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Crime and Punishment in the Russian Village: Rural Concepts of Criminality at the End of the Nineteenth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Cathy Frierson
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Extract

On 23 April 1873, the peasant Kuz'ma Rudchenko was found near the village of Brusovka. His head was completely crushed, his hands had been chopped off, and the plank that had been used to beat him had been thrust through his anus, piercing the full length of his body and extruding from his gaping mouth. In 1881, in the village of Mukhovitsie, Kiev province, peasants apprehended a thief and sliced the tendons in his right leg and left hand. In the same year and province, in the village of Iazvinkie, the peasants carved a special toothed stake, so that it resembled a series of arrowheads on one shaft. They then shoved it up the rectum of a suspected thief, with the arrows positioned so that he could not remove it.

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Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 46 , Issue 1 , Spring 1987 , pp. 55 - 69
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1987

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References

The research for this article was made possible by support through the IREX and the Fulbright-Hays programs, as well as by the generous and intelligent assistance of the archival staff of the State Museum of Ethnography of the Peoples of the U.S.S.R. in Leningrad.

1. E. Iakushkin, Obychnoe pravo, 4 vols. (Iaroslavl', 1896) 2: 74 and 88.

2. Samosud represents the Russian manifestation of the phenomenon of self-help, of which Sidney Post Simpson and Julius Stone wrote, “Self-help is in time as well as in reason the predecessor of social control. And though the latter was never completely absent in any society we know about, thegrowth of politically organized society can be measured precisely by the extent that that form of social control which we term law has superseded self-redress,” Simpson, and Stone, , Cases and Readings on Law and Society in Three Books, Book One: Law and Society in Evolution (St. Paul, 1948), p. 3 Google Scholar.

3. The most important early survey of rural practices in justice was the Senatorial Commissionof 1872, which published its findings in Trudy komissii po preobrazovaniiu volostnykh sudov (St.Petersburg, 1873–1874). The Ethnographic Department of the Russian Geographic Society sponsoredseveral individuals who studied rural justice and published their findings either as separate monographsor as part of the society's serial publications: Such was P.P. Chubinskii's Trudy etnograficheskostatisticheskoi ekspeditsii v zapadno-russkii krai (St. Petersburg, 1872). Scholars wrote lengthy studiesbased on these materials: Pakhman, S. V., Obychnoe grazhdanskoe pravo v Rossii, Iuridicheskie ocherki, 2 vols. (St. Petersburg, 1877 and 1879Google Scholar); Orshanskii, I.G., Issledovaniia po russkomu pravu obychnomu i brachnomu (St. Petersburg, 1879)Google Scholar. There were numerous others, as well as articles in the legal andliterary-journalistic journals of the day.

4. See, for example, the following of many possible references: Trudy komissii 3: 20, 7: 190–191;Chubinskii, Trudy, pp. vii-viii; G. F., “Po voprosu o preobrazovanii volostnykh sudov,” Otechestvennye zapiski, January 1873, p. 88; K. N. Zh—, “Nuzhno li sokhranit’ volostnye sudy?” Iuridicheskii vestnik, March 1873, p. 26; E. Iakushkin, “Volostnye sudy v Iaroslavskoi gubernii,” Iuridicheskii vestnik, March 1872, pp. 7–8.

5. The Tenishev Bureau sent an extensive questionnaire on peasant culture to local officials in1898. The responses to this questionnaire are in the Archive of the Museum of Ethnography of thePeoples of the USSR in Leningrad as the Tenishev Fund. The geographic society published twocollections from similar surveys: Zapiski IRGO, Sbornik narodnykh iuridicheskikh obychaev, 2 vols. (St. Petersburg, 1878–1900). The Society of Admirers of Natural Science, Anthropology, and Ethnography published three major volumes of materials resulting from its survey: Sbornik svedenii dlia izucheniia byta krest'ianskogo naseleniia Rossii, 3 vols. (Moscow, 1889–1891).

6. The description of the fond in the archive states that there are 1, 866 manuscripts from twentythree provinces. My figures come from Nachinkin, N., “Materialy‘Etnograficheskogo biuro’ V.N.Tenisheva,” Sovetskaia etnografia no. 1 (1955): 161 Google Scholar. This source provides a breakdown, by province, of the manuscripts in the archive.

7. A. A. Leont'ev was perhaps the most consistent critic of the notion of customary law as anykind of norm, arguing that there was no consistency within the same village, much less in villages from different regions. See, for example, his Volostnoi sud i iuridicheskie obychai krest'ian (St. Petersburg, 1895). This theme was also taken up in the Witte commissions on the subject of the volost’ court. See A. A. Rittikh, comp., Svod trudov mestnykh komitetov po 49 guberniiam Evropeiskoi Rossii. Tom 17: Krest'ianskii pravoporiadok (St. Petersburg, 1904), pp. 21–63. For discussion of other statementsof this view, see my article, “Rural Justice in Russia: The Volost’ Court Debate, 1861–1912,” Slavonic and East European Review (October 1986).

8. Cathy A. Frierson, “Volost’ Court Activity at the End of the Nineteenth Century,” paperpresented at the NEH Conference on Recent Studies on the Russian Peasantry, Boston, August 1986.

9. Svod trudov mestnykh komitetov po 49 guberniiam Evropeiskoi Rossii, 23 vols., vol. 17, Rittikh, A. A., Krest'ianskii pravoporiadok (St. Petersburg, 1904), pp. 11–61 Google Scholar.

10. Archive of the State Museum of Ethnography of the Peoples of the USSR, fond 7, opii 1, delo 1, 691 (Smolensk), p. 9.

11. See my article “Rural Justice in Russia” for a discussion of the hopes of jurists, populists, and bureaucrats for the development of legal consciousness among the peasantry.

12. S. V. Pakhman, “Ocherk narodnykh iuridicheskikh obychaev Smolenskoi gubernii,” Zapiski IRGO, Sbornik obychaev (1900), p. 93; Tenishev, delo 651 (Nizhnii Novgorod), pp. 1–5, and 1457 (Riazan), p. 35.

13. Pakhman, Obychnoe grazhdanskoe pravo (1877), p. 348.

14. E. T. Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie i nakazanie po poniatiam krest'ian Povolzh'ia,” in ZapiskiIRGO, Sbornik obychaev (1900), p. 279.

15. Aleksandra Efimenko was one of the first students of peasant attitudes toward justice toconclude that this was the case, in her Issledovaniia narodnoi zhizni. Vypusk pervyi: Obychnoe pravo (Moscow, 1884), pp. 34–37.

16. This was Peter Czap's conclusion on the principles that guided the judges on the volost’ court when they judged civil offenses; it is also true for criminal deeds, as the following discussionwill demonstrate. On attitudes toward civil offenses, see Czap, Peter, “Peasant-Class Courts and Peasant Customary Justice in Russia, 1861–1912,” Journal of Social History 1, no. 2 (1967): 149–179.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

17. Tenishev, delo 209 (Vologda), p. 11; 259 (Vologda), p. 18; 1021 (Orel), p. 14; 1179 (Orel), p.14; 432 (Orel), p. 1; 515 (Kaluga), p. 1; 940 (Orel), p. 2; 983 (Orel), p. 2; 1708 (Smolensk), p. 11; 1760 (Iaroslavl’), p. 11; 529 (Kaluga), p. 6; 604 (Kostroma), p. 9; 654 (Nizhnii Novgorod), p. 1; 737 (Novgorod), p. 8; 768 (Novgorod), p. 6; 794 (Novgorod), p. 12; 817 (Novgorod), p. 12.

18. Ibid., delo 1760 (Iaroslavl’), p. 10; 432 (Orel), pp. 2 and 4; 451 (Viatka), p. 6; 529 (Kaluga), p. 4; 604 (Kostroma), p. 8; 743 (Novgorod), p. 3; 817 (Novgorod), p. 8; and A. A. Titov, Iuridicheskie obychai sela Nikola-perevoz, Sulotskoi volosli. Rostovskogo uezda (Iaroslavl', 1888), p. 94; and V. N.Bondarenko, “Ocherki Kirsanovskogo uezda. Tambovskoi gub., I-II,” Etnogra/icheskoe obozrenie, no. 3 (1890): 74–75.

19. Tenishev, delo 1007 (Orel), p. 2; 1443 (Riazan), p. 17; 1460 (Riazan’), p. 20.

20. Ibid., delo 1387 (Penza), p. 2.

21. Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie i nakazanie,” p. 277.

22. Tenishev, delo 432 (Orel), p. 1; 577 (Kostroma), p. 2; 1691 (Smolensk), p. 13.

23. Ibid., delo 794 (Novgorod), p. 1.

24. Ibid., delo 156 (Vologda), p. 13; 652 (Novgorod), pp. 14–15.

25. Ibid., dela 221 (Vologda), p. 7; 1387 (Penza), p. 2; 1486 (Saratov), p. 16; 737 (Novgorod), p.22; 794 (Novgorod), p. 11; 940 (Orel), p. 2; 1001 (Orel), p. 6; 1460 (Riazan), p. 20.

26. Ibid., delo 794 (Novgorod), p. 11.

27. Ibid., 831 (Novgorod), p. 11; see also Titov, Iuridicheskie obychai sela Nikola-perevoz, p. 96.

28. Tenishev, delo 794 (Novgorod), p. 12.

29. Tenishev, delo 221 (Vologda), p. 7; 652 (Novgorod), p. 5; 737 (Novgorod), p. 8, 794 (Novgorod), p. 10; Titov, Iuridicheskie obychai sela Nikola-perevoz, p. 94; and Bondarenko, “OcherkiKirsanovskogo uezda,” p. 79.

30. Tenishev, delo 1691 (Smolensk), p. 15.

31. Ibid., delo 173 (Vologda), p. 43; 422 (Viatka), p. 5; 432 (Orel), p. 3; 529 (Kaluga), p. 6; 654 (Nizhnii Novgorod), p. 14; 983 (Orel), p. 6.

32. Ibid., delo 794 (Novgorod), p. 20; 817 (Novgorod), pp. 14–15; 1457 (Riazan), p. 37; 1708 (Smolensk), p. 21.

33. P. N. Obninskii, “V oblasti sueverii i predrassudkov (ocherk iz byta sovremennoi derevni),” Iuridicheskii vestnik, October 1890, pp. 361–362.

34. Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie i nakazanie,” p. 279. Iakushkin also includes several incidents of murdering sorcerers and witches. Iakushkin, Obychnoe pravo (1896), p. 76, for example.

35. Tenishev, delo 221 (Vologda), p.7.

36. Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie i nakazanie,” p. 281.

37. Bondarenko, “Ocherki Kirsanovskogo uezda,” p. 76.

38. See Tenishev, delo 415 (Viatka), p. 4, for one explicit statement of this pattern. See below forfurther examples.

39. Ibid., delo 1486 (Saratov), p. 16; 451 (Viatka), p. 2; 475 (Kazan’), p. 1; 1691 (Smolensk), p.13; Titov, Iuridicheskie obychai sela Nikola-perevoz, p. 95; and Bondarenko, “Ocherki Kirsanovskogo uezda,” pp. 85–86.

40. Tenishev, dela 160 (Vologda), p. 11; 1387 (Penza), p. 5; 1179 (Orel), p. 7; 1708 (Smolensk), p. 18; 831 (Novgorod), p. 15; 794 (Novgorod), p. 16; 604 (Kostroma), p. 9; 737 (Novgorod), p. 11;1760 (Iaroslavl’), p. 13; 1809 (Iaroslavl’), p. 30; Bondarenko, “Ocherki Kirsanovskogo uezda,” p. 76.

41. Bondarenko, “Ocherki Kirsanovskogo uezda,” p. 77; Titov, Iuridicheskie obychai sela Nikolaperevoz, p. 106.

42. “Konokradstvo kak organizovannyi promysel,” Iuridicheskaia gazeta, no. 45 (1892): 2.

43. Tenishev, delo 451 (Viatka), p. 9; 1753 (Iaroslavl’), p. 8; 651 (Nizhnii Novgorod), pp. 6–18;Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie i nakazanie,” p. 287; and N. V. Teslenko, “O sudoproizvodstve po obychnomupravu belorussov,” Etnograficheskoe obozrenie, no. 3 (1893), 43.

44. Tenishev, delo 652 (Nizhnii Novgorod), p. 3; Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie i nakazanie,” pp.281–282; Bondarenko, “Ocherki Kirsanovskogo uezda,” p. 83.

45. Iakushkin, Obychnoe pravo (1896), pp. 69ff., including more than two hundred newspaperreports of samosud between 1860 and 1889.

46. G. I. Uspenskii, Sobranie sochinenii, 9 vols. (Moscow, 1956) 4: 151–152.

47. See Evgenia Vsevolzhskaia, “Ocherki krest'ianskogo byta Samarskogo uezda,” Etnograficheskoe obozrenie, no. 1 (1895): 31, for one of many descriptions of this phenomenon.

48. Tenishev, delo 422 (Viatka), 529 (Kaluga), 631 (Kursk); 794 (Novgorod), 831 (Novgorod), 935 (Orel), 983 (Orel), 1007 (Orel), 1128 (Orel), 1486 (Saratov), 1500 (Saratov), 1147 (Orel), 1408 (Pskov), 1691 (Smolensk), 1711 (Smolensk), 151 (Vologda), 308 (Vologda).

49. Ibid., delo 1 (Vladimir), 1125 (Orel), 1023 (Orel), 308 (Vologda), 242 (Vologda), 173 (Vologda), 124 (Vologda), 1747 (Iaroslavl’), 1708 (Smolensk), 1147 (Orel), 1500 (Saratov), 1400 (Penza), 561 (Kostroma), 529 (Kaluga), 515 (Kaluga).

50. Ibid., delo 794 (Novgorod), 908 (Orel), 960 (Orel), 1760 (Iaroslavl’), 216 (Vologda), 242 (Vologda), 308 (Vologda), 1023 (Orel), 1125 (Orel).

51. Ibid., delo 151 (Vologda), 1007 (Orel), 216 (Vologda), 794 (Novgorod), 831 (Novgorod).

52. Ibid., delo 1747 (Iaroslavl’), 167 (Vologda), 1125 (Orel), 653 (Nizhnii Novgorod).

53. Ibid., delo 1486 (Saratov), p. 22; 561 (Kostroma), p. 4. These represent two of the numerous descriptions of this pattern in the Tenishev Archive.

54. Vsevolozhskaia, “Ocherki krest'ianskogo,” p. 31.

55. Titov, Iuridicheskie obychai sela Nikola-perevoz, pp. 110–111.

56. Tenishev, delo 631 (Kursk), p. 71.

57. Ibid., delo 1500 (Saratov); pp. 6–7.

58. Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie i nakazanie,” pp. 281, 70, 99, 85.

59. Teslenko, “O sudoproizvodstve,” p. 42.

60. Tenishev, delo 515 (Kaluga), p. 2.

61. Iakushkin, Obychnoe pravo (1896), p. 74.

62. Tenishev, delo 908 (Orel), pp. 15–17.

63. Ibid., delo 1068 (Orel), pp. 4–5; 218 (Vologda), pp. 13–14; and Solov'ev, “Prestuplenie inakazanie,” pp. 280–281.

64. Tenishev, delo 794 (Novgorod), p. 37.

65. Ibid., delo 831 (Novgorod), p. 6.

66. Ibid., delo 151 (Vologda), pp. 25–26.

67. Iakushkin, Obychnoe pravo (1896), p. 74.

68. Tenishev, delo 1125 (Orel), p. 3.

69. Tenishev, delo 216 (Vologda), p. 159; 1032 (Orel), p. 35; 475 (Kazan’), p. 7; 794 (Novgorod), p. 8; 1125 (Orel), p. 3; and E. Solov'ev, “Samosudy u krest'ian Chistopol'skogo uezda, Kazanskoigubernii,” Zapiski RGO, Sbornik obychaev (1878), p. 15.

70. Tenishev, delo 216 (Vologda), p. 159.

71. Ibid., delo 1128 (Orel), p. 15.

72. Ibid., delo 218 (Vologda), pp. 13–14; 1125 (Orel), p. 3; 167 (Vologda), p. 4; 529 (Kaluga), p. 12.

73. Ibid., delo 908 (Orel), pp. 15–17. Eating earth was a favored oath among the peasants; seeS. V. Maksimov, Nechistaia, nevedomaia, i krestnaia si/a (St. Petersburg, 1903), pp. 257–258.

74. Tenishev, delo 150 (Vologda), p. 1; 167 (Vologda), pp. 15–18, 1125 (Orel), p. 4.

75. Esipov, Vladimir Vladimirovich, Grekh i prestuplenie, sviatotatstvo i krazha (St. Petersburg, 1894), pp. 162–167 Google Scholar. For example, in formal law as in popular belief, crimes committed at night wereconsidered more serious because they indicated premeditation.