The first University handbook of Medieval history and Medieval history Department at Leningrad State University
The present paper deals with the one aspect of forming a Soviet medieval studies in difficult and tragic times of 30th, when the pressure of Marxism and Leninism ideology became a more visible and sensible and this process immediately infl uenced on the fates of a single scholars and the trends of investigations as whole. In 1934 the branches (Faculties) of History within the Soviet Universities-system were restored by the order of Th e central committee of Soviet Communist Party, therefore the question on training of a new cadres and manuals for lecturing of a different disciplines in the framework of History section, and the edition of a handbook of Medieval history among these tasks, was clearly posted. Th is handbook should be implemented in a sharp Marxist style, but there was a serious clash of opinions between direction of State Academy of Material culture, who took initiative in handbook-writing primarily, and the professors of a pre-revolutionary generation in Leningrad. Th erefore the handbook under the title of «Essays in history of West Europe in XVI-XVII A.D.» was published in 1938 by the lecturers of Medieval history Department at Leningrad State university. Formally it was edited under the authorship of P. P. Shchegolev, who was an associate of Department and whose lecture courses became a basis of a handbook, but really the manual was a result of collective work of all the Department’s associates, prepared the text to printing and made all necessary improvements. We may assume, that the handbook represents a last trace of a certain freedom in Soviet social thought, as it not includes so many references to authors of Marxist theory by each point of treatment - the outstanding feature, that was so characterized for the further steps of Soviet Medieval studies.