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clergy should be educated. It largely took the form ofa struggle between the 'Latinists' (mainly from theUkraine) and the ' Greeks' over the foundation and controlof an academy in Moscow similar to that in Kiev. Afterinitial successes for the 'Latinists,' the ' Greeks,' headedby the Patriarch Joachim (1674-90), won the day andthe leading 'Latinist' was hanged (1691), it is trueostensibly on political grounds rather than on account6f his reputedly western views on the eucharist.The Old Believers had rebelled against the church,backed by the state, in the name of ancient custom andnational tradition. In the same name, though necessarilynot in alliance with the Old Believers, a large section ofthe official church fought against western, but notsouthern, i.e. Greek, innovations, whether in questions ofeducation and religion or in those concerning contactswith ' Germans' and western importations. In so doingthe Patriarch Joachim and his adherents fought againstthe strongest tendencies in the government.The struggle for power between the rival families ofthe first wife of tsar Alexis (d. 1676) and his second wife,the mother of Peter the Great (b. 1672), was the mainpolitical thread between 1676 and 1694. Both groups infact looked to the West, but both had to manoeuvrecautiously, especially in face of the reactionary nationalismof the turbulent streltsy, the privileged Moscow garrison.In 1682, Sophia, half-sister of Peter, having won overthe streltsy, effected a coup d'etat and seized power,proclaiming herself regent. Peter never forgot that daywhen, as a boy of ten, standing by the side of his tremblingmother on the great red flight of open stairs in the Kremlin,he had to face the reeking streltsy as they bore off on theirpikes the gory heads of his supporters. He had to facethem again in 1689, and in 1698 when they revoltedagainst him. Then they were crushed without a shred ofmercy, broken on the wheel as only Peter could breakmen.The rule of the regent Sophia (1682-89) and herfavourite Prince Golitsyn, despite the events of 1682, wasin many ways tolerant, except of Old Believers, andit actively favoured westernizing influences. Golitsyn333