# Visual Materials Catalogue — В чём моя вера? (What I Believe, 1882–1884)

Sweep date: 2026-06-06  
Intensity: MEDIUM  
Channels consulted: Wikimedia Commons API (gsrsearch), Commons category pages, archive.org IIIF, Google Books thumbnail API, imwerden.de (no matching item found), tolstoy-iss.kamiscloud.ru (404 on search endpoint), tolstoy.ru (text only, no visual assets), gallica.bnf.fr (no scanned Ma religion first edition located).

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## TARGET 1 — Tolstoy ~1883–1884 (author-portrait, composition window)

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### VIS-001 · KEYSTONE AUTHOR PORTRAIT

- **id**: VIS-001
- **type**: portrait (painting)
- **subject**: Leo Tolstoy writing at a desk
- **relatedEntity**: Nikolai Ge (artist); Leo Tolstoy (subject)
- **holding**: State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
- **archiveId**: File:Nikolay_Ge_-_Léon_Tolstoï._1884.jpg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (artist died 1894; published before 1931)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/Nikolay_Ge_-_L%C3%A9on_Tolsto%C3%AF._1884.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/commons-ge-tolstoy-writing-1884.jpg
- **note**: Painted by Nikolai Ge in 1884, the same year В чём моя вера? was suppressed by censors. Shows Tolstoy at work, likely at Yasnaya Polyana. Exact composition window match. 1184×1107 px, 325 KB. This is the keystone author-image for the work.

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### VIS-002 · TOLSTOY PHOTOGRAPH c.1880–1886

- **id**: VIS-002
- **type**: photograph
- **subject**: Leo Tolstoy, half-length portrait
- **relatedEntity**: Sass studio, Moscow (photographer); Library of Congress (holding)
- **holding**: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division (digital ID cph.3c28302)
- **archiveId**: File:Leo_Tolstoy,_portrait.jpg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (Creative Commons Public Domain Mark 1.0)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a3/Leo_Tolstoy%2C_portrait.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/commons-tolstoy-portrait-sass-1880-1886.jpg
- **note**: Dated "between 1880 and 1886" by Library of Congress. High-resolution scan (2467×3362 px, 803 KB). Falls squarely within the composition window of В чём моя вера?. Preferred for high-res reproduction.

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### VIS-003 · TOLSTOY PHOTOGRAPH 1885 (Scherer & Nabholz)

- **id**: VIS-003
- **type**: photograph (cropped)
- **subject**: Leo Tolstoy, arms crossed, full beard
- **relatedEntity**: Шерер, Набгольц и Кº studio, Moscow (photographer)
- **holding**: Wikimedia Commons (sourced from Russian digital collections)
- **archiveId**: File:Лев_Толстой_(Шерер_и_Набгольц,_1885)_(cropped).jpg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (published before 1931)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/%D0%9B%D0%B5%D0%B2_%D0%A2%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%B9_%28%D0%A8%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%80_%D0%B8_%D0%9D%D0%B0%D0%B1%D0%B3%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%8C%D1%86%2C_1885%29_%28cropped%29.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/commons-tolstoy-scherer-nabholz-1885.jpg
- **note**: 296×394 px cropped version. Dated 1885, one year after В чём моя вера? was suppressed. Same studio that photographed Tolstoy repeatedly in the 1880s–1900s. Low resolution — adequate for identification, not for large-format reproduction.

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### VIS-004 · REPIN PORTRAIT 1887 (just outside window — noted for context)

- **id**: VIS-004
- **type**: portrait (painting)
- **subject**: Leo Tolstoy, seated, three-quarter view
- **relatedEntity**: Ilya Repin (artist); State Tretyakov Gallery (holding)
- **holding**: State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
- **archiveId**: File:Ilya_Efimovich_Repin_(1844-1930)_-_Portrait_of_Leo_Tolstoy_(1887).jpg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (artist died 1930; published before 1931 — PD in US; PD in Russia)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/Ilya_Efimovich_Repin_%281844-1930%29_-_Portrait_of_Leo_Tolstoy_%281887%29.jpg
- **localPath**: — (not downloaded; just outside the 1882–1884 composition window)
- **note**: 1887, three years after the text was complete. Not downloaded — included here as the closest major Repin portrait to the composition window. Repin's first Yasnaya Polyana visit was in 1887. Use with explicit dating caveat.

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## TARGET 2 — The work-object (title pages / edition covers)

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### VIS-005 · 1884 MOSCOW FIRST (SUPPRESSED) EDITION

- **id**: VIS-005
- **type**: title-page (not located as scan)
- **subject**: В чём моя вера?, Moscow, January 22 1884, first printing — 50 copies at 25 rubles
- **relatedEntity**: Imperial censorship authority (suppressor)
- **holding**: State Museum of L. N. Tolstoy, Moscow (holds a photocopy of the first printed edition per published sources)
- **archiveId**: — (no publicly accessible scan found)
- **access**: physical only (museum copy); no open digital scan located in this sweep
- **rights**: PD
- **licence**: unknown (scan not found)
- **usable**: not yet
- **url**: —
- **localPath**: —
- **note**: The 1884 Moscow edition was the first typeset printing; censors impounded the run but paradoxically distributed all 50 copies in response to individual requests from ministers and court figures. The State Tolstoy Museum in Moscow holds a photocopy. Not yet digitized openly. To obtain: contact ГМТ (gmt.tolstoy.ru) or tolstoy-iss.kamiscloud.ru directly.

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### VIS-006 · 1885 LONDON FIRST ENGLISH EDITION (E. Stock) — COVER

- **id**: VIS-006
- **type**: title-page (scan)
- **subject**: *What I Believe* (also issued as *My Religion*), trans. Constantine Popoff, E. Stock, London, 1885
- **relatedEntity**: E. Stock (publisher); Constantine Popoff (translator)
- **holding**: Internet Archive (digitized from University of Toronto library copy)
- **archiveId**: archive.org identifier: whatibelieve00tolsuoft
- **access**: open (archive.org, public domain)
- **rights**: PD (published 1885, US copyright expired)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://iiif.archive.org/iiif/whatibelieve00tolsuoft%240001/full/600,/0/default.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/emigre-what-i-believe-1885-london-stock-p0001.jpg
- **note**: p0001 is the front cover/binding scan (600×955 px, 82 KB). p0003 (title page proper) also downloaded. This is the first English edition; published the year after censorship in Russia. The translation was made from the French *Ma religion* (Ourousov), not directly from the Russian.

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### VIS-007 · 1885 LONDON FIRST ENGLISH EDITION — TITLE PAGE (p0003)

- **id**: VIS-007
- **type**: title-page (scan)
- **subject**: *What I Believe* title page, E. Stock, London, 1885
- **relatedEntity**: E. Stock (publisher); Constantine Popoff (translator)
- **holding**: Internet Archive (digitized from University of Toronto library copy)
- **archiveId**: archive.org identifier: whatibelieve00tolsuoft, page 3
- **access**: open (archive.org, public domain)
- **rights**: PD
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://iiif.archive.org/iiif/whatibelieve00tolsuoft%240003/full/600,/0/default.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/emigre-what-i-believe-1885-london-stock-p0003-titlepage.jpg
- **note**: 600×982 px, 46 KB. Interior title page showing full bibliographic details of the 1885 E. Stock London edition. Dedup note: VIS-006 and VIS-007 are from the same scan set (whatibelieve00tolsuoft); cover and title page respectively.

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### VIS-008 · 1885 NEW YORK FIRST AMERICAN EDITION (T.Y. Crowell) — COVER

- **id**: VIS-008
- **type**: title-page (scan)
- **subject**: *My Religion*, trans. Huntington Smith, T.Y. Crowell & Co., New York, 1885, xii+274 pp.
- **relatedEntity**: T.Y. Crowell & Co. (publisher); Huntington Smith (translator)
- **holding**: Internet Archive / Library of Congress (digitized 2011)
- **archiveId**: archive.org identifier: myreligion01tols
- **access**: open (archive.org, public domain)
- **rights**: PD
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://iiif.archive.org/iiif/myreligion01tols%240001/full/600,/0/default.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/emigre-my-religion-1885-ny-crowell-p0001.jpg
- **note**: 601×1009 px, 65 KB. Front cover of the first American edition, published the same year as the London Stock edition. Both appeared in 1885 — the first year the work was available in English.

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### VIS-009 · 1885 NEW YORK EDITION — TITLE PAGE (p0003)

- **id**: VIS-009
- **type**: title-page (scan)
- **subject**: *My Religion* title page, T.Y. Crowell & Co., New York, 1885
- **relatedEntity**: T.Y. Crowell & Co. (publisher); Huntington Smith (translator)
- **holding**: Internet Archive / Library of Congress
- **archiveId**: archive.org identifier: myreligion01tols, page 3
- **access**: open (archive.org, public domain)
- **rights**: PD
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://iiif.archive.org/iiif/myreligion01tols%240003/full/600,/0/default.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/emigre-my-religion-1885-ny-crowell-p0003.jpg
- **note**: 600×1047 px, 79 KB. Interior title page. Dedup note: VIS-008 and VIS-009 are from the same scan set.

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### VIS-010 · 1885 PARIS FRENCH FIRST EDITION (Fischbacher) — COVER

- **id**: VIS-010
- **type**: title-page (cover scan)
- **subject**: *Ma religion*, trans. Prince L.D. Ourousov, Librairie Fischbacher, Paris, 1885, 33 rue de Seine, 266 pp.
- **relatedEntity**: Librairie Fischbacher (publisher); L.D. Ourousov (translator)
- **holding**: Google Books (source copy unspecified)
- **archiveId**: Google Books ID: KcUnAAAAYAAJ
- **access**: open (Google Books, public domain book)
- **rights**: PD (published 1885)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes (Google Books thumbnail is freely accessible; no full-scan download)
- **url**: https://books.google.com/books/content?id=KcUnAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&img=1&zoom=3&edge=curl
- **localPath**: visuals/emigre-ma-religion-1885-paris-fischbacher-cover.png
- **note**: 575×886 px PNG, 873 KB. The French translation by Ourousov was the first publication of this work in any language accessible outside Russia (Paris, 1885). The English translations by Popoff and Smith were both made from this French text, not from the Russian. This is therefore the editorial origin-point for Western reception of the work. Full-text also at fr.wikisource.org (Ma_religion_(Tolstoï,_trad._Ourousov)).

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### VIS-011 · GENEVA / ELPIDINE RUSSIAN EDITION — NOT YET LOCATED

- **id**: VIS-011
- **type**: title-page (not located as scan)
- **subject**: В чём моя вера?, Genève, M. K. Elpidine (publisher of Russian émigré texts). First undated Russian complete edition; second edition 1888; further editions 1892, 1900.
- **relatedEntity**: M.K. Elpidine (publisher, Geneva)
- **holding**: Unknown; possibly Bibliothèque de Genève, British Library, or rare-book collections
- **archiveId**: — (no open digital scan found)
- **access**: not yet digitized openly
- **rights**: PD
- **licence**: unknown (scan not found)
- **usable**: not yet
- **url**: —
- **localPath**: —
- **note**: This is the first *complete Russian-language* edition of В чём моя вера?. Elpidine published the first undated edition (c.1885–86), then the dated 1888 edition. Neither imwerden.de nor archive.org nor gallica.bnf.fr had a scan in this sweep. To locate: check Bibliothèque de Genève (BGE) digitized holdings, or vtoraya-literatura.com author page for Tolstoy, or the Hoover Institution (Stanford) Elpidine collection.

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## TARGET 3 — Manuscript facsimiles

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### VIS-012 · В ЧЁМ МОЯ ВЕРА? MANUSCRIPT — NOT YET LOCATED

- **id**: VIS-012
- **type**: manuscript-facsimile (not located)
- **subject**: Autograph manuscript(s) of В чём моя вера?, 1882–1884
- **relatedEntity**: Leo Tolstoy (author); РГАЛИ or ОР РГБ (probable holding institutions)
- **holding**: Отдел рукописей РГБ (Russian State Library manuscript dept) or РГАЛИ — standard repository for Tolstoy autographs
- **archiveId**: PSS Vol. 23 (text with variants, pp. 304–465) references manuscript sources; no facsimile images found in open access
- **access**: physical archives only; no open digital facsimile located
- **rights**: PD (manuscript pre-1900)
- **licence**: unknown
- **usable**: not yet
- **url**: —
- **localPath**: —
- **note**: Manuscript pages are described in PSS Vol. 23 commentary (pp. 548–560 in this dive's extract set). The work went through extensive revision documented in the variants section (pp. 512–512 in this dive's extracts). No publicly accessible facsimile images found. Tolstoy Museum digital catalogue (tolstoy-iss.kamiscloud.ru) returned 404 on search; recommend direct query to museum.

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## TARGET 4 — People around the work

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### VIS-013 · V.G. CHERTKOV — KRAMSKOY PORTRAIT 1881

- **id**: VIS-013
- **type**: portrait (painting)
- **subject**: Vladimir Grigorievich Chertkov (1854–1936), aged ~27
- **relatedEntity**: Ivan Kramskoi (artist, 1837–1887); State Tolstoy Museum, Moscow (holding)
- **holding**: Leo Tolstoy State Museum, Moscow
- **archiveId**: File:Chertkov_by_Kramskoy.jpg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (artist died 1887)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Chertkov_by_Kramskoy.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/commons-chertkov-kramskoy-1881.jpg
- **note**: Oil on canvas 82×64 cm, 1881. Chertkov met Tolstoy in autumn 1883 — the year В чём моя вера? was being written — and became his closest disciple and publisher. This portrait was painted two years before their meeting. 944×1366 px, 350 KB.

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### VIS-014 · N.N. STRAKHOV — PHOTOGRAPH 1885

- **id**: VIS-014
- **type**: photograph
- **subject**: Nikolai Nikolaevich Strakhov (1828–1896), philosopher and literary critic
- **relatedEntity**: Strakhov was a close correspondent of Tolstoy throughout the 1880s and engaged deeply with В чём моя вера?
- **holding**: Wikimedia Commons (source unspecified)
- **archiveId**: File:Nikolay_Strakhov.jpg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (published before 1931; subject died 1896)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Nikolay_Strakhov.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/commons-strakhov-portrait-1885.jpg
- **note**: Dated 1885 (the year the French translation appeared). 416×600 px, 15 KB — low resolution; adequate for identification. Strakhov was one of the main intellectual interlocutors for the ideas in В чём моя вера?.

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### VIS-015 · COUNTESS A.A. TOLSTAYA — PHOTOGRAPH c.1860s

- **id**: VIS-015
- **type**: photograph
- **subject**: Countess Alexandra Andreevna Tolstaya (1817–1904), great-aunt and lifelong correspondent of Leo Tolstoy
- **relatedEntity**: Leo Tolstoy (correspondent); court of Alexander II (her milieu)
- **holding**: Wikimedia Commons (digitized from Russian collection)
- **archiveId**: File:A.A.Tolstay.jpg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (Creative Commons Public Domain Mark 1.0; subject died 1904)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/A.A.Tolstay.jpg
- **localPath**: visuals/commons-tolstaya-alexandra-andreevna-1860s.jpg
- **note**: Portrait labelled "Графиня Александра Андреевна Толстая (1817–1904)", dated to the 1860s. She was an important epistolary interlocutor for Tolstoy's religious crisis; their correspondence became strained as his heterodox views deepened. 409×665 px, 73 KB.

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### VIS-016 · N.N. GE — SELF-PORTRAIT 1892

- **id**: VIS-016
- **type**: portrait (self-portrait painting)
- **subject**: Nikolai Nikolaevich Ge (1831–1894), painter, close friend of Tolstoy
- **relatedEntity**: Kyiv National Art Gallery (holding); Ge was among Tolstoy's inner circle during the 1880s and painted the keystone Tolstoy-writing portrait (VIS-001)
- **holding**: Kyiv National Art Gallery
- **archiveId**: File:Nikolay_Ge_selfportrait.jpeg
- **access**: open (Wikimedia Commons)
- **rights**: PD (PD-old-100-expired; artist died 1894)
- **licence**: PD
- **usable**: yes
- **url**: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/Nikolay_Ge_selfportrait.jpeg
- **localPath**: visuals/commons-ge-selfportrait-1892.jpg
- **note**: 1892 self-portrait, two years before Ge's death. Ge was deeply committed to Tolstoy's religious ideas and painted several works illustrating them. His 1884 portrait of Tolstoy (VIS-001) is the keystone image of this dive. 225 KB.

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## Dedup notes

- VIS-006 / VIS-007: same archive.org scan set (whatibelieve00tolsuoft); cover (p0001) and title page (p0003) treated as separate catalogue items because they serve different purposes.
- VIS-008 / VIS-009: same scan set (myreligion01tols); same rationale.
- VIS-001 (Ge 1884 Tolstoy portrait) and VIS-016 (Ge self-portrait 1892) are by the same artist; not duplicates — subject differs.

## Summary

| # | Type | Subject | Downloaded | Usable |
|---|------|---------|------------|--------|
| VIS-001 | portrait/painting | Tolstoy writing (Ge, 1884) — KEYSTONE | yes | yes |
| VIS-002 | photograph | Tolstoy (Sass, 1880–1886) | yes | yes |
| VIS-003 | photograph | Tolstoy (Scherer & Nabholz, 1885) | yes | yes |
| VIS-004 | portrait/painting | Tolstoy (Repin, 1887) — context only | no | yes |
| VIS-005 | title-page | 1884 Moscow suppressed edition | no | not yet |
| VIS-006 | title-page/cover | 1885 London E. Stock cover | yes | yes |
| VIS-007 | title-page | 1885 London E. Stock title page | yes | yes |
| VIS-008 | title-page/cover | 1885 NY Crowell cover | yes | yes |
| VIS-009 | title-page | 1885 NY Crowell title page | yes | yes |
| VIS-010 | title-page/cover | 1885 Paris Fischbacher (French) cover | yes | yes |
| VIS-011 | title-page | Geneva Elpidine Russian edition | no | not yet |
| VIS-012 | manuscript-facsimile | Autograph manuscript | no | not yet |
| VIS-013 | portrait/painting | Chertkov (Kramskoy, 1881) | yes | yes |
| VIS-014 | photograph | Strakhov (1885) | yes | yes |
| VIS-015 | photograph | Countess A.A. Tolstaya (1860s) | yes | yes |
| VIS-016 | portrait/painting | Ge self-portrait (1892) | yes | yes |

**Total catalogued: 16 items. Downloaded: 11 files (all PD). Not yet accessible: VIS-005 (1884 Moscow), VIS-011 (Geneva Elpidine), VIS-012 (manuscript).**