Who is Who in Fourteenth-Century Novgorod? Evidence from Hanseatic Sources

Jos Schaeken

Who is Who in Fourteenth-Century Novgorod? Evidence from Hanseatic Sources

Jos Schaeken

Abstract

This article analyses the names of Novgorodians that appear in two Hanseatic documents from the beginning of the fourteenth century. Together, they shed further light on the identities and relationships of individuals in medieval Novgorod. In the first document, dated 1331 and written in Middle Low German, I will concentrate on a person called Thyrentekey. I will propose that this individual is the same person that is mentioned in a birchbark document (under the name Terentij Koj) and in the First Novgorod Chronicle (Terentij Danilovič). With regard to the second Hanseatic document (1311–1335), which is in Latin, I will examine a mysterious and distorted list of names of Novgorodians (and Pskovians), who “were betrayed by their own slave, who is called drelle in the vernacular.” This list most probably includes the name of the posadnik Semen Klimovič (symon filius klementis), whose son, Jakun, figures in the 1331 document (jacone symonen sone possatnicke), together with Thyrentekey.

Keywords

medieval Novgorod; Hanseatic league; birchbark letters; First Novgorod Chronicle; social network analysis

Full Text:

PDF

References

Dubrovin G. E., “O boiarstve Plotnitskogo kontsa srednevekovogo Novgoroda,” Drevniaia Rus′: Voprosy medievistiki, 2010, 3 (41), 48–54.

Dubrovin G. E., “Formirovanie Plotnitskogo kontsa i gosudarstvennye reformy v Novgorode v seredine–vtoroi polovine XIII v.,” Drevniaia Rus′: Voprosy medievistiki, 1/51, 2013, 41–53.

Franklin S., Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, c. 950–1300, Cambridge, 2002.

Gippius A. A., Zaliznyak A. A., “Berestianye gramoty iz novgorodskikh raskopok 2015 g.,” Voprosy iazykoznaniia, 4, 2016, 7–17.

Gordienko E. A., “Ulitsy Velikogo Novgoroda v predelakh Okol′nogo goroda,“ in: V. L. Yanin et al., eds., Velikii Novgorod. Istoriia i kul′tura IX–XVII vekov. Entsiklopedicheskii slovar′, St. Petersburg, 2007, 459–465.

Khoroshev A. S., “Semen Klimovich,” in: V. L. Yanin et al., eds., Velikii Novgorod. Istoriia i kul′tura IX–XVII vekov. Entsiklopedicheskii slovar′, St. Petersburg, 2007, 430. Lukin P. V., Novgorodskoe veche, Moscow, 2014.

Polechov S. V.,“Neuerussische Quelleneditionen zu den altrussischlivländischen Beziehungen,” Forschungen zur baltischen Geschichte, 12, 2017, 11–59.

Schaeken J., “Comments on birchbark documents found in the twentyfirst century,” Russian Linguistics, 41/2, 2017, 123–149.

Schaeken J., “What to give as wedding gifts in medieval Novgorod? On birchbark document nos. 261–264,” in: R. Genis, E. de Haard, R. Lučić, eds., Definitely Perfect. Festschrift for Janneke Kalsbeek, Amsterdam, 2017, 557–567.

Skvajrs E. R. [Squires C.], Ferdinand S. N., The Hanse and Novgorod: linguistic aspects of the historical contacts, Moscow, 2002.

Squires C., Die Hanse in Novgorod: Sprachkontakte des Mittelniederdeutschen mit dem Russischen. Mit einer Vergleichsstudie über die Hanse in England, Köln–Weimar–Wien, 2009.

Stepanov A. M., “Iurii Danilovich,” in: V. L. Yanin et al., eds., Velikii Novgorod. Istoriia i kul′tura IX–XVII vekov. Entsiklopedicheskii slovar′, St. Petersburg, 2007, 543–544.

Vasilev V. L., Arkhaicheskaia toponimiia Novgorodskoi zemli (Drevneslavianskie deantroponimnye obrazovaniia), Velikii Novgorod, 2005.

Yanin V. L., Novgorodskaia feodal′naia votchina (Istoriko-genealogicheskoe issledovanie), Moscow, 1981.

Yanin V. L., Novgorodskie akty XII–XV vv. Khronologicheskii kommentarii, Moscow, 1991.

Yanin V. L., Novgorodskie posadniki, 2nd ed., Moscow, 2003.

Yanin V. L., Zaliznyak A. A., Gippius A. A., Novgorodskie gramoty na bereste. Iz raskopok 2001–2014 gg., Moscow, 2015.

Zaliznyak A. A., Drevnenovgorodskii dialekt. Vtoroe izdanie, pererabotannoe s uchetom materiala nakhodok 1995–2003 gg., Moscow, 2004.

Refbacks

There are currently no refbacks.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Username
Password
Remember me