On the correspondence between I.M. Grevs and S.I. Arkhangelsky (1920s): The aspects of personal biography and historiography

K.V. Gersh a*, A.A. Kuznetsov b**

aKuzbass Humanitarian Pedagogical Institute of Kemerovo State University, Kemerovo, 650000 Russia

bLobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod, Nizhny Novgorod, 603950 Russia

E-mail: *bambizova@mail.ru, **nalbuz@mail.ru

Received March 16, 2022

 

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

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DOI: 10.26907/2541-7738.2022.3.48-74

For citation: Gersh K.V., Kuznetsov A.A. On the correspondence between I.M. Grevs and S.I. Arkhangelsky (1920s): The aspects of personal biography and historiography. Uchenye Zapiski Kazanskogo Universiteta. Seriya Gumanitarnye Nauki, 2022, vol. 164, no. 3, pp. 48–74. doi: 10.26907/2541-7738.2022.3.48-74. (In Russian)

Abstract

This article considers an important source on the evolution of Russian historical science. These are four letters written in 1926–1928 by the leading historian I.M. Grevs (1860–1941) to his colleague S.I. Archangelsky (1882–1958), a future corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Unfortunately, the response letters of S.I. Arkhangelsky have been lost. The letters under study focus on two main problems. I.M. Grevs unsuccessfully helped S.I. Arkhangelsky to publish the historical source he had translated – “The Edict on Maximum Prices” of Emperor Diocletian. In this connection, the problems of scientific formation and ideas of S.I. Arkhangelsky, the difficulties faced by the USSR historians of the 1920s who wanted to publish their scientific works, and the scholarly activity of I.M. Grevs in the Soviet period are considered. S.I. Arkhangelsky and I.M. Grevs adhered to different directions in interpreting world economic history – Eduard Meyer and Karl Bücher, respectively. S.I. Arkhangelsky refused to criticize I.M. Grevs, the reasons for which are discussed here. Another chief point of interest in the letters is the problems of local history studies. Based on the analysis of the exchange of views, new interpretations of the facts of I.M. Grevs’s biography – his travels along the Volga River, meetings with the figures of the Nizhny Novgorod Scientific Society for the Study of Local History – are offered. These and other issues are presented in the biographical context of communication ties bet­ween both the historians. The article is accompanied by the full texts of the letters and commentaries.

Keywords: I.M. Grevs, S.I. Arkhangelsky, correspondence, “The Edict on Maximum Prices” of Roman Emperor Diocletian, Henri Pirenne, historiography, Archive of Russian Academy of Sciences, historical regional studies, biographies of historians

Acknowledgements. We are grateful to Natal’ya Borisovna Kuznetsova (Head of the Science Museum of Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod) for her valuable advice and support, Aleksandr Valentinovich Makhlayuk (Professor, Doctor of History, Head of the Department of Ancient and Medieval History of Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod) for his help during the translation of Latin terms and for his expert guidance through the foreign historiography of Rome, as well as Olga Vladimirovna Selivanova (Head of the Department of Acquisition of Personal Collections of Scientists and Their Scientific Description of the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Senior Research Fellow, PhD in History) for her helpful comments and consultations on the documents stored in the S.I. Arkhangelsky Collection of the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Figure Captions

Photo 1. Ivan Mikhailovich Grevs.

Photo 2. Sergei Ivanovich Arkhangelsky, second half of the 1920s.

Photo 3. I.M. Grevs’ letter to S.I. Arkhangelsky (autograph) (State Archive of the Nizhny Novgorod Region. F. 6299. Op. 1. D. 147. L. 3–4.).

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