Solonchenko A.D.
Formation of the east Slavic law: from the Veche to serfdom in the interpretation of F.F. Siegel
Keywords: F.F. Siegel, the Slavic law, sources of law, custom, veche, Sudebnik of 1497, court, dependent population, enslavement, institutional evolution
The transition from assembly-based and communal forms of public proceedings to written judicial procedures illustrates how the very method of establishing the truth in East Slavic law changed: decisions relied less and less on the memory and recognition of the community alone, and increasingly required a document, payment, a time limit and enforcement action. Against this background, the issue of how early legal forms prepared regimes of limited mobility of the dependent population without the direct and simultaneous introduction of serfdom is particularly significant. The purpose of the study is to identify the relationship between changing sources of law and formation of legal mechanisms for limited mobility of the dependent population. Materials and methods. The research is based on Sudebnik of 1497, the works of F.F. Siegel on Slavic legislation, comparative Slavic material and historiography of Veche institutions, courts and enslavement; historical-comparative, source studies, textual and lexical-semantic methods are applied. Results. The article consistently analyzes the veche publicity, the effect of custom, the judicial procedure of the Judicial Code of 1497 and the norm on peasant "refusal". It is established that a custom does not disappear overnight, but changes the legal status: it retains its meaning insofar as it can be recognized by a court, expressed in a procedure and confirmed by documentation or public action. It is shown that the right to exit turns into an operation depending on the calendar period, calculation of the "elderly" and proving the legality of the transition. Conclusions. The results obtained make it possible to consider enslavement as a cumulative effect of legal techniques, rather than as an instantaneous replacement of freedom with prohibition. Restriction of mobility turned out to be due not only to direct prohibitions, but also to the fact that the freedom of transition was transferred to a rare, paid and provable procedure. The practical significance of the research consists in clarifying the methodology of reading early legal monuments without transferring later categories of serfdom to them.
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About authors
- Solonchenko Andrey D.
- a Competitor of Scientific Degree of Legal Sciences Candidate, Department of Theory of Law and Civil-Law Education, The Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia, Russia, St. Petersburg (pass12355pass@yandex.ru; )
Article link
Solonchenko A.D. Formation of the east Slavic law: from the Veche to serfdom in the interpretation of F.F. Siegel [Electronic resource] // Oeconomia et Jus. – 2026. – №3. P. 122-132. – URL: https://oecomia-et-jus.ru/en/single/2026/3/9/. DOI: 10.47026/2499-9636-2026-3-122-132.
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