Kodeks Supraski i jego odkrywca – ks. Michał Bobrowski (1784–1848)

Father Michał Bobrowski (1784–1848) was a 19th-century Slavist and scholar, researcher of Slavic languages, including Old Church Slavonic, and the earliest written preserved texts in Glagolitic and Cyrillic scripts. In the history of Slavic studies, however, he is best known as the discoverer of the Codex Suprasliensis (1823), one of the oldest preserved writings of Cyrillic script. Bobrowski’s interest in paleoslavistics was focused on three main periods, two of which were associated with Vilnius – the early period of scholarly work in Vilnius before his five-year scholarship abroad (until 1817) and his work after returning home (from 1822). A very important middle period (1817–1822), namely his time abroad, where Bobrowski not only had the opportunity to work on many manuscripts in the Vatican Library and other libraries as well but also established direct contacts with many specialists in the field. During his stay abroad, Bobrowski mastered many Slavic languages, studied individual Slavic dialects, and, importantly, was highly regarded by his contemporaries as a “distinguished expert in Slavic studies and languages.” One of Bobrowski’s goals during his travels abroad was to collect Slavic manuscripts, which he either bought when possible or “copied precisely.” In the Vatican Library, he worked at the request of the library’s prefect, the renowned Orientalist Angelo Mai. He cataloged all Slavic manuscripts, and this catalog and description both were later published in the library’s volume V: “Nova Collectio Veterum Patrum” [titled: Codices Slavici Bibliothecae Vaticanae]. Information on certain Slavic manuscripts in the Vatican Library’s catalogs still credits Bobrowski as the first person to draw attention to these relics. He was a very interesting figure, a scholar who contributed significantly to global Slavic studies and paleoslavistics. In academic works from that period, Bobrowski is often referred to as: “Polacco-russe Bobrovski de Vilna,” “Belarusian Slavic scholar and Orientalist,” “Polish scholar,” or most frequently, as “Professor from Vilnius”. In Poland, he was long forgotten or even unknown until the famous work by A. Kaszlej on the Codex Suprasliensis, in which M. Bobrowski finally received the deserved recognition.