The Beginning of Written Slavic

Author(s): Horace G. Lunt

Source: Slavic Review, Vol. 23, No. 2 (Jun., 1964), pp. 212-219
Published by:
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2492931 .
Accessed: 19/01/2015 07:09

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve
and extend access to Slavic Review.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 THE BEGINNING
OF WRITTEN SLAVIC
BY HORACE G. LUNT

The lucid account of the Moravian mission of Constantine-Cyril and

Methodius that ProfessorDvornik has given is a persuasive and up-to-
date statementof widely accepted views. Yet scarcely a single specialist
would be willing to agree unhesitatinglywith all the details even in
such a brief resume of the quarter-centuryof relations between the
emerging Slavic nations and their neighbors. Indeed, some, as his foot-
notes suggest,might take exception to certain of his major points.
The difficultylies in our historical sources-in their paucity, their
unclear allusions, theiromissions,and, worstof all, their contradictions.
material has survived that we
First of all, so little of the nlinth-century
are dependent on the views writtendecades or even centuries after the
events. Then, even the contemporarywritings have come down to us
in modified forin,owing to varying amounts of recopying and editing,
with inevitable distortions,omissions, reinterpretations,and interpola-
tions.
The two principal sources are the Lives of Cyril and Methodius, com-
posed originally in Old Church Slavonic.1 The Vita Constantini (VC)
was very likely written by Methodius. Only about a third (i.e., about
eleven pages of this format) is devoted to the Moravian mission, the
rest chronicling Con-stantine'searlier missions to the Saracens and Kha-
zars, and in particular his theological debates with various opponents.
The Vita Methodii (VM) must have been wvritten immediatelyafterthe
death of Methodius (885), for it makes no mention of the sudden dis-
persal of his followers and the termination of their work in Moravia.
It is shorter(about ten pages of this format)and includes a floridthiree-
page introduction recounting the historyof chosen men from the Crea-
tion down to the Church Councils. The biography itselfis stylistically
much simpler than that of VC, and there seems to be an assumption
that the reader is acquainted with VC, for only the most necessary

MR. LUNT is professorof Slavic languages at Harvard University.

1 The traditional name is the "Pannonian Legends," where the epithet is due to a
mistakeninineteenthl-century theory that Old Church Slavonic was a Pannoniian dialect,
wlhile the noun is a technical term for the life of a saint. I prefer to avoid the term
"legend" hierebecause of the automatic association of that word with fictionand fantasy;
these two Lives are biographies of solid historical value that emphasize the sanctityanld
)iety of the "heroes" without attributingsupernatural powers or miracles to them.

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 The Beginningof WrittenSlavic 213

major points are reiterated; the aim is to chronicle Methodius' activi-

ties without repeating what was said about Constantine.
The manuscript tradition of the two texts is very different.VM is
known only in eight copies, all Russian, and none of the later seven
(fifteenth-eighteenth centuries) offersreadings that enable us to recon-
struct anything of importance not found in the oldest, a clear and
rather archaic copy from the end of the twelfthcentury (in the Uspen-
skii sbornik). VC has survived in some thirtycopies of importance,
none older than about 1450. There are two major redactions, a South
Slavic and an East Slavic one, the latter furthersubdivided into a num-
ber of groups.2 Thus our text of VM is at least three hundred years
removed from the original, and that of VC has undergone at least five
centuries of copying and editing.
Nearly all the other pertinent Slavic texts (brief Lives, panegyric
eulogies to the Saints, hymnsand services to their memory,lives of their
disciples, references in the Povest' vremennykh let) either offerlittle
supplementary informationor else are so patently of later origin that
the additional points theyseem to provide are always suspect.
There are some ninth-centuryLatin sources, comprising about a
dozen papal letters and similar documents as well as some rather
oblique referencesin the Carolingian chronicles compiled fairlysoon
after the events. Yet the known penchant of local bishops and prince-
lings for suppressing documents and forging new ones in support of
various claims to lands and privileges has led scholars to question the
authenticityof some of these texts or at least of some of the important
details. One later compilation, a seven-page Latin account of the dis-
covery and transferof the relics of St. Clement, confirmsmany details
of VC and VM, and adds some new information. It looks as though the
author of this "Italian Legend," Leo of Ostia (ca. 1100), had at hand
both Slavic and Latin sources-the question is just what he had and how
he used it. Being two centuries removed from the events, his views are
not necessarilyentirelycorrect.
The only Greek source of real value supplies the epilogue-the
account of the destruction of Methodius' work in Moravia-Pannonia,
the dispersal of his pupils, and the floweringof his teachings in Mace-
donia. Known as the "Bulgarian Legend," it is a twenty-five-page Life
of Kliment, a pupil of Methodius who was bishop in Macedonia, 893-
916. The author is generally recognized as the Greek Theophylactus,

2 The standard editioinof these and almost all other Slavic soturcetexts is unfortunately

very rare: II. A. JJaBpoB,ed., Maamepuaznuno ucmnopuu6O3UMUMCfOenu Opeenteueu

c.zaemcnCoiunucutennocmu (Leningrad, 1930). A new edition of VC and VM, with most
of the Latin sources directly connected with the brothers,is now available: F. Grivec
and F. Tomsic, Constantinus et Methodius Thessalonicenses: Fontes (Radovi Staroslav-
enskog instituta,Vol. IV; Zagreb, 1960). It includes a full Latin translation of tlle two
Lives and a brief commentaryabout the manuscripts. Nonetheless, a reprint of Lavrov
would be highlydesirable.

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
214 Slavic Review

Archbishop of Ohrid, 1084-1107, but many scholars are convinced

that he merelyadapted an originally Slavonic biography writtenshortly
afterKliment's death.
To oversimplifythe problem, the inner core of reasonably firsthand
evidence could be printed on about seventypages, most of which repre-
sent the result of several (how many?) copyings and redactions (of what
kind?). Or, to be so generous as to include much furtherrepetition, all
possible referencesand obviously late compilations and even fictionsup
to about 1700, the total text could still be accommodated easily in a
three hundred-page volume. And this is to cover the actions and moti-
vations of several popes and patriarchs, of Byzantine emperors, Caro-
lingian kings and dukes, a number of Slavic rulers in three or four
nascent states, with the details of subtle theological disputes and com-
plex political negotiations.
It is then no wonder that scholarly controversyhas continued from
the firstnotice of VC and VM in 1843. Every investigator,armed by
infallible instinct, is able to spot an interpolation, supply a missing
1)assage,correcta bias that is obvious in one of the sources. An author
who can call the work of another "two-penny romance fantasies" can
draw important conclusions by extracting out the "true facts" artfully
woven in with fabricationsin a document known to be a medieval falsi-
fication. Even the soberest of scholars must be constantlyon guard to
remember how much of his interpretationis based on his own assump-
tions and to keep in sight the multiple adjustments in the whole struc-
ture of explanation that must be made when one change of hypothesis
is made.
To cite a single example from ProfessorDvornik's essay, he deduces
that Rastislav3 had requested Rome to send a bishop and that Pope
Nicholas "was too dependent on the support of the Franks" and re-
jected the request, whereupon the Moravian turned toward Byzantium.
Now the word "bishop" is only in VC xiv, where Rastislav (alone) asks
for a "bishop and teacher." In VM v Rastislav and Svatopluk ask only
for "a teacher," and in VM viii (cf. Dvornik's note 6) Hadrian writes to
Rastislav and Svatopluk and Kocel, "For you asked for a teacher not
only of this episcopal see, but of the true-believing emperor Michael.
And he sent you the blessed philosopher Constantine, even with his
brother,while we did not get to it." If one chooses to regard the word
"bishop" in VC as an interpolation4the whole picture looks different:
the Moravians are making then a purely cultural request, not a far-
reaching political gambit. Further, Rome's failure to react to such a
request is of much less importance than ignoring the plea for a bishop
or, as Dvornik will have it, actually refusing,for reasons supplied by
3 I defer to Father Dvornik in using this Soutlh Slavic form for the West Slav whose
name is recordedcorrectlyin VM as Rostislav.
4 Cf. J. Kurz, Slavia, XXXII (1963), 314.

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 The Beginningof WrittenSlavic 215

the scholar. The point is a small one, but it is the sum of such little
disputed details that adds up to the total summarymade by Dvornik or
any other specialist.
The linguist oftendisagrees with the historian's interpretationof the
sources, partlybecause he may be less concerned with the broader con-
sequences of his reading of certain passages. VM, for example, four
times uses forms of the word korol-,usually translated "king," in
accordance with the meaning attested from about 1100 (at the earliest
1000) on. The etymologyis generally agreed to be the personal name
Karl, that is, Charlemagne, who died in 816. Yet the passages concerned
cause difficulty, for the "kings" referredto do not quite fitthe general
historical sense. It seems to me, as I have set forthin detail elsewhere,
that the Moravians, dealing from day to day with the descendants of
Charlemagne, were not yet so remote that they would use his name as
a title of honor for their own rulers. Indeed it seems that to read
"Karl" in VM makes much better sense, but bringing unexpected
Carolingians onto the scene upsets some of the quite reasonable plausi-
bilities that historians have woven into a consistent series of explana-
tions that fitboth VM and the bits of data from chronicles and papal
letters. It becomes necessaryto find new plausibilities that account for
the Karls, separating out Karl II from Karlmann and Karl III, all of
whom were powerful men the Moravians and Methodius surely had to
deal with.
It is necessaryperhaps to insist that historians and philologists alike
have to operate largely in plausibilities in all their broader interpreta-
tions as well as in many minor points of detail. How many plausibilities
must interlockto add up to a reasonable certainty?A specious question,
of course, yet I think that many investigatorswould do well with a
larger dose of sober skepticism. It is healthy to admit frankly,from
time to time, that one does not have all the answers for certain.

Perhaps the clearest indication of the relative interest in Constantine

and Methodius and their Moravian mission is the fact that their impact
is recorded in Western sources as a dangerous but passing encroachment
on the German bishoprics, while Greek chroniclers make no mention
at all. At best, perhaps, Byzantium regarded the mission as a minor
failure. It is the Slavs who have clung to the pious memory of the
holy brothers,never allowing their fame to die. It would, to be sure,
be fascinating to be fully apprised of the motives of Rastislav and
Svatopluk and of Rome and Byzantium and to know the full details
of the Mission.
Yet the importance is that 863, despite many unanswered questions,
marks the beginning of written Slavic culture. It does not matter
whether the Moravians wanted a bishop, a teacher of law, a learned
theologian, or merely a skilled translator,nor does it matter whether

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
216 Slavic Review

the brotherswent to Rome by invitation or by summons, or whether

their pupils ever worked in Poland. The important thing is that all
sources attribute to Cyril and/or Methodius the invention of the Slavic
alphabet and to the brothersand their immediate pupils the translation
of the major liturgical books and thereby the establishment of a new
writtenlanguage.
Certain Bulgarian and Russian scholars are reluctant to admit the
sudden burgeoning of the new books and argue that the brothers'
accomplishment in producing so many translationsmust have been the
result of a long process. They exaggerate the dimensions of the
problem. We must assume that the ambitious Slav in the Byzantine
Empire would strive to be acculturated-to become a Christian adept
in Greek. Since there surely were many Christian Slavs around such
centersas Salonika, the elementaryterminologyof the new religion had
undoubtedly been created. Surely many Greeks, like Constantine and
Methodius, had grown up speaking Slavic.
VC makes it clear, and contemporaryLatin documents seem to sup-
port the point, that Constantine was a gifted linguist whose experience
included languages writtenin various alphabets. It is only a pious ex-
aggeration of the hagiographers to regard as superhuman Constantine's
skill at devising new letters suitable to express a Slavic dialect accu-
rately. Nor need we resort to divine assistance as the explanation for
the rapid translation of the most urgently needed texts, presumably
a few prayers,the Psalter, and the lectionaries containing lessons from
both Old and New Testaments. VC and VM indicate that the Gospel
lectionary was first,and meticulous philological analyses of surviving
manuscripts have established clearly that the most ancient form of
the evangeliarium is an excellent translation. Constantine was able
to render the sense in natural, unforced Slavic, although, naturally
enough, with frequent Hellenisms. It was not his fault that later
scribes constantly"corrected" the translationwith a slavish mechanistic
literalism that eventually led to a wooden word-for-wordreproduction
of the officialGreek versions. The other books, so far as the sparse
supply of manuscripts allows us to reconstruct the most ancient tra-
dition, show the same historyof progressiveHellenizing purism. Indeed
it is this very historythat justifiesthe admiration of the ninth-century
papal librarian Anastasius for Constantine's learning and the hagiog-
raphers' wonder at his skill as a writer and translator.
Yet Constantine was not working alone. Methodius had been some
sort of administratorin a Slavic area and was surely adept at expressing
complex ideas in a Slavic idiom. At the very least five more associates
are mentioned (though not in VC or VM) as having accompanied the
brothersfromConstantinople, and in Moravia theyfound Slavs already
trained in Latin culture who surely helped speed the translations.None
of the indispensable church books is very large, and one can easily

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 The Beginningof WrittenSlavic 217

imagine the translation being done from week to week and revised
from year to year in the light of continued experience.
The reasons for introducing the vernacular into the full church
usage are extremelycontroversial. It looks as though Greek clerics near
Byzantium preferredto identifyChristianitywith Greek language and
culture, and baptism with a desire for Hellenization. In the West, it
was established that a Clhristianwvasobliged to know the Lord's Prayer,
the Apostles' Creed, and some form of general confession in his native
tongue, but all furthereffortstoward education were in Latin. Some
scholars speak darkly in termsof political intrigue about "orders" from
the Byzantine emperor and patriarch, while others argue in terms of
the nineteenth-centuryromanticism-based struggles for national self-
determination. Unless some sensational new source is discovered, we
shall never know the true motivation, but it is certain that Constantine
was a tenacious and devoted advocate of the right of every man to
worship the Lord in his own language. He and his followers found
eloquent support for this view in Scriptures,particularly St. Paul, and
did battle by word and deed against all opponents. The pervasiveness
of this ideology in all the Cyrillo-Methodian writings allows no other
conclusion, even though one admits that the political overtones,partic-
ularly in regard to the anti-Slavonic forces,are very strong indeed.
Given the initial impulse, whatever it may have been, the brothers
pressed on to carry through a complete Slavonicization of the whole
culture. The Greek scholar and writer desired that the Slav too have
all the same advantages, not only the basic Gospel word and indispen-
sable prayersbut the subtle arguments of the Church Fathers and the
enrichment of poetry and Christian song. The transfer of poetical
formsto a new language was more difficult,but the Proglasz, an intro-
duction to the Gospel, is amazingly successful, and its attribution to
Constantine is surelyright. The mass translationsof the myriad hymns
of the ever longer and more complex church services, mostly accom-
plished in tenth-centuryBulgaria, are frequently dismal failures, but
the original compositions of obscure or unknown Slavs often were of
good quality. Most important was the demonstrated fact that the new
writtenlanguage couild be used for all purposes, and the step from tlhis
possibility to the belief in the necessity underlay the development of
Slavic Christian culture.
The dispute about the alphabet invented by Constantine continues,
with nothing really new to invalidate the very strong arguments in
favor of Glagolitic. Again it is the modern Slavs who use Cyrillic who
object, but their disquisitions about the mysteriousscratchingson va-
rious objects discovered at widely scatteredpoints in the East and South
Slavic areas have added only examples of the infiniteimagination some
men possess,and nothing to counteract the fact that the oldest and most
archaic textsare writtenin Glagolitic. The Psalter and Gospel written

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
218 Slavic Review

"rushskymipismeny" found by Cyril in the Crimea on the way to the

Khazar court (VC viii) still nourish Russian patriots,who translate "in
Russian letters" and interpret the episode as irrefutable evidence that
the East Slavs indeed had Christians who had invented an alphabet
("proto-Cyrillic") and translated the books.5 More plausible is an
ancient and banal transpositionof an original surtsk-"Syrian, Syriac":
the presence of either refugee or merchant Syriac-speakingChristians
in Cherson at the time is highly likely.6 Cyril's knowledge (presumed,
not specified in the sources) of Hebrew and probably Arabic would
make it easy for him quickly to learn the Syriac alphabet and, mirac-
ulously, to "interpret" texts he knew by heart in Greek. He seems to
have been extremely interested in heretical and non-Christian works
precisely in order to prepare himself for the disputes with Jewish and
perhaps other opponents among the Khazars.
Yet again, in the final analysis, none of this really matters. What is
important is that the language and example of Cyril and Methodius
were the basis for the floweringof the Byzantinoslavic culture of Bul-
garia in the ninth century,and of Rus' in the tenth century. Serbs and
Croats too shared in this culture, although the beginnings are obscure.
For the Orthodox Slavs, this original heritage was diluted and reinter-
preted, but it remained vital down to modern times. The embattled
Slavonic-language culture of Bohemia, more Latinate in flavor, was
finallysuppressed at the end of the eleventh century and is known to
us only from scraps of evidence preserved chieflyamong the East and
South Slavs. Nonetheless, Czech scholars have demonstrated that it
contributed to the floweringof a specificallyCzech and Latin literature
in the thirteenth century. In Dalmatia the Roman rite accepted a
Slavonic garb, and the Cyrillo-Methodian tradition lived on. The exact
routes by which manuscriptsfound their way fromMoravia to Bulgaria
and Macedonia, to Rus' and Croatia, will probably never be known;
the interrelationswere very likely immensely complicated.
The remarkable fact is how circumstancesconspired to produce in a

5 So, mosE recently,B. A. HCTpHu, 1100 zemcaaeJZncou a36yvu(Moscow, 1963), p. 105.

Istrin is remarkablyignorantof the contentof the workswrittenin various alphabets and
extraordinarilycavalier about the shapes of the letters themselves. His reproductiolnof
others' theoriesleaves a great deal to be desired.
6 Apologists like Istrin doggedlyignore the point that the occurrenceof a reading in all
copies does not make it a part of the original VC, but merely takes it back to some point
in the thirteenthor fourteenthcentury. At least one crippling error (umom, for ujern,
"uncle") is common to nearly all copies and to the excerptsin Croatian breviaries: it thus
probably dates from no later than the eleventh century. Of course any emendation for
such a passage can be only plausible, but Jakobson long ago pointed out that in VC xvi
the list of nations already praising the Lord in their own tongue includes the Syrians,
Suri, but in two of the relativelyold and accurate copies they are called Rusi (cf. Grivec
and Tom?iR,op. cit., p. 136, note ad XVI.8). I noted that in the Novgorod First Chronicle
the mitropolitzsurtskyi("Syrian bishop"), whose arrival in Kiev constitutesthe sole entry
under 6412/1104in the oldest copy (Synodal), has been naturalized to ruskyiin all other
copies.

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 The Beginningof WrittenSlavic 219

few generations an almost pan-Slavic writtenlanguage. Byzantine Slavs

working in Moravia produced excellent translationsprecisely at a time
when both Central European and Balkan Slavs (and probably the Dal-
matians) were willing and eager to accept them. Very soon the East
Slavs wanted them too. Dialect differenceswere partially suppressed
so that the homogeneity of the language of the oldest manuscripts
defiesthe linguists' attemptsto localize them; somewhat later textsshow
such a mixture of identifiable but minor local features that again the
place of origin often cannot be specified. This Slavonic written lan-
guage then became relatively standardized in Serbian, Bulgarian, and
Russian varieties, but at no time can we find evidence that the dif-
ferenceswere regarded as vital. The diffusionof texts went on regard-
less of the political rivalries and the occasional complaints of scribes
at the difficultyof transcribingfrom one recension to another. The
historyof medieval Slavic literature is usually compartmentalized ac-
cording to modern nationalism ("Old Russian," "Old Serbian," etc.)
more than is justified by the fact of the language-Slavonic-and the
Byzantine orthodox connections.
A great deal of preparatory work was done by the scholars of the
nineteenth century,but it is only very recently that the need has been
recognized to investigate separately the history of Slavonic, from the
Cyrillo-Methodian Old Church Slavonic, through the Macedonian,
Bulgarian, Kievan and other recensions and on down until the printing
press and nationalistic forcesin the really modern states left Slavonic as
a purely liturgical language. For the historian, the Moravian mission
of Cyril and Methodius is an intriguing puzzle in diplomatic and
ecclesiastical jurisdictional struggles,but for the Slavist it marks the
creation of the vehicle in which Slavic culture was expressed, the birth
date, so to speak, of Slavic literature.

This content downloaded from 87.205.40.179 on Mon, 19 Jan 2015 07:09:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions