scholarly journals Slavonic Translations of the “Master of Rhodes Letter”

Scrinium ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-27
Author(s):  
Maria Korogodina ◽  
Aleksey Sergeev ◽  
Aleksey Sirenov

Abstract The “Master of Rhodes Letter”, which tells of the birth of the Antichrist, was one of the most popular eschatological writings in Europe in the 15th century. This pseudo-epistle was translated from Latin into Russian in the middle of the 15th century in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania by Feofil Dederkin, an informant for the Grand Duke of Moscow Vasily Vasilyevich. Previously only one letter from Dederkin to the Grand Duke Vasily Vasilyevich was known: a translation from Latin describing the earthquakes in Italy in 1456. The “Master of Rhodes Letter” was translated a second time into Ukrainian from Latin in the 1630s, during a time when the Orthodox hierarchy in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth resisted the adoption of the Union of Brest. The third translation was made from English into Russian at beginning of the 18th century, and was believed by Metropolitan Job of Novgorod to be the work of Old Believers.

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-60
Author(s):  
Adam Stankevič

This article gives an analysis of the punishment the noble courts of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania applied to murderers in the second half of the 18th century, where the noble courts acted as courts of first instance in hearing murder cases. The author aims to determine the catalogue of punishments applied in such cases and the trends in the application of punishments in terms of how they conformed with the valid legal norms of the day, and search for manifestations of the humanisation of the law. After an examination of 184 verdicts, the author found that in cases of wilful murder, the noble courts usually applied the death penalty as per the set laws. Exceptions applied only to individuals from the estate of nobles, who instead of receiving a death sentence were sometimes sentenced to lower or upper tower punishment, which was by law ordinarily applied to other crimes. At the same time, the executors avoided qualified ways of applying the death sentence (capital punishment). Of the qualified forms of punishment, only quartering was applied, usually to those convicted of the aforementioned crime, ritual murder, and, in some instances, in cases of robbery. Alternative forms of punishment were episodic, and were only applied to a small number of convicted persons: imprisonment as a form of punishment recommended by philosophers of the Age of Enlightenment was applied in only 5.3 per cent of murder cases. In most instances, imprisonment was related to the introduction of the 1782 Cardinal Laws of the Permanent Council. In this way, the research reveals the conservative nature of the estate of nobles in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and their efforts to continue to adhere to the strict law outlined in the Third Statute of Lithuania. It is likely that this practice could have been a result of the poor state of the penitentiary system, as there was not a single public prison in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania at the time where long-term imprisonment could have been possible.


2020 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
pp. 38-53
Author(s):  
Jelena Celunova

This article is devoted to the research of the Book of Psalms manuscript from A. S. Norovʼs book collection stored in the Department of manuscripts of the Russian State Library. The manuscript is written in the beginning of the 18th century in Church Slavonic language Polish letters. This manuscript has never been studied before, it is nonetheless of interest primarily as a Latin-graphic text, which is a transliteration of the originals in Church Slavonic. Very few such texts have survived, and almost all of them were created in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The article provides a complete description of the manuscript and analyses of its language peculiarities. The analysis has made it possible to identify Church Slavonic protographs of the manuscript, and also to establish that the manuscript was written by women (most likely nuns) for private use. Since the authors of the transliteration themselves had very good command of Church Slavonic, it can be assumed that the text was written to order. Against the background of the cultural and historical context of the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries it can be assumed that the manuscript was written by the nuns of one of the southwestern Russian Uniate monasteries who had moved to one of the monasteries in Russia at that time.


2013 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 7-34
Author(s):  
Сергей Юрьевич Темчин

В статье обосновывается характеристика недавно обнаруженного рукописного кириллического учебника древнееврейского языка, созданного совместными усилиями православных и иудейских книжников, как учебного пособия, с методической точки зрения значительно превосходящего иные восточнославянские двуязычные справочные материалы того же времени. С этой целью подробно описаны применяемые в нем приемы, направленные на такую подачу языкового и сопутствующего текстового (религиозно-культурного) материала, которая облегчила бы его усвоение потенциальным читателем. Методическую сторону рассматриваемого памятника письменности следует признать одним из результатов еврейского вклада в его создание.Ключевые слова: Великое княжество Литовское, кириллическая письменность, иудейско-христианские отношения, древнееврейский язык, руськамова, библейские переводы, жидовствующие....Sergei TemchinCyrillic 16th-century manuscript “Manual of Hebrew” and its teaching methods A concise Manual of Hebrew, recently discovered in a Cyrillic manuscript miscellany of the 3rd quarter of the 16th century (Moscow, the Russian State Archive of Early Acts, F. Mazurin collection (f. 196), inventory 1, No 616, f. 124–130) is very important for the history of the Ruthenian written culture in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The Manual of Hebrew comprises material of three different kinds: a) some excerpts from the original Hebrew Old Testament text (Ge 2.8, 32.27–28; Ps 150; So 3.4 (or 8.2), 8.5; Is 11.12) written in Cyrillic characters; b) a bilingual Hebrew–Ruthenian vocabulary with explanatory notes; c) small quotations from the Ruthenian text of three Old Testament books (Genesis, Isaiah, Song of Songs).The meta-language used in the Manual of Hebrew is Ruthenian. The translations present in the Manual had been made directly from Hebrew. A comparison of the quotations from the Song of Songs found in the Manual and all the known Cyrillic and Glagolitic versions of this book (referring to both the manuscript and the printed sources of different periods) reveals their principal coincidence with the Ruthenian translation found in the Vilnius Old Testament Florilegium (Vilnius, Wróblewskie Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, F 19–262). The originals of the two manuscripts probably originated in the 2nd half of the 15th century in the circle of the learned Kievan Jew Zachariah ben Aaron ha-Kohen who is also known as Skhariya, the initiator of the Novgorod movementof the Judaizers (1471–1504).The Cyrillic Manual of Hebrew is a clear evidence of this language being taught/learned in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania during the late 15th–early 16th century. The learning material and its presentation methods reveal a quite elaborate (although inconsistently implemented) pedagogical approach which puts the Manual aside from the rest of early East Slavic glossaries of the same or earlier date. Thus, the Manual presents, among other features: a) a number of original Hebrew texts written in Cyrillic, divided into small portions (each with a Ruthenian translation) which are then put together to form a continuoustext; b) certain trilingual glossary entries where Hebrew, “Greek” (in reality Slavic borrowings from Greek) and Slavic words are juxtaposed, while in other cases double translations in two different Slavic languages (Ruthenian and Old Church Slavonic) are given; c) some long elaborated definitions, sometimes containing synonymous variants or alternative translations; d) information about the sources of variant Hebrew forms or their meanings; e) information on certain grammatical (gender, plural, possessive) forms and word formation (compounds), etc.It is beyond doubt that the Cyrillic manuscript “Manual of Hebrew” is a result of joint efforts of Jewish and East Slavic bookmen, but the relatively high level of pedagogical and linguistic sophistication of the joint result is to be ascribed to the Jewish compilers of the Manual rather than to their East Slavic co-authors.


2013 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-78
Author(s):  
Рима Циценене

Цель статьи — проанализировать эволюцию представления о рукописной книге и ее рецепции обществом ВКЛ. Для этого требуется установить, каким образом в обществе проявлялась рецепция книги и как это отраженo в источниках того времени. Материалом исследования послужили рукописные кодексы, архивные документы и объекты искусства. Установлено, что книга удовлетворяла служебные, общественные и личные потребности членов общества того времени. С увеличением числа экземпляров и собраний, с повышением разнообразия взаимоотношений человека с книгой в обществе ВКЛ изменялось и само представление о книге. Если на раннем этапе кодекс воспринимался как статичный, сакральный, целостный объект, мало подверженный человеческому влиянию, то уже с XV в. можно говорить о книге как о мобильном, меняющемся объекте, крайне зависимом от связанного с ним человека. Книги мигрировали в географическом и жизненном пространстве.В начале XVI в. изменилось восприятие целостности книги. Понятие о кодексе как о единице, физически объединяющей отдельные произведения (книги), сменило понятие кодекса как единого целого (нового произведения), имеющего общие внутренние и внешние признаки.Ключевые слова: рукописная книга, средневековые кодексы, книжная культура, книга и средневековое общество, Великое княжество Литовское....Rima CicėnienėThe reception of the manuscript book in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the 14th– mid-16th centuries The article aims to analyze changes in society’s view of the manuscript book and its reception. The author investigates the ways in which society manifested its reception of the book and how it is reflected in the sources of that time. Manuscript books, archival sources, and objects of art were used as the sources for the research. It has been established that the book satisfied official, social, and personal needs of society and individuals of the time. As books and collections became increasingly numerous and the relationship with books diversified, the idea of the book in the GDL’s society also underwent a significant change. While during the early stage of the period under study a book was understood as a static and uniform sacral object little influenced by an individual, since the 15th century it was considered to be a mobile, mutable object strongly affected by the persons directly connected with the book. Codices migrated both in the geographical and living space. In the early 16th century, the concept of a book as a unit item also underwent a significant change. The concept of a codex as an object that physically joins separate works (books, liber) was replaced by the idea of a codex as an integral unit (a new work) which possesses both internal and external unifying elements of a book.


Author(s):  
Eduard V. Kaziev

The fortress in the village of Achabet is known from a number of written sources of the early 15th and 18th centuries. Despite this circumstance, in the scientific tradition it is contradictory to believe that the first information about the fortress contained in written sources refers to the events of the middle of the 16th century, and the lower limit of several periods of its construction is correlated by researchers with the same time. The presence of a contradiction between the information about the fortress contained in written sources and the presentation of this information in the scientific tradition determined the relevance of this study. The aim of the study, therefore, was to resolve this contradiction by analyzing and comparing the known information from written sources about this monument with information about it contained in the historical and linguistic literature, as well as with descriptions of the monument presented in the literature on the history of fortifications of the Transcaucasia. This comparison, in turn, made it possible to present a possible chronology of the construction of a number of objects that made up the complex of the monument over several periods of its construction. According to the results of the study, it is assumed that the tower and the adjacent semicircle of the first fortress wall were erected at the turn of the 13th–14th centuries, the second fortress wall was built along the first in the second half of the 15th century, and the third wall, the largest in terms of area covered, was erected in the 30-s of the 18th century. The materials for the study were written sources, as well as information about field examinations of the monument, available in the scientific tradition. The research was carried out on the basis of the method of comparative historical analysis.


Author(s):  
O. Yashchuk

The article is devoted to the problem of representations of supreme authority in the Belarusian-Lithuanian chronicles through a prism of the notices about the gaining and deprivation of the power of the ruler. The author analyzed the first redaction of the Belarusian-Lithuanian chronicles that containing the "Chronicle of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania”, the second redaction that containing the "Chronicle of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania” and the third redaction ("Bychowiec Chronicle”). The study highlighted several ways of the supreme authority’s legitimation: by right of establishment, by right of inheritance, by right of conquest, by the acceptance of the local population, by the electoral way, by the coup if the organizers of it belonging to the ruling dynasty. It should be noted that the way of justifying the right to power through to underscores of blood ties and prince's enthronement of the son of the previous ruler or less often brother is the main way of gaining the power in the chronicles. The article gives a detailed analysis of features of the chronicle notices about the coronation of the representatives of the Gediminids dynasty. In addition, the notices about the deprivation of the authority usually as a result of the death of the ruler are investigated in the article. Notices of the death of the ruler in contradistinction to notices about the enthronement are mainly the fact statements. In the most complete form, the notes of the death of the ruler include the information about a long successful reign, facts of the ruler death and information about the birth and enthronement of the successor.


2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-30
Author(s):  
Ramunė Šmigelskytė-Stukienė

In the mid-18th century, with the spread of the ideas of the Enlightenment, fundamental reforms of the state’s governance were introduced in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Part of the state’s modernisation concerned the reform of the court system, considered by 18th-century political theorists to be one of the composite branches of the state administration (alongside the treasury, the police and the army). During the reign of Stanislas Augustus Poniatowski, the work of the courts of first instance underwent reform on several occasions in Poland and Lithuania: with the passing of laws in 1764, 1792 and 1793 on the structure and organisation of the activities of the castle and land courts, the existing court system was changed, as was the procedure for electing judges, also defining the scope of competency of the courts, regulating court activities and the duties of judges, introducing new requirements for the handling of court procedural documents, and the calculation of judges’ working hours. During the course of the introduction of these reforms, principles reflecting the administrative ideas of the Enlightenment were gradually entrenched in the court system of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which concerned the election of judges and other court officials, the acceptance of collegial decisions, the elimination of the influence of any blood and marital ties, and the principles for remuneration, seeking to introduce stricter requirements for the qualification of judges. In this article, based on legislation on the organisation of court activities passed at the diets (Sejm) of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and documents from the dietines (sejmiki) of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the author seeks to analyse changes to the activities of the courts and the regulation of judges’ duties, and reforms made in the court chanceries between 1764 and 1793.


Archaeology ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 61-80
Author(s):  
Heorhii Kozubovskyi ◽  

The article is devoted to the problem of the «plaiting» presence on the Lithuanian, Lithuanian-Rus and the Golden Horde coins of the 14th century. The coins with portrait and the beast lion (or the leopard) with a «plaiting» over its head and the coins with the beast lion (or the leopard) with a «plaiting» and Arabic (or Cyrillic legend (?)) are analyzed. The Kyivan Rus coins of Vladimir Olgerdovich (1362—1394) with princely sign and «plaiting» (around which is the inscription with the name of the prince) and the Golden Horde coins with «plaiting» are also examined. Many researches associate the «plaiting» with the Tatar «tamga», and the coins with such a symbol might have indicated the Golden Horde dependence. However, this ornament («ornamentum monetale» by Ch. M. Fraehn) may have a special meaning related to the Juchid monetary coinage. The Golden Horde coins with «plaiting» were the most important instrument of payment and taxation realization on the greater part of the Lithuanian and Lithuanian-Rus principalities. After the Syni Vody River battle of 1362 many the Golden Horde centers and trade routes in the basins of the Dnipro, Dnister and Southern Buh rivers were significant sources of the monetary silver arrival. Many qualitative (also with «ornamentum monetale» — «plaiting») silver coins of Abdallah Khan (1363—1370) and Muhammad Bulaq Khan (1370—1380), were minted in the western mints of the Mamai Horde (Azak, Ordu, Shehr al-Jedid). The silver coins of the Golden Horde were the source for the oldest Lithuanian and Lithuanian-Rus coins and bars of Olherd (1345—1377) and his sons. The oldest Lithuanian and Lithuanian-Rus coins made of approximately 900-standart silver corresponded to silver coins of the Golden Horde. The Golden Horde silver coins (also with «ornamentum monetale» — «plaiting») are one of the most constant parts of money circulation in Ukrainian territories of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from the 1360-ies till the first quarter of the 15th century.


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