No 5 (2024)

The paper provides a genetic analysis of the European narrative about the Oprichnina of Ivan the Terrible: A. Schlichting, I. Taube and E. Kruse, G. Staden, A. Guagnini, P. Oderborn. The assumption is substantiated that the source for individual fragments of the works of A. Schlichting, A. Guagnini and P. Oderborn was a common text that has not reached us (possibly avvissi), creatively revised by these authors. The origin of information in the writings of foreigners is established, a hypothesis about textual borrowings and the relationship of texts is proposed. The conclusion is substantiated about a significant proportion of the literary component in these sources, which requires a special source analysis when using them as sources on the history of the Oprichnina of Ivan the Terrible.

The article analyzes one of the episodes of the Oprichnina – Basargin pravezh. This name was given to the defeat by the oprichnics detachment of the Pomorian volosts on the White Sea coast of the Kola Peninsula. The ruin was caused by economic disputes between rich Dvina peasants and peasants of Pomorian volosts over the right to own fishing grounds. The inclusion of Dvina land in the Oprichnina allowed the Dvina peasants to resolve the conflict in their favor. The article reveals the extent of the ruin and decline of the economy of the Pomerian volosts.

The article is devoted to the study of the phenomenon of bribery in the Peter the Great era through the prism of interdisciplinary research: closely related methods of cultural anthropology, linguo-semiotics, linguistics proper, historical semantics and historical-legal approach. Such methodological synthesis is aimed at studying the words that marked the phenomena defined by the author as private rewards of officials. Private rewards of officials are a complex social phenomenon that cannot be reduced to the modern concept of a bribe. The combination of methods of philological, historical and legal sciences allowed us to obtain a more subtle optics of its study, to see how the evolution and criminalization of ancient practices of gift exchange and tribute took place in the context of the emerging modern state, on the one hand, and how difficult it was for the legal concept of a bribe to mature as a criminal variety of such rewards, on the other.

The article examines the origin and development of film censorship in Russia since the advent of cinema in the country and before the outbreak of the First World War. The first restrictions were imposed on the court chronicle. Since the mid-1900s, with the development of feature films and the rapid expansion of the cinema network, the issue of introducing film censorship was increasingly raised. Some steps in this direction have been taken, but mainly at the level of local authorities. As a result, by 1914 film censorship remained decentralized, and decisions on the rental of a particular film were usually made by police officers and local administration officials. A feature of film censorship in the period under study was the significant influence of "grassroots" initiatives: various committees, assemblies, political forces and moral zealots demanded that the state tighten control over the rental in order to protect children and the whole society from the "corrupting" influence of cinema. However, before the outbreak of the World War and the revolution, the government did not take practical steps to centralize film censorship.

The article is devoted to the analysis of historical and cultural traditions of depicting the Russian Empire on European satirical maps of the 19th century. The study of this historical and cultural source allows us to identify the origins of critical strategies in visualizing the place and role of Russia in the geopolitical space of Europe and Asia by involving and comparative analysis of such additional documents as medieval and modern world maps. Despite all the differences in motives and interpretations of geographical objects by the creators of maps of different eras, what was common in their goals was the desire to semantize space, to give a significant – in spiritual, ideological, cultural, political, propaganda sense – meaning to the geographical location of that or another country in a global (but more often European) “concert” of countries, peoples, states and cultures. Satirical maps of the world traditionally spoke the language of allegories and metaphors, creating images of “neighbor”, “other”, “stranger”, “enemy” depending on the geopolitical and ideological relevance of the moment, but relying on the deep layers of cultural perception of spatial realities. The image of the Russian Empire, which combined “European-Asian”, “Western-Eastern” identities in both a geographical and cultural-civilizational sense, became for satirists a convenient propaganda method of ideological semantization and critical interpretation of its role in the system of great powers.

The role of the People's Commissariat of Justice (NKYu) of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) in the development of early Soviet legislation has drawn the attention of researchers previously but remains underexplored. Therefore, it is crucial to analyze codification work led by NKYu as part of the 1922 reform and afterwards, study the specific features of those efforts, clarify the positions of legal scholars who drafted the first Soviet codes, examine the challenges they encountered, as well as the different perspectives on the new legislation at the time.

The article examines the key moments in the history of the creation and formation of three Moscow volunteer divisions. They arose on the basis of the workers'/Communist and extermination battalions of Moscow in October 1941 as the last reserve on the near approaches to the capital. For a comprehensive study and analysis of the process of transformation of Moscow militia formations into regular units of the Red Army (November 1941- January 1942), not only new documents from the Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense (CAMO), but also unique interviews with former militia members from the Mints Commission of the Scientific Archive of the IRI RAS were used for the first time. An attempt has been made to reconstruct and show not only the military-organizational aspect of this process, but also an equally important humanitarian one, which can be reflected in the course of studying the military everyday life of that time.

The article analyzes the first year of the implementation of radical economic reforms in Russia, also known as the policy of "shock therapy". The author examines the conditions prevailing by the early 1990s for the transition to a market economy and examines the key measures of the government of E.T. Gaidar in 1992. Assessing the activities of the new Russian government, the author draws attention to the fact that the reformers actually had to act in a time-consuming environment: the economy was completely unbalanced, the old mechanisms of public administration were destroyed, new mechanisms of public administration had not yet been created. In addition, the institutions functioning in the country were not adapted for a rapid transition to a new social formation, which in many ways predetermined the difficulties of the transition period. At the same time, the author notes numerous mistakes made by the new government during the period of radical economic reform.

Using the example of M.V. Sidorova's monograph «On Gendarmes, Emperors and Fine Arts», the article discusses the organization of the higher (political) police of the Russian Empire in the XIX century, the activities of Alexander Benckendorff and Leonty Dubelt.

The book was written by M.V. Sidorova, an experienced archival curator, researcher and curator of exhibitions of exhibits from the funds of the State Archive of the Russian Federation. Based on these materials on a thematic basis, the monograph includes chapters on the life and work of emperors and members of the royal family, on gendarmes, as well as on fine art at the imperial court of the 19^th century. The review focuses on the assessment of the pictorial materials presented in the third chapter and their role in the activities and lives of representatives of the imperial family.

The review analyzes the articles of the famous historian, Doctor of Historical Sciences, professor, employee of the IRI RAS S.V. Tyutyukin and his memoirs published in the book "Stanislav Vasilyevich Tyutyukin. Selected works / Comp. I.S. Udaltsov et al. M.: Collection, 2022". A wide range of his scientific interests, attention to documentary material, accuracy of assessments of the studied events, and the ability to make historical predictions are noted. The importance of preserving the "off-duty" biography of S.V. Tyutyukin in historical memory, reflecting his creative inclinations and pedagogical talents, is emphasized.

The review is devoted to the latest biography of B.V. Savinkov, written by K.N. Morozov.