title: The Circulation of Sciences in Europe, or Peter the Great’s ‘Greek project’
metadata.name: dc.contributor.author
metadata.value: Pozdnev, Michael M.
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.accessioned
metadata.value: 2022-02-21T19:29:16Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.available
metadata.value: 2022-02-21T19:29:16Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.issued
metadata.value: 2021-12
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.citation
metadata.value: Pozdnev M. M. The Circulation of Sciences in Europe, or Peter the Great’s ‘Greek project’. Philologia Classica 2021, 16 (2), 290–307.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.identifier.other
metadata.value: https://doi.org/10.21638/spbu20.2021.210
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.uri
metadata.value: http://hdl.handle.net/11701/35195
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.description.abstract
metadata.value: In his famous speech of 1714, Peter I depicts Europe as a single organism with Greece as its
  heart: it is from here that “the sciences,” like blood, once flowed and along the homeward
  path they run, having first gained a firm foothold in Russia. The18th century perceived this
  comparison as a real political program: the similarity was supposed to imply that the European
  culture should be brought back to Greece on Russian bayonets. This rendering was
  born with the utopian “Greek project” of Catherine II and lasted until the end of the century.
  Neither confirming nor contradicting it, the 19th century prefers to see in Peter’s words pride
  in the successes of the Russian enlightenment which was introduced during the two decades
  of his reformist activity. The 20th century, burdened with the baggage of literary associations,
  interprets this image as commonplace for baroque rhetoric, a routine metaphor for translatio
  studii with little or no actual political meaning. Undoubtedly authentic, transmitted by several
  early witnesses, the speech became part of the ‘Petrine myth,’ but, surprisingly enough, was
  never the subject of critical source analysis. Thus, its historical context and intended meaning
  remained largely obscured. A comparative study leads to the conclusion that all its renderings
  originated from a common literary source. The archetypal version was that of F. Chr. Weber,
  while the other variants are more or less remote copies containing deliberate amendments.
  A closer look at the relevant paragraphs of Weber’s notes reveals the true pathos of the speech.
  Peter’s rhetoric, prompted by his immediate concerns, boils down to an admiration for the
  culture of Western Europeans. The historical context clarifies what motivates the central image
  of the simile — Greece as the heart of European enlightenment: shortly before the episode,
  the tsar was treated to a Greek speech delivered by the six-year-old son of the learned Moldavian
  prince Dimitrie Cantemir who was one of Peter’s principal allies.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.description.sponsorship
metadata.value: The reported study was funded by Russian Foundation for Basic Research, project number 20-012-
  42005.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.language.iso
metadata.value: ru
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.publisher
metadata.value: St Petersburg State University
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.relation.ispartofseries
metadata.value: Philologia Classica;Volume 16; Issue 2
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Peter I
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: the Greek project
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: translatio studii
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Dimitrie Cantemir
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.title
metadata.value: The Circulation of Sciences in Europe, or Peter the Great’s ‘Greek project’
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.type
metadata.value: Article
metadata.lang: en_GB
resources.filename: 290-307.pdf
resources.url: https://dspace.spbu.ru/bitstream/11701/35195/1/290-307.pdf
resources.format: Adobe PDF
resources.size: 783,71 kB