The byzantine factor in the political-symbolic and church practices of the Eastern Slavs (mid 15th - late 17th century)

Even after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Byzantium remained a commonplace of historical memory for the Eastern Slavs (Rus) and was the subject of ideological confrontation between two main land owners of the lands of historical Rus - the Grand Duchy of Lithuania / Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Moscow State. Their perception of the legacy of the Eastern Roman Empire and their relationships were significantly influenced by the activities of post-Byzantine Greeks on the lands of Rus, the idea of liberating Constantinople from the Ottoman Turks, Byzantine titles in the political-symbolic practices of Moscow rulers, the struggle between the two Eastern Slavic states for the ancient Kiev, the legend of the “Monomakh’s Cap,” concepts of the head of the Orthodox world and the Orthodox Empire after 1453, the tradition of calling Moscow the “Third Rome” and Kiev the “Second Jerusalem,” projects to transfer the seat of the Ecumenical Patriarch from Constantinople to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, contacts between the Metropolitans of Kiev and Moscow and the Greek clergy, the practice of teaching the Greek language in Rus, and disputes about the significance of the Florence Union (1439) and the Union of Brest (1596) for the Eastern Slavs and Greeks. All these aspects of manifestation of the Byzantine factor in the socio-political thought of the Eastern Slavs are examined from the perspective of the concept of “Byzantium after Byzantium.”