Item: i101363

 Authentic Coin of:

Belarus
120th Anniversary of Birth of Maxim Bagdanovich
2011 Proof Silver 10 Roubles 31mm (16.81 grams) 0.925 Silver (0.4999 oz. ASW)
Reference: KM# 349 | Engraver: S. Zaskevich 
РЭСПУБЛІКА БЕЛАРУСЬ 10 РУБЛЁЎ 2011, State Coat of Arms of the Republic of 
Belarus, on the right, ornamental pattern used in the illustrations to Maxim 
Bagdanovich’s book of poems.
М. БАГДАНОВІЧ 1891-1917, On the left – the relief portrait a classic of the 
Belarusian literature Maxim Bagdanovich,  the ornamental motif of 
cornflowers.

You are bidding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.

 
Maksim Adamavič Bahdanovič (Belarusian: Максім Адамавіч Багдановіч, IPA:  baɣdaˈnɔvʲit͡ɕ]; Russian: Максим Адамович Богданович, romanized: Maksim Adamovich Bogdanovich; 9 December 1891 – 25 May 1917) was a Belarusian poet, journalist, translator, literary critic and historian of literature. He is considered one of the founders of the modern Belarusian literature.

Bahdanovič was born in Minsk in the family of Adam Bahdanovič, an important Belarusian ethnographer, who through most of his career worked as a bank clerk. Maksim was born in a family apartment at Karakazov House located at Trinity Hill next to the First Parish School. His father was of unlanded peasantry family, while his mother (née Myakota) was of old Belarusian noble family of Kurcz coat of arms that was not adopted in the Russian Empire. Grandfather on his mother side, Apanas Janovich Myakota, was a Russian veteran of the Crimean War who for his military service received a lifelong nobility. Both of Maksim parents graduated pedagogical schools. Later father of Maksim, Adam, was involved with members of the revolutionary anti-tsarist Narodnaya Volya organization.

In 1892 the family moved to Hrodna where Maksim’s father received a job at local bank. Soon after the move the future poet’s mother, Maria, died of tuberculosis in 1896.

In 1896 Adam Bahdanovič moved with his children to Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. At that time Maksim wrote his first poems in the Belarusian language. In 1902 Bahdanovič attended a gymnasium. During the Revolution of 1905 he was an active participant of the strikes organised by his commilitodes.

In 1907 Nasha Niva came out with Bahdanovič’s first published work — the novel Muzyka.

In June 1908 the poet’s family moved to Yaroslavl’. After finishing school in 1911 Bahdanovič went to Belarus to meet important figures of the Belarusian Renaissance: Vaclau Lastouski, Ivan Luckievič and Anton Luckievich. In the same year he began studying of law at a Yaroslavl’ lyceum. During his studies Bahdanovič worked at a newspaper, wrote numerous works of literature and was actively published in both Belarus and Russia.

In the beginning of 1914 his only book of poems, Vianok (A Wreath), was published in Vilna (today Vilnius).

In the summer of 1916, after absolvation of the lyceum, Maksim Bahdanovič moved to Minsk and worked there at the local guberniya administration.

In February 1917 Bahdanovič went to Crimea to be treated for tuberculosis. The treatment was unsuccessful, and that year he died in Yalta.

The poet’s papers were kept at his father’s house, but the collection was heavily damaged during the Russian Civil War in 1918.

In 1991–1995 a full collection of Bahdanovich’s poetry was published in Belarus.

Nowadays there are museums of the poet open in Minsk (Maksim Bahdanovič Literary Museum), Hrodna and Yaroslavl’. Several streets in major cities of Belarus and Russia are named after him.

The operas Zorka Venera (by Jury Siemianiaka and Ales’ Bachyla), and Maksim (by Ihar Palivoda).

Bahdanovich created many examples of social, artistic and philosophical lyrics. He was the first poet to introduce several new lyrical forms to Belarusian literature.

Maksim Bahdanovich was a translator of Paul Verlaine, Heinrich Heine, Alexander Pushkin, Ovid, Horace and other poets into Belarusian and of Janka Kupala, Taras Shevchenko, Ivan Franko into Russian.

In 1916, Maksim Bahdanovič wrote a poem “Pahonia”. The music was written by a Belarusian composer and immigrant activist Mikalay Shchahlou-Kulikovich (Belarusian: Мікалай Шчаглоў-Куліковіч). The song was originally meant to be sung a capella Mikola Ravienski (Belarusian: Мікола Равенскі), Aliaksiej Turankoŭ  and Vladimir Mulyavin also wrote their own musical arrangements. In the early 1990s, Shchahlou-Kulikovich’s version was considered as one of the options for the national anthem of the Republic of Belarus. In 2020, under the patronage of Anton Mezhy a choral performance of the anthem was recorded with an orchestra accompaniment.

In 2020, the “Pahonia” anthem and the poem resurged in popularity as one of the symbols of the 2020 Belarusian protests against the Lukashenko regime, along with the white-red-white flag. The anthem was spontaneously performed in several public places: near the Belarusian State Philharmonic, in malls, in the Minsk subway, at the Minsk Kamaroŭski market  tarask], and at the Minsk railway station.

Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus covers an area of 207,600 square kilometres (80,200 sq mi), with a population of 9.4 million, and is the thirteenth-largest and the twentieth-most populous country in Europe. The country is administratively divided into seven regions, and is one of the world’s most urbanized, with over 40% of its total land area forested. Minsk is the country’s capital and largest city.

Until the 20th century, different states at various times controlled the lands of modern-day Belarus, including Kievan Rus’, the Principality of Polotsk, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the Russian Empire. In the aftermath of the Russian Revolution in 1917, different states arose competing for legitimacy amidst the Civil War, ultimately ending in the rise of the Byelorussian SSR, which became a founding constituent republic of the Soviet Union in 1922. After the Polish-Soviet War, Belarus lost almost half of its territory to Poland. Much of the borders of Belarus took their modern shape in 1939, when some lands of the Second Polish Republic were reintegrated into it after the Soviet invasion of Poland, and were finalized after World War II. During WWII, military operations devastated Belarus, which lost about a quarter of its population and half of its economic resources. The republic was redeveloped in the post-war years. In 1945, the Byelorussian SSR became a founding member of the United Nations, along with the Soviet Union.

The parliament of the republic proclaimed the sovereignty of Belarus on 27 July 1990, and during the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Belarus declared independence on 25 August 1991. Following the adoption of a new constitution in 1994, Alexander Lukashenko was elected Belarus’s first president in the country’s first and only free election post-independence, serving as president ever since. Lukashenko’s government is widely considered to be authoritarian and human rights groups consider human rights in the country to be poor. Belarus is the only country in Europe officially using the death penalty. Lukashenko continued a number of Soviet-era policies, such as state ownership of large sections of the economy. In 2000, Belarus and Russia signed a treaty for greater cooperation, forming the Union State.

Belarus is a developing country ranking very high in the Human Development Index. It has been a member of the United Nations since its founding; and a member of the CIS, the CSTO, the EAEU, and the Non-Aligned Movement, it has shown no aspirations for joining the European Union but nevertheless maintains a bilateral relationship with the Union, and likewise participates in two EU projects: the Eastern Partnership and the Baku Initiative.