Nikolai Ivanovich Kostomarov: Russian folk historian
Nikolai Ivanovich Kostomarov: Russian folk historianThe life and scientific career of N. I. Kostomarov were in many respects “borderline”.He was born in the family of a landowner and a serf peasant woman on the border of the Great Russian Voronezh province and Little Russia.He was repeatedly persecuted, exiled and censored, but he occupied the chairs of the leading universities of the empire.He did not directly deny the dominant historiographic tradition, but stood apart from his contemporaries.He rushed about in his historical views from pan-Slavism to «light» nationalism.To this day, his scientific ideas deserve the most polar assessments.