Maslenitsa “made people forget about winter…”

This year Butter week will run from February 24 to March 1. Since ancient times, people have loved Maslenitsa, waited it and called it “honest”, “wide”, “loose”. Interesting facts about the most outstanding holidays in Russia are illustrated in unique publications, digital copies of which are available on the Presidential Library’s portal.

Peter the Great instilled in Russian people the tradition of Butter Week - "the main initiator of foreign amusements in Russia". It was with him that during Maslenitsa they began to build booths and carousels in the squares, to arrange masquerades. By the will of the emperor, the first grandiose masquerade was given on Thursday of the cheese week of 1722 in Moscow. The details are reflected in Bozheryanov’s publication How Russian People Celebrated and Celebrate the Russian Christmas, New Year, Epiphany and Maslenitsa.

It is interesting that all the most striking innovations and ideas of Peter immediately spread throughout the cities and towns of vast Russia. The book by A. Tereshchenko The Life of Russian People (1848), an electronic copy of which is available on the Presidential Library’s portal, contains a description of a similar Butter Week tradition, common in Siberia.

Peter the Great organized similar entertainments on Maslenitsa in St. Petersburg. On the eve of the masquerades, which lasted throughout the Butter week, their participants gathered in the palace of Prince Menshikov, where everyone was shown his place in the procession. It was forbidden to remove masks at the time of the carnival; a fine was threatened for this.

In St. Petersburg, slides and booths on Maslenitsa were built on the Neva, between the Peter and Paul Fortress and the Winter Palace. Here, in the last days of his power, Biron presented an unprecedented sight to Petersburg residents. For the amusement of Empress Anna Ioannovna, he decided to build an ice house; it is described in the document A True and Comprehensive Description of the Ice House Built in St. Petersburg in January 1740, available on the Presidential Library’s portal. The event itself formed the basis of the famous novel by Ivan Lazhechnikov.

Butter week in Petersburg during the time of Catherine II was also a vibrant carnival, usually ending in the theater. In S. Poroshin’s Notes Serving the History... (1881) posted on the Presidential Library’s portal, we find a description of the “butter” year 1765. In the first four days of the festive week, performances were given at the court theater, and on the fifth “the agenda was to come together in a comedy in a fancy dress and from there, whoever deigned, go to the masquerade to Lokately, in the old wooden palace. This masquerade is supposed to continue from this evening until Sunday morning”.

The cheerful festivities held by Catherine in her youth she will remember until her old age, which is illustrated in 1792 in the Diary of State Secretary of Catherine II A. V. Khrapovitsky, which is available on the Presidential Library’s portal.

During these days people sang, danced and had fun. They were patient with longsuffering, because the celebrations were demanded by the Great Lent following the Butter week, the strict regulations of which are also written in detail in ancient books, electronic copies of which are provided in the Presidential Library.