University of Oxford

e l e n a e n e d r ă g h I C I –V a s I l e s C u University of Oxford LA BI BLI O T HÈQ UE DE L A FA MI LLE MA VRO CORDATOS ▪ T H E LI B RA R Y O F MAVRO CORDATOS F AMIL Y Abstract This article is about the library set up by the Mavrocordatos family. It refers to all three of its branches: Constantinople, Chios and Văcăreşti, but focuses especially on the latter. The library in the monastery near Bucharest was one of the most complete of its days, and was well known even in the West. Some of its content is presented in my text, including its various catalogues; the scholars who worked on these compilations will also be mentioned. A project similar in its scope – the reconstitution of a library – has accomplished in the library of Peter Mohyla in Kiev. Keywords books, Mavrocordatos family, Văcăreşti, Chios, the Danubian Principalities HE LIBRARY established by the Mavrocordatos family had branches in Chios (Greece), Constantinople/Instanbul (today Turkey), and Văcăreşti Monastery (Bucharest, Romania). Its initiator was Alexander Mavrocordatos (1636–1709). He, known also as Alexander Delibey (the ‘Exhaporite’, i.e. secret adviser), set up the nucleus of his family library on the island of Chios, Greece (Dima-Drăgan, 1974, 55–71; 104–127). The founder had a doctorate in Philosophy and Medicine from the University of Bologna and in 1673 became a Dragoman at the Sublime Porte during Sultan Mehmed IV’s rule (1642–1693; ruled 1648 to T 52 ▪ É t u d e s b i b l i o l o g i q u e s / l i b r a r y r e s e a r c h s t u d i e s 1687). He was also the personal translator of the Turkish ruler (Sandys, 2011, 360). Alexander was instrumental in the negotiations with the Habsburg monarchy during the Great Turkish War. He collected books and manuscripts from Europe and Asia. Then, in a large building dedicated to this purpose in Constantinople, a substantial library was amassed (Radu, 2005, 157). In 1723, during the rule of his son, Nicholas, in the Danubian Principalities, a branch of it was set up in the princely house built at the same time as a monastery in Văcăreşti, near Bucharest (Radu, 2005, 156–157). Both were destroyed in 1986 during one of the Communists’s project of the modernization of the capital city (Ene Draghici-Vasilescu, 2009, 137; Anania et al., 1995, 171–172; Leahu, 1995, 81). The collection in Constantinople still exists, as well as the one in Wallachia. Nicholas (1670–1730) was also a Great Dragoman in 1697, during the reign of Sultan Mustafa II (1664–1704; ruled 1695–1703). The Prince began building the house and Văcăreşti Monastery in 1716 and, after a first phase of construction, the latter was consecrated in 1724. It was finished in 1736 by his son, Constantine (1710–1769), who, from 1725, had his own collection of books. In addition to the library, Nicholas founded a Greek school and a printing house (Leahu, 1995, 81). The library began with a few books brought by Nicholas from Chios and expanded through acquisitions made by Nicholas himself and by his chancellor [Stolnic] Constantine Cantacuzino; also Nicholas’s son-in-law, Ioan Scarlat, was involved in this enterprise. A few recent articles in Romanian offer substantial information about Mavrocordatos Library, especially about the Romanian branch. I consider that is is necessary to systematize in English the content of this material; my text does this to same extent. After having the chance and honour to see some of the books that used to belong to the branch in Văcăreşti, writing it felt like a moral obligation. On several volumes, I have also seen Nicholas’s hand-written annotations as well as his signature. Some of them used to be owned by both Nicholas and Constantine. The two Princes administrated the Danubian Principalities as follows: Nicholas ruled a few times between 1710 and 1730, and Constantine ruled a few times between 1730 and 1769. The books that used to be in the library in Văcăreşti are mainly in Greek, Latin, French, Italian, and a few in Romanian (as, for instance, Miron Costin’s Letopiseţ, i.e. chronicle). But that, as the entire Mavrocordatos collection, had also pieces in Turkish, Arabic, and Persian. About 40 volumes passed through my hands in the Library of the Romanian Academy and in the library of the Romanian Patriarchate; I am aware that Corneliu Dima-Drăgan also discovered within the former books annotated or just with the signature of Nicolae Mavrocordatos on some of their pages, but I am not sure that these were the same I saw. Among the books I have personally checked at the Academy are N° 3 (2021) ▪ 53 the following: Peri kathēkontōn biblos, 1722; Opere by Niccolò Machiavelli, vol. 1–3 (with Nicholas Mavrocordatos’ notes on some of its pages) as well as Machiavelli’s Nell’ Haya, 1726; Institutionum politicarum. Libri iv. Qui omnia Civilis Doctrina elementa continant by Nicolaus Vernulaneus, the third edition, Lovanii/Leuven Typis Francisci Simonis/The Printing House Francis Simonis,1635; and an Evhologhion adecă M[o]l[i]tv[e]nic. Acum a treia oară tipărit, după rânduiala celui grecesc, 1722. Other documents belonging to Nicholas have survived in Bucharest, but I have not seen all of them. Various lists regarding the content of Mavrocordatos Library have been made public: one compiled by Stephan Bergler (c. 1680–1738); one commission by the French Royal Library; one with commentaries in Romanian compiled by Nicolae Iorga (1871 –1940), and two in Greek, collated by Athanasios Papadopoulou Kerameos (1856–1912). (Only one of Papadopoulou Kerameos is dedicated in its entirety to Mavrocordatos Library in Constantinople/ Instanbul; the other also has references to other similar institutions). These considerable compilations are as follows: 1. The catalogue written by Stephan Bergler (c. 1680–1738) in 1723. It mentions 625 titles: 405 Greek and 220 Latin, Italian and French authors. Bergler was Nicholas’s secretary and a scholar in its own right; he became a Librarian in Văcăreşti in 1720s.1 Before working for Nicholas, he was employed by German and Dutch publishers (Radu, 2005, 159). The knowledge acquired with them helped Bergler to organize and extend the library in Bucharest. Also it aided in the process of writing its catalogue, which is, in fact, a complex bibliography. 2. A second catalogue was drafted after the death of Nicholas Mavrocordatos in 1730 for the French Royal Library; it contained 162 titles. 3. Nicolae Iorga, Catalogul tuturor cărţilor greceşti, greco‑latine, italiene, franceze ale lui Constantin Mavrocordat, pentru uzul lui în afară de cele din biblioteca cea mare a preaînălţatului domn [The catalogue of all books owned by Constantine Mavrocordatus in Greek, Graeco‑Latin, Italian, [and] French except for those in the large library of His Highness for his use], 1926; this contains mainly the list of the books written in 1723 (Iorga, 1926 A; see also Iorga,1926 B, Iorga, 1914). “His Highness” was Prince Nicholas Mavrocordatos. 4. Athanasios Papadopoulos Kerameos, Μαυρογορδάτειος Βιβλιοθήκη: ήτοι γενικός περιγραφικός κατάλογος των εν ταις ανα την Ανατολήν βιβλιοθήκαις ευρισκομένων ελληνικών χειρογράφων καταρτισθείσα και συνταχθείσα κατ’ εντολήν του εν Κωνσταντινουπόλει Ελληνικού Φιλολογικού Συλλόγου/ υπό Α. Παπαδοπούλου του Κεραμέως, T. A’‑B’. Εν 1 Stephan Bergler, a Saxon from Transylvania, was a classical scholar and antiquarian and had a significant contribution to the creation and expansion of Nicholas’s library. 54 ▪ É t u d e s b i b l i o l o g i q u e s / l i b r a r y r e s e a r c h s t u d i e s Κωνσταντινουπόλει: Τύποις Σ.Ι. Βουτυρά, 1884; [Mavrocordatos Library: a general descriptive catalog of the Greek manuscripts found in the libraries of the East, compiled and collated for the Hellenic Philological Association in Constantinople under the direction of A. Papadopoulos-Kerameos, 1884] (Papadopoulos Kerameos, 1884 A). 5. Athanasios Papadopoulou Kerameos, Ανέκδοτα Ελληνικά, σουνγράμματα έγγραφα τε και άλλα κεμένα κατ’ έκλογεν σουλλεγέντα εκ των εν τε Μαυρογορδάτειο βιβλιοθήκη αναγράφω, Κωνσταντινουπόλει (Ελληνικού Φιλολογικού Συλλόγου), 1884 [Anecdotes scripts, documents and other excerpts in Greek selected from the Mavrocordatos Library, 1884] (Papadopoulos Kerameos, 1884 B). The catalogue in Nicholas’s library was a typical bibliographic one: it recorded the name of the author, the title, the place, and the year of publication. With respect to the catalogue in Constantine Mavrocordatos’s library, as was the practice within the libraries of his time (and of today) it refers to books in accordance with the language in which they were written, as well as to their subject-matter. I have already remarked on the languages of the volumes earlier. From the point of view of the topics they discussed, the volumes were classified thus: History, Philosophy, Philology, Medicine, Geography, Ethics, Miscellanea, Politics, Ecclesiastica, Biblical, Law, Numismatics, Grammar, Rhetorics, Theology, Poetry, etc. Vasile Mihordea, wrote about Biblioteca domnească a Mavrocordaţilor in 1940 (Mihordea, 1940). Also Eudoxiu Hurmuzachi made reference to this library in his book Fragmente din istoria românilor (Hurmuzachi, 1900). Later, in 1971, Constantine Caradja / Karadja mentioned the princely institution in his article “Despre vechile biblioteci din sud-estul Europei” (Caradja/Karadja, 1971). Most recently, Raisa Radu, has gathered the information known about it up to 2005 in her piece “Biblioteca Mavrocordaţilor” (Radu, 2005, 156–162). I take this enterprise further. Due to the catalogues mentioned above we know that among the most valuable pieces in the library in Bucharest there were a Coptic Bible from the third century; a history of Poland written by Martin Cromer and published in Basel in 1571; a collation of chronicles referring to the Ottoman Empire by Nicolaus Reusner published in Leipzig in 1596; and the works of Niccolo Machiavelli published in the Hague in 1726. There is information about an edition of the Septuagint which Nicholas bought from Alexander Ghica (the father-in-law of the Dragoman at the Porte in Constantonople) for 700 piastri/piastres (Radu, 2005, 160). Also in Nicholas’s time, Bergler discovered on the shelves in Văcăreşti the introduction and the first three chapters of Eusebius’s Demonstratio Evangelica. Doru Bădără elaborates in detail on a particular book of Byzantine provenance, which is now in the Biblioteca N° 3 (2021) ▪ 55 Centrală Universitară Bucureşti [The Central Library of the University of Bucharest]. The book is entitled Ἰουστινιανοῦ, Ἰουστίνου καί Λέοντος αὐτοκρατόρων νεαραί διατἀξεις Αὺγούστῃ/ The Emperors Justinian, Justin and Leo as young men instructed by Augustus. This Greek work is registered as mss 603 f. 271–294 in the Library of the Romanian Academy [of Arts and Sciences], file 271. It has Nicholas’s signature on page no. 1. The document in The Central Library of the University of Bucharest is the edition of the legislative texts – the Novels (The Novellae Constitutiones) – by Justinian, Justin, and Leon VI published by Henry Scrimger in Geneva in anul 1558 (Bădără, 1983, 76–77). Among the Romanian books in Mavrocordatos’ Library there were Vechiul şi Noul Testament / The Old and the New Testament (Bucureşti 1688); Teoria creştină / Chrisian Theory (1694) and Floarea darurilor / The Flower of Virtues (1700), both printed in Snagov, Psaltirea / The Psalter in Romanian (Târgovişte, 1611), the Evanghelia greco‑română / The Greco‑Romanian Gospel (1693), and the famous book by Dimitrie Cantemir Gâlceava înţeleptului cu lumea / The Argument of the Wise Man with the World (1698). The chronicles of Moldova –Letopiseţul – by Grigore Ureche (ca. 1590 –1647) and Miron Costin (1633–1691), as well as Radu Greceanu’s Istoria domniei lui Constantin Brâncoveanu/ The History of Constantin Brâncoveanu’s rule were also there. It is easy to observe that the two rulers were equally interested in universal as well as local culture. Nicholas was famous at the European Courts for acquiring books and manuscripts from all over the Ottoman Empire. Because at that time a standardized system of ordering such texts and records was not in place in the Romanian Principalities, the members of the Mavrocordatos family brought some of these both by direct correspondence with publishers and similar collectors, and through their agents in other libraries. They also bought some from monasteries, antique stores, and at auctions in Western Europe: Leipzig, Vienna, Leiden, Hague, London, and Amsterdam (Radu, 2005, 158–159). In some cases, they obtained books from other libraries that had several copies of a particular item. For example, when the King of France requested manuscripts from Mavrocordatos’s library to be reproduced for his own similar institution, he compensated Nicholas by sending him volumes that existed in duplicate within the Royal Library of France. Some of the volumes mentioned in Iorga’s The catalogue of all books owned by Constantine Mavrocordatus… were offered by Nicholas to his son, Constantine, who was only 14 years old at the time when he received the gift of 237 volumes. Among these were the following: the works of Dio Cassius published in Paris in 1599; Herodotus’s texts printed in Leiden in 1715; Plutarh’s writings printed in Basel in 1542 and 1560; a history of India and 56 ▪ É t u d e s b i b l i o l o g i q u e s / l i b r a r y r e s e a r c h s t u d i e s the Brahmans printed in London in 1688; The History of the European States by Samuel de Pufendorf published in Frankfurt in 1700; and Tacitus’ Annals edited in Venice in 1708. As one can see, most of Constantine’s books had a historical subject. But Nicholas and Constantine Mavrocordatos were not simple collectors; they read the tomes they owned. Both left notes and various recommendations on a considerable number of pages after reading them. These illustrate the thoughts of the two men with respect to the content of the volumes. As already communicated, I have seen some of those annotations. When these were missing, Nicholas inserted the names of the authors of the books; (Radu, 25, 158). There is information about the library in Văcăreşti in similar institutions in Paris, Hamburg, and Leiden (Radu, 2005, 157). Also, in Great Britain, William Wake, 1657–1737, before becoming Archbishop of Canterbury (1716–1737), was in contact with Nicholas Mavrocordatos. The former was a Canon of Christ Church in Oxford in 1689–1693 and then he contacted the Phanariot Prince; in addition to collecting manuscripts for John Fell, the Dean of this college and the Bishop of Oxford, Wake, was himself a collator and collector of manuscripts. For example, Mss 73 and 74, Byzantine minuscules of the New Testament, which came to England from Constantinople in about 1731, were in his private collection. Nicholas and Constatine Mavrocordatos were known in Western European capitals as erudite people and supporters of culture. Information about their library appeared in the Giornale de Letterati d’Italie, as well as in German publications. From this and from the above references to Paris, The Porte, etc., one can observe that the books within Mavrocordatos Library constituted a good opportunity for erudite people across Europe to exchange ideas and converse. But, sometimes, in time of crisis, Nicholas and Constantine sold some of their tomes. After Constantine’s rule ended, the books in Văcăreşti were dispersed to various locations, institutions, and private collections. He also sold a part of his library from Constantinopole to the English merchant William Barker (1731–1825) (Anania et al., 1995, 171). The books that were not sold at auction reached, in Chios, the library of his heirs, Mavrocordatos –Baltatzis family. Most of that collection was bought in 1930 by the Greek government and its books are in the National Library of Athens and at the Institute of Neo-Hellenic Studies of the Academy of Athens, but some are still with the family. ▪ N° 3 (2021) ▪ 57 Bibliography ANANIA, Lidia, LUMINEA, Cecilia, MELINTE, Livia, PROSAN, Ana-Nina, STOICA, Lucia, and IONESCU-GHINEA, Neculai, Bisericile osândite de Ceauşescu. Bucureşti 1977–1989, București, Editura Anastasia, 1995. ANDEA, Avram, BĂLAN, Constantin, CERNOVODEANU, Paul et al., Românii între Europa Clasică şi Europa Luminilor, Bucureşti, Editura Enciclopedică, 2002. BARBU-CHIRIMBU, Mihaela, The cultural impact of Greek culture on the development of the Romanian Principalities during Phanariot period, Piteşti, Universitatea Pitești, 2010. BĂDĂRĂ, Doru, “O carte din Biblioteca Mavrocordaților în Colecțiile Bibliotecii Centrale Universitare, Bucureşti”, in: Valori Bibliofile din Patrimoniul Cultural National. Cercetare şi valorificare, Bucureşti, 1983, pp. 75–79. BULUŢĂ, Gheorghe, Civilizaţia Bibliotecilor, București, Editura Enciclopedică, 1998. BULUŢĂ, Gheorghe, Scurtă istorie a bibliotecilor din România, București, Editura Enciclopedică, 2000. CARDAŞ, Gheorghe, “Biblioteci românești vechi”, in: Boabe de grâu, an.1, no. 10 (decembrie), 1930, pp. 611–616. DIMA-DRĂGAN, Corneliu, Biblioteci umaniste romaneşti: istoric, semnificație, organizare, Bucureşti, Editura Litera, 1974. DJUVARA, Neagu, Între Orient şi Occident.Ţările Române la începutul epocii modern, Bucureşti, Editura Humanitas, 2007. ENE DRAGHICI–VASILESCU, Elena, Between Tradition and Modernity: post‑ Byzantine Iconography: icons and iconographers in Romania, Saarbrücken, VDM Verlag, 2009. HURMUZACHI, Eudoxiu, Fragmente din istoria românilor, vol. III, Bucureşti, 1900; on-line Dacoromanica, Biblioteca Digitală a României, 2013. GEORGESCU, Vlad, Istoria ideilor politice româneşti (1369–1878), Munich, Jon Dumitru Verlag, 1987. GIURESCU, Constantin, Istoria românilor, vol. III, De la moartea lui Mihai Viteazul până la sfârșitul epocii fanariote (1601–1821), București, Fundația pentru literatură și Artă, 1944. IORGA, Nicolae, Acte si fragmente cu privire la istoria Romanilor adunate din depozitele de manu‑ scrise ale Apusului, vol. 1, Bucureşti, Imprimeria Statului, 1895. IORGA, Nicolae, Pilda bunurilor domni din trecut fața de şcoală românească, Bucureşti, Librăriile Socec et comp, 1914. IORGA, Nicolae, Catalogul tuturor cărţilor greceşti, greco‑latine, italiene, franceze ale lui Constantin Mavrocordat, pentru uzul lui în afară de cele din biblioteca cea mare a preaînălţat‑ ului domn, Bucureşti, 1926. IORGA, Nicolae, Știri nouă despre Biblioteca Mavrocordaților şi despre viața muntenească din timpul lui Constantin Vodă Mavrocordat, Bucureşti, 1926. IORGA, Nicolae, “Știri nouă despre Biblioteca Mavrocordaților şi despre viața muntenească din timpul lui Constantin Vodă Mavrocordat”, in: Memoriile secțiunii istorice, serie III, tom. VI, mem.6, pp. 135–151. KARADJA/ CARADJA, Constantin, “Despre vechile biblioteci din sud-estul Europei”, Analele Universității Bucureşti, nr. 1–2, 1971, pp. 30–36. LEAHU, Georghe, Bucureştiul dispărut, Bucureşti, Arta Grafică, 1995. MEHMET, Mustafa, A., Documente turceşti privind istoria României, Bucharest, Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, 1976; reprint 1983, vols. 1–3; for the topic especially vol. 3. MIHORDEA, Vasile, Biblioteca domnească a Mavrocordaților, Bucureşti, Monitorul oficial şi imprimeriile statului, Imprimeria Națională; also in: Analele Universității Bucureşti, the Section Historical Memoirs, vol. 22, the third series, 1940, pp. 1–61. 58 ▪ É t u d e s b i b l i o l o g i q u e s / l i b r a r y r e s e a r c h s t u d i e s PAPADOPOULOS KARAMEOS, Athanasios, Μαυρογορδάτειος Βιβλιοθήκη: ήτοι γενικός περιγραφικός κατάλογος των εν ταις ανα την Ανατολήν βιβλιοθήκαις ευρισκομένων ελληνικών χειρογράφων καταρτισθείσα και συνταχθείσα κατ’ εντολήν του εν Κωνσταντινουπόλει Ελληνικού Φιλολογικού Συλλόγου/ υπό Α. Παπαδοπούλου του Κεραμέως, T. A’‑B’. Εν Κωνσταντινουπόλει: Τύποις Σ.Ι. Βουτυρά, 1884 [Mavrocordatos Library: a general descriptive catalog of the Greek manuscripts found in the libraries of the East, compiled and collated for the Hellenic Philological Association in Constantinople under the direc‑ tion of A. Papadopoulos‑Kerameos, S. I. Voutiras (i.e. Neologos), Istanbul, 1884]. PAPADOPOULOS KARAMEOS, Athanasios, Ανέκδοτα Ελληνικά, σουνγράμματα έγγραφα τε και άλλα κεμένα κατ’ έκλογεν σουλλεγέντα εκ των εν τε Μαυρογορδάτειο βιβλιοθήκη αναγράφω, Κωνσταντινουπόλει (Ελληνικού Φιλολογικού Συλλόγου), 1884 [Anecdotes scripts, documents and other excerpts in Greek selected from the Mavrocordatos Library, Hellenic Philological Association, Constantinople/ Istanbul, 1884]. POPESCU, Radu, Istoriile domnilor Ţării Romîneşti, edited by Constantin Grecescu, Editura, Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne (sic!), București, 1963. Part of the work has been attributed to Constantin Filipescu (ca. 1655-c. 1696). RADU, Raisa, “Biblioteca Mavrocordaţilor”, in: Economia, Seria Management, anul VIII, nr. 2, 2005, pp. 156–162. SANDYS, John Edwin, A history of classical scholarship, vol. 3, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2011 (available on-line). SHARIPOVA (CHARIPOVA), Liudmila V., Latin Books and the Eastern Orthodox clerical elite in Kiev, 1632–1780, Manchester and New York, Manchester University Press, 2006. DOI: 10.33993/EB.2021.04