Duma (redirected from Boyarskaya Duma)

duma (d`mä), Russian name for a representative body, particularly applied to the Imperial Duma established as a result of the Russian Revolution of 1905. The parliamentary organization of 1906, largely the work of Count Witte, provided for a state council (an upper house, with some members appointed by the czar and others elected by the nobility, the zemstvos, the clergy, trade and industry, and the university faculties) and for the Duma (a lower house elected by a system of suffrage that was neither equal nor direct); no law was to be passed without the consent of the Duma. When Czar Nicholas II found that a majority of opposition candidates had been elected in 1906, he dissolved the Duma after 10 weeks. The second Duma (1907), even more hostile to the government, was also dissolved. The third Duma (1907–12) was the product of an electoral change that made it the tool of the government. It did, however, extend the peasants' rights and enact some labor laws. The fourth Duma (1912–17) had a conservative majority; called at rare and brief intervals, it was in constant conflict with the czar. It was dissolved by Nicholas in Mar., 1917 (Feb., O. S.), but refused to disband. Revolution (see Russian Revolution) broke out, and the Duma, after electing a provisional committee, disintegrated. The committee and the Petrograd soviet appointed the provisional government. The current State Duma (est. 1993) is the popularly elected lower house of the Russia Federation's legislature.

Bibliography

See V. A. Maklakov, The First State Duma (tr. 1964); A. Levin, The Second Duma (2d ed. 1966).

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Duma

 Russian Gosudarstvennaya Duma (“State Assembly”)

Elected legislative body that, with the State Council, constituted the imperial Russian legislature (1906–17). It had only limited power to control spending and initiate legislation, and the four Dumas that convened (1906, 1907, 1907–12, 1912–17) rarely enjoyed the cooperation of the ministers or the emperor, who retained the right to rule by decree when the Duma was not in session. In the Soviet era, soviets were the basic unit of government. After the fall of the Soviet Union (1991), the Russian parliament (composed of the Congress of People's Deputies and the Supreme Soviet) exercised legislative responsibilities until 1993, when conflicts with Pres. Boris Yeltsin reached a crisis. Parliament's revolt was suppressed by military force, and a new constitution established a new parliament composed of a Federation Council (in which all 89 of Russia's republics and regions have equal representation) and a Duma, with 450 members, half elected through proportional representation on a party basis and half through single-member constituencies. The president may override and even dissolve the legislature under certain circumstances.

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Duma 

an epic-lyrical genre of Ukrainian vocal musical folklore.

Historical in content, the duma originated and developed under the social conditions of cossack military democracy of the 15th-17th century. It is characterized by an absence of division into stanzas, free rhythm, improvised development, and harmonic originality (augmented seconds in the melody). Dumy were an important part of the repertoire of blind kobzari (folk singers who accompanied themselves on the kobza, a type of plucked string instrument) and bandura (another type of plucked string instrument) players. They were performed in a melodic recitative to the accompaniment of the kobza or bandura. In each performance improvised elements were added to the text and the music.

The oldest dumy, of the 15th to early 17th century (such as those about Marusia Boguslavka and the escape of three brothers from Azov), tell about the suffering of the Ukrainian prisoners enslaved by the Tatars and the Turks. The lofty patriotism of fighters against foreign oppression is extolled in the dumy about Cossack Golota, Fedor Bezrodnyi, Ivas Udovichenko, Old Mat’iash, and Samoila Koshka. A large number of dumy originated soon after the Ukrainian People’s War of Liberation of 1648-54 against oppression by the Polish nobles (dumy about the Korsun’ victory, the campaign in Moldavia, Bogdan Khmel’nitskii and Barabash, Ivan Bogun, and Maksim Krivonos). The struggle against the Ukrainian starshina (the prosperous cossacks) and against the Polish landlords has been reflected in a number of dumy with clearly social implications. There were also dumy about everyday life.

In the 19th century there were virtually no new dumy. Most of the dumy known today were written by such outstanding kobzari as Ivan Strichka, Ostap Veresai, Andrei Shut, Ivan Kravchenko, and Fedor Kholodnyi. Extensive transcription began only in the 19th century. Research on the duma was conducted by N. Tsertelev, M. Maksimovich, P. Lukashevich, A. Metlinskii, P. Kulish and especially V. Antonovich and M. Dragomanov. During the Soviet period this research has been carried on by M. Ryl’skii, D. Revutskii, A. Beletskii, and P. Tychina. Dwmy have been composed about the Great October Socialist Revolution and the heroes of the Civil and the Great Patriotic wars.

TEXTS

Istoricheskie pesni malorusskogo naroda, vols. 1-2. Kiev, 1874-75. (With notes by V. Antonovich and M. Dragomanov.)
Kolessa, F. Melodii ukrains’kykh narodnikh dum, series 1-2. L’vov, 1910-13.
Kolessa, F. Ukrains’ki narodni dumy. Kiev, 1927.
Revuts’kyi, D. Ukrains’ki narodni dumy ta pisni istorychni, 2nd ed. Kharkov-Kiev, 1930. (With bibliography.)
Dumy. Kiev, 1959. (Preface by M. Stel’makh.)

REFERENCES

Lysenko, N. V. “Kharakteristika muzykal’nykh osobennostei malorusskikh dum i pesen.” Zapiski iugo-zapadnogo otdeleniia, russkogo geograficheskogo obshchestva, vols. 1-2, Kiev, 1873-74.
Zhitetskii, P. Mysli o narodnykh malorusskikh dumakh. Kiev, 1893.
Franko, I. Studii nad ukrains’kymy narodnymy pisniamy. L’vov, 1913.
Kolessa, F. Pro genezu ukrains’kykh narodnykh dum. L’vov, 1922.
Ukrains’ka narodna poetychna tvorchist’, vols. 1-2. Kiev, 1958.

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Duma 

the name for various representative, elective, legislative, consultative, and administrative institutions in tsarist Russia, including the Boyar Duma, the municipal duma, and the State Duma.