Konstantin Aksakov
Critic and writer (1817-1860)
Konstantin Sergeyevich Aksakov (Russian: Константи́н Серге́евич Акса́ков; 10 April 1817 – 19 December 1860) was a Russian critic and writer. He became one of the earliest and most notable Slavophiles. He wrote plays, social criticism, and histories of the ancient Russian social order. His father Sergey Aksakov and his sister Vera Aksakova were writers, and his younger brother, Ivan Aksakov, was a journalist.
Konstantin Aksakov was the first to publish an analysis of Nikolai Gogol's 1842 work Dead Souls; he compared the author with Homer and with Shakespeare. In 1856, after Tsar Alexander II's accession to the throne in 1855, Aksakov sent the emperor a letter advising him to restore the zemsky sobor. Aksakov also penned a number of articles on Slavonic linguistics.
Personal life
Aksakov was born into a family of prominent Russian writer Sergey Timofeevich Aksakov (1791—1859) and his wife Olga Semyonovna Zaplatina (1793—1878). His paternal grandfather Timofey Stepanovich Aksakov belonged to an old noble Aksakov family whose members claimed to be the decedents of Šimon. Their first documented ancestor was Ivan Feodorivich Velyaminov nicknamed Oksak who lived during the 15th century.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q722730. VIAF identifies the subject as 17552092. The Library of Congress control number is n81082938. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1817, 1860, 1842 and 1856.
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This entry incorporates text from “Konstantin Aksakov” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.