after his arrival another boyar with a retinue of 1,300 left it. As already emphasized, members of the upper classes of appanage Russia were landlords. They acted as virtual rulers of their large estates, levying taxes and administering justice, although it is worth noting that, as Moscow rose, the immunities which they received to govern their lands no longer extended to jurisdiction in cases of major crimes. Votchiny, that is, hereditary land-holdings, prevailed in the appanage period. However, with the rise of Moscow, the pomestie, that is, an estate granted by a prince to a servitor during the term of his personal service, became common. The earliest extant reference to a pomestie goes back to Ivan Kalita's testament, but the pomestie system developed on a large scale only in the fifteenth and subsequent centuries. We shall meet it again when we discuss Muscovite Russia.
Traders, artisans, and the middle class as a whole experienced a decline during the appanage period. Except in Novgorod and a few other centers, members of that layer of society were relatively few in number and politically ineffective.
Peasants constituted the bulk of the population. It is generally believed that their position worsened during the centuries which followed the collapse of the Kievan state. Political division, invasions, and general insecurity increased the peasant's dependence on the landlord and consequently his bondage, thus accelerating a trend which had already become pronounced in the days of Kiev. While serfdom remained incomplete even at the end of the appanage period - for the peasant could still leave his master once a year, around St. George's day in late autumn, provided his accounts had been settled - it grew in a variety of forms. Principal peasant obligations were of two types: the as yet relatively little developed barshchina, or corvee, that is, work for the landlord, and obrok, or quitrent, that is, payment to the landlord in kind or in money. It should be noted, however, that many peasants, especially in the north, had no private landlords, a fortunate situation for them, even though they bore increasingly heavy obligations to the state.
The slaves, kholopy, of the Kievan period continued to play a significant role in the Russian economy, performing all kinds of tasks in the manorial households and estates. In fact, a small upper group of kholopy occupied important positions as managers and administrators on the estates. Indeed Diakonov suggested that in the Muscovite principality, as in France, court functionaries and their counterparts in most noble households were originally slaves, who were later replaced by the most prominent among the free servitors.
In the period which followed the fall of Kiev, the Church in Russia maintained and developed its strong and privileged position. In a time of division it profited from the best and the most widespread organization in the country, and it enjoyed the benevolence of the khans and the protection of Rus-
sian, especially Muscovite, princes. Ecclesiastical lands received exemptions from taxation and sweeping immunities; also, as in the West - although this is a controversial point - they probably proved to be more attractive to the peasants than other estates because of their relative peace, good management, and stability. The Church, or rather individual monasteries and monks, often led the Russian penetration into the northeastern wilderness. Disciples of St. Sergius alone founded more than thirty monasteries on or beyond the frontier of settlement. But the greatest addition to ecclesiastical possessions came from continuous donations, in particular the bequeathing of estates or parts of estates in return for prayers for one's soul, a practice similar to the granting of land in free alms to the Catholic Church in the feudal West. It has been estimated that at the end of the appanage period the Church in Russia owned over 25 per cent of all cultivated land in the country. As we shall see, these enormous ecclesiastical, particularly monastic, holdings created major problems both for the religious conscience and for the state.
The unification of Russia under Moscow meant a victory for a northeastern political system, characterized by the dominant position of the prince. Princes, of course, played a major part in the appanage period. It was during that time that they acted largely as managers and even proprietors of their principalities, as illustrated in the celebrated princely wills and testaments which deal indiscriminately with villages and winter coats. Princely activities became more and more petty; public rights and interests became almost indistinguishable from private. With the rise of Moscow, the process was reversed. The rulers "of Moscow and all Russia" gained in importance until, at about the time of Ivan III, they instituted a new era of autocratic tsardom. Yet, for all their exalted majesty, the tsars retained much from their northeastern princeling ancestry, combining in a formidable manner sweeping authority with petty despotism and public goals with proprietary instincts. Their power proved to be all the more dangerous because it went virtually unopposed. After the absorption of Novgorod, Pskov, and Viatka, the veche disappeared from Russian politics. The third element of the Kievan system of government, the boyar duma, it is true, continued to exist side by side with the princes and with the tsars. However, as will be indicated in later chapters, the duma in Muscovite Russia supported rather than effectively circumscribed the authority of the ruler. The evolution of Russia in the appanage period led to autocracy.
XIII
The Mongol yoke, which dealt a heavy blow to the manufactures of the Russian people in general, could not but be reflected, in a most grievous manner, in the artistic production and technique closely related to manufacturing… The second half of the thirteenth and the entire fourteenth century were an epoch "of oppression of the life of the people, of despair among the leaders, of an impoverishment of the land, of a decline of trades and crafts, of a disappearance of many technical skills."
If we consider nothing but its literature, the period that extends from the Tatar invasion to the unification of Russia by Ivan III of Moscow may be called a Dark Age. Its literature is either a more or less impoverished reminiscence of Kievan traditions or an unoriginal imitation of South Slavonic models. But here more than ever it is necessary to bear in mind that literature does not give the true measure of Old Russian culture. The fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the Dark Age of literature, were at the same time the Golden Age of Russian religious painting.
The Russian icon was the most significant artistic phenomenon of ancient Russia, the fundamental and preponderant means, and at the same time a gift, of its religious life. In its historical origin and formation the icon was an expression of the highest artistic tradition, while in its development it represented a remarkable phenomenon of artistic craftsmanship.
The religion and culture of appanage Russia, like its economic and social development, stemmed directly from the Kievan period. The hard centuries which followed the collapse of a unitary state witnessed, however, a certain retardation, and even regression, in many fields of culture. Impoverishment and relative isolation had an especially adverse effect on education in general and on such costly and difficult pursuits as large-scale building in stone and certain luxury arts and crafts. Literature too seemed to have lost much of its former artistry and elan. Yet this decline in many areas of activity coincided with probably the highest achievements of Russian creative genius in a few fields which included wooden architecture and, especially, icon painting.