Hunting chimeras through the mirror of historiography

Abstract

This review represents a monograph by Andrei Dvornichenko Yurievich professor of St. Petersburg State University, Doctor of History. His work is dedicated to a historiographical analysis of a significant number of works regarding the Russian medieval period and problems related to the genesis of the social and political structure of Ancient Rus’. The attention of researcher was concentrated not only on the evolution of historians’ opinions in regard to topical questions about the progress of society and government of the Eastern Slavs, but also at unreasonable, as the researcher maintains, stereotyped representations, established in national historiography. The author has relied on metaphors that quite accurately reflect the idea of work that was conceived and realized to present his ideas. As a result, the monograph demonstrates original means of analysing historical concepts and offers an informal view of the historian’s work to its readers. This work is very valuable because at this moment it is the only monograph that reviews controversial aspects of modern historiography dedicated to the history of Ancient Rus’. The same interest represents an emotional part of the text that sincerely and openly reflects uneasy relations within scientific and teaching institutions and research centers. Such circumstances add unquestionable uniqueness to this work. Many of the author’s comments are arguable but he definitively identifies the most critical moments of modern historical research on both conceiving the field of studying mediaeval Rus’ and national historians’ works in common. His work is an invitation to conversation. Many conclusions of Professor A. Dvornichenko are disappointing but the fact they are reflected in a significant body research brings hope that crisis in modern Russian science will be resolved. Refs 9.