The Laurentian Codex

In one of my recent posts, I briefly mentioned a manuscript called the Laurentian Codex. I believe the history of this document, and the story of how it was digitised, deserve a post of their own.

The Laurentian Codex is held by the National Library of Russia in St Petersburg. It is a unique manuscript: the oldest surviving dated Russian chronicle. The scribe recorded its date of creation on its folios—between 14 January and 20 March 1377. This is an extremely important fact, because the Laurentian Codex provides indisputable evidence that Rus’ already existed in 1377.

It is theoretically possible that humanity will one day discover an older dated manuscript about Rus’, but if we are honest with ourselves, that is unlikely to happen.

We all know the Tale of Bygone Years from school. In fact, the text survives in several versions found in different manuscripts. The Laurentian Codex contains the oldest surviving version of the Tale of Bygone Years.

In 2012, a comprehensive project to digitise the Laurentian Codex was completed under the direction of yours truly. The project had several interesting features.

First, as I have already mentioned, the pages were photographed repeatedly from different angles (see the photos), then combined in image-editing software. This was necessary because of the relief of the pages.

Second, there is the fascinating story of the chronicle’s translation. Yes, you read that correctly—translation. The Laurentian Codex is written in Old Russian, and readers without specialist training may find it difficult to understand from the digital copy alone. The manuscript’s virtual pages are therefore accompanied by the necessary reference material: a transliteration of the text and a translation into modern Russian (see the photos).

In the transliteration, the Laurentian Codex is rendered in modern civil script, with obsolete letters of the Slavonic alphabet replaced by their modern equivalents.

The translation was made available free of charge by the heirs of Dmitry Likhachev, as his translation of the Tale of Bygone Years is considered definitive.

You can learn more about the codex and its history, explore the manuscript itself, and read about the project to which I devoted several months of my life at the following link.