A silver casket with a scroll is kept in the Archive of Ancient Acts

A silver casket with a scroll is kept in the Archive of Ancient Acts. The casket was made in 1767, and a scroll 309 metres long, with 959 glued joins, was placed in it. The scroll contains the Law Code (Sobornoye Ulozheniye) of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich of 1649, bearing the signatures of all the delegates of the Zemsky Sobor and the authors of the text. The Law Code consists of 25 chapters and 967 articles. The document codified the laws, tsarist decrees and boyar verdicts then in force, and introduced new laws.

Work on the Law Code began by decision of the Zemsky Sobor on 16 June 1649, in response to the collective petition of the nobility, merchants and townsfolk of 10 June 1648. The codification commission was headed by Prince Odoevsky. Its task was to create a universal law, so that «for people of every rank, from the greatest to the least, justice and redress should be equal to all in all matters».

The Law Code remained in force from 1649 until 1832.

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At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free

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Frederic Leighton

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A silver casket with a scroll is kept in the Archive of Ancient Acts

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At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free

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