The Language of Peasant Justice in the Second Half of the 19th Century: From Oral to Written

Abstract

The article examines the role of written law in the post-reform era Russia and its penetration into the mostly oral peasant culture that drew on customary law norms in settling everyday legal matters. The author points attention to the variety of written legal acts that were becoming increasingly widespread in the peasant milieu. Having the weight of legal evidence, they were not infrequently used in courts of law. Owing to the 1864 reforms, the institutions of legal justice gradually assumed the role of channels through which official legal terms would be translated into an accessible language, thus being instrumental in strengthening the written form of law in the peasant social milieu.