pyotr also attempted to hand over Iliodor’s letter of accusations regarding Rasputin to the Tsar. P. A. Badmaev also supported Bishop Hermogen, by postponing his departure from St. Petersburg under the pretext of illness (Hermogen also had been ordered to leave the capital). When the Tsar gave order to the Minister of Internal Affairs to expel Hermogen from the city, Badmaev adopted the role of a peacemaker and persuaded the monk to leave the city on his own. (Grekova, 1998, p. 137).
 
 

Gusev’s book shows a photograph of Pyotr and his second wife (left). Kaufmann erroneously states that Pyotr was a celibate and Gelong (AV, pp. 7, 9, 10).

Bolsokhoeva: Pyotr was not a celibate and Gelong but was married twice. Gusev mentions that Elizaveta Petrovna was the second wife of Pyotr Alexandrovich Badmaev, and was his (Gusev’s) grandmother. She did not know the exact birth date of Pyotr.
 

The source of Kaufmann’s narration on Pyotr’s death (AV, 10) is not mentioned. Details on his imprisonment and death are provided below.

Bolsokhoeva: Kaufmann’s narration on Pyotr’s death is very questionable, as he was not a monk and thus most probably not trained in Buddhist death practices. Also his age of 112 years is not confirmed (see previous comments). After the October Revolution, the life of Pyotr Badmaev completely changed. He was arrested several times and sent to prison, where he suffered from pneumonia and typhoid. His health was very delicate. Shortly before his death, Pyotr was released from prison to stay with his family. He passed away in 1920. His funeral was held on August 1 at the Shuvalovo cemetery, then a vicinity of St. Petersburg (Gusev, 1995, pp. 75-76).  Pyotr A. Badmaev’s grave inscription only mentions the date of his death, 1920 (Gusev, 1995, p. 65, footnote 1).

Badmaev: In 1920, Pyotr was released from the Bolshevik prison because of old age and poor health (probably due to a congestive heart failure), and in part because he had successfully cured his captors from venereal diseases - rampant at that time of turmoil. He was never allowed to return to his Poklonnaya Gora dacha and Tibetan Sanatorium. His dacha was annexed by the Revolutionary Committee, and later transformed into a Police (Militia) Station. In the 1980s (!) the dacha was demolished (by a regrettable mistake according to the St. Petersburg officials) when there was a need to widen the nearby highway.

Pyotr died in 1920 and is buried at the Shuvalovskoye [= Shuvalovo] cemetery. His grave stone is a simple wooden cross. I have never heard the story of Pyotr’s death in a Buryat tradition as cited by Kaufmann. However, I have heard a story from P. Cyrill von Korvin-Krasinski, conveyed to him by my grandfather Vladimir N. Badmaev, about the death of my grandfather’s close relative in Buryatia. This relative was an old and accomplished person and was visited by a Lama who told him that he is ready for Nirvana, meaning that he is about to die. The description of his death was similar to the one described by Kaufmann. However, I do not recall that the dying person himself recited from the Tibetan Book of Death. It was rather a family gathering to bid farewell to a person who departed to Nirvana out of his own will and as advised by the priest. To the best of my recollection, the story told by Krasinski referred to the father of my grandfather, whose name was Buddha.
 

Part Two of Kaufmann’s chapter, ‘Physician out of Passion’, narrates the story of Vladimir N. Badmaev and his life. Clarifying comments below refer to Vladimir’s life with his uncle Pyotr (AV, 9, 11) and his treatment of P. Cyrill von Korvin-Krasinski (AV, pp. 12).

Bolsokhoeva: When Vladimir came to St. Petersburg, “the 85-year old uncle” (AV, 9,11) was, as already mentioned, married twice and his age was not known. Most probably, life in his home was not “as strict as in a monastery” (AV, 11).

Badmaev: My grandfather, Jamjan Badma, was born in Chita, Siberia, on December 10, 1884. He was baptised on April 5, 1897 in St. Petersburg and his godfather was Tsar Nicholas II. Therefore his full name was Vladimir Nikolayevich Badmaev. He escaped from Bolshevik Russia to Poland in the 1920s and married twice. Vladimir N. Badmaev practised medicine until the late 1950s when he developed Parkinson’s disease. He died in 1961 and is buried at the Powonzki cemetery in Warsaw.

Kaufmann’s narration about P. Cyrill Johannes von Korvin-Krasinski is correct. I have known Cyrill personally and spent quite some time with him at Maria Laach monastery discussing Tibetan medicine and his fascination with that medical art. He was a patient and disciple of my grandfather. Cyrill died at Maria Laach monastery on March 30, 1992. He was 91 years old. He is buried at the monastery’s cemetery.

I think that Kaufmann received the information on Vladimir Badmaev from Korvin-Krasinski, possibly from the quarterly magazines published by my grandfather entitled Die Synthetische Medizin (Badmajeff, W., 1938) and from the book by Feliks Brodowski, The Badmaevs-Tibetan Medicine in Contact with Western Civilisation (Brodowski, 1932).
 
 

On the Commentators: