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Sorok (Russian:cорóк) was a historical subdivision ofMoscow in terms ofparishes, used during 17-19th centuries. In the Russian language the word may beconfused with "cóрок" (with the first syllablestressed), which means "forty".
By a decision of theStoglavy Sobor of 1551, Moscow was subdivided into 6soroks:
On average, at these times eachsorok encompassed 45parochial churches.
The term gave rise to a Russiansaying (recorded e.g., byVladimir Dahl in hisSayings and Bywords of Russian People) "There aresorok sorokov of churches in Moscow" (meaning "multitudes of churches in Moscow"). It is sometimes mistakenly interpreted as 40 times 40, i.e., 1600 churches in Moscow, which is an exaggeration: in 1917 there were "only" 441 parochial churches and slightly over 200home churches in Moscow.
At present, the Russian Orthodox realm is subdivided intoeparchies, further subdivided intoblagochiniyes (blagochinny okrugs, благочиние, благочинный округ).
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