of the rather complex genre idiomelon. The Kievan Rus' and the earliest manuscripts of the cathedral rite The background of Antonin's interest in celebrations at the Hagia Sophia of Constantinople, as they had been documented by his description of the ceremony around Christmas and Theophany in 1200, were diplomatic exchanges between Novgorod and Constantinople. Reception of the cathedral rite In the Primary Chronicle (Повѣсть времѧньныхъ лѣтъ "tale of passed years") it is reported, how a legacy of the Rus' was received in Constantinople and how they did talk about their experience in presence of Vladimir the Great in 987, before the Grand Prince Vladimir decided about the Christianization of the Kievan Rus' (Laurentian Codex written at Nizhny Novgorod in 1377): There was obviously also an interest in the representative aspect of those ceremonies at the Hagia Sophia of Constantinople. Today, it is still documented by seven Slavic kondakar's: Tipografsky Ustav: Moscow, State Tretyakov Gallery, Ms. K-5349 (about 1100) Two fragments of a kondakar' (one kondak with notation): Moscow, Russian State Library (RGB), Fond 205 Ms. 107 (12th century) Troitsky-Lavrsky Kondakar': Moscow, Russian State Library (RGB), Fond 304 Ms. 23 (about 1200) Blagoveščensky Kondakar': Saint Petersburg, National Library of Russia (RNB), Ms. Q.п.I.32 (about 1200) Uspensky Kondakar': Moscow, State Historical Museum (GIM), Ms. Usp. 9-п (1207, probably for the Uspensky Sobor) Sinodal'ny Kondakar': Moscow, State Historical Museum (GIM), Ms. Sin. 777 (early 13th century) South-Slavic kondakar' without notation: Moscow, State Historical Museum (GIM), part of the Book of Prologue at the Chludov collection (14th century) Six of them had been written in scriptoria of Kievan Rus' during the 12th and the 13th centuries, while there is one later kondakar' without notation which was written in the Balkans during the 14th century. The aesthetic of the calligraphy and the notation has so developed over a span of 100 years that it must be regarded as a local tradition, but also one which provided us with the earliest evidence of the cheironomic signs which had only survived in one later Greek manuscript. In 1147, the chronicler Eude de Deuil described during a visit of the Frankish King Louis VII the cheironomia, but also the presence of eunuchs during the cathedral rite. With respect to the custom of the Missa greca (for the patron of the Royal Abbey of Saint Denis), he reported that the Byzantine emperor sent his clerics to celebrate the divine