Alexander Lappo-Danilevsky

 

From a Preface, James Duff 1917

Alexander [*] Lappo-Danilevsky, who here gives a general survey of the progress of learning in Russia, is a distinguished historian and a Fellow of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, the famous institution founded in 1725 by Peter the Great. The Transactions of the Academy contain many important historical monographs from his pen.

Russian realities & problems,
by Paul Milyoukov, Peter Struve, A. Lappo-Danilevsky,
Roman Dmowski, and Harold Williams; ed. by J. D. Duff ...
Cambridge : University press, 1917.

      [*] the spelling in the text by James Duff is clearly given as �Alexander', an �e� between �d� and �r�. The library catalogues give, consistently, 'Alexandr' (with the 'e' suppressed).

This is one of the numerous instances noticed by me, of �improvements� in the library data, which in the end will only confuse the scholar and which may prevent him on occasion from locating what is being sought.

That exact issue is present with Alexander Kerensky. Every one of the hard copies of his books, of which I have seen four (4 — different titles), spells �Alexander� (and not some �Alexandr�). Then, Stefan Osusky (as at head of his �The Way of the Free�, Dutton 1950) has been spelled �Stepan� in the catalogues. Karl Czerny (the piano-teacher) has been spelled �Carl�.

The �best� number I have seen was �Alger Hiss� (in the title of book by Toledano and Lasky 1950) altered as �Alter Hiss�. Is that the commie sense of humour ? (Presumably yes.)

Such finagling with the data will simply prevent finding the correct items — and may facilitate their disappearance from sight.

(I am not at all kidding ; I have already seen much of the works by the communist "no conspiracy" — and those chaps do know about planning -- this usually goes unnoticed by people who are for the most part busy with the sports, business, and other things.)

The name of the author is the name as given on the materials that have been published 'under his (or her) name'. In cases of mistakes, which do occur, one indicates the mistake when referring to the title, if mistake material.

But, on what authority is the data of the common human literary and scientific heritage falsified in the library catalogues, with some 'Alexandr' in the place of Alexander, �Carl� in the place of Karl, or �Stepan� in the place of Stefan, etc. ?

WPT, 9 April 2005

 

 

From The Development of Science and Learning in Russia, Alexander Lappo-Danilevsky 1917

. . . the principle that reason must be subordinated to revelation was expounded by a father of the Greek Orthodox church, was stated by a series of Russian writers of the 15th and 16th centuries, and prevailed even in the 17th in Muscovy.

From this point of view the Bible . . . supplied the place of scientific and learned works on nature and man ; pious commentaries . . . took the place of treatises on natural science ; and the lives of the saints . . . stood for monographs on moral and historical subjects.

Although Greek culture was much better fitted for such a rôle, Russian men of letters began to have recourse to Latin civilization and to study Latin books, particularly those which were of use for theological controversy and scholastic learning. By degrees some notions on formal logic, some dissertations of Aristotle on natural science, expounded in this spirit, some treatises of Thomas Aquinas on justice and other topics, and some works on history, for instance, the chronicle of Martin Byelsky, penetrated into Russia.

The movement developed first in Kiev, and somewhat later spread to Moscow.

The enlightened metropolitan of Kiev, Peter Mogila, transformed the famous school at Kiev into a college in 1631 ; he himself had a humanistic conception of knowledge and education, but the place became later, under Polish influence, a centre of scholastic learning ; the enlightened spirit of this college was well represented by Stephen Yavorsky, one of the professors who lectured there for some years before the college was transformed into a theological seminary.

The wise monk Simeon Polotsky, one of the opponents of the learned Epiphanius Slavinetsky, began, probably in 1664, to impart in Moscow the Latin learning, that he had got from the Kiev college and from the Polish schools in Vilna and other cities ; one of his pupils—Silvester Medvedyev, was a zealous partisan of Latin learning and took a lively part in the contest, which arose thus early between the zapadniki and vostochniki, i.e., the partisans of " Western" Latin civilization and those who, like the monk Euthymius and the brothers Lihudy, maintained the "Eastern" Greek tradition.

These fears were not entirely unfounded. Men who applied themselves to Latin civilization were sometimes unable to preserve the Greek faith from contamination and to square with its principles all the ideas, more or less intimately connected with the Catholic or Protestant confessions and their sects. Thus Maxim the Greek was somewhat troubled by the ideas he learned during his residence in Italy ; Silvester Medvedyev was accused of having expressed Latin rationalistic opinions . . . Matvei Bashkin was perhaps influenced by Protestant or Calvinistic ideas . . . .

But the fundamental point of view, from which all this knowledge acquired some unity, continued to be religious. The Russian scholars of the 16th and 17th centuries were obliged to conform to the precepts of Russian Orthodoxy, as expounded in the �Profession� of Peter Mogila and the later treatises of Stephen Yavorsky and Theophan Prokopovich, though these were influenced to some extent by Catholic and Protestant ideas. Orthodoxy continued to subdue reason and to humble its independent creative power .  .

( pages 159 - 161 )

* * *

. . .  In view of [the] practical needs elementary manuals were composed particularly in the 17th century : thus Meletius Smotitsky wrote the first detailed �Slavonic� grammar in 16191 ; Basile Burzev compiled the first Russian arithmetic in 1645 ; Bogdan Lykov translated Mercator's Geography in 1637, and some of the manuscript copies contained additional Russian notes ; Innokenty Giesel produced in 1674 an historical survey of the "beginnings of the Slavonic Russian people and of the first Russian princes, who reigned in Kiev."

( pages 163 - 164 )

      1 This grammar was printed in Eviev near Vilna in 1619, and reprinted with some modifications in Moscow in 1648.

* * *

The humanistic and individualistic spirit of the Renaissance was not quite unknown to the Russians of the 17th century. Peter Mogila, the enlightened metropolitan of Kiev, had an opportunity of learning something about it, and the monk Epiphanius Slavinetsky, who came from Kiev to Moscow, was acquainted with some of its literary productions. For instance, Russian translation of the treatises of Vesalius on anatomy and of Mozhevsky [Modrevius/Modrzewski ?] on politics prove that this movement was beginning to penetrate into literary circles at Moscow.

The confessional type of culture which predominated in Europe even in the 17th century had also some influence on Russian literature : Krizhanich was one of the most fervent adherents of Catholic culture. But this type was obliged to give way to the Protestant atmosphere . . . and was fairly well assimilated by one of his adherents—the high-spirited Theophan Prokopovich. This influence promoted the development in Russia of the individualistic and rationalistic spirit which permeated, for instance, the conceptions of one of the friends of Protestant culture—Dmitri Tveritinov : he would have paid for his boldness with his life, if Peter the Great had not hushed up the affair (1711-1723).

( pages 164 - 165 )

* * *

Mathematics have developed in a much more logical manner, than other branches of knowledge : for they were much more independent of exterior circumstances and had no need of expensive laboratories, complicated implements, etc. ; nevertheless they turned out to be of great practical value and inspired no alarm in the Government.

It is natural, therefore, that mathematics have continuously developed in Russia from the Times of Bernoulli and Euler. The latter trained the first Russian mathematicians who were able to use mathematical analysis, particularly Kotelnikov and Rumovsky. Somewhat later Guryev demanded stricter method in mathematical investigations, and Ossipovsky tried to systematize mathematical knowledge ; at the same time he bestowed his attention upon the rising genius of Ostrogradsky. After studying in Paris, especially under Cauchy, Ostrogradsky wrote some noteworthy papers, especially on the integration of algebraic functions and the calculus of variations. Together with Bunyakovsky, Ostrogradsky was one of the founders of the Russian mathematical school, which gained great distinction from the work of a famous mathematician of the second half of the century, Chebyshev, who discovered new solutions of many difficult mathematical problems. Chebyshev elucidated the theory of probabilities, elaborated a remarkable theory of numbers, wrote valuable papers on integral calculus and interpolation, continued fractions, and problems concerning maxima and minima, etc. ; he started, moreover, new problems which were further investigated by his pupils. Markov, who studied also under the influence of Korkin, was particularly interested in the theory of probabilities and of algebraic numbers and continued fractions ; Lyapunov, who gave himself up to the study of theoretical mechanics, guided the first steps of Steklov, and so on. This movement in the domain of mathematics was supplemented by another, produced by the genius of Lobachevsky (1826) : his �pan-geometry,� which revealed an entirely new and comprehensive conception of space, eventually found some partisans among Russian mathematicians, for instance, Vashchenko, and Zacharenko.

( pages 177 - 179 )

* * *

. . . Messerschmidt and other travelers, particularly in the second half of the 18th century, had gathered linguistic materials. Backmeister made a great collection of such data, which were published in a great dictionary of �all known languages� under the direction of Pallas. The study of Indo-European languages began in the same century, from the time of Baier who took some interest in Sanskrit, and was directed especially to Russian grammar. Lomonosov made a valuable attempt to establish the principal groups of Slavonic languages ; he distinguished also the Church-slavonic and Russian elements of our language, elucidated its �rational use� and sketched its probable development ; and his views were adopted by Barsov and other Russian writers. Later on, comparative linguistics began to be treated in a much more scientific way : Korsh was well versed in European and even Oriental languages, but neither he, nor Böthlingk, the great Sanskritist, was able to found new linguistic schools in Russia : these arose, thanks to the learned activity of Fortunatov in Moscow and Baudouin de Courtenay in Kazan. The late professor Fortunatov made acute investigations concerning the comparative grammar of Indo-European languages and their dialectical peculiarities in the most ancient periods. The original representative o the neogrammatical movement, Baudouin de Courtenay, studied the physiology and psychology of language : he discovered the laws of reduction of the stems of words in favour of their terminations, and of phonetic change, and was specially interested in the Slavonic dialects. . . .

( pages 190 - 191 )

* * *

Russian study of China . . .  The foundation of the Orthodox Russian mission to Pekin proved to be of some consequence in this respect. Russian sinology was inaugurated by Bichurin and Katharov, the investigators of China�s culture, and promoted by Vasiliev, who spent ten years at the Mission and became one of the highest authorities on Buddhism in China. Under the influence of the lectures delivered by Vasiliev in Petrograd, Minayev, the well-known critic of the �pali-theory� of Buddhism, began to study the evolution of Buddhism in the original texts and observed its mainfestaions in Ceylon, Nepal and Burma. (etc).

In Russian realities & problems, ed. by J. D. Duff ... Cambridge : University press, 1917.

Duff, J. D. (James Duff), 1860-1940. Title Russian realities & problems, by Paul Milyoukov, Peter Struve, A. Lappo-Danilevsky, Roman Dmowski, and Harold Williams; ed. by J. D. Duff ... Publisher Cambridge : University press, 1917. Description vi p., 1 l., 229, [1] p. 20 cm. Note Lectures delivered at Cambridge in August 1916. Contents The war and Balkan politics [by] P. N. Milyoukov.--The representative system in Russia [by] P. N. Milyoukov.--Past and present of Russian economics [by] P. Struve.--Poland, old and new [by] R. Dmowski.--The nationalities of Russia [by] H. Williams.--The development of science and learning in Russia [by] A. S. Lappo-Danilevsky. Language English

Lappo-Danilevskai︠a︡, N. A. (Nadezhda Aleksandrovna), b. 1876 Author (Exact) Current: Lappo-Danilevsk�ĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919 Browse Next: Lappo-Danilevskiĭ, Ivan Aleksandrovich, 1896-1931 # Author Title Year 1 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevsk�ĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Istorii︠a︡ russkoĭ obshchestvennoĭ mysli i kulʹtury : XVII-XVIII vv. / 1990 2 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevskiir, Aleksandr Sergeevich, 1863-1919. Organizatsiia priamago oblozheniia v Moskovskom gosudarstvie so vremen smuty do epokhi preobrazovanii. 1969 3 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevskiir, Aleksandr Sergeevich, 1863-1919. Organizatsiia priamago oblozheniia v Moskovskom gosudarstvie so vremen smuty do epokhi preobrazovanii. 1969 4 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevsk�ĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Metodolog�i︠a︡ istor�i. Vyp. 1. Posmertnoe izd. 1923 5 Details/Locations Duff, J. D. (James Duff), 1860-1940. Russian realities & problems, 1917 6 Details/Locations Sbornik dokumentov, kasai︠u︡shchikhsi︠a︡ istor�i Nevy i N�enshant︠s︡a : prilozhen�e k trudu A.I. Gippinga "Neva i N�enshant︠s︡," s predvaritelʹnoĭ zami︠e︡tkoĭ A.S. Lappo-Danilevskago. 1916 7 Details/Locations [Sbornik stateĭ, posvi︠a︡shchennykh A.S. Lappo-Danilevskomu 1916 8 Details/Locations Stanis�aw II August, King of Poland, 1732-1798. M�moires du roi Stanislas-Auguste Poniatowski. 1914 9 Details/Locations Karty i plany Nevy i N�enshant︠s︡a / 1913 10 Details/Locations Hipping, Anders Johann, 1788-1852. Neva i Nienshant︠s︡ / 1909 11 Details/Locations Boleslav-I︠U︡r�ĭ II, kni︠a︡zʹ vseĭ Maloĭ Rusi : sbornik mater�alov i izsli︠e︡dovan�ĭ / 1907 12 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevsk�ĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Pechati posli︠e︡dnikh galichsko-vladim�rskikh kni︠a︡zeĭ i ikh sovi︠e︡tnikov. 1906 13 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevsk�ĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Russk�i︠a︡ promyshlennyi︠a︡ i torgovyi︠a︡ kompan�i v pervoĭ polovini︠e︡ XVIII stoli︠e︡t�i︠a︡ : istorichesk�ĭ ocherk / 1898 14 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevsk�ĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Ocherk vnutrenneĭ politiki imperatit︠s︡y Ekateriny II. 1898 15 Details/Locations Russia. Arkheograficheskai︠a︡ kommiss�i︠a︡. Zapisnai︠a︡ kniga kri︠e︡postnym aktam XV-XVI vv., 1898 16 Details/Locations Pist︠s︡ovai︠a︡ i perepisnai︠a︡ knigi XVII veka po Nizhnemu Novgorodu. Pist︠s︡ovai︠a︡ i perepisnai︠a︡ knigi XVII vi︠e︡ka po Nizhnemu Novgorodu / 1896 17 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevskīĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Drevnosti kurgana "Karagodeuashkh" kak materīal dli︠a︡ bytovoĭ istorīi prikubanskago krai︠a︡ v IV-III vv. do r.kh. 1893 18 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevskīĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Kn. L. Golit︠s︡yn i S. Krasnodubovskīĭ, Ukek, doklady i izsli︠e︡dovanīi︠a︡ po istorīi Ukeka. 1891 19 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevsk�ĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Organizat︠s︡�i︠a︡ pri︠a︡mago oblozhen�i︠a︡ v Moskovskom gosudarstvi︠e︡ so vremen smuty do �pokhi preobrazovan�ĭ / 1890 20 Details/Locations Lappo-Danilevskīĭ, A. (Aleksandr), 1863-1919. Opisanīe dokumentov i di︠e︡l, khrani︠a︡shchikhsi︠a︡ v Moskovskom arkhivi︠e︡ ministerstva i︠u︡stit︠s︡īi. Knigi V.M. 1888. [Kritika]

 

Page created 9 April 2005
Last updated

W. Paul Tabaka
Contact [email protected]

Hosted by www.Geocities.ws

1