Slozka, Mykhailo

Slozka, Mykhailo [Сльозка, Михайло; Sl'ozka, Myxajlo (Sliozka)], b ? in Belarus, d 2 August 1667 in Lviv. Printer and bookseller. He worked at (1633) and directed (1634–7, 1643–51) the Lviv Dormition Brotherhood Press. From 1638 he also ran his own printing press in Lviv. Slozka printed over 50 books in Church Slavonic, Latin, and Polish. Among his most important publications were the Apostolos (1639), with illustrations by the renowned engraver Master Illia; Ioanikii Galiatovsky’s Kliuch razumieniia (The Key of Understanding, 1659) and Nebo novoie (The New Heaven, 1665); Latin works by Szymon Okolski; and Teofan Prokopovych’s panygeric in honor of Bishop Arsenii Zhelyborsky. Slozka often clashed with the Lviv Dormition Brotherhood, who tried to maintain their publishing monopoly; in the prefaces to some of his publications he defended his independence as a publisher. In 1646 Metropolitan Petro Mohyla forbade him to print church books, but Slozka disregarded the ban and was anathematized by Mohyla. Only 14 days after Slozka’s death was the anathema lifted and his burial allowed.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 4 (1993).]