Short Prologue texts (16th – 17th centuries)

Nicholas Zharkikh

Late short Prologue texts (16th – 17th centuries), in contrast to the early short texts discussed above, arose from the need to reduce the SMF to the size of a typical Prologue article.

We have two such abbreviations, one comes from the manuscripts of the 16th century and was published by N. I. Serebryansky under the title "All-Russian edition of the SMF" [NIS-2, p. 52]. I refer to this variant as S-11. Later, a version of the printed Prologue (S-12) was written using it.

The SMF first reached printing press in Moscow in 1642. The first volume Prologue (September-February) was published there in 1641. Without finishing this edition, the printers started a new one in 1642, which included more than 20 articles about Russian saints, including the SMF we need, which I abbreviate as S-12. In 1643 the second volume of this edition was published (March – August).

Comparison table (78 episodes).

Short text S-11

S-11 is an abbreviation of chronicle texts, most likely S1LSI. Having before him the chronicle, the author of S-11 could take from it the date of Batu’s campaign, without resorting to other versions of the SMF.

Short text S-12

The author of the S-12 created a greatly abbreviated combined edition, which in the beginning quite clearly followed the S-11, and then switched to TPS. With this reduction completely fell Eldega, the king does everything himself. Michael’s political declaration was also dropped, leaving only his refusal to worship. Due to this reduction in S-12 there are no characteristic structural features.

Shortened text of the section. Full text in ukrainian version.