XI International Conference of the Study Group on Eighteenth-Century Russia
10th-14th July 2023
Andrey V. Gornostaev (University of Toronto, Canada), “Depriving of Honour, Depriving of Nobility in the Age of Catherine II”
Catherine II’s reign is commonly viewed as the “golden age” of the nobility when their position in Russia’s social structure reached an unprecedented height. Economic privileges, land grants, serf ownership, and the proximity to the monarch served as markers of their unique status. At the same time, it depended on the maintenance of honorable conduct and non-performance of deeds that would disgrace a nobleman or noblewoman in the eyes of the law and the empress. This paper explores the issue of denoblement both as a symbolic act and as a punishment for specific crimes. It demonstrates that the deprivation of nobility and subsequent downward mobility were an astonishingly frequent occurrence in the latter half of the eighteenth century, and stresses the need for a more balanced perception of the nobility's place in the legal and social framework.
