Alexander Borisovich Lakier (russian: Лакиер, Александр Борисович) (1825-1870) was a Russian historian of

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descent who was interested in

heraldry Heraldry is a discipline relating to the design, display and study of armorial bearings (known as armory), as well as related disciplines, such as vexillology, together with the study of ceremony, rank and pedigree. Armory, the best-known branch ...

. Alexander Lakier was born in the city of Taganrog in 1825. His father, Boris Lakier, a convert from Judaism, was the doctor who certified the death of the late Russian Emperor Alexander I of Russia who died in Taganrog in 1825. Lakier graduated from the Legal Dept. of the

Moscow University M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU; russian: Московский государственный университет имени М. В. Ломоносова) is a public research university in Moscow, Russia and the most prestigious ...

and defended his thesis with ''On Domains and Estates'' (O Votchinah i Pomestyakh) released in Saint Petersburg in 1848. In 1856-1858, Lakier traveled across Europe,

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and the United States of America. He kept a travel diary, fragments of which were published in ''

Sovremennik ''Sovremennik'' ( rus, «Современник», p=səvrʲɪˈmʲenʲːɪk, a=Ru-современник.ogg, "The Contemporary") was a Russian literary, social and political magazine, published in Saint Petersburg in 1836–1866. It came out f ...

'' (1858) and ''

The Russian Messenger The ''Russian Messenger'' or ''Russian Herald'' (russian: Ру́сский ве́стник ''Russkiy Vestnik'', Pre-reform Russian: Русскій Вѣстникъ ''Russkiy Vestnik'') has been the title of three notable magazines published in ...

'' (1858) and were later included in the book ''The Travel Through North American States, Canada and Cuba'', which was published in Saint Petersburg in 1859. In 1858, Alexander Lakier entered the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, where he was involved in statistics work and worked as editor in the commission on liberation of peasants. In 1860, he returned to Taganrog, where he worked as lawyer. Alexander Lakier published ''The History of Russian Sovereigns' Titles'' (1847), ''On Service in Russia before Peter The Great Times'' (Saint Petersburg, 1850), ''Review of Relations between Russia and England in 16th and 17th Centuries'' (1854) and other. His most famous work was "Russian Heraldry" (Saint Petersburg, 1855). This oeuvre is still a valuable reference, where Lakier made an attempt to analyze and explain coats of arms of Russian dukes and nobility. The volume also featured the history of Russian stamps - unique until the early 20th century.

References

* Walter Laqueur ''Thursday's Child Has Far to Go. A Memoir of the Journeying Years.''New York etc. (Maxwell Macmillan) 1992, 44-47. * Таганрог. Энциклопедия, Таганрог, издательство АНТОН, 2008 Image:Lakier_Coatofarms.jpg, The ancestral coat of arms of Lakier family. {{DEFAULTSORT:Lakier, Alexander 1825 births 1870 deaths Writers from Taganrog People from Yekaterinoslav Governorate Nobility from the Russian Empire 19th-century historians from the Russian Empire Moscow State University alumni