History 440: Peasants and the end of Serfdom

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History 440 Peasants and the end of Serfdom
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Pre-1861 peasants lives

• Serfdom an unequal, reciprocal relationship
• Land was power
• Lords owned the land
• Exploitation was central
• Labor rent (barshchina)
• Payment in cash or kind (obrok)
• Up to half their harvests went to lord and the
  state.
• Harshest close to center of power.

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Pre-1861 peasants lives

• The States impositions
• Poll tax (Peter I, until 1880s)
• Military service Peter I lifetime service in
  1793 reduced to 25 years
• 1720-1867 7 million peasant men conscripted.
• Peasant communities were jointly responsible for
  all obligations (until 1903)
• Landlord also had responsibilities protection,
  safety net, authority

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Weather and soil

• North and northwest
• forest, poor soil
• Winters long, low precipitation
• South and southeast
• Semi-forested steppe
• quite fertile (Black Earth)
• Weather varied
• Led to redistributive commune
• Spread risk

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Regional economic patterns
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How did they farm?

• Subsistence
• Three-field system
• No legumes or potatoes
• Some livestock, but small, underfed
• Resistant to improvement
• Preferred security of old methods
• KEY Redistributive commune
• Large households

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But population grew enormously

• 1678 9 million
• 1795 20 million
• 1857 32 million
• 1914-1917 90 million
• With conquests, by 1917 172 million (80 percent
  peasants)
• And spread out extensive (not intensive)
  agriculture

• Why?
• Peasants married young
• Had many babies
• So some survived
• Landlords encouraged this.
• Created a strong pro-birth mentality.
• Hard habit to break.

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Gender differences

• Sexual exploitation, especially of
  daughters-in-law
• Men heavy field work plowing, harrowing, sowing
• Women household, children, kitchen garden, small
  animals
• Everyone harvested
• Also generational conflict

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Peasants resistance

• Flight (common earlier)
• Revolt
• 1606-7 Bolotnikov revolt (reached Moscow)
• 1670-1 Razin revolt
• 1707-8 Don Cossack revolt
• 1773-4 Pugachev revolt
• All were suppressed with massive state violence

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Peasants resistance

• Weapons of the weak
• Worked badly
• Stole estate property
• Broke new machines
• Late paying dues
• Feigned incomprehension
• Hid in the woods
• Took solace in the churchs promised afterlife

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Finally, Emancipation, 1861