”, dif erent categories of pretenders are described: ones posed themselves as real members of ruling families, others pretended to be fi ctitious princes; specific group of impostors was presented by princes whose origin was not clear and they were recognized as legal heirs by one part of subjects and as usurpers by another one. Besides that some cases of impostures couldn’t be attributed to one of above mentioned types (for example, adopted or legitimized sons, persons who pretended not to be members of royal families but subjects of foreign suzerains, etc.).
In the chapter 10, “Limits of Claims for Power”, author analyzed the “scale of ambitions” of specific impostors. So, pretenders for the throne of regional level had chance to obtain and save power for some time, as for claimants for supreme power, practically all of them were disclosed and killed or executed. In this connection it’s interesting to mention rather specific group of impostors who quite didn’t attempt to reach the regional or supreme power: some carpet-baggers posed themselves as rulers (who, in fact was already dead) or descendants of khans to get protection or to improve own well-being.
The part V, “Usurpers and Impostors of History”, devoted to historiography phenomenon: some rulers became usurpers and impostors in historians’ opinion. The cases of such accusations hurled by medieval historians are examined in the chapter 11, “Usurpers and Impostors in the Medieval Historiography”, and the same accusation from the scientists of the 19th – beginning of the 21th cent. – in the chapter 12, “Usurpers and Impostors in the Modern Historiography”.
The research is based on the wide range of historical sources (chronicles, of cial documents, memoirs of contemporaries, etc.) as well as on research works since 18th to the beginning of the 21th cent.
