Том 82, № 2 (2021)

This article continues the previous publication of V.M. Lavrovsky’ memories based on his impressions of a scientific trip to Great Britain in the mid-1920s. In the second part documents in which E.A. Kosminsky wrote about two scientific trips to the United Kingdom in 1952 and 1956 are presented to readers. In the preface the authors pay their attention to the difference between the scientific trips of 1925–1926 and the 1950s (particularly combination of scholarly studies with administrative duties, significant resonance of these trips in the English press). Each of the published documents is provided with a detailed commentary, which indicates the date and circumstances of its appearance, as well as corrections and explanations made by E.A. Kosminsky in printed texts.

John Barbour (ca. 1320–1395) has been justly acknowledged as the founder of literature in Scots. The Bruce, his monumental achievement, is at once a metrical romance, a biography of Robert I, King of Scots, and a historical chronicle which became the national epic of Scotland. The first full Russian translation of this outstanding work is continued below, with an introductory article and commentary.

The paper offers a number of problems connected with special forms of peasant property’s transfers in everyday life of medieval English manor. Research is made mainly on the basis of manorial court rolls (in particular, of XIII–XIV centuries). As far as English medieval peasantry (villeins and copyholders) had no legal rights to probate, they had to use special forms of «property succession». Thus, they had to transfer their land in the manorial courts (that is to surrender it «into lord’s hands» either to be admitted again or to pass the land to children or other persons after the term of holding’s expiration). Conditions of land transfer were written in indenture and were followed by fealty to the lord and by paying the entrance fine. Transfer of peasant property in the manorial courts took place not only in case of peasant holding term’s expiration or tenant’s death, but also in order to register dower of widows, to register cases of urgent necessity (deadly disease, debt obligations, starvation etc.) or mark the status of land’ changing. Sometimes there also occurred land transfers for reasons of mercy, but the most unique were so called deathbed transfers (out-of-court surrenders), just a little studied by historians. Deathbed surrenders took place at the housing of the peasant, who was deadly ill and wasn’t able personally to walk to manorial court. Thus he had orally to express his will in the presence of witnesses and representatives of manorial administration, who later made notes at the court. This form of manorial transfer, rather unique, needs further thorough research on the basis of special documents.

16 февраля ушла из жизни Лидия Михайловна Брагина, доктор исторических наук, профессор кафедры истории Средних веков Исторического факультета МГУ им. М.В. Ломоносова, председатель Бюро Комиссии по культуре Возрождения Научного совета «История мировой культуры» РАН.