In the second half of 17. Domestic and foreign policy of Russia in the second half of the XVII century

Content

Introduction
I. Reforms of Peter I
1.1. Economic transformation
1.2. Church reform
1.3. Changes in the field of culture, science and life
II. Reforms of Catherine II
Conclusion

Introduction
In the reign of Peter the Great, reforms were carried out in all areas of the state life of the country. Many of these transformations go back to the 17th century. The socio-economic transformations of that time served as the prerequisites for Peter's reforms, the task and content of which was the formation of the nobility and bureaucracy of absolutism.
Peter turned Russia into a truly European country (at least, as he understood it) - it is not for nothing that the expression “cut a window to Europe” has become so often used. Milestones on this path were the conquest of access to the Baltic, the construction of a new capital - St. Petersburg, active intervention in European politics.
Peter's activity created all the conditions for a wider acquaintance of Russia with the culture, lifestyle, and technologies of European civilization.
One more important feature Peter's reforms was that they affected all sectors of society, in contrast to the previous attempts of Russian rulers. The construction of the fleet, the Northern War, the creation of a new capital - all this became the business of the whole country.
The reforms of Catherine II were also aimed at creating a powerful absolute state. The policy pursued by her in the 1960s and early 1970s was called the policy of enlightened absolutism. This policy brought the moment of transition of public life to a new, more progressive formation.
The time of Catherine II was the time of the awakening of scientific, literary and philosophical interests in Russian society, the time of the birth of the Russian intelligentsia.

I. Reforms of Peter I

Economic transformation
During the Petrine era, the Russian economy, and above all industry, made a giant leap. At the same time, the development of the economy in the first quarter of the XVIII century. It followed the path outlined by the previous period. In the Muscovite state of the XVI-XVII centuries. There were large industrial enterprises - the Cannon Yard, the Printing Yard, the arms factories in Tula, the shipyard in Dedinovo, etc. Peter's policy in relation to economic life was characterized by a high degree of command and protectionist methods.
In agriculture, opportunities for improvement were drawn from the further development of fertile lands, the cultivation of industrial crops that provided raw materials for industry, the development of animal husbandry, the advancement of agriculture to the east and south, as well as the more intensive exploitation of the peasants. The increased needs of the state for raw materials for Russian industry led to the widespread use of crops such as flax and hemp. The decree of 1715 encouraged the cultivation of flax and hemp, as well as tobacco, mulberry trees for silkworms. The decree of 1712 ordered the creation of horse breeding farms in the Kazan, Azov and Kiev provinces, sheep breeding was also encouraged.
In the Petrine era, the country was sharply divided into two zones of feudal economy - the lean North, where the feudal lords transferred their peasants to quitrent, often letting them go to the city and other agricultural areas to earn money, and the fertile South, where the nobles - landowners sought to expand corvee .
The state duties of the peasants also increased. Cities were built by their forces) 40 thousand peasants worked for the construction of St. Petersburg), manufactories, bridges, roads; annual recruiting was carried out, old fees were increased and new ones were introduced. The main goal of Peter's policy all the time was to obtain the largest possible financial and human resources for state needs.
Two censuses were carried out - 1710 and 1718. According to the 1718 census, the "soul" of the male sex became the unit of taxation, regardless of age, from which the soul tax was levied in the amount of 70 kopecks per year (from state peasants 1 rub. 10 kopecks per year). This streamlined the tax policy and sharply raised state revenues.
In industry, there was a sharp reorientation from small peasant and handicraft farms to manufactories. Under Peter, at least 200 new manufactories were founded, he encouraged their creation in every possible way. State policy was also aimed at protecting the young Russian industry from Western European competition by introducing very high customs duties (Customs Charter of 1724).
The Russian manufactory, although it had capitalist features, but the use of mainly the labor of peasants - possession, ascribed, quitrent, etc. - made it a serf enterprise. Depending on whose property they were, manufactories were divided into state, merchant and landowner. In 1721, industrialists were granted the right to buy peasants to secure them to the enterprise (possession peasants).
State state-owned factories used the labor of state peasants, bonded peasants, recruits and free hired craftsmen. They mainly served heavy industry - metallurgy, shipyards, mines. The merchant manufactories, which produced mainly consumer goods, employed both sessional and quitrent peasants, as well as civilian labor. Landlord enterprises were fully provided by the forces of the serfs of the landowner.
Peter's protectionist policy led to the emergence of manufactories in various industries, often appearing in Russia for the first time. The main ones were those who worked for the army and navy: metallurgical, weapons, shipbuilding, cloth, linen, leather, etc. Entrepreneurial activity was encouraged, favorable conditions were created for people who created new manufactories or rented state ones.
There are manufactories in many industries - glass, gunpowder, paper, canvas, paint, sawmill and many others. A huge contribution to the development of the metallurgical industry of the Urals was made by Nikita Demidov, who enjoyed the special favor of the king. The emergence of the foundry industry in Karelia on the basis of the Ural ores, the construction of the Vyshevolotsky Canal, contributed to the development of metallurgy in new areas, brought Russia to one of the first places in the world in this industry. At the beginning of the XVIII century. About 150 thousand poods of cast iron were smelted in Russia, in 1725 - more than 800 thousand poods (from 1722 Russia exported cast iron), and by the end of the 18th century. - more than 2 million pounds.
By the end of the reign of Peter in Russia there was a developed diversified industry with centers in St. Petersburg, Moscow, and the Urals. The largest enterprises were the Admiralty shipyard, Arsenal, St. Petersburg powder factories, metallurgical plants of the Urals, Khamovny yard in Moscow. There was a strengthening of the all-Russian market, the accumulation of capital thanks to the mercantilist policy of the state. Russia supplied competitive goods to world markets: iron, linen, potash, furs, caviar.
Thousands of Russians were trained in Europe in various specialties, and, in turn, foreigners - weapons engineers, metallurgists, locksmiths were hired into the Russian service. Thanks to this, Russia was enriched with the most advanced technologies in Europe.
As a result of Peter's policy in the economic field, a powerful industry was created in an extremely short period of time, capable of fully meeting military and state needs and not dependent on imports in anything.

1.2. Church reform

Peter's church reform played an important role in establishing absolutism. In the second half of the XVII century. The positions of the Russian Orthodox Church were very strong; it retained administrative, financial and judicial autonomy in relation to the royal power. The last patriarchs Joachim (1675-1690) and Adrian (1690-1700) pursued a policy aimed at strengthening these positions.
Church policy of Peter, as well as his policy in other areas of public life. It was aimed primarily at the most efficient use of the church for the needs of the state, and more specifically, at squeezing money out of the church for state programs, primarily for the construction of the fleet. After Peter's journey as part of the great embassy, he is also occupied with the problem of the complete subordination of the church to his authority.
The turn to the new policy took place after the death of Patriarch Hadrian. Peter orders to conduct an audit for the census of the property of the Patriarchal House. Taking advantage of the information about the revealed abuses, Peter cancels the election of a new patriarch, at the same time entrusting Metropolitan Stefan Yavorsky of Ryazan with the post of "locum tenens of the patriarchal throne." In 1701, the Monastery Order was formed - a secular institution for managing the affairs of the church. The church begins to lose its independence from the state, the right to dispose of its property.
Peter, guided by the enlightening idea of the public good, which requires the productive work of all members of society, launches an offensive against monks and monasteries. In 1701, the royal decree limited the number of monks: for permission to be tonsured, now you need to apply to the Monastic order. Subsequently, the king had the idea to use the monasteries as shelters for retired soldiers and beggars. In the decree of 1724, the number of monks in the monastery is directly dependent on the number of people they look after.
The existing relationship between the church and the authorities required a new legal formalization. In 1721, Feofan Prokopovich, a prominent figure in the Petrine era, drew up the Spiritual Regulations, which provided for the destruction of the institution of the patriarchate and the formation of a new body - the Spiritual College, which was soon renamed the "Holy Government Synod", officially equalized in rights with the Senate. Stefan Yavorsky became president, Feodosy Yanovsky and Feofan Prokopovich became vice presidents.
The creation of the Synod was the beginning of the absolutist period of Russian history, since now all power, including church power, was concentrated in the hands of Peter. A contemporary reports that when Russian church leaders tried to protest, Peter pointed them to the Spiritual Regulations and said: “Here is the spiritual patriarch for you, and if you don’t like him, then here you are (throwing a dagger on the table) a damask patriarch.”
The adoption of the Spiritual Regulations actually turned the Russian clergy into state officials, especially since a secular person, the chief prosecutor, was appointed to supervise the Synod.
The reform of the church was carried out in parallel with the tax reform. Records and classification of priests were carried out, and their lower layers were transferred to the capitation salary. According to the consolidated statements of the Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod and Astrakhan provinces (formed as a result of the division of the Kazan province), only 3044 priests out of 8709 (35%) were exempt from tax. A stormy reaction among the priests was caused by the Decree of the Synod of May 17, 1722, in which the clergy were charged with the obligation to violate the secrecy of confession if they had the opportunity to communicate any information important to the state.
As a result of the church reform, the church lost a huge part of its influence and turned into a part of the state apparatus, strictly controlled and managed by secular authorities.

1.3. Changes in the field of culture, science and life.
The process of Europeanization of Russia in the era of Peter the Great is the most controversial part of the Petrine reforms. Even before Perth, the prerequisites for broad Europeanization were created, ties with foreign countries were noticeably strengthened, Western European cultural traditions gradually penetrate into Russia, even barbering goes back to the pre-Petrine era. In 1687, the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy was opened - the first institution of higher education in Russia. Yet Peter's work was revolutionary. V.Ya. Ulanov wrote: “What was new in the formulation of the cultural issue under Peter the Great was that now culture was called upon as a creative force not only in the field of special technology, but also in its broad cultural and everyday manifestations, and not only in application to the chosen society ... but also in relation to the broad masses of the people.
The most important stage in the implementation of the reforms was the visit of Peter as part of the Great Embassy of a number of European countries. Upon his return, Peter sent many young nobles to Europe to study various specialties, mainly to master the marine sciences. The tsar also took care of the development of education in Russia. In 1701, in Moscow, in the Sukharev Tower, the School of Mathematical and Navigational Sciences was opened, headed by a professor at the University of Aberdeen, a Scot Forvarson. One of the teachers of this school was Leonty Magnitsky, the author of "Arithmetic ...". In 1711, an engineering school appeared in Moscow.
Peter sought to overcome as soon as possible the disunity between Russia and Europe that had arisen since the time of the Tatar-Mongol yoke. One of its appearances was a different chronology, and in 1700 Peter transferred Russia to a new calendar - the year 7208 becomes 1700, and the celebration of the New Year is postponed from September 1 to January 1.
In 1703, the first issue of the Vedomosti newspaper, the first Russian newspaper, was published in Moscow; in 1702, the Kunsht troupe was invited to Moscow to create a theater.
There were important changes in the life of the nobles, which remade the Russian nobility “in the image and likeness” of the European one. In 1717, the book “An Honest Mirror of Youth” was published - a kind of textbook of etiquette, and from 1718 there were Assemblies - noble assemblies modeled on European ones.
However, we must not forget that all these transformations came exclusively from above, and therefore were quite painful for both the upper and lower strata of society.
Peter aspired to make Russia a European country in every sense of the word and attached great importance to even the smallest details of the process.

II. Reforms of Catherine II

As a result of the latter in the XVIII century. The palace coup, carried out on June 28, 1762, the wife of Perth III, who became Empress Catherine II (1762-1796), was elevated to the Russian throne.
Catherine II began her reign with the confirmation of the Manifesto on the Liberty of the Nobility and generous gifts to the participants in the coup. Having proclaimed herself the successor of the cause of Peter I, Catherine directed all her efforts to create a powerful absolute state.
In 1763, the Senate reform was carried out in order to streamline the work of the Senate, which had long turned into a bureaucratic institution. The Senate was divided into six departments with clearly defined functions for each of them. In 1763-1764. the secularization of church lands was carried out, which was associated with a reduction (from 881 to 385) in the number of monasteries. Thus, the economic viability of the church was undermined, which from now on became completely dependent on the state. The process of turning the church into a part of the state apparatus begun by Peter I was completed.
The economic base of the state has been significantly strengthened. In 1764, the hetmanship in Ukraine was liquidated, management passed to the new Little Russian Collegium, located in Kiev and headed by Governor-General P.A. Rumyantsev. This was accompanied by the transfer of the mass of ordinary Cossacks to the position of peasants, serfdom began to spread to Ukraine.
Catherine received the throne illegally and only thanks to the support of noble officers, she sought support in the nobility, realizing the fragility of her position. A whole series of decrees expanded and strengthened the class rights and privileges of the nobility. The Manifesto of 1765 on the implementation of the General Land Survey for the nobility was assigned a monopoly right to own land, it also provided for the sale to the nobles of 5 kopecks. for a tithe of lands and wastelands.
The nobility was assigned super-preferential conditions for promotion to officer ranks, and funds for the upkeep of estates of the nobility increased significantly. educational institutions. At the same time, the decrees of the 60s consolidated the omnipotence of the landowners and the complete lack of rights of the peasants. According to the Decree of 1767, any, even just, complaint of the peasants against the landowners was declared the gravest state crime.
So the landowner's power under Catherine II acquired wider legal boundaries.
Unlike her predecessors, Catherine II was a major and intelligent politician, a clever politician. Being well educated, familiar with the works of the French enlighteners, she understood that it was no longer possible to rule by the old methods. The policy pursued by her in the 60s - early 70s. called the policy of enlightened absolutism. The socio-economic basis of the policy of enlightened absolutism was the development of a new capitalist order that destroyed the old feudal relations.
The policy of enlightened absolutism was a natural stage of state development and, despite the half-heartedness of the reforms carried out, brought the moment of transition of social life closer to a new, more progressive formation.
Within two years, Catherine II drafted a program of new legislation in the form of a mandate for the convened commission to draw up a new Code, since the Code of 1649 was outdated. The "mandate" of Catherine II was the result of her previous reflections on enlightenment literature and a peculiar perception of the ideas of the French and German enlighteners. The “mandate” concerned all the main parts of the state structure, administration, supreme power, the rights and obligations of citizens, estates, and to a greater extent legislation and the court. In Nakaz, the principle of autocratic rule was substantiated: “The Sovereign is autocratic; for no other, as soon as the power united in his person, can act similarly to the space of such a great state ... ”A guarantee against despotism, according to Catherine, was the assertion of the principle of strict legality, as well as the separation of the judiciary from the executive and the continuous transformation associated with it legal proceedings, liquidating obsolete feudal institutions.
The program of economic policy inevitably brought to the fore the peasant question, which was of great importance under the conditions of serfdom. The nobility showed itself as a reactionary force (with the exception of individual deputies), ready to defend the feudal order by any means. Merchants and Cossacks thought about acquiring privileges to own serfs, and not about softening serfdom.
In the 1960s, a number of decrees were issued that dealt a blow to the prevailing system of monopolies. By decree of 1762, calico factories and sugar factories were allowed to open freely. In 1767, the freedom of urban crafts was declared, which was of great importance. Thus, the laws of the 60-70s. created favorable conditions for the growth of peasant industry and its development into capitalist production.
The time of Catherine II was the time of the awakening of scientific, literary and philosophical interests in Russian society, the time of the birth of the Russian intelligentsia. And although it covered only a small part of the population, it was an important step forward. In the reign of Catherine, the first Russian charitable institutions also appeared. Catherine's time is the heyday of Russian culture, this is the time of A.P. Sumarokova, D.I. Fonvizina, G.I. Derzhavin, N.I. Novikova, A.N. Radishcheva, D.G. Levitsky, F.S. Rokotova, etc.
In November 1796, Catherine passed away. Her son Pavel (1796-1801) reigned on the throne. Under Paul I, a course was established to strengthen absolutism, maximize the centralization of the state apparatus, and strengthen the personal power of the monarch.

Conclusion
The main result of the set of Peter's reforms was the establishment of absolutism in Russia, the crown of which was the change in 1721 of the title of the Russian monarch - Perth declared himself emperor, and the country began to be called the Russian Empire. Thus, what Peter was going for all the years of his reign was formalized - the creation of a state with a coherent system of government, a strong army and navy, a powerful economy that had an impact on international politics. As a result of Peter's reforms, the state was not bound by anything and could use any means to achieve its goals. As a result, Peter came to his ideal state structure - a warship, where everything and everyone is subject to the will of one person - the captain, and managed to bring this ship out of the swamp into the stormy waters of the ocean, bypassing all the reefs and shoals.
The role of Peter the Great in the history of Russia can hardly be overestimated. No matter how one relates to the methods and style of carrying out transformations, one cannot but admit that Peter the Great is one of the most famous figures in world history.
All the reforms of Catherine II were also aimed at creating a powerful absolutist state. The policy pursued by her was called "the policy of enlightened absolutism."
On the one hand, Catherine proclaimed the progressive truths of enlightenment philosophy (especially in the chapters on legal proceedings and economics), on the other hand, she confirmed the inviolability of the autocratic-serf system. While strengthening absolutism, it preserved autocracy, introducing only adjustments (greater freedom of economic life, some foundations of the bourgeois legal order, the idea of the need for enlightenment), which contributed to the development of the capitalist way of life.
The undoubted merit of Catherine was the introduction of widespread public education.

Bibliography.
1. Soloviev S.M. On the history of the new Russia. - M.: Enlightenment, 1993
2. Anisimov E.V. Time of Peter's reforms. - L .: Lenizdat, 1989
3. Anisimov E.V., Kamensky A.B. Russia in the 18th - the first half of the 19th century: History. Document. - M.: MIROS, 1994
4. Pavlenko N.I. Peter the Great. - M.: Thought, 1990

I. Introduction. Socio-economic conditions prevailing in Russia by the middle of the 17th century

II. The economic situation in Russia in the second half of the XVII century

III. The social structure of Russia in the second half of the XVII century

IV. Conclusion. Russia on the threshold of the 18th century

Introduction. Socio-economic conditions prevailing in Russia by the middle of the 17th century

Russia at the beginning of the 17th century - centralized feudal state. Agriculture remained the basis of the economy, in which the vast majority of the population was employed. By the end of the 16th century, there was a significant expansion of sown areas associated with the colonization of the southern regions of the country by Russian people. The dominant form of landownership was feudal landownership. Feudal ownership of land was strengthened and expanded, and the peasants were further enslaved.

In the leading branches of production, more or less large enterprises, mostly state-owned, began to occupy a prominent place: the Cannon Yard, the Armory, the City Order and the Order of Stone Affairs with its brick factories, etc. The creation and development of large enterprises contributed to the growth of the division of labor and the improvement of technology. A characteristic feature of the development of urban crafts was the emergence of new, narrower specialties.

The commercial and industrial population of Russia increased. Foreign specialists and merchants flocked to Moscow, which led to the emergence in Moscow of the German settlement, trading yards - English, Pansky, Armenian. This testifies to the ever-increasing role of trade in the Russian economy of that time.

The growth of handicrafts and trade was the first sign of the emergence of capitalist relations in Russia, but at that time there were no conditions that could radically change the existing economic structure in the country, while the economies of Western European countries were rapidly developing towards the establishment of capitalism. There was no single national market in Russia; commodity-money relations were based on the sale of the surplus product of the feudal natural economy. Market relations were based on the division of labor associated with differences in natural geographical conditions.

The beginning of the 17th century in the history of Russia was marked by major 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. Nevertheless, the Russian people quickly coped with the disasters, and by the middle of the 17th century, life began to return to its former course.

The economic situation in Russia in the second half of the XVII century

1. General characteristics

Having recovered from the war and intervention at the beginning of the century, the country entered a new stage of socio-economic development. The 17th century was a time of significant growth in the productive forces in industry and agriculture. Despite the dominance of natural economy, the successes of the social division of labor led not only to the flourishing of small-scale production, but also to the emergence of the first Russian manufactories. The industrial enterprises of the merchants and the agricultural holdings of the large patrimonials and petty servants were throwing an increasing amount of surplus product onto the market. At the same time, not only domestic, but also foreign trade grew. The formation of the all-Russian national market was a qualitatively new phenomenon, which prepared the conditions for the emergence of capitalist production and, in turn, experienced its reverse powerful influence.

In the 17th century, there were signs of the beginning of the process of primitive accumulation - the emergence of merchants, owners of big capital, who amassed wealth through non-equivalent exchange (traders in salt, precious Siberian furs, Novgorod and Pskov flax).

However, under the conditions of the serf Russian state, the processes of monetary accumulation proceeded in a peculiar and slow manner, sharply differing from the rates and forms of initial accumulation in Western European countries. The Russian state of the 17th century did not have favorable conditions for its economic development: its trade and industry did not reach a level that could ensure the gradual elimination of the peasant's personal dependence; remote from the western and southern seas, it could not establish independent, active maritime trade; fur wealth of Siberia could not compete with the inexhaustible values of the American and South Asian colonies. Drawn into the whirlpool of world trade at the very beginning of the capitalist era, in the 17th century Russia acquired the importance of a raw material market, a supplier of agricultural products to economically more developed countries. Another condition slowed down the process of primitive capital accumulation. Huge land reserves, relatively easily accessible to settlers, contributed to the gradual thinning of the population in the historical center, mitigating the sharpness of class contradictions as a result, and at the same time spreading feudal relations to new, unoccupied territories.

The inhibition of the process of primitive accumulation led to important consequences for the entire subsequent economic development of the country. In Russia, the growth of commodity production for a long time outpaced the expansion of the labor market. Manufacturers sought to make up for the lack of civilian workers by recruiting serfs to work at their enterprises. Russia found itself in the position of a country that was drawn into world capitalist circulation and began to join capitalist production without having had time to get rid of inefficient corvée labor. The result of this dual situation was not only the intertwining of old and new production relations, but, up to a certain point, the simultaneous development of both. Feudal ownership of land continued to expand and consolidate, serving as the basis for the development and legalization of serfdom.

2. Agriculture

In the second half of the 17th century, grain farming remained the leading branch of the Russian economy. Progress in this sphere of material production at that time was associated with the widespread use of three-field cultivation and the use of natural fertilizers. Bread gradually became the main commercial product of agriculture.

By the middle of the century, the Russian people with hard work overcame the devastation caused by foreign invasions. The peasants repopulated the abandoned villages, plowed the wastelands, acquired livestock and agricultural implements.

As a result of Russian peasant colonization, new areas were developed: in the south of the country, in the Volga region, Bashkiria, and Siberia. In all these places, new centers of agricultural culture arose.

But the overall level of agricultural development was low. In agriculture, such primitive tools as plows and harrows continued to be used. In the forest regions of the North, the undercut still existed, and in the steppe zone of the South and the Middle Volga region, there was a fallow.

The basis for the development of animal husbandry was the peasant economy. Cattle breeding especially developed in Pomorye, in the Yaroslavl region, in the southern counties.

Noble land ownership grew rapidly as a result of numerous government grants of estates and estates to nobles. By the end of the 17th century, patrimonial noble land ownership began to exceed the previously dominant land ownership.

The center of an estate or patrimony was a village or village. Usually in the village there were about 15-30 peasant households. But there were villages with two or three courtyards. The village differed from the village not only large sizes, but also the presence of a church with a bell tower. It was the center for all the villages included in his church parish.

Subsistence farming predominated in agricultural production. Small-scale production in agriculture was combined with domestic peasant industry and small-scale urban handicrafts.

In the 17th century, trade in agricultural products increased markedly, which was associated with the development of fertile lands in the south and east, the emergence of a number of fishing areas that did not produce their own bread, and the growth of cities.

A new and very important phenomenon in agriculture of the XVII century. There was his connection with industrial entrepreneurship. Many peasants in their free time from field work, mainly in autumn and winter, were engaged in handicrafts: they made linens, shoes, clothes, dishes, agricultural implements, etc. Some of these products were used in the peasant economy itself or given as quitrent to the landowner, the other was sold at the nearest market.

The feudal lords increasingly established contact with the market, where they sold the products and handicrafts received by dues. Not satisfied with the dues, they expanded their own plowing and established own production products.

Preserving mostly natural character, Agriculture feudal lords were already largely connected with the market. The production of foodstuffs for the supply of cities and a number of industrial regions that did not produce bread grew. The southern districts of the state turned into grain-producing regions, from where bread came to the region of the Don Cossacks and to the central regions (especially to Moscow). The counties of the Volga region also gave an excess of bread.

The main way for the development of agriculture of that time was extensive: landowners included an increasing number of new territories in the economic circulation.

3. Industry

Unlike agriculture, industrial production has advanced more noticeably. The most widespread domestic industry; throughout the country, peasants produced canvases and homespun cloth, ropes and ropes, felted and leather shoes, various clothes and utensils, and much more. Through buyers, these products entered the market. Gradually, peasant industry outgrows the domestic framework, turns into a small commodity production.

Among the artisans, the most numerous group was made up of draft workers - artisans of urban settlements and black-moss volosts. They carried out private orders or worked for the market. Palace artisans served the needs of the royal court; state-owned and written ones worked on orders from the treasury (construction work, procurement of materials, etc.); privately owned - from peasants, beavers and serfs - produced everything necessary for landowners and estate owners. The handicraft on a rather large scale developed, primarily among the taxpayers, into commodity production.

Metalworking, which has long existed in the country, was based on the extraction of swamp ores. The centers of metallurgy were formed in the counties south of Moscow: Serpukhov, Kashirsky, Tula, Dedilovsky, Aleksinsky. Another center is the districts to the north-west of Moscow: Ustyuzhna Zheleznopolskaya, Tikhvin, Zaonezhye.

Moscow was a major center of metalworking - back in the early 1940s, there were more than one and a half hundred forges here. The best gold and silver craftsmen in Russia worked in the capital. The centers of silver production were also Ustyug the Great, Nizhny Novgorod, Veliky Novgorod, Tikhvin and others. Copper and other non-ferrous metals were processed in Moscow, Pomorie (the manufacture of cauldrons, bells of dishes with painted enamel, chasing, etc.).

Metalworking is to a large extent converted into commodity production, and not only in the towns, but also in the countryside.

Blacksmithing reveals tendencies towards the enlargement of production, the use of hired labor. This is especially true for Tula, Ustyuzhna, Tikhvin, Veliky Ustyug.

The largest center of the leather industry was Yaroslavl, where raw materials for dressing were supplied from many districts of the country. leather goods. A large number of small "factories" - craft workshops - worked here. The leather was processed by craftsmen from Kaluga and Nizhny Novgorod. Yaroslavl tanners used hired labor; some “factories developed into manufactory-type enterprises with a significant division of labor.

With all its development, handicraft production could no longer satisfy the demand for industrial products. This leads to the emergence in the 17th century of manufactories - enterprises based on the division of labor between workers. If in Western Europe In the early 1900s, manufactories were capitalist enterprises, serviced by the labor of hired workers, then in Russia, under the dominance of the feudal serf system, the emerging manufacturing production was largely based on serf labor. Most of the manufactories belonged to the treasury, the royal court and large boyars.

Palace manufactories were created to produce fabrics for the royal court. One of the first palace linen manufactories was the Khamovny yard, located in the palace settlements near Moscow. State manufactories, which arose as early as the 15th century, were usually founded for the production of various types of weapons. The state-owned manufactories were the Cannon Yard, the Armory, the Money Yard, the Jewelery Yard and other enterprises. The population of Moscow state and palace settlements worked at state and palace manufactories. Workers, although they received a salary, were feudally dependent people, did not have the right to quit their jobs.

The patrimonial manufactories had the most pronounced serf character. Iron-making, potash, leather, linen and other manufactories were created in the estates of the boyars Morozov, Miloslavsky, Stroganov and others. Here, almost exclusively forced labor of serfs was used.

Wage labor was used in merchant manufactories. In 1666, the Novgorod merchant Semyon Gavrilov, having started the creation of an iron-working manufactory, laid the foundation for the Olonets factories. In Ustyuzhna, Tula, Tikhvin, Ustyug the Great, some wealthy merchants began to establish metalworking enterprises. In the 90s of the 17th century, the wealthy Tula blacksmith-artisan Nikita Antufiev opened an iron-smelting plant. Some manufactories and crafts were founded by wealthy peasants, for example, the Volga salt mines, leather, ceramic and textile manufactories. In addition to merchant manufactories, hired labor is also used in brick production, in construction, in the fishing and salt industries. Among the workers there were many quitrent peasants who, although personally not free people, sold their labor power to the owners of the means of production.

4. Trading

In the North, in need of imported bread, there are grain markets, the main of which was Vologda. Novgorod remained a trading center in the northwestern part of the state - a large market for the sale of linen and hemp products. Important markets for livestock products were Kazan, Vologda, Yaroslavl, markets for furs - some cities in the northern part of Russia: Solvychegodsk, Irbit, etc. Tula, Tikhvin and other cities became the largest producers of metal products.

The main trading center throughout Russia was still Moscow, where trade routes converged from all over the country and from abroad. Silks, furs, metal and woolen products, wines, lard, bread and other domestic and foreign goods were sold in 120 specialized rows of the Moscow market. Fairs acquired all-Russian significance - Makarievskaya, Arkhangelsk, Irbitskaya. The Volga connected many Russian cities with economic ties.

The dominant position in trade was occupied by townspeople, primarily guests and members of the living room and cloth shop. Large merchants came out of wealthy artisans, peasants. They traded various goods and in many places; trade specialization was poorly developed, capital circulated slowly, free funds and credit were absent, usury had not yet become a professional occupation. The scattered nature of trade required many agents and intermediaries. Only towards the end of the century does specialized trade appear.

In Russia, the demand for industrial products increased, and the development of agriculture and handicrafts made it possible for stable exports.

In imports from Western European countries to Russia, an important place was occupied by silk fabrics, weapons, metals, cloth, and luxury goods. Furs, leather, hemp, wax, and bread were exported from Russia.

Trade with the countries of the East was lively. It was conducted mainly through Astrakhan. Silks, various fabrics, spices, luxury items were imported, furs, leather, handicrafts were exported. Russian merchants, less economically strong than merchant capital Western countries, suffered losses due to Western competition, especially if the government granted European merchants the right to duty-free trade. Therefore, in 1667, the government adopted the Novotragovy Charter, according to which retail trade by foreigners in Russian cities was prohibited, duty-free wholesale trade was allowed only in border cities, and in inner Russia foreign goods were subject to very high duties, often in the amount of 100% of the cost. The Novotragovy charter was the first manifestation of the protectionist policy of the Russian government.

5. Public finances

With the formation of the Russian centralized state, a single monetary system was created (reform of 1535). Since that time, the minting of a new national coin began - Novgorod, or kopeck, and Moskovka-Novgorod. The structure of the Russian monetary system became decimal. The minting of coins was one of the items of state income. The vast majority of state revenues were numerous taxes - direct and indirect, which steadily increased. From the middle of the XVI to the middle of the XVII century. Tax rates have doubled.

In the 17th century, the system of direct taxes was changed. Land taxation was replaced by household taxation. The proportion of indirect taxes - customs and taverns - has increased. So, in 1679-1680. Indirect fees provided 53.3% of all state revenues, and direct fees - 44%.

The most important expenditure item in the budget (over 60%) was military spending.

The social structure of Russia in the second half of the XVII century

1. Estates

Among all classes and estates, the dominant place undoubtedly belonged to the feudal lords. For their benefit government carried out measures to strengthen the ownership of the boyars and nobles on land and peasants, to rally the strata of the feudal class. Service people took shape in the 17th century in a complex and clear hierarchy of officials who were obliged to the state to serve in the military, civil, court departments in exchange for the right to own land and peasants. They were divided into duma ranks (boyars, roundabouts, duma nobles and duma clerks), Moscow (stewards, solicitors, Moscow nobles and residents) and city (elected nobles, nobles and children of boyars yards, nobles and children of boyars city). By merit, service and nobility of origin, the feudal lords passed from one rank to another. The nobility turned into a closed class - an estate.

Large land holdings with peasants belonged to spiritual feudal lords. In the 17th century, the authorities continued the course of their predecessors to limit church land ownership. The Code of 1649, for example, prohibited the clergy from acquiring new lands. The privileges of the church in matters of court and administration were limited.

Unlike the feudal lords, especially the nobility, the situation of peasants and serfs in the 17th century deteriorated significantly. Of the privately owned peasants, the palace peasants lived better, the worst of all - the peasants of the secular feudal lords, especially the small ones. The peasants worked for the benefit of the feudal lords in the corvée (“product”), made natural and cash quitrents. The usual size of the "product" is from two to four days a week, depending on the size of the lord's economy, the solvency of the serfs, and the amount of land they have. "Table supplies" - bread and meat, vegetables and fruits, hay and firewood, mushrooms and berries - were taken to the owners' yards by the same peasants. Nobles and boyars took carpenters and masons, brickmakers and other masters from their villages and villages. Peasants worked at the first factories and factories that belonged to feudal lords or the treasury, made cloth and canvas at home, and so on. Serfs, in addition to work and payments in favor of the feudal lords, carried duties in favor of the treasury. In general, their taxation, duties were heavier than those of the palace and black-mowed. The situation of the peasants dependent on the feudal lords was aggravated by the fact that the trial and reprisals of the boyars and their clerks were accompanied by overt violence, bullying, and humiliation of human dignity. After 1649, the search for fugitive peasants assumed wide dimensions. Thousands of them were seized and returned to their owners.

In order to live, the peasants went to waste, to "farm laborers", to work. The impoverished peasants passed into the category of beans.

Feudal lords, especially large ones, had many slaves, sometimes several hundred people. These are clerks and servants for parcels, grooms and tailors, watchmen and shoemakers, falconers, etc. By the end of the century, serfdom merged with the peasantry.

Life was better for the state, or black-mowed, peasants. They depended on the feudal state: taxes were paid in its favor, they carried various duties.

Despite the modest share of merchants and artisans in the total population of Russia, they played a very significant role in its economic life. Leading craft center industrial production, trading operations - Moscow. Here, in the 1940s, metalworkers (in 128 forges), fur craftsmen (about 100 craftsmen), various food (about 600 people), leather and leather products, clothes and hats, and much more - everything that a large populous city.

To a lesser, but quite noticeable degree, the craft developed in other cities of Russia. A significant part of the artisans worked for the state, the treasury. Part of the artisans served the needs of the palace (palace) and the feudal lords living in Moscow and other cities (patrimonial artisans). The rest were part of the township communities of cities, carried various duties and paid taxes, the totality of which was called tax. Craftsmen from township tax workers often switched from working on the order of the consumer to working for the market, and the craft, thus, developed into commodity production. Simple capitalist cooperation also appeared, hired labor was used. Poor townspeople and peasants went as mercenaries to the wealthy blacksmiths, boilermakers, bakers and others. The same thing happened in transport, river and horse-drawn.

The development of handicraft production, its professional, territorial specialization, revitalizes the economic life of cities, trade relations between them and their districts. It is to the XVII century. the beginning of the concentration of local markets, the formation of the all-Russian market on their basis. Guests and other wealthy merchants appeared with their goods in all parts of the country and abroad. During the Time of Troubles and after it, they more than once lent money to the authorities.

Wealthy merchants, artisans, industrialists ran everything in the township communities. They shifted the main burden of dues and duties to the poor peasants - small artisans and merchants.

In cities, peasants, serfs, and artisans have long lived in the yards and settlements that belonged to the boyars. They were engaged, in addition to serving the owners, and trade. Moreover, unlike the townspeople, they did not pay taxes and did not carry duties in favor of the state. This freed the people who belonged to the boyars and monasteries, in this case, artisans and merchants, from the tax.

2. Popular uprisings

From the middle of the 17th century, Russia was shaken by powerful uprisings that took place in response to government measures to increase exploitation and further enslavement of the peasants - the growth of noble land ownership, the introduction of new fees and duties.

In 1648, a movement broke out in Moscow, which was called the “salt riot”. Beginning on June 1, the uprising continued for several days. The people smashed the courts of the Moscow boyars and nobles, clerks and wealthy merchants, demanding to extradite the hated officials Pleshcheev, who was in charge of the administration of the capital and the head of the government, boyar Morozov. To stabilize the situation, the authorities convened the Zemsky Sobor, which decided to prepare a new "Codex". Unrest in the capital did not stop until the end of the year. A powerful, albeit short-lived, uprising broke out in Moscow - the "copper riot" on July 25, 1662. Its participants - the capital's townspeople and part of the archers, soldiers, reiter of the Moscow garrison - presented their demands to Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich: tax cuts, which had greatly increased due to wars with Poland and Sweden, the abolition of copper money, issued in huge quantities and equated to silver. In addition, a lot of counterfeit money appeared on the market. All this led to a strong depreciation of the copper coin, high cost, hunger. This uprising was brutally suppressed by the authorities. At the beginning of 1663, copper money was abolished, frankly motivating this measure with the desire to prevent new bloodshed.

In 1667 On the Don, an uprising of Cossacks led by Stepan Razin broke out.

The bulk of the Cossacks, especially the fugitives, lived poorly, meagerly. The Cossacks were not engaged in agriculture. The salary received from Moscow was not enough. By the mid-1960s, the situation on the Don had deteriorated to the extreme. A large number of fugitives have accumulated here. Hunger has begun. The Cossacks sent an embassy to Moscow with a request to accept them into the royal service, but they were refused. By 1667, the Cossack uprisings had turned into a well-organized movement under the leadership of Razin. A large army of rebels was defeated in 1670 near Simbirsk. At the beginning of 1671, the main centers of the movement were suppressed by the punitive detachments of the authorities.

Conclusion. Russia on the threshold of the 18th century

During the 17th century, great changes took place in the history of Russia. They touched every aspect of her life. By this time, the territory of the Russian state had noticeably expanded, and the population was growing.

The 17th century was marked in the history of Russia by the further development of the feudal-serf system, the significant strengthening of feudal land ownership. The new feudal nobility concentrated vast patrimonial wealth in their hands.

ruling class in the seventeenth century. There were feudal landowners, secular and ecclesiastical landowners and estate owners. This class in this period began to acquire class isolation. Another class of feudal society included the peasantry, which by this time was gradually beginning to get rid of its former division into numerous categories. The Cathedral Code of 1649, which formalized the system of serfdom and completed the development of serf legislation, assigned privately owned peasants to landowners, boyars, monasteries, and increased local dependence of peasants on feudal lords and on the state. According to the same Council Code, the heredity of serfdom and the right of the landowner to dispose of the property of a serf were established. Granting extensive serf rights to landowners, the tsarist government at the same time made them responsible for the performance of state duties by their peasants.

Under these conditions, the development of trade is of particular importance. Several large shopping centers were formed in Russia, among which Moscow stood out with its huge trade, with more than 120 specialized rows. Merchants were the leaders and masters of this process.

The growth of commodity production in the 17th century led to a sharp growth of cities. Suffice it to say that during this period there were more than 225 cities in Russia. The urban population increased sharply.

Meanwhile, in the same years, uprisings broke out in the country every now and then, in particular, the rather powerful Moscow uprising of 1662. The largest uprising was the uprising of Stepan Razin, who in 1667 led the peasants to the Volga.

After the peasant war in Russia, a number of important state measures were carried out, including the transition to a system of household taxation, transformations in the army, etc.

By the beginning of the XVIII century. Economically, Russia continued to lag behind the main Western European countries. It produced less industrial output than England, the Netherlands, and France. Manufactories in Russia were just emerging, among them capitalist enterprises constituted an insignificant minority. The economic situation in Russia was negatively affected by the fact that the country actually did not have free access to the sea. The Baltic was completely dominated by Sweden. The route to Western Europe through the White Sea was long and could only be used during the summer months.

During the period of colonial conquests in the world, Russia's economic backwardness from the West, which caused her military weakness, threatened her with the loss of national independence. To eliminate this threat and overcome economic, military and cultural backwardness, it was necessary to urgently implement a number of economic reforms: to further strengthen state power, to Europeanize state administration, create a regular army and navy, build a merchant fleet, achieve access to the sea, quickly move manufacturing production forward at a rapid pace, draw the country into the system of the world market, subordinate the entire tax and monetary system to these tasks.

The economic prerequisites for the reforms of the early 18th century were created by the entire course of Russia's development in the 17th century. - the growth of production and the expansion of the range of agricultural products, the success of crafts and the emergence of manufactories, the development of trade and the growth of the economic role of the merchants.

Bibliography

1. Bushchik L.P. Illustrated history of the USSR. XV-XVII centuries Handbook for teachers and students ped. in-comrade. M., "Enlightenment", 1970.

2. Danilova L. V. Historical conditions for the development of the Russian nationality during the formation and strengthening of the centralized state in Russia // Questions of the formation of the Russian nationality and nation. Digest of articles. M.-L., USSR Academy of Sciences, 1958.

3. Druzhinin N. M. Socio-economic conditions for the formation of the Russian bourgeois nation // Questions of the formation of the Russian nationality and nation. Digest of articles. M.-L., USSR Academy of Sciences, 1958.

4. History of Russia from ancient times to the end of the 17th century / A. P. Novoseltsev, A. N. Sakharov, V. I. Buganov, V. D. Nazarov, - M .: AST Publishing House, 1996.

5. Munchaev Sh. M., Ustinov V. M. History of Russia. Textbook for universities. M., Publishing house Infra M-Norma, 1997.

6. Chuntulov V. T. et al. Economic history of the USSR: Uchebn. for economy universities. -M.,: Higher. school, 1987.

In the second half of the XVIII century. the feudal-serf system in Russia began to be undermined by the growth of capitalist relations. The penetration of commodity production into agriculture accelerated the property stratification of the peasantry, especially in quitrent districts. Hundreds of thousands of ruined peasants broke ties with the land and looked for work in non-agricultural trades. This created a labor market for large-scale industry and other conditions for the development of capitalist manufacture.

A striking indicator of the beginning decomposition of the feudal system was the desire of part of the landowners to introduce agricultural improvements, as well as to engage in commercial and industrial activities. This indicated that the traditional methods of organizing the economy and exploiting labor required significant changes.

1. Agriculture

Agriculture in this period, as before, remained the basis of the country's economy, and rural residents dominated the population (by the end of the century, about 4% lived in cities).

The development of agricultural production was mainly of an extensive nature and was achieved due to the following factors:

1. Population growth, which was ensured both by the annexation of new territories and by population growth in the central regions of Russia. If in 1721 15.5 million people lived in the Russian Empire, then in 1747 - 18 million people, and in 1796 - 36 million people.

2. Development of new territories. After the annexation of Novorossia (Northern Black Sea and Azov), Crimea, some regions of the North Caucasus, Ukrainian, Belarusian and Lithuanian lands that belonged to Poland, the country's territory increased significantly. At the same time, the growth occurred, first of all, due to the fertile black earth lands, which were provided not only to the landowners for the withdrawal of serfs (1.5-12 thousand dess.), but also to state peasants (60 dess.), retired soldiers , foreign colonists (Germans, Greeks, Armenians, Jews, Swiss, etc.).

In addition, the agricultural development of Siberia and the Urals continued, where, in addition to migration from the central regions, there was a gradual transition of the local population - Bashkirs, Buryats, from nomadic pastoralism to settled plow agriculture.

3. A major role in the growth of agrarian, primarily grain production was played by the preservation and strengthening of serfdom, as well as the expansion of the zone of serfdom to the Left-Bank Ukraine and the Trans-Volga region.

At the same time, progressive factors in the development of agricultural production began to operate. Some of them contributed to a slight intensification of production in certain areas and farms.

Increased regional specialization of agricultural production.

New crops were introduced. If the potato was still a garden crop, then the sunflower became widespread in Ukraine and New Russia. Sugar beet began to be cultivated.

The marketability of agriculture increased. On the one hand, the landowners needed everything more money to purchase luxury goods. On the other hand, the purchases of grain for the army, industrial crops for the growing industry increased, grain exports to Western Europe increased several times. In addition, with the development of industry and cities, an increasing part of the population moved away from self-sufficiency in agricultural products and needed to purchase them.

Due to the increase in demand, prices for agricultural products have increased.

By the end of the 18th, on the basis of the growth of marketability, the strengthening of trade ties between different regions of the country, and the transformation of such ties into regular ones, a single all-Russian grain market was formed.

As a result of these processes, commodity-money relations developed in the country.

During this period, the first attempts to apply new methods and technologies, scientific achievements for the development of agricultural production began. To this end, in 1765, on the initiative of Catherine II, the Free Economic Society was created. But his activities under the conditions of the serfdom did not lead to significant results, only in a few individual estates the landowners bought some agricultural equipment and tried to introduce a multi-field crop rotation.

2. Industrial development

The growth of industrial production was more significant than in agriculture, which was ensured by the growth of the needs of the Russian army and navy, the increased demand in the world market for iron and sailing fabric, as well as the growth of the non-agricultural population in Russia.

Heavy industry. Ferrous metallurgy developed especially rapidly (primarily in the Urals), increasing production by 5 times. Russian iron not only became one of the important factors in strengthening the army and navy, but was also exported to Western Europe - at the end of the century, most of the iron shipped to England was of Russian origin. Gold mining began in Siberia.

Light industry also grew rapidly. Textile production developed rapidly, providing more than 80% of the value of all products of large, medium and light industry. New enterprises sprang up in the center of the country, and were especially active in the Ukraine (cloth manufactories), Estonia and Latvia.

Various forms of industrial organization developed in Russia. The main ones were handicraft, small-scale commodity production, as well as medium and large-scale commodity production in the form of manufactories.

Handicraft production was widespread both in the city and in the countryside. In a number of regions of the Center and the Volga region, the leather, textile peasant industry developed, which was such a serious competitor to urban handicraft and merchant enterprises that in the 1760s-1770s. complaints from merchants in many provinces about unmanaged peasant factories became commonplace. In some large villages of the Center, the peasants abandoned agriculture altogether.

Manufactory (medium and large-scale commodity production based on the division of labor and manual labor) dominated the iron and steel industry, the production of linen, cloth, silk, and a number of other industries. The number of factories increased rapidly - from 600 in the era of Elizabeth to 1200 by the end of the reign of Catherine II.

The main types of manufactories

State-owned - belonged to the state, provided with state orders and were based on serf labor. Their products were intended primarily for the army and navy. These manufactories developed slowly.

Possession private manufactories were provided with workers attached to enterprises from which they could not be alienated. The work of sessional workers who had their own plots of land was paid in money, they could not be used for agricultural work, be recruited, they were under the jurisdiction of the Berg and Manufactory colleges. But otherwise, their position did not differ from that of a serf.

Such enterprises were especially common in the Urals (mining and metallurgy) and in the Central regions (linen and cloth production), their products were also mainly bought by the state.

Estates - belonged to the landowners. On them, serfs worked out corvee. Such enterprises (primarily distilleries and textiles), despite their very low productivity, were profitable due to the free labor of serfs, but developed more and more slowly. The situation of the serf workers in these manufactories was extremely difficult. According to the memoirs of a contemporary, the peasants said - in this village there is a factory - with such an expression as if they said: There is a plague in this village.

Merchant and peasant manufactories were based on free hired labor. The number of such manufactories grew very rapidly, their size increased. Such enterprises formed the backbone of the cotton industry, where at the turn of the 18-19 centuries. more than 80% of the workers worked as freelance workers.

According to some quantitative indicators of large-scale industrial production, Russia was ahead of all continental Europe, including France, Holland, Prussia; Russian metallurgy continued to be a supplier of iron to European countries. But while England entered the era of the industrial revolution, the industrial technology of Russia remained old. The relations of production also wore backward forms in such branches of industry as the metallurgical and cloth industries. The mining industry of the Urals and the cloth industry of European Russia were, according to V. I. Lenin, an example of “that original phenomenon in Russian history, which consists in the application of serf labor to industry” (Lenin, Development of Capitalism in Russia, Soch., x. 3 , p. 411.).

By 1767, there were 385 manufactories in Russia (cloth, linen, silk, glass, etc.) and 182 iron and copper foundries, that is, a total of 567 industrial enterprises. The number of large enterprises by the end of the XVIH century. doubled.

The presence of large stocks of their own raw materials (flax, hemp, leather, wool, grain, etc.) and gratuitous labor, the possibility of profitable marketing of products pushed the landlords to set up patrimonial manufactories. On the estates of Russian, Ukrainian, Baltic landowners, cloth, linen, leather, glass, distilleries and other enterprises were created. The work of serfs in these enterprises was the most difficult form of corvée.

But, despite the absolute growth in the number of manufactories of the nobility, by the end of the century their share falls due to an increase in the number of merchant and peasant manufactories, which were the direct predecessors of the capitalist factory.

Capitalist manufactory grew most often out of peasant crafts, primarily in light industry. So, in the late 40s of the XVIII century. In the Ivanovo textile district, with rare exceptions, the manufactories used the labor of hired workers rather than sessional peasants.

Manufactories in the light industry of Russia were distinguished by their large size. Among them there were those that employed up to 2 thousand people and even more, and enterprises served by 300-400 workers were considered average. At the sailing manufactory of the Goncharovs at the end of the 18th century. there were 1624 workers, at the cloth factory of the princes Khovansky - up to 2600 workers.

3.Trade

Development of the domestic market

The granary of Russia in the middle of the XVIII century. there were central black earth regions, especially Belgorod and Voronezh provinces, and by the end of the century - the Middle Volga region. From here, bread was exported to Moscow and St. Petersburg, to Yaroslavl, Kostroma. The sellers of bread were both landowners and peasants. The landowners sold bread and other agricultural products in order to increase their cash income. Most of the peasants sold the bread they needed for their own consumption, because they needed money to pay quitrent and head tax, to buy salt and industrial products.

The detachment of the peasants from agriculture and household crafts contributed to the expansion of the capacity of the domestic market for manufactured goods. The products of large metallurgical plants and manufactories that produced linen gradually penetrate into the peasant and landowner economy, displacing household products. Both these branches of industry, which for a long time supplied most of their products abroad, began to produce consumer goods in connection with the expansion of the domestic market.

The development of domestic trade prompted the government to make major changes in its economic policy. They were determined both by the interests of the trading nobility, who sought the elimination of trade monopolies and restrictions, and by the interests of the merchants.

In the middle of the XVIII century. 17 different types of internal customs duties were levied. The existence of internal customs hindered the development of the all-Russian market. By decree of December 20, 1753, internal customs duties were abolished.

Equally important for the growth of trade and industry were the abolition by decree of 1767 and the manifesto of 1775 of industrial monopolies and the proclamation of freedom of industry and trade. The peasants were given the opportunity to freely engage in "needlework" and the sale of industrial products, which contributed to the more rapid development of small-scale commodity production into capitalist manufacture.

International trade

If in 1749 the export of goods from Russia amounted to about 7 million rubles, then 35 years later, in 1781-1785, it reached almost 24 million rubles annually, and the export significantly exceeded the import.

In the first place in Russian exports, as in previous times, were raw materials and semi-finished products - flax, hemp and tow, which accounted for 20 to 40% of all exports. They were followed by leather, fabrics, wood, ropes, bristles, potash, lard, furs.

All in export greater value purchased manufactured goods. For example, iron accounted for 6% of Russian exports in 1749, and 13% in 1796. The maximum figure for the export of Russian iron falls on 1794, when it reached almost 3.9 million poods; in subsequent years, the export of iron abroad has steadily declined. The export of grain fluctuated depending on the harvest and grain prices in the domestic market, on the prohibitions imposed on the export of grain. In 1749, for example, the export of bread was expressed in an insignificant figure - 2 thousand rubles (0.03% of the total export). From the 1960s, the export of grain began to grow rapidly, reaching 2.9 million rubles in the early 1990s.

Among the goods imported into Russia, items of noble consumption continued to dominate: sugar, cloth, silks, wines, fruits, spices, perfumes, etc.

4. The position of the main estates

The main socio-economic tasks of the state during this period were: the adaptation of the ruling class - the nobility to the developing commodity-money relations, the adaptation of the serf estate to the new economic system, and, ultimately, the strengthening of the renewed noble feudal state.

On the other hand, it was necessary to contribute to the economic strengthening of the country in order to contribute to its further transformation into a great power, to ensure the fulfillment of foreign policy tasks, and also to relieve social tension, resulting in speeches and even uprisings of various segments of the population. Catherine II, a supporter of free trade and industrial activity, considered it her task to free entrepreneurship from oppression.

These two tasks, objectively contradicting each other, at this stage were relatively successfully combined in the economic policy of the state.

Peter III provided new benefits to entrepreneurs from the nobility - in 1762, manufacturers of non-noble origin were forbidden to buy serfs for their enterprises, the nobles were exempted from compulsory public service, which was supposed to direct their efforts to the national economy.

These privileges were confirmed and expanded by the Charter to the nobility, issued by Catherine II. 1785 In 1782, mountain freedom was abolished - the landowners were declared the owners of not only the land, but also its subsoil. But the nobles were not very willing to go into business due to the lack of sufficient funds and estate vestiges in their outlook.

Catherine's main liberal measure was the Manifesto of 1775, which greatly facilitated the development of entrepreneurship. Representatives of all classes, including serfs, received the right to start camps and needlework without asking for any permissions and without any registration (therefore, the manifesto of 1775 is usually called the manifesto on freedom of enterprise in literature). This contributed to the rapid growth of peasant crafts and handicraft industries.

Strengthening of serfdom in the second half of the XVIII century. reached its climax. This was due to: the expansion of the zone of application of serf labor to the Left-Bank and Sloboda Ukraine (in 1783, the peasants here were forbidden to move from landowner to landowner), the areas of the Kursk-Belgorod and Voronezh zasechny lines, to the Don, Trans-Volga, Urals. In addition, state lands and lands confiscated from the church were actively distributed to the nobility: thus, under Catherine II, more than 800 thousand peasants became serfs; strengthening the power of the landlords over the peasants: the decrees of Peter III and Catherine II proclaimed the right of the landowner to send peasants into exile in Siberia (1760), to hard labor (1765) without trial, the peasants were forbidden to complain to the monarch about their landowner (1767), etc. Moreover, the exiled serfs were counted to the landowner as recruited, and as a result, he did not suffer any losses. For 5 years, about 20 thousand serfs were exiled and sent to hard labor. The sale and resale of serfs without land flourished, auctions were held.

As a result, serfdom at the end of the enlightened 18th century differed from slavery only in that the peasants ran their own households, while the serfs were practically equated with slaves.

The possibilities of developing the economy on the basis of feudalism were seriously reduced. Serfdom became a brake on economic progress.

The extensive development of the economy dominated. The level of development of the Russian economy and the rate of its growth lagged behind the advanced countries of the West.

At the same time, progressive trends developed in the country's economy. Industry, including manufacturing, and trade grew rapidly. Commodity-money relations developed, including in agriculture. In state policy, under the influence of the ideas of the European Enlightenment, elements of economic liberalism were practiced.

The development of commodity-money relations, the formation of the all-Russian market, the emergence of the capitalist way of life led to the deformation of the main features of serfdom. Gradually began the process of decomposition of the feudal-serf system.

At the same time, in the second half of the XVIII century. Russia's economy, especially industry and trade, developed at a relatively high pace. During this period, the combination of pro-noble policy and elements of economic liberalism was still bearing fruit and ensured the creation of a powerful army and navy by the end of the reign of Catherine II, the solution of foreign policy tasks and socio-political stabilization in the country.

Ticket 19.

Russia at the turn of the 17th-18th centuries.

Russia at the turn of XVII-XVIII was a state whose politics and public life were characterized by complete confusion. Society understood that the old way of life was beginning to fade into the past, but it was not ready to accept innovations.

Russia at the early stage of the Emperor's reign

After the death of Alexei Mikhailovich, the contenders for the throne began to wage a fierce struggle among themselves, which further complicated the already unstable economic state of the country. In August 1689, supporters of the son of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, 17-year-old Peter, were able to install their protege to the kingdom.

At the beginning of his reign, Peter showed absolute indifference to public affairs. He was satisfied with the fact that in fact the country was ruled by his closest relatives, in whose hands he was just a puppet that carried out their will.

Instead of being interested in the problems of society and gradually solving them, Peter indulged in various amusements, which consisted in making models of ships and organizing competitions that tested the viability of royal handicrafts.

As history will show us, over time, Peter, thanks to his hobby, will be able to create the most powerful fleet in Europe. But this will be later, but for now the young king idly indulged in fun and completely ignored his direct duties.

Peter was incredibly lucky with the environment, which was very capable and wise, and was able to maintain the prestige of the king in the eyes of the people. The tsar's associates, J. Bruce, F. Lefort, P. Gordon, were gradually able to convince the tsar of the need to change priorities and engage in state administration. Thanks to their influence, the first state activity of the king, as the sole ruler, began.

Peter's first achievements

The military amusements of Peter gradually transformed into the military strategy of the state. The king began to realize the need to open new trade routes that would make it possible to improve the economy of the state.

Peter logically understood that a strong flotilla was needed for this. However, it was not possible to open exits to the strategically important seas due to the unpreparedness of the army. The king did not have the opportunity to reform it at an early stage of his reign, therefore, special attention began to be paid to the construction of river ports on the Volga, which contributed to the development of domestic trade.

But the idea of getting access to the seas did not leave Peter, for this it was necessary to find out the political situation in Europe in order to find future allies for himself in the war with the Ottoman Empire.

The Tsar initiated the creation of the Great Embassy in 1689, the main function of which was to visit European countries and resume diplomatic relations with them. Incognito, Peter himself was among the Russian delegations.

The activities of the Great Embassy played a grandiose role in the history of Russia and became a turning point in its further course. Peter was not only able to find allies for his state, he realized the depth of that large-scale abyss that separated progressive Europe and boyar Russia.

It was from this moment that a new stage in the policy of the tsar began - the reformism of Peter, who was able to further not only strengthen the Russian state, but make it a powerful European empire.

Outwardly, he was a success. The only, but extremely significant (and perhaps decisive) “blot” for all participants was that in one of the halls of the palace the king discovered a portrait of Louise de Lavalier, his beloved. Rumors that the good Louise, despite her sincere love for her Louis, had also sinned with the vain Fouquet, vividly rose in the irritated mind of the sovereign
A month later, Fouquet will be arrested and convicted; he will end his days in the fortress of Piñerol. Vaux-le-Vicomte is confiscated. The best of the castle furnishings, including the orange trees in silver tubs (they are still very valuable and expensive in the flora market), the king will take for his palace under construction. The team of geniuses who created Vaux-le-Vicomte will also migrate there.
They have to create an even more beautiful and grandiose masterpiece - the famous palace and park ensemble in Versailles.

Who are you, King Louis?

Louis the Fourteenth liked to repeat that he liked cheerful and good-natured people. What was the king himself, who was sometimes called great and the sun, sometimes superficial and ordinary self-lover, sometimes humane, sometimes soulless? Louis lived for 77 years, of which he was on the throne for 72 years. Being the center of attention of his contemporaries all his life, could he hide his true face from them?
So we will test the personality of Louis on several indicators.
INTELLIGENCE. Louis received almost no education. His childhood was rather difficult - in any case, meager. He lost his father early, and Mazarin's possible stepfather was so stingy that, according to the stories of some contemporaries, Louis slept on torn sheets as a child. Then the Fronde was raging with might and main, the position of the mother and regent Anna of Austria was precarious - in short, no one bothered to occupy himself with the education of Louis. Even in his old age, he did not like to read, using for this the gift of Racine, who not only translated Roman authors from the sheet, but also clothed it on the move in refined French. Nevertheless, the ignorant Louis was a witty man, naturally subtle, and most importantly, he skillfully and successfully carried out the policy of the hegemon of Europe for several decades. Having no education, he was excellently brought up, having no training, he acted intelligently and logically. We can say that Louis was a practitioner to the marrow of his bones and a man who made himself. However, he also owned the theory of the question, that is, he had unshakable convictions about his rights as an absolute monarch and about the divine origin of royal power. Even his religiosity acquired in connection with this somewhat grotesque features. So, having learned about one lost battle, he melancholy remarked: “As you can see, the Lord forgot all the good things that I did for him!” These already somewhat archaic ideas "helped" him to make a number of political mistakes in his old age. However, it is unlikely that a mentally limited person is capable of self-criticism. Louis knew how to criticize himself - in his youth he asked the ministers to tell him if they discovered that any lady of his heart would begin to influence politics, and promised that he would part with this person at the same hour, and dying, he said with deep sadness : "I loved the war too much..."
COURAGE, WILLPOWER. It is said that the feeling that the king inspired in those who first saw him was fear. Tall, majestic, laconic, at first he overwhelmed people. Perhaps they felt precisely the pressure of the special, “monstrous” physics of this person. Ludovic was born with two teeth in his mouth, so that no nurse at his cradle could withstand more than a month. And after the death of the sun king, it was discovered that his stomach and intestines were twice the size of ordinary human ones. (Hence his brutal appetite.) By nature, he was extremely hardy, and while the courtiers were escaping from the drafts of Versailles, wrapping themselves in bearskins, like the Marquis de Rambouillet (Rambouillet), he threw open the windows in the room where he was. Louis did not understand and did not take into account the ailments of those around him, but he endured his own with great courage. His fistula was removed, as well as part of the maxillary bone (which is why food sometimes climbed out through the nostrils), but during these monstrous operations due to the lack of anesthesia, the sun king not only did not "peep", but even kept an even pulse! .. And after all, the operation to remove the fistula lasted six hours - as long as the execution through the wheel lasted
HUMANITY. They say that the king did not want to hear about the poverty and calamities of the people. I think, however, this is not because of callousness, but because of the feeling of one's own powerlessness to change something for the better. Was Louis cruel? Unlikely. In any case, this convincingly refutes the new version of who was hiding behind the "iron mask", put forward by French historians and cited in the book: S. Tsvetkov. Prisoners of the Bastille. - M.. 2001. - S. 180-194. It turns out that, firstly, the mask was not made of iron, but of black velvet. Secondly, it is very convincingly proved that the most mysterious prisoner of the Sun King could not be his brother or relative. According to the latest research, it could be, most likely, Count Ercole Antonio Matteoli, minister of Charles the Fourth, Duke of Mantua. He was a witness and participant in the political embarrassment of Louis the Fourteenth, to whom, through the mediation of Matteoli, the Duke of Mantua, who was always in need of money, sold one of his cities. The city was considered the key to Northern Italy. Matteoli blabbed about the deal, Europe rose to its ears, rightly seeing in the actions of the French an illegal annexation, and Louis had to urgently pretend that there was no deal at all. Matteoli, however, was captured and probably taken to France, where he would wear a mask over his face for decades and die in the Bastille. He wore a mask because it was a custom practiced in Venetian prisons (the deal took place in Venice), and also because, first of all, in the prisons where he was, there were Italian prisoners who knew Matteoli well - and after all, French the ambassador announced the death of the count during a road accident! In addition, the mask was supposed to remind him of his betrayal. In the 20th century, which is about to be punished, all these velvet reproaches of conscience seem like a childish prank. But Ludovik, probably, simply has not yet grown up to the personnel policy of the wise Stalin, who claimed: “No man - no and problems!” That is why the "predatel" Matteoli, even while in the dungeon, ate from gold and silver utensils
ARTISTIC ABILITIES, TASTE. One of his relatives ironically called Louis “the monarch of the stage” (see: N. Mitford), and the great finance minister Colbert wrote about his patron, writing in despair: “Do you know as well as I do the person with whom we are we both dealing? Do you know his fondness for effects, paid for at any cost? (cited in: J. Le Nôtre, p. 68). Louis was indeed endowed with refined taste (which the passionate collector Mazarin developed in him), a subtle sense of language, and a talent as a dancer - until the age of forty, the king performed in court ballets. He did not like the theater too much, especially in old age, because his whole life was a theatrical performance, filled with ceremonies and intrigues, and the endless, blinding brilliance of gold and diamonds. The passion for splendor, the passion to play the role of a monarch and shine like the earthly sun, was so great in Louis that even in his old age, seven months before his death, he last appeared on the stage in the role of a monarch when he gave an audience to the Persian ambassador in the winter 1715. There was such an abyss of diamonds on Louis' robe that he could hardly move his legs. And before whom did he try so hard? In front of some semi-adventurer who disappeared in his Persia (and maybe also in Russia), without doing anything for the interests of France ... (See: J. Le Nôtre, pp. 104-110).
ATTITUDE TO PEOPLE. In dealing with people, the king was courtesy itself. They say that in his whole life he lost his temper only three times, and of these three times only once did he allow himself to hit a person: a footman who pulled a biscuit from the table - however, the old Louis already lost his nerve and he was angry, in fact, not at the footman but on their relatives. Louis appreciated talents, but above all he valued himself and was noticeably jealous of someone else's glory. That is why he constantly kept his truly talented relatives in the shadows. Louis' favorite was the insignificant clown Duke du Maine, his son by the Marquise de Montespan, a witty but empty man. However, du Maine was lame, and the father treats a sick child differently than a healthy one, so humanly everything is very clear here. He called the courtiers by title and surname, which gave his courtesy a touch of officiality. But with the common people, Louis was less ceremonious and sometimes behaved almost easily. There is a famous anecdote connected with this. Once the king entered the room and saw a man who climbed a ladder and unscrewed an expensive clock from the wall. The king volunteered to hold the ladder. When the man left, it turned out: Louis helped the thief, whom he mistook for a court mechanic! .. This anecdote is quite plausible, given that the parks and front rooms of Versailles were open to everyone around the clock. When, during the French Revolution, the women of Paris went to Versailles, the guards tried to close the gates of the park, but in vain: for more than a hundred years, the hinges of the always open gates rusted tightly
We will talk about other nuances of the king's relationship with people a little later.
In the meantime, here's our VERDICT:
Louis XIV was neither a tyrant nor a despot. He was, above all, a talented egocentric with a well-developed sense of duty, which, however, he perceived as a fanfare voice of royal destiny.

From the tender heart of the Duchesse de La Vallière to the "black masses" of the Marquise de Montespan

And yet the image of the sun-king in the writings of historians doubles and sways. Time inexorably drives him under those vaults of our memory, where historical figures wander, like the vague shadows of the heroes of myths. Even information about his appearance looks contradictory. In any case, in the book: A.G. Sergeev. Secular and spiritual rulers of Europe for 2000 years. - M., 2003, it is stated that Ludovic “had a height of only 1.59 m and therefore introduced high-heeled shoes into men's fashion. In addition, having a huge bump on his head from birth, he always wore high hats” (p. 481). It is quite natural that the king wanted and knew how to look taller than the people around him - which is why he seemed remarkably tall to many memoirists. But, if the indicated height corresponds to the real thing, then the king's brother Philip of Orleans (about whom they unanimously write that he was almost two times lower than Louis) did not reach a meter much, even with a cap! .. However, Philip still was not considered a dwarf.
The information about the events of the personal life of the great king is equally contradictory. What remains indisputable is that he, like most Bourbons, was distinguished by an increased libido. Louis began to look at women as a child, and became a man at the age of 15 in the arms of a forty-year-old court lady. Male power the king kept it until old age - his second wife, the pious de Maintenon, complained to the confessor that she was forced to deal with "this business" with Louis every day! The king was then about seventy years old
Louis had a lot of fleeting hobbies and more than a dozen illegitimate children. At the same time, the king considered it his duty twice a month to share the bed with the unloved (but passionately loving him) queen.
Historians divide his reign into three periods, according to the surnames of his three main favorites: the Lavaliere period (1661–approximately 1675), Montespan (1675–approximately 1683) and Maintenon (1683–1715). We write "approximately", because the king liked to keep with him both a mistress who had just entered into favor, and an already almost retired mistress. The poor queen had to endure it all. For example, once Louis went to war with his wife, as well as with Lavaliere and Montespan, and all three women not only sat in the same carriage (and the crowd ran to look at the “three queens of France”! ..), but also in the marching royal tent of six rooms each had its own separate bedroom
Historians unanimously cite the formula of one memoirist who wrote that Lavalier loved Louis as a person, Montespan as a king, and Maintenon as a husband. There is another version of this formula: Lavalier loved him like a mistress. Montespan is like a mistress, and Maintenon is like a governess.
In this chapter, we will cover the first two.
Louise de Lavalier - the name of this pure soul, disinterested lady overshadows the youth of the king. She was not too beautiful: pockmarked and a little lame. She could not be compared with the brilliant beauties, this modest provincial noblewoman, the maid of honor of Henrietta of England (Henrietta was the daughter of Charles the First of England and the wife of Philip of Orleans). Henriette herself fell in love with Louis, but he preferred to her the dear Lavalier, who passionately, tenderly and helplessly looked at him from the crowd of courtiers.
So “beautiful” Louis did not love anyone, neither before nor after. They say that one day a thunderstorm caught them in the open. The lovers took refuge under a tree, and the king covered Lavaliere from the rain with his hat for two hours. They vowed not to prolong any quarrel between themselves until the next day. And when the king once "dragged" her, Louise fled to the monastery. The monarch gave chase. Needless to say, the quarrel ended in a stormy, violent reconciliation.
Lavalière gave Louis four children, of whom two survived to adulthood. One day, Louise was giving birth in pain. Everyone thought she was dying. "Give her back to me and take everything I have!" Louis cried out through tears.
At first, the lovers hid their relationship from the Queen Mother and the Queen Wife. The day after the birth, Lavalier was already rushing to the ball so that Their Majesties would not learn anything about the birth of a child from the king. But both "Spaniards", both "their most Christian majesties", understood everything very soon. "This woman is the king's mistress!" Maria Theresa said in Spanish to her lady-in-waiting as Lavalier passed by. And Anna of Austria began to read morality to her son. “When we are tired of love, when we are fed up with it and grow old, then we, in our turn, fall into hypocrisy and indulge in moralizing,” Ludovik retorted (quoted from: 100 great mistresses. - M., 2004. - P. 294 ). He almost prophesied. "Almost" - because he could not do without sex until the last
And poor Lavaliere suffered - remorse tormented her, because communication with the king (a married man) was a very great sin.
The windy “sire” also tormented her. There is a beautiful legend that he conceived Versailles as a monument to his love for Lavalier. But the king still did not think so broadly: from the very beginning, Versailles was conceived as a monument to him personally, the sun king. When in 1667 Lavalier was granted the title of duke, the courtiers saw this as a sign of Louis' chill. He gave his mistress as a gift, as if feeling guilty in front of her. She loved him, and he no longer loved her. The heart of the king was captured by another woman - Françoise-Athenais, Marquise de Montespan.

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Belgorod Law Institute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia

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TOPIC #9: Russia in the second half of the 17th century

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1. Socio-economic development of the country

By the middle of the 17th century, the devastation and ruin of the Time of Troubles had been overcome. The economy recovered slowly in the conditions of preservation of traditional forms of farming (poor productivity of the peasant economy with its primitive equipment and technology; sharply continental climate; low soil fertility in the Non-Black Earth region).

In the second half of the 17th century, agriculture remained the leading branch of the Russian economy. Progress in this sphere of material production at that time was associated with the widespread use of three-field cultivation and the use of natural fertilizers. Bread gradually became the main commercial product of agriculture. By the middle of the century, the Russian people with hard work overcame the devastation caused by foreign invasions. The peasants repopulated the abandoned villages, plowed the wastelands, acquired livestock and agricultural implements. As a result of Russian peasant colonization, new areas were developed: in the south of the country, in the Volga region, Bashkiria, and Siberia. In all these places, new centers of agricultural culture arose. But the overall level of agricultural development was low. In agriculture, such primitive tools as plows and harrows continued to be used. In the forest regions of the North, the undercut still existed, and in the steppe zone of the South and the Middle Volga region, there was a fallow.

The basis for the development of animal husbandry was the peasant economy. Cattle breeding especially developed in Pomorye, in the Yaroslavl region, in the southern counties. Noble land ownership grew rapidly as a result of numerous government grants of estates and estates to nobles. By the end of the 17th century, patrimonial noble land ownership began to exceed the previously dominant land ownership. The center of an estate or patrimony was a village or village. Usually in the village there were about 15-30 peasant households. But there were villages with two or three courtyards. The village differed from the village not only in its large size, but also in the presence of a church with a bell tower. It was the center for all the villages included in his church parish. Subsistence farming predominated in agricultural production. Small-scale production in agriculture was combined with domestic peasant industry and small-scale urban handicrafts. Trade in agricultural products also increased markedly, which was associated with the development of fertile lands in the south and east, the emergence of a number of fishing areas that did not produce their own bread, and the growth of cities. A new and very important phenomenon in agriculture was its connection with industrial enterprise. Many peasants in their free time from field work, mainly in autumn and winter, were engaged in handicrafts: they made linens, shoes, clothes, dishes, agricultural implements, etc. Some of these products were used in the peasant economy itself or given as quitrent to the landowner, the other was sold at the nearest market. The feudal lords increasingly established contact with the market, where they sold the products and handicrafts received by dues. Not satisfied with dues, they expanded their own plowing and set up their own production of products. Preserving a largely natural character, the agriculture of the feudal lords was already largely connected with the market. The production of foodstuffs for the supply of cities and a number of industrial regions that did not produce bread grew. The southern districts of the state turned into grain-producing regions, from where bread came to the Don Cossacks region and to the central regions (especially to Moscow). The counties of the Volga region also gave an excess of bread. The main way for the development of agriculture of this time was extensive: landowners included an increasing number of new territories in the economic circulation.

Among all classes and estates, the dominant place, of course, belonged to the feudal lords. In their interests, the state power carried out measures to strengthen the ownership of the land by the boyars and nobles and the peasants, to unite the strata of the feudal class. Service people took shape in a complex and clear hierarchy of ranks, obliged to the state by service in the military, civil, court departments in exchange for the right to own land and peasants. They were divided into the ranks of the Duma (boyars, okolnichi, duma nobles and duma clerks), Moscow (stewards, solicitors, Moscow nobles and residents) and city (elected nobles, nobles and children of boyars yards, nobles and children of boyars of the city). By merit, service and nobility of origin, the feudal lords passed from one rank to another. The nobility turned into a closed class - an estate.

The authorities strictly and consistently sought to keep their estates and estates in the hands of the nobles. The demands of the nobility and the measures of the authorities led to the fact that by the end of the 17th century the difference between the estate and the estate was reduced to a minimum. Throughout the century, the government, on the one hand, handed out vast tracts of land to the feudal lords; on the other hand, part of the possessions, more or less significant, was transferred from the estate to the estate. Large land holdings with peasants belonged to spiritual feudal lords. In the 17th century, the authorities continued the course of their predecessors to limit church land ownership. The Code of 1649, for example, prohibited the clergy from acquiring new lands. The privileges of the church in matters of court and administration were limited. Unlike the feudal lords, especially the nobility, the situation of peasants and serfs in the 17th century deteriorated significantly. Of the privately owned peasants, the palace peasants lived better, the worst of all - the peasants of the secular feudal lords, especially the small ones. The peasants worked for the benefit of the feudal lords on corvée and paid tribute in kind and money. Nobles and boyars took carpenters and masons, brickmakers and other masters from their villages and villages. Peasants worked at the first factories and factories that belonged to feudal lords or the treasury, made cloth and canvas at home, and so on. Serfs, in addition to work and payments in favor of the feudal lords, carried duties in favor of the treasury. In general, their taxation, duties were heavier than those of the palace and black-mowed. The situation of the peasants dependent on the feudal lords was aggravated by the fact that the trial and reprisals of the boyars and their clerks were accompanied by overt violence, bullying, and humiliation of human dignity. After 1649, the search for fugitive peasants assumed wide dimensions. Thousands of them were seized and returned to their owners. In order to live, the peasants went to waste, to "farm laborers", to work. The impoverished peasants passed into the category of beans. Feudal lords, especially large ones, had many slaves, sometimes several hundred people. These are clerks and servants for parcels, grooms and tailors, watchmen and shoemakers, falconers, etc. By the end of the century, serfdom merged with the peasantry. Life was better for the state, or black-mowed, peasants. They depended on the feudal state: taxes were paid in its favor, they carried various duties. Despite the modest share of merchants and artisans in the total population of Russia, they played a very significant role in its economic life. Moscow was the leading center of handicraft, industrial production, trade operations. Here in the 1940s, masters of metalworking, fur making, the manufacture of various food, leather and leather products, clothes and hats, and much more - everything that a large populous city needed. A significant part of the artisans worked for the state, the treasury. Part of the artisans served the needs of the palace (palace) and the feudal lords living in Moscow and other cities (patrimonial artisans). Simple capitalist cooperation also appeared, hired labor was used. Poor townspeople and peasants went as mercenaries to the wealthy blacksmiths, boilermakers, bakers and others. The same thing happened in transport, river and horse-drawn. The development of handicraft production, its professional, territorial specialization, revitalizes the economic life of cities, trade relations between them and their districts. It is to the XVII century. the beginning of the concentration of local markets, the formation of the all-Russian market on their basis. Guests and other wealthy merchants appeared with their goods in all parts of the country and abroad. Wealthy merchants, artisans, industrialists ran everything in the township communities. They shifted the main burden of fees and duties to small artisans and merchants.

In industry, unlike agriculture, things were much better. The most widespread domestic industry; throughout the country, peasants produced canvases and homespun cloth, ropes and ropes, felted and leather shoes, various clothes and utensils, and much more. Gradually peasant industry is transformed into petty commodity production. Among the artisans, the most numerous group was made up of draft workers - artisans of urban settlements and black-moss volosts. They carried out private orders or worked for the market. Palace artisans served the needs of the royal court; state and notebook worked on orders from the treasury; privately owned - from peasants, beavers and serfs - produced everything necessary for the landlords and estate owners. Metalworking, which has long existed in the country, was based on the extraction of swamp ores. The centers of metallurgy were formed in the counties south of Moscow: Serpukhov, Kashirsky, Tula, Dedilovsky, Aleksinsky. Another center is the districts to the north-west of Moscow: Ustyuzhna Zheleznopolskaya, Tikhvin, Zaonezhie. Moscow was a major metalworking center - in the early 1940s there were more than one and a half hundred forges here. The best gold and silver craftsmen in Russia worked in the capital. Ustyug the Great, Nizhny Novgorod, Veliky Novgorod, Tikhvin and others were also centers of silver production. Copper and other non-ferrous metals were processed in Moscow and Pomorye. Metalworking is to a large extent converted into commodity production, and not only in the towns, but also in the countryside. Blacksmithing reveals tendencies towards the enlargement of production, the use of hired labor. This is especially true for Tula, Ustyuzhna, Tikhvin, Veliky Ustyug.

Similar phenomena, although to a lesser extent, are observed in woodworking. Throughout the country, carpenters worked mainly to order - they built houses, river and sea vessels. Carpenters from Pomorye were distinguished by special skill. The largest center of the leather industry was Yaroslavl, where raw materials for the manufacture of leather products were supplied from many districts of the country. A large number of small "factories" - craft workshops - worked here. The leather was processed by craftsmen from Kaluga and Nizhny Novgorod. Yaroslavl tanners used hired labor; some factories grew into manufactory-type enterprises with a significant division of labor. With all its development, handicraft production could no longer satisfy the demand for industrial products. This leads to the emergence in the 17th century of manufactories - enterprises based on the division of labor between workers. If in Western Europe manufactories were capitalist enterprises, served by the labor of hired workers, then in Russia, under the dominance of the feudal serf system, the emerging manufacturing production was largely based on serf labor. Most of the manufactories belonged to the treasury, the royal court and large boyars. Palace manufactories were created to produce fabrics for the royal court. One of the first palace linen manufactories was the Khamovny yard, located in the palace settlements near Moscow. State manufactories, which arose as early as the 15th century, were usually founded for the production of various types of weapons. The state-owned manufactories were the Cannon Yard, the Armory, the Money Yard, the Jewelery Yard and other enterprises. The population of Moscow state and palace settlements worked at state and palace manufactories. Workers, although they received a salary, were feudally dependent people, did not have the right to quit their jobs. The patrimonial manufactories had the most pronounced serf character. Iron-making, potash, leather, linen and other manufactories were created in the estates of the boyars Morozov, Miloslavsky, Stroganov and others. Here, almost exclusively forced labor of serfs was used. Wage labor was used in merchant manufactories. In Ustyuzhna, Tula, Tikhvin, Ustyug the Great, some wealthy merchants began to establish metalworking enterprises. In the 90s of the 17th century, the wealthy Tula blacksmith-artisan Nikita Antufiev opened an iron-smelting plant. Some manufactories and crafts were founded by wealthy peasants, for example, the Volga salt mines, leather, ceramic and textile manufactories. In addition to merchant manufactories, hired labor is also used in brick production, in construction, in the fishing and salt industries. Among the workers there were many quitrent peasants who, although personally not free people, sold their labor power to the owners of the means of production.

The growth of productive forces in agriculture and industry, the deepening of the social division of labor and territorial production specialization led to a steady expansion of trade ties. At the end of the 17th century, trade relations already exist on a national scale. In the North, in need of imported bread, there are grain markets, the main of which was Vologda. Novgorod remained a trading center in the northwestern part of the state - a large market for the sale of linen and hemp products. Important markets for livestock products were Kazan, Vologda, Yaroslavl, markets for furs - some cities in the northern part of Russia: Solvychegodsk, Irbit, etc. Tula, Tikhvin and other cities became the largest producers of metal products. The main trading center throughout Russia was still Moscow, where trade routes converged from all over the country and from abroad. Silks, furs, metal and woolen products, wines, bacon, bread and other domestic and foreign goods were sold in 120 specialized rows of the Moscow market. Fairs acquired all-Russian significance - Makarievskaya, Arkhangelsk, Irbitskaya. The Volga connected many Russian cities with economic ties. The dominant position in trade was occupied by townspeople. In trade, specialization was poorly developed, capital circulated slowly, and there were no free funds and credit. In Russia, the demand for industrial products increased, and the development of agriculture and handicrafts made it possible for stable exports. Therefore, trade was conducted with the countries of the East, through Astrakhan. Silks, various fabrics, spices, luxury items were imported, furs, leather, handicrafts were exported. Russian merchants suffered losses as a result of Western competition, especially if the government granted European merchants the right to duty-free trade. Therefore, in 1667, the government adopted the Novotragovy Charter, according to which retail trade by foreigners in Russian cities was prohibited, duty-free wholesale trade was allowed only in border cities, and in inner Russia foreign goods were subject to very high duties, often in the amount of 100% of the cost.

The development of the country's economy was accompanied by major social movements. The 17th century is not accidentally called the “rebellious century”. It was during this period that two peasant “disturbances” took place (the Bolotnikov uprising and the peasant war led by S. Razin), as well as the Solovetsky rebellion and two streltsy uprisings in the last quarter of the 17th century. The history of urban uprisings opens with the "Salt Riot" in 1648 in Moscow. Various segments of the population of the capital took part in it: townspeople, archers, nobles, dissatisfied with the policy of B.I., Morozov (1590-1611), who headed the Russian government. A decree of 7 February 1646 imposed a heavy tax on salt. And salt was the product that people in the 17th century could not get away from. In 1646-1648, salt prices increased 3-4 times. The people began to starve. Everyone was dissatisfied. Expensive salt sold less than the previous treasury suffered significant losses. In 1647 the salt tax was rejected, but it was too late. The reason for the speech was the defeat of the delegation of Muscovites by the archers, who were trying to sell the petition to the tsar at the mercy of the clerks. The uprising began on June 1 and lasted several days. The people smashed the courts of the Moscow boyars and nobles, clerks and wealthy merchants, demanding to extradite the hated officials Pleshcheev, who was in charge of the administration of the capital and the head of the government, boyar Morozov. The Duma clerk Nazariy Chistoy was killed, Leonty Pleshcheev and others were given to be torn to pieces by the crowd. The tsar managed to save only Morozov, urgently sending him into exile at the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery. The Moscow "salt riot" responded with uprisings of 1648-1650 in other cities as well. The most stubborn and prolonged uprisings in 1650 were in Pskov and Novgorod. They were caused by a sharp increase in the price of bread. To stabilize the situation, the authorities convened a Zemsky Sobor, which agreed to prepare a new Code.

On July 25, 1662, the “Copper Bund” took place in Moscow, caused by the financial crisis of the Monetary Reform (the minting of depreciated copper money), which was caused by the protracted Russian-Polish war, led to a sharp drop in the ruble. As a result, the appearance of counterfeit money on the market. At the beginning of 1663, copper money was abolished, frankly motivating this measure with the desire to prevent new bloodshed. As a result of the brutal massacre, several hundred people died, and 18 were publicly hanged.

In 1667, an uprising of Cossacks led by Stepan Razin broke out on the Don.

The introduction of a new code of laws, the "Council Code" of 1649, a cruel investigation of the fugitives, and an increase in taxes for the war aggravated the already tense situation in the state. The wars with Poland and Sweden ruined the bulk of the working strata of the population. In the same years, crop failures, epidemics occurred more than once, the position of archers, gunners, etc. worsened. Many fled to the outskirts, especially to the Don. In the Cossack regions, it has long been the custom not to extradite fugitives. The bulk of the Cossacks, especially the fugitives, lived poorly, meagerly. The Cossacks were not engaged in agriculture. The salary received from Moscow was not enough. By the mid-1960s, the situation on the Don had deteriorated to the extreme. A large number of fugitives have accumulated here. Hunger has begun. The Cossacks sent an embassy to Moscow with a request to accept them into the royal service, but they were refused. By 1667, the Cossack uprisings had turned into a well-organized movement under the leadership of Razin. A large army of rebels was defeated in 1670 near Simbirsk. At the beginning of 1671, the main centers of the movement were suppressed by the punitive detachments of the authorities.

The social crisis was accompanied by an ideological crisis. An example of the development of a religious struggle into a social one is the "Solovki uprising" (1668-1676). It began with the fact that the brothers of the Solovetsky Monastery flatly refused to accept the corrected liturgical books. The government decided to tame some of the monks by blockading the monastery and confiscating its land holdings. High thick walls, rich food supplies extended the siege of the monastery for several years. Razintsy exiled to Solovki also joined the ranks of the rebels. Only as a result of betrayal, the monastery was captured, out of 500 of its protective 60 remained alive.

Thus, during the seventeenth century, great changes took place in history. They touched all aspects of life. By this time, the territory of the Russian state had noticeably expanded, and the population was growing. The feudal-serf system also developed further, with a significant strengthening of feudal land ownership. The ruling class in the 17th century was the feudal landowners, secular and ecclesiastical landowners and estate owners. The development of trade is also of particular importance. In Russia, several large shopping centers were formed, among which Moscow stood out with its huge bargaining. Meanwhile, in the same years, uprisings broke out in the country every now and then, in particular, the rather powerful Moscow uprising of 1662. The largest uprising was the uprising of Stepan Razin, who in 1667 led the peasants to the Volga. Russia's economic situation was negatively affected by the fact that the country actually did not have free access to the sea, so it continued to lag behind the main Western European countries.

The economic prerequisites for the reforms of the early 18th century were created by the entire course of Russia's development in the 17th century. - the growth of production and the expansion of the range of agricultural products, the success of the craft, the emergence of manufactories, the development of trade and the growth of the economic role of the merchants.

2. Top coups and favoritism in the political life of Russia

The 37-year period of political instability (1725-1762) that followed the death of Peter I was called the “era of palace coups”. During this period, the policy of the state was determined by separate groups of the palace nobility, which actively intervened in resolving the issue of the heir to the throne, fought among themselves for power, thus carrying out palace coups. Also, the decisive force in the palace coups was the guard, a privileged part of the regular army created by Peter (these are the famous Semenovsky and Preobrazhensky regiments, in the 30s two new ones, Izmailovsky and Horse Guards, were added to them). Her participation decided the outcome of the case: on whose side the guard, that group won. The guard was not only a privileged part of the Russian army, it was a representative of the whole class (nobles), from whose midst it was almost exclusively formed and whose interests it represented. The reason for the intervention of certain groups of the palace nobility in the political life of the country was the Charter “on the succession to the throne” issued by Peter I on February 5, 1722, which abolished “both orders of succession to the throne that were in force before, and the testament, and conciliar election, replacing both with a personal appointment, discretion of the reigning sovereign. Peter I himself did not use this charter. He died on January 28, 1725, without appointing himself a successor. Therefore, immediately after his death, a struggle for power began between representatives of the ruling elite. Also, palace coups testified to the weakness of absolute power under the successors of Peter I, who could not continue the reforms with energy and in the spirit of the initiator and who could govern the state only relying on their close associates. Favoritism flourished during this period lush color. Favorites-temporary workers received unlimited influence on the policy of the state.

The only heir of Peter I in the male line was his grandson - the son of the executed Tsarevich Alexei Peter. Around the grandson were grouped mainly representatives of the well-born feudal aristocracy, now a few boyar families. Among them, the leading role was played by the Golitsyns and Dolgoruky, and some associates of Peter I (Field Marshal Prince B.P. Sheremetev, Field Marshal Nikita Repnin, and others) joined them. But the wife of Peter I, Catherine, claimed the throne. The heirs were also two daughters of Peter - Anna (married to the Holstein prince) and Elizabeth - by that time still a minor. The ambiguity of the general situation contributed a lot to the decree of February 5, 1722, which abolished the old rules of succession to the throne and approved the personal will of the testator into law. The figures of the Petrine era, who were always at war with each other, rallied for a while around the candidacy of Catherine. They were: A.D. Menshikov, P.I. Yaguzhinsky, P.A. Tolstoy, A.V. Makarov, F. Prokopovich, I.I. Buturlin and others. The issue of a successor was resolved by the quick actions of A. Menshikov, who, relying on the guards, carried out the first palace coup in favor of Catherine I (1725-1727) and became an all-powerful temporary worker under her.

In 1727 Catherine I died. The throne, according to her will, passed to the 12-year-old Peter II (1727-1730). Affairs in the state continued to decide the Supreme Privy Council. However, there were rearrangements in it: Menshikov was removed and exiled with his family to the distant West Siberian city of Berezov, and the tutor of Tsarevich Osterman and two princes Dolgoruky and Golitsyn entered the Council. The favorite of Peter II was Ivan Dolgoruky, who had a huge influence on the young emperor.

In January 1730, Peter II dies of smallpox, and the question of a candidate for the throne again arises. The Supreme Privy Council, at the suggestion of D. Golitsyn, chose the niece of Peter I, the daughter of his brother Ivan, the Dowager Duchess of Courland Anna Ioannovna (1730-1740), but limited her power. The throne was offered to Anna by the "supervisors" on certain conditions - conditions, according to which the empress actually became a powerless puppet. The reign of Anna Ioannovna (1730-1740) is usually assessed as a kind of timelessness; the empress herself is characterized as a narrow-minded, uneducated, little interested in state affairs woman who did not trust the Russians, and therefore brought a bunch of foreigners from Mitava and from various "German corners". “The Germans poured into Russia, like rubbish from a holey bag - they stuck around the courtyard, sat down on the throne, climbed into all the profitable places in management,” Klyuchevsky wrote. The guards, protesting against the conditions, demanded that Anna Ioannovna remain the same autocrat as her ancestors. Upon arrival in Moscow, Anna was already aware of the mood of wide circles of the nobility and guards. Therefore, on February 25, 1730, she broke the conditions and "became sovereign." Having become an autocrat, Anna Ioannovna hastened to find support for herself, mainly among foreigners who occupied the highest posts at the court, in the army and in the highest government. A number of Russian surnames also fell into the circle of persons devoted to Anna: relatives of the Saltykovs, P. Yaguzhinsky, A. Cherkassky, A. Volynsky, A. Ushakov. Mittava's favorite of Anna Biron became the de facto ruler of the country. In the system of power that developed under Anna Ioannovna, without Biron, her confidant, a rude and vindictive temporary worker, not a single important decision was made at all.

According to the will of Anna Ioannovna, her great-nephew, Ivan Antonovich of Braunschweig, was appointed her heir. Biron was appointed regent under him. Against the hated Biron, a palace coup was carried out just a few weeks later. The ruler under the minor Ivan Antonovich was proclaimed his mother Anna Leopoldovna. However, there were no changes in policy, all positions continued to remain in the hands of the Germans. On the night of November 25, 1741, the grenadier company of the Preobrazhensky Regiment carried out a palace coup in favor of Elizabeth, the daughter of Peter I (1741-1761). Under Elizabeth, there were no cardinal changes in the composition of the ruling elite of the state apparatus - only the most odious figures were removed. So, Elizabeth appointed A.P. Bestuzhev-Ryumin, who at one time right hand and Biron's creature. Among the highest Elizabethan dignitaries were also brother A.P. Bestuzhev-Ryumin and N.Yu. Trubetskoy, who by 1740 was the Prosecutor General of the Senate. The observed certain continuity of the highest circle of people who actually exercised control over the key issues of foreign and domestic policy testified to the continuity of this policy itself. Despite the similarity of this coup with similar palace coups in Russia in the 18th century. (apical character, guard strike force), he had a number of distinctive features. The striking force of the coup on November 25 was not just the guards, but the lower guards - people from the taxable estates, expressing the patriotic sentiments of the broad sections of the capital's population. The coup had a pronounced anti-German, patriotic character. Wide sections of Russian society, condemning the favoritism of the German temporary workers, turned their sympathies towards Peter's daughter, the Russian heiress. A feature of the palace coup on November 25 was the fact that the Franco-Swedish diplomacy tried to actively intervene in the internal affairs of Russia and, for offering help to Elizabeth in the struggle for the throne, to obtain certain political and territorial concessions from her, which meant a voluntary rejection of the conquests of Peter I.

Elizabeth Petrovna's successor was her nephew Karl-Peter-Ulrich - Duke of Holstein - the son of Elizabeth Petrovna's older sister - Anna, and therefore on the mother's side - the grandson of Peter I. He ascended the throne under the name of Peter III (1761-1762) February 18, 1762 The Manifesto was published on the award of "liberty and freedom to the entire Russian noble nobility", i.e. for exemption from compulsory service. The "Manifesto", which removed the age-old duty from the class, was received with enthusiasm by the nobility. Peter III issued Decrees on the abolition of the Secret Chancellery, on the permission to return to Russia to schismatics who had fled abroad with a prohibition to prosecute for a split. However, soon the policy of Peter III aroused discontent in society, restored the metropolitan society against him. The refusal of Peter III from all conquests during the victorious Seven Years' War with Prussia (1755-1762), which was waged by Elizaveta Petrovna, caused particular dissatisfaction among the officers. A conspiracy to overthrow Peter III matured in the guard. As a result of the latter in the XVIII century. The palace coup, carried out on June 28, 1762, the wife of Peter III, who became Empress Catherine II (1762-1796), was elevated to the Russian throne.

Thus, the palace coups did not entail changes in the political, and even more so the social system of society, and were reduced to the struggle for power of various noble groups pursuing their own, most often selfish interests. At the same time, the specific policy of each of the six monarchs had its own characteristics, sometimes important for the country. In general, socio-economic stabilization and foreign policy successes achieved during the reign of Elizabeth created the conditions for more accelerated development and new breakthroughs in foreign policy that would occur under Catherine II. Historians see the reasons for the palace coups in the decree of Peter I "on changing the order of succession to the throne", in the clash of corporate interests of various groups of the nobility. With a light hand, V.O. Klyuchevsky, many historians estimated the 1720s - 1750s. as a time of weakening of Russian absolutism. N.Ya. Eidelman generally considered palace coups as a kind of reaction of the nobility to a sharp increase in the independence of the state under Peter I and as historical experience showed, - he writes, referring to the "unbridled" absolutism of Peter, - that such a huge concentration of power is dangerous both for its holder and for the ruling class itself." V.O. Klyuchevsky also associated the onset of political instability after the death of Peter I with the "autocracy" of the latter, who, in particular, decided to break the traditional order of succession to the throne (when the throne passed in a straight male descending line) - by the charter of February 5, 1722, the autocrat was granted the right, to appoint his own successor of his own free will. “Rarely did autocracy punish itself so cruelly as in the person of Peter with this law on February 5,” Klyuchevsky concluded. Peter I did not have time to appoint an heir to himself, the throne, according to Klyuchevsky, turned out to be given "to chance and became his toy": it was not the law that determined who should sit on the throne, but the guard, which at that time was "the dominant force." Thus, the reasons that caused this era of upheavals and temporary workers were rooted, on the one hand, in the state of the royal family, and on the other hand, in the characteristics of the environment that managed affairs.

3. Catherine II

Catherine II was born on April 21, 1729 in the German seaside town of Stettin, died on November 6, 1796 in Tsarskoye Selo (Pushkin). Born Sophia Frederick Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst, she came from a poor German princely family. Catherine II was a rather complex and certainly outstanding personality. On the one hand, she is a pleasant and loving woman, on the other, a major statesman. From early childhood, she learned a worldly lesson - to cheat and pretend. In 1745, Catherine II adopted the Orthodox faith and was married to the heir to the Russian throne, the future Peter III. Once in Russia as a fifteen-year-old girl, she asked herself two more lessons - to master the Russian language, customs and learn to please. But with all the ability to adapt Grand Duchess it was hard: there were attacks from the empress (Elizaveta Petrovna) and neglect from her husband (Peter Fedorovich). Her pride suffered. Then Catherine turned to literature. Possessing remarkable abilities, will and diligence, she studied the Russian language, read a lot, and acquired extensive knowledge. She read a lot of books: French enlighteners, ancient authors, special works on history and philosophy, works by Russian writers. As a result, Catherine learned the ideas of the enlighteners about the public good as highest goal statesman, about the need to educate and educate his subjects, about the supremacy of laws in society. In 1754, Catherine had a son (Pavel Petrovich), the future heir to the Russian throne. But the child was taken from the mother to the apartments of the empress. In December 1761, Empress Elizaveta Petrovna died. Peter III came to the throne. Catherine II was distinguished by her enormous capacity for work, willpower, determination, courage, cunning, hypocrisy, unlimited ambition and vanity, in general, all the features that characterize a “strong woman”. She could suppress her emotions in favor of developed rationalism. She had a special talent - to win the general sympathy. Catherine slowly but surely advanced to the Russian throne, and, as a result, took away power from her husband. Soon after the accession of Peter III, unpopular among the tribal nobility, relying on the guards regiments, she overthrew him.

On June 28, 1762, a manifesto was drawn up on behalf of Catherine, speaking about the reasons for the coup, about the emerging threat to the integrity of the fatherland. 06/29/1762 Peter III signed a manifesto about his abdication. Not only the regiments of the guard, but also the Senate and the Synod readily swore allegiance to the new empress. However, among the opponents of Peter III were influential people who considered it more fair to enthrone the young Paul, and Catherine to allow her son to rule until the age of majority. At the same time, it was proposed to create an Imperial Council that would limit the power of the empress. This was not included in Catherine's plans. In order to force everyone to recognize the legitimacy of her power, she decided to be crowned in Moscow as soon as possible. The ceremony took place on September 22, 1762 at the Assumption Cathedral in the Kremlin. On this occasion, a rich meal was offered to the people. From the first days of her reign, Catherine wanted to be popular among the broadest masses of the people, she defiantly visited pilgrims, went to worship at holy places.

The reign of Catherine II is called the era of "enlightened absolutism". The meaning of enlightened absolutism lies in the policy of following the ideas of the Enlightenment, expressed in the implementation of reforms that destroyed some of the most outdated feudal institutions (and sometimes took a step towards bourgeois development). The idea of a state with an enlightened monarch, capable of transforming public life on new, reasonable principles, became widespread in the 18th century. The monarchs themselves, in the conditions of the disintegration of feudalism, the maturation of the capitalist way of life, the spread of the ideas of the Enlightenment, were forced to take the path of reforms.

The development and implementation of the principles of enlightened absolutism in Russia acquired the character of an integral state-political reform, during which a new state and legal image of an absolute monarchy was formed. At the same time, social and legal policy was characterized by class delimitation: the nobility, the bourgeoisie and the peasantry. The domestic and foreign policy of the second half of the 18th century, prepared by the events of previous reigns, was marked by important legislative acts, outstanding military events and significant territorial annexations. This is due to the activities of major statesmen and military figures: A.R. Vorontsov, P.A. Rumyantseva, A.G. Orlova, G.A. Potemkina, A.A. Bezborodko, A.V. Suvorov, F.F. Ushakov and others. Catherine II herself actively participated in public life. The thirst for power and glory was an essential motive for her activities. The policy of Catherine II in its class orientation was noble. In the 1960s, Catherine II covered up the noble essence of her policy with liberal phrases (which is typical of enlightened absolutism). The same goal was pursued by her lively relations with Voltaire and the French encyclopedists and generous monetary offerings to them.

Catherine II imagined the tasks of the “enlightened monarch” as follows: “1. It is necessary to educate the nation, which must govern. 2. It is necessary to introduce good order in the state, to support society and force it to comply with the laws. 3. It is necessary to establish a good and accurate police in the state. 4. It is necessary to promote the flowering of the state and make it abundant. 5. It is necessary to make the state formidable in itself and inspire respect for its neighbors.” But in real life, the declarations of the empress often disagreed with deeds.

4. Domestic policy of Catherine II

The main task of domestic policy Catherine II considered the reform of the central government. To this end, the Senate was divided into 6 departments and deprived of legislative initiative. Catherine II concentrated all legislative and part of the executive power in her hands.

In 1762, a manifesto "on the freedom of the nobility" was published, where the nobles were exempted from compulsory military service.

In 1764, secularization of the lands was carried out.

In 1767, the Legislative Commission was working. Catherine II convened a special commission to draw up a code of new laws of the Russian Empire instead of the Council Code of 1649. This law provided for the class structure of Russian society. But in 1768 these commissions were dissolved, no new legislation was adopted.

In 1775, in order to make it easier to manage the state, Catherine II issued the Institution for the Administration of Provinces, which strengthened the local bureaucracy and increased the number of provinces to 50. There were no more than 400 thousand inhabitants per province. Several provinces constituted the vicegerency. Governors and governors were elected by Catherine II herself from Russian nobles. They acted according to her orders. The governor's assistants were the vice-governor, two provincial councilors and the provincial prosecutor. This provincial government was in charge of all affairs. State revenues were in charge of the Treasury Chamber (revenues and expenditures of the treasury, state property, farming, monopolies, etc.). The vice-governor headed the Treasury Chamber. The provincial prosecutor was in charge of all judicial institutions. In the cities, the position of mayor appointed by the government was introduced. The province was divided into counties. Many large villages were turned into county towns. In the county, power belonged to the police captain, who was elected by the assembly of the nobility. Each county town has a court. In the provincial city, the highest court. The accused could bring a complaint to the Senate. To make it easier to pay taxes, a Treasury was opened in each county town. A system of class courts was created: for each class (nobles, townspeople, state peasants) their own special judicial institutions. Some of them introduced the principle of elected judges. The center of gravity in the management moved to the field. There was no need for a number of boards, they were abolished; the Military, Naval, Foreign and Commerce Colleges remained. The system of local government created by the provincial reform of 1775 was preserved until 1864, and the administrative-territorial division introduced by it until the October Revolution. The nobility was recognized as a special main class. Merchants and philistinism were also recognized as special estates. The nobles were supposed to carry out public service and conduct agriculture, and merchants and philistines were to engage in trade and industry. Some areas used to be governed differently, Catherine II made sure that the new legislation was introduced everywhere.

In 1785, a Letter of Complaint to the nobility was issued. “Charter on the rights of liberties and advantages of the noble Russian nobility” was a set of noble privileges, formalized by the legislative act of Catherine II of 04/21/1785. The freedom of the nobles from compulsory service was confirmed. The complete emancipation of the nobility made sense for several reasons:

1) there was a sufficient number of trained people who were knowledgeable in various matters of military and civil administration;

2) the nobles themselves were aware of the need to serve the state and considered it an honor to shed blood for the fatherland;

3) when the nobles were cut off from the lands all their lives, the farms fell into decay, which adversely affected the country's economy.

Now many of them could manage their own peasants. And the attitude towards the peasants on the part of the owner was much better than on the part of an accidental manager. The landowner was interested in ensuring that his peasants were not ruined. With a letter of grant, the nobility was recognized as the leading class in the state and exempted from paying taxes, they could not be subjected to corporal punishment, only a court of nobility could judge. Only the nobles had the right to own land and serfs, they also owned subsoil in their estates, they could engage in trade and set up factories, their houses were free from standing troops, their estates were not subject to confiscation. The nobility received the right to self-government, constituted a “noble society”, the body of which was a noble assembly, convened every three years in the province and district, which elected provincial and district marshals of the nobility, court assessors and police captains who headed the district administration. With this charter, the nobility was encouraged to participate widely in local government. Under Catherine II, the nobles occupied the positions of local executive and judicial authorities. The charter granted to the nobility was supposed to strengthen the position of the nobility and consolidate its privileges. The charter granted to the nobility testified to the desire of Russian absolutism to strengthen its social support in an atmosphere of exacerbation of class contradictions. The nobility turned into the politically dominant class in the state.

04/21/1785 - Along with the Charter to the nobility, the "Charter to the cities" saw the light of day. This legislative act of Catherine II established new elected city institutions, somewhat expanding the circle of voters. The townspeople were divided into six categories according to property and social characteristics: “real city dwellers” real estate owners from the nobility, officials, and clergy; merchants of three guilds; artisans registered in workshops; foreigners and non-residents; "eminent citizens"; “townspeople”, i.e. all other citizens who live in the city by trade or needlework. These ranks according to the Letter of Complaint to the cities received the foundations of self-government, in a certain sense similar to the foundations of the Letter of Complaint to the nobility. Once every three years, a meeting of the “city society” was convened, which included only the most wealthy citizens. The permanent city institution was the "general city council", consisting of the mayor and six vowels. Magistrates were elected judicial institutions in the cities. However, the privileges of the townspeople against the backdrop of permissiveness of the nobility turned out to be imperceptible, the city self-government bodies were tightly controlled by the tsarist administration, and the attempt to lay the foundations of the bourgeois class failed.

Catherine is a traditional figure, despite her negative attitude towards the Russian past, despite, finally, the fact that she introduced new methods of management, new ideas into public circulation. The duality of the traditions that she followed determines the dual attitude of her descendants towards her. If some, not without reason, point out that Catherine's internal activity legitimized the abnormal consequences of the dark epochs of the 18th century, others bow before the greatness of the results of her foreign policy. The historical significance of the activities of Catherine II is determined quite easily on the basis of what was said above about certain aspects of Catherine's policy. Many of her undertakings, outwardly spectacular, conceived on a grand scale, led to a modest result or gave an unexpected and often erroneous result. It can also be said that Catherine simply implemented the changes dictated by the time, continued the policy outlined in previous reigns. Or to recognize in it a paramount historical figure who took the second, after Peter I, step along the path of Europeanization of the country, and the first along the path of reforming it in the liberal-enlightenment spirit.

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In the second half of 17. Domestic and foreign policy of Russia in the second half of the XVII century

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