The arch vault is the Tsar-book of Russian history

2010 was marked by a very important event for experts studying ancient Russia and simply for history lovers: the face-to-face chronicle of Ivan the Terrible was posted on the Internet (in the people it is called the Tsar's book). Scanned it and placed in the worldwide network of representatives of the Society of lovers of ancient writing.

What is the importance of this event?

Agree that the most important thing in the work of each historian is the primary sources: written, works of art, architecture, household items and other artifacts. Unfortunately, in our time not so many researchers of the past are turning to them. Often they study and quote the work of other historians, and those of the third and so on. As a result, if we start to understand, most of these scientists never used the original sources, and all their works were created on the basis of other people's words and opinions. It turns out that these works can be compared to a bad copy of a copy of a "blockbuster". If you open and read what is written in the ancient document and compare information with what modern historians write, you can often find not only minor inaccuracies, but sometimes completely opposite facts. That's so, and this happens all the time.

Ancient artifacts of Russia

Unfortunately, not so many original sources have survived to this day, as we would like. If you look at architectural monuments, there are very few of them left, and besides, most of them belong to the 18-19th centuries, because in Russia the main building material is the forest, and regular wars and fires do not spare such structures. If you take household items and jewelry, so here and not everything is so simple: what was saved - it's all artifacts of the 15-19 centuries. And this is also quite understandable, because precious metals and stones have always been the goal of various kinds of amateurs and black archeologists. Almost all ancient burials (mounds and other) on the territory of our country were plundered back in the time of Catherine II.

Oral stories

The most complete historical information about the history of our land has been preserved in the memory of the people - legends, legends, fairy tales, bylinas, etc. However, scientists categorically deny the possibility of considering oral creativity as a source of information, at least as to what is related to the former Russia, although they are ready to fully accept the legends of, say, Scandinavian or British peoples. But in our tales and legends there are many interesting facts, a certain interpretation of which confirms one of the popular modern theories (A. Sklyarov, "Inhabited Island of the Earth"). For example, we all know about such a fairy-tale wonder, like a magic saucer with a filling apple, in which the whole world is seen - what is not the "iPhone" with its logo - a bitten fruit? And carpets-planes, and high-boots? Yes, you never know what else ...

However, we are very distracted, it's time to return to the main topic of our article, and this, we recall, the Archives of Tsar Ivan (iv) Grozny.

Written sources

The main written sources of Ancient Rus are chronicles. Since the 19th century, a complete collection of Russian chronicles began to be published. Everyone could get acquainted with this printed edition by contacting the library. However, now work is under way in the project "Handwritten Monuments of Ancient Rus" to translate it into digital format, and in the near future, like the Ivan the Terrible Manuscript, it will be posted on the Internet for general use. Beginning researchers should know that in ancient manuscripts the source of information is not only text, but also drawings. It's about the illustrated documents. The main one is the Face Vault. It consists of ten thousand sheets and seventeen thousand illustrations.

The chronicle of the chronicles

This document is the largest chronicle-chronographic arch of Ancient Russia. It was created at the request of the Tsar in the Alexander Sloboda between 1568 and 1576. The front arch contains a presentation of world history from the creation of the world to the 15th century and Russian history to the 67th of the 16th century. Amosov AA calculated that this ancient artifact consists of ten volumes totaling 9745 sheets, which are decorated with 17 744 color miniatures. Historians reasonably believe that the Tsar-book contained the eleventh volume as well. Now it is lost, and this is understandable, because it was about the most controversial period of Russian history - until 1114.

Facial vault: content

The first three volumes contain texts of biblical books, such as the Pentateuch, the Books of Judges, Joshua, the Kings, and also the books of Ruth, Esther, the prophet Daniel. In addition, they contain the full texts of Alexandria, two narratives about the Trojan War (The Story of Creation and the Splotting of the Troysky, extracted from The Chronograph of the Russian, and The History of the Destruction of Troy - the translation of the novel by Guido de Cologne) and the work of Josephus Flavius History of the Jewish War ". For subsequent world events, sources of information were the work "The Chronicler of Illinois and Rome" and "The Chronograph Russian".

History of Russia The arch of the vault describes in 4-10 volumes, the source was mainly the Nikon chronicle. According to the researchers (for example, Kloss BM), since the events of 1152, additional sources, such as the Novgorod Vault (1539), the Resurrection Chronicle, the "Chronicler of the Beginning of the Kingdom" and others have been found in the document.

Ancient Editing

The Tsar-book has a number of revisions, it is believed (there is no proof to this, it is true) that they were made around 1575 on the orders of the Tsar Ivan the Terrible himself. The processing of the already finished text affected mainly the period from 1533 to 1568 years. An unidentified editor made notes on the margins of the document, some of them contain charges against persons who were subjected to repression and executed during oprichnina.

Unfortunately, the work on the Face Vault was not completed: some of the miniatures were made only in ink, they did not have time to color them.

conclusions

The obverse of Ivan the Terrible is not only a monument to the book art of Russia, but also a very important source of historical events: the miniatures, despite their conventionality and rather symbolic character, provide rich material for researching the realities of that time. In addition, the study of editorial corrections, which are included in the last volume (The Royal Book), provide an opportunity to get more in-depth information about the political struggle of the post-primal period. They allow us to judge the changed assessments of the tsar by the activities of certain of his associates. And also about new views on the events themselves during his reign.

Finally

Thanks to the activities of the Society of Lovers of Ancient History, now everyone can get acquainted with this priceless artifact. After all, in order to gain access to this document, it was necessary to exert a lot of effort, and only historians could receive it. But today it is available to everyone. All that is needed is access to the worldwide network, and you can immerse yourself in the fascinating world of studying our past. To see everything with my own eyes, add up your opinion about certain events, and not read the ready-made stamps of historians, who, perhaps, never even opened the original source.