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The Rus, also known as Russes, were a people in
early medieval The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th to the 10th century. They marked the start of the Middle Ages of Europ ...
Eastern Europe. The scholarly consensus holds that they were originally
Norsemen The Norsemen (or Northmen) were a cultural group in the Early Middle Ages, originating among speakers of Old Norse in Scandinavia. During the late eighth century, Scandinavians embarked on a Viking expansion, large-scale expansion in all direc ...
, mainly originating from present-day
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...
, who settled and ruled along the river-routes between the Baltic and the
Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...
s from around the 8th to 11th centuries AD. The two original centres of the Rus' were Ladoga (''Aldeigja''), founded in the mid-8th century, and Rurikovo Gorodische (''Holmr''), founded in the mid-9th century. The two settlements were situated at opposite ends of the Volkhov River, between Lake Ilmen and
Lake Ladoga Lake Ladoga is a freshwater lake located in the Republic of Karelia and Leningrad Oblast in northwestern Russia, in the vicinity of Saint Petersburg. It is the largest lake located entirely in Europe, the second largest lake in Russia after Lake ...
, and the Norsemen likely called this territory ''Gardar''. From there, the name of the Rus' was transferred to the Middle Dnieper, and the Rus' then moved eastward to where the Finnic tribes lived and southward to where the
Slavs The Slavs or Slavic people are groups of people who speak Slavic languages. Slavs are geographically distributed throughout the northern parts of Eurasia; they predominantly inhabit Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Southeastern Europe, and ...
lived. The name '' Garðaríki'' was applied to the newly formed state of
Kievan Rus' Kievan Rus', also known as Kyivan Rus,. * was the first East Slavs, East Slavic state and later an amalgam of principalities in Eastern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical At ...
, and the ruling Norsemen along with local Finnic tribes gradually assimilated into the East Slavic population and came to speak a common language.
Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...
remained familiar to the elite until their complete assimilation by the second half of the 11th century, and in rural areas, vestiges of Norse culture persisted as late as the 14th and early 15th centuries, particularly in the north.Melnikova, E.A. (2003) ''The Cultural Assimilation of the Varangians in Eastern Europe from the Point of View of Language and Literacy'' in Runica – Germ. – Mediavalia (heiz./n.) Rga-e 37, pp. 454–465
.
The history of the Rus is central to 9th through 10th-century state formation, and thus national origins, in Eastern Europe. They ultimately gave their name to
Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...
and
Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...
, and they are relevant to the national histories of Russia,
Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...
and Belarus. Because of this importance, there is a set of alternative so-called " anti-Normanist" views that are largely confined to a minor group of Eastern European scholars.


Etymology

:Note: The þ ( thorn letter) represents the
voiceless dental fricative The voiceless dental non-sibilant fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. It is familiar to most English speakers as the 'th' in ''think''. Though rather rare as a phoneme among the world's languages, it is encount ...
/θ/ of ''th'' in English ''thing'', whereas the ð ( eth letter) represents the voiced dental fricative /ð/ of ''th'' in English ''the''. When þ appears in intervocalic position or before a voiced consonant, it is pronounced like ð, so the pronunciation difference between ''rōþer'' and ''róðr'' is minute. The name '' Rusʹ'' remains not only in names such as ''Russia'' and ''Belarus'', but it is also preserved in many place names in the
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
and Pskov districts, and it is the origin of the Greek ''Rōs''. ''Rus'' is generally considered to be a borrowing from Finnic '' Ruotsi'' ("Sweden"). There are two theories behind the origin of ''Rus''/''Ruotsi'', which are not mutually exclusive. It is either derived more directly from OEN '' rōþer'' ( OWN ''róðr''), which referred to rowing, the fleet levy, etc., or it is derived from this term through ''Rōþin'', an older name for the Swedish coastal region Roslagen.Stefan Brink, 'Who were the Vikings?', in
The Viking World
'', ed. by Stefan Brink and Neil Price (Abingdon: Routledge, 2008), pp. 4–10 (pp. 6–7).
The Finnish and Russian forms of the name have a final -s revealing an original compound where the first element was - (preceding a voiceless consonant, ''þ'' is pronounced like ''th'' in English ''thing''). The prefix form ''rōþs-'' is found not only in ''Ruotsi'' and '' Rusʹ'', but also in
Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...
''róþsmenn'' and ''róþskarlar'', both meaning "rowers", and in the modern Swedish name for the people of Roslagen – '' rospiggar'' which derives from ON *''rōþsbyggiar'' ("inhabitants of Rōþin"). The name ''Roslagen'' itself is formed with this element and the plural definite form of the neuter noun '' lag'', meaning "the teams", in reference to the teams of rowers in the Swedish kings' fleet levy. There are at least two, probably three, instances of the root in Old Norse from two 11th c. runic inscriptions, fittingly located at two extremes of the trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks. Two of them are roþ for ''rōþer ''/''róðr'', meaning "fleet levy", on the Håkan stone, and as i ruþi (translated as "dominion") on the lost Nibble stone, in the old Swedish heartland in the Mälaren Valley, and the possible third one was identified by Erik Brate in the most widely accepted reading as on the Piraeus Lion originally located in
Athens Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...
, where a runic inscription was most likely carved by Swedish mercenaries serving in the
Varangian Guard The Varangian Guard () was an elite unit of the Byzantine army from the tenth to the fourteenth century who served as personal bodyguards to the Byzantine emperors. The Varangian Guard was known for being primarily composed of recruits from Nort ...
. Brate has reconstructed *''Rōþsland'', as an old name for Roslagen. Between the two compatible theories represented by ''róðr'' or ''Róðinn'', modern scholarship leans towards the former because at the time, the region covered by the latter term, Roslagen, remained sparsely populated and lacked the demographic strength necessary to stand out compared to the adjacent Swedish heartland of the Mälaren Valley. Consequently, an origin in word compounds such as ''róþs-menn'' and ''róþs-karlar'' is considered the most likely one. Moreover, the form ''róþs-'', from which ''Ruotsi'' and ''Rusʹ'' originate, is not derived directly from ON ''róðr'', but from its earlier Proto-Norse form ''roðz'' ().Larsson, Mats G. (1997). ''Rusernas rike'' in ''Vikingar i österled''. Atlantis, Stockholm. . pp. 14–15. Other theories such as derivation from ''Rusa'', a name for the Volga, are rejected or ignored by mainstream scholarship.


History

Having settled Ladoga in the 750s, Scandinavian colonists played an important role in the early
ethnogenesis Ethnogenesis (; ) is the formation and development of an ethnic group. This can originate by group self-identification or by outside identification. The term ''ethnogenesis'' was originally a mid-19th-century neologism that was later introduce ...
of the Rus people, and in the formation of the Rus' Khaganate. Ladoga, then known as ''Aldeigja'' by the Norsemen, was the earliest and most significant settlement of the Rus', while Gorodische, likely known as ''Holmr'', was founded over a century later. It was from the Ladoga area, which formed the centre of the Rus', that the envoys went to
Constantinople Constantinople (#Names of Constantinople, see other names) was a historical city located on the Bosporus that served as the capital of the Roman Empire, Roman, Byzantine Empire, Byzantine, Latin Empire, Latin, and Ottoman Empire, Ottoman empire ...
in 838. The Varangians are first mentioned in the '' Primary Chronicle'' as having exacted tribute from the Slavic and Finnic tribes in 859. It was the time of rapid expansion of the Vikings' presence in Northern Europe; England began to pay
Danegeld Danegeld (; "Danish tax", literally "Dane yield" or tribute) was a tax raised to pay tribute or Protection racket, protection money to the Viking raiders to save a land from being ravaged. It was called the ''geld'' or ''gafol'' in eleventh-c ...
in 865, and the Curonians faced an invasion by the Swedes around the same time. The Varangians are mentioned in the ''Primary Chronicle'', which suggests that the term ''Rus'' was used to denote Scandinavians until it became firmly associated with the now extensively Slavicised elite of Kievan Rus. At that point, the new term ''Varangian'' was increasingly preferred to name the Scandinavians, probably mostly from what is currently Sweden, plying the river routes between the Baltic and the Black and Caspian Seas. Relatively few of the rune stones Varangians left in their native
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...
tell of their journeys abroad, to such places as what is today Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Greece, and Italy. Most of these rune stones can be seen today, and are a significant piece of historical evidence. The Varangian runestones tell of many notable Varangian expeditions, and even recount the fates of individual warriors and travelers. In Russian historiography, two cities are used to describe the beginnings of the country: Kiev and Novgorod. In the first part of the 11th century the former was already a Slav metropolis, rich and powerful, a fast growing centre of civilisation adopted from Byzantium. The latter town, Novgorod, was another centre of the same culture but founded in different surroundings, where some old local traditions moulded this commercial city into the capital of a powerful oligarchic trading republic of a kind otherwise unknown in this part of Europe. These towns have tended to overshadow the significance of other places that had existed long before Kiev and Novgorod were founded. The two original centres of Rus were Staraya Ladoga and Rurikovo Gorodische, two points on the Volkhov, a river running for between Lake Ilmen in the south to
Lake Ladoga Lake Ladoga is a freshwater lake located in the Republic of Karelia and Leningrad Oblast in northwestern Russia, in the vicinity of Saint Petersburg. It is the largest lake located entirely in Europe, the second largest lake in Russia after Lake ...
in the north. This was the territory that most probably was originally called by the Norsemen ''Gardar'', a name that long after the Viking Age acquired a much broader meaning and became '' Garðaríki'', a denomination for the entire state. The area between the lakes was the original Rus, and it was from here that its name was transferred to the territories inhabited by the Slavs on the middle Dnieper, which eventually became the "land of Rus" (''Ruskaja zemlja''). The ''Primary Chronicle'' portrays the East Slavic tribe of Polans as the most civilised of the East Slavs, and that they were therefore predisposed to host the Rus', but not give their name to the land. From this area, the Rus' moved eastward to the lands inhabited by Finno-Ugric tribes in the Volga-Oka region, as well as south along the Dnieper. The
prehistory Prehistory, also called pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the first known use of stone tools by hominins   million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use ...
of the first territory of Rus has been sought in the developments around the early-8th century, when Staraja Ladoga was founded as a manufacturing centre and to conduct trade, serving the operations of Scandinavian hunters and dealers in furs obtained in the north-eastern forest zone of Eastern Europe. In the early period (the second part of the 8th and first part of the 9th century), a Norse presence is only visible at Staraya Ladoga, and to a much lesser degree at a few other sites in the northern parts of Eastern Europe. The objects that represent Norse material culture of this period are rare outside Ladoga and mostly known as single finds. This rarity continues throughout the 9th century until the whole situation changes radically during the next century, when historians meet, at many places and in relatively large quantities, the material remains of a thriving Scandinavian culture. For a short period of time, some areas of Eastern Europe became as much part of the Norse world as were Danish and Norwegian territories in the West. The culture of the Rus contained Norse elements used as a manifestation of their Scandinavian background. These elements, which were current in 10th-century Scandinavia, appear at various places in the form of collections of many types of metal ornaments, mainly female but male also, such as weapons, decorated parts of horse bridles, and diverse objects embellished in contemporaneous Norse art styles. The Swedish king Anund Jakob wanted to assist Yaroslav the Wise, Grand prince of Kiev, in his campaigns against the Pechenegs. The so-called Ingvar the Far-Travelled, a Swedish Viking who wanted to conquer Georgia, also assisted Yaroslav with 3000 men in the war against the Pechenegs; however, he later continued on to Georgia. Yaroslav the Wise married the Swedish king's daughter, Ingegerd Olofsdotter of Sweden, who became the Russian saint, Anna, while
Harald Hardrada Harald Sigurdsson (; – 25 September 1066), also known as Harald III of Norway and given the epithet ''Hardrada'' in the sagas, was List of Norwegian monarchs, King of Norway from 1046 to 1066. He unsuccessfully claimed the Monarchy of Denma ...
, the Norwegian king who was a military commander of the Varangian guard, married Elisiv of Kiev. The two first uncontroversially historical Swedish kings Eric the Victorious and Olof Skötkonung both had Slavic wives. Danish kings and royals also frequently had Slavic wives. For example,
Harald Bluetooth Harald "Bluetooth" Gormsson (; , died c. 985/86) was a king of Denmark and Norway. The son of King Gorm the Old and Thyra Dannebod, Harald ruled as king of Denmark from c. 958 – c. 986, introduced Christianization of Denmark, Christianity to D ...
married Tove of the Obotrites. Vikings also made up the bulk of the bodyguards of early Kievan Rus rulers. Evidence for strong bloodline connections between the Kievan Rus and Scandinavia existed and a strong alliance between Vikings and early Kievan rulers is indicated in early texts of Scandinavian and East Slavic history. Several thousand Swedish Vikings died for the defence of Kievan Rus against the
Pechenegs The Pechenegs () or Patzinaks, , Middle Turkic languages, Middle Turkic: , , , , , , ka, პაჭანიკი, , , ; sh-Latn-Cyrl, Pečenezi, separator=/, Печенези, also known as Pecheneg Turks were a semi-nomadic Turkic peopl ...
.


Scandinavian sources

In Scandinavian sources, the area is called ''Austr'' (the "East"), '' Garðaríki'' (the "realm of cities"), or simply ''Garðar'' (the "cities"), and ''Svíþjóð hin mikla'' ("Great Sweden"). The last name appears in the 12th century geographical work '' Leiðarvísir ok Borgaskipan'' by the Icelandic abbot Nicolaus (d. 1161) and in ''
Ynglinga saga ''Ynglinga saga'' ( ) is a Kings' sagas, Kings' saga, originally written in Old Norse by the Icelanders, Icelandic poet and historian Snorri Sturluson about 1225. It is the first section of his ''Heimskringla''. It was first translated into Engl ...
'' by
Snorri Sturluson Snorri Sturluson ( ; ; 1179 – 22 September 1241) was an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician. He was elected twice as lawspeaker of the Icelandic parliament, the Althing. He is commonly thought to have authored or compiled portions of th ...
, which indicates that the Icelanders considered Kievan Rus to have been founded by the Swedes. The name "Great Sweden" is introduced as a non-Icelandic name with the phrase "which we call Garðaríki" (''sú er vér köllum Garðaríki''), and it is possible that it is a folk etymological interpretation of '' Scythia magna''. However, if this is the case, it can still be influenced by the tradition that Kievan Rus was of Swedish origin, which recalls ''
Magna Graecia Magna Graecia refers to the Greek-speaking areas of southern Italy, encompassing the modern Regions of Italy, Italian regions of Calabria, Apulia, Basilicata, Campania, and Sicily. These regions were Greek colonisation, extensively settled by G ...
'' as a name for the Greek colonies in Italy. When the Norse sagas were put to text in the 13th century, the Norse colonisation of Eastern Europe, however, was a distant past, and little of historical value can be extracted. The oldest traditions were recorded in the ''
Legendary saga A legendary saga or ''fornaldarsaga'' (literally, "story/history of the ancient era") is a Norse saga that, unlike the Icelanders' sagas, takes place before the settlement of Iceland.The article ''Fornaldarsagor'' in ''Nationalencyklopedin'' (1991 ...
s'' and there Garðaríki appears as a Norse kingdom where the rulers have Norse names, but where also dwelt the Dwarves Dvalin and Durin. There is, however, more reliable information from the 11th and the 12th centuries, but at that time most of the Scandinavian population had already assimilated, and the term ''Rus'' referred to a largely Slavic-speaking population. Still, Eastern Europe is presented as the traditional Swedish sphere of interest. The sagas preserve Old Norse names of several important Rus settlements, including (
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
), and (
Kiev Kyiv, also Kiev, is the capital and most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city of Ukraine. Located in the north-central part of the country, it straddles both sides of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2022, its population was 2, ...
); Fjodor Uspenskij argues that the use of the element in these names, as well as in the names and (Constantinople), shows the influence of
Old East Slavic Old East Slavic (traditionally also Old Russian) was a language (or a group of dialects) used by the East Slavs from the 7th or 8th century to the 13th or 14th century, until it diverged into the Russian language, Russian and Ruthenian language ...
(city), as usually means farmstead in Old Norse. He further argues that the city names can be used to show that the Rus were also competent in Old East Slavic. At this time the Rus borrowed some 15 Old East Slavic words,There were also about 14 other words borrowed from Old East Slavic: *''dyblitsa/dyfliza'' (*'' tĭmĭnica'', "dungeon"), *''Grikkiʀ'' ('' Griky'', "Greek"), *''kassa/kaza'' ('' kaša'', "gruel"), ''læðia'' (*''lodĭja'', "boat"), *''Læsiʀ'' (''l'äs'i'', "Poles"), *''poluta'' (''polota'', "palace"), *''polyði'' (*''pol'ud'je'', "Northmen's winter tour of East Slavic areas for lodging and provisions"), *''sabaló'' ('' soboljĭ'', "sable skin/fur"), *''stóll'' (''stolǔ'', "banquet table"), *''taparöks'' (''topor-'', "small war ax"), *''tulka'' (''tǔlkovati'', "to interpret"), *''tulkʀ'' (''tǔlkǔ'', "interpreter"), *''Waldimarr'' ('' Vol(o)dimēr'', "ruler of peace"), and *''warta'' (''vor(o)ta'', "gate"), in , citing Strumiński (1996, 246–54). such as the word for marketplace, '' tǔrgǔ'', as '' torg'', many of which spread to the other Old Norse-speaking regions as well. The most contemporary sources are the Varangian runestones, but just like the sagas, the vast majority of them arrive relatively late. The earliest runestone that tells of eastwards voyages is the Kälvesten runestone from the 9th century in Östergötland, but it does not specify where the expedition had gone. It was
Harald Bluetooth Harald "Bluetooth" Gormsson (; , died c. 985/86) was a king of Denmark and Norway. The son of King Gorm the Old and Thyra Dannebod, Harald ruled as king of Denmark from c. 958 – c. 986, introduced Christianization of Denmark, Christianity to D ...
's construction of the Jelling stones in the late 10th century that started the runestone fashion that resulted in the raising of thousands of runestones in Sweden during the 11th century; at that time the Swedes arrived as mercenaries and traders rather than settlers. In the 8th, 9th and 10th centuries runic memorials had consisted of runes on wooden poles that were erected in the ground, something which explains the lack of runic inscriptions from this period both in Scandinavia and in eastern Europe as wood is perishable. This tradition was described by Ibn Fadlan who met Scandinavians on the shores of the Volga.Braun, F. & Arne, T. J. (1914). "Den svenska runstenen från ön Berezanj utanför Dneprmynningen", in Ekhoff, E. (ed.) ''Fornvännen årgång 9'' pp. 44–48

, p. 48
The Varangian Runestones#Sö 126, Fagerlöt runestone gives a hint of the Old Norse spoken in Kievan Rus, as ''folksgrimʀ'' may have been the title that the commander had in the
retinue A retinue is a body of persons "retained" in the service of a noble, royal personage, or dignitary; a ''suite'' (French "what follows") of retainers. Etymology The word, recorded in English since circa 1375, stems from Old French ''retenue'', ...
of Yaroslav I the Wise in
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
. The suffix - is a virtually unique word for "leader" which is otherwise only attested in the Swedish medieval poem '' Stolt Herr Alf'', but in the later form ''grim''. It is not attested as a noun in the sense "leader" in West Norse sources. In
Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...
, the basic meaning of the adjective is "heartless, strict and wicked", and so is comparable in semantics to Old Norse which meant both "wrath", "king" and "warrior".Runic Dictionary Entry for grimm
at the runic dictionary of the University of Nottingham.
Other runestones explicitly mentioning warriors serving the ruler of Kievan Rus are one of the Skåäng runestones, the Smula runestone and most famously, the Turinge runestone which immortalises the dead commander with a poem: The Veda runestone is of note as it indicates that the riches that were acquired in Eastern Europe had led to the new procedure of legally buying clan land,Jansson, Sven B. F. (1980). ''Runstenar''. STF, Stockholm. p. 31 and the Swedish chieftain Jarlabanke used his clan's acquired wealth to erect the monument Jarlabanke Runestones after himself while alive and where he bragged that he owned the whole
hundred 100 or one hundred (Roman numerals, Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 (number), 99 and preceding 101 (number), 101. In mathematics 100 is the square of 10 (number), 10 (in scientific notation it is written as 102). The standar ...
.


Slavic sources

The earliest Slavonic-language narrative account of Rus history is the '' Primary Chronicle'', compiled and adapted from a wide range of sources in Kiev at the start of the 13th century. It has therefore been influential in modern history-writing, but it was also compiled much later than the time it describes, and historians agree it primarily reflects the political and religious politics of the time of Mstislav I of Kiev. However, the chronicle does include the texts of a series of Rus–Byzantine Treaties from 911, 945, and 971. The Rus–Byzantine Treaties give a valuable insight into the names of the Rus. Of the fourteen Rus signatories to the Rus–Byzantine Treaty in 907, all had Norse names. By the Rusʹ–Byzantine Treaty (945) in 945, some signatories of the Rus had Slavic names while the vast majority had Norse names. The Chronicle presents the following
origin myth An origin myth is a type of myth that explains the beginnings of a natural or social aspect of the world. Creation myths are a type of origin myth narrating the formation of the universe. However, numerous cultures have stories that take place a ...
for the arrival of Rus in the region of
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
: the Rus/ Varangians 'imposed tribute upon the Chuds, the
Slavs The Slavs or Slavic people are groups of people who speak Slavic languages. Slavs are geographically distributed throughout the northern parts of Eurasia; they predominantly inhabit Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Southeastern Europe, and ...
, the Merians, the Ves', and the Krivichians' (a variety of Slavic and Finnic peoples). From among
Rurik Rurik (also spelled Rorik, Riurik or Ryurik; ; ; died 879) was a Varangians, Varangian chieftain of the Rus' people, Rus' who, according to tradition, was invited to reign in Veliky Novgorod, Novgorod in the year 862. The ''Primary Chronicle' ...
's entourage it also introduces two Swedish merchants Askold and Dir (in the chronicle they are called " boyars", probably because of their noble class). The names Askold () and Dir () are Swedish; the chronicle says that these two merchants were not from the family of Rurik, but simply belonged to his retinue. Later, the ''Primary Chronicle'' claims, they conquered
Kiev Kyiv, also Kiev, is the capital and most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city of Ukraine. Located in the north-central part of the country, it straddles both sides of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2022, its population was 2, ...
and created the state of Kievan Rusʹ (which may have been preceded by the Rusʹ Khaganate).


Arabic sources

Arabic-language sources for the Rus people are relatively numerous, with over 30 relevant passages in roughly contemporaneous sources. It can be difficult to be sure that when Arabic sources talk about ''Rus'' they mean the same thing as modern scholars.P.B. Golden, "Rūs", in ''Encyclopaedia of Islam'', Second Edition, Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Consulted online on 26 July 2018 .James E. Montgomery,
Ibn Faḍlān and the Rūsiyyah
', ''Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies'', 3 (2000), 1–25.
Sometimes it seems to be a general term for Scandinavians: when Al-Yaqūbi recorded ''Rūs'' attacking Seville in 844, he was almost certainly talking about Vikings based in Frankia. At other times, it might denote people other than or alongside Scandinavians: thus the '' Mujmal al-Tawarikh'' calls the Khazars and Rus 'brothers'; later, Muhammad al-Idrisi, Al-Qazwini, and
Ibn Khaldun Ibn Khaldun (27 May 1332 – 17 March 1406, 732–808 Hijri year, AH) was an Arabs, Arab Islamic scholar, historian, philosopher and sociologist. He is widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest social scientists of the Middle Ages, and cons ...
all identified the Rus as a sub-group of the Turks. These uncertainties have fed into debates about the origins of the Rus. Arabic sources for the Rus had been collected, edited and translated for Western scholars by the mid-20th century. However, relatively little use was made of the Arabic sources in studies of the Rus before the 21st century. This is partly because they mostly concern the region between the Black and the Caspian Seas, and from there north along the lower Volga and the Don. This made them less relevant than the Primary Chronicle to understanding European state formation further west. Imperialist ideologies, in Russia and more widely, discouraged research emphasising an ancient or distinctive history for Inner Eurasian peoples. Arabic sources portray Rus people fairly clearly as a raiding and trading diaspora, or as mercenaries, under the Volga Bulghars or the Khazars, rather than taking a role in state formation. The most extensive Arabic account of the Rus is by the Muslim diplomat and traveller Ahmad ibn Fadlan, who visited Volga Bulgaria in 922, and described people under the label ''Rūs''/''Rūsiyyah'' at length, beginning thus: Apart from Ibn Fadlan's account, scholars draw heavily on the evidence of the
Persia Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...
n traveler Ibn Rustah who, it is postulated, visited
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
(or Tmutarakan, according to George Vernadsky) and described how the Rus exploited the Slavs.


Byzantine sources

When the Varangians first appeared in
Constantinople Constantinople (#Names of Constantinople, see other names) was a historical city located on the Bosporus that served as the capital of the Roman Empire, Roman, Byzantine Empire, Byzantine, Latin Empire, Latin, and Ottoman Empire, Ottoman empire ...
(the Paphlagonian expedition of the Rusʹ in the 820s and the Siege of Constantinople in 860), the Byzantines seem to have perceived these people, whom they called the ''Rhos'' (), as a different people from the Slavs. At least no source says they are part of the Slavic race. Characteristically, Pseudo-Simeon and Theophanes Continuatus refer to the ''Rhos'' as ''dromitai'' (Δρομῖται), a word related to the Greek word meaning ''a run'', suggesting the mobility of their movement by waterways. In his treatise '' De Administrando Imperio'', Constantine VII describes the ''Rhos'' as the neighbours of
Pechenegs The Pechenegs () or Patzinaks, , Middle Turkic languages, Middle Turkic: , , , , , , ka, პაჭანიკი, , , ; sh-Latn-Cyrl, Pečenezi, separator=/, Печенези, also known as Pecheneg Turks were a semi-nomadic Turkic peopl ...
who buy from the latter cows, horses, and sheep "because none of these animals may be found in ''Rhosia''"; his description represents the Rus as a warlike northern tribe. Constantine also enumerates the names of the Dnieper cataracts in both ''rhosisti'' ('ῥωσιστί', the language of the Rus) and ''sklavisti'' ('σκλαβιστί', the language of the Slavs). The Rus names are usually etymologised as
Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...
.H. R. Ellis Davidson, ''The Viking Road to Byzantium'' (London: Allen & Unwin, 1976), p. 83.p. 83. An argument used to support this view is that the name ''Aeifor'' in reference to the fourth cataract is also attested on the Pilgårds runestone from the 10th c. on
Gotland Gotland (; ; ''Gutland'' in Gutnish), also historically spelled Gottland or Gothland (), is Sweden's largest island. It is also a Provinces of Sweden, province/Counties of Sweden, county (Swedish län), Municipalities of Sweden, municipality, a ...
. However, some researches indicate that at least several of the Rus names can be Slavic and, as for the Dnieper cataract ''Aeifar'' / ''Aeifor'', its name doesn't have an acceptable and convincing Scandinavian etymology. At the time, the Byzantines also recorded the existence of some of the lesser important Slavic tribes in the region, and the emperor only knew of ''Rhosia'', which referred to the Rus' who lived in Kiev, closer to Byzantium, and the Rus' who lived in the north, along the Volkhov River. :


Western European sources

The first Western European source to mention the Rus are the Annals of St. Bertin (Annales Bertiniani). These relate that Emperor
Louis the Pious Louis the Pious (; ; ; 16 April 778 – 20 June 840), also called the Fair and the Debonaire, was King of the Franks and Holy Roman Emperor, co-emperor with his father, Charlemagne, from 813. He was also King of Aquitaine from 781. As the only ...
' court at Ingelheim, in 839, was visited by a delegation from the
Byzantine emperor The foundation of Constantinople in 330 AD marks the conventional start of the Eastern Roman Empire, which Fall of Constantinople, fell to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 AD. Only the emperors who were recognized as legitimate rulers and exercised s ...
. In this delegation there were men who called themselves ''Rhos'' (in the Latin text, ''... qui se, id est gentem suam, Rhos vocari dicebant, ...''; translated by Aleksandr Nazarenko as ''... who stated that they, i.e. their nation, were called Rhos, ...''). Once Louis enquired the reason of their arrival (in the Latin text, ''... Quorum adventus causam imperator diligentius investigans, ...''), he learnt that they were Swedes (''eos gentis esse Sueonum''; verbatim, ''their nation is Sveoni''). Fearing that they were spies, he detained them, before letting them proceed after receiving reassurances from Byzantium. Subsequently, in the 10th and 11th centuries, Latin sources routinely confused the Rus with the tribe of Rugians. Olga of Kiev, for instance, was designated as queen of the Rugians (''reginae Rugorum'') in the Lotharingian Chronicle compiled by the anonymous continuator of Regino of Prüm. At least after the 6th century, the name of the Rugii referred to Slavic speaking peoples including the Rus. According to the Annals of St. Bertin, the Rus leader had the title ''Khagan'' (''... quod rex illorum, Chacanus vocabulo, ...''). Another source comes from Liutprand of Cremona, a 10th-century Lombard bishop whose ''Antapodosis'', a report from
Constantinople Constantinople (#Names of Constantinople, see other names) was a historical city located on the Bosporus that served as the capital of the Roman Empire, Roman, Byzantine Empire, Byzantine, Latin Empire, Latin, and Ottoman Empire, Ottoman empire ...
to Holy Roman Emperor Otto I, says that Constantinople 'stands in territory surrounded by warlike peoples. On the north it has the ... ''Rusii'' sometimes called by another name ''Nordmanni'', and the ''Bulgarii'' who live too close for harmony'.


Assimilation

The Scandinavian influence in Kievan Rus was most important during the late 9th c. and during the 10th c. In 976,
Vladimir the Great Vladimir I Sviatoslavich or Volodymyr I Sviatoslavych (; Christian name: ''Basil''; 15 July 1015), given the epithet "the Great", was Prince of Novgorod from 970 and Grand Prince of Kiev from 978 until his death in 1015. The Eastern Orthodox ...
(''Valdamarr gamli'') fled from his brother Yaropolk to Sweden, ruled by Erik the Victorious, where he gathered an invasion force that he used to conquer Kievan Rus. Vladimir was initially a pagan who is reported by the ''Primary Chronicle'' to have worshiped
Perun In Slavic paganism, Slavic mythology, Perun () is the highest god of the Pantheon (religion), pantheon and the god of sky, thunder, lightning, storms, rain, law, war, fertility and oak trees. His other attributes were fire, mountains, wind, ir ...
and Veles, and this is probably a Slavic translation of the corresponding Norse gods Thor and Freyr, who beside
Odin Odin (; from ) is a widely revered god in Norse mythology and Germanic paganism. Most surviving information on Odin comes from Norse mythology, but he figures prominently in the recorded history of Northern Europe. This includes the Roman Em ...
were the two most important gods to the Swedes. However, in 988, he converted to the
Eastern Orthodox Church The Eastern Orthodox Church, officially the Orthodox Catholic Church, and also called the Greek Orthodox Church or simply the Orthodox Church, is List of Christian denominations by number of members, one of the three major doctrinal and ...
, whereas the Norse in Scandinavia remained Norse pagans or converted to the
Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
. After this, the Norse influence decreased considerably both in character and in size, and in the 11th c. the Norse are mentioned as Varangian mercenaries and employees serving the princely family. at the
Russian Academy of Sciences The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS; ''Rossíyskaya akadémiya naúk'') consists of the national academy of Russia; a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation; and additional scientific and social units such ...
notes that in Russian historiography, the assimilation of the Norse Rus is presented as a very rapid affair, based on studies of material culture. However, material objects are not as strong an indicator of ethnic identity as the language spoken in a society. Usually, the only non-archaeological claim to rapid assimilation is the appearance of three Slavic names in the princely family, i.e. '' Svjatoslav'', ''Predslava'', and ''Volodislav'', for the first time in the treaty with Byzantium of 944. Another reason for assuming a rapid assimilation is given by Yaroslav Shchapov, who writes that as a consequence of the Rusadoption of Byzantine (Eastern) rather than Roman Christianity, as well as the assimilation of Byzantine culture, "writing, literature and law in the national language" spread much earlier than in Western countries. Melnikova comments that the disappearance of Norse funeral traditions c. 1000, is better explained with Christianisation and the introduction of Christian burial rites, a view described with some reservations by archaeologist Przemysław Urbańczyk of the Institute of Archeology and Ethnology at the
Polish Academy of Sciences The Polish Academy of Sciences (, PAN) is a Polish state-sponsored institution of higher learning. Headquartered in Warsaw, it is responsible for spearheading the development of science across the country by a society of distinguished scholars a ...
. So the lack of Norse burials from c. 1000 is not a good indicator of assimilation into Slavic culture, and shows instead that the Rus had turned Orthodox Christian. Also the use of material objects is more connected to change in fashion and to change of social status than it is to ethnical change. She also notes that no systematic studies of the various elements that manifest ethnic identity in relation to the Rus has been done to support the theory of rapid assimilation, in spite of the fact that " e most important indications of ethno-cultural self-identification are language and literacy."


Urban

The Rus elite became bilingual c. 950 but it was not until the end of the 11th century that
Old East Slavic Old East Slavic (traditionally also Old Russian) was a language (or a group of dialects) used by the East Slavs from the 7th or 8th century to the 13th or 14th century, until it diverged into the Russian language, Russian and Ruthenian language ...
can be shown to have become their native language. Until the mid-10th century all the attested Rus names were Norse. In the Rus'–Byzantine Treaty of 944 or 945 there are 76 names among whom 12 belong to the ruling family, 11 to emissaries, 27 to other agents, and 26 to merchants. In the princely family, there are three Slavic names ''Svjatoslav'', son of prince Igor' (Ingvar) and ''Volodislav'' and ''Predslava'' (of unknown relation). The other members of the family have Norse names, i.e. Olga ('' Helga''), Akun ('' Hákon''), Sfanda (''Svanhildr''), Uleb ('' Óleifr''), Turd (''Þórðr''), Arfast (''Arnfastr''), and Sfir'ka ('' Sverkir''). The emissaries also have Old Norse names except for three who have Finnish names. Olga has a representative by the Finnish name ''Iskusevi'', whereas Volodislav is represented by the Norse Uleb (''Óleifr''). Among the 27 agents there are some who have Finnish names, but none with Slavic, while among the 26 merchants there are three with Finnish names and two with Slavic. In the 980s, among Sviatoslav's grandchildren, the ''Primary Chronicle'' informs that
Vladimir the Great Vladimir I Sviatoslavich or Volodymyr I Sviatoslavych (; Christian name: ''Basil''; 15 July 1015), given the epithet "the Great", was Prince of Novgorod from 970 and Grand Prince of Kiev from 978 until his death in 1015. The Eastern Orthodox ...
had twelve sons and one daughter. Only one of them, a son, had a Norse name, Gleb (''Guðleifr''), whereas the other children had Slavic compound names mostly ending with -'' slav'' ("fame"). After this generation, the ruling dynasty restricted itself to five Norse male names and one female name, of which the most popular ones would be Oleg, Igor and Gleb (was murdered in 1015 and canonised). The name Rurik (''Hrœrekr'') reappears in the mid-11th c. but stays restricted in use. Among female names, only Olga stays popular. The Norse names ''Hákon'', ''Óleifr'', and ''Ivarr'' remain in use among the East Slavic nobility, but Norse names become rarer at the end of the 10th c. which may point to increased assimilation of the Rus into the Slavic population. Among the Norse names that are not used in the ruling family, there is great variation in how they are spelled in the treaties. All names except for Oleg, Olga and Igor are spelled as closely to Old Norse as was possible in Old East Slavic. There were also variations in how the vowels were presented ''Óleifr'' was shown as ''Oleb'' or ''Uleb'', ''Hákon'' as ''Jakun'' and ''Akun'', ''Arnfastr'' as ''Arfast'' and ''Fastr'' as ''Fost''. The interdentals /þ/ and /ð/ are rendered as ''d'', but also rarely as ''z'' or ''t'' as in ''Turd'' from ''Þórðr'' and in ''Vuzlev'' from ''Guðleifr''. The ''Fr-'' in the beginning of names which was common in Old Norse but rare in Old East Slavic usually appeared as ''Pr-'' as in ''Prasten'' from ''Freysteinn''. There was no standard way of spelling ON names. While the ''Primary Chronicle'' uses the same Slavicised forms throughout, rendering ''Helgi'' as , ''Helga'' as Ol'ga, ''Ingvarr'' as Igor' and ''Guðleifr'' as Gleb, they are unlikely to represent the form the names had at the end of the 10th c. Foreign sources give forms closer to the Old Norse originals. Byzantine sources from the second half of the 10th c. preserve the nasalisation in ''Ingvarr'', and in the Cambridge document written in Hebrew, Helgi appears as HLGW, with initial H-. The adaptation of ''Guðleifr'' was still not complete by 1073, as shown in a manuscript where there is a vowel between G- and -l- in Gleb, showing that the name is still pronounced with an initial Gu-. Theses sources reflect authentic Old Norse pronunciation of these names, which shows that the adaptation of these names did not take place in the 10th c. but was finished a century later. When the ''Primary Chronicle'' was written in 1113, the annalist used the already fully adapted Old East Slavic forms and he does not appear to have known that ''Gleb'' and ''Vuzlev'' both represented ''Guðleifr'', but instead kept them distinct. Later in the 12th c., in spite of the renown of the name Igor', the original Norse form ''Ingvar'' was borrowed again as a separate name, and it appears in the '' Hypatian Codex'' as the name of Ingvar Yaroslavich (d. 1212), and two princes of
Ryazan Ryazan (, ; also Riazan) is the largest types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and administrative center of Ryazan Oblast, Russia. The city is located on the banks of the Oka River in Central Russia, southeast of Moscow. As of the 2010 C ...
. One of the latter was named ', mentioned in 1207–1219, which shows that the two names were no longer connected. Consequently, Melnikova, considers that the 12th c. stands in stark contrast to the previous two centuries, showing that the Slavicisation of the Rus elite would have been complete after the second half of the 11th c. On the other hand, the scholar Omeljan Pritsak considered that Old Norse must have been well known in Kiev and Novgorod, especially during the early decades of the 12th century. The
linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...
and literary theorist Roman Jakobson held a contrasting opinion, writing that Bojan, active at the court of Yaroslav the Wise, and some of whose poetry may be preserved in the epic poem '' The Tale of Igor's Campaign'', or ''Slovo'', in
Old East Slavic Old East Slavic (traditionally also Old Russian) was a language (or a group of dialects) used by the East Slavs from the 7th or 8th century to the 13th or 14th century, until it diverged into the Russian language, Russian and Ruthenian language ...
, may have heard Scandinavian songs and conversations from visitors as late as 1110 (about the time his own work was done), and that even later, at the court of Mstislav (''Haraldr''), there must have been many opportunities to hear them. He cautions, however, that it cannot be presumed that Old Norse was still habitually spoken in 12th-century princely courts. Further, he says that Bojan's own life and career did not necessarily coincide with the time of the men whose lives he commemorated, and that he may have written of princes of an earlier period known to him only by report. Scholarly consensus holds as well that the author of the national epic, ''Slovo'', writing in the late 12th century, was not composing in a milieu where there was still a flourishing school of poetry in the Old Norse language.


Rural

There are remains of Old Norse culture as late as the 14th and early 15th centuries in the form of runic or rune-like inscriptions and as personal names. The c. 1000 birch-bark letters from
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
contain hundreds of names, most of them Slavic or Christian, and according to Melnikova there are seven letters with Old Norse names, but Sitzman identifies as many as 18, including Staraja Russa no. 36.Sitzmann, A. 2007. "Die skandinavischen Personennamen in den Birkenrindeninschriften" he Scandinavian Personal Names in the Birchbark inscriptionsScando-Slavica 53; 25–31 The oldest of these letters (no. 526) is from the 1080s, and refers to ''Asgut'' from a village in the vicinity of Lake Seliger which was on the road between Novgorod and the central parts of Kievan Rus. Another letter (no. 130) is from the second half of the 14th century and was sent to Novgorod from another part of the Novgorod Republic and mentions the names Vigar' (Vigeirr or Végeirr), Sten (''steinn'') of Mikula, Jakun (''Hákon''), and the widow of a second Jakun. The most interesting of the letters (no. 2) mentions a place called ''Gugmor-navolok'', which may derive from Guðmarr, and two people living in the vicinity called Vozemut (Guðmundr) and Vel'jut (Véljótr). Perhaps a Guðmarr once settled near a portage (''navolok'') on the route to
Lake Onega Lake Onega (; also known as Onego; , ; ; Livvi-Karelian language, Livvi: ''Oniegujärvi''; ) is a lake in northwestern Russia, on the territory of the Republic of Karelia, Leningrad Oblast and Vologda Oblast. It belongs to the basin of the Baltic ...
and naming traditions were preserved in the settlement until the 14th century It is unlikely that he was a new settler because there are no traces of 14th century immigration, nor are there any Scandinavian remains. It is likely that his people adopted the local material culture but kept the family naming traditions. Sten, the man from Mikula, could be a visitor from Sweden or Swedish-speaking Finland, but the other letters suggest people who had Norse names but were otherwise part of the local culture. They appear together with people of Slavic names and take part in the same activities, and they lived in scattered villages in the north-east periphery of the Novgorod Republic. The area was visited by Novgorod tribute collectors in the 11th century, and was integrated in the republic through colonisation during the 12th and 13th centuries. Since Varangians were part of the administration of Novgorod they likely ventured in the area and sometimes settled there. The use of their naming traditions in the 14th century show the conservatism of some of the Rus traditions. The runic script survived for some time in remote parts of Kievan Rus, as evidenced by two finds. One of them is a weaver's slate spindle-whorl found in Zvenigorod in the south-westerm part of Kievan Rus. The whorl has the runic inscription siriþ, representing the Norse female name ''Sigrið'' on the flat top and two crosses and two f runes () on the side.UA Fridell2004;1 i
Runor
.
The whorl is dated thanks to being found in a layer from the period 1115–1130, when the settlement grew and became a town. No other Scandinavian finds were made except for two other whorls with runic-like inscriptions from the same time. Another whorl with a runic-like inscription was found in the old Russian fort of Plesnesk not far from Zvenigorod. This was a strategically important location and there are several warrior burials dating to the late 10th c. These graves belonged to warriors of a rank similar to a Kievan grand prince and some of them could have been of Scandinavian descent. The inscriptions could be from descendants of the Rus who settled in the area as protection for the western border of Kievan Rus. The inscription shows archaic features and the g rune (X) is from the
Elder Futhark The Elder Futhark (or Fuþark, ), also known as the Older Futhark, Old Futhark, or Germanic Futhark, is the oldest form of the runic alphabets. It was a writing system used by Germanic peoples for Northwest Germanic dialects in the Migration Per ...
, which could be due to copying the inscription from generation to generation. In that case the name ''Sigriðr'' was inherited for generations in the family. However, the f runes show that this was not the case, because the rune and the cross have similar meaning, although in different religions. Only those who had adhered to
Norse paganism Old Norse religion, also known as Norse paganism, is a branch of Germanic paganism, Germanic religion which developed during the Proto-Norse language, Proto-Norse period, when the North Germanic peoples separated into Germanic peoples, distinc ...
and later converted to Christianity would understand their significance, which necessitates a survival of old Norse traditions. It is possible that this community of descendants of late 10th century Rus who lived in a remote area of Kievan Rus preserved family names, runic lore in archaic forms, ancestral beliefs and some of the Old Norse language, as evidenced by the runes. There is another set of inscriptions that look like runes from an old fortification named Maskovichi, on the river route of Western Dvina. It was on the
Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...
n border and could control the river, although it was located several km away. The fort was used in the 12th and 13th century, and would later turn into a small castle. C. 110 bone fragments with graffiti have been found and they include inscriptions and pictures of warriors and weapons. The runic-like inscriptions are only three to six letters long and some can be interpreted. Some 30 of them are clearly Cyrillic, while 48 are runic.Duchits, L. V. and Melnikova, E. A. "Nadpisi i znaki na kostiakh s gorodishscha Maskovichi (Severo-Zapadnaia Belorussiia) ''DGTSSSR'' 1980 god (1981), pp. 185–216Franklin, S. 2002 (2004). ''Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, c.950–1300''. Cambridge University Press. p. 113 Some of the runic inscriptions are written with mirror-runes ( right-to-left) and are illegible, but several can be read as personal names, words and individual runes. The reading of them is uncertain, but they were made by people who knew or remembered runes. Consequently, in Kievan Rus there were descendants of the Rus who preserved parts of their heritage during centuries, the countryside being more conservative than towns.


Legacy

The Norse influence is considered to have left many traces on the Old East Slavic legal code, the '' Russkaja Pravda'', and on literary works such as '' The Tale of Igor's Campaign'', and even on the '' Byliny'', which are old heroic tales about the early Kievan Rus (
Vladimir the Great Vladimir I Sviatoslavich or Volodymyr I Sviatoslavych (; Christian name: ''Basil''; 15 July 1015), given the epithet "the Great", was Prince of Novgorod from 970 and Grand Prince of Kiev from 978 until his death in 1015. The Eastern Orthodox ...
and others), where one of the words for "hero" is derived from ''Viking'', i.e. (). Several scholars note that this is "of considerable importance generally, as far as social and cultural background of language is concerned". Although, they also note that parallels may arise from general similarities between Germanic and Slavic societies, they state that these similarities remain a profitable field of comparative studies. Russian contains several layers of Germanic
loanword A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...
s that need to be separated from the North Germanic words that entered Old East Slavic during the Viking Age. Estimations of the number of loan words from Old Norse into Russian vary from author to author ranging from more than 100 words (Forssman) down to as low as 34 (Kiparsky) and 30 (Strumiński), including personal names. According to the most critical and conservative analysis, commonly used ON words include '' knut'' (" knout"), '' seledka'' (" herring"), '' šelk'' ("silk"), and '' jaščik'' ("box"), whereas '' varjag'' ("Varangian"), '' stjag'' ("flag") and '' vitjaz'' ("hero", from ''
viking Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...
'') mostly belong to historical novels. Many belong to a special field and ceased to be commonly used in the 13th c., such as ' (from ON *, i.e. " Birka/ birk pound", referring to 164 kg), '' varjag'', ''vitjaz'', (from ''gulf'' meaning "box", "crate" or "shed"), ', ''gridi'' (from ''griði'', ''grimaðr'' meaning a "king's bodyguard"), '' lar'' (from *''lári'', ''lárr'' meaning "chest", "trunk"), '' pud'' (from ''pund'' referring to 16.38 kg), ''Rus'' (see etymology section above), ''skala'' (''skál'', "scale"), (''thiónn'', "
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
official" in the 12th c.), '' šelk'' (*''silki'', "silk"), and '' jabeda'' ('' embætti'', "office"). Norse settlers also left many toponyms across north-western Russia, where the names of settlements or nearby creeks reveal the name of the Norse settler, or where he came from. A man named Asviðr settled in a place today known as ''Ašvidovo'', Bófastr in ', Dýrbjǫrn in ''Djurbenevo'', Einarr in ''Inarevo'', Kynríkr in ''Kondrikovo'', Rødríkr in ', Ragnheiðr in '' Rognedino'', Snæbjǫrn in '' Sneberka'', Sveinn in ', Siófastr in ''Suchvostovo'', Steingrímr in ', and Thorbjǫrn in ''Turyborovo''. More common Norse names have left several toponyms, such as Ivarr in ' and ''Ivorovka'', Hákon in ''Jakunovo'' and ''Jakunicha'', Oléf in ''Ulebovo'', ''Olebino'' and ''Olibov'', and Bjǫrn, appears in ', ', ''Bemniški'', ''Bernavo'', and in ''Bernoviči''. There is also '' Veliž'' which is the same place name as ', an old estate near Stockholm, in Sweden. Many place names also contain the word ''Varangian'', such as ', ''Varež(ka)'', ''Varyzki'', ''Varjaža'', ''Verjažino'', and ''Verjažka''. Other names recall the '' Kolbangians'', such as ''Kolbežycze'', ''Kolbjagi'', and ''Kolbižicy'', and a group called "Burangians" (''Byringar''), in the names ''Burjaži'', ''Buregi'', ''Burigi'', ''Burezi'', ''Burjaki'', ''Burjaz'', etc. As for other influences on the Russian language, they are less apparent, and could be due to coincidence. In Old Norse and the modern Scandinavian langues (except for the Jutish dialect of Danish), the
definite article In grammar, an article is any member of a class of dedicated words that are used with noun phrases to mark the identifiability of the referents of the noun phrases. The category of articles constitutes a part of speech. In English, both "the" ...
is used as an enclitic article after the noun. In Europe, this is otherwise only known from
Basque Basque may refer to: * Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France * Basque language, their language Places * Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France * Basque Country (autonomous co ...
and from the Balkan sprachbund, in languages such as Macedonian and Bulgarian. However, it also appears in dialects in Northern Russia, too far away from Bulgarian to have been influenced by it. As standard Russian has no definite article at all, the appearance of a postpositioned definite article in Northern Russian dialects may be due to influence from Old Norse. As for standard Russian, just like in Old Norse, and in the modern Scandinavian languages, there is a passive construction using an enclitic
reflexive pronoun A reflexive pronoun is a pronoun that refers to another noun or pronoun (its antecedent) within the same sentence. In the English language specifically, a reflexive pronoun will end in ''-self'' or ''-selves'', and refer to a previously n ...
, '' -s'' in North Germanic and '' -s'(a)'' in Russian. However, it is not known from written Russian before the 15th c. and a corresponding construction has appeared independently in modern
Romance languages The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...
, e.g. Italian '' vendesi''.


Archaeology

Numerous artefacts of Scandinavian affinity have been found in northern Russia (as well as artefacts of Slavic origin in Sweden). However, exchange between the northern and southern shores of the Baltic had occurred since the Iron Age (albeit limited to immediately coastal areas). Northern Russia and adjacent Finnic lands had become a profitable meeting ground for peoples of diverse origins, especially for the trade of furs, and attracted by the presence of oriental silver from the mid-8th century AD. There is an undeniable presence of goods and people of Scandinavian origin; however, the predominant people remained the local (Baltic and Finnic) peoples. In the 21st century, analyses of the rapidly growing range of archaeological evidence further noted that high-status 9th- to 10th-century burials of both men and women in the vicinity of the Upper Volga exhibit material culture largely consistent with that of Scandinavia (though this is less the case away from the river, or further downstream). This has been seen as further demonstrating the Scandinavian character of elites in "Old Rusʹ".Jonathan Shepherd, 'Review Article: Back in Old Rus and the USSR: Archaeology, History and Politics', ''English Historical Review'', vol. 131 (no. 549) (2016), 384–405 . There is uncertainty as to how small the Scandinavian migration to Rus was, but some recent archaeological work has argued for a substantial number of 'free peasants' settling in the upper Volga region. The quantity of archaeological evidence for the regions where the Rus people were active grew steadily through the 20th century, and beyond, and the end of the
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
made the full range of material increasingly accessible to researchers. Key excavations have included those at Staraya Ladoga,
Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...
, Rurikovo Gorodische, Gnyozdovo, Shestovitsa, numerous settlements between the Upper Volga and the Oka. Twenty-first century research, therefore, is giving the synthesis of archaeological evidence an increasingly prominent place in understanding the Rus. The distribution of coinage, including the early 9th-century Peterhof Hoard, has provided important ways to trace the flow and quantity of trade in areas where Rus were active, and even, through graffiti on the coins, the languages spoken by traders. There is also a great number of Varangian runestones, on which voyages to the east (''Austr'') are mentioned. In the mythical lays of the
Poetic Edda The ''Poetic Edda'' is the modern name for an untitled collection of Old Norse anonymous narrative poems in alliterative verse. It is distinct from the closely related ''Prose Edda'', although both works are seminal to the study of Old Norse ...
, after her true love Sigurd is killed,
Brunhild Brunhild, also known as Brunhilda or Brynhild ( , , or ), is a female character from Germanic heroic legend. She may have her origins in the Visigoths, Visigothic princess and queen Brunhilda of Austrasia. In the Norse tradition, Brunhild i ...
(Brynhildr in Old Norse) has eight slave girls and five serving maids killed and then stabs herself with her sword so that she can be with him in Valhalla, as told in The Short Lay of Sigurd, similarly to the sacrifices of slave girls that Ibn Fadlan described in his eyewitness accounts of the Rus. Swedish ship burials sometimes contain both males and females. According to the website of ''Arkeologerna'' (The Archaeologists), part of the National Historical Museums in Sweden, archaeologists have also found in an area outside of Uppsala a boat burial that contained the remains of a man, a horse and a dog, along with personal items including a sword, spear, shield, and an ornate comb. Swedish archeologists believe that during the Viking age Scandinavian human sacrifice was still common and that there were more grave offerings for the deceased in the afterlife than in earlier traditions that sacrificed human beings to the gods exclusively. The inclusion of weapons, horses and slave girls in graves also seems to have been practiced by the Rus.


Historiography

Prior to the 18th century, it was the consensus of Russian historians that the Rus arose out of the native Slavic populations of the region. This changed following a 1749 presentation by German historian Gerhardt Friedrich Müller before the
Russian Academy of Sciences The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS; ''Rossíyskaya akadémiya naúk'') consists of the national academy of Russia; a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation; and additional scientific and social units such ...
, built in part on earlier work by Gottlieb-Siegfried Bayer and based on primary sources, particularly the Russian Primary Chronicle. He suggested that the founders of the Rus were ethnically Scandinavian Varangians, what became known as the 'Normanist' view. Though Müller met with immediate nationalistic opprobrium, by the end of the century his views represented the consensus in Russian historiography.Serhii Plokhy, ''Ukraine and Russia: Representations of the Past'' (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008), chapter 1. The attribution of a Slavic origin to the Rus saw a politically motivated 'anti-Normanist' resurgence in the 20th century within the Soviet Union, and this revisionist view also received nationalistic support in the nation-building post-Soviet states, but the broad consensus of scholars is that the origin of the Rus lies in Scandinavia.Omeljan Pritsak, "Rus", in
Medieval Scandinavia: An Encyclopedia
'', ed. by Phillip Pulsiano (New York: Garland, 1993), pp. 555–56.


Genetics

The ''cemetery of Ostriv'' is located in the region along the Ros' River. By 2020, 67 inhumation graves had been excavated there and dated from the early 11th century. Most of the artefacts found there are uncommon in Ukraine, but typical for the East Baltic region. This suggests a complex multi-ethnic population, presumably consisting of Baltic region migrants and locals. The ancient DNA analysis shows that the tested individuals cluster with present-day Icelandic and East Baltic populations. They are on the edge of the variability of previously published Swedish Vikings and close to dated medieval individuals from Estonia.Roman Shiroukhov et al. (2022) Baltic Migrants in the Middle Dnipro Region: A Comparative Study of the Late Viking Age Archaeological Complex of Ostriv, Ukraine, Medieval Archaeology, 66:2, 221–265, DOI: 10.1080/00766097.2022.2118419


Notes


References


Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Gerard Miller as the author of the Normanist theory
( Brockhaus and Efron)


External links

* * James E. Montgomery,
Ibn Faḍlān and the Rūsiyyah
, ''Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies'', 3 (2000), 1–25

Includes a translation of Ibn Fadlān's discussion of the ''Rūs''/''Rūsiyyah''. {{DEFAULTSORT:Rus' people Varangians Origin hypotheses of ethnic groups Historical ethnic groups of Europe 0700