en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_the_Terrible
2 corrections found
Polotsk was also included following its capture in 1562.
The city was taken in 1563, not 1562. Authoritative reference works date Ivan IV’s Polotsk campaign to 1562–63, with the surrender of Polotsk on 15 February 1563.
Full reasoning
This sentence gives the wrong year for the capture of Polotsk.
The Great Russian Encyclopedia entry on the Polotsk campaign of 1562–63 states that Ivan IV's army left Moscow in late 1562, reached the area in January 1563, and that on 15 February 1563 a delegation announced the city's surrender. In other words, the campaign began in 1562, but the capture of Polotsk itself occurred in 1563.
So saying Polotsk was included in Ivan's title after its capture in 1562 is inaccurate by one year.
2 sources
- The Mapping of a Russian War (Brill PDF)
15 February 1563 | The siege of Polatsk and taking ... army of Ivan IV the Terrible;
- ПОЛОЦКИЙ ПОХОД 1562–63 • Большая российская энциклопедия
30.11.1562 русские войска... выступили из Москвы... 5.1.1563 прибыли в Великие Луки... Утром 15 февр. делегация... объявила о сдаче города.
Other events of the period include the introduction of the first laws restricting peasants' mobility, which would eventually lead to serfdom and were instituted during the rule of the future Tsar Boris Godunov in 1597.
This is chronologically wrong. Restrictions on peasant movement in Muscovy existed long before 1597: the Sudebnik of 1497 already limited moves to St. George’s Day, and broader 'forbidden years' were operating by the early 1580s.
Full reasoning
The statement says the first laws restricting peasant mobility were instituted in 1597 under Boris Godunov. That is contradicted by standard reference works.
- Encyclopedia of Russian History explains that the restriction began much earlier: a minor limitation was extended to all peasants in the Law Code (Sudebnik) of 1497, and the same rule was repeated in the Sudebnik of 1550.
- Europe, 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World likewise says the origins of Russian serfdom as migration control can be seen in mid-fifteenth-century documents restricting movement to St. George’s Day, and that by the early 1580s decrees of "forbidden years" were already operating in some districts.
- A classic legal history hosted by Yale’s Avalon Project also states that the 1497 Sudebnik fixed St. George’s Day as the lawful period for peasant removals, while the 1597 law merely authorized landowners to demand the return of peasants who had left.
So 1597 was not the first time Muscovy restricted peasant mobility; it was a later stage in a much longer process.
3 sources
- Enserfment | Encyclopedia.com
For unknown reasons this fundamentally trivial measure was extended to all peasants in the Law Code (Sudebnik) of 1497... The 1497 language was repeated in the Sudebnik of 1550... the forbidden years initially applied to only a few situations, but in 1592 they were applied temporarily to all peasants.
- Serfdom in Russia | Encyclopedia.com
The origins of serfdom as a form of migration control can be seen in mid-fifteenth-century documents that restricted peasant movement to the period on or around St. George's Day in November. By the early 1580s decrees proclaiming 'forbidden years'... were already functioning in certain districts... By 1597 the state instituted central registration...
- The Avalon Project: Modern Customs and Ancient Laws of Russia - Lecture VI
The first Soudebnik, the legal code published by Ivan III in 1497, speaks of the festival of Saint George... as a period at which all removals ought to take place... This law was promulgated in 1597. As no mention is made in it of the right previously enjoyed by the peasants of removing from one manor to another on St. George's Day, this law of 1597 has been considered by historians as the direct cause... Such was certainly not its object.