To the question of seizure of land in the European part of the Russian Empire in the second half of XIX - early XX centuries

The article is devoted to analyzing practices of seizure of lands in the European part of the Russian Empire in the second half of XIX -early XX centuries. The task is to analyze what was understood under the "seizure of lands" in late Imperial Russia, and what kind of violation of rights of ownership of land was regarded as a "seizure". Based on the materials of the committees on development of the agricultural industry and the works of experts about land relations in late Imperial Russia, the author emphasizes on the features of seizure and using land in the European part of the country. The author shows, that in the second half of XIX - early XX centuries illegal using of other people's land became common practice in the central part of the Russian Empire. Its main target was the neighboring area. In reality, the seizure was for quite a long time, gradually expanding and covering much wider strip of neighboring land. These miniature seizures became obvious only over time, when the neighbor attached considerable strip of the adjacent land to his own land. Landlords suffered from such kind of actions. They were not working on their own land, they were not able to notice the small seizure of neighboring farms. By the end of the nineteenth century, this problem was so serious that began to attract the attention of the Royal administration, which initiated in 1903 the research of this problem in 49 provinces of the European Russia. Meanwhile, a seizure of lands was virtually an absent "category" in Russian law. Until the fall of the Empire in 1917 the term "seizure" did not appear in the Russian legislation. Plowing other people's land was mentioned in the article about the unauthorized use someone else's land property and there were not punishment for these actions on Russian law. In addition, in Russia the "actual" possession of the land was more significant, than the legal possession of the land. Those who managed illegally use the lands belonged to other people for 6 months or more could claim their rights on treated areas. As a result, the concept of land ownership was the uncertain category in the Empire. Based on the conducted research the author came to the conclusion that land ownership was not protected from various kinds of the seizure, which in the European part of Russia were regarded as unauthorized using of the land resources belonging to others. Such seizures were feasible because of the uncertainty of the rights of land ownership and deficiency of law of the Empire, clearly manifested in the late XIX century.

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