The Virtualization of the Sociocultural Frontier “Tertius Romae.” Translation from Russian

The article addresses the need to clarify the semantic core of the sociocultural frontier Tertius Romae. The theoretical construct of Tertius Romae, originating in the writings of Marcus Tullius Cicero, has undergone significant semantic transformations throughout history. It has acquired diverse meanings—from politico-geographic ambitions, such as the ideologies of “Moscow as the Third Rome” and the “Third Reich,” to connotations of Christian sacred-eschatological expectations, and further, to the ideological core of national sovereignty, world dominance, global economics, and, ultimately, the virtual global order. The aim of this study is to identify the historical stages in the evolution of the sociocultural frontier Tertius Romae. In addition to the period of its initial appearance in Cicero’s legacy, we distinguish three global stages of its evolution: the sacred stage (5th–16th centuries), the secular stage (16th‑20th enturies), and the virtual stage (from the 21st century onward). While during the prolonged sacred phase, the semantic core of Tertius Romae was shaped by the centers of political and religious power, in later stages it was increasingly appropriated and instrumentalized by the same centers. In the new digital reality, the notion of the sociocultural frontier takes on the meaning of a shifting boundary between a technologically dependent periphery and a more advanced metropole that provides connectivity, regulates informational content, and ensures cybersecurity. What was once tied to territory and a specific form of governance has now come to signify virtual power, and sociocultural frontiers are increasingly determined by bandwidth and device capacity.