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Alexander Iwan Pereswetoff-MorathResearcher

About me

B. 1969, Raus, province of Scania. PhD (2002, Lund), docent (Associate Professor) in Slavonic Studies (2008, Lund). Researcher in Slavonic (Old East Slavic/‘Old Russian’) and Old and Middle Church Slavonic philology, Slavonic manuscripts in Sweden, the language and culture of the Russians of 17th-century Ingria, text editing, premodern and early modern Russian–Swedish relations, premodern Slavonic–Jewish relations and Slavonic anti-Judaic literature. Teacher of Russian, the history of Russian and Church Slavonic, the history of Russian culture.

 

Degrees

BA (Slavonic studies, French, Greek, Musicology), Lund University, 1996

PhD (Slavonic Studies, specialising in Russian linguistics), Lund University, 2002

Docent (Associate Professor/Privatdozent) (Slavonic Studies), Lund University, 2008

 

Guest scholar

Pushkin House, Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, 2007

The Israel Institute for Advanced Study, Jerusalem, 2011

 

Current research

At present conducting the project Rossica Ingrica on written Russian in Swedish Ingria 1611–1704 (Rossica Ingrica: The Paths of Native Written Russian in Swedish Ingria, 1611–1704. A Sociophilological Study with a Digital Edition) funded by the Marcus and Amalia Wallenberg Memorial Foundation.

Other current work concerns the philology of anti-Judaic texts in medieval Rus´ and Bulgaria/Macedonia, and medieval Slavonic manuscripts in Swedish repositories.

 

Keywords

East Slavonic philology, Russian and Church Slavonic medieval literature, the history of East Slavonic and Church Slavonic, text editing (ecdotics), Ingria, Swedish–Russian relations in the 17th century, digital humanities, Slavic–Jewish relations in premodern Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine

 

Teaching

At Stockholm University I have taught Russian Text Analysis on various levels, Russian for beginners, the History of Russian Culture and Ideas, the History of Russian (and Church Slavonic).

 

Publications while at Stockholm University 2008–, see the bottom of the page)

 

Some publications while at Lund University, 1999–2007, cf. link to the right.

Monographs

‘Whereby we know that it is the last time’: Musings on Anti-Messiahs and Antichrists in a Ruthenian Textual Community. Lund 2006.

A Grin without a Cat, vol. 1: Adversus Iudaeos Texts in the Literature of Medieval Russia (988-1504), vol. 2: Jews and Christians in Medieval Russia – Assessing the Sources, Lund 2002. (Vol. 1 — doctoral thesis)

 

Edited books

(w. Fiona Björling:) Words, Deeds and Values. The Intelligentsia in Russia and Poland during the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Lund 2005.

(w. Birgitta Dimitrova Englund:) Swedish Contributions to the Thirteenth International Congress of Slavists, Ljubljana, 15-21 August 2003. Lund 2003.

[(w. Fiona Björling:)] The Intelligentsias of Russia and Poland: the Intelligentsia as Creators of Social Values in Russia and Poland during the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: Abstracts from the Conference Held at Lund University, August 22-25, 2002. Lund 2002.

 

Scholarly papers

‘Адонаи, заблудихомъ!’: об образе спорящего жидовина в восточнославянской письменности (XIV–XV вв.), Еврейский исторический архив 4. Москва 2007, pp. 51–83.

‘Simulacra of Hatred’: on the Occasion of an Historiographical Essay by Mr. Dennis Eoffe, Ab Imperio 2003:4 (2004; Kazan´), pp. 603–50.

‘Otiosorum hominum receptacula’: Orthodox Religious Houses in Ingria, 1615–52, Scando-Slavica 49 (2003), pp. 101–25.

‘And was Jerusalem builded here...?’: on the Textual History of the Slavonic Jerusalem Disputation, Scando-Slavica 47 (2001), pp. 19–38.

‘A Shadow of the Good Spell’: on Jews and anti-Judaism in the World and Work of Kirill of Turov, Kirill of Turov: Bishop, Preacher, Hymnographer, ed. I. Lunde. Bergen 2000, pp. 33–75.

‘Из Ростова в Ингерманландию. М. А. Пересветов и другие русские baijor’ы’, Новгородский исторический сборник 7 (17), Санкт-Петербург 1999, pp. 366–78.

‘An Alphabetical Hymn by St. Cyril of Turov? — on the Question of Syllabic Verse Composition in Early Medieval Russia’, Scando-Slavica 44 (1998), pp. 115–30.

Publications

A selection from Stockholm University publication database

  • Ulwichius’ lista och rösterna från Caporie län

    2019. Alexander Pereswetoff-Morath. Slavica antiqua et hodierna, 79-106

    Chapter

    The paper introduces two sources on toponymy and linguistic groups in early Swedish Ingria. The first, a 1626 project for the organisation of parishes in western Ingria by the provost Johannes Ulwichius, specifies villages where ingerska (Izhorian/Votic) was spoken – villages with, arguably, at least some 4 000–5 000 individuals – uncovering a compact Fennic presence in parts of the area. It also allows for cautious conclusions as to villages where Russian was the main language, providing, all in all, unique data for the ethnic map of western Ingria before the migrations of the second third of the century. The second source consists of c.145 petitions from orthodox peasants of the same general area, penned by local scribes in Russian in 1635–42. Most of the peasants were from villages whose inhabitants, as the 1626 project shows, knew ingerska. A diglossic situation is revealed where Izhorian/Votic was never committed to writing, whereas Russian remained a written medium for Fennic and Slav peasants alike. The mechanisms through which complex texts were communicated from Fennic Ingrians to Slav scribes remain inadequately known. The petitions also record a large number of oikonyms in Cyrillic, whereas most period sources preserve Ingrian toponyms only in a Latin script which hides linguistic details in Russian as well as in local Fennic. 

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  • Den sista munken i Ingermanland

    2016. Alexander I. Pereswetoff-Morath. Da veselitsa Novʹgradʹ = Må Novgorod fröjda sig, 143-166

    Chapter

    This paper analyses sources for the life of the Ingrian peasant prophet Lëvuška (Leontij, Laure) Semenov Lemboinen (fl 1619–52), previ- ously known to scholarship mainly from a 1637 court hearing at Nyenskans. The movements of his family from Korbosel ́skij to Ingris (Ižorskij) pogost in 1617/18 are traced, and the environments in which he became a man are reconstructed. The paper adduces some new information about the events leading to the 1637 court examination as well as Lemboinen’s time in prison, and identifies him, in his final years, as the probable leader of a semi-monastic community of both sexes in an abandoned religious house on the banks of Lake Ladoga.

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  • ‘The old is in the new revealed’

    2016. Alexander I. Pereswetoff-Morath. Palaeobulgarica 40 (1), 51-80

    Article

    „Старото се разкрива в Новото“: За пророческите цитати в славянския превод на „Doctrina Iacobi“ в най-старата литература на Киевска Русия (Първа част) В първата част на настоящата статия се анализират няколко цитата от пророческите книги, намиращи се в „Речта на философа“, частично открити от Л. Мюлер и О. В. Творогов, които по форма и/или езикови особености очевидно се различават от известните от първите векове на славянската писменост канонични преводи на Свещеното писание. През 2006 г. авторът на тази статия доказва, че за основа на един от тези цитати – разказа на Ездра за разпятието, е послужил славянският превод на византийското антиюдейско съчинение „Doctrina Iacobi“ (Поученията на Яков), известен от староруски преписи от XV в. В настоящата статия се доказва, че същият произход имат в „Речта на философа“ цитатите от Ис. 9:2; Ис. 56:7; Ер. 17:9 (в много изменен вид в сравнение с библейския текст); Ер. 38 (31):31, 33; Зах. 7:13. Л. Мюлер излага хипотезата (Müller 1962; Müller 1971; Müller 1988–1989), че в литературата на Древна Русия е съществувала изгубена (?) днес тематична сбирка от старозаветни цитати за отхвърлянето на юдеите и призоваването на новия на- род, което е намерило отражение както в „Речта на философа“, така и в „Словото за закона и благодатта“ на Иларион Киевски. В следващата и заключителна част на статията ще бъдат анализирани някои неканонични по форма цитати от пророците при Иларион с цел да се определи техният източник, да се оспори хипотезата на Мюлер за колекцията от пророчески цитати и по-точно да се фиксира времето на появата на „Doctrina Iacobi“ в източнославянската литература.

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  • ‘The old is in the new revealed’

    2016. Alexander I. Pereswetoff-Morath. Palaeobulgarica 40 (2), 9-48

    Article

    „Старото се разкрива в Новото“: За пророческите цитати в славянския превод на „Doctrina Iacobi“ в най-старата литература на Киевска Русия (Втора част). Втората част на тази статия (вж. първата част в Palaeobulgarica, 40, 2016, No 1) въвежда цитати от пророчески текстове в „Речта на философа“ и в „Словото за закона и бла- годатта“ от киевския митрополит Иларион (1037–1050), които по форма и/или език се различават от техните съответствия в наличните в Киевска Русия достъпни преводи и за които може да се покаже, че са извлечени от славянския превод на „Doctrina Iacobi“. Това включва цитатите, които в голяма степен съвпадат в „Речта на философа“, а и в „Словото за закона и благодатта“ (Ис. 52:10; Ис. 63:9; Ис. 51:4–5 и комбинация от 2 Кор. 5:17; Ис. 42:9–10 и Ис. 65:15–16), но също цитати, които в този си вид се намират само при Иларион (Ис. 35:6–7 и Мал. 1:10–11). В статията е показано, че два други цитата от пророчески текстове в „Повест за изминалите години“ извън „Речта на философа“ в крайна сметка произхождат от славянския текст на „Doctrina Iacobi“ (Ез. 36:25 и Мих. 7:18–19); става дума за т.нар. „Сказание о книжном учении“ в текста, отнасящ се за 988/989 г. Някои от пророческите цитати в „Речта на философа“ вместо това имат за свой извор Хрониката на Георги Монах (Амартол), от чийто текст няма следи у Иларион. Авторът заключава, че тезата на Л. Мюлер за Spruchsammlung oт пророчески свидетелства, налични в Киевска Русия, е напълно доказана. Тази колекция е включвала материал от славянския превод на „Doctrina Iacobi“ и от каноническите вер- сии на Библията. Оказва се, че Иларион не е извлякъл материал директно от „Doctrina Iacobi“, и следователно дори само по хронологически причини е почти невъзможно тя да е била преведена в Киевска Русия. Бихме предпочели да заключим по-точно, че това е един старобългарски или може би моравски превод. В някакъв момент през втората половина на XI в. една такава колекция (Spruchsammlung) е била разкъсана за материал за друга колекция от пророчества, вероятно по-агресивно антиюдейска, в която е бил включен също много материал от Георги Монах. Пророческата колекция, запазена в „Речта на философа“ и в цитатите в „Сказание о книжном учении“, вероятно са вторични отражения на този труд. Те са били добавени в хронографската компилация, която вече е включвала „Речта на философа“. 

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  • "Who instructed our troops on how to reach Novgorod"

    2015. Alexander I. Pereswetoff-Morath. Novgorodskij istoričeskij sbornik 15 (25), 165-174

    Article

    This paper introduces previously unknown Swedish archival sources on the rôle of Ivan Šval ́ in the Swedish capture of Novgorod in 1611 and its aftermath. It is confirmed that Šval ́ “instructed” the Swedes how to “reach Novgorod”, for which he was rewarded with corn. It is also shown that he was allocated the two hamlets Staraburja and Kljasino in Ingria, probably in 1615, but that this grant was revoked in late 1616 or early 1617 and given to the bayor A. I. (Šum) Chomutov, after which time Šval ́ disappears from both Swedish and Russian sources. 

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  • Klinckowströms samling

    2013. Alexander I. Pereswetoff-Morath. Slovo (54), 114-132

    Article

    Klinckowström’s Collection. The Establishment of the Stafsund Manor and Swedish Royal Library Collections of Church Slavonic Parchment Fragments

    This paper examines the role of the Swedish Baron R. M. Klinckowström (1816–1902) as a collector of Church Slavonic parchment fragments. In the 1840s or early 1850s, he acquired from the archives of the Swedish Chamber and War Colleges some 90 medieval East Slavonic parchment leaves which during the 16th and 17th centuries had been used as wrappers for accounts by Swedish bailiffs and administrators. Through an analysis of surviving correspondence between Klinckowström, G. E. Klemming (acting head of the Royal Library) and Professors B. Dudík and F. von Miklosich, as well as of data from the parchment fragments themselves, it is shown that the Baron had his collection evaluated in Vienna in 1862–63 by the Slavists Dudík and von Miklosich. In connection with this he divided the leaves between himself and the Swedish Royal Library, a fact which can still be traced in some of the shelf numbers of the two collections. Miklosich later used his excerpts from those manuscripts that are now held at the Royal Library in the second edition of his Church Slavonic dictionary (1862–65). The Baron’s own collection, kept at his Stafsund Manor, was examined by the Swedish Slavist K. Knutsson in the 1920s or 1930s but was then lost for many years until acquired in 1981 by the Swedish National Archives at Stockholm.

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  • ‘Episkop Ingomerlianskii i vsego pomoriia polunoshchnogo otseana’

    2010. Alexander Pereswetoff-Morath. Scando-Slavica 56 (1), 48-83

    Article

    The paper treats the short “Ingrian” period in the life of the Belorussian monastic Athenogenes (Anfinogen) Kryžanovskij (fl. 1629–68), a man known to scholarship mainly from his adventurous involvement in Muscovite and Ruthenian church affairs. He is identified as the mysterious archbishop “Arfimager” of Ingria (known from 1638/9), one of of a mere couple of attested Orthodox hierarchs in that Swedish province, and as Aaron “Semblicenscoi”, “archimandrite of Nazareth”, whose epistle to the Ingrian Orthodox in 1651 was to add to the clash between local Lutherans and Orthodox during the Russian–Swedish war of 1656–8 when discovered by local authorities in 1656. The identifications explain several of the outlandish titles bestowed upon Athenogenes in a satirical poem by his countryman Symeon Polockij and throw light on aspects of Orthodox life in Swedish Ingria.

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