Peter I, Proclamation on the Introduction of a New Calendar
Through the end of the 15th century, the Muscovite new year began on 1 March. For roughly two centuries thereafter, the start of the new year was shifted to September 1. In both cases, years were counted from the "creation of the world," which was reckoned ecclesiastically as having occurred in 5509 BC. In December of what the West considered 1699, Peter the Great resolved to bring Russia closer into line with European practice. He ordered the scrapping of the old Muscovite calendar at the end of the month and the official adoption of the Julian calendar with the start of the coming month. This shifted the start of the new year to January 1, with its date now reckoned as 1700.
1. How does Peter's Proclamation attempt to justify the calendar reform?
2. How does the Proclamation order Russians to celebrate the calendar reform--and the centennial it marked?
3. Why do you think the Proclamation takes such pains to prescribe regulations for celebratory bonfires?
4. Not until 1709 was a Julian calendar actually printed and distributed in Russia. What does this suggest about the general acceptance of Peter's reform?
20 December 1699
The Great Sovereign has ordered that it be said: It is known to him, the Great Sovereign, that not only in many European Christian countries, but also among the Slavic peoples who are in full accord with our Eastern Orthodox Church (such as the Wallachians, Moldavians, Serbs, Dalmations, Bulgarians, and Cherkassians, subjects of the Great Sovereign himself; and all the Greeks, from whom our Orthodox faith was received), years are counted starting eight days from the birth of Christ, that is from the first day of January, and not from the creation of the world… Now the 1699th year from the birth of Christ has come, and next January from the first of the month will begin the new 1700th year along with the new century. For this good and opportune occasion, the Great Sovereign has ordered that from the present first of January on, the chancelleries are to count the years starting with 1700 after the birth of Christ. All papers and documents are to be so dated.
As a sign of this benevolent endeavor and the new centennial era in the capital city of Moscow, after the requisite thanks to God and singing of prayers in Churches and in the homes…decorations are to be put up along the large streets and thoroughfares and along the gates of the greatest houses of lay and clerical servitors. [They] should be made from the limbs and branches of pine, yule and juniper trees in accordance with the models that are displayed at the trading court and the pharmacy building, or in whatever way seems most appropriate and decent. Poor people should put up at least a bough or a branch on the gate or on their houses. It should be done on time, this coming January by the first day of this year. This decoration is to stay in place until the seventh day of 1700.
On the first day in January, as a sign of merriment, in congratulating each other on the New Year and centennial era, the following should be performed. When the fireworks are lighted on the Great Red Square and the salute begins, the high court boiars and okol'nichie, (1) the important officials, the most prominent people of the chancellery, the military servitors and the high ranking merchants, each in his own court, should perform a triple salute from a small cannon (those who have them), or from several muskets or other small arms and should set off several rockets, as many as can be mustered. In the large streets, where there is space, from January 1 to 7 bonfires should be lit at night from logs or brush or straw. Small families should assemble in groups of five or six households and build their fires, for those who so desire, on platforms in one, two, or three tar barrels, which they should fill with straw or brush and ignite. This is so that it will be within the power of the City Administrator (2) to [oversee] these salutes and fires, and also to have jurisdiction over these fires and salutes and decorations.
(1) Okol'nichie = service-rank heads of Prikazy (Departments of the State) and/or of regiments. Prior to Peter's reform of the service hierarchy, okol'nichii (sing.) was the second-highest rank in the Boiar Duma (Council of Boiars).
(2) Major Russian cities at the time were headed by an official known as a gorodovoi prikaznik or gorodnichii (Head of the City Administration; = Burgomeister).
Source: Polnoe Sobranie Zakonov Rossiiskoi Imperii, v. 3, no. 1736.
Original translation by Nathaniel Knight, 1/18/2000. Syntactical simplifications and emendations Jon Bone.