For the Muscovite state, the seventeenth century was one of evolution and growth, rather than radical change. The century experienced no political revolutions of the magnitude seen during the reigns of Ivan III and Ivan IV. Russia, having recovered from the confusion of the Time of Troubles, remained a strong autocracy held firmly in the hands of a small, martial ruling class. This is not to say that there was general stasis. Things still fell apart, though only for brief moments. And one can detect a single important political trend – the remarkable inflation of honours begun under Tsar Aleksei (Alexis) Mikhailovich and radically amplified by his weak successors. Nonetheless, the general picture was one of continuity, punctuated by momentary fits of confusion and gradual change.

The case is much the same in the realm of institutions. Seventeenth-century Muscovy was administered by the same fundamental types of organisation that it had been before the great upheaval of the beginning of the century. The most important institutions remained the royal family, its court and courtiers (gosudarev dvor) and the administrative chancelleries (prikazy). Similarly, the boyar council and the Assembly of the Land – both inventions of an earlier age – continued to operate in the seventeenth century much as they had before. All of these institutions grew, but not so much as to fundamentally alter their essential character.