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Okolnichy ((ロシア語:Око́льничий), ) was an old rank and a position at the court of Moscow rulers from the Mongol invasion of Rus' until the government reform undertaken by Peter the Great. The word is derived from the Russian word for "close," "near," meaning "sitting close to the Tsar." The duties of first known ''okolnichies'' included arranging the travel and quarters of grand princes and tsars, as well as accommodating foreign ambassadors and presenting them to the court. Initially their number was very small, but it grew over time and they acquired more duties. An ''okolnichy'' could head a state office (''prikaz'') or a regiment, could be an ambassador or a member of the state duma. Initially the rank of ''okolnichy'' was the second highest after that of ''boyar'', while often they performed similar duties. According to the system of ''mestnichestvo'', a person could not be made ''boyar'', unless someone else in his family had recently held a ''boyar''/''okolnichy'' rank. Consequently, a position of ''okolnichy'' was a step towards granting the ''boyar'' rank to a non-noble. Even Prince Dmitry Pozharsky, though a Rurikid ''knyaz'' by birth and the "Saviour of Fatherland" by royal mercy, could not secure a position higher than ''okolnichy'', because neither his parents nor uncles had ever held a rank higher than ''stolnik''. Under the Romanovs, the 18 noblest families of Muscovy were given the privilege of starting their official career from the rank of ''okolnichy'', skipping all the lower ranks, such as ''stolnik''. At the same period, the positions of ''okolnichy'' were differentiated and some of them (''quarters okolnichy'' or ''close okolnichy'') were of higher rank than that of ''non-close boyars''. The terms derive from a semi-formal ranking based on the proximity to the tsar at the tsar's table. ==References== * 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「okolnichy」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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