Granted letter to the nobility: history and content

The gratuitous letter to the nobility begins a new stage in the history of this class. After the adoption of the document, the nobles became a legislatively privileged layer and received ample opportunities and rights.

The gratuitous letter to the nobility was adopted by the great transformer Catherine II. No one suspected that a woman who had no rights to the Russian crown could become the second after Peter the Great empress. Her politics went down in history as "enlightened absolutism." And indeed it is. With her letter she made the nobility the most notable estate.

The gratuitous letter to the nobility of 1785 freed the nobles from compulsory service. But it is worth noting that the beginning of this legal design of the rights of this estate was laid by Peter 3 in his Manifesto on Liberty of the Nobility. This document gave the right to the nobles to continue the service of their own volition, and they were allowed to enter service in other states, but on the condition that at the first demand of the Russian Empire they would return to the location of the Russian army.

The grudged charter of the nobility also decided that only children about the place of education should be provided about children under the age of 18 years. The content of this manifesto aroused doubts in Catherine, and she convened a special commission to amend the document. After that, on the basis of the already existing regulations, the Charter was issued. It had its own structure and was divided into 4 parts:

• Personal advantages;
• Meetings and reform of the noble society;
• Instructions for the compilation of genealogical books;
• Proof of origin.

The new document freed the nobles from corporal punishment , allowed the man in the case of marriage to a non-noble woman to give her his status, and a woman in the event of marriage to a non-nobleman, this right was not granted.

Also this document of Catherine II fixed the following provision: only an equal court could judge a nobleman and no one else. Nobles got the right to gather their societies and assemblies - this speaks for their self-government. It is worth noting that the charter leveled all sorts: from noble to ordinary. Thus, all noble families had the same rights and opportunities. A distinctive feature of that time was the creation of genealogical books, the availability of which was judged on the nobility of the family.

Granted letters to the nobility and cities became a symbol of enlightened absolutism in the time of Catherine 2. On the day of her birth, they became as symbolic as the figure of the Great Empress. Of great importance was the adoption of these documents for the final social stratification of Russian society.

Granted certificate of nobility was adopted in the late 18th century. It enshrined the privileges of the nobility, determined the conditions of their life and the great possibilities with regard to the disposal of the peasants. The document was an excellent opportunity to develop the managerial and entrepreneurial qualities of the estate, as well as to form a confident gentry self-government.