In the summer of 1668, a detachment of archers, 125 people, appeared under the walls of the Solovetsky Monastery. They looked confused: it seemed that the archers themselves did not understand why they were brought here. Among the inhabitants of Solovki and the brothers, the appearance of a small military detachment caused bewilderment. Thus began a unique event in world history when the Orthodox army besieged an Orthodox monastery. The siege will last eight years and will go down in history as the Solovetsky standing.
Monastery-fortress
There was no siege in the thoughts of those who arrived on the island. How can you besiege a fortress whose garrison is seven times the number of your army? And in the fortress there were a little more than seven hundred defenders. Half of them are monks, but not simple ones, but trained in military affairs and sometimes even more skillful than the Pomor and Arkhangelsk archers. “Elder Hilarion, a gunman, a sailor, at a copper shot cannon, and with him on the turn of worldly people - 6 mercenaries,” - this is the composition of one of the detachments of the garrison.
The monastery was one of Russia's outposts in the north. The walls at the base were 5-7 meters thick, 8-11 meters high, and a little over a kilometer long. The arsenal of the holy fathers contained 90 cannons, 900 pounds of gunpowder, and large stocks of hand-held firearms.
Why a siege?
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It all began in 1653, with the church reform that Patriarch Nikon started unexpectedly in Lent. Along with the pilgrims, a rumor spread to the monastery brethren that in Moscow churches they began to be baptized not with two, but with three fingers. And in 1657, innovations affected the monastery itself: new service books came from the patriarch. But the monks were aware of the reform, they knew Nikon himself, therefore they locked the heretical books under lock and key, without reading.
Nikon vs. Solovki
Nikon's relationship with the Solovetsky Monastery began long before his patriarchate. Back in 1639, he was expelled from here, and, ten years later, becoming the Metropolitan of Novgorod and Velikie Luki, he began to oppress in every possible way the Solovetsky brethren that were subordinate to him. He came to the point of outright robbery: not only did he “borrow” several books from the monastery library, paying only for one, and appropriated a gold cufflink with a yacht and an emerald donated by Simeon Bekbulatovich to the monastery, he also took the remains of Metropolitan Philip to Moscow.
Archimandrite Nikanor
The main ideologist of the uprising was the elder Nikanor, who was popular among the monks. The origins of the Tsar's conflict with the Solovetsky Monastery are also associated with his personality. It so happened that it was in 1653, when the first signs of church schism appeared, that the abbot of the monastery died, and the brethren chose Nikanor as the new abbots. However, Moscow did not approve their decision and imposed Bartholomew as hegumen. His relationship with the monks is evidenced at least by the fact that they wrote denunciations to the tsar against him, and in 1666 a mutiny broke out against the hegemen. Nikanor, in 1653, was appointed archimandrite of the Zvenigorod monastery and became the confessor of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich himself. Here he served for seven years and in 1660, due to the fact that he did not hide his sharp rejection of the church reform, he was returned to Solovki. During the rebellion of 1666, Bartholomew was deposed,and Nikanor was elected to his place.
Correspondence of the Solovetsky Monastery with Alexei Mikhailovich
The tension between the king and the brethren grew gradually. He can be judged by the intonations contained in the correspondence of the parties. “We pray for the king and his family, we are ready to lay down our souls for their royal majesty,” the monks assure the king after the uprising of 1666. The only thing they ask for is to allow them not to leave the “traditions of the holy fathers”. And a year later, in September 1667, they no longer hesitate to give the tsar an ultimatum: “If you, our great sovereign, the anointed of God, are not in the old faith handed down to us in the old faith, you will not be pleased to change the books, mercy We ask you, sir: have mercy on us, do not lead us, sir, send more teachers to us in vain, we will not at all change our former Orthodox faith, and lead us, sir,Send your king's sword against us and from this rebellious life move us into a serene and eternal life!"
The tsar's response in February 1668 was even more categorical: he called Nikanor's supporters schismatics and ordered "the conciliar and ordinary elders who are not disgusted with the holy cathedral and apostolic church and obedient to us, the great sovereign," to immediately leave the islands.
From words to deeds
The tsar moved from words to deeds: he sent investigators to clarify the situation in the monastery, tried to exhort the schismatics, declared an economic blockade on Solovki and took away all their possessions in favor of the treasury. It is possible that, in addition to the desire to pacify the monks, he was also guided by the desire to seize the income of the monastery.
The siege that had been smoldering for eight years, like the events that preceded it, happened as if by itself, against the will of the people: in the summer the archers arrived under the walls of the fortress, tried to reason with the monks, and by winter they returned to the mainland. For 8 years, three governors were replaced: the first, Volokhov, shared power and fought with the hegumen Joseph appointed by Moscow. The second, Ievlev, who brought 500 Cossacks with him, killed the cattle, tore fishing tackle, burned the buildings around the monastery, and then ordered his subordinates to dig fortifications. The defenders of the fortress covered them with dense fire, and the frightened archers and Cossacks complained to the tsar about the voivode. Ievlev resigned, and a third was appointed in his place - the steward Ivan Mescherinov.
Bloody denouement
During the years of the siege, about two hundred people left the monastery for various reasons. Many considered armed struggle unacceptable. But fugitive peasants, archers, Cossacks flocked to the fortress. Despite the tsarist ban, the Pomors supplied food to the monastery. In 1674, the brethren decided not to pray for the Tsar-Herod. Archimandrite Nikanor walked with a censer from cannon to cannon, sprinkled them with holy water, saying: "Mother Galanochki, we have hope for you."
A sluggish struggle with the monastery and countless clashes between schismatics and Nikonians, mass self-immolations, brutal reprisals of opponents with each other forced the tsar to show political will.
In December 1674, he ordered Mescherinov to show zeal in the fight against the rioters and, on pain of death, ordered him not to leave the island. And in June he repeats the threat: "Will you soon go to the Solovetsky monastery on the island and learn to repair the craft carelessly, and you, Ivan, should be sentenced to death for that."
And Meshcherinov will approach the reprisal with all zeal. The fugitive from the monastery, monk Theoktist, will point out a weak spot in the defensive fortifications. At first they won't believe him, but then, for lack of other means of struggle, they will decide to take advice - and on a snowy night on February 1, they will take the fortress. And then they will begin to mend the court. The leader of the rioters, Samko Vasilyev, will be executed, Nikanor will be left to freeze alive, and 26 more people will be killed. Later, the reprisals will befall the rest. Of the five hundred defenders of the fortress, only 14 will survive.
And a week after the suppression of the uprising, Alexei Mikhailovich will die.