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God, Tsar, and People: The Political Culture of Early Modern Russia

Online ISBN:
9781501752117
Print ISBN:
9781501752094
Publisher:
Cornell University Press
Book

God, Tsar, and People: The Political Culture of Early Modern Russia

Daniel B. Rowland
Daniel B. Rowland
University of Kentucky
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Published online:
20 May 2021
Published in print:
15 November 2020
Online ISBN:
9781501752117
Print ISBN:
9781501752094
Publisher:
Cornell University Press

Abstract

This book brings together essays written over a period of fifty years, using a wide variety of evidence — texts, icons, architecture, and ritual — to reveal how early modern Russians (1450–1700) imagined their rapidly changing political world. The book presents a more nuanced picture of Russian political thought during the two centuries before Peter the Great came to power than is typically available. The state was expanding at a dizzying rate, and atop Russia's traditional political structure sat a ruler who supposedly reflected God's will. The problem facing Russians was that actual rulers seldom — or never — exhibited the required perfection. This book argues that this contradictory set of ideas was far less autocratic in both theory and practice than modern stereotypes would have us believe. In comparing and contrasting Russian history with that of Western European states, the book is also questioning the notion that Russia has always been, and always viewed itself as, an authoritarian country. The book explores how the Russian state in this period kept its vast lands and diverse subjects united in a common view of a Christian polity, defending its long frontier agai-nst powerful enemies from the East and from the West.

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