The administrative division reform of 1708 was carried out by

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

Tsar Tsar ( or ), also spelled ''czar'', ''tzar'', or ''csar'', is a title used by East Slavs, East and South Slavs, South Slavic monarchs. The term is derived from the Latin word ''Caesar (title), caesar'', which was intended to mean "emperor" i ...

Peter the Great Peter I ( – ), most commonly known as Peter the Great,) or Pyotr Alekséyevich ( rus, Пётр Алексе́евич, p=ˈpʲɵtr ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ, , group=pron was a Russian monarch who ruled the Tsardom of Russia from t ...

in an attempt to improve the manageability of the vast territory of Russia. Prior to the reform, the country was subdivided into

uyezd An uezd (also spelled uyezd; rus, уе́зд, p=ʊˈjest), or povit in a Ukrainian context ( uk, повіт), or Kreis in Baltic-German context, was a type of administrative subdivision of the Grand Duchy of Moscow, the Russian Empire, and the ea ...

s and

volost Volost ( rus, во́лость, p=ˈvoləsʲtʲ; ) was a traditional administrative subdivision in Eastern Europe. In earlier East Slavic history, ''volost'' was a name for the territory ruled by the knyaz, a principality; either as an absolute ...

s, and in the 17th century the number of the uyezds was 166.

Creation

On , 1708, Peter issued an

edict An edict is a decree or announcement of a law, often associated with monarchism, but it can be under any official authority. Synonyms include "dictum" and "pronouncement". ''Edict'' derives from the Latin edictum. Notable edicts * Telepinu Proc ...

dividing Russia into eight governorates ('' guberniyas'').Указ об учреждении губерний и о росписании к ним городов
The edict established neither the borders of the governorates nor their internal divisions; instead, their territories were defined as the sets of cities and the lands adjacent to those cities. Some older subdivision types also continued to be used.

List of the governorates created in 1708

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Administrative divisions of Russia in 1708-1710 1708-1710 1700s in Russia 1710 in Russia