Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T15:52:31.696Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

12 - The Peasantry

from Part II - The Expansion, Consolidation and Crisis of Muscovy (1462–1613)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

Maureen Perrie
Affiliation:
University of Birmingham
Get access

Summary

Peasant farming and material culture

One way to focus sharply on this topic is to compare the situation of the Russian peasant with that of the American farmer. The American farmer was a completely free man who lived in his own house with his family on an isolated farmstead/homestead that belonged to him. The stove in his log cabin vented outside through a chimney and he owned everything in his cabin. Because land was free, he could farm as much land as his physical capacity permitted. His land was comparatively rich and harvests were relatively abundant. He was able to accumulate and store wealth in many forms: grain, cattle, material possessions and cash. Typically he had no landlord and was solely responsible for his own taxes. In contrast, by the end of this period the Russian peasant was for most practical purposes enserfed (see Chapters 16 and 23) and he lived in a village and farmed land that was not his own. Although he may have believed that the land was his, in fact the state believed that the land belonged to it and could be confiscated for a monastery, other Church institution or a private landholder/owner who was in full-time state military or civil service employ. His hut was roughly the same size as the American’s log cabin, and it was built in roughly the same way: notched logs stacked on top of one another and chinked with moss and/or clay. The Russian peasant’s land, although abundant, was of poor quality and the crop yields were extraordinarily low. As will be described further below, the interior of the Russian peasant’s hut was considerably different from that of his American counterpart. Russian livestock, work implements, and crops were significantly different from the American.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2006

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alekseev, Iu. G., Agrarnaia i sotsial’naia istoriia Severo-Vostochnoi Rusi XV–XVI vv. Pereiaslavskii uezd (Moscow and Leningrad: Nauka, 1966).
Baranov, D. A., et al., Russkaia izba. Illiustrirovannaia entsiklopediia. Vnutrennee prostranstvo izby. Mebel’ i ubranstvo izby. Domashniaia i khoziaistvennaia utvar’ (St Petersburg: Iskusstvo, 1999).
Degtiarev, A. Ia., Russkaia derevnia v XV–XVII vekakh. Ocherki istorii sel’skogo rasseleniia (Leningrad: LGU, 1980).
Gol’tsberg, I. A. (ed.), Agroklimaticheskii atlas mira (Moscow and Leningrad: Gidrometeoizdat, 1972).
Gorskaia, N. A., et al., Krest’ianstvo v periody rannego i razvitogo feodalizma (Istoriia krest’ianstva SSSR s drevneishikh vremen do velikoi oktiabr’skoi sotsialisticheskoi revoliutsii, vol. II) (Moscow: Nauka, 1990).
Gorskii, A. D., Ocherki ekonomicheskogo polozheniia krest’ian Severo-Vostochnoi Rusi XIV–XV vv. (Moscow: MGU, 1960).
Gorskii, A. D., Bor’ba krest’ian za zemliu na Rusi v XV–nachale XVI veka (Moscow: MGU, 1974).
Halperin, Charles J., ‘Thoughts on the Absence of Elite Resistance in Muscovy’, Kritika 1 (2001).Google Scholar
Hellie, Richard, ‘What Happened? How Did he Get away with it? Ivan Groznyi’s Paranoia and the Problem of Institutional Restraints’, RH 14 (1987).Google Scholar
Hellie, Richard (ed. and trans.), Muscovite Society (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1967, 1970).
Hellie, Richard, ‘Muscovite Law and Society. Enserfment and Military Change in Muscovy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971).
Hellie, Richard, ‘The Stratification of Muscovite Society: The Townsmen’, RH 5 (1978).Google Scholar
Hellie, Richard, ‘The Russian Smoky Hut and its Possible Health Consequences’, RH 28 (2001).Google Scholar
Ivina, L. I., Krupnaia votchina Severo-Vostochnoi Rusi kontsa XIV–pervoi poloviny XVI v. (Leningrad: Nauka, 1979).
Karagodin, G.M., Kniga o vodke i vinodelii (Cheliabinsk: Ural LTD, 2000).
Kobylianskii, V. D. (ed.), Rozh’ (Leningrad: Agropromizdat, 1989).
Kochin, G. E., Sel’skoe khoziaistvo na Rusi v period obrazovaniia Russkogo tsentralizovannogo gosudarstva, konets XIII–nachalo XVI v. (Moscow and Leningrad: Nauka, 1965).
Kopanev, A. I., Krest’ianstvo Russkogo Severa v XVI v. (Leningrad: Nauka, 1978).
Mavrodin, V. V. (ed.), Materialy po istorii krest’ian v Rossii XI–XVII vv. (Sbornik dokumentov) (Leningrad: LGU, 1958).
McCloskey, Donald N., ‘Scattering in Open Fields’, Journal of European Economic History 9 (1980)Google Scholar
Mesiats, V. K. (ed.), Sel’sko-khoziaistvennyi entsiklopedicheskii slovar’ (Moscow: Sovetskaia entsiklopediia, 1989).
Petrov, V. P., Podsechnoe zemledelie (Kiev: Naukova Dumka, 1968).
Shapiro, A. L., Russkoe krest’ianstvo pered zakreposhcheniem (XIV–XVI vv.) (Leningrad: LGU, 1987).
Shapiro, A. L., et al., Agrarnaia istoriia severo-zapada Rossii, vtoraia polovina XV–nachalo XVI v. (Leningrad: Nauka, 1971).
Shapiro, A. L., et al., Agrarnaia istoriia severo-zapada Rossii XVI veka. Sever. Pskov. Obshchie itogi razvitiia Severo-Zapada (Leningrad: Nauka, 1978).
Shepard, J., ‘A Cone-Seal from Shestovitsy’, Byzantion 56 (1986).Google Scholar
Tulupnikov, A. I. (ed.), Atlas sel’skogo khoziaistva SSSR (Moscow: GUGK, 1960).
Ul’ianovskii, V. I., Rossiiskie samozvantsy: Lzhedmitrii I (Kiev: Libid’, 1993).
Veselovskii, S.B., Selo i derevnia v Severo-Vostochnoi Rusi XIV–XVI vv. (Moscow and Leningrad: OGIZ, 1936).
Vorms, A. E., et al. (eds.), Pamiatniki istorii krest’ian XIV–XIX vv. (Moscow: N. N. Klochkov, 1910).
Voronin, N. N., K istorii sel’skogo poseleniia feodal’noi Rusi. Pogost, svoboda, selo, derevnia (Leningrad: OGIZ, 1935).

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • The Peasantry
  • Edited by Maureen Perrie, University of Birmingham
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Russia
  • Online publication: 28 March 2008
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521812276.013
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • The Peasantry
  • Edited by Maureen Perrie, University of Birmingham
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Russia
  • Online publication: 28 March 2008
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521812276.013
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • The Peasantry
  • Edited by Maureen Perrie, University of Birmingham
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Russia
  • Online publication: 28 March 2008
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521812276.013
Available formats
×