Boyar
A boyar or bolyar was a member of the highest rank of the feudal nobility in many Eastern European states, including Bulgaria, Kievan Rus' (and later Russia), Moldavia and Wallachia (and later Romania), Lithuania and among Baltic Germans.
Also known as bolyar; variants in other languages include Bulgarian: боляр or болярин; Russian: боярин, romanized: boyarin, IPA: [bɐˈjærʲɪn], pl.
The plural form of boila ("noble"), bolyare is attested in Bulgar inscriptions[1][2] and rendered as boilades or boliades in the Greek of Byzantine documents.
[3][4] Multiple different derivation theories of the word have been suggested by scholars and linguists, such as it having possible roots from old Turkic: bai ("noble, rich"; cf.
Presently in Bulgaria, the word bolyari is used as a nickname for the inhabitants of Veliko Tarnovo—once the capital of the Second Bulgarian Empire[citation needed].
Boyars of Kievan Rus were visually very similar to knights, but after the Mongol invasion, their cultural links were mostly lost.
They received extensive grants of land and, as members of the Boyars' Duma, were the major legislators of Kievan Rus'.
After the Mongol invasion in the 13th century, the boyars from western and southern parts of Kievan Rus' (modern Belarus and Ukraine) were incorporated into Lithuanian and Polish nobility (szlachta).
In the 16th and 17th centuries, many of those Rus boyars who failed to get the status of a nobleman actively participated in the formation of the Cossack army.
Boyars in Novgorod and Pskov formed a sort of republic, where the power of princes (knyaz) was strongly limited until the conquest by Moscow.
Agreements, such as one between Ivan III and Mikhail Borisovich in 1484 showed how allegiances needed to be earned and secured, rather than implied and enforced.
[9] They answered questions posed by the grand prince, and Ivan III even made sure to get their approval on special events, such as his marriage to Zoe Paleologa, or the attack on Novgorod.
After Ivan IV, a time of troubles began when his son Fedor died without an heir, ending the Rurik dynasty.
[17] Second, the boyars lost their independent principalities, where they maintained all their power, and instead governed districts and regions under the grand prince of the time.
After the revolt of the streltsy regiments in 1698, Peter the Great returned to Russia, forcing government officials and those that were financially able to have clean shaven faces and wear Western clothing.
[18] Peter also reformed the judicial system, and created a senate with members appointed by him, replacing the old council of boyars that originally advised the tsar.
[18] Peter was driving out the conservative and religious faction of the boyars out of the courts, and instead using both foreign and Russian officials to fill the administrative system.
With the annexation of Galicia by the Kingdom of Poland as the result of the Galicia-Volhynia wars, local boyars were equated since 1430 in rights along with Polish nobility (szlachta).
[19] In the Carpathian regions inhabited by present day Romanians, the boyar (boier) class emerged from the chiefs (named cneaz ("leader") or jude ("judge") in the areas north of the Danube, and celnic south of the river) of rural communities in the early Middle Ages, who made their judicial and administrative attributions hereditary and gradually expanded them upon other communities.
After the appearance of more advanced political structures in the area, their privileged status had to be confirmed by the central power, which used this prerogative to include in the boyar class individuals that distinguished themselves in the military or civilian functions they performed, by allocating them lands from the princely domains.
[20] The Romanian social hierarchy was composed of boyar, mazil (turkish: mazul), răzeș (yeoman, freedman) and rumân (serf).
Landowners with serfs but no function were categorized as mazil but were still considered to be of noble origin (din os boieresc, literally "of boyar bone").
