Działalność piśmiennicza monasterów prawosławnych w Wielkim Księstwie Litewskim w XVI wieku
ENIn the Great Duchy of Lithuania and Ruthenian territories of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, monasteries were the main owners of book collections. The most frequently mentioned monastic libraries in the Great Duchy of Lithuania are those in the following monasteries: the monastery of the Annunciation of the Mother of God in Supraśl (this collection was significantly enriched under the Archimandrite Sergei Kimbara), the monastery of the Divine Trinity in Vilna, the monastery of the Divine Trinity in Slutsk, the monastery of the Dormition of the Mother of God in Żyrowice, the Leszcz monastery near Pinsk and the Lauryshava Monastery. The Polotsk library of the St. Sophia Cathedral was also connected with the monastic tradition. The writing, and later also the publishing activities of the Orthodox Church in the 16th century concentrated on liturgical books, which were indispensible for conducting religious services, as well as on homiletics, hagiography and various editions of the Holy Bible. In the second half of the 16th century works of a polemic nature became popular; this was connected not only with the development of the religious situation in the Great Duchy of Lithuania in that period, but also with the general cultural situation there.
