The Department of Old Slavic Literatures represents the Moscow School of Medieval Studies, which aims the scientific interpretation of Old Russian and Old Slavonic texts, the creation of a methodology of scientific evidence, the clarification of the history of literary and poetic creation. The study of medieval texts by Moscow researchers is based on a triad: textology - poetics - hermeneutics (that is, interpretation and explanation based on a multitude of facts).

Scientific and methodological base

• Poetics, stylistics, aesthetics of Old Russian literature as a continuation and development of the traditions established by academicians F.I. Buslaev, A.S. Orlov, D.S. Likhachev;
• The School of N.K. Gudziy, V.D. Kuzmina: the history of social thought and the psychology of the literary creativity of the scribes of Old Russia;
• Textology and comparative studies: comparison of Old Russian texts with medieval Slavic and Western European texts;
• Source study.

Presently, the Department conducts comprehensive studies of Old Russian texts of various genres and eras, from liturgical texts of the most ancient period to Russian translated literature (and even foreign literature on Russian realities) of the turn of the 17^th – 18^th centuries.