(“waiting train” tactics) forced a division of Bulgaria intro three parts-only the northern one being truly autonomous under Russian tutelage with far fewer Russia troops there-and made Russia limit its acquisitions in Asiatic Turkey, while he stood by London’s separate arrangements with Istanbul regarding the Straits and Cyprus. Shuvalov did salvage the port of Varna for autonomous Bulgaria and one Adriatic port for Montenegro, as well as Southern Bessarabia, Kars, Ardahan, and Batum (nominally an open port) for Russia.
The Treaty of Berlin, signed by Britain, France, and Germany, as well as Russia, Turkey, and Austria-Hungary, achieved a tenuous Balkan peace lasting thirty-four years, but left Serbian and Russian nationalists seething-a catalyst for the secret Austro-German Dual Alliance of 1879 and mounting German distrust of Russia. Russia and Austria-Hungary dared agree on the latter’s eventual annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina only by a secret agreement (1881), which caused a storm when implemented in 1908. The southern Balkan settlement collapsed in 1885, when Bulgarians on their own, in defiance of the Russians, united the southern third with the north. See also: BALKAN WARS; GORCHAKOV, ALEXANDER MIKHAILOVICH; RUSSO-TURKISH WARS; SAN STEFANO, TREATY OF
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Medlicott, W. N. (1963). The Congress of Berlin and After: A Diplomatic History of the Near East Settlement, 1878-1880, 2nd ed. London: Frank Cass. Sumner, Benedict Humphrey. (1962). Russia and the Balkans, 1870-1880, reprint ed. Hamden, CT: Ar-chon.
Russia. Each power pledged to remain neutral if one of the signatories were to become involved in a war with another Great Power. The closing of the Straits to all warships was reconfirmed. A separate protocol recognized Austria’s right to annex Bosnia-Herzegovina (an option exercised in 1908) and reiterated the Bulgarian territorial settlement imposed by the 1878 Congress of Berlin.
The treaty reflected Otto von Bismarck’s strategy of keeping France isolated following the Franco-Prussian war, in part by binding Russia to Germany. The Russian government viewed the convention as a necessary evil to give Russia a period of peace on its western frontiers, to counter the Austro-German alliance, and to avoid a repetition of 1878, when a coalition of other Great Powers had prevented Russia from fully exploiting its victory over Turkey. A December 1879 Foreign Ministry conference chaired by Minister Nikolai Karlovich Giers concluded that a nonaggression pact with Vienna and Berlin was absolutely essential to obtain “the repose of which [Russia] has the most imperious need.” Faced with growing internal social unrest and the need to slash military spending, Russia could not afford renewed military competition.
Alexander III renewed the alliance in 1884, but it expired in 1887. The convention failed to provide any mechanism for regulating Austro-Russian rivalries in the Balkans, especially because Germany was unable to function as an honest broker between Vienna and St. Petersburg. Nor was Russia inclined to permanently accept a status quo predicated on its post-1878 weakness. Bismarck concluded a nonaggression pact (the Reinsurance Treaty) when the convention lapsed, but Germany abrogated this agreement in 1890 when Bismarck was retired. This paved the way for the 1894 Franco-Russian alliance. See also: GERMANY, RELATIONS WITH; THREE EMPERORS’ LEAGUE
BERLIN, CONVENTION OF
Concluded June 18, 1881, this Convention of Berlin recreated the Three Emperors’ League between the Great Powers: Austria-Hungary, Germany, and
Dmytryshyn, Basil. (1974). Imperial Russia: A Sourcebook, 1700-1917. Hinsdale, IL: Dryden Press. Fuller, William C., Jr. (1992). Strategy and Power in Russia, 1600-1914. New York: Free Press. Riasanovsky, Nicholas V. (1984). A History of Russia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
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The practice of compensation for a humiliating insult or dishonor.
Beschestie meant “dishonor” in early modern Russia and referred both to humiliating insult and to the amount of compensation awarded to victims of insult. There is ample evidence in law codes in other East Slavic societies (Kievan Rus, Novgorod, Pskov) before the fifteenth century for the principle of compensation for humiliating insult, but this term and legal norms for defense of honor were first systematized in the Grand Principality of Muscovy. The major Muscovite law codes of 1550, 1589, and 1649 cite beschestie specifically and provide schedules of compensation for dishonor.
Beschestie was socially inclusive (applying to all social ranks) but also socially hierarchical (the amount of compensation was determined by social status). In the most detailed account in the Law Code of 1649, compensation for insult between individuals in the lowest social ranks was a simple, paltry fine. As the social rank of litigants rose, fines rose; and for the very highly placed, physical punishment was levied on the offender in addition to a high fine. At the same time, dishonor litigation provided protection for all social ranks, from the highest secular and clerical ranks to slaves, serfs, and (in the 1589 sudebnik) witches and minstrels.
Muscovite laws do not define honor; its content has to be reconstructed from complaints in litigations. Insult to honor in practice was primarily verbal; most physical assault was litigated separately. But those forms of physical assault considered humiliating (such as pulling a man’s beard, or uncovering a woman’s hair by knocking off her headdress) were deemed dishonor. Dishonoring verbal insults included accusations of criminal behavior or of disloyalty to the tsar, aspersions on sexual probity or religious faith, insults to an individual’s station in life, no matter how lowly, and insults to their heritage and kinsmen. Women played a pivotal role in this code of social values: Their behavior reflected on family honor, and thus their dishonor compensation was reckoned higher than men’s. A wife, for example, received twice her husband’s dishonor compensation, while an unmarried daughter received four times.
Litigations show that men and women in all social ranks litigated for dishonor, even non-Russians and non- Orthodox. Judges took dishonor suits seriously, and were concerned primarily not with the truth of an allegation, but whether an insulting phrase was uttered or a humiliating assault carried out. People could use dishonor litigation to pursue quarrels and vendettas, but overall the practice of defense of honor probably worked to enhance social stability by protecting individual and family dignity. Most broadly, the consciousness of honor constituted a form of social integration across the empire, although limited by the ethnic, religious, and cultural diversity of Muscovy.
Case law on dishonor litigations survives only sparsely from the late sixteenth century, but the number of recorded suits rose steadily in the seventeenth century, even accounting for accidents of document survival. In the eighteenth century, terminology changed (obida and oskorblenie came to replace beschestie for “insult”), but the consciousness of personal honor and the right to litigate to defend it endured into the Imperial period. See also: BOYAR; LAW CODE OF 1649; MESTNICHESTVO; OKOLNICHY
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Dewey, Horace W. (1968). “Old Muscovite Concepts of Injured Honor (Beschestie).” Slavic Review 27(4): 594-603. Kollmann, Nancy Shields. (1999). By Honor Bound. State and Society in Early Modern Russia. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
BESPRIZORNYE See HOMELESS CHILDREN.
The region of Bessarabia lies between the Prut and Dniester Rivers and constitutes the rump of what is today the Republic of Moldavia. Although the historical region of Bessarabia stretched to the coast of the Black Sea, southeastern Bessarabia is presently incorporated in Ukraine.
The region formed part of the broader Principality of Moldavia, which first emerged as a distinct area of rule in the fourteenth century. This territory was brought into the Ottoman sphere of influence in 1538, following conquests led by S?-leyman the Magnificent. The region was allowed a measure of self-government until 1711, when
