About the Journal

The main goal of the online scientific periodical "Caurus" is to objectively cover the problems of the historical development of the states of the Baltic region and the Russian North-West in the Middle Ages and the New Age, when the foundations of modern interstate and international relations were formed, and to create, by synthesizing domestic and world historiographic experience, a publicly accessible theoretical methodological, historiographic and source study base for scientific research and presentation of socio-economic, political-legal, military-political, diplomatic, inter-confessional, and socio-cultural international relations within the Baltic region.

The stated goal requires the implementation of the following tasks:

• The development of new theoretical and methodological foundations for the scientific vision of the Baltic historical problems and the elimination of historiographic clichés require the publication of articles by Russian and foreign historians belonging to different scientific schools, available for the Russian reader — translated into Russian or with an extended annotation in Russian. The format of the scientific periodical takes into account the possibility of holding discussions on key issues, which should contribute to their scientific understanding and transformation into a system of social mental values.
• A crucial objective is to expand the thematic spectrum of research and develop, along with the traditional (economic, military-political, etc.), new areas of historical research including legal, socio-cultural, prosopographic, anthropological, material, domestic ones, which would be welcomed by the Editorial Board. Particular attention regarding the publishing "case" is supposed to be given to articles that reflect the factors that influenced the nature of international relations in positive and negative terms; they may be related to the nature of the internal development of the states of the Baltic region and Rus/Russia.
• It is required to expand the base of scientific research in the field of a comprehensive analysis of the relationship between the Russian state and the states of the Baltic region in the conditions of the "battle for the Baltic" (16^th – early 17^th centuries), in particular, to investigate the causes of conflict situations, forms of their manifestation, their economic, political, social and confessional aspects, the correlation of aggression and political and legal principles in them, the role of authorities and individuals, as well as resolution mechanisms.
• Improving the methods of researching the historical experience of international relations is impossible without a consistent expansion of the range of historical sources, and therefore the Editorial Board involves the publication of new sources, mainly archival ones, made in accordance with modern world standards (in bilingual mode, using illustrative, graphic, statistical material, accompanied by comments made on the basis of the latest world achievements, and a bibliography).
• In order to present the achievements of the “Baltic study”, it is planned to publish a chronicle of scientific forums, reviews (abstracts) of the most interesting modern research, including foreign ones, and annual bibliographic reviews.
• Scientific publications reflecting modern historical, historiographical and source studies should contribute to the awareness of Russia's belonging to the European cultural and historical space and its role in the all-European progress.