Osadnyj spisok 1618 goda. [Die Belagerungsliste von 1618.] Sostaviteli toma: Jurij V. Anchimjuk, Andrej P. Pavlov. Moskva Varšava: Drevlechranilišče, 2009. 683 S., Tab. = Pamjatniki istorii vostočnoj Evropy. Istočniki XV

Osadnyj spisok 1618 goda. [Die Belagerungsliste von 1618.] Sostaviteli toma: Jurij V. Anchimjuk, Andrej P. Pavlov. Moskva Varšava: Drevlechranilišče, 2009. 683 S., Tab. = Pamjatniki istorii vostočnoj Evropy. Istočniki XV–XVII vekov, 8. ISBN: 978-5-93646-159-0.

Although the half-hearted attempt of prince Ladislas (future king of Poland Ladislas IV) to capture Moscow in October 1618 did not amount to much, militarily speaking, the siege of Moscow proved to be an event of major political importance. This is why the publication by Ankhimiuk and Pavlov of the “1618 siege roll” (osadnyi spisok) is of particular interest.

One of the objectives of Ladislas was to put to the test the loyalty of his Russian subjects. Regularly elected in 1610, he remained, formally at least, tsar of Muscovy. True, his troops had been driven out of Moscow by force in 1612, but was there no hope of recovering lost ground? Conversely, the very young dynasty of which tsar Mihail Fedorovich Romanov was the founder was not too sure of its followers. The land was still in turmoil: as late as July 1615, Moscow had been, once again, besieged by cossacks, and not a few Russian nobles assisted Ladislas in his campaign.

Nevertheless, the defenders of Moscow, among them the major part of the Muscovite elite, stood fast. After an unsuccessful attempt on the Arbatskie gates (October 4; all dates in this review are in the Julian calendar), Ladislas gave up, and talks began as early as October 20. No wonder, the Russian government wished to reward their subjects, thus showing gratitude, and at the same time laying a foundation for future loyalty. Since the Treasury was short of money, the authorities resorted to rewards in land: every noble or official who had taken part in the defence of the city and possessed a pomest’e (an estate held on condition of service) would be given in full ownership (“in votchina”) 20 % of the acreage his rank and past services entitled him to hold. Previous rulers, Vasilii Shuiskii and Sigismund III (in the name of Ladislas), had likewise granted land to their followers.

A siege roll, i. e. a list of defenders to be rewarded, was compiled by the Military service chancellery (Razriad) and completed on April 19, 1619 (p. 11). It survived the catastrophic fire of 1626, and historian Gerhard Friedrich Müller (in Russian “Miller”) had it copied in the XVIII century. The original document was then destroyed in the fire of 1812, so that Ankhimiuk and Pavlov had to rely on the only manuscript extant, i. e. Miller’s copy, for this first edition. The copy was accurate enough, but the original itself had been damaged: a number of stol’niki and striapchie, as well as two dvoriane moskovskie at least, were missing. The editors have accordingly interpolated 46 names (p. 32–35), taken from other documents. The siege roll, thus reconstructed, includes 1950 individuals; another 109 defenders, too late to be entered in the osadnyi spisok before April 19, are listed in annex I. Therefore, out of the strength of more than 11,000 men assigned to guard the city walls – 11,163, if we are to trust the figures of the Military chancellery (Knigi razriadnye po offitsial’nym onym spiskam. Vol. 1. Sankt-Peterburg 1853, col. 504–519) –, 2059 only were deemed worthy of reward. Since no outstanding feat of arms has been recorded, and none of the rank and file or common town-dwellers appears in the roll, we may safely conclude that the beneficiaries were chosen on social grounds: the rewards went to the elite, not only to the sovereign’s court, but also to minor chancellery clerks (pod’iachie), petty country squires, servitors in the Palace and other second-rate officials, as well as to cossack atamans.

Putting the tsar’s gift in practice was a protracted business, yet unfinished well into the 1630’s. It was entrusted to the Land service chancellery (Pomestnyi prikaz), which collected data on the service men’s estates, worked out which villages or hamlets corresponded to a fifth of the appointed surface and finally issued a formal charter to that effect. A document, registering all grants given to the defenders of Moscow in 1618, was kept in the Land chancellery; unfortunately, it got lost in the 1626 fire (p. 13). In order to check if the rewards had been actually received by service men, the editors had to turn to other sources: the archives of the Seal chancellery (Pechatnyi prikaz) and the numerous cadastres (pistsovye knigi) which describe minutely the estates of the Muscovite gentry. They nearly always indicate the status of the land, and how the current owner acquired it – in our case, the land is dubbed “reward-estate” (vysluzhennaia votchina). The authors have perused 250 cadastres, covering 100 districts (p. 14–16). The results of this tremendous effort are:

–The osadnyi spisok itself, pp. 28–104; 1950 names.
–Annex I: the defenders acknowledged as such after April 19, 1619, pp. 107–110; 109 names.
–Annex II: a list of individuals rewarded for the 1618 siege, according to the cadastres and the Seal chancellery archives, pp. 101–202; 1475 names, plus 213 dubious cases listed in Annex VI, pp. 521–533.
–Annex III: combines the data of the osadnyi spisok with those of Annex II; pp. 203–385, 2478 names.
–Annex IV: a reconstructed list of the land grants by tsar Vasilii Shuiskii, rewarding for the defence of Moscow (1608–1610), pp. 386–506; 1776 names. Dubious cases in Annex VII, pp. 534–545, 336 names.
–Annex V: individuals rewarded during the Time of troubles for other services, pp. 507–520; 122 names.

These lists frequently overlap, but they do not coincide. Only 1007 names, out of 1950 listed in the siege roll, could be found in cadastres, whereas of the 1475 individuals in Annex II, 530 are not mentioned either by the main roll or in Annex I. This can be due partly to the often unpredictable methods of Muscovite chancelleries in general, partly to missing documents and probably also to favoritism, corruption, and the sheer stubbornness of the applicants.

The value of this remarkable tool put at the disposal of historians of early modern Russian society can hardly be exaggerated. In the first place, it is a “Who is who”, the most comprehensive to-date, of the Russian elite at the beginning of XVII century, much more so than the Court-books (boiarskie knigi) or Court-rolls (boiarskie spiski). To be sure, these do list all the courtiers, or members of the sovereign’s court, and not only those who defended Moscow. But they do not include the pages (zhil’tsy), the provincial gentry, or such little-known categories as the staff of the imperial stables (the Equerry chancellery archives have been lost), palatial servants at large, or the retinue of the female members of the dynasty.

At the same time, it provides unique information on Muscovite landowning. If one adds to the volume under review previously published land grants by Sigismund III (Akty, otnosiashchiesia k istorii Zapadnoi Rossii [AZR]. Vol. 4 (1588–1632). Sankt-Peterburg, 1851, n° 183, pp. 320–427 (“Zhalovannye i drugie gramoty pol’skogo korolia Sigismunda moskovskim sanovnikam […] na otchiny i pomest’ia […]”); L. M.Sukhotin: Zemel’nye pozhalovaniia v Moskovskom gosudarstve 1610–1611. Moskva, 1911 [independent volume], or in Chteniia v Moskovskom obshchestve istorii i drevnostei rossiiskih [ChtOIDR], 1911, 4: Smutnoe vremia Moskovskogo gosudarstva, 8; index to the AZR documents, pp. 131–151), the soundings of Stepan B. Veselovskii in Arzamas district (S. B. Veselovskii (ed.): Arzamasskie pomestnye akty 1578–1618 gg. Moskva, 1916, independent volume, or in ChtOIDR, 1916, 1: Smutnoe vremia Moskovskogo gosudarstva, 4), and the very substantial collection of noblemen’s archives compiled by Anton V. Antonov: Akty sluzhilyh zemlevladel’tsev XV – nachala XVII vv. Vol. 1–4. Moskva, 1997–2008. The end of XVI – beginning of XVII century documents are by far the most numerous. Index to vol. 1–3 in: Russkii diplomatarii 8. Moskva, 2002), we may consider agrarian history of Russia during the Time of troubles and the early years of tsar Mihail Fedorovich’s reign as exceptionally well documented.

The authors of “Osadnyi spisok 1618 goda”, published in 2009, did not have the opportunity of cross-checking their data with those of the 46 “Record Books of Property” (zapisnye votchinnye knigi) kept by the Land service chancellery between 1626 and 1657. These have preserved the proceedings of 2139 land transactions of all kinds (sale/purchase, mortgage, dowry, legacies, etc.) The catalogue, mostly compiled by A. V. Antonov (Zapisnye votchinnye knigi Pomestnogo prikaza 1626–1657 gg. A. V. Antonov, A. Berelowitch, V. D. Nazarov (ed.) Moskva, 2010, 1658 p.), enables the reader to learn what happened to the reward-estates granted in 1619 and later. Incidentally, it sometimes supplies further data on the rewarded: e. g. Fedor, Gleb’s son, Lever’ev, a majordomo in the palatial Kitchens (putnyi kliuchnik Kormovogo dvortsa). He appears in the siege roll (p. 98), but no mention of his estate has been found in the cadastres (p. 286). However, according to Record Book of Property n° 5970, his widow, who in 1626 had mortgaged the reward-estate to secure a loan of 50 roubles and failed to repay the money, was compelled to give up the land to her creditor, another majordomo in the same Kitchens (pp. 35–36.). A copy “word for word” of the original charter, dated September 23, 1619, which granted to Lever’ev six hamlets and three halves of hamlets in Vologda district, features among the supporting documents (RGADA, f. 1209, op. 4, kn. 5970, fols. 63–71).

“Osadnyi spisok 1618 goda” confirms the current, unmistakable trend of Russian historiography dealing with the early modern period. Nearly half a century ago, Iurii Alekseev’s book on the “social history of North-Eastern Russia” created a sensation, because it proposed a detailed regional monography instead of global, and often hollow, generalizations (Iu. G. Alekseev: Agrarnaia i sotsial’naia istoriia severo-vostochnoi Rusi XV–XVI vv. Pereiaslavskii uezd. Moskva, Leningrad, 1966). He has had many successors, from 1966 onward. In the second half of the 1980’s, Russian historiography has taken a new turn. It deals now, for choice, with clans, families, and, whenever possible, individuals, applying more and more refined analysis to prepare the synthesis to come, which will be more reliable because grounded in concrete facts. The truly remarkable feat of erudition performed by Ankhimiuk and Pavlov will no doubt prove extremely helpful for this kind of research.

André Berelowitch, Paris