Bankrupts and Usurers of Imperial Russia: Debt, Property, and the Law in the Age of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy

Sergei Antonov

Published by Harvard University Press 2016

Bankrupts and Usurers of Imperial Russia

Debt, Property, and the Law in the Age of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy

Sergei Antonov

In the series Harvard Historical Studies

https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674972599

Overview
Contents

About this book

As readers of classic Russian literature know, the nineteenth century was a time of pervasive financial anxiety. With incomes erratic and banks inadequate, Russians of all social castes were deeply enmeshed in networks of credit and debt. The necessity of borrowing and lending shaped perceptions of material and moral worth, as well as notions of social respectability and personal responsibility. Credit and debt were defining features of imperial Russia’s culture of property ownership. Sergei Antonov recreates this vanished world of borrowers, bankrupts, lenders, and loan sharks in imperial Russia from the reign of Nicholas I to the period of great social and political reforms of the 1860s.

Poring over a trove of previously unexamined records, Antonov gleans insights into the experiences of ordinary Russians, rich and poor, and shows how Russia’s informal but sprawling credit system helped cement connections among property owners across socioeconomic lines. Individuals of varying rank and wealth commonly borrowed from one another. Without a firm legal basis for formalizing debt relationships, obtaining a loan often hinged on subjective perceptions of trustworthiness and reputation. Even after joint-stock banks appeared in Russia in the 1860s, credit continued to operate through vast networks linked by word of mouth, as well as ties of kinship and community. Disputes over debt were common, and Bankrupts and Usurers of Imperial Russia offers close readings of legal cases to argue that Russian courts—usually thought to be underdeveloped in this era—provided an effective forum for defining and protecting private property interests.

Author / Editor information

S. Antonov, Affiliated Scholar, Dep. of History, Queens College, City Univ. of NY and Adjunct Assistant Prof. of History, Columbia Univ.

Reviews

Sergei Antonov introduces us to an imperial Russia in which aristocratic sons borrowed from usurers for their military uniforms and gambling debts and landowners borrowed money from serfs they owned and had mortgaged as collateral for other loans. With imagination and rich detail, he shows how informal personal credit pervaded every aspect of culture, society, and government, undergirding the social order and an entire regime of private property ownership. Bankrupts and Usurers of Imperial Russia is a masterly addition to the new cultural and social history of debt.
-- Bruce H. Mann, author of Republic of Debtors: Bankruptcy in the Age of American Independence

Antonov is a pioneer in the use of sources about private moneylending as a lens onto the tsarist social order. He is a keen analyst of large-scale processes, but his book is also highly readable and brings everyday imperial Russia to life. Bankrupts and Usurers of Imperial Russia is an important scholarly intervention, one built on archival sleuthing, expertise in social and legal history, a skillful integration of Russian developments into a global context, and a solid familiarity with the Western, imperial Russian, Soviet, and post-Soviet Russian literature.
-- Alexander M. Martin, author of Enlightened Metropolis: Constructing Imperial Moscow, 1762–1855

From humble peasants to wealthy aristocrats, Russian pre-revolutionary society was permeated by the bonds of debt. Antonov’s meticulously researched and beautifully written book uncovers the circuits of unofficial credit relations that existed outside of the state banking system. It tells the stories of tragic bankruptcies and prodigious fortunes, family strife, legal battles, and reconciliations between debtors and usurers. This is an important study that fundamentally recasts our understanding of the legal regimes, economy, and sociability of credit in imperial Russia.
-- Ekaterina Pravilova, author of A Public Empire: Property and the Quest for the Common Good in Imperial Russia

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part I: The Culture of Debt
1. Usurers’ Tales Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	33
2. Nobles and Merchants Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	74
3. The Boundaries of Risk Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	105
4. Fraud, Property, and Respectability Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	133
5. Kinship and Family Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	159
Part II: Debt and the Law
6. Debtors and Bureaucrats Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	191
7. In the Pit with Debtors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	228
8. Intermediaries, Lawyers, and Scriveners Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	261
9. Creditors and Debtors in Pre-Reform Courts Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	284
Conclusion Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	311
Appendix A: Glossary Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	317
Appendix B: The Table of Ranks (as of 1850) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	319
Appendix C: St. Petersburg Pawnbrokers, 1866 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	321
Appendix D.1: Objectives of Legal Representation, Based on the Powers of Attorney Registered at the Moscow Chamber of Civil Justice Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	323
Appendix D.2: Legal Representatives Registered at the Moscow Chamber of Civil Justice Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	325
Appendix E: Agreement to Provide Legal Services, 1865 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	327
Notes. Abbreviations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	329
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	373
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	377

Language: English
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 350
Illustrations
- Other: 6 halftones, 14 tables

eBook

Published: October 10, 2016
ISBN: 9780674972599