About the travels of ancient Christians and our ancient pilgrims to the Holy Land, Rome and Constantinople

A reverent attitude towards the Christian shrine and to places sanctified and glorified by the life, suffering and death of the God-man and the exploits of His saints, gave rise in the Christian world to the deeply pious and widespread custom of the so-called pilgrimage or pilgrimage. Not alien to other religions, for example: Greco-Roman, Jewish, Mohammedan, visits by Christians to holy places for worship and prayer at all times constituted one of the most tangible manifestations of the feeling of Christian piety, and one of the preferred forms of church-religious life of Christians. As a votive feat, the custom of pilgrimage was always accompanied by prayers and ritual details of a liturgical and ascetic nature. Before the wanderer set off on his journey, he asked for prayers in the church and received a blessing from one of its most respected leaders, who often indicated the direction and limiting point of the journey being undertaken. Unfortunately, neither our ancient liturgical writing nor the Greek church books have preserved, as far as we know, information about those ancient rites and prayers with which the departing pilgrim was advised, just as they did not tell us news about the latter’s special clothes. This gap in Eastern practice can be filled to some extent from Western sources. In the Roman Catholic Church, the departure of the pilgrims developed into a church rite, precisely defined and recorded in various rites. The ceremony of releasing the pilgrims took place here on Tuesday of Holy Week, just as in the east at this time some of the monks accepted the schema. Those intended to participate in the ritual had to come to the church on this day in the clothes of pilgrims: in tunics or shirts and outer cloaks with hoods or hoods, with staves and scrips, in caligas on their feet and with wide-brimmed hats for their heads. The staff and scrip constituted, as it were, the motto of pilgrimage and its necessary accessory, without which not a single official pilgrim could do. When presenting the staff and scrip, special prayers were read, a small number of which have survived to this day 2 . One of them says: “We pray to You, grant that these bags (bags) hang at their hips, like some kind of weapon, acceptable by them out of love for Your name, and bless their staffs, as a support for a weak body and a sign of their path.” Quite early on, it became a custom to set out on the journey barefoot (discalceate), but even in such cases, the wanderers always had shoes with them, namely kaligs, from which perhaps the very name of wanderers kalikas originates. Returning from their journey, the pilgrims decorated their bags and hats with flowers, sea shells and, as a symbol of a happily ended journey, they brought with them a palm branch, a branch of Palestine, from which our Slavic name pilgrim comes. How early did Christians begin traveling to places dear to them in their historical and religious memories? Some Western writers, referring to the blessed. Jerome, they claim that they were started by the ap. Paul going to Jerusalem to worship (Acts 24:11), and that subsequent Christian pilgrims imitated his pious example. And there is no reason to doubt that Christians’ visits to St. places is a custom of apostolic times and has been going on since the very first centuries of the Church of Christ. “It would be a long time to count now,” let’s say in the words of the blessed one. Jerome, “how many evangelists (evangelists), how many martyrs, how many men most skilled in church teaching have gone to Jerusalem in all times from the Ascension of the Lord to the present day. They all thought that they would have less religiosity, less knowledge, and that they would not receive, as they say, the high hand of virtues (summam manum virtutum) if they did not worship Christ in those places where the first gospel shone from the cross” 3 . From the long line of names of pious travelers heading to St. earth during the first three centuries, history, which did not consider it its task to celebrate simple, unknown pilgrims, has preserved for us only two glorious names. In the Church History (VI, 11) of Eusebius we read about Alexander, the Cappadocia bishop of the 2nd century, “who fought valiantly in the persecution of Septimius Severus and glorified himself by confessing the name of Christ”: “following as if a divine beckoning, he (i.e. Alexander) from Cappadocia went to Jerusalem to pray and visit holy places, and was received by the brethren very friendly, so they didn’t want to let him go home” 4). At the beginning of the 3rd century, the famous Origen, who lived and taught for some time in Palestine, went to Jerusalem to contemplate and reverently honor the feet of the Savior, His apostles and prophets, as he himself testifies to in the interpretation of John 5. With the establishment of church peace under Constantine the Great and the cessation of persecution, which was not favorable for Christians to visit St. places, the number of noble and ignorant travelers to Jerusalem, naturally, should have increased significantly. And indeed, the movement of fans heading to Palestine and St. the city became a widespread phenomenon in the 4th century, captivating, according to Gregory of Nyssa, whole crowds of husbands and wives, and according to the letters of Bl. Jerome - a great many bishops, martyrs and famous people. “From which side do people not come to the holy places,” asks the latter in a letter to Eustochius, and he himself answers in another place: “here (i.e. Jerusalem) flock from all over the world... The best Christians in this world gather here together... Each of the best people of Gaul hurries here. The Briton, removed from our world, as soon as he begins to succeed in religion, having left the West, strives for a place so well known by rumor and biblical memories. And what can we say about the Armenians, the Persians, the peoples of India and Ethiopia, about the country near Egypt, seething with monks, about Pontus, Cappadocia, Calen Syria and Mesopotamia, and about all the peoples of the East in general? They are, according to the word of the Savior: wherever there is a corpse, there the eagles will gather (Matthew 24:28), flock to these places and present us with a spectacle of all kinds of virtues” 6. St. John Chrysostom in the XXVI conversation on the second letter to the Corinthians wrote: “Tell me, where is the tomb of Alexander (Macedonian)? Point and tell me on what day he died? And the tombs of Christ’s servants are glorious and are located in the royal city; the days of their death are known, for they constitute a triumph for the whole universe. Even our own people do not know Alexander’s tomb, but even the barbarians know the tomb of Christ. And the tombs of the slaves of the Crucified One are more brilliant than the royal palaces, not only in the size and beauty of the buildings - for they are superior to all - but, what is much more important, in the jealousy of those who flock to them. For the one who wears scarlet comes to kiss these tombs and, putting aside pride, stands before them and prays to the saints to intercede for him before God. In the intercession of the already deceased, both the tabernacle maker and the fisherman, there is a need for those clothed in a diadem” 7 . Particularly large, and according to the historian Sozomen (II, 26), there was a gathering of fans in Jerusalem on the day of the annual consecration of the church built under Constantine the Great. At Golgotha. “On the occasion of this celebration, there to visit St. places, many flock from almost the entire sunflower region.” Among the numerous travelers to Jerusalem and its environs, sanctified by the events of Old Testament and New Testament history, there were many glorious men in one way or another. From among these we can point out: Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, Triphyllius, Bishop of Leukusia of Cyprus, Porphyry, Bishop. Gazsky, bl. Jerome, St. Hilaria, Rufina of Aquileia. “Meeting with kind and pleasant people,” wrote St. Gregory of Nyssa to Eustathia, Ambrose and Vasilisa, “and the monuments of the Lord’s great love for them, which they showed me on the spot, were for me the subject of the greatest joy and joy; because in both of these the feast of God was revealed to me: both in the fact that I saw the saving traces of the presence of God who revived us here, and in the fact that I met souls in whom the same signs of the grace of the Lord are spiritually contemplated, so that you believe that truly in the heart of the one who has God is Bethlehem, Golgotha, the Mount of Olives, the Resurrection... So, since I saw holy places with my sensual gaze, Moreover, I saw in you clear signs of such places, then I was filled with such joy that no word can convey” 8). No less deep, gratifying and edifying impression was made by Jerusalem and its countless admirers in the bl. Jerome, who later lived for a long time and died in Bethlehem (420). “No matter how different the voices (of pilgrims from different countries), the religion is one. As many different folk choirs as there are, there are almost as many singing choirs. But between them, what constitutes exclusively or predominantly Christian virtue, there is no dispute due to either self-interest or motives of pride; general competition over humility. Let him be the very last, he will be revered as the first. There are no differences, nothing striking about the clothes. No matter how you want to walk, there is neither blame nor praise. And fasting does not elevate anyone: non-eating is not extolled, and moderate saturation is not condemned. Each one stands or falls for his Lord. No one judges another, lest he be condemned by the Lord. And gnawing each other with your teeth, which is so common in many countries, is not the case here at all. No luxury, no entertainment. But there are so many places of prayer in the city that it wouldn’t take a whole day to get around them” 9 ). In the 5th century he traveled to St. land ascetic Peter from Galatia. He went to Palestine, according to the blessed one. Theodoret in order to “observe the places where saving sufferings took place, and there to worship the Savior God and satiate your eyes with the contemplation of desired objects. For those who are passionately attached to someone usually feel joy not only when they see him, but also receive pleasure if they see his house, clothes and shoes. This blessed man, being embraced by love for Christ, applied to himself the words from the Song of Songs: I am wounded by love (Song. 5:8), and, as if wanting to see even the shadow of the Bridegroom, he turned to the places that exuded currents of salvation for all people” 10. Travel to holy places, especially Jerusalem, found even more warm sympathy in women, who at all times were distinguished by the liveliness of their religious feelings and simple-hearted curiosity. The name of Equal-to-the-Apostles Queen Helen, mother of Tsar Constantine, occupies first place among the devout worshipers of the holy land. We do not want to say that she was the first example of a pious pilgrim, but that her stay in Palestine was marked by particularly important discoveries for all Christians in the field of Christian shrines and was accompanied by the construction of more or less magnificent churches over the Cave of the Holy Sepulcher, in Bethlehem at the site of the Nativity of Christ, on the Mount of Olives and at the Oak of Mamre. The story of Queen Helena finding the life-giving cross of the Lord is now well known to almost every Christian. In view of what has been said, it is quite understandable why the pilgrimage of St. the mother of King Constantine and the affairs of her religious zeal in Palestine deserved the special attention and sympathy of the first Christian historian and were described by him in some detail. The Holy Land, which saw the greatest humility and self-abasement of the Savior, made such a deep impression on Queen Helena that, according to historians Eusebius 11 and Rufinus 12, having taken off the jewelry appropriate to her rank, in the most modest clothes, so as not to be recognized, she intervened in the crowd to distribute generous alms, inviting virgins who lived in Jerusalem, and as a simple slave she herself served them at the table. It is clear that the example of such a noble and pious wanderer should have had a strong effect on contemporaries and descendants, arousing them to imitation and further elevating in their eyes the importance of traveling to holy places. And St. Elena was not left without followers. In the same fourth century she traveled to St. on earth another no less pious wife, a rich and noble Roman widow named Paula. Bl. Jerome, who tells us in detail about her wanderings, himself, with all his curiosity and deeply religious disposition of his soul, was not particularly inclined to this kind of travel, preferring to them the calm and secluded life of a hermit, but in relation to Pavla - his student and her enterprise, he somewhat softened his view and presented her wanderings as a highly virtuous feat that deserves full respect. “Forgetting home, your children, kinship, property, everything that belongs to the world,” writes Bl. Jerome about St. Pavle, she decided to leave her fatherland; alone and unaccompanied by anyone, she wanted to visit Palestine. Arriving in Jerusalem, she walked around all the saints here. places with such warmth and love, “that I would not have been able to tear myself away from the first ones if I had not hurried to the others.” Having prostrated herself before the life-giving cross of Christ, she prayed as if she saw the Lord hanging on it. Having entered the cave of resurrection, she kissed the stone that the angel had rolled away from the door of the tomb; like one thirsty for long-desired waters, she fell with believing lips to the place where the body of Jesus lay. She was shown a pillar sprinkled with the blood of the Lord, to which He was tied during the scourging, and the upper room of Zion, where the Holy Spirit descended on the first one hundred and twenty believers. In Bethlehem, she visited the tomb of Rachel, the den of the Savior. “And after she saw the sacred shelter of the Virgin and the stall in which she saw the ox of the one who had acquired and the donkey of her Master’s manger (Is. 1:3) ..., she swore in my hearing,” notes Bl. Jerome about St. Paul, “that I saw with the eyes of faith a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes, the Lord crying in a manger, the wise men worshiping, a star shining from on high, the Virgin Mother, a diligent teacher, shepherds who came at night to see the fulfillment of the word spoken to them (Luke 2:17)…, I saw babies beaten, a raging Herod, Joseph and Mary fleeing to Egypt! She walked into the valley in which Jacob tended his flocks, and the watchful shepherds were honored to hear: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men” (Luke 2:14); I saw the birthplace of Isaac, traces of the oak of Abraham, the tomb of Lazarus, the house of Mary and Martha, the graves of the twelve patriarchs in Samaria, where, according to legend, John the Baptist was buried with the prophets Elisha and Obadiah, the fig tree of Zacchaeus; worshiped the tomb of Joshua on Mount Ephraim, surveyed Nazareth, Cana, Capernaum, Lake Tiberias, and climbed Mount Tabor. So, driven by a feeling of faith, without further ado, St. passed through. Paul throughout Palestine with constant recollection of the sacred events that took place there or here. Having then visited Egypt and bowed here to the great Macarius, Arseny, Serapion and other monks, she returned to St. land and settled in Bethlehem, where she lived for three years in a cramped cell, until she founded monasteries and hotels for those wanderers who would like to follow the mournful path along which she herself walked, accompanied by many pious virgins and her daughter Eustochia 13. And then there were many such pilgrims in the holy land. In the letters of the same blessed. Jerome, we find the names of Melania and Fabiola, noble by birth and famous for the holiness of life, who came to worship in Jerusalem and lived nearby for some time 14. How highly developed and widespread was the custom of traveling to St. by the beginning of the fifth century? in places, how many zealots of piety rushed to St. hail to worship the local shrine, is evident from the fact that pilgrimage has now become a matter of time and prompted representatives of theological thought of that time to express their views on Christians visiting St. places and the hardships, dangers and disadvantages with which it was inevitably associated. As a sample of the judgments of the church leaders of that time on this issue, we will present mainly the reviews of St. Gregory of Nyssa and Blessed. Jerome. Of these, the first expressed his opinion about the importance and significance of pilgrimage mainly in a small letter or treatise: About those who undertake a journey to Jerusalem, and the second, having lived for a long time in Bethlehem, was well acquainted with pilgrimage and touched on it more than once in his creations. In the words of Gregory of Nyssa and Bl. Jerome, which we will present below, of course, one can discern some aversion to pilgrimage, bitter regrets about the strengthening of the custom of confining one’s religious feeling to distant shrines; but any reader who would decide, on the basis of these words, to assert that the saints we have named would be cruelly mistaken. the fathers, like other remarkable teachers of the church, were generally against traveling to St. places, they saw them as an undesirable phenomenon. Church writers who themselves wandered around St. earth and who, as we saw, found joy and peace for themselves in this way, did not really praise this custom in one case and treated it with complete sympathy and respect in others. “For those who have once devoted themselves to a higher kind of life, I consider it very useful,” wrote St. Gregory of Nyssa, “so that they constantly turn to the words of the Gospel and live according to it and direct themselves to God. So, since there are people who have chosen the monastic and hermit life, who consider it a matter of piety to visit places in Jerusalem in which monuments of the Lord’s presence in the flesh are visible, it would be good for them to conform their actions to the commandments of the Lord. If this is not in the Lord’s commandments, then I don’t know where it would be commanded to want to do something, making oneself a law in choosing what is good. Where the Lord calls the blessed to inherit the kingdom of heaven, He did not count the journey to Jerusalem among the good deeds. Where He proclaims beatitudes, He did not include their zeal for Him. Let him who has intelligence think about why try to do something that does not make you blessed or close to the kingdom of heaven?” After careful consideration, St. the father finds that traveling to St. In some places, instead of benefit, they can even bring spiritual harm to those who have chosen a perfect life. “A godly lifestyle is obligatory for everyone, both husbands and wives; The difference between a wise life is chastity, and it is preserved with an unmixed and separate way of life, so that nature is not offended by the mixing and close proximity of either women with men, or men with women, as long as they strive to maintain chastity. But during a journey, necessity always leads to a breach of caution and to indifference in observing the rules; for it would be inconvenient for a woman to make such a long journey if she did not have a guardian; due to physical weakness, she is lifted by someone onto a pack animal, and descended from it, and in difficult cases is supported. And in order to raise, you need to have either an acquaintance or a mercenary; In both cases, criticism is inevitable here. For whether he entrusts himself to someone else’s or to his own, he does not preserve the law of chastity. And since in eastern countries, in inns, in hotels and cities, there is a lot of debauchery and opportunity for sin, how can it be that the eyes of one walking in the smoke will not hurt? How can one pass dispassionately through places where passions operate? And what more will the one who visits these places receive, as if the Lord still physically dwells in them, but has moved away from us, or as if the Holy Spirit abounds among the Jerusalemites, but cannot come to us...? If there had been greater grace in the places of Jerusalem, then sin would not have entered into those living there”... Against these calm moral and practical arguments of St. Many of his contemporaries said to his father: “Why didn’t you prescribe this law to yourself? For if there is no benefit for someone who lives according to God to be there, why did you take such a path in vain? In response to this reproach of inconsistency, the strength and height of the views of St. Gregory of Nyssa and his impartiality in judging the matter, which he himself knew. “Because of the necessity in which I was assigned to live by the Ruler of our life, it happened to me to be in those places for the sake of the holy council convened for the organization of the Arabian Church. And since Arabia is adjacent to the country of Jerusalem, I promised the primates of the holy churches of Jerusalem to come to them for a conference, since matters were in confusion and they needed a mediator... So let no one be tempted by us, only our advice should be more convincing, because we advise on what we have seen with our own eyes. That the revealed Christ is the true God, we confessed this even before we were in place, and after this our faith did not decrease or increase. We knew about the incarnation through the Virgin before we were in Bethlehem; and we believed in the resurrection from the dead before we saw the tomb; They confessed that the rapture was true before they saw the Mount of Olives. The only benefit that the journey brought us was that, in comparison, we learned that we have more sacred things than in other countries. Therefore, you who fear the Lord, praise Him in the places where you are; for a change of place does not bring God closer to us. But wherever you are, the Lord will come to you if the abode of your soul turns out to be such that the Lord can dwell in you and walk (Lev. 26:12)" 15 ... Strict judgments of St. Gregory of Nyssa about his travels to St. in some places were caused by the circumstances among which he wrote, although they were not exceptional and seemed to find a response in the opinions of other famous church fathers. So blessed. Jerome, from whose words we briefly recounted the journey of St. Pavly, was far from the idea of ​​​​making the enterprise of this pious and wealthy woman an example obligatory for everyone to follow. “What is worthy of praise is not that he was in Jerusalem, but that he lived well in Jerusalem,” wrote Blessed. Jerome to the monk Paulinus, who asked him for advice regarding a trip to St. land. “All believers receive retribution not according to the difference in places, but according to the measure of faith, and true worshipers worship the Father not in Jerusalem or on Mount Garizin... The places of death on the cross and resurrection benefit only those who bear their cross and are resurrected daily with Christ, those who imagine themselves worthy of such a dwelling... The heavenly church is equally visible from Jerusalem and from Britain, for the Kingdom of God is within you. Anthony and the entire host of monks of Egypt, Mesopotamia, Pontus, Cappadocia and Armenia did not see Jerusalem: even without this city the gates of heaven were opened to them. Blazh. Hilarion was from Palestine and lived in Palestine, but was only in Jerusalem for one day, so as not to show disdain for the holy places, due to their proximity, but at the same time not to show that he limits the Lord only to this place... If the places of resurrection and death on the cross were not in the most famous city, where there is a palace, barracks, public women, comedians, jesters and everything that usually happens in other cities, or if this city was visited only by crowds of monks, then one could really wish that such a city was the home of all monks. And now it would be very stupid to leave your homeland, leave the cities, be considered a monk and live among a large crowd in exactly the same way as you would live in your homeland... The city is filled with people of all kinds, and there is such oppression of both sexes that what you avoided in another place, here you are forced to endure everything 16.” It is easy to see that St. Gregory of Nyssa and Blessed. Jerome, speaking strictly on the issue of traveling to St. places, they meant those who dedicated themselves to a higher kind of life, who chose a strictly monastic and hermit life, as well as all those people who exaggerated the significance of this feat and looked at pilgrimage as a special guarantee of salvation. The first St. the fathers and teachers of the church instill the idea that travel to holy places is not equally beneficial for everyone, that instead of benefit, others may end up harming their soul from them; the latter are taught to value their feat not because of how far or close they travel, but because of the spiritual disposition with which they perform their feat. To all Christians in general, St. the fathers in the above words give an excellent lesson - to be prudent and extremely careful in your impulses to travel; not to think that the land, holy by name, is also holy by the quality of those living in it; remember that in Palestine there are many temptations to sin, and a person, having visited Jerusalem, does not become holier or more religious than other people; not to be arrogant and not to take special credit for it if any of them happens to visit St. earth; Do not forget for one minute that true service to God is in the spirit, and that those traveling in St. earth only in the case when, having seen the places of death and resurrection of Christ, they bury themselves for sin and are resurrected for a new, perfect life, but the main thing is not to imagine that in a future life, when distributing rewards, this feat will be taken into account first of all, and not deeds in general. The judgment of the named church authorities was thus aimed at limiting the excessively increased pilgrimage in their time, at preventing its undesirable consequences, and at eliminating a kind of abuse that began to creep into this phenomenon of the church-religious life of Christians. The custom itself is to visit St. places recognized by St. Gregory of Nyssa, Blessed. Jerome and other church fathers, a pious deed that is very important for the moral success of a person, and therefore deserves approval and encouragement. St. Gregory of Nyssa and Blessed. Jerome considered themselves, as we have seen, very happy that they had to visit St. earth and see the saving traces of the Lord’s presence in it, contemplate the monuments of His love for mankind. Having derived from their wanderings in the holy land an extremely gratifying and calming feeling, they were far from the idea of ​​​​forbidding Christians from worshiping the shrines of Jerusalem, of blocking their path to the source of unspeakable joy, unearthly peace and spiritual joy. “If we worship the slaves of the martyrs,” wrote Blessed. Jerome Marcellus, “and even, placing, if possible, their remains in sight, we venerate them with our lips, then why ignore the tomb in which the Lord was buried?... If after the suffering of the Lord, this place (the Promised Land, watered with the blood of Christ), as the wicked tongue whispers, became shameful, then what did it mean that Paul was hastening to Jerusalem to spend Pentecost there?... Why? should we speak further about other saints and glorious men who, after the glorification of the Lord, brought their vows and donations to the brethren who were in Jerusalem? 17 "St. Paulinus of Nolan († 431) in his letters said: “a pious desire to see those places along which Christ walked, suffered and ascended; It is also a blessed thing to have something from those places, even an insignificant dust or something from the tree of the cross of Christ, even if it was the size of a stalk 18.” St. John Chrysostom 19, bl. Theodoret and Eusebius of Caesarea spoke in exactly the same way more than once about traveling to St. places as a matter of religious zeal, which is very important for Christians. In the sympathetic attitude of the fathers and teachers of the church to the pilgrimage of St. places and it seems to us necessary to look for the real reason why strict voices, apparently heard at times against travel, did not make a change in the prevailing views on the latter and did not weaken the desire of Christians to visit St. places The series of centuries following the 5th century presents us with an ever greater strengthening and at the same time distortion of the custom of travel. The holy city with its surroundings continued to be the subject of the most ardent aspirations of Christian pilgrims in the Middle Ages. A long line of laymen, priests, monks, bishops, nobles, princes and even kings come to worship eastern shrines. Some of them make their way among wealth and luxury, sometimes using idle time for bad things; others go to the Holy Sepulcher, feeding on the name of Christ, spending the time on the road in fasting, prayer and singing sacred hymns, 20 purifying the soul to contemplating holy places. What attracted you to St. land with such extraordinary power of Christians? What attracted countless fans here, who sometimes left enthusiastic descriptions of their travels around the holy land in various memoirs and chronicles? What made pilgrims of all times take on a heavy burden - to cross seas, pass through many countries, endure all kinds of inconveniences, hardships and dangers of the journey? Historical and religious memories, the desire to resurrect in the soul with all its strength those great events that took place in St. earth in the times of the Old and New Testaments; to revive, aggravate and strengthen in oneself the religious feeling, which in the midst of everyday life usually dulls, weakens and even completely disappears - this is what prompted, first of all, Christians to undertake the difficult feat of travel, and then the great many material monuments of the life and work of Christ, preserved in Palestine and filling the souls of pilgrims with joy and tranquility according to the natural law that the blessed one points to. Theodoret that “whoever is attached to someone feels joy not only when he sees him, but also if he sees his house, clothes and shoes.” Various kinds of legends began to emerge very early about the holy city and its attractions and quickly spread everywhere, strongly influencing the imagination of the masses and drawing tens, hundreds and even thousands of devout people to the east. It is enough here to just name the story that appeared long ago and is now well-known to everyone, “About the Holy Light that Descends from Heaven to the Holy Sepulcher 21” on the night of St. Easter and lights the lamps hanging above him. Many of the medieval pilgrims, lovers of the miraculous, hurried to Jerusalem on this day precisely to see such an unusual phenomenon with their own eyes. The religious enthusiasm of the Christian world and the influx of fans in St. the land especially intensified after Jerusalem fell to the rule of the Mohammedans. The collision of travelers with non-believers and other difficulties of travel that now appeared made the feat itself seem more valuable and higher in the eyes of Christians. Those who went to worship the Jerusalem shrine now looked at themselves as martyrs and heroes. The time of the Crusades - this bloody drama of the Middle Ages and a kind of journey to St. earth - was an outwardly brilliant era in the history of Christian pilgrimage. It was the time of some kind of passionate, epidemic attraction to St. earth, when being in Jerusalem and taking out from there a part of some shrine, a palm branch or even a handful of earth was considered the greatest happiness, and dying in it or its environs was recognized as one of the guarantees of salvation. It is not without reason that a story arose about one medieval pilgrim named Letbalda, originally from Burgundy, that he, having climbed the Mount of Olives, fell on this St. the ground with his arms outstretched in a cross shape and, shedding tears, let out joyful cries. Then rising from the ground and raising his hands to the sky, he jumped as high as possible and rushed down. At the same time, he asked the Savior to send him death not far from the place of His ascension, so that it would be easier for him to reach the abodes of heaven. And his wish came true: he soon died, showing almost no signs of illness. The unusually strong impression made by St. land on the pilgrims, and the falsely directed religious feeling of Letbald make this circumstance possible to some extent, about which the medieval annalist, who relayed the whole story of the Burgundian pilgrim from the words of eyewitnesses, notes that the latter, without a doubt, was awarded a blessed fate. No one, of course, knows about the true fate that befell Letbald beyond the grave; but his action on the Mount of Olives speaks more eloquently than any words that the initial motivation for traveling to St. the earth, precisely the desire to see and kiss the places that served, as the beautiful expression of the bl. Jerome, the birthplace of the entire Christian religion 22, in the Middle Ages, especially in the West, completely lost its highly religious character and thereby degraded the pilgrimage itself. Jerusalem and the Holy Land in general, which at all times constituted the most expensive object of worship for Christian pilgrims, were not, however, the only place of pilgrimage in the Christian world. In the western half of the latter, its own special and very important pilgrimage point was formed very early on, concentrating a local shrine and attracting numerous crowds of wanderers in the Middle Ages. It was precisely Rome, in fact, its environs, where there were catacombs or Christian tombs that preserved the precious remains of countless holy martyrs and confessors. Here, according to the famous ancient Christian poet Prudentius, who sang in verse the exploits of the martyrs, not only the inhabitants of Italy, but also the most remote provinces came to worship every year. “Early in the morning he is going to honor the martyr,” he says, for example, describing the suffering of the most blessed Hippolytus; “all youth bring worship; they walk back and forth (honoring the martyr) until sunset. Piety gathers both the inhabitants of Latium and foreign peoples to the tomb of the martyr. They kiss the shiny metal (the tomb of the martyr), pour balm, and water their faces with tears. And when, after a certain number of months, the year returns and the memory of the martyr is honored with a solemn service, then how great, competing in zeal do the crowds gather and what songs do they sing in glorification of God? The sovereign city takes out and beats its citizens; the patricians, filled with an equal degree of religious zeal, are joined by a phalanx of plebeians, having the same weapons; for faith destroys differences of origin. In exactly the same way, a brilliant formation unfolds from the gates of the Alban cities, stretching out in long rows. You can hear joyful shouts on various roads here and there. The natives of Cicenum and together the population of Etruria approach. The stern Samnites are coming, the Campanian, an inhabitant of high Capua, is coming, the inhabitants of Nola are coming. Everyone, rejoicing, hastily makes their way along with their spouse and dear children. Wide-spread fields can barely accommodate joyful travelers, and tightly closed hosts occupy vast spaces...” 23. The influx of pilgrims to Rome and its environs was so great, especially on the feast day of St. Apostles Peter and Paul 24 that the popes ordered that all Roman churches be opened to pilgrims and that Mass be celebrated twice a day. Western bishops set an example for their flock to visit holy places, and those who did not do so were reprimanded by the Roman high priests. St. Gregory the Great wrote, for example, to the Bishop of Rouen: “What occupation, what insurmountable difficulty keeps you from visiting St. for such a long time? Peter, when we see how every year even newly converted peoples flock to us from all over the world - men, women and young children, even the sick and crippled, moved by love for St. Peter, they don’t lag behind the others and hurry here on carts.” "Oh Rome!" with these words an unknown poet of the 7th-8th centuries addresses him, “you are a noble city, dominating the world, rising high above all cities, sprinkled with the blood of martyrs and shining with the whiteness of the virgin hosts; We send you greetings and pray for your good.” 25 The impression of the holy city, which the admirers of Rome felt even in the Middle Ages, is conveyed by Manuel Chrysologus, a Greek by birth and a classicist by education, in his enthusiastic letter to Emperor John Komnenos, in which he compares the old Rome with the new and speaks of the advantages of the first. Here is what he wrote among other things: “There are many churches here in honor of the apostles, but even more in honor of the holy martyrs, blessed women and virgins. Who is able to list their numerous remains, both relics preserved in their entirety and those divided into parts? In truth, this is a great repository of holy relics and a treasury of sacred remains! Who, seeing such a host of saints resting here, would not say about Rome that it is part of heaven and inhabited by celestials! Here are the main luminaries Peter and Paul, attracting the eyes of the whole world. And it’s a truly wonderful sight when you see a countless number of fans rushing here from Spain, Gaul, the British Isles; from countries even further to the west and north, from Pannonia, Germany, Sarmatia and even Greece; you see not only husbands of various ages and conditions, but also wives, neglecting the dangers and hardships of a long journey: cold, heat, dirt, dust and all this only in order to bow to the tomb and shrine of the apostles, at least through the bars and curtains, to put their faces and heads to the floor, the dust and the copper and iron bars enclosing their remains" 26 . Indeed, the sacred dungeons of Rome, which served for Christians during times of persecution as places of liturgical meetings, temporary refuge and eternal rest, contained a great wealth of historical and religious monuments associated with the memories of the first Christian era, with centuries of persecution, martyrdom and confession. In the Roman catacombs, every object, not to mention its historical and archaeological significance, could arouse in pilgrims both pious curiosity and a deeply religious feeling. But of the numerous objects contained in the Roman tombs, in addition to the very remains of the martyrs and confessors, the instruments of torture of the latter, located in the sacred tombs, where they were buried by the pious hand of the witnesses of their suffering, deserved special attention of the visitor. In Rome, the chains of St. are still preserved and shown to noble admirers. ap. Peter and the iron grates on which the archids were burned. Lawrence and the martyr Sebastian. There is no doubt that in ancient times there were many similar sacred relics in the catacombs, contemporary with the death of certain martyrs and confessors. This is not denied by the latest archaeological research carried out in the sacred dungeons of Rome, but is further confirmed by historical evidence. According to St. John Chrysostom, the Sicilian martyr of Babyla, who suffered at the end of the 3rd century, wished that his chains would be placed with him in the grave. The martyr Sabinius asked not to be separated from the stone with which he would be drowned. St. Ambrose of Milan found in the tombs of the martyrs Agrippina and Vitaly nails and pieces of wood on which the latter was crucified. Thanks to the latest research in the catacombs, many iron rods, chains, rings, pincers, nails and other accessories for torturing Christians were found in them 27 . In the tomb of St. Agnes's head was found with a nail driven into it. In the Vatican Museum in Rome, one can still see one of these tools of the martyrs, somewhat reminiscent of our rake, with the difference, however, that it bifurcates in the form of a fork and is equipped with long and sharp claws, which, piercing the body, were supposed to tear it into small pieces and shreds and thereby cause the greatest suffering. Another item that aroused deep reverence among ancient Christians and brought them to the catacombs were cups containing the blood of martyrs (phialae cruentae). The custom of collecting the blood of martyrs in vessels and placing the latter at the tombs of the first arose from the same pious motive that forced the worshipers of the martyrs to preserve their holy remains in general. Acts of martyrdom and other monuments of ancient church literature provide many examples of the greatest respect with which Christians treated the blood of martyrs - that seed from which, in the famous expression of Tertullian 28, the trees and fruit of Christianity grew. “Here a crowd of faithful gathers from all over the city (Saguntum), we read from Prudentius in the description of the sufferings of the martyr Vincent, “arranging a soft bed, drying unhealed wounds. He covers the double claw wounds with kisses; he happily collects purple blood. Many stain pieces of linen in the blood dripping (from wounds) in order to preserve them in their homes, as sacred protection for descendants 29.” On the way, Christians threw scarves and bandages in front of the passing martyrs in order to use them to collect drops of blood flowing from their wounds. The blood of martyrs was used to stain the cement used in the construction of churches, and this was seen as one of the advantages of church buildings. Gaudentius, Bishop of Brestia, received with deep gratitude several pieces of such cement from St. Ambrose and expressed his gratitude to him in a special letter. Most often, the blood of the martyrs was collected with sponges 30 and from there they squeezed it into a special kind of vessels, which are still found in the catacombs with traces of dried blood in them. A careful examination of the contents in these vessels, the inscriptions found on them (sa. sang), in which, not without reason, the abbreviation of the word is read: sanguis, and the immediate feeling of everyone convinces that they really contain the remains of blood. Those who have seen these vessels assure that even the ordinary, naked eye can notice a dark red sediment on the bottom and on the walls, in which it is easiest to recognize traces of dried blood 31 . In view of what has been said, it was quite natural for Christian pilgrims from the very first times of the church to go to worship in Rome, the soil of which was watered with the blood of martyrs and filled with sacred tombs and holy remains dear to religious feelings. And Christians not only from the West, but also from the most distant countries of the East, diligently visited the city of martyrs and saints. According to Eusebius, the famous Origen, “while the Roman church was ruled by Zephyrinus (202–218), traveled to Rome with the intention, as he himself writes nowhere, to see the most ancient Roman church” 32. Many of the wanderers who came on pilgrimage to the catacombs even left tactile traces of their visits here. On the walls of underground passages and tombs of especially famous persons, for example, St. Kallista, inscriptions and images of crosses made with coal, graphite or the first sharp tool that came across by the pious hand of the pilgrims have been preserved to this day. One of the most ancient records of this kind, dating back to the year 270, speaks of a visit to Rome by an entire noble family, who came from Persia to worship in Rome and here suffered martyrdom 33. But most of the inscriptions belonging to early times - the era of the 3rd-4th centuries, contain only the bare names of visitors to the catacombs without indicating the time of travel, the homeland of the pilgrims and the motives that led them to the sacred dungeons. In inscriptions of later times, on the contrary, the spiritual dispositions of pilgrims, their thoughts and feelings, are often explained upon arrival at the place of worship; in others, entire prayers are read, in which the pious pilgrims expressed their joy and feelings of gratitude to God for the fulfillment of their vow. In one epitaph, located on a gravestone now kept in the Lyon Museum, the name of a Christian is read: Agapus, who was distinguished, among other virtues, by his special zeal for visiting holy places (loca sanctorum adsedue) 34). Another inscription, located in one of the halls of the Vatican Museum, says that a Christian named Justus happily arrived at the place of his pious journey, fulfilled his vow and thanks Providence for this 35. What gives the inscription now given particular importance and undoubtedly scientific merit is the image of kaligs, two soles of the feet, attached to it. Although the image of caligas, found occasionally in the catacombs, still constitutes a scientific problem, but in connection with this inscription and with others of the same content, it seems most natural to see in them a symbol of the journeys undertaken by pilgrims to St. places. Explaining this time the image of kaligas in the sense of a sign of pilgrimage, we do not deny that in other cases Christians expanded the meaning of the symbol in question, expressing to them the idea that the deceased, on whose grave the kaligas were depicted, happily completed his earthly journey, finally reached the goal of his earthly wandering. - Blazh. Jerome, while studying in Rome, loved to visit the catacombs during the hours of rest from his studies. “Together with my comrades and peers,” he writes about himself, I had the custom of visiting the tombs of the apostles and martyrs on Sundays, often going down into caves dug in the depths of the earth, within the walls of which on both sides lie the bodies of the dead, and in which there is such darkness that here this prophetic saying almost comes true: let them go down to hell and live (Psalm 54:16); occasionally the light let in from above moderates the horror of the darkness, so that the openings through which it enters are better called a crack than a window. There they walk step by step (groping) and in the midst of the gloomy night this Virgilian verse is remembered: horror is everywhere, and the very silence frightens the soul” 36. But the great fame of the catacombs as one of the favorite places of Christian pilgrimage was relatively short-lived. Despite the efforts of the popes (Symmachus, Vigilius, John III, Sergius I, Gregory III, Stephen III, Adrian I and Leo III) to preserve the sacred dungeons of Rome in their original form and in their former glory, their decline began and occurred simultaneously with the invasion of barbarians into Italy. Terrible devastation caused by the Goths, Longobards and others. in the vicinity of Rome, on the one hand, they served as a plausible pretext for the Roman bishops (Theodore I, Leo II, Paul I, Paschal, Sergius II and Leo IV) to transfer from Christian tombs to the city basilicas all the most remarkable remains of martyrdom and, in general, monuments of the ancient shrine, on the other hand, they significantly damaged the catacomb entrances and corridors and, thus, made access to the city difficult. sacred dungeons. As a result of these unfavorable historical conditions, from the middle of the 9th century until the 17th, the catacombs remained in complete near obscurity and were occasionally visited by more courageous pilgrims, who did not pay attention either to direct government prohibitions to enter the dungeons, or to the destruction caused by the hands of barbarians and time. From this obscurity, which lasted throughout the medieval era, the catacombs were brought out by scientific expeditions of the famous Bosio, Boldetti and others, who began a period of archaeological research into catacomb art, sanctified the dark dungeons of Rome with their research and reopened them to scientists, tourists and pious pilgrims. While underground Rome was deprived of its best riches - the greatest and most numerous monuments of the early Christian era and seemed to be completely lost from sight, the glory of aboveground Rome was rapidly growing, striving with all its might to concentrate the remains of an ancient shrine and become the center of not only church-political, but also religious life, at least in the Western world. While Christian memories huddled in the vicinity of Rome - where the martyrs and confessors were buried, Rome remained a semi-pagan city in which the traditions of paganism stubbornly held on, which served as one of the reasons for Constantine the Great to move the capital from west to east. Carrying away the shrine, during the devastating raids of the barbarians, from the catacombs to the city basilicas, the Roman high priests took care both to protect it from the sacrilegious hand of robbers, and to use it to elevate the sacred authority of the eternal city, making it the subject of reverent celebration by Christians. Rome is truly being reborn into a Christian city: the relics of the supreme apostles are transferred to it, and along with them a great many other remains and sacred relics. The plight of the eastern Roman Empire, which first became the prey of the Crusaders, and then fell to the power of the Turks, gave the popes every opportunity, with the help of trade operations and through the mediation of the Venetians, to transfer a lot of the shrines that belonged to the east to Roman churches. And it is not without reason that medieval traditions and legends, which propagated the idea of ​​​​the world-religious significance of Rome, populate the latter with shrines from all over the world and make it a participant in the discoveries made in Palestine by Queen Helena. The metropolis of Western Christianity, thanks to the efforts of the popes, has become a rich treasury of Christian shrines. In the ancient basilica of St. Peter, and then the famous cathedral of the same name, in addition to the relics of St. the apostles Peter and Paul were present and the most honorable visitors to the city were shown a part of the Life-Giving Tree, the spear with which our Lord was pierced on the cross; the image of the Savior, imagined by Himself on the canvas of the pious Veronica; head of the evang. Luke and part of the relics of Gregory the Theologian, John Chrysostom and the holy Roman popes: Gregory Dvoeslov, Leo, Agathon, Martin and many others. In the Lateran Basilica, the foundation of which dates back to very ancient times, the judge who was at the head of Christ in the tomb was kept; the lention with which He was girded while washing the feet of His disciples; part of the vestment and vestments of the saint. Mother of God, head of St. apostle Peter and Paul and the prophet. Zechariah, Father Predtechev, and in a special chapel there is a wooden throne on which Christ supposedly celebrated the Easter supper with the apostles. According to legend, this throne was brought to Rome during the reign of Vespasian and has remained here since then as a sacred relic. In the Basilica of Mary the Great they showed: the manger in which the infant Christ was laid at His birth, and the shrouds with which He was wrapped around His Mother; image of the saint Theotokos, written by St. ev. Luke; parts of the relics of the evangelists Matthew and Mark and saints Jerome, Epaphroditus and others. In the church of St. Sylvester, Pope of Rome, kept the Ubrus of Christ Not Made by Hands and the head of St. John the Baptist, and in the Church of All Saints, which, as is known, is from the Pantheon of Agrippa, was converted by the emperor. Phocas and Pope Boniface IV (in 608–610) collected such a large number of holy relics and generally sacred objects into the Christian church dedicated to the memory of all martyrs, as opposed to the previous purpose of the building in honor of all gods, that it could rightfully be called in its time a museum of Christian relics 37 . It is clear that the cherished desire of the Roman high priests to make their residence a place of pilgrimage for Western Christians was fully realized: countless crowds of pious pilgrims in an uninterrupted line have been going to worship in the eternal city since ancient times, as they went in the first centuries to its sacred dungeons. The system of indulgences, according to which remission of sins was given in the Middle Ages to everyone who undertook a trip to Rome, greatly contributed to the arousal of general sympathy for visiting it and supported the importance of the eternal city among Western Christians. The establishment of holy years, the so-called jubilees, the necessary accessory of which is a complete indulgence (indulgentia plenaria) or the remission of all church penances, also attracted ad limina apostolorum from all over the earth a great multitude of people, including many crowned heads. Justice, however, requires that it be said that no matter how much the popes tried to oppose the eternal city to Jerusalem as the center of the Christian shrine, their attempts could not be crowned with complete success, and Rome could never capture the religious primacy of Jerusalem, on the side of which were not the countless relics and the splendor of the capital of the West, but historical and religious memories, dear to all without exception, the Christian world. The third major place of pilgrimage in Christendom, especially lively and attractive in the Middle Ages, was Byzantium or Constantinople. Of course, it was a relatively young city, its history was not associated with such important historical and religious memories as were surrounded by Jerusalem and Rome - witnesses to the bloody events of the early Christian era: but the founder of Constantinople used all efforts and means to equalize his royal city with ancient Rome, not only in civil, but also in church-religious terms. Constantine the Great wanted to make his new residence the capital of the entire Christian world, he wanted to place it under the protection of a shrine and surround it with an aura of sacred glory, as the mother of all Christian cities. Both he himself and many of his successors strove to achieve this task. The Byzantine emperors made a lot of efforts to concentrate in Byzantium not only a local, but also a general Christian shrine, before which the Greeks, Romans and all other Christian peoples would equally reverence. For this purpose, Equal-to-the-Apostles Queen Helena brought from the East to Byzantium part of the Life-Giving Cross of the Lord and the relics of the prophet. Daniel. During the reign of her blessed son, the rod of Moses and the relics of the martyrs Mina, Emilian, Florus and Laurus were brought here; under imperial Constantia - the relics of St. the apostles Andrew, Luke and Timothy; under Julian or Jovian - the relics of the great martyr. Artemia; under Theodosius the Great - the head of John the Baptist and the relics of the martyrs Terence and Africanus; under Arcadia - the relics of the prophet. Samuel; under Theodosius the Younger, the right hand of St. the first martyr Stephen, the relics of the prophet. Zechariah and St. archid. Lawrence, the image of the Mother of God, painted by St. Evangelist Luke, and one of the faiths of St. ap. Petra; under Marcian - St. cancer with clothes and burial shrouds of the Mother of God and the relics of the prophet. Isaiah; under Leo Makela - the relics of St. Anastasia; under Heraclius - part of the Life-giving Cross of the Lord, the instrument of the passion of Christ and the power of St. great martyr Euphemia; under Justin II - the relics and omophorion of Righteous Anna, mother of the Most Holy Theotokos; under Constantine Copronymus - the relics of St. much Pelagia; under Leo the Wise - the relics of St. Mary Magdalene and righteous Lazarus; under Constantine the Porphyrogenitus - the Image of the Savior Not Made by Hands; under Isaac II Angela the head of St. Mamanta 38. In addition to the named shrines, a great many other saints were kept in Byzantine churches, monasteries, chapels and imperial palaces. relics and sacred objects, it is not known for certain when and by whom were brought to Constantinople, as well as found in it itself. These include the relics of the martyrs: Nikita of Goth, Markian and Martyrius, Simeon the God-Receiver, James the Lord's brother, prophet. Zechariah, the Apostle Philip, Panteleimon and Marin, Agathia, Aquilina, Ia or Eudokia, St. Eusebius Bishop of Samosata, St. pillars Daniel and Akakios, St. John Kushchnik, forty martyrs, Phokas of Sinope, Clement of Ancyra, Paraskeva-Pyatnitsa, St. Virgin Helena, St. Averky, John the Merciful, Mary of Cleopas, St. Irina, much Feodosia, prophet Elisha, martyr. Lazarus, Spiridonius of Trimifuntsky, Gregory the Theologian, the Great. Agathonics and the holy infants beaten by Herod; horn of the prophet Samuel, from whom, according to legend, he anointed Saul and David for the kingdom, alabaster vessels of St. myrrh-bearing women and many miraculous Images of the Savior and the Mother of God 39. It should be added to this that Constantinople considered St. ap. Andrew, who, according to one Byzantine legend, was in ancient Byzantium and, as a harbinger of its future glory, carved with his own hands a stone cross, which in later times attracted the pious attention of Christian pilgrims; and according to another legend he even founded a church in Pera - ancient. Argyropol. From the presented bare and, of course, far from complete list of Byzantine shrines, it is not difficult to see that most of them were collected here from different parts of the then Christian world: Jerusalem, Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Ephesus, Cappadocia, Chalcedon, Cyprus, Patras, Tarsus, Mediolanus, Dorostola, Sirmium, Byblos and other little-known cities and towns; It is not difficult to obtain a clear understanding that the new Rome very early, no later than the second half of the 5th century, prepared for church-religious representation for the entire Christian East and acted as a serious rival with ancient Rome. Events of subsequent history: a double siege and the capture of the latter by barbarians, the loss of Alexandria during the reign of the emperor. Justinian's hegemony and generally educational significance in the east, the decline in the second half of the 6th century in Syria, which later became the center of the Muslim struggle, the devastating raids on St. land in the VII-VIII centuries. Arabs and Persians, as much as possible, contributed to the concentration of a common Christian shrine in Constantinople, which also occupied a very advantageous geographical position. After Omar took Jerusalem in 638 and plundered the Basilica of St. Sepulcher, and in 644 Alexandria was finally conquered, Christian shrines flowed in abundance from the East to the capital of the empire, and the city of Constantine the Great became richer in sacred treasures not only of its metropolis, but of the entire East, not excluding even St. land. To characterize this last side of Byzantium, which attracted countless numbers of pilgrims from everywhere throughout the Middle Ages, we consider it not superfluous to cite an excerpt from a letter from the emperor. Alexei Comnenus to Count Robert of Flanders, in which he, inviting Western peoples to take up arms against the Muslims, describes the sacred inventory and wealth of the capital of the Eastern Empire of his time as follows. “Before Constantinople is taken by the Turks and Pechenegs, exert all your strength. Better let Constantinople go to you than to the pagans. It contains the most precious relics of our Lord, namely: the pillar to which He was tied; the scourge with which He was scourged; the scarlet robe with which He was clothed; the crown of thorns with which His head was crowned; the reed which He held in His hands instead of a scepter; the vestments removed from Him before the crucifixion; most of the Life-Giving Tree on which He was crucified; the nails with which He was nailed, as well as numerous relics of the holy apostles and martyrs, such as: the head of John the Baptist, the incorruptible body of the first martyr Stephen... All this should not fall into the power of the pagans, for this would be a great loss and condemnation for Christians. If your warriors do not want to fight for the sake of such shrines and prefer gold, then I remind you of the countless riches and treasures that have been accumulated in our capital. The treasures of the churches of Constantinople - in silver, gold, pearls and precious stones, in silk fabrics - can be sufficient to decorate all the churches of the world. But the wealth of the Sophia Church can surpass all these treasures combined and is equal only to the wealth of the Temple of Solomon. There is nothing to talk about the innumerable treasury of nobles and even merchants and peasants, but about the imperial treasury it is enough to remember only that it contains not only the treasures of the recent rulers of Constantinople, but also the ancient Roman emperors. So, hurry with all your people, strain all your strength so that such treasures do not fall into the hands of the Turks and Pechenegs 40.” The Western militias, well aware of the untold wealth of Constantinople through their travelers, ambassadors and merchants, deeply heeded the call of the Byzantine emperor. Driven by the desire for profit and sacred loot, accumulated over centuries in the capital of the Eastern Empire, imbued with religious hatred of the Greeks, the Latins could easily be carried away by their religious enthusiasm to the point of neglecting everything else: the veneration of relics and shrines in general often led to sacrilege, especially in the Middle Ages. This is exactly what the capital of Constantine the Great had to experience. Having subjected the latter to terrible ruin and devastation in April 1204, having taken possession of its enormous wealth, alien to any enlightened interest in monuments of art and true Christian religious feeling, the crusaders did not spare artistic works of classical and Byzantine antiquity and laid their sacrilegious hand on the Constantinople shrines. With many works of sculpture, mosaics, icon painting, carving, etc. a considerable number of sacred relics, mainly St. the relics were destroyed, plundered and taken to the West by the Venetians, French and Italians. The shrines, which were its most valuable asset before the capture of the Crusaders by the Crusaders and were included in the list of Byzantine relics, later became the best decoration of the basilicas of Rome, the churches of France, Venice and other large and small Western European cities. True, the pious hand of the Greeks and other Orthodox peoples tried in every possible way to preserve the shrines from destruction and plunder during the catastrophe that befell Constantinople from the Catholic West; but the saved sacred treasures of Orthodox Byzantium were destined to remain in possession for a short time. The disastrous situation that arose for the Greeks with the final conquest of Constantinople by the Turks forced them to part with many of their shrines, take many St. relics and other sacred objects to Rus', as if in repayment for the abundant alms sent by Russia to the Orthodox East 41. The main centers of pilgrimage in the Christian world that we have noted were far from equal in veneration among one or another people. So, for example, the paths of ancient Russian pilgrims, who in the old days were known more under the name of Kalik travelers, in addition to domestic holy places, were directed almost exclusively to the East - to Jerusalem and Constantinople, less often to the monasteries of Mount Athos and very rarely to Rome. The pilgrimages of our pious ancestors to the Holy Land and Constantinople began very early, almost from the very first times of Christianity in Rus'. In the second half of the 12th century, the famous Euphrosyne of Polotsk traveled to Jerusalem with her sister and stayed there in a Russian monastery, and this makes it clear that there was already a Russian colony in the holy land at that time. In the monuments of our book and folk literature of the 12th-13th centuries, Kalikis appear with such definite, typical features, which themselves say that the pilgrims at that time were already very well known to the Russian people and managed to acquire their sympathy. The position of the wanderers, if one can judge it from the epics, was very honorable. The Vladimirov heroes: Ilya Muromets, Alyosha Popovich and Mikhail Potok Ivanovich were not ashamed to be called Kaliki; in a wanderer's costume - in bast shoes, with bags and sticks, they did not hesitate to appear at the honorary feasts of Vladimir the Red Sun and were received by the latter, as everywhere else they went, with respect and hospitality. Kaliki of our epics, folk songs, etc. do not at all resemble those who are now commonly called cripples: no, they were portly fellows, abundantly endowed with daring and physical strength, which they immediately proved at the feast; and even if they were old, they no longer aroused compassion for themselves by any physical defects. Judging by the very nature of the difficulties that enterprising and courageous wanderers had to overcome during their travels, it is easy to understand why those whom nature has richly endowed with health stand out among them. At the same time, and as if next to this epic type of ancient Russian Kaliki wanderer, stands a large, actually existing class of pilgrims, ordinary in the strict sense of the word, who, without having the claim to elevate their journey to the level of a high-profile feat, undertook long wanderings for religious reasons, with the goal of “bowing at the holy place and kissing the bodies of the saints,” in order to atone for sins and fulfill their old vow. Among these simple pilgrims there were also those who went to Jerusalem, Constantinople and generally to the east simply out of a desire to wander, like migratory birds, to visit those protected countries about which there were so many animated and tempting stories then. There were already so many of these lovers of travel to holy places in Rus', especially in the Novgorod region, their periodic migrations to distant eastern countries were so unprofitable in everyday economic life and harmful for the travelers themselves that the famous Kirik of Novgorod addressed the question of this class of pilgrims to Bishop Niphon (1130–1156). Kirik asked his ruler whether it was a sin to forbid some people from going to Jerusalem and to holy places in general? Niphon answered: not only is it not a sin, on the contrary, it is a great good if they travel in order to be idle and only eat and drink during the journey. St. John of Novgorod even allowed penance to be imposed on those who bound themselves with a vow to go to Jerusalem, “for these vows are destroying the earth.” They ruined it because they disrupted the economy, distracting workers from work and accustoming the working part of the population to vagrancy and idleness 42 . The second class of ancient Russian pilgrims, somewhat different from the previous one, consists of book-educated people, more or less financially secure and even high-ranking, who were able to combine the interests of pious curiosity with the religious goals of pilgrimage. Walking through the holy places of the East, observing the Constantinople shrines, living here and there for several months and even years, they turned their attention not only to what served as the object of reverent veneration and universal worship, but also to everything that touches the curiosity of an enlightened person. Stopping mainly where they found more interest for themselves, these pilgrims simultaneously studied churches, monasteries, shrines and generally sacred objects, as well as all other attractions, became acquainted with the nature and life of Palestine and Constantinople, and especially with their church orders. There were also pilgrims who, having taken refuge in one of the Greek monasteries, worked a lot on copying and translating liturgical books into their native language, which were then sent to Rus' and entered into liturgical practice here in more or less copies. Stefan Novgorodets, our famous pilgrim of the 14th century, says that during his journey through the Constantinople monasteries, he met with the Novgorodians he knew, Ivan and Dobrila, and rejoiced greatly, since he did not expect to meet with them, considering them missing. “And now,” he says, they live here, writing off the books of the Holy Scriptures in the Studite monastery, for they have become skilled in the book 43.” These last wanderers, these enlightened people and workers of the Russian land, deserved the attention of modern science and the gratitude of descendants especially because everything they saw and heard, without further ado, was recorded in more or less detail in their Walks or Pilgrims “for the guidance and memory and prayer of a faithful person 44.” Notes or memoirs of ancient Russian pilgrims constitute a whole and quite significant branch of literature, the main monuments of which have now already been made known, published and scientifically examined. At the head of them, both in time and in internal dignity, is “The Walk of Daniel, the Russian Land Abbot,” the first of our pilgrim-writers who traveled to the holy land at the very beginning of the 12th century. He spent more than two years in Palestine (1106–1107), going from end to end and describing the entire holy land, starting with its shrines and ending with its topography. In the footsteps of the abbots. Daniel, our later pilgrim-writers went to Jerusalem or Constantinople, surveyed the shrines and monuments of the Greek land, often talked about the same sights in their travel notes and to some extent repeated each other 45. With all that, the content of their memoirs is so diverse and rich that we do not see the possibility and, perhaps, the need to convey it here in any kind of integral essay, but we consider it not superfluous to say a few words in conclusion about the general character of our pilgrim-writers. We should not forget that the ancient Russian pilgrims-writers were, first of all, pious people, devout admirers who wanted to see, “with their sinful eyes all that land, where Christ our God walked upon His feet and showed many miracles gloriously to His holy apostle and disciple 46”; burning with impatience to personally survey the Constantinople shrines and churches and venerate the relics of the saints resting in them. It was not scientific, but exclusively religious interests that initially drew them to the east; It was not historical, archaeological, topographical, ethnographic and similar research that forced them to embark on this distant and unknown path, often associated with great hardships and even danger to life, but mainly the power of their religious inspiration. To understand the motives for the travels of these venerable wanderers and at least partly adopt their point of view, you need to read and study their notes, which to a greater or lesser extent captured their thoughts, feelings and very deeds. "... But, brothers and fathers, my lords,” Abbot Daniel wrote in the preface to his walk, “forgive me, and do not look at my weak-mindedness and my rudeness, which I wrote about Jerusalem, and about the blessed land, and about this holy path: whoever walks this path with fear and humility will not sin in the mercy of God in any way. I do not walk like those who walked this holy path, in all weakness and laziness, drinking and eating and doing everything inappropriate, but I still hope in the mercy of God and in your prayer, that Christ God will forgive me my inexorable sins, and behold, I have written off this path and this holy place, without being arrogant, without being magnified in this way: do not be that, it is nothing. I did not do good on this path, but for the sake of love for the holy places I wrote everything that I saw sinners with my eyes, so that it would not be forgotten, God showed me to the unworthy, and I was afraid of the condemnation of that lazy servant, who hid the talent of his master and do not make a purchase to them; Yes, and this is written for the sake of the faithful, so that anyone who hears about the holy places and gravitates in soul and thought to this holy place and receives an equal reward with those who went to these holy places. There are many good people at home in their places, with alms to the poor and their good deeds reaching these holy places, and they will receive a greater reward from God; and having walked many of these holy places and having seen the holy city of Jerusalem, and being lifted up in mind as if I had done something good, they again destroy the reward of their labor, and from them I am the first” 47). Being neither archaeologists, nor ethnographers, nor artists in the sense of today's scientists and tourists traveling to the east with similar scientific purposes, subordinating their pilgrimage to the interests of piety, our pilgrim-writers included in their memoirs much that introduced their contemporaries to the sights of Palestine and Constantinople and which continues to this day as an interesting historical and archaeological material to acquaint us with topography and nature and the way of life of these countries. Exclusively religious interest did not distract them completely from observing natural phenomena, nor did it prevent them from starting to describe civil monuments and various rarities of these fertile countries. So, for example, Abbot Daniel writes about the gonfit tree (incense), which will be born in Palestine, about the pillar of David, the oak of Mamre; gives a description of the Dead Sea, Jordan and its environs, reports measurements of the distances between the main stations of his route 48. Hierodeacon Zosima, who was in Constantinople at the beginning of the 15th century, describes in some detail the location of the city and its monuments, talks about his journey by sea, about his meetings and adventures along the way. And one must be amazed at the mass of heterogeneous information that these inquisitive pilgrims preserved in their memoirs. Finding themselves in the country of the shrine they desired, surrounded by numerous and varied monuments and rarities, they, as if for fear of getting lost in the sight of this new and amazing sight, often hastened to record their observations in travel notes, often without a specific system, so that later, upon returning to their homeland, they could share them with their compatriots. One may perhaps regret that the descriptions of certain sights of the Holy Land and Constantinople were compiled by these workers of religious zeal, often under the influence of living, immediate impressions and were not sufficiently verified through sober criticism. Driven by piety, untouched by any doubt, they looked at the monuments and shrines of the notorious Greek land with the eyes of an enthusiastic, but one-sided religious feeling, and therefore in their notes the legendary often takes precedence over the historical, the imaginary over the real, naivety and gullibility over the fundamental and critical. Even if they wanted to have correct information, our pilgrim-writers were at times victims of deception on the part of their unscrupulous and ignorant guides. Of necessity, completely trusting the instructions and guidance of the latter, they took on faith and passed on in their “Walkings” as a positive fact everything that they reported to them. “It is impossible to walk without a leader and without a tongue to experience and see all those holy places,” notes Abbot Daniel. Understanding how important it is to have good guides, the latter spared nothing to obtain knowledgeable persons. “And that I had in my hand my poor spoils, and from that I gave to all those who knew good all the holy places in the city and outside the city (Jerusalem), so that they would show me everything good, as it had been. And God grant me to place in the Lavra of Saint Sava that man who is holy and old in days and a book of greatness, and that God put in the heart of that holy man to love me with the evil commandment, and that I decree good all the holy places that are in Jerusalem, and throughout all that land lead me kindly... And work with me for the sake of love” 49 . It is clear that the shrines and generally sights of Jerusalem and Constantinople were not open and accessible to everyone: the pleasure of being everywhere and seeing everything was not bought at a cheap price. “The stingy and wretched,” according to Stefan Novgorod, “could neither see nor kiss a single saint, except on whose feast day there would be a saint.” But those of our pilgrims who, like abbots. Daniel, had material wealth, were more educated and experienced in travel, not only themselves saw the shrines and monuments of the Orthodox East, but also managed to describe them for the benefit of their contemporaries and as a souvenir for distant descendants. Their “walks or travels,” despite the inevitable inaccuracies and obvious errors in works of this kind, have served a great service to the Russian people and science, which has now appreciated them in a worthy manner. In Western literature, the idea has been repeatedly expressed that medieval pilgrims descending into the Roman catacombs for a long time served as the only indicators of the way to these sacred dungeons and were the first figures in the field of studying monuments of ancient Christian art in their original locations. Exactly the same place is occupied by the humble and pious ancient Russian pilgrims-writers in relation to the monuments of Constantinople and St. land. Without setting scientific goals, alien to antiquarian interests, they, without knowing it, paved the way for subsequent scientific researchers in the field of Byzantine and Palestine studies. In Russian literature on this issue we know the articles of the priest. V. I. Nechaeva: About travels to St. places (Dush. Thu. 1862. II) and prof. A.P. Lebedeva: About travel to St. land in the ancient church (Ibid. 1881. I). The first article perfectly explains the spiritual benefits of traveling to St. places; in the second, the history of travel to St. is described in detail and in detail. earth from the beginning of the church until the time of the Crusades. The author of the proposed essay would like to introduce readers in general terms to “Bogoslovsk. Vestn." with the main points of the pilgrimage movement in the Christian world and with the character of Russian wanderers of old. See Martene: De antiquis ecclesiae ritibus. Created. bl. Jerome vol. II, p. 11. Kiev 1879 Russian lane composition Eusebius vol. I, pp. 309, 305–306 Shower. Thurs. 1881. I, pp. 307–308 Created. bl. Jerome vol. II. 451, 133, 11–12 Created. I. Chrysostom, pp. 530–531. M. 1843 Creation Gregory Nissk. Part VIII, pp. 455–456. M. 1872 Creation bl. Jerome vol. II, 12 Histor. God-lover ch. 9. St. Petersburg. 1853 Life Const. Vel. III, 26–40, 43, 45, 53 Histor. eccles. L. I, p. 8 Creation bl. Jerome. Vol. II. pp. 449–466 Ibid. vol. I, 207–208; vol. II, 291 Created. St. Gregory of Nyssa, part VIII, pp. 449–454 Created. bliss Jerome vol. II, pp. 131–134 Creation bl. Jerome II, 10–11 Shower. Thurs. 1881, I p. 424 Creation Chrysostom vol. I, pp. 291, 297, 251, etc. Creation Gregory of Nyssa. Part VIII, p. 453; Histor. God-lover ch. 29 A. S. Norov. Abbot's journey. Daniel, page 138 Creation bl. Jerome vol. II, 5 Prof. P. I. Tsvetkov: Aurelius Prudentius, attached. pp. 193–194; sl. 90. 200, etc. See also adj. pp. 90. 184, etc. Sn. P. I. Tsvetkova: Aurelius Prudentius, adj. pp. 67, 68, 70, 96, 110, 113–115, etc. P. I. Tsvetkov: Aurelius Prudentius, adj. p. 118. 103 approx. 30 Some of the skeptical writers suggested that the phialae cruentae contained not blood, but wine, used during agape and during the celebration of the Sacrament of the Eucharist. This idea, shared by a few archaeologists, was strongly refuted upon closer acquaintance with the contents of these vessels. In some of them, along with dark red remains, the very sponges in which the blood of martyrs were collected were found. An analysis of the substance preserved on the bottom and walls of the bowls led to the same conclusion. The famous Leibniz carried out an experiment on one of these vases and came to the conclusion that it actually contained the remains of blood, which he reported at one time to the chief overseer and custodian of the Roman catacombs, Fabretti. In 1844, the experiment was repeated on one vessel found in a sarcophagus near Milan, and the results of the experiment turned out to be the same as the previous one. In some vases, carefully sealed, they found at the bottom a layer of liquid, whitish on top and dark red below, which, according to careful observation, turned out to be coagulated blood. The most serious researchers: Bosio, Mabillon, Marchi, Rossi have attested to this fact. Martigny, Dictionnaire des antiquités crétiennes, p. 589–592; Kraus, Real-Encyclopädie d. christl.Alterthümer, II, 620–621. Hist. eccl. I.VI, p. 14; Russian translation vol. I, p. 316 In its restored form, the inscription reads: Romae, Via Cornelia sanctorum marthyrum Marii et Marthae conjugum, et filiorum Audifacis et Abachum nobilium Persarum, qui Romam temporibus Claudii principis ad orationem venerant. Martigny, Diction. p. 521 Martigny, Diction. p. 522 Deo annoente (annuente), felis pedatura Susti (Justi) votum posuit. Martigny, Diction. p. 521 Commentar. in Ezechiel. cap. XI In a manuscript collection of the 17th century. Florishcheva Hermitage (No. 102–675 pp. 198–201) we came across an interesting and quite detailed “Painting of relics that are preserved in the city of Rome in the church of the verb Holy of Holies.” In its content and character, it resembles that part of the article list of the embassy of boyar Boris Petrovich Sheremetev to Krakow, Venice, Rome and Malta in 1697–1690, which tells about our pious ambassador’s inspection of the more famous Roman churches and about the shrines he saw in each of them (Ancient Russian. Vivlioliki, part V, p. 336–340. Moscow 1788). The information provided by the author of the article list about the relics and relics of the Roman Church of the Holy of Holies is relatively brief, and most importantly, somewhat dissimilar from that contained in the Paintings of the Florishchevsky collection. Does the latter represent only a different, perhaps draft edition of that part of Sheremetev’s article list, which lists St. the relics of the Roman Church of All Saints, or whether it is an extract from a hitherto unknown description of the journey to Rome of a Russian pilgrim of the 17th century - we cannot decide definitively. Taking into account the difference between the “Painting” and Sheremetev’s article list, also the fact that immediately after it in the collection of the Florishcheva Hermitage there follows an insignificant, endless passage, beginning with the words: “The book in which the sacraments are told, performed by God and the Most Holy Theotokos” and telling about the Nazareth house of Godfather Joachim and Anna, in which the Mother of God stayed with Her divine Son, we are inclined to assume in the “Painting” an extraction from a hitherto unknown monument of ancient Russian pilgrimage literature. Bearing in mind the small volume of the “Mural” and its direct relation to the issue that interests us, we present it here with some, however, omissions from the not entirely correct list of the Florishcheva Hermitage. “Paintings of relics that are preserved in the city of Rome in the church of the verb Holy of Holies. In the post, which stands before the holy altar, the holy image of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Savior of the human race is preserved; written off, when still thirty-three years old, from the holy and glorious Evangelist Luke, at the request of the Most Holy Theotokos and the holy Apostle; After His ascension into heaven, He was accomplished by the hands of angels; It was brought to Rome from Jerusalem by Titus and Vespasian, the Roman kings. Velmi is wonderful and terrible to eat against demons. On the two small iron windows above the altar to the image of St. Sylvester the Pope there are many bones of holy babies, beaten by Herod, and a great ark with vessels full of the relics of the holy martyrs, as if it were impossible to open it. On another window to the image of the holy king Constantine, there are many relics of the holy martyrs, between which there is one great head without a name... There are also the essence of the clothes of St. Peter the Apostle and the holy first martyr and archdeacon Stephen, in which he was stoned, and all are bloodied. There are also the clothes of the holy martyr Lawrence with many coals, which were also used for yarn... Under the image of the Savior there is one box full of relics, earth from Jerusalem, Bethlehem, the den of the Lord, Tabor - where he was transfigured, the Mount of Olives; the mountains where Christ was crucified; a place called lyphostroton, and the Holy Sepulcher, the pillar near which our Lord Jesus Christ was beaten, the stone on which the angel sat at the Holy Sepulcher, Mount Sinai, the place where the Cross of the Lord stood, the tomb of the Most Holy Theotokos; part of the copy with which the rib of the Savior was pierced... Here are other relics of the holy martyr, confessor and virgins. There is also a precious golden cross, in which there is part of the Cross of the Lord. There is also a silver box, in which a certain golden cross is preserved, and on it are carved the essence of the seven mysteries of the Lord, which in ancient times was shown to the people on Exaltation Day. There is also another silver box, in which there is another cross, in which there is the wood of the holy cross of the Lord, which Heraclius, the Greek king, brought from Persia, with the body of the holy martyr Anastasius, which is preserved in the same church under the altar... There is also a great part of the lip, which is not full of bitterness and bile and was brought to the mouth of Christ. There is also a part of the cane, with which our Lord beat the soldiers... There is also a single ivory box containing many relics of various saints, that is, the holy self-martyrs of the Process, Martian, Abdon, Seven, Felicus, Adauctus, Irenaeus, Abbondius, Pigienus and Saturninus, along with the relics of St. Damasus, Pope of Rome, and St. Felicus, Pope with clothes St. John the Evangelist, the hand of St. Caesar the Martyr, the relics of St. Dionysius the Areopagite, St. Sebastian the Martyr and the Holy Martyrs Tibutria, Silius, Crematia, Nereus, Achilleus, Acimus, Priscomus, Mark, Markelimus, Primus, Felicianus and Pontician the Pope and Martyr and St. Jerome the Confessor, chapter Venerable Eupraxia..., there is also the head of the holy martyr Barbara and the head of the holy martyr Euphemia, and the head of the holy martyr Anna and part of her clothing, the relics of the holy martyr Eulalia and the holy martyr Anastasia the Patternmaker, the relics of the holy martyrs Agapius, Skenia, Irene, Cylea and Elna and the holy virgin Brigida wonderworkers, and many sponges with which the holy martyr Eupraxia collected the blood of holy martyrs and placed them in special treasures... In another reliquary are the relics of Saint Cyriacus the Hermit and Saint Sava the Sanctified and a great part of Nicholas of Myra. Here is another copper ark, full of the relics of various saints; in another ark there are many relics, sponges and parts of clothes that are believed to be the holy Apostle Peter, the holy martyr Lawrence and the holy martyr Vincent with many coals, which to this day still contain the blood of the holy martyr with many bones. And in the white tablecloth there are thousands of relics and various bones of saints, coals, sponges, ashes... And other are lead vessels with different signatures, but obscure... There are also two icons on which are written the essence of the holy apostles Peter and Paul, which show their true image. Many more are cloth rags with which Saint Hippolytus the Martyr saw the angels wipe the wounds of the Holy Martyr Lawrence when he suffered for Christ... And in another wooden box, which was made by the ancient popes, in it there are three lambs printed on wax with many relics. There are also many bones of saints, wrapped in white cloth, between which there is one hand with many bones of different saints, but without a name. There, in red damask, there is a cross in which the body and blood are visible, printed on all four corners, so that not one would be revealed in them. There are also many boxes there, full of relics with parts of clothes, many sponges, and ashes. In the same church there is preserved the tska on which the Lord, washing the apostle’s feet, saddled, and many other holy things in great honor among the people, which for the sake of brevity are not described here. In the same church, the image of the Most Holy Theotokos is preserved, on the wall it is written from the Egyptians in this way, when she fled with the Eternal Child to Egypt. There, beside the relics, an image is found on which there is a carved child, with which he catches a fish.” The given monument largely confirms the ancient one, dating back to the first half of the 9th century. the tradition of the Roman Church about thirty-two chariots that once transported the relics of the holy martyrs, confessors and blessed ones. maidens from the catacombs to the Pantheon. Archim. Sergius: Full. Month. East vol. II, part 2 pp. 390, 209, 247–248, 375, 227, 49, 240, 128, 293, 121–122, 246, 293, etc., etc. prof. N.P. Kondakova: Byzantine churches and monuments of Constantinople, in Trud. VI Archaeologist. Congress, vol. III pp. 9, 12, 33, 29–30, 14–15, 42, 17, 34, 68, 51, 68, 79, etc. Archim. Sergius: A month. East vol.II, part 2, pp. 290, 45. 166–167. 233–234. 174. 301–302. 84.337: sl. Kondakova Vizant. churches, pp. 12. 16. 17. 33. 34. 35. 37. 38. 43. 45. 46. 58. 68. 82. Prof. Vasilievsky: Letter from Alexei Komnenos to Count Robert of Flanders in J. M. N. Pr. Part CCVII, pp. 230–231, 239. Prof. N. F. Kaptereva: The nature of Russia’s relationship to rights. East, pp. 60–102. M 1885. Russian Histor. Books vol. VI, p. 27, Shower. Thurs. 1862. 11, 248. Archim. Leonid: Observed. Tsargradsk memorable and shrines, p. 33, M. 1870 P. Savvaitov: Way to go. Novgor. archbishop Anthony to Constantinople. pp. 53, 172 The most famous of the ancient Russian literary pilgrims are the following: Archbishop Anthony of Novgorod (about 1200), Stefan-Novgorodets (1350), Deacon Ignatius (1389), Ignatius-Smolnyanin (1389–1405), clerk Alexander (1391–1395), Mnich-Epiphanius (1415–1417), Hierodeacon Zosima (1419–1422), guest Vasily (1465–1466), merchant Vasily Poznyakov (1558–1561), Trifon Korobeinikov (1593–1596), Kazanets Vasily Yakovlevich Gagara (1634–1637), Arseny Sukhanov (1649–1653), Vasily Grigorovich-Barsky (1724–1747) and father Ignatius (1766–1776). A. S. Norov: Journey of the Abbots. Daniel, page 1. A. S. Norov: Put. abbot. Dan. pp. 10, 33–35, 53–57, 87–88, 113, etc. You might be interested in: