A New Rival State? Australia in Tsarist Diplomatic Communications by Massov Alexander (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS 177 off of the altars of its Nativity and Intercession cathedrals, preventing their use for religious services. It was only at Easter 1905, against the background of the developing revolution, that the altars were re-opened, on the eve of Nicholas II’s decree on religious toleration. De Simone’s account of the history of the Rogozhskoe community provides a detailed and illuminating picture of many aspects of the lives of the Moscow popovtsy, including the architecture of their cathedrals, the activities of their charitable and educational institutions and the growth of merchant dynasties such as the Morozovs and the Riabushinskiis. The author has made good use of archival materials, although his attitude towards his sources is somewhat uncritical, producing a highly sympathetic picture which sometimes verges on the hagiographical. De Simone focuses on the relationship of the Rogozhskoe community to the state and the official Orthodox Church, while largely ignoring its position in the broader spectrum of Old Belief. He says little about the attitude of the Rogozhskoe priested community to its priestless counterpart, the Moscow Preobrazhenskoe Cemetery community, nor to other priestless and priested communities throughout the Empire. Many of the more radical groups considered the Moscow popovtsy to be hopelessly compromised, not least by their swearing of the oath of loyalty to Alexander III after the assassination of Alexander II in 1881. It is not too surprising, therefore, that the authorities were mistrustful of professions of loyalty by a community that aspired to a leading role in a movement that included groups which still identified the tsar as Antichrist. The monograph is thoroughly researched, with a full scholarly apparatus and some well-chosen illustrations. Unfortunately, however, the author’s style is somewhat pedestrian and repetitious, and the publisher has allowed far too many typos to slip through the proof-reading net. But overall this is a valuable contribution to our knowledge of Russian religious history. Centre for Russian, European and Eurasian Studies Maureen Perrie University of Birmingham Massov, Alexander; Pollard, Marina and Windle, Kevin (eds). A New Rival State? Australia in Tsarist Diplomatic Communications. Australian National University Press, Acton, ACT, 2018. xiii + 353 pp. Illustrations. Tables. Notes. Index. AUS$ 55.00 (paperback). This volume covers six decades of despatches by imperial Russia’s consular representatives in Melbourne, from the establishment of a Russian consular service in the Australian settler colonies in 1857 to the Russian revolutions SEER, 98, 1, JANUARY 2020 178 of 1917. The reports selected from the Arkhiv vneshnei politiki Rossiiskoi Imperii (AVPRI) throw an interesting light on the growing relations between the two countries in this period. But they also offer useful insights into the economic, social and political history of the Australian federation. Ever since Leopold von Ranke based his history of the Reformation on the Venetian relazioni ambasciatori, historians have learnt to appreciate the value of foreign diplomatic sources for the study of a country’s internal history. Historians of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Australia will similarly find much of interest in the reports compiled by the eight Russian consuls. At the same time, their despatches also reveal the cultural, social and political norms of the country which they represented in this fast modernizing outpost of the British world in the Southern hemisphere. Its dynamism elicited admiration and fascination, but it also met with an altogether more traditional Russian response of hostility towards uncontrolled, from-the-bottom-up change, unfettered by governmental direction. Russia’s first contact with the Antipodes occurred in 1807, when the Russian sloop Neva put into Sydney harbour en route from Kronstadt to Alaska. From the early 1850s onwards there was an increase in immigration from Russia to Australia, triggered initially by the ‘gold fever’ of 1851. This first wave of immigration lasted until the 1890s, to be followed by a second in the decade before 1914. Indeed, on the eve of the First World War, the Russian community inAustraliaincreasedby120–150permonth.Inbothperiods,therecentarrivals were drawn mostly from the peasant class, reflecting the shortage of available land in Russia. But there was also a significant element formed of political refugees and oppressed ethnic minorities. Following the Polish uprising in 1863, Poles arrived in substantial numbers (doc. no...