') The legend says that after drinking, Skopin’s “eyes were clearly indignant, and his face was terribly marked with blood, and his womb began to be tormented fiercely”; and further: “he is on his bed in anguish, tossing and thrashing and groaning, screaming fiercely, like a beast under the earth” (Izborn. 383). In another, modern story, it is noted: “and in that hour they began to torment his heart” (Add. to Pekov. Let. p. 59).
According to the latest news, Skopin was brought home from the feast by “their own”; but from the Legend it is clear that his mother was not present at the feast. This is understandable if we take into account her warning that he should not go to Moscow. Without a doubt she was at odds with the Shuiskys.
’) “Suspicious seizures acquire more evidentiary force when they appear soon after eating food” (Berber, 7).
[fragment illegible in the scan of the first edition]
But if Skopin’s death could arouse suspicion among his contemporaries and suggest an idea of inheritance, then the question naturally arose as to who might need this death and what goals his enemies pursued.
We have already seen that both those testimonies that name the house of Prince Vorotynsky as the place of the feast, and those that attribute the accomplished fact directly to Shuisky, implicate the latter in this matter. Later researchers, being skeptical of this testimony, had in mind the actual defense of c. Shuisky. But this does not exhaust the whole question.
Indeed, Tsar Vasily could have been jealous of his nephew, and, due to his suspicion, should have been wary of his influence on the people. But he could not have a keen interest in such violence. In order to place Skopin on the throne, it was necessary to know Tsar Vasily, and Skopin himself would hardly have decided to do this, if only in view of the sad circumstances of that time. An agreement in such a matter could only have been mutual and voluntary, but according to the news, which reports that Tsar Vasily had already decided to cede the throne to another, it is clear that he set an indispensable condition for Skopin to first clear Russia of the Poles (Diary. Sigism. 584). Tsar Vasily had a direct plan to stick to Skopin, in whose name everything was held together. Therefore, he tried to hide his envy and openly honored the winner. They say that he even wanted
In the old days, poisoning*, spoilage* and witchcraft* were usually mixed together. Patr. Nikon, considering himself “spoiled* or “poisoned”*, took antidotes: “We took a drink of stone and indrog sand...; and the elders lay for three days; by the same thing that I drank, and now I am grieving with my stomach* (letter to Nik. Zyuzin, Notes of the Department of Rus. and Slav. Archaeol. N, 588). Bezui is an animal stone, bezoar. It was used as a diaphoretic (Acts of History 1P, 387). Indrogovy - made from unicorn bones. The horn of the unicorn was considered a sure remedy against serious illnesses and for maintaining flourishing health. Foreigners contributed to the approval of this opinion, and Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich was ready to pay 10,000 rubles for three such horns. sables and junk (Acts of History IV, 242).
For an interesting case about arsenic (1630), see Zabelin, Life of Queens, P, 531-538.
V. 0. ICONNIKOV,
hit his brother Dmitry with a stick when he continued to pester him with denunciations about his nephew, and drove him out of sight (Videk. 136) *). Moreover, D. Shuisky did not have a dynastic calculation, since he did not have children. Those writers who do not talk about the tsar’s direct interest in eliminating his nephew judge either by those manifestations of his displeasure towards the latter, which were then rumored, or by the disposition of people to go back to a more distant source, or, finally, by the general dislike of Tsar Vasily, who, like Godunov, began to be considered the culprit of all troubles.
Externally should have been guided by other motives. D. Shuisky. He cherished the thought of the possibility, after the death of the king, to take his place, and it flattered his ambition. But D. Shuisky’s pride knew no bounds. His subordinates hated him for his inaccessibility and contemptuous attitude towards them, but he cared only about satisfying his passion in luxury, while the general state of affairs required constant sacrifices. This is how writers who are personally disposed towards Tsar Vasily speak about him (Palvtsyn and the author of Another Legend). The Dutchman Gerkman, who wrote his note from the words of eyewitnesses, traces D. Shuisky’s enmity to Skopin from time