Russkaya Pravda. The Legal Code of Kievan Rus’ E-Book

Boris Yousef

• Herausgeber: Edizioni Aurora Boreale
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

The deepest historical, cultural and spiritual roots of Russian national identity can be found in an ancient kingdom known as Kievan Rus’, a state that flourished from the end of the 9th to the middle of the 13th century over a vast geographical area including a large part of today’s western Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, from the Baltic and White Seas in the north to the Black Sea coasts in the south.
According to the Russian Primary Chronicle, the first ruler to start uniting East Slavic lands into what would become Kievan Rus’ was Prince Oleg (879-912). He extended his control from Novgorod south along the Dnieper river valley to protect trade from Khazar incursions from the east, and took control of the city of Kiev. Sviatoslav I (943-972) achieved the first major expansion of Kievan Rus’ territorial control, fighting a war of conquest against the Khazars. Vladimir the Great (980-1015) then introduced Christianity with his own baptism and, by decree, extended it to all inhabitants of Kiev and beyond. Kievan Rus’ reached its greatest extent under Yaroslav the Wise (1019-1054); his sons assembled and issued its first written legal code, the Russkaya Pravda, shortly after his death.

Leseprobe

SYMBOLS & MYTHS

Edited by

BORIS YOUSEF

RUSSKAYA PRAVDA

(Русская Правда)

The Legal Code of Kievan Rus’

(Short Version)

Edizioni Aurora Boreale

Title: Russkaya Pravda. The Legal Code of Kievan Rus’ (Short Version)

Edited by Boris Yousef

With a preface by Boris Yousef

Publishing series: Symbols & Myths

ISBN: 979-12-5504-176-4

Edizioni Aurora Boreale

© 2022 Edizioni Aurora Boreale

Via del Fiordaliso 14 - 59100 Prato - Italia

[email protected]

www.auroraboreale-edizioni.com

ONCE UPON A TIME… THE KIEVAN RUS’

THE CULTURAL AND HISTORICAL ANCESTOR OF THE RUSSIAN NATIONAL IDENTITY

By Boris Yousef

The deepest historical, cultural and spiritual roots of Russian national identity can be found in an ancient kingdom known as Kievan Rus’, a state that flourished from the end of the 9th to the middle of the 13th century over a vast geographical area including a large part of today’s western Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, from the Baltic and White Seas in the north to the Black Sea coasts in the south.

Encompassing a variety of political communities and peoples, including Eastern Slavs, Norwegians, and Finns, this ancient kingdom was ruled by the Rurik dynasty, founded by the Varangian Prince Rurik.

According to the Russian Primary Chronicle (the Tale of Bygone Years), the first ruler to start uniting East Slavic lands into what would become Kievan Rus’ was Prince Oleg (879–912). He extended his control from Novgorod south along the Dnieper river valley to protect trade from Khazar incursions from the east, and took control of the city of Kiev. Sviatoslav I (943–972) achieved the first major expansion of Kievan Rus’ territorial control, fighting a war of conquest against the Khazars. Vladimir the Great (980–1015) then introduced Christianity with his own baptism and, by decree, extended it to all inhabitants of Kiev and beyond. Kievan Rus’ reached its greatest extent under Yaroslav the Wise (1019–1054); his sons assembled and issued its first written legal code, the Russkaya Pravda, shortly after his death.

The Kievan Rus’ began to decline in the late 11th century, gradually disintegrating into various rival regional powers throughout the 12th century. It was further weakened by external factors, such as the decline of the Byzantine Empire, its major economic partner, and the accompanying diminution of trade routes through its territory. It finally fell to the Mongol invasion of the 1240s, though the Rurik dynasty would continue to rule parts of Rus’ until the 14th century in the Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia and until the 16th century after the establishment of the Tsardom of Russia.

Prior to the emergence of Kievan Rus’ in the 9th century, the lands between the Baltic Sea and Black Sea were primarily populated by eastern Slavic tribes. In the northern region around Novgorod were the Ilmen Slavs and neighboring Krivichi, who occupied territories surrounding the headwaters of the West Dvina, Dnieper and Volga rivers. To their north, in the Ladoga and Karelia regions, were the Finnic Chud tribe. In the south, in the area around Kiev, were the Poliane, a group of Slavicized tribes with Iranian origins, the Drevliane to the west of the Dnieper, and the Severiane to the east. To their north and east were the Vyatichi, and to their south was forested land settled by Slav farmers, giving way to steppelands populated by nomadic herdsmen.

There was once controversy over whether the Rus’ were Varangians or Slavs, however, more recently scholarly attention has focused more on debating how quickly an ancestrally Norse people assimilated into Slavic culture.

Beyond the various nationalist theories proposed today by both Western and Eastern historians, we must underline that it is precisely from this historical assimilation between an autochthonous Slavic ethnic component and an immigrant Nordic-Germanic ethnic component that a new cultural and national identity was born and developed: the Russian one.