Talk:Muscovian Tsardom

While I generally like the Wikipedia:Be bold in updating pages policy, creating a whole new section in our cycle of articles about Russian history should have been done after some discussion and not unilaterally.

Anyway, no sources have been presented for making this rather arbitrary division in historical periods at the year 1547. Balcer 15:17, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I find this sentence slightly odd:

Some Western sources refer to this state as Muscovite Russia or Muscovy, although the term originally applied to its predecessor, the Grand Duchy of Moscow.

The sentence makes it seem as if there's a contradiction or a mistake somewhere in referring to Russia during that period as "Muscovy"; but I think that was what it was often called by normal English speakers, not just by "sources". The Muscovy Company was, of course, founded at the very time this usage is said to have become inapplicable; and I know that Samuel Pepys referred to Muscovy later still, in his diary of the 1660s—even to the "Tsar of Muscovy". It seems to me that the issue of what English-speaking people called Russia and what it called itself are slightly different and overlap confusingly; the English-language nomenclature lagging behind the change in political reality. I'm in favour of dropping "Muscovy" in favour of forms with "Moscow" or "Russia" from the period indicated (because it sounds antequated; we don't use words like Musselman for Muslim etc. anymore, after all—and British people would not like to be told that they came from "Londony"); but that doesn't mean it's mistaken to use "Muscovy" for that period, given the historical usage in English and in contemporary history books that necessarily use the old term.

Perhaps the sentence can be amended along the lines of: Some Western sources refer to this state as Muscovite Russia or Muscovy, the term originally applied to its predecessor, the Grand Duchy of Moscow. The removal of "although" would make a world of a difference. I'll do it if no-one objects to my comments here. qp10qp 04:28, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't object to this change. I consulted several books. Sir John Mandeville speaks about "Prussia and Russia". The Winter's Tale: "My father was the Emperor of Russia". The use of "Muscovy" actually increased in the 17th century, and Daniel Defoe uses Muscovy and Russia as synonyms in Robinson Crusoe Continued. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 11:44, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, they were both used. Absolutely. qp10qp 16:51, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Qp10qp, an original article called Muscovy (here as of 19 December 2006) was first moved to Grand Duchy of Moscow and subsequently split in two: Grand Duchy of Moscow and Tsardom of Russia (diff. & diff.).

The old Muscovy was thus first a redirect to Grand Duchy of Moscow (diff.), then transformed in two succesive disambiguation pages (diff. & diff.), and again redirected to Grand Duchy of Moscow (diff.).

All this was done on December 20 by User:Ghirlandajo, apparently without any previous discussion (see Talk:Grand Duchy of Moscow#Moving the article, permanent link). Personally, I'm used to see the term Muscovy used in modern English-language history books for the period until well into the 17th century (sometimes until Peter the Great).

I know, I haven't really answered your comment :-) I'm restricting myself to giving you the general picture of how this article came to be like you found it. After what this whole episode showed, I don't want to be involved in content discussions here. - Best regards, Evv 12:09, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think there's room for separate articles on this period and on the earlier period, as well as one on the overall period from Daniel to Peter. This one can be regarded not so much as a fork but as a form of summary style, so long as all the articles build up interlinks to each other and don't contradict each other about the facts. Ghirlandajo may have ignored all rules, but, after all, this is The Glass Bead Game, not chess. qp10qp 16:51, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]