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TheMoscow Print Yard (Russian:Московский Печатный двор) was the firstpublishing house inRussia.[1] It was established inKitai-gorod at the behest ofIvan the Terrible in 1553. The historic headquarters of the Print Yard now house theRussian State University for the Humanities.
The Moscow Print Yard was first mentioned inAufzeichnungen über den Moskauer Staat byHeinrich von Staden. It is known to have publishedLentenTriodion,Triodion in Pictures,Gospel,Psalter, and other books which did not have anyimprints (hence, another name for the Print Yard, theAnonymous Printing House). On March 1 of 1564,Ivan Fyodorov andPyotr Timofeyev (Mstislavets) published the very first dated book calledApostle (Апостол) at the Moscow Print Yard. In 1565, the printing house publishedChasovnik (Часовник, orBook of hours) and thenPsalter (1568).
In 1612, the Moscow Print Yard was destroyed by fire, but it was soon rebuilt. In 1620, a two-story stone chamber was erected for the Print Yard, moving seventypesetters and eighty employees from theKremlin to the new premises. In 1625, several underground storage rooms and tunnels were built, leading to the Kremlin. The fire of 1634 destroyed all of the buildings belonging to the Print Yard. In 1642–1643, several new stone chambers for the publishing house were built under the supervision of an apprentice fromStoneworks Prikaz named T. Shaturin. In 1644, an apprentice, I. Neverov, and a foreigner named Christopher erectedGothic stone gates with towers, which divided the chambers of the Print Yard in two. These buildings housed theBookprinting Prikaz andProofreading Chamber. In 1679, they dismantled the so-called old "Big Chamber" building in the Print Yard, which was adjacent to the wall of Kitai-gorod.Stonemasons S. Dmitriyev and I. Artemyev supervised the erection of a new building over the old foundation, which would later be painted by court icon painter L. Ivanov and house the proofreading chamber and a library.
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In 1653,Patriarch Nikon (who supervised the work of the Print Yard) sent a scientific expedition to the East. Its leader, A. Sukhanov, brought five hundredGreek manuscripts fromMount Athos to Moscow. These books laid the foundation for the library of the Moscow Print Yard. In 1681, they opened a Greek school on the premises of the printing house. By the end of the 17th century, the staff of the Print Yard already numbered 165 people. It was placed under the authority of theBig Palace Prikaz (Приказ Большого дворца) and published the so-calledmenology books (Анфологион, orAnfologion, 1660), polemical works, translations, textbooks (Букварь 'Primer' byVasily Burtsov-Protopopov, 1634;Грамматика 'Grammar' byMeletiy Smotritsky, 1648;Арифметика, or 'Arithmetics' byLeonty Magnitsky, 1703, etc.). All in all, the Moscow Print Yard published 30 books (1000 copies each) between the late 16th and early 17th centuries.ProofreadersAndronik Timofeyev Nevezha andIvan Andronikov Nevezha influenced the formation of a certain style of MoscowCyrillic editions from the 17th century.Karion Istomin is known to have worked at the Print Yard first as a proofreader (from 1682) and then its inspector (1698–1701).
From 1703 to 1711, the Moscow Print Yard published the first Russian newspaper,Vedomosti. In 1710, proofreaderFedor Polikarpov-Orlov (future director of the publishing house from 1726 to 1731) presented a copy of theAlphabet (Азбука) with the pictures of ancient and contemporarySlavonic letters toPeter the Great. Between 1564 and 1711, the Moscow Print Yard published approximately 700 kinds of books (some of them, such as theAlphabet, reached 10,000 copies from 1657 to 1677). In 1721, the Print Yard was transferred under the authority of theMost Holy Synod, with its publishing house becoming Synodal. In the middle of the 18th century, they constructed theBaroque-style side housing together with the printing and library premises, which would close the perimeter of the yard (architectsIvan Fyodorovich Michurin andDmitry Ukhtomsky). In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the Print Yard building onNikolskaya Street was dismantled and replaced with a monumental edifice for the Synodal Publishing House (1811–1815, architectIvan Mironovsky). In the 19th century, the publishing house's buildings were perceived as a single architectural ensemble with the towers and walls of Kitai-gorod, with the extensions and alterations by future generation architects (Mikhail Chichagov,Nikolai Artleben, S. Slutsky and others).
The state monopoly on publishing continued until 1783 when some private publishing was permitted with great reluctance, although the state continued to exercise complete control through censorship. Some reforms occurred in 1861, but it was not until 1905 that greater freedom of the press was granted.55°45′27″N37°37′19″E / 55.75750°N 37.62194°E /55.75750; 37.62194
