Modern American historians study many aspects of the history of the Russian city during the feudal period. Most of all, their attention is drawn to such aspects of urban life in Russia as the urban system, city management, urban autonomy, the state and the city, urban reforms, the place of the city in the socio-political structure of society, the city and the nature of Russian society, the urban bourgeoisie, and the mentality of citizens. As a rule, the study of a city takes place in a comparative historical context, from the point of view of finding out what is common and special in the history of a Russian and Western European city, in order to get answers to the following questions: how much and in what ways was the Russian city similar to the Western European one and how much and in what aspects did it differ from the latter? In turn, the answers to these questions are considered in the context of fundamental problems about the ways of development of Russia and the West, about the causes and destinies of the Russian revolutions of the early XX century.

Although many of the ideas prevailing in American Slavic studies are derived from Russian liberal-bourgeois historiography, it would be wrong to think that at present all American authors remain epigones of our pre-revolutionary historians. Modern American Russianists develop their own approaches, sometimes apply an original research methodology, and use a different conceptual framework for analysis than before. These new trends, which are also reflected in urban studies, have not yet attracted the attention of Soviet researchers .1 However, they deserve serious analysis for two reasons. First, the most common ideas in American urban studies are directed against Marxist historiography, and historians who share them, willingly or unwittingly pursue political goals - to prove the unacceptability of the Soviet model of development for the rest of the world, primarily for the West, due to the alleged dissimilarity of the historical process in Russia and Western European countries before the October Revolution. Secondly, a certain number of American historians express positive ideas that are of particular interest to Soviet researchers.

The purpose of this article is to examine exactly these new trends in American works about the Russian feudal city.

Currently, the prevailing view in American Slavic studies is that the Russian feudal (pre-industrial) state was formed in the Soviet Union.-

1 Recent works on foreign historiography of the Russian feudal City appeared more than 20 years ago: Klokman Yu. R. Russkiy gorod v sovremennoy bourgeois historiography. In: Critique of Bourgeois concepts of Russian History during the Feudalism Period, Moscow, 1962; Khoroshkevich A. L. Russkiy gorod XI-XVI vv. v sovremennoy bourgeois Science. - In the same place.

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the gens represented the complete opposite of the Western European one and played a rather negative role in the country's history; urbanization in Russia occurred differently than in the West; the townspeople were poor, had a special non-bourgeois mentality, and did not have any significant influence on the fate of their country .2 What, in the opinion of the proponents of this concept, hindered the successful development of the Russian city and the Russian bourgeoisie in the feudal-serf era? The Russian bourgeoisie, they believe, was small in composition, poor and unaffected.

The actual urban estates-merchants and philistines-were indeed relatively small in Russia: in 1678 - about 500 thousand people (3% of the total taxable population of the country), in 1795 - 1542.6 thousand people (4.2%) and in 1857-3688.4 thousand people (6.4%) 3 . However, American authors do not take into account that other classes, especially the peasantry, which accounted for about a third of the permanent urban population , were quite actively engaged in commercial and industrial activities4, and do not take into account the volume of activity and the amount of capital of Russian entrepreneurs. In addition, American historians clearly underestimate the degree of urbanization of Russia. They base their assessment on taking into account only the number of urban estates, but when comparing a Russian city with a Western European one, they take into account the entire population that lived there, and usually take the most urbanized countries for comparison. This results in unfavorable ratios for a Russian city. For example, by the end of the 18th century, about 4% of Russians lived in cities, in France, according to various estimates, from 10 to 16%, and in England-21% .5 However, if we take into account the entire permanent urban population for Russia, it turns out that by the end of the XVIII century, according to various estimates, from 7.5 to 10% of the country's population lived there6. It follows that before the XIX century. Russia in terms of urban population did not lag behind most Western countries: in 1800, the percentage of the urban population

2 Baron S. H. The Town in "feudal" Russia. -Slavic Review, 1969, vol. 28. pp. 116 - 122; Pipes R. Russia under the Old Regime. N. Y. 1974, pp. 191, 202 - 203, 207; Fed or Th. S. Patterns of Urban Growth in the Russian Empire during the Nineteenth Century. Chicago. 1975, pp. 173 - 178; Miller D. H. State and City in Seventeenth Century Muscovy. In: The City in Russian History. Lexington. 1976, pp. 34 - 52; Daniel W. The Merchants View of the Social Order. - Canadian- American Slavic Studies, 1977, Vol. 11, N4, pp. 503 - 522; ejusd. The Merchante and the Problem of Social Order in the Russian State. - Slavonic and East European Review, April 1977, Vol. 55, N 2, pp. 185 - 203; Eaton H. L. Decline and Recovery of the Russian Cities from 1500 to 1700. -Canadian- American Slavic Studies, 1977, Vol. 11, N 2, pp. 220 - 252; H i 111 e J. M. The Service City. State and Townsmen in Russia, 1600 - 1800. Cambridge. 1979.

3 Kabuzan V. M. Changes in the distribution of the population of Russia in the XVIII-first half of the XIX century. Moscow, 1971, p. 118, 177; Vodarsky Ya. E. Population of Russia for 400 years (XVI-early XX centuries). Moscow, 1973, p. 36.

4 Shapiro A. L. Peasant trade and peasant contracts in the Petrine period. - Istoricheskie zapiski, 1948, vol. 27; Bakhrushin S. V. Trade peasants in the XVII century-In: Bakhrushin S. V. Nauchnye trudy, Vol. 2. M. 1954, pp. 118-139; Ryndzyun P. G. Krestyane i gorod v doreformennoi Rossii. - Voprosy istorii, 1955, No. 9; his own journal. Urban citizenship of pre-reform Russia, Moscow, 1958, pp. 52-95; Volkov M. Ya. Formation of the urban bourgeoisie in Russia of the XVII-XVIII centuries. In: Cities of Feudal Russia, Moscow, 1966; Sviridov N. S. Trading peasants of the late serf era. - Istoriya SSSR, 1969, N 5; see also: Morrison D. "Trading Peasants" and Urbanization in Eighth Century Russia. Columbia University. 1981.

5 Woytinsky Wl. Die Welt in Zahlen. Bd, 7. Bri. 1928, S. 147; Rozman G. Urban Networks in Russia 1750 - 1800 and Premodern Periodization Princeton 1976, p. 245.

6 Kabuzan V.; Pullat R. Review of statistical sources on the number and composition of the urban population of Russia in the XVIII-early XX centuries (1719-1917). - Izvestiya AN ESR, social Sciences, 1975, vol. 24, N 2, p. 153; Storch H. Statistisch Obersicht der Stathalterschaften des Russischen Reichs. Riga. 1795, S. 123.

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It was 3.8% in the USA, 7.7% in Ireland, 4.4% in Austria, 3.9% in Sweden, 10.9% in Denmark, and 3.3% in Norway 7.

To correctly assess the degree of urbanisation of a country, it is necessary to take into account not only the size of the urban population, but also other indicators, in particular the proportion of the population who lived in large cities, and the consistency and interconnectedness of the urban network .8 Sociologists, geographers and economists have found that the larger the proportion of the population living in large cities, the greater the role of cities in the life of the country, the more developed the urban life itself. In terms of the concentration of the urban population, Russia at the time under review probably surpassed all European countries. For example, in 1811, about 22% of the total urban population of the country lived in St. Petersburg and Moscow, and in five cities with a population of more than 50 thousand people - 28% .9 A direct link to urbanisation is also the systemic nature of the urban network: the structure of cities in which they lose their economic and administrative autonomy and become elements of an interconnected whole, a single national economic and political organism. Cities formed in such a system have an incomparably stronger impact on the economic and socio - cultural life of the countryside than autonomous cities that affect each separately. Studies have shown that already in the second half of the 18th century, Russian cities as industrial and commercial centers formed an interconnected system under the leadership of Moscow, 10 while political and administrative centralization was achieved two centuries earlier .11 Few Western European countries had such centralization, consistency, and interconnectedness of their cities in the feudal era.

American Slavists also belittle the importance of Russian cities due to their exaggeration of the commercial and industrial function of the pre-industrial city and lack of attention to its other functions. Meanwhile, the idea of a feudal city as an exclusively commercial and industrial point is extremely narrow 12 and may lead to: a misunderstanding of its role. It is generally recognized that the city performs military, commercial, industrial, cultural, administrative and political functions 13 . The relative importance of the commercial and industrial functions of a Russian feudal city was probably indeed less than that of a Western European city (largely due to the fact that in Russia, unlike in the West, these functions were traditionally performed successfully by the countryside in some countries). But the rest of the functions of the Russian city was very successful, and in terms of administrative-political and military-defense functions, it probably surpassed the western city 14.

7 Wоуtinskу Wl. Op. cit., S. 147.

8 Polyan P. M. Urbanizirovannost ' i metody ee otsenki [Urbanizability and methods of its assessment]. - Izvestiya AN SSSR, seriya geografii, 1980, N 5.

9 Rakhin A. G. Naselenie Rossii za 100 let (1811-1913) [Population of Russia for 100 years (1811-1913)]. Moscow, 1956, pp. 86, 93.

10 Mironov B. N. The internal market of Russia in the second half of the XVIII - first half of the XIX centuries L. 1981, pp. 235-242.

11 Tcherepnin L. V. Obrazovanie Russkogo tsentralizirovannogo gosudarstva v XIV-XV vekakh [Formation of the Russian centralized state in the XIV-XV centuries]. Moscow, 1960, pp. 895-896.

12 Baransky I. N. Stanovlenie sovetskoi ekonomicheskoi geografii [Formation of Soviet Economic Geography]. Izbrannye trudy. M. 1980, p. 211; see also: Mundy J., Riesenberg; P. The Medieval Town. N.Y. 1958, pp. 7-8; Mum ford L. The City in History. Its Origins, its Transfor mations and its Prospects. N. Y. 1961, p. 571; Burke P. Some Reflections on the Preindustrial City. -Urban History Yearbook, 1975, pp. 13 - 21.

13 Beaujeu-Garnier J. and Chabot J. Essays on the geography of cities, Moscow, 1967, pp. 104-115.

14 Sakharov A.M. Goroda Severo-Vostochnoy Rus ' XIV-XV vekov [Cities of North-Eastern Russia of the XIV-XV centuries]. Moscow, 1959, pp. 189-190; Klokman Yu. R.Sotsial'no-ekonomicheskaya istoriya russkogo goroda [Socio-economic history of the Russian city]. The second half of the 18th century, Moscow, 1967, p. 33.

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the difference in the relative importance of individual functions of Russian and Western European cities is clearly visible in the professional and social structure of the urban population. In a Russian city, the share of the nobility, officials, clergy, military, and peasants is higher than in a Western European city, while the share of merchants, artisans, bankers, and industrialists is correspondingly lower. Thus, judging by some functions, we can say that the western city lagged behind the Russian one, while judging by others, we can say that the Russian city lagged behind. Of course, both conclusions are historically limited. However, the differences in the relative importance of the functions of the Russian and Western cities had a significant impact on the fate of both.

Due to the relative predominance of military and administrative functions in the early stages of the Russian city's history, trade, especially handicrafts and industry, were not concentrated mainly within the city walls, as was the case in most Western European countries, but were more or less evenly distributed between town and country until the twentieth century. There was an intense pendulum migration of rural residents to the city 15 and, to a lesser extent, urban residents to the countryside 16 . Such relations between town and country hindered, but did not exclude, the division of labor and the separation of town and country, slowed down, but did not put insurmountable obstacles to the formation of a specific urban system and the acquisition of political freedoms and economic privileges by citizens, and contributed to the development of Russian society along the lines of political and economic centralization and homogeneity.

In the West , due to the predominance of commercial and industrial functions of the city, 17 the bourgeoisie and capital were concentrated mainly within its limits, 18 which ultimately greatly contributed to the accelerated formation of a special urban system and the autonomy of cities in the state system, which sometimes reached complete independence. However, in Russia, due to special political conditions (constant military danger from outside), such urban development would not only prevent the centralization of the state, so necessary for the Russian people, in order to gain political independence and independence, but could even lead to the loss of national identity. As a result, the development of Russian cities went in the direction of limiting the autonomy of cities, which was observed in the Kievan period, and completely and organically including them in the system of centralized control.-

15 Zaozerskaya E. I. Begstvo i otkhod krestyan v pervoi polovine XVIII v. Flight and departure of peasants in the first half of the XVIII century. In: On the question of initial accumulation in Russia (XVII-XVIII centuries), Moscow, 1958; Plushevsky B. G. Razrabotka voprosa o krestyanskikh otkhodikh promyslyakh period razlozhdeniya serfdom v sovetskoy istoricheskoy nauke [Development of the question of peasant latrines of the period of decomposition of serfdom in the Soviet historical Science]. In: Historical Science in the Urals for 50 Years, 1917-1967, Issue 1. Istoriya SSSR. Sverdlovsk. 1967.

16 Systematic data on the pendulum migration of urban estates to the countryside are available only for the second half of the 19th century. According to the population census of 1897, 20.3% of the merchant class and 47.4% of the middle - class class lived in rural areas in European Russia, and 6.6% of the peasant class lived in cities (General Summary for the Empire of the results of the development of data from the first general population census of 1897. I. SPB. 1905, pp. 160-161).

17 In Western European cities, as in Russian cities, the burghers were engaged for a long time in grain farming, gardening, gardening, and cattle breeding, while the cities performed military, administrative, cultural, and other functions. Therefore, we can only talk about the relative predominance of commercial and industrial functions (see Kulisher I. T. Lectures on the history of economic life in Western Europe, St. Petersburg, 1913, pp. 116, 121). Similarly, in the case of Russian cities, we should speak about the relative predominance of defense-administrative functions in the early stages of their development.

18 Although rural industry was widespread in Western Europe: Kellenbenz H. Rural Industries in the West from the End of the Middle Ages to the Eighteenth Century. In: Essays in European Economic History. 1500 - 1800. Oxford. 1974, pp. 45 - 88.

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state. That is why cities have not become antagonists of the central government, as was the case in a number of Western European countries.

Thus, the predominance of certain functions of cities in the early stages of their existence, which largely determined the direction of their further development, is explained not by any internal properties inherent in Russian, French, German, etc. cities, not by the national character and mentality of a particular people, but by the peculiarity of the conditions in which they had to live. cities of individual countries should develop. With a comprehensive approach, there is every reason to say that Russian cities have had as great a positive significance in the history of Russia as Western European cities have in the history of the West .19 With the help of the Russian city, a powerful centralized absolutist state was formed, which defended its political independence. 20 The city played an exceptional role in religious and cultural affairs, in creating conditions for the formation of the Russian nation and its transformation into a Russian nation. 21 The system of Russian cities allowed the Russian bourgeoisie to create a single national market and unite individual parts of the country into an integral national economic organism operating on the basis of social and geographical division of labor 22 .

An important place in the argumentation of American historians is occupied by the thesis about the complete absence of self-government in Russian cities .23 Facts, including those long noted in the pre-revolutionary literature, show, however, that "at no time in our history has the structure of local government been complete without the participation of representatives of the local population itself." 24 The state apparatus was too weak to take full control even in the eighteenth century. Therefore, government agents carried out local management, relying on elected representatives of the posadsky worlds, which was firmly established in pre-revolutionary historiography .25 The nature, forms, and degree of involvement of the village communities in local government changed over time, but the police, the court, and especially the financial administration usually functioned with their participation, and therefore, despite the strong government guardianship, local authorities were not completely alienated from the townspeople, at least from their upper stratum-the merchants 26 . Moreover, responsibilities for

19 Klokman Yu. R. Russian city of the XVIII century and the evolution of the urban system of Western Europe. In: Feudal Russia in the World-historical Process, Moscow, 1972.

20 Cherepnin L. V. On the role of cities in the formation of the Russian centralized state. In: Cities of Feudal Russia, pp. 105-124.

21 Dmitriev S., S. On the issue of education and the main stages of development of the Russian nation. - Bulletin of Moscow State University, series 9, history, 1955, N 11; Tikhomirov M. N. Russkaya kul'tura X - XVIII vekov. M. 1968; Ocherki russkoy kul'tury XVI veka. Ch. I. M. 1977; Ocherki russkoy kul'tury XVII veka. Ch. I. M. 1979, pp. 22-24.

22 Rubinshtein N. L. Territorial division of labor and development of the All-Russian market. In: From the History of the Working Class and the Revolutionary movement, Moscow, 1958, pp. 88-100; Cherepnin L. V. Obrazovanie Russkogo tsentralizirovannogo gosudarstva v XIV-XV vekakh, pp. 373-389; Tverskaya D. I. K voprosu o roli kupechestva v protsesse formirovaniya vserossiiskogo rynka v XVII V. [Formation of the Russian centralized state in the XIV - XV centuries]. In: New about the Past of our Country, Moscow, 1967; Shapiro A. L. Problemy sotsial'no-ekonomicheskoi istorii Rusi XIV-XVI vv. l. 1977, pp. 109-120.

23 Ваrоn S. The Town in "feudal" Russia, p. 121; M i 11 e r D. H. Op. cit., pp. 30 - 31; Pipes R. Op. cit., pp. 191, 203; Langer L. N. The Medieval Russian Town. In: The City in Russian History, pp. 30 - 31; Linсоln W. B. N. A. Miliutin and the Sh. Petersburg Municipal Act of 1846: A Stady in Reform under Nicholas I. - Slavic Review, 1974, vol. 33, March, pp. 55 - 68; Hitlle J. M. Op. cit., pp. 237 - 242.

24 Kiesewetter A. A. Local self-government in Russia. IX . - XIX art. Historical sketch. Pg. 1917, p. 117.

25 See, for example: Bogoslovsky M. M. Zemstvo self-government in the Russian North in the XVII century Ch. 1-2. SPb. 1909-1912; Kiesewetter A. A. Uk. soch., p. 40 - 42, 52, 70 - 71, 89, 100- 101.

26 Tikhomirov M. N. Drevnerusskie goroda [Ancient Russian Cities], Moscow, 1956, pp. 214-232; Klokman Yu. R. Sotsial'no-ekonomicheskaya istoriya russkogo goroda, pp. 54-76, 109-121;

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They were so large and burdensome to the city government that the posadsky population, rarely receiving material remuneration for their work, evaded their fulfillment. Nevertheless, almost all adult male townspeople took turns in one way or another participating in the management of the city.

Paradoxical (from the point of view of Western European traditions) is the situation when public affairs were performed voluntarily-forcibly, and almost all adult men were chosen in turn for public positions, when the rights of citizens turned into duties, and the fulfillment of public duty - into a difficult public service, when local affairs were considered as an integral part of national tasks, and the elected representative of local society - as a representative of the central government, is not understood by American historians. Not having discovered the Western model of self-government and not allowing the idea that there might be any other, they took the path of denying any self-government in general in the urban social life of Russia.

A comparison of self-government in Russian and Western European cities during the feudal era reveals important, but not fundamental, differences. The main feature of self-government in Russian cities was that it was carried out in conditions of strong government control and mixed management of national and local affairs; individual estates, and in large cities - estate-territorial communities, exercised self-government separately, poorly coordinating their activities; the all-orthodox citywide society and the citywide system of self-government were formed late, in 1785 27 . However, the lack of organizational unity and integrity of urban society was observed in the early stages of urban development and in Western European countries, the unification of many urban corporations of burghers into a single whole - into a special privileged local community-a commune with autonomous rights-also took place far from immediately and not everywhere, state intervention in the life of urban communes took place in the West (in some countries more, in others-less) 28 . But the degree and nature of heterogeneity and subsequent cohesion of urban society, as well as the degree of state intervention in the affairs of urban societies in Russia and in most Western European countries, were different.

The peculiar type of Russian city self-government was closely associated with the presence of a strong political centralization of the state. It would be wrong, however, to see only the negative side of this. The government of a centralized, albeit feudal, state could pursue an effective domestic economic policy, encourage the development of industry and trade by administrative and financial measures, subsidies and loans, and protect the interests of national capital in the foreign market. To see this, it is enough to compare the Dutch Republic and Russia in the 17th century. -

Rafienko L. S. Posadskie skhody v Sibiri XVIII v. Posadsky gatherings in Siberia of the XVIII century. In: Cities of Siberia. Novosibirsk. 1974; Ryndzunsky P. G. The estate-tax reform of 1775 and the urban population. In: Society and the State of Feudal Russia, Moscow, 1975; Bogoyavlensky S. K. Nauchnoe nasledie [Scientific Heritage]. About Moscow of the 17th century, Moscow, 1980, pp. 74-105.

27 Dityatin I. I. Device and management of Russian cities. Vol. 1. SPb. 1875, pp. 500-507; Milyukov P. N. Essays on the history of Russian culture. Ch. I. SPb. 1896, pp. 184-185; Kiesewetter A. A. Posadskaya obshchina v Rossii XVIII st. Moscow, 1903, pp. 797 - 799; Essays on the history of the USSR. The period of feudalism. Russia in the second half of the XVIII century, Moscow, 1956, pp. 160-163; Ryndzyun P. G. Urban citizenship of pre-reform Russia, pp. 48, 384-385.

28 Kulisher I. M. Uk. soch., pp. 116-118; Karey V. N. I. Istoriya Zapadnoy Evropy v novoe vremya [History of Western Europe in modern times]. St. Petersburg, 1913, p. 53, 90 - 91, 120 - 121; Yastrebitskaya A. L. The Western European City in the Middle Ages. - Voprosy istorii, 1978, N 4.

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XVIII centuries. According to Western researchers, the Dutch federal system, based on the broad autonomy of cities and provinces, was a serious obstacle to the formation of a modern industrial society. The country, which consisted of many almost sovereign units, was not able to pursue a single economic, financial and foreign policy. The Government of the Republic, which had a very modest budget, could not finance the construction of the fleet, roads, encourage industrial entrepreneurship, and did not have the power to force foreign governments to grant privileges to Dutch ships in their ports and Dutch goods in their domestic markets. 29 On the contrary, in the centralized feudal Russia of the first quarter of the eighteenth century, the government managed to take effective measures for the development of domestic industry and trade.

To explain the backwardness and peculiarity of urban development in Russia, American bourgeois historians also use Weber's concept of "patrimonial society", under which they (in contradiction with M. Weber 30 ) bring Russian society of the XIII-XVIII centuries. According to these views, the government of the country was a private matter for princes, then tsars. The source of political power was the supreme ownership of land, since no distinction was made between property and power. The whole country was considered as the court (economy) of the ruler, so the solution of all political, economic and other issues was considered his personal business. The rights of individuals or social groups were understood as privileges granted or taken away from the ruler. Within the traditional customs of the country, the ruler acted at his own discretion in relation to his subjects, who were all considered his servants, including officials.

According to American bourgeois historians, the patrimonial regime had a profound impact on the fate of the Russian feudal city. The urban estates, like the rural ones, were enslaved, they did not own real property, because even commercial warehouses and shops did not actually belong to them. The tsar sought to use mineral and energy sources exclusively for his own purposes, putting insurmountable obstacles to the development of urban industry and trade. The city estates and economy were subordinated to the requirements of the tsar, the city itself turned into a service city, i.e. it functioned not in the name of the personal welfare of citizens, but in the name of the sovereign's needs. The possibilities for its development were extremely limited. In contrast, in the West in the Middle Ages, there was not a patrimonial, but a feudal society, which was based on the concept of law, on contractual relations between free people, on the recognition of property rights for individual citizens. That is why feudalism contributed to the formation of corporate organizations of citizens, the development of urban self-government and urban freedoms, and ultimately to the successful development of the Western European city. 31
29 Baash E. Istoriya ekonomicheskogo razvitiya Hollandii [History of Economic Development of the Netherlands], Moscow, 1949, pp. 48-49; Swart K. W. Holland's Bourgeoisie and the Retarded Industrialization of the Nether lands. In: Failed Transitions to Modern Industrial Society: Renaissance Italy and Seven teenth Century Holland. First International Colloquium, April 18 - 20, 1974. Proceedings. Montreal. 1975, pp. 44 - 45.

30 According to M. Weber, the patrimonial type of society took place in Byzantium, in the countries of Western Asia and in Egypt before the Mamelukes (Weber M. Staatssoziologie. Brl. 1966, p. 104).

31 Мurvar V. Max Weber's Typology and Russia. - Sociological Quarterly, N 8, 1967, pp. 481 - 494; ejusd. Patrimonial-Feudal Dichotomy and Political Structure in Prerevolutionary Russia. - Sociological Quarterly, 1971, Vol. 12, pp. 500 - 524; Ваrоn S. H. The Weber Thesis and Failure of Capitalist Development in "early modern" Russia. -Jahrbucher fur Geshichte Osteuropas, 1970, Bd. 18, N 3, S. 321 - 336; Pipes R Op. cit.; Hi 111 e J. M. Op. cit., pp. 9 - 16, 237 - 244.

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Thus, the weakness of urban life in Russia and the prosperity of the city in the West are made dependent on the general structure of society, its socio-economic and political structure. This is how the desire of American historians for structural and systemic analysis is realized. In this lengthy argument, it is only true that the attitude of the supreme power to the urban estates and commercial and industrial activities depends on the nature of power. However, neither the supreme power nor society in Russia before 1861 fit under patrimonial (patrimonial)status the type of power and society, although they contain some features (in some periods more, in others - less) of this type-this conclusion, despite some discrepancies, was reached by the largest pre-revolutionary authorities in the field of the history of Russian law and the overwhelming majority of Soviet historians .32
There is not a single period in Russian history when the supreme power was completely patrimonial in nature, almost always it had to share its legislative, executive and judicial power with any institutions, institutions and elected bodies that expressed the will or opinion of society, the idea of the state. In addition, since the 15th century, the sovereign himself was considered by Russian society not so much as a private individual, but as an exponent of the idea of the Russian land, the state, which also does not agree with the patrimoniality of Russia. In the political and social nature of Russia of the XIV-XV centuries. there are patrimonial features. But similar features were observed in the corresponding periods in Western European countries, although, perhaps, to a lesser extent. Therefore, Russian and Western European societies in the Middle Ages and early Modern times are not opposed in nature, as American bourgeois historians believe, but only different.

The same stretch sounds and another important position of American historians that the entire state was considered the private property of the Moscow sovereigns and Russian emperors. Throughout the feudal period, the right of ownership of the church to its land and property was recognized, boyars and nobles-to purchased and ancestral fiefdoms, citizens - to immovable property 33 . Of course, the sovereign (or the government) interfered with the private rights of the church, patrimonial estates and citizens, and in case of urgent need "unsubscribed" their property, but - and this is the essence - not as a private legal person, but on behalf of the state - a political union that he headed, for the sake of state goals. The same thing has been done in Western European countries up to the present time. Thus, in many capitalist countries, private enterprises and entire industries were nationalized after World War II; today, in almost all capitalist countries, the government actively intervenes in the economy. But it does not occur to anyone to deny the existence of private property in these countries on this basis.

It is true that some Muscovite sovereigns did have a tendency to view themselves as the sole supreme owner of the country, but the same is true in the West. Louis XIV,

32 Sergievich V. I. Lectures and studies on the history of Russian Law, St. Petersburg, 1888, pp. 694, 702-703, 763; Vladimirsky-Budanov M. F. Review of the history of Russian Law. Kiev, St. Petersburg, 1900, p. 39 - 40, 162, 260 - 261; Dyakonov M. A. Ocherki obshchestvennogo i gosudarstvennogo stroya Drevnoi Rus ' [Essays on the social and state system of Ancient Russia]. St. Petersburg, 1912, p. 116, 191, 444 - 445, 487 - 495, 487 - 488; History of the State and law in the USSR, part I. M. 1972, p. 126 - 127, 165 - 179, 206 - 219; Soviet Historical and Legal Science. Ocherki stanovleniya i razvitiya [Essays on formation and Development], Moscow, 1978, pp. 95-100, 121-123; Cherepnin L. V. Zemsky sobory Russkogo gosudarstva v XVI-XVI-1 vv., Moscow, 1979, pp. 55-63.

33 Sergievich V. I. Uk. soch., pp. 940-942; Vladimirsky - Budanov M. F. Uk. soch., p. 528 - 530, 558 - 562, 605 - 606; Istoriya gosudarstva i prava v SSSR [History of State and Law in the USSR]. 182 - 184, 203 - 206, 221 - 223.

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Declared to the States-General: "The state is me," in his instructions to the Dauphin, he expressed, among other things, the following thoughts:: "All that is within the limits of our dominions belongs to us; you must be convinced that kings are absolute rulers, and that they naturally have the full and free disposal of all the property that belongs to both churches and secular people, in order to use it as befits a wise master. ". These claims of the King, however, do not give grounds for denying the existence of private property in France, even in the reign of Louis XIV.

The complex and controversial issue of property in feudal-feudal Russia 35 thus receives a simplified and distorted interpretation in the writings of American bourgeois historians. The citizens ' ownership of their property was sufficient to create opportunities for the accumulation of capital in the hands of merchants, as evidenced by the evidence of large private wealth. And if this process was slow, it was not because the right to private property did not exist in Russia for a long time, 36 but because of the special socio-economic conditions in which this accumulation took place .37 Thus, in the last third of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, when the fact of the existence of full property rights in Russia is not denied by anyone, and merchants managed to emancipate themselves from the state to a very significant extent, merchant families rarely retained their wealth for two, three or more generations. Continuity of capital was still relatively rare, just as it had been in the seventeenth century .38
A new point in the argument of American bourgeois historians is that the Russian feudal city, according to the classification adopted in Western historiography, belongs to the type of eastern, and not Western city, on the grounds that the historical role of a Western European city is supposedly fundamentally different from the role of a Russian city, as well as the role of a city in the "Eastern world"in general. In the West, the city carried out a liberation mission in relation to feudally dependent people, creating a class of free citizens from the previously enslaved peasants who had passed over to it. The Russian city, like the city of Vostochny, according to this concept, for the most part consisted of serfs sent to earn money, who fully maintained their dependence on the landowner and the rural community, as well as from small towns.-

34 Cit. by: Sergievich V. I. Uk. soch., p. 942.

35 Pre-revolutionary and Soviet historiography expressed different points of view on the nature of land ownership in Russia: on the supreme property of sovereigns; on the divided (split, dismembered) form of property; on private property; on the communal form of property (see Shapiro A. L. On the nature of feudal land ownership. - Voprosy istorii, 1969, N 12, p. 71; Novoseltsev A. P., Pashuto V. T., Tcherepnin L. V. Puti razvitiya feodalizma (Zakavkazie, Srednaya Aziya, Rus', Pribaltika). Moscow, 1972, p. 198-203, 210-214; Kopanev A. I. Krestyanskoe russkogo Severa v XVI v. L. 1978, pp. 413-63.

36 Ваrоn S. H. The Weber Thesis, p. 336; ejusd. Who Were the Gosti?- California Slavic Studies, 1973, N 7, pp. 1 - 42.

37 The American historian P. A. Bushkovich, noting the "instability" of large merchant families of the XVI-XVII centuries, correctly explains this phenomenon by the weak development of credit, accounting, and strong competition from Western European merchants (Bushkovitch P. A. The Merchants of Moscow, 1580-1650. Cambridge, 1980, p. 170); see also: Shirokiy V. F. Voprosy torgovogo ucheta v zakonodatel'nykh aktakh i literatere Rossii XVIII v.-Trudy Leningradskogo instituta torgovli, 1940, no. 3; Borovoy S. Ya. Kredit i banki Rossii (seredina XVII-1861), Moscow, 1958; Golikova N. B. Kredit and its role in the activities of the Russian merchant class at the beginning of the XVIII century. In: Russian City, Issue 2, Moscow, 1979.

38 Za ozersk ya E. N. Manufaktura pri Petre I. M. 1947, p. 60; Mironov B. N. Sotsial'naya mobil'nost ' rossiiskogo kupechestva v XVIII - nachale XIX veka [Manufactory under Peter I. M. 1947, p. 60].

In: Problems of Historical demography in the USSR. Tallinn. 1977; Detkin A.V. On the issue of continuity of trade capitals of the second half of the XVII-beginning of the XVIII century. - History of the USSR, 1982, N 1; and others.

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schanstvo-an estate enslaved by the state and the posadsky community. Neither the peasants nor the urban estates themselves felt the need to organize their social life on the principles of freedom and urban self-government. In the city, therefore, free citizenship was not created, but simply a union of people settled in the city, united by common duties, the fortress complex retained all its strength there until the abolition of serfdom in 1861. And in economic terms, the Russian city, according to these authors, more closely resembled a patrimonial, rather than a western city, because in it industry and trade served mainly the ruling class-the nobility and bureaucracy .39
The thesis about the fundamental difference between the Russian and Western feudal cities is speculative in nature, does not rely sufficiently on facts, and its justification has obvious methodological flaws. First, certain features of the Russian city are taken out and absolutized, and some secondary points are given hypertrophied significance. Secondly, the argument is based on dichotomous logic: either a Russian city should be exactly like a Western European city, or it is not a real, eastern city. Such straightforwardness coarsens historical reality, makes it difficult to assess the quantitative gradations of a particular trait, property, or quality, and forces the researcher to state qualitative differences where there are only quantitative differences, or to state the opposite where in reality there is only a difference. Third, when American bourgeois historians contrast Russian and Western European cities, they do not take into account the fact that the history of cities in individual countries is very peculiar. The feudal Western city, which is opposed to the Russian one, is an abstract model; under the pen of these authors, it appears as an autonomous commune from the state and the countryside, with highly organized self-government and developed trade, crafts and industry, with a rich bourgeoisie with political freedoms and economic privileges. It is quite obvious that such an ideal type of Western city only partially corresponded to specific types of cities in different Western European countries at certain moments of the feudal era. In Italy, for example, there was no political and socio-economic opposition of the city to the countryside; in England, cities were under the seigniorial authority of the king and could not achieve full autonomy, the guild system was relatively poorly developed, the government often confiscated the property of burghers; many major medieval cities, such as Paris and Rome, were more consuming the urban air made serfs free in Western European cities not automatically, but after a certain period of time-from 6 weeks to 10 years, etc. 40 .

As a result, the differences between a specific historical Russian city and the Western European city model constructed by American historians do not correspond to the differences between specific historical cities in Western European countries and Russia. This is about-

39 Baron S. H. The Town in "feudal" Russia, pp. 116 - 122; Helli R. The Stratification of Muscovite Society: the Townsmen. - Russian History, 1978, Vol. 5, N 2, pp. 119- 175;Pipes R. Op. cit., pp. 202 - 203.

40 Problems of methodology of the history of the Middle Ages: the European city in the system of feudalism. Vol. 1. Moscow, 1979, pp. 33, 71, 135, 170; vol. 2, pp. 101, 200; Social nature of the medieval Burghers of the XIII-XVII centuries. Moscow, 1979, pp. 64-70; Yastrebitskaya A. L.

A Western European city in the Middle Ages; her own. The main problems of the early history of the medieval city in the light of modern Western medieval studies. Middle Ages, 1980, issue 43.

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This is completely ignored by American bourgeois historians, who constantly forget that they are comparing the abstract with the concrete. As a result of this methodological miscalculation, the degree of difference between urbanization in Russia and other European countries is excessively increased, and the difference is brought to the complete opposite.

The Russian feudal city did have a significant peculiarity, but at the same time it did not represent a radical opposite of the western city. It carried out a mission of liberation in relation to the serf peasantry, although not to the same extent as the city of zapadny, 41 giving, in the words of P. G. Ryndzunsky, "relative liberation from feudalism." 42 In Russia, at least since the 16th century, just as in the West, there was a special zone of urban rights for the exclusive possession of urban crafts and trades by townspeople, which corresponded to the Western European norms of "guild coercion" and "forbidden mile" 43 . True, these special rights of citizens were often violated, but the same thing was observed in the West. The urban estates, especially the merchants, with all their limited rights, were also privileged classes in Russia in comparison with the peasantry, which led to a steady and constant desire of the peasantry to be attributed to the city .44 Among the urban population, the peasantry occupied a prominent place, but only in exceptional cases did they constitute the majority of the inhabitants. The share of peasants in some cities ranged from 7 to 33% 45 .

The desire to achieve privileges, to free themselves from feudal and state oppression was characteristic of the Russian townspeople no less than of the Western European burghers, as evidenced by the ongoing social struggle of the townspeople throughout the entire period of feudalism. The rights they have achieved are the result of this struggle .46
In economic terms, the Russian feudal city was inferior to the Western European ones, but its backwardness was relative, since it was the Russian cities that were the main centers of craft and trade during the entire feudal period47 .

41 Tikhomirov M. N. Srednevekovaya Moskva v XIV-XV vvakh [Medieval Moscow in the XIV-XV centuries], Moscow, 1975, pp. 99-100; Cherepnin L. V. Obrazovanie Russkogo tsentralizirovannogo gosudarstva v XIV-XV vekakh, p. 339.

42 Ryndzunsky P. G. Urban citizenship of pre-reform Russia, p. 556.

43 Smirnov P. P. Posadskie ludi i ikh klassovaya borba do sredni XVII veka [Posadskie ludi and their class struggle up to the middle of the 17th century]. Vol. 2. Moscow, 1948, pp. 719-724; Sakharov A.M. Uk. soch., p. 180; Tikhomirov M. N. Drevnerusskie goroda, pp. 435-436; Cherepnin L. V. Obrazovanie Russkogo tsentralizirovannogo gosudarstva v XIV-XV vekakh, p. 414.

44 Smirnov P. P. Uk. soch., pp. 294, 724; Ryndzyun P. G. Urban citizenship of pre-reform Russia, pp. 40-51.

45 Smirnov P. P. Goroda Moskovskogo gosudarstva v pervoi polovinei XVII veka [Cities of the Moscow State in the first half of the 17th century]. 1919; Vodarsky Ya. E. The number and placement of the posadsky population in Russia in the second half of the XVII century. In: Cities of feudal Russia, pp. 276, 279; Ryndzyun P. G. Urban citizenship of pre-reform Russia, pp. 225, 264, 338.

46 Smirnov P. P. Posadskie ludi... Vol. 2; Tikhomirov M. N. Drevnerusskie goroda, pp. 185-186; Sakharov A.M. Uk. soch., p. 233; Cherepnin L. V. Obrazovanie Russkogo tsentralizirovannogo gosudarstva v XIV-XV vekakh, pp. 444-451; Kurmacheva M. D. Gorody Srednego Povolzhya i vosstanie pod predvodstvom E. I. Pugacheva. In: Cities of Feudal Russia, pp. 463-472; Buganov V. I. Moskovskie vosstaniya kontsa XVII v. M. 1969; Chistyakova E. V. Gorodskie vosstaniya v Rossii v pervoi polovinei XVII veka [Moscow uprisings of the late 17th century]. Voronezh. 1975; Prokhorov M. F. The Moscow Uprising in September 1771. In: Russian City, Issue 2; et al.

47 Cm., eg.: B. A. Rybakov Craft Of Ancient Rus. M. 1948; Bakhrushin, S. V. Scientific works. Vol. 1. Essays on the history of crafts, trade and cities of the centralized Russian state in XVI - early XVII centuries. M. 1952; Tikhomirov, M. N. The ancient city, p. 65 - 137; of Kafengauz B. B. Essays on the domestic market of Russia in the first half of the XVIII V. M. 1958; Rydzynski P. G. City -

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Finally, when American bourgeois historians bring the Russian feudal city under Weber's definition of "eastern city", they overlook the fact that M. Weber considered the absence of an urban community, a special class of citizens, and specific urban institutions to be the most important feature of the eastern city .48 The Russian feudal city, as shown by pre-revolutionary and Soviet historians, had a village community, city estates, and city institutions .49 As a result, it was precisely in the city that a specific way of social life developed, which ultimately contributed to the development of bourgeois relations, bourgeois law and morality .50
Thus, consideration of the most widespread concept of the Russian feudal city in American Slavic studies reveals its groundlessness. The Russian city solved basically the same economic, political, social and cultural problems as the Western European one, only in a different sequence, and sometimes by different means. The process of urbanization in Russia and Western Europe during the feudal period was similar in spirit, in essence, but often different in form; it obeyed the same laws, although each time different political, social, economic and geographical conditions left the imprint of national identity on urban development. From a comparative historical point of view, it is correct to talk about the types of urbanization in different European countries, perhaps about the optimal urban development option. But it is wrong and historically limited to deny that the process of urbanisation is very important and positive for Russia.

The illegality of contrasting Russia and the West in general, and the Russian and Western European cities in particular, is becoming more and more clearly recognized in American Slavic studies itself .51 At the same time , the influence of the Marxist concept 52 is reflected, and there are voices of those who, while noting the originality of the Russian historical process, nevertheless emphasize that Russia belongs to Europe, that Russian civilization is a branch of European civilization .53 In addition, American bourgeois historiography has put forward an alternative to the most common concept and a compromise between them point of view on the Russian feudal city.

Russian citizenship of pre - reform Russia, pp. 22-40, 367, 384; Sakharov A.M. Uk. soch., pp. 130-174; Polyansky F. Ya. Urban craft and manufactory in Russia of the XVIII century, Moscow, 1960; Nosov N. E. Russkiy gorod i russkoe kupechestvo v XVI vetiye. In: Issledovaniya po sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii Rossii [Studies on the Socio-political history of Russia], L. 1971; Klokman Yu. R. Sotsial'no-ekonomicheskaya istoriya russkogo goroda, pp. 207-313; Ustyugov N. V. Nauchnoe nasledie [Scientific Heritage], Moscow, 1974, pp. 18-74, 157-162; Vodarsky Ya. E. Gorody i gorodskoe naselenie Rossii v XVII v. In: Voprosy istorii khozyaistva i naseleniya Rossii XVII v. M. 1974; Golikova N. B. Ocherki po istorii gorod Rossii kontsa XVII - nachala XVIII V. M. 1982, pp. 110-158; et al.

48 Weber M. Gorod. Pg. 1923, p. 20.

49 Tikhomirov M. N. Drevnerusskie goroda, p. 43-52; Sakharov A.M. Uk. soch., p. 17, 23; Cherepnin L. V. Obrazovanie Russkogo tsentralizirovannogo gosudarstva v XIV-XV vekakh, p. 329-330.

50 Ryndzunsky P. G. Osnovnye faktory gorodoobrazovaniya v Rossii vtoroy poloviny XVIII v. The main factors of urban development in Russia in the second half of the 18th century In: Russkiy Gorod (Russian City), Moscow, 1976, p. 108.

51 См., напр.: Bill V. T. The Forgotten Class: the Russian Bourgeoisie from the Earliest Beginnings to 1900. N. Y. 1959; В lack well W. L. The Beginning of Russian Industrialization. 1800 - 1860. Princeton-N. J. 1968, pp. 98, 404 - 406; Bushkovitch P. A. Op. cit., pp. 170 - 172; ejusd. Modernization and Urbanization in Russia: a Comparative View. In: The City in Russian History, pp. 291 - 330.

52 Kakhk Yu. Y. On some new phenomena in the relationship of Marxist theory to bourgeois historical science. - Eesti NSV Teaduste Akademia, Toimetised, 1977, 26(4), pp. 338-343.

53 Sukhotina L. G. The problem of "Russia-West" in modern Anglo-American bourgeois historiography. In: Questions of methodology of history, historiography and Source Studies. Tomsk. 1980, pp. 127-131.

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An alternative point of view was put forward by G. Rozman54 . He believes that Russian backwardness in general and in relation to urbanization in particular is a myth that by the beginning of the XVIII century. Russia was a developed "pre-modern" society, which was at the level of the advanced European countries-France and England. Neither the absence of true urban self-government, nor the existence of serfdom, nor the significant participation of the peasantry in the economic life of the city could prevent urban development in Russia. By the middle of the 18th century, a dense network of commercial and urban settlements (central places) was created in it, which united the country into a single national economic organism, into a strong centralized state. From this, G. Rozman rightly concludes that urbanization can occur on a different political basis and in different social conditions, can be combined with centralized and decentralized governance, with serfdom and political freedom.

Rozman rejects the prevailing understanding in Western historiography of the essence of a feudal city, which he calls "legal" (since it also focuses on self-government and political institutions), and contrasts it with an economic and political understanding. He notes that the main function of the feudal city was to unite the country politically and economically, so the degree of its urbanization is determined not by the development of urban freedoms and self-government, but by the density of the network of central places (as the author calls commercial rural and all urban settlements), the size of the urban population and the degree of political and economic integration of the country.

In accordance with this approach to urbanization, Rozman analyzes the development of a network of central settlements from the 9th to the 18th centuries in Russia, as well as in Japan, China, England, and France. All central settlements form a hierarchical system consisting of seven groups (levels). The highest level is made up of national administrative and economic centers with a population of more than 300 thousand people (these are usually state capitals); the lowest level is made up of local markets or administrative centers with a periodic market and a population of less than 3 thousand people. At each historical moment, the system of central places is original, since, firstly, it includes a different number of settlements, and secondly, the settlements are not at all, but at some levels. Over time, the system develops in quantitative and qualitative terms, until it reaches the highest level of development, when all seven levels of administrative and market centers are fully integrated under the auspices of the main center of the country - the capital. In Russia, as in France, England and Japan, this happened, according to Rozman, in the XVIII century, which can therefore be considered as a turning point in the urban and economic history of Russia.

Rozman's concept is very realistic. However, it is not sufficiently supported by actual data. Using the theoretical scheme of "central places" developed by geographers, the author assumes that if there are cities in a country, they always and necessarily form an integral hierarchical system. But this is true only for capitalism. In the feudal era, cities could exist, and did exist, autonomously, regardless of their administrative significance and the size of the population living in them. Therefore, the presence of an interconnected system of cities is necessary to prove that-

54 Rоzman G. Comparative Approaches to Urbanization: Russia, 1750 - 1800. In: The City in Russian History, pp. 69 - 86; ejusd. Urban Networks in Russia, 1750 - 1800, pp. 74, 245, 276 - 284.

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It is clear that Rozman's book is not sufficiently convincing. Because of this, and also because the author does not take into account the specific historical situation, social, economic and political conditions in which the development of Russian cities took place, the dynamics of central places in Russia of the IX-XVIII centuries, drawn by him, looks too schematic and abstract.

L. Langer expressed a compromise opinion on the Russian feudal city 55 . He believes that both of the above points of view are one-sided. The majority concept is focused on the state, on political, social and legal institutions. Rozman is only interested in the network of central settlements without a concrete historical analysis of its structure and functions. As a result, representatives of the first trend wrongly deny any significance of the city in Russian history, and Rozman does not take into account the peculiarity of the process of urbanization in Russia, while the level of its urban development is exaggerated. According to Langer, the importance of a feudal Russian city should not be underestimated due to its lack of Western-style self-government, but its role should not be overestimated based solely on the existence of a fairly dense network of urban settlements. A relatively intensive urban life, although complicated by unfavorable social, political and economic conditions, existed in Russia, Langer believes, and cities thus had a positive impact on the course of the Russian historical process; but, reflecting the basic structures of society, the Russian city developed relatively slowly and rather peculiarly.

Langer's desire to bring together the points of view of most American bourgeois historians and Rozman is still declarative, since the author only proclaims the need for compromise. There is a plan here that still needs to be implemented. However, Langer's idea that the process of urbanization can proceed quite vigorously in various socio-economic conditions is fruitful. Supplemented by the idea of the types of urban development determined by the peculiar political and socio-economic conditions in which it took place in each country, this idea can become a starting point for a comparative historical study of the process of urbanization in Russia. Thus, there are also positive trends in modern American urban studies: close attention to socio-economic processes in urban life, independent study of sources, taking into account a number of provisions of the Marxist concept, attempts to use interdisciplinary and systematic approaches.

The most widespread concept in American bourgeois historiography, which contrasts the Russian city with the Western European one, turns out to be an exaggerated and updated version of the concept put forward by our pre-revolutionary authors. The new elements of this concept do not concern its essence, but its argumentation, which is brought into line with the sociological schemes and concepts currently popular in bourgeois historiography. However, the fashionable attire and scientific entourage that claims to be ultra-modern do not add to this concept of credibility and authenticity.

55 Langer L. N. The Historiography of the Preindustrial Russian City. -Journal of Urban History, 1970, Vol. 5, N 2,pp. 209 - 240; ejusd. The Medieval Russian Town. In: The City in Russian History, pp. 11 -13.

56 Russian pre-revolutionary historians, with some exceptions, did not bring the differences between the Russian and Western European cities to the complete opposite, but found common features in the process of urbanization in Russia and in the West (see Shirin D. A. Russian Medieval city in pre - revolutionary historiography (mid - XIX-1917). - Historical Notes, 1982, vol.108.

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