Old Believers (2 results)

4to (204 x 242 mm). 3, 366, (9) ff. Engraved head- and tailpieces, text rubricated throughout. Original full reddish-brown morocco over bevelled boards. Gilt spine title; low bands with repeated zigzag roll in gilt, foliate lozenges to the compartments with similar cornerpieces, elaborate concentric panelling in gilt and blind to both boards. Metal bosses to the lower, brass hook-clasps cast with the publisher's name, on leather straps. Moiré effect endpapers. All edges goffered and gilt. First edition. Rare Old Believer prayer book printed in Uralsk, Kazachstan, soon after the imperial 'Edict on Toleration' of 1905, which relaxed restrictions on Old Believer worship. Issued from the pioneering press of the merchant-publisher Andrey Vasilievich Simakov, the first legally operating Old Believer printing house in Uralsk, established on the initiative of Bishop Arsenius of the Urals and Orenburg (Anisim Vasilyevich Shvetsov). By 1910 the Uralsk enterprise had expanded to six steam presses and some seventy workers, serving a long-established Starovéry community in the region. - Printed in Church Slavonic and carefully rubricated throughout, the book contains the fixed texts of the daily cycle of Orthodox prayer preserving the pre-Nikonian Russian rite. A superb example preserved in the provincial publisher's deluxe binding, combining gilt-and-blind panelled decoration with goffered gilt edges and brass hook-clasps personalised with the publisher's name. - Very scarce: a single institutional copy traceable online, at the State Historical Museum, Moscow. One heavily worn copy recently sold by a Russian bookseller; no other copies seen in the trade. - Binding slightly rubbed with some cracking on the joints; lower clasp lacking the angled hook; some soiling and toning to the text-block throughout, the lower right-hand corners in particular showing varying degrees of finger-soiling; mild dampstaining to foredge towards the rear, affecting about 20 leaves, some colour transfer from the binding barely encroaching on the margins. Remains very good and handsome. - Purchased from a Russian emigrant family in Florida. - Not in OCLC.

An Old Believers' miscellany, with interesting annotations from a community in the village of Tolozhno, in the Okulovsky district, near Novgorod. Among the annotations is the 19th-century inscription "No passport", likely a reference to the Old Believers' resistance to owning state documents. Some Old Believers saw the very act of owning a passport as a sin, as equalling "the seal of the Antichrist" (Mon. Chr. Spec., p. 650). There is also an ownership inscription whereby Dariy Ivanovich gave this book to "the sweet" Katerina Mikhailovna. Old Believers' manuscripts typically blended the biblical, the hagiographic, and the didactic, canonical and traditional motifs, as well as scriptural, apocryphal, and popular sources. Generally, they saw printing itself "as a symbol of detested Tsarist authority" (Carey, p. 207), fostering a large manuscript production within local communities. This miscellany comprises nine dialogues, preceded by an introduction, on death and repentance, all based on the works of the most important Orthodox authorities, including the Greek and Syrian Church Fathers and the Saints of the Russian Church, such as John Chrysostom, Theophylact, Athanasius, Dorotheus, and Methodius of Patara. Archpriest Avvakum (d. 1682), a major opposer of Nikon's reforms, is also mentioned. The community of the Old Believers (Raskolniki) developed after the religious reforms introduced by Patriarch Nikon in 1652, which advocated greater alignment with the practices of the Greek Orthodox Church. Nikon's reforms met with strong resistance by the supporters of the old Russian ritual in Moscow. The Pan-Orthodox Synod (1666), spearheaded by Tsar Alexis, precipitated the situation towards a schism (raskol) of the Russian Orthodox Church; previously-imprisoned Old Believers were declared heretical and sentenced to exile and imprisonment in remote monasteries. "The mass flight of Old Believers from persecution by the authorities, towards the outskirts of Russia, contributed to the creation of centres of Old Believer manuscript literature" (Medvedeva, p. 69), especially in remote areas of the country. Provenance: Katerina Mikhailovna, Tolozhno, Novgorod - Arno Collection, New York (-1995)- Sam Fogg, London, April 1995 - Martin Schøyen. N.I. Medvedeva, 'Repertuar staroobrjadcheskoj rukopisnoj knigi v Rossii: XVIII-XX vv.', Vestnik SPbGIK, vol. 17, 2013; The Monthly Christian Spectator, 1851-1859, 1858. Octavo (160 x 100 mm), manuscript on paper. Ff. 70 (- fol.19), 25 lines per full page in Cyrillic half-uncial. Watermark: Pro Patria by J. Honig (cf. Klepikov I, 1135 and 1144, dated 1762 and 1765). Rubricated headings and initials, 2 black and green ornamental headpieces and borders. Contemporary Russian black calf over bevelled wooden boards, outer border double blind ruled with dentelles, central panel with lozenge-shaped centrepiece and stamped fleurons in blind to corners, all edges red. Later Russian inscriptions in ink, pencil, and red crayon to one blank and last verso. Extremities rubbed, minor loss to front cover, lacking two clasps, half a dozen scattered small worm holes, a little craquelure to spine, contents toned, light water stain and finger soiling to lower margin, occasionally to centre, long clean tear along outer border of one decorated border, one leaf torn away: a very good example.