First estate: Aristocrats, boyars.

Rights: The upper class in the country. They owned lands, herds of cattle and serfs as personal property. Their power over the serfs was practically unlimited, and often any atrocities were committed against them. The rights of the boyars could be limited only by representatives of their own estate, or the royal family.

Responsibilities: To serve for the benefit of the state. This service consisted in holding public posts, that is, administrative activities, military and diplomatic activities. These are ministers, generals, governor-generals of large regions, ambassadors in major powers. For this they are called "service people"

Estate: nobles and boyar children(lower strata of aristocratic society)

Rights: Similar to the first estate, but they had few lands and lackeys, they obeyed the boyars in everything.

Responsibilities: Serving obligatory (until the 18th century) service for the benefit of the state. "Service people". Most often they occupied managerial positions of a lower rank. This class included officers, ambassadors of small principalities, more often Asian ones, governors and mayors of insignificant provinces.

Condition: Sagittarius

Rights: The lowest class of all "service people" was traditionally called "instrument people" (that is, those who were called up to the army from the outside). They received monetary and food salaries from the state, as well as the right to use land plots. They lived in the streltsy settlements on the outskirts of the city "posads". These are the wealthy segments of the population.

Responsibilities: Military service for the benefit of the state. This is the regular army of Russia. Their commanders were noblemen and boyar children. Sometimes the archers themselves became commanders (they were called "initial people")

Estate: Posad people(lower strata of city dwellers, commoners)

Rights: Minimum. Submit to all the higher classes and work for them. These are artisans called "black people". Personally free.

Responsibilities: To serve the "tax"(a system of duties and taxes in favor of the state), for this they were called "tax people". It was most often quitrent or payment of taxes. For example, a city dweller served for some time in the service of a coachman and brought income from the service to the treasury. They did not have the right to own land, they lived in communities, the community owned the land, obeyed it.

Estate: Peasants

Rights: Minimum. Until the end of the 18th century, the peasants did not even have the right to complain about the cruelty to them of the state. Personally free. Also "Tight people", "black people", "black souls", residents of "black settlements".

Responsibilities: Work on communal land (they did not have private ownership of it), submit to the community, pay a lot of taxes to the treasury.

Estate: Serfs:

Rights: Zero. Full property of the master. They can be killed, maimed, sold or separated from the family by order of the master. The murder of a serf was not considered murder by law, the owner did not answer for it - only the killer of someone else's serf answered with a fine. The lowest class of the whole society. They did not even treat "hard people." They did not answer before the court for theft or other offense, because they were not considered subjects of the law, only the master could punish. They did not pay taxes to the treasury, the master decided everything for them.

Responsibilities: To work for a gentleman, to serve a corvée, that is, the amount of labor in favor of the owner, even unbearable. In general, the rights and obligations of a slave. It was possible to sell oneself into slaves for debts. They did menial work, sometimes handicraft.

19th century table of estates

Class: nobles

Rights: This is the feudal privileged class. A nobleman could simultaneously belong to the clergy. Until 1861, the nobles were mainly landowners in Russia - the owners of land and peasants. After the reform, the right to own people was taken away from them, but most of the lands and lands remained in their possession. They had their own estate self-government, freedom from corporal punishment, the exclusive right in the country to buy land.

Responsibilities: Officers were recruited from among the nobles, but the military and state service has not been compulsory since 1785. Local power - governor, city self-government in major cities, in the 19th century was exclusively from the nobility. Most of the nobles also sat in the zemstvos. There was a personal and hereditary nobility. The first was appointed for services to the Fatherland and could not be inherited.

Class: clergy.

Rights: They were freed from corporal punishment, taxes and duties, they had class self-government inside. The clergy were only half of one percent of the total population of the country. They were exempted from military service (and recruitment from their abolition during the reform of 1861).

Responsibilities: They served in churches - Russian Orthodox, Catholic or other denominations. Part of the clergy could inherit their estate. Some acquired it only for the duration of their lives. If the priest took off his rank, he returned to the estate in which he had been before taking the rank.

Condition: urban. It was divided into five very dissimilar states. These included honorary citizens of cities, merchants, philistines, artisans and workers. Merchants, in turn, were divided into guilds according to the degree of the number of privileges.

Rights: Merchants have the right to be called the merchant class only as long as they pay the fee to their guild. Honorary citizens, like nobles and clergy, were exempt from corporal punishment. Honorary citizens (not all) could transfer their fortune in the estate by inheritance.

Responsibilities: Workers and artisans (since they united in workshops, they were also called guild people, they had practically none of the privileges. The urban estate did not have the right to move to the villages (as well as the peasants were forbidden to move to the city). The urban estate paid the bulk of taxes in the country.

Estate: peasants

Rights: Peasants received personal freedom only in 1861. Prior to this, there were virtually no free peasants in Russia - they were all serfs. According to the principle of who they belonged to, the peasants were divided into landowners, state-owned, that is, state and property (belonged to the enterprise). They had the right to file complaints against their landowners for ill-treatment. They had the right to leave the village only with the consent of the landowner (or a representative of the administration). Those at their own discretion gave them passports.

Responsibilities: To work for the owner, serve a corvee, or, working outside his household, bring him quitrent in monetary terms. They didn't have land. The peasants received the right to own land or rent it from the landowner only after 1861.

Estates are social groups that had certain rights and obligations that were enshrined in custom or law.

When did estates appear?

Estates in Russia began to appear after the unification of Russian lands into a single state. At the same time, there was a weakening of the influence of the local specific feudal aristocracy and an increase in the influence of the nobility in the township elite.

With the beginning of the Zemsky Sobors, the circle of participants also expands. Here, together with the boyars and the nobility and the clergy, the top tenants also take part. Representatives of the black-mossed peasantry were invited to the council of 1613. At this time, the class division was distinguished by great diversity and diversity.

The rank lists of the 16th century and the Velvet Book (1687) led to the fact that the nobles turned from a service class into a hereditary class. Some changes in the hereditary principles of class organizations occurred under Peter I with the introduction of the Table of Ranks.

Nevertheless, the existing class division into nobles, clergy, urban and rural inhabitants lasted until October revolution 1917.

Estates, their rights and obligations

estate	Intra-estate groups	Rights and privileges	Responsibilities
Nobility	Hereditary and personal.	Ownership of inhabited lands. Exemption from taxes. Exemption from zemstvo duties. Freedom from corporal punishment. Exemption from compulsory service. Estate self-government. Entering the civil service and getting an education. Personal nobles could not pass on their dignity by inheritance.	No special responsibilities.
Clergy	White (parochial), black (monastic).	The clergy were exempted from recruitment duty and corporal punishment. Church officials were entitled to a good education.	Members of the clergy were obliged to devote their lives to the church. They were required to preach the Word of God.
honorary citizens	Hereditary and personal.	Freedom from conscription, poll tax and corporal punishment. The right to choose public office, but not public office.	No special responsibilities.
Merchants	1st, 2nd and 3rd guilds.	Merchants of the 1st guild had a large domestic and foreign trade turnover. They were exempted from many taxes, recruitment and corporal punishment. Merchants of the 2nd guild were engaged in conducting large-scale domestic trade. Merchants of the 3rd guild conducted city and county trade. The merchant class had the right to class self-government and access to a decent education.	Merchants of the 2nd and 3rd guilds were obliged to bear recruitment, zemstvo and tax duties.
Cossacks		The Cossacks owned the land, were exempted from paying taxes.	The Cossacks were obliged to carry military service(urgent and in reserve) with their own equipment.
Philistinism	Artisans, craftsmen and small traders.	The philistines were engaged in urban crafts and county trade. They had the right to class self-government and limited access to education.	The philistines paid all the then existing taxes, carried recruiting duties. In addition, they did not own land, had curtailed rights and broad responsibilities.
Peasantry	State and serfs until 1861 (landowners, sessional and appanage).	State peasants had the rights of communal ownership of land and estate self-government. Serfs had no rights at all. After 1861, the peasant class was unified, having received a minimum of civil and property rights.	The serfs had to work off the corvée, pay dues and bear other duties in favor of the owners. Until 1861 and after, all the peasantry carried the recruiting duty (until 1874) and most of the tax in favor of the state.

In the feudal societies that existed in Europe from TV to the 14th century, people were divided into estates - a form of stratification that precedes classes.

estate- a social group with fixed custom or legal law and inherited rights and obligations. The estate system, which includes several strata, is characterized by a hierarchy, expressed in the inequality of their position and privileges.

Europe was a classic example of a class organization, where at the turn of the XIV-XV centuries. society was divided into upper classes (nobility and clergy) and an unprivileged third estate (artisans, merchants, peasants). Earlier, in the X-XIII centuries, there were three main estates: the clergy, the nobility and the peasantry. Such a three-part scheme symbolized the trinity of the divine essence and the social harmony based on it.

The rights and obligations of each estate were determined by legal law and consecrated by religious doctrine. Membership in the estate was determined by inheritance. Social barriers between the estates were quite rigid, so social mobility existed not so much between as within the estates. Each estate included many layers, ranks, levels, professions, ranks. So, only nobles could engage in public service. The aristocracy was considered a military class (chivalry). The higher the estate was in the social hierarchy, the higher was its status (Fig. 4.5).

A characteristic feature of the estates is the presence of social symbols and signs: titles, uniforms, orders, titles. Classes and castes did not have state distinctive signs,

Rice. 4.5.

although they were distinguished by clothing, jewelry, norms and rules of conduct, and a ritual of conversion. In a feudal society, the state assigned distinctive symbols to the main class - the nobility. Titled nobility included noble families who had baronial, county, princely and other generic titles. in Russia until the 18th century. there was only a princely title, denoting belonging to a family that in ancient times enjoyed the right to reign ( government controlled) in a given area. Under Peter I, the generic titles of Western states were introduced: count and baron. In the XVIII century. the title of a count was regarded as equal or more honorary than that of a prince.

The titled aristocracy has survived in modern England. Its total number is about 800 families, the heads of which are members of the House of Lords. In 1950, there were 26 dukes, 38 marquises, 138 earls, 99 viscounts, 453 barons. Titles are hereditary, but only the heads of families hold them. Nevertheless British aristocracy is considered relatively young: only 2% of aristocrats date back to 1485, 6% to 1689, more than half to 1906.

Estates may be open to candidates from lower strata, or they may practice endogamy and exclusivity by adopting certain traits of the caste system.

For those singles who were able to make their way from the bottom of society to its heights, the obligatory entrance fee is the adoption of a class lifestyle - "noble" in France and "gentlemanly" in England. A lot of time must pass, during which the individual is obliged to observe all the rules of etiquette and be accepted among "their own", before he is allowed some liberties in behavior.

In Russia from the second half of XVIII V. the class division into the nobility, the clergy, the merchants, the peasantry and the bourgeoisie (middle urban strata) was established. Estates were based on landed property. The status of each Russian citizen was determined by his origin (by birth), as well as his official position, education and occupation (property status). In other words, it could change depending on promotion in the state (military or civil) service, receiving an order for official and extra-service merit, graduating from a higher educational institution, the diploma of which gave the right to move to the upper class, and successful commercial and industrial activity. For women, an increase in class status was also possible through marriage with a representative of a higher class.

The first privileged estate in Russia was considered the nobility, the second - the clergy. The rest of the estates were not privileged. The nobility was divided into two groups: hereditary and personal. Within each estate there were smaller estates and layers. Officials, the state apparatus, which was based on the service nobility, regulated relations between the estates. As social and legal groups, the estates differed in the scope of rights and obligations in relation to the state. The rights were guaranteed to the estates only insofar as they performed certain duties in favor of the state (they grew bread, were engaged in crafts, served, paid taxes).

There were few rich nobility in Russia, most of them belonged rather to the middle class. A significant part of the nobles did not own land or serfs. Descendants of the feudal landowning nobility (Golitsyns, Baryatinskys, Dolgorukovs, Gagarins), royal confidants and famous statesmen(Menshikovs, Orlovs, Vorontsovs, Adlerbergs, etc.) constituted the aristocracy and belonged to the upper stratum of the upper class.

In the estate hierarchy of Russia, achieved and prescribed (innate) statuses were very intricately intertwined. The presence of a pedigree indicated a prescribed, and its absence, an achieved status. In the second generation, the achieved (granted) status turned into a prescribed (inherited).

The estate system existed for more than 5 thousand years. Experts list a huge number of its modifications. She was in every country that reached high level civilization. Until the 18th century there was no other system capable of challenging it. As the new, capitalist system gained momentum, the old, estate system was rapidly fading away. Behind short term- in just 150 years - it disappeared almost everywhere.

Estates and classes.

The entire urban and rural population was divided "according to the difference in the rights of the state" into four main categories: nobility, clergy, urban and rural inhabitants.

The nobility remained a privileged class. It was shared on personal and hereditary.

Right to personal nobility, which was not hereditary, were received by representatives of various classes, who are in the public service and have the lowest rank in the Table of Ranks. Serving the Fatherland, one could receive hereditary, i.e., inherited, nobility. To do this, it was necessary to receive a certain rank or order. The emperor could be awarded by hereditary nobility and for successful entrepreneurial or other activities.

city ​​dwellers- hereditary honorary citizens, merchants, philistines, artisans.

Rural inhabitants, Cossacks and other people engaged in agriculture.

The formation of a bourgeois society was going on in the country with two of its main classes - the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. At the same time, the predominance of semi-feudal agriculture in the Russian economy contributed to the preservation and two main classes of feudal society - landowners and peasants.

The growth of cities, the development of industry, transport and communications, the increase in the cultural demands of the population lead in the second half of the 19th century. to increase the proportion of people professionally engaged in mental work and artistic creativity - intelligentsia: engineers, teachers, doctors, lawyers, journalists, etc.

Peasantry.

The peasants are still constituted the vast majority population of the Russian Empire. Peasants, both former serfs and state, were part of self-governing rural societies - communities. Several rural communities made up the volost.

The members of the community were bound mutual responsibility in paying taxes and performing duties. Therefore, there was a dependence of the peasants on the community, manifested primarily in the restriction of freedom of movement.

For the peasants there was special parish court, whose members were also elected by the village assembly. At the same time, the volost courts made their decisions not only on the basis of the norms of laws, but also guided by customs. Often, these courts punished peasants for such offenses as wasteful spending of money, drunkenness, and even witchcraft. In addition, the peasants were subjected to certain punishments that had long been abolished for other classes. For example, volost courts had the right to sentence members of their class under the age of 60 to flogging.

Russian peasants revered their elders, considering them as bearers of experience and traditions. This attitude also extended to the emperor, served as a source of monarchism, faith in the “tsar-priest” - an intercessor, guardian of truth and justice.

Russian peasants professed Orthodoxy. Unusually harsh natural conditions and the hard work associated with them - suffering, the results of which did not always correspond to the efforts expended, the bitter experience of lean years immersed the peasants in the world of superstitions, signs and rituals.

Liberation from serfdom brought to the village big changes:

• P First of all, the stratification of the peasants intensified. The horseless peasant (if he was not engaged in other, non-agricultural work) became a symbol of rural poverty. At the end of the 80s. in European Russia, 27% of households were horseless. The presence of one horse was considered a sign of poverty. There were about 29% of such farms. At the same time, from 5 to 25% of the owners had up to ten horses. They bought up large land holdings, hired laborers and expanded their economy.

• a sharp increase in the need for money. The peasants had to pay redemption payments and a poll tax, have funds for zemstvo and worldly dues, for rent payments for land and for repayment of bank loans. There was an involvement of the majority of peasant farms in market relations. The main item of peasant income was the sale of bread. But due to low yields, peasants were often forced to sell grain to the detriment of their own interests. The export of grain abroad was based on the malnutrition of the villagers and was rightly called by contemporaries "hungry exports."

• Poverty, hardships associated with redemption payments, lack of land and other troubles firmly tied the bulk of the peasants to the community. After all, it guaranteed its members mutual support. In addition, the distribution of land in the community helped the middle and poorest peasantry to survive in the event of a famine. Allotments were distributed among the community members striped rather than being reduced to one place. Each member of the community had a small allotment (band) in different places. In a dry year, a plot located in a lowland could give a quite tolerable harvest; in rainy years, a plot on a hill helped out.

There were peasants who were committed to the traditions of their fathers and grandfathers, to the community with its collectivism and security, and there were also “new” peasants who wanted to manage on their own at their own peril and risk. Many peasants went to work in the cities. The prolonged isolation of men from the family, from village life and rural work led to an increase in the role of women not only in economic life, but also in peasant self-government.

The most important problem of Russia on the eve of the XX century. was to turn the peasants - the main part of the country's population - into politically mature citizens who respect both their own and other people's rights and are capable of actively participating in public life.

Nobility.

After the peasant reforms In 1861, the stratification of the nobility proceeded rapidly due to the active influx into the privileged class of people from other segments of the population.

Gradually, the most privileged class also lost its economic advantages. After peasant reform In 1861, the area of ​​land owned by the nobility decreased by an average of 0.68 million acres per year. The number of landowners among the nobles was declining. At the same time, almost half of the landowners considered the estates to be small. In the post-reform period, most of the landlords continued to apply semi-serf forms of farming and went bankrupt.

Simultaneously part of the nobles was widely involved in entrepreneurial activities: in railway construction, industry, banking and insurance. Funds for doing business were received from the redemption under the reform of 1861, from the lease of land and on bail. Some nobles became owners of large industrial enterprises, took prominent positions in companies, became owners of shares and real estate. A significant part of the nobles joined the ranks of the owners of small commercial and industrial establishments. Many acquired the professions of doctors, lawyers, became writers, artists, artists. At the same time, part of the nobles went bankrupt, replenishing the lower strata of society.

Thus, the decline of the landlord economy accelerated the stratification of the nobility and weakened the influence of the landowners in the state. In the second half of the XIX century. there was a loss by the nobles of a dominant position in life Russian society: political power was concentrated in the hands of officials, economic power was in the hands of the bourgeoisie, the intelligentsia became the ruler of thoughts, and the class of the once all-powerful landowners gradually disappeared.

Bourgeoisie.

The development of capitalism in Russia led to growth of the bourgeoisie. Continuing to officially be listed as nobles, merchants, petty bourgeois, peasants, representatives of this class played an increasing role in the life of the country. Since the time of the "railway fever" of the 60-70s. the bourgeoisie was actively replenished at the expense of officials. Entering the boards of private banks and industrial enterprises, officials provided a link between state power and private production. They helped industrialists get lucrative orders and concessions.

The period of formation of the Russian bourgeoisie coincided in time with the vigorous activity of the Narodniks within the country and with the growth of the revolutionary struggle of the Western European proletariat. Therefore, the bourgeoisie in Russia looked at autocratic power as its protector from revolutionary uprisings.

And although the interests of the bourgeoisie were often infringed upon by the state, they did not dare to take active steps against the autocracy.

Some of the founders of well-known commercial and industrial families - S. V. Morozov, P. K. Konovalov - remained illiterate until the end of their days. But they tried to give their children a good education, including a university one. Sons were often sent abroad to study commercial and industrial practice.

Many representatives of this new generation of the bourgeoisie sought to support scientists, representatives of the creative intelligentsia, invested in the creation of libraries and art galleries. A. A. Korzinkin, K. T. Soldatenkov, P. K. Botkin and D. P. Botkin, S. M. Tretyakov and P. M. Tretyakov, S. I. Mammoths.

Proletariat.

Another The main class of industrial society was the proletariat. The proletariat included all wage-workers, including those employed in agriculture and crafts, but its core was factory, mining and railway workers - the industrial proletariat. His education went along with the industrial revolution. By the mid 90s. 19th century about 10 million people were employed in the sphere of wage labor, of which 1.5 million were industrial workers.

The working class of Russia had a number of features:

• He was closely associated with the peasantry. A significant part of the factories and factories were located in the villages, and the industrial proletariat itself was constantly replenished with people from the countryside. The hired factory worker was, as a rule, a proletarian in the first generation and maintained close ties with the countryside.
• Representatives became workers different nationalities.
• In Russia, there was a significant increase concentration proletariat in large enterprises than in other countries.

The life of the workers.

In the factory barracks (dormitories), they settled not in the workshops, but in the provinces and counties from which they came. At the head of workers from one locality was a master who recruited them to the enterprise. Workers hardly got used to city conditions. Separation from their native places often led to a drop in morale, drunkenness. The workers worked long hours and, in order to send money home, huddled in damp and dark rooms and ate poorly.

The speeches of the workers for the improvement of their situation in the 80-90s. became more numerous, sometimes they took sharp forms, accompanied by violence against the factory authorities, the destruction of factory premises and clashes with the police and even with the troops. The largest was the strike that broke out on January 7, 1885 at Morozov's Nikolskaya manufactory in the city of Orekhovo-Zuevo.

The labor movement during this period was a response to the specific actions of "their" factory owners: increasing fines, lowering prices, forced payment of wages in goods from the factory shop, etc.

Clergy.

Church ministers - the clergy - constituted a special estate, divided into black and white clergy. The black clergy - the monks - assumed special obligations, including leaving the "world". The monks lived in numerous monasteries.

The white clergy lived in the "world", their main task was the implementation of worship and religious preaching. From the end of the 17th century the order was established according to which the place of the deceased priest was inherited, as a rule, by his son or other relative. This contributed to the transformation of the white clergy into a closed estate.

Although the clergy in Russia belonged to a privileged part of society, the rural priests, who made up the vast majority of it, eked out a miserable existence, as they were fed by their own labor and at the expense of parishioners, who themselves often barely made ends meet. In addition, as a rule, they were burdened by large families.

The Orthodox Church had its educational establishments. IN late XIX V. in Russia there were 4 theological academies, in which about a thousand people studied, and 58 seminaries, which trained up to 19 thousand future clergy.

Intelligentsia.

At the end of the XIX century. out of more than 125 million inhabitants of Russia, 870 thousand could be attributed to the intelligentsia. There were over 3 thousand scientists and writers, 4 thousand engineers and technicians, 79.5 thousand teachers and 68 thousand private teachers, 18.8 thousand doctors, 18 thousand artists, musicians and actors in the country.

In the first half of the XIX century. The ranks of the intelligentsia were replenished mainly at the expense of the nobility.

Part of the intelligentsia was never able to find a practical application of their knowledge. Neither industry, nor zemstvos, nor other institutions could provide employment for many university graduates whose families were experiencing financial difficulties. Receipt higher education was not a guarantee of an increase in living standards, and hence social status. This created a mood of protest.

But in addition to material rewards for their work, essential need intellectuals is the freedom of self-expression, without which true creativity is unthinkable. Therefore, in the absence of political freedoms in the country, the anti-government sentiments of a significant part of the intelligentsia intensified.

Cossacks.

The emergence of the Cossacks was associated with the need to develop and protect the newly acquired marginal lands. For their service, the Cossacks received land from the government. Therefore, the Cossack is both a warrior and a peasant.

At the end of the XIX century. there were 11 Cossack troops

In villages and settlements there were special primary and secondary Cossack schools, where great attention devoted to military training of students.

In 1869, the nature of land ownership in the Cossack regions was finally determined. The communal ownership of the stanitsa lands was consolidated, of which each Cossack received a share in the amount of 30 acres. The rest of the land was a military reserve. It was intended mainly to create new stanitsa sections as the Cossack population grew. In public use were forests, pastures, reservoirs.

Conclusion:

In the second half of the XIX century. there was a breakdown of estate partitions and the formation of new groups of society along economic, class lines. Representatives of the merchant class, successful peasant entrepreneurs, and the nobility are also joining the new business class - the bourgeoisie. The class of hired workers - the proletariat - is replenished primarily at the expense of the peasants, but the tradesman, the son of the village priest and even the "noble gentleman" were not uncommon in this environment. There is a significant democratization of the intelligentsia, even the clergy are losing their former isolation. And only the Cossacks to a greater extent remain committed to their former way of life.

Today in Russia there is no class division, it was abolished after the revolution, in 1917. And what is an estate in pre-revolutionary Russia, what social groups did our ancestors belong to, and what rights and obligations did they have? Let's figure it out.

What is an estate in the Russian Empire?

Such a division of the people was official in pre-revolutionary Russia. And first of all, the estates were divided into taxable and non-taxable. Within these two large groups there were subdivisions and layers. The state granted certain rights to each estate. These rights were enshrined in legislation. Each of the groups had to perform certain duties.

So what is an estate? So in Russia one can name a category of subjects who enjoyed special rights and had their own obligations in relation to the state.

When did estates appear in Russia?

Class division began to emerge from the time of the formation of the Russian state. Initially, it was a class group, not particularly different from each other in rights. The transformations in the era of Peter and Catherine formed clearer class boundaries, but at the same time, the difference between the Russian system and the Western European one was much wider opportunities for transition from one group to another, for example, through public service.

Estates in Russia ceased to exist in 1917.

The main difference between estates in the Russian Empire

The main noticeable difference between them was their right to privileges. Representatives of the exempt class had significant privileges:

• did not pay the poll tax;
• were not subjected to corporal punishment;
• were exempted from military service (until 1874).

The unprivileged, or taxable, estate was deprived of these rights.

privileged social groups

The nobility was the most honorable estate of the Russian Empire, the basis of the state, the support of the monarch, the most educated and cultured stratum of society. And you need to understand that such an estate was dominant in Russia, despite its small number.

The nobility was divided into two groups: hereditary and personal. The first was considered more honorable and was inherited. Personal nobility could be obtained by order of service or by a special highest award, and it could be hereditary (inherited to descendants) or lifelong (did not apply to children).

The clergy is a privileged class. It was divided into white (worldly) and black (monastic). According to the degree of priesthood, the clergy were divided into three groups: bishop, priest and deacon.

Belonging to the clergy was inherited by children, and could also be acquired by joining the white clergy of representatives of other social groups. The exception was serfs without a leave of absence from the owners. Upon reaching the age of majority, the children of the clergy retained their belonging to the clergy only if they entered the clergy position. But they could also choose a secular career. In this case, they had the same rights as personal nobles.

The merchant class was also a privileged class. It was divided into guilds, depending on which the merchants had various privileges and rights to trade and fishing. Registration in the merchant class from other classes was possible on a temporary basis when paying guild duties. Belonging to a given social group was determined by the size of the declared capital. The children belonged to the merchant class, but upon reaching the age of majority, they had to independently enroll in the guild to acquire a separate certificate, or they became philistines.

The Cossacks are a special semi-privileged military estate. The Cossacks had the right to corporate ownership of lands and were exempt from duties, but they were obliged to perform military service. Belonging to the Cossack estate was inherited, however, representatives of other social groups could also enroll in the Cossack troops. Cossacks could reach the service of the nobility. Then belonging to the nobility was combined with belonging to the Cossacks.

Unprivileged social groups

Philistinism - urban unprivileged taxable class. The bourgeois were necessarily assigned to a certain city, from which they could only leave with a temporary passport. They paid a poll tax, were obliged to carry out military service, and did not have the right to enter the civil service. Belonging to the bourgeois class was inherited. Craftsmen and small merchants also belonged to the bourgeois class, but could increase their position. Craftsmen were enrolled in the workshop and became workshops. Small merchants could eventually move into the merchant class.

The peasantry is the most numerous and dependent social group deprived of privileges. The peasantry was divided into:

• state-owned (belonging to the state or the royal house),
• landlord,
• sessional (assigned to factories and factories).

Representatives of the peasantry were attached to their community, paid a poll tax and were subject to recruitment and other duties, and could also be subjected to corporal punishment. However, after the reform of 1861, they had the opportunity to move to the city and register as a tradesman, subject to the purchase of real estate in the city. They used this opportunity: a peasant bought real estate in the city, became a tradesman and was exempt from part of the taxes, while continuing to live in the countryside and farm.

At the beginning of the 19th century, by the time of the revolution and the abolition of the class organization in Russia, many boundaries and divisions between the strata of society were noticeably erased. Representatives of the estates had much more opportunities to move from one social group to another. Also, the duties of each class have undergone significant transformations.