Scientific instruments in Russia from the middle ages to Peter the Great

Summary

This paper surveys the evidence for the use of scientific and mathematical instruments from tenth-century Kiev Rus' to the death of Peter the Great in 1725 and the literature devoted to the subject. The evidence is extremely sparse before the sixteenth century; in the seventeenth century there is more, both in the form of artefacts, either local or imported, and texts; at the end of the seventeenth century and in the first quarter of the eighteenth century, Peter the Great opted for complete Westernization, and both by edict and by creating a need for their products in effect established the instrument making and scientific book publishing trades in Russia.