Part 2
We draw historical information, as already mentioned, from historical sources. Among them, a special place is occupied by archival documents and books.
Depending on how archives and libraries are completed, what documents and books enter them, what documents are destroyed, for what reasons they are destroyed, one can judge the usefulness of the source base of historical science. Naturally, not all historical sources that were created in the past have survived to this day.
In practice, we have fragmentary data, single documents that were created earlier than the 16th century. The body of sources began to form more or less evenly after the invention of book printing. The appearance of replicated publications ensured their greater safety.
Handwritten documents and books were created and kept, as a rule, in monasteries. The most valuable documents for the state were kept in the princely palaces.
The first creators of world chronology are considered the Bishop of Caesarea Eusebius Pamphilus, St. Jerome and Bishop of Ip-ponskiy Augustine. The World Chronicle was written by Archbishop Anthony of Florence in the middle of the 15th century. The chronicles of Hartman Schedel, Marcin Velsky, Jacopo Philippe Forest, Mark - Anionino Sabellino are known.
These works were generalized and reinterpreted in the 16th - 17th centuries by Joseph Scaliger, who is considered the founder of modern chronology, and Dionysius Petavius. The chronology of antiquity adopted today is conventionally called Scaligerian, thereby emphasizing that it is the creation of several persons, of which Scaliger is best known. It is interesting that Scaliger brought his chronology to "absolutely exact dates" of all major events in human history. He gave not only the year of the event, but also the month, day, and sometimes even the hour of the day.
The first Russian "Chronograph according to the great exposition" (Chronograph is a Greek word meaning "time" in translation.) Was compiled on the basis of Byzantine chronographs.
Promotional video:
The oldest type of Russian chronograph is represented by the Chronograph of 1512.
Among the clergy there are theories explaining the power of Russia by its religious superiority, after Byzantium, the concentration of the true faith in Russia. At the end of the 15th century, Metropolitan Zosima calls Moscow and the Russian land "the new city of Constantine," that is, the second Constantinople. At the beginning of the 6th century, the Pskov monk Philotheus formulated the theory "Moscow - the Third Rome".
In the third quarter of the 16th century, under the supervision of the Moscow Metropolitan, the Book of Degrees was compiled, which is a grandiose portrait gallery of figures from Russian history.
The systematic collection of books and documents begins in the 17th century. But not only and not so much collecting as editing and reworking them.
In the official historiography of the 17th century, the “Charter Approved for the Election of Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov-Yuryev to the Russian throne by Tsar and Autocrat”, which was drawn up in connection with the election of Mikhail Romanov as Tsar, was of great importance. At the Zemsky Sobor in 1613, the "Charter" became a model that noble historians began to follow in assessing historical events.
Clerk Ivan Timofeev wrote "The Chronicle of the Days and Tsars and Saints of Moscow …", praising Mikhail Romanov.
In 1617 and 1620, new, so-called second and third editions of the Chronograph were created, in which the history of Russia is covered in the framework of general history. In the 17th century editions, the Chronographs are enriched with new historical sources, they use not only Russian chronicles, historical stories, but also Western European chronicles. In the 20s - 30s of the 17th century, the "New Chronicler" was created, emerging from circles close to Patriarch Filaret, the founder of the Romanov dynasty.
Thus, we see how the process of "rewriting history" begins.
The creation of official historical works continued under Alexei Mikhailovich. For this purpose, a special Written Order was created in 1657. The clerk Timofey Kudryavtsev was put in charge of the order. An active collection of materials began in various orders, libraries, monasteries, and private individuals. The work of Kudryavtsev was continued by the clerk Grigory Kunakov. But, apparently, the work of this order on writing the necessary history did not satisfy the royal court. The order ceased to exist.
The successor to the compilation of the official history was the clerk of the order of the Kazan Palace Fedor Griboyedov. At the end of the 60s, he compiled the "History of the Tsars and Grand Dukes of the Russian Land", which was the "Book of Degrees of the Noble and Pious House of the Romanovs," that is, it actually performed the task assigned to the Written Order.
In 1672, the Ambassadorial Prikaz prepared the “Big State Book, or the Root of Russian Sovereigns” (“Titular”), containing portraits of the Kiev and Moscow Grand Dukes and Tsars from Rurik to Alexei Mikhailovich in chronological order.
In 1674 the Synopsis was published - the first edition of the official version of Russian history.
Why did an active process of collecting and editing documents suddenly begin in the 17th century? How did it go?
Describing the 17th century, Archpriest Georgy Florovsky wrote in his book The Ways of Russian Theology that it was a “critical”, not “organic” era in Russian history. It was a century of lost balance, an age of surprises and inconstancy, a century of unprecedented and unheard-of events … Not hibernation, rather to be dismayed … Everything has been torn down, moved from its place. And the soul itself has shifted … This frightened century ends with an apocalyptic convulsion, a terrible attack of apocalyptic fanaticism. He categorically disagrees with the fact that it is still customary to depict the 17th century, in contrast to the Peter's era, as "pre-reform time", as a dark background of great transformations …
In his opinion, the fateful theme of the Moscow XVII century, the book on the right, was in reality much more difficult and complicated than it usually seems … Moscow reference books were immediately involved in all the contradictions of the handwritten tradition. Around the young Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, notes G. Florovsky, an influential circle is united, which is engaged in correcting old books. Among the correctors of the books, one can name the tsarist confessor - Archpriest Stefan Vonifatyevich, the tsar boyar F. M. Rtischev and others. From Kiev invited "teachers" for information. Then arrived in 1649 Epiphany Slavinetsky, Arseny Satanovsky, the next year Daskin Ptitsky. At the same time, Kiev books are being republished in Moscow: "Grammar" by Smotritsky and even "short" "Catechism" by Peter Mogila (1649). In "Helmsman" of 1649-1650, the so-called 51st chapter is taken from the book of the Grave (of Western origin). In the same years, the so-called "Kirillov's book" was compiled and the Kiev "Book of Faith" was republished. At that time, Russian books were being burned on Athos. As G. Florovsky notes, “the initiative of church reforms came from the tsar, with restrained stubborn opposition from the patriarch. The reform was decided and thought out in the palace."
In 1652 Nikon became the patriarch. Nikon, according to G. Florovsky, belongs to those strange people who seem to have no face, but only temperament. Instead of a face, an idea or a program. Contemporaries spoke and wrote a lot about the church reform of Nikon, contradictory. He did not know Greek, but he “had an almost painful tendency to alter and re-dress everything in Greek, as Peter later had a passion for dressing everyone or everything in German or Dutch. They are also related by this strange ease of breaking with the past, this unexpected non-existence, willfulness and artificiality in action … Nikon's Grecophilism was not a return to paternal foundations, there was not even a return of Byzantism. In the "Greek" rank he was attracted by great solemnity, festivity, splendor, wealth, visible well-being. " G. Florovsky rightly notes that opponents of Nikonova's law rightly insisted that they were equating new books “from newly printed Greek books by the Germans, from books of the lame and abandoned … The main acuteness of Nikon's“reform”was in a sharp and sweeping denial of the whole Old Russian rite and rite. Not only was he replaced by a new one, but he was also declared false, heretical, almost impious. " At a large cathedral in 1667, where 14 out of 30 bishops were foreign, the old Russian rite was "suspected and condemned, under a terrible baptism."At a large cathedral in 1667, where 14 out of 30 bishops were foreign, the old Russian rite was "suspected and condemned, under a terrible baptism."At a large cathedral in 1667, where 14 out of 30 bishops were foreign, the old Russian rite was "suspected and condemned, under a terrible baptism."
Russian church antiquity was condemned as ignorance and folly, as superstition and heresy. Under the pretext of universal completeness, the old Russian is replaced by the modern Greek. According to G. Florovsky, “this was not the opinion of the Greek Church, it was the opinion of the itinerant“Greek”bishops …”.
As noted by the Russian historian S. F. Platonov, after the Time of Troubles the participation of foreigners in Russian life becomes more and more sensitive. During the years of the Troubles, they spread so much throughout the Moscow state that they became familiar to every Russian. G. Florovsky correctly noted: “Here we have before us not random and incoherent facts, but precisely the connection of facts. And it is not important that in the 17th century various Western trifles and details are included in the Moscow circulation. But the very style or "ritualism of life" is changing, psychological skills and needs are changing, a new "pour" the king is introduced.
The wave of "scribes of history" was growing. Among them was, for example, Simeon Polotsky. He was a rather ordinary Western Russian scribe, or a scribe, but very clever, resourceful and controversial in everyday affairs, who managed to stand high and firmly in a perplexed Moscow society (he appears here in 1664), or rather, at the Moscow court, as a poet or a verse-ranger, as a learned man for all sorts of assignments. At first he taught the clerks "in Latin", according to the inevitable Alvar, then he became the teacher of Tsarevich Alexei and Fyodor. He composed speeches for the tsar, wrote solemn "announcements" of the tsar.
With the arrival of the Romanovs to the throne, orders are given to monasteries to collect documents and books in order to correct them. People also gathered for the "book help". So, in November 1616, Archimandrite Dionysius, cellar Avraamy Palitsin and all the brethren of the Trinity Monastery received a royal letter: “By our decree, the canorhist Elder Arseny, and the village of Klementyev priest Ivan, were taken to Moscow from the Trinity Sergius Monastery, and the village of Klementyev priest Ivan printed and Consumer … And we, - continues the tsar, - have instructed the correction of the consumer to entrust you, Archimandrite Dionysius, and with you Arseny and Ivan and other spiritual and reasonable elders … "(Soloviev S. M. Reading and stories on the history of Russia. M., 1989.)
During these years, active work began on the revision of libraries, book depositories, archives. Documents were often simply destroyed.
Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich in the middle of the 17th century ordered to deliver to him all the books on the history of Russia available in the capital, but neither the tsar's nor the patriarchal libraries found a single historical book (Bocharov L. I. et al. Conspiracy against Russian history. M., 1998.).
Unfortunately, historians have paid very little attention to the issue of distorting the source base of the 17th century. Scientists have certainly found obvious forgeries in 17th century books. So, for example, Karamzin found in the Khrushchev list of the Degree Book a retelling of the speech of Ivan the Terrible at Execution Ground in 1550. The famous historian-archivist V. N. Avtokratov proved that the fake speech of Ivan the Terrible was fabricated in the 17th century (Autocrats V. N. The speech of Ivan the Terrible in 1550 as a political pamphlet of the end of the 17th century // Proceedings of the Department of Old Russian Literature. M.; L., 1955.). The famous correspondence between Grozny and Prince Kurbsky, according to some scholars, is a literary work written by S. Shakhovsky in the 17th century. But, unfortunately, these were only isolated facts of detecting distortions in sources on the history of Russia.
The facts of the distortion of the source base of historical science can be traced more clearly in the 18th century, when the process of creating a new (distorted) history of Russia begins actively.
“Suffice it to note,” write the authors of The Conspiracy Against Russian History, “that even Peter I during his reign repeatedly issued decrees in which he commanded ancient chronicles to be brought to the capital from all over the country. What for? Ostensibly for writing a true history of Russia. Just what is meant by the word "truthful"? Here, as they say, how many people, so many opinions."
Even stranger things happened during the reign of Peter I's elder brother, Fyodor Alekseevich. Once, for example, he ordered to collect all the category books and burn them in the hallway of the front royal chamber. These books represented the history of ancient Russian families, where the merits of each family to the Fatherland were noted. As a result, not only the genealogy of the Russian nobility was destroyed, but also the memory of the deeds of our ancestors.
As a result of such a "purge", as noted by the famous historian RG Skrynnikov, "the preservation of Russian archives and book depositories of the 16th century is the worst in all of Europe."
The distortion of the source base occurs in the future.
Under the Empress Anna Ioannovna, a stream of foreigners poured into Russia. The Germans become the founders of the modern version of Russian history. The beginning was laid by Bayer (Gottlieb - Siegfried Bayer was born in 1649 in Königsberg. Graduated from the university. Since 1725 he took the department of Oriental antiquities and languages at the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences.), Miller (Gerard Friedrich Miller. In Russia since 1725. In Siberia was engaged in the collection of documents that became known as "Miller's Portfolios".), Schletzer (August Ludwig Schletzer - German historian, was in the Russian service from 1761 to 1800.) in the middle of the XVIII century.
The task of the German scientists was to prove that the Eastern Slavs in the 9th-10th centuries were real savages, rescued from the darkness of ignorance by the Varangian princes. For this Gottlieb - Siegfried Bayer put forward the Norman theory of the formation of the Russian state. According to his theory, a handful of Normans who arrived in Russia in a few years turned the "dark country" into a powerful state.
Catherine II appointed Schletzer an academician. At the same time, he not only received all the documents in the Academy for uncontrolled use, but also the right to demand everything that was considered necessary from the imperial library and other institutions.
The struggle against distortions of Russian history was led by M. V. Lomonosov. In 1749-1750, he opposed the historical views of Miller and Bayer. He criticized Miller's dissertation "On the Origin of the Name and the Russian People," and gave a devastating criticism of Bayer's works on Russian history. Lomonosov was supported by many outstanding Russian scientists.
Member of the Academy A. K. Martov filed a complaint with the Senate about the dominance of foreigners in the Russian Academy. It was signed by I. Gorlitsky, D. Grekov, P. Shishkarev, V. Nosov, A. Polyakov, M. Kovrin and others.
The Senate created a commission of inquiry headed by Prince Yusupov. The commission considered the performance of Russian scientists as a “rabble revolt” against the authorities. The commission's decision was terrible: to execute I. Gorlitsky, exile D. Grekov, A. Polyakov and V. Nosov to Siberia, leave P. Shishkarev and others under arrest until the case was decided by the future president of the Academy.
The commission stated that Lomonosov "for repeated disrespectful, dishonorable and disgusting actions both in relation to the Academy and to the commission, and to German soil, is subject to the death penalty, or, in extreme cases, punishment with lashes and deprivation of rights and fortunes." Lomonosov spent almost seven months in custody awaiting the approval of the verdict … By Elizabeth's decree he was found guilty, but "released" from punishment. His salary was cut in half, and he had to apologize to the professors for the prejudices he had committed … Miller made a mocking "repentance" that Lomonosov was obliged to publicly pronounce and sign … This was the first and last time when Lomonosov was forced to give up his views (See: M. T. Belyavsky M. V. Lomonosov and the foundation of Moscow University (1755 - 1955). M, 1955.).
German professors sought to remove Lomonosov and his supporters from the Academy. In 1763, on the denunciation of Taubert, Miller, Shtelin, Epinuss and others, Catherine fired Lomonosov from the Academy, but soon the decree on his resignation was canceled.
After Lomonosov's death, on the very next day, the library and all Lomonosov's papers were sealed by Count Orlov on the orders of Catherine, transported to his palace and disappeared without a trace.
G. F. Miller in 1765 at the request of Prince Golitsyn was appointed head of the Moscow archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. As V. O. Klyuchevsky, “from that moment this archive, so important for Russian history, came to life. More than one diplomatic correspondence of the Moscow government from the late 15th century is kept here; The ambassadorial order was in charge of other branches of government, and all documents on these parts of government were also preserved in its archives, and in remarkable completeness. Miller felt at home in this atmosphere. He began a systematic description of the archive, continued by his successors. In addition, he began to process the material that was there; he wanted to write a new Russian history from the time of the impostors (Klyuchevsky V. O. Works. T. 8. M., 1957.).
At first glance, there is nothing unusual in the activities of G. F. Miller is not present, moreover, it seems that he is doing a good deed: the archive came to life with him, he began a systematic description of the archive, began to process the material that was there. That's right, to process. No wonder V. O. Klyuchevsky writes here: "Lomonosov did not take his eyes off Miller … he was very afraid of Miller's works, he saw spitefulness and reprehensible speeches in each of his works, he said that Miller only noticed spots on the clothes of the Russian body, not noticing its decorations."
Miller organizes an expedition to Siberia and brings from there a lot of collected documents that have come down to us as Miller's Portfolios. Why he went to Siberia, how he took the documents there, we do not know, but it is quite possible to assume (since MV Lomonosov was very much afraid of Miller's works) that documents were not only collected there, but also destroyed.
Miller was not alone in organizing expeditions for archival documents. In 1828, according to the idea of the famous archaeographer P. M. Stroev, an archaeographic expedition was organized with the aim of examining all the ancient depositories in Russia, mainly church, monastery. For six years P. M. Stroyev and his assistant Ya. I. Berednikov studied documents of Northern, Eastern and Central Russia, examined government and monastery libraries, choosing from them acts and literary sources of our history.
But not only the archaeographic expeditions of Miller and P. M. Stroev influenced the state of the source base for the history of Russia. Active work on revising documents began in the state archives as well. This should be discussed in more detail.
The fact is that archival documents have always been kept in the order in which they were deposited in the office work. The state apparatus, created during the formation of the centralized state, acquired a powerful system of state institutions. The most important organ of the state, which shared the supreme power with the tsar, was the boyar Duma. More than 90 central institutions - orders of different meanings, functions and sizes were formed by the 18th century. In the process of practical activity of orders, as is well known, extensive paperwork appeared. The powerful bureaucratic machine of the order system required a photographic reflection of its activities and the preservation of documents in the order in which they were formed in office work.
But starting from the middle of the 17th century, there has been a change in the order of storage of documents in archives. The documents begin to regroup. That is, instead of storing documents in the order in which they were formed in office work, they began to sort and store them according to the thematic principle. Instead of archival funds of institutions, collections of documents on topics began to be created. For example, foreign policy documents were withdrawn from all funds of institutions, and a collection on the history of foreign policy was formed. So the cases were scattered and thematic collections were formed. Subsequently, scientists were looking for an explanation for this phenomenon.
The essence of these rearrangements of documents was explained, as a rule, by the search for optimal ways of storing them, which would provide a quick search for the necessary documents. And no one has ever raised the question that the regrouping of documents was carried out exactly the opposite - in order to complicate the search for documents, to ensure the possibility of their destruction with impunity. For this, it was necessary, first of all, to bring the archives into such a state that no one could understand them.
Not only the source base of the history of Russia was artificially changed, the source base of the entire world history was distorted.
It is possible to define a certain border (the beginning of the 17th century), separating more or less reliably dated sources of the 17th - 19th centuries from unreliable ones, to which all supposedly earlier documents (up to the beginning of the 17th century) should be attributed. Of course, among them there may be ancient originals, but very few of them remain. Moreover, those of them that are most often referred to today, for some reason very well "confirm" the traditional chronology (the chronology of Scaliger - Petavius). Therefore, they are primarily suspected, if not of forgery, then at least of purposeful later processing and distortion of the ancient original. In other words, almost all the sources dating today before the beginning of the 17th century are actually only available today in the edition of the 17th - 18th centuries.
I would like to draw the reader's attention to yet another, from our point of view, very important conclusion. If medieval history before the 15th century was distorted mainly as a result of natural unintentional errors, then from the end of the 15th to the beginning of the 17th century, apparently, a deliberate falsification of the history of both this era and the earlier period was carried out. As a result, today we consider the entire medieval history before the beginning of the 17th century through the prism of the falsifications of the 16th - 17th centuries. This image of the distorting prism of the XVI-XVII centuries should be constantly kept in mind if we want to finally understand the events earlier than the XVII century. The goals of this falsification were dictated by the political situation of the epoch of the XVI-XVII centuries, that is, the era of fierce struggle and schism that swept the whole of Western Europe during the Reformation.
Many documents and books were simply destroyed both in Western Europe and in Russia during the Romanov era. Destruction was one of the main goals of the famous Forbidden Books Index. The index was compiled by the Catholic Church in Italy, in the Vatican, starting from 1559, that is, from the middle of the 16th century. The books that got into the Index were systematically destroyed The essence of these rearrangements of documents was explained, as a rule, by the search for optimal ways of storing them, which would provide a quick search for the necessary documents. And no one has ever raised the question that the regrouping of documents was carried out exactly the opposite - in order to complicate the search for documents, to ensure the possibility of their destruction with impunity. To do this, it was necessary, first of all, to bring the archives to such a state that no one could understand them.
Not only the source base of the history of Russia was artificially changed, the source base of the entire world history was distorted.
It is possible to define a certain border (the beginning of the 17th century), separating more or less reliably dated sources of the 17th - 19th centuries from unreliable ones, to which all supposedly earlier documents (up to the beginning of the 17th century) should be attributed. Of course, among them there may be ancient originals, but very few of them remain. Moreover, those of them that are most often referred to today, for some reason very well "confirm" the traditional chronology (the chronology of Scaliger - Petavius). Therefore, they are primarily suspected, if not of forgery, then at least of purposeful later processing and distortion of the ancient original. In other words, almost all the sources dating today before the beginning of the 17th century are actually only available today in the edition of the 17th - 18th centuries.
I would like to draw the reader's attention to yet another, from our point of view, very important conclusion. If medieval history before the 15th century was distorted mainly as a result of natural unintentional errors, then from the end of the 15th to the beginning of the 17th century, apparently, a deliberate falsification of the history of both this era and the earlier period was carried out. As a result, today we consider the entire medieval history before the beginning of the 17th century through the prism of the falsifications of the 16th - 17th centuries. This image of the distorting prism of the XVI-XVII centuries should be constantly kept in mind if we want to finally understand the events earlier than the XVII century. The goals of this falsification were dictated by the political situation of the epoch of the XVI-XVII centuries, that is, the era of fierce struggle and schism that swept the whole of Western Europe during the Reformation.
Many documents and books were simply destroyed both in Western Europe and in Russia during the Romanov era. Destruction was one of the main goals of the famous Forbidden Books Index. The index was compiled by the Catholic Church in Italy, in the Vatican, starting from 1559, that is, from the middle of the 16th century. The books that entered the Index were systematically destroyed throughout Europe. And in Russia, many books were destroyed in the 17th century, after the Romanovs came to power.
Fortunately, some of these books have survived to our time. For example, the book by Mavro Orbini (Or as it is written in the book itself - Mavroubina: “The book of the historiography of the honor of the name, glory, and expansion of the Slavic people and their Kings and Masters under many names and with many Kingdoms, Kingdoms, and Provinces. Collected from many books of history, through the Lord Mavroubin Archimandrite Raguzhsky .).
The book of Orbini (Orbini was the Archimandrite of Ragusa (Ragusa), that is, he held a major ecclesiastical post in the city of Ragusa. A city with this name still exists in Italy (Sicily)) was written in Italian and published in 1601. Translated into Russian in 1722. We will dwell on this book in more detail because of its significance for understanding world history in the light of the new chronology (in 1722 it was published from a distance, apparently, only on the direct order of Peter I, overwhelmed by the idea of moving the capital of the Russian Empire closer to Scandinavia - to the place from where the Slavs allegedly went to the conquest of Europe. This is how St. Petersburg appeared.).
Orbini formulated the main result of his historical research at the beginning of the book. “The Slavic people embittered almost all peoples in the Universe with their weapons; ruined I will pass; owned Asia and Africa; fought with the Egyptians and the great Alexander; conquered Greece, Macedonia, Il-lyric land; took possession of Moravia, the Slansky land, Czech, Polish and the shores of the Baltic Sea, went to Italy, where he fought against the Romans for a long time.
Sometimes he was defeated, sometimes he raged in battle, he took revenge on the Romans with a great death; sometimes, while raging in battle, he was wounded. Finally, having conquered the Roman state, he took possession of many of their provinces, ruined Rome, inflicting tributaries to the Roman Caesars, which other people did not repair in the whole world.
He owned France, England and established a state in Ishpania; He took possession of the best provinces in Europe, and from this always glorious people in the past, the strongest peoples arose, that is, the Slavs, Vandals, Burgontions (that is, the Burgundians in modern France), Goths, Ostrogoths, Rus or Rasi, Visigoths, Gepids, Getalans (that is, Goths - Alans), Uerls, or Grules; Avars, Skirrs, Girrs, Melandens, Bashtarns, Peuks, Dacians, Swedes, Normans, Tennes or Finns, Ukry, or Unkras (Ukrainians), Marcomannians, Quads, Tuxedos (or Trucks, if "fit" is read as "t"), Alleri were near the Wends, or Genets, who inhabited the Baltic Sea coast, and divided into many origins; that is, Pomeranians (Pomeranians, that is, Pomerania), Uvilians, Rugians, Uvarnavs, wiped out, Polabs, Uvagirs, Lingons, Tolents, Redats, or Riaduts, Circipans, Kizins: Erula, or Elu-Eldy, Levbuzy,uvilins, stredans, and britzans (the British, that is, the British! or the Bretons), with many others who were all the very people of the Slavic (that is, who were all part of the Slavic people themselves)."
Part 2