ABSTRACT
Among the historical influences to which the agricultural geography of European Russia is due, the oldest and the most fundamental one is probably that of colonization. It may be said that, at least up to the nineteenth century, natural conditions and the trend of migration were the two principal forces which helped to shape the agricultural map of Russia. The country was still living, in the main, under conditions of self-sufficient natural economy. Economic factors, accordingly, could not be expected to exercise the same degree of influence that they have in modern society. The era of railways also brought into play a set of factors of great importance in the evolution of farming and the shaping of the agricultural map of Russia, by enabling the State to exercise a powerful influence over the economic development of the country by means of its railway-building policy, on the one hand, and by its control over rates, on the other.
