concept
"Not remembering kinship" (nepomnyashchy rodstva)
not remembering kin
also: непомнящий родства, не помнящий родства
The fixed Imperial Russian legal formula for a passportless person detained without identity papers who refuses or is unable to state his true name and origin; declaring oneself so drew administrative exile to Siberia rather than the harsher sentence that would follow from being correctly identified, making it a real strategy among escaped convicts.
Reading notes
- Dreams §2 непомнящий родства
"One who does not remember his kin" -- the fixed legal formula under the Russian passport system for a person detained without identity papers who refuses (or is unable) to state his real name, origin, and estate. Declaring oneself "not remembering kinship" was a real and fairly common strategy among escaped convicts and fugitives: it drew a lighter administrative penalty (resettlement, corporal punishment) than being identified and returned to a hard-labor sentence already underway, which is exactly the calculation the tramp explains in loc 25.
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