Cultural and Historical Sources of Urban Culture

The article analyzes the characteristics of medieval burgher culture as a basis for the formation of modern urban culture, traces the continuity of qualities and properties of European burgher and Russian petty bourgeois in the typical features and lifestyle of early twentieth century citizen. It is noted that a Western European burgher and a merchant possessed such qualities as quickness, risk, practicality, subtlety, deceit, arithmetical mentality, prudence and rationality, which can be found not only in professional matters but also in the life organization. A petty bourgeois is conservative, apolitical, rational, prudent, and thrifty, he understands the value of labor and does not accept wasting money. Despite the large number of recent peasants in the petty bourgeois society and specific folk urban culture formation, city life still left an imprint on the life and views of petty bourgeoisie. The researchers of urban culture of the late XIX – early XX century called the rationality, the primacy of monetary relations, estrangement as a typical features of citizen. The analysis shows that these qualities of the citizen did not appear suddenly, but became the result of the evolution of medieval urban culture.