Documents of the Russian Archive of Jan Piotr Sapieha: Findings of 2013–2018

Abstract

Introduction. The authors analyze previously unknown forty documents from the Archive of Jan Sapieha of 1608–1611 discovered over the last five years. The authors apply the following Methods: Russian and Polish Archeography, Historical Source Studies, Paleography and Linguistic Source of Studies. The new materials significantly fill in the earlier revealed “gaps” in archival fund previously reconstructed on the basis of preserved and published data on the events of the Time of Troubles. The necessity of looking for new data is determined by the demand for further exploration of one of the most important periods in the history of Russia. Introduction of revealed new documents to the scientific discourse enables us to examine previously known events from new perspectives reflecting confrontation of different political forces, to correlate the newly-appeared facts, to clear up the process of converting Russian population to Cossacks by means of robbing the populace (zemshchina) on the territories under “Tushino Regime”, to detail the circumstances of the beginning of the first militia, systematize the information about the state of peasants and orders reigning in Cossack Regiments of Tushino forces as well as in governing bodies of local administration (office environment), to reveal the sources of popular unrests in occupied Moscow, to show social and class, family and household problems of Russian people on the lands occupied by outlanders. The research performed resulted in many-faceted characteristics of the documents that significantly extend the informative value of the reconstructed archive giving new opportunities for scientific research of events of the Time of Troubles. I.O. Tyumentsev read, systematized the documents, gave description of documents from the perspective of Archeography and Source Studies. N.A. Tupikova read and interpreted the content of the texts as well as translated from Polish and commented the documents. N.E. Tyumentseva read the documents translated from Latin and commented fragments written in Latin.