Boyar scions
In the late 1700s—early 1800s descendants of the boyar scions who failed to prove nobility or regain it through the Table of Ranks were enrolled within the social group named odnodvortsy.
For example, these completely opposite positions on the subject-matter were held in the 18th century by General Ivan Boltin [ru] and Prince Mikhail Scherbatov.
[2] Dmitry Samokvasov considered them impoverished descendants of boyar families, yet he believed they were successors of the junior druzhina: gridi and detskie.
[11] The famous Russian historian Sergey Soloviev believed that boyar scions emerged as a result of the dissolution of the junior druzhina.
[16] Practically, almost every Russian noble family descended from the ancient Muscovite aristocracy had part of their ancestors in the rank of boyar scions.
The impoverished descendants of originally allodial families started to receive fiefs in exchange for service on the massive scale.
The fiefs were meant as temporary landed estates to provide a living for a boyar scion, however, by the 17th century they were practically inherited and even given as dowries in marriages, yet they could not be sold.
Since the 15th century, the boyar scions gradually evolved into two sub-ranks: ‘gorodovye’ (enlisted with the ‘serving town’) and ‘dvorovye’ (candidates to service at the Moscow court).
[23] Kozlyakov believes that until the mid-1500s the ‘gorodovye’ boyar scions could make it to the Moscow court[24] The situation had changed with the Tysyatskaya Kniga[25] (the Book of one thousand) established in 1550 by Ivan the Terrible, when one thousand members of nobility, both high aristocracy and landed gentry, were chosen for the Moscow court.
Achieving due age, boyar scions received land allotments (pomestnyi oklad) according to their economic conditions, service and rank.
[26] The boyar scions were listed in the so-called desyatnyas, i.e. special books made during military inspections, that contained review of the local gentry's serving potential (number of armed servants they could provide, armor, horses, etc.
[27] Denis Lyapin paid attention to the significant role of the boyar scions in the development of the Russian southern frontier in the late 16th-early 17th centuries.
This was the main reason why the region was especially known for the prevalence of odnodvortsy, a word that originally stood for boyar scions that temporarily found themselves with no serfs on their land.
[29] Ruslan Skrynnikov emphasized the major role of the southern Muscovite gentry lacking in land and serfs in the turbulent events of the 17th century: the Time of Troubles and the uprising of 1648.
He had to seek shelter with his mother in the nearby Novosil, and settled in a separate homestead on the estate of the local boyar scion, S. Frolov, who hired him as a servant.
He had concluded that in the south most gentry had so few serfs, while some boyar scions did not have any personal estates, while being constantly absent on the military service, that they hardly were the main factor in enslaving peasants.
[35] Because of the lack of peasants, the local authorities attempted to force boyar scions to participate in building the fortresses and even plowing the steppe, despite the prohibition of the central government.
[36] The hardship of the southern living made many boyar scions avoid the service, while some people of ignoble background tried to get enrolled with the local gentry.
