Texts Devoted to St Nicholas in the Balkan Cyrillic Calendar of Saints. Clementina Ivanova (Sofia, Bulgaria)
The memory of St Nicholas in Bulgaria was soon established as one of the most venerated holy days. This is why translations of St Nicholas' lives and miracles were published first as part of Old Bulgarian calendar of saints and later included in Southern-Slavic calendars and were made required reading. Before the 17th century the chapter on St Nicholas' Day, the 6th of December, incorporated many texts on this saint but up to this day they have never been systematized and properly studied. The purpose of this paper is to compile a list of such works existing in Southern Slavic tradition, such as Panegyrics and the Book of Months. The translations of St Nicholas' lives and miracles made before the end of the 10th century were recognized as part of the old menology while the translations made in the 14th century and later were recognized as belonging in the new menology and included in the newly-translated Panegyrics, the Books of Months and those edited on Mount Athos and/or in Tyrnovo.
The miracle of St Nicholas rescuing seven men from imminent death (Miracle about Three Voivode) has also been included in the old menology. The text was probably translated a very long time ago (its archaic nature is established by the study of the first translations from St Germanicus' collection), probably even twice, and has gone though several editorial recensions. From the 14th century the old-menology translation of the Miracle was included in the cycle uniting several such miracles.
The second work translated before the end of the 10th century is the Life of St Nicholas, in which two different saints had been mixed up: St Nicholas of Myra in Lycia, who lived in the reign of Emperor Constantine, and St Nicholas of Pinar who lived in the reign of Justinian I. This translation was current in the Slavic South before the Renaissance and was preserved mainly in the Serbian copies. In the 14th-century and later calendars this work was replaced with the version of the Life by Simeon Metaphrastes.
Two more texts should be included in the ancient protograph: Miracle about the Youth Nicholas and part of the Constantinople Miracle about Dimitry.
Apart from these works there are two more original rhetorical works: two Laudations for St Nicholas. They occur very rarely and usually in later collections originating from the ancient Russian protograph. Both Laudations are attributed to Clement of Ochrid by most paleo-slavists, and some scholars believe Yefrem, bishop of Pereyaslavl, to be one of the authors.
The most popular Life of St Nicholas, the one written by Simeon Metaphrastes, belongs in the new menology. Since the 14th century this Life is usually included in all the calendars of the new menology. Many of its Serbian and Bulgarian copies have been preserved. This Life was probably translated back in the 13th century, supposedly on Mount Athos.
Apart from Simeon Metaphrastes' Lives two more works were sometimes included in the new menology comprising a cycle together with it. These are: the «Tale about Burying a Saint», always occurring together with Nicholas' life and always following it; and «The Praise of St Nicholas» by Andrei, the bishop of Crete. The translation of the Tale can probably be dated to the second half of the 14th century. It is hard to establish the exact date of the translation of the Praise but it was hardly made before the middle and later than the end of the 14th century. Beginning with the 15th century the above three texts were joined by more miracles and other texts found by scribes in various sources, and among them a rhetorical life known from the 16th-century copy.
In the new menology or collected Books of the Months, mainly Serbian, instead of the full text of Simeon Metaphrastes' Lives only individual miracles are included, such as Miracle of St Dimitry, Miracle of St Basil Son of Agrik, and Miracle of a Certain Nicholas in Constantinople (Miracle of a Carpet).
For the sake of the future studies of the South Slavic translated texts devoted to St Nicholas it is necessary to publish all of the available copies with the variant readings and also compare the South Slavic texts with the Russian because the larger portion of these translations moved on to Russia where the original was sometimes better preserved.