Preobrazhenskiy Prikaz

   Tsar Petr the Great created the Preobrazhenskiy prikaz [Preobrazhenskiy Office] in 1699 as a secret chancery to prosecute treason and disloyalty. The tsar was concerned about opposition to his modernization policies, which were seen as violating Russian Orthodox religious precepts. The group had the tsar’s mandate to seek out, detain, torture, and kill those suspected of disloyalty to the throne. The officials of this secret chancery recruited informants to gather intelligence about public animosity toward the tsar among the nobility, clergy, and peasantry. Like the Oprichnina of Ivan the Terrible, the Preobrazhenskiy prikaz did not survive its founder’s death; it was abolished in 1725.