Moscow printing houses of the Beglopopovtsy Old Believers in 1905–1917

Old Believer printing is one of the most difficult aspects of the study of Russian book culture. Two centuries of illegal existence have led to the appearance of publications with and without false information in the imprint, creating many problems in attributing book artefacts of this type. However, the legalization of the Old Believers and their book printing after 1905 did not eliminate all the problems in working with their editions. A striking example is the products of two Moscow printing houses of the Beglopopovtsy ("followers of fugitive priests") Old Believers - the Moscow Old Believer Printing House and the L.M. Orlov-Zhitkov and D.L. Kuchkin Printing Establishment. The Moscow Old Believer Printing House was organized by L.M. Orlov-Zhitkov and L.A. Malekhonov, possibly with the financial support of N.A. Bugrov, one of the richest Volga merchants, patron of the Beglopopovtsy Old Believers. The organizers of the printing house were prominent figures in their denomination. Orlov-Zhitkov wrote a genealogy of the Beglopopovtsy denomination, outlining its history from the end of the 17th to the beginning of the 20th century. Particular attention was focused on personalities of the 19 th century, the narrative about them was accompanied by photographs. In writing the essay, the author relied on materials from his library, with more than 1,200 books. L.A. Malekhonov was an influential figure in the Nikolo-Rogozhsky community of the Beglopopovtsy Old Believers in Moscow. He was the treasurer of the community. In 1911, Orlov-Zhitkov and Malekhonov stopped collaborating. The Moscow Old Believer Printing House continued its activities under the leadership of Malekhonov, and Orlov-Zhitkov found another partner, D.L. Kuchkin, with whom he organized a new printing house. The Moscow Old Believer Printing House operated from 1908 to 1917 and published several hundred editions during this time. This is evidenced by the trade catalogs regularly published by it. There is little information about the printing house of Orlov-Zhitkov and Kuchkin. To date, six of its editions are known, published in 1912-1914. The difficulty in working with editions of both printing houses and in describing them when creating collection catalogs is that if there are no title pages or sheets with imprint data in the copies, it is almost impossible to distinguish them. They printed books in the same font; some editions of both printing houses are well-illustrated; many of their cliches copy the decor of an illegal printing house of the second half of the 19th century (from the late 1850s to 1894), which belonged to the Fedoseevtsy brothers Alexei and Andrei Petrovich Ovchinnikov. Therefore, only a careful comprehensive analysis of editions, taking into account the features of decor, fonts, and the history of printing houses, will allow their correct attribution. For example, the author of the article identified a complex of original initials, which is typical only for the L.M. Orlov-Zhitkov and D.L. Kuchkin Printing Establishment. The author declares no conflicts of interests.

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