Before the Russian Revolution, a vypiska was a document that served as a certification of both a child’s birth and baptism. The modern equivalent of a vypiska from a parish register (birth certificate) is sometimes called by its old name, metrika, from the Russian word for “parish register” – metricheskaya kniga. The word was borrowed from the Polish metryka during the reign of Peter the Great. The Russian dictionary compiled by Vladimir Dal gives the following meanings for metrika: 1. parish register of births, deaths and marriages; 2. certificate of birth and baptism; 3. collection of acts on noble families, book of genealogy.

The document shown at this exhibit is written on a form that was printed on both sides. The full name of the document is printed on the front side: “Vypiska (Record Extract) from the 1892 parish register of the Church of the Saviour Not Made by Hands in Saratov on the birth of Konstantin, son of Alexander Yeforeev Fedin, a Penza townsperson.” Nearby a stamp is affixed: “Duty stamp. Eighty kopecks.” The paper has been folded in half.

The reverse side of the document features a printed table with the following columns filled in by hand in black ink:
Child number (for males and females separately). Written in the “male” field is the number 7.
Day and month (date of birth and date of baptism, written separately): “12 February (Birth); 23 February (Baptism).”
Given name: “Konstantin”
Title, first name, patronymic, last name and religion of parents: “Penza townsperson Alexander Yeforeev Fedin and his legal wife Anna Pavlova, both of Orthodox faith.”
Title, first name, patronymic and last name of the godparents: “Private (honourable) citizen Semyon Ivanov Moshkov and wife of a Saratov tradesman Lidia Timofeeva Stepanova.”
Sacrament of baptism performed by: “Archpriest Lavrentiy Nechaev and Subdeacon Feodor Kamensky.”
Witness signatures, signed at will. Column left blank.
Below the table there is a note reading: “No erasures or amendments have been made in this record extract.”
In the lower left corner there is a handwritten entry: “No. 61. The 12th day of August 1894.”
Next to this is the seal of the Church of the Saviour Not Made by Hands with a silhouette of the three-domed church. To the right are the signatures of the archpriest (senior priest, rector of the church) and the deacon (a clergyman of the first, lowest degree of the priesthood).