The history of our city and region has sparked interest not only among contemporary researchers. Scholars who lived more than 100 years ago also worked in archives, gave lectures, and wrote books, shedding light on various aspects of the city’s and region’s past.
These days, you can come across references to the book *The History of the City of Kharkiv: 250 Years of Its Existence*, written by Dmitry Miller and Dmytro Bahalii, practically everywhere you turn. Perhaps this is why there is a false impression that no one wrote about Kharkiv before them. This is understandable: a book with a grand title, of impressive volume, which has undergone numerous reprints and undoubtedly contains invaluable material, has truly earned recognition from both contemporaries and future generations. However, today I would like to recall the works of Amfian Lebedev—a figure less well-known among researchers of our city’s past than Miller and Bahalii.
Amfian Stepanovich Lebedev was born on February 20, 1833, into a priest’s family in the village of Karpovo, Bogorodsky District, Moscow Governorate. After graduating from the Vifan Theological Seminary (in 1852) and the Moscow Theological Academy (in 1856), he served as an assistant inspector at the Moscow Theological Seminary and as a lecturer at the Kherson Theological Seminary and the Moscow Theological Academy. In 1869, at a meeting on April 9, the Council of Kharkiv University elected Amfian Lebedev to the chair of Church History. And on January 20, 1891, he was appointed dean of the Faculty of History and Philology (a position he held until 1901).
You can learn a great deal about the attitude toward Lebedev in Kharkiv’s academic circles from a short book by Yegor Kuzmich Redin, *Prof. A. S. Lebedev. In Honor of His Tenure as Dean of the Faculty of History and Philology, 1891–1901.”
The new dean, Professor Vladislav Petrovich Buzeskul, said the following as he bid farewell to Lebedev:
You are leaving your successor a precious legacy: a spirit of collegiality and unity, and a wholesome atmosphere of faculty life, free from intrigue, scheming, and squabbling… It was the early 1990s, a time when the dean was the boss, with the power to punish and pardon, and the faculty council’s influence was negligible… You, dear A. S., were not our boss, but first among equals; you made us forget the difficult conditions under which faculty life was conducted, and you set an example of respect for the principle of collegiality and respect for the opinions of individuals… You embodied the principles of collegiality, respect for the individual, humanity, and scholarly aspirations…
Dmytro Bahalii, in a speech about Amfian Stepanovich, pointed out that Lebedev
“He earned universal respect for his straightforward, honest way of thinking and acting, for his pursuit of truth and justice, and for his humanity, kindness, and dove-like gentleness.” Until the end of his days, Lebedev lived in our beloved city, participated in archaeological conferences, and gave charity lectures. For example, on March 4, 1901, in the auditorium of Kharkiv University, Amfian Stepanovich delivered a lecture titled “Christian Charity in Ancient Times.”
Of course, the passing at the age of 76 of this outstanding scholar and one of the founders of the “Kharkiv Historical and Philological Society” was a source of great sorrow among his colleagues. Throughout his life, Lebedev wrote numerous scholarly articles and books. These were devoted to the general history of the Orthodox Church and its figures, the Serbian clergy, and the Belgorod Diocese. While working with documents from the Kharkiv Ecclesiastical Consistory, Amfian Stepanovich introduced a considerable number of documentary sources on church life in Sloboda Ukraine into scholarly circulation. At various times, he authored such outstanding works as:
— The Struggle of the Clergy in Sloboda Ukraine in the 18th Century Against the “Vechnitsy” (The journal *Mir*, 1882)
— Ownership Documents of the Sumy Assumption Monastery (1884)
— Itinerant Clerks in Sloboda Ukraine (“Kharkiv Calendar,” 1885)
The book *The Kharkiv Collegium as an Educational Center of Sloboda Ukraine Prior to the Establishment of a University There* (1885) is of extraordinary importance to the history of our city.
— The Dukhobors in Sloboda Ukraine (1890)
— Grigory Skovoroda as a Theologian (1895)
— Information on Certain Archives of the Ministry of Religious Affairs in the Kursk and Kharkiv Provinces (1902).
However, I would like to discuss in a bit more detail the book *On Marital Divorces Based on Archival Documents from the Kharkiv and Kursk Ecclesiastical Consistories*, written by Lebedev in 1887. Despite its modest length (only 30 pages), it is of immense significance for the history of Slobozhanshchina. In it, the researcher, drawing on 18th-century archival documents, provides a detailed account of the various causes of divorce, which the author classifies into several categories.
From the chapter “Divorces Due to Illness and Sexual Inability,” for example, it appears that in 1786, Yakov Kovalenko, a resident of the village of Mogritsa—which we are already familiar with—submitted a petition to the consistory in which he explained that his son-in-law, Zakhariy Bobritsky, had failed to fulfill his marital duties for two and a half years following his marriage to his wife, Euphrosyne, due to his inability to do so. For this reason, the concerned father-in-law requested a divorce. A doctor who was summoned attested to the husband’s inability, and Euphrosyne was granted permission to remarry. Which, incidentally, she quickly took advantage of. Eleven years later, Zachary Bobritsky himself appeared before the Myropil Ecclesiastical Administration with a petition requesting permission to marry. In the document, Zachary also stated that “he no longer feels any painful seizures within himself” and attached the city doctor’s report to it. But apparently, this was not enough for the clergy. Bobritsky was sent for an examination by the chief medical officer in Belgorod, and only after this examination did he receive permission from the consistory to remarry.
And just think of the stories from Sloboda Ukraine you can learn from the section “Divorces Due to Polygamy”! In early July 1764, the archpriest of Izyum filed a complaint against the clerk Maxim Karpov. It turns out that Karpov had abandoned his first wife, Ulyana, and married a woman named Irina without first obtaining a divorce. During questioning, Karpov stated that he had left his wife because he had been forced to remain married to her for 10 years. Moreover, Ulyana herself was not particularly faithful. Consequently, Karpov filed a petition for divorce, but, without waiting for a decision from the church authorities, he married Irina. The church authorities decided to investigate the matter.
It turned out that Karpov had indeed submitted a petition to the consistory on April 29, 1756, in which he stated that at the age of 13 he had been forcibly married to 15-year-old Ulyana. According to Maxim, throughout their years of married life, his first wife had constantly been drinking, committing adultery with various individuals, secretly taking various household items from the home, selling them, and drinking away the proceeds. During questioning, Ulyana did not deny anything; on the contrary, she confirmed everything Karpov had said and also stated that she did not want to live with him. Afterward, Ulyana was entrusted, against receipt, to the Belgorod merchant Bogatyrev and to the consistory guard Popov until further notice. However, some time later, they reported that Ulyana, “having lived in Belgorod with various people of rank, had fled to an unknown location nearly a year ago, and although she was sought in various places, she was not found anywhere.” The Spiritual Consistory’s subsequent decision was quite just.
I won’t go so far as to cite examples of Sloboda Ukraine “divorces for adultery.” Since the book is freely available, anyone who’s interested can read about them for themselves. However, stories of divorces by mutual consent, in my opinion, are worth paying attention to.
For example, in 1712, Prokopiy Dedenko, a resident of Merefa, was taken captive by the Tatars and remained in captivity for 22 years. After waiting for her husband for 8 years, Elena Dedenko remarried and had children with her new husband. Upon returning from Tatar captivity, Prokopiy Dedenko did not seek to dissolve his wife’s 14-year marriage. Instead, he took only 5 rubles to enter into another marriage himself and a letter as proof that he was free to marry…
The history of our region and city is an inexhaustible treasure trove of fascinating stories and facts. Each new generation of researchers brings these treasures to light from the depths of the archives. However, despite this, interest in the past of Sloboda Ukraine has shown no signs of waning for several centuries now.
