The Ruling Elite in Russia at the End of the 15th — 17th Сenturies in Modern Russian and Foreign Historiography

Abstract

The article is devoted to modern Russian and foreign historiography of the ruling elite (the Sovereign's Court) of the 16th — 17th centuries. The article analyzes both general special studies on the ruling elite and works that touch upon certain aspects of the history of the court (study of the genealogy of noble families, land ownership of the nobility, analysis of the history of boyar clans, participation of the elite in the court struggle, anthropological plots concerning the mentality, religious life, everyday life of the upper classes of Russian society). The paper notes nowadays a significant increase of interest in the study of the nobility, including the ruling elite. It is shown that the studies of the last decades are developing in line with those directions that were outlined in soviet and foreign historiography back to the 80s of 20th century Modern researchers of the history of the ruling elite pay great attention not only to the traditional institutional approach, but also to the study of informal relations in the court environment, inner—family ties, behavioral strategies at court, cultural needs, and religiosity of representatives of noble families. Particularly noted is the introduction into scientific circulation of a huge array of new sources for studying the composition and structure of the Sovereign's court, family ties, land ownership of the ruling elite, which creates favorable prerequisites for further study of this topic.