title: The Double Standard: Livonian Chronicles and Muscovite Barbarity during the Livonian War (1558–1582)
metadata.name: dc.contributor.author
metadata.value: Halperin, Charles
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.accessioned
metadata.value: 2018-08-07T11:43:10Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.available
metadata.value: 2018-08-07T11:43:10Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.issued
metadata.value: 2018-06
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.other
metadata.value: 10.21638/11701/spbu19.2018.106
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.uri
metadata.value: http://hdl.handle.net/11701/14726
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.description.abstract
metadata.value: This article analyzes the image of Ivan IV (Ivan the Terrible) and Muscovites in the chronicles
  written by Livonian Germans during the Livonian War: Johannes Renner’s Livonian History, Balthasar
  Russow’s Chronicle, and Salomon Henning’s Chronicle of Courland and Livonia. Although these authors
  came from different backgrounds, supported different policies, and disagreed with each other in many ways,
  they all presented Ivan IV and Muscovites in extremely negative terms, focusing on the atrocities committed
  by the despot and tyrant Ivan IV and the barbaric Muscovites, consistent with the sixteenth-century Muscovite
  Discourse of German pamphlets identified by Cornelia Soldat, a stereotype copied directly from the
  fifteenth-century discourse about the Ottoman Turks. However, in addition each chronicler presents fewer
  and less graphic incidents in which Livonians committed atrocities and equally rare instances in which Ivan
  IV and Muscovites acted virtuously or honorably. Such positive portrayals of Ivan and Muscovites, were inconsistent
  with that Muscovite Discourse. This constitutes the first level of the Livonian chroniclers’ double
  standard in describing Ivan IV and Muscovites. The second level of the double standard of the chronicles
  consists in not letting episodes of “good” behavior by Ivan or Muscovites influence their identity as barbarians,
  and not letting episodes of “bad” behavior by Livonians or other peoples influence their identity as
  civilized. Warfare between Livonians and Muscovites was a contest between civilization and barbarism, between
  good and evil. Evidence of Livonian vice or Muscovite virtue by definition could not overturn the
  essentialist stereotypes, propagated without qualification in the anti-Muscovite pamphlets, underneath the
  chroniclers’ perception of Ivan and the Russians. This essentialist argument finessed behavioral ambiguities
  and permitted the chroniclers to present in their narratives examples of virtuous behavior by Ivan and the
  Muscovites without sacrificing their prejudices. The bias of the Livonian chroniclers was more complicated
  than has been appreciated, but its two levels permitted the chroniclers to include in their narratives a modest
  number of episodes which show Ivan and the Russians in a favorable light. Just as these episodes do not
  make the numerous atrocity stories from the chronicles deriving from the same anti-Muscovite discourse
  that informed the pamphlets any more credible, they do not transform the chroniclers from biased partisans
  into unbiased objective observers.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.language.iso
metadata.value: en
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 1(23)
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Ivan IV
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Livonia War
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Johannes Renner
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Balthasar Russow
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Salomon Henning
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Muscovites
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.title
metadata.value: The Double Standard: Livonian Chronicles and Muscovite Barbarity during the Livonian War (1558–1582)
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.type
metadata.value: Article
metadata.lang: en_GB
resources.filename: 06-Halperin.pdf
resources.url: https://dspace.spbu.ru/bitstream/11701/14726/1/06-Halperin.pdf
resources.format: Adobe PDF
resources.size: 517,62 kB