The Copper Riot is a significant event in history.Russia, the uprising of the urban poor and the lower classes, which occurred in Moscow during the reign of Alexei Mikhailovich. The concept of "copper revolt" has become a household word. It is used whenever you need to comment on the depreciation of money and the bankruptcy of the state.
Copper Riot: Causes and Historical Situation
Muscovy State waged a long war forUkraine against the Commonwealth, which was spent a huge amount of financial resources. There was a shortage of money. Russia had no own deposits of precious metals from which money was minted, so they were imported from abroad. The Mint used foreign money to make Russians Russian - pennies, polushki and money.
The situation came to the fact that the boyar Ordin-NashchokinHe proposed a very controversial way out: to mint copper money at the face value of silver. At the same time, taxes were still collected in silver, but the salary was already issued by new copper coins. Since 1654, copper money was officially put into circulation instead of silver.
At first, everything went as planned by the government:new money was taken at the price of the former silver money. But soon they began to produce an incredible amount, because there were no problems with copper. Minted yards in Moscow, Pskov, Novgorod worked at full capacity. The flow of unsecured money supply overflowed Russia, so very soon the demand for silver began to grow rapidly, and the purchasing power of copper money fell.
Началась сначала медленная, а потом и обвальная inflation. The government refused to accept copper money as taxes, so the old silver coins jumped sharply in price: for one former silver ruble they gave from 15 to 20 new copper ones. The merchants went to the market and carried the copper money literally carts, while the copper depreciated every day. The townspeople panicked: nothing could be bought for copper coins, and there was nowhere to get silver.
Но правительство не хотело признавать ошибочность and, out of habit, it began to search for those guilty on the side. The counterfeiters were called the cause of inflationary inflation. Demonstration courts began to settle throughout the country. At that time, there was only one verdict for the production of “left-wing” coins: a cruel execution. According to the Code, guilty poured hot metal into the throat.
The problem was that making coins fromCopper could almost anyone who knew how to at least a little to deal with the metal. At that time, “Kotelniki and Tinovniki” became rich in wealth, were able to build stone houses for themselves, and bought expensive goods. After all, each had its own small mint. Fake copper coins in Moscow alone went more than half a million.
Copper Riot: events
On the morning of June 25, 1662, at the pillaron Lubyanka in Moscow an incriminating letter was pasted, in which Rtishchev, Miloslavsky and their guest Vasily Shorin were called traitors. In fact, they were imputed to the relationship with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which until now was a war. The accusation was absolutely groundless, but the people already needed any excuse to start the unrest.
A crowd of several thousand people reading thisthe message went to the village of Kolomna, the summer residence of the king. The guards were crushed, and the people freely broke into the royal court. Alexey Mikhailovich ordered Rtishchev and Miloslavsky to hide in the tsarina's wards, and he himself went out to the people. And then there was a scene that violated all the foundations and canons of society. The commoners surrounded Alexei Mikhailovich, and literally holding onto the buttons of the royal attire, they asked: "Where is the truth?" One of the rebels even "beat his hands with the king." After that, the crowd calmed down and began to disperse. The incident seemed to be settled. But this day was destined to end differently.
Another crowd at that moment trashed Shorin’s house, andforced his young son to write a confession stating that his father allegedly sold himself to the Poles and made a special idea with copper money to help the hated enemy. With this “confession” in their hands, the rebels rushed into Kolomenskoye, dragging back those who had already returned from there. At this time, the king was about to go to Moscow to investigate the case. However, the new threats of the rebels brought him out of himself. From Moscow by that time the archers and soldiers pulled up. And Alexey Mikhailovich gave the order to Artamon Matveyev to chop the rebels.
Began a real slaughter. The crowd was unarmed.People crushed, drowned in the river, stabbed and chopped. That day more than a thousand people died. During the following days, they stubbornly searched for participants in the march to Kolomenskoye, arrested, hung, chopped off arms and legs, branded, expelled from Moscow to the eternal settlement. Many of those arrested were forced to write under dictation in order to compare the handwriting with that unfortunate leaflet. However, the true instigators were not found.
The copper revolt of 1662 was the performance of the realurban base - artisans, peasants, butchers, the local poor. Of the merchants and people of the higher class, no one participated in it. Moreover, they also contributed to the subsequent arrests of the rebels.
As a result of the rebellion, about three thousand people suffered, and most of them were just a curious crowd.
Copper Riot: Consequences
The king kept his promise and figured outthe problem of copper money. In 1663, the minted factories in Novgorod and Pskov were closed, and the copper money was completely withdrawn from circulation. Silver coinage was resumed. And from copper coins it was ordered to melt the boilers or hand them over to the treasury. Copper cash was exchanged for new silver coins at the previous inflation rate of twenty to one, that is, the state officially recognized that the old copper rubles were not secured in any way. Salary soon again began to pay silver.