MILITARY EDUCATION OF THE GREAT PRINCES NIKOLAEVICHS: TANGIBLE AND INTANGIBLE CULTURE (ROMANOVS PERSONAL FUNDS IN SARF)
The author addresses the conception of military education, elaborated by Emperor Nicholas I together with V. A. Zhukovsky. The study aims to detect key components of this conception belonging to the tangible as well as intangible culture. As the author notes these two aspects of culture were in demand in terms of their interaction. Thus, for instance, military toys served four emperor`s sons not only for game purposes, but also for study of the military history and military science. The paper traces the dynamics of the great princes` education from the birth to their adulthood and identifies the main personalities that influenced this process the most: besides the father-emperor, those were the tutors of the grand princes (reputable persons with a real military and life experience, St. George Cross holders). In addition to Zhukovsky's “Plan of education,” the diaries of the Romanovs, their tutors and fellows served as the main sources of research. The biographical method and chronological and problematic approaches constitutes methodological basis of this research: their intersection allowed identifying synchronous boundary stages of the young Romanovs lives. The results obtained complement already well-known military education history in the Russian nobility culture. For the first time the study introduces, as an addendum, documents from the personal funds of the Romanovs in the SARF, illustrating key points of the research.