Censorship in the Russian Empire

In the Russian Empire, government agencies exerted varying levels of control over the content and dissemination of books, periodicals, music, theatrical productions, works of art, and motion pictures. The agency in charge of censorship in the Russian Empire changed over time. In the early eighteenth century, the Russian emperor had direct control, but by the end of the eighteenth century, censorship was delegated to the Synod, the Senate, and the Academy of Sciences. Beginning in the nineteenth century, it fell under the charge of the Ministry of Education and finally the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

The history of censorship in the Russia began long before the emergence of the empire. The first book containing an index of prohibited works dates to the year 1073, in Kievan Rus. For several centuries these were mere translations of censorship lists from other languages; the first authentic old Russian censorship index was created only in the fourteenth century. The number of indices (as well as illegal publications) increased steadily until the beginning of the sixteenth century. Censorship first attained a kind of official status in the period of the Tsardom (1547–1721): it was encoded in law in the Stoglav and was directed against heresies, schisms, and other alleged deviations from religious dogmas and sacred texts.

Significant changes in censorship policy occurred over the course of the imperial period. The reforms of Peter I marked the beginning of the separation between ecclesiastical and secular censorship. A greater delineation of the responsibilities of censorship organizations took place in the reign of Empress Elizabeth. The period of Elizabeth's reign is also notable for the appearance of the first private journals, which greatly promoted the development of journalism in the Russian Empire. One of the most important events in the history of Russian censorship occurred in the course of Catherine II's reforms: the establishment of a censorship institute and the creation of the position of professional censor. Paul I, Catherine's son, continued the business of his predecessor, by expanding the areas that were subject to state control. Alexander I, however, reversed some of these policies and weakened the censorship. In the second half of the nineteenth century, under Alexander III, freedom of the press was once again significantly restricted.

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