{{italic title ''Vsya Rossiya'' (literally translated "''All Russia''" or "''The whole Russia''") was the title of a series of directories of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the List of Russian monarchs, Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended th ...

published by Aleksei Sergeevich Suvorin (and his heirs; Suvorin died in 1912) on a yearly basis from 1895 to 1923 and was continued under the name ''Ves SSSR'' (Literally translated ''All of the USSR'' or ''The whole USSR'') from 1924 to 1931. Each volume was anywhere between 500 and 1500 pages long. The directories contained detailed lists of government offices, public services and medium and large businesses present in major cities across the Russian Empire. These directories are often used by

genealogists Genealogy () is the study of families, family history, and the tracing of their lineages. Genealogists use oral interviews, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kins ...

today to trace family members who were living in pre-revolutionary Russia and the early

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

period when

vital records Vital records are records of life events kept under governmental authority, including birth certificates, marriage licenses (or marriage certificates), separation agreements, divorce certificates or divorce party and death certificates. In ...

are missing or prove difficult to find.

Historians A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the st ...

use them to research the

social histories Social history, often called the new social history, is a field of history that looks at the lived experience of the past. In its "golden age" it was a major growth field in the 1960s and 1970s among scholars, and still is well represented in his ...

of late 19th century and early 20th century Russia.

The following information can be found in most editions: *a surname index of over 100,000 names and thousands of companies *a directory of prominent landowners *lists members of the Imperial House of Russia and government officials *statistical information about the Russian Empire *population figures *information and guidelines about trade and industry in Russia *lists of joint-stock companies *sub-sections detailing a directory of each district of each province, listing administrative officials, merchants, industrial and commercial manufacturers *original advertising

Availability

Many original directories in the series (or

microfiche Microforms are scaled-down reproductions of documents, typically either films or paper, made for the purposes of transmission, storage, reading, and printing. Microform images are commonly reduced to about 4% or of the original document size. F ...

copies thereof) can be found in libraries across the U.S., Europe (including the

Baltic countries The Baltic states, et, Balti riigid or the Baltic countries is a geopolitical term, which currently is used to group three countries: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. All three countries are members of NATO, the European Union, the Eurozone, ...

, Finland the United Kingdom and Germany) however most only have an incomplete collection.

Other city directories in Russia

Suvorin also published city directories for

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

under the title '' Ves Petersburg'' (Literally translated ''All Petersburg'' or ''The Whole Saint Petersburg'') for the years 1894 to 1940 and for

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

under the title ''

Vsia Moskva ''Vsya Moskva'' (literally translated "''All Moscow''" or "''The Entire Moscow''") was a series of city directories of Moscow, Russia, published on a yearly basis from 1872 to 1936 by Aleksei Sergeevich Suvorin. The directories contained detaile ...

'' (Literally translated ''All Moscow'' or ''The Whole Moscow'') for the years 1875 to 1936.

External links

A Russian website offering a search engine in Cyrillic for some city directories.
Directories Russian non-fiction books Russian Empire 1895 non-fiction books

Contents

Availability

Other city directories in Russia

External links