Everyone in the late Russian Empire was in agreement: the country had a vodka problem. But what were its causes and how should it be dealt with? For answers, many turned to Ivan Churikov, a peasant who became a St Petersburg faith healer after suffering personal tragedy. But his attempts to form a sobriety movement involved him in an endless struggle with the Orthodox Church, one that occasionally cost him his freedom. In this episode, we follow Churikov and his struggles, looking at the alcohol policies of the imperial Russian state and the civic activism that tried to save the empire from drowning in a sea of vodka.

Sources

P. Herrlinger, Holy Sobriety in Modern Russia: A Faith Healer and His Followers (Ithaca and London: Northern Illinois University Press, 2023)

P. Herlihy, The Alcoholic Empire: Vodka and Politics in Late Imperial Russia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002).

P. Herlihy, ‘The Russian Vodka Prohibition of 1914 and Its Consequences’ in E. U. Savona, M. A. R. Kleiman, and F. Calderoni, eds., Dual Markets: Comparative Approaches to Regulation (Cham: Springer, 2017): 193-206.

P. Herlihy, ‘"Joy of the Rus’": Rites and Rituals of Russian Drinking’, The Russian Review, vol. 50, no. 2 (1991): 131-147.

R. J. Abbott, ‘Alcohol Control and Russian Politics, 1863-1876’, Russian History, vol. 43 (2016): 87-100.

I. H. Mäkinen and T. C. Reitan, ‘Continuity and Change in Russian Alcohol Consumption from the Tsars to Transition’, Social History, vol. 31, no. 2 (2006): 160-179.

D. Christian, ‘Vodka and Corruption in Russia on the Eve of Emancipation’, Slavic Review, vol. 46, no. 3/4 (1987): 471-488.

I. N. Fedotova, ‘K istorii monastyrskikh tiurem v Rossii: Suzdal’skaia Spaso-Evfimieva obitel’ kak mesto lisheniia svobody (konets XVIII – nachalo XX veka)’, Intelligentsiia i mir, no. 2 (2018): 75-86.

In 1704, Colonel Rudolph Felix Bauer found himself involved in the siege of Tartu, one of the many battles of the Great Northern War between Russia and Sweden. This tale tells of how Bauer came to be before the bloody walls of Tartu while also recounting the trevails of the siege itself.

Sources

M. Laidre, The Great Northern War and Estonia: The Trials of Dorpat 1700-1708, trans P. Ruustal (Tallinn: Argo, 2010)

R. Slavnitskii, ‘Deistviia Russikh voisk v khode osadnykh operatsii nachal’nogo perioda severnoi voiny 1700-1721’, Voennaia letopis’ otechestva, no. 6 (2018), 54-58

V. Berendsen, E. Küng, and M. Maiste, ‘Tartu rahvastik 17. sajandi lopul ja 18. sajandi algul’, Tuna, no. 1 (2010), 29-44

Between 1905 and 1912, the monk Iliodor (Trufanov) set Russia ablaze with his inflammatory right-wing rhetoric, causing scandal after scandal. In this episode, we follow Iliodor's remarkable life from humble beginnings to would-be assassin of Grigorii Rasputin.

Sources

S. Dixon, ‘The “Mad Monk” Iliodor in Tsaritsyn’ in S. Dixon, ed., Personality and Place in Russian Culture: Essays in Memory of Lindsey Hughes (London: Modern Humanities Research Association for the UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies, 2010), pp. 377-415.

D. Smith, Rasputin (London: Pan Macmillan, 2017).

M. Iu. Krapivin, ‘Deiatel’nost’ S. M. Trufanova (byshego ieromonakha Iliodora) v Sovetskoi Rossii (1918-1922) v sviazi s formirovaniem gosudarstvennoi politiki v otnoshenii pravoslavnoi tserkvi’, Vestnik tserkovnoi istorii, no. 1/2 (21/22), 2011, pp. 137-149.