Repertoire and functions of prayer chanting books in liturgical practice of Old Believers Stranniki direction

In the present article one of possible aspects of studying of liturgical practice of modern Siberian Old Belief - chanting books and forms of their functioning in church service - is considered. The tradition of Old Believers of the Stranniki direction living in the territory of the Kemerovo region is chosen as the object of the analysis. This tradition draws attention because of high level of liturgical chanting culture, and also preservation of the most archaic forms of the Old Russian cult monodiya. The printing editions of the chanting books which have been carried out in the beginning of the XX century in Old Believers' printing house of the Preobrazhenskiy Almshouse served as the material for research. These editions are kept in communal library. Stranniki prefer them to hand-written chanting codes. Old Believers' printing editions of chanting books have not become earlier object of independent research. In the community studied by us three printing chanting books are used: "Irmosa", "Oktay", "Obikhod". They give rather fair idea of publishing tradition of Old Believers of the bespopovtsian direction formed at the beginning of the XX century. Its distinctive features become apparent both at substantial level, and in nature of book design. The analysis of editions allowed to come to the conclusion on orientation of these books to monastic practice before Raskol, probably, connected with traditions of the Solovetsky monastery which was the most authoritative spiritual center for bespopovtsian. Among analyzed books the greatest interest "Obikhod". This book should be considered as encyclopedia of chanting genres and styles, reflecting the melodic wealth which has been saved up by Russian medieval singing culture to the middle of the XVII century. Nevertheless, the volume of the chants, containing in three above-named books, doesn't settle all chanting repertoire of Old Believers' church service. In this regard in the article the question of sufficiency of the specified number of books of znameny notation for high-grade service is considered. The analysis of distribution of forms of vocal execution concerning a range of the liturgical genres involved on church service allowed to establish that hymns of a znamenny chant containing in books make only insignificant part of texts executed on service. There are other forms of chanting occurring in oral tradition. Using these forms, Old Believers can reproduce these or those texts on liturgic books without notation which in this context assume functions of chanting miscellanies.

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