Sudebnik of Tsar

Ivan IV Ivan IV Vasilyevich (russian: Ива́н Васи́льевич; 25 August 1530 – ), commonly known in English as Ivan the Terrible, was the grand prince of Moscow from 1533 to 1547 and the first Tsar of all Russia from 1547 to 1584. Ivan ...

(russian: Судебник) was an expansion and revision of the Sudebnik of 1497, a code of laws instituted by Ivan the Great, his grandfather. It is considered the result of the first

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eight ...

n parliament of feudal Estates (

Zemsky Sobor The Zemsky Sobor ( rus, зе́мский собо́р, p=ˈzʲemskʲɪj sɐˈbor, t=assembly of the land) was a parliament of the Tsardom of Russia's estates of the realm active during the 16th and 17th centuries. The assembly represented Russi ...

). The Sudebnik of 1550 liquidated the aristocracy's judicial privileges and strengthened the role of state judicial bodies. The Sudebnik also provided for the active participation of the elective representatives of local communities (rural heads, jurymen, ''tselovalniki'', ''dvorskie'' etc.) in legal proceedings. The arrest of suspects could be made only at the consent of the local community. The representative of a community (''dyak'') participated in judicial office-work. Town and rural communities had the right to self-management and the distribution of taxes. The Sudebnik confirmed the right of peasants to leave their feudal lords. The law precisely defined that the peasant had the right to leave the landowner after the payment of two fixed fees (a "break-away" fee called ''pozhiloye'' and a transportation fee called ''povoz'').

Sources

* * Беляев И.Д. Крестьяне на Руси. Исследование о постепенном изменении значения крестьян в русском обществе. М. 1891 Типография Общества распространения полезных книг
Monuments of Imperial Russian Law: Medieval Origins
{{Muscovite Constitution 1550 in law 1550s in Russia Legal history of Russia Medieval legal codes