UPDATES TO THE BIOGRAPHY OF APOS-TOLOS TSIGARAS
Apostolos Tsigaras (+ 1637), a native of Ioannina, is not included in the galaxy of prominent representatives of the Greek people in the era of the Turkish rule. Not being a statesman or church leader, a big businessman or a military man, he lived his life as a political emigre in exile, engaging in trade. Nevertheless, despite the minority position among the educated Greeks of the diaspora, he was destined to play a significant role in the enlightenment of his compatriots, as well as in the process of establishing ties between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Philadelphia Metropolitanate of the Patriarchate of Constantinople. The article examines the connections of the Apostolos with Russia and the Russian Church. In addition to the already known facts, new unexplored data are presented. Tsigaras played an important role - he introduced the Russian Church to its defender in far-off Europe, the Metropolitan Gabriel Severos of Philadelphia. After that, the Metropolitan was honored with the attention of the Moscow Patriarch Job. As an editor and co-author he made the Chronicle of Pseudo-Dorotheus - the history of the Greeks in the Byzantine and post-Byzantine periods, which, inter alia, tells about the founding of the patriarchate of the Russian Church - available to the general reader in Europe. The paper specifically focuses on his role in the publication of the Chronicle. The testament of Apostolos Tsigaras, which has not been published in Russian before, is presented in the appendix to the article.