Muscovy Company
![Seal of the Muscovy Company, showing the date 1555 above an escutcheon of arms: Barry wavy of six argent and azure, over all a ship of three masts in full sail towards sinister proper, sails, pennants, and ensigns of the first, each charged with a cross gules all between three bezants, a chief or, on a pale between two roses gules seeded or, barbed vert, a lion passant guardant of the fifth[1] All encircled by motto: Refugium Nostrum in Deo Est (](/uploads/202501/28/MuscovyCompany_Seal_15552347.jpg)
The Muscovy Company (also called the Russian Company or the Muscovy Trading Company, Russian:Московская компания, Moskovskaya kompaniya), was an English trading company chartered in 1555. It was the first major chartered joint stock company, the precursor of the type of business that would soon flourish in England, and became closely associated with such famous names as Henry Hudson and William Baffin. The Muscovy Company had a monopoly on trade between England and Muscovy until 1698 and it survived as a trading company until the Russian Revolution of 1917. Since 1917 the company has operated as a charity, now working within Russia.