Serfdom in Russia

The peasants were forced to return to their land holdings (the so-called attachment of peasants to the land, or "serfdom to the land"); the runaways were subjected to forced return. It included prohibition for peasants to leave their land allotments (so called attachment of peasants to land, or "serfdom" of peasants to land; runaways were subject to forced return), hereditary subordination to so called patrimonial (administrative and judicial) power of a certain feudal lord, deprivation of serfs' right to alienate land allotments and limitation of the right to acquire real estate. It is accepted to distinguish serfdom as a system of social relations from serfdom as a legal form of their expression.

Legal attachment of peasants to land existed in early Middle Ages only in South-Western Europe, in the former Roman Empire. In Western and Central. Europe peasants were by inheritance in personal or judicial and administrative dependence on lords, but, except for court men and slaves planted on land allotments, they were not legally attached to land or personally to the lord.

In the 10th-15th centuries in Western Europe some elements of the LP (prohibition to leave their land allotments, hereditary personal dependence on a lord, etc.) developed for certain categories of peasants: villains of the central part of England, remens of Catalonia, and peasantry. The C.P. as a set of legal and legal dependence on landed estates, etc., was established for certain categories of peasants: villas of central England, remens of Catalonia, French and South-Italian servs, Mid-Italian and North-Italian colonies and massaria, South-German Leibeigenen. The C.P. as a totality of legal norms was fixed in feudal (customary) law codes ("Barcelona customs", French kutyums, etc.).

In the 12-15 centuries in the course of the expansion of the rights of peasants to buy and sell land, their repayment of the main feudal obligations, the establishment of the fixed monetary rent and also the development of kinds of land holdings other than feudal, the peasants of the Western Europe were set free from serfdom.

In Central and Eastern Europe, the spread of C. p. determined the growth of landed estates, oriented on the production of marketable agricultural products, in the late 15th-17th centuries. In East (Saelb) Germany, the LP was formed after the Peasants' War of 1524-26 and was especially developed in the 1st half of the 17th century. 17 в. (it became most severe in Mecklenburg, Pomerania, and East Prussia). In Hungary, the C. Penal Code was fixed in the Edict of 1514, issued after the suppression of George György's rebellion in 1514. In Poland the C. P. is fixed in the Statute of Petrkow in 1496. The P.P. in this region was applied to the masses of peasants. It provided for a several-day (up to 6 days a week) serfdom, serfs' deprivation of the majority of proprietary and personal rights and the reduction of the peasant's allotment or the disfranchisement of some peasants. The abolition of the serfdom in Eastern and Central Europe took place in the course of the reforms. Europe took place in the course of the reforms of the late 18th and 19th centuries (in the 17th century). 18-19 centuries (in 1781-82 in Bohemia, Moravia and Krain, in 1785 in Hungary, in 1807 in Prussia, in 1808 in Bavaria, in 1820 in Mecklenburg and Hessen-Darmstadt, in 1848 in Galicia, in 1864 in Romania, etc.).

Serfdom in Russia. The initial stage in the formation of the serfdom is associated with the limitation of the right of some categories of peasants from certain estates to move to other estates. For some categories of peasants of some estates in the 15 century the right to move to other estates during the week before and after the St. George's day of autumn (26 November of Old Style) was limited. The exit period specified in the charters of the ser. The period of exit specified in the charters from the middle of the 15th century, was additionally confirmed as a nationwide rule by the Code of Laws of 1497 (see in the article of Code of Laws of the 15th-16th centuries), which also established the size of exit fee ("aged"). Legal formalization of the KP became intensive from the end of the 16th century with the introduction of the Kremlin. In the late 16th century with the introduction of Reserved Years (early 1580s when in some regions any crossing of peasants was forbidden) and "urochnye yody" (1597) which means a 5-year period during which the owner could legally return his runaway peasants. Some researchers refer to the end of the 16th century. Some researchers relegate the initial stage of serfdom formation to the late 16th century. The emancipation of serfs was a result of the State taxation and the simultaneous reduction of allotments and the number of laborers. Land serfdom was extended to the heads of the peasant households. Search and return of fugitives were in the domain of private law, the law originally did not provide for sanctions for the reception and maintenance of the fugitives (first established in 1607 - a fine in favor of the state and the "old" to the old owner of the fugitive). During the years of restoration of the economy after the Time of Troubles the 5-year term of capture was confirmed. For some clerical and later (1637) secular owners it was extended to 9 years, in 1641 it was extended to 10 years for runaways and 15 years for peasants who ran away. In the 1st half. The sale of peasants without land began in the 17th century (authorized by the decrees of 1675, 1682 and 1688). In the 17th century a peasant's average price which did not depend on the price of the land was worked out. The Sobor Legal Code of 1649 introduced an indefinite and personal ancestral attachment of all private peasants (including gentry) to the land (allotments) with the establishment of penalties for the intake of fugitives and the subsequent practice of their public search. Meanwhile the serfs still remained subjects in separate spheres of law, they entered into transactions within and outside the estates, were financially liable in court for their actions, and could act as witnesses, plaintiffs, and defendants in the patrimonial, zemstvo, and partially in the state court. Their murder or injury in a number of cases was subject to criminal prosecution, their "disgrace" was fined. From the 2nd half of the 17th century corporal punishment was introduced. In the second half of the 17th century corporal punishment was introduced for a peasant who disobeyed the will of a landowner. At the end of the 17th century the landlords were subject to corporal punishment. In the late 17th century feudal lords had the right to take peasant's children as peasants' servants.

In 1783-85 in the connection with the granting of the rights of the Russian nobility to the Ukrainian Cossack Elderry the Ukrainian peasantry that lived on their lands was also enslaved. The expansion of the serfdom to the outskirts of the Russian Empire was also carried out through the resettlement of the serfs by the landlords on the lands granted to them in the southern steppe and Volga provinces. For serfs were imposed bans or restrictions in the field of entrepreneurship: to join payoffs and contracts (1731), to start cloth factories (1734). The landlords were given a right to buy peasants as recruits and to sell their peasants to other landlords for that purpose (1747); to exile undesirable peasants (not older than 45 years) to settle in Siberia as recruits (1760; every year it sent 5-6 thousand persons; the measure was considered as a way to develop the Russian outskirts) and to do hard labor (1765), to imprison peasants (1775). It was allowed to separate parents and children when peasants were sold or exiled to Siberia (1760). Sale and purchase of serfs without land were not restricted in any way, except the prohibition to sell them 3 months before the recruitment drive (1766) (this did not apply to the elderly and minors) and at the confiscation or sale of estates at auction (1771). Soon after the prohibition for all peasants to submit petitions to the Emperor under the threat of criminal punishment (1765), the serfs were separately forbidden to submit petitions with complaints about the cruelty of their lords (1767). In 1782 the landlords were allowed to set free the sick and old peasants, i.e. to get rid of the maintenance of the disabled peasants. The landlord's decision to punish the peasants was peremptory and was enforced immediately. The law provided for the punishment of the landlord only for the death of a serf from torture. By the end of the 18th century. By the late 18th century the process of serfdom had finished: serfs were in fact a full property of landlords. They could take all the property from serfs. They could sell them and their families or leave them alone, mortgage, present or interfere in the affairs of peasant self-government.

At the same time, the state took measures against abuses of the landlord's power and allowed, under certain conditions, the possibility for peasants to sue for their release from serfdom. In the 1st quarter of the 18th century a rule was introduced to disqualify a landlord from administering an estate if he ruined the peasants by excessive levies. The landlord had to put the next of kin in charge of his estate while the latter were sent "for correction under the principles". The decrees of 1718, 1734, 1750, 1761, and 1767 obliged the landlords to feed their peasants during the time of crop failure and famine, and to prevent their impoverishment. Beginning from 1722 the landlords were responsible for correct payment of the per capita tax (the tax was collected from the peasants and paid to the treasury by the landlord or his clerk). It was forbidden to put the peasants "to the rights" for the debts of their lord. In order to stop the machinations of landlords who during the revision of their property wrote down persons who did not belong to the serfs, allegedly with their consent, the decrees of 1775, 1781 and 1783 prohibited a voluntary registration of serfs. Legislation provided for conditions that allowed peasants to withdraw from serfdom. The decrees of 1737, 1743, 1744, 1745, 1770 and 1773 declared freedmen, who came back from captivity, as well as natives, who converted to Orthodoxy. Pupils of the orphanages and those who had graduated from the Academy of Arts were not subjected to emancipation. Retired soldiers from serf peasants were granted freedom.

Due to dissemination of the Enlightenment and humanistic ideas among the Russian nobility at the turn of the 18th-19th centuries, the belief in flawed system of serfdom emerged. The first attempt of the state to regulate serfs' duties was a decree of Emperor Paul I of 5(16).4.1797 on 3-day bondage which prohibited landlords to force peasants to work on Sundays and recommended to divide the other 6 days of the week equally, specifying that for the master "with a good disposal will be enough to satisfy all the household needs for half of these days". Despite the recommendatory nature of this decree, it was respected in practice and the 4-6 days of serfdom was an exception. In the 1st half of the 19th century. In the 1st half of the 19th century the problem of the "peasant question" came to the fore. The Decree on the Free Farmers of 1803 provided for releasing serfs by mutual consent with the landlord for the land buyout (according to this decree 152 thousand male souls, or 1.5% of the serfs were bought out by 1858). As a result of the peasant reform in the Baltic provinces in 1804-19 the Livonian, Kurland and Estonian peasants gained their personal freedom (the land remained the property of the landlords). Alexander I prohibited to advertise the sale of serfs without land (1801), to sell peasants at fairs (1808), abolished the right of landlords to exile peasants to hard labor (1807) and to settle in Siberia (1809). In 1818 Alexander I gave secret instructions to 12 dignitaries to develop projects of abolition of the penal code (among the authors of the projects: A. A. Arakcheev, P. A. Vyazemsky, V. N. Karazin, P. D. Kiselev, N. S. Mordvinov, N. G. Repnin). All these projects were united by the principle of gradual emancipation of the peasants without infringement of the economic interests of the landlords. But in 1822-23, due to the change of domestic policy, Alexander I. again prohibited serfs to complain to the government about their lords' cruelty and raise release suits. He also restored the right of landlords to exile peasants to Siberia at their discretion.

The need to resolve the "peasant question" became acute during the reign of Emperor Nicholas I. Recognizing that "serfdom in its present state is an evil tangible for all," Nicholas I considered its abolition premature. The Emperor and the higher state officials feared that the emancipation of the peasants would be accompanied by national unrests and took into account the reluctance of the landlords to lose their "serfdom". Nicolas I set up 9 secret committees to discuss the "peasant question" and published nearly 100 decrees which were intended to soften the Peasant Right but did not touch its basis. From 1833 it was not permitted to sell serfs from public auction "with fragmentation of families", "to satisfy state and private debts" by paying off serfs' debts by tearing them off the land, as well as to transfer peasants into serfs' household plots by taking away their allotments. The right of landlords to exile peasants to Siberia at their discretion was limited (1828). The edict about obliged peasants (1842) was issued according to which the landlords could let their peasants go free, but the allotments were given not to the peasants as property but for the use and they were obliged to do service for the benefit of the landlord. The landlords were given the right to set at liberty their peasants by a mutual agreement with them (1844). The peasants of landowners' estates which were sold by auction for the owner's debts were allowed to be bought out (1847; in 1848-52 964 male peasants had used this right). In 1847-48 in the provinces of the Right-bank Ukraine (Volyn, Kiev and Podol) and in 1855-1861 in the Belarusian provinces (Vitebsk, Grodno, Minsk and Mogilyov) the stock rules which fixed peasant assignments and obligations were introduced. In 1857 the Emperor Alexander II started to prepare for the abolition of the serfdom. It was carried out in the course of the peasant reform in 1861.