In a telling sign of how he wants Russians to imagine their past, President Vladimir Putin has introduced a new national day—November 4th—to replace the old communist Revolution Day holiday on November 7th. What the new date recalls is the moment in 1612 when Russia, after a period of chaos, drove the Catholic Poles and Lithuanians out of Moscow. Despite the bonhomie of this week's 25-minute chat between Mr Putin and Pope Benedict XVI, the president is promoting a national day which signals “isolation and defensiveness” towards western Christendom, says Andrei Zorin, a Russian historian.

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