6. Connected Sbornic (18th century manuscript) and "The New Testament" of Antim Ivireanul, from the time of Constantin Brâncoveanu, Bucharest, 1703, extremely rare, collector's piece

The New Testament in Romanian, printed entirely at the expense of Lord Constantin Brâncoveanu and with the support of Metropolitan Theodosie, the typographer being Antim Ivireanul. 2f.nen +209 pages, book block size 22,5 x 16 cm., framed text, 35 lines per page, black print, typographical ornaments, ornate black initials, the coat of arms of Constantin Brâncoveanu on the verso of the title leaf. At the end of the Gospel of Luke - a final fitomorphic vignette, and at the start of the Gospels - a fitomorphic frontispiece with a medallion featuring a Face of Jesus. The New Testament is preceded by 14 manuscript pages in black and red representing some compilations in Romanian. Ownership note from Priest Ioan at page 93, a note about the New Testament dated 1795, December 18th, on the last verso.

References

BRV, I. p. 139

Dimensions

width 17 cm, height 24 cm

Research information

Antim Ivireanul, born in 1650, is of Georgian origin but his journey within Orthodoxism brought him to the mouths of the Danube, in Wallachia. Before this period, he lived near the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Constantinople, where he penetrated the mysteries of faith as well as those of the typographic craft in all its details, from writing, to paper making and xylography. Imbued in the erudite and cultivated atmosphere and environment patronized by the Orthodox Patriarchate, he learned several languages, Greek, Turkish-Ottoman and Arabic. The one who brought him north of the Danube was ruler Constantin Brâncoveanu who entrusted him with the development and management of the royal typography in Bucharest in 1691. Extremely active and dedicated to both books and the church, he held several ecclesiastical dignities crowned with that of Metropolitan of Wallachia in which he was installed in 1708. Using the authority that he had and the funds to which he had access, he developed the network of typographies in the country, with one in Râmnicu Vâlcea and one in Târgoviște. Through the numerous church works that he edited and supervised, Antim Ivireanul created the church language in Romanian and put into circulation the foundational works of orthodoxism transposed into a Romanian version. Exiled from the country as a result of his opposition to the Phanariot regime, he was assassinated on his way to Constantinople in circumstances still not fully elucidated. He was canonized by the Romanian Orthodox Church in 1992.

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