This article explores the notion of discipline in Russia since the late 17th century and up to the accession of Catherine II. Discipline and disciplining occupy a central place in our thinking about early modern state, and the reconstruction of debates about school building helps to illuminate...

Radical “Westernizing” transformations in extra-European countries, from Peter I’s Russia to Meiji Japan, are traditionally presented as a response to threats from the more militarily and technologically advanced European powers. This corresponds to the general tendency to view war as the...

This study employs a unique database covering 2,293 cadets who graduated from the Noble Land Cadet Corps in St Petersburg from 1732-1762 to investigate the role of cultural capital in early modern Russia. Our analysis suggests that within this sample cultural capital was negatively correlated...

V. K. Trediakovskii’s translation of Paul Tallement Voyage de lisle d’amour occupies a special place in the history of Russian 18th-century literature: it is often credited with creating a new vocabulary of love and amorous intercourse, an innovation that would pave the way for much of the...

This essay focuses on debates about the proper rules and procedures of promotion in military service from Peter I's reign and into the 1740s. It begins by considering the meaning of such peculiar Petrine innovation as selection of candidates for promotion through “elections” and the...

This preprint is divided on three issues: A) a poll tax in Russia as an indicator of the effectiveness of the state B) Description of data and assessing the overall level of "nedoimochnost" in the post-Petrine period C) Factors affecting the collection of the poll tax in the post-Petrine period

In this paper we use the records of the Heraldry and the Noble Land Cadet Corps to explore the career and educational choices made by Russian nobles in the 1730s and 1740s. We make use of the fact that after the 1736-7 reform of noble service, young members of the elite were allowed to express...

This study employs a unique database covering 2,293 cadets who graduated from the Noble Land Cadet Corps in St Petersburg from 1732 – 1762 to investigate the role of cultural capital in early modern Russia. Our analysis suggests that within this sample cultural capital was negatively...