Abstract: The article focuses on the role of A. E. Evert, the commander-in-chief of the armies of the Western Front, in the events of the February Revolution. Russia's top military leadership took a consolidated position on the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II from the throne, but the unity regarding the fate of the Empire's future was only an appearance. This is made clear through a detailed examination of the decisions made by Evert during the last crucial days for the Russian Empire and of his motives. The author pays particular attention to the period after the emperor’s abdication when, in the political vacuum, the commander-in-chief of the armies of the Western Front changed his line of conduct and proposed the bold project of transferring the country's real political power under military control. The methodological basis of this study is the principles of historicism, systematicity and scientific objectivity, while also using the comparative and historical-genetic methods. Evert considered the constitutional monarchy with Mikhail Alexandrovich on the throne as a worthy alternative to the forceful suppression of the revolution in the rear, which cannot be said about his view on the Provisional Government and the prospect of elections to the Constituent Assembly during the war. In this regard, the commander-in-chief of the armies of the Western Front hoped, with the support of his colleagues, to impose his will on the rebellious capital. However, his project did not receive the necessary support, and his disloyalty to the Provisional Government led to his early resignation.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32412

Abstract: This paper consists of an introductory article and an original source text with the author's commentary. It introduces into scientific circulation S. I. Archangelsky's report "T. N. Granovsky as a Scholar of History", prepared for public reading in 1955. The research object of the introductory article is the scientific work of Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor and Associate Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences S. I. Arkhangelsky (1882-1958). The research subject is his work focused on the history of historical sciences and the place that he assigned to himself in the framework of the Moscow school of scholars at that time. The author also attempts to delimit S.I. Arkhangelsky's texts, conducted within the framework of cooperation with Nizhny Novgorod and Moscow scientific organizations. The work of S.I. Arkhangelsky is considered through the prism of an analysis of the scientific schools and corporations of scholars. The author applied the comparative-historical and biographical methods, as well as the general scientific methods of analysis and synthesis. The novelty of the presented research lies in the fact that, in the first place, it introduces into scientific circulation the previously unknown text of S.I. Arkhangelsky, dedicated to the work of T.N. Granovsky, which is important both for the further development of the history of Russian historical sciences and for the reconstruction of the scientific biography of S.I. Arkhangelsky; secondly, the author significantly enhances the picture of the initial formation of S.I. Arkhangelsky as a specialist in world history, differentiating between his research on domestic and foreign history; the author also reveals the role and place of the scientist within the corporation of scholars.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32607

Abstract: The article takes a look at the works of various porcelain manufactories: Italian Docchia, German Meissen and Nymphenburg, Viennese and French Sèvres. These works are subject to allegorical interpretation and symbolic meaning. This content feature is one of the characteristic features of Baroque and Rococo art. The author pays particular attention to the identification of allegorical attributes and specific elements of form and decor that carry symbolic meaning. Porcelain artifacts, the authors of which are prominent European masters (Soldani, Kändler, Eberlein, Bustelli, Niedermeier and Fournier), are examined in detail. These kinds of decorative and applied arts reflected the unique worldview of a person living in the 18th century - the period of Enlightenment. The following methods of art history laid the foundation for this study: the formal-stylistic and iconological analyses of porcelain artifacts, which enabled the author to identify the semantic content of examined images. The scientific novelty of this article lies in the fact that for the first time in Russian art studies, a comprehensive study of the works of 18th-century porcelain crafts from different countries was carried out in order to identify their symbolic meanings. A detailed study of these works gives the author reason to conclude that bestowing artifacts with symbolic content is characteristic of Baroque and Rococo art, and that these works reflected one of the features of the figurative art system of the 18th century.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32522

Abstract: The article focuses on the study of the particular features in understanding the relationship between general and specific manifestations of reality in historical research. The author describes historical civilizations as the unity of social, cultural, political and economic manifestations in societies. The author also examines the role of emergentism and mental causality in the understanding of global social phenomena and gives particular attention to the local-temporal changes in civilizations. The author analyzes the differences in understanding a historical event within the framework of modern philosophy and historical sciences. According to the philosophy of Heidegger and Deleuze, only large-scale phenomena that transcend the boundaries of daily life can be called “events”. An occurrence in everyday life should not be called an event. Taking into account the close ties among major historical events and happenings in daily life, and based on the role of specifics in the modern post-non-classical historical paradigm, the author proposes that the social phenomena of everyday life should also be considered in historical studies as events. The author also discusses the analysis of linguistic methods in historiography and the role of induction in historical research. The text focuses on the particularities of using mathematical methods in the historical analysis of the distant past and highlights historical transdisciplinarity. Finally, the author considers the role of the modern post-non-classical scientific paradigm and the role of synergy in historical research, The findings are illustrated using examples from Byzantine history.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.31837

Abstract: The research subject of this article is the mathematical modeling of the process of spatial settlement among medieval rural populations. Due to the heterogeneous features of land in different regions, the distribution of populations is not uniform. Along with the system of ordinary settlements, the presented model examines the system of the centers serving them. As such, there are settlements that have concentrated on themselves the functions of serving the entire surrounding population (for example, tribute collection centers or parish centers). The model assumes that the distribution of the system of centers is not uniform. The aim of the developed model is to describe the laws of such settlement systems. In order to achieve this goal, an innovative variational approach is developed, the essence of whichconsists in considering the process of historical settlement as a self-developing system, characterized by its parameters and needs. The use of the mathematical methods of variation calculations within the framework of this approach allowed the author to find the parameters of the existing systems for establishing centers and to quantitatively describe the relevant phenomena occurring within them. The testing of the proposed model is carried out on the basis of one rural settlement structure from the late 15th - early 16th centuries (Derevskaya Pyatina on the territory of Novgorod). A high degree of correspondence in the obtained theoretical results from empirical data allows the author to consider mathematical modeling as an adequate and convenient auxiliary tool for studying the process of historical settlement.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32033

Abstract: The article considers the difficulties in formulating the correct methodological approaches for studying the Soviet print mass media. The article's research subject is the source study specifics of the sectoral newspaper of the USSR food industry during the first and second Five-Year Plans, which influence the choice of methods for analyzing this source. The author proposes an approach to studying this periodical based on a combination of classical sources and computerized analysis of editorial texts in the MAXQDA 2020 program, providing a brief description of the possibilities offered by the new version of this program to scholars studying media texts. The article concludes that the study of such a multifaceted historical source as the branch newspaper Pishchevik ("For the Food Industry", "Food Industry") should be carried out using content analysis, which will systematize the dynamics of changes in the agenda of one of the largest industries of the USSR in 1928–1937. The article considers the difficulties in formulating the correct methodological approaches for studying the Soviet print mass media. The article's research subject is the source study specifics of the sectoral newspaper of the USSR food industry during the first and second Five-Year Plans, which influence the choice of methods for analyzing this source. The author proposes an approach to studying this periodical based on a combination of classical sources and a computerized analysis of editorial texts in the MAXQDA 2020 program, providing a brief description of the possibilities offered by the new version of this program to scholars studying media texts. The article concludes that the study of such a multifaceted historical source as the branch newspaper Pishchevik ("For the Food Industry", "Food Industry") should be carried out using content analysis, which will systematize the dynamics of changes in the agenda of one of the largest industries of the USSR in 1928–1937.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.31589

Abstract: The research subject of this study is the reciprocal influence of the problems of food supply and the social stability of the Soviet state with an analysis aiming to establish the relationship between the onset of the provision crisis and the massive politicization of economic processes in the USSR on the part of society during the examined period.The article is directed at studying the degree of impact the unfulfilled consumer expectations had on the social perception of power by the population of the Soviet Union during the agrarian crisis of the early 1970s.Particular attention is paid to the interaction between the government and society on questions of food supply, as well as the alleviation of the provision crisis through imports.The methodological basis of this work is founded on the basic principles of scientific knowledge - objectivity and historicism, which allowed the authors to study the evolution of the population's mass consciousness in a dialectical relationship with the era's phenomena. Upon implementing the above-mentioned principles, a number of both general scientific and specific historical research methods were applied (historical-situational, historical-comparative, historical-systemic, and statistical methods). The scientific novelty of this work is its attempt to reflect on the course of the socio-political development of the USSR under the influence of changing internal and external factors caused by the consumer crisis.The authors note that under difficult conditions, the authorities of the USSR and the CPSU Central Committee were forced to meet the social needs of the population in order to maintain a certain level of food provisions, as well as to support welfare. Evidence supports that increased social payments and higher wages in the early 1970s temporarily reduced the population's discontent with the Soviet political regime. The authors conclude that the concentration of the population’s attention on the low level of meeting their urgent needs was the basis of social inversion and the revision of the Soviet government approval index.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.30953

Abstract: The article discusses the issues related to the implementation of the Francophone policy in African and Asian countries. The author examines France's methods of cooperating with its former colonies; which countries received more attention; why specifically education played an important role in the implementation of the Francophone policy, and how did the financial support for this field change during the presidency of Charles de Gaulle. In the presented work, the policy of Francophonie is understood as the totality of France’s actions towards creating privileged political and economic ties with foreign states through the means of the French language and culture.In accordance with the latest methodological developments, foreign cultural policy is viewed as a group of measures developed and implemented by a state on an external level in order to promote national culture and language. The perception of the problems of foreign cultural policy was significantly influenced by the concept of "soft power" elaborated by political scientist J. Naya. This study applied several research methods: the system analysis method and the comparative analysis method. Topics related to the political implementation of Francophonie are little studied in Russian historiography. The article uses documents from the archives of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs previously unfamiliar to the general public. The implementation of the Francophone policy in the countries of Asia and Africa in 1958-1969 resulted in the extensive cultural, economic and political cooperation between France and its former colonies. Despite the numerous successes in implementing the Francophone policy, by 1969, the government of the Fifth Republic had failed to restore the French cultural influence on the territories that had gained independence from France in a non-peaceful way.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32200

Abstract: The research object of this study is the changes in the number of people belonging to the Russian-speaking diaspora in California. As the research subject, the author chose the social composition of migrants in the first pre-revolutionary wave of emigration to this region. The author also addresses the issue of the influence of the Russian colonization in the northwestern part of the American continent in the 18th-19th centuries on the process of forming a diaspora in California. Of particular importance to this study are the official statistics from the Immigration Commission and the United States Census Bureau. These sources are analyzed and compared with the findings presented in pre-revolutionary and modern Russian historiography. The methodological basis of this study and the provisions put forward in this work are the principle of historicism, the comparative historical method and the systematic approach. The author used materials from consular reports and official notes found in the collections of the Archive of Foreign Policy of the Russian Empire. The study's main findings are the thesis of the multi-ethnic nature of the California pre-revolutionary diaspora. The social composition and size of the community at each stage of its formation were also established.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.30687

Abstract: The article's research subject is the mentality of the representatives of the privileged social strata of imperial Russia living on the southern coast of Crimea during the years of the Civil War (1917-1921). On the basis of memoirs, little-known in historiographical circulation, as well as other sources, the author attempts to reconstruct the conditions of the daily life of the representatives of this social group during the indicated period and to describe the main features of their mentality. The author proposes a model that explains the mood and behavior of these figures with the help of "The Idle Class” concept, which was introduced at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries by the American sociologist T. Weblen. The narrative of "political history" is supplemented by research in the field of "local history" and "daily history", "micronarratives" based on the historical memory of event participants, affixed in sources of personal origin and designed to reveal how people of that era experienced their daily life. This has allowed the author to supplement and clarify the scientific knowledge about historical changes and to identify whether the changes at the macro and micro levels correlate with each other. The author uses the concept of "The Idle Class" to explain the fatal carelessness shown by representatives of the privileged social group of imperial Russia on the southern coast of Crimea even when the fire of the civil war had already been raging for several years in the country and when the Bolsheviks had governed over Crimea twice, even if not for long, by conducting searches, arrests and executions of class enemies. This, in turn, demonstrates that the interpretation of the revolution and the civil war in Russia in the 1917-early 1920s should be done in the broadest sense, as not only a socio-economic conflict, but also a socio-cultural and mental one.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32466

Abstract: The research subject of this study is the fate of a priest in Russia: Fr. Dmitry Vvedensky, who began his ministry before the Revolution, lived through Soviet camps, was convicted three times, managed to survive the difficult conditions of camp life and continued to serve after the death of Stalin.The research object of this study is the Vvedensky dynasty of priests.The author considers D. Vvedensky's life in the context of the priestly environment in which he found himself. At the microhistory level, the author describes the fate of one of the representatives of the Russian Orthodox clergy during a civilizational breakdown. The study was prepared on the basis of two kinds of sources: firstly, archival materials from the state archives (the State Archive of the Russian Federation and the Central State Historical Archive of Moscow) and private collections (the Vvedensky family archive, which was donated to the Church and History Museum of the Men's Stavropegalny Danilov Monastery of the Russian Orthodox Church ); secondly, interviews with the descendants of the Vvedensky family: the granddaughter of Fr. Dmitry - Lyubov', the grandson of Fr. Dmitry's brother - Rostislav, the niece of Fr. Dmitry's wife - I. K. Miloslavina, the granddaughter of the second priest serving in the same "Life-Giving Spring" Church with Fr. Dmitry, - E. P. Thebes.The scientific novelty of this research is its introduction into scientific circulation of new archival materials concerning the life of Russian priests, including from new archives, in particular, the Vvedensky archive stored in the Danilov Monastery.The study of priestly fates on the example of the Vvedensky family has made it possible for the author to identify the main trends in the life of the priesthood at the turn of the Russian-imperial and Soviet periods in the history of Russia.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32531

Abstract: The article's research subject is the sources from corporate meetings of the clergy in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century: conventions of monks, clergy and laity, as well as the Local Council of 1917–1918. The author considers how the monastic reform was planned and what role Optina Pustyn' played in this process. The author analyses the participation of this monastery's monks in corporate meetings, identifies in what context Optina Pustyn' was mentioned at these meetings, and clarifies how the monastery's traditions and experience were used in the church's monastic reform. Optina Pustyn' is considered as one of the main spiritual centers of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century. In accordance with the “center-periphery” model, Optina and its traditions influenced the development of the Church at the regional and then at the central level. Based on the article's material, the author demonstrates that at the beginning of the 20th century, Optina Pustyn', administratively remaining in deep province, in the spiritual sense had reached the national level. This was manifested not only in mass pilgrimages, but also in the fact that Optina was openly recognized by the Holy Synod and the monastic community as an exemplary, well-maintained monastery. Optina monks were invited to various corporate meetings of the clergy - up to the Local Council of 1917-1918, and Optina traditions were sought in chartering the monastic reform. Thus, the author argues that when reforming monasteries, the church administration tried to rely on the informal category of spiritual experience.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.31947

Abstract: In the late 1920s - 1930s, according to official figures, the Soviet Union significantly increased its volume of timber industry production. However, the statistics did not include the private harvesting and procurement of wood by the population, that is, for household consumption, which until about the mid-1930s and its almost complete cutback, reached impressive quantities. Historiography formed an incomplete picture of timber management in the Soviet Union during the modernization period, and part of the official indexes are still today used by researchers to prove a significant increase in the volume of timber production in the country during the late 1920s - 1930s. This has made currently very relevant the task of studying changes in the structure of forest management and of determining the country's place in the global timber industry using estimates of the total volume of forestry resources and the value of the gross output of the wood industry. The author reveals that in the first decades of the 20th century the most actively developed areas of forestry were logging and mechanical processing of wood, while the proportion of deep wood processing in the value structure of forest management has changed little and remained at a low level. The author identifies the principal systemic problems in the forest industry of the Soviet Union in the late 1920s - 1930s, which became the causes of imbalances in its structure. Additionally, the author conducted a comparative analysis of the indexes of the Soviet state and of other countries and regions - leaders in the global wood industry. The study's conclusions include the highlighting of the persistence of imbalances in the timber industry in the late 1920s - 1930s and the lagging of the Soviet Union from other countries - industry leaders in the most important areas of timber production.

DOI: 10.7256/2454-0609.2020.2.32327

Abstract: The research subject of this article is the salt industry in the Astrakhan Governorate during the second half of the 19th century. The article's research object is the role of the Baskunchak railway in the development of the salt industry in the Astrakhan Governorate during the second half of the 19th century. The chronological framework of this study encompasses the period from the second half of the 19th century, when precisely at this time the government policy changed to the state reorganization of the entire railway system in Russia in the reign of Alexander II, and later in the reign of Alexander III, on the discussed here example, construction and operation of the Baskunchak railway. The author provides a detailed comprehensive analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of transporting salt along the Baskunchak railway compared with transportation by oxen, which leads to the affirmation that after its opening this railway became the most important economic artery in Russia. This work uses the problem-chronological method, the historical-descriptive method, the historical-comparative and historical-systemic methods. The novelty of this study lies in its detailed elaboration of a previously unstudied direction, such as the influence of the new railway on the development of the salt industry in the Astrakhan Governorate during the second half of the 19th century.The role of the Baskunchak railway in the growth of the salt industry in the Astrakhan Governorate during the second half of the 19th century is indisputable. The railway connecting Lake Baskunchak with Port Vladimir has opened the most reliable and convenient form of transport. The materials used in this work are relevant for use in university education processes in the Astrakhan region for teaching general and specialized courses in Russian history and other related disciplines.