Academician Nikolai Petrovich Likhachev as a Library Historian

This article analyzes the contributions of the distinguished historian, source scholar, art historian, bibliophile, and academician Nikolai Petrovich Likhachev (1862—1936) to the study of library history. Three areas of his research are highlighted: monastic book collections, the library of Ivan the Terrible, and the Likhachev family collection. Throughout his life, the scholar collected books, amassing tens of thousands of volumes, and it was his bibliophilic passions that stimulated his interest in library studies. Works in this field are few in number, cover a wide range of topics, and are concentrated primarily in the late 1880s and first half of the 1890s. They should be considered in the context of N.P. Likhachev’s research into the history of the Russian Middle Ages and source studies. He examined descriptions of monastic book collections from the 16th and early 17th centuries, actively participated in the debate over Ivan the Terrible’s library, and, taking a principled stance, demonstrated that information about it was either unreliable or derived from forged texts. When describing the Likhachev family library, the scholar employed a new methodological approach, successfully linking the history of its formation with genealogy. All of N.P. Likhachev’s works are characterized by a prioritization of source-study discourse, often combined with an archaeographic examination of texts. This commitment to analyzing specific subjects within a broad historical and cultural context objectively facilitated the development of interdisciplinary dialogue and the formation of points of interaction with many fields of humanities knowledge, most significantly with archaeography, source studies, and genealogy. In essence, a new methodological model for the study of book collections was created, based on a consistent analysis of written monuments and implying the resolution of traditional external criticism issues regarding authenticity, authorship, chronological localization, and the reliability of information. All of N.P. Likhachev’s research demonstrates such profound knowledge of libraries that he can rightfully be considered a library historian. The appendix contains N.P. Likhachev’s response to archaeologist I.Ya. Stelletsky’s letter to the USSR Academy of Sciences regarding the search for Ivan the Terrible’s library (1925).

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12. Likhachev N.P. The Library of the Koryazhemsky Monastery in 1586, Bibliograf [Bibliographer], 1889, no. 3, pp. 86—87 (in Russ.).

13. Likhachev N.P. The Library of the Trifonov Uspensky Vyatsky Monastery in 1601, Knigovedenie [Book Studies], 1894, no. 9—10, pp. 54—58 (in Russ.).

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17. Likhachev N.P. The Tsar’s Library in the 16th Century: A Summary of a Paper Read on March 19, 1893, at the Society of Lovers of Ancient Writing, Novoe vremya [New Time]. 1893, March 24, no. 6131 (in Russ.).

18. Pamyatniki drevnei pis’mennosti i iskusstva [Monuments of Ancient Writing and Art]. St. Petersburg, Tip. Imp. Akad. Nauk Publ., 1893, vol. 95, 40, [8] p.

19. Arkheologicheskie izvestiya i zametki [Archaeological News and Notes]. Moscow, 1893, no. 6, 237 p.

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29. Likhachev N.P. Genealogicheskaya istoriya odnoi pomeshchich’ei biblioteki [The Genealogical History of a Landowner’s Library]. St. Petersburg, Tip. “Sirius” Publ., 1913, 101, 2 p.

30. Likhachev N.P. Chronicles and Inscriptions in Manuscripts and Books as Genealogical Material, Izvestiya Russkogo genealogicheskogo obshchestva [Proceedings of the Russian Genealogical Society]. St. Petersburg, 1900, issue 1, sec. 1, pp. 133—149 (in Russ.).

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