Ivan Porfirevich Filevich (August 20 (September 1), 1856 – January 7 (20), 1913) – a Russian historian, publicist, and public figure, born in Chełm Land to the family of a Uniate priest, a native of Galicia, Orthodox. He graduated from St. Petersburg University, later taught Russian language, literature, and history at the First Realschule and at the Gymnasium of the Imperial Philanthropic Society in St. Petersburg. Since 1890, he worked at the Department of Russian History at the Imperial Warsaw University, first as an extra-ordinary professor, and since 1897 as an ordinary professor. His origin predetermined his interest in the history of Carpathian Rus, in particular Galicia and Chełm Land, and its population. In 1890, he received a Master’s degree for his work “The Struggle of Poland and Lithuania-Rus for the Galician-Vladimir Legacy”. In 1897, he defended his doctoral degree at Kazan University on “History of Ancient Rus. Territory and Population”. He frequently travelled across Carpathian Rus. Having retired in 1908, he devoted himself to journalistic and social activities. Ivan Filevich authored monographs: “The Struggle of Poland and Lithuania-Rus for the Galicia-Vladimir Legacy. Historical Sketches” (1890) and “History of Ancient Rus. Territory and Population” (1896), as well as numerous studies, among which were: “A Forgotten Corner” (1881), “Ugric Rus and Related Issues and Tasks of Russian Historical Science” (1894), “Sketch of the Carpathian Territory and Population” (1895), “On the development of geographical nomenclature” (1899), “Concerning the theory of two Russian nationalities” (1902), “The question of two Russian nationalities and ‘Kievan Antiquity’” (1902), “Carpathian Rus on the eve of the 20th century” (1905), “From the History of Carpathian Rus. Essays on Galician-Russian Life Since 1772 (1848–1866)” (1907) etc. Many of his minor materials (criticism and bibliographies) were published in Izvestia of the St. Petersburg Slavic Charitable Society, Slavic Review, Journal of the Ministry of Public Education, Warsaw University News, etc. In his last years, Filevich was actively involved in social and journalistic activities, popularizing scientific knowledge and informing readers about Western Russian, especially Chełm and Polish issues. His articles were published mainly in Novoye Vremya. He drew up notes and historical references for the development of legislative proposals on the Chełm and presented historical, statistical, and economic materials in the Duma commission on the separation of Chełm. Filevich managed to see the results of his work. The law “On the formation of Chełm province from the eastern parts of the Lublin and Sedletsk provinces, with its removal from the administration of the Warsaw Governor-General” was approved on June 23 (July 6) 1912. However, in fact, the province was officially opened on September 8, 1913, after I.P. Filevich’s death.
The stories of Batyrbek Tuganov and their signifi cance in the history of Ossetian Russian-language prose
