Product Code Database
The Russian nobility or dvoryanstvo () arose in the Middle Ages. In 1914, it consisted of approximately 1,900,000 members, out of a total population of 138,200,000 (1.38% of the population). Up until the February Revolution of 1917, the Russian noble estates staffed most of the Russian government and possessed a self-governing body, the Assembly of the Nobility.
The Russian language word for nobility, dvoryanstvo derives from Slavonic dvor (двор), meaning the noble court of a prince or duke ( knyaz), and later, of the tsar or emperor. Here, dvor originally referred to servants at the estate of an aristocrat. In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, the system of hierarchy was a system of seniority known as mestnichestvo. The word dvoryane described the highest rank of gentry, who performed duties at the royal court, lived in it ( Moskovskie zhiltsy, "Moscow dwellers"), or were candidates to it, as for many boyar scions ( dvorovye deti boyarskie, vybornye deti boyarskie). A nobleman is called a dvoryanin (plural: dvoryane). Pre-Soviet Union Russia shared with other countries the concept that nobility connotes a status or social category rather than a title. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, the title of the nobleman in Russia gradually became a formal status, rather than a reference to a member of the aristocracy, due to a massive influx of via the Table of ranks.
Many descendants of the former ancient Russian aristocracy, including royalty, saw their formal standing change to , burghers, or even , while people descended from (like Vladimir Lenin's father) or clergy (like in the ancestry of actress Lyubov Orlova) gained formal nobility.
As different rulers ascended the throne in the 19th century, each figure brought a different attitude and approach to ruling the nobility. Yet, the cultural impact of Peter I and Catherine II was set in stone. Ironically, by introducing the nobility to political literature from Western Europe, Catherine exposed Russia's autocracy to them as archaic and illiberal. While the nobility was conservative as a whole, a liberal and radical minority remained constant throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, resorting to violence on multiple occasions in order to challenge Russia's traditional political system (see Decembrist Revolt, Narodnaya Volya).
Peter's westernizing efforts became more radical after 1698 when he returned from his expedition through Europe known as the Grand Embassy. Upon arriving Peter summoned the nobility to his court and personally shaved almost every beard in the room. In 1705 he decreed a beard tax on all men of rank in Moscow and ordered certain officers to seek out noble beards and shave them on sight. He only allowed peasants, priests, and serfs to retain the ingrained and religious Russian tradition of wearing beards, which the Orthodox populace considered an essential aspect of their duty to convey the image of God. He also reformed the clothing of the nobility, replacing the long-sleeved traditional Muscovite robes with European clothing. Beginning in 1699 the tsar decreed strict dress requirements borrowing from German, Hungarian, French and British styles, fining any noblemen who failed to obey. Peter himself, who usually wore German dress and had a trimmed mustache, acted as a prime example. While the nobility universally followed Peter's fashion preferences at court, they greatly resented these styles, which they saw as blasphemous. Away from St. Petersburg, very few noblemen followed Peter's guidelines and enforcement was lax.
Peter also demanded changes in mannerisms and language among nobles. To supply Russians with a basic set of “proper” morals and habits, he ordered publication of manuals on Western etiquette. The most popular of these was The Honourable Mirror of Youth or A Guide to Social Conduct Gathered from Various Authors, a compilation of rules of conduct from numerous European sources, initially published in St. Petersburg in 1717. He also encouraged the learning of foreign languages especially French language, which was the foremost political and intellectual language of Europe at the time. For the nobility, these changes felt even more forced than fashion regulations. As with clothing, there was uniform acceptance of Western mannerisms at court but general disregard for them outside of St. Petersburg. Furthermore, when Westerners visited Peter's court they found the image and personality of the courtiers to appear forced and awkward. Friedrich Christian Weber, a representative of Britain, commented in 1716 that the nobles “wear the German Dress; but it is easy to observe on many, that they have not been long used to it”.Hughes, Lindsey. 1998. Russia in the age of Peter the Great. New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press. pp. 281–290
The period between Peter I and Catherine II represents gradual yet significant developments in western culture among the nobility. Empress Anna gave many privileges to the nobility. In 1730 she repealed the primogeniture law introduced by Peter the Great allowing the sub-division of estates. In 1736 the age at which nobles had to start service was raised from 15 to 20 and length of service was changed to 25 years instead of life and families with more than one son could keep one to manage the family estate.Richard Pipes, Russia under the old regime, page 133 In 1726 Catherine I and in 1743 Empress Elizabeth further regulated noble dress in a Western direction.Hughes, Lindsey. 1998. Russia in the age of Peter the Great. New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press. p. 286. In 1755 also during Elizabeth's reign, advanced secondary schools and the University of Moscow were founded with curricula that included foreign languages, philosophy, medicine and law; the material was chiefly based on imported texts from the west. Most significantly Peter III freed the nobility from obligatory civil and military service in 1762, allowing them to pursue personal interests. While some used this liberty as an excuse to lead lavish lives of leisure, a select group became increasingly educated in Western ideas through schooling, reading, and travel. As before, these changes applied to few and represented a gradual shift in noble identity rather than a sudden or universal one.Dukes, Paul. 1967. Catherine the Great and the Russian nobility: a study based on the materials of the Legislative Commission of 1767. London: Cambridge U.P. pp. 27, 38–44 Marc Raeff in Origins of the Russian Intelligentsia has suggested this was not a noble victory but a sign the state didn't need them as much now that they had plenty of trained officials.
Catherine also made specific reforms in institutional education that pushed the nobility's culture further westward. She based Russian education on that of Austria, importing German textbooks and adopting in 1786 a standardized curriculum to be taught in her newly created public schools.Dukes, Paul. 1967. Catherine the Great and the Russian nobility: a study based on the materials of the Legislative Commission of 1767. London: Cambridge U.P. p. 241. While many members of the lower classes were allowed into these schools, Catherine hoped that they could become educated enough to rise through the meritocratic Table of Ranks and eventually become nobles themselves. Catherine also established the Society for the Translation of Foreign Books, “to bring enlightenment to those Russians who could not read either French or German.”Madariaga, Isabel de. 1981. Russia in the age of Catherine the Great. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 31, 95. It is clear that, like Peter I, Catherine the Great desired to construct a new nobility, a “new race,” which would both resemble western noblemen and prove knowledgeable in discussions of modern issues. And, according to accounts from foreign visitors, the noblemen did, in fact, resemble those of Western Europe in their dress, topics of discussion, and taste in literature and performance.Madariaga, Isabel de. 1981. Russia in the age of Catherine the Great. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 102.
She also gave away 66,000 serfs in 1762–72, 202,000 in 1773–93, and 100,000 in one day: 18 August 1795.Richard Pipes, Russia under the old regime, p. 119 Thus she was able to bind the nobility to herself. From 1782, a kind of uniform was introduced for civilian nobles called uniform of civilian service or simply civilian uniform. The uniform prescribed colors that depended on the territory. The uniform was required at the places of service, at the Court, and at other important public places. The privileges of the nobility were fixed and were legally codified in 1785 in the Charter to the Gentry. The Charter introduced an organization of the nobility: every province ( guberniya) and district ( uyezd) had an Assembly of Nobility. The chair of an assembly was called Province/District Marshal of Nobility. In 1831 Nicholas I restricted the assembly votes to those with over 100 serfs, leaving 21,916 voters.Richard Pipes, Russia under the old regime, page 179
| + Serfs owned by European Russian landlords | ||
| 1.1 | ||
| 2 | ||
| 18 | ||
| 35.1 | ||
| 43.8 | ||
| Source:Richard Pipes, Russia under the old regime, page 178 | ||
Descended from the gentry, the landholding, but not serf-owning, odnodvortsy were between peasants and nobles. They emerged as frontier settlers recruited from the class of boyar scions. The status of the odnodvortsy changed gradually from singleholding farmers to taxed state peasants.
The nobility was too weak to oppose the Emancipation reform of 1861. In 1858, three million serfs were held by 1,400 landlords (1.4%) while 2 million by 79,000 (78%).Richard Pipes, Russia under the old regime, page 175 In 1820 a fifth of the serfs were mortgaged, half by 1842.Geoffrey Hosking, Russia: People and Empire, page 164 By 1859, a third of nobles' estates and two-thirds of their serfs were mortgaged to noble banks or to the state.Orlando Figes, A People's Tragedy, page 48 The nobility was also weakened by the scattering of their estates, lack of primogeniture and the high turnover and mobility from estate to estate.
| 80 | |
| 72 | |
| 55 | |
| 39 | |
| 36 | |
| Source:Seymour Becker, Nobility and privilege in late imperial Russia, page 29 | |
After the peasant reform of 1861 the economic position of the nobility weakened. The influence of the nobility was further reduced by the new law statutes of 1864, which repealed their right of electing law officer. The reform of the police in 1862 limited the landowners' authority locally, and the establishment of all-estate Zemstvo local government did away with the exclusive influence of nobility in local self-government.
These changes occurred despite the nobles keeping nearly all the meadows and forests and having their debts paid by the state, while the ex-serfs paid 34% over the market price for the shrunken plots they kept. This figure was 90% in the northern regions, 20% in the black-earth region but zero in the Polish provinces. In 1857, 6.79% of serfs were domestic, landless servants who stayed landless after 1861.Donald Wallace, Russia vol. II, page 145 Only Polish and Romanian domestic serfs got land. Ninety percent of the serfs who got larger plots lived in the eight ex-Polish provinces where the Tsar wanted to weaken the Szlachta. The other 10% lived in Astrakhan and in the barren north.Geroid Robinson, Rural Russia under the old regime, page 88. In the whole Empire, peasant land declined 4.1% - 13.3% outside the ex-Polish zone and 23.3% in the 16 black-earth provinces.Jerome Blum, The end of the old order in Europe, page 395 Georgia's serfs suffered the loss of of their land in Tiflis province, in Kutaisi province.Ronald Suny, The making of the Georgian nation, page 107 These redemption payments were not abolished till January 1, 1907.
The influx of New World grain caused a slump in grain prices, forcing the peasants to farm more land. At the same time, despite their efficiency, large peasant households split up (from 9.5 to 6.8 persons per household in central Russia, 1861–1884).Orlando Figes, A People's Tragedy, page 92 The resulting land hunger increased prices 7-fold and made it easier for nobles to sell or rent land rather than farm it themselves. From 1861 to 1900 40% of noble land was sold to peasants (70% of this went to the ObshchinaSeymour Becker, Nobility and privilege in late imperial Russia, page 36 and by 1900 two thirds of the nobles' arable land was rented to the peasantry). Between 1900–1914, over 20% of remaining noble land was sold but only 3% of the 155 estates over 50,000 destiny.Dominic Lieven, The Cambridge History of Russia, vol. II, page 232 According to the 1897 census, 71% of the top 4 ranks of the civil service were nobles.Orlando Figes, A People's Tragedy, page 36 But in the civil service as a whole, noble membership declined from 49.8% in 1755 to 43.7% in the 1850s and to 30.7% in 1897.Seymour Becker, Nobility and privilege in late imperial Russia, page 109 There were 1.2 million nobles, about 1% of the population (8% in Poland; compare with 4% in Hungary and 1 to 1.5% in France).Dominic Lieven, The Cambridge History of Russia, vol. II, page 230 Their military influence waned: in the Crimean War 90% of officers were noble, by 1913 the proportion had sunk to 50%.Dominic Lieven, The Aristocracy in Europe, page 182 They lived increasingly away from their estates: in 1858 only 15 to 20% of Russian nobles lived in cities, by 1897 it was 47.2%.Seymour Becker, Nobility, and privilege in late imperial Russia, page 28
| 96.3 | |
| 92.6 | |
| 88.4 | |
| 81.7 | |
| 76.7 | |
| 72.4 | |
| 67.1 | |
| 61 | |
| 58.8 | |
| 52.3 | |
| 47.6 | |
| 47.1 | |
| Source:Seymour Becker, Nobility and privilege in late imperial Russia, page 32 | |
By 1904 of noble land was mortgaged to the noble bank.Geroid Robinson, Rural Russia under the old regime, page 131. During the 1905 Russian Revolution 3,000 manors were burnt (15% of the total).Orlando Figes, A People's tragedy, page 181
| 105,000,000 | |
| 73,077,000 | |
| 52,104,000 | |
| Source:Geroid Robinson, Rural Russia under the old regime, pp 63, 131. | |
Finns were not generally part of the Russian nobility, but the Finnish nobility was recognised and maintained as a distinct, privileged class within the Russian Empire during the era of the Grand Duchy of Finland. While some Finns did receive Russian noble titles and imperial orders for service - such as Gustaf Mauritz Armfelt and Johan Fredrik Aminoff. The Finnish nobility had its own institution known as the House of Nobility in Finland. The Emperor was the Grand Duke of Finland.
The Russian economy was based on agriculture. The abolition of serfdom in Russia - except in Finland, where serfdom did not exist - transformed the economic landscape and led to the emergence of new social classes, which affected both the Russian and non-Russian nobility. Later, many of the impoverished or déclassé Polish and Georgian nobles became leaders of nationalist and radical political movements, including Bolshevism. (2025). 9781107014220, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107014220 (2025). 9781317568100, Routledge. ISBN 9781317568100
Quoting historian John Armstrong, Andrei Znamenski describes the Baltic Germans as a "mobilized diaspora" who acted as the Russian Empire's cultural and diplomatic envoys.
The vast majority of wealthy and high-ranking nobles left Russia as "White émigrés" or fell victim to the Russian Civil War or the Red Terror by the Bolsheviks (Grand Duke Kirill, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna, Felix Yusupov). Countless nobles died in the civil war after the October Revolution - in the White Army units there were entire regiments that consisted exclusively of noble officers (Sergey Markov, Mikhail Drozdovsky, Dmitry Bagration). Others emigrated, especially to Switzerland, preferably to Geneva, to Finland, Poland, Germany and France, where Paris became the center of Russian emigrants (the “princely taxi drivers” were a stereotype there in the 1920s)From 1919 to 1939, with nearly 45,000 Russians living in the capital and its immediate suburbs, Paris became the center of attraction for the entire Russian diaspora: Hélène Menegaldo: Les Russes à Paris : 1919-1939, éditions Autrement; Les russes blancs,chauffeurs de Taxis à Paris; «La petite Russie» ou la saga des réfugiés devenus chauffeurs de taxi à Paris; Guichet du Savoir: Russes Blancs chauffeurs de taxi and from there often to the USA, where a large part of the surviving members of the Imperial Family of Russia, the House of Romanov, and their descendants live today. The Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia quickly developed.
Under Bolshevik rule, many nobles were persecuted, imprisoned, tortured, and shot (Grand Duke George, Nicholas and Sergei). Emperor Nicholas II and his family were banished to Yekaterinburg and murdered there. Thousands of dissidents, devout Christians, members of non-Russian peoples, communist officials and many nobles who remained in the Soviet Union later fell victim to the “Great Purge” under Stalin. However, a significant number of the (mostly untitled) small nobility, who had inconspicuous names, had previously served as civil servants and mostly owned little land, came to terms with the circumstances. Some of them even took part in building the new state - such as Lenin himself,In 1882, Lenin's father Ilya Ulyanov was promoted to the rank of Active State Councillor, which gave him a privilege of hereditary nobility, accompanied by the award of the Order of Saint Vladimir, 3rd Class. [4] (in Russian), Uniros.ru. Foreign Minister Georgy Chicherin as well as intelligence chief Felix Dzerzhinsky and his successor Vyacheslav Menzhinsky, both of whom came from Polish noble families; also Stalin's secret service chief Vsevolod Merkulov, Marshals Mikhail Tukhachevsky and Konstantin Rokossovsky. Occasionally, members of prominent aristocratic families also adapted to the circumstances, either becoming Bolsheviks themselves, like the diplomat Leonid Leonidovich Obolensky (1873−1930), father of the actor Leonid Obolensky, or supporting the new system, like the writer Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy or the actor Mikheil Gelovani. Some married into the proletariat and the next, Soviet-influenced generation was accepted into the Soviet academic elite, such as Georgy Golitsyn, Vladimir Vladimirovich Golitsyn or Andrey Gagarin.
Many members of the Russian nobility who fled Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution played a significant role in the White Emigre communities which settled in Europe, in North America, and in other parts of the world. In the 1920s and 1930s, &!80 k h UN m several Russian nobility associations were established outside Russia, including groups in France (the Union de la Noblesse Russe (UNR) is a member organization of CILANE), Website of Union de la Noblesse Russe (UNR), Paris Belgium, and the United States. In New York, the Russian Nobility Association in America, was founded in 1933.
| +List of notable White Emigre of Russian nobles !Name !Settlement | |
| Serge Obolensky | United States |
| Georgy Lvov | |
| Prince Sergei Rachmaninoff | |
| Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna | |
| Princess Nina Georgievna of Russia | |
| Princess Xenia Georgievna | |
| Felix Yusupov | France |
| Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich of Russia | |
| Grand Duchess Marie Pavlovna the Elder | |
| Princess Irina Alexandrovna of Russia | |
| Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich | |
| Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna | United Kingdom |
| Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark | |
| Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna | Canada |
| Princess Tatiana Konstantinovna | Switzerland |
| Prince Rostislav Alexandrovich | |
| Grand Duchess Anastasia Mikhailovna | |
| Prince Michael Andreevich of Russia | Australia |
| Prince Roman Petrovich of Russia | Italy |
After the Dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, aristocratic associations and organizations that maintained noble traditions were permitted again in Russia, but the Russian nobility no longer exists as a social class. The historical noble families are known from the sources. However, in Russia, as everywhere in Europe, according to historical aristocratic law, the nobility was only passed on in the Patrilineality. The acceptance of descendants through the female line, which is contrary to tradition and is now practiced by some of the more recent associations, is therefore very controversial. Comment devenir membre de l'UNR, on www.noblesse-russie.org, website of the Union de la Noblesse Russe, Paris (French): “Absolute condition: Belonging to the hereditary nobility of the former Russian Empire through legitimate and direct male descent.”
The various aristocratic associations have different opinions not only with regard to aristocratic law, but also with regard to the succession of the pretenders to the Russian tsar's crown. Some see Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna of Russia as the legitimate heir to the throne, but she is not recognized by the other remaining branches of the Romanov family. In particular, she has come to terms with the new Russian elite around President Vladimir Putin and awards some historical dynastic orders of the Tsars and sometimes even newly created orders such as the Order of the Archangel Michael (founded in 1988) or the Ladies' Order of Saint Anastasia (founded in 2010) to their members. She even goes so far as to raise such people “to the nobility.” In 2007, she is said to have ennobled the former head of the Russian domestic secret service Federal Security Service (FSB), Nikolai Patrushev, who is considered one of Vladimir Putin's closest confidants (and one of his possible successor candidates).German article: Die Patruschew Familie und Russlands Monarchisten (The Patrushev family and Russia's monarchists), 16 February 2024; Russian-language sources: Хотят ли русские царя?, on svoboda.org;
on versia.ru; geroldia.ru LIST OF THE HEROLDY E.I.V. APPROVED PERSONS IN HEREDITARY NOBILITY AND INCLUDED INTO THE ALL-RUSSIAN NOBILITY GENEALOGY BOOK IN 2005 Patrushev himself described the FSB employees in an interview as “our new nobility” because of their sense of dedicated service. Russia’s New Nobility − The Rise of the Security Services in Putin’s Kremlin, in: Foreign Affairs (foreignaffairs.com), 1. September 2010
The aristocratic associations are therefore faced with the question of how to deal with such “new aristocrats”, who usually have no biographical or cultural connection to the traditional nobility, but are often historically connected to the CPSU or the KGB and are often influential. Some of these associations have taken this line and recognize such “nobility” as legitimate. Most, however, reject it, because Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna is neither the undisputed pretender to the throne nor does she - who is not a reigning monarch - have any constitutional authority to ennoble herself. Neither the Russian CILANE member association, the Union de la Noblesse Russe based in Paris, which largely consists of descendants of the “White Emigrants”, nor the Association of Baltic knighthoods, which unites the families of the Baltic-German enrolled nobility of the former Russian Empire, recognize Maria Vladimirovna or anyone else as holder of the throne with the power of ennoblement. However, the fact that influential “would-be nobles” make up a significant proportion of the members of the new Russian aristocratic associationsRefer: geroldia.ru LIST OF THE HEROLDY E.I.V. APPROVED PERSONS IN HEREDITARY NOBILITY AND INCLUDED INTO THE ALL-RUSSIAN NOBILITY GENEALOGY BOOK IN 2005 leads to major conflicts within and between the Russian aristocratic associations. Since membership in the nobility is neither legally recognized nor protected, a large market for fake titles and coats of arms has developed since 1991. Supposedly original letters of nobility “from the Tsarist era” or confirmation diplomas from dubious associations can even be purchased on the Internet.See for example: Russian titles of nobility (Webseite noble-society.net)
Unlike the ancient nobility, which was exclusively hereditary, the remaining classes of nobility could be acquired.
A newly designated noble was usually entitled to . A loss of land did not automatically mean loss of nobility. In later Imperial Russia, higher ranks of state service (see Table of Ranks) were automatically granted nobility, not necessarily associated with land ownership.
Russian did not in general employ a nobiliary particle before a surname (as von in German language or de in French language); however, the Russian name suffix -skij which means “of” and is equal to “von” and “de” was used in many noble surnames especially topographic surnames as nobiliary particle. Russian noblemen were accorded an official salutation, or style, that varied by rank: your Hochgeboren (), your Hochwohlgeboren (), your Wohlgeboren (), etc.
| +Noble titles of the Russian Empire !Title !Crown !Application !Style of Address | |||
| Emperor of All Russia
His Imperial Majesty The Sovereign, Emperor and Autocrat of All Russia
( Его Императорское Величество Государь Император и Самодержец Всероссийский) | The ruler of the Russian Empire and its constituent entities. | Your Imperial Majesty ( Ваше Императорское Величество) | |
| Tsesarevich
His Imperial Highness The Lord Heir Tsesarevich and Grand Prince
( Его Императорское Высочество Государь Наследник Цесаревич и Великий Князь) * | Heir apparent of the Russian Empire. | Your Imperial Highness
( Ваше Императорское Высочество) | |
| Grand Prince
His Imperial Highness The Grand Prince
( Его Императорское Высочество Великий Князь) * | Descendants of the House of Romanov. After the introduction of the title Prince of Blood Imperial, the title of Grand Prince was reserved for sons and grandsons of Romanov emperors. | Your Imperial Highness
( Ваше Императорское Высочество) | |
| Prince of the Blood Imperial
His Highness the Prince Firstname Patronymic of the Blood Imperial
( Его Высочество Князь Крови Императорской) | Introduced by Alexander III on January 24, 1885 in order to reduce the number of members of the House of Romanov titled (as each Grand Prince received 200,000 annually from the state budget and enjoyed other high privileges). The male-line great-grandchildren of the Romanov emperors and their male-line descendants were titled Prince of the Blood Imperial to distinguish them from those of the noble Russian families titled simply Prince. | Your Highness ( Ваше Высочество) | |
| Prince
His Serenity The Prince
( Его Сиятельство Князь) * | List of Russian princely families | Your Serenity ( Ваше Сиятельство) | |
| Duke
His Highness the Duke
( Его Светлость Герцог) **
| Applied to some French and German relatives of the Romanov dynasty. Also used by dukes in Russian service, which were bestowed with ducal dignity by other monarchs and therefore did not officially belong to the Russian nobility. | Your Grace ( Ваша Светлость) | |
| Marquis
His Serenity The Marquis
( Его Сиятельство Маркиз) | Used by marquises residing in Russia and/or in Russian service, which were bestowed with marquisal dignity by other monarchs and therefore technically did not belong to the Russian nobility. | Your Serenity ( Ваше Сиятельство) | |
| Count
His Serenity the Count
( Его Сиятельство Граф) | Your Serenity ( Ваше Сиятельство) | ||
| Baron
The Well Born Baron
( Его Благородие Барон) | There were landed and landless barons in the Russian Empire. | The Well Born ( Ваше Благородие) | |
| Dvoryanin / Pomeshchik | The lowest ranks of hereditary nobility. Dvoryanin comes from dvor (the court of a ruler or a high nobleman). Originally these were free commoners in the service of noblemen who also had serfs. Pomeshchiks were the landed gentry. | Your Well Birth
( Ваше Благородие) | |
| Baltic knights | Baltic Noble Corporations of Courland, Livonia, Danish Estonia, and Oesel (Ösel) were medieval formed by German nobles in the 13th century in vassalage to the Teutonic Knights or Denmark in modern Latvia and Estonia. The territories continued to have semi-autonomous status from 16th to early 20th century under Swedish and Russian rule. The dukes, princes, counts, and barons of Courlandish, Livonian, Estonian and Oesel extraction were gradually absorbed into the Russian nobility due to their services to the realm. The Russian medieval equivalent of knights (the armored boyars, the vityazes) was ultimately abolished by the reforms of Peter the Great. The ethnically German knights of Baltic extraction retained their social prominence and equalled the Russian Pomeshchiks due to their wealth and lands. | Your Well Birth
( Ваше Благородие) | |
|
Between 1722 and 1845 hereditary nobility was given to military officers who achieved the 14th rank of ensign, to civil servants who achieved the 8th rank of Collegiate Assessor and to any person who was awarded any order of the Russian Empire (since 1831 – except the Polish order of Virtuti Militari).
Between 1845 and 1856 hereditary nobility was given to military officers who achieved the 8th rank of major/captain 3rd rank, to civil servants who achieved the 5th rank of State Councillor and to any person who was awarded the Order of Saint George or the Order of Saint Vladimir of any class, or any order of the Russian Empire of the first class.
From 1856 to 1917 hereditary nobility was given to military officers who achieved the 6th rank of colonel/captain 1st rank, to civil servants who achieved the 4th rank of Active State Councillor and to any person who was awarded the Order of Saint George of any class or the Order of Saint Vladimir of any class (since 1900 - of the third class or higher), or any order of the Russian Empire of the first class.
Personal nobility could be acquired in the following ways: 1) by Imperial grant; 2) by attaining the 14th military rank of ensign or the 9th civil rank of Titular Councillor; 3) by being awarded the orders of the Russian Empire unless those gave hereditary nobility; except merchants (unless those were awarded between 1826 and 1832), who acquired honorary citizenship instead. Personal nobility was not inherited by children but was shared by the recipient's wife.
|
|
