The female image presented in the small painting “Allegory of Music” by Filippino Lippi (Gemaeldegalerie, Berlin) is most likely associated with the plot of a theatrical performance played out in 1475 in Pesaro on the occasion of the wedding of Costanzo Sforza and Camilla of Aragon. The similarity of the attributes of the heroine with the attributes of the muse Erato, who greeted the newlyweds, was pointed out by A. Warburg, who placed two images, the Filippino board and an illustration from the Vatican manuscript containing the text of the wedding performance, next to each other in his “Mnemosine Atlas”. It is impossible to substantiate this version with documents, but the Florentine artist, who nominally interprets the plot differently from the anonymous northern Italian miniaturist, could be familiar with the description of the celebration, known not only from illustrated lists, but also from printed brochures. The origins of the “Allegory of Music” are traditionally traced to a wedding commission — on the occasion of the marriage of Giovanni Vespucci and Namicina Nerli in 1500 — which also included paired spalliers depicting “History of Lucretia” and “History of Virginia” by Sandro Botticelli and a panel by Piero di Cosimo displaying bacchanalia. The present article advances arguments in favor of this version, building on other episodes of cooperation between Botticelli and Filippino Lippi, both between the two of them and with the two intermarried Florentine families. The painting in question contains elements that may indicate its connection with the wedding ritual. It is impossible to establish how all the listed panels were arranged in the interior. However, on the whole, this alleged ensemble, designed in the all’antica style, could be thought of as a glorification of sublime and chaste love. The theme, traditional for the decoration of the matrimonial bedroom, is eleborated simultaneously in brutal scenes from Roman history, which in Florentine artistic culture were laden with explicit republican connotations, as well as in small-scale mythological “poetry”, that softens political accents and, moreover, can be associated with a magnifi cent princely wedding, glorifying the nobility of the newlyweds.

According to the generally accepted view there were no stainedglass windows in ancient Russian religious architecture. This opinion is undoubtedly based on the absence of stained-glass sets in the then-existing temples that have survived to this day. The information collected by the author of the article, on the contrary, testifies to the use of stained-glass windows in the architecture of Ancient Rus. One of such testimonies is the discovery of three stained-glass windows in the Yaroslavl’ Kremlin, in the cultural layers of the first half of the 13th century. To establish the place of production, the windows were studied using optical emission spectrography. The analysis in all three cases showed the same chemical composition — wood-ash lead glass. This type of glass was imported to Rus’, and is well known in stained glass windows of the twelfth–fifteenth centuries proceeding from what is now Germany and Austria. An additional argument for the non-local origin of the Yaroslavl’ finds is the use of casting and rolling techniques in the manufacture of glass. The present study makes it possible to expand the geography of the distribution of glass with the indicated composition, which, until recently, was mainly limited to the area of Central Europe. The uniformity of all the characteristics of the stained-glass finds indicates that they belong to a single set of stained-glass windows. Most likely, they were used in the Assumption Cathedral, the only stone building that existed in Yaroslavl’ in the pre-Mongolian period. It was founded, according to chronicles, in 1215 by the Rostov prince Konstantin Vsevolodovich. The question of how stained-glass windows from German-speaking countries ended up in Yaroslavl’ was resolved owing to the art history research by V.V. Sedov, who established that the Assumption Cathedral in the capital of the principality, Rostov, was founded by the same prince Konstantin Vsevolodovich in 1213 and built with the participation of Romanesque — apparently German — craftsmen who worked on creating the decor of the building. This suggests that the German craft smen also took part in the decoration of the Yaroslavl’ Cathedral, and this was why the material for future stained-glass compositions was brought to Rus’..

The aim of the study is to examine the activities of professional academic associations in the U.S., which are close to the memory institutions in Europe. The author examines the role of professional associations as memory institutions in the development of memorial culture through the representation of the past in contemporary politics, its reflection in public and public spaces of American society. The novelty of the study lies in the comparison of institutions that determine the main vectors and trajectories of historical policy as memory policy in the United States. The article analyses the problems of the activities of institutionalized actors of collective memory policy in the U.S., including the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians and the Southern Historical Association. It hypothesizes that these groups can shape civil society versions of collective memory as alternatives to politically motivated use of the past by political elites. The article deals with the institutional and formal features of historical politics in the United States, the participation of historical associations in memorial confl icts and “memory wars”, issues of politicization of history and the academic community’s attempts at forming a canon of historical collective memory which is formally free from ideological infl uences. The activities of professional historical associations have supposedly been a factor in the development of revisionism in the interpretation of the history of the American South and the Confederate States of America. Therefore, the author considers the role and responsibility of American historians as public intellectuals who shaped compromise versions of memorial culture that contributed to the consolidation of society. The article highlights the contribution of professional historical associations as memory institutions to the development of mnemonic spaces of American society and its memorial culture. It analyses the attempts of American historians to preserve the “purity” of academic research in the context of the growing ideologization and instrumentalization of history by ruling elites. The research results suggest that memory institutions are an important factor in the development of contemporary identities in the United States in the context of revision of the past and the formation of new or alternative memorial canons in American political culture.

The article is devoted to the memory of Vladimir Anatolievich Georgiev, Associate Professor of the Faculty of History at Moscow State University, his scholarly heritage and participation in the activities of Professor N.S. Kinyapina’s school in the study of foreign policy of the Russian Empire, especially concerning national peripheries — the Caucasus and Central Asia. The author provides the main facts of Georgiev’s biography, including information about the activities of his parents, who were also professional historians and graduates of the Department of History, Moscow State University. Georgiev was a representative of one of the four generations of this family who graduated from the Faculty of History of Moscow State University. His scholarly career and many years of teaching are connected with the Department of Russian history in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Under the supervision of Professor N.S. Kinyapina he successfully defended his PhD thesis “Russian Foreign Policy in the Middle East in the Late 1830s and Early 1840s” and published a corresponding monograph in the mid-1970s. The article also deals with his major publications in the Soviet and post-Soviet periods, in particular, with his contribution to the collective monograph The Eastern Question in Russian Foreign Policy. From the Late Eighteenth through the Early Twentieth Century. Special attention is paid to the group set up by Georgiev for research on Russian policy in the Caucasus during the imperial period. The article lists all of the students, who studied under his direction from writing student essays to defending dissertations and compiling their own monographs. Georgiev’s multifaceted work on popularization of historical knowledge in text- and handbooks for students and schoolchildren is not forgotten. They are still in great demand and published in large editions. Georgiev also wrote for the Soviet Military Encyclopedia and the Large Russian Encyclopedia.

The article is a tribute of respect to the memory of Gennady Evgenyevich Markov, a major Russian ethnologist, archaeologist and historian of primitive society, doctor in history, professor of the Department of Ethnology, Faculty of History, Lomonosov Moscow State University. The authors provide a detailed analysis of the scientific contribution and life path of the outstanding Soviet/Russian scholar and place their narrative in a broad socio-cultural and intellectual context of the country and society. G.E. Markov’s biography is closely connected with the history of the Department of Ethnography/Ethnology at the Faculty of History, Moscow State University and serves as a serious basis for reconstructing the genesis of university ethnography and its dynamics over the course of nearly 85 years. Such a long period of existence of the university department and its sustainable effectiveness in training professional staff were essentially ensured by the high qualifi cation of scientific and pedagogical staff, reliance on solid theoretical and methodological foundations and interdisciplinarity, a combination of conservatism with flexibility and adaptability to the challenges of the time, the ability to preserve disciplinary continuity and ensure the transmission of the scholarly tradition. All these components of the successful development of university ethnology are subjected to a comprehensive and balanced examination in the article. G.E. Markov’s biography in all its typical and special manifestations forms the semantic core of the analysis and presentation. The authors offer their view on complex and sharply debatable issues of professional self-determination,.

In the 1960s the Komsomol began to give particular attention to its international activity, which was not only limited to participation, but also involved the organization of many different events for foreign youth and students — international friendship camps, forums, trips of foreign delegations. The creation of the Committee of Youth Organizations of the USSR (KMO USSR) and the Sputnik International Youth Tourism Bureau (BMMT) contributed to the intensification of the tourist exchange between Soviet and foreign youth. Both organizations were subordinate to the Central Committee of the Komsomol and received funding from the Komsomol budget. In 1962, additional funds started being allocated for international activities, as evidenced by a new item of expenditure that appeared in the budget of the Komsomol. Most of this money was spent by the Central Committee, with excessive expenditure on the reception of foreign delegations and gifts, which was repeatedly noted by audit checks. Twelve to thirty committees with international youth camps (out of 86 regional Komsomol committees) received money under the framework of this funding item. During the period under study, the Komsomol actively helped with the payment of organizational fees to the funds of the World Festivals of Youth and Students, and then began to provide direct material assistance to the youth organizations in Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa, which regularly applied for it. It is important to note that the annual increase of spending on international activities occurred in the context of the termination of state funding for the Komsomol, which in 1959 became fully financially self-sufficient. Based on a wide range of archival documents introduced into scientific circulation for the first time, the article presents an analysis of the financial activities of the Central Committee of the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, its sources of funding and directions for spending the funds allocated for international activities. The relevance of the study is determined by the lack of serious scholarly investigation of this problem and the need to study the financial support of international activities in order to give a comprehensive assessment of its impact and efficiency.

The article examines the history of menu formation in the Russian public eating establishments in the19th and early 20th centuries. Taverns and pancake houses appeared in the 16th and 17th centuries. the main principles of cookery (its bread character, the use of grits or flour in all dishes and main drinks) are outlined on the basis of available sources of that time. There were important food bans (besides fasts): to eat blood, animal prey, calves, goats, pigeons, bears, etc. Due to these prohibitions medieval Russian cuisine did not use finely chopped raw meat (minced meat), respectively, there were no sausages and pates. The materials of archaeological research allow to determine the ratio of the main elements in the diet of medieval urban dwellers and cooking technology. The author pays special attention to the evolution of stoves and hearths, the gradual development of the construction of the Russian oven at the turn of the 15th and 16th centuries. She traces the innovations of the late 17th and 18th centuries, reveals the intensifi cation of the innovation process in the 18th century and its influence on both kitchen equipment and new ways of making butter, sour cream, sauces, etc. The article briefly deals with the evolution of 18th-century cookbooks from the formation of the genre (ca. the 1730s) to the generalized compilations of the 1790s and examines their vocabulary and structure. It is noteworthy that their authors were not cooks, but officials-translators looking for literary work. The author suggests the existence of a handwritten collection of recipes for the traditional Russian cuisine, known to the compilers of culinary compilations in the 18th century. She focuses on the adaptation of new dishes, drinks, foods, and the special role of eating establishments (eateries, taverns, herbergs) in this process. Through the example of tea-drinking the author demonstrates the way of transformation of the earlier unknown dishes into the customary and widespread ones, which became the attributes of traditional tavern cuisines by the middle of the 19th century.

The article covers the important aspects of the Russian-Swedish war of 1741–1743, which has attracted little attention in Russian historiography. The war was waged over three campaigns, witnessed by two British ambassadors in Russia, Edward Finch and Cyril Wyche. Based on the diplomatic correspondence of the British ambassadors, previously unexplored in the Russian historical science, the author analyzes the information which they received from high-ranking Russian offi cials, including commanders of the troops, and then passed on to London. In particular, it concerned the state of the Russian armed forces on the eve of the war with Sweden. The diplomats noted and informed their superiors about the weaknesses of the Russian navy. Keeping track of the course of the war, the ambassadors briefed the Secretary of State about its causes, the main being the desire of the Swedes to abrogate the conditions of the Nishtad peace and regain the territories lost during the Northern War of 1700–1721. Both ambassadors acknowledged the courage and heroism shown by the Russian soldiers in battles with the enemy, as well as their humane treatment of the captured Swedes. At the same time, they drew attention to the manifestations of cruelty infl icted by irregular troops who participated in the raids in Finland. The dispatches of the ambassadors also reveal the stance taken by a number of countries towards the conflict between Russia and Sweden: hostile on the part of France and generally benevolent on the part of offi cial London, which did not want to spoil relations with the Russian court on the eve of the conclusion of the 1742 Treaty of Alliance. Other documents of indisputable interest are manifestos (included in the correspondence of diplomats) addressed by the Swedish king and the Russian empress to the population of the border territories and aimed at showing goodwill towards the enemy troops. The facts about the Russian-Swedish war presented by the British ambassadors and analyzed in the article fill the existing gap in one of the episodes of Russian-Swedish relations in the middle of the eighteenth century.

The article examines a little-studied problem in the period of formation of the system of overland roads in the central part of the Russian state. The purpose of the study is to find out how stable were the road routes in the southern (Zaretskaya) part of the Moscow uyezd in the 17th and the fi rst third of the 18th century. This choice is explained by the fact that the roads in the southern part of the uyezd, separated from its northern (Zamoskovnaya) part by the Moskva river, were a unified complex of communications. The research was based on the cadasters of 1627–1629, Moscow uyezd’s maps of the second half of the 17th century, as well as land surveyor’s plans in the 1720s from the map collection of J.-N. Delisle. The study included identifi cation of settlements indicated on the early 18th-century maps and plans of the second half of the 17th century, a comparison of identified settlements, and search for settlements from the cadasters of 1627–1629 on the basis of comparisons of maps and plans (in some cases, the settlements in the cadasters have references to roads that serve as landmarks). The author concludes that five major roads in southern Moscow suburbs, New Mozhaisk, Zvenigorod, Borovsk, Kashira and Kamensk roads, were formed up to the mid-17th century and kept their importance throughout the 18th century. They were postal highways, “federal highways” of that time. It is impossible to draw a conclusion about the route stability of country roads on the basis of the analyzed sources. The data of cadasters of 1627–1629 allows to confi rm that at least three out of five roads (Borovsk, Kamensk and Kashira) existed not only in the second, but also in the first half of the 17th century. The absence of the Zvenigorod road in the Zaretskaya part of the uyezd in the cadasters does not mean that it did not exist in the first third of the17th century. Most likely the scribe simply did not indicate it as a landmark.

The Rule of Joseph Volotsky (1439–1515) was known to his first biographers of the 19th century, P.S. Kazansky, N.A. Bulgakov and I. Khrushchov. All of them worked with the Rule incorporated in the Great Menaion Reader by Metropolitan Macarius of Moscow and All Russia. Ya.S. Lur’e at 1950th discovered a different version of the Rule, the brief one, which consists of 11 Discourses, and several collections with an incomplete set of Discourses and potential Discourse 12. The brief version was published by Ya.S. Lur’e together with potential Discourse 12 in 1959. He characterized the manuscript tradition of the Rule as very stable in contrast to another work, the Enlightener. The author of the article found the manuscript in OR GIM (Manuscript Department of the State Historical Museum), Diocesan Collection, N 248. It is indicated as Discourse 12 of the Enlightener in the description, but, after having examined the manuscript, the author identifi ed this text as fragments of Joseph Volotsky’s Rule, which can be dated to the late 15th century, and thus it is a lifetime fragments of the Rule. The verification of the versions helps to establish that the first fragment is Discourse 11 of the Extended Rule. It is followed by the previously unknown Discourse 12, which is very much alike with Discourse 13 of the Menaion version. It is followed by Discourses 2 and 3 of the Brief Rule, and by a substantially shortened text of Discourse 13. The author concludes that originally the Brief Rule may have contained 13 instead of 11 Discourses. At the same time the Brief Rule consists of two “wills”, and the second one contains Discourses 12–14. Ya.S. Lur’e established that much of their content duplicates the first 11 Discourses. In the Moskovskiye tserkovnyye vedomosti the auther found a note with references to the lost manuscript N 482 from the Volokolamsk Monastery, which could contain only the “second” will without the first. He concludes that the Menaion redaction could originally contain 11 Discourses instead of 14, and the merging of the two wills occurred after the death of Joseph Volotsky