The origin and development of the death penalty in ancient Russia
“The death penalty is irreversible. And since the criminal justice system is not immune from mistakes, it will inevitably be applied to the innocent. ”
October 30 1653 year, that is exactly 360 years ago, in the Russian state issued a personal royal decree on the abolition of the death penalty for robbers and taty (thieves). This document by Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich modified some provisions of the Code of Law of 1550 and the Council Code of 1649. It resulted in the fact that, for all thieves and thieves who were caught and awaiting execution, they were replaced with capital punishment by cutting off a finger, cutting it with a whip and sending it to Siberia. All this looks like an important step towards the complete abolition of the most cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. However, was this really the case? Let's try to understand the birth and development of the death penalty in Russia.
An old Russian proverb says: "The sword does not flop the blameless head." Historians have two versions about the appearance of the death penalty in ancient Russia. Supporters of the first theory argue that it originated as a continuation of the ancient custom of blood feud. To punish the guilty, to take revenge and restore justice, was considered a matter of necessity not only for the victim, but for all his relatives. And Russkaya Pravda, in general, legislatively asserts the right of blood vengeance: “Kill the husband of the husband, then revenge the brother, brother, or sons of the father ...”. In the absence of relatives, the state intervened in the revenge case - a fine was levied on the killer. If the offender did not have money and property to compensate for the damage, then he was given to the victim in servitude "until atonement", that is, until personal labor did not work out the full amount of damage caused. Finally, the blood feud was canceled at the princely 20 congress on May 1072 of the year (Vyshgorod congress) by the sons of Yaroslav the Wise.
The second group of researchers of the past speaks of the rise of the death penalty due to Byzantine influence. The annals describe well the aspirations of the Byzantine bishops to annex Russia to the provisions of the Kormchy book, which speaks of the need to destroy those who engage in robbery. The same bishops argued to Prince Vladimir the Holy: "You are from God put to execute the evil." For a time, the death penalty for robbery was actually practiced in Russia, but soon Vladimir Krasnoe Soneshko abolished it, moving to a well-known and proven over the years system of monetary fines. Yaroslav I and his successors also rejected the death penalty, leaving no such sanction in the Russian Truth. And the Grand Duke Vladimir Vsevolodovich Monomakh and at all in the famous "Instructions" bequeathed to the children: "Neither kill the guilty, nor the right, and do not command such a killing. Even if someone was guilty of death, do not destroy the Christian soul. "
However, the absence of a penalty in the lists of punishments of the Russian Truth does not mean its absence in real life. There is evidence of the use of the death penalty for treason, crimes against the faith and rebellion. For example, in the 1227 year in Novgorod, four wise men were burned, accused of witchcraft. And in 1230 year, during the famine in the same Novgorod, the boyars ordered to burn people engaged in cannibalism. In addition, the provisions of Russian Pravda allowed the murder of a thief at the crime scene (albeit with some restrictions) and a serf who raised his hand to a free man.
Today the death penalty in Russia can neither be imposed nor executed. Adopted in 1993, the Constitution of the Russian Federation established the use of the death penalty as an exceptional punishment for especially grave crimes. However, in 1996, Russia entered the Council of Europe, which obliges us to sign the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights. And on May 16 of 1996, the President of Russia issued a decree on the phased reduction of the death penalty, and on April 16 of the Russian Federation signed Protocol 1997 to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in Peacetime. And although the sixth protocol was not ratified by our country (the only member of the Council of Europe), the death penalty from this point in Russia is forbidden to apply. This follows from the Vienna Convention, which decides that the signatory state should behave in accordance with the treaty before ratification. The last time the death penalty was applied in the 6 year.
In 1398, the Dvina charter, saw the first official sanctioning the death penalty under Russian law. The death penalty - hanging - threatened only thieves caught for the third time. However, once penetrating the punitive measures of secular law, the death penalty began to develop rapidly. In just sixty-nine years (in the Pskov Literacy of the 1467 year) at the border of the Odelny and Moscow stages of development of domestic legal life, the death penalty already plays a prominent role in the hierarchy of the punishments presented. In particular, in the Pskov Judicial Charter, five crimes are identified for which you have to pay for life: blasphemous theft from the church, horse stealing (so often leading to bloody self-prosecution), passing secret information to the enemy, arson and theft for the third time. In the document itself, the death penalty is described by the only possible atonement for the evil will manifested by the criminal, a way to protect the whole society from the villain.
According to the data of the All-Russian poll in July 2001 of the year, the death penalty for particularly grave crimes was advocated by 72% of respondents (9% against, the rest abstained). In 2005, the year for the abolition of the moratorium was already 84% of Russians, and 96% of them supported the death penalty against terrorists.
Among the supporters of the introduction of the death penalty in Russia - the Communist Party of the Russian Federation with the rationale: "The moratorium contradicts the interests of the country" and the LDPR party: "If you hang in the center of the city, and the corpse will hang for several days, then the number of crimes will definitely decrease."
Among the opponents are Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev: “The toughening of punishment will not lead to the eradication of crime”, as well as the Russian Orthodox Church: “Human life does not end with bodily death, abolishing the death penalty provides more opportunities for repentance of the stumbled and for pastoral work with him. Mercy for the fallen is always preferable to revenge. ” In the party "United Russia", as well as among the staff of the system of execution of punishments there is no consensus on this issue.
The economic side also opposes the death penalty, since this type of punishment is not economically viable (although there are proposals to use the organs of the convicted person). Persons who have committed crimes may perform their labor duties for a long time, thus compensating for the material damage.
Among the supporters of the introduction of the death penalty in Russia - the Communist Party of the Russian Federation with the rationale: "The moratorium contradicts the interests of the country" and the LDPR party: "If you hang in the center of the city, and the corpse will hang for several days, then the number of crimes will definitely decrease."
Among the opponents are Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev: “The toughening of punishment will not lead to the eradication of crime”, as well as the Russian Orthodox Church: “Human life does not end with bodily death, abolishing the death penalty provides more opportunities for repentance of the stumbled and for pastoral work with him. Mercy for the fallen is always preferable to revenge. ” In the party "United Russia", as well as among the staff of the system of execution of punishments there is no consensus on this issue.
The economic side also opposes the death penalty, since this type of punishment is not economically viable (although there are proposals to use the organs of the convicted person). Persons who have committed crimes may perform their labor duties for a long time, thus compensating for the material damage.
The lawsuit of 1497 of the year continued the tendency to expand the use of the death penalty. To the already existing crimes punishable by death, added slander, robbery, various types of murder. Thieves began to go to the gallows after the second theft. Public and torture-related executions became frequent phenomena during the reign of Ivan Vasilyevich the Terrible, which was noted in this field by the release of the Code of Laws of 1550.
It is curious that in the annals of the rights of the early Moscow period, the initial view of the crime of violating private interests is gradually replaced by the notion of evil (“dashing” or “dashing business”) directed against the whole state. Thus, the punishment for crimes becomes a state, royal affair, and mob law is declared prohibited and raised to an independent crime. The need for the death penalty in Subobniki is justified by the fact that the evil will of the participants in criminal acts is so “spoiled and entrenched” that only the physical destruction of its owner can protect society from danger. Also, these legislative collections did not allow for the possibility of reconciliation of the victim with the criminal and the abolition of the penalty in order to compensate for material damage.
During the period of criminal proceedings for criminal actions, the initiative of which the state took on itself, a new form of investigation appeared. In the investigation, the presence of a private prosecutor was not an important detail, since the government itself appeared in the role of prosecutor. And when investigating offenses with might and main, two powerful tools were used: a general search and torture.
We will try to restore all types of the death penalty that have taken place in the practice of Muscovy throughout the seventeenth century.
1. Cutting off the head. It was considered the standard type of execution and was applied if there were no other indications or the words "without any mercy."
2. Hanging. One of the most ancient types of execution, which came to us from Byzantium. Appointed for robbery and tatba, as well as for the betrayal of military people. In the second half of the seventeenth century, hanging by the rib on an iron hook appeared, which became one of the most cruel executions.
3. Drowning. It was used in cases of mass execution. For parricide and matricide in the era of Sudebnikov, drowning was performed along with a rooster, a cat, a dog and a snake.
4. Quartering or cutting off all limbs and the head at the very end. It was considered one of the most shameful executions and was appointed for state crimes. In the fifteenth century impostors were executed in this way.
5. Pouring molten metal down the throat. It was performed exclusively on counterfeiters, and in 1672 it was replaced by cutting off the left arms and both legs.
6. Burying alive in the ground. This execution was appointed for homicide. Moreover, the convict with her hands tied was buried up to her shoulders and left in anticipation of death from hunger or thirst. Guards stood nearby, and passers-by were allowed to bring the guilty only money, which then went to buy a coffin.
7. Landing on a stake. Like quartering, it was applied mainly to rebels. The execution was very painful - under the own weight of the executed, the stake slowly pierced the insides and came out between the shoulder blades or from the chest. To increase the torment, the tip of the stake was equipped with a crossbar.
8. Wheeling. It was the crushing of all the large bones of the convict lying on the ground with an iron wheel. After that, the wheel was mounted on a pole in a horizontal position, and the mutilated body of the executed was laid or tied to it from above and left to die from dehydration and shock. This execution was especially often used during the reign of Peter I.
9. Burning alive. A specific type of death penalty used for arson and crimes against faith. Criminals were burned at an ordinary fire, sometimes they were first put in an iron cage. The first cases of the use of such an execution were noted as early as the thirteenth century. At the end of the seventeenth century, burning began to be used as a punishment for persistence in the "old faith". As a stricter punishment, the convicts were fumigated with caustic compounds or burned on a slow fire.
Not satisfied with the horrors of these types of death penalty, in practice they tried to make it even more frightening. The time and place of the execution were announced in advance, furnished accordingly, arranged a solemn procession to the place. "The wounded affairs of the master" independently tried to diversify the disgusting course of executions. The bodies of criminals or parts of their bodies were put up for a certain period of time for everyone to see in various public places.
1. Cutting off the head. It was considered the standard type of execution and was applied if there were no other indications or the words "without any mercy."
2. Hanging. One of the most ancient types of execution, which came to us from Byzantium. Appointed for robbery and tatba, as well as for the betrayal of military people. In the second half of the seventeenth century, hanging by the rib on an iron hook appeared, which became one of the most cruel executions.
3. Drowning. It was used in cases of mass execution. For parricide and matricide in the era of Sudebnikov, drowning was performed along with a rooster, a cat, a dog and a snake.
4. Quartering or cutting off all limbs and the head at the very end. It was considered one of the most shameful executions and was appointed for state crimes. In the fifteenth century impostors were executed in this way.
5. Pouring molten metal down the throat. It was performed exclusively on counterfeiters, and in 1672 it was replaced by cutting off the left arms and both legs.
6. Burying alive in the ground. This execution was appointed for homicide. Moreover, the convict with her hands tied was buried up to her shoulders and left in anticipation of death from hunger or thirst. Guards stood nearby, and passers-by were allowed to bring the guilty only money, which then went to buy a coffin.
7. Landing on a stake. Like quartering, it was applied mainly to rebels. The execution was very painful - under the own weight of the executed, the stake slowly pierced the insides and came out between the shoulder blades or from the chest. To increase the torment, the tip of the stake was equipped with a crossbar.
8. Wheeling. It was the crushing of all the large bones of the convict lying on the ground with an iron wheel. After that, the wheel was mounted on a pole in a horizontal position, and the mutilated body of the executed was laid or tied to it from above and left to die from dehydration and shock. This execution was especially often used during the reign of Peter I.
9. Burning alive. A specific type of death penalty used for arson and crimes against faith. Criminals were burned at an ordinary fire, sometimes they were first put in an iron cage. The first cases of the use of such an execution were noted as early as the thirteenth century. At the end of the seventeenth century, burning began to be used as a punishment for persistence in the "old faith". As a stricter punishment, the convicts were fumigated with caustic compounds or burned on a slow fire.
Not satisfied with the horrors of these types of death penalty, in practice they tried to make it even more frightening. The time and place of the execution were announced in advance, furnished accordingly, arranged a solemn procession to the place. "The wounded affairs of the master" independently tried to diversify the disgusting course of executions. The bodies of criminals or parts of their bodies were put up for a certain period of time for everyone to see in various public places.
One hundred years, from the appearance of the Law Code of 1550-year to the birth of the Council Code of 1649, were filled with the tireless struggle of the Moscow kingdom with real or imaginary anti-state elements. At the time of the prosperity of the idea of a harsh, absolute statehood, the “dashing man”, the criminal, seemed to be a dangerous force with which state power had to fight. And the Muscovite state fought with “dashing people”, fought tirelessly and without mercy. The inevitable result of this state of affairs was a general increase in the scale of the punitive system, and the death penalty came to the fore. For example, after a terrible fire in the capital in 1634, they began to use it even as a punishment for ordinary smokers.
The vigorous confrontation with the “dashing people” reached its climax in the Cathedral Code of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. The awesome element of punishment imbues all this legislative monument. The code seems to see in every member of society a “dashing person” and hurry to intimidate him with threats in order to keep him from crime. Punitive sanctions of the Code are constantly accompanied by the words: "and others will accept fear" or "so that it may not look different to others." It also indicates that the punishment of a criminal should be carried out like the one he himself perpetrated. That is, murder is committed - the Code orders to punish “with the same death”, arson — a criminal is burned, forgery of coins — get melted metal in the throat, mutilate someone — you will undergo the same injury.
The number of crimes for which the Code of Aleksei Mikhailovich was threatened with death leaves all Sudebniki far behind - it gives sanction to execution in fifty-four (and according to some experts in sixty) cases. If we add to this a number of cruel punishments with a whip (a terrible tool, from which death very often followed) and a whole set of self-injurious injuries (due to underdeveloped medicine, also ending in death), the actual limits of the death penalty can be extended even further. Establishing the death penalty for various criminal acts, the Code very inaccurately determines the type of execution itself. “Execute without mercy,” “execute with death,” are the favorite formulations in this historical document. In addition, the order of its commission is not described at all, leaving it to the choice of local authorities.
In the following years, separate articles were issued that modify, supplement and develop the definitions concerning the death penalty, as set out in the 1649 Code of the Year. It cannot be said that the new laws were distinguished by some consistency. Some of them contradicted both the Code and each other; new sanctions were imposed on the death penalty, while existing ones were abolished, then restored and re-abolished. However, in general, new decrees (especially adopted in 1653-1655-s) still somewhat softened the former severity and cruelty defined by the Code of the Code. As if the law itself frightened the new code, rushing to adopt a number of amendments to limit the death penalty in respect of certain crimes.
One of such mitigating orders was the Decree of October 30 of 1653. The death penalty was left in force only for repeat offenders. And the Decree of 16 of August 1655 of the year ordered to “give a belly” to all the thieves, who voluntarily repented and surrendered to the authorities. It is very similar to the fact that Moscow legislation signed in powerlessness in the fight against “dashing” and tried to find a compromise with them. The death penalty is also mitigated. For example, the Decree of 25 of May 1654 of the year prescribes replacing the agonizing burning of arsonists with simple hanging.
However, this direction of the Russian criminal law did not last long. Soon everything was back to normal. We are interested in the provision on the abolition of the death penalty for robbers and thieves 8 August 1659-th year ceased to operate. On this very day, at the request of landlords and landowners, a decree appeared to restore the hanging of the robbers detained in lower-town cities. And on May 11 of 1663, each convicted thief and thief, instead of death, was ordered to cut off his left arm and both legs. As a deterrent, severed members nailed to trees along the roads. Obviously, this given measure, in essence, is the death penalty, only even more painful as compared with hanging. Only the law adopted by 24 on January 1666 of the year prescribed the execution of thieves and robbers by hanging again.
According to the internal content of the Code of the Year 1649, the death penalty was imposed for the following acts:
1. Crimes against the faith, including: blasphemy, perversion from Orthodoxy, sacrilegious theft, murder in a church, and violation of the liturgy.
2. State crimes. These included: malevolence against the king, murder in his presence, high treason.
3. Crimes against appointed authorities. Here appear: the murder of a bailiff from Moscow, an open uprising, the murder of a judge, damage to a state act or its forged drawing up, unauthorized travel abroad.
4. Crimes against state regalia, income and property of the treasury. This includes: spoiling real and making counterfeit coins, selling tobacco in the tavern.
5. Crimes against deanery and public amenities. Here we have in mind the inciting of citizens to turmoil and malevolence in "fun things."
6. Crimes against the honor and life of individuals. It is noted: the murder of a child by a mother, the murder of parents by children, sodomy, all types of qualified murder, an insult to the honor of women associated with violence.
7. Crimes against property: arson, secondary robbery, third unskilled tatba.
1. Crimes against the faith, including: blasphemy, perversion from Orthodoxy, sacrilegious theft, murder in a church, and violation of the liturgy.
2. State crimes. These included: malevolence against the king, murder in his presence, high treason.
3. Crimes against appointed authorities. Here appear: the murder of a bailiff from Moscow, an open uprising, the murder of a judge, damage to a state act or its forged drawing up, unauthorized travel abroad.
4. Crimes against state regalia, income and property of the treasury. This includes: spoiling real and making counterfeit coins, selling tobacco in the tavern.
5. Crimes against deanery and public amenities. Here we have in mind the inciting of citizens to turmoil and malevolence in "fun things."
6. Crimes against the honor and life of individuals. It is noted: the murder of a child by a mother, the murder of parents by children, sodomy, all types of qualified murder, an insult to the honor of women associated with violence.
7. Crimes against property: arson, secondary robbery, third unskilled tatba.
Thus, in the second half of the seventeenth century, the threat of death penalty became the favorite means of encouraging citizens to obey the king. The phrases: “to execute those by death”, “to be them in the death penalty” - at that time become common prohibitive language. And although in most cases this threat was not carried out, its very constant appearance in various decrees clearly demonstrates how well the principle of deterrence has taken root in us, as the best way to force citizens to obey royal laws.
However, there was a negative consequence of the widespread abuse of death sentences. Already by the beginning of the Petrovsky period, public executions became the most common phenomenon in the Moscow State. The society has become so accustomed to it, it has taken a closer look at the daily shows that people have ceased to be horrified by the “merciless” punishments. Executions did not hit anyone, did not touch anyone. To stare at execution from idleness, to execute a criminal, to be executed myself — all this was not something outstanding against the gray background of the life of a demoralized society. The type of corporeal and mortal executions hardly carried out the main goal - the purpose of intimidation.
Foreigners who visited our fatherland were amazed with how easily the convicts themselves treated death. People went into the loop, under the ax, on the fire with the same silent courage with what would have gone to the enemy line. The Englishman Perry in essays about Russia since the time of Peter the Great writes: “Russians are not afraid of death and do not put it in anything. When they are told to go to execution, they do it carelessly. ” His contemporary, Collins, also noted that those sentenced to hanging themselves climb the stairs, say goodbye to the people, put loops on their necks and are thrown down. Another overseas traveler by the name of Berchholz watched the case when one man, after having been wheeled, pulled his arm from the wheel with great difficulty, wiped his nose with it and again calmly put it back. Then, when he saw that he had soiled the wheel with blood, he again pulled out a shattered hand and wiped the blood with his sleeve. ”
These were the results of the merciless domination of frightening punishments. The death penalty turned into an ordinary punishment, and the authorities' struggle against “thieves” and “dashing” people, against “nepochechiteli” and “disobedient” royal decrees increasingly heated, creating new deterrents and new austerity, which further demoralized society, but were powerless to reduce crime rates. It was in this form that the question of the death penalty was passed on to the new eighteenth century, the first quarter of which was marked by the reforms of Peter the Great.
Curiously, but Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, nicknamed Tishayshiy, was never marked by historians as a cruel and merciless ruler. In the preserved chronicles, he appears to be a gentle and good-natured, religious man who can respond to someone else's grief. The second Russian tsar of the Romanov dynasty possessed a passive, contemplative nature, trying on the old Russian and Western situations, but never surrendering to them with the ardor of Peter I. It should be added that Alexey Mikhailovich was the most educated man of his time, read many books, tried to write, practiced in versification. He was a man of order, it is to him that the words belong: “to time, fun for an hour”, and also “without a thing, every thing will not be strengthened and not established”.
If you try to designate one common goal of all the criminal laws of Peter I, it will be the desire to force the subjects to unconditional obedience to the royal will. A similar goal was already manifested in the decrees of the second half of the seventeenth century. However, now in the first place was no longer the intensity of the evil will, and not even the amount of the evil caused, but only the disobedience of the royal commandment, which was punished. As an example, you can bring penal servitude and confiscation of property for a master who accidentally made bad shoes, death “without mercy” for taking a shower at the census, “depriving the belly” of a nobleman for his failure to appear in Moscow or Petersburg. In addition, from now on, the felling of oak in the reserve, slowness in delivering mail, negligence in sending cases to officials was punishable by death.
The death penalty in the criminal law of Peter the Great not only continues to retain its dominant value, but also further expands its scope. In particular, according to the Military Charter of the 1716 of the year, modeled on Western European criminal law, the death penalty is imposed in one hundred twenty-two cases (per two hundred articles of the Charter), that is, twice as often as in the Code of the 1649 of the year. The epoch of Peter I was marked by the use of all types of the death penalty already known in Russia from past centuries, as well as the addition of one new one - “arc-biting” or the usual shooting by bullets from a firearm. weapons. In addition, two other types are authorized - quartering and wheeling, which were previously used in practice and now received legislative recognition.
Only after Peter I, the punitive wave began to subside, and in the second quarter of the eighteenth century in our fatherland, the first timid attempts were made to limit the death penalty. Russian criminal legislation has set out on the path of its gradual denial, returning to the basics of the original Russian legal outlook on this type of punishment.
The 1649 Code of Law and subsequent decrees tell about some of the rituals that accompanied the execution of the death sentence. According to them, the sentenced was ordered to imprison him for six weeks in a so-called “penitential hut”, in which he had to repent and prepare for the end, respectively. Execution over him could be made only after this period. By decree of 1669, the penitential term was reduced to ten days, of which seven were set aside for fasting, two for confession, and the tenth for execution of the sentence. It was impossible to execute anyone on Sunday or on the day of the royal commemoration. Execution of the sentence over pregnant women was postponed until delivery. It was prescribed to carry out the execution, if possible, in the same place where the crime was committed. However, it was impossible to execute a person on an “empty” (uninhabited) place, only in a city or village.
In conclusion, it remains to be noted that, despite all the cruelty and bloodthirstiness of the monuments of legislation of the era of Ancient Russia, researchers of national criminal law unanimously agree that all the horrors perpetrated in their native land turn pale before the fury of justice in the states of Western Europe that “flooded blood seventeenth century". Before the known data on the number of state-owned in France and Germany in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the numbers of those executed during the same period in Russia completely disappear. Even in spite of the frequent resolution of the death penalty, the Code of the 1649 of the year, compared with simultaneous Western codes, seems too soft-hearted. Of course, the forms of execution in ancient Russia were rude and cruel, however, to such sophistication and variety of ways of depriving the life of intruders, to such complex structures that increase the suffering of criminals, which were in the Western "enlightened" states, our ancestors never reached.
Information sources:
http://kir-a-m.livejournal.com/622031.html
http://www.allpravo.ru/library/doc101p0/instrum2363/item2365.html
http://ru.wikipedia.org/
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