Chronicle - tale - history: author's search for genre definition within the texts of Siberian chronicles of the XVII century

In scientific literature the records giving account of Yermak’s military campaign are referred to as Siberian chronicles or historical accounts. The general name does not imply unanimity of inner meanings for all authors. The majority of texts contain definitions of such terms as chronicle, tale, chronicle account, description, story, chronicler. Semantically close lexemes do not always reflect the record’s genre objectively, but the choice of a certain word reveals the degree of creative independence of the text’s compilor or scribbler. In this paper an attempt is made to find the motive for author’s word choice in terms of genre in the manuscripts from Yesipovskaya Chronicle group, based on the contextual and semantic analysis and the data of the Old Russian language dictionaries. As sources of the language material, the following texts of this group have been used: Yesipovskaya chronicle principal version, Likhachev’s version, Abramovsky, Zabelinsky and Titovsky editions, Pogodinsky and Buzunovsky chronicles. Analysis of authors’ genre definitions in the above chronicles has shown that an unambiguous author’s position to the created text as a chronicle, has been reflected only in the principal edition of the Esipov chronicle. As an experienced scribe, he was guided by relics of the most ancient chronicles. His author’s task was a creation of the history of Siberian land as a single entity, a chronicle. This is reflected in the material presentation, as well as in the genre characteristics of the text. His followers rewriting the original text have preserved at the end of the manuscript the definition of the protograph, the chronicle, if they did not have had their own view of the events described, so they limited themselves by short addendums or a styling. If the inserting text changes were considerable, the scribe made attempts to give personal definitions, by choosing a genre word which has characterized the text as a narrative text, because to XVII century, a chronicle suggesting a private reading, has been deeply interwoven with a historical story-telling. This is confirmed by the use in the headings of lexemes like account, tale, story («Certain account on a Siberian land» in the text of Titovsky edition, «Chronicle tale» in Pogodinsky chronicler, «Story on capture of Siberian land» in Buzunovsky chronicler), which shows a close, partially synonymous relation with the lexeme chronicle, the main genre definition of texts of this group.