Home – Home – Jornals – Humanitarian sciences in Siberia 2016 number

The article examines the features of hagiography development in Siberia in the XIX - early XX centuries. For the first time it raises the problem whether there was a single Siberian hagiographic tradition, or it was composed of separate territorial loci. According to modern concepts, the place where a Saint performed his ascetic labors provided the basis for the development of regional hagiographic traditions. The analysis of “Siberian Paterik” project by Omsk hagiographers (1916) allowed to hypothesize on forming regional hagiographic traditions in Siberia - territorial loci. Unlike the XVII century, when there was the only Tobolsk metropolis in Siberia, so the individual loci were not the subject to dispute, the XIX century witnessed a different situation: there were grounds to talk of the Tobolsk, Tomsk, Irkutsk, and other hagiographies. Their further development was provided by the penetration and spread of printing technology in Siberia as is evident from the “Joint Catalogue of the Siberian and Far Eastern book. 1780-1917” (Vol. 1-3. Novosibirsk, 2004-2005). Formation of the regional loci is indicated by the growing activities on collecting the information about the saints and piety ascetics in individual dioceses. The “Nests of Holiness” were formed; along with writing the texts of individual biographies and hagiography, the hagiographic collections and “Lives of the Fathers” associated with several territories, monasteries, and Orthodox missions were prepared. The project of “Siberian Paterik” can be viewed as a possible result of this process. The author raises an issue of the need to study the creative legacy of Siberian historians, such as A. I. Sulotsky, N. A. Abramov, A. I. Yurievsky and others, in the context of regional hagiographic tradition development.