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Inheritance in Muscovy in XVIth Century

Student: Kamentseva Veronika

Supervisor: Adrian A. Selin

Faculty: Saint-Petersburg School of Social Sciences

Educational Programme: History (Bachelor)

Final Grade: 9

Year of Graduation: 2018

This project involves discovering how inheritance occurred in the 16th century. The goal is to show common inheritance practices and, moreover, similarities and differences between inheritance legislation and everyday practice, which sometimes used customary law. This has been done by examining legislative sources (Sudebniks of 1497, 1550, 1589) and wills (‘duhovnye gramoty’). The methodology of the research includes formular analysis of wills and comparison of trends revealed in wills with legislative sources. Upon examination of these sources, it becomes clear that wills are the main representative source of inheritance. They reflect social, family and ownership structure of Early New Modern Muscovy’s society. It was found out that although according to the law the estate (‘pomestie’) was conditional land ownership, in practice it was sometimes inherited. In addition, it was found that women actively participated in the inheritance on a par with men. Through showing common inheritance practices in the 16th century, this research continues the discussion about the nature of property and power in Early New Modern Muscovy.

Full text (added May 25, 2018)

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