The duties of the first known
okolnichies included arranging the travel and quarters of grand princes and
tsars, as well as accommodating foreign
ambassadors and presenting them to the court. Okolnichies had a seat in
prikazes, were appointed as
namestniks and
voivodes, served as diplomatic envoys and members of the tsar's council (
duma). Initially the rank of
okolnichy was the second highest after that of
boyar, while often they performed similar duties. According to the system of
mestnichestvo, a person could not be made a
boyar unless someone else in his family had recently held the
boyar/okolnichy rank. Consequently, a position of
okolnichy was a step towards granting the
boyar rank to a non-noble. Even Prince
Dmitry Pozharsky, though a
Rurikid knyaz by birth and the "Saviour of the Motherland" by royal mercy, could not secure a position higher than
okolnichy, because neither his parents nor uncles had ever held a rank higher than
stolnik. Under the
Romanovs, the 18 noblest families of
Tsardom of Russia were given the privilege of starting their official career from the rank of
okolnichy, skipping all the lower ranks, such as
stolnik. At the same period, the positions of
okolnichy were differentiated and some of them (
quarters okolnichy or
close okolnichy) were of higher rank than that of non-close
boyars. The terms derive from a semi-formal ranking based on the proximity to the tsar at the tsar's table. == List of okolnichies ==