How Peter the Great STOLE a year from Russian history

You won’t find records of any events happening in Russia in Spring or Summer of 1699. The explanation is simple – there were none, actually. How could this happen?

Before 1700, the New Year in Russia was celebrated on September 1 and the years were counted “from the creation of the world” – the so-called ‘Constantinople Era’. According to this system, in Russia, the year 7208 began on September 1, while, in Europe, the year 1699 began on January 1, 9 months prior to the New Year 7208 in Russia.

In 1698, just a year before, Peter the Great returned from his Great Embassy, the first ever voyage of the Russian tsar abroad. Having spent more than a year in Europe, Peter noticed how hard it was for the European merchants and salesmen to have business with Russians in September, when the Russians were celebrating their New Year. The celebrations usually lasted no less than two weeks and, for that period, the business was on hold – the Russians were, naturally, drinking.

Peter decided to adjust the Russian time to the European time. In his decree from December 19, 1699, he ordered that January 1 would become the first day of the new year 1700 and the New Year would onwards be celebrated on January 1, instead of September 1. Thus, the year 1699 in Russia lasted only 4 months: September, October, November and December.

The tsar argued that the change was being made because “many Christian peoples that are united with us in professing Eastern Christian faith, write their years from the birth of Christ”. However, the decree said if someone wanted to write both dates from the Creation and from the Birth of Christ, one could write them both – but the “new” date must be used anyway.

Of course, the reform caused a stir among the Russian Orthodox clergy – many of them were angry Peter was ‘stealing’ a great chunk of the year 1699, along with many important Orthodox Church holidays and feasts. All the state services and institutions also had to re-edit their documents and charts to fit the new chronology. To sweeten the pill, Peter issued another decree that established a European-like celebration of the new year 1700. Everybody who owned a gun or a cannon was obliged to fire a triple salute on the celebration night and people were encouraged to decorate their homes with spruce trees and branches – something not seen before in Russia, where spruce branches were originally associated with the deceased.

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