The Church schism of the mid- and second half of the XVII century was associated with a number of acute issues and problems of a historical, liturgical and theological nature, which were subjected to detailed research and gave rise to extensive polemics, which were not outlived for centuries. The patristic heritage, mainly of Byzantine church authors, played a key role in the “ideological” struggle between the defenders of “ancient piety” and their irreconcilable opponents from the official Church. With the beginning of the schism the names of one of the greatest representatives of Antiochian theology, Sts. Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrus, and Meletius of Antioch, also John Chrysostom, Simeon of Thessalonica and others thoroughly entered the manuscript and old-printed book tradition, associated with the Church split. The “Skrizhal” compendium, initiated for compilation and publication by Patriarch Nikon, was intended to be a kind of summary of information about the ecclesiastical practice of the Eastern Church with interpretations as well as a source of correction of various church “disorders”. During the development of the controversy many topics came under such close attention for the first time in Russian church history. The issues of the “visible image” of God, of the time of the coming of the Kingdom of Christ and one of the most controversial ones throughout the second half of the XVII century, and not only within the church schism — the topic of the transubstantiation of the consecrated elements and etc. Patristic heritage and the art of its interpretation became the main “tool” in unprecedented disputes, when both parties of the conflict — Archpriest Avvakum, Simeon Polotsky, Priest Lazar, Nikita Suzdalets and others, were in search of some universal and authoritative sources to prove their right.

The article is devoted to a comparative examination of important historical and literary sources reflecting the attitude of Old Believers to the leaders of two opposing ideological currents of the era of church reform in Russia: the autobiographical Life of Archpriest Avvakum and the anonymous “Decorated Tale” (or “anti-life”) of Patriarch Nikon, written by Old Believers in the 18th century. This consideration makes it possible to assess the position of the Old Believers in resolving the issue of true faith, true priesthood, attitude towards the Church and secular authority. The heroes of the two considered non-canonical Old Believer “lives” go to their goal and achieve it, resorting to the help of miraculous otherworldly forces — light (divine) and dark (antichrist), entering into direct communication with them, like the New Testament apostles or ancient prophets.

The publication on concrete facts reveals the tradition of veneration of the ideologists of the early Old Believers — Archpriest Avvakum “with goods” among the local citiazens officially belonged to the Orthodox Chuch (Synodical period) at the place of their execution in the Arctic Pustozersk and its surroundings (now the territory of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug) from the end of the 17th century to the first third of the 20th century.

The worldview of all Old Believers’ groups is based on a fundamental traditionalism. One of them strictly monitor its performance in everything associated with the faith; the other ones claim that following the ancient tradition is needed in the majority or prevalence of social, family relations and even in everyday life. But in a number of cases, adherence to the traditional way is a characteristic of the entire Old Believers’ community. Therefore, it is important to trace the changes or fading of the tradition in Old Believers’ communities according to changes in geographical, historical and social conditions of life. An attempt to trace a real life in the traditions through centuries is made in the proposed article on the topic of the phenomena of the Pomor Old Believers’ communities of Verkhokamye.

The article discusses 19th century icons “The Image of the Church” known as picturing “a high iconostasis crowned by the Crucifixion with Passion icon row”. These icons are known in Russia since the last quarter of the 18th century. This special type of icons was in demand by popovtsy (accepting priesthood) Old Believers and according to contemporaries’ witnesses sacraments used to be performed before them. The article shows that, despite the authoritative protograph (the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin iconostasis), in these icons a number of interesting features have been preserved.

The image “The Hermitage of the Solovky Miracle Workers” appeared in Russian icon painting in the middle of the 16^th century and developed over the course of 17^th — 18^th centuries. The article examines similarities and differences between the Old Believers’ and ‘Nikonian’ versions of the Solovetsky monastery on the example of icons represented at the exhibition “Me Avvakum Archpriest, I believe so” which held in the Museum of Russian icon in 2021. From the end of the 17^th to 19^th centuries two versions of the image of Solovetsky monastery which could be confidently associated with both the official Church and clearly Old Believers’ communities have survived. On the “Nikonian” icons the image of the monastery is close to its actual appearance to the time of creating of an icon, icon painters use coeval engravings actively. The Old Believers either ignored references to the real appearance of the monastery or preferred to focus on the iconography of the 17^th century. They also used engravings but used to adopt those samples to their specific requirements: the cathedral could have a hipped roof, the crosses on all domes were strictly eight-pointed, the blessing gestures of the saints and the inscriptions retained the Old Believer features.

The article is devoted to an overview to the monuments of the 19^th — early 20^th centuries from the collection of the Old Believers’ Intercession Church in Serpukhov. Along with the ancient icons this collection also includes quite numerous of late works, which writing technique and style imitates earlier monuments of Russian icon painting of the 15^th — 17^th centuries. The article gives a definition of the term “antique painting”, provides a description of these certain icons to which this term is applicable. Almost all the monuments described in the article are being published for the first time, since for a long time this kind of icon painting did not enjoy the attention of researchers and collectors. Мany of these icons were placed in the most honorable places of the temple space and venerated by parishioners. In particular this refers to the image of the Mother of God Hodegetria from the central iconostasis, icons of St. Paisius the Great and St. Sergius of Radonezh.

The article examines the icons recently discovered in private, museum and church collections with the monogram “K.M.” on the backside, all dated around the 1890s. Based on a comparative analysis of these inscriptions with the signed icon by Konstantin Moseichev from the collection of the Kirov local history museum, his authorship was established in relation to the entire group of the examined pieces. In this article their existence among the Old Believers Fedoseevtsy (after Feodosiy Vasilyev (1661 — 1711) is traced and the conclusion is drawn that the icon painter belongs to the masters of the Transfiguration almshouse in Moscow.

The article is an expanded description of three 18^th — 19^th c. Old Believers’ origin chanting manuscripts from the collection of the Andrey Rublev Museum demonstrated at the anniversary Avvakum exhibition at the Museum of Russian Icon. These manuscripts — “Holidays”, “Octoechos and Obikhod” and “Trezvony” represent two branches of the Old Believers — accepting priesthood (popovtsy) and priestless (bespopovtsy) which in regards to singing books affects the editions of the text: so called “true-speech” and “separate-speech”. The author speaks about the contents of the books, their repertoire and its musical characteristics, specific singing concepts and terms found in them. The manuscript of the Pomor “Trezvons” is examined in more detail including the сomprehensive list of services containinig a large number of Russian saints feasts the features of rites with a short and a complete composition of chants genres.

To illustrate the unique artistic design of the manuscripts the article publishes photographs of various colored handdrawn headpieces, frames, drop caps, flowers on the page margins, a miniature of the seated St. John of Damascus and a sample of hook notation.

From the Appendix of Guslitsy “Obikhod” of 1809 is given a musical example of the chant “The monk is coming from the monastery” which represents a translation of the hook znamenny notation into the modern one. It is designated in the manuscript as “Examples of odes” and is an example of a non-liturgical educational genre, where each new line is sung to the motive of one of the eight odes of the znamenny chant. To make it easier to memorize the melodies a subtext was invented, telling a story reminiscent to a folk song or a spiritual verse. So, in the Old Believers singing books the ancient Russian tradition of monophonic znamenny singing in which an archaic melody, considered sacred and not made by hands is combined with folk elements of paralyturgical genres and decorative design of manuscripts and persists.

This article examines the chased relief icon “Cross of Calvary” made on a thin brass plate fastened to a rectangular wooden board. The chased icon compositional construction and the inscriptions-cryptograms are similar to the wood-carved Old Believers’ icons of the 18^th — 19^th centuries made by masters of the Russian North. The general composition, the style of the ornament, the technique of execution and the inset inscription on the engraved icon “Cross of Calvary” testify that this work was created by an Old Believers master, a follower of the Old Pomor community Filippovtsy in the Russian North in the first half of the 19^th century and is focused on the oldest traditions of church art. The chased relief icon depicting the eight-pointed Calvary Cross is an echo of the ancient tradition of creating a Staurotheke, well-known in ancient Russian and Byzantine art. Such icons did not only belong to churches but also were carefully kept as family relics in the Cross chambers or in the Red corners of the living quarters and subsequently contributed to the church. Making of a Staurotheke is associated with the veneration and preservation of liturgical or pectoral crosses, which were cut into a board or placed in closed arks then becoming an icon of the Cross. Those Staurothekes were сonsidered to be sacred objects richly decorated with oklads, precious stones and pearls. This article also presents various types of liturgical and pectoral crosses with embedded sacred relics, which were especially revered. Old Russian crosses were made in different periods of time with different art styles, shape, proportions, sizes, nature of decor. All this indicates a variety of traditions and revered sanctities which served as models in the process of making later crosses.

At the exhibition dedicated to the history and culture of the Old Believers in the Museum of Russian Icon, a number of objects of copper artistic casting expanding our understanding of the development of this type of applied art were presented. During the pre-exhibition research three signed and dated objects were identified as a part of the complex of Moscow Old Believers plastics. Among them one can find a rare triptych “Deesis, with selected saints” of 1798/1799. The date (from the creation of the world) was engraved on the lower end.

The image of the “Mother of God and Child” (“Kazansksya”) 1809/1810 from the museum collection belongs to the same group of dated monuments. These two items are the works created by master Mikhail Gupkin. His career started in Moscow at the end of the 18th century and then continued in Kaluga. Two signed and dated items from the collection of the Museum of Russian Icon appear to be a valuable addition to the complex of copper-cast plastic made by the master in his Kaluga period.

The Moscow group of subscription copper casting is supplemented with an icon made after the model of master Ignat Timofeev. This image of the “Mother of God and Child” (“Kazanskaya”) is distinguished by the inscription on the upper smooth frame of the centerpiece: “S IK KA IG TI”. These first letters of five words can be deciphered as followed: “Siya Ikona Kazanskaya IGnata Timofeeva” (“This Kasanskaya icon made by Ignat Timoeev”). Later the works of this master, who carried out orders from the Preobrazhenskaya Old Believers community became the basis of Moscow copper workshops’ range of products.