Criminal liability for suicide in the law of pre-Petrine Russia

Abstract

This study is devoted to the criminal law regulation of issues related to suicide in pre-Petrine Russia. This period of development of domestic law is characterized by a rather weak, compared with the later stages of the history of criminal legal counteraction to suicide, study. The work presents the testimonies of contemporaries, as well as the monuments of law that were not previously considered in publications devoted to a similar topic. The prescriptions of the norms of positive law affecting suicidal behavior, as well as the sanctions that threatened suicides under the church and customary law of the period under review, are described. Special attention is paid to the popular opinion about the identity of murder and suicide in ancient Russian criminal law. Based on the analysis of normative legal acts of the era in question, it is concluded that although there was no legal responsibility directly for committing suicide in pre-Petrine Russia, the condemnation of suicide by the state authorities still found expression in other forms, in particular, by mentioning this phenomenon in a negative context. At the same time, on the example of a number of normative legal acts of the period under review, the inconsistency of the statement common in Russian science that the term "murder" included not only murder, but also suicide is shown.