Russian civil society in XXI century

On the 26th, January we continued with our historical lectures.
Now it's time to talk about Russian society transformation.
And the best topic we could choose for the lecture was about it.

The next lecture will be on 31st, January at 7 PM. Talk-club.ru

Christmas in January?

Today Russian Orthodox believers celebrate Christmas.

But why January?

It’s an interesting historical fact.

Until1582 people used the Julian calendar in Europe.

The Gregorian calendar was soon adopted by most Catholic countries (e.g. Spain, Portugal, Poland, most of Italy) and then by the Protestant ones.

In Russia the Gregorian calendar was accepted after the October Revolution in 1918.

On 24 January 1918 the Council of People's Commissars issued a Decree that Wednesday, 31 January 1918 was to be followed by Thursday, 14 February 1918, thus dropping 13 days from the calendar.

(The Decree, 1918)

Ok, but what’s up with Christmas?

Our Russian Orthodox Church didn’t change its Julian calendar and didn't drop those 13 days!

It means that today they have the 25^th, December.

The thing is that the clergy and the secular calendar differs.

Look at their web-site patriarchia.ru and find their calendar there.

Serfdom

Now you see that a new dynasty - The Romanovs - tried to find supporters which was quite reasonable. But what to distribute?
They thought it should be people.
From the 17th century a part of Russians became things - they could be bought, sold, changed, etc.
It was differnent from other countries: ususally serfs didn't belong to the main nationality of the state they lived in. E.g.: USA - from Africa, in Europe - from Africa or India and other colonies.
I could hardly imagine a Swedish landlord posessing another swedish man.

Serfdom

Hi,

We continue with serfdom.
It was confirmed in the 17th century when a new dynasty - The Romanovs - came to power.
Just imagine, you're a new tsar (cyrillic for "king"), what would you do to attract supporters and other people?
Would you give them money or lands?

Please, think on it, and tomorrow I'll continue with it.

The beginning of 19th century

Hello,
here I continue with Russin history.

The beginning of the 19th century was quite unhappy.
In 1801 Emperor Pavel I was killed by his own people. In school we just study the fact "he was killed and his son succeeded". But what was the reason for such a crime?
As we know, it was nearly the 2nd case of leader killing in Modern History of Russia. What terrible did he do to be killed?

In the beginning of the 19th century Russia was a friend of England, also Pavel started to be a leader of Sovereign Military Order of Malta. Englishmen cooperated with Russia (as we were friends) against Napoleon and took Malta island which was under french occupation.
Pavel was furious! How could they take his island?
He changed his mind and cooperated with Napoleon against England.

This seemed good through the eyes of Pavel I, but it was an economical destruction in merchants' eyes: 3/4 of all wheat grains (the main sourse which was exported (as oil now) were exported to England.

Now some historians think - there was a plot among richest merchants which aimed to kill Pavel I, some think that Russian people (especially aristocracy) were too tired of his madness (he used to prohibit french dresses/things, etc.), after he turned to France - he sent a military troop to India to fight against England there.

Anyway - one dark night Pavel I was killed. His son, Alexander, who succeeded him, had known about the plot, and later was blamed for it.
From Alexander's time Russia started to lead reasonable policy. Except one thing - peasantry, as we had serfdom.

Peasantry serfdom will be the next topic.

The XIX century in Russian history

Hello dear friends,
the whole October will be devoted to the XIX century - the key point in Russian history.
In the XIX century our country turned into capitalism, became a motherland of such geniuses as Pushkin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Turgenev, Stanislavsky, Tchaikovsky, Mendeleev, etc.
What political/economical/social processes did we have?
What was a role of emperors?
Did we have alternatives? And what alternatives did we have?
How such a country could turn to the Revolution?

All thes questions will be highlighted in October in this historical blog of MoscowMania.

Feek free to ask any questions. We hope to see you at our walks!

History shouldn't be boring!

Hello,
We're starting our historical blog. I'll post here everything that's connected with Russian history. The main aim is to explain history quite clear through your own experience and feelings. Believe me, it's something special.
That's what we do in MoscowMania - create a definitely new approach of explanation.

See you in our blog!