Alim M. Abidulin , Kirill E. Baldin Memoirs of the orthodox priest Ioann Dobrotvorsky about a pilgrimage to the Christian shrines of the East

Abstract

The article analyzes the content of the travel notes of the priest John Dobrotvolsky from Sergach district of Nizhny Novgorod province. At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries he made a pilgrimage to the Eastern Mediterranean. In two essays, published in the Nizhny Novgorod Church and Public Bulletin, he reflected his impressions of visiting the Turkish capital of Constantinople and the Oak of Mamre, located in the Holy Land. His memoirs critically examine the foreign surroundings, which is characterized by a different religion and a different culture. In this regard, the non-verbal categories of «other» and «alien» are viewed in the text of travel notes. The author was particularly impressed by Christian shrines in the hands of Gentiles and memorials related to the repression of the Turks against the Orthodox minority of the Ottoman Empire. At the same time, the article pays great attention to the process of constructing the national, religious and cultural identity of the memoirist and other Russian pilgrims in a foreign surroundings. Individual and collective identity was formed as a result of the communication of fellow pilgrims among themselves, in the process of their living together in the shelters, opened by Russian Orthodox structures in Constantinople and Palestine. Also on the territory of the Ottoman Empire, Russian pilgrims had the opportunity to attend services and pray in churches of the Patriarchates of Constantinople and Jerusalem, where the structure of temples and the features of worship differed from the practices familiar to Russians, but were still Orthodox. At the household level, identification was carried out in the ability to communicate in their native language and eat familiar foods.

Keywords:

Orthodox pilgrimage; Orthodox clergy; Constantinople Orthodox Church; Ottoman Empire; Constantinople; Oak of Mamre; national identity; religious identity

For сitation:

Alim M. Abidulin, Kirill E. Baldin. Memoirs of the orthodox priest Ioann Dobrotvorsky about a pilgrimage to the Christian shrines of the East // The Historical Reporter. 2026. Vol. 58. P. DOI:

Alim M. Abidulin

C.Sc. (History), Associate Professor of the Department of Oriental Languages and Linguocultural Studies Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod. Nizhny Novgorod, Russian Federation.

e-mail: abidulin@imomi.unn.ru

ORCID: 0000-0002-3322-0240

Kirill Y. Baldin

D.Sc. (History), Professor, Leading Researcher, Ivanovo State University. Ivanovo, Russian Federation.

e-mail: kebaldin@mail.ru

ORCID: 0000-0002-7568-0528

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