15. Ancient Rus and the Great Steppe, Gumilev
XIV. Burial of the epoch (1062-1115), 81. By the BLUE SEA; (we're half uploaded with number this number 15.)
It was not boring to live in medieval Darkness (of Tarakan). Greek ships sailed across the Black Sea with gold-embroidered fabrics, sweet wine, honed weapons, in order to load up with Scythian grain and skins on the way back. From the Sea of Azov, boats full of silver fish were moored to the pier. In the east, herds of cows and sheep grazed, and sometimes cautious wolves ran among the stakes. And above all this splendor stretched the blue tent of a cloudless sky.
And the people were different. Those who were called "Khazars" walked in long-skirted clothes and pulled their curly hair with golden hoops, calmly entered synagogues to perform the prescribed rituals and ... waited in the wings. Kasogi from Kuban pranced on slender horses on the square, and steppe-yases drove sheep for sale. A few Russians with trimmed blond beards stood out from the crowd. These were the owners of the city, and the Church of the Virgin, built by Mstislav, stood against the background of other houses like a jewel in a frame.
The inhabitants of this city were not alien to each other, but also did not seek to mix. According to M.I. Artamonov, two political parties formed in the 11th century in the Darkness of Tarakan: one, consisting of militant natives, aspired to the political independence of the city and surrounding territories; the other, which M.I. Artamonov unsuccessfully called "Russian", was interested in developing trade relations with Byzantium and Russia. The basis of this party was the "Khazars" of the Jewish faith.[1]
In Russia, three princes ruled, and good relations with one meant spoiling relations with others. The troubles between the princes began back in 1060. Nikon, a monk of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra, the first of the Russian chroniclers, whose name became known in history, had to flee from the wrath of Prince Izyaslav to the Darkness, to Gleb Svyatoslavich [2]. There he was safe from the persecution of the Grand Duke.
Russian Metropolitan Hilarion[3], the defender of the Russian National Church, may have been hiding under the name of Nikon. If this is the case, then the beginning of the struggle of "Westernism" with Russianism can be dated to 1060, but if this is not the case, then the date will be close - 1073.
Which party in the Darkness supported Gleb Svyatoslavich? It is clear that the steppe people, the Yasi and the Kasogi are under the friendly neutrality of the Polovtsians. So, the Jewish party is against Svyatoslavich. So where did they acquire the challenger?
In 1064, the outcast Prince Rostislav Vladimirovich "fled" from Novgorod to Dark-Tarakan. What does "fled" mean and from whom is unclear, but having appeared in the Darkness, he immediately expelled Gleb. However, since he had no troops of his own, and only two companions accompanied him [4], he could only do this if he was supported by a strong party inside the city, and since there were only two parties, it is not difficult to guess which one. In 1065, Svyatoslav appeared with an army in the Darkness and restored Gleb. Rostislav retreated outside the city for a while, then, after Svyatoslav left, he drove Gleb out again, and then imposed tribute on the Kasogs and other tribes. This time the Jews won the game.
But then the Greeks rushed in, who did not want to strengthen the Jews on the Black Sea. The bloody hecatombs of Pesach were not yet forgotten, and Rostislav was the son of that commander who, only in 1043, went to smash Constantinople. The situation turned out to be excessively acute, but...
In 1066, the kotopan of the Kherson fema came to visit Rostislav and poisoned him at a feast. Seven days later, Prince Rostislav died, and with his death, the Jewish predominance in Darkness disappeared.
The chronicle adds: "The same Kotopan was stoned by the Korsunians"[5], but does not explain whether for the murder of the prince or for something else. But the dark-Balkan Russians have said their word. They begged Monk Nikon to reconcile them with Svyatoslav and return Gleb to them. The latter marked his return to Temutarakan with a scientific work - measuring the distance to Korchev - Kerch on ice, which was also part of the Principality of Temutarakan [6]/sup>
In 1068, Gleb was transferred by his father to Novgorod, and his younger brother Roman was appointed in his place. For the whole 10 years, silence reigned in the Darkness of Tarakan. The Jews lost this game.
[Here we get into the names of many Kievan princes. Maybe repeating this list will help sort them out. Actually this is a very complicated chapter that raises more doubts that answers. I will write a comment about it in the comment section.]
Oleg (882–912) Igor (912–945) Olga (Regent) for young Sviatoslav (945–962) Sviatoslav I (962–972) Yaropolk (972–980) Vladimir I (980–1015) Sviatopolk I (1015–1019) Yaroslav the wise (1019–1054) started as a brutal pagan, ended as a brutal Christian Iziaslav (1054–1073), (1076–1078) Vseslav (1068–1069) Sviatoslav II (1073–1076) Vsevolod (1078–1093) Sviatopolk II (1093–1113) Vladimir Monomakh (1113–1125) Mstislav (1125–1132) Yaropolk II (1132–1139) Vyacheslav (1139, 1151–1154). Vsevolod II (1139–1146) Igor II (1146) Iziaslav II (1146–1154, with intervals) Yuri Dolgoruky (1149–1151, 1155–1157) Rostislav (1154–1167, with intervals) Iziaslav III (1155–1162, with intervals) Mstislav II (1167–1169) Gleb (1169, 1170–1171) Vladimir II (1171) Mikhailo (1171) Roman (1171–1173, 1175–1177) Vsevolod III (1173) Volyamir II (1172–1211, with intervals) Yaroslav II, (1174–1175, 1180) Sviatoslav III (1173, 1176–1180, 1181–1194) Igor III (1202, 1214)* Roman the Great (1203-1205) Rostislav II (1204–1206) Vsevolod IV (1206–1212, with intervals) Mstislav III (1214–1223) Vladimir III (1223–1235) Iziaslav IV (1235–1236) Yaroslav III (1236–1238, 1246) Mikhailo II (1238–1239, 1241–1246) Rostislav III (1239) Danylo (1239–1240)
82. IN RUSSIA
The rule of the triumvir princes in Russia was carried out unhindered... before the first shock. In September 1068, a detachment of Polovtsians in 12 thousand sabers approached Kiev and put the princely squad to flight. The unsuccessful skirmish would by no means have been decisive if it had not been for Izyaslav's refusal to give the Kievans weapons from the arsenal to repel the Polovtsians. The refusal caused an uprising, Izyaslav's flight to Poland and his return with the help of the Polish king Boleslav II. During this time, Svyatoslav, having only 3 thousand warriors, managed to break the Polovtsian detachment on the Snovi River (November 1, 1068) and restore order in Russia.
The return of Izyaslav in 1069, with the military support of the Poles, was marked by brutal executions; 70 Kievans were killed on the day of surrender, then arrests, executions, and blinding began. The people of Kiev responded to this with secret murders of Poles divorced for a stay. Anthony, the abbot of Pechersk, fled to Chernigov at night to Svyatoslav.[7]
Magi appeared all over the Russian land, fighters against Christianity. The people believed their prophecies, which caused murders and retaliatory punitive expeditions. The regime of the Westerners' clique gave unfavorable results: the Russian land was under threat even in the absence of external enemies.
And the enemies appeared. In 1071, the Polovtsians attacked the cities of Rostovets and Neyatin, located southwest of Kiev. They did not dare to attack the Chernihiv land after the defeat at Snovi. At the same time, Polotsk was lost, where Izyaslav sent two of his sons successively. The first died under unclear circumstances (1069), and the second - Svyatopolk - was expelled by Vseslav (1071). The attempt of the third son of the Grand Duke to defeat Vseslav gave only a fruitless victory at the Holotic. Izyaslav had to start negotiations with the rebellious Prince of Polotsk, which greatly worried other members of the triumvirate and forced them to take measures to restore order.
In 1072 (in the chronicle - 1073) Svyatoslav and Vsevolod entered Kiev with their troops. Izyaslav went to Poland "with a lot of wealth", saying that "with this I will find warriors"[8]. The Poles took away most of the wealth, but even what Izyaslav brought to Germany was enough to impress the imagination of Henry IV, the Holy Roman Emperor of the German nation. At first, he promised to help Izyaslav, but, being busy suppressing the uprising of the Saxons, he limited himself to an embassy to Svyatoslav. When the latter showed the German ambassadors even greater treasures, they advised Henry to stop supporting Izyaslav. Then Izyaslav turned to Pope Gregory VII, i.e. he changed from Orthodoxy. The pope, in a letter dated April 17, 1075, recognized Izyaslav's right to the golden table of Kiev, and on April 20 sent a letter to Boleslav II demanding that the property taken away be returned to Prince Dmitry (baptized name of Izyaslav). He returned and, moreover, in 1076 he detached an army with which Izyaslav returned to Russia.
And during that time, while the Grand Duke of All Russia "walked... wandering in a foreign land"[9], Svyatoslav in Kiev encountered the resistance of Theodosius, abbot of Pechersk. Feodosiy Pechersky was not a member of any direction. He worked not in the name of political programs, but for the sake of his conscience. He was the first pillar of non-possessiveness and asceticism in Russia, but he was not a fanatic either: he allowed eating meat on Wednesday and Friday if there were major holidays on those days. Being loyal to Prince Izyaslav, Theodosius fought against "Latinism", equating Catholicism with the antitrinitarian heresy of Savely (III century), and Arianism.[10] Loyalty to the prince did not prevent the abbot from defending his ideological line. In fact, Feodosiya became the head of a special political line, the time of which came only in the XIV century.
The reign of Svyatoslav, i.e. the triumph of the Russian party, corrected the situation of Russia. An alliance was concluded with Poland, and the Russian expeditionary force, headed by Oleg Svyatoslavich and Vladimir Vsevolodovich Monomakh, helped the Poles in the war with the Czech Republic in 1076[11], the truth is unsuccessful. But unfortunately, Prince Svyatoslav died on December 27, 1076 with an unsuccessful operation of a tumor (a muscle), and Vsevolod, who replaced him, considered it good to negotiate with Izyaslav and return him to the grand duchy, and take the deserted Chernigov for himself. In 1077, the Russian party found itself in opposition to the Greek-Westernist bloc. And then it started!
But before we go any further, let's see why Svyatoslav lost. He found himself without allies! Let the Greek support for Vsevolod and the Latin support for Izyaslav be ephemeral, but no one helped Svyatoslav. The position he took led to the isolation of his party, which doomed his children to defeat. Svyatoslav's natural allies would have been the Polovtsians if Vladimir Monomakh had not attracted them to his side. In 1076, he took them to Polotsk and allowed them to empty the parish, and Svyatoslav was left alone. He was just lucky that he did not live to see the collapse of his business, which inevitably followed from the installation he took.
But the Grecophiles also found themselves in a difficult situation. The power of Byzantium was inexorably melting away due to the collision of two active forces that were not registered in the party, but acted very consistently: supporters of the metropolitan nobility - the synclite, on the one hand, and provincial landowners and border guards - on the other.
The former were rich and they hired Varangians for their protection; the latter were belligerent, but they had to fight on two fronts: with the advancing Seljuks and with their own superiors. And I must say that the intensity of the civil war was higher than during the defense of the borders. Both of them did not refuse the help of the enemy, just to defeat the opponent. The money collected by the thrifty Vasily II was squandered on bribing supporters and paying mercenaries, and luxurious estates and lovingly cultivated peasant plots were looted during the constantly arising uprisings, the enumeration of which would have carried us away from our topic.
In short, from 1064 (the fall of the fortress of Ani, captured by the Seljuks) to 1071 (the loss of Bari, the last Byzantine citadel in Southern Italy, taken by the French Normans, and the defeat of Roman Diogenes by the Seljuks at Manitskert), Byzantium turned from the strongest power in the Middle East into an object of encroachments by foreigners and gentiles. When the leader of the military "party" Alexei Komnenos took the capital, his soldiers raged there as in a conquered city: they dishonored women, robbed temples, undressed synclites on the street. Well, how was it to focus on a country that could not even help itself?! So thought the main Russian princes, including Vsevolod Yaroslavich. And cruelly miscalculated.
83. SVYATOSLAVICHI
Having taken power, Izyaslav and Vsevolod declared the reign of Svyatoslav usurpation. So, his children became outcasts and were deprived of all their positions. Gleb, who had ruled in Novgorod until then, was replaced by Svyatopolk, Izyaslavich fled to Zavolochye and was killed there. David - a complete nonentity - saved his life, living in obscurity. But Oleg Svyatoslavich, a friend, godfather and associate of Vladimir Monomakh, on April 10, 1078, fled to his brother Roman in the Darkness of Tarakan, where Boris Vyacheslavich, the outcast prince, Vsevolod's opponent, who tried in 1077, lived to lead the resistance of Chernihiv residents to the new order (Boris lasted only eight days and had to flee).
So, activists of the Russian "party" gathered in the Darkness of Tarakan, hoping to regain their lost positions in Russia. There were chances for this: Chernihiv was for them. Roman corrected his father's miscalculation by entering into an alliance with the Polovtsians. But the time was lost: Vsevolod and Izyaslav had incomparably greater forces than the Svyatoslavichi. In addition, the latter did not have a rear: the Jewish community of Temutarakan was on the side of the older princes, especially the Westerner Izyaslav.
In August 1078 Oleg and Boris with a squad of exiles and the Polovtsian auxiliary corps entered the Russian land, defeated Prince Vsevolod and occupied Chernigov, leaving a garrison there. Vsevolod rushed to Kiev to Izyaslav for help. Vladimir Monomakh led the army from Smolensk by rapid marches. Fresh troops approached Chernigov and stormed the city, but unsuccessfully. Meanwhile, Oleg and Boris brought reinforcements from the Darkness of Tarakan. Iziaslav and Vsevolod lifted the siege and moved towards Oleg and Boris. Chernihiv was saved thanks to that. that the young princes took the blow on themselves.
In October 1078, the elder princes met with the rogue princes in the Nezhatina Field, near Chernigov, and won a complete victory. There was an evil battle in which Boris Vyacheslavich, a young man who was looking for a glorious death, since he had no prospects in life, and Grand Duke Izyaslav, an old man who had already received everything he could wish for, both died. His death opened the way for Vsevolod to the golden table of Kiev, and for his son Vladimir Monomakh to the actual power in Russia.
Vsevolod was a very visionary politician and a very educated man. He knew five languages and was well versed in world politics. He won a decisive victory over the Svyatoslavichs without shedding a drop of blood. When in 1079 Roman Svyatoslavich with the Polovtsians and the Dark-Tarakan army repeated the campaign against Chernigov, Vsevolod agreed with the Polovtsians on peace, which ended the war. On the way back, Roman was killed by the Polovtsian nomads, but apparently Vsevolod was not the initiator of this atrocity. From subsequent events, it is clear that the perpetrators of the death of the Novel were the "Kozars"[12], i.e. the Jewish community of Darkness.
And this is natural: they were most interested in getting rid of the Svyatoslavichs. Therefore, they seized Oleg Svyatoslavich, who was in Darkness, and sent him abroad to Constantinople, where Emperor Nikephoros III kept the Russian prince under house arrest, obviously wanting to please Vsevolod, who also took possession of Darkness. There he sent not a specific prince, but a simple landowner Ratibor. The Grecophile party won, since the heir to the throne, Svyatopolk Izyaslavich, was sitting in Novgorod as a simple viceroy of the Grand Duke Vsevolod.
It is unlikely that the Jewish party in Dark-Tarakan was satisfied with the Greek dominance carried out through the Russian voivode Ratibor, but they waited, because time was working for them. In Constantinople, the struggle of bureaucrats against the stratiots (warriors) was considered a matter of much more importance than the defense of borders. As a result, in 1078 Nicaea surrendered to the Seljuks without resistance; in 1079 They took Chrysopolis, on the shore of the Bosphorus. In the same years, the Pechenegs crossed the Balkans and smashed Thrace, and the Italian possessions of Byzantium were captured by the French Normans.
And against this gloomy background, an incident occurred that was of great importance for the relationship between Kiev and Constantinople, and thereby for the Darkness of the Volcano. At the turn of 1079 and 1080, Russian varangians broke into the imperial chambers for no apparent reason, broke into the doors, shot at the emperor with bows. They were all drunk. The Greek soldiers detained them, knocked them down from the stairs and blocked them in some fortress. The intoxication of the varangians passed, and they began to ask for forgiveness, which they received, but the initiators of the riots were sent to the garrisons of different fortresses, i.e. into exile [13]. At the same time, Oleg Svyatoslavich was exiled from the capital to the island of Rhodes.
This silly story had an impact on the seemingly persistent Russian-Greek contact. The Russians ceased to seek service in Constantinople, and the Greeks preferred to replace them with Anglo-Saxons, who left their homeland captured by the French Normans in large numbers [14]. Vsevolod's positions in the Black Sea region turned out to be unsupported, and the Dark-Balkan Jews immediately played on this.
It should be noted that in the XI century. the most combat-ready troops in Eastern Europe were princely squads, as they consisted of professional soldiers. Therefore, even rogue princes found a use for themselves if they had the means to pay for a certain number of soldiers sufficient to carry out the necessary operations. So, in 1081, such funds appeared with two outcasts: Volodar Rostislavich, the son of the poisoned prince (see above), and David Igorevich. Both of them fled from Russia into the Darkness of Darkness, drove out Ratibor and sat down to reign. Obviously, they were ready for an alliance with the devil, just to get a place under the sun.
Vsevolod did not take any measures against these princes, because his hands were tied by the war with Polotsk. In addition, it was difficult to act in the south without the support of the Greeks, and Emperor Alexei Komnenos himself needed help against the Pechenegs and Seljuks. He found this help from the Polovtsian khans Tugorkan and Bonyak, with whose help he saved Byzantium and provided it with an age of brilliance (although not prosperity). And since the Polovtsians continued the border war with Russia, the alliance of Alexei and Vsevolod became a fiction, and the time came for the prince-prisoner Oleg Svyatoslavich.
84. THE ADVENTURES OF OLEG SVYATOSLAVICH
Prince Oleg languished for four years in Constantinople and in exile on the island of Rhodes, but another coup restored his freedom. In March 1081, Emperor Nikephoros III Votaniates was deposed from the throne. Alexey Komnenos carried out many reforms, but in 1082 he encountered resistance from the "Manichaeans", i.e. Bulgarian Bogumils and Pavlikians, old friends of the Jewish Khazaria. Then, in 1083, the emperor released Oleg into the Darkness of Tarakan together with his wife, the Byzantine patrician Theophania Muzalon. Returning, Oleg "excised" the Khazars involved in the murder of his brother and who conspired against him. The motives of revenge are clear, but how did he manage to achieve this?
Let's imagine this picture: Prince Oleg and his wife go ashore from a Byzantine ship near the walls of the city, where Oleg's rivals rule: David Igorevich and Volodar Rostislavich, and the most influential part of the population - the Khazars - has every reason to hate the returned exile. The same one has neither troops nor money. It's so easy to kill him, but suddenly this man alone exterminates his enemies and takes two princes prisoner! How could he have carried out such a coup d'etat?
This means that there was a powerful party behind Oleg, obviously the one that M.I. Artamonov dubbed "native". Circassians, Ossetians and Polovtsians flocked to Oleg, found a leader in him and "excised" traitors.
Oleg's arrival was the quantum of energy that caused the explosion of "superheated steam". There is no reason to say that this "explosion" was historically predetermined. The intensity of passions could have weakened if the activities of their carriers had flowed in a different channel, in other words, if the Caucasian passionaries had found another use for their forces. For example, the Polovtsians would go to war with the Bulgarians, and the Circassians would fight with the Ossetians. But that didn't happen. The flash hit the junction of two superethnoses: local - Turkic-Japhetic - and alien, and the latter burned down. And no one regretted it - neither former allies nor neighbors. Thus ended the history of the Jewish Khazaria.
Could it have been otherwise? It could have, but it's unlikely. Contacts at the level of superethnoses, as a rule, lead to annihilation. The only exceptions are brief periods of passionate explosions, but even then, the old ethnic groups disappear, merging into a new one. In the XI century in Eastern Europe, the processes of ethno-cultural crystallization were going on against the background of declining passion tension. Consequently, there were few chances for a creative fusion of superethnoses, and there were many chances for the death of one of the two; and now the theory of probability in ethnic history has received another confirmation. It is only a pity that the brevity of the chronicler, who disliked Prince Oleg Svyatoslavich, deprived the descendants of curious and certainly dramatic details of this extraordinary event.
Having turned out to be an independent sovereign of Darkness, Oleg showed generosity, which he did not change until the end of his difficult life. He released his rivals, David Igorevich and Volodar Rostislavich, to Russia. David immediately engaged in robbery: he took goods from merchants who traded with the Greeks in the town of Oleshye, a transshipment trading post at the mouth of the Dnieper [15]. By this act, he deprived himself of the support of Grand Duke Vsevolod Yaroslavich, who put him to reign in a small Dorogobuzh.
Vsevolod lost an ally in the fight against Oleg. And the latter, being an ally of Alexei Komnenos, gradually took a leading position in the ranks of the "Russian" direction, previously owned by his father, and then gradually lost by his uncle. Despite the fact that Vsevolod ruled the entire Russian land, his power did not extend to the Darkness of Tarakan, covered by the Polovtsian nomads, because peace with the Polovtsians had not been violated for 15 years.
The support provided by Emperor Alexei to Oleg could not but upset Grand Duke Vsevolod. He responded to what had happened by reorienting himself to the West. This was expressed in the fact that Vsevolod married off his daughter Eupraxia to Margrave Henry the Long of Staden. In 1083, the young princess arrived in Germany "with a magnificent embassy and camels loaded with luxurious clothes, precious stones and in general untold wealth"[16].
Until 1086, Evpraxia was brought up in a monastery. When she reached marriageable age, she married the margrave, soon became a widow and returned to the monastery. In 1088, Emperor Henry IV fell in love with a young widow and married her. Princess Eupraxia turned into Empress Adelheid, but this marriage was not happy: Henry IV belonged to the satanic sect of the Nicolaitans, whose mysteries, like all Satanists, consisted in outraging church rites and sacraments. He involved his wife in participating in the mysteries: a blasphemous mass was celebrated on her naked body.
Evpraxia was a Russian woman. She could not stand the German outrages and ran away from her husband to his enemies: Countess Matilda and Pope Urban II. In 1094, she performed at the Council of Constance, and a year later at the council in Piacenza with the exposure of her husband, received absolution for involuntary sin and was sent through Hungary to Russia, where she ended her days on July 9, 1109.
This story, including the marriage of an Orthodox princess with a Catholic who turned out to be a Satanist, an enemy of Christianity and his people, compromised Vsevolod's policy and pushed many Russian people into the ranks of the patriotic party, which was in Oleg's favor. Metropolitan John II Prodrom categorically condemned the ties with Rome. The power of public opinion, in which ethnic self-perception crystallized, turned out to be more powerful than political calculations and broke them.
That was not the case in Germany. It would seem that exposing the emperor as a criminal Satanist should have alienated all Christian subjects from him, but this did not happen. Henry IV continued to fight his political enemies with the forces of his political supporters, and the problem of conscience, so important for Russia, had no significance for the participants of these events.
It would seem that the romantic tragedy of Princess Evpraxia could not have serious consequences either for international relations, or even more so for the ethnogenesis of the Eastern Slavs. How many similar stories have disappeared into eternity without a trace! And the same thing could have happened here, if not for the circumstances of the time and place.
Apparently, the unfortunate princess, having become a nun, did not spread about her difficult past, but in the West the scandal was grandiose and with the revival of trade relations between Germany and Russia, it simply could not fail to reach Kiev, where the trading and usurious quarter of German Jews with their own stone synagogue was already flourishing. Jews, of course, influenced public opinion in Kiev. In the West, the Jews supported the emperor, the feudal lords supported the pope. Since the Jews, under the patronage of the grand dukes, successfully competed with Russian merchants and artisans, the sympathies of the latter were on the side of the feudal lords, who in the XI-XII centuries. we haven't climbed to the East yet. Thus began the involvement of Ancient Russia in the great European struggle of the parties, which later became known as the Ghibellines and Guelphs. At the beginning of the XIII century. the Volyn princes were on the side of the Ghibellines, and the Seversky - Guelphs, but the beginning of this discord in Russia, which led to tragic events, apparently lies in the collision of the unsuccessful marriage of Evpraxia Vsevolodovna, and she herself was innocent of future troubles.
One way or another, we can state the revival of Grecophile sentiments and the threat of the German orientation of the grand dukes, whose strength was great, but without the sympathy of the general population is ephemeral.
Grand Duke Vsevolod ruled Russia for 15 years (1078-1093), was "bored" in Kiev because of the claims of his nephews who asked for volosts, was ill and completely passed in his old age. The golden table of Kiev, according to the ladder, passed to his eldest nephew Svyatopolk Izyaslavich, a man of mediocrity, but crafty [17]. Vsevolod's son Vladimir Monomakh was sitting in Chernigov, fearing to provoke the anger of his cousin. The people of Kiev welcomed the new prince with joy. But events took an unexpected turn.
85. ECHO OF THE CURSED PAST
The undisputed merit of Prince Vsevolod Yaroslavich was a lasting peace on the steppe border. The Polovtsians had no reason to go to war with Russia, which also had superior forces. Those collisions that preceded the world were accidental and episodic. And the enemies of the Polovtsians and Rusichs were the same: Torks and Pechenegs. The war with the Pechenegs absorbed all the forces of the Polovtsians until the battle of Leburn in 1091, and during this time the Torques submitted to the Kiev prince.
This world has almost eliminated the “plague” of the last century - the slave trade. The cadres of slaves were replenished only during the war. The winner sold the captives to merchants, and they took them along the beaten paths, where local rulers provided the caravan with security for a share of the income. Neither Rusichi nor Polovtsy could be such merchants.
The Polovtsians were friends with Byzantium, which did not buy Christian slaves, and the Seljuks, relatives of the Pechenegs, were enemies of the Polovtsians. Consequently, the southern route for the slave trade was closed.
The Russians did not establish contacts with the Catholic kings after the church schism. Therefore, those who wanted to sell slaves needed intermediaries, i.e. Rachdonite Jews.[18] Then the "buyer's address" of the slaves changed. After the fall of the Umayyads in 1031 and the collapse of the caliphate into small states, the Spanish Arabs could not afford such luxury. And after 1085, when the Christians took Toledo and the Emir of Seville Mutamid called the Tuaregs, the need for slaves disappeared. But the Egyptian Caliph Fatimid Mustansir (1036-1094) was ready to buy any number of "Turks", and he had money. Therefore, the demand for slaves in the XI century exceeded the supply, but not for long.
Fatimid Egypt of the XI century was a kind of analogue of Umayyad Spain of the X century. Here and there, the Arabs conquered a rich country with a non-religious population with the hands of militant Berbers. In Spain, Christians became subjects of Sunni Muslims; in Egypt, Sunni Muslims became subjects of Ismailis. Both states lost the support of their mother country (Spain fell away from the caliphate in 756; Ifriqiya rebelled against the Fatimids in 1041) and were forced to hire or buy their own soldiers. The latter was more profitable. In Spain, the soldiers bought at the bazaar were called sakaliba, in Egypt - Mamluks. It was dangerous to have slave warriors of the same ethnic composition. They could easily seize power, as the Turks did in Baghdad in the IX century. Therefore, warriors were acquired in Africa and Eastern Europe. The Spanish caliphs hired Berbers, the Egyptian caliphs bought Sudanese negroes. Under Mustansir, who himself was the son of a black woman, there were 50 thousand black slave warriors in Cairo. Consequently, it was necessary to buy them, and the same number of "Turks" were bought, who instantly "quarreled with the Negroes and defeated them" in 1062 [19].
And since Cairo's relations with Baghdad continued to remain hostile, it was necessary to increase the number of Mamluks. This is where the money received from the population went... and there was no end in sight.
Against this background, thanks to the "power of things", the leaders of the sectarians, the Fatimids, were reborn into ordinary sultans of an ordinary state who loved to have fun at the expense of the treasury. They sincerely believed that slaves and intermediary merchants would provide them with safety and comfort. At that time, some Christian sovereigns were willing to sell their subjects for a good price. Jewish slave traders, who moved freely throughout the Mediterranean, had to find them, since they did not participate in wars.
It goes without saying that those who were sure that he himself would not be sold wanted to return to the "golden age" of the slave trade, i.e. to the IX-X centuries. They were residents of fortified and commercial cities. In the XI century there were two such cities on the territory of Eastern Europe: Kiev and Chersonesos (Korsun). All the others could be taken by the means of that time, and these two were practically irresistible. Therefore, colonies of Jews appeared here and there, mediating in the slave trade, but their positions were different.
Eastern Jews lived in Chersonesos, who were not affected by the defeat of the Khazar khaganate. In Orthodox Byzantium, they had a number of restrictions in trade, in particular, they were forbidden to sell Christians into slavery. But during the troubled time of coups and rebellions, Chersonesos was left to itself for a while, and a Jew who was baptized for a career became the ruler there.[20] Without breaking ties with the community, this ruler allowed his tribesmen to trade in Russian prisoners, whom the Polovtsians could sell them cheaply. But war was necessary for this.
The war began in May 1093, and a stream of Russians, shackled, barefoot and pale, poured into the Korsun slave market. There they were bought cheaply by Jews for resale and, according to this source,[21] they were treated worse than the Polovtsy. Just as in ancient times the Jews bought slaves - Hellenes and Christians to kill, so here they sometimes starved and thirsted prisoners, and one fanatic crucified on the cross, the monk of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra Evstratiy Postnik, captured by the Polovtsians in 1096, But this act caused a resonance that reached Constantinople. Alexey Komnenos was a resolute man and ordered an investigation, which revealed the criminal activities of the eparch (ruler) and the entire community.
Basileus Alexei ordered the eparch to "kill evil" and carried out repressions against the Crimean Jews, and the murderer of the martyr Evstrati was hanged "on a tree", likening him to Judas.
Not all Crimean Jews were persecuted, but only those who were associated with the slave trade. Others expressed a desire to be baptized, after which they were left alone. The sincerity of the decision is more than doubtful, but the slave trade was stopped, and it is no coincidence that after 1097 the Russian-Polovtsian war took on a different character: its meaning and goals were already different. In order to understand the evolution of the Russian-Polovtsian clashes over the past period, it is necessary to turn to the consideration of some phenomena of ancient Russian history.
86. THE RETURN OF OLEG SVYATOSLAVICH
In the huge and rich Kiev, the situation was acute. The reason is the intensive process of ethnogenesis, i.e. the change of the stereotype of behavior in generations. The chronicler notes that the old and sick Prince Vsevolod "became... to love the mind of the young... they started setting him up so that he would neglect the squad with the old one"[22]. Here there is the usual conflict of "fathers and children", smoothed out during the quiet phases of ethnogenesis, but extremely painful in critical periods. In such situations, the "old" is discarded not because it is "bad", but because the younger generation craves self-affirmation and does not shun any means for this. Sometimes this activity is useful for the entire ethnosystem, and sometimes vice versa. However, the contemporaries of the events are guided not by distant forecasts, but by their pressing sympathies and desires. In this case, the young, taking advantage of the infirmity of the old prince, "began ..... to rob and sell people" [23], i.e. crossed out the century of the heroic struggle of their ancestors for the freedom and peace of the Slavic population of the Dnieper.
Prince Svyatopolk Izyaslavich (in epiphany - Mikhail Dmitrievich) leaned on this youth, and he did not separate his interests from their interests. Immediately after his accession to the throne, he arrested the Polovtsian ambassadors who came to him to confirm the terms of peace. The war he unleashed, he spent extremely mediocre due to an incredible predilection for the advice of the "young" and the neglect of experienced boyars. He even managed to quarrel with the Pechersk Monastery, which traditionally supported the anti-Grech line, because he took away the salt from the monks, with which they supplied the people of Kiev. The Grand Duke put this salt on sale at an increased price and tortured the monks who allegedly found and hid the treasure.
Such a selfish and unprincipled position of the Grand Duke and the senseless, unsuccessful war with the Polovtsians in 1093-1094 undoubtedly led to the emergence of discontent in Russia, which gave Oleg Svyatoslavich a reason to decide that his hour had come. The old enmity of the Chernihiv and Kiev residents, the policy of Svyatopolk II and the hope for the charm of Russian patriotism pushed him to act, the consequences of which were irreversible.
In 1094 Oleg left the darkness forever. He took with him all his supporters - Russian, local and Polovtsian, and left the principality to his benefactor Alexei Komnenos, who annexed the Darkness of Tarakan to Byzantium. Since Oleg had no secret enemies in the rear, his campaign was successful, Monomakh, besieged in the citadel of Chernigov, fought back for eight days, but the Chernihiv people themselves stood against him, except for Oleg's squad and the Polovtsians. This is evident from the fact that Vladimir had only about 100 people, including women and children. Oleg generously released his former friend from the trap that Chernigov prison had become, and he recognized his right to reign in Chernigov.
Chernihiv was considered the second city of the "empire of Rurikov". According to the ladder system, the prince of Chernigov had the right to ascend to the golden table of Kiev after the death of his elder brother. Oleg "himself through to the Grand Duchy”... Svyatoslav was also more of a brother to Vsevolod"[24], but his legitimate position was weak, since he had an older brother, David, who was sitting in Smolensk under the patronage of Grand Duke Svyatopolk II and David was his faithful henchman. David and then his children were constant opponents of Oleg and his descendants. And this opened the way to the throne to Vladimir Vsevolodich Monomakh, the enemy of the Polovtsians, the enemy of the Westerners and the leader of the Grecophiles. The combined forces of Svyatopolk and Vladimir Monomakh outnumbered Oleg's forces, but behind the latter was the Polovtsian steppe, which paralyzed a possible counterattack from Kiev. Therefore, Svyatopolk and Vladimir, in an effort to isolate Oleg, unleashed a war with the Polovtsy, which was by no means necessary for their subjects, even the boyars.
87. OLEG SVYATOSLAVICH'S APOLOGY
History is often unfair, especially when it is interpreted by poets. The author of the "Words about Igor's Regiment" was not guided by the search for truth when he called Prince Oleg Gorislavich because he used an alliance with the Polovtsians to return his native Chernigov.
That's so, but what can I say about Vladimir Monomakh, who was the first to hire the Polovtsians and ruined Minsk with their help, so much so that there was not a single living soul left there? And then he himself notes that he concluded "19 worlds" with the Polovtsians and used Polovtsian mercenaries in the war against Oleg. And other princes did not disdain Polovtsian help, so it was not about "sedition", which Oleg allegedly "forged with a sword" [25], but something else. We will try to find this "other" using only facts.
In the early 90s of the XI century, a poor, sheepskin-clad wanderer came to Constantinople from the east and declared himself a Lion, the son of Emperor Roman Diogenes, blinded and died in 1072. Alexei Komnenos exiled him to Chersonesos. The pseudo-Lion ran away, married Vladimir Monomakh's daughter Maritsa [26] and took the Polovtsian princes Itlar and Kytan on a campaign to Byzantium to return him to the throne. In 1095, near Adrianople, this Lion was captured by government troops, was blinded and ended his life in prison, and Itlar and Kytan came to Vladimir, their friend's father-in-law, "for peace." The Polovtsians believed so much in the sanctity of hospitality that Itlar with the best squad entered Pereyaslavl and spent the night with the boyar Ratibor, the former governor of Temutarakan, in the hayloft (Kytan stopped outside the city, having received the son of Prince Vladimir as a hostage and an oath of security and peace [27]). Let us recall that the Polovtsians recently came out of Siberia, the peoples of which were unaware of treachery and parricide.
Unfortunately, at this time, the boyar Slavyata came to Vladimir from Kiev on some business and organized with the help of the Ratiborov squad, who once fought with the Polovtsians in Darkness, the treacherous murder of their Polovtsian khans and their retinue. Vladimir did not want to do this, but yielded to the pressure of the ambassador of the Grand Duke Svyatopolk and the Ratiborov squad.
What caused the crime is clear from the following. Svyatopolk and Vladimir demanded that Oleg give them their son Itlar, who was visiting Chernigov, for death, and he joined their campaign against the unsuspecting Polovtsians. In this campaign, they captured "cattle and horses, camels and people" who did not expect a sudden breach of the peace.
The meaning of this operation is obvious. Svyatopolk and Vladimir wanted to involve Oleg in a crime and thereby quarrel with the Polovtsians, thanks to whom Oleg returned freedom to Chernigov, and his homeland and a place under the sun. Oleg did not succumb to the provocation and refused. Then in 1096 he was summoned to Kiev for the trial of the bishop, the abbot and the townspeople, i.e. for reprisals. He did not go, and the war began, where part of the Polovtsians fought for Oleg, and the other part - for Vladimir Monomakh. Oleg lost Chernigov, Khan Bonyak burned the environs of Kiev and in 1097 ruined the Pechersk Lavra.
How many senseless disasters! And because of what? Who benefited from the war with the Polovtsians, they who asked for peace? After all, the strength of the Russian princes, who possessed fortresses impregnable for the Polovtsian cavalry, iron weapons in abundance, trained squads and, although untrained, but numerous militia, left no doubt as a result of the war. But the Russians didn't need the war either. In response to the treacherous actions and direct provocations of the great Kiev Prince Svyatopolk II, the Polovtsy responded with raids, during which smerds and Gridni died. Oleg was an opponent of this policy... and he paid for it. The Chernigov Principality, which he had obtained with such difficulty, was transferred to his elder, but insignificant brother David, who faithfully served the Grand Duke. Oleg went to Murom; Rostov and Suzdal supported him and tried to accept Novgorod. But the forces were unequal.
For two years Oleg fought off the superior forces of the Grand Duke and his henchmen; finally, after the defeat on the Koloksha River, Oleg appeared at the congress of princes in Lyubech and accepted what they decided to give him - Novgorod-Seversky.
And suddenly he got lucky. The Grand Duke took part in the heinous crime of blinding Cornflower, Prince Terebovlsky. Here even Vladimir Monomakh "was horrified and cried." The public opinion of Russia condemned the Grand Duke, and there was a place for Oleg in life, since in 1100 the princes, meeting in Uvetichi, "created the world."
The main problem in Russia was the attitude towards the Polovtsians. The merchant circles of Kiev – the slavers - were extremely belligerent, because the war fed them. But it was not possible to win the war, as stated by Vladimir Monomakh himself, who took part in it.
In 1103, at the princely congress in Dolobsk, Vladimir Monomakh opposed his program to the program of the Svyatopolk squad, which wanted to continue a protracted war that promised considerable benefits. Monomakh demanded a decisive offensive in order to end the war, and achieved his goal. The offensive was made and the victory was won! [28]
The history of this campaign allows us to abandon the preconceived idea that the Polovtsians were nomads, like the eastern Mongols and the Aral Sea Kazakhs of the Adai clan. Camp, i.e. year-round, nomadism is unthinkable in the Dnieper region, where the thickness of the snow cover exceeds 40 cm and, consequently, in winter cattle need hay, and in spring they need long-term feeding after a hungry winter.
That is why Monomakh attacked the winter quarters of the Polovtsians in early spring and forced them to fight, depriving them of the possibility of maneuver. In the face of a counter battle, the victory of the Russians was a foregone conclusion. Unable to withstand the psychic attack, the Polovtsians ran, and the Russian riders on well-fed horses cut down the fleeing ones without incurring losses, after which the Vezhi, i.e. winter quarters, where Polovtsian women, children, cattle and Torki and Pechenegs who found shelter with the Polovtsians were looted.
The war did not end there. Vladimir Monomakh executed Khan Beldyuz, who was captured, but this only aggravated the situation: the Polovtsy stopped surrendering. The resistance to the Russian offensive was led by Khan Bonyak, the same one who saved Byzantium in 1091, defeated the Hungarian king Coloman on the San River in 1097, after the murder of Itlar, broke into the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra and now has not laid down his arms.
Bonyak responded to Vladimir 's campaign with raids on Pereyaslavl in 1105 and 1107. The second campaign was repulsed by seven princes. This victory did not promise peace, and Vladimir in 1110 tried to undertake a new campaign, but so sluggishly that he did not meet the Polovtsians, but they plundered many villages in the Pereyaslavl principality. Only the following year, again in the spring, the princes Svyatopolk, Vladimir and David moved to the southeast, and on March 27, 1111, in the famous battle on the Salnitsa River (near Sovr. Raisins) Russian troops won a complete victory. And finally, in 1116, the last campaign to the Don was made, by which the Donets was understood. Three Alan fortresses and a beautiful princess, whom Yaroslav Vladimirovich married, were taken there; but then the Russian offensive choked.
In the same 1116, the Torki and Pechenegs allied with the Russians were defeated by the Polovtsians in a two-day battle near the Don and fled to Russia. They were followed in 1117 by the Russian inhabitants of Belaya Vezha, a fortress on the left bank of the Don.[29] And subsequent events in Russia itself prevented the further conquest of the Great Steppe. So, it turned from the Russian outskirts into the "unknown land" and was returned only in the XVIII century.
However, it could not be otherwise. The forces of the Monomashichs were limited, as was their popularity in Russia. The nomads of the Polovtsians stretched from the Dniester to the Irtysh, and the Zadonsk steppes, not to mention the Zayaitsk ones, were unattainable for the Kiev troops. Therefore, after a decisive, but, alas, useless victory, Oleg Svyatoslavich's program became the basis of the steppe policy of Russia. Oleg, considering trips to the Steppe pointless, replaced them with peace negotiations and dynastic marriages. But, refusing to participate in campaigns, he always joined forces with other princes when it came to protecting the borders.[30] It was a policy adopted by his heirs - the princes of the Seversk land. And they brought them success.
So, Oleg Svyatoslavich has not done anything shameful for the 60 years he has lived. On the contrary, if there was a knight in Russia without fear and reproach, it was he - the last Russian kagan. His characterization in the "Word about Igor's Regiment" seems biased and unfair. After Oleg's death (1115), Russian-Polovtsian relations entered a new phase.[31] The Great War ended, replaced by the participation of the Polovtsians in the internecine wars of the Russian princes. And a century later, Russians and Polovtsians act as allies in the fight against external enemies: Crusaders, Seljuks and Mongols.
Russians and Polovtsy suffered equally in the senseless war unleashed by Svyatopolk and his advisers. Since Svyatopolk himself was not personally an enemy of the Polovtsians and even married a Polovtsian princess, then, apparently, the blame for the strife lies precisely with those "young" who surrounded the Grand Duke, using his weakness and narrow-mindedness. To please them, Oleg was slandered and conscious bills were made in the "Tale of Bygone Years", and didactic novels appeared in place of the missed events. But who were these "advisers"?
88. A TERRIBLE EPILOGUE
The appearance of phenomena is deceptive. Although the actions performed by individuals are the basis of historical events, it would be wrong to attribute to these people (persons) a decisive role in major historical phenomena. The actions of persons are significant only insofar as they are supported by consortia clothed in social forms. There were three of them in Kiev at the end of the XI century: the old boyars, the masses and the "young" (young) associates of Svyatopolk II.
The former were in opposition to the political line of the Grand Duke [32], the next openly disliked him, and the third lived at the expense of the prince's favors and could not imagine the strength themselves. But there was another real force in Kiev that gave Svyatopolk money to pay for the squad and bribe other princes. It was a Jewish colony, consisting not of enterprising and brave Rachdonites, but of cunning moneylenders who came through Poland from Germany [33].
Using the patronage of Western princes, these Jews gained weight and importance in Kiev, which allowed them to take revenge on the enemies of their Eastern brethren - Oleg Svyatoslavich and his Polovtsian friends.
After Oleg's "relocation" to Novgorod-Seversky and the defeat of the Polovtsians, the last opponent of the Jews in Russia was the Orthodox Church - the Kiev Metropolia, associated with the Patriarchate of Constantinople. The break between Svyatopolk and the metropolis was achieved, and with a very cunning trick: the prince defended the Pechersk Monastery as the Russian national church and entrusted this monastery with the alteration of the chronicle, which was carried out in 1100-1113[34].
It seemed that the murdered chimera of Judeo-Khazaria had been resurrected on the banks of the Dnieper, into whose veins the renewed blood brought from the banks of the Rhine and the Rhone had flowed. Western Jews did not repeat the mistakes of Iranian and Byzantine Jews. They did not seize power, but simply helped the legitimate Grand Duke in his enterprises. The old nobility remained in their places, but lost the favor of the prince and influence on state affairs. Trade and crafts gradually passed into the hands of Jews, as each of them was helped by the Jewish community, while Russian merchants and artisans acted each at their own individual risk. At the same time, the influx of Jews from Germany was motivated by the fact that the Crusaders staged wild pogroms there, which the feudal rulers of the Rhine cities could not curb. And in Kiev, Svyatopolk II firmly held power with the help of the "younger", which meant not so much age as political sympathies.
So, at the head of the army was Tysyatsky Putyata Vyshatich, the brother of the famous Yan Vyshatich. In 1071, Yan Vyshatich pacified the movement of the Magi in the Rostov-Suzdal land, showing considerable courage and efficiency. Under Vsevolod 1, he was a thousand-year-old, i.e. commander of the troops, but did not get along with the prince when he began to flirt with Germany. Svyatopolk II completely removed him from state affairs, and brought his brother Jan - Putyatu closer to his person, who made, without special talents, a brilliant career. Note that his companion in the campaign of 1106 was the voivode Kazarin, i.e. Khazarin, mentioned both in the chronicle and in the epic [35]. Since the activity of the Jewish community did not affect the nature of social relations, it remained out of the field of view of most historians.
The political line under Svyatopolk was aimed at personal recruitment. The prince tried to get rid of "meaningful", i.e. passionate, people who had conscience, abilities and energy. For this purpose, he even used blinding after cross-kissing, i.e. betrayal, as was the case with Vasyl Rostislavich, and opals, as with Vladimir Monomakh and Jan Vyshatich. The management mechanism became extremely simple: Jewish moneylenders received income from the Kievans and shared it with the prince, who supported the army with this money and ensured further income. Those dissatisfied with this order lost their leaders and seemed safe for the government. In fact, what could the scattered appanage princes, unarmed smerds and townspeople who were under supervision do? The new order seemed solid, despite its unpopularity.
Alas, the extinction of passionarity does not entail a reduction in bloodshed. Sub-passionaries, having got rid of the press of passionaries, break the rigid system created by them and open the way to their hitherto delayed instincts.
So it was in Ancient Rome, and after A.D. - in Constantinople and Baghdad; so it happened in Kiev, which at that time was the third richest and most populous city in Europe. Only Constantinople and Cordoba were more magnificent than Kiev, but both capitals were already declining.
Kiev was not threatened by external enemies, and the rich nature generously fed its population, which rapidly increased, but did not increase the level of passionarity. On the contrary, the passionaries went to the squads of rogue peripheral princes or to the varangian regiments - to Tsargrad. And the sub-missionaries lived at home and behaved quietly, because the vigilantes of the Grand Duke Svyatopolk II could terrify anyone. In 1113 Svyatopolk II died, his rightful heir was Prince David of Chernigov, who had a certain number of supporters among the associates of Svyatopolk, but had neither political talents nor thirst for power. And in Kiev, ethnic disintegration has gone so far that the instincts of the crowd turned out to be stronger than the norms of law and state prospects. The chroniclers said better about what happened than I can do it, and V.N. Tatishchev has already made a summary of the data.[36]
In Kiev, after the death of the Grand Duke, the unpopularity of his political line was fully manifested. Popular unrest began under the slogan: "We don't want Svyatoslavichev!"[37]. First, the house of Putyata, Tysyatsky (who commanded the army), and the houses of his friends were looted, then the people's anger turned to the Jewish colony, caressed by the late prince. The Jews gathered in the synagogue and bravely fought back, hoping for the arrival of Vladimir Monomakh from Pereyaslavl. The Kiev nobles managed to send messengers for the prince, who came with a squad, was received "with honor and great joy" by the people, the boyars and the metropolitan and sat down on the golden table of Kiev. Wishing to gain support among the people, Vladimir called the princes to a council, which was held at Vydobich. At the suggestion of the Grand Duke, the Jews were evacuated from the Russian land without confiscation of property, but without the right to return back. Secretly returning Jews were denied the protection of the law, even in the case of robbery and murder of the returned. In Poland and Hungary, Jews gained the sympathy of kings, but their field of activity has noticeably narrowed.
There is an acute controversy about the reliability of V.N. Tatishchev's information. S.L. Peshtich calls the testemony he gave "falsification"[38], and E.M. Dobrushkin believes that it is "impossible to use Tatishchev's data"[39]. The reverse position is defended by I.I.Smirnov[40], B.A.Rybakov [41] and A.G.Kuzmin[42]. The latter, being carried away by polemics, tries to defend even obviously outdated opinions, for example, about the Slavs of the Judeo-Khazars. The most weighty opinion of D.S. Likhachev: V.N.Tatishchev cannot be considered a falsifier, but his narrative should be taken critically[43], which, however, applies to all authors of historical genres.
Very little attention was paid to this event in Russia, because the social system has not changed, there have been no coups d'etat and art still reproduced samples, similar to those created in the spirit of Byzantium. But for ethnic history, this event was of great importance. The zigzag of history that gave rise to the ethnic chimera has straightened out, and the history of the ethnic groups of Eastern Europe has returned to its course.
89. EXODUS
Owning half of the Darkness after losing hegemony on half of the continent was by no means tempting. Jews did not try to establish friendly relations with Greeks and steppe people - Cumans, Yases, Kasogs, and ties with some Russian rogue princes turned out to be fragile and ended in the massacre of 1083, when Oleg Svyatoslavich "excised" the dark-Balkan Khazars, as Eastern European Jews were then called.
The Jews had to look for a "new Khazaria"... and they found it. An influential colony of Jews was in Spain, under the wing of the Umayyad caliphs, but in 1031 the caliphate broke up into many small dynasties, the number of which reached twenty-three. These dynasties differed ethnically: Arab, Berber and Sakaliba warriors from former slaves, but all of them, with the exception of the sultans of Grenada [44], disliked Jews. But they did not lose their heads and offered their help to the Castilian king Alfonso VI. This king took Toledo and, since the Muslims had left the city, invited the Jews, giving them rights equal to Christians. He used Jewish scientists as diplomats. However, it was not always successful. In 1086, the Castilian ambassador, a Jew, was so rude to Mutamid of Seville that he executed him, and this caused a war between Castile and Seville. The war entailed, as a consequence, the invasion of Africans - Almoravids - and the defeat of Christians at Zalak.[45]
The Castilians defended Toledo, but in 1108 they suffered a new defeat - at Ucles. The battle was lost due to the fact that the Jews standing on the left wing of the Castilian army fled from the battlefield, and this allowed the Muslims to inflict so much damage on the Spaniards that even the heir to the throne died. Enraged by this, Archbishop Bernardo of Toledo organized a pogrom, but King Alphonse stood up for the Jews.[46] In 1134 King Ramiro II of Aragon established the same rights for Christians, Jews and Muslims in the four major cities of Aragon[47], which saved many Jews from the fanatical Berber, the so-called Almogads (Mahdists)[48].
The ethnic situation in the Christian part of Spain is exhaustively described in the report of the Cortes Commission on December 8, 1812 on the reasons for the establishment of the Inquisition. I quote: "Jews (in Spain. - L.G.) enjoyed freedom of religion and special rights, had their own judges and the protection of the laws”: when converting to Catholicism, they were related to grandees and held prominent positions. They collected taxes while remaining Jews and received orders. On the other hand, according to the laws of Alphonse X, Christians were forbidden to serve in the homes of Jews, to visit them, to drink and eat with them, to bathe in the bath where Jews bathed, and to take their medicines... they were two peoples separated by law and customs, and it was believed that they were one people. The baptism of Jews was hypocritical!"
And what was it supposed to be? The profession of faith always reflects the worldview of an ethnic group, historically formed over the centuries on the basis of certain prohibitions and permits, and both are perceived as something natural, self-implied and not subject to double-checking. This is a stereotype of behavior; for each ethnic group it is not similar to all other stereotypes.
But if the ethnic groups of the same group have close stereotypes, at the superethnos level they are practically incompatible. And the Berbers and Spaniards belonged to different superethnoses, whose passionate tension was equally or almost equally high - a situation in which breaking an ethnic stereotype often leads to a fatal outcome.
The venture of the Spanish kings can be considered as an experiment, set unconsciously, but gave an unambiguous result, recorded in the above quote scientifically, but somewhat late. The authors of the document could no longer take any measures to prevent the consequences of the "zigzag of ethnic history", since it described the completion of the long process of turning Castile from an ethnic integrity into a chimera. It took about 200 years, during which the influence of Jews, and especially Jewish women, on the Spanish nobility grew steadily.
This process is vividly depicted by L. Feuchtwanger in the novel "The Spanish Ballad". Castile replaced Khazaria, with the only difference that its kings could not abandon the Christian religion, because their people, who were experiencing the akmatic phase of ethnogenesis, did not allow such metamorphoses. Nevertheless, an attempt to destroy the aristocracy was made by King Pedro the Cruel, whom the Spaniards considered a half-Jew [49]. It is difficult to say whether this was fair, but during the civil War, the Jewish community of Castile supported King Pedro, and after his death in 1369, the anti-Jewish sentiments of the Spaniards grew and resulted in a grandiose pogrom of 1391. [50] Then the Jewish masses escaped from the enraged peasants by being baptized. However, they continued to observe their rituals, which could not be hidden for long. As a result, under Isabella and Ferdinand, in 1478, the Inquisition was introduced to combat systematic deception [51] - a medicine more terrible than the disease [52]. But this is no longer our era, and after leaving Castile, we can return to our topic.
90. TWO MERITS OF VLADIMIR MONOMAKH
Popular indignation brought Vladimir Monomakh to the golden table of Kiev, who was not only a talented commander, but also a visionary politician. He realized that it was better and easier to live in harmony with his people than to intimidate them forever with the strength of vigilantes and the wealth of foreigners. Therefore, the policy of the Kievan state had been reversed. The war with the Polovtsians, difficult and unpromising for both sides, faded away, as the Western Polovtsian Union (according to S.A. Pletneva) became part of the Russian land, retaining autonomy, and the Zadonsk Polovtsians in 1116 they defeated the allies of Russia - the Torks and the Pechenegs, taking revenge for the defeat in 1111. In the future, they act as allies of the Suzdal princes.
Russian-Polovtsian relations, characterized by the participation of the Polovtsians in the internecine wars of the Russian princes, came to an end with this, and a new period of Russian-Polovtsian relations began[53]. In fact, in the XII-XIII centuries. Polovtsian land (Deshti-Kipchak) and Kievan Rus were one polycentric state. This was beneficial to both ethnic groups, as they were threatened both from the south, where the Seljuks-Turkmens became active, and from the west, from where an unexpected blow was struck, and, surprisingly, by Russian hands.
Any feudal regime has opponents. The order established by Monomakh was no exception. The "offended" were the "uny" associates of Svyatopolk II. They lost their leading role in the administration, the program - the fight against the Polovtsy - and the monetary support of the prince, who drew funds from the Jewish community, just as the German emperors of the Franconian dynasty did. The sympathies of the people were not on their side, so they began to seek support in the West: in Poland and Hungary, setting up in this sense their natural leader - Yaroslav Svyatopolchich, who ruled rich Volhynia.
It is difficult to say what the advisers who were friends of his father suggested to this prince, and what came from him, but in general it is not so important. The events speak for themselves.
Yaroslav Svyatopolchich in 1111 bravely fought with the Polovtsians, and in 1112-1113 - with the Yatvyags, was married to the granddaughter of Monomakh and, it would seem, confirmed his loyalty to the golden table of Kiev, which did not prevent him from being friends with the enemies of the German king Henry V, relatively loyal to the Kiev throne - the Hungarian Kalman (Coloman), also married to the daughter of Monomakh, and Polish Boleslav III, an ally of Hungary. The German Empire sought to conquer the Slavs and Hungarians.[54] In 1110, a war broke out in which the Czech Republic submitted to Germany, and the Hungarians and Poles repelled the German onslaught to the east. And suddenly, around 1117, the Hungarian king Kalman defiantly sent his young pregnant wife Euphemia Vladimirovna to Russia [55], and Yaroslav Svyatopolchich - his granddaughter Monomakh. [56] It was not a family scandal, but a challenge.
Monomakh acted quickly. Vladimir-Volynsky was besieged by the combined forces of the Russian princes, and after 60 days of the siege, Yaroslav accepted his uncle's forgiveness. But the most interesting thing was not that, but the behavior of the people. While the siege lasted, the Volyn boyars valiantly defended their prince, but when everything went well and the enemy left, "the boyars retreated from him," and the people followed their example. What happened?
It can be assumed that for Volyn public opinion the reason for the strife was unclear, but when peace was concluded and something became clear, the Kiev conflict of 1113 was repeated. Volynians, like Kievans, orientation to Catholic Europe was not needed. The prince had to emigrate to Hungary in 1118, i.e. immediately after the successful repulse of the enemy. Volyn boyars invited the seventh son of Monomakh, Andrei, to the throne.
This episode is not a simple civil strife, of which there were many in Russia, because it entailed a serious external war with Poland and Hungary. In both kingdoms, pro-Russian and pro-German parties emerged,[57] just as Yaroslav tried to lead the "Westernist" party created by his father. Being expelled, he did not lay down his arms. In 1121, he approached the city of Cherven with an army, but was repulsed. But in 1123 he brought a huge army of Ugrians, Czechs and Lyakhs to Vladimir. The Galician princes Volodar and Vasilko and the Hungarian King Stephen II (1115-1131) himself took part in the campaign.
The Volynians prepared to stand to the death, but chance helped them. Yaroslav traveled around the city, threatened citizens with punishments, offered surrender and stumbled upon an ambush: two lyakhs who served Prince Andrew suddenly jumped out of the bushes, hit Yaroslav in the stomach with a spear and disappeared into the city. After the death of the prince, the army dispersed, despite the persuasions of King Stephen to continue the siege. Apparently, the absence of potential allies in Russia made the further campaign hopeless. This was the end of another attempt to turn Russia into the flax of the empire and the diocese of the pope.
Of course, one should not think that an accidental spear strike is sufficient to change the history of contact at the superethnic level, but sometimes, although rarely, chance creates zigzags of historical formation, and their consequences are often felt for a long time. Such zigzags occur when the opposing forces are equalized at the moment. That's when His Majesty's fate comes into play.
In 1123 there was just such a moment. The German Empire was weakened by a long civil war for investiture between popes and emperors, or, what is the same, between Franconians and Saxons. The Worms Concordat of 1122 marked the extreme fatigue of the entire German ethnic group, as a result of which the pressure on the east was suspended. And in Hungary and Poland there was not even a shadow of unanimity: some Poles and Hungarians stood for the Catholic faith, while others, remaining Catholics, wanted to free themselves from the Germans. It was in this atmosphere of confusion that the flame of the renewed struggle of the "Christian world" with Eastern Orthodoxy was transferred to the west from the Carpathians, which made it possible for Russia to strengthen ideologically and economically, as well as achieve political unification. No wonder the son of Monomakh Mstislav was called Great!
Under Vladimir Monomakh and Mstislav, Russia finally established itself in history as a power allied to Byzantium and, moreover, as a co-religionist and equal.[58] Vladimir Monomakh began to be called not just a grand duke, but a tsar. But since the relations between Catholics and Orthodox could not be corrected, the rejection of "Latinism" extended to Russia, which, however, did not prevent the Volyn Prince Izyaslav from using the help of the Hungarian cavalry, without incurring complaints of apostasy. After all, these were political alliances, not ethnic contacts.
So, Vladimir Monomakh is rightly considered the greatest commander and politician of Ancient Russia, but, alas, not for what he did. The war with the Polovtsians took place during the reign of Svyatopolk II, and during the reign of Monomakh it died out. An insulting peace treaty was not concluded, but simply a "steppe fire" stopped burning by 1116, by 1125 the coals of the fires turned black, and after 1132 a new grass grew and the time of the Russian-Polovtsian symbiosis came.
And is it possible to be proud of a victory over an opponent who did not have a single chance to win? The population of Russia was about 5-6 million, and the Polovtsians - 300-400 thousand. Russia possessed impregnable fortresses and skilled blacksmiths who forged weapons for fighters. The element of risk in this war was completely absent, because the Polovtsians had no rear and allies. Monomakh's merit is not in defeating a weak opponent, but in concluding peace, which ensured the Russian-Cuman union for 130 years. But this is not a little!
A small episode in 1123 - the siege of Vladimir-Volynsky by the Hungarian-Czech-Polish army in the presence of Russian allies, in fact agents of the Vatican, promised tragic consequences, which is easy to see, taking for comparison the fate of the Polab Slavs. Yaroslav Svyatopolchich's reserve was inexhaustible: all the chivalry of Germany and the merchants of Italy, who were in the akmatic phase of passionate tension. In order to reach the Dnieper line, the Hungarians needed only guides and intermediaries with the local population, but this was what the far-sighted Vladimir Monomakh, who knew how to act in harmony with the people, deprived them of. Therefore, when he proposed to the masses a program of alliance with Byzantium, peace with the Polovtsians and rejection of the West, it was accepted by public opinion conciliated, i.e. as something self-evident.
Hungary missed the time to strike, the Old Russian Westerners scattered peacefully, and Orthodoxy saved Russia from occupation, the attempts of which were repeated only 100 years later. It is for this that Russia should be grateful to Vladimir Monomakh.
As mentioned, the war spread to the territory of Hungary, but its initiative passed to Byzantium. The son of King Kalman and grandson of Monomakh Boris, born in Russia by the exiled wife of the Hungarian king, grew up at his grandfather's court, moved to Constantinople in 1129 and was sent by Emperor Manuel to Hungary as heir to the throne. King Stephen II received him in a brotherly manner and appointed him heir to the throne, but the Hungarian nobles resisted and nominated Prince Bela, blinded by Kalman, as a candidate for king. Stefan and Boris relied on Greeks and Polovtsians, Bela - on Germans and Czechs.
In 1131, Stephen died, and the war broke out. Poles and Russians came to Boris's aid, but were defeated by the Germans in 1133. Lothair of Saxony reconciled the opponents in 1135, but after the death of the emperor in 1137, Boris's former enemies - the Margrave of Austria and the Duke of Bohemia - used him to invade Hungary and in 1146 suffered a heavy defeat. Boris fled to Byzantium, where he was received by Emperor Manuel, participated in his war with Hungary and was killed in one of the skirmishes with the Cumans, now fighting under Hungarian banners. The prince became a victim of superethnic contact.
Compared to all the countries described here, Russia was the happiest. Of course, there were frequent feuds here, but this did not prevent them from creating wonderful architecture and writing wonderful books. Up to 1200, the Russian land was a country of abundance, culture and not threatened from anywhere. Byzantium, which inherited wealth and brilliance of education from the warlike emperors of the Komnenos dynasty, was friends with co-religionist Russia, did not encroach on its borders. In the West, the power of chivalry and merchant Hansa grew, but the barrier in the person of Lithuanians, Letts, Kurs and Estonians protected the Russian principalities from German and Danish aggression. The Polovtsy, defeated by Vladimir Monomakh, sought the friendship of Russian princes, were baptized into the Orthodox faith by whole families and repelled the raids of the Seljuks - representatives of the "Muslim world", at that time fragmented into numerous rival sultanates. With the help of the Polovtsians, Georgia defeated the Seljuk troops. The kingdom of David the Builder, Queen Tamara and Georgy Lash was, like Byzantium, an ally of Russia. Russian land's prosperity seemed to last forever, but these words were extracted from a work of the XIII century, called "The Word about the Destruction of the Russian Land." The author of this treatise knew that he was describing the "golden autumn".
Let's digress and clarify. By the XIII century. the inertia force of the initial explosion of ethnogenesis was on the wane, which was noted by another Old Russian author in the "Word about Igor's Regiment", describing princely strife. Feuds are feudal wars. They were fought everywhere: between barons in France and between emirs in Syria, in Hindustan - between Rajputs (princes), in Germany - between dukes of the Holy Roman Empire, in Japan - between the noble families of Minamoto and Taira, in England - between kings and princes of the blood. Everywhere they had different meanings for the country and the people, but only in Russia of the XIII century. led to a tragic outcome. Why? And are they?
91. THE LEGACY OF MSTISLAV THE GREAT
The eldest son of Vladimir Monomakh, Mstislav, was a loyal and talented assistant to his father. His will and extraordinary abilities of the ruler not only saved the Kiev Principality from collapse, but also allowed him to complete the political unification of the Russian land. In 1127, Mstislav annexed the Polotsk Principality to Russia, and sent the captured Polotsk princes to Constantinople. No wonder the chronicler called him Great, and the Orthodox Church honored him with canonization. But after his death in 1132, the forces of ethnic development pushed Kievan Rus to collapse. Strife arose, reprisals became tougher, the political disintegration of the state, but not of the ethnos, came.[59]
The appanage princes of the XII century. after the death of Mstislav the Great became sovereign sovereigns of their principalities because they were supported by the population, burdened by dependence on Kiev. Chernihiv's Olgovichi - Vsevolod II and Igor II - sat on the golden table of Kiev for a while, but the people of Kiev were burdened by them. The conspirators called Izyaslav Mstislavich who came to the throne, and when he approached Kiev with an army in 1146, the townspeople defected to his side. Igor was captured and a year later was torn apart by the Kiev crowd.[60] In 1157 in Kiev, the legitimate heir of Monomakh, the Suzdal prince Yuri Dolgoruky, was poisoned, but in 1169 his son Andrew took Kiev and gave it to the army for a three-day robbery: previously, this was done only in foreign conquests, not in their own cities.
Not the passionate tension, but the unbridled instincts characteristic of the inertial phase of ethnogenesis are visible in these and many similar events in the history of the collapse of Kievan Rus. It was a good thing that there were no strong enemies on its borders. The Polovtsians, defeated by Vladimir Monomakh, preferred to plunder the Russian land not independently, but in alliances with the warring princes [61]. The Western Slavs restrained the German "onslaught to the east", and the Volga Bulgarians reduced the constant war with Suzdal and Murom to an exchange of raids for the capture of slaves. The Bulgarians replenished their harems, and the Russians made up for the damage. At the same time, the children of mixed marriages were considered legitimate, but the exchange of the gene pool did not lead both neighboring ethnic groups to unite. Orthodoxy and Islam were shared by Russians and Bulgarians, despite the genetic mixing, economic and social similarities, the monolithic geographical environment and the extremely superficial knowledge of the dogmas of both world religions by the majority of the Slavic and Bulgarian population.
This is strange: after all, the nomadic Polovtsians were willingly baptized, and the pagan yatvyagi did not accept Christianity, preferring death or heavy captivity. And the Russians themselves, with the brutality of internal wars and the loss of political unity, were preserved as an ethnic integrity. Obviously, in addition to ethnogenesis, cultural genesis must also be taken into account here; although these two processes are interfaced, they are not identical to each other.
Let us recall that until the tenth century, Slavs, although politically fragmented, represented a single superethnic entity that gradually perceived Christianity, which was also presented to contemporaries as a cultural unity. But already in the IX century, when a phase of fracture came for both superethnoses, the situation began to change, slowly but steadily.
In the east, in Byzantium, where the traditions of the era of the Great Cathedrals of the V-VI centuries were preserved, and the church service was conducted in a generally understandable Greek language, the basis of cultural unity was a belief for which understanding was necessary. Therefore, in Greek cities there were constant disputes on the topics of dogmatics, ethics, apologetics and other theological disciplines. The clergy practically did not separate themselves from the flock, so secular educated people sometimes became patriarchs: Tarasius, Nikephoros, Photios.[62]
That is why, preaching Orthodoxy, Cyril and Methodius translated sacred books for the Slavs. In their view, conversion was inextricably linked with enlightenment and education. The Slavs liked it, because, having been baptized, they ceased to be "barbarians", and were compared with the Greeks. Having passed the necessary Christian sciences, capable Slavic youths, such as, for example, the priest Hilarion, could even become bishops and teach their flock, who understood the language of the liturgy and sermon. Therefore, Orthodoxy took root in the kingdom of Bulgaria [63] and the Khaganate of Kiev; However, in Moravia, the neighbor of aggressive Bavaria, Christianity was defeated.
Christian preaching in Western Europe under the Carolingians was completely different. There arose the idea that Christian theology is a secret science, access to which should be open only to the clergy. This opinion existed already in the VIII century. because in 794 the Frankfurt Synod condemned the obligation of church services in only one of three languages: Hebrew, Greek and Latin, but this decision was subsequently ignored. According to the tradition in the West, only individual prayer and preaching were allowed in the native language.[64]
The obligation of "trilingualism" actually abolished the Christian enlightenment, because it was possible to study the Hebrew language only in Muslim Cordoba, where a Jewish colony lived, and Greek - nowhere, because in Byzantium iconoclasts ruled, who were considered heretics. Nevertheless, in the early 30s of the IX century, the German clergy baptized Moravia. However, after 846, Prince Rostislav turned to Constantinople with a request to send him a bishop who would also be a teacher, "so that... he explained the Christian faith to us" [65].
The further history of the mission of Cyril and Methodius has been repeatedly described, up to its tragic conclusion. The nephew of Prince Rostislav Svyatopolk betrayed Methodius and his disciples in 879, united with the Germans and left his people as a sacrifice to the pagan Hungarians. When in the XI century the Czech king appealed to Pope Gregory VII with a request for permission to worship in the Slavic language, the pope replied: "God Almighty has found it pleasing that the Holy Scripture in some of its parts should remain a mystery, because otherwise, if it were completely understandable to everyone, it would be valued too low and lost respect for it.[66]
I wonder how the pope himself felt about the Scripture, which he was obliged to know by his position? And it is clear that the southern Slavs - Bulgarians and Serbs, having the opportunity to choose, preferred the faith of the Greeks, with whom they fought, to the Latin faith, which they were given as the inferior, in a truncated form. The Czechs had nowhere to go, and the Poles of the XI century were so simple-minded and gullible that they did not suspect the offensiveness of the principle of "trilingualism". But the Russians, who lived along the Great Path "from the Varangians to the Greeks" and experienced in trade and diplomacy, rejected the confession that limited their freedom of conscience. Olga and her grandson Vladimir deliberately chose the Greek faith.
NOTES
[1] See: Artamonov M.I. History of the Khazars.P-442.
[2] See: PVL. Ch. II. p. 85.
[3] See: Priselkov M.D.Decree.op.181-184.
[4] Their names were Leek, the Kiev voivode, and Vyshata, the son of Ostromir, the voivode of Novgorod, the grandson of the posadnik Konstantin, the great-grandson of Dobrynya, the uncle of Prince Vladimir (see: PVL. 4.1. pp. 11014.11. pp.393-394). These were people with connections who provided them with support among the Russian population of Dark-Tarakan, which made the rogue prince a valuable ally of the Jews.
[5] PVL. Ch. 1. p. 111,311.
[6] See: Artamonov M.I. History of the Khazars.P.440.Note.6.
[7] See: PVL. Ch. II. p. 82.
[8] PVL. Ch. 1. pp. 122, 322.
[9] Ibid. pp. 132, 335.
[10] See: Introduction of Christianity in Russia. pp. 210-211.
[11] See; Soloviev S.M. History of Russia...Book 1. T. P.S.348.
[12] See: Solovyov S.M. History of Russia...Book 1. T. P.S.353.
[13] See: Vasilevsky V.G. Varyago-Russian and Varyago-English squad in Constantinople//Trudy. Vol. 1. pp. 353-354.
[14] The Normans who settled in Northern France gradually turned into the French Normans - a process typical of the phase of passionate ascent.
[15] See: PVL. Ch. II. p. 413.
[16] Pashuto V.T. Foreign policy... pp. 125-128.
[17] S.M. Solovyov writes: "Svyatopolk was cruel, mercenary and power-hungry without intelligence and firmness" (History of Russia... Book 1. Vol. II. P. 363), and M.N.Tikhomirov attributes to him the characteristic: "Unets" (bull) is bright and lute: he has "volostitelev zlii and boyars lyutia opalchivii" (Ancient Rus. M., 1975. p. 137).
[18] See: Bosworth K.E. Muslim dynasties. pp.80-81.
[19] Muller A. The history of Islam.Vol.11.pp.342-343.
[20] See: Kiev-Pechersk paterik / Edited by D.I. Abramovich. Kiev, 1931. pp. 106-107.
[21] See: ibid., p. 107.
[22] PVL. Ch. I. P. 343.
[23] Ibid.
[24] PSRL. Vol.1H. P.153.
[25] Tybo Oleg with a sword of sedition to shovel and arrows on the ground to sow..." and "Then, under Olza Gorislavichi, it is sown and spread strife, perish the life of a Dazhdbozh grandson" (A word about Igor's regiment. M.; L.. 1950. pp. 15-16).
[26] Or Mary (see: PVL. Ch. 11. p. 388, 421).
[27] See: ibid. Ch.1.P. 148.
[28] The Battle of Suteni on April 4, 1 103 (see: PVL. 4.1. pp. 183-185).
[29] See: Artamonov M.I. Decree. op. pp. 450-452.
[30] See: Golubovsky P. V. Pechenegs, Torks, Polovtsy before the invasion of the Tatars: The History of the South Russian steppes of the IX-XIII centuries. Kiev, 1884.0.110,111.
[31] See: Pletneva S.A. Polovtsian land//The Old Russian Principality of the X- XIII centuries. p. 275.
[32] See: PVL.Ch.II.P.99-101.
[33] See: Tyumenev A.I. Decree. op.
[34] See: PVL. Ch. II. p. 102.
[35] See: PVL. Ch. II. P. 20.
[36] Cm: Tatishchev V.N. Russian History. Book II.P.128- 130. In the Ipatiev Chronicle it is said that the Kievans looted the houses of Jews (PSRL. Vol. II. M., 1962, stb. 275). For modern interpretations of this event, see; Grekov B.D. Kievan Rus. pp. 496-498; Tikhomirov M.N. Ancient Rus. pp. 131-138.
[37] This motivation is absent in the chronicle texts. If this is not the speculation of V.P. Tatishchev, it must be assumed that Putyata was a supporter of David Svyatoslavich, a faithful servant of Svyatopolk 11, but not Oleg, who reconciled with Monomakh back in 1104.
[38] Peshtich S.L. Russian historiography of the XVIII century. Part 1.L., 1961.P.250.
[39] See: E.M. Dobrushkin. About two izvestiya "Russian History" by V.N.Tatishchev under 1113//Auxiliary historical disciplines. Issue III. L 1965. p. 290.
[40] See: Smirnov I.I. Essays on socio-economic relations of Russia of the XII-XIII centuries. M.; L., 1963. pp. 252-265.
[41] See: Rybakov B.A. V.N. Tatishchev and the chronicles of the XII century. // History of the USSR 1979. No. 1.
[42] See: Kuzmin A.G. Article 1113 in the "History of the Russian" V.N.Tatishchev//Vestn. MSU. 1972. No. 5.
[43] See: Likhachev D.S. Is it possible to include V.N.Tatishchev's "Russian History" in the history of Russian literature?//Russian literature. 1971. N 1.
[44] See: Muller A. The history of Islam. Vol. IV. p.167.
[45] See: Lozinsky S. G. History of the Inquisition in Spain. St. Petersburg., 1914. Vol. III. p. 9.
[46] Ibid. p. II.
[47] Ibid. p. 6.
[48] Ibid. p. 21.
[49] Ibid. p. 17-19.
[50] Ibid., p. 21.
[51] Ibid., p. 430.
[52] The abuse of secret proceedings was such that the queen was offered to transfer the affairs of religion to the bishops, but this did not help, and the further history is known.
[53] See: Pletneva S.A.//Ancient Russian principalities of the X-XIII centuries. P.275.
[54] See: Weber G. General History. Vol.IV. p.371.
[55] See: Pashuto V.T. Foreign policy ... p. 167.
[56] See: Soloviev S.M. History of Russia...Book 1.T.11.S.391-392.
[57] See: Pashuto V.T.Decree.soc.s.151, 167-168.
[58] Ibid. p. 186.
[59] See: Rybakov B.A. Kievan Rus and the Russian Principalities of the XII-XIII centuries. p. 472 et seq.
[60] The death of Igor II, a prisoner brutally tortured by the rabble, was equated to martyrdom; Igor was canonized.
[61] See: Gumilev L. N. Myth and reality//Problems of reconstructions in ethnography. Novosibirsk, 1984. pp. 5-24.
[62] See: Florya B.N. Legends about the beginning of Slavic writing. M., 1981. p. 35.
[63] Ibid. pp. 51-52.
[64] Ibid., pp. 26-27.
[65] Ibid., p. 26.
[66] Ibid., p. 29.
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I'll just share this personal note: On post # 14 (Sep 28th). I said that I will take a break after this post. I didn't know for how long? On the 29th Sunday morning I was in surgery for 4 hours and they cut a malignant tumor out of my liver. WOW. On Monday night the 30th I went home from the hospital with no pain nor weakness. Of course I have tiredness, but good appetite and good mobility.
Modern surgery is a miracle and nothing to fear about. (I guess that I beat cancer in 4 hours?)
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Here are recounted 100's of skirmishes describing princely strife. It seems like a simple "board game" where personal opponents make irrational decisions based on emotional reactions, and then carry them out. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE?
OK they all collected taxes, and they all hired mercenary armies. Those they could direct at will. War is a miracle of logistics, but nothing is said about it. How did the people support these efforts? Were they as detached as they are now, from war and peace. For instance, reading "The Good Earth" by Pearl S buck, the Chinese civil war raged, but most people were unaware of it. Only once in a while did it pass through your village.
Where did they get food, weapons and supplies. Especially they needed horses. So then they needed fodder. For me, this kind of writing has to be taken with a grain of salt. It is a portrayal of a hostile humanity, willing to battle any assumed adversary. It seems an arbitrary blood letting, the overheating of passion. Was normal life so boring? Was the army the only way to advance in life? This chapter raises more questions than answers.
He did say in 88. A TERRIBLE EPILOGUE
"The appearance of phenomena is deceptive. Although the actions performed by individuals are the basis of historical events, it would be wrong to attribute to these people (persons) a decisive role in major historical phenomena. The actions of persons are significant only insofar as they are supported by consortia clothed in social forms."
BUT HE DOES NOT ELABORATE ON THAT. That would be the interesting history. What were the people like? Were they only pawns that could be moved at will?
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