The article considers the problem of the creation and evolution of aspecific genre of medieval Russian literature – order (a description of court ceremonial). The article identifies the origins of the genre form, its artistic and aesthetic basis, analyzes the evolution of the Russian publishing tradition of book of the 12–17th centuries. Particular attention is drawn to the existence of the called genre forms in the Russian court culture of the 1650s, the era of the reign of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich.