Светци и памети в сборника „Различии потреби“ – Венеция (1571–1572)
Saints and Memories in the Miscellany “Razlichni Potrebi” – Venice, 1571–1572

Summary/Abstract: The article deals with the peculiarities of the Calendar in the fourth book printed by Yacob Kraykov, called "Various readings" and considered to be functionally identical to the miscellanies for travellers, generally associated with Bozidar Vucovichs printing activity in Venice at the beginning of the 16th century. This Venetian edition is an absolute rarity since only 4 copies have been preserved. However, a focused and in-depth study of the history of this book in the Slavonic tradition has not yet been conducted. There is no facsimile edition or digitalized copy to make available to a larger scholarly community its diversified text composition that has no analogues in the overall printed tradition. Only the apocryphal part has been published by Y. Y. Capaldo in the late 80th. The Calendar is not included. The article focuses on the text as a whole, discussing the issue of holiness, conceived as a complex mixture of Orthodox canonic patterns and legendary oral culture. Together with the Calendar, another text is analysed in depth, viz. the so-called Legend of how many relics of saints the town of Venice possesses. The Venetian miscellany contains unique details of a legendary character about Bulgarian history and geographical names linked to popular sacred places for religious cults in the region of Western Macedonia populated by Bulgarians. It bears traces of the self-consciousness of its compiler, which stood out against the background of the predominantly expressed common Orthodox identity. The author claims that these questions are the key to the central problem the sources of the printed book and the role of the printer himself in its composition and literary message. The article is based on the first complete copy of the book from the holdings of the Leiden University Library in Holland. The Library authorities kindly permitted its analysis for scholarly purposes.

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