1. | May 30, 2014

This web site really has all of the information I wanted about this subject and didn't know who to ask.

2. | Mar 15, 2014

, decrees as pncteerage of total, while useful to know, still wouldn't tell the whole story, since it wouldn't tell us about whose laws didn't make the cut. And even if we had estimates of the latter which of course would be very useful there's always the case that the one thing that's crucial to somebody gets left out, because it seems too personal, temporary, or trivial (to later editors). In the end, it seems the basic unity of administrative, executive and legislative functions makes the whole idea of a complete collection very complex. Almost any imperial action could be law, it seems and then how could you collect or publish that? It's almost like the problem of the , rather than the problem of how to edit the complete Dostoevskii.It will be great to hear about your work in this venue I suspect that our projects have a lot of common issues between them.

3. | Mar 14, 2014

That was fascinating hoesntly, I think I could fall in love with trivia for its own sake, because it's like getting a few more pieces of a gigantic jigsaw puzzle.Talking about why these men returned . I can think of a couple of possibilities. For one, unless they settled in areas with sizeable Russian enclaves, they had probably encountered isolation and loneliness. An amnesty that meant they could not only go home but be free would settle all their problems at once supposedly. Second, they had entered on a voluntary self-exile, but there does seem to be a strong theme in Russian culture that being exiled is only about two steps better than being dead. You're cut off, you've been sent to the outside. So the pull to go back could be very strong, even if they were living in an otherwise supportive or prosperous environment. And of course, as you suggested, they may have had families back home.(I too am familiar with the wish-I'd-found-that-earlier bug, as I think most historians/historical writers are. He's an itchy little pest.)Thanks for a fun post!

4. | Nov 15, 2013

yes! there are people who read both your fb page *&* your blog *&* who want to know the traonlatinss under the animals so we can personally identify. Happy Thanksgiving Seth!

5. | Nov 12, 2013

Hi, Alison!I agree that the phrasing is sktriing. And I like the point you make about truth and reconciliation being a modern concept. I'd be interested to see when it first cropped up, because it's something human beings tend to shy away from, as a whole. Governments/powers/etc., certainly do, on the grounds of avoiding embarrassment.Another thing that occurred to me, too, after I replied, was the use of semantics. If I understand the climate of Catherine's time correctly, one couldn't pardon treason. It simply wasn't done. One could, however, pardon a disturbance.But you're right that it does sound an eerie note. I think because the language itself, however kindly, is only a mask for the motives. Catherine may have been looking to show mercy, but others have used similar phrases to mask some of the world's great horrors. Reading it is like looking through a smoky glass; what's hidden behind can be light or disturbingly dark.All the best,Lucy

6. | Oct 17, 2013

Oh, now I want to know how the story comes out. (It's a writer thing, yes.) But a rlelay good point there history is only fragments, in the end. A jumble of the archives that were saved, the things that survived in print. And when it comes to modern accessibility, we take what we can well reach, and make history out of even smaller fragments.The good thing in all this yes, there's an upside is that the rage to digitize shows no signs of slowing down. New collections are going up every day; and while the Full Collection of Laws may exert a heavier influence on research for a time, it is likely to be counterbalanced by the greater availability of other documents. (Which, may I add, I'm looking forward to the more free research material, the better.)

7. | Sep 5, 2013

This is so interesting, John! First, I feel like I see a spike of cases of plpoee firming up their status in the early 1760s, too and my theory is that it has a lot to do with the third revision. The action of cleaning up the books certainly affected individuals and societies in terms of having them register properly, and I can also see it having the effect of making societies guard their privilege more carefully.As far as what makes it in to the PSZ, there's also the factor that apparently Nicholas didn't open all state archives and files to Speransky et al (see here: Marc Raeff, “Preface,” Catherine II’s Charters of 1785 to the Nobility and the Towns,, trans. and edited by David Griffiths and George E. Munro (Bakersfield: Charles Schlacks, Jr., Publisher, 1991), xii.)Then there were a number of books in the early 1800s in which individual authors tried to recover all the laws (or a lot of the laws) pertaining to various subject. I looked at one of them: P. Khavskii, Sobranie zakonov o kuptsakh, meshchanakh, posadskikh i tsekhovykh, ili Gorodovoe Polozhenie so vkliucheniem zakonov predshestvuiushchikh i posleduiushchikh s 1766 po 1823 god (SPb, 1823). I sat there in the Publichka using a usb modem to search through the PSZ online as I looked through the book, to see what wasn't in one or the other. Somewhat to my surprise, the things missing in the PSZ were mostly ukazes from Alexander's reign (and I should note that they may be there, hidden under a different date I had that problem, too, that things were reported oddly).

8. | May 24, 2013

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