Catholic monk

Taras Shevchenko. Catholic monk. Illustration to the story "Willpower. Memoirs of traveler" by N.I. Nadezhdin
[1839, no later than February 12. St. Petersburg].
Published from engravings on steel 11,8 × 8,8 (22,7 × 15,7) cm, placed in the second volume of collection "One hundred Russians writers"
[Nadezhdin N. Willpower. Memoirs of traveler // One hundred Russians writers. – SPb., 1841. – T. 2. – Between the p. 398 – 399].

Figure illustrates the text works on pages 421 – 423, which describes the appearance of the main character:

At the entrance on the edge of the bench sat the monk across the picturesque garb minorit's poverty, as they are called in Italy. He was dressed in gray cassock girded with a thick knotted rope. Hard tied to barefoot sandals foot narrow straps that red scar cut in feet, choppy from the sun. Monk hood was abandoned by the shoulders, so his whole head was out, it shine with bronze shimmer, created by non-European sky […] he still looked at the waves that rolled near his feet.

In February 1839 illustrations for second volume of the collection have already been made by the authors and were engraved in London. Publisher A.F. Smirdin in the preface to the first volume (12 February 1839) wrote: "The first volume is now before the public, for the second article received, waiting for prints from London" (p. VI). This allows to date Shevchenko's work no later than February 12, 1839, when the prints were made [Sudak V.O. Pages of T.H. Shevchenko illustration creativity // Folk art and ethnography. – 1989. – № 1. – S. 5].

There is an unjustified assumption that the artwork was engraved by Shevchenko himself in St. Petersburg [Gasko M. In the circle of Gogol and Shevchenko's friends. – K., 1980. – S. 244, 252].

For the first time a work unnamed mentioned in review, published in 1841 [Art newspaper. – 1841. – № 13. – S. 7 – 8]

Mentioned the names: "Capuchin monk" [Shyrotsky K. Shevchenko as an illustrator // Shevchenko collection. – SPb., 1914. – T. 1. – S. 94 – 96], "Monk-minorit" [D. Antonovich Shevchenko as a painter // Full publication of Taras Shevchenko. – Warsaw, Lvov, 1937. – T. 12. – S. 108 – 110].

V.O. Sudak

After publication: T.H. Shevchenko Complete Works in 12 volumes. – K.: Naukova Dumka, 2003, v. 7, p. 104 – 105 (image), p. 392 (notes).