The author of the birch bark letter wished the addressee to “hang himself”: this year archaeologists found such a letter in Veliky Novgorod
Russian scientists spoke about the first results of a study of birch bark documents found during the current field season in the Novgorod region. Most of the artifacts from this excavation date from the 12th century.
One of the unusual letters consists only of an address formula and a wish – in the letter, a certain Prokosha wrote “getting satisfied” in a letter to Nechai. Perhaps this is a threat, although it is possible that this could be some kind of joke.
Analysis of these texts revealed Slavic names that had never previously been found in birch bark documents: Zhidil, Kvas, Bratogost, Sinitsa and Pribysh. The researchers also found references to the so-called “water test”: when a person was tied up and thrown into water. According to the letter, a certain Dedoslav was threatened with execution.
You can also mention the whole letter No. 1211, in which, on the contrary, the scribe named Roshka turned out to be a very kind person and in his letter he accompanied the request to Stepan with several polite phrases.
