Initial history of Chazhenga settlement

The problem of typology of the Old Believers’ settlement is raised for the first time in Russian historiography. The objective of the study is to find out what guided the way of the life of the Old Believers living on the Chazhenga River, and how these rules corresponded to the name of the settlement which emerged as an agricultural branch of the Vyg-Leksa Community. On the basis of a wide range of sources, the time of the settlement foundation and the name of its founder, as well as the composition and the number of settlers are specified. Particular attention is paid to the management structure and typology of the settlement, named skete in historiography. Since the Chazhenga settlement was a branch of the Vyg Community, it copied its structure and organization. Therefore, the inhabitants of the settlement lived by the coenobitic charter characteristic of a coenobitic monastery. The settlement had no permanent residents - it was inhabited by the brethren of the Vyg Monastery for the period of agricultural work. The article deals with the issues of the first buildings and localization of the settlement. The study showed that it is wrong to classify the Chazhenga settlement as a skete.