This controversial and groundbreaking book revisits the origins of one of the most beloved works of East Slavic literature, the Slovo o polku Igoreve (the Igor' Tale). Keenan delves into the history of the publication of the Tale and produces a meticulous analysis of its language in order to demonstrate that the text is not an authentic twelfth-century document. Rather, Keenan argues that it is a product of the late eighteenth century, created by the Bohemian scholar Josef Dobrovsky'. Keenan's thought-provoking insights into the creation and publication of the Tale will spark scholarly debate for many years.

Edward L. Keenan is Andrew W. Mellon Professor of History and Director, Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Harvard University.

Read More by Edward L. Keenan:

• The Kurbskii-Groznyi Apocrypha: the 17th-Century Genesis of the "Correspondence" Attributed to Prince A. M. Kurbskii and Tsar Ivan IV
• Cultures and Nations of Central and Eastern Europe: Essays in Honor of Roman Szporluk