Muscovite Russia Research Articles

The trial of Damaskin of Chilandar on Mount Athos and inter-Orthodox relations in the mid-XVIIth century

The paper analyses the influence of the trial against a leading Serbian spiritual elder on Mount Athos, Damaskin of Chilandar, on the inter-Orthodox relations in the mid-17th century. Greek Athonite elders tried Damaskin for his practicing of the Russian pre-Nicone rite, whose main characteristic was making the sign of the Cross with two fingers. The details of this trial, in which Russian theological books were burnt and the Russian pre-Nicone rite was pronounced a heresy, was reported by a Russian diplomat Arseny Sukhanov in his writing Prenija s grekami o vere. The Athonite trial led to the serious dispute between Sukhanov and the members of the delegation of Paisios, the Patriarch of Jerusalem, in Trgoviste, in 1650. The basis of the dispute were the differences between Greek and Russian rites. In the meantime, as the certain pro-Greek changes were introduced regarding the ritual issue in Moscow, at the time of the Patriarch Nicon, 'the case of Damaskin the Serb' became a part of the arguments of the Old Believers opposition. The second part of the paper deals with the position of the Serbian Church regarding the Athonite trial and 'the Russian ritual issue'. The author pays special attention to the attitudes of the leading Serbian hierarchs of the time - Patriarch Gavrilo I (Rajic) and Metropolitan of Kratovo Mihail. These hierarchs admitted the legitimacy of Nicon's ritual reforms, thus indirectly rejecting the standpoint of Damaskin of Chilandar. Damaskin's case announced the changes in the inter-Orthodox relations of the time, particularly in the relations between Muscovite Russia and the Greek East.

Vozgrin, V. E. Istoriia krymskikh tatar (review)

SEER, 92, 3, JULY 2014 556 together of the larger historical narrative with the Kremlin specifics that will make this book attractive. One way or the other, for an intelligent, wellresearched , engagingly-written and often surprising history of a key cultural icon of Russia and of the country itself, Red Fortress is heartily recommended. Department of History Theodore R. Weeks Southern Illinois University, Carbondale Vozgrin, V. E. Istoriia krymskikh tatar. Four volumes. Tezis, Simferopol, 2013. 870 + 938 + 879 + 619 pp. Illustrations. Notes. Appendices. Bibliography. Index. UkrH 600.00. In the Crimean crisis of 1855 there was no shortage of scholarly and popular works giving an insight into the history of the Crimea and of the Crimean Tatars. For the 2014 crisis there is just this one magisterial survey which, because of its sympathetic treatment of the Crimean Khanate and the Tatar population, has brought so much antagonism upon its author that it cannot be bought in the Russian Federation (the author is still a Professor of Modern History in St Petersburg, but accusations of Russophobia resulted in him losing his position in the Russian Academy of Sciences). The sole source of copies at the time of writing appears to be the Simferopol shop of ATR, the Tatar television service (www.atra.ua). Modern archaeological excavations have given little new information on the history of the Crimea in antiquity and the classical period. More recently, the Ottoman archives have revealed (see Alexander Bennigsen et al, Le Khanat de Crimée, Mouton, 1976) the degree to which the Crimean khans were independent of the Golden Horde and the Sublime Porte (recently published Turkish presidential archives are now revealing more). This gives the lie to the Russian view underlying V. D. Smirnov’s Krymskoe khanstvo of 1886 that the Khanate was essentially an instrument of pan-Islamic and pan-Turkic hostility to Russia. Vozgrin takes the more plausible view that the Crimean Khanate and Muscovite Russia should be seen as competing successor states to the Golden Horde, that the Khanate’s ravages on the steppes and raids on Moscow were politically rational acts to protect its borders, and that the Khanate would willingly ally itself to any of the steppe powers, including the Don Cossacks and Muscovy, to maintain a balance in its own interests (for instance, the Khan would not necessarily obey the Ottomans’ call to attack Poland). What emerges from the immense amount of detail — anthropological, economic, as well as political — marshalled by Vozgrin is the degree to which the Khanate was a religiously tolerant state, comparable with El Andaluz, allowing several varieties of Judaism and Christianity to flourish. The khans, REVIEWS 557 although in principle subject to the approval of the Sultan, were effectively answerable to the beys of the leading Genghisid clans, and their autocracy limited to foreign policy, diplomacy and justice. By the mid eighteenth century, despite appalling destruction by Russian forces in 1736, Bakhchisarai and the port of Gözlev (Eupatoria) were cities foreign travellers compared favourably to Rotterdam, and Tatars had high levels of literacy both male and female. The miracle is that the Tatars survived at all: they were treated far worse than most of the other nations absorbed into the Russian empire by force or fraud at the end of the eighteenth century. The systematic razing of cities, cemeteries, orchards and forests was matched only by the deportations, which took on almost genocidal proportions and were regularly repeated: 1786, 1812, 1860, 1880 and, of course, May 1944, when the entire peninsula was purged of Tatars. Vozgrin (a native of Simferopol, but an ethnic Russian) does not skirt around the brutality of Russian occupation: the Tatars were victims of a peculiar libel, perhaps stemming from their burning of Moscow in 1571: Catherine the Great called them a ‘nest of predators and robbers’, just as Stalin branded them ‘a traitor nation’, although there were probably fewer collaborationists in the Crimea than in Pskov, Kiev or Kharkov. True, the Nazis had been persuaded that the Ostrogoths (who did in actual fact establish a kingdom in the Crimea and whose language was spoken there a thousand years after it had died out elsewhere) were the ancestors of the...

Biblical Languages and National-Religious Boundaries in Muscovy

Inspired in part by conversations with David Goldfrank, this essay considers aspects of how attitudes toward biblical language contributed to representations of national and religious identity in late medieval and early modern Muscovite Russia. At roughly the same time in history that revived Hebrew and Greek study in Western Europe helped to stimulate the Renaissance and Reformation, bookmen in East Slavia also reconsidered the original languages of sacred writings. Contrary to what is sometimes assumed, such interest was neither unknown nor marginal within Muscovite religious culture. Hebrew-Russian glossaries circulated in leading monasteries from at least the thirteenth century; major infusions of Greek (and other) words and definitions in the sixteenth century transformed these texts into multilingual dictionaries. This mainstream tradition in Russian Orthodoxy can be linked to such important religious figures as Nil Sorskii and Maksim Grek. I argue that by “appropriating” biblical languages and terminology, often via inaccurate translations, Muscovite Russian literati created and defended their distinctive identity vis-à-vis Jews and Greeks, who were considered God’s former chosen peoples. These findings suggest reconsideration of the nature and boundaries of faith in Muscovy in the “age of confessionalism.”

Russia’s Administrative Agony 400 Years Ago

Dmitrii Vladimirovich Liseitsev, Prikaznaia sistema Moskovskogo gosudarstva v epokbu Smuty (The Chancellery System of the Muscovite State during the Time of Troubles). 788 + iii pp. Moscow-Tula: Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk, 2009. ISBN-13 978-5812512538. Nataliia Vladimirovna Rybalko, Rossiiskaia prikaznaia biurokratiia v Smutnoe vremia (The Russian Chancellery System in the Time of Troubles). 654 + i pp. Moscow: Kvadriga, 2011. ISBN-13 978-5917910208. There is no other epoch in Russian history matching the consummate disorder and unraveling of statehood of the Time of Troubles (Smuta), 1598-1613, with its seemingly endless dismantlement of dynastic and political legitimacy, government, military effectiveness, social cohesiveness, territorial integrity, and of national control over the capital itself. Though they elicit parallels with the Smuta, the Russian Civil War (1918-21) never saw its capital cities fall under foreign control, and the tumultuous 1990s still had a ways to go to mirror the Russian state's calamity four centuries earlier. Imperial Russia's numerous 18th- and early 19th-century coup attempts were tame by comparison; even the horrific Pugachev rebellion (1773-75) was short and geographically confined. The Smuta's trauma fashioned a post-1613 restorationist saga, deeply imbued with social conservatism, to endure throughout the Romanov dynastic era, and refortified a social order, despite its many imperial alterations, to survive deep into the 19th century. (1) The dimensions of the Smuta's calamity intrigue historians of Russia of all periods, for this episode indelibly affected Russian historical memory, reminding officials and subjects alike of a certain fragility of the power held in the capital. And fragility there was in the decades running up to the late 1590s, when the Rurikovich dynasty became extinct: the stresses of the ultimately unsuccessful Livonian War (1558-83), the horrors of Ivan the Terribles oprichnina (1565-72), and the gradual subjugation of a big percentage of the population to forced labor of various forms. All this carried with it potentially high risks of social explosion for any regime. Judging by the historically quite low ratios of administrators to the general populace--significantly lower than in European countries--it is, perhaps, remarkable that the Russian government was able to survive at all into the 19th century. Staffing the capital, major cities and towns, and the provinces was always a barrier for early modern Russian civil administration. There were insufficient numbers of trained officials available, even taking into account a gradual rise in the administrator-to-population ratio between the early 17th century and 1800. Although we have a dearth of quantitative information for the lesser central and provincial administrative officials of 16th-century Russia, there can be no doubt--given the immaturity of the chancellery system into the late 1590s--that 16th-century staffing ratios would have been even lower than in the 17th century. Not surprisingly, the 400th anniversary of the Time of Troubles witnessed a swelling of Russian-language scholarship on its causes, events, institutions, dramatis personae, and outcomes. From the 1990s to the present, academic Russian historians have published a plethora of articles, books, and document collections on the general time period of the Smuta, with many of them touching on the civil administration. (2) D. V. Liseitsev and N. V. Rybalko capture our attention for their recent, lengthy monographs on Time of Troubles' central administration. All specialists in Russian history can study these two works profitably. The broad dimensions of Muscovite Russia's Time of Troubles are generally well known, but until recently this statement is less true of the numerous blows delivered to the central and provincial administration--the one institution, along with the Russian Orthodox Church, keeping the country stitched together. …

Russia and Early Modern European Medicine

Russia and Early Modern European Medicine Clare Griffin (bio) Sandra Cavallo and David Gentilcore, eds., Spaces, Objects, and Identities in Early Modern Italian Medicine. 136 pp. Oxford: Blackwell, 2008. ISBN 1405180404. $34.95. Sabine Dumschat, Ausländische Mediziner im Moskauer Russland (Foreign Doctors in Muscovite Russia). 750 pp. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2006. ISBN 3515085122. €88.00. Aleksandra Borisovna Ippolitova, Russkie rukopisnye travniki XVII–XVIII vekov: Issledovanie fol′klora i etnobotaniki (Russian Manuscript Herbals of the 17th and 18th Centuries: An Investigation of Folklore and Ethnobotany). 511 pp. Moscow: Indrik, 2008. ISBN-13 978-5857594650. David Lederer, Madness, Religion, and the State in Early Modern Europe: A Bavarian Beacon. 383 pp. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. ISBN 0521853478. $52.00. Russian courtly medicine of the pre-Petrine period was heavily influenced by European trends. It was practiced by Western graduates of prestigious universities, who brought the ideas they had learned at these institutions with them to Russia. A sizable proportion of the medical preparations used by the Russian court also came from Western Europe. On the one hand, Russia was a part of the European medical world. On the other, Muscovy lacked a number of central features of that world: there were no universities, [End Page 967] no surgeons’ guilds or medical colleges, and no private apothecary shops before the 18th century. Muscovy’s ambiguous status vis-à-vis the European medical world may explain the fact that the historiography of Muscovy and that of early modern European medicine rarely overlap. Here I reassess this historical and historiographical divide. Based on the books under review, this essay seeks to demonstrate that, despite the differences between Europe and Muscovy, approaches and methods developed during the investigation of the former can fruitfully be applied to the latter. One aspect of medicine in Muscovy that has attracted much scholarly attention is the role of medical practitioners at the Russian court. Sabine Dumschat’s work on foreign physicians’ occupational and social activities in Moscow belongs to this tradition. A volume of articles edited by Sandra Cavallo and David Gentilcore on medicine in Italy offers a useful comparison, since it too deals with physicians’ occupational and social activities. Moreover, it presents both new approaches and nonstandard sources for the study of medicine—court proceedings and canonization hearings rather than medical records—suggesting directions of development for the history of Muscovy. David Lederer’s work on state-sponsored spiritual healing in Bavaria is also helpful, as it raises the issue of the relationship between religious and secular healers. These works allow us to address questions about the status of foreign medical practitioners and the forms and institutions of professional medical practice in various societies, including Muscovy, during the early modern period. A second area of focus for this review is the history of ideas. Lederer’s work is important in this regard too, as he devotes much space to the classification of mental disorders. His approach invites interesting comparisons with Aleksandra Ippolitova’s classification of illnesses in her study of herbals. These two works allow us to look at how European ideas interacted with Russian beliefs, both secular and religious. Sabine Dumschat’s doctoral dissertation, Ausländische Mediziner im Moskauer Russland, written at Universität Hamburg, looks at the activities and experiences of foreign physicians employed in the Aptekarskii prikaz (Apothecary Chancery). The chancery came into being at some point in the late 16th century, although the surviving records cover the period 1629–1713. During this period a number of medical practitioners came to Russia from across Europe, including surgeons, distillers, apothecaries, and physicians. Dumschat’s work is by no means the first to exploit the chancery records as a source base. An initial publication of the documents appeared in the 1880s (although unfortunately it is now a bibliographical rarity).1 Since then, a number of scholars have published studies focusing on this institution [End Page 968] and its employees.2 Dumschat’s work appears less than a decade after the publication of Maria Unkovskaya’s collective biography of the Apothecary Chancery’s medical staff.3 Dumschat’s central question is what role foreign physicians played in Muscovite culture. She frames this question as a reaction to a...

Power, Sainthood, and the Art of Myth

Pierre Gonneau, A l'aube de la Russie muscovite: Serge de Radonege et Andre Roublev. Legendes et images (XIVe-XVIIe siecles) (At the Dawn of Muscovite Russia: Sergius of Radonezh and Andrei Rublev. Legends and Images [14th-17th Centuries]). 357 pp., illus., appendices. Paris: Institut d'etudes slaves, 2007. ISBN-13 978-2720404351. 24.00 [euro]. Elisabeth Teiro, L'Eglise des premiers metropolites russes (The Church of the First Saintly Russian Metropolitans). 418 pp., illus., appendices. Paris: Institut d'etudes slaves, 2009. ISBN-13 978-2720404511. 24.00 [euro]. During the Soviet era, publications covering the religious life of medieval and early modern Rus' tended to emphasize land issues and the condition of the peasantry. The scope of this area of scholarship has broadened considerably in recent years to encompass the cultural and spiritual aspects of Muscovite church history. This expansion has been aided significantly by the publication of documents supplementing fundamental collections of source materials created in the 20th century. Rich collections in Russian museums and art restorers' revelations are becoming increasingly accessible through the bountiful production of high-quality albums and exhibit catalogues as well as the development of websites devoted to art and architecture. The two excellent monographs reviewed here will further expand our understanding of the formative period of the Muscovite polity because they underscore the crucial interconnections that permitted church leaders and Moscow's princes to construct the symbiotic relationships that promoted their mutual success. Both books reveal the importance of sainthood as the social and political glue holding together the rising status of rulers and church hierarchs, while simultaneously laying out the widely divergent itineraries for future to follow during their earthly lives. The who figure in Elisabeth Teiro's examination of the Russian metropolitanate during the 14th to 16th centuries are cut from very different cloth from the legendarily humble monk Sergius of Radonezh--adviser of princes, conciliator, counterpart of St. Francis in giving away worldly possessions, and source of inspiration for unity against the Tatars and rebuilding Russian spirituality. In contrast, the saintly metropolitans contribute to the building of church and state as political activists who move to Moscow and thereafter link the destiny of their church to that of the local rulers. Sergius and the metropolitans alike were then posthumously claimed as wonder-working intercessors for Moscow, an image fostered both by church hierarchs and by Moscow's rulers. Teiro's study begins with Peter's relocation of the seat of the metropolitan to Moscow, his initiation of the construction of the Dormition Cathedral, and his burial in 1326 in his unfinished church. His relatively rapid recognition as the first saint associated with the principality of Moscow was initiated by his successor, Theognost, backed by Ivan Kalita of Moscow; and the Byzantine patriarch agreed to canonization. Metropolitans before Peter had not been the focus of special veneration, but thereafter his successors came to be given serious consideration for this status. Analyzing the grounds for sainthood, Teiro concludes that after Peter admission to the ranks of the saints (199) rather than canonization, with its connotation of the procedure used in the Roman Catholic Church, better describes the process at work in Muscovy, especially before Metropolitan Makarii's councils of 1547-49 made glorification a more formal process. Incorrupt relics served as an indication of worthiness for sainthood, but the indispensable requirement was that the potential saint perform miracles, in life or after death (and a candidate's record in this regard might be improved to strengthen his claim). After the Russian church became autocephalous in 1448, candidates native to the Russian lands were more likely to be canonized. …

The discovery of Muscovite Russia in Tudor England

The discovery of Muscovite Russia in Tudor England

Through the Filter of Tobacco: The Limits of Global Trade in the Early Modern World

In 1663, an English Embassy lead by the Earl of Carlisle traveled to Muscovite Russia. Failing to make any significant breakthroughs in Anglo-Russian trade relations, a member of the Earl's Embassy observed that the Russians will in time leave off that rustick and barbarous humor, which is so natural to them, and learn by degrees to live with more civility.... And were they under a gentler Government, and had a Trade with every body, no doubt but this Nation would in short time be taken with our civility and decent way of living.' Even in this short passage, the plan for English economic expansion was clear. The first step was the establishment of trade between the countries, which would produce widespread cultural change as the Russians adopted the superior English customs. In the end, a transformed Muscovy would become a natural market for English goods, producing only increased profits. This plan remained essentially unchanged from the beginning of regularized trade between England and Muscovy in the sixteenth century to the beginning of the eighteenth, despite the lack of success in changing Muscovite culture in the direction of an English-inspired model.2 In fact, while they remained committed to the cause of increasing trade with Muscovy, English traders struggled during the seventeenth century. They expected tremendous advantages from free trade, by which they meant their

Reconstructing the Life of Simeon Polotskii on the Basis of Manuscripts

There are still many unanswered questions about the biography of Simeon Polotskii, a Belarusan monk who became a prominent figure in the cultural process of Muscovite Russia in the years 1660–1670. This article presents some new data culled from Simeon’s notes and letters, which were preserved in his draft manuscripts. They add to our knowledge of his life and provide more precise information about previously known issues.

The Russian and Slavonic Languages in Sixteenth-Century Muscovy

THE SLAVONIC AND EAST EUROPEAN REVIEW Volume 85, Number I - January 2007 The Russian and Slavonic Languages in Sixteenth-Century Muscovy* CHARLESJ. HALPERIN In memory of BenjaminUroff IN sixteenth-centuryMuscovy authors wrote in one of two languages, first, Slavonic or Church Slavonic, the Russian recension of Church Slavonic, or second, chancery (prikaz) Russian or simply Russian. The relationshipbetween them has been the subjectof considerablediscussion by linguistsand literaryscholarsas a fundamental feature of the evolution of the modern Russian literarylanguage, but historianshave also addressedthe issue in termsof Muscovite culturalhistory.There is no questionbut that texts in Slavonic and chancery language look and feel differentenough to permit assigning them to differentlanguages. A reader of a sermon by Metropolitan Makarii and the Sudebnik (law code) of I550 would have no difficultyassigning the texts to different languages. Scholarsdo not agree on how the languageswere treatedby Muscovites. The linguist Boris 0. Unbegaum, for example, described the coexistence of two written languages, Church Slavonic and chancery language, utilized for differentfunctions, in which chancery Charles J. Halperin is a Visiting Scholar at the Russian and East European Institute of Indiana University. * I wish to express my sincerest appreciation to the four conscientious referees of 7he Slavonicand East European Reviewfor their numerous useful stylistic, substantive and bibliographic suggestions. I have tried to incorporate as many of them as possible. I am solely responsible for any remaining errors. 2 RUSSIAN & SLAVONIC IN I6TH-CENTURY MUSCOVY language,employedin jurisprudence and correspondence, was pure Russianand virtuallyfree of Slavonicinfluence.'Bothlanguages,he observed,couldbe influencedby colloquialexpressions.2 Kuznetsov, on the otherhand,wrotethattherewas no cleardistinction between Slavonicand Russian.3The 'linguisticquestion',therefore,possesses interdisciplinarysignificance. The distinguishedlinguist, philologist and semiotician Boris Uspenskii haspresented themostsystematic theory.4 He viewsSlavonic and Russian(russkii)5 as a diglossia,a specificlinguisticsituationin whichtwolanguagesfunctionas one, the firstas a privileged, literary languageand the secondas a spoken,non-written language.Because nativespeakers learnthebookishlanguagefromthe non-bookish,6 the two languagesareperceivedas one language.To a foreignerthe two languages appearto bejustthat,twolanguages.7 AmongtheEastSlavs fromtheeleventhto theseventeenth century,Slavonic wasthebookish, literary, indeedsacred,writtenlanguage,whichcouldnotbe employed 1 Boris 0. Unbegaum, 'Russe et slavon dans la terminologie juridique', RevuedesEtudes Slaves,34, 1957, pp. I29-35, as reprinted in id., Selected PapersonRussianandSlavonic Philology, Oxford, I969 (hereafter, Unbegaum, Selected Papers),pp. 176-84; id., 'Le russe literaire est-il d'origine russe?', Revuedes EtudesSlaves,44, I965, pp. I9-28, as reprinted in Unbegaum, Selected Papers,pp. 299-311; id., 'lazyk russkogo prava', in Na temyrusskiei obshchie. Sbornik stateiv chest'prof.N S. Timasheva, New York, I965, pp. 178-84, as reprinted in Unbegaum, Selected Papers, pp. 312-I8. 2 Boris 0. Unbegaum, 'The Language of Muscovite Russia in Oxford Vocabularies', OxfordSlavonicPapers, io, I962, pp. 237-54 (hereafter, Unbegaum, 'The Language of Muscovite Russia'), as reprinted in Unbegaum, Selected Papers,pp. 237-54 (p. 237). 3 P. S. Kuznetsov, U istokovrusskoigrammaticheskoi mysli, Moscow, 1958 (hereafter, Kuznetsov, U istokov), pp. II, 27. 4 Boris A. Uspenskii, Istoriiarusskogo literaturnogo iazyka(XI-XVII), Munich, I987 (hereafter, Uspenskii, Istoriia(I987)), pp. 14-21 (esp. I4-I6), 66-72, 244-58 (on Muscovy); id., 'The Language Situation and Linguistic Consciousness in Muscovite Rus': The Perception of Church Slavic and Russian', Michael Flier trans. (hereafter, Uspenskii, 'The Language Situation'), in Henryk Birnbaum and Michael Flier (eds), MedievalRussianCulture,Cal4fomia SlavicStudies,12, I984 (hereafter, AMedieval RussianCulture), pp. 365-85; Boris A. Uspenskii, Istoriiarusskogo literaturnogo iazyka(XI-XVII), 3rd edition, Moscow, 2002 (hereafter, Uspenskii, Istoriia(2002)), pp. 24-29, IOI-II, 365-95 respectively. I wish to express my sincerest appreciation to both Boris Uspenskii and Hugh Olmsted for answering some questions about diglossia; neither is in any way responsible for my conclusions. 5For the Kievan period, it would be preferable to speak of the East Slavic vernacular or Rus' language, which would be cumbersome and violate the linguistic continuity between Kiev and Moscow which Uspenskii implies. In general in this article occurrences of the word russkii,in sources or secondary works, will uniformly be translated as 'Russian'. 6Uspenskii, Istoriia(I987), p. I5; Uspenskii, Istoriia(2002), p. 25. On the other hand, literacy (like religion) was acquired by reading religious texts such as the Psalter. Ivan IV ordered a Circassian who was going to convert to Orthodox Christianity to be taught gramota(Polnoesobranierusskikh...

Ethnicity as Social Rank: Governance, Law, and Empire in Muscovite Russia

Most European early-modern states transitioned from composite monarchies into centralized ones. Essentially, composite monarchies were “more than one country under the sovereignty of one ruler.” As Moscow expanded and acquired the surrounding principalities either by inheritance or force, its grand princes enacted a series of legal and administrative reforms to dissolve the differences among its territories and create a centralized monarchy. These political reforms began under Ivan III, who instituted a standardization of Muscovite legal practice and formalized a defined system of social precedence,mestnichestvo, which accorded high rank to his newly acquired provincial elites within the Muscovite social system. Change could not happen overnight, and further legal reforms by Ivan IV, in addition to new religious reforms to eradicate differences of practice among his subjects, centralized the Grand Prince's political and religious authority.

Unmaking imperial Russia: Mykhailo Hrushevsky and the writing of Ukrainian history

From the eighteenth century until its collapse in 1917, Imperial Russia -- as distinct from Muscovite Russia before it and Soviet Russia after it -- officially held that the Russian nation consisted of three branches: Great Russian, Little Russian (Ukrainian), and White Russian (Belarusian). After the 1917 revolution, this view was discredited by many leading scholars, politicians, and cultural figures, but none were more intimately involved in the dismantling of the old imperial identity and its historical narrative than the eminent Ukrainian historian Mykhailo Hrushevsky (1866--1934). Hrushevsky took an active part in the work of Ukrainian scholarly, cultural, and political organizations and became the first head of the independent Ukrainian state in 1918. Serhii Plokhy's Unmaking Imperial Russia examines Hrushevsky's construction of a new historical paradigm that brought about the nationalization of the Ukrainian past and established Ukrainian history as a separate field of study. By showing how the 'all-Russian' historical paradigm was challenged by the Ukrainian national project, Plokhy provides the indispensable background for understanding the current state of relations between Ukraine and Russia.

Ivan the Terrible by Joan Neuberger (review)

272 Reviews A short review is no place to enumerate a collection like this?suffice it to say that there are no 'duds' in this volume, and while readers may spot the omission of their favourite topic (music, magic, the celebration of seasonal festivals, perhaps), there is a diversity that both satisfies and challenges. My own complaint is that the majority of papers focus on the seventeenth century and later?Michael Flier's examination of the Apocalypse in Russian historical experience before 1500, to a lesser extent Isolde Thyret's article on women and Orthodoxy in Muscovite Russia and Daniel Row? land's study of the political language of Orthodoxy expressed by sixteenth-century murals, comprise the few forays into medieval territory.But (given the subtitle ofthe volume) this is an unreasonable gripe, since the firstTsar of Russia (Ivan IV) was not thus crowned until 1547. The collection is rounded offwith a 'view from the West'?a response by Thomas N. Tentler, a historian of medieval and early modern Christianity in Western Eu? rope. This is a practice which might well be promoted?the debates initiated in the 1950s (and continuing today) about 'popular belief and 'Christianization' in Western European culture have not informed the work of Russianists to the extent that they should have. In this volume, Vera Shezov's thought-provoking article in particular is evidence of how fruitfulthat cross-fertilizationcan be. Prompted by the controversy over 'popular faith' versus 'the church', Shezov argues for a concept of 'church' as 'sacred community' rather than a fixed, hierarchical edifice ministering to a populace outside its walls?a use traditional in theological discourse but novel in academe. Attractively illustrated, supplied with a chronology, a map (which could be improved ), proper footnotes, and a decent index, the volume is as impressive in its presentation as in its content. The annotated bibliography includes only Englishlanguage sources for the study of Orthodoxy, and naturally there are omissions, but it offers a useful chronological summary of significant publications none the less. Finally, it is gratifyingto note that while the contributors are generally 'big names', one of the co-editors is a doctoral student?another practice that might be promoted more widely. In short, this book offers a model that might profitably be replicated by other collections arising from workshops and seminars. Would that all were such good value formoney. University of Sussex, Brighton Stella Rock Ivan the Terrible. By Joan Neuberger. (KINOfiles Film Companion 9) London and New York: Tauris. 2003. x+145 pp. ?x2.99. ISBN 1-86064-560-7. This short study of Sergei Eisenstein's film Ivan the Terrible is written by Joan Neuberger of the University of Texas at Austin, the author of a monograph on hooliganism in early twentieth-century St Petersburg. The book's structure is somewhat strange. A brief introduction and chapter on the film's production history are fol? lowed by a long chapter entitled Analysis', which comprises about three-quarters of the total length of the volume. Fortunately, this chapter is subdivided into sections devoted to themes such as 'Politics and History', 'Autobiography and Psychology', and 'Aesthetics and Visual Strategies'. Eisenstein was commissioned to make a film about the sixteenth-century tsar in January 1941, at a time when films,plays, and novels about 'great' historical figures fromthe Russian past were being utilized to develop a sense ofpatriotism in the Soviet people, in a dangerous international situation which was to culminate in the German invasion of June 1941. Eisenstein had earlier contributed to the patriotism campaign with his anti-German Alexander Nevskii (1938), which won a Stalin Prize before be? ing withdrawn from circulation on the signing of the Nazi-Soviet pact in 1939. Ivan MLRy ioo.i, 2005 273 the Terrible was also to sufferfrom the vicissitudes of Soviet political life. Part 1 was awarded a Stalin Prize; but in 1946 Part 11was officiallycriticized, and it was released only in 1958, ten years afterthe director's death. Neuberger is not, however, primarily interested in the cultural politics of the making and reception of Eisenstein's film. She argues that the director wanted 'to offera critique of violent despotism in general' (p. 29) as well...

К вопросу о межславянских лексических заимствованиях в русском приказном языке XVII века

The article examines the history of the following words found in diplomatic correspondence of Muscovite Russia of the 17th century: vstupan'e 'entry (into); come into smth. (administration, possession); accession to the throne', vygubiti 'kill; exterminate, extirpate; destroy', vyznan´e 'confession; confirmation, evidence', vymogati, vymoci 'extort (from)', vypušcen´e 'release; liberation,', vysvobo?(d)en'e 'liberation; discharge', vysluchati 'listen (to)'. The author aims at proving that these intraslavonic derivates are interslavonic borrowings/loanwords in the written Russian language of the second half of the 16th and 17th centuries. The article contains facts proving these words to be Polonisms in the Russian language and “prostaja mova”, the latter, in the author's opinion, appeared to be the mediator when these words were being borrowed by the Russian language. The materials of the article considerably specify the chronology of vstupan´e, vymogati, vymoci, vypušcen´e in the Russian written language...

Orthodox Russia: belief and practice under the tsars

Contents Acknowledgments List of Illustrations Chronology Introduction Valerie A. Kivelson and Robert H. Greene Part I: Destabilizing Dichotomies 1. Old and New, High and Low: Straw Horsemen of Russian Orthodoxy Laura Engelstein 2. Two Cultures, One Throne Room: Secular Courtiers and Orthodox Culture in the Golden Hall of the Moscow Kremlin Daniel Rowland 3. Letting the People into Church: Reflections on Orthodoxy and Community in Late Imperial Russia Vera Shevzov Part II: Imagining the Sacred 4. From Corpse to Cult in Early Modern Russia Eve Levin 5. Protectors of Women and the Lower Orders: Constructing Sainthood in Modern Russia Nadieszda Kizenko Part III: Encountering the Sacred 6. Till the End of Time: The Apocalypse in Russian Historical Experience Before 1500 Michael S. Flier 7. Women and the Orthodox Faith in Muscovite Russia: Spiritual Experience and Practice Isolde Thyret Part IV: Living Orthodoxy 8. Quotidian Orthodoxy: Domestic Life in Early Modern Russia Daniel H. Kaiser 9. God of Our Mothers: Reflections on Lay Female Spirituality in Late Eighteenth- and Early Nineteenth-Century Russia Gary Marker 10. Paradoxes of Piety: The Nizhegorod Convent of the Exaltation of the Cross, 1807-1935 William G. Wagner 11. Orthodoxy as Ascription (and Beyond): Religious Identity on the Edges of the Orthodox Community, 1740-1917 Paul W. Werth Epilogue: A View from the West Thomas N. Tentler Annotated Bibliography List of Contributors Index

Isolde Thyret. Between God and Tsar: Religious Symbolism and the Royal Women of Muscovite Russia. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2001. xvi, 275 pp. $40.00.

"Isolde Thyret. Between God and Tsar: Religious Symbolism and the Royal Women of Muscovite Russia. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2001. xvi, 275 pp. $40.00." published on 01 Jan 2004 by Brill | Schöningh.

Between God and Tsar: Religious Symbolism and the Royal Women of Muscovite Russia by Isolde s> Thyret (review)

I40 SEER, 8i, I, 2003 Bushkovitchacknowledgesthat such 'bizarre'appointmentswere 'important' (p. 373), but makesno attempt to explore the linksbetween 'real' and 'mock' roles or to reflect in his narrative the comparatively large amount of time which Peter devoted to 'play'. The forthcoming work of Ernest Zitser, who arguesthat parodic institutionswere vital for binding Peter's'disciples'to his cause, should provide a corrective.Another omission within the goals which the authorsetshimselfis any systematicexaminationof the role ofwomen and female networks.Despite the statementthat 'inattentionto Peter'sprivatelife is a basic methodological error' (p. 6), he offers surprisinglylittle on Peter's relationship with his second family and especially with his second wife Catherine. The couple's wedding in I712, the guest list of which had implications for court politics, is passed over in a few sentences, Catherine's alliance with Alexander Menshikov is never explored in any detail and even her children are mostly consigned to footnotes. There is littlepreparationfor the statementthatby I724 she had become a 'formidablefigure'(p. 433). My other criticism concerns the vexed issue of 'user-friendliness'.To take full advantage of the considerable erudition displayed here, readers need a sound knowledge of Russian history and a command of Russian and several otherEuropeanlanguages.The footnotes,which at a roughestimatecomprise some thirty per cent of the text, feature extensive extracts from primary sources in the original languages French, German, Dutch, Swedish sometimes accompanying Englishtranslationsin the text, more often without benefitof translation.Charactersand institutionsareoftenintroducedwithout explanation and sometimes are spelt inconsistently (e.g., Westphal/ Westphalen,Jules/Juel). Just a few nods in the direction of intelligent nonspecialists providinga glossaryof the Russiantermsin the text, familytrees of the royal family and leading clans, more references to furtherreading in English - could have widened the book's usefulnesswithout compromising its scholarship. In conclusion, as a narrative about relations between the ruling, male elite in the period I671-17I8 aimed at specialists in Russian history, this book has no rivals. Readers wishing to know about women, peasants, buildings, pictures, battles, ceremonies, religion, historiography, myths and legends and Peter's own pastimes and passions will need to look elsewhere. School ofSlavonic andEastEuropean Studies LINDSEY HUGHES University College London Thyret, Isolde. Between GodandTsar.Religious Symbolism andtheRoyalWomen of Muscovite Russia.Northern Illinois University Press, DeKalb, IL, 2001. XiV+ 275 PP. Illustrations. Tables. Notes. Glossary. Appendix. Bibliography .Index. [30.50. DURING recent years, scholars of medieval and early modern Europe have shown a resurgence of interest in women's studies and in the concept of queenship. As a result,Russianwomen, too, have been the subjectsof several new studies, among which Isolde Thyret's book is a timely and valuable addition. BetweenGodand Tsardoes not replicate, nor aim to supersede, REVIEWS I4I previous authors on Russian women, such as Susanne McNally, Alexandre Eck or Lindsey Hughes, but seeksto complement theirwork, and in doing so providesa fascinatingnew insightinto thepoliticaland sociallife of Muscovite Russia. The author'sstatedaim isto explore the development of the image and role of royal women in the evolution of the ideology of centralizedgovernment in Muscovy, fromthe consolidationof the GrandPrincipalityin the late fifteenth century to the end of the Muscovite period in the late seventeenth century. Thyret considers the role that royal women played in politics, society and culture, and the extent to which religious symbolism interpreted that role. Much of the book dealswith the productionof mythsdefiningthe role of royal women, and the part played by the Russian Orthodox Church and royal women themselvesin thismythopoeic process. Between GodandTsarchallenges previous assumptionsabout the oppressive nature of the Russian autocracy's impact on the role of royal women, who have frequently been portrayed as victims. Thyret refutes the view that the terem (theliving quartersof female members of the ruler'sfamily)implied the removal of these women from public life, and points out that their lives were far more complex and dynamic than historians, all too often influenced by contemporarynotions, have formerlyassumed.Likewise,Thyretconvincingly shows that the Byzantine religious heritage did not influence the position of Russianwomen entirelynegatively,as some scholarshave claimed. Although the chapters of Between GodandTsarare arranged thematically, thisarrangementoften coincideswith a chronologicalviewpoint. Chapterone analysesthe myth of the 'Tsaritsa'sBlessedWomb', focusing on the maternal role of Muscovite queens. The second chapter considersthe tsaritsa'srole as helpmate...

Between God and Tsar: Religious Symbolism and the Royal Women of Muscovite Russia

Between God and Tsar: Religious Symbolism and the Royal Women of Muscovite Russia

Reviews of Books:Between God and Tsar: Religious Symbolism and the Royal Women of Muscovite Russia Isolde Thyret

Reviews of Books:Between God and Tsar: Religious Symbolism and the Royal Women of Muscovite Russia Isolde Thyret

Archangel: Nederlandse ondernemers in Rusland 1550-1785 (review)

Jan Willem Veluwenkamp's history of Dutch entrepreneurship in early modern Russia is in many ways a long-overdue work. The relationship between Muscovite Russia and the Republic of the United Provinces of the Netherlands was of crucial importance for Russia's development during a period that saw its rise from a peripheral grand duchy to a great European power. By 1600, the Netherlands had established itself as Russia's most important trade partner in the West - or, indeed, anywhere - and it retained that position without a serious challenge for the century that followed. In their efforts to create a basic industrial infrastructure to support, above all else, the armed forces, Russian rulers turned first and foremost to the Dutch. Whether we look at the history of the White Sea port of Arkhangel'sk or the rise of Russian iron manufacturing, we are constantly reminded that the "Golden Age" of the Dutch republic was also the golden era of Dutch-Russian relations. It was also, as Veluwenkamp reminds us at the outset, in a very real sense Russia's first "window on Europe," or at least one of the first. Veluwenkamp's study does valuable work in tracing the evolution of these relations beyond their zenith into the first century of the Russian empire.