Court councillor

[1] The signs of the distinction of this rank were double-luminous buttonholes or epaulets with three stars.

Initially, persons who had reached this rank were automatically given hereditary nobility.

After 1803, directors of departments of ministries and provincial authorities (governors, stewards, governors-general) could confer this rank.

Since the 19th century, all persons who had a doctor’s degree or academic title of professor received this rank automatically.

This policy led most of the outstanding Russian scientists of that time to receive hereditary nobility.