Band of thieves who stole 1574 Apostol arrested in Kiev

Moscow, April 26, 2017

Photo: Pravoslavie.ru

Last May, a copy of Ukraine’s oldest printed version of Ivan Fedorov’s Apostol, printed in Lviv in 1574, was stolen from the Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine, located in Kiev. Yesterday, Kiev’s criminal investigation department detained members of a criminal group responsible for the theft, a police source reported to 112.ua.

“Right now employees of the criminal investigation department are arresting members of the criminal gang who stole the 1574 Apostol from the Vernadsky Library in a restaurant on Saksagansk Street. The book is currently being stored,” the source reported.

The criminals wanted to sell the book for $150,000, but settled on $100,000. The sale was underway in the restaurant when the criminals were detained.

According to Vernadsky Librayr staff, a man came to them, calling himself a representative of a supervisory body, and provided copies of documents for verifying the books preserved in the library. He then gave a list of books he wanted to check, and requested a separate room to work quietly in. He left the room several times throughout the day, leaving his things behind, and at the end of the day he left and did not return. When library staff began to check the list of books given to him, they discovered that the 1574 Apostol was missing.

The large format Lviv Apostol had a print run of 1000-1200 copies; presently there are 120 known surviving copies. The Vernadsky National Library preserves five copies, although all are incomplete. Additionally, copies of the book are to be found in the archives of Lviv, Kharkiv, and Dnipropetrovsk, as well as in other countries including Russia, Belarus, Poland, Bulgaria, and America.

Ivan Fedorov, born in the Grand Duchy of Moscow in 1525, is considered one of the fathers of Eastern Slavonic printing.