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Reconstructing the Life of Simeon Polotskii on the Basis of Manuscripts
Canadian Slavonic Papers, Sep-Dec 2007 by Podtergera, Irina A
ABSTRACT:
There are still many unanswered questions about the biography of Simeon Polotskii, a Belarusan monk who became a prominent figure in the cultural process of Muscovite Russia in the years 1660-1670. This article presents some new data culled from Simeon's notes and letters, which were preserved in his draft manuscripts. They add to our knowledge of his life and provide more precise information about previously known issues.
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There are still many unanswered questions about the biography and works of Simeon Polotskii,1 one of the most prominent personalities in East Slavic culture during the seventeenth century. We still know little or nothing about certain periods of his life. This is due to a lack of documents that could give us a sense of Simeon Polotskii's life during this or that period.2 Some of the available documents have not yet been studied thoroughly and described in a scholarly manner. Except for the Mohyla Collegium in Kyiv, we still do not know where he studied, although it is probable that he attended die Jesuit academy of Vilnius. However, for the latter we have only indirect clues.3 What did Simeon do between 1649 (when, presumably, he left Athens for Kyiv) and 1656, when he became a monk at the Epiphany monastery in Polatsk4 and together with his disciples met tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich in Vitebsk and in Polatsk?5 There is no doubt that he was advancing his education at that time. But was that all? The next dates we are certain about are 1659, the year of his arrest in Polatsk,6 and 1660, the year of his first trip to Moscow where he and his disciples escorted Ignatii Ievlevych.7 In 1664 he moved to the capital of Muscovite Russia. That year the Father-Superior of the Polatskii monastery died, and Simeon went to fetch his patron's belongings from Moscow.8 About everything else that happened in between we can only speculate. What we know for sure is that Simeon was a teacher at the school for monks in Polatsk. However, he could also have fulfilled other functions there. His life in Moscow from 1664 till 1680 has not yet been studied in detail, though most of the available documents date from mat period. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that most of Simeon Polotskii's works are still unstudied or unknown.9
Every time one turns to some unpublished text by Simeon Polotskii, one discovers something new. Thus, L.I. Sazonova has discovered among me drafts for Vertograd Mnogotsvetnyi a letter addressed to die Patriarch Ioakim requesting the investigation of the murder of Simeon's brother Isaakii.10 Through this letter, Sazonova obtained some knowledge about Simeon's family life. P.A. Rolland had published some of Simeon Polotskii's letters to his Ukrainian and Belarusan correspondents." He made significant additions to the description of Simeon's life in Moscow. Rolland also made important comments concerning the complicated historical relationship between Moscow and Ruthenia in the 17th century. M.Iu. Gordeev found Simeon's mother's will in the books of the Magistrate in Polatsk; this was a significant contribution to the research on Simeon Polotskii's biography.12
The present article offers some new data in order to add to our knowledge of Simeon Polotskii's life and supplies more precise information on what has already been known.
Some interesting facts about Simeon's private life can be culled from his manuscripts, which contain notes and marginal comments that may be read for historical information. They point to die dates of events, die names of those involved and, in some cases, to Simeon's observations on what was happening.13 The history of the compilation of these manuscripts provides food for thought. When and for what reason were papers of different content put together? Many questions are still awaiting unambiguous answers. But some notes mat mention, either directly or indirectly, Simeon and the people close to him can be united and correlated with the facts already known.
One of Simeon Polotskii's earliest manuscripts, which has already been mentioned (RGADA, fond 381 MS 390),14 is called "Sobraniie razlichnykh epistol" ["Collection of various epistles"]. When Silvestr Medvedev was arrested in 1689, Moscow scribes called it "Gramoty obrastsovye vsiakie" [Sample documents of various kinds].15 Before this collection came into the possession of Simeon it had belonged to his mentor and friend Ignatii Ievlevych. This can be proved by the following owner's note (f. 10, which, however, is in Simeon Polotskii's handwriting:
Ex catalogo librorum bibliothecae indigni Ieromonachi Ignatij Iewlewicz, Archimandritae ad aedes St. Boris et Hleb, igumeni ad aedes St. Epiphaniorum Polocensis
[From the library catalogue of the worthless hieromonk, Ignatii Ievlevych, archimandrite of the church of St. Boris and Hleb, hegumen of the church of St. Epiphany in Polatsk.]
The collection consists of two parts. The first contains official documents connected to the Epiphany and Boris-and-Gleb Monasteries of Polatsk,16 i.e., sample letters of appointment which, presumably, were always within the reach of the monastery management. (It should be noted that all the texts have their own headings, probably to facilitate their use as examples.) It also contains copies of original historical documents, letters, official requests, speeches (e.g., letters of Sylvestr Kossov and Kallist Ritoraiskii, speeches, and request letters of Ignatii Ievlevych "z bratieiu" [with fraternity], ff. 37v-85). All these documents date from between 1650 and the early 1660s. The owner's note pointing to Ignatii Ievlevych refers, no doubt, only to this first part of the manuscript.17 The second part is made up of several poems, speeches and letters of Simeon Polotskii and his relatives or "colleagues." The texts date from 1664-1667. The two different 'packages of documents' were united into one miscellanea in me 17th century, probably during Simeon Polotskii's lifetime: the marginal notes were made in the same handwriting and with the same ink as me glosses to Simeon's texts and other rough drafts. Most of the marginal notes were made at the same time, apparently when the papers were sorted.18
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