Regional Features of Planning and Decorative Housing Traditions of Slobozhanshchyna

Folk architecture is one of the markers of ethnic culture. Builders had to take into account the features of natural conditions, with using natural materials of their dwelling area. However, abode is still the embodiment of the ideal of beauty and comfort, so even while moving to another region, people tried to recreate the ideal under new conditions. Since the reputable researchers of Slobozhanshchyna Ukrainians’ ethno-culture Mykola Sumtsov, Stefan Taranushenko and others convincingly proved the Hutsuls’ participation in the settlement of Sloboda Ukraine in the XVIIth century, it seems interesting to conduct a comparative analysis of folk architecture of Slobozhanshchyna and Hutsulshchyna Ukrainians. Materials from expeditions to Slobozhanshchyna and the 2012 exploration journey to Hutsulshchyna became the ground for our studies. Comparison of planning and decoration solutions, as well as principles of housing of Ukrainians in different parts of Ukraine proves their all-Ukrainian character. Changes in housing construction and decoration materials are caused by socio-economic transformations. However, the significance of a House for Ukrainians remains unchanged.

MYTHOPOEIC PARADIGM IN ENGLISH BAROQUE DRAMA (JOHN WEBSTER “THE WHITE DEVIL”)

The article deals with the mythopoeic analysis of the play of revenge “The White Devil” by John Webster. The historical background of the play is also under examination. The tragedy “White Devil” (1612) is known in the translations by I. Aksenov, T. Potnitseva. The genre of tragedy in the XVII th century reflects the writers’ appeal to the biblical text and its transformation in motives, images, stylistic and generic systems, this tradition is particular important for the baroque writers, the constant feature of the English dramaturgy of the XVIIth century is appeal to the antique mythology and the national cultural heritage.

The Birth of the National Historical Writing in England and France

The monograph is a study of main trends of emergence and evolution of the national historical writing in Western Europe in the XVIIth century. Based on a complex analysis of several phenomena which defined the development of the Early Modern historical writing, it provides a comparative analysis of the regional schools of historical writing (particularly those of the English antiquaries and French érudits) in the process of their respective growth and formation accomplished by the end of XVIIth century with the advent of the national historiography. The conceptual unity of the book is verified within the context of the rise of the national states in England and France, which stipulated a consistent demand for reinforcing the nationally orientated discourses not only in a historical writing but also in legal and political thought. The perception of England as an empire, entrenched in the insular historical and legal consciousness, recurring during the reigns of the Stuarts and extending to the whole British archipelago, determined the establishment of chorography as a prevalent form characteristic of the English historiography. Chorographic structure of the narrative unfolding the space of the territorial “empire” to the reader corresponded to the method of “intellectual appropriation” of the British Isles by the English antiquarians which could be defined as “cultural-historical”. A considerable role was devoted to reactualization of ethnogenetic myths at different levels: while some of them (primarily – the Galfridian myth) were regarded as relevant to the pan-British cultural and historical past, others emphasized autonomous dimensions of the past and present of distinct composites (Scotland, Ireland, Wales) The continental French variant of proto-national historiography also utilized the idea of empire but in a different mode defined by the formula “rex in regno suo imperator est”. The emerging school of érudits modelled principles of its narratives on patrimonial structures rooted in the feudal medieval society (dynasty; royal family; aristocratic lineages; seigneurial rights and vassal obligations; the system of offices created by the monarch stemming from the royal household etc.). The unity of the subjects of the French kingdom was ensured not by the shared territorial commonality but by their loyalty to the king. Therefore, the French variant of “intellectual appropriation” was developed in a socio-political direction in contrast to the territorial.

The Eclipse of Reason. M.F. Sciacca on Western Civilization

We offer to our readers the first Russian translation of the chapter “La stupidita” from the book L’oscuramento dell’intelligenza by the Italian Catholic philoso­pher M.F. Sciacca, who called his teaching Christian Spiritualism. The starting point for him is the ancient idea of measure, understanding the finiteness of exis­tence in relationship with other finite beings and with infiniteness of God. The wisdom consists of life according to the order of being, in the perfect real­ization of the proper finite existence. The eclipse of mind is the strife of identifi­cation with the beings, having a lower place in the cosmic order, or a hubris, a loss of pietas, an exaltation of himself to the level of God. The civilizations die as a result of arrogance and stupidity, of the eclipse of reason. Hellenism re­placed the ancient wisdom, the Roman was replaced by Romanism; during the last four centuries, the eclipse of the western reason is in process, transforming the West into “Occidentalism”. This process began in the baroque times, so-called “Great Systems” of the XVIIth century were the first stage of this eclipse: ontology was replaced by methodology, gradually transformed into technology of attainment of the “optimum of happiness”. The contemporary stage of this de­cline is not even decadence but complete corruption. The West is dead now, rests the “Occidentalism’, imposed on the entire world. All the religions and even the ideologies of previous times gave way to the cult of production and consump­tion. The ruling technocracy replicates the type of homo calculator, claiming to be the apex of human development and “measure of all the things”.

Interiors of Moscow Palaces of the Second Half of the XVIIth Century: Experience of Inventory-Taking

The article is dedicated to investigation of the palaces’ interiors of the XVIIth century. No genuine palace interior of that time has survived in Russia; therefore, inventories of palaces including the wooden palace which was built in Kolomenskoye are analysed. The goal of the study is to check the possibility of interiors’ visualization on the basis of detailed criss-cross study of documents, pictures and authentic items presented by archaeological findings from museum collections. Both published as and unpublished materials were considered by author. The earlier attempts of such reconstructions took place and were successful in their own ways. However, the researchers restricted themselves with the information contained in written sources. A critical analysis of those attempts is provided. In general, involvement of the survived items and rare pictures as analogues used for saturation of interiors of the 17th and the 18th centuries with items was tested as early as in 2010s when interiors in a copy of the palace in Kolomenskoye were restored in nature. Such experiment in itself demands understanding and scientific substantiation, that is related to a source study task. One of the way to solve it is to evaluate the very possibility of forming of complete inventories of the modern type for palaces’ interiors of the XVII-early XVIII centuries.

Epidemie w dziejach Wadowic w okresie przedrozbiorowym – studium przypadku miasta małopolskiego

Epidemics in the history of Wadowice in the pre-partition period. A study of a town in Małopolska This article aims to analyze the traces of the pestilence in Wadowice in Małopolska up to 1772, when the town became part of the Austrian partition. Hitherto this topic has only been mentioned in the literature. Thanks to a use of sources from the period, and, above all, archives in, for example, the Archiwum Parafialnym Bazyliki Ofiarowania Najświętszej Marii Panny w Wadowicach and in the Archiwum Kurii Metropolitalnej w Krakowie, the author has discovered traces of the appearance of large-scale epidemics in Wadowice in 1585, 1601, 1652–1653, and probably in 1737, 1752, and 1758. In the Wadowice records of deaths (Liber Mortuorum), it has been possible to identify entries that would indicate the appearance of at least local epidemics in the period 1730–1772. In addition, a hitherto unknown note by the local pastor from 1756 has been found, which provides information about epidemics in the town in the XVIIth century and of their avoidance at the time of pestilence raging over large areas of the Polish Commonwealth and beyond its borders between 1708 and 1709. This source, published as an annex to the article, also shows the approaches of the inhabitants of Wadowice to the plague, which were typical of the period, and included: dedicating the town to the Mother of God, and the conviction that the misfortunes falling on the town, such as epidemics or fires, were a punishment for sins. The article ends with a recommendation in the future to carry out comparative research that makes it possible to compare the results from Wadowice with those from other towns in the western part of Małopolska.