From the fourteenth century until the beginning of the nineteenth century, Russian literature, instead of being a panorama of various and equally splendid periods of production, such as the Elizabethan epoch, the Jacobean epoch, and the Georgian epoch, or, as in France, the Renaissance, the _Grand Siècle_, and the philosophic era of the eighteenth century, has nothing to show at all to the outward world; for during all this time the soil from which it was to grow was merely being prepared, and gradually, with difficulty and delay, gaining access to such influences as would make any growth possible. All that is important, as far as literature is concerned, in this period, are those events and factors which had the effect of making breaches in the wall which shut Russia off from the rest of Europe; in letting in that light which was necessary for any literary plants to grow, and in removing those obstacles which prevented Russia from enjoying her rightful heritage among the rest of her sister European nations: a heritage which she had well employed in earlier days, and which she had lost for a time owing to the barbarian invasion.
The first event which made a breach in the wall was the marriage of Ivan III, Tsar of Moscow, to Sophia Palæologa, the niece of the last of the Byzantine Emperors. She brought with her Italian architects and other foreigners, and the work of Peter the Great, of opening a window in Russia on to Europe, was begun.
The first printing press was established in Moscow during the reign of Ivan the Terrible, and the first book was printed in 1564. But literature was still under the direct control of the Church, and the Church looked upon all innovations and all foreign learning with the deepest mistrust. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, Peter the Great had a strange forerunner in the shape of that enigmatic historical personage, the false Demetrius, who claimed to be the murdered son of Ivan the Terrible, and who, in spite of his western ideas, Polish manners, and Latin culture, succeeded in occupying the throne of Moscow for a year. His ideal was one of progress; but he came too soon, and paid for his prematurity with his life.
But it was from Kiev and Poland that the fruitful winds of enlightenment were next to blow. Kiev, re-risen from its ruins and recovered from its long slumber, became a centre of learning, and possessed a college whose curriculum was modelled on the Jesuit schools; and although Moscow looked upon Kiev with mistrust, an imperative demand for schools arose in Moscow. In the meantime a religious question had arisen fraught with consequences for Russia: namely that of the revision of the Liturgical books, into the text of which, after continuous copying and recopying, errors had crept. The demand for revision met with great opposition, and ended ultimately in producing a great schism in the Russian Church, which has never been healed. But, with the exception of the Little Russians, there was no one at Moscow capable of preparing texts for printing or of conducting schools. The demand for schools and the decision to revise the texts were simultaneous. The revision was carried out between 1653-7, and a migration of Kiev scholars to Moscow came about at the same time. In 1665 Latin was taught in Moscow by SIMEON POLOTSKY, who was the first Russian verse-maker. It is impossible to call him a poet; he wrote what was called syllabic verse: the number of syllables taking the place of rhythm. As a pioneer of culture, he deserves fame; but in the interest of literature, it was a misfortune that his tradition was followed until the middle of the eighteenth century.