introduction (references to the past, historical background) “lament” (gathering of the hosts, 1st battle and the defeat, wives lamenting their fallen husbands) “praise” (second battle and praise to the princes) Contents and message Zadonshchina presents a detailed description of the Battle of Kulikovo against the Tatars led by Mamai. The leader of the Muscovy hosts was prince Dmitry Ivanovich (entered in history as Dmitry Donskoy, Дмитрий Донской). The story propagates the importance of the unification of Russian principalities in order to defeat the common enemy – the Golden Horde. This epic also reflects the rise of the Moscow principality and stresses that the Muscovy princes were successors to the Kievan princes. Zadonshchina and The Tale of Igor's Campaign A French Slavist André Mazon and later a Soviet/Russian historian A. A. Zimin proposed that, The Tale of Igor's Campaign was written based on poetic images and ideas from Zadonshchina. They proposed that The Tale of Igor's Campaign was not an Old Russian text, but an 18th-century forgery. Indeed, the view of the Igor' Tale as a late forgery certainly implies that it is imitation of Zadonshchina, as the two texts are undoubtedly related. This approach is criticized by linguists, notably Roman Jakobson and Andrey Zaliznyak who show that the language of the Igor's Tale is far more archaic, and that the passages in Zadonshchina allegedly borrowed from the Tale differ from the rest of the work by linguistic criteria (whereas in the Tale no such distinction can be drawn). Translation The English translation can be found in Medieval Russia's Epics, Chronicles and Tales by S. Zenskovsky (New York: Meridian, 1974). Other sources on the Battle of Kulikovo 1. Chronicles (Simeonovskaya, Novgorodskaya, Sofiyskaya) 2. The Word of Mamay's Defeat (Russian: Сказание о Мамаевом побоище, Skazaniie o Mamaevom poboishche) 3. The Word on the Life and Death of Dmitry Ivanovich (Слово о житии и преставлении Дмитрия Ивановича, Slovo o zhitii i o prestavlenii Dmitriia Ivanovicha) References External links Zadonshchina in contemporary Russian translation Zadonshchina in Old Russian East Slavic literature Medieval literature 14th-century books Epic poems East Slavic manuscripts Cyrillic manuscripts