Sources for the study of the Russian emigration to Italy

Abstract

The article presents the currently important sources for studying Russian emigration to Italy after 1918. During the 1920s — 1930s and after the Second World War the most important funds of documents were being formed in Italy and in Russia as well. These funds include not only the correspondence between emigrants or their private documents, but the materials about emigrants’ social and economic standing abroad. It is important to determine what funds and documents in Italian and Russian archives contain nowadays necessary and unpublished information for the future study of Russian emigrants’ history in Italy. Through the example of three large archives — Central State Archive of Rome, Roman Archive of Vyacheslav Ivanov, State Archive of Russian Federation — are chosen the archival documents. Its analysis is currently central for the future studying of the theme. The Central State Archive of Rome stores the materials about cultural contacts of the URSS and Italy in the mid-1930s, in particular, about the XIII International Congress of Architects in Rome. Roman Archive of Vyacheslav Ivanov has a significant amount of correspondence of one of the most important representatives of Russian emigration to Italy. On the basis of these documents we can select the circle of the main Ivanov’s correspondents, as well as the themes of the key figures’ of Russian culture in exile correspondence. From the materials of the State Archive of the Russian Federation it is important to analyze the documents from the fund of the historian E. F. Shmurlo, especially his social activity in Rome (in particular, the fate of “Russian academic group” in Rome). In addition, the archive contains documents describing the attempts of Russian immigrants to unite under the social and public organizations in Italy, to be absorbed in the Italian socio-cultural context. In general, the further analysis of the documentation of the Russian and Italian archives is necessary for the study of cultural transfer between the USSR and Italy, one of the most important trends of the modern study of the topic. Refs 16.