Collecting practices among Russian aristocrats of the XVIIIth and XIXth centuries

The article deals with the evolution of the functions of aristocratic collecting in Imperial Russia from the first half of the XVIIIth century up to the mid-XIX* century in close connection with the social context of these practices. The author concludes that at the beginning of this period for the Russian nobility collecting was the way to identify with a certain social class and a form of public presentation of person’s status and commitment to European cultural patterns, and by the end of the period it evolved into an opportunity for self-fulfillment in leisure time and the sphere of intellectual leisure.