The precedence conflict of Princes A.B. Trubetskoy and P.M. Shcheniatev in Polotsk in the spring of 1564: To the question of the position of the Trubetskoy's Princes in Moscow State on the Oprichnina's eve

Abstract

The article attempts to identify the circumstances of the parochial conflict of the princes A.B. Trubetskoy and P.M. Shchenyatev in the Polotsk voivodeship in the spring of 1564, as well as the reasons for the final transition of the Trubetskoy princes to the sovereign service with the help of comparative and histotical method, analysis and synthesis, literature and sources on the investigated topic. As a result of the study, it was found that up to the 1560-ies the Trubetskoys occupied military and administrative posts sporadically and were not firmly embedded in the system of service relations of the Moscow state. Adopted in the early 1560s. the new land legislation jeopardized the further existence of the Trubetskoy estate and forced them to intensify their official activities. The conflict in Polotsk was the first attempt by the Trubetskoys to find out their real parochial status. Prince A.B. Trubetskoy was guided by the old ideas about the exclusive role of service princes, characteristic of the first third of the 16th century. He entered into a parochial dispute with an obviously superior enemy and did not emerge victorious from it. The author concluded that, faced with the new realities of the sovereign service, the Trubetskoys, who, due to their official passivity, were inferior to many less noble families in a parochial relation, sacrificed their relative independence and went over to the tsarist service. During the years of the oprichnina, they actively served in the oprichnina estate of Tsar Ivan the Terrible, won his favor and were able to raise their parochial status.