Russia Historical Geography: Difference between revisions

Imperial Russia was divided into states - '''gubernii'''. In 1708 Peter divided Russia into eight large gubernii. A county - '''uyezd''' was the subdivision of a guberniya. The statute of 1775 divided Russia into 40 gubernii (divided into an average of 10 districts). At the beginning of the 20th century there were 50 gubernii in European Russia; not including Finland, Poland, and the Caucasus. Most of the provinces in the Caucasus, Central Asia, and Far East corresponding to gubernii were called '''oblasti'''. In 1914, there were 78 gubernii and 20 oblasti.  

An '''uyezd''' was divided by district - '''volost''' and village - '''derevnya''' or '''selo'''. A selo usually had a church. In Russia today, an oblast is equivalent to a guberniya. There are more oblasti in modern Russia than there were gubernii in imperial Russia. Often, the records of several modern oblasti are found in the archive of a single oblast whose capital happened to be the capital of an imperial guberniya. A '''raion''' is the intermediate jurisdiction in modern Russia, taking the place of the uyezd and volost.