The Russian Empire 1450–1801

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consulted boyars in decision making. Respect was ceremonially marked in ban-
quets, where grand princes personally distributed choice food and drink, as well as
valuable presents, to the assembled great men.
Historians have institutionalized such consultation as the“Boyar Duma,”as if it
were afixed, proto-parliamentary body. This is too reified an image; consultation
with boyars took place constantly and personally, with hours of meeting defined
only late in the seventeenth century when the number of men in conciliar ranks had
grown so large that format meetings were necessary. That immense size (almost 150
men) also spelled the end of Muscovy’s traditional face-to-face, personalized politics
of tsar and his men. Personal advice giving continued in a small inner circle of tsar
and favored boyars and in-laws.
Similarly amorphous were assemblies of most social ranks (peasants were
excluded) summoned in the name of the tsar on an irregular basis to discuss issues
of pressing state concern—the succession of a new dynasty (1598, 1613), taxation,
legal reform, war, and peace. About thirty such assemblies are cited between the
1540s and 1653; dubbed“Councils of the Land”by nineteenth-century historians,
they had none of the attributes of early modern parliaments (fixed meeting times,
division into chambers representing different social groups, elected and/or repre-
sentative membership, legal definitions of spheres of competence, power offisc,
legislation, or other constraints on executive power). Rather, they legitimized
the government in moments of political crisis or import. Displays of ideal, con-
sultative rulership, such councils also probably functioned as communication
between state and society, particularly from the center down. Not constitutional
bodies,“Councils of the Land” fulfilled the expectations of the ideology of
Moscow’s patrimonial ruler.
The ruler’s obligation to heed the advice of his people was couched in a
personalized language. Individuals were to approach him directly and humbly,
and he was to give them“mercy”and“favor.”Muscovy paralleled Chinggisid
tradition in language and rituals of servility towards the ruler. Petitioners called
themselves variously“slaves”(for the highest ranking),“orphans”(for taxpayers)
and“intercessors”(for clerics); the document they submitted was called achelobit’e,
literally meaning“beating one’s forehead to the ground,”although such prostra-
tions took place only in the most extreme circumstances (Figure 6.2). This termin-
ology of servility, and court rituals that elevated the ruler, befuddled early modern
European noblemen. Coming from an arena of bitter struggles for noble privilege
and political freedoms in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century France, England,
Austria, Poland, and elsewhere, they took literally the terminology of“slavery”
and denounced Muscovy as a despotism. And indeed, Muscovite rulers often
exerted the complete power they claimed—they claimed all land patrimonially,
liberally dispensed peasant villages (let alone conquered lands) to military men and
favorites, and enserfed peasants to provide a steady tax and labor supply. But the
language of tsarist humility and elite servility also provided parameters for political
interaction.
The complex interplay of ideology and political reality can be observed in the
judicial realm. Here the ruler was given opportunity to act on his obligation to


Broadcasting Legitimacy 137
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