The Rus are a people of what is now eastern Russia, considered the founders of the first Russian state, which grew from the city of Kiev. They are associated with the Vikings, a subgroup of Germanics, known in eastern Europe as the Varangians and Varjager, and with the Eastern sLAVs. The Rus, and to a much greater degree the slavs, are ancestral to modern-day Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians (see Russians: nationality; Belarusians: nationality; Ukrainians: nationality).
Origins
The origins of the Rus have long been a matter of controversy. Since the 18th century there has been debate about whether the Rus are descendants of the Vikings or whether they are a subgroup of Slavs. Many Russian scholars, especially during the soviet regime, along with some Westerners, considered the Rus to be a slavic tribe living along the Ros River who founded a tribal league; they maintained that the Kievan state was founded by Slavs and was attacked and controlled for a time by the Varangians. German scholars presented what is known as the “Normanist theory” (because Vikings in France founded Normandy and became known as Normans), based on the Russian Primary Chronicle. Also called Chronicle of Nestor, Kiev Chronicle, or Povest vremennykh let (Tale of bygone years), the Russian Primary Chronicle gives a detailed account of the period from 852 to 1110 C. E. It has been ascribed to a monk living in Kiev in the 11th-12th century by the name of Nestor, who probably compiled the material from a number of sources, including official documents of the Kievan state and oral sagas. Nestor’s chronicle is similar to many chronicles written or compiled in the early Middle Ages across Europe, composed at the behest of newly established (and newly literate) ruling dynasties to record their origins. Typically preliterate tribal dynasties locate their origins in a semimythical past and have a founder hero. Chronicles partly based on such oral traditions have to be used with caution and sifted, using other sources of information, to find grains of fact amid much chaff. But this is not to say that they must be rejected out of hand.
The Russian Primary Chronicle states that the Rus, a Viking people, were invited to
Novgorod by the local population to help end their violent feuding, then later extended their rule to Kiev. Russian scholars rejected the Russian Primary Chronicle as unreliable and insisted that the Eastern Slavs, before the entry of the Varangians, had evolved a sophisticated feudal state comparable to the Carolingian Empire in the West.
Another written source that gives further credence to Nestor’s account and to the Normanist theory is that of the Arab traveler Ibn Fadlan, who was in Bulgar at the bend of the Volga River in the summer of 922. At the time Bulgar at the bend of the Volga, was an
Important trading city There the Rus met Turkics and other people from the south. Caravans from China traveled there, carrying silk. Ibn Fadlan wrote of the Rus that they were tall and had white skin and blond or red hair. This in itself proves nothing one way or another about the ethnicity of the people Ibn Fadlan describes (a Byzantine source describes Slavs as being tall with reddish hair, though with dark skin). But other details from Ibn Fadlan’s account—the ships of the Rus, their practice of ship cremation, the heavy gold and silver neck rings that both men and women wore, and other matters—have no correspondence with
RUS
Location:
Baltic Sea region; Russia; Ukraine; Black Sea region
Time period:
862 to 1250 C. E.
Ancestry:
Germanic
Language:
Old Norse; then East Slavic; first written language Old Church Slavonic
Anything known of Slavs (whose material culture was comparatively meager at this time) but accord well with Viking custom. Other early Arab writers had described the seat of the Rus as an island covered with woods and marshes; excavations of ninth - and 10th-century tumuli have confirmed the presence of Norse warriors in such a region around Lake Ilmen, near present-day Novgorod, and Lake Ladoga, where the Neva River has its origin.
On the other hand archaeological research has found no evidence whatsoever of the existence of a Slavic state in the area of Novgorod in the ninth century, when the Rus are said to have arrived. Any evidence at all of Slavs there before the ninth century is highly uncertain. There is good evidence of a modest Slavic presence by that time; therefore it is inferred that small groups of Slavs had been moving into the region for a century or so. They probably settled alongside the indigenous Balts and Finno-Ugrians.
Meanwhile ancient Scandinavians had begun making trading contacts to their east along the Baltic coast as early as the first century C. E. They trafficked in slaves between Baltic tribesmen and the Roman Empire, for which slaves were an essential part of the economy. in the fifth century trading centers in southern Sweden and Gotland were obtaining gold coins, either by raiding or trading, from tribes to the east who were receiving subsidies from Byzantine Rome. By the eighth century Vikings (mostly from Sweden and Denmark) had penetrated deep into the Russian interior. They built settlements that are known archaeologically; Staraia Ladoga near Lake Ladoga was first settled in the eighth century, and another site near Novgorod in the mid-ninth century.
In light of the evidence, theories—most of them proposed by Soviet scholars with nationalistic agendas—of a Slav state in the Baltic region attacked by and ultimately absorbing Viking invaders are more likely the product of wishful thinking than of fact. Archaeological and other evidence tends rather to support at least some of Nestor’s account and, in general, the Normanist theory
In any case, the Slavic peoples who later made up tribes called Dregovichians, Drevlyans, Dulebians, Ilman Slavs, Krivi-CHIANS, POLIANIANS, RaDIMICHIANS, SeVERIANS, Tivertsians, Ulichians, and Vyatichans ultimately paid tribute to the Rus rulers and served in their armies. The Viking Rus were the first leaders of the polity that became the Kievan state and the ruling dynasty in all probability was originally Norse. Later as commonly happened among the Viking Norse they lost their Norse culture and became absorbed into the prevailing culture of the region—that of the numerically dominant Slavs. The pattern of subjugation by a powerful warrior elite society that later absorbed many elements of Slav culture, a process sometimes called Slavicization, was repeated several times in the history of Slavic peoples.
The name Rus is possibly from the Norse word for “warrior-rowers” on Viking ships, or possibly from Ruotsi, a Finnic word meaning “Swedish.”
The Rus were originally a Germanic-speaking people, who used a variety of Scandinavian dialects. They eventually spoke Slavic dialects as well. The first written language among the Rus was Old Church Slavonic, which was also used by other Slavs who adopted the Eastern Orthodox Christian religion.
The Viking who in about 862, according to Nestor, answered the call of the people of Novgorod was a prince by the name of Rurik from Jutland (Denmark) or from the Scandinavian Peninsula. Two brothers were said to have accompanied him. One theory holds that after he had established a stronghold at Staraia Ladoga near Lake Ladoga (which dates from the eighth century), Rurik led his followers southward along the Volkhov River and captured Novgorod. The town of Novgorod (New Town) actually did not exist at this time; it was built about a century later. A large settlement near the future site of Novgorod that dates from this time was called Ryurikovo Gorodische (Rurik’s Stronghold). Whether Rurik and his followers built this town or simply took it over is unknown. However, the long-established Norse practice of building trading towns (and the absence of any such practice among the Slavs, Balts, or Finnics of this time) supports the former. Another theory holds that Rurik was a leader of a group of mercenaries hired to guard the Volkhov-Dnieper waterway who eventually seized power from his employers. Again this theory has no support in the archaeological record and does not accord with what is known of the most developed Eastern Slavic societies of the ninth century, none of which was more than a simple chieftaincy, probably owing allegiance to the Khazars of the Middle Don and the Lower Volga region. Although an exchange network of some kind seems to have been established through slavic lands linking the Khazars with Baltic sources of amber and furs, it was limited in scope and most unlikely to involve mercenaries hired by the slavs. The slavs at this time were still an undeveloped warrior society who did their own fighting. Rather, Slavic chieftaincies—and only those far south of Novgorod in the region around Kiev—seem to have acted as tribute takers for the Khazars from nomads and traders passing through their territory. Only with the entry of the Rus did a full-fledged trade network begin to import large amounts of Islamic silver to the region.
Furthermore the presence in Sweden of large hoards of eighth-century Islamic coins from Baghdad demonstrate that Swedes had been tapping into a rich trade network long before any strong Slavic presence existed in the Novgorod region (again far richer than that moving through contemporary Slav lands to the southwest). Later Kievan tradition does not mention previous important trade centers that the Rus took over from earlier peoples, and the trading empire that the Rus built seems to have had little or no precedent. The first enclosed site at Kiev, built by Slavs (who had been building strongholds for only a century or so) in the early ninth century, had only limited importance, judging by the moderate amounts of Islamic silver found there. The Russian Primary Chronicle tells of a ferryman named Kiy after whom the city was named, a probably mythical tale that nevertheless may indicate the nature of Kiev’s role in the Khazar exchange network. This compares to the enormous eighth-century coin hoards still being found at Birka, a Swedish trading town, and indeed to the rich trade in Byzantine gold that was entering to Scandinavia already by the fifth century C. E. (before the Slavs had even emerged as a coherent ethnic group). It was the accomplished Viking raiders and traders who opened up the highly lucrative trade between the Near East and the fur regions of the far north—they who had been engaging in wide-ranging trade links for centuries—not the still rustic and parochial Slavs. The kernel of truth in Nestor’s account— whether or not Rurik himself actually existed and did all the things recounted of him—is the involvement of Vikings in the creation of the trade networks that would enable the founding of the Kievan state.
Rurik was the putative founder hero of what is known as the Rurikid dynasty. Swedish names are included in the earliest peace treaties that are quoted in their entirety in the Nestor chronicle. They have been misspelled slightly but can be read as Sven, Gunnar, Tord, Ulf, and Karl. These Swedes, as did Vikings in other regions, soon became assimilated with the natives and took Slavic names. The Rurikidernas dynasty ruled over the Volchov-Lovat-Dnieper area until the year 1610, when the last Rurikiden, Vassilij IV Sjusjkij, died and was succeeded by the Romanov dynasty.
On his death, said to have been in 879, Rurik was succeeded by his kinsman Oleg. Oleg went on to conquer Smolensk and Kiev. In 882 he made the latter the capital of the principality known as Kievan Rus, uniting Varangians, Slavs, and Finns under him. In 907 he led an army against Constantinople (modern Istanbul), by way of the Dnieper and Black Sea, holding it for a time until negotiating a treaty with the Byzantines. Regular trade contacts were established between Constantinople and Kievan Rus. Oleg was succeeded as the grand prince by Igor (formerly Ingvar). In 941 Igor attempted another invasion of Constantinople. His army was routed, and in
Vladimir I: Nation Builder and Saint
Born in 956 C. E., son of the grand prince Svyatoslav of Kiev, Vladimir I is recognized for politically uniting Kievan Rus and establishing Eastern Orthodox Christianity as its official religion.
At the death of Svyatoslav a civil war broke out between Vladimir and two brothers, forcing Vladimir to flee to Scandinavia. He returned with a Viking army and managed to seize power from his now-feuding brothers. Vladimir continued campaigning in the region, uniting the Eastern Slavs as well as other peoples, and ultimately consolidated territory from Ukraine to the Baltic Sea.
The Byzantine emperor Basil II requested military aid fromVladimir to suppress a rebellion. The two negotiated on terms in which Vladimir, a fervent pagan with seven wives, converted to Christianity and took Basil’s sister, Anna, as his wife.
Vladimir was baptized in 988 or 989 before his marriage to Anna. He henceforth spread Eastern Orthodoxy and culture throughout his reign, forcibly converting Kiev and Novgorod and ordering pagan idols to be thrown into the Dnieper River. He also introduced the Western custom of tithes as religious contributions, discouraged the practice of capital punishment, and met frequently with bishops on matters of state and security, thus endowing the church with important political powers such as settling family disputes and inheritances. On his deathbed Vladimir, who was known for distributing food among the poor, reportedly gave away all his possessions to friends and the needy. Russians, Ukrainians, and others today celebrate a feast in his name. He is also known as Vladimir Svyatoslavitch, Vladimir the Great, and Saint Vladimir.
945 he concluded a new commercial treaty with the Byzantines. He was killed by rebellious Drevlyans while attempting to collect tribute. His wife, Saint Olga, then served as regent for their son, Svyatoslav I.
Kievan power grew under Prince Svyatoslav, who engaged in victorious campaigns against other centers of Viking power in the region, against Khazars, and against Volga Bulgars. He also intervened in the Byzantine-Danube Bulgar conflicts of 968-971. But Svyatoslav was neither a lawgiver nor an organizer.
The role of state builder fell to his son, Vladimir I (see sidebar, p. 669), who established the dynastic seniority of his clan over the scattered territories of Rus. In 988 he converted to Christianity and invited or permitted the patriarch of Constantinople to establish an Eastern Orthodox see (a region under the authority of a bishop) in his territory. Vladimir extended the realm—the principality of Vladimir—to include the watersheds of the Don, Dnieper, Dniester, Neman, Western Dvina, and Upper Volga; destroyed or incorporated the remnants of competing polities; and established relations with neighboring dynasties. The newly established religion strengthened the upper class and wealthy merchants through the placement of influential leaders within administrative centers, religious schools, and the bureaucracy.
The successes of Vladimir’s long reign made it possible for the reign of his son, Yaroslav, in 1019-54 to produce a flowering of cultural life. But neither Yaroslav nor his successors in Kiev were able to provide lasting political stability within the enormous realm. The political history of the Rus, like that of their ancestors in Scandinavia, is one of competing trends toward independence and toward centralization, inherent in the contradiction between local settlement, on the one hand, and the hegemony of the clan elder, ruling from Kiev, on the other hand. As Vladimir’s 12 sons and innumerable grandsons prospered in the rapidly developing territories they inherited, they and their retainers engaged in conflict both with one another and with the Kievan central authority The conflicts were not confined to Slavic lands: The Turkic nomads who moved into the southern steppe during the 11th century became involved in the constant internecine rivalries, and Rurikid and Turkic princes often fought on both sides. In 1097 representatives of the leading branches of the dynasty, together with their
Turkic allies, met at Liubech, north of Kiev, and agreed to divide the Kievan territory among themselves and their descendants. Vladimir II later made a briefly successful attempt to reunite the land of Rus.
The primacy of the prince of Kiev depended on both the cohesion of the clan of Rurik and the relative importance of the southern trade, both of which began to decline in the late 11th century The First Crusade in 1096-99 seems to have made the route from the Black Sea to the Baltic less attractive to commerce. At the same time conflicts among the Rurikid princes became more regional and separatist as a consequence of new patterns in export trade that diverted the focus of different cities in the region to trading interests in different directions. The unifying force of the Byzantine trade no longer existed. Novgorod, in particular, began to gravitate toward closer relations with the cities of the German Hanseatic League, which controlled the Baltic trade. Smolensk, Polotsk, and Pskov became increasingly involved in trade along western land routes, while Galicia and Volhynia established closer links with Poland and Hungary. The princes of these areas still contested the crown of the “grand prince of Kiev and all of Rus,” but the title had become an empty one. When Andrew Bogolyubsky of Suzdal won Kiev and the title in 1169, he sacked the city and returned to the Upper Volga, apparently seeing no advantage in establishing himself in the erstwhile capital. By the middle of the 12th century the major principalities, which had benefited from the prosperity of the Kievan period, had developed into independent political and economic entities. In the late 12th century the power of Kiev declined further in the face of constant nomad attacks and warfare with other Slavic princes, and in 1240 the city was completely destroyed by the Mongols under Batu Khan, the grandson of Genghis Khan.
After the Mongol invasion princes needed the approval of the khan to become grand prince. Rivalry developed among the princely houses, and Tver and Moscow became more influential than Kiev. The grand principality of Moscow was eventually formed.
Economy
During the Kievan Rus period trade was the most important economic activity. Rus society was hardly feudal in the Western sense, with complex and clearly defined interrelationships among rulers of greater or lesser power; more important, the land and agriculture played only a minor role in the Kievan economy, which was based on trade.
Many hoards of Arab silver coins, minted in Baghdad in the eighth century, have been found buried in Sweden, suggesting that Russia was only a waystation en route to the Rus’s real goal: the riches of the Arab world. It is thought that their furs were bartered for Arab silver. Rus traders set up a trade network between northern Russia—where Finnic tribes trapped coveted beaver, sable, and ermine—and Baghdad.
The early social and political institutions in Kievan Rus were rudimentary. Unlike the Normans, who had the example of the political institutions of the Franks and Anglo-Saxons to imitate, the Rus settled among tribal peoples. The Rus themselves until well into the 10th century had little interest in institutions more elaborate than those necessary for the exploitation of their rich new territory. The territory of Rus, moreover, was immense and sparsely settled. The scattered towns, some little more than trading posts, were separated by vast primeval forests and swamps. Early Rus leaders thought of their domains as clan possessions rather than as territorial or national states.
The government of the Rurikid dynasty, with a system of grand prince and regional princes that began in 1097, is thought to have evolved out of the necessities of maintaining unity, with power shared among the members of the ruling clan. Seniority passed from elder brother to younger brother and from the youngest eligible uncle to the eldest eligible nephew Clan members served apprenticeships in the various territories of the realm, allowing control of trade and giving them knowledge of lands they might someday rule from Kiev.
Rurikid princes maintained military retinues led by boyars, an aristocratic order with special privileges second only to those of the princes. Princes and boyars collected annual taxes from the free peasant population. The earliest known law code, from 1016, known as the “Russian Law,” dealt primarily with fines imposed by princes or representative boyars for offenses.
With the adoption of Christianity by Vladimir in 988 society became more regulated. Vladimir seems to have realized that one political element, the presence of an organized religion, distinguished both Byzantium and the newly established principalities in Poland and Hungary from his own. The anointing of Vladimir as first Christian of the realm clothed him in a mantle of spiritual as well as temporal authority and he was further able to propagate Byzantine principles of imperial power.
Military Practices: The Varangian Guard
The Byzantines as a regular practice recruited barbarians into their armies; some among the Rus were invited to form the elite Varangian Guard, who protected the Byzantine emperor. The Varangian Guard was founded by Emperor Basil II in 988, with 6,000 Rus warriors, possibly sent by Vladimir to gain favor with the emperor. (In Byzantium the term Varangian applied not only to the Rus, but to anyone of a nationality other than “Greek”; there is reason to believe, then, that Varangian was a term used for a foreigner in the service of the Byzantine government.)
Rus warriors had been serving in the Byzantine army and navy for some time already when Basil formed them into a distinct regiment. They were known as the ax-bearing guard, from the enormous two-handed axes they carried. They served at the forefront of many of the empire’s battles, fighting Normans, Bulgars, Turks, and various nationalities participating in the Crusades. They also performed garrison duty in the Byzantine Empire’s cities.
The Varangian Guard were the best paid of all the Byzantine troops. It may have been common for Vikings to go to Byzantium from all over Scandinavia and Russia, spend time in the Varangian Guard, and return home rich. The guard were unusual in conspiracy-ridden Byzantium in their loyalty to the emperors; this trait was possibly a legacy of their Viking forebears, for whom disloyalty was one of the most shameful of transgressions.
Dwellings and Architecture Most Rus buildings were of wood, although some were stone; streets were often paved in wood as well. Dwellings had multiple rooms— typically a main room, a hall, and an extra room, which was used for storage in the winter. At the center of the main room was a hearth (in later centuries a stove). Stories might be added; buildings might also be added and connected by a gallery, an enclosed walkway. Buildings were elaborately carved and painted. The dwelling was surrounded by wood or wattle fencing. Some buildings had windows of mica; oil lamps were used for lighting after dark. Furniture included carved wooden tables,
This church in St. Petersburg, Russia, is named after Vladimir I (St. Vladimir). (Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division [LC-USZ62-i0i8ii])
Chairs, benches, beds, and washstands with copper ewers and bowls. It is assumed that icons adorned the walls.
The ruling families had the largest dwelling, very likely of stone, with several interconnected multistoried buildings. After adopting Christianity the Rus built a great number of churches, which also served as libraries, warehouses, treasuries, and defensive structures if necessary The 11th-century Cathedral of St. Sophia, modeled on Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, is known for its mosaics, frescoes, and icons. The ninth-century St. Vladimir Cathedral is famed for its murals.
Clothing
Materials and Dyes The clothing of the Rus in the beginning of their sojourn in Russia was probably similar to that of the VIKINGS. Later, during the Kievan period, the Rus wore bleached linen as well as the woven wool of their forebears. Cloth was interwoven with multicolor threads or printed. Remains of clothing found in burials show that at least by the 12th and 13th centuries a kind of checked wool fabric was worn. Wool was imported to Novgorod during the 13th century from England, Holland, and Flanders. Cotton was also imported; some cotton was produced in the village of Zandana not far from Bukhara. The majority of the populace wore a local homespun wool for their outer garments.
The clothing of the nobility was made of fabric imported primarily from Byzantium, but also from Asia and Europe. These fabrics included aksamit samite (fabric with golden tracery), taffeta, brocade (silken fabric with monochrome patterned design), velvet with stamped designs, and golden velvet (with gold embroidery). The most common were gold brocade, velvet (with a pattern formed by gold or silver thread tied and woven into a dense silk warp), overall-gold altabas, and lightweight silken taffeta covered with a monochromatic pattern. These expensive imported fabrics were called pavolok. Pavalok generally had a typically Byzantine pattern of dark-red (cinnabar), crimson (carmine), purple, and azure. One princess owned dresses of fabrics ranging from silk to brocade to velvet to chiffon, called “cloth of air” because this cotton fabric was so light and thin.
The overgarment of princesses in the 10th to the 13th centuries was sewn of eastern embroidered silk or tightly woven fabric with gold or silver threads, similar to velvet. Ibn-Fadlan noted that noble women of the Rus wore xilu (Oriental robe), an upper silk garment. The chronicles mention such a garment as holiday clothing called rizy.
The Rus commonly wore fur. It was used in linings of winter clothing and as ornamental edgings and borders, especially on hats. Furs were worn in the winter by even the poorest. The wealthy had coats made of fox, ermine, sable, marten, lynx, otter, and beaver. The most expensive furs (such as ermine and sable) are mentioned in chronicles only in reference to princely women’s clothing. Poorer men and women wore wolfskins, sheepskin, fox, she-bear, hare, wolverine, and squirrel; the most accessible and durable was sheepskin. Unmarried women might wear rabbit or squirrel furs, which were considered too frivolous for married women.
Ancient frescoes show that the nobility wore multicolored clothing and used striking combinations of fresh, rich tones. Letters written on birch bark in Novgorod mention green and sky-blue clothing. Favored colors included various shades of red (crimson, magenta), blue (dark blue, sky blue), and sometimes green. The most popular color was red, as demonstrated in archeological finds, among which more than half are fabric of reddish brown tones. Other colors were black, bluish, green, and light brown.
Fabrics were dyed mainly with vegetable dyes, but also with animal dyes. Blue dye was made from cornflower, blueberry/huckleberry, and bilberries. Yellow was from blackthorn and birch. Golden-brown was obtained from onion skins, oak, and pear bark. Red-brown dyes were made from buckwheat, St. John’s wort, alder, and buckthorn. Linen worn by nobles was dyed, but unbleached linen predominated in peasant clothes, with bleached white linen appearing in separate costume elements.
Fabric was blockprinted by using black, dark blue, bright red, yellow, or white dye on unbleached linen, which was then dyed dark blue or green. This was used in peasant clothes and the everyday clothing for the nobility. Motifs include stylized plant forms, and animals such as horses, deer, and birds were common. The lower classes favored these styles as well, substituting simpler geometric patterns such as diamonds, triangles, stars, and sunbursts.
As with most medieval cultures in this period the various classes did not adopt different styles (except the parade costumes worn by princes), but exhibited their wealth through the quality of fabric and the amount of ornamentation. Underclothes for all classes were made of linen (from flax or hemp), the fineness of weave dictating the quality. Ukrainian and Russian embroidery still incorporate many motifs favored by the Rus. They were particularly fond of the combination of red thread on white linen, adding other bright colors to augment the designs of geometrics, animal, and plant motifs. As were the Byzantines, the Rus were fond of pearls and incorporated them into the embroideries, used them for borders, or seeded them all over a tunic.
Men The basic garment worn by men was the shirt. The wealthy would add multiple layers on top of the shirt; poorer people used it as the main layer of clothing. The shirt was commonly embroidered around the neck. Those who could not afford embroidery often substituted strips of red cloth.
Sleeves were cut longer than the arms so the wearer could tuck his hands inside for warmth. To keep the sleeves out of the way for everyday activity, the Rus either added a wristband or used bracelets. The shirt had no collar; there was a deep slit down the front, which was held shut with a button. The shirt fell nearly to the knees and was always worn untucked, with a narrow belt of fabric or leather. The other essential garment was a pair of linen breeches. The rich added a pair of wool breeches over these, and princes sometimes wore silk breeches. They were held up by a belt or rope in drawstring fashion and were tucked into the tops of the shoes or boots.
Finally there was a traditional outer garment similar to traditional “Cossack style” coats of the Russians and Ukrainians today. This was cut nearly straight, with only a slight widening toward the bottom, of wider wool fabric. It fit the torso closely, with a slit to the waist area closed by three or four buttons, and fell between the knee and calf. The aristocracy often decorated these with horizontal strips of braid or cloth. The sleeves fit closely as well, tapering slightly to the wrist. The garment was often lined or trimmed in fur and worn with a wide belt of fabric.
Princes adopted modified Byzantine fashions for their parade dress. The very long Byzantine talaris favored by the upper classes was cut slightly shorter by the Rus. The princes also used the Byzantine chlamys, a semicircular robe hung over the left arm and fastened on the right shoulder with a brooch.
Women Women wore a shirt similar to that of the men, except longer. Two were usually worn together, one (sometimes called a dalmatic) slightly shorter than the other, belted at the waist. The edges of these garments were decorated as were those of the men, but women are often depicted with an additional strip of fabric or embroidery down the front of the garment. Sometimes a triangular “shawl” called a superhumeral was worn over the tunics. Empresses and other high-ranking ladies seem to have also worn separate jeweled collars.
Royal women also wore the chlamys. Jeweled mesh hairnets seem to have been common, along with the ubiquitous veil.
Transportation: The Trade Route
The route frequented by Vikings and Rus south from northern Russia to the Black Sea was some 2,000 miles through swamps, forests, and steppe. Much of the vast Russian interior was interlaced with rivers, not all of them connected. On one route from Staraja Ladoga the traders headed south across Lake Ilmen and had to row or sail upstream on the Lovat River. After a few hundred miles the Lovat narrows and eventually shrinks to a shallow stream. Here they would have to portage their boats;
Those they used on these journeys were much smaller than long ships, probably only 40 feet long. Even so the Rus probably relied on local labor to carry boats and provisions over the long portages.
Settlements sprang up at these portage points, as local tribes joined to haul the boats. They would also take in food and other provisions for the Rus traders. Many of these settlements became important trading centers. Smolensk is situated near an important portage site between the Western Dvina and Dnieper Rivers.
A characteristic art form in Russia dating from the time of the Rus was the icon, the pictorial representation of Christ, the Virgin, and the saints. Icons play an integral part in Russian Church ritual; processions through the church to kiss the icons are a part of the liturgy. Icons are expected to heal and work miracles.
The creation of icons had been strictly regulated since the Seventh Ecumenical Council in Nicaea in 787. The sanctity of icons derives from their high degree of stylization prescribed by church law, which arouses reverence for their prototypes that date from the time of Christ.
The earliest icons were introduced to Kievan Rus from Constantinople, and the first masters of icon painting who worked in the country were Greek. An icon created in Byzantium in the early 12th century, the Vladimir Virgin, is considered one of three images of the Virgin Mary painted by St. Luke himself and consequently one of the holiest objects by modern Russians. Yet the Rus eventually developed their own stylistic characteristics. The Byzantine style retains its roots in Greco-Roman art, with an emphasis on naturalism and spatial values, whereas the Russian eschews spatial masses in favor of a rhythmic use of line, perhaps a heritage of the decorative styles of the Vikings.
Music: Byliny
A bylina (pl. byliny) is a Russian folk song of epic or balladic character, sung in Old Russian or Russian. The oldest byliny relate a cycle of tales about Kievan Rus in the 10th to 12th centuries, centering on the deeds of Prince Vladimir I and his court, including warfare against the Mongols. Byliny endured as a tradition, for a time in the area around Kiev and now among peasants living in northwestern European Russia and northeastern Siberia.
Literature: Old Russian Literature
Russian literature is said to have begun with various texts from the oldest Kievan period, written for religious and sometimes utilitarian purposes, and is referred to as Old Russian literature, although Ukrainian and Belarusian literature also began with these texts.
The pagan Rus in all probability shared the Nordic gods and beliefs common to the people of Scandinavia. Pagan Slavs worshipped Perun, the god of lightning and thunder. The Rus probably identified him with Thor, the Viking god of rain and thunder. The Rus also believed in good and evil spirits among the wood and river spirits, known as the rusalki. They were typically depicted as female. The evil spirits lured travelers to become lost in the woods or drown.
The conversion to Christianity, which happened earlier in the south closer to Constantinople and in urban areas, did not mean cessation of all pagan practices. Many Rus maintained a double faith, attending church yet continuing to participate in pagan festivals, such as summer solstice celebrations. With time the two faiths merged into one, as pagan mythological became identified with Christian historical figures. Perun was identified with the prophet Elijah, depicted as riding a fiery chariot.
Vladimir reportedly chose the Eastern Orthodox religion over that of the church in Rome because of the beautiful liturgy practiced in Constantinople, designed to create an experience of “heaven on Earth.”
The Vikings who became known as Rus had developed a prestige goods economy and a warrior society as a result of contact with the ROMANS. Slowly penetrating farther eastward along the Baltic Sea and then southward into and through the Russian interior, they completed the circle whereby the wealth of Arab civilization and the wealth of “Rome in the East” both reached “Rome in the West,” that is, the Carolingian Empire of the Franks. In doing so the Rus linked the future Russian nation with both East and West. And in importing to Russia the Eastern Orthodox religion they helped foster elements of the advanced culture of Byzantium. Thus by putting the Slavic Russian interior into contact with the outside world the Rus helped set the stage for early
Russia’s development into an early modern political state.
The Rus as a distinct people may always have been confined to the upper classes, descendants of the Vikings who had created the Kievan trading empire. With each succeeding generation distinctions between Germanic and Slavic peoples in the region faded more and more.
Further Reading
Wladyslaw Duczko. Viking Rus: Studies on the Presence of Scandinavians in Eastern Europe (Leiden, Netherlands: Brill Academic, 2004). Simon Franklin. Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, c. 950-1300 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2002).
Simon Franklin and Jonathan Shepard. The Emergence of Rus, 750-1200 (Boston: Addison-Wesley, 1996).
Michael F Hamm. Kiev (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1995).
Thomas Schaub Noonan. The Islamic World, Russia and the Vikings, 750-900: The Numismatic Evidence (Brookfield, Vt.: Ashgate, 1998). Jaroslaw Pelenski. The Contest for the Legacy of Kievan Rus’ (Boulder, Colo.: East European Monographs, 1998).
Elaine Rusinko. Straddling Borders: Literature and Identity in Subcarpathian Rus’ (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003).
Orest Subtelny. Ukraine: A History (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994).
Vladimir Volkoff. Vladimir, the Russian Viking (Woodstock, N. Y.: Overlook, 1985).
World History
