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Ivan Zabelin | |
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 Portrait byIlya Repin, 1877 | |
| Born | 29 September 1820[3] |
| Died | 13 January 1909 (aged 88)[3] |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | Kremlin Armoury[1][2] State Historical Museum |
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Ivan Yegorovich Zabelin (Иван Егорович Забелин; 29 September 1820 – 13 January 1909) was a Russianhistorian andarchaeologist with aSlavophile bent who helped establish theNational History Museum onRed Square and presided over this institution until 1906.[4] He was the foremost authority on the history of the city ofMoscow and a key figure in the 19th-century RussianRomantic Nationalism.
Zabelin joined theMoscow Kremlin staff in 1837. Influenced by the early Muscovite "antiquaries" such asIvan Snegirev andPavel Stroyev, Zabelin was one of the first to investigate the history of Moscow's suburbs and monasteries. While working in theArmoury, Zabelin studied the history of metalworking andenamel work in medieval Russia. He was also considered an expert on icon-painting andMuscovite architecture.[5]
In 1859 CountSergei Stroganov invited Zabelin to excavate theScythiantumulus graves in South Russia and theCrimea. He is credited with introducingstratigraphic methods in Russian field archaeology. It was he who excavated theChertomlyk grave, one of the largest Scythiankurgans. His findings are now part of theHermitage Museum collection. Zabelin joined forces with CountAleksey Uvarov in establishing theRussian Archaeological Society (in 1846). He summed up his findings inThe Antiquities ofHerodotus's Scythia (1866, 1873).
In 1873 Zabelin quit archaeological pursuites and devoted himself to the study of Pre-Petrine, late medievalMuscovy. He headed theMoscow Society of History and Archaeology between 1872 and 1888 and was revered by the Romantic Nationalist artists such asAndrei Ryabushkin,Sergei Milyutin, andViktor Vasnetsov.[6] In 1894 Zabelin was elected into thePetersburg Academy of Sciences (honoris causa).
Zabelin believed that the "soul of the people" manifests itself not so much in the state institutions and political history (as his German colleagues held) but in the quotidian particulars of domestic life and family relations.[6] He elaborated his views in the series of monographs detailing the "private life of Russian people" in the 16th and 17th centuries.[1]
Zabelin's great trilogy "The Domestic Life of the Russian Tsars" (1862), "The Domestic Life of Russian Tsarinas" (1872) and "GreatBoyars in TheirVotchinas" (1871) is still consulted and quoted by modern historians. His magnum opusThe History of the Russian Mode of Life from the Earliest Times was left unfinished.
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