Prof. Frank Wcislo Office Hours: T, 2-4; W, 1-3
114 Benson and by prior app't (2-3413 or 2-2575) Department of History e-mail: francis.w.wcislo@vanderbilt.edu

History 237 (syllabus from last offering of this course)
Russia: Tsardom to Empire
History 237 introduces Russian history before the modern era and pays varying attention to the four polities that exerted dominance over the lands of far eastern and northeastern Europe: Kievan Rus= (9th-12th c.); the Mongol suzerainty of the Golden Horde (13th-15th c.); the Muscovite Tsardom (15th-17th c.); and the 18th-century Russian Empire. Broadly thematic, the course challenges students both to expand and deepen their understanding of place and time. The place is the far eastern edge of Europe, influenced as much by the huge Eurasian land mass reaching toward China, the nomadic civilizations of the steppe, and the orthodox Christian Byzantine Empire, as it was by western Europe. The time predates the technologies that have shaped our modern sensibilities: computers, steam engines, even, for much of the course, the printing press. Within this historical context, students will gain a greater understanding of the societies, cultures, and identities that have shaped Russian life through much of the second millennium. Finally, the course is not a podium-centered lectures-notes-bluebooks course. Rather, professor and students study together (really) via informed consideration of the syllabus: reading of selected primary and secondary sources, critical thinking, writing, tutorials, and some lectures. (If you don=t have fun, neither do I).

Required for Purchase
Janet Martin, Medieval Russia 980-1584 (Cambridge, 1995)
Daniel H. Kaiser & Gary Marker, Reinterpreting Russian History. Readings, 860-1860s (Oxford, 1994) (hereafter K/M)
Carolyn Pouncy, The Domostroi. Rules for Russian Households in the Time of Ivan the Terrible (Cornell, 1995)
V.O. Kliuchevsky, The Time of Catherine the Great: A Course in Russian History (M.E. Sharpe)
John Channon, The Penguin Historical Atlas of Russia (Penguin)

Required Reserve (see enforcement rules below):
1)V.O. Kliuchevsky, excerpt from A Course on Russian History. The Seventeenth Century: 3-49
2)Primary Sources for Muscovite Society (professor=s materials): AThe Structure of Russian Society in the 17th Century@, AThe Military Service Groups@ and Chapter VII of the 1649 Ulozhenie: 17-29; AMuscovite-Western Commercial Relations@ and APetition...on forbidding foreign merchants to trade in Russian towns, with the exception of Arkhangelsk@: 63-91; AThe Enserfment of the Russian Peasantry@ [various documents]: 92-93, 110-122, 213-232
3)Valerie A. Kivelson, AThe Devil Stole His Mind: The Tsar and the 1648 Moscow Uprising,@ American Historical Review (June 1993): 733-756
4)Michael Cherniavsky, AThe Old Believers and the New Religion@: 140-188
5)James Cracraft, ASt. Petersburg@: 52-66




Course Requirements
1)format: Lectures and tutorials are scheduled below.
2)readings: Books may be purchased at VU Bookstore, but are definitely available at www.amazon.com (prices vary). Required reserve reading is held at the Reserve Reading Room of the Central Library. All students must obtain copies of reserve reading and may not sign the attendance sheet for a given tutorial without said copies.
3)tutorials: Tutorials are formal discussions focused upon primary and secondary sources, and analysis of issues raised by them. They are germane to the final examination. The general question for each tutorial is included in the syllabus. Students are urged to prepare written informal "talking points" to address the questions posed for the tutorial. Two formal tutorial essays must be submitted during the semester. In addition, my own record of individual student participation in each discussion will support a subjective judgement contributing to the class participation grade (see below). Attendance sheets will be circulated at all tutorials; originality, creativity, insight, boldness, risk-taking, idiosyncracy, and teaching the prof something new are valued more highly than volume.
4)examinations: typed, take-home, comprehensive final (7-8 pages), which emphasizes ability to synthesize overviews of student learning during the semester. The final will be distributed on the last day of class and due at the later of the two scheduled examinations for this course. Essays in place of mid-term, see #5.
5)essays:
a)2 2-3 page tutorial essays, due at the scheduled tutorial class. Students must deposit one of these essays no later than the class session of 12 October, the second no later than 18 November (the last class before Thanksgiving vacation);
b)3 five-page course essays, due Sept. 30, 2 November, and 2 December. Essay I (5 pages) is a synopsis of the key arguments found in Janet Martin, Medieval Russia. Essay II (5 pages) uses the primary source, The Domostroi, to imagine life in an early modern aristocratic/boyar household. Essay III (5 pages) assesses a 19th-century Russian historian=s lectures about 18th-century Russia.
6)honor code: honored and enforced; see especially ch. 8 of the Student Handbook regarding plagiarism, the HIGH CRIME of representing another's idea as your own. If unsure, ask. .
7)grading: tutorial essays, 5%+5%; course essays I (15%), II (20%), III (15%); final examination, 20%; class participation, pre-midterm deficiencies, 10%; class participation, post-midterm deficiencies, 10%.
8)LATE PAPERS AND EXTENSION POLICY: [The only extenuating circumstances to the following policy are physical and psychological illness verified by the Dean=s Office or family tragedy; I honor your honesty in such matters.] The final exam and the two tutorial essays are due without exception as scheduled. Late tutorial essays will be graded 0; late final examinations may be given to associate deans. For the three course essays, all course members have three late days to use at their discretion (all three on essay I, one day on each assignment, etc.). After an individual has used these days, however, late assignments will be graded down 2 grade (A, A-) per 24 hours.

8/ 26 Introduction. Geography and History



Kievan Rus= (Martin:1-133; K/M: 3-78)
31 The State K/M: 9-24
9/2Society and Economy, K/M: 26-37, 38-44, 50-59
tutorial: Why read law codes? What categories of question can the detective-historian ask and answer about Kievan society and economy via law codes (Pravda russkaia) and statutes (Statute of the Grand Prince Iaroslav)?

7 Christianity, K/M:60-71
9 Culture of Medieval Life: K/M: 26-29, 50-54, 73-78, 133-136
tutorial: Culture, which we create, also creates our individual identity. It is a network of values by which we understand ourselves. Using this week=s primary sources, characterize the culture of medieval life in Kievan Rus=.

Mongol Conquest and Suzerainty (Martin:134-235; K/M: 79-145)
14 The Mongol Conquest, The Tatar Yoke, or the Golden Horde? KM: 79-84, 99-102, 104-107, 124-126, 137-140
16 Appanage Principalities and the Northeastern Russian Lands, K/M: 87-90, 114-122
tutorial: Use the Novgorod chronicle account of the Mongol invasion and one secondary source to characterize the significance of the Mongol conquest and the subsequent hegemony of the Golden Horde. How important were they and for whom were they most important---contemporaries, subsequent historians?

21The Medieval Church, K/M: 140-145
The Consolidation of the Muscovite Tsardom and the AGathering of the Russian Lands@ (Martin: 236-399, K/M: 147-171)
23 Consolidation of the Muscovite Tsardom: how and why?

28 Language of Muscovite Power, Two Examples: Novgorod; the All-Russian Boiarstvo, K/M: 84-85, 90-99, 154-158
tutorial: Use the primary source to tell the story of Athe annexation of Novgorod as seen from Moscow.@ Think about voices, words, language.
30 Ivan the Terrible, K/M: 164-171, 151-154
Essay I due: Synopsis of Janet Martin, Medieval Russia, 980-1584

10/5 The Time of Troubles and the 17th Century, Vasilii Kliuchevsky, excerpt from A Course in Russian History. The Seventeenth Century: 1-49
Muscovite Society and Culture (K/M, 172-222; Pouncy, The Domostroi)
7Social Hierarchy: Service and Place (Primary Sources for Muscovite Society: 16-29 [@Chart@ and @Military Service Groups@])



12Languages of Subordination: three examples [Primary Sources for Muscovite Society: 63-91; K/M: 213-216; Valerie A. Kivelson, AThe Devil Stole His Mind: The Tsar and the 1648 Moscow Uprising@: AHR, June 1993: 733-756
tutorial: A subordinate uses a language of subordination. Individuals and entire social groups can be subordinated. Use the two primary sources to characterize the ways in which subordinates spoke in Muscovy. Are subordinates passive receivers of orders, humble petitioners of benefits and favors alone? Or do they have active power?
MID-TERM DEFICIENCY REPORTS DUE, 10/13
14Town Life, K/M: 176-180, 205-212, 216-222

19Rural People and Enserfment I, K/M: 173-176; Primary Sources for Muscovite Society:213-32
21Rural People and Enserfment II, KM: 180-183; Primary Sources for Muscovite Society, 92-122 passim
tutorial: The explanation of the enserfment of the peasantry is a still contentious, complex, perhaps ultimately unresolvable historical problem. The voices of rural peasants who experienced this process, and thus its impact upon their lives, is recoverable, to an extent, through primary sources. What did peasants experience?

26Cultural Order and Orthodox Civilization
28 tutorial: Sample draft review essays of The Domostroi (not eligible for tutorial essay)

Empire and the 18th-Century (Kliuchevsky, The Time of Catherine the Great; K/M,223-255, 268-285, 290-295, 297-336, 339-408)
11/2 Petrine Era I: Reform?, K/M, 223-229, 232-237, 246-250
Essay II, The Domostroi, due
4 Petrine Era II: Revolution? Michael Cherniavsky, AThe Old Believers and the New Religion,@ pp.140-188
tutorial: Use Cherniavsky=s article to answer the following question. If you were a boyar woman who had embraced the Old Belief, how would you regard Peter the Great---as a reformer, a revolutionary, or something else? Why?

9Empire and Westernization, James Cracraft, ASt. Petersburg,@ 53-66; K/M, 268-285, Kliuchevsky, ch.1-4
11Noble Lords, Serfs, and Peasants I, K/M, pp.230-232 (1762 emancipation), 242-246 (prov. adm. and charter), 290-295 (Nakazy), 297-311 (Hoch and Kolchin), 356-362 (Czap), 388-399 (Folklore)

16Noble Lords, Serfs, and Peasants II, Kliuchevsky, ch.8
tutorial: Role-playing the countryside. Class to be divided between lords and peasants and, based on readings of 11/11, opinions exchanged about the "order of life."
18Economy and Merchantry: Where=s the Bourgeoisie? K/M, 268-285, 312-318, 321-324, 328-3



23TG
25TG

30 Catherinian Russia, K/M 351-356, 370-385, Kliuchevsky, ch.9
12/2 tutorial: Kliuchevsky, The Time of Catherine the Great. How did a Russian historian of our era, albeit a century ago, look back to the Russia of his era, albeit a century before that?

7 Conclusion