Russia's Theatrical Past

Court Entertainment in the Seventeenth Century

Claudia R. Jensen, Ingrid Maier, Stepan Shamin, Daniel C. Waugh

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9780253056375
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Music History & Criticism

In the 17th century, only Moscow's elite had access to the magical, vibrant world of the theater.

In Russia's Theatrical Past, Claudia Jensen, Ingrid Maier, Stepan Shamin, and Daniel C. Waugh mine Russian and Western archival sources to document the history of these productions as they developed at the court of the Russian tsar. Using such sources as European newspapers, diplomats' reports, foreign travel accounts, witness accounts, and payment records, they also uncover unique aspects of local culture and politics of the time. Focusing on Northern European theatrical traditions, the authors explore the concept of intertheater, which describes transmissions between performing traditions, and reveal how the Muscovite court's interest in theater and other musical entertainment was strongly influenced by diplomatic contacts.

Russia's Theatrical Past, made possible by an international research collaborative, offers fresh insight into how and why Russians went to such great efforts to rapidly develop court theater in the 17th century.

1

COURT MUSIC AT HOME AND ABROAD

Osip Nepea, Russia’s first ambassador to England, very nearly did not make it to London at all. This was not a case of a diplomatic mission metaphorically foundering on the shoals of political intransigence or blunder, although that happened often enough in future meetings—in this case, Nepea’s ship, in 1556, literally foundered on the wild shoals of Scotland, killing many of the English sailing crew as well as members of the Russian party and destroying much of their precious cargo. The ambassador’s life was spared, and this terrifying event served, in some ways, to solidify the fledgling relationship: the Crown (and the English merchants who were determined to develop the newly discovered trade opportunities) stepped in, providing for the “gentle comfortment and entertainment of the saide Ambassadour, his traine and companie” while in Scotland and escorting them safely to London, where they were lavishly provided for.¹ Although trade relations were the overriding concern of both the English and the Russian representatives, and would remain so for the next century, this shipwrecked mission also introduces the cultural contacts and interactions that are the primary concern of this study.

In this chapter, we highlight the entertainments offered to Russian diplomats abroad, how the visitors described them (if, in fact, they were able to describe them at all), and what the consequences of such exposure might have been. Two early examples, both commonly cited in studies of such encounters between Russian and Western cultural traditions, illustrate the different trajectories such contacts might produce. One of the Russian representatives to the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1438–1439), Bishop Avramii of Suzdal’, famously reported on the elaborate productions of liturgical dramas he saw in Florence; such performed ingredients seem to have been incorporated later into the Russian Play of the Furnace (Peshchnoe deistvo), a liturgical drama that enjoyed its heyday from the mid-sixteenth to mid-seventeenth centuries. Although the results were not immediate, it seems plausible that Avramii’s experiences of performed church drama were ultimately influential in Russia because of the shared traditions of liturgical drama in Eastern and Western rites. As the theater historian Petr Morozov pointed out, sustained interest in Avramii’s theatrical descriptions in Russia is indicated by the fact that they were copied multiple times over the following years. Such shared traditions were likely bolstered by the influx of Italians (or Italo-Greeks) in the suite of Grand Prince Ivan III’s bride, Zoe (Sofiia) Paleologue, the Italian-raised niece of the last Byzantine emperor (the marriage was in 1472).² However another trip to Italy shortly thereafter, also frequently cited in the music-historical literature, was less impactful. A Russian diplomatic mission to Rome, Venice, and Milan brought back to Moscow, in 1488, an Augustinian monk who was an organist; he remained in Moscow, converted to Orthodoxy, married, and was rewarded for his service to the tsar.³ The appearance of this organist was certainly natural, given the Italian presence at the Russian court at this time. But in this case, the influence was restricted—organs were (and are) not used in Orthodox services, so if the organist was employed professionally, it must have been in a limited fashion, one that apparently did not continue, for example, by training students or hiring instrument builders. As we shall see, the performative keyboard tradition at the Russian court eventually emerged from different sources and different contacts and in wholly secular court entertainments.⁴

This opening chapter also highlights the possibilities and limitations of our source materials. In the case of Nepea, for instance, no Russian account survives, so we rely only on English descriptions of events that were, to the hosts, quite normal. For other ambassadorial trips, although we do have the Russian reports, we notice difficulties in describing musical performances that would have been simultaneously familiar and out of context—for example, singing in church but with instrumental accompaniment. As the music historian Dinko Fabris points out, most European travelers, whether diplomats or simply tourists, brought with them certain expectations. These savvy travelers were equipped with guidebooks and must-see destination points, and, just as important, they brought with them on their journeys their previous experiences from home: they could compare the theater of their own country to that of Italy or recollect musical performances as they exceeded or failed to live up to expectations.⁵ For the most part, and particularly in the sixteenth century, this was not generally the case for the Russian ambassadorial personnel, and the novelty of their experiences is reflected only partially in their reports, which were fairly inflexible in their format. The ambassadorial party was not expected to produce an entertaining diary documenting its experiences but rather an account demonstrating how scrupulously it fulfilled the detailed operating instructions it was provided before leaving. Thus, in our context, certain activities were worthy of note—toasting at banquets, for example, or seating plans at entertainment events; these were matters of precedence and honor, and the reports describing them were filed away for future reference, as we see in later chapters.

Finally, in this context we approach, gingerly, the enormous divide between what was written down and what must have been communicated orally. We know that the exhilarating events experienced by Russian diplomats abroad were not confined to official written reports. One Russian ambassador, Grigorii Mikulin, who was sent to London in 1600–1601, talked frequently about his time abroad. As the Englishman Richard Barne wrote, from Arkhangel’sk in 1601, Mikulin “imparteth at large every particular of his entertainment: in which discourse he intermingleth commendations of our country and people.” We necessarily rely on the surviving written accounts, with a rueful awareness of their shortcomings.⁶

We begin by providing some background to our main focus—the seventeenth century—in order to suggest the range of experiences such diplomatic interchange might generate. We survey primarily contacts with England and the Holy Roman Empire, adding a short overview of the musical consequences stemming from the Time of Troubles and the presence of the False Dmitrii’s Polish cohort in Moscow. We then move to the world of entertainment established at the court of the first Romanov tsar, Mikhail Fedorovich, keeping in mind how the previous experiences may have rippled through the menu of amusements offered during his reign. Osip Nepea’s visit to London thus serves as a useful embarkation point, one of a suite of diplomatic interactions that took place over decades.

THE BACKSTORY: DIVERTISSEMENTS FOR MOSCOW’S DIPLOMATIC CORPS

Nepea had been dispatched to London with the English navigator Richard Chancellor, who died in the disastrous shipwreck in Scotland. (Indeed, the origins of the English “discovery” of Russia was also the result of a seafaring mishap, when two of three English ships perished during their journey—Chancellor’s was the only one to survive, finding the entrance to the White Sea and landing along its coast and then continuing overland to meet Tsar Ivan IV in Moscow.) After arriving in London, Nepea plunged into the ceremonies of diplomatic life. He hit the entertainment trifecta immediately, experiencing the delights of public, private, and sacred performances during the two months of his stay in the city. The climate-related travel times required by the northern sailing route, icebound most of the year, resulted in fairly long stays abroad for the Russian ambassadors, which gave them extra time to enjoy the delights of London life at roughly the same times in the year. This travel constraint also accounts for some of the overlap in the Russian ambassadors’ experiences in England and, later, in the Italian states.⁷

The most generic of such diplomatic ceremony, processional fanfare, is the least documented of Nepea’s experiences. Nepea’s initial entry into the city, on February 27, 1557, is described in the diary kept by Henry Machyn (d. 1563).⁸ Machyn had been a member of the Merchant Taylors’ Company since 1530, so he had good reason to be interested in Nepea’s visit, which was lavishly sponsored by the merchants of London. Machyn, perhaps naturally, described the pageantry with particular focus on the clothing that was displayed in the parade. Neither Machyn nor the contemporary English account of this mission specifically mentions music, although the large size of the greeting party and the high rank of the attending dignitary (Viscount Montague) suggests that there must have been some sort of accompanying fanfare. One assumes that Nepea’s entrance would have been marked in a fashion similar to that of another Russian envoy to London, A. G. Savin, who, in 1569, was “saluted with [the] sound of Drums, noise of Flutes, Trumpetts &c” as his party approached the city.⁹ A few weeks after Nepea’s arrival, Queen Mary and King Philip made a procession into London, accompanied, as Machyn says, by “trumpets blowing with other instruments with great joy and pleasure and great shooting of guns at the Tower.”¹⁰ This rambunctious greeting was typical; as the Brandenburg traveler Paul Hentzner observed during his 1598 tour through England, the English “are vastly fond of great noises that fill the ear, such as the firing of cannon, drums, and the ringing of bells.”¹¹ Nepea, waiting for his summons from the rulers, would surely have been aware of the joyous reception, which supports the idea of a similar (necessarily more subdued) fanfare for his own entry. Trumpets and percussion were standard military accoutrements in Russia also, mentioned in descriptions by English visitors a few years later.¹²

Nepea’s audience was on March 25, 1557. About a month later, he was invited to accompany the royal couple to Westminster Abbey, where the remains of Edward the Confessor had recently been returned at Queen Mary’s instigation. As Machyn noted: “The twentieth day of April went to Westminster to hear Mass and to the lord abbot’s to dinner, the Duke of Muscovy, and after dinner came into the monastery and went up to see St. Edward’s shrine new set up.”¹³ Machyn’s reference to Mass suggests there was singing and perhaps an organ. A slightly later visitor to this shrine, Frederick, Duke of Württemberg, did hear organ music and singing there, in 1592, during Elizabeth’s reign.¹⁴ A few days later, on April 23, Nepea witnessed the festivities of St. George’s Day and the ceremony of the Order of the Garter, and in this instance, Machyn reports that the ambassador heard Evensong at Westminster. The contemporary English account also mentions his presence at the services.¹⁵

But Nepea also had the opportunity to hear music in a less structured setting. Machyn writes about a March 31 dinner for the ambassador given by the Lord Mayor—apparently Machyn did not attend, for he describes only the grand procession there and back.¹⁶ A month later, on April 29, Nepea attended a banquet at Draper’s Hall given by the merchants of the city: “During his abode in London, [the merchants] did both invite him to the Maior, and divers worshipfull mens houses, feasting and banquetting him right friendly, shewing unto him the most notable and commendable sights of London. . . . And also the said 29. day of April, the said merchants assembling themselves together in the house of the Drapers hal of London, exhibited and gave unto ye said Ambassador, a notable supper garnished with musicke, Enterludes and bankets.”¹⁷ We have no record of Nepea’s reaction to such amusement, but based on the account of the Englishmen who accompanied the ambassador on his return to Russia, we know the event would have been a novelty—at least, it was not the kind of entertainment provided in Moscow for a banquet attended by th...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• A Note on Dates, Transliteration, and Translation
• List of Abbreviations
• Introduction: The Comedians Come to Pskov
• 1. Court Music at Home and Abroad
• 2. The Theater of Diplomacy
• 3. Introducing Pickleherring: The Origins of the Russian Court Theater
• 4. The Plays and “Ballets” for the Tsar
• 5. The Play of Tamerlane
• 6. From Tamerlane to Tamerlane and Beyond
• Bibliography
• Index
• About the Authors