Land use practices in the estates of landlords in the late XIX – early XX century

Abstract

Importance. Unequal resource provision of owners’ property and a significant shortage of peasant hay and forest lands, aggravated by overgrowth and far-earth land, determined the practice of economic relations between landlords and communal farms.

Research Methods. The problem of land use in the landlord economy system of post-reform Russia remains one of the most difficult in agrarian historiography. In the writings of prerevolutionary historians, the modernization of estates is highlighted in the writings of conservatives who linked crisis moments in the economy of estates with insufficient state support for owners and liberal figures stratifying savings into labor and capitalist ones. In the works of Soviet historians, the modernization of the latifundia is severely criticized.

Results and Discussion. Many landlords, taking advantage of the positive situation in the grain market, expanded production and established a diversified economic complex. These trends were especially strong in estates with sugar and distilleries. However, even during the period of maximum capitalist development of the agricultural sector, the predominant form of land use of Latifundists remained a combination of running their own farm and rental distributions.

Conclusion. The transition from a serfdom to a productive economy was associated with the modernization of the field-growing complex of estates, the use of agricultural innovations. However, the active introduction of grass planting by owners and the mechanization of agriculture have long been combined with unproductive methods of agricultural development.