THE MONASTERY AND ITS INDUSTRIES.
After Trifon’s death the monastery continued to grow in numbers,
wealth, and influence. A large conventual building was erected close
beside the church; in it each of the monks had his own separate cell,
but the refectory was common to them all. There was connected with the
convent an entire suite of apartments for guests and pilgrims, who came
to the monastery every returning season.
Opposite the dwellings of the monks there were workmen’s dwellings, and
in these the serving-men lived. All the buildings, as well as the
church, were surrounded by a strong wall of wood. The country was
unsettled and poorly governed, and it was by no means impossible that
some hostile bands might find their way to the monastery in search of
plunder. The monks at the monastery of Solowetski had often to defend
themselves against such attacks.
The church, which was built in honour of the Holy Trinity, was adorned
with a tower and dome. It was decorated inside with paintings and with
the gifts of pious pilgrims. It was constructed after the old Greek
Church plan, which is followed throughout Russia, whether the church is
large or small, or whether it is built of stone or merely of wood. Such
a church has three divisions, viz.: the narthex, or outer church; the
hieron, the sacred part, or church proper; and the hieraton, the
sanctuary, or holy place. This division is said to be a representation
of the Temple at Jerusalem. The outer church is separated from the
hieron by a wall, in which are two large folding doors; these are
always open during Divine service. The hieraton, or sanctuary, in which
the altar is placed, is in turn separated from the church, or hieron,
by the iconastasis, or wall of pictures. This wall is decorated with
carvings, and there are three doorways in it leading to the holy place.
The middle one of these doorways is only closed with a wooden door for
half of its height, but the upper half is shut off by a curtain, which
can be drawn aside so that the priest as he officiates and offers
incense may be seen. At other times he is hidden from the congregation.
Not a pew or seat is to be found in the church. Everybody has to stand,
rich and poor alike, for no distinction is made. Turning to the holy
place, or towards the picture of some particular saint, the people
cross themselves three times in the Greek manner, by putting three
fingers, the first finger, thumb and middle finger, on the right and
left shoulders, the forehead and breast, and bowing themselves very
low, with their foreheads touching the ground, at the same time saying,
‘Gospodi pomilui’ (Lord, have mercy). This sentence is constantly
repeated throughout the service, and it frequently happens that the
more devout members of the congregation, by reason of their continual
bowings to the ground, leave the church with red spots on their
foreheads.
All the walls inside the church are covered as completely as possible
with pictures, which are either painted on the walls themselves, or are
hung in frames against them. The pictures in the narthex are taken, as
a rule, from the Old Testament, and those in the hieron from the New
Testament. Besides these there are pictures of men and women who are
recognised as saints in the Eastern Church. The older these pictures
are, the holier they are esteemed. In copying them, therefore, the
chief object is to give the copy an appearance of antiquity. Many of
the pictures have been painted by the monks themselves, and, as a rule,
they are done in very glaring colours. The heads of the saints are
always surrounded by a golden glory, on the gilding of which much money
is frequently expended. They are also often hung with presents, such as
handkerchiefs and other personal finery, which have been offered by
pilgrims whose particular saint is represented. Sometimes one sees a
wreath of blown birds’ eggs hung up by the picture, a melancholy token
of hopes blighted in this world. The front wall in the church, through
which access to the outer church is gained, is covered with a lean-to
roof, and on this wall there is depicted, in order to excite the
imagination and the fear of the heathen folk, on the right hand of the
door the bliss of Paradise, and on the left hand the torments of Hell.
Here the heathen as they stood outside the church and listened to the
singing, would have made manifest to them what would be the lot of
those who did not seek the help which the Church offered them, and who
refused to be baptized. One thing, however, in the pictures was strange
and suggestive, and might have made the heathen doubtful about the
charms of Paradise, and this was, that the saints in Paradise were
delineated as so fearfully emaciated that they seemed to be nothing but
skin and bone, owing to the fasting and the asceticism by which they
had made themselves worthy of heaven. The other folk, moreover, who
were in hell, seemed to be well-favoured, lusty, and thriving, and
altogether more attractive.
In the middle of the courtyard, between the monastery buildings, there
was a draw-well, and upon a beam placed over it there was the following
inscription, which can be read backwards,
Νίψον ἀνομήμα μὴ μόναν ὄψιν [3]—
(Wash away uncleanness, not from the face alone)—a reminder that water
is used in the administration of Holy Baptism.
The monks, who year by year became more numerous, obtained by degrees
still further privileges from the Czar of Russia.
According to the rules of the monastery, the monks had both ‘to till
the ground and to follow all such profitable employment as was
practicable.’ There were people among them who had a very fair
knowledge of secular affairs, and who, moreover, did not always despise
the good things of the world. Accordingly, the monks summoned competent
artisans and work-people from Russia, and with their help they devised
boat and ship building on the river Pasvig, and also further out in the
Munkfjord at the Warehouse Inlet, where the water was clear of ice even
in the winter. They had their own store of timber, and they were
enabled to build comparatively large ships; in these they exported the
produce of the country. A great number of rafts and boats were also
built, and these were sold to the Russian and Norwegian fishermen.
Besides boat-building, they also had salt-pans on such a large scale
that they not only provided the whole fishing population with salt, but
also exported salt to the interior of Russia. In their ships they
brought back in return, ‘flour, wax, drapery goods, and cordage.’ The
salt-pans were probably situated on Fiskerö, where the sea-water is
least mixed with fresh-water from the inland rivers.
One of the most remarkable of their doings was the erection of a mill
at the Kujasuga River, immediately behind the monastery. This is the
only establishment which existed during the prosperous days of the
monastery of which there is any trace still left. The monks must have
found that it was more profitable to import corn and to grind it
themselves, than to import the ground flour, as is usually done now.
They had also out-houses, and must have owned a considerable herd of
cattle. They had occasion to clear out and till meadows, both on
Fiskerö and along the Petschenga River. Several of the meadows where
the monks used to mow their hay are now overgrown with birch-trees that
are more than a century old. It may not have been exclusively for the
sake of the flesh that they kept these herds of cattle, because the
long fasts allow the Russians only to eat sparingly of meat. It was no
doubt also for purposes of trade as well as for the sake of their
skins. It is expressly stated that the monks possessed a tannery, and
that they tanned leather both for their own requirements, and for
supplying the people of the country.
They are also said to have worked mines. Possibly the monks were the
first people to wash gold in the rivers in the interior of Lapland.
Their most important means of support were, however, the fisheries,
both the sea and the fresh-water fisheries, involving the exportation
of fish. They understood how to make good use of the deed of gift,
which they had obtained from the Czar Ivan Wasilievitsch. According to
it, everything that was found in land or water belonged to the monks,
and the inhabitants were compelled either to deliver up or sell to the
monks what they did not themselves use, of course at the price which
the monks saw fit to arrange. The fisheries were carried on by their
own numerous servants or the lay-brothers of the monastery. Some of
these lived at the monastery itself, others at the Warehouse Inlet, at
the mill, or in Kjörvaag, or West Bumand Fjord. By these fisheries the
monks obtained such an immense quantity of fish, that they not only
exported it to Vardö and Archangel, but also entered into mercantile
connection with foreign towns, principally with Antwerp and Amsterdam.
Information as to this is obtained from a Dutchman named Simon van
Salingen, who for several years made business journeys in Finmark and
Russian Lapland. He records that in the years (1562–1564) when Eric
Munck was bailiff of Vardöhus, ‘the monks from the monastery in
Munkfjord were in the habit of coming with their fish, train-oil, and
other local produce, which they collected during the summer and winter,
that they might sell them. In Munck’s service there was a youth named
Philip Winterkonig, a Dutchman from Oltgensplaet, in Zeeland; but
either voluntarily or otherwise, he left his master, and entered into
partnership with John van Reide, Cornelius de Meyer Simonsen, of
Malines, and in 1564 he came in a large vessel from Antwerp to Vardö,
under the impression that Munck was still bailiff there.’ He must have
sailed direct to Vardö without touching at Bergen, and so he had not
heard that this town had recently obtained the monopoly of the trade of
Finmark. ‘When he arrived at Vardö, he found that Munck was no longer
bailiff there, and that a certain James Hansen held the office in his
stead. Hansen made Winterkonig and his crew prisoners, seized the ship
and its cargo, and maintained that Winterkonig had forfeited his life,
because he had acted in opposition to the privileges of the citizens of
Bergen.’
While these people were detained in custody, God vouchsafed such a rich
harvest of fish that the Lapps, the Norsemen, and the monks at
Munkfjord, caught so large a quantity that there were not ships, or
yachts sufficient in draught, to carry the fish to Bergen.
James Hansen therefore arranged with Winterkonig that he should be let
off his punishment if he would load his vessels with fish, and take
them to Bergen on behalf of Norway, and would also promise never again
‘to trade contrary to the privileges of the town of Bergen.’
Winterkonig readily agreed to this, and was set at liberty. At the same
time some of the monks of Petschenga, who were present at Vardö, made
an arrangement with Winterkonig, that next year he should come to them,
and lade his ship with the things which they would have ready.
According to this agreement Winterkonig came to Munkfjord in 1565 with
a large ship, which he loaded with fish, and then despatched back again
to the ship-owners at Antwerp. He hired, on his own account, a Russian
lodje (yacht), with thirteen men in order to carry the rest of his
goods from Antwerp to St. Nicholas. [4]
On the way, however, near the promontory of Tiriberka, on the Murman
coast, he was overtaken by such a severe storm that he was obliged to
seek a harbour of refuge. While he lay there another Russian lodje
arrived, also having goods on board, which the captain sold to
Winterkonig. But as soon as the Russians saw the valuable cargo which
Winterkonig had on board his lodje, they were seized with a desire to
possess it, and they fell on him at night, and cut the throats of his
three servants and thirteen sailors while they were asleep. Winterkonig
awoke and escaped to land severely wounded, but he was followed, and
was shot through with an arrow from behind a tree. The robbers then
hastily plundered the ship, and, as they saw another yacht approaching,
they left the seventeen corpses unburied and escaped. However, they
could not take everything with them, and among the things left behind
were ‘four hogsheads of wine, and these remained on the beach.’
The firm at Antwerp, who had not heard of the murders, directly after
the big ship had arrived from Munkfjord, sent two more ships to
Winterkonig, and these were laden with all sorts of goods which he had
ordered. Both the ships reached Munkfjord safely in the autumn, and
anchored off the Warehouse Inlet. As soon as the monks heard of this,
they despatched one of the ships back to Antwerp with the news that
Winterkonig and his men had been murdered on his way to St. Nicholas,
and that the goods had been stolen. The other ship the monks sent, with
Cornelius de Meyer Simonsen, to Malmis (Kola), from which place
Simonsen travelled to Moscow, in order to lay a complaint concerning
the murder, and the plundering of the ship. He failed, however, to
obtain an audience with the Grand-Duke, because the name of the
Grand-Duke (Ivan the Cruel) was not written sufficiently large in his
letter of complaint, and he had to return to Kola with his object
unaccomplished.
In the following year, 1566, the firm at Antwerp sent Simon van
Salingen with two ships to Munkfjord, where he arrived late in the
spring, and they made him fetch the ship that had been left at Malmis
by Cornelius Simonsen. Salingen then loaded all the three ships—partly
at Munkfjord, partly at Keervagh (Kjorvaag or Kjervan, a harbour at the
western entrance of the Bumandfjord on Fiskerö)—with as much fish-oil,
salmon, and other goods as were suitable for export to Antwerp. He
hired on his own account two lodjer from the monks, and laded them with
his goods and sailed for Malmis. Here he met Cornelius Simonsen who had
just returned from Moscow. They travelled, together with their goods,
through Russia during the winter as far as Moscow, and traded with the
inhabitants.
At a later period it would seem that the monastery entered more
especially into commercial connection with Amsterdam. A treaty has been
found which was concluded between a firm in that town and the monks of
Petschenga. The agent of the firm was named Andrew Neich. He went every
year to Munkfjord with a large ship laden with barrels of salt, in
order to take on board, and bring back to Amsterdam, the fish they had
caught. The convent had pledged themselves ‘for six years to sell to
Neich all the red fish (salmon), and not to sell to anyone else the
fish taken in draught-nets or in rivers; and in like manner not to
lease or sell the fishing in the sea for sjomga (salmon), cod, or cod
blubber, or whale blubber, but on the contrary they were to be held
bound to bring to them (the merchants), to their storehouse (factory),
the fish from Kola and the river Tulom. If the chief of the monastery,
or the Brothers, kept back or sold them to others, the chief of the
monastery was to pay a hundred roubles.’ In addition to this, it was
also arranged what the quality of the fish contracted for was to be.
‘And the Superior and convent are not to deliver any “tinda” or
“waltschak” (presumably smaller kinds of sea-fish); broken, damaged, or
stale salmon; damaged, stale, raw, half-dried cod; or salmon of less
than 7½ lb. weight. And if any fish is delivered under 7 lb. weight,
two such fish are to be taken in place of one; but of fish from
Tiriberka, whether large or small, two are to be reckoned as one, and
none are to be accepted of less than 4 lb. weight.’ Then several other
kinds of fish are mentioned. As to the price of the fish there was a
still further arrangement that they were to give ‘ten roubles for 100
salmon, or twenty good jefimker’ (Dutch silver money). The period
appointed for receiving the fish was from May 10 to July 20. The
merchants were bound to leave salt and barrels at Kola, so that the
agent at that place would deliver these to the fishermen. ‘If the fish
from lack of salt, or vat, were spoilt, the Amsterdam merchants were
still bound to accept them, and to pay the same price as for good
fish.’ The fish were to be paid for at two terms: ‘the first term was
St. Peter’s Day, and the second term July 20; the one half in roubles,
and the other half in jefimker, and one jefimke was reckoned as half a
rouble.’
From the ship the Brothers of the monastery obtained all that they
needed or required in the way of goods, partly for their own use, and
partly for trading purposes with the inhabitants of those parts, or,
indeed, for exporting again to St. Nicholas, Cholmogor, Wologda, and
Jaroslav. Thus, no doubt, they obtained no inconsiderable supply of
corn, since they had built a mill for themselves. In addition to the
goods which the firm at Amsterdam had to send according to requisition,
Neich was also bound to bring with him, as a donation and gift to the
monastery, ‘1 pud [32 lb.] of incense, 2 pud of wax, 1 cask of red
church wine, as well as two casks of brandy, and one firkin of Rhenish
wine.’
The monastery in its time carried on no inconsiderable whale fishery.
It is distinctly stated that the monastery ‘should be free of taxation
for exporting whale blubber.’ The train-oil was exported to other parts
of Holland as well as to Amsterdam. The Dutch people were themselves
carrying on at this time a whale-fishery, both in Norwegian Finmark,
where they had a special place of resort at Sörö, and along the coast
of Russian Lapland. At that time the Greenland whale was found along
the Norwegian and Russian coasts, or, at any rate, a kind of whale
which could be somewhat easily killed with the harpoon. A loose harpoon
was mostly employed. Whenever a whale was encountered, they hurled one
or more harpoons at it, and these had the owner’s name marked on them.
Then the whale was allowed to go its way. Sometimes it escaped and was
never seen again; but generally it died, and was thrown up on the shore
at one point or another, but most frequently in the Mutkatfjord, where
even at the present day whales are frequently stranded high and dry.
The people attached to the monastery soon got information of the
reappearance of the harpooned whale, and took possession of it, for,
according to their prerogatives, they alone had the right to all
flotsam and jetsam.
In such ways the monastic establishment, in the course of about fifty
years, developed into a very important colony, which must have had an
extraordinary influence in the civilization of those parts, in a wider
extension of the fisheries, and in the foundation of several towns, if
it had continued to prosper, and had not, as the sequel will show, come
to such a sudden and unexpected end.
In no respect does the improvement of the inhabitants appear to have
been the object of the labours of the brotherhood. Certainly they
christened or baptized the Lapps, so that they could no longer be
called heathens, but that was all. Not a word is said as to any schemes
for their education and civilizing. The priests of the Greek Church,
even at the present day, take no trouble to teach the people. The
Russian Lapps, therefore, as a rule, cannot even now either read or
write, while among the Norwegian, Swedish, and Finnish Lapps there are
but few who cannot do both.