Pavlov, Platon

Born Oct. 7 (19), 1823, in the village of Tamozhennoe, now Tamozhnikovo, Gorky Oblast; died Apr. 29 (May 11), 1895, in St. Petersburg. Russian historian and public figure.

The son of a nobleman, Pavlov graduated from the Chief Pedagogical Institute in St. Petersburg in 1844. Between 1847 and 1859 he was professor of Russian history at the University of Kiev. In 1849 he received a doctor’s degree in history, political economy, and statistics; his dissertation was entitled On the Historical Significance of the Reign of Boris Godunov.

Pavlov became a member of the Archaeographic Commission in St. Petersburg in 1859. He helped organize the first Sunday schools in Kiev in 1859 and was a member of the Council of Sunday Schools in St. Petersburg in 1860. In 1860 he was brought to trial in the case of the Kharkov-Kiev Secret Society. In March 1862, Pavlov, in a public lecture on Russia’s thousandth anniversary, urged the Russian intelligentsia to become closer to the people. As a result, he was banished to Vetluga and later to Kostroma.

On returning to St. Petersburg in 1866, Pavlov taught in military schools and at the Archaeographic Commission that prepared the Siberian Chronicles for publication. From 1875 to 1885 he was professor of history and art theory at the University of Kiev.