Proceeding from materials relating to the Time of Troubles, Kalinin's article examines the phenomenon of imposture [samozvanchestvo] as one of the symbols of Russian political history from the early seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century. The duration of the impostor epidemic coincides exactly with that of serfdom, and imposture itself can be describ ed as a social reaction to a form of authority founded on total personal dependence. Much has been written about imposture accompanying serfdom. But the impostor has been examined as a fi gur e opposed to the tsar, one dependent either on outside assistance or the support of the enslaved masses (or on both at once). However, imposture can be seen as objectifying the tension between abso lute power and slavery, that is, the internal and reverse side of Russian autocracy itself, as well as a manifestation of its internal crisis generated by the clash of two versions of sovereign power: The patrimony [votchina] and the contract.