Francysk Skaryna’s Bivlia ruska as a holistic humanist project: pursuit of knowledge and aesthetic ideas of the Renaissance

ENThe article attempts to examine Francysk Skaryna’s Bivlia ruska within the framework of the Renaissance ideas of contemporary to him epoch. Francysk Skaryna’s biblical project as ‘an embodiment of the seven liberal arts’ and as a manual for ‘the common people’ apparently is very close to the one of the Italian Bible translator Nicolò Malermi. This Italian translation inspired Skaryna with the idea to publish the Bible for the gens simples. There is also another important resemblance between the prefaces of two translators of the Bible, which lies in the very nature of the translational task: the proximity of languages – Latin vs ‘il volgare’ Italian and Church Slavonic vs ‘Rus/Ruthenian’. Francysk Skaryna drew inspiration from the Malermi Bible not only in the sense of its Renaissance ideals to educate people but also in its form, and particularly in the graphic style of Malermi’s historiated edition (Biblia vulgare istoriata, Venetia: Giovanni Ragazzo, for Luchantonio di Giunta, 15 October 1490). The style of the ‘figures venetians’ appeared in the engravings of the Northern Italy and responding to the tastes of the clientele‘ marvelled’ by the Antiquity, found an echo in the content of the Bivlia ruska: its ornamentations, engravings with architectural details (columns, urns, arcades, entablatures, sculpted balconies, balustrades) and other elements of the ancient tradition (garlands, putti, tritons, bucranes, centaurs), fashion styles and even the initials.In its entirety, Bivlia ruska displays Skaryna’s implication which required a mastery of classical and contemporary languages, a connoisseurship of the arts and architectural theory, interests steeped in biblical studies and classical authors, sympathies to Neoplatonic and mystical concepts, astronomy. All these elements makes evident his mastery of humanist learning and the Renaissance nature of his holistic project to enlighten the ‘ordinary people’ and convey to them his vision of the world. Keywords: Francysk Skaryna, Bivlia ruska, Nicolò Malermi, engravings, initials, the Renaissance. [From the publication]