The authors analyze domestic pre-revolutionary historiography according to the problem of the Kazakh-Cossack inter-ethnic relations in the forest-steppe zone of Southern Siberia. The largest waterway in the region of the Irtysh River was the object of attention of two groups during the second half of XVIII - early XIXth century, who were competitors in the struggle for its natural resources. The analysis of the rich heritage of pre-revolutionary Russian historiography suggests that the subject of attention of researchers began the history of the Siberian Cossack Army, the gradual settlement of the nomadic Kazakh tribes of the Upper Irtysh and the creation of the Irtysh ten-verst (desyativerstnoye) space as a special buffer zone. In the view of researchers were also questions of transformation of “desyativerstnoye space” during the second half of the XIXth century, its expansion to the Kazakh Steppe, contents of strategies and specificity of ethnic practices, including an open confrontation. At the same time the legal status of “desyativerstnoye space”, the contents of the interdepartmental struggle around it, projects and mechanisms to solve the problem of land management of the Kazakhs, nomadizing near the Irtysh, the nature of ethnic Kazakh-Cossack relations after the decree of 1904 - remained outside the focus of pre-revolutionary researchers. All this requires further study of the indicated problem aspect.