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Publication detail

Russian nobility and its self-presentation in the final years of the Tsarist regime

Authors: Vydra Zbyněk

Year: 2014

Type of publication: ostatní - přednáška nebo poster

Page from-to: nestránkováno

Titles:

Language	Name	Abstract	Keywords
eng	Russian nobility and its self-presentation in the final years of the Tsarist regime	As a ruling class for centuries, nobility created a complex system of symbols and rituals which jointly formed the (political) culture in Russia. Especially during the second half of the 19th century, the position of nobility was gradually, but substantially, changed. Russian society evolved towards a civic society, mainly as a consequence of the Great Reforms of the 1860’s. Nobility, traditionally the most prominent social estate (soslovie), was confronted with peasant’s emancipation, the emergence of bourgeoisie and its rising influence. Therefore its dominant public role was challenged. The paper is focused on the public role of Russian nobility in the final years of the tsarist regime. Author analyses several ways of nobility’s self-presentation towards the public and tries to answer the question how far the “portrait of nobility” was real and imagined. The analysis is based on various primary sources, foremost on the journal Stolitsa i usad’ba (City and country estate). The journal was published in the years 1913-1917, designed as a journal of “beau monde”, and tried to present the crucial role of the nobility in Russia’s past and present political, social and cultural life. Nonetheless such presentation was full of contradictions. The publishers declared that journal is “non-political” and “non-class”, but with the emphasis on the nobility and its distinctive role in the past and present, it hardly could compete with the values of lower classes. If the nobility was able to cooperate with the industrialists and educated classes and create new civic elite, it remained an old enemy for the peasants. The lower classes refused the elite as a whole and the cultural scenario presented by Stolitsa i usa’dba had no future in the revolutionary Russia.	Russia - nobility - first world war - cultural history - collective memory