Sigizmund Valk

Valk, Sigizmund Natanovich 

Born Dec. 1 (13), 1887, in Vilnius. Soviet historian. Student of early texts. Doctor of historical science (1936) and professor (1946). Graduated from St. Petersburg University in 1913.

Valk worked in the Revolutionary History Archive from 1918. He was one of the founders of Soviet historiography and the study of early texts. He taught at Leningrad State University from 1921 and worked in the Leningrad division of the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR from 1932. Valk published many valuable documents on the history of the social and revolutionary movement and domestic policy of Russia in the 19th and early 20th centuries (primarily in the journal Krasnyi Arkhiv). With his assistance the collections Deeds of GreatNovgorod and Pskov (1949), The Abolition of Serfdom (1950), M. M. Speranskii: Projects and Memoranda (1961), and a new seven-volume edition of V. N. Tatishchev’s History of Russia (vols. 1-6 were issued between 1962 and 1966) were published. He worked out the Draft of the Rules for the Publication of the Works of V. I.Lenin (1926) and published Documents of October 25, 1917 (1958), as well as the works Soviet Study of Early Texts (1948) and “Russian Law in the Publications and Studies of the XVIII-early XIX Centuries,” which was published in Yearbook on the Study of Early Texts for 1958 (1960). The Rules for the Publication of Historical Documents (1955) was compiled with his assistance. He was the editor of the collection Revolutionary Populism of the 1870’s, vols. 1-2 (1964-65). He participated in the preparation for publication of the collection Decrees of Soviet Power, vols. 1-4 (1957-68). Valk has been awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor and medals.