Study of description
N.I. Zharkikh
The study of Makarius' travel began in 2 quarters 19 cent. Immediately after Hilford's manuscript came to London, F. Belfour began to translate it in English. This translation was published in 1829 – 1836's. Translator made certain reductions, particularly obscure for him details of Orthodox religious life (so, he excluded description of the Assumption Cathedral of Kiev-Pechersk Lavra). Sometimes the places of these reductions marked in the text, and sometimes – not. In the late 19 century it was found that this manuscript (and therefore translation) had lacuna, which accounted for the description of the Moscow Kremlin cathedrals.
At this first stage researchers used exclusively this English translation. In 1836 in the journal «Bibloteka dlja chtenija (Library for Reading)» (№ 3 – 4) P.S. Saveliev published report based of the first volume of translation. In 1872 – 1873 description of Kyiv was published in the "Kievskie eparchialnye vedomosti" magazine.
In 1874 description of Kyiv was published in the "Collection of materials for historical topography of Kyiv and its neighborhood" prepared by the Kiev Commission for analyzing the old documents. The editor of 2nd section, which contained a passage from Paul, was professor of the Kiev Theological Academy F.A.Ternovski. The text of the description published here consists of two parts. First, perhaps, is the reprint of "Kievskie eparchialnye vedomosti" (although this was not stated clearly, and I have not had occasion to compare texts), translator of this part remained unknown. The second part of the description translated by N.P.Dashkevich.
This translation, because it was included in a separate book publication, became very common, gained extraordinary publicity and is often used. Along with this translation spread error: description mistakenly dated 1653 year.
Paul was in Kiev twice – in 1654 and 1656 years, the first part concerns the description of the visit of 1654, and the second – in 1656. Thus, modern researchers will be careful not to further distribute this error.
The following Russian publication – the translation of description beginning by D.Blagovo (1875); review of the trip, written by Abolensky (1876).
Belfour's translation was considered so valuable that in Main Moscow archive of the Foreign Ministry was carried out full Russian translation, the manuscript of which was used in the archive.
During this period, accounting interest for description in Romania. Thus, in 1862 published a fragments, translating by Negruzzi from Russian article by P. Saveliev; B.P.Hidzeu (1865) and Choran (1900) did their translations from Belfour's edition.
In the same period, accounting the discovery (and copying) of new manuscripts of descriptions that laid the basis of next studies.
The second period of research began in the late 19 century, when Professor of Lazarev Oriental Languages Institute (Moscow) George Murkos (1846-1911) performed the complete Russian translation and published it in the "Readings of Imperial Society of Russian history and antiquity" (1896 – 1900) and as a separate imprint. Please be aware that this translation is combined: most of the text translated from Arabic manuscript of Moscow archive, and those parts that are missing in this manuscript, translated from Belfour. In particular, from Belfour's translation translated initial and final sections (chapters 1 – 16 of 1st book – from the beginning up to departure from Constantinople, chapters 16 – 18 of 12th books – from departure from Moscow to arrival to Rashkiv, chapters 7 – 12 of 14th book and the entire 15th book – since the last visit to Bucharest).
After this important articles about description were published by the professors of the Lazarevsky Institute Agatangel Krymsky and Andrew Olesnytsky.
G.Murkos' translation aroused considerable interest in work of Paul. In 1898, St. Petersburg publisher P. Soykin, foregoing translation in print CHOYDR, released excerpts from a printed parts, which certainly helped popularize the work.
Center for studies in this period was the Moscow. High-quality, easily accessible (by printing in Russia and Russian language) translation by Murkos almost completely ousted from the research practice the rare book of Belfour. The main achievement of this period was the widespread introduction of this source to research the history of Russia and Ukraine – the countries of primary attention of the text. G. Murkos intend to remake his translation and publish it along with Arabic text, but this intention remained unrealized.
Third period of studies began after World War I and continue, in our opinion, to our time. It is characterized by the decline of basic research, the proliferation of their geography and regionalization.
The greatest achievement of this period one will recognize the work of Romanian Arabist Basil Radu, which examined the Parisian manuscript of description and prepared its Arabic text and French translation. This work was published in three issues of "Patrologia orientalis" in Paris in 1930 – 1950's.
But this great work is still some fatal unusable. In a time when it was published, evil empire called the Soviet Union distance themselves from the rest of the world with iron curtain, and all scientific contacts of Soviet scientists with civilized world were broken. I assume that the Communists were not willing to subscribe for state expense book called "Patrology" and distribute such a "religious literature". Thus, scientists of the countries that most in need of this edition were cut from this source of information and had no opportunity to take advantage of it in their investigations. For the geographical and linguistic barriers to this edition added even political barrier. Even as a specialist Krachkovsky in his article in 1949 mentions only the first issue of work by B. Radu, though had already been released the second issue and preparing a third.
From the Ukrainian scientists this work was examined only by Ja.Polotnjuk who appreciated its scientific level and at the same time said that it contains only fragments of the description: "Only a small portion of the text of the Paris manuscript was available to us through the publication of B. Radu" (1990) – which again is a riddle, what is the scope of the Paris edition.
European scientists, for whom this edition was available easier, also showed no particular activity in its use (at least Google gives very little facts cited.)
Geographical extension of the work of Paul's studies appeared in the publication of several translations of Ukrainian and Polish, which were printed in Poland and Ukraine. Besides translations were published review articles and a source-study articles. Regionalization of studies proved that from all the great description researchers interested primarily in description of Ukraine.
This approach, on the one hand, helped popularize the Paul's information, broad introduction to the educational and research practice. On the other hand, in terms of historical methods, it was a step backwards compared to the 2nd period, because to clarify a number of purely regional issues one should considered a broad term of whole description.
For example, to answer questions about the authenticity of Paul's description of the Ukrainian context, we must determine the extent of our confidence in the description as a whole and for the researcher should draw on the full publication and may not restrict to excerpts, admissible in Ukrainian translations.
So, recognizing the regional works to be valuable in particular questions (these notes and observation should be taken into account in future work), I do not see capital improvements in the research topic in general.
I have no information on similar regional studies of the Paul's description in Russia, Moldova and Romania, although for the history of these countries it is no less important than for the history of Ukraine. Especially regrettable that remain unknown in Ukraine works of Romanian researchers: although geographically Ukraine borders with Romania, in cultural terms as if we live on different planets.
The fundamental items of research work of Paul, in our opinion, are:
- determining the correspondence between the text of all manuscripts, establishing their origin and division for versions;
- digital publication of all manuscripts in the Internet;
- reconstruction of the most complete source text in completing the maximum number of gaps;
- the critical edition of Arabic text after all available manuscripts;
- preparation of new scientific translations based on the critical edition;
These tasks (except Internet) generally repeated items, pointed out by Ja. Polotnjuk in 1971 and over the past ca 40 years they don't lost their relevance.