The Female Tonsure and Female Monasticism in Old Russia and the Balkans

Abstract

This paper describes a rare rite of female tonsure that is known from five Slavonic Euchologia (Trebnik) of the 13th–16th centuries and attempts to investigate on the basis of historical sources how this rite of tonsure could be applied in the Balkans and in Early Russia. N. F. Krasnosel′tsev suggested that this tonsure was of a very ancient origin and was intended for tonsuring virgins who took the vow of celibacy. The Greek original of this rite is preserved only in one known Euchologion Coisl.213 (1027). We argue that its Slavonic translation is of a Serbian origin and was made not earlier than in the 13thcentury, but that it apparently was not used in the Balkans afterwards. In Early Russia this rite is scantily attested in written sources — since the 14thcentury its content was shortened and influenced by the later practice of tonsure. However, historical sources prove that tonsuring of virgins was very common in Kievan Rus′ with its urban convents, while it was practically unknown in the Balkans. In medieval Bulgaria and Serbia there were recorded cases of widows tonsured without entering the monastery. It is difficult to say whether before the end of 14th century any fully developed female monastic communities existed in this region in the form in which they are known in Rus′. Probably, the rite of tonsure of virgins in Old Russia was very close to the rite from the manuscript Gilf.21, though, most likely, it did not contain the final part — the prayer for the removal of the veil (kukol'), as in Coisl.213.