Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies
Finland
fellow
Oleksiy Tolochko
Home institution
Center for Kievan Rus’ Studies
Country of origin (home institution)
Ukraine
Discipline(s)
Medieval history
Modern history
Theme(s)
Cultural Studies
Religion
Fellowship dates
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Biography
Oleksy Tolochko is the director of the Center for Kievan Rus’ studies at the Institute of Ukrainian History (National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine). His research has addressed various problems of Eastern Europe’s Medieval and Early Modern history. Among his latest books are ‘Russian History’ by Vasily Tatishchev: Sources and Accounts (Moscow, 2005), The Short Version of ‘Pravda Ruskaia’: The Origin of the Text (Kyiv, 2010), and Essays on the Early Rus’ (Kiev and Saint Petersburg, 2015). His most recent project was leading a team of Ukrainian scholars in textological examination of the thirteenth-century Galician-Volhynian Chronicle (2021). Oleksiy Tolochko’s current project, Saints, Relics, and Miracles in Medieval Rus’, aims at studying the ways by which Christian relics were acquired, their place in ideology and rituals of power, as well as their role in the communication of ideas of social prestige and authority.
Research Project
Saints, Relics, and Miracles in Medieval Rus’
Kievan state came rather late into Christian family of nations, as did other Central and North European nations. As a territory outside the Roman civilisation, Rus’ lacked relics. Nevertheless, with time, Rus’ acquired some first-rate Christian relics, such as those of Pope Clement and his disciple Phoebus, a finger of John the Baptist, and a stone from the Holy Sepulchre. The history of these relics that emerges from the recent research can shed new light on cultural and ideological impulses coming to Rus’ from the Latin West and the Byzantine East. Oleksy Tolochko’s project aims at studying the ways by which Christian relics were acquired, their place in ideology and rituals of power, as well as their role in the communication of ideas of social prestige and authority.
Research Interests:
Kievan Rus' history; chronicle studies; history of Ukraine