Summary
This paper demonstrates how study of a monastery's manuscript library enables us to flesh out the skeletal history provided by archival documents. A preview of the Introduction to the forthcoming Catalog of the Greek Manuscripts of Philotheou Monastery, it summarizes both the "external" or chronological history of the monastery and its "internal" or spiritual and intellectual history as derived from manuscript evidence, with emphasis on methodology. Philotheou began as a small hesychasterion in the last decade of the tenth century, and continued as such for some sixty years. Silence of the documents from 1051 to 1141 suggests that the monastery was vacant during this time. Documentary attestation of the abbot, Arsenios, in 1141 corroborates the identification of an Arsenios as one of the founders of Philotheou in the lost wall painting of the old catholicon described in the proskynetarion John Comnenos. From the documents the question of a second period of abandonment (from 1169 until 1284) remains ambiguous. Here the manuscripts of Philotheou come to our rescue. Moscow, State Historical Museum, Synodal Library cod. 50 includes a dated note of dedication from the year, 1203. Since the codex was at Philotheou until Arsenios Suchanov took it in 1654, we conclude that the monastery was neither ruined nor vacated during this time. That is one of the most important items of information regarding external Philotheite history derived from the manuscripts. It also informs us that the collection of manuscripts at Philotheou has existed continuously since the mid-12th century refoundation of the monastery, when books must have been part of the needs supplied for its functioning by St. Savas. Codicological study of the 14th-century codices produced at Philotheou, only two of which are signed, enable us to identify a group of manuscripts written there at that time. The Philotheite scribes, Gerasimos and Ignatios, created a new kind of hagiographical collection in which encomia for the menological and movable liturgical calendars were integrated. The recension of this "Integrated Panegyrikon," inspired by Gregory Palamas' collection of patristic evidence in defense of Athonite hesychasm, provided Philotheite monks with hesychastic models for emulation, replacing the Metaphrast. It provides us with a window into the spiritual world of Mount Athos during this important period.
In the mid-16th century, following the restoration of the monastery ·under Dionysios ο εν Ολύμπω, numerous hieromonks wrote liturgical books at Philotheou, under the tutelage of two monks from Kallioupolis, Maximos and Gabriel, and under the direction of the abbot, Kallinikos. From a codex which he brought with him we learn that he had come from Dionysiou, bringing with him the calligraphic ideals of the school of copyists from the Athonite monasteries on the southwest coast. The number of these hieromonks, and the small number of books surviving from each one, suggest that their tenure at Philotheou was brief, and that they were being prepared for an anti-Islamization mission on the Greek mainland.
The acquisition of manuscripts also contributed to the growth of the library and thus to our understanding of Philotheite history. Acquisition of books in the earlier centuries apparently accompanied restorations of the monastery under the ktitores, Arsenios and Dionysios ο εν Ολύμπω, meet the monastery's own liturgical needs. A more or less standard curse formula is the mark of accession of Philotheite books from the sixteenth century on, while notes of donation and personal possession colophons of individual monks distinguish those books from purchases in the earlier centuries. In the 16th century acquisitions on a large scale as well as "ransom" of books from the infidel attest to the monastery's wider purpose of preserving Orthodoxy and supporting its anti-Islamization mission.
The sixteenth century copyists also preserved and restored older copies of the orthodox liturgical books. The centralization of these older books into a formal library may date from this time, when a systematic survey of the condition of books at Philotheou was conducted by Moyses. An exceptional collection of menaia at Philotheou enables comparison of the sixteenth century copies with prototypes from the older manuscripts in the collection, some of which probably date from the 12th century revival of the monastery.
