Diarium of Bishop Maximilian Ryllo

The proposed article publishes a small fragment from the six-volume Diarium of the Uniate hierarch Maximilian Ryllo (c. 1715–1793). The text was transcribed from a preserved Latin manuscript and translated into Ukrainian. In the introductory note to the publication of the document, brief information is provided about the life and activities of the author, who was initially a Basilian monk and later became the Bishop of Chełm and Przemyśl, within the socio-religious context of the second half of the 18th century.Thanks to the preserved Diarium, we learn many interesting factual details that the author carefully collected, recorded, and supplemented with his own commentary. He also documented copies of various letters from his extensive epistolary legacy. For the first time, we can trace in considerable detail the process of formation of a young Uniate priest, beginning immediately after his return from studies in Rome and his gradual ascent along the winding steps of his ecclesiastical career, which he had to navigate while performing extraordinary tasks.From Ryllo’s Diarium, we discover numerous previously unknown aspects of the activities of the Basilian Order as a whole, as well as personal characteristics of many monks residing in the monasteries of the vast Kyiv Uniate Metropolitanate. Particularly valuable are the details concerning Uniate bishops and metropolitans, with most of whom Ryllo closely collaborated or corresponded on important matters. The document occasionally mentions contacts between Uniate clergy and Roman Catholic bishops or monastic orders. Interestingly, these references usually do not concern any polemics, misunderstandings, or conflicts, as might be expected. On the contrary, some of them attest to examples of cooperation and even friendly relations.By introducing the texts of Maximilian Ryllo’s Diarium into more active academic circulation, the authors of the publication aim to encourage scholars to study the activities of this bishop, as well as to more actively turn to personal diaries of clergy as extraordinarily rich sources for the history of the Church.