Revin K. The Formation and Work of Spiritual Courts in Taurida Governorate (late eighteenth to early twentieth century): a historical-legal survey.

The dissertation analyses the problems of the formation and development of spiri-tual courts in Taurida governorate from the late eighteenth to the early twentieth century. Legal principles for the system of spiritual courts in the Russian empire, their reformation under Peter I, and later development throughout the imperial period have been established. Legal principles for the work of spiritual courts, their functions, competence, personnel, features of the legal procedure, staffing, subordination, collaboration with other courts in-cluding civil ones and state institutions have been analysed. The dissertation has discovered the process of the formation and further work of the system of spiritual courts in Taurida governorate, with its main elements: Taurida Spiritual Consistory, Taurida Mohammedan Spiritual Administration, Karasubazar Roman Catholic Court, and others. The main directions and forms of their work have been uncovered, and specific groups of cases subject to their judicial activity have been established. Their place within the court system in the governorate and state has been indicated. The process of the change of competence of these court bodies during the period under study has been repro-duced; it has been shown that this competence became much narrower and spiritual courts almost lost their judicial functions on the turn of the twentieth century.