The basis of the Russian economy in the second half of the 17th century was serfdom. However, along with it, new phenomena are found in the economic life of the country. The most important of these was the folding of all Russian market. In Russia of this time, small-scale commodity production and money circulation develop, and manufactories appear. The economic disunity of individual regions of Russia is beginning to recede into the past. The formation of an all-Russian market was one of the prerequisites for the development of the Russian people into a nation ( See V. I. Lenin, What are “friends of the people” and how do they fight against the Social Democrats? Works, vol. 1, pp. 137-138.).

In the 17th century there was a further process of formation of the feudal-absolutist (autocratic) monarchy. Zemsky Sobors, which met repeatedly in the first half of the century, finally ceased their activity by the end of the century. The significance of the Moscow orders has increased as headquarters with their bureaucracy represented by clerks and clerks. In his domestic politics autocracy relied on the nobility, which becomes a closed estate. There is a further strengthening of the rights of the nobility to land, and landownership is spreading in new areas. The "Cathedral Code" of 1649 legally formalized serfdom.

The strengthening of feudal oppression met with fierce resistance from the peasants and the lower classes of the urban population, which was expressed primarily in powerful peasant and urban uprisings (1648, 1650, 1662, 1670-1671). The class struggle was also reflected in the largest religious movement in Russia in the 17th century. - schism of the Russian Orthodox Church.

The rapid economic growth of Russia in the 17th century contributed to the further development of the vast expanses of Eastern Europe and Siberia. In the 17th century there is an advance of Russian people to the sparsely populated territories of the Lower Don, the North Caucasus, the Middle and Lower Volga regions and Siberia.

The reunification of Ukraine with Russia in 1654 was an event of great historical significance. The kindred Russian and Ukrainian peoples united in a single state, which contributed to the development of productive forces and the cultural upsurge of both peoples, as well as the political strengthening of Russia.

Russia, 17th century acts in international relations as a great power, stretching from the Dnieper in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east.

Serfdom

In the second half of the XVII century. The main occupation of the population of Russia remained agriculture, based on the exploitation of the feudally dependent peasantry. In agriculture, the methods of tillage that had been established in previous times continued to be used. Three fields were most common, but in the forest regions of the North, undercutting occupied an important place, and in the steppe zone of the South and the Middle Volga region - fallow. Primitive tools of production (plow and harrow) and low yields corresponded to these methods of cultivating the land, characteristic of feudalism.

The land was owned by secular and spiritual feudal lords, the palace department and the state. Boyars and nobles by 1678 concentrated in their hands 67% of peasant households. This was achieved through grants from the government and direct seizures of palace and black-moss (state) lands, as well as the possessions of small service people. The nobles created serf farms in the uninhabited southern districts of the state. By that time, only a tenth of the taxable (that is, those who paid taxes) population of Russia (townspeople and black-skinned peasants) was in an unenslaved state by this time.

The overwhelming majority of secular feudal lords belonged to the middle and small landowners. What was the economy of a middle-class nobleman can be seen from the correspondence of A.I. Bezobrazov. He did not disdain any means if the opportunity presented itself to round off his possessions. Like many other landowners, he vigorously seized and bought up fertile lands, shamelessly driving out small servants from their homes, and resettled his peasants from the less fertile central districts to the South.

The second place after the nobles in terms of land ownership was occupied by spiritual feudal lords. In the second half of the XVII century. Bishops, monasteries and churches owned over 13% of taxable households. The Trinity-Sergius Monastery stood out especially. In his possessions, scattered throughout the European territory of Russia, there were about 17 thousand households. The votchinniki-monasteries ran their households in the same serf ways as the secular feudal lords.

In a few best conditions in comparison with the landlord and monastic peasants, there were black-haired peasants who lived in Pomorie, where there was almost no landownership and land was considered state owned. But they were also burdened with various kinds of duties in favor of the treasury, they suffered from the oppression and abuses of the royal governors.

The center of the estate or patrimony was a village, or village, next to which stood the master's estate with a house and outbuildings. A typical manor yard in central Russia consisted of a chamber set on the basement floor. With her were the canopy - a spacious reception room. Outbuildings stood next to the upper room - a cellar, a barn, a bathhouse. The yard was fenced, next to the garden. The estates of the wealthy nobles were more extensive and luxurious than those of the small landowners.

The village, or village, was the center for the villages adjacent to it. In a medium-sized village, there were rarely more than 15-30 households, in the villages there were usually 2-3 households. Peasant yards consisted of a warm hut, cold vestibules and outbuildings.

The landowner kept serfs in the estate. They worked in the garden, barnyard, stables. The master's household was in charge of the clerk, the confidant of the landowner. However, the economy, which was carried out with the help of courtyard people, only partially satisfied the landowners' needs. The main income of the landowners was brought by corvée or quitrent duties of serfs. The peasants cultivated the landlords' land, harvested crops, mowed meadows, carried firewood from the forest, cleaned ponds, built and repaired mansions. In addition to the corvee, they were obliged to deliver to the masters "table stocks" - a certain amount of meat, eggs, dry berries, mushrooms, etc. In some villages of the boyar B. I. Morozov, for example, it was supposed to give a pig carcass, two ram, goose with giblets, 4 piglets, 4 hens, 40 eggs, some butter and cheese.

The increase in domestic demand for agricultural products, as well as, in part, the export of some of them abroad, prompted the landowners to expand the lordly plowing and increase the dues. In this regard, peasant corvee was continuously increasing in the black earth belt, and in the non-chernozem regions, mainly central (with the exception of estates near Moscow, from which supplies were delivered to the capital), where corvée was less common, the share of quitrent duties increased. The landowner's plowing expanded at the expense of the best peasant lands, which went under the master's fields. In areas where quitrent prevailed, the value of monetary rent slowly but steadily increased. This phenomenon reflected the development of commodity-money relations in the country, in which peasant farms were gradually involved. However, in its pure form, cash dues were very rare; as a rule, it was combined with the rent of products or with corvee duties.

A new phenomenon, closely connected with the development of commodity-money relations in Russia, was the creation of various types of fishing enterprises in large landlord farms. The largest estate of the middle of the XVII century. boyar Morozov organized the production of potash in the Middle Volga region, built an ironworks in the village of Pavlovsky near Moscow, and had many distilleries. This hoarder, according to contemporaries, had such a greed for gold, "like an ordinary thirst for drink."

Morozov's example was followed by some other major boyars - Miloslavsky, Odoevsky and others. At their industrial enterprises, the most burdensome work of transporting firewood or ore was assigned to the peasants, who were obliged in turn to work sometimes on their own horses, leaving their arable land abandoned in the hottest time of field work. . Thus, the passion of large feudal lords for industrial production did not change the feudal foundations of the organization of their economy.

Large feudal lords introduced some innovations in their estates, where new varieties of fruit trees, fruits, vegetables, etc. appeared, and greenhouses were built for growing southern plants.

The emergence of manufactories and the development of small commodity production

An important phenomenon in the Russian economy was the foundation of manufactories. In addition to metallurgical enterprises, leather, glass, stationery and other manufactories arose. The Dutch merchant A. Vinius, who became a Russian citizen, built the first water-powered ironworks in Russia. In 1632, he received a royal charter for the construction of factories near Tula for the production of iron and iron, casting cannons, boilers, etc. Vinius could not cope with the construction of factories on his own and a few years later entered into a company with two other Dutch merchants. Large iron-working plants were created somewhat later in Kashira, in the Olonets region, near Voronezh and near Moscow. These factories produced cannons and gun barrels, strip iron, boilers, frying pans, etc. In the 17th century. the first copper-smelting plants appeared in Russia. Copper ore was found near Salt Kamskaya, where the treasury built the Pyskorsky plant. Subsequently, on the basis of the Pyskorsky ores, the factory of "smelters" of the Tumashev brothers operated.

Work in the manufactories was carried out mainly by hand; however, some processes were mechanized with water engines. Therefore, manufactories were usually built on rivers blocked by dams. Labor-intensive and cheaply paid work (earthworks, logging and transportation of firewood, etc.) was carried out mainly by ascribed peasants or their own serfs, as was the case, for example, at the ironworks of the royal father-in-law I. D. Miloslavsky. Shortly after their foundation, the government attributed two palace volosts to the Tula and Kashira factories.

The decisive role in providing the population with industrial products, however, did not belong to manufactories, the number of which, even by the end of the 17th century, was 100%. did not reach even three dozen, but to peasant household crafts, urban crafts and small commodity production. In connection with the growth of market relations in the country, small-scale commodity production has intensified. Serpukhov, Tula and Tikhvin blacksmiths, Pomeranian carpenters, Yaroslavl weavers and tanners, Moscow furriers and cloth makers worked not so much to order as to the market. Some commodity producers used hired labor, though on a small scale.

Seasonal trades have also been greatly developed, especially in the non-chernozem regions near Moscow and to the north of it. The growth of property and state duties forced the peasants to go to work, to be hired for construction work, for salt and other crafts as auxiliary workers. A large number of peasants were employed in river transport, where barge haulers were required to pull ships up the river, as well as loaders and ship workers. Transport and salt production were served mainly by hired labor. Among the barge haulers and ship workers there were many "walking people", as the documents called people who were not associated with a specific place of residence. In the 17th century, the number of villages and villages inhabited by "non-arable peasants", "non-arable bobs" continuously increased.

Economic regions of Russia

Separate parts of the vast Russian state, which occupied vast areas in Europe and Asia, naturally, were heterogeneous both in terms of natural conditions and in terms of socio-economic development. The most populated and developed was the central region, the so-called Zamoskovny cities with adjacent counties. Villages and villages surrounded the capital from all sides. Moscow was the largest city in Eastern Europe and had up to 200 thousand inhabitants. It was the most important center of trade, handicraft and small commodity production. In it and its environs, first of all, enterprises of the manufactory type arose.

In the central region of Russia, various peasant crafts and urban handicrafts were greatly developed. There were also the largest Russian cities - Yaroslavl, Nizhny Novgorod, Kaluga. A direct land road connected Moscow via Yaroslavl with Vologda, from where the waterway to Arkhangelsk began.

The vast region adjacent to the White Sea, known as Pomorie, was relatively poorly populated at that time. Russians, Karelians, Komi, etc. lived here. In the northern regions of this region, due to climatic conditions, the population was more engaged in crafts (salting, fishing, etc.) than agriculture. The role of Pomerania in supplying the country with salt was especially great. In the area of ​​the largest center of salt production - Kamskaya Salt, there were more than 200 breweries that supplied up to 7 million pounds of salt annually. The most important cities of the North were Vologda and Arkhangelsk, which were the extreme points of the Sukhono-Dvina river route. Trade with foreign countries passed through the port of Arkhangelsk. There were rope workshops in Vologda and Kholmogory. Relatively fertile soils in the region of Vologda, Veliky Ustyug and in the Vyatka region favored the successful development of agriculture. Vologda and Ustyug, and in the second half of the XVII century. Vyatka region were large grain markets.

In the west of Russia there were lands "from German and Lithuanian Ukraine" (outskirts). These were areas that exported flax and hemp to other regions and abroad. The largest cities and trading centers here were Smolensk and Pskov, while Novgorod withered away and lost its former importance.

In the XVII century there was a rapid settlement of the southern regions. Fugitive peasants from the central districts were continuously sent here. The trade and crafts of this region were insignificant, and there were no large cities here, but grain farming successfully developed here on the rich black soil.

Russian peasants also fled to the Middle Volga region. Russian villages arose near Mordovian, Tatar, Chuvash and Mari villages. The lands south of Samara were still sparsely populated. The largest cities in the Volga region were Kazan and Astrakhan. A diverse population lived in Astrakhan: Russians, Tatars, Armenians, people from Bukhara, etc. A lively trade was carried out in this city with the countries of Central Asia, Iran and the Transcaucasus.

In the south of the East European Plain, it was part of Russia in the 17th century. part of the North Caucasus, as well as the regions of the Don and Yaitsk Cossack troops. The wealthy industrialist Guryev founded the city of Guryev with a stone fortress at the mouth of the Yaik (Urals).

After 1654, the Left-bank Ukraine was reunited with Russia along with Kiev, which had self-government and an elected hetman.

By the size of its territory, Russia already in the 17th century was the largest state in the world.

Siberia

The largest region of Russia in the 17th century. was Siberia. It was inhabited by peoples who stood at different levels community development. The most numerous of them were the Yakuts, who occupied a vast territory in the basin of the Lena and its tributaries. The basis of their economy was cattle breeding, hunting and fishing were of secondary importance. In winter, the Yakuts lived in heated wooden yurts, and in the summer they went to pastures. At the head of the Yakut tribes were elders - toyons, owners of large pastures. Among the peoples of the Baikal region, the first place was occupied by the Buryats. Most of the Buryats were engaged in cattle breeding, led a nomadic lifestyle, but there were also agricultural tribes among them. The Buryats were going through a period of the formation of feudal relations, they still had strong patriarchal-tribal remnants.

Evenki (Tungus) lived in the vast expanses from the Yenisei to the Pacific Ocean, engaged in hunting and fishing. Chukchi, Koryaks and Itelmens (Kamchadals) inhabited the northeastern regions of Siberia with the Kamchatka Peninsula. These tribes then sewed in a tribal system; they did not yet know the use of iron.

The expansion of Russian possessions in Siberia was carried out mainly by the local administration and industrial people who were looking for new "lands" rich in fur-bearing animals. Russian industrial people penetrated into Siberia along the high-water Siberian rivers, the tributaries of which come close to each other. Military detachments followed in their footsteps, setting up fortified prisons, which became centers of colonial exploitation of the peoples of Siberia. The path from Western Siberia to Eastern Siberia went along the tributary of the Ob, the Keti River. On the Yenisei, the city of Yeniseisk arose (originally the Yenisei prison, 1619). Somewhat later, another Siberian city, Krasnoyarsk, was founded on the upper reaches of the Yenisei. Along the Angara or the Upper Tunguska, the river route led to the upper reaches of the Lena. The Lensky jail was built on it (1632, later Yakutsk), which became the center of control of Eastern Siberia.

In 1648, Semyon Dezhnev discovered "the edge and end of the Siberian land." The expedition of Fedot Alekseev (Popov), the clerk of the Ustyug trading people, the Usovs, set out to sea from the mouth of the Kolyma, consisting of six ships. Dezhnev was on one of the ships. The storm swept the ships of the expedition, some of them died or were washed ashore, and Dezhnev's ship rounded the extreme northeastern tip of Asia. Thus, Dezhnev was the first to make a sea voyage through the Bering Strait and discovered that Asia was separated from America by water.

By the middle of the XVII century. Russian detachments penetrated into Dauria (Transbaikalia and Amur). The expedition of Vasily Poyarkov along the Zeya and Amur rivers reached the sea. Poyarkov sailed by sea to the Ulya River (Okhotsk region), climbed up it and returned to Yakutsk along the rivers of the Lena basin. A new expedition to the Amur was made by the Cossacks under the command of Yerofey Khabarov, who built a town on the Amur. After the government recalled Khabarov from the town, the Cossacks stayed in it for some time, but due to a lack of food they were forced to leave it.

Penetration into the Amur basin brought Russia into conflict with China. Military operations ended with the conclusion of the Nerchinsk Treaty (1689). The treaty defined the Russian-Chinese border and promoted the development of trade between the two states.

Following industrial and service people, peasant settlers were sent to Siberia. The influx of “free people” into Western Siberia began immediately after the construction of Russian towns and especially intensified in the second half of the 17th century, when “many numbers” of peasants moved here, mainly from the northern and neighboring Ural counties. The arable peasant population settled mainly in Western Siberia, which became the main center of the agricultural economy of this vast region.

Peasants settled on empty lands or seized lands that belonged to local "yasak people". The size of arable plots owned by peasants in the 17th century was not limited. In addition to arable land, it included hay meadows, and sometimes fishing grounds. The Russian peasants brought with them the skills of a higher agricultural culture than that of the Siberian peoples. Rye, oats and barley became the main agricultural crops of Siberia. Along with them, industrial crops appear, primarily hemp. Animal husbandry has been widely developed. Already by the end of the XVII century. Siberian agriculture satisfied the needs of the population of Siberian cities in agricultural products and, thus, freed the government from the expensive delivery of bread from European Russia.

The conquest of Siberia was accompanied by the taxation of the conquered population with yasak - tribute. The payment of yasak was usually made in furs, the most valuable commodity that enriched the royal treasury. The "explaining" of the Siberian peoples by service people was often accompanied by outrageous violence. Official documents admitted that Russian merchants sometimes invited "people to trade and had wives and children from them, and they robbed their stomachs and cattle, and many people did violence to them."

The vast territory of Siberia was under the control of the Siberian order. The intensity of the robbery of the peoples of Siberia by tsarism is evidenced by the fact that the income of the Siberian order in 1680 accounted for more than 12% of the total budget of Russia. The peoples of Siberia, moreover, were subjected to exploitation by Russian merchants, whose wealth was created by exchanging handicrafts and cheap ornaments for fine furs, which constituted an important article of Russian export. The merchants Usovs, Pankratievs, Filatievs and others, having accumulated large capitals in Siberian trade, became owners of manufactories for boiling salt in Pomorye, without stopping their trading activities at the same time. G. Nikitin, a native of the black-haired peasants, at one time worked as a clerk E. Filatiev and for short term moved into the ranks of the Moscow merchant nobility. In 1679, Nikitin was enrolled in the living room hundred, and two years later he was granted the title of guest. By the end of the XVII century. Nikitin's capital exceeded 20 thousand rubles. (about 350 thousand rubles for the money of the beginning of the 20th century). Nikitin, like his former patron Filatiev, made his fortune in the predatory fur trade in Siberia. He was one of the first Russian merchants who organized trade with China.

By the end of the XVII century. significant areas of Western and partly Eastern Siberia were already populated by Russian peasants, who had mastered many previously deserted areas. Most of Siberia became Russian in terms of its population, especially the black earth regions of Western Siberia. Relations with the Russian people, despite the colonial policy of tsarism, were of great importance for the development of the economic and cultural life of all the peoples of Siberia. Under the direct influence of Russian agriculture, the Yakuts and nomadic Buryats began to cultivate arable land. The accession of Siberia to Russia created conditions for the further economic and cultural development of this vast country.

The formation of the all-Russian market

A new phenomenon, exceptional in its significance, was the formation of an all-Russian market, the center of which was Moscow. By the movement of goods to Moscow, one can judge the degree of social and territorial division of labor on the basis of which the all-Russian market was formed: the Moscow region supplied meat and vegetables; cow butter was brought from the Middle Volga region; fish was brought from Pomorye, the Rostov district, the Lower Volga region and the Oka places; vegetables also came from Vereya, Borovsk and Rostov district. Moscow was supplied with iron by Tula, Galich, Ustyuzhna Zhelezopolskaya and Tikhvin; skins were brought mainly from the Yaroslavl-Kostroma and Suzdal regions; wooden utensils were supplied by the Volga region; salt - the cities of Pomorie; Moscow was the largest market for Siberian furs.

Based on the production specialization of individual regions, markets were formed with the primary importance of any goods. So, Yaroslavl was famous for selling leather, soap, lard, meat and textiles; Veliky Ustyug and especially Salt Vychegodskaya were the largest fur markets - furs coming from Siberia were delivered from here either to Arkhangelsk for export, or to Moscow for sale inside the country. Flax and hemp were brought to Smolensk and Pskov from the surrounding areas, which then entered the foreign market.

Some local markets establish intensive trade relations with cities far removed from them. Tikhvin Posad, with its annual fair, supported trade with 45 Russian cities. Buying iron products from local blacksmiths, buyers resold them to larger merchants, and the latter transported significant consignments of goods to Ustyuzhna Zhelezopolskaya, as well as to Moscow, Yaroslavl, Pskov and other cities.

An enormous role in the trade turnover of the country was played by fairs of all-Russian importance, such as Makarievskaya (near Nizhny Novgorod), Svenskaya (near Bryansk), Arkhangelskaya, and others, which lasted for several weeks.

In connection with the formation of the all-Russian market, the role of the merchants in the economic and political life of the country increased. In the 17th century, the top of the merchant world, whose representatives received the title of guests from the government, stood out even more noticeably from the general mass of merchants. These major merchants also played the role of financial agents of the government - on his behalf, they conducted foreign trade in furs, potash, rhubarb, etc., carried out construction contracts, purchased food for the needs of the army, collected taxes, customs duties, tavern money, etc. The guests attracted smaller merchants to carry out contract and farming operations, sharing with them huge profits from the sale of wine and salt. Farming and contracts were an important source of capital accumulation.

Large capitals sometimes accumulated in the hands of individual merchant families. N. Sveteshnikov owned rich salt mines. The Stoyanovs in Novgorod and F. Emelyanov in Pskov were the first people in their cities; their opinion was considered not only by governors, but also by the tsarist government. The guests, as well as merchants close to them in position from the living room and cloth hundreds (associations), were joined by the top of the townspeople, who were called "best", "big" townspeople.

Merchants begin to speak to the government in defense of their interests. In petitions, they asked that English merchants be banned from trading in Moscow and in other cities, with the exception of Arkhangelsk. The petition was satisfied by the tsarist government in 1649. This measure was motivated by political considerations - the fact that the British executed their king Charles I.

Great changes in the country's economy were reflected in the Customs Charter of 1653 and the New Trade Charter of 1667. The head of the Ambassadorial Order, A. L. Ordin-Nashchokin, took part in the creation of the latter. According to the mercantile views of that time, the New Trade Charter noted the special importance of trade for Russia, since “in all neighboring states, in the first state affairs, free and profitable auctions for collecting duties and for the worldly possessions of the world are guarded with all care.” The customs charter of 1653 abolished many small trading fees that had been preserved from the time of feudal fragmentation, and instead of them introduced one so-called ruble duty - 10 kopecks each. from the ruble for the sale of salt, 5 kop. from the ruble from all other goods. In addition, an increased duty was introduced for foreign merchants who sold goods within Russia. In the interests of the Russian merchants, the New Trade Charter of 1667 further increased customs duties from foreign merchants.

2. The beginning of the formation of the feudal-absolutist monarchy

Tsar and Boyar Duma

Great shifts in the economic and social life of the Russian people were accompanied by changes in the political system of Russia. In the 17th century there is a folding in Russia of a feudal-absolutist (autocratic) state. Characteristic for a class-representative monarchy existence next to the royal power. The Boyar Duma and Zemstvo Sobors no longer corresponded to the tendencies to strengthen the dominance of the nobility in the face of a further aggravation of the class struggle. The military and economic expansion of the neighboring states also required a more perfect political organization of the rule of the nobility. The transition to absolutism, which had not yet been completed by the end of the 17th century, was accompanied by the withering away of zemstvo sobors and an ever greater subordination of spiritual authority to secular ones.

Since 1613, the Romanov dynasty reigned in Russia, considering themselves the heirs of the former Moscow tsars through the female line. Mikhail Fedorovich (1613-1645), his son Alexei Mikhailovich (1645-1676), the sons of Alexei Mikhailovich - Fedor Alekseevich (1676-1682), Ivan and Peter Alekseevich (after 1682) reigned successively.

All state affairs in the XVII century. performed in the name of the king. In the "Council Code" of 1649, a special chapter was introduced "On the sovereign's honor and how to protect the state's health", threatening the death penalty for speaking out against the king, governor and clerks "in droves and conspiracy", which meant all mass popular demonstrations. Now the closest royal relatives began to be regarded as the sovereign's "serfs" - subjects. In petitions to the tsar, even noble boyars called themselves diminutive names (Ivashko, Petrushko, etc.). Class distinctions were strictly observed in appeals to the tsar: service people called themselves "serfs", peasants and townspeople - "orphans", and spiritual "pilgrims". The appearance of the tsar on the squares and streets of Moscow was furnished with magnificent solemnity and complex ceremonial, emphasizing the power and inaccessibility of tsarist power.

State affairs were in charge of the Boyar Duma, which also met in the absence of the tsar. The most important cases were dealt with on the royal proposal to "think" about this or that issue; the decision began with the formula: "The king indicated and the boyars were sentenced." The Duma, as the highest legislative and judicial institution, included the most influential and wealthy feudal lords of Russia - members of noble princely families and the closest relatives of the tsar. But along with them, more and more representatives of unborn families penetrated into the Duma - Duma nobles and Duma clerks, who were promoted to high positions in the state thanks to their personal merits. Along with some bureaucratization of the Duma, there was a gradual limitation of its political influence. Next to the Duma, in whose meetings all the Duma ranks took part, there was a Secret, or Near Duma, consisting of the tsar's proxies, who often did not belong to the Duma ranks.

Zemsky Sobors

The government for a long time relied on the support of such an estate-representative institution as the Zemstvo Sobors, resorting to the help of elected people from the nobility and the top of the township society, mainly in the difficult years of the struggle against external enemies and in internal difficulties associated with raising money for urgent needs. Zemsky Sobors functioned almost continuously during the first 10 years of the reign of Mikhail Romanov, for some time gaining the significance of a permanent representative institution under the government. The council that elected Michael to reign (1613) sat for almost three years. The following councils were convened in 1616, 1619 and 1621.

After 1623, there was a long break in the activities of the cathedrals, associated with the strengthening of royal power. The new council was convened in connection with the need to establish extraordinary collections of money from the population, as preparations were made for the war with Poland. This cathedral did not disperse for three years. During the reign of Mikhail Fedorovich, Zemsky Sobors met several more times.

Zemsky Sobors were an institution of a class character and consisted of three "ranks": 1) the higher clergy headed by the patriarch - the "consecrated cathedral", 2) the Boyar Duma and 3) elected from the nobility and from the townspeople. The black-eared peasants, perhaps, participated only in the council of 1613, while the landlords were completely removed from political affairs. Elections of representatives from the nobility and from the townspeople were always made separately. The protocol of the election, the "electoral list", was submitted to Moscow. Voters supplied "elected people" with instructions in which they declared their needs. The council was opened with a royal speech, which spoke about the reasons for its convocation and raised questions for the elected. The discussion of issues was carried out by separate class groups of the cathedral, but the general conciliar decision had to be taken unanimously.

The political authority of the zemstvo sobors, which stood high in the first half of the 17th century, was not durable. The government subsequently reluctantly resorted to convening zemstvo sobors, at which elected people sometimes criticized government measures. The last Zemsky Sobor met in 1653 to resolve the issue of the reunification of Ukraine. After that, the government convened only meetings of individual class groups (service people, merchants, guests, etc.). However, the approval of "the whole earth" was recognized as necessary for the election of sovereigns. Therefore, the meeting of Moscow officials in 1682 twice replaced the Zemsky Sobor - first when Peter was elected to the throne, and then when the two tsars Peter and Ivan were elected, who were supposed to rule jointly.

The zemstvo sobors, as organs of class representation, were abolished by growing absolutism, just as was the case in the countries of Western Europe.

Command system. Governors

The administration of the country was concentrated in numerous orders that were in charge of individual branches of state administration (Ambassadorial, Discharge, Local, Order of the Big Treasury) or regions (Order of the Kazan Palace, Siberian Order). The 17th century was the heyday of the order system: the number of orders in other years reached 50. However, in the second half of the 17th century. in a fragmented and cumbersome command administration, a certain centralization is carried out. Orders related in terms of business were either combined into one or several orders, although they retained their independent existence, they were placed under the general control of one boyar, most often a confidant of the tsar. The associations of the first type include, for example, the combined orders of the palace department: the Grand Palace, the Palace Court, Kamenye Del Konyushenny. An example of the second type of associations is the assignment to the boyar F. A. Golovin to manage the Ambassadorial, Yamsky and Military Naval Orders, as well as the Chambers of the Armory, Gold and Silver Affairs. An important innovation in the order system was the organization of the Order of Secret Affairs, a new institution where "boyars and duma people do not enter and do not know about affairs, except for the tsar himself." This order in relation to other orders performed control functions. The order of secret affairs was arranged so that "the royal thought and deeds would be fulfilled according to his (royal) desire."

The chiefs of most orders were boyars or nobles, but office work was kept on a permanent staff of clerks and their assistants - clerks. Having mastered well the administrative experience passed down from generation to generation, these people ran all the affairs of the orders. At the head of such important orders as Razryadny, Pomesny and Posolsky, there were duma clerks, that is, clerks who had the right to sit in the Boyar Duma. The bureaucratic element became increasingly important in the system of the emerging absolutist state.

The vast territory of the state in the 17th century, as in previous times, was divided into counties. What was new in the organization of local power was the reduction in the importance of the zemstvo administration. Everywhere power was concentrated in the hands of governors sent from Moscow. Assistant governors - "comrades" - were appointed to large cities. Office work was in charge of clerks and clerks. The moving out hut, where the voivode sat, was the center of administration of the county.

The service of the governor, like the old feeding, was considered "mercenary", that is, bringing income. The governor used every excuse to "feed" at the expense of the population. The arrival of the voivode to the territory of the subordinate county was accompanied by the receipt of “entry food”, on holidays they came to him with an offering, a special reward was brought to the voivode during the submission of petitions. The arbitrariness in the local administration was especially felt by the social lower classes.

By 1678, the census of households was completed. After that, the government replaced the existing sosh taxation (sokha - a taxation unit that included from 750 to 1800 acres of cultivated land in three fields) with household taxation. This reform increased the number of taxpayers, taxes were now levied on such segments of the population as "business people" (serfs who worked on the landlords' farm), beans (impoverished peasants), rural artisans, etc., who lived in their yards and had not previously paid taxes . The reform caused the landowners to increase the population in the yards by amalgamating them.

Armed forces

New phenomena are also taking place in the organization of the state's armed forces. The local noble army was completed as a militia from nobles and boyar children. Military service was still compulsory for all nobles. Nobles and boyar children gathered in their counties for a review according to the lists, where all the nobles fit for service were entered, hence the name "service people". Penalties were taken against "netchikov" (who did not show up for service). In summer, noble cavalry usually stood at border cities. In the south, the gathering place was Belgorod.

The mobilization of the local troops was extremely slow, the army was accompanied by huge carts and a large number of landlord servants.

Archers - foot soldiers armed with firearms - were distinguished by a higher combat capability than the noble cavalry. However, the streltsy army by the second half of the 17th century. clearly did not meet the need to have a sufficiently maneuverable and combat-ready army. In peacetime, the archers combined military service with petty trade and crafts, as they received insufficient bread and cash salaries. They were closely associated with the townspeople and took part in the urban unrest of the 17th century.

The need to reorganize the military forces of Russia on new principles was acutely felt already in the first half of the 17th century. Preparing for the war for Smolensk, the government bought weapons from Sweden and Holland, hired foreign military people and began to form Russian regiments of the "new (foreign) system" - soldier's Reiters and Dragoons. The training of these regiments was carried out on the basis of the advanced military art of that time. The regiments were recruited first from "free hunting people", and then from among the "subjective people" recruited from a certain number of peasant and township households. The lifelong service of subordinate people, the introduction of uniform weapons in the form of muskets and flintlock carbines lighter than squeakers gave the regiments of the new system some features of a regular army.

Due to the increase in cash receipts, the cost of maintaining the army has steadily increased.

Strengthening of the nobility

Changes in the state system took place in close connection with a change in the structure of the ruling class of feudal lords, on which the autocracy relied. The top of this class was the boyar aristocracy, who replenished the court ranks (the word "rank" was not yet understood as an official position, but as belonging to a certain group of the population). The Duma ranks were the highest, then the ranks of Moscow followed, followed by the ranks of the city. All of them were included in the category of service people "according to the fatherland", in contrast to the service people "according to the instrument" (archers, gunners, soldiers, etc.). Serving people in the fatherland, or nobles, began to take shape in a closed group with special privileges, inherited. From the middle of the XVII century. the transition of instrumental servicemen to the ranks of the nobility was closed.

Of great importance in eliminating the differences between the individual strata of the ruling class was the abolition of parochialism. Localism had a detrimental effect on the combat capability of the Russian army. Sometimes, just before the battle, the governors, instead of taking decisive action against the enemy, entered into disputes about which of them was higher in “place”. Therefore, according to the decree on the abolition of parochialism, in past years “in many of their state military and embassy, ​​in all sorts of affairs, great dirty tricks and disorganization and destruction were done from those cases, and joy to the enemies, and between them - contrary to God - dislike and great , prolonged feuds. The abolition of localism (1682) increased the importance of the nobility in the state apparatus and the army, since localism prevented the nobility from being promoted to prominent military and administrative posts.

3. Popular uprisings

The position of the peasants and the urban lower classes

The feudal order laid down with all its weight on the broad masses of the people, on the peasants and on the townspeople.

The position of the peasants was difficult not only economically, but also legally. The landlords and their clerks beat the peasants with whips, shackled them in shackles for any offense. The spontaneous manifestation of the struggle of the peasants against the oppressors was the frequent murder of landowners and peasant escapes. The peasants left their homes, hiding in remote and sparsely populated areas in the Volga region and in southern Russia, especially on the Don.

In the city, property and social differences among the townspeople were emphasized by the government itself, which divided the townspeople according to their prosperity into “kind” (or “best”), “middle” and “young”. Most of the townspeople belonged to young people. The best people numbered in the few, but they owned the largest number of trading shops and trade establishments (lard ovens, wax slaughterhouses, distilleries, etc.). They entangled in debt obligations and often ruined young people. Contradictions between the best and youngest townspeople invariably manifested themselves during the elections of zemstvo elders, who were in charge of the distribution of taxes and duties in the township community. Attempts by young people to promote their candidates to zemstvo elders met with a resolute rebuff from the city's wealthy, who accused them of rebellion against the tsarist government. The young townspeople, "looking for the truth" and "from all evil deliverance and from all sorts of violence," burningly hated the city's "world eaters" and took part in all the uprisings of the 17th century.

The feudal state resolutely suppressed any attempt at protest by the dispossessed masses of the people. The scammers immediately reported to the governors and in orders about "unsuitable speeches against the sovereign." The arrested were subjected to torture, which was carried out three times. Those who confessed their guilt were punished with a whip in the square and exile to distant cities, and sometimes even the death penalty. Those who withstood three times of torture were usually released crippled for life. "Izvet" (denunciation) on political matters was legalized in Russia in the 17th century as one of the means of reprisal against popular discontent.

Urban uprisings

Contemporaries called the XVII century "rebellious" time. Indeed, in the previous history of feudal-serf Russia there were not so many anti-feudal uprisings as in the 17th century.

The largest of them in the middle and second half of this century were the urban uprisings of 1648-1650, the "copper riot" of 1662, the peasant war led by Stepan Razin of 1670-1671. A special place is occupied by "split". It began as a religious movement that later found a response among the masses.

Urban uprisings 1648-1650 were directed against the boyars and the government administration, as well as against the tops of the townspeople. Public discontent was intensified by the extreme venality of the state apparatus. Townsmen were forced to give bribes, "promises" to governors and clerks. Craftsmen in the cities were forced to work for free for governors and clerks.

The main driving forces of these uprisings were young townspeople and archers. The uprisings were predominantly urban, but in some areas they also engulfed the countryside.

Unrest in the cities began already in the last years of the reign of Mikhail Romanov, but took the form of uprisings under his son and successor Alexei Mikhailovich. In the first years of his reign, the actual ruler of the state was the royal educator ("uncle") - the boyar Boris Ivanovich Morozov. In his financial policy Morozov relied on merchants, with whom he was closely connected by general trade operations, since his vast estates supplied potash, resin and other products for export abroad. In search of new funds to replenish the royal treasury, the government, on the advice of the Duma clerk N. Chisty, in 1646 replaced direct taxes with a tax on salt, which immediately rose in price almost threefold. It is known that a similar tax (gabel) in France caused in the same XVII century. great popular uprisings.

The hated salt tax was abolished in December 1647, but instead of the revenues received by the treasury from the sale of salt, the government resumed collecting direct taxes - streltsy and yamsky money, demanding their payment in two years.

Unrest began in Moscow in the first days of June 1648. During the procession, a large crowd of townspeople surrounded the tsar and tried to send him a petition complaining about the violence of the boyars and clerks. The guard dispersed the petitioners. But the next day, archers and other military men joined the townspeople. The rebels broke into the Kremlin, in addition, they defeated the courtyards of some boyars, archery chiefs, merchants and clerks. The Duma clerk Chistoy was killed in his house. The rebels forced the government to extradite L. Pleshcheev, who was in charge of the Moscow city administration, and Pleshcheev was publicly executed on the square as a criminal. The rebels demanded that Morozov also be extradited, but the tsar secretly sent him into an honorable exile in one of the northern monasteries. "Posadsky people throughout Moscow", supported by archers and serfs, forced the tsar to go to the square in front of the Kremlin Palace and give an oath promise to fulfill their demands.

The Moscow uprising found a wide response in other cities. There were rumors that in Moscow "the strong are beaten with shards and stones." The uprisings swept a number of northern and southern cities - Veliky Ustyug, Cherdyn, Kozlov, Kursk, Voronezh, etc. In the southern cities, where the townspeople were few, the uprisings were led by archers. They were sometimes joined by peasants from nearby villages. In the North, the main role belonged to the posad people and the black-eared peasants. Thus, already the urban uprisings of 1648 were closely connected with the movement of the peasants. This is also indicated by the petition of the townspeople, submitted to Tsar Alexei during the Moscow uprising: “The whole people in the entire Muscovite state and in its border regions become unsteady from such untruth, as a result of which a great storm rises in your royal capital city of Moscow and in many other places, cities and counties.

The reference to the uprising in frontier places suggests that the rebels may have been aware of the successes of the liberation movement in Ukraine led by Bogdan Khmelnitsky, which began in the spring of the same. 1648

"Code" 1649

The armed uprising of the lower ranks of the city and the archers, which caused confusion in the ruling circles, was used by the nobles and the elite of the merchants to present their estate demands to the government. In numerous petitions, the nobles demanded the issuance of salaries and the abolition of "lesson years" for the investigation of fugitive peasants, guests and merchants sought the introduction of restrictions on the trade of foreigners, as well as the confiscation of privileged urban settlements owned by large secular and spiritual feudal lords. The government was forced to succumb to the harassment of the nobility and the tops of the settlement and convened the Zemsky Sobor to develop a new code of law (code).

At the Zemsky Sobor, convened on September 1, 1648 in Moscow, elected representatives from 121 cities and counties arrived. Provincial nobles (153 people) and townspeople (94 people) ranked first in terms of the number of elected officials. The "Cathedral Code", or a new code of laws, was drawn up by a special commission, discussed by the Zemsky Sobor and printed in 1649 in an exceptionally large circulation of 2,000 copies for that time.

The Code was compiled on the basis of a number of sources, among which we find the Sudebnik of 1550, royal decrees and the Lithuanian Statute. It consisted of 25 chapters divided into articles. The introductory chapter to the "Code" established that "every rank by people, from the highest to the lowest rank, the court and reprisal should be equal in all matters." But this phrase had a purely declarative character, since in reality the Code asserted the estate privileges of the nobles and the tops of the township world. The "Code" confirmed the right of owners to transfer the estate by inheritance, provided that the new landowner would perform military service. In the interests of the nobles, it prohibited the further growth of church land ownership. The peasants were finally assigned to the landowners, and the "lesson summer" for the search for runaway peasants was canceled. The nobles now had the right to search for runaway peasants for an unlimited time. This meant a further strengthening of the serfdom of the peasants from the landlords.

The "Code" forbade the boyars and the clergy to arrange their so-called white settlements in the cities, where their dependent people lived, engaged in trade and craft; all the people who fled from the township tax had to return to the township community again. These articles of the "Code" satisfied the demands of the townspeople, who sought the prohibition of the white settlements, whose population, being engaged in trades and crafts, was not burdened by the township tax and therefore successfully competed with the taxpayers of the black settlements. The liquidation of privately owned settlements was directed against the remnants of feudal fragmentation and strengthened the city.

The "Cathedral Code" became the main legislative code of Russia for more than 180 years, although many of its articles were canceled by further legislative acts.

Uprisings in Pskov and Novgorod

The "Code" not only did not satisfy the broad circles of the townspeople and peasants, but even more deepened the class contradictions. New uprisings in 1650 in Pskov and Novgorod unfolded in the context of the struggle of young townspeople and archers against nobles and large merchants.

The reason for the uprising was grain speculation, which was carried out on the direct orders of the authorities. It was beneficial for the government to raise the price of bread, since the retribution that was taking place at that time with the Swedes for defectors to Russia from the territories that had ceded to Sweden according to the Peace of Stolbov in 1617 was partially made not in money, but in bread at local market prices.

The main part in the Pskov uprising, which began on February 28, 1650, was taken by townspeople and archers. They took the governor into custody and organized their own government in the Zemskaya izba, headed by the baker Gavrila Demidov. On March 15, an uprising broke out in Novgorod, and thus the two large cities refused to obey the tsarist government.

Novgorod lasted no more than a month and submitted to the tsar's governor, Prince I. Khovansky, who immediately imprisoned many participants in the uprising. Pskov continued to fight and successfully repelled the attacks of the tsarist army that approached its walls.

The government of the rebels of Pskov, headed by Gavrila Demidov, took measures to improve the situation of the city's lower classes. The zemstvo hut took into account the food stocks that belonged to the nobles and merchants; young townspeople and archers were placed at the head of the military forces defending the city; executed some nobles caught in relations with the royal troops. The rebels paid special attention to attracting peasants and townspeople in the suburbs to the uprising. Most of the suburbs (Gdov, Ostrov, etc.) joined Pskov. A broad movement began in the countryside, covering a vast territory from Pskov to Novgorod. Detachments of peasants burned the landowners' estates, attacked small detachments of the nobility, disturbed the rear of Khovansky's army. In Moscow itself and other cities it was restless. The population discussed rumors about the Pskov events and expressed their sympathy for the rebellious Pskovites. The government was forced to convene the Zemsky Sobor, which decided to send a delegation of elected people to Pskov. The delegation persuaded the people of Pskov to lay down their arms, promising an amnesty for the rebels. However, this promise was soon broken, and the government sent Demidov, along with other leaders of the uprising, into a distant exile. The Pskov uprising lasted for almost half a year (March - August 1650), and the peasant movement in the Pskov land did not stop for several more years.

"Copper Riot"

A new urban uprising, called the "copper riot", took place in Moscow in 1662. It unfolded in the conditions of economic difficulties caused by the long and devastating war between Russia and the Commonwealth (1654-1667), as well as the war with Sweden. Due to the lack of silver money, the government decided to issue a copper coin, equal in value to silver money. Initially, copper money was accepted willingly (they began to be issued from 1654), but copper cost 20 times cheaper than silver, and copper money was issued in excessive quantities. In addition, "thieves", counterfeit money appeared. They were minted by the moneymakers themselves, who were under the auspices of the royal father-in-law, the boyar Miloslavsky, who was involved in this business.

Copper money gradually began to fall in price; for one silver money they began to give 4, and then 15 copper money. The government itself contributed to the depreciation of copper money, demanding that taxes to the treasury be paid in silver coins, while the salaries of military men were issued in copper. Silver began to disappear from circulation, and this led to a further drop in the value of copper money.

From the introduction of copper money, the townspeople and service people suffered the most according to the device: archers, gunners, etc. Townsmen were obliged to pay cash contributions to the treasury with silver money, and they were paid with copper. “They don’t sell for copper money, there is nowhere to get silver money,” said “anonymous letters” distributed among the population. The peasants refused to sell bread and other provisions for depreciated copper money. Bread prices rose at an incredible rate, despite good harvests.

The dissatisfaction of the townspeople resulted in a great uprising. In the summer of 1662, the townspeople defeated some of the boyar and merchant courts in Moscow. A large crowd went from the city to the village of Kolomenskoye near Moscow, where Tsar Alexei lived at that time, to demand a reduction in taxes and the abolition of copper money. The “quietest” tsar, as the churchmen hypocritically called Alexei, promised to investigate the case of copper money, but immediately treacherously broke his promise. The troops called by him carried out a brutal reprisal against the rebels. About 100 people drowned in the Moskva River during their flight, more than 7 thousand were killed, wounded, or imprisoned. The most severe punishments and torture followed the first massacre.

Peasant war led by Stepan Razin

The most powerful popular uprising of the XVII century. There was a peasant war of 1670-1671. under the leadership of Stepan Razin. It was a direct result of the aggravation of class contradictions in Russia in the second half of the 17th century. The difficult situation of the peasants led to increased escapes to the outskirts. The peasants went to remote places on the Don and in the Volga region, where they hoped to hide from the yoke of landlord exploitation. The Don Cossacks were not socially homogeneous. The "domovity" Cossacks mostly lived in free places along the lower reaches of the Don with its rich fishing grounds. It reluctantly accepted into its composition new aliens, poor (“goofy”) Cossacks. "Golytba" accumulated mainly on the lands along the upper reaches of the Don and its tributaries, but even here the situation of fugitive peasants and serfs was usually difficult, since the thrifty Cossacks forbade them to plow the land, and there were no new fishing places for the newcomers. Golutvenye Cossacks especially suffered from a lack of bread on the Don.

A large number of runaway peasants also settled in the regions of Tambov, Penza, and Simbirsk. Here the peasants founded new villages and villages, plowed up empty lands. But the landowners immediately followed them. They received letters of grant from the tsar for supposedly empty lands; the peasants who settled on these lands again fell into serfdom from the landowners. Walking people concentrated in the cities, who earned their living by odd jobs.

The peoples of the Volga region - Mordovians, Chuvashs, Maris, Tatars - experienced heavy colonial oppression. Russian landowners seized their lands, fishing and hunting grounds. At the same time, state taxes and duties increased.

A large number of people hostile to the feudal state accumulated on the Don and in the Volga region. Among them were many settlers who were exiled to distant Volga cities for participating in uprisings and various kinds of protests against the government and governors. Razin's slogans found a warm response among the Russian peasants and the oppressed peoples of the Volga region.

The beginning of the peasant war was laid on the Don. Golutvenny Cossacks undertook a campaign to the shores of the Crimea and Turkey. But the thrifty Cossacks prevented them from breaking through to the sea, fearing a military clash with the Turks. The Cossacks, led by Ataman Stepan Timofeevich Razin, moved to the Volga and, near Tsaritsyn, captured a caravan of ships heading to Astrakhan. Having sailed freely past Tsaritsyn and Astrakhan, the Cossacks entered the Caspian Sea and headed to the mouth of the Yaik (Ural) River. Razin occupied the Yaitsky town (1667), many Yaitsky Cossacks joined his army. The following year, a detachment of Razin on 24 ships headed for the shores of Iran. Having ravaged the Caspian coast from Derbent to Baku, the Cossacks reached Rasht. During the negotiations, the Persians suddenly attacked them and killed 400 people. In response, the Cossacks defeated the city of Ferahabad. On the way back, at Pig Island, near the mouth of the Kura, the Iranian fleet attacked the Cossack ships, but suffered a complete defeat. The Cossacks returned to Astrakhan and sold the captured booty here.

A successful sea trip to Yaik and to the shores of Iran sharply increased Razin's authority among the population of the Don and the Volga region. Fugitive peasants and serfs, promenading people, the oppressed peoples of the Volga region were only waiting for a signal in order to raise an open uprising against their oppressors. In the spring of 1670, Razin reappeared on the Volga with a 5,000-strong Cossack army. Astrakhan opened the gates for him; Streltsy and townspeople everywhere went over to the side of the Cossacks. At this stage, Razin's movement outgrew the framework of the campaign of 1667-1669. and resulted in a powerful peasant war.

Razin with the main forces went up the Volga. Saratov and Samara met the rebels with bells, bread and salt. But under the fortified Simbirsk, the army lingered for a long time. To the north and west of this city, the peasant war was already raging. A large detachment of rebels under the command of Mikhail Kharitonov took Korsun, Saransk, and captured Penza. Having united with the detachment of Vasily Fedorov, he went to Shatsk. Russian peasants, Mordovians, Chuvashs, Tatars went to war almost without exception, without even waiting for the arrival of Razin's detachments. The peasant war was getting closer and closer to Moscow. Cossack atamans captured Alatyr, Temnikov, Kurmysh. Kozmodemyansk and the fishing village of Lyskovo on the Volga joined the uprising. Cossacks and Lyskovites occupied the fortified Makariev Monastery in the immediate vicinity of Nizhny Novgorod.

On the upper reaches of the Don, the rebels were led by Stepan Razin's brother Frol. The uprising spread to the lands south of Belgorod, inhabited by Ukrainians and bearing the name Sloboda Ukraine. Everywhere the “muzhiks,” as the tsarist documents called the peasants, rose up with weapons in their hands and, together with the oppressed peoples of the Volga region, fought fiercely against the feudal lords. The city of Tsivilsk in Chuvashia was besieged by "Russian people and Chuvash".

The nobles of the Shatsk district complained that they could not get to the royal governors "because of the unsteadiness of the traitorous peasants." In the area of ​​Kadoma, the same "traitor-muzhiks" set up a notch in order to detain the tsarist troops.

Peasant War 1670-1671 covered a large area. The slogans of Razin and his associates raised the oppressed sections of society to fight, the “charming” letters drawn up by the differences called on all “enslaved and disgraced” to put an end to worldly bloodsuckers, to join Razin’s army. According to an eyewitness to the uprising, Razin told the peasants and townspeople in Astrakhan: “For the cause, brothers. Now take revenge on the tyrants who have hitherto kept you in captivity worse than the Turks or the pagans. I have come to give you freedom and deliverance."

The Don and Zaporozhye Cossacks, peasants and serfs, young townspeople, service people, Mordovians, Chuvashs, Maris, Tatars joined the ranks of the rebels. All of them were united by a common goal - the struggle against feudal oppression. In the cities that went over to the side of Razin, the voivodship power was destroyed and the management of the city passed into the hands of the elected. However, fighting against feudal oppression, the rebels remained tsarist. They stood for the “good king” and spread the rumor that Tsarevich Alexei was with them, who at that time in reality was no longer alive.

The peasant war forced the tsarist government to mobilize all its forces to suppress it. Near Moscow, for 8 days, a review of the 60,000th noble army was carried out. In Moscow itself, a strict police regime was established, as they were afraid of unrest among the city's lower classes.

A decisive clash between the rebels and the tsarist troops took place near Simbirsk. Large reinforcements from the Tatars, Chuvashs and Mordovians flocked to the detachments to Razin, but the siege of the city dragged on for a whole month, and this allowed the tsarist governors to gather large forces. Near Simbirsk, Razin's troops were defeated by regiments of a foreign system (October 1670). Expecting to recruit a new army, Razin went to the Don, but there he was treacherously captured by thrifty Cossacks and taken to Moscow, where he was subjected to a painful execution in June 1671 - quartering. But the uprising continued even after his death. Astrakhan held out the longest. She surrendered to the tsarist troops only at the end of 1671.

Split

The fierce class struggle that unfolded in Russia in the second half of the 17th century was also reflected in such a social movement as the schism of the Orthodox Church. Bourgeois historians emphasized only the ecclesiastical side of the schism and therefore focused their main attention on the ritual disagreements between the Old Believers and the ruling church. In fact, the split also reflected class contradictions in Russian society. It was not only a religious, but also a social movement, which clothed class interests and demands in a religious shell.

The reason for the split of the Russian Church was the disagreement on the issue of correcting church rites and books. Translations of church books into Russian were made from Greek originals at different times, and the originals themselves were not exactly the same, and the scribes of the books additionally made changes and distortions to them. In addition, rituals that were not known in the Greek and South Slavic lands were established in Russian church practice.

The question of correcting church books and rituals became especially acute after Nikon was appointed to the patriarchate. The new patriarch, the son of a peasant from the vicinity of Nizhny Novgorod, who took the monastic vows under the name of Nikon, quickly advanced in church circles. Elevated to the patriarchy (1652), he took the position of the first person in the state after the king. The tsar called Nikon his "common friend".

Nikon energetically set about correcting liturgical books and rites, seeking to bring Russian church practice into line with Greek. The government supported Nikon's undertakings, since the introduction of the uniformity of church services and the strengthening of the centralization of church administration corresponded to the interests of absolutism. But the theocratic ideas of Nikon, who compared the power of the patriarch with the sun, and the power of the king with the moon, only reflected sunlight, contradicted the growing absolutism. For several years, Nikon imperiously interfered in secular affairs. These contradictions led to a quarrel between the tsar and Nikon, which ended in the deposition of the ambitious patriarch. The Council of 1666 deprived Nikon of his patriarchal rank, but at the same time approved his innovations and anathematized those who refused to accept them.

From this council begins the division of the Russian Church into the dominant Orthodox and the Orthodox Old Believers, that is, rejecting Nikon's church reforms. Both churches equally considered themselves the only Orthodox; the official church called the Old Believers "schismatics", the Old Believers called the Orthodox "Nikonians". The schismatic movement was led by Archpriest Avvakum Petrovich, also from Nizhny Novgorod, a man with the same indomitable and domineering nature as Nikon himself. “We see that winter wants to be; my heart went cold and my legs trembled,” wrote Avvakum later about correcting church books.

After the council of 1666, the supporters of the schism were persecuted. However, it was not easy to deal with the split, as it found support among the peasants and townspeople. Theological disputes were little accessible to them, but the old was their own, familiar, and the new was forcibly imposed by the feudal state and the church supporting it.

The Solovetsky Monastery offered open resistance to the tsarist troops. Located on the islands of the White Sea, this richest of the northern monasteries was at the same time a strong fortress, was protected stone walls, had a considerable number of guns and food stocks for many years. The monks who stood for an agreement with the tsarist government were removed from the management of the monastery; power was taken over by the archers, exiled to the North, differences and working people. Under the influence of the peasant war taking place at that time, led by Razin, the Solovetsky uprising, arising on the basis of a split, turned into an open anti-feudal movement. The siege of the Solovetsky Monastery lasted eight years (1668-1676). The monastery was taken only as a result of treason.

The growing oppression of the feudal state led to the further development of the split, despite the most severe government persecution. Archpriest Avvakum, after a tedious stay in an earthen prison, was burned in 1682 in Pustozersk at the stake, and by his death further strengthened the "old faith." The Old Believers fled to the outskirts of the state, to dense forests and swamps. However, religious ideology gave this movement a reactionary character. Among its participants, the savage doctrine of the imminent end of the world and the need for self-immolation began to spread in order to avoid the "anti-Christ" power. At the end of the XVII century. self-immolation became a common occurrence in the north of Rus'.

4. Russia's international position

Russia was greatly weakened by the prolonged Polish-Swedish intervention and lost large and economically important territories in the west. Especially hard was the loss of Smolensk and the coast of the Gulf of Finland, as a direct outlet to the Baltic Sea. The return of these original Russian territories, which were of great importance for the entire economic life of the country, remained the direct task of Russia's foreign policy in the 17th century. An equally important task was to fight for the reunification of the Ukrainian and Belarusian lands within the framework of a single Russian state, as well as to defend the southern borders from the Crimean raids and the aggressive campaigns of the Turks.

"Azov seat". Zemsky Sobor in 1642

The unsuccessful outcome of the Smolensk war complicated the international position of Russia. The situation on the southern outskirts of the country, which was constantly devastated by the predatory raids of the Crimean Tatars, was especially alarming. Only in the first half of the XVII century. the Crimean Tatars, who were in vassal dependence on Turkey, took up to 200 thousand Russian people to the “full”. To protect the southern borders, the Russian government in the 30s of the XVII century. began the repair and construction of new defensive structures - the so-called notch lines, which consisted of notches, ditches, ramparts and fortified towns, stretching in a narrow chain along the southern borders. The defensive lines made it difficult for the Crimeans to reach the inner districts of Russia, but their construction cost the Russian people enormous efforts.

Two Turkish fortresses stood at the mouth of the largest southern rivers: Ochakov - at the confluence of the Dnieper and Bug into the sea, Azov - at the confluence of the Don into the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. And although there were no Turkish settlements in the Don basin, the Turks held Azov as the base of their possessions in the Black Sea and the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov .

Meanwhile, in the first half of the XVII century. Russian settlements on the Don reached almost to Azov. The Don Cossacks grew into a large military force and usually acted in alliance with the Cossacks against Turkish troops and Crimean Tatars. Often, light Cossack ships, having deceived the Turkish guards near Azov, broke through the Don branches into the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. From here, the Cossack fleet headed for the shores of the Crimea and Asia Minor, making raids on the Crimean and Turkish cities. For the Turks, the Cossack campaigns against Kafa (present-day Feodosia) and Sinop (in Asia Minor) were especially memorable, when these largest Black Sea cities were devastated. Wishing to prevent the Cossack fleet from penetrating into the Sea of ​​Azov, the Turkish government kept a military squadron at the mouth of the Don, but the Cossack naval boats with a team of 40-50 people nevertheless successfully broke through the Turkish barriers into the Black Sea.

In 1637, taking advantage of the internal and external difficulties of the Ottoman Empire, the Cossacks approached Azov and took it after an eight-week siege. This was not a sudden raid, but a real regular siege with the use of artillery and the organization of earthworks. According to the Cossacks, they “crushed many towers and walls with cannons. And they dug in ... near the whole hail, and the tunnel was let down.

The loss of Azov was extremely sensitive for Turkey, which, thus, was deprived of its most important fortress in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. However, the main Turkish forces were distracted by the war with Iran, and the Turkish expedition against Azov could take place only in 1641. The Turkish army sent to besiege Azov many times exceeded the Cossack garrison in the city, had siege artillery and was supported by a powerful fleet. The besieged Cossacks fought fiercely. They repelled 24 Turkish attacks, inflicted enormous damage on the Turks and forced them to lift the siege. Nevertheless, the issue of Azov was not resolved, because Turkey did not want to give up this important fortress on the banks of the Don. Since the Cossacks alone could not defend Azov against overwhelming Turkish forces, the question arose before the Russian government whether to wage war for Azov or abandon it.

To resolve the issue of Azov in Moscow, the Zemsky Sobor was convened in 1642. The elected people unanimously proposed leaving Azov to Russia, but at the same time they complained about their difficult situation. The nobles accused the clerks of extortion during the distribution of estates and money, the townspeople complained about heavy duties and cash payments. Rumors circulated in the provinces of an imminent "distemper" in Moscow and a general uprising against the boyars. The situation within the state was so alarming that it was impossible even to think of a new, hard, protracted war. The government refused to further protect Azov and invited the Don Cossacks to leave the city. The Cossacks left the fortress, ruining it to the ground. The defense of Azov was sung for a long time in folk songs, in prosaic and poetic stories. One of these stories ends with the words, as if summing up the heroic struggle for Azov: "There was eternal glory to the Cossacks, and eternal reproach to the Turks."

War with Poland for Ukraine and Belarus

The largest foreign policy event of the 17th century, in which Russia took part, was the long war of 1654-1667. This war, which began as a war between Russia and the Commonwealth for Ukraine and Belarus, soon turned into a major international conflict, in which Sweden, the Ottoman Empire and its vassal states - Moldavia and the Crimean Khanate took part. In terms of its significance for Eastern Europe, the war of 1654-1667. can be put on a par with the Thirty Years' War.

Hostilities began in the spring of 1654. Part of the Russian troops were sent to Ukraine for joint operations with the army of Bogdan Khmelnitsky against the Crimean Tatars and Poland. The Russian command concentrated its main forces on the Belarusian theater, where it was supposed to inflict decisive blows on the troops of the gentry of Poland. The beginning of the war was marked by great successes of the Russian troops. In less than two years (1654-1655), Russian troops captured Smolensk and important cities of Belarus and Lithuania: Mogilev, Vitebsk, Minsk, Vilna (Vilnius), Kovno (Kaunas) and Grodno. Everywhere Russian troops found the support of Russian and Belarusian peasants and the urban population. Even official Polish sources admitted that wherever the Russians came, “muzhiks gather in droves” everywhere. In the cities, artisans and merchants refused to oppose the Russian troops. Peasant detachments smashed the pan's estates. Military successes in Belarus were achieved with the support of Ukrainian Cossack detachments.

Significant success was also achieved by Russian troops and Khmelnitsky's detachments operating in Ukraine. In the summer of 1655 they moved west and during the autumn they liberated the western Ukrainian lands up to Lvov from the Polish-gentry oppression.

Russia's war with Sweden

The weakening of the Commonwealth prompted the Swedish king Charles X Gustav to declare war on it under an insignificant pretext. Encountering weak resistance, the Swedish troops occupied almost all of Poland, together with its capital Warsaw, as well as part of Lithuania and Belarus, where the Swedes were supported by the largest Lithuanian magnate Janusz Radziwill. The intervention of Sweden dramatically changed the balance of power in Eastern Europe. Easy victories in Poland significantly strengthened the position of Sweden, which established itself on the shores of the Baltic Sea. Considering that the Polish army had lost its combat capability for a long time, the Russian government concluded a truce with Poland in Vilna and started a war against Sweden (1656-1658).

In this war, the issue of obtaining access to the Baltic Sea by Russia was of great importance. Russian troops took Koknese (Kokenhausen) on the Western Dvina and began the siege of Riga. At the same time, another Russian detachment took Nyenschantz on the Neva and laid siege to Noteburg (Oreshek).

The war between Russia and Sweden diverted the main forces of both states from the Commonwealth, where a broad popular movement began against the Swedish invaders, which led to the cleansing of Polish territory from Swedish troops. The government of the Polish King Jan Casimir, not wanting to put up with the loss of Ukrainian and Belarusian lands, resumed the fight against Russia. At the cost of territorial concessions, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1660 concluded the Peace of Oliva with Sweden, which made it possible to throw all the armed forces against the Russian troops. This prompted the Moscow government to first conclude a truce, and then peace with Sweden (the Peace of Cardis in 1661). Russia was forced to abandon all its acquisitions received in the Baltic states during the Russo-Swedish war.

Andrusovo truce of 1667

The hostilities resumed in 1659 developed unfavorably for the Russian troops, who left Minsk, Borisov and Mogilev. In Ukraine, the Russian army was defeated by the Polish-Crimean forces near Chudnov. Soon, however, the advance of the Poles was suspended. A protracted war began, exhausting the forces of both sides.

Meanwhile, the tension caused by the war aggravated the internal political situation both in Russia and in the Commonwealth. A “copper riot” broke out in Russia, and an opposition movement of magnates and gentry, dissatisfied with the policies of Jan Casimir, arose in the Commonwealth. Exhausted opponents ended the long war in 1667 with the Andrusovo truce for a period of 13 and a half years.

Negotiations in Andrusovo (near Smolensk) were conducted by an outstanding diplomat, the head of the Ambassadorial Department Afanasy Lavrentievich Ordin-Nashchokin, who received the title of "royal great seal and state great embassy affairs saver." According to the agreement reached, Russia retained Smolensk with its surrounding territory and the Left-Bank Ukraine. The city of Kyiv on the right bank of the Dnieper was transferred to the possession of Russia for two years; Belarus and Right-bank Ukraine remained under the rule of the Commonwealth.

The Andrusovo truce of 1667 did not resolve the complex issues facing Russia. Ukraine was divided into two parts. Its left-bank part, together with Kiev, reunited with Russia, received the opportunity for economic and cultural development. Right-bank Ukraine experienced all the horrors of the Crimean Tatar invasions and remained under the rule of the Polish pans.

Through the Peace of Cardis, Sweden kept the Russian coast of the Gulf of Finland in its possession, the only significance of which for Sweden was only that Russia, the largest country in Europe, was deprived of direct access to the Baltic Sea. This created a constant threat of a new military conflict between Russia and Sweden.

The question of Russia's relations with the Crimean Khanate and Turkey also remained unresolved. Azov remained a Turkish fortress, and the Crimean hordes continued to attack the southern outskirts of Russia.

Russian-Turkish war 1676-1681

At the end of 1666, the wars between Turkey and the Commonwealth began, which continued with short breaks for more than 30 years. The Turks laid claim not only to the Right-Bank, but also to the Left-Bank Ukraine. The threat of Turkish aggression hanging over the largest Slavic states - Poland and Russia - contributed to the Russian-Polish rapprochement. As early as 1672, on the eve of one of Turkey’s aggressive campaigns against the Commonwealth, the Russian government warned the Sultan of its readiness to help the Polish king: “We will teach you how to fish against you and we will send our order to the Don atamans and Cossacks, so that they are on the Don and the Black Sea they had every kind of military craft. Acting in this way, Moscow was convinced that the Turks intended "not only to ruin and take possession of the Polish state, but also to take possession of all the surrounding Christian states."

Nevertheless, two months after receiving this letter, Turkey moved its troops against Poland and captured Kamenets, the largest fortress in Podolia. Russian diplomacy developed energetic activities to organize an anti-Turkish coalition. In 1673, the British, French and Spanish governments were invited by royal letters to joint military operations against the "common Christian enemy - the Sultan of Tur and the Crimean Khan." However, the Western European states, between which there were major contradictions and which, moreover, were interested in maintaining their trading privileges in the Ottoman Empire, refused to take any action against the Turks.

It was not for nothing that the Russian government feared a possible action by the Turks against Russia. In 1676, Turkey made peace with Poland, and in the summer of 1677, a huge Turkish army of Ibrahim Pasha and the Crimean Khan Selim-Girey moved to the Ukrainian fortress on the right bank of the Dnieper - Chigirin, intending to capture Kiev in the future. The Turkish command was sure that the small garrison of the fortress, consisting of Russian detachments and Ukrainian Cossacks, would open the gates of the 100,000-strong army of Turks and Crimeans. But the Russian-Ukrainian army under the command of boyar G. G. Romodanovsky and hetman I. Samoylovich, hurrying to help the garrison of the besieged Chigirin, in August 1677, in the battles for the crossing across the Dnieper, inflicted a feast on the Turks, forced them to lift the siege of Chigirin and hastily retreat.

In the summer of the next 1678, the Turks again undertook the siege of Chigirin, and although they captured the dilapidated fortress, they could not hold it. Russian sources note that the Turks, having met "a strong and courageous stand and great losses in their troops, against the 20th of August, at midnight ... ran back." After lengthy negotiations between Russia and Turkey in 1681, a 20-year truce was concluded in Bakhchisarai. The Sultan recognized Russia's right to Kyiv and promised to stop the Crimean raids on its lands.

Crimean campaigns of 1687 and 1689

Although the sultan swore "a terrible and strong oath ... in the name of the one who created heaven and earth" not to violate the terms of the Bakhchisaray truce, enshrined in the next year by the Treaty of Constantinople, the Crimeans continued to devastate the Ukrainian lands and southern regions of Russia. At the same time, the sultan was able to intensify his aggression against other European states by directing the freed armed forces against them. Under these conditions, an anti-Turkish coalition of European states arose, the participants of which (Austria, Poland and Venice) sought to involve Russia in the union. The Russian government of Princess Sophia (1682-1689) made it an indispensable condition for its participation in the Holy League to conclude an "eternal peace" with Polynia, confirming the terms of the Andrusovo truce. "Eternal Peace" (1686) marked a turning point in relations between Russia and Poland and contributed to the unification of the efforts of the two states in the fight against Turkey.

Fulfilling its allied obligations to Poland and other members of the league, Russia organized two campaigns in the Crimea. Already in the period of preparation for the first campaign, the properties of the local cavalry had a negative effect: discipline was weak in its ranks, the fees were extremely slow, and some of the late nobles, as a sign of disbelief in the success of the campaign, arrived in mourning clothes and with black blankets on horseback. Finally, in the spring of 1687, an army of 100,000 (partly consisting of regiments of the new system), accompanied by a huge convoy, moved to the Crimea. Moving along the steppe scorched by the Tatars, suffering severely from lack of water and losing horses, the Russian army did not reach the Crimea. She had to return to Russia, having lost a large number of people during the exhausting campaign.

To avoid hostilities in the summer heat, the government organized the second Crimean campaign (1689) in early spring, and already in May the Russian army reached Perekop. But this time the Russians failed to succeed. The favorite of Princess Sophia, Prince V.V. Golitsyn, who commanded the Russian army in both campaigns, was a good diplomat, but turned out to be an unsuccessful commander. In connection with the sluggish actions of Golitsyn, who abandoned the general battle and retreated from Perekop, there were even rumors in Moscow, which, however, turned out to be unreliable, that the prince's indecision was explained by the fact that he was bribed by the Turks.

Despite the unsuccessful results of the Crimean campaigns, Russia made a significant contribution to the fight against Turkish aggression, since these campaigns diverted the main forces of the Tatars, and the sultan thus lost the support of the numerous Crimean cavalry. This created favorable conditions for the successful actions of Russia's allies in the anti-Turkish coalition in other theaters of war.

International relations of Russia

Russia occupied a prominent place in the international relations of the 17th century. and exchanged embassies with major countries Europe and Asia. Relations with Sweden, the Commonwealth, France, Spain, as well as with the Austrian emperor, "Caesar", as official Russian documents called him, were especially lively. Relations with Italy were also of great importance, primarily with the Roman Curia and Venice. Constant ties were maintained with Turkey and Iran, the Central Asian khanates and China. Relations with China, Iran and the khanates of Central Asia, as a rule, were peaceful.

The embassy order, which was in charge of relations with foreign states, was a very important institution, headed in most cases not by boyars, but by duma clerks, that is, people of humble origin, but well-versed in international affairs. The high importance of the Duma clerk of the Posolsky Prikaz was emphasized by the fact that foreigners called him "chancellor".

Russian embassies in the 17th century. appeared in almost all major capitals of Western Europe, and Russian merchants carried on a brisk trade with Sweden, the Commonwealth and German cities. A significant number of Russian merchants visited Stockholm, Riga and other cities.

In turn, trade affairs attracted a large number of foreigners to Russia. Many of them took Russian citizenship and remained forever in Russia. Initially, they mieli yards among Russians, and from the middle of the 17th century. in Moscow, outside the Earthen City, on the Kokuya, a special German settlement arose. It had over 200 households. Despite the name Germanskaya, there were few Germans in it, since Germans in Russia were then usually called not only Germans, but also Scots, British, Dutch, etc. Almost three-quarters of the population of the German settlement were military men who entered the Russian service, the rest foreigners were doctors, artisans, etc. Thus, the settlement was populated mainly by wealthy people. In the German Quarter, houses were built according to the Western European model, they had a Protestant church (kirka). However, the idea of ​​the inhabitants of the German Quarter as people of a higher culture compared to the Russian population is greatly exaggerated.

"German" customs influenced mainly the top of Russian society. Some Russian nobles arranged their home decoration according to the overseas model, began to wear foreign clothes. Prince V.V. Golitsyn also belonged to their number.

Fortified in the 17th century. and cultural ties between Russia and Western Europe. By this time, the appearance in Russia of a number of translated works on various branches of knowledge. At the court, "chimes" were compiled, a kind of newspaper with news of foreign events.

Russia's long-standing ties with the peoples of the Balkan Peninsula continued to expand. Representatives of the Bulgarian, Serbian and Greek clergy received "alms" in Russia in the form of cash gifts, some of the newcomers remained forever in Russian monasteries and cities. Learned Greeks were engaged in translations of books from Greek and Latin, served as editors ("referencers") at the Printing House. They were often teachers in wealthy families, like Ukrainian monks, usually pupils of the Kyiv Theological Academy. The influence of the people of Kiev especially increased towards the end of the 17th century, when many of them occupied the highest positions in the church hierarchy.

The influence of Russian culture on the Bulgarians and Serbs, who were under the Turkish yoke, was especially significant. Visiting Bulgarians and Serbs took home with them a large number of books printed in Moscow and Kyiv. The opening of the first printing house in Iasi (Moldova) in 1640 happened with the help of the Kyiv Metropolitan Peter Mohyla. Ties with the Russian and Ukrainian peoples were of great importance for the struggle of the peoples of the Balkan Peninsula against Turkish oppression.

In the 17th century, Russia's ties with the peoples of Transcaucasia also strengthened. Georgian and Armenian colonies existed in Moscow and left a memory of themselves in the names of the streets (Small and Big Georgians, Armenian lane). The Kakhetian king Teimuraz personally came to Moscow and asked for support against the Iranian Shah (1658). Numerous Armenian colony was located in Astrakhan, which was the center of Russian trade with Eastern countries. In 1667, an agreement was signed between the tsarist government and an Armenian trading company for the trade in Iranian silk. The head of the Armenian Church, the Catholicos, appealed to Tsar Alexei with a request to protect the Armenians from the violence of the Iranian authorities. The peoples of Georgia and Armenia became more and more closely associated with Russia in their struggle against the Iranian and Turkish enslavers.

Lively trade relations existed with Russia and with the peoples of Azerbaijan and Dagestan. There was a Russian merchant colony in Shamakhi. Information about the eastern regions of the Caucasus, especially about the cities of Azerbaijan, is contained in the "walks" of Russian people of the 17th century, of which the notes of the merchant F. A. Kotov are especially interesting.

Relations with distant India were also expanding. Settlements of Indian merchants who traded with Russia arose in Astrakhan. Tsarist government during the 17th century. several times sent its embassies to India.

5. Russian culture of the 17th century.

Education

In the 17th century great changes took place in various areas of Russian culture.

The "new period" in the history of Russia imperiously broke with the traditions of the past in science, art and literature. This was reflected in a sharp increase in printed output, in the appearance of the first higher educational institution, in the birth of a theater and a newspaper (handwritten "chimes"). Civic motifs are gaining more and more space in literature and painting, and even in such traditional arts as icon painting and church murals, there is a desire for realistic images, far from the stylized manner of writing by Russian artists of previous centuries.

The reunification of Ukraine with Russia had enormous and fruitful consequences for the Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian peoples. The birth of the theater, the spread of partes singing (church choral singing), the development of syllabic versification, and new elements in architecture were common cultural phenomena for Russia, Ukraine and Belarus in the 17th century.

Literacy has become the property of a much wider circle of the population than before. A large number of merchants and artisans in the cities, as shown by the numerous signatures of townspeople on petitions and other acts, were able to read and write. Literacy also spread among the peasant population, mainly among the black-skinned peasants, as can be seen from the notes on manuscripts of the 17th century made by their owners - peasants. In noble and merchant circles, literacy was already a common phenomenon.

In the 17th century, intensified attempts were made to create permanent educational institutions in Russia. However, only at the end of the century these attempts lead to the creation of the first institution of higher education. First, the government opened a school in Moscow (1687), in which the learned Greek brothers Likhud taught not only ecclesiastical, but also some secular sciences (arithmetic, rhetoric, etc.). On the basis of this school, the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy arose, which played a prominent role in Russian education. It was located in the building of the Zaikonospassky Monastery in Moscow (some of these buildings have survived to this day). The Academy mainly trained educated people to fill spiritual positions, but it also provided quite a few people employed in various civil professions. As is known, the great Russian scientist M. V. Lomonosov also studied there.

Further development was received by book printing. Its main center was the Printing Yard in Moscow, the stone building of which still exists today. The printing house mainly published church books. During the first half of the 17th century Approximately 200 individual editions were released. The first book of civil content printed in Moscow was the textbook of the patriarchal clerk Vasily Burtsev - “A Primer of the Slavonic Language, that is, the beginning of teaching for children”, first published in 1634. In the second half of the 17th century. the number of secular books produced by the Printing House is increasing dramatically. These included "The Teaching and Cunning of the Military Structure of Infantry Men", "Cathedral Code", the Customs Regulations, etc.

In Ukraine, the most important centers of book printing were Kyiv and Chernigov. In the printing house of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, the first textbook on Russian history was printed - "Synopsis or a short collection from various chroniclers about the beginning of the Slavic-Russian people."

Literature. Theater

New phenomena in the Russian economy of the XVII century. found their way into the literature. Among the townspeople, a household story is born.

"A Tale of Woe and Misfortune" describes the gloomy story of a young man who failed on the path of life. “Ino I know and know that you can’t put scarlet without a master,” the hero exclaims, citing an example from the life of artisans and merchants who are familiar with the use of scarlet (velvet). A number of satirical works are devoted to ridiculing the negative aspects of Russian life in the 17th century. In the story about Yersh Yershovich, unrighteous order courts are ridiculed. Ruff is known and eaten only by "moth hawkers and tavern pebbles", who have nothing to buy good fish. Ruff's main fault is that he took possession of Lake Rostov "en masse and conspiracy" - this is how the story parodies the article of the "Cathedral Code" about speaking out against the government. There is also a caustic satire on church orders. "Kalyazin petition" ridicules the hypocrisy of the monks.

The archimandrite drives us to the church, the monks complain, and at that time we “are sitting around a bucket (with beer) without trousers in the same scrolls in cells ... we won’t be in time ... and ruin the buckets with beer.” In the "Feast of the Tavern Rows" we find a parody of the church service: "Vouchee, Lord, this evening, without beatings, drink us drunk."

In the literature of the second half of the XVII century. folk elements are more and more pronounced: in the stories about Azov, in the legends about the beginning of Moscow, etc. Folk chants sound in the poetic story about Azov, in the cry of the Cossacks: “Forgive us, dark forests and green oak forests. Forgive us, the fields are clean and the backwaters are quiet. Forgive us, the sea is blue and the rivers are fast.” In the 17th century, it is established the new kind literary work - notes that will receive special development in the next century. The wonderful work of the founder of the schism - "The Life" of Archpriest Avvakum, which tells about his long-suffering life, is written in simple and clear language.

Illustration from the comedy "The Parable of the Prodigal Son" 1685

The teacher of Princess Sofya Alekseevna Simeon Polotsky launched a wide literary activity as the author of numerous verses (poems), dramatic works, as well as textbooks, sermons and theological treatises. To print new books, a special court printing house was created by the “sovereign at the top”.

The appearance of theatrical performances in Russia was a great cultural event. Russian theater arose at the court of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. For him, Simeon of Polotsk wrote "The Comedy of the Parable of the Prodigal Son." It depicted the story of the prodigal son, who repented after a dissolute life and was taken back by his father. For the performance in the royal village near Moscow, Preobrazhensky, a “comedy temple” was built. Here the play "Artaxerxes action" on the biblical story was played. The play was extremely liked by Alexei Mikhailovich, and the tsar's confessor relieved him of doubts about the sinfulness of the theater, pointing to the examples of Byzantine pious kings who loved theatrical performances. The director of the court theater was Gregory, a pastor from the German Quarter. Soon his place was taken by S. Chizhinsky, a graduate of the Kyiv Theological Academy (1675). In the same year, a ballet and two new comedies were staged at the court theater: about Adam and Eve, about Joseph. The troupe of the court theater consisted of over 70 exclusively male members, since female roles were also performed by men; among them were children - "unskillful and unintelligent lads."

Architecture and painting

In the 17th century, stone construction was greatly developed. Stone churches appeared not only in cities, but also became commonplace in rural areas. In large centers, a considerable number of stone buildings for civil purposes were built. Usually these were two-storied buildings with windows decorated with architraves and a richly trimmed porch. Examples of such houses are "Pogankin's chambers" in Pskov, Korobov's house in Kaluga, etc.

The architecture of stone churches was dominated by five-domed cathedrals and small temples with one or five domes. Artists liked to decorate the outer walls of churches with stone patterns of kokoshniks, cornices, columns, window architraves, sometimes multi-colored tiles. The heads, set on high necks, took on an elongated onion shape. Stone hipped churches were built in the first half of the 17th century. Later, hipped temples remained the property of the Russian North with its wooden architecture.

At the end of the XVII century. a new style appears, which sometimes received the wrong name of "Russian baroque". The temples had a cruciform shape, and their heads began to be located also in a cruciform instead of the traditional arrangement in the corners. The style of such churches, unusually effective in their rich external decoration, was called "Naryshkin" because the best churches of this architecture were built in the estates of the Naryshkin boyars. An excellent example of it is the church in Fili, near Moscow. Buildings of this kind were erected not only in Russia, but also in Ukraine. Unusually slender and at the same time richly decorated with columns, architraves, parapets, buildings of this style delight with their beauty. According to the territory of its distribution, this style could be called Ukrainian-Russian.

The best master painter of that era, Simon Ushakov, strove to paint not abstract, but realistic images. Icons and paintings of such “Fryazhsky writing” show the desire of Russian artists to get closer to life, leaving abstract schemes. New trends in art caused deep indignation of zealots of antiquity. Thus, Archpriest Avvakum spoke venomously about the new icons, saying that they depicted “the merciful one who saved” like a drunken foreigner with a blush on his cheeks.

Applied art reached a high level: artistic embroidery, decorative woodcarving, etc. Fine examples of jewelry art were created in the Armory, where the best craftsmen worked, fulfilling orders from the royal court.

In all areas of the cultural life of Russia, new trends were felt, caused by profound economic and social changes. These shifts, as well as the fierce class struggle and powerful peasant uprisings that shook the feudal-feudal state, were reflected in folk poetry. Around the majestic figure of Stepan Razin, a cycle of songs of an epic nature has developed. “Turn, guys, to the steep bank, we will break the wall, and we will smash the prison stone by stone,” the folk song sings of the exploits of Razin and his associates, calling for the fight against landlords, serfdom, and social oppression.

In the XVI century. the process of division of labor deepens, the number of specialties in metal processing increases. More sophisticated raw-hearth furnaces began to appear for smelting iron from swamp ores, tools for deep drilling of salt wells, firearms and ammunition. An example of high technical and artistic skill is the Tsar Cannon (master Andrey Chokhov, 1586). Moscow, Tver, Nizhny Novgorod, Kostroma and others are becoming major centers of handicraft.

In the XVI century. trade has increased. Foreign trade had great momentum, the most important direction of which was the east. Since 1553, the sea route to England through the White Sea was opened.

Throughout the 17th century domestic industry became widespread: the peasants produced linen, homespun cloth, ropes and ropes, felted and leather shoes, various clothes and utensils, bast shoes, bast and matting, tar and resin, etc. Gradually, the peasant industry turned into commodity production. The products of crafts were connected with the subsistence economy and partially entered the market.

For the 17th century the following groups of artisans were characteristic: tax-paying (performed private orders); palace artisans (served the royal court); state-owned (worked on orders from the treasury); privately owned (produced everything necessary for landlords and estate owners).

On the basis of the development of the fishing industry, the exchange between the regions of the country increased. In many regions of Russia they made tar and saltpeter. Woodworking was widespread in Pomorie, where sea and river ships were built. Resin industry developed in different regions of the country. In Novgorod, Pskov, Vologda, Yaroslavl and other cities, products were made from hemp, linen, canvas. Glass and paper factories appeared. Construction equipment has reached a high level.

Moscow, Tula, Ustyuzhna, Ustyug Veliky and others became the largest metalworking centers.

In the 17th century the technical level of the craft increased, manifested in the production of weapons. In 1615, the first cannon with screw threads was made.

Several large shopping centers were formed, among which Moscow stood out.

In Russia there were the following the most important centers of trade:

- bread was sold in the north of Russia, in Vologda and Ustyug the Great;

- flax and hemp were sold mainly in Novgorod, Pskov, Smolensk;

- leather, meat, lard - in Kazan, Vologda, Yaroslavl;

— salt came from Solikamsk;

- large fur trades were held at the Makarievskaya and Irbitskaya fairs.

The first industrial establishments in Russia appeared at the end of the 15th - beginning of the 16th century. These were state-owned military enterprises - the Cannon Yard, the Armory for the production of firearms and edged weapons, the Tula Arms Manufactory, etc., where English and German specialists worked together with Russian craftsmen. All major construction work was carried out under the direction of the Order of stone affairs.

By the end of the XVI century. one of the most famous manufactories was the Khamovny yard (weaving enterprise) in Moscow. In the 17th century manufactories of this type appeared in the Vladimir, Vologda and Yaroslavl districts and had a privately owned character.

By the beginning of the XVII century. the main source of manufactory industry was the serf village, which was the most important reason for the slow pace of its development.

The transformation of handicraft into small-scale production, the development of specialization of individual territories and the growth of trade turnover, the emergence of manufactories in the 17th century. contributed to the formation of a single all-Russian market.

Serfdom in the 17th century. Agriculture recovered slowly. The reasons for this were the weakness of peasant farms, low productivity, natural disasters, crop shortages, etc. From the middle of the century, an increase in agricultural production began, which was associated with the development of fertile lands in Central Russia and the Lower Volga region. The main way in which agriculture developed was extensive.

Peasant, as well as landlord, economy basically retained a subsistence character: the peasants were content with what they produced themselves, and the landowners were content with what the same peasants delivered to them in the form of quitrent in kind: poultry, meat, butter, eggs, lard, and also such handicrafts, such as linen, coarse cloth, wooden and earthenware, etc.

In the 17th century the expansion of feudal landownership occurred due to the granting of black and palace lands to the nobles (landowners), which was accompanied by an increase in the number of enslaved population. The main trend in the socio-economic development of Russia was the further strengthening of serfdom. Rural population The country was divided into two main categories: the landowning and black-mossed peasants.

Serfdom was reflected in the fate of serfs, whose position was reduced to the position of serfs.

The "Cathedral Code" of 1649 limited the sources of replenishment of serfs, which only free people could become. The economic basis of serfdom was feudal ownership of land in all its forms - local, patrimonial, state.

Stages of enslavement of peasants

I National restriction of peasant freedom

1481 - the first mention in documents of "enslaved" people - a transitional state to servitude for debts.

1497 - the establishment of the St. George's Day rule: peasants can move to another landowner in a limited time - a week before and a week after November 26. At the same time, the payment for the "elderly" ("Sudebnik" of Ivan III) grew.

1550 - the abolition of slavery for debts, confirmation of St. George's Day, but at the same time, the payment for the "elderly" was increased. Attachment to the tax of townspeople ("Sudebnik" of Ivan IV).

1581 - the first decree on " reserved years", prohibiting the transition of peasants due to emergency circumstances (Decree of Ivan IV).

1597 - the establishment of a five-year term for lawsuits about fugitive peasants and lifelong service in bondage ("The Code" of Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich).

1601 - prohibition of the transition of peasants, recorded in the scribe books of 1592-1593. (Decree of Boris Godunov).

1642 - the limitation period for claims for exported peasants is increased to 15 years, and for runaways - up to 10 years (Decree of Mikhail Romanov).

1646 - the statute of limitations for claims about fugitive and exported peasants was canceled (Decree of Alexei Mikhailovich).

II Legal registration of serfdom

1649 - a complete ban on the transition of peasants, including St. George's Day. Attachment to the personality of the owner, and not to the land, securing hereditary serfdom and the right of the landowner to dispose of the property of the serf, the prohibition of leaving the urban estate. The final legalization of serfdom ("Council Code" by Alexei Mikhailovich).

III. Strengthening and further development of serfdom

Middle of the XVII-XVIII century. - an increase in the size of peasant duties, intensification of feudal exploitation, the transfer of land and peasants to the full ownership of the landowner. Serfdom acquired the most crude and severe forms: with the growth of corvée and dues, legislation consolidated the regime of unlimited landowner arbitrariness.

Historical concepts of the process of enslavement of the Russian peasantry

a) N. M. Karamzin, S. M. Solovyov, N. I. Kostomarov, B. D. Grekov, R. G. Skrynnikov - “decree enslavement of the peasants”: serfdom was introduced at the initiative of the state authorities based on the needs of the country's defense and to provide for the service class.

b) V. O. Klyuchevsky, M. P. Pogodin, M. A. Dyakonov: “unauthorized enslavement of the peasants” - serfdom is a consequence of the real living conditions of the country, formalized by the state only legally.

The ruin caused by the Time of Troubles is difficult to express in numbers, but it can be compared with the devastation after the Civil War of 1918-1920. or with damage from military operations and occupation in 1941-1945. Official censuses - scribe books and "watches" of the 20s. 17th century - they constantly noted “a wasteland that was a village”, “arable land overgrown with forest”, empty yards, whose owners “wandered off without a trace”. In many districts of the Muscovite state, from 1/2 to 3/4 of the arable land was "deserted"; a whole layer of ruined peasants appeared - "bobs", who could not conduct an independent economy. Entire cities turned out to be abandoned (Radonezh, Mikulin); in others (Kaluga, Velikiye Luki, Rzhev, Ryazhsk) the number of households was a third or a quarter of what it was at the end of the 16th century; According to the official census, the city of Kashin "Polish and Lithuanian people burned, and carved, and ravaged to the ground" so that only 37 inhabitants remained in it. According to modern demographic estimates, only by the 40s. 17th century the population of the 16th century was restored.

These consequences of the Time of Troubles were gradually overcome, and in the second half of the 17th century. in the economic development of the country can be noted the territorial division of labor. In the second half of the XVII century. there were areas specializing in the production of flax (Pskov, Smolensk), bread (territories south of the Oka); the population of Rostov and Beloozero grew vegetables for sale; Tula, Serpukhov, Ustyuzhna Zhelezopolskaya, Tikhvin became the centers of iron production. The inhabitants of many villages were mainly engaged in trade and handicrafts (Ivanovo, Pavlovo, Lyskovo, Murashkino, etc.): they produced and sold iron products, linen, felt boots, caps. The peasants of the Gzhel volost near Moscow made dishes that later became famous, the Kizhi churchyard was famous for its knives, and Vyazma for its sledges.

Formerly fortresses, the southern cities (Orel, Voronezh) became grain markets, from where grain collected from local black soil went to Moscow and other cities. Yaroslavl was the center of leather production: raw leather was supplied there, then dressed by local artisans and dispersed throughout the country. When in 1662 the state declared a monopoly on the trade in this commodity, the treasury in Yaroslavl bought up 40% of the country's hides. The government sought to streamline the collection of customs fees: since 1653, all merchants paid a single "ruble" duty - 10 money (5 kopecks) from each ruble of the value of the goods, with one half at the place of purchase, and the other at the place of sale of the goods.

Both peasants and feudal lords entered the market with their products. A reflection of this process was the development of monetary rent, which at that time, according to historians, was found in every fifth land holding - an estate or estate. Documents of the 17th century talk about the emergence of prosperous

nyh "merchant peasants" and urban "rich men and throats" from yesterday's townspeople or archers. They started their own business - forges, soap factories, tanneries, bought up home canvas in the villages, and shops and yards in the cities. Having grown rich, they subordinated other small producers to themselves and forced them to work for themselves: for example, in 1691, the artisans of Yaroslavl complained about "trading people" who had 5-10 shops and "cut off" small producers from the market. Such rich peasants appeared as Matvey Bechevin, who owned a whole river fleet and delivered thousands of quarters of grain to Moscow; or serf B.I. Morozov Alexei Leontiev, who easily received a loan of a thousand rubles from his boyar; or the patriarchal peasant Lev Kostrikin, who kept taverns at the mercy of the country's second largest city, Novgorod. Trade people increasingly actively mastered distant and near markets.

After the Time of Troubles, the government restored the former monetary system. But still, the weight of the penny gradually halved (from 0.7 to 0.3 g), and it literally fell through the fingers. In 1654 an attempt was made monetary reform: the silver kopeck was replaced by large silver coins of 1 ruble, 50 kopecks and copper coins. But the reform ended in failure. The annexation of Ukraine in 1654 and the ensuing protracted war with Poland led to increased production of copper money, rapid inflation and the “Copper Riot” of 1662, during which Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich had to go out to the angry Muscovites and even “beat on the hands” with them. As a result, the government was forced to return to the old monetary system.

The volume of foreign trade for a century increased 4 times: at the end of the XVI century. 20 ships came to Arkhangelsk annually, and in the second half of the 17th century. already 80; 75% of Russia's foreign trade turnover passed through this port. English and Dutch merchants brought colonial goods here from Africa, Asia and America: spices (cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, pepper, saffron), sandalwood, incense. In the Russian market, non-ferrous metals (tin, lead, copper), paints, glass glasses and wine glasses brought in thousands of pieces, and large quantities of paper were in demand. Hundreds of barrels of wine (white French, Renskoe, Romanea, red church wine, etc.) and vodka, despite their high cost in Russia, and lots of imported herring were bought up.

An Armenian court was built in Astrakhan; Merchants of the Armenian Company, under a charter of 1667, were allowed to import and export silk and other goods from Russia in order to direct the transit of Persian silk to Europe through Russia. Merchants of the Astrakhan Indian Court brought morocco, precious stones, and pearls to Russia. Cotton fabrics came from the countries of the East. Servicemen valued sabers made in Iranian Isfahan. In 1674, the first Russian caravan of the guest O. Filatiev went through the Mongolian steppes to distant China, from where they brought precious porcelain, gold and no less expensive tea, which at that time was considered in Russia not as a drink, but as a medicine.

Among the export goods, it was no longer furs and wax, but leather, lard, potash (potassium carbonate obtained from ash for the manufacture of soap and glass), hemp, resin, i.e. raw materials and semi-finished products for further processing. But bread until the second half of the XVIII century. remained a strategic commodity (there was not enough grain on the domestic market), and its export was an instrument of foreign policy: for example, during the Thirty Years' War, the government of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich allowed the purchase of bread for the countries of the anti-Habsburg coalition - Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and England.

The British and the Dutch fought for the Russian market, together they made up half of the 1,300 merchants and landowners known to us who traded in Russia. Russian merchants complained in petitions: “Those Germans in Russia have multiplied, they have become great poverty, that all sorts of auctions have been taken away from us.” In 1649, the privileges of English merchants were abolished, and the New Trade Charter of 1667 banned retail trade for foreigners: when transporting goods from Arkhangelsk to Moscow and other cities, the amount of travel duties for them increased by 3-4 times compared to those paid by Russians merchants.

In 1654, the first exploration expedition to Novaya Zemlya set off from Moscow. On the Volga in 1667 foreign craftsmen built the first "European" ships of the Russian fleet. In 1665, regular postal communication began with Vilna and Riga.

Finally, in the 17th century a transition began from small-scale handicraft production, which at that time numbered 250 specialties, to manufactory based on a detailed division of labor (technology was not always used in manufactories). Back in the early 30s. 17th century state-owned copper-smelting enterprises appeared in the Urals. Then private manufactories were founded - merchant rope yards in Vologda and Kholmogory, ironworks of the boyars I. D. Miloslavsky and B. I. Morozov; Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich himself had four vodka factories and a “morocco yard” in the palace economy. Foreign experience and capital were also attracted: in the 30s. 17th century Dutch merchants A. Vinius, P. Marselis and F. Akema built three ironworks in Tula and four in the Kashirsky district. The Swede B. Koyet founded a glass manufactory, the Dutchman fan Sveden - paper production. In total, throughout the 17th century. up to 60 manufactories arose in the country. And yet, manufactory production in Russia took only the first steps and could not even satisfy the needs of the state: by the end of the 17th century. iron had to be imported from Sweden, and muskets for the army had to be ordered from Holland.

There are disputes in science whether it is possible to consider the enterprises of the 17th century. capitalist. After all, distilleries, Ural or Tula factories worked primarily for the treasury at fixed prices, and only the surplus could be put on the market. At the Tula factories, masters and apprentices - Russian and foreign - had good earnings (from 30 to 100 rubles a year), and the bulk of the working people were ascribed state peasants who worked at enterprises in return for paying state taxes. Rather, it can be said that Russian manufactories combined contradictory trends in the development of society: a new technical level of production with the use of forced labor and state control.

The weakness of the Russian city did not contribute to the development of capitalist relations. The population of cities was divided (archers, for example, were exempted from taxes for their service); people were in charge and judged by various state institutions. The state sent citizens of all categories to a free service: to collect customs duties or sell salt and wine to the "sovereign"; they could be "transferred" to live in another city.

Business activity was undermined by periodically announced state monopolies for trade (furs, caviar, leather, lard, flax, etc.): then all owners of such goods had to immediately hand them over at a “specified” price. There were also local monopolies, when an enterprising person agreed with the governor that only he would have the right to bake gingerbread in the city, write petitions for the illiterate, or sharpen knives; after that, an order followed: “besides him, Ivashka, do not order other third-party people” to engage in one or another craft. The state received a guaranteed income from such a monopolist. A loan was expensive for a business person: there were no bank offices in Russian cities, and money had to be borrowed from usurers at 20% per annum, since the legislation did not guarantee the collection of interest on the loan.

Russia remained on the periphery of the world market. Elements of bourgeois relations appeared in the country, but they were deformed by the feudal system and state control. According to a number of scientists, pre-Petrine Russia was at the level of England in the 19th-16th centuries in terms of the degree of economic development, however, there are disagreements in science on the issue of the formation of capitalist relations in Russia.

Some authors (V. I. Buganov, A. A. Preobrazhensky, Yu. A. Tikhonov and others) prove the simultaneous development in the 17th-18th centuries. and feudal-serfdom, and bourgeois relations. They consider the main factor in the development of capitalism to be the impact of the growing market on the feudal patrimony, as a result of which the landowner's estate became a commodity-money economy, and the peasant household turned into a base for small-scale commodity production, which was accompanied by the stratification of the peasants. Other historians (L. V. Milov, A. S. Orlov, I. D. Kovalchenko) believe that quantitative changes in the economy and even commodity production associated with the market do not yet indicate the emergence of a capitalist economy, and the formation of a single all-Russian market took place on a non-capitalist basis.

The All-Russian market, its traditions and peculiar appearance, its difficult and contradictory path of formation are an integral part of Russian history. An appeal to the history of its formation is important in understanding the prospects for a modern market economy.

Early 17th century in the history of Russia was marked by the largest political and socio-economic upheavals. This time was called by historians the Time of Troubles. Numerous popular unrest, anarchy and arbitrariness of the Polish-Swedish interventionists led the country to unprecedented economic ruin. The consequence of the Time of Troubles was a powerful regression of the economic and socio-political situation compared to that achieved by the end of the 16th century. Documentary and literary sources of that time paint gloomy pictures of devastated, depopulated cities and villages, desolated arable land, the decline of crafts and trade.

Thus, the formation of the all-Russian market faced a number of intractable problems: the processes of monetary accumulation proceeded slowly, differing sharply from the rates and forms of initial accumulation in Western European countries; trade and industry have not reached a level that could ensure the gradual elimination of the personal dependence of the peasant; lack of qualification of workers; low purchasing power of the population; difficult communication between regions of the country due to lack of infrastructure; competition with foreign manufacturers.

Nevertheless, the formation of the all-Russian market was an organic, viable, historically conditioned process, which in its development went through a number of important stages: the development of handicraft into small-scale production; trade development; the growing role of the merchants; the emergence of the first manufactories; settlement of the legal side of ensuring business operations.

By the end of the XVII century. in accordance with the natural and geographical conditions, handicraft production areas were mainly formed. The exchange of goods between individual regions of the country expanded significantly, and the merging of individual lands into a single economic system began. The development of small-scale production prepared the basis for the emergence of manufactories, since, with all its development, handicraft production could no longer satisfy the demand for industrial products.

Russia, 17th century had a solid natural resource base involved in the economic turnover: this is evidenced by overproduction in the field of subsistence farming, a high share of exports of luxury goods abroad, as well as the intensive restoration of agriculture after the Time of Troubles. The problem of labor resources was solved by attaching peasants to the manufactory, as well as by the influx of immigrants to Russia. In addition, the country witnessed obvious scientific and technological progress associated with the emergence of the first manufactories in qualitatively new industries (blacksmithing, metallurgy, leatherworking and woodworking). The structure of the economy as a whole was archaic, but the mercantile population and the peasantry adapted to a disorganized order structure and inappropriate monetary reforms as the government sought to improve the terms of trade by passing bills banning usury and encouraging domestic producers. Although aggregate demand of the population was one of the most painful points in the economy of the 17th century, since the purchasing power of the population was low and subsistence farming was still flourishing, there was a process of folding the specialization of areas, which significantly increased demand and stimulated supply. Type economic system 17th century it is difficult to determine, since the market was free and competitive, but state regulation, which compensated the aggregate demand of the population at the expense of orders from the treasury. Socio-political factors were formed mainly in favor of developing entrepreneurship: the adoption of the Commercial Charters of 1653 and 1667. provided patronage to the national economy, after the Time of Troubles, a dynastic order of government was established, which largely ensured political stability.

Based on the analysis of the correspondence of the situation of the XVII century. the presence of the main features of the existing domestic market, we can conclude that not only was the beginning of the all-Russian market, but also the prerequisites for further reforming the country.

Appolinary Vasnetsov. Red Square in the second half of the 17th century (1918)

Territory of Russia by the end of the 17th century. increased significantly due to the annexation of the Left-Bank Ukraine and Eastern Siberia. However, the vast country was sparsely populated, especially Siberia, where on the verge of the XVII-XVIII centuries. lived only 61 thousand Russian people.

The total population of Russia in 1678 is 11.2 million people, of which the townspeople accounted for 180 thousand. This testified to the low level of the division of labor, and, consequently, the development of the economy. The bulk of the population was made up of peasants, among whom landowners predominated (52%), followed by peasants belonging to the clergy (16%) and the royal family (9.2%). There were 900 thousand unenslaved peasants. All this population was feudally dependent on the landowners, the clergy, the royal family and the state. The privileged estates included the nobility (70 thousand) and the clergy (140 thousand). The most populated areas were considered to be the non-chernozem center, as well as the western and northwestern regions, that is, territories with the least fertile lands.

Cathedral Code of 1649 and the legal registration of serfdom

Due to extremely primitive tools for the development of the economy and the state's regular need for funds (mainly for the maintenance of the state apparatus itself and the conduct of wars), by the middle of the 17th century. the state chose the path of further enslavement of the peasants, and the Cathedral Code of 1649 became its legal framework.

According to the Code of 1649, an indefinite search for fugitive peasants was established, which indicates their transformation into the hereditary property of the landowner, palace department and spiritual owners. Article XI of Chapter "The Court of Peasants" provided for the amount of a fine (10 rubles per year) for receiving and keeping fugitives, the procedure for transferring them to their rightful owners, the fate of children who had been adopted on the run, as well as property, instructed what to do in cases where a fugitive peasant, to cover his tracks, change his name, etc.

The status of the posad population, hitherto considered free, also changed. Thus, Chapter XIX extended serf relations to the posad population - it forever attached the posad man to the posad, determined the criteria for enrolling the population in it. One of the main norms of the head is the liquidation of white settlements, as a rule, belonging to large secular and spiritual feudal lords. The class privilege of the townspeople is a monopoly on trading and crafts. The head determined the order of acquisition of the settlement by the commercial and fishing population. There were three signs according to which those who left the settlement were forcibly returned to it: “in the old days”, that is, persons who were previously registered in it; by kinship, that is, all relatives of the townsman were enrolled in the settlement; Finally, by occupation. The main duty of the townspeople was the obligatory occupation of trading and crafts - both were a source of financial income to the treasury.

Serfdom

Troubles at the beginning of the 17th century. accompanied by the destruction of productive forces and a decrease in the population. Both caused desolation: on a vast territory, especially in the center, sources in many cases noted the presence of arable land, “overgrown with forest” as thick as an arm. But the Time of Troubles, in addition, undermined the centuries-old living conditions: instead of a plow and a sickle, a flail turned out to be in the hands of a peasant - detachments roamed the country, robbing the local population. The protracted nature of the restoration of the economy, which took three decades - 20-50s. XVII century, was also explained by the low fertility of the soil of the Non-Black Earth Region and the weak resistance peasant economy natural conditions: early frosts, as well as heavy rains that caused crops to get wet, led to crop failures. The scourge of animal husbandry was contagious animal diseases, which deprived the peasant family of both draft cattle and milk and meat. Arable land was cultivated with traditional tools that remained unchanged for centuries: a plow, a harrow, a sickle, less often a scythe and a plow. The dominant farming system was three-field , that is, the alternation of winter and spring crops with fallow. In the northern regions, preserved undercut - the most labor-intensive system of farming, when the plowman had to cut down the forest, burn it, loosen the ground and then sow. True, the exhausting labor of the peasant was rewarded with higher yields in those few years when the ash fertilized the soil. The abundance of land made it possible to use fallow - depleted soil was abandoned for several years, during which it restored fertility, then again put into economic circulation.

The low level of agricultural culture was explained not only by unfavorable soil and climatic conditions, but also by the peasant’s lack of interest in increasing the results of labor generated by serfdom - landlords, monasteries and the administration of royal estates often seized not only surpluses, but also the necessary product. This largely resulted in the use of routine equipment and routine farming systems, which gave invariably low yields - two or three, that is, from each sown grain, the tiller received two or three new ones. Major shift in agriculture consisted in some elimination of its natural isolation and gradual involvement in market relations. This long process proceeded extremely slowly and in the 17th century. affected only an insignificant layer of landowners, especially those who had large farms. The bulk of both peasant and landowner farms retained a natural character: the peasants were content with what they themselves produced, and the landowners were content with what the same peasants delivered to them in the form of quitrent: poultry, meat, lard, eggs, hams, coarse cloth , canvas, wooden and earthenware, etc.

17th century sources preserved for us descriptions of two types of farms ( small local And large local ) and two trends in their development. An example of one of the types was the farm of the country's largest landowner, Morozov. boyar Boris Ivanovich Morozov , the "uncle" (tutor) of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, who was also married to the sister of the Tsar's wife, was distinguished, as they believed, by excessive greed and money-grubbing. Contemporaries said about the boyar that he had "the same thirst for gold as an ordinary thirst for drink." Savings in this childless family absorbed a lot of the energy of his head, and he significantly increased his possessions: in the 20s. behind him were 151 households, inhabited by 233 male souls, and after his death, 9,100 households with 27,400 serfs remained. The peculiarity of Morozov's economy was given by the presence of various crafts in it. Along with agriculture, in his estates, located in 19 districts of the country, they were engaged in the production of potash - fertilizer from ash, not only used in their households, but also exported abroad. The weekday camps located in the Volga estates, where potash was produced, brought the boyar a grandiose profit for those times - 180 thousand rubles. Morozov's economy was diversified - he contained distilleries and an ironworks in the Zvenigorod district.

The economy of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich also belonged to a similar type, with the difference, however, that it, being also diversified, was not market-oriented: metallurgical, glass and brick factories operated in the royal estates, but the products produced on them were intended for the needs of a vast the king's household. Alexey Mikhailovich was known as a zealous owner and personally delved into all the little things in the life of the estates. For example, he bought thoroughbred cows abroad, including Dutch ones, introduced a five-field crop rotation, and demanded mandatory fertilization of fields with manure. But in the economic plans of the king there was also a lot of ephemeral: for example, he tried to grow melons, watermelons, grapes and citrus fruits in Izmailovo, to boil salt from brines of low concentration in Khamovniki, on Devichye Pole, near Kolomenskoye. Some monasteries also organized crafts in their estates (they arose as early as the 16th century). Solovetsky, Pyskorsky, Kirillo-Belozersky and other monasteries, whose possessions were located in Pomorye, rich in brines containing a lot of salt, started salt production in their estates. Salt was on sale. Other large feudal lords also maintained connections with the market: Miloslavsky, Odoevsky.

A different type of economy was formed by a middle-class landowner Bezobrazova. It does not reveal traces of intensification in the form of fisheries and market links. Bezobrazov did not like the service, resorted to tricks to evade it, and preferred to spend time in the countryside for household chores or in Moscow, from where he vigilantly followed the activities of 15 clerks. If Morozov's entire complex economy was managed by the patrimonial administration located in Moscow, which sent orders to the clerks on behalf of the boyar, then Bezobrazov personally led the clerks. Even more primitive was the economy of small landlords and monasteries. The peasants who belonged to them barely provided the life resources of the master and the monastic brethren. Such feudal lords, both secular and spiritual, and there were an overwhelming majority of them, conducted a simple subsistence economy.

The emergence of manufactories

The main innovation in the economic development of the country was the appearance of manufactories. In the countries of Western Europe, in most of which serfdom had long since disappeared, the emergence of manufactories led to the onset of the era of capitalism in them. In Russia, serfdom dominated in all spheres of life. Hence the insufficiently high level of small industries from which manufactory could grow, the absence of a wage labor market, the lack of necessary capital for the creation of manufactories, the construction and operation of which required significant costs. It is no coincidence that the owners of the first ironworks in Russia were not domestic, but foreign merchants who attracted foreign craftsmen to work on them. But the emergence of manufactory in Russia was marked by the activities of the Dutch merchant Andrey Vinnius , who brought an outlandish method of production to Russia. The history goes back to the 1630s, when deposits of iron ore were found near Tula. Since Andrei Vinnius often visited those places, he quickly realized the profitability of his idea. Andrei Vinnius not only donated money for the extraction of iron, but also received the mercy of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich in 1632 founded the first iron-working manufactory. So we stopped importing iron from Europeans, and the benefits of manufactory were already evident during the Smolensk War.

At the first stage of the development of manufactory production in Russia, two features should be noted: transferred to serfdom, it acquired the features of a patrimonial economy associated with the market; the second feature is the state's active patronage of large-scale production. Since cannons and cannon balls were cast at metallurgical plants, in the presence of which the state was interested, it provided the manufacturer with benefits: already the state attached peasants to the first metallurgical plants, obliging them to perform the most labor-intensive work that did not require high professional skills - to mine ore and manufacture charcoal. There are disputes among scientists about the number of manufactories in Russia in the 17th century. Some of them included in the list of manufactories enterprises that lacked one of the main signs of manufactories - the division of labor. At distilleries, salt pans, tanneries, the labor of a master and an apprentice was used. Such enterprises are usually called cooperation. They are distinguished from manufactories by the absence of a division of labor. Therefore, there is every reason to consider the presence in Russia of the end of the 17th century. only 10-12 manufactories, and all of them functioned in metallurgy. For the emergence of metallurgical manufactories, triune conditions were required: the presence of ore deposits, forests for the production of charcoal, and a small river, blocked by a dam, for year-round use of the energy of water, which set in motion bellows in blast furnaces and hammers in forging iron. Thus, in the most time-consuming processes, simple mechanisms were used. The first blast-furnace and hammer mills arose in the Tula-Kashirsky region, then in the Lipetsk region, and also in Karelia, where the first copper smelter in Russia appeared. All factories in European Russia used swamp ores, from which brittle cast iron and low-grade iron were obtained. Therefore, Russia continued to buy high-quality iron from Sweden. The famous ore of the Ural deposits began to be used only from the beginning of the next century.

Formation of a single all-Russian market and the emergence of fairs in Russia

Despite the low purchasing power of the population, due to the subsistence nature of the economy, certain successes can be traced in the development of domestic trade. They were caused by the beginning of the specialization of some areas in the production of any type of product:

• Yaroslavl and Kazan were famous for leather dressing;
• Tula - manufacture of iron and products from it,
• Novgorod and Pskov - paintings.

Wholesale trade was concentrated in the hands of the richest merchants, enlisted by the state in the privileged corporations of guests and merchants of the living room and cloth hundreds. The main privilege of the guests was the right to travel abroad for commercial transactions. Both manufacturers of goods and resellers, as well as agents of wealthy merchants, were engaged in petty trade. Everyday trade was conducted only in large cities. Fairs have become of great importance in internal exchange. The largest of them, such as Makarievskaya near Nizhny Novgorod, Irbitskaya in the Urals, Svenskaya near Bryansk and Arkhangelsk in the North, were of all-Russian significance and attracted merchants, mainly wholesalers, from all over the country. In addition to them, there were fairs of regional and city significance. They differed both in their modest size and in a less diverse assortment of goods.

More noticeable shifts can be traced in foreign trade, as can be judged by the number of ships arriving in Arkhangelsk - the only seaport that connected Russia with the countries of Western Europe: in 1600, 21 of them sailed, and at the end of the century about 70 ships arrived a year. The main article of Russian export was the “soft junk” mined in Siberia, as furs were then called. Following it were raw materials and semi-finished products: flax, hemp, resin, wood, tar, potash. Mast timber, flax and hemp were in great demand by maritime powers, who used them to equip ships. The semi-finished products made by artisans included leather, especially yuft, representing its highest grade, as well as linen. Large landowners (Morozov, Odoevsky, Romodanovsky, etc.), as well as rich monasteries, participated in the export. Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich did not consider it shameful to participate in foreign trade. The imports were mainly products of Western European manufactories (cloth, mirrors, iron, copper, etc.), as well as luxury items used by the court and the aristocracy: wines, expensive fabrics, spices, jewelry. If in the north the window to Europe was Arkhangelsk, then in the south the same role fell to the share of Astrakhan, which became a transit point in trade with Iran, India and Central Asia. Astrakhan, in addition, served as a transit point for Western European merchants who traded with Eastern countries. Throughout the 17th century on economic development Russia was influenced by two interrelated factors: backwardness gave rise to serfdom, which, in turn, aggravated the backwardness. Nevertheless, progress is noticeable, reflected in the emergence of manufactories, the revival of domestic trade, and the establishment of closer economic ties with the countries of Western Europe and the East.

Russia lagged behind the most developed countries Western Europe. Due to the lack of access to non-freezing seas, it was difficult to expand ties with these countries. The development of trade was also hampered by internal customs barriers, preserved from the times of fragmentation . IN 1653 was accepted Customs charter, which eliminated petty customs duties, and New trade charter of 1667 further limited the rights of foreign merchants: now they could sell their goods in bulk only in border towns. Further across Russia, Russian merchants were supposed to sell them. Higher taxes were imposed on imported goods. However, Russian merchants did not have the skills and energy that their foreign competitors had. As a result, we defended the economic space, but by the end of the 17th century it was turned out to be practically empty due to routinized production, the backwardness of technologies in agriculture and manufactories. Russia still had to make its economic breakthrough, which was due to the serious needs of Peter I in the costs of the great war.