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Did a Church Council Meet in 1581? A Question of Method

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

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Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1983

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References

1. Sobranie gosudarstvennykh gramot i dogovorov (hereafter SGGD), vol. 1 (Moscow, 1813), 200: 583-87.

2. S., Vashilov, Sudebnik gosudaria tsaria i velikogo kniazia loanna Vasil'evicha i nekotorye sego gosudaria ukazy, sobrannye V. N. Tatishchevym (Moscow, 1768)Google Scholar, ms. BAN 16.14.9; Svodnyi sudebnik uchinennyi po ukazu ego velichestva gosudaria tsaria i velikogo kniazia loanna Vasil'evicha vseia Rossii samoderzhtsa (St. Petersburg, 1774), pp. 51-53; L., Maksimovich, Ukazatel’ Rossiiskikh zakonov, pt. 1 (Moscow, 1803), pp. 26–106 Google Scholar; L., Maksimovich, Ustavy velikogo kniazia Vladimira Kievskogo i vseia Rusi, Russkaia pravda velikogo kniazia laroslava Vladimirovicha, Sudebnik tsaria loanna Vasil'evicha, Ulozhenie tsaria Alekseia Mikhailovicha, so svodom novoukaznykh statei (Moscow, 1808), pp. 26–106 Google Scholar; Pamiatniki russkogo prava (hereafter PRP), vol. 4, Pamiatnikiprava perioda ukrepleniia russkogo tsentralizovannogo gosudarstva XV-XVII vv. (Moscow, 1956), pp. 526-29, ms. GBL, Rogozh. 660.

3. Akty, sobrannye v bibliotekakh i arkhivakh Rossiiskoi imperii Arkheograficheskoi ekspeditsei imperatorskoi Akademii nauk (hereafter AAE), vol. 1, 308: 372-73, ms. GPB, Pogodin 1842

4. A., Pavlov, Istoricheskii ocherk sekuliarizatsii tserkovnykh zetnel’ v Rossii, pt. 1 Google Scholar, Popytki k obrashcheniiu v gosudarstvennuiu sobstvennost’ pozemel'nykh vladenii russkoi tserkvi v XVI veke (1503-1580 g.) (Odessa, 1871), pp. 142-43 n. 3; Rozhdestvenskii, S. V., Sluzhiloe zemlevladenie v Moskovskom gosudarstve XVI veka (St. Petersburg, 1897), p. 114 n. 3Google Scholar.

5. V. Miliutin, “O nedvizhimykh imushchestvakh dukhovenstva v Rossii,” Chteniia v Obshchestve istorii i drevnostei rossiiskikh pri Moskovskom universitete (Moscow, 1859), book 4, section 1, p. 43; Gorchakov, M. I., O zemel'nykh vladeniiakh vserossiiskikh mitropolitov, patriarkhov i sv. Sinoda (St. Petersburg, 1871), p. 165 Google Scholar.

6. A. I., Andreev, “Svodnyi sudebniklzvestiia Rossiiskoi akademii nauk, 6th ser., 19 (1925): 639 Google Scholar.

7. Veselovskii, S. B., Feodal'noe zemlevladenie v Severo-Vostochnoi Rusi (Moscow and Leningrad, 1947), p. Leningrad Google Scholar. But he provided no examples.

8. A. A. Zimin, “Istoriko-pravovoi obzor,” PRP, vol. 4 (1956): 560. An American historian subsequently seems to have implicitly adopted Andreev's position that a new decision confirmed the old decision without a new council having been convened: “It [the Decree of 1580] was reaffirmed on January 15, 1581.” Richard, Hellie, Enserfment and Military Change in Muscovy (Chicago and London, 1971), p. 292 n. 150Google Scholar. Hellie cites Veselovskii and Zimin, but not Andreev.

9. Shmidt, S. O., Stanovlenie rossiiskogo samoderzhavstva. Issledovanie sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii vremeni lvana Groznogo (Moscow, 1973), pp. 182–83 Google Scholar.

10. B. N. Floria, “Voina mezhdu Rossiei i Rech'iu Pospolitoi na zakliuchitel'nom etape Livonskoi voiny i vnutreniaia politika pravitel'stva lvana IV,” Voprosy istoriografii i istochnikovedeniia slaviano-germanskikh otnoshenii (Moscow, 1973), p. 185 n. 29. He pointed out that instead of document A's “Arkhimandrit Troitsy zhivonachal'nye Sergieva monastyria Iona, Troitsy zhivonachal'nye Sergieva monastyria byvshei Arkhimandrit Feodosei,” document B reads “Arkhimandrit Troitsy Sergieva monastyria byvshei Arkhimandrit Feodosei,” and instead of document A's “Igumen Pakhnot'evskoi iz Borovska Tikhan, Igumen Osifovskogo monastyria Volotskoi Eufimei,“ document B reads “Igumen Eufimei.“

11. Floria, p. 185 n. 29.

12. Skrynnikov, R. G., Rossiia posle oprichniny. Ocherki politicheskoi i sotsial'noi istorii (Leningrad, 1975), p. 70 Google Scholar. He mentions only the “Igumen Eufimei” reading that Floria pointed out.

13. Skrynnikov, pp. 69-70.

14. For the 1446 council, see Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisei (hereafter PSRL), 37 vols. (St. Petersburg and Moscow, 1843-1982), 21:467; for the 1447 council, see Akty istoricheskie, sobrannye i i^dannye Arkheograficheskoi komissiei (hereafter AI), vol. 1, 40: 75-83; for the 1448 council, see Pamiatniki drevne-russkogo kanonicheskogoprava (hereafter PDKP), pt. 1 (Pamiatniki XI-XV v.), 2nded. (St. Petersburg, 1908) (Russkaia istoricheskaia biblioteka, vol.6, 2nd ed. [St. .Petersburg, 1908]), cols. 555-64, PSRL, 21:470, and AI, 1, 43: 86; for the 1503 council, see AAE, 1, 382 and 383a: 484-87 and Donald Ostrowski, “A ‘Fontological’ Investigation of the 1503 Church Council,” Ph.D. diss., Pennsylvania State University, 1977, pp. 517-47; for the 1504 council, see PSRL, 6:49, PSRL, 8:244, and PSRL, 12:258; for the 1553 council, see AAE, 1, 238: 246-49; for the 1554 council, see AAE, 1, 239:249-56 and PSRL, 13:232; for the 1555 council, see PSRL, 13:249-50; for the 1572 council, see AAE, 1, 284: 329-32; and for the 1573 council, see AI, 1, 154: 270.

15. See Stoglav sobor byvshii v Moskve (London, 1860), pp. 195-97; Stoglav (Kazan', 1862), pp. 356-64; and Jack Kollmann, “The Moscow Stoglav ('Hundred Chapters’) Church Council of 1551,” Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan, 1978, pp. 342-48.

16. Spiski ierarkhov i nastoiatelei monastyrei Rossiiskie tserkvi, comp. by Pavel Stroev (St. Petersburg, 1877), col. 58. For this datum about Iosif, Floria also cited the Opisanie Antonieva Novgorodskogo monastyria (Moscow, 1810), which is unavailable to me. Thus, no direct primary source evidence is known that can be brought to bear on this question.

17. According to Stroev, other participants either died or left their positions in 1581, and no further mention is made of them. Stroev, cols. 6, 169, 175, 287, 746, and 816. Also several prelates are not heard about after January 15, 1580. Stroev, cols. 65, 143, 150, 247 339, 385, 421, 448, 571, 600, 610, 662, 697, 748, 1031, 1035, and 1049-1050. But none of these can be used as evidence against the 1581 council simply because, in the first case, we do not know when in 1581 they might have died (anytime after January 15) and, in the second case, Stroev did not use the B document as a source for his list. If he had, then 1581 would be the last date of mention for them

18. See Lur'e, la. S., ldeologicheskaia bor'ba v russkoipublitsistike kontsa XVnachala XVI veka (Moscow and Leningrad, 1960), pp. 239–41 Google Scholar. Marc Szeftel, “Joseph Volotsky's Political Ideas in a New Historical Perspective,” Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas, 13 (1965): 19-29; see also Daniel Rowland, “The Problem of Advice in Muscovite Tales about the Time of Troubles,” Russian History, 6 (1979): 259-83 and idem, “Towards an Understanding of the Political Ideas in Ivan Timofeev's Vremennik,” Slavonic and East European Review, forthcoming.

19. For example, the Decision of the 1503 Church Council concerning widower priests was annulled by the Church Council of 1667. Deianiia moskovskikh soborov 1666-1667 gg. (Moscow, 1893), fols. 86v-89v. The decision concerning simony from that same 1503 council, however, was never annulled, but was enforced only once — in 1504. See PRSL, 6:49, 244; PSRL, 8:244; PSRL, 12:258; PRSL, 20, pt. 1, p. 374; PSRL, 28:337; and Ioasafovskaia letopis', ed. A. A. Zimin (Moscow, 1957), p. 146.

20. See McGeehon, M. B., “The Problem of Secularization in Sixteenth-Century Muscovy,” The Council of 1503: Source Studies and Questions of Ecclesiastical Landowning in Sixteenth-Century Muscovy, ed. Keenan, Edward L. and Ostrowski, Donald (Cambridge, Mass., 1977), pp. 164–88Google Scholar.

21. PRP, 4:495-98, 548; cf. pp. 363-70.

22. For example, in sec. 1, chap. 127, the date of the decree of May 5, 1555 is listed in various copies as May 5, 1552; May 15, 1552; 1557/1558; May 15, 1558; and May 15, 1559 (PRP, 4:546). In sec. 1, chap. 128, the decree of December 25,1557 is listed in various copies as 1555/1556; August 4, 1558; and 1558/1559 (PRP, 4:548). In sec. 12, chap. 149, the decree of November 30, 1558 is listed in some copies as November 30, 1557 (PRP, 4:552). In sec. 13, chap. 119, the decree of May 11, 1551 is listed in various copies as May 1, 1551; May 5, 1555; May 1, 1557; and May 1, 1558 (PRP, 4:555-56).

23. In addition to the copying errors pointed out by Floria, we see that instead of document A's ”… Varlam, episkop Smolenskoi i Brianskoi Selivestr, episkop Rezanskoi i Muromskoi Leonid,“ document B reads “ … Varlam, episkop Rezanskii i Muromskii Leonid“; instead of document A's ”… Zakhariia, episkop Iur'evskoi i Vilianskoi Kornilei, episkop Kolomenskoi i Koshirskoi Davyd,” document B reads ”… Zakhariia, episkop Kolomenskii i Koshirskii Davyd.“

24. It omits these names: the hegumen of the Pskov-Pechersk Monastery Selivestr; the archimandrite of the Kamenskii-Vologda Monastery [Ignatii?]; the hegumen of the Nikitskii-Periaslavl' Monastery Nikon, the hegumen of the Kolotskii-Mozhaisk Monastery Eufimei, and the hegumen of the Vezhitskii-Novgorod Monastery Selivestr; as well as the elder Izamilo Snazin. Document A is not faultless either: it omits the name Misailo, archimandrite of the Luzhetskii- Mozhaisk Monastery. It also omits, according to the conjecture of the editor (SGGD), l:584n), the words: “Khristofor, Simonova monastyria arkhimandrit Germogen Bogoroditsyna monastyria iz Sviizhska arkhimandrit Avramei.” From the omission the compiler of document B manages to restore the first five words, presumably taking them (as the SGGD editor did) from the list of signatures on the reverse side of document A.

25. Karl, Popper, The Poverty of Historicism, 2nd ed. (London, 1960), pp. 133–34 Google Scholar.

26. S. B., Veselovskii, “Monastyrskoe zemlevladenie v Moskovskoi Rusi vo vtoroi polovine XVI v.htoricheskie zapiski, 10 (1941): 101 Google Scholar.

27. Rude and Barbarous Kingdom. Russia in the Accounts of Sixteenth-Century English Voyagers, ed. Lloyd E. Berry and Robert O. Crummey (Madison, Milwaukee, and London, 1968), p. 281.

28. Russia at the Close of the Sixteenth Century, ed. E. A. Bond (London, 1856), p. 175.

29. Ellerd, Hulbert, “The Zemskii Sobor of 1575: A Mistake in Translation,” Slavic Review, 25 (1966): 321 Google Scholar.

30. There appears to be some confusion about when Ivan married Mariia Nagaia. For example, Berry and Crummey place the marriage in 1581. Berry and Crummey, p. 286 n. 2. Payne and Roumanoff place it in “the summer of 1580.” Payne, Robert and Roumanoff, Nikita, Ivan the Terrible (New York, 1978), p. 1978 Google Scholar. The best evidence is provided by Skrynnikov for October 1580. Skrynnikov, p. 67 n. 25.

31. Skrynnikov, pp. 70-71 n. 39.

32. For the council of 1459, see PDKP, cols. 627-32; for the council of 1503, see AAE, 1, 382: 484-85 and 383a: 485-87 and Ostrowski, pp. 517-47; for the council of 1554, see AAE, 1, 239: 249-56; for the council of 1564, see AI, 1, 173: 331-33; for the council of 1572, see AAE, 1, 284: 329-32; for the council of 1584, see SGGD, 1, 202: 592-93; for the council of 1589, see SGGD, 2, 59: 95-103; for the council of 1592, see Dopolneniia k AI, 1 (St. Petersburg, 1846), 137: 228-30; and for the council of 1598, see AAE, 2, 6: 13-16.

33. This is, in effect, what Keenan did when he challenged the authenticity of the Kurbskii- Groznyi Correspondence, for he also challenged all the writings that had been attributed to them. See Keenan, Edward L., The Kurbskii-Groznyi Apocrypha: The Seventeenth-Century Genesis of the “Correspondence” Attributed to Prince A. M. Kurbskii and Tsar Ivan TV, with an appendix by Daniel C. Waugh (Cambridge, Mass., 1971), pp. 62-71, 211–14CrossRefGoogle Scholar.