BOYAR (Russ. boyarin, plur. boyare), a dignity of Old Russia conterminous with the history of the country. Originally the boyars were the intimate friends and confidential advisers of the Russian prince, the superior members of his druzhina or bodyguard, his comrades and champions. They were divided into classes according to rank, most generally determined by personal merit and service. Thus we hear of the “oldest,” “elder” and the “younger” boyars. At first the dignity seems to have been occasionally, but by no means invariably, hereditary. At a later day the boyars were the chief members of the prince’s duma, or council, like the senatores of Poland and Lithuania. Their further designation of luchshie lyudi or “the best people” proves that they were generally richer than their fellow subjects. So long as the princes, in their interminable struggles with the barbarians of the Steppe, needed the assistance of the towns, “the best people” of the cities and of the druzhina proper mingled freely together both in war and commerce; but after Yaroslav’s crushing victory over the Petchenegs in 1036 beneath the walls of Kiev, the two classes began to draw apart, and a political and economical difference between the members of the princely druzhina and the aristocracy of the towns becomes discernible. The townsmen devote themselves henceforth more exclusively to commerce, while the druzhina asserts the privileges of an exclusively military caste with a primary claim upon the land. Still later, when the courts of the northern grand dukes were established, the boyars appear as the first grade of a fullblown court aristocracy with the exclusive privilege of possessing land and serfs. Hence their title of dvoryane (courtiers), first used in the 12th century. On the other hand there was no distinction, as in Germany, between the Dienst Adel (nobility of service) and the simple Adel. The Russian boyardom had no corporate or class privileges, (1) because their importance was purely local (the dignity of the principality determining the degree of dignity of the boyars), (2) because of their inalienable right of transmigration from one prince to another at will, which prevented the formation of a settled aristocracy, and (3) because birth did not determine but only facilitated the attainment of high rank, e.g. the son of a boyar was not a boyar born, but could more easily attain to boyardom, if of superior personal merit. It was reserved for Peter the Great to transform the boyarstvo or boyardom into something more nearly resembling the aristocracy of the West.
See Alexander Markevich, The History of Rank-priority in the Realm of Muscovy in the 15th-18th Centuries (Russ.) (Odessa, 1888); V. Klyuchevsky, The Boyar Duma of Ancient Russia (Russ.) (Moscow, 1888).
(R. N. B.)
BOY-BISHOP, the name given to the “bishop of the boys” (episcopus puerorum or innocentium, sometimes episcopus scholariorum or chorestarum), who, according to a custom very wide-spread in the middle ages, was chosen in connexion with the festival of Holy Innocents. For the origin of the curious authority of the boy-bishop and of the rites over which he presided, see [Fools, Feast of]. In England the boy-bishop was elected on December 6, the feast of St Nicholas, the patron of children, and his authority lasted till Holy Innocents’ day (December 28). The election made, the lad was dressed in full bishop’s robes with mitre and crozier and, attended by comrades dressed as priests, made a circuit of the town blessing the people. At Salisbury the boy-bishop seems to have actually had ecclesiastical patronage during his episcopate, and could make valid appointments. The boy and his colleagues took possession of the cathedral and performed all the ceremonies and offices except mass. Originally, it seems, confined to the cathedrals, the custom spread to nearly all the parishes. Several ecclesiastical councils had attempted to abolish or to restrain the abuses of the custom, before it was prohibited by the council of Basel in 1431. It was, however, too popular to be easily suppressed. In England it was abolished by Henry VIII. in 1542, revived by Mary in 1552 and finally abolished by Elizabeth. On the continent it survived longest in Germany, in the so-called Gregoriusfest, said to have been founded by Gregory IV. in 828 in honour of St Gregory, the patron of schools. A school-boy was elected bishop, duly vested, and, attended by two boy-deacons and the town clergy, proceeded to the parish church, where, after a hymn in honour of St Gregory had been sung, he preached. At Meiningen this custom survived till 1799.
See Brand, Pop. Antiquities of Great Britain (1905); Gasquet, Parish Life in Medieval England (1906); Du Cange, Glossarium (London, 1884), s.v. “Episcopus puerorum.”
BOYCE, WILLIAM (1710-1779), English musical composer, the son of a cabinet-maker, was born in London on the 7th of February 1710. As a chorister in St Paul’s he received his early musical education from Charles King and Dr Maurice Greene, and he afterwards studied the theory of music under Dr Pepusch. In 1734, having become organist of Oxford chapel, Vere Street, Cavendish Square, he set Lord Lansdowne’s masque of Peleus and Thetis to music. In 1736 he left Oxford chapel and was appointed organist of St Michael’s church, Cornhill, and in the same year he became composer to the chapel royal, and wrote the music for John Lockman’s oratorio David’s Lamentation over Saul and Jonathan. In 1737 he was appointed to conduct the meetings of the three choirs of Gloucester, Worcester and Hereford. In 1743 was written the serenata Solomon, in which occurs the favourite song “Softly rise, O southern breeze.” In 1749 he received the degree of doctor of music from the university of Cambridge, as an acknowledgment of the merit of his setting of the ode performed at the installation of Henry Pelham, duke of Newcastle, as chancellor; and in this year he became organist of All-hallows the Great and Less, Thames Street. A musical setting to The Chaplet, an entertainment by Moses Mendez, was Boyce’s most successful achievement in this year. In 1750 he wrote songs for Dryden’s Secular Masque and in 1751 set another piece (The Shepherd’s Lottery) by Mendez. He became master of the king’s band in succession to Greene in 1757, and in 1758 he was appointed principal organist to the chapel royal. As an ecclesiastical composer Boyce ranks among the best representatives of the English school. His two church services and his anthems, of which the best specimens are By the Waters of Babylon and O, Where shall Wisdom be found, are frequently performed. It should also be remembered that he wrote additional accompaniments and choruses for Purcell’s Te Deum and Jubilate, which the earlier musician had composed for the St Cecilia’s day of 1694. Boyce did this in his capacity of conductor at the annual festivals of the Sons of the Clergy at St Paul’s cathedral, an office which he had taken in succession to Greene. His twelve trios for two violins and a bass were long popular. One of his most valuable services to musical art was his publication in three volumes quarto of a work on Cathedral Music. The collection had been begun by Greene, but it was mainly the work of Boyce. The first volume appeared in 1760 and the last in 1778. On the 7th of February 1779 Boyce died from an attack of gout. He was buried under the dome of St Paul’s cathedral.