Slavic Greek Latin Academy - Beginnings

Beginnings

The academy's establishment may be viewed as a result of the incorporation of the Left-Bank Ukraine into Muscovy after the Treaty of Pereyaslav. Under Fyodor Rtishchev's auspices, Epiphanius Slavinetsky and other learned monks moved from Kiev to Moscow and brought a taste for learning there. The Ukrainian and Polish influence was paramount at the court of Tsar Feodor III. In 1682, he signed the academy's charter (priviley), which had been elaborated by Sylvester Medvedev.

The academy was organized in 1685-1687 under the guidance of two Greek brothers Joannicus and Sophronius Likhud on the premises of the Zaikonospassky Monastery with over 70 students. The academy was placed under the care of the Patriarch Prikaz. The curriculum was divided into several levels ("schools"), including Slavonic and Greek writing, seven liberal arts (septem artes liberales), and theology.

The academy itself was named the "Greek Latin School", or "Spassky schools" (Спасские школы). After the dismissal of the Likhud brothers in 1694, their students Feodor Polikarpov-Orlov and N. Semyonov (Golovin) became teachers at the academy. By the beginning of the 18th century, there had been more than 200 students at the Slavic Greek Latin Academy. In 1701, Peter the Great turned it into a state academy. A celibate priest Palladius (Rogovsky), president of the academy, invited the graduates of Lvov and Kiev seminaries (so-called "brotherhood schools"), familiar with educational practices of Western Europe, to teach at the Slavic Greek Latin Academy. After that, the Latin language became the principal teaching language of the establishment.