KRIZANIC, JURAJ (CRISANEO). — Croatian missionary and man of letters, b. at Obrh in 1618. Enthused by the idea of uniting all schismatic Slavs around Catholicism, he first studied theology at Bologna and Rome, then went alone to Russia, where, after some initial success, he was eventually exiled to Siberia. There he wrote his most demanding works, in which he advocated not only the religious unity of the Slavs but also their linguistic and political unity; in a grammatical work he laid the groundwork for a Slavic interlanguage. Having managed to escape from Russia, he died beneath the walls of Vicenza in 1683, fighting against the Turks in the Polish ranks led by Sobieski.
The few tranquil and serene moments of his life belong to the period of his stay in Bologna and Rome. His guiding principle can be summarized thus: the Slavs with Moscow, Moscow and the Slavs with Rome; that all Slavs should thus be one with Muscovy, but have Rome as their sole religious center. This was the stance of a fervent Catholic and ardent Pan-Slavist. He saw the Turks and the Germans as the enemies of the Slavic race. The political discord between Russia and Poland he deplored with arguments that curiously foreshadow ideas and tendencies of the 19th century. To him, schism appeared as the exclusive work of the Greeks, who had risen in pride against Rome; the Slavic peoples, still naive, had been deceived by the Greeks. The Slavs, in any case, were not conscious schismatics. Given Russia’s particular structure, K. maintained, it was necessary to win the Tsar to the Catholic cause, to make him understand that among the Slavs he was the greatest and that it fell to him to free Europe from the looming threat of the Crescent. K.’s Christian and Pan-Slavic ideal bore no practical fruit, but the 19th century reworked many of his ideas. In Russia, Vladimir Solov’ev (Solov’ëv) may in a sense be considered his spiritual heir. Among K.’s writings to be noted are the treatise *Politika* and the grammar *Gramatiko iskazanje ob ruskom jeziku*.