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Consumer patterns of Moscow nobles and merchants in the late 18th and early 19th centuries
Did Russian nobles and merchants indulge in luxury which captured the imagination of foreign travelers? To shed light on this question we investigate the consumer patterns of Moscow nobles and merchants in the heyday of serfdom and during Westernization process, searching for the items that unite and divide nobles and merchants in their consumption. Although this topic presents an interesting perspective for economic and social history it still remains unexplored. We analyze new unique archival data regarding consumption of one hundred persons. Our dataset consists of petitions of Moscow habitants who suffered property loss at the time of fire in Moscow in 1812. Petitioners indicate a lot of information about themselves and attach a list of their lost property, evaluated by them. Such petitions, being a mass source, allow us to investigate real estate and movable property that owners of different social groups mentioned in the petitions. We find that luxury consumption among both merchants and nobles was primarily associated with status (e.g., house improvement and hosting dinner parties). The nobles, whose income was tied to traditional agriculture, primarilyspent money on Westernized consumption. Meanwhile, the merchants, whose income was derived mostly from trade and proto industry, primarily spent it on traditional Russian products. While wealth served as a marker of status for the middle-class nobility, it functioned as investment capital for merchants. Considering explored sample, signs of a Consumer Revolution in Russian Empire are observed at least from the turn of the 19th century. (Refs 34.)