Basil Lourié St Petersburg SLAVONIC TEXTS OF HARD FATE: THE PROPHECY OF SOLOMON AND SOME OTHERS Toward a recent book: . . , ( - XI–XV ). 2- , - ( .: - « », 2008) ( - « »). 494 ., 8 . ISBN 978-5–91476-007-3. Ye. G. Vo olazkin, World History in the Literature of Old Rus’ (according to the data of the Chronographs and Palaeas of the 11 th –15 th centuries). 2 nd edition, reworked and augmented (St Petersburg: “Pushkinsky Dom”, 2008) (Series “Library of Pushkinsky Dom”). 494 p., 8 colour ill., German Zusammenfassung, p. 468–472. The author presents an improved and enlarged edition of his monograph, first appearing in 2000 in Munich under the same title, also in Russian (in the series “Sagners Slavistische Sammlung”, Bd. 26). Despite the fact that it is focused on the problems of Russian me- dieval historical monuments, about half of the book is interesting in the larger context of the Christian Orient and the early Christian and Jewish pre-Rabbinical traditions. The author, in collaboration with Tatiana Rudi, provides the first critical edition of the so-called Prophecy of Solomon (previously widely known under the title Slovesa svjatyx prorok “Words of Holy Prophets”), and this fact alone is enough to make his book worthy of the a ention of anybody interested in Jewish and Christian pseudepigrapha. This is not the only interesting part of the monograph, though. The two first chapters of the book (Introduction, p. 9–38, and “Historiography as Theology”, p. 39–159), as well as the fourth (“Chronicle of Georges Hamartolos, the main source of Russian Chronography”, p. 209–236) are deeply immersed in the centuries-