New information on the biography and the figure of Belarusian first printer Frantsysk Skaryna were found by Ales Zhlutka, a senior fellow at the Institute of History of Belarus. During a recent trip to the Vatican the researcher clarified the link of the first printer with the V Lateran Council which took place in 1512-1517, respectively.
This council was attended by a delegation of the Danish King which included Skaryna. And after three months Frantsysk Skaryna was called the Secretary of the Danish King Hans during the defense of his doctoral work in Padua. The scientist wanted to know if it was the same person referred to in different sources.
While working in the Vatican archive Ales Zhlutka found interesting documents, in which the Secretary of the Danish king announces that the Moscow tsar wanted to join the V Lateran Council.
The researcher noted that while working with the documents he found out some very interesting facts: before 1508 the Danish king Hans hosted a delegation from the Moscow Tsar Basil III. The ambassadors were asking the king to negotiate with Pope Julius II the access of the Moscow embassy to the Vatican. It is known that the Danish monarch tried through the French king to contribute to the Vatican arrangement of the Moscow ambassadors. During these and subsequent negotiations, the Danish king tried to negotiate with Vasily III the unification of Churches.
“In 1509, the Danish court also received a delegation of the King of Poland and Grand Duke Sigismund, in which allegiance were the Belarusian and Ukrainian lands with Orthodox people and where documentation was conducted in Latin and Old Russian language. The question arises: why did the Danish King need Skaryna as a secretary? The answer suggests itself: for diplomatic relations with Sigismund and Basil III; Skaryna served an ecumenical mission in the reconciliation of the two branches of Christianity. It is very likely that he received his medical education in Denmark to later defend the doctorate in medicine in Padua,” said the researcher, restoring the chronology of events that took place more than five centuries ago.
Frantsysk Skaryna could get medical education from 1509 to 1512, but so far it has only been a theory, because it is that time is still a blank spot in his biography. In any case, the fact that Skaryna could be a direct participant in the Danish delegation to the V Lateran Council is a very important fact, says Ales Zhlutka. This is not surprising: Skaryna was educated in the eastern and western Christian tradition, he studied at the Catholic University, worked at the court of the Danish king and the bishop of Vilna, published the Bible and liturgical books for the Orthodox believers.
“The range of his personality was expanding together with the range of his movements in Europe. This suggests that he was a person of the Renaissance type. As you know, the Renaissance figures in that time did a lot of traveling around Europe acquiring knowledge and working in different areas. His work in the ecumenical direction indicates the width of his outlook, his openness. The fact that he could participate in the reconciliation of divided parts of Christianity on the eve of the new devision which was ushered by the upcoming Reformation, gives even greater grandeur to his figure,” said the scientist.
Doctor of Medicine and Liberl Sciences, possible party to the disputes with Paracelsus – famous mystic of the XVI century, and Martin Luther, is of course a majestic but also a mysterious figure – all of this was Frantsysk Skaryna. Ales Zhlutka recognizes that following in the footsteps of the first printer is like to unravel a detective the end of which is still unknown, as even Skaryna’s place of death is still unknown. But you can almost certainly recreate the data on the first half of life, particularly about where Skaryna received his early education and religious knowledge. He was named in honor of St. Francis of Assisi – the patron saint of the Bernardine convent in Polatsk, in which he received the knowledge of the Latin language and knowledge of the Orthodox tradition and old Belarusian book language – at one of the Polatsk Orthodox monasteries.
All new information will surely be published: the scientists are planning to release a new collection of documents about the life and work of Skaryna, and perhaps it will be released in 2017.
Many people will still have to understand the figure of Skaryna, and there is the appropriate occasion: in 2017 the world will celebrate the anniversary of the first printed Bible by Skaryna. Work on the study of his biography is being carried out by many institutions in Belarus, and, considering the greatness and celebrity of this figure, there was even an idea to name the national airport after Frantsysk Skaryna.
