Historians and Historical Societies in the Public Life of Imperial Russia

334 Pages·2017·9.009 MB·English

by  Vera Kaplan

HISTORIANS and HISTORICAL SOCIETIES
in the PUBLIC LIFE of IMPERIAL RUSSIA
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HISTOR IANS and
HISTOR ICAL SOCIETIES
in the PUBLIC LIFE of
IMPER IAL RUSSIA
Vera Kaplan
Indiana University Press
Bloomington and Indianapolis
This book is a publication of
Indiana University Press
Office of Scholarly Publishing
Herman B Wells Library 350
1320 East 10th Street
Bloomington, Indiana 47405 USA
iupress.indiana.edu
© 2017 by Vera Kaplan
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or
by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying
and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association
of American University Presses’ Resolution on Permissions
constitutes the only exception to this prohibition.
∞ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum
requirements of the American National Standard for Information
Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials,
ANSI Z39.48–1992.
Manufactured in the United States of America
Cataloging information is available from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-0-253-02398-8 (cloth)
ISBN 978-0-253-02406-0 (ebook)
1 2 3 4 5 22 21 20 19 18 17
For my father,
and in fond memory of my mother
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Note on Transliteration xi
List of Abbreviations xiii
Introduction 1
1 From Associations of the Educated to Societies for Education:
Historical Background 23
2 Historical Societies at the Juncture of Scholarship, Politics, and
Education 80
3 From the University Societies to the “University Extension”:
Historians as Public Activists 154
4 The Society of Zealots of Russian Historical Education:
Conservative Activism and the Quest for Useful History 182
Conclusion: Voluntary Historical Societies in the Fin-de-Siècle
Associational World 262
Bibliography 277
Index 313
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Acknowledgments
I
t is a distinct pleasure to begin this book with words of thanks to all those peo-
ple and institutions who have advised, assisted, and supported me in the course
of the research for this book, and during its writing.
My research was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (grant no.
134/09). Its generous funding enabled me to undertake extensive archival research,
which constitutes the most fascinating part of the historian’s labor. Yet, anyone
who has ever visited the Russian archives knows how complicated their structure
and methods of operation are. However, my work there was made pleasant and
effective thanks to the assistance of my colleague from the Cummings Center of
Russian and East European Studies at Tel Aviv University, Boris Morozov. As a
renowned expert on Russian archives, he helped me to collect documents from
the Moscow archives. Furthermore, I would never have been able to discover and
explore the treasures of St. Petersburg’s archives without the invaluable aid and
advice of Viktor Efimovich Kelner, who shared with me his extraordinary erudi-
tion and experience. I am also deeply grateful to the staff of the Russian state and
municipal archives, whose names usually remain unknown, but whose every-
day efforts to fulfill researchers’ requests deserve much greater appreciation. I
am especially grateful to the personnel of the Department of Manuscripts of the
Russian National Library, who were so kind and helpful. Special thanks are due
to this Department and its head, Aleksei Ivanovich Alekseev, for permission to
reproduce some photographs from its rich collection of visual sources.
I was privileged to be able to discuss the idea for this book with the late
Michael Confino, from whom so many of us learned so much. My colleagues
and, in various ways, academic mentors, Gabriel Gorodetsky and Avner Ben-
Amos, read the first version of a project proposal in which the plan for the study
was outlined; their thoughtful criticism helped me to turn my vague aspirations
into a “flesh and blood” research program. The study has also benefited a great
deal from my conversations and correspondence with Boris Kolonitsky, Pavel
Tribunskii, Vitalii Tikhonov, Wladimir Bérélowitch, Frances Nethercott, Larry
Holmes, and Ben Eklof. The members of Tel Aviv University’s Department of
History were very attentive and encouraging when I presented them the inter-
mediary results of the research; their questions and suggestions made a valuable
contribution to its further progress. Mark Gamsa, Igal Halfin, Yaacov Ro’i, and
Oded Rabinovitch read various portions of the manuscript; their critical com-
ments were constructive and extremely beneficial for me. Iris Rachamimov, Dina
Moyal, Inna Shtakser, and Deena Leventer, with whom I have worked closely in
ix