title: Alexander the Great and Solomon the Wise: Who was Ivan the Terrible quoting?
metadata.name: dc.contributor.author
metadata.value: Veselov, Fedor Nikitovich
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.accessioned
metadata.value: 2024-06-06T20:01:40Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.available
metadata.value: 2024-06-06T20:01:40Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.issued
metadata.value: 2023-12
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.citation
metadata.value: Veselov, Fedor Nikitovich. Alexander the Great and Solomon the Wise: Who was Ivan the Terrible quoting?, in Studia Slavica et Balcanica Petropolitana. 2023. № 2. Pp. 3-13. DOI https://doi.org/10.21638/spbu19.2023.201
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.identifier.other
metadata.value: https://doi.org/10.21638/spbu19.2023.201
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.uri
metadata.value: http://hdl.handle.net/11701/45551
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.description.abstract
metadata.value: Numerous legends and apocrypha, circulating in the non-literary scene of Slavia Orthodoxa, in which both Alexander the Great and Solomon the Wise were gradually endowed with parallel features, should have become the basis for the functional similarity of these images in Slavic literature. An important role in the literature of the southern and eastern Slavs in this process was played by the Serbian recension of the Alexander Romance, the second Slavonic translation of the pseudo-Callisthenes work. In the Romance Alexander the Great not only inherits the relics of King Solomon, but the Old Testament king becomes a favorite source for the author’s quotations; Alexander himself acquires a «all-wise heart», and perishes from the «women malice», like Solomon, who «heirs hell because of woman». The wisdom of Alexander in the South Slavic Romance allows one to explain one of Ivan the Terrible’s confusing apothegms in the First Epistle to Andrei Kurbsky: referring to an unnamed prophet, the tsar compares «the madness of women» with «the power of many». It seems that both parts of the apothegm are based on Serbian Alexander Romance, while the one that is dedicated to «women malice» is taken from the «proverbs of Alexander», which in their structure copy the apocryphal Judgments of Solomon. Apparently, thanks to Serbian Alexandria, the images of the kings of antiquity merged even in the mind of the Russian sovereign, who impressed his contemporaries with his education. It is possible that one of the consequences of this was the inclusion of Ivan the Terrible in the alternation of already three figures of legendary rulers who had similar functions in the later folklore narrations.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.description.sponsorship
metadata.value: The study is supported by the Russian Scientific foundation grant No 21-78-00050 «Alexander the Great in the Muscovite Tsardom: Old Rus’ illuminated manuscripts of the Serbian Alexander Romance».
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: Studia Slavica et Balcanica Petropolitana;Issue 2
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Alexander the Great
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: King Solomon
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Ivan the Terrible
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Serbian Alexander Romance
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Slavonic apocrypha
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Old Rus’ literature
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.title
metadata.value: Alexander the Great and Solomon the Wise: Who was Ivan the Terrible quoting?
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.type
metadata.value: Article
metadata.lang: en_GB
resources.filename: 01-VeselovFN.pdf
resources.url: https://dspace.spbu.ru/bitstream/11701/45551/1/01-VeselovFN.pdf
resources.format: Adobe PDF
resources.size: 629,79 kB