In search of traces of medieval Russian church archives of the 11th-13th centuries

The study of the existence of church archives in Russia in the 11th-13th centuries is significantly hampered by the fact that the sources available to historians are laconic. Meanwhile, indirect reports from chronicles, the Kiev Caves Patericon and the norms of the Studite-Alexis Typicon allow us to speak about the existence of such an archive in the Kiev Caves Monastery. Probably, the archive of the famous monastery was combined with the library and sacristy, located in the choirs of the second tier of the monastery cathedral. This circumstance suggests that the emergence of chronicle writing in the Kiev Caves Monastery became possible precisely due to the presence of such a valuable documentary collection in the monastery. There is reason to believe that St. Nestor the Chronicler was a member of the council of the elders of the monastery, performing the duties of a “bookkeeper”, which allowed him to be familiar with the archives of the monastery. This circumstance, most likely, largely predetermined the results of his work.