‘Lectures on the History of the Ancient Church’ – it was a lecture course prepared by A. I. Brilliantov for the students of the St. Petersburg Spiritual Academy, where he has worked for many years. A limited period inside the general schedule explained the fact that some parts of the course were rather detailed, and others were presented in a meager way (for instance, there was no lectures on the Second Council of Nicaea, and the Sixth Ecumenical Council/the Third Council of Constantinople was given in a quite short way, but the history of the Trinitarian and Christological controversies was analyzed in the most detailed way, as well as the genesis of Christian dogmas an the history of the first heresies).
‘Lectures on the general Ecclesiastic History for the Students of the LXXIII Course, by Professor of the St. Petersburg Spiritual Academy A. I. Brilliantov, made in 1911/1912’ were published in 1911 in a reprint way in 60 copies; but that publication was completely lost. The new publication of 2007 was made on the base of a typescript marked with an inscription: ‘Publisher – Student of the Imperial St. Petersburg Spiritual Academy Ivan Stepanov, 1913, March 31’. The lectures were kept thanks to that ‘self-printing’ popular among students. There were many mistakes in that typescript which were corrected by publishers.