Letters from the cellarer of the Chudov Monastery, Varlaam Palitsyn, to the Tikhvin Dormition Monastery, From the materials of the Swedish State Archives in Stockholm, second half of the 17th century

Document publication

DOI 10.28995/2073-0101-2026-3-866-885

For citation

Sheremetov, N. A. (2026). Letters from the cellarer of the Chudov Monastery, Varlaam Palitsyn, to the Tikhvin Dormition Monastery, From the materials of the Swedish State Archives in Stockholm, second half of the 17th century, Herald of an Archivist, no. 3, pp. 866-885. DOI 10.28995/2073-0101-2026-3-866-885

Sheremetov, N. A., St. Petersburg Institute of History of the Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia

Letters from the cellarer of the Chudov Monastery, Varlaam Palitsyn, to the Tikhvin Dormition Monastery, From the materials of the Swedish State Archives in Stockholm, second half of the 17th century

Abstract

The article analyzes and publishes two letters from the second half of the 17th century, discovered among the archive materials of the Tikhvin Dormition Monastery, housed in the Swedish National Archives in Stockholm (Riksarkivet, Tichuinarkivet). According to E. L?fstrand, who is credited with introducing this corpus of documents into scholarly circulation, before they arrived at the archive in 1997, they were kept by the family of the Norwegian diplomat Einar Krane, who served at the Norwegian Embassy in Moscow from 1921 to 1946, and then in a parish of the Russian Orthodox Church in Stockholm. In its current form, the corpus of documents that make up the Stockholm section of the Tikhvin Dormition Monastery archive could have been compiled by I. P. Mordvinov, who was in charge of the archive after the monastery's abolition. The Tikhvin archive in Stockholm consists of four cardboards, one of which contains codices, and three cardboards, scrolls. The largest number of documents pertain to the monastery's 1673 court case against landowner Peter Artsybashev and the monastery's economic activities. Of particular interest are individual examples of various sources on the monastery's history, including letters from Varlaam Palitsyn, cellarer of the Moscow Chudov Monastery, addressed to Archimandrites Jonah (Baranov) (1668–1674) and Ephraim (1676–1678). Both letters have survived in their original form, written on columns, the first in Varlaam Palitsyn’s own hand, and represent examples of the personal and business correspondence of clergy. In scholarly literature, the cellarer is known as a companion of Patriarch Joachim and the compiler of the 1670s edition of the Patriarchal Chronicle. The discovery of his correspondence is particularly noteworthy because the opinion about Varlaam's chronicling activities is based on the contents of the so-called «Synopsis of Russian History», preserved in a single 18th-century copy. The original, judging by a copy of the 1686 contribution, was intended by the cellarer for donation to the Assumption-Tikhvin Monastery. An analysis of the letters, based primarily on 17th-century materials from the archives of the Assumption-Tikhvin Monastery (Archive of the St. Petersburg Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, F. 132), revealed that, from at least the late 1660s to the 1670s, Varlaam Palitsyn was an active patron of the Assumption-Tikhvin Monastery in Moscow. The cellarer's letters, on the one hand, provide a private illustration of the business ties between Moscow and the provincial black clergy. On the other hand, thanks to the mention of Ivan's parents and brother in one of the letters, it is possible to reliably establish the circle of Varlaam's family ties and substantiate his Novgorod origin.

Keywords

Tikhvin Archives in Stockholm (Riksarkivet, Tichuinarkivet), private correspondence, cellarer Varlaam Palitsyn, archimandrite Jonah Baranov, Chudov Monastery, Dormition Tikhvin Monastery, biography.

Download the article: sheremetov_doi

References

Abelentseva, O. A. (2005). Inventories of the Property of the Great Tikhvin Dormition Monastery of the Mother of God, 17th Century. IN: Essays on Feudal Russia, Issue 9, Ed. by S. N. Kisterev, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Alliance-Archeo, pp. 285–310.

Abelentseva, O. A. (2020). Materials on the History of the Tikhvin Dormition Monastery, Iss. 1, Cadastre Acts and Materials, Part 2, 1644–1675, Moscow; St. Petersburg, Alliance-Archeo, 488 p.

(1842). Historical Acts, Collected and Published by the Archaeographic Commission, St. Petersburg, The 2nd Section of His Imperial Majesty's Chancellery publ., Vol. 5, 1676–1700, 567 p.

Barsukov, A. P. (1902). Lists of City Voivodes and Other Persons of the Voivodeship Administration of the Muscovite State in the 17th Century Based on Printed Government Acts, St. Petersburg, M. M. Stasyulevich publ., 611 p.

Bogdanov, A. P. (2024). All-Russian Chronicle of the End of the 17th Century, Moscow, Alma Mater, 926 p.

Varakin, E. P., Pyatnitskaya, T. N. (2017). The Architectural Ensemble of the Assumption Monastery in Tikhvin, St. Petersburg, Faces of Russia, 302 p.

(1897). The Case of Patriarch Nikon, Publication of the Archaeographic Commission on the Documents of the Synodal (Former Patriarchal) Library, St. Petersburg, S. P. Yakovlev publ., 453 p.

Kloss, B. M. (1992). Varlaam Palitsyn. IN: Dictionary of Scribes and Bookworms of Ancient Rus', Ed. by D. S. Likhachev, In 3 Iss., Iss. 3, 17th century, Part 1, St. Petersburg, IRLI, 410 p.

Kloss, B. M. (1998). Selected Works, T. I, The Life of Sergius of Radonezh, Moscow, Languages of Russian Culture, 564 p.

(1992). Corpus of Inscriptions on Early Printed Books, Library of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Inscriptions on Books in Cyrillic Script, Printed in Moscow in the 16th-17th Centuries, Comp. by L. I. Kiseleva, Responsible editor A. I. Kopanev, St. Petersburg, BAN, 217 p.

Liseytsev, D. V., Rogozhin, N. M., Eskin, Yu. M. (2015). Orders of the Moscow State in the 16th–17th centuries. Dictionary-reference book, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Center for Humanitarian Initiatives, 301 p.

Lobanov-Rostovsky, A. B. (1895). Russian genealogical book, T. 2, St. Petersburg, A. S. Suvorin publ., 481 p.

Mordovina S. P., Stanislavsky, A. L. (1990). Genealogical list of the Palitsyn nobles. IN: Archaeographic Yearbook for 1989, Moscow, Nauka, pp. 276–291.

Novombergsky, N. (1905). Materials on the History of Medicine in Russia, St. Petersburg, M. M. Stasyulevich publ., 191 p.

Novokhatko, O. V. (2018). Russia, Private Correspondence of the 17th Century, Moscow, Monuments of Historical Thought, 664 p.

Selin, A. A. (2008). Novgorod Society during the Time of Troubles, St. Petersburg, Blitz, 752 p.

Solodkin, Ya. G. (1997). History of Late Russian Chronicles, Moscow, MALP, 199 p.

Stanislavsky, A. L., Mordvinova, S. P. (1990). Genealogical List of the Palitsyn Nobles. IN: Archaeographic Yearbook for 1989, Moscow, Nauka, pp. 276–291.

(1965). Description of the Manuscript Department of the Library of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Vol. 3, Iss. 2, Historical Collections of the 15th–17th Centuries, Comp. by A. I. Kopanev, M. V. Kukushkina, V. F. Pokrovskaya, Moscow, Leningrad, Nauka, 362 p.

(2003). Scribe and Census Books of Novgorod the Great in the 17th – Early 18th Centuries, Comp. by I. Yu. Ankudinov, St. Petersburg, Dmitry Bulanin, 665 p.

Prozorovsky, D. I. (1879). Inventory of Ancient Manuscripts Stored in the Museum of the Imperial Russian Archaeological Society, St. Petersburg, Imperial Academy of Sciences publ., 307 p.

Shabaev, L. E. (2021). Genealogical Lists Submitted to the Chamber of Genealogical Affairs at the End of the 17th Century: Provincial Service Nobility (Veliky Novgorod), Russian Genealogy, no. 9, pp. 177–261.

Khrustalev, M. Yu. (1999). Estates and Their Owners. IN: Chagoda, Historical and Local History Almanac, Iss. 1, Vologda, Ardvisura, pp. 147–157.

Shimko, I. I. (1894). The Patriarchal State Prikaz, Its External History, Structure, and Activities, Moscow, I. N. Kushnerev and Co. publ., 361 p.

About authors

Sheremetov Nikita Andreevich, St. Petersburg Institute of History of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Scientific and Historical Archive, junior researcher, St. Petersburg, Russia, +7-952-277-46-99, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Grant information

The study was conducted at the expense of a grant from the Russian Science Foundation № 20-78-10060-П, https://rscf.ru/project/20-78-10060/

The article was received in the editorial office on 24.02.2025, recommended for publication on 20.06.2026