A letter from an unknown person with a list of the Tushino embassy to the King of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

Abstract

The events of the Russian Turmoil are insufficiently studied due to the destruction of Russian archives during the hard times and in the Moscow fire of 1626. The state archives in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were not accumulated. Statesmen, after the end of their powers, took the documents to their private collections, which were then shared by the heirs. The search for and introduction of these documents into scientific circulation has now accelerated due to the digitization and placement of archival materials on the Internet. A document called «Spis przedstawicieli Rosji przysięgających wierność Zygmuntowi III» by Polish archivists has become available on the Platforma Cyfrowa Biblioteki Kórnickiej resource, which lists 26 senior ambassadors from 259 persons of the embassy of the Tuszyn boyars to the Polish king. Until recently, historians have judged the personnel of this embassy presumably on the basis of indirect data from other sources. The document published below, despite the fact that the names in it are greatly distorted, contains a direct reference to the persons who are members of the Tushinsky Embassy. Comparison of the data in this document with the information available in the Lithuanian Metrica, sinelnikove the Tushino boyars and nobles by the king in February-July 1610 allows with high accuracy to establish the personalities of the management team "of the men of Tushino" sworn to the king of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth Sigismund III Vasa. The embassy under analysis was an important stage in the formation of the project for the elevation of a foreign prince Vladislav to the Russian throne, which led to the creation of a third center of power in the country.

Keywords:

Source studies, history of the Troubles, Polish and Russian diplomatic documents, personalities of the Tushino embassy to King Sigismund III