j.0963-9462.2003.00121.x

Tale of Bygone Years: the Russian PrimaryChronicle as a family chronicle

Alexandr Rukavishnikov

This paper aims to develop a new approach to the investigation of the oldestRussian historical text, the Tale of Bygone Years or Russian PrimaryChronicle. The purpose of this study is to examine methods by which thechronicler constructed the Riurikid princely dynasty from legendaryforefathers to the author’s own time. How did the contemporary politicalsituation at the beginning of the twelfth century influence the presentationof the Riurikids of the ninth and tenth centuries? What was the place of oraltraditions within the work? How did the ideology of princely powerinteract with the presentation of family and kinship?

Introduction

Amovement of the 1970s, subsequently called the ‘literary turn’, proposeda new dimension in historical studies. Analyses moved beyond the searchfor historical truth or the gathering of historical facts so stereotyped inresearch from classical – positivist and Marxist – schools. In medievalstudies, this has led to the investigation of historiographic and hagio-graphic texts as products of their epoch.1 Walter Goffart’s book onJordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede and Paul the Deacon2 took a furtherstep as it stimulated medievalists elsewhere ‘to locate texts as precisely aspossible in their environment’ and to study carefully, where possible, anauthor of a text; or, to put it another way, ‘reading a text necessitates theassembly of as much data as possible about the author’s chronological,geographical, social and cultural locations as a key to unlock historicalcontext’.3 Goffart’s work has sparked further debates, focusing on the

1 For the key parameters of the ‘linguistic turn’ see: H. White, The Content of the Form: NarrativeDiscourse andHistorical Representation (Baltimore, 1978); G. Spiegel,The Past as Text: The Theoryand Practice of Medieval Historiography (Baltimore and London, 1997).

2 W. Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History: Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede and Paul theDeacon (Princeton, 1988).

3 M. Innes, ‘Introduction: Using the Past, Interpreting the Present, Influencing the Future’, inY. Hen and M. Innes (eds), The Uses of the Past in the Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2000),pp. 1–9, at p. 4.

Early Medieval Europe 2003 12 (1) 53–74 # Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2003, 9600 GarsingtonRoad, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden MA 02148, USA

degree of authorial intent that can be ascribed to often anonymous andshifting early medieval works,4 and Walter Pohl has shown that inconstructing the past authors and scribes were constantly revising receivedmaterial in the light of immediate and contemporary concerns.5

Russian material has never been actively involved in this interesting anduseful discussion, which has opened new and fascinating approaches formedievalists. For example, the Tale of Bygone Years or Russian PrimaryChronicle (RPC ), which develops a story of ninth-, tenth- and eleventh-century Rus’, has never been studied as a source for twelfth-centuryhistory, the time when it was finally formed. In this case the figure of theauthor was vital as he was a direct constructor of the past; but another,sometimes even more important, role was played by the commissioner ofthe work. The commissioner set the parameters of the author’s work, andthe overall direction of his argument. The RPC was a creation of,primarily, Russian princes and, then, of Russian educated monks: inthis article it will be argued that this fact is crucial for understanding theRPC ’s presentation of the Russian past. Moreover, in offering a veryparticular presentation of the distant past, the RPC can be seen as engagingwith what some historians would call a ‘collective memory’, as identifiedwith ‘the common cultural pool which informed a vision of the collectivepast, explaining how and why present society came into being’.6 ‘Collect-ive memory’, as it was constructed, helped to shape collective identity, butin the case of the RPC it was a collective memory focused on thetransmission of princely power within the ruling dynasty. In this sense,then, it may be possible to study the RPC as a family chronicle, drawingon the recent work of Elisabeth van Houts on the dynamics of familymemory and the processes whereby originally orally transmitted stories,after several generations of constant shaping and reshaping on account ofchanging political and cultural contexts, were used as the basis for writtenversions of the family past.7

RPC: the text and context

The RPC is the main primary source on the early medieval history of Rus’.It is a narrative telling us a story from the very beginning of human

4 P. Magdalino (ed.), The Perception of the Past in Twelfth-Century Europe (London, 1992); Henand Innes (eds), The Uses of the Past.

5 W.Pohl, ‘History inFragments:Montecassino’s Politics ofMemory’,EME 10 (2001), pp. 343–74,at p. 349.

6 M. Innes, ‘Introduction’, pp. 6, 7.7 E. van Houts, Memory and Gender in Medieval Europe, 900–1200 (Toronto and Buffalo, 1999).

See examples of changing genealogies of European aristocracy: J. Dunbabin, ‘Discovering a Pastfor the French Aristocracy’, in Magdalino (ed.), The Perception of the Past, pp. 1–14; G.M.Spiegel, Romancing the Past: The Rise of Vernacular Prose Historiography in Thirteenth-CenturyFrance (Berkeley, 1993).

54 Alexandr Rukavishnikov

Early Medieval Europe 2003 12 (1) # Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2003

history – from the Flood and the division of lands between the three sonsof Noah – until 1110. There is a large body of historiography concerning itsdate and place of composition, and its sources. There is no evidence ofhistorical writing in Rus’ before the conversion to Christianity in 988.Commercial and political treaties with the Greeks (911, 944, 971) insertedin the RPC were written in Greek and translated (and also edited) in thelate eleventh or twelfth century. Some facts on Russo-Byzantine relationsin the ninth and early tenth centuries (for example, of the raid onConstantinople in 860) were extracted by the author of the RPC fromthe Continuation of George the Monk or, in two or three instances, fromother Byzantine sources.8 Evidence of writing in the Russian vernacularbegins with the sermons of Archbishop Ilarion (c.1030–1040s), but there isnothing to suggest that there was any Russian chronicle written in the firsthalf of the eleventh century. It is clear that the RPC ’s written sources werecomplemented by material that was transmitted orally.9 We can evenname several of the sources for these oral traditions among the highnobility: the tysiatskii (military commander of a high rank) Ian Vyshatichand his father, and also tysiatskiiVyshata. The RPC tells us that Ian died in1106, at ninety years of age. The author of the RPC states that ‘he heardmany stories from him, which he used [inserted] in the chronicle’.10 Therole of these individuals is reminiscent of the role of the Norman court inshaping the parameters of Dudo of St-Quentin’s history of the Normans(written between 996 and c.1020), according to the recent arguments ofscholars such as Eric Christiansen and Eleanor Searle. Christiansen’sconclusions on Dudo – firstly, that ‘Dudo is not a reliable source for theearly history of the Normans; nor did he know of any; nor do we’,11 andsecondly, that ‘he was not so much an author as a transmitter to posterityof a body of material already formed in the memories and traditions ofsome historically-minded Norman body: the family of the ruler, thehousehold warriors, the nobles, or the itinerant professional entertainersof the period’12 – suggest important questions to be posed of the RPC andits sources.

There are three main versions of the text. The first version waspreserved in the Laurentian Chronicle (1377); the second in the Ipatian

8 S. Franklin and J. Shepard, The Emergence of Rus, 750–1200 (London and New York, 1996), p. 57.See also I. Sorlin, ‘Les premieres annees byzantines du Recit des temps passes’, Revue des etudesslaves 63 (1991), pp. 8–18, at pp. 15–17.

9 N.K. Chadwick, The Beginnings of Russian History: An Enquiry into Sources (Cambridge, 1946),p. 25; 2.?. 9VcNeSP, ‘=\PS_‘j P^SZS[[ic YS‘ (V_‘\^VX\-YV‘S^N‘a^[iW \eS^X)’, in 0.=..[R^VN[\PN-=S^S‘d (ed.), =\PS_‘j P^SZS[[ic YS‘, 2 vols (Moscow and Leningrad, 1950),II, 1–149, at p. 36.

10=\Y[\S _\O^N[VS â__XVc YS‘\]V_SW (Moscow, 1997), (hereafter =?>9), I, 281 (text).

11 E. Christiansen, ‘Introduction’, in Dudo of St. Quentin, History of the Normans, trans.E. Christiansen, (Woodbridge, 1998), p. xv.

12 Christiansen, ‘Introduction’, p. xvii.

The Russian Primary Chronicle as a family chronicle 55

# Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2003 Early Medieval Europe 2003 12 (1)

Chronicle (c.1410–1420s); and the third version in the Commission andAcademic copies (mid-fifteenth century) of the Novgorodian FirstChronicle.13 For several reasons the Laurentian Chronicle remains thebest for reconstructing the twelfth-century text. Firstly, amidst all othercopies of the RPC it is the oldest one (1377) in which the text of the wholechronicle was preserved. Secondly, only the Laurentian version includes anote at the end, stating that ‘Silvestr, hegumen of St Michael’s [mon-astery], hoping for favour from God, wrote these books named Chronicleat []^V] prince Vladimir’s [court]. He was reigning in Kiev and I washegumen of St Michael’s [monastery] in 1116.’ The note ends with arequest for commemoration of Silvestr in prayers, underlining theconnection between Christian commemoration of the dead and remem-brance of the past.14 In all other copies the RPC is followed immediately bythe text of other, later chronicles and only in the Laurentian does thisconcluding note survive.

There are many difficulties with the RPC. First of all, it is impossible tosay for certain that any of the surviving versions have not been editedsince 1116. In addition, we cannot be sure that there was only one author,the Silvestr mentioned in the Laurentian version. In fact, there is a strongcase that there were several earlier versions of the text, which were nottransmitted to the present. There is a voluminous historiography con-cerning a number of hypotheses – which this essay will only skirt –including A.A. Shakhmatov’s theory that the Commission and Academiccopies preserved an earlier version of the RPC written in 1093–1095, andother attempts to identify the author of the final version of the RPC asNestor, a monk of the Caves monastery in Kiev, writing in the early 1110s.In terms of the prehistory of the surviving texts, it is striking that precisedating and detailed descriptions begin in the 1060s; this might indicatethat the earliest original written layer of the chronicle dates to this period.15

Inner contradictions, such as the case of prince Vseslav of Polotsk, who is

13 The best edition of Russian chronicles so far is a new publication of =\Y[\S _\O^N[VS â__XVcYS‘\]V_SW (Full Gathering of Russian Chronicles) started in 1997. The first volume, theLaurentian Chronicle, was published in 1997; the second volume, the Ipatian, in 1998; thethird volume, the Commission and Academic copies, in 2000 (;\PQ\^\R_XNm ]S^PNm

YS‘\]V_j _‘N^fSQ\ V ZYNRfSQ\ VUP\R\P). The advantage of this edition is a new textualreview of all copies of the RPC by B.M. Closs and in some indices. I have used this new editionfor references, but it is worth noting that the text of the chronicles was just reprinted from earliereditions, so it is possible to use them as well. The translation of the RPC into English byS.H. Cross and O.P. Sherbowitz-Wetzor (Russian Primary Chronicle: Laurentian Text) waspublished first in 1930, with a third reprint from theMediaeval Academy of America Publication60 (Cambridge, MA) in 1973. It is not as accurate as one would wish, so I have made my owntranslations into English. Those who wish to check may find the relevant passages in the Cross/Sherbowitz-Wetzor translation.

14=?>9, I, 286 (text).

15 The best book on the beginnings of the writing of the RPC continues to be::.2. =^S_[mX\P,6_‘\^Vm â__X\Q\ YS‘\]V_N[Vm XI–XV PP, 2nd edn (St Petersburg, 1996).



mentioned as being still alive at the time the chronicle was written (R\_SQ\ R[S), but whose death is described under the year 1101,16 remind us ofDmitri S. Likhachev’s warning that ‘Russian history as it is presented inthe Tale of Bygone Years has itself the history of its creation, which is notbrief.’17 In writing of an author or chronicler, we must understand that itmight not be one individual, but several, or rather, that we are dealingwith the final shaping of a composite and shifting text drawing on a varietyof traditions. In such a case, Silvestr’s work looks like only one link in achain of numerous rewritings of the chronicle, but his status at VladimirMonomakh’s court and the presence of his note in a copy of 1377 (whichwas done 250 years later) prove that the hegumen’s work was of aparamount importance and he really did compose, and not simplycopy, the text.

Nonetheless, as Christiansen and Searle have shown for Dudo, it isimportant to study a text in the context of the time and place in which itwas finally shaped, and here the connection between the earliest extantversion of the RPC and Silvestr’s note of 1116 is of paramount importance.As we have seen, the text runs from Noah until 1110, the time contem-porary to Silvestr. There is a gap of six years between the last entry in theRPC and the note. All this survives in a chronicle of 1377, rewritten byscribes several times in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries (after Silvestr’snote follows the text of the Suzdalian Chronicle – named after the city ofSuzdal’ in the north-east of Russia – running from 1111 till 1305). Wecannot be sure that there were no texts interpolated into the RPC after1116, but there are strong arguments that there was no major rewriting, forthe Ipatian Chronicle, which has only minor differences to the Laur-entian, was preserved independently in the Ukrainian (Volynia) tradition.Furthermore, the Commission and Academic copies, in which the text of1045–1074 is similar to the Laurentian, come from Novgorod (in north-west Russia) and again were independently compiled. So there are strongarguments that the final version of the RPC was finished in Kiev, c.1110–1116, and then copied throughout Rus’ as an authoritative work on theorigins of Rus’ and Russian princes. We can therefore treat the RPC as anarrative receiving its final shape at the beginning of the twelfth century inKiev and preserved in the Laurentian copy, which was made by aSuzdalian monk, Laurentii, in 1377.

What do we know about Silvestr, hegumen of St Michael’s? What doesthis strange note about writing ‘at prince Vladimir’ (]^V X[mUS

0YNRVZV^S) in Silvestr’s famous inscription mean? Answers to thesequestions will certainly help us to understand the context of Silvestr’s

16=?>9, I, 155, 274.

179VcNeSP, ‘=\PS_‘j P^SZS[[ic YS‘’, II, 133.



work. Most of the ecclesiastical career of the hegumen Silvestr has falleninto oblivion. He first appears in 1115 during the transmission of St Boris’sand St Gleb’s relics to the stone church in Vyshegorod (Kiev’s ‘satellitetown’ or prigorod), when he is described as hegumen of St Michael’smonastery in Vydubichi, one of the Kievan suburbs. On 1 January 1119 hebecame the bishop of Pereyslavl’ and died in this position in April 1123.18

Throughout Silvestr’s career, the dominant political figure was VladimirMonomakh (1053–1125), the prince of Kiev from 1113–25. There were verystrong links between these two men. Vladimir’s father, Vsevolod, was thegrandson of Vladimir the Saint (the first Christian prince in Rus’, whoruled in Kiev from 980–1015), and the third son of the Kievan princeIaroslav. After Iaroslav’s death in 1054, Vsevolod received Pereyaslavl’ as apatrimony, but his high status allowed him to found a monastery in Kiev,dedicated to St Michael and under the control of St Michael’s church.Construction was started in 1070, and finished in 1088. Vsevolod was theKievan prince from 1078–1093, while his sons, Vladimir Monomakh andRostislav-Michael (1070–1093), controlled Pereyaslavl’. Vladimirremained the prince of Pereyaslavl’ until 1113. After moving to Kiev,Pereyaslavl’ was governed by his son, Iaropolk. The positions of hegumenat St Michael’s and the bishopric of Pereyaslavl’ were thus under the firmcontrol of first Vsevolod, and then his son, Vladimir Monomakh.Silvestr was thus a close follower of Vladimir’s, and his note ‘at princeVladimir’ we thus have to decode as ‘at prince Vladimir’s court’, ‘at hisguidance’. If we look at the RPC ’s account of the late eleventh and earlytwelfth centuries we find a number of entries praising prince Vladimir.For example, under the year 1097 we have the characteristic: ‘Vladimir_loves the metropolitan, the bishops, the hegumens, and loves monks andnuns still more. They come to him and he feeds them and gives themdrink, like a mother to her children. If he sees somebody noisy or agitated,he never condemns, but is loving and calming.’19 During the crucial warsagainst the Kumans at the beginning of the twelfth century, PrinceVladimir’s role was vital. After the 1103 victory, defeating the Kumans,the Pechenegs and the Oguz, Vladimir – and not Sviatopolk, the Kievanprince – summoned all the Russian princes for a feast and ‘gave alcohol[O^Nf[\] to all the warriors’.20 There is no doubt that Vladimir waspatronizing Silvestr’s work and that Silvestr was rewriting the RPC, in theform we can observe in the Laurentian Chronicle, for this particularprince.

18=?>9, II, 280; I, 291, 293.

19=?>9, I, 264 (text): ‘0\Y\RVZS^h_ YlO\Pj VZSm X ZV‘^\]\YV‘\Z, V Xh S]V_X\]\Zh, VXh VQaZS[\Z, ]NeS TS V eS^[Sej_XiV eV[h YlOm, V eS^[VdV YlOm.=^Vc\RmgNm X [SZa,[N]V‘NfS V [N]NmfS, NXi ZN‘V RS‘V _P\m. .gS X\Q\ PVRmfS YV flZ[N, YV P X\SZ

UNU\^S, [S \_aRmfS, [\ P_m [N YlO\Pj ]^SXYNRNfS, V a‘SfNfS.’20

=?>9, I, 279 (text): ‘RNY S_V _Vc O^Nf[\ YlRSZ >a_j_XiZ’.



Claims to princely power in late eleventh- and early twelfth-centuryRus’ rested on descent from St Vladimir. Each line of Riurikids ruled itsown patrimony. Kiev was the main political centre of Rus’, the site of themetropolitan see, and the richest and biggest city in Eastern Europe; andby convention was usually ruled by the eldest, most powerful Russianprince. There were no exact rules of succession in Rus’: brother mightfollow brother, son his father, nephew his uncle. Everything depended onthe specific political situation, in which the role of local (city) elites ofnobility and merchants was significant in determining allegiances. Vlad-imir Monomakh was not the eldest of St Vladimir’s descendants in the1110s, but the most powerful one. His prestige by that time was extremelyhigh: he was the grandson of the Byzantine Emperor Constantine XIMonomakh; and his first wife, Gytha, was the daughter of the last Anglo-Saxon king, Harold. Furthermore, he had close matrimonial ties withalmost all the ruling families of Europe. Vladimir’s men were fightingwith Byzantines in Bulgaria (the Lower Danube region) in 1116–1117,following in the footsteps of Vladimir’s famous forefather Sviatoslav,whose career is vividly recounted in the RPC. It is possible to characterizeVladimir’s power over Rus’ as virtually absolute. He reigned in Kiev andhis sons controlled Novgorod, Pereyaslavl’, Volynia, Turov, Smolensk,Minsk, Suzdal’ and Rostov: almost two-thirds of all Russian land. AllRiurikids hostile to Vladimir’s regime were either incarcerated, like Glebof Minsk, or went to exile, as did Iaroslav of Volynia. Vladimir and hissons controlled the famous Russian trade route ‘from the Varangians tothe Greeks’, i.e. the route from the Baltic to the Black Sea. Can we relatethe version of the past constructed in the RPC to this political situation?

Riurik, Oleg and Olga: constructing origins

In reading the RPC’s story of the first Russian princes, from Riurik to StVladimir, we are dealing with a literary work – and, as in a good story, wehave all types of characters in it. Each character acts according tothe narrative’s demands. The story was given its final shape in the 1110’sby the hegumen Silvestr, under the close guidance of Prince VladimirMonomakh. The chronicler starts the family story with a progenitor: theleader of the Varangians-Rus’, Riurik, and his two brothers, Sineus andTruvor (see Table 1). As V. Thomsen demonstrated a century ago, all threebear Scandinavian names.21 The story tells us that after the expulsion of theVarangians there were cruel wars between the different peoples of the Slavs(Slovene and Krivichi) and the Finno-Ugrians (Meria), so they decided toinvite the Varangians-Rus’ to reign over them. So along came Riurik and

21 V. Thomsen, The Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia and the Origin of the RussianState (Oxford and London, 1877).



his brothers, and took power (Riurik placed himself in Novgorod – or inLadoga, according to another version – Sineus in Beloozero, and Truvorin Izborsk). Together they governed the Slovene, Krivichi, Meria, Ves’and the Muroma (the Slavs and Finno-Ugrians), until after the death ofSineus and Truvor, Riurik seized sole power and ruled alone until his owndeath. We know nothing about Riurik from other sources. Clearly, ‘it isimpossible to verify the historical base of the story’.22 What the story doesdo is emphasize the role of Riurik as a progenitor of the dynasty and thefirst ruler of a huge territory in the north-eastern corner of Europe. Otherthan the invitation, the RPC only tells us that before his death Riurik – hisson, Igor, being too young to rule – transferred power to Oleg, hisrelative.23 The author uses a special lexicon in both episodes – ‘to takepower’ (]^Vm PYN_‘j), ‘to possess power’ (\OYNRN‘V, PYNRS‘V), ‘totransmit the reign’ (]^SRN_‘j X[mTS[jS). We have a legitimating storyof the genesis of Riurikovichi power over Rus’. I cannot agree withMel’nikova and Petrukhin, that the invitation to Riurik and his brotherswas ‘a boundary event, connecting myth and history according to the aimsof early historical description’.24 There is no division between myth andhistory in the RPC. It is all one story, one long narrative, without anystages and periods. It is, rather, modern historians who are concerned todelineate between myth and history, and place their belief in historicaldates. The chronicler’s inclusion of dates from 852 was not because he wassure that before this there were only myths, nor was it due to himsearching for a ‘boundary event’ between myth and history. In fact, in

223... :SYj[VX\PN and 0.M. =S‘âcV[, ‘9SQS[RN \ ‘‘]^VUPN[VV PN^mQ\P’’ V _‘N[\PYS[VS

R^SP[Sâ__X\W V_‘\^V\Q^NbVV’, 0\]^\_i V_‘\^VV 2 (1995), pp. 44–57, at p. 50.23

=?>9, I, 20–2 (text).24

:SYj[VX\PN and =S‘âcV[, ‘9SQS[RN \ ]^VUPN[VV PN^mQ\P’, p. 49.

Table 1. The genealogical table of Russian princes in theninth and tenth centuries.

Riurikd. 879?

|Igor � Olga

d. 945? | d. 969?|

Sviatoslavd. 972

1. ? | 2. Malusha| | |

Iaropolk Oleg Vladimird. 980? d. 977? d. 1015

(no children) (no children) |all Russian princes



establishing an origin legend that framed the power of the Riurikids as aguarantee of order, and creating a template for the circulation of powerwithin a wide kin group, the story of Riurik provided a legitimizingtemplate for the political system. Another point is that the story explainsfor the twelfth-century audience why Novgorodians have the right tochoose any Riurikid to govern them – a tradition vividly depicted in theSuzdalian Chronicle (1169): ‘for a long time Novgorodians are free by theforefathers of our princes, but even if it is so, if our first princes orderedthem to break the cross-kissing and shame their grandsons and great-grandsons?’.25

The circulation of power within a wide kin group is most clearly shownby the RPC ’s treatment of two other figures whose careers are located inthis period: Askold and Dir. The RPC tells the story of two of Riurik’snobles not of his kin – Askold and Dir – asking their leader to send them toattack Constantinople. Riurik permitted this and they sailed down theDnieper and came to Kiev and conquered the city.26 The archaeology ofKiev strongly suggests that there was no fortress or trade point until the endof the ninth century, and Askold and Dir are not mentioned in othersources. There is a detailed description of a Rhos attack onConstantinoplein 860, recorded by the patriarch Photius, and also by theGreek chroniclerin the Continuation of George the Monk, but no names of the Rus’/Rhosleaders are reported.27 The author of the RPC took the information aboutthis raid from the Continuation (866 in the RPC). Here the RPC usesAskold and Dir to connect this raid with Riurik, with the passageexplaining that Riurik sent them to attack Constantinople. This followsa similar logic to Dudo’s presentation of early Norman politics, in whichall known raids of independent Viking leaders in the late ninth and tenthcenturies were attributed to the legendary progenitor of the Normanrulers’ dynasty, Rollo, or leaders (nobles) dependent on him.28 Linguistic-ally, Askold is probably a Scandinavian name,29 but the derivation ofDir isunclear; indeed the name is otherwise unattested. According to the RPC,after the death of Riurik the new prince, Oleg, organized a militaryexpedition against Askold and Dir (882 in the RPC). He went with theyoung Igor to Kiev, and found that Askold and Dir were rulers there.

Oleg hid some warriors in boats, others he left in the back_ and Olegsent to Askold and Dir saying that he was Oleg’s and Igor’s merchant

25=?>9, I, 362 (text): ‘VURNP[N _a‘j _P\O\TS[i;\PQ\^\RdV ]^NRSRi X[mUj [NfVc, [\ NgS

Oi ‘NX\ OiY\, ‘\ PSYSYV YV VZh ]^SR[VV X[mUV X^S_‘h ]^S_‘a]N‘V VYV P[aXV VYV

]^NP[aXV _\^\ZYm‘V’.26

=?>9, I, 20–1 (text).27 Photios,Homilies, trans. C.Mango,DumbartonOaks Studies 3 (Washington,DC, 1958), pp. 82,

96–101; Theophanes Continuatus, Chronographia, ed. I. Bekker (Bonn, 1838), pp. 826–7.28 Dudo, History, pp. 32–4, 42.29 V. Thomsen, The Relations, p. 68.



sailing to the Greeks, and invited them to come. Askold and Dir came.Oleg’s warriors, hidden in the boats, surrounded them, and Oleg saidto Askold and Dir: ‘You are not princes and not of their kin, but I’m oftheir kin and this is (he showed Igor) the son of Riurik.’ And then hiswarriors killed Askold and Dir _ Oleg started to govern in Kiev.30

This is a very significant episode, telling the reader that only Riurikovichior their kinsmen may rule in Rus’. Compare the RPC ’s similar treatmentof the Derevlians (the Slavic tribe in the Middle Dnieper region): whenthe Derevlians kill Igor in 945, and Derevlian noblemen plan to marrytheir prince, Mal, to Igor’s wife, Olga, and murder her son Sviatoslav, thebest Derevlians are cruelly destroyed by Olga, and PrinceMal ‘disappears’from the pages of the chronicle. Like Askold and Dir, Mal is a potentialclaimant whose failure is presented in terms of his lack of Riurikid blood.31

Again we see the importance of Riurikid legitimacy for the chronicler,who once more stresses the idea of the Riurikovichi’s unique right topossess Rus’ as their own household (see Oleg’s words to Askold and Dir:‘You are not princes and not of their kin, but I’m of their kin and this is (heshowed Igor) the son of Riurik’); here it is linked to the particularimportance of Kiev.32

Riurik’s successor, Oleg, called Veshii or the Wise, is one of the mostmysterious figures in the RPC. We can divide his career, as it was depictedby the chronicler, into three periods. First, in 882–885 Oleg conqueredSmolensk, Liubech and Kiev, and imposed tribute on some Slavonictribes (Derevlians, Severians and Radimichi) around the Upper andMiddle Dnieper. Second, in 907 he attacked Constantinople and in 911concluded a treaty with the Byzantine emperors, Leo VI and Alexander.Finally, in 912, he died. To understand the traditions surrounding Oleg itis necessary to look at the role of oral transmission, and folklore parallels.Franklin and Shepard argue that ‘local legend told of how Prince Oleg haddied in accordance with a pagan prophecy’.33 The basis for this claim is thestory that a ‘sorcerer’ (P\YcP) predicted that Oleg would die due to hisfavourite horse. Oleg ordered that the horse be kept but never led to him.Many years later, after the war with the Greeks, he visited the horse’scorpse and put his foot upon its forehead (Y\O), from which slithered out

30=?>9, I, 23 (text): ‘<YSQ_ ]\c\^\[V P\V Ph Y\Rjmc, N RâQVm [NUNRV \_‘NPV_6 ]^V_YN

X\ ._X\YRa V 2V^\PV, QYNQ\Ym, mX\ Q\_‘j S_Zj V VRSZh Ph 1^SXV \‘ <YQN V \‘ 6Q\^m

X[mTVeN, RN ]^VRS‘N X [NZ X ^\R\Zh _P\VZh.._X\YRh TS V 2V^h ]^VR\_‘N.6 Pi_XNXNP

TS P_V ]^\eVV VUh Y\Rjm, V ^SeS <YSQh ._X\YRa V 2V^\PV: ‘‘0i [S_‘N X[mUV [V ^\RN

X[mTN, [\ NUh S_Zj ^\Ra X[mTN (V Pi[S_\fN6Q\^m) V _S S_‘j _i[h >l^VX\Ph’’.6aOVfN

._X\YRN V 2V^N _ 6 _SRS <YSQh X[mTN P 8VSPS.’31

=?>9, I, 23 (text).32

=?>9, I, 55–60 (text): ‘0i [S_‘N X[mUV [V ^\RN X[mTN, [\ NUh S_Zj ^\Ra X[mTN (VPi[S_\fN 6Q\^m) V _S S_‘j _i[h >l^VX\Ph.’

33 Franklin and Shepard, The Emergence of Rus, p. 318.



a snake that bit Oleg on the foot. From this Oleg fell ill and died.34 Wehave a close parallel to this in an Icelandic saga about Orvar/Oddr.According to the saga, a sorcerer predicted that Orvar/Oddr would die onaccount of a snake, which would slither from the skull of his horse, namedFaksi. Oddr killed Faksi, and after many years, and following variousvoyages and exploits in distant lands, he returned to places where he hadlived in his youth, being sure that the prophecy would never come true.Orvar/Oddr tripped on Faksi’s skull and hit it with his spear; a serpentslithered out and bit him, causing his death.35 We have several closeparallels between Oleg’s and Orvar/Oddr’s stories, for both were Vikingsand both travelled and struggled in distant lands. According to anotherversion of Oleg’s legend (‘others are saying’), he ‘went beyond the sea [i.e.to Scandinavia] and a snake bit his leg, and he died from this’.36 Thismight indicate that both stories were based on the same legend. ButRydzevskaia wisely reminds us that ‘a legend of a hero’s death by ananimal_ is so widespread among different peoples and countries, that wemay suppose an independent existence of the Scandinavian and theRussian versions’. We know of the Serbian fairy tale about a Sultan andhis horse; Danish stories that replace the horse with a dragon; and similarGerman legends.37 In an English version a female sorcerer predicted that aknight would meet his death by his horse. The knight ordered the pooranimal to be killed. However, after returning from the Crusades he visitedthe horse’s corpse, hurt his foot on a bone, and died.38 Rather than seeing agenealogical link tying all these stories back to a common ancestor, it isperhaps more helpful to think of parallel local oral traditions rooted infolklore. This material shapes the chronicler’s account of Oleg.

The role of local traditions is further suggested by a common featureshared by the stories about the deaths of Askold and Dir, Oleg, and alsoIgor, all of which identify the location of their graves in the present. AboutOleg’s grave the RPC states: ‘And all the people cried and carried him andburied him on the hill, Shekovitza, where is his grave, called the grave ofOleg, to the present day.’39 Similarly, of Igor it relates: ‘And Igor wasburied, and there is his grave near the town of Iskorosten’ in theDerevlians land to the present day.’40 This formulation expresses a

34=?>9, I, 38–9 (text).

35 From 3... >iRUSP_XNm, ‘8 P\]^\_a \O a_‘[ic ]^SRN[Vmc P _\_‘NPS R^SP[SWfSW â__X\W

YS‘\]V_V’, in 3... >iRUSP_XNm, 2^SP[mm >a_j V ?XN[RV[NPVm P IX–XIV PP. (Moscow,1978), pp. 159–236, at p. 186.

36=?>9, III, 109 (text): ‘VRagl SZa UN Z\^S, V aXYl[a UZVN P [\Qa, V _ ‘\Q\ aZ^S’.

37>iRUSP_XNm, ‘8 P\]^\_a \O a_‘[ic ]^SRN[Vmc’, pp. 186, 187, 189; 8.B. @VN[RS^, =\SURXV_XN[RV[NP\P P /SY\S Z\^S (Saint Petersburg, 1906), pp. 235–45.

38 A. Taylor, ‘The Death of Orvar–Oddr’, Modern Philology 19 (1921), pp. 93–106, at p. 93.39

=?>9, I, 39 (text): ‘6 ]YNXNfN_m YlRS P_V ]YNeSZ PSYVXVZ, V [S_\fN, V ]\Q^SO\fN SQ\

[N Q\^S, STS QYNQ\YV‘_m SX\PVdN, SQ\ TS Z\QVYN V R\ _SQ\ R[V _Y\PS‘j Z\QiYN <YjQ\PN’.40

=?>9, I, 55 (text): ‘V ]\Q^SOS[h Oi_‘j 6Q\^j, V S_‘j Z\QVYN SQ\ a 6_X\^\_‘S[m Q^NRN P

2S^SPSch V R\ _SQ\ R[S’.



concern in the chronicle to remember and honour these sites of memory.We do not know if Oleg and Igor were indeed buried in the placesmentioned in the RPC (for example, the Commission and Academiccopies tell us that Oleg’s grave ‘is in Ladoga’, in the north of Rus’41), butfor the author it was important to specify the exact position, and indeedthe alternative traditions in the Commission and Academic copies suggestthe significance of this information.42 Twelfth-century Russian citiessought to connect their memory with the princely family, as a means ofbolstering their current status. Pskov claimed that Princess Olga was bornthere, and the author of the RPC confirms that her sledge was still in Pskovat the beginning of the twelfth century (_‘\m‘ P\ =_X\PS).43 We thusneed to emphasize the significance of topography to the RPC as a familychronicle: it was very important to describe the circumstances of the deathof a contemporary ruler’s ancestors, and to attach to exact spots memoriesabout their graves or places of demise. It is very difficult to say what theimmediate political value was of such a tradition of commemoration ofthe burial places of ancestors; but within the dynasty the honouring andremembrance of progenitors served as a tool to unite the numerousRiurikids. Representatives of two rival lines, Vladimir Monomakh andthe princes of Chernigov (David and Oleg Sviatoslavichi), took partin the transmission of St Boris’s and St Gleb’s relics (the sons of StVladimir) to the new church in Vyshegorod in 1115.44

Although we can detect oral tradition underpinning the account ofOleg, he also plays a significant role in the RPC ’s plot: the organizing ofRus’ into a state focused on Kiev, and the masterminding of the firstsuccessful attack on Byzantium. He gained power over southern Rus’: thewaterway along the Dnieper to the Black Sea was secured, and severalSlavonic tribes (the Derevlians, Severians, Radimichi and Polianians)were in his hands. The chronicler tells us that Oleg prophesied that Kievwould be a ‘mother of Russian cities’ (Metropolis), in a clear allusion to thecontemporary situation. After conquering Kiev, an important step forOleg was the foundation of cities and the imposition of a fixed tribute onnorthern (the Slovene, Krivichi andMeria) and southern Rus’ tribes. Here

41=?>9, III, 109 (text): ‘S_‘j Z\QiYN SQ\ P 9NR\US’.

42 See also 0.M. =S‘âcV[, ‘8 R\c^V_‘VN[_XVZ V_‘\XNZ R^SP[Sâ__X\Q\ X[mTS_X\Q\

XaYj‘N’, POLYTPOPON (Moscow, 1998), pp. 881–9, at p. 883; van Houts, Memory andGender, p. 94: ‘The object on which memorial tradition was most immediately focused was thebody of a dead person. Once buried, the burial place and tomb became the centre for the familytradition of mourning and commemoration.’

43=?>9, I, 55 (text). Similarly, the bones of the pagan princes Iaropolk and Oleg, sons ofSviatoslav, grandsons of Igor, were excavated, christianized and buried in the church of theMother of God (‘Tithe church’) in Kiev (1044 in the RPC, seventy years after their death!), see=?>9, I, 155 (text). Dudomentioned the place of the battle betweenWilliam Longsword and hisrebellious vassals: ‘And the place where the wonderful battle was fought is called ‘‘At the Field ofBattle’’ to the present day’ (Dudo, History, p. 68).

44=?>9, II, 280, 281 (text).



a clear pattern thus begins to emerge. Firstly, Riurik founded the state andwas the progenitor of the dynasty. Then Oleg united northern Novgorodand southern Kiev, imposed the first taxes, and organized the new state.Another of Oleg’s very significant functions was that of being Igor’smentor (fostri, kormilets): ‘Igor grew up and followed Oleg and obeyedhim. And [Oleg] brought him a wife from Pskov namedOlga.’45 Oleg andOlga have the same name (Old Norse Helgi and Helga – the ‘saint’),which, like the names of Riurik and Igor, seems to be princely in bothRussian and Scandinavian traditions.46War with theGreeks was the last ofOleg’s achievements. The chronicler states that in 907 the Russian leaderattacked Byzantium: he destroyed everything around Constantinople(palaces and churches), took a large number of captives and killed all ofthem, gained a great tribute from the Greek emperors, and concluded apeace treaty with them.47 In 911 Oleg and the Greek emperors concludedanother treaty, also recorded in the chronicle. Textual analysis shows thatthe wording of the treaty of 907 is based on the later treaty of 911. TheGreek text of the 911 document was translated into Russian in the eleventhcentury, or even in the first half of the twelfth century, and then insertedinto the chronicle.48 There is nothing about the Russian attack of 907 inthe Greek sources at all, and it looks as though the treaty of 907 wasconstructed by the chronicler using the text of the later source.

Having observed certain principles in the narrative it becomes clearthat the activities of Oleg, Igor and Olga all share the same framework.49

In tabular form this can be set out as follows in Table 2. Of course,Olga’s death as a Christian was commemorated in a different mannerthan those of the pagans Oleg and Igor. However, we can clearly see thechronicler using their careers to discuss the same themes, and drawing ona similar mixture of translated Greek sources and topographical tradi-tions to do so.

The treaty of 944 and the aims of the chronicler’s work

It is worth comparing the chronicler’s depiction of the structure ofthe early Russian polity, with its stress on Riurikid legitimacy and thecentrality of Kiev, with alternative testimonies. One of the few genuine

45=?>9, I, 29 (text): ‘6Q\^SPV TS PhU^N_‘Nfl, V c\TNfS ]\ <YUS, V _YafN SQ\. 6]^VPSR\fN SZa TS[a \‘ =j_X\PN VZS[SZh <YQa’.

46=S‘âcV[, ‘8 R\c^V_‘VN[_XVZ V_‘\XNZ’, p. 886: ‘The names of the first Russian princes –Riurik (Hrorekr), Oleg (Helgi), Igor (Ingvar – is an anthroponym with the name Ingvi-Frair) –seemed to be princely both in Russian and Scandinavian tradition.’

47=?>9, I, 29–31 (text).

48 See M.:NYV[QaRV, ‘>a__X\-PVUN[‘VW_XVS _PmUV P X PSXS _ ‘\eXV U^S[Vm RV]Y\ZN‘VXV’,0VUN[‘VW_XVW P^SZS[[VX 1995 Q. 56 (81) (1996), pp. 68-91; 0VUN[‘VW_XVW P^SZS[[VX 1997Q. 57 (82) (1997), pp. 58–87.

49=?>9, I, 22, 32, 38, 42, 46, 54–5, 59–61, 67–9 (text).



tenth-century documents inserted into the RPC is a peace treaty betweenRus’ and Byzantium concluded in 944. It includes a list of the ambas-sadors in Constantinople who took an integral part in the treaty’snegotiation. What are the differences between this list and other partsof the chronicle’s text? And what might these differences tell us about theaims of the chronicler’s work?

The treaty of 944 is preserved in the chronicle in its entirety. It is anoriginal charter, presumably, kept in the prince’s archive in Kiev, whichwas translated fromGreek into Russian, and interpolated into the RPC. Itis not known if it was translated and simultaneously inserted in thechronicle, or whether there was a more complex multi-stage process. Thelexicon of the treaty, as it is now in the RPC, contains words and terms thatappeared in Russian chronicles and ecclesiastical texts rather late. For

Table 2. Careers of Oleg, Igor and Olga

Oleg Igor Olga

1. 879: Obtaining powerafter Riurik’s death.

2. 882–885: Statebuilding (conquering ofSmolensk, Liubech,Kiev; imposing tributeon Slavonic tribes).

3. 907: ‘Oleg went tothe Greeks’. Successfulwar and return home:‘and came Oleg to Kievtaking gold and silks,and vegetables, andwines _’.

4. 911: Peace treaty withthe Greeks.

5. 912: The story of hisdeath. Starts with: ‘AndOleg was ruling in Kievhaving obtained peacewith all countries andautumn came _’.

1. 913: Obtaining powerafter Oleg’s death.

2. 914: State building(‘Igor went to theDerevlians and won avictory over them andimposed a tributegreater than Oleg’s’).

3. 941: ‘Igor went to theGreeks’. Unsuccessfulwar, but then (944) asuccessful one: ‘[Igor]took from the Greeksgold and silks for all ofhis warriors andreturned back to Kiev.’

4. 944: Peace treaty withthe Greeks.

5. 944: The story of hisdeath. Starts with: ‘Igorstarted to rule in Kievhaving obtained peacewith all countries andautumn came _’.

1. 945: Obtaining poweras a regent after Igor’sdeath (Olga’s sonSviatoslav was tooyoung to rule).

2. 946–947: Statebuilding (imposition ofa new system of taxationover the Derevlians andSlovene).

3. 955: ‘Olga went to theGreeks’. She wasbaptised and thenreceived from theemperor ‘gold andsilver, silks and differentpottery _’.

4. - - - - - - - -

5. 969: Death of Olga.Praise in Christianmanner for all of hervirtues.



example, the term ‘grand prince’ (PSYVXVW X[mUj) appeared from themid-twelfth century.50 So it looks as if the treaty was translated relativelylate, and perhaps immediately inserted into the RPC. There have also beensome speculations that the compiler who added the treaty to the chroniclemight have changed or added some details, such as the names of cities.51

The list of ambassadors contained within the treaty gives an invaluablesnapshot of the Russian polity in the middle of the tenth century, whichcontrasts significantly with that portrayed in the chronicle text; for thisreason alone it is improbable that it has been subject to wholesaletampering. It names twenty-four individuals, and then indicates theperson who was responsible for sending each individual ambassador toByzantium. The list runs as follows:

Ivor ambassador of Igor, great prince of Rus’Vuefast of Sviatoslav, son of IgorIskusevi of princess OlgaSludi of Igor, nephew (net’ ) of IgorUleb of VladislavKanizar of PredslavaShikhbern of Sfandr, wife of UlebPrasten of TurdrLibiar of FastGrim of SfirkPrasten of Iakun (Hakon), nephew (net’) of IgorKari of TudokKarshev of TurdrEgri of EvliskVoist of VoikIstr of AmindPrasten of BernIatviag of GunnorShibrid of AldanKol of KlekSteggi of EtonAlvad of GudFrudi of TuadMutr of Outin.52

We can not be sure that the chronicler used the proper spellings of allthe names in the list as the translation from the original Greek might notalways have been correct, and few of these individuals appear otherwise in

50:NYV[QaRV, ‘>a__X\-PVUN[‘VW_XVS _PmUV’, p. 87.

51 Franklin and Shepard, The Emergence of Rus, pp. 107, 117, 118.52

=?>9, I, 46–7 (text).



the chronicle. The first three names in the list are well known to us: Igor,prince of Kiev; his son, Sviatoslav; and Igor’s wife, Olga. That Olga’sname is in third position is very significant, for all Igor’s male relatives(his nephews) are below her. Igor’s nephew, Igor, is in fourth place.It is interesting to note that he bore the same name as his uncle, forthere were no Riurikovichi with the same name in the following threegenerations. The next Igor – the youngest son of the Kievan princeIaroslav – died in 1060. Another nephew – Iakun – is only eleventh inthe list, and we do not know why. Iakun is a Slavonic spelling of aScandinavian name, Hakon. It is significant that such a name was neverused by Riurikovichi, but it is well known as a name of noblemen intwelfth-century Rus’. (Iakun, a nobleman from Smolensk, is mentionedin the Ipatian Chronicle in 1159; Iakun, son of Miliata, a Kievan noble-man, is mentioned in the same chronicle in 1162;53 and there are severalnoblemen with the name Iakun in Novgorodian chronicles from thetwelfth century.) It is highly possible that the first Igor’s nephew (Igor) wasa son of the Kievan prince’s brother, who bore a royal name; Iakun(Hakon) is a Scandinavian noble name (even a king’s name), and his nameand relatively low position might be explained if his kinship with Igorcame through the maternal rather than the paternal line.54 The next pair –Vladislav and Predslava (fifth and sixth on the list) – seems to be a couple,for they both bear Slavonic names frequently mentioned in Russianmedieval sources. However, there is one very important difference:Vladislav is a noble (boyar) name (a nobleman Vladislav is mentionedby the Ipatian Chronicle in 117255 and there are many other examples forthe same period); Predslava is a name frequently used by the Riurikidfamily. For example, Predslava, the daughter of St Vladimir, is mentionedin the RPC in 1016; she played a prominent role in the dynastic disputethat followed Prince Vladimir’s death.56 Several daughters of Russianprinces of the late eleventh to the early thirteenth centuries also bore thisname. There are no indications that boyars or other nobles of that timecalled their daughters Predslava. We may only suppose that Predslava wasa sister or a daughter of Igor, but there is no direct evidence of this.Seventh on the list is Sfandr ‘wife of Uleb’. An Uleb was mentioned as an

53=?>9, II, 503, 518 (text).

54 E. Searle, Predatory Kinship and the Creation of Norman Power, 840–1066 (Berkeley, Los Angelesand London, 1988), pp. 160–1; D.A. Bullough, ‘Early Mediaeval Social Groupings: TheTerminology of Kinship’, Past and Present 45 (1969), pp. 3–18, at pp. 13–14: ‘_ it is clear thatkinship was non-unilineal or bilateral: that is to say, every individual had in general the option oftracing relationships to other individuals through either parent and operative relationships(those involving rights and obligations) were created among the consanguines on both sides,although consanguineal relationships on the father’s side tended to have greater advantages anddisadvantages.’

55=?>9, II, 557 (text).

56=?>9, I, 135, 140 (text).



ambassador of Vladislav (fifth on the list). It is highly possible that Sfandrwas thus his spouse, for it would have been senseless to use the phrase ‘wifeof Uleb’ without elsewhere having included him. It is odd that Sfandr senther own ambassador, while her husband, Uleb, was himself one. It mightbe there was a mistake in the translation from the Greek, but anotherreasonmay be that Sfandr’s role in Rus’ society was muchmore importantthan her husband’s. There is another Uleb in the list of Russian merchantswho were also involved in the negotiations in Constantinople. Of course,Sfandr was not the wife of the merchant Uleb, but we can see from thishow popular the name ‘Uleb’ was in tenth-century Rus’. There are otherexamples of this name in early Russian chronicles: oneUleb was a posadnik(mayor) of Novgorod in the late eleventh century;57 another was a Kievantysiatskii, mentioned by the Ipatian Chronicle in 1146 and 1147.58 Bycontrast, there is no name ‘Sfandr’ in the Russian chronicles at all.We thushave strong indications in the treaty’s text of women playing an importantrole in Rus’ society of the tenth century. Indeed, in this list of the mostprominent and powerful, of the first seven mentioned, three are women.

But what of the questions posed earlier concerning the textualdifferences within the chronicle, and the aims of the RPC ’s author?Firstly, are there any dissimilarities between the body of the RPC and thetext of treaty? Close scrutiny reveals several striking differences. First of all,only Igor, Sviatoslav and Olga appear in the chronicle; while bothnephews, Vladislav, Predslava, Uleb, Sfandr and all the others in theambassadorial list were mentioned only in the document of 944. There areother characters whose role in the RPC might be expected to warrant amention in the treaty, but who are conspicuous by their absence. Forexample, Svenald, senior voevoda (military commander) of Igor and thenof Sviatoslav, is mentioned by the RPC in 945 and 946, whilst Asmund,mentor of Sviatoslav, appears in 946.59 These two do not, however, appearin the treaty, which is a striking anomaly. Secondly, the one and onlydocument of 944 tells us much more about Igor’s family, and particularlyabout collateral kin, than the whole of the RPC. It might be that thechronicler possessed no information about Igor’s nephews and otherrelatives; however, it is more probable that this information was deliber-ately suppressed in order to reinforce the idea of Vladimir’s descendantspossessing exclusive rights of power over Rus’. We might compare thiswith Searle’s observations on ‘nonrecognition of kin’ as ‘the mostimportant fiction’ in Dudo of St-Quentin’s account of the Normanducal house: ‘The suppression of the memory of any but a single child inDudo’s myth can be interpreted as a political act to maintain the unique

57=?>9, III, 164 (text).

58=?>9, II, 324–6, 344–5 (text).

59=?>9, I, 54–5 (text).



legitimacy of Richard.’60 This nonrecognition of kin is a very importantfeature whereby family memory can be reworked to fit the agenda of thepresent, and the RPC gives several fine examples. Askold and Dir were notof Oleg and Igor’s kin and they were murdered. We do not know abouttheir children or relatives. Riurik had only one child – Igor. The only childof Igor was Sviatoslav. He had three sons – Iaropolk, Oleg and Vladimir.The first two had no children, so only the sons and daughters ofVladimir, the first Christian ruler of Rus’, appear in the chronicle. It isobvious now that one of the main objects of the author was to show thatthe RPC is the chronicle of the descendants of St Vladimir – the Christianprincely descendants – and there is no space for their kinsmen. We have astraight line of power transmission from Riurik to Vladimir. In otherwords, the chronicler’s prime political idea was to substantiate the rightsof only the Vladimirikids to absolute power over Rus’. In the treaty, we seean ethnically mixed society, with women enjoying high political status,and a wide range of collateral kinship links with the ruling dynastycreating claims to power and tying together an extensive and apparentlydecentralized polity. In the chronicle, we are provided with a linearnarrative of descent in one lineage, from which all current Russian rulersclaimed their origins: the descendants of Riurik, and of Vladimir, the firstChristian ruler of Rus’.

Vladimir: family memory and political legitimacy

We can trace the various techniques so far identified – themanipulation ofdiverse traditions to legitimate the present political system – in the RPC ’stelling of the story of Vladimir. According to the RPC, Sviatoslav hadthree sons – Iaropolk, Oleg and Vladimir. It is very significant that we donot know the name of the mother (or mothers) of the first two. We mayonly suggest that she was certainly of a higher rank than Vladimir’smother, Malusha. Malusha was Olga’s housekeeper (XYle[VdN) andslave, for Vladimir was called ‘slave’s son’ (^\OVeVe) by the Polotskianprincess, Rogneda.61 If the pagan Sviatoslav contracted many othermarriages during his short but turbulent life, the chronicler names onlyMalusha. Also we find out from the RPC that Malusha’s father was Malkof Liubech and her brother was Dobrynia.62 Dobrynia’s role in the RPC isan important one: he was Vladimir’s mentor and played an active role inhis nephew’s struggle for the Kievan throne. Thus we know aboutVladimir’s paternal, and maternal lineage. All the Russian princes of

60 E. Searle, Predatory Kinship, p. 93.61

=?>9, I, 69, 76 (text).62

=?>9, I, 69 (text).



the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries were descendants of Vladimir:the RPC is their family story, the story of the Vladimirikids (grandsonsand great-grandsons of St Vladimir). It was thus essential to preserve andpresent Vladimir’s genealogy, including both his Scandinavian fore-fathers and Slavic ancestors. We may suppose that for the chronicler itwas important to underline Vladimir’s mixed origin, as his descendants,remembering their Scandinavian roots, were ruling Slavic lands. TheNovgorodians (people from northern Rus’) asked Sviatoslav to sendVladimir to govern them, the same as they had invited Riurik and hisbrothers to come a century before. For the twelfth-century Riurikids itwas necessary to explain their rights to govern in Novgorod, as well as theroots of the Novgorodian tradition of inviting princes to rule.

After Olga’s death (969) Sviatoslav divided his territories into three:Iaropolk got Kiev, Oleg was given the Derevlians’ land; and Vladimirwent to Novgorod. This division of Rus’ lands before Sviatoslav’s death isanother of the chronicler’s interesting textual strategies. The chroniclerfelt it necessary to point out that this division occurred in 970, two yearsbefore Sviatoslav’s murder, in order that power was seen to have beentransmitted successfully to his inheritors, his three sons. As mentionedabove, after Igor’s death the prince of the Derevlians, Mal, claimed theKievan throne, which precipitated a purely Riurikid family dispute. Nostrangers, no other noblemen, no other kinsmen took part, only Sviato-slav’s three sons. The war between the brothers began as follows. Oleg andLiut, the son of the senior commander Svenald, were hunting in the sameforest. It seems that Oleg, acting like the possessor of absolute power,killed Liut for trespassing on Oleg’s prerogative. This, of course, is theview of affairs as seen from the twelfth century, but for the chronicler it ismore than likely that princes of the tenth century possessed the samequalities as the princes contemporary to him. Svenald, Liut’s father (at thistime Iaropolk’s chief commander), persuaded his leader to attack Oleg.Iaropolk won the battle near the Derevlian town of Vruchii. The storycontinues:

Oleg ran with his warriors into Vruchii. There was a bridge over theditch leading to the town gates, and there was a crush on the bridge.People were stuffing each other into the ditch and Oleg was pushedfrom the bridge with many other strangled men and their horses.And Iaropolk came into Oleg’s town, taking his power, and com-manded that Oleg be found _ And one Derevlian told how he hadseen Oleg pushed from the bridge. And Iaropolk sent to search for hisbrother. And they were taking corpses out of the ditch from themorning to the afternoon, and they foundOleg amidst the corpses, andcarried him and put him on a carpet. And Iaropolk came and cried over



him_ And buried him in the place near Vruchii, and there is his graveto the present day. And Iaropolk took his power.63

Once again we come across two main features of the family chronicle: thetransmission of power from one prince-Riurikovich to another, and avivid description of Oleg’s death that points out the exact place of hisgrave. Though Oleg’s bones were taken in 1044 and buried in Kiev, hisoriginal burial place was still of prime significance in the chronicler’s owntime.

This was the beginning and not the end of the war. Vladimir learnedthat Oleg had been killed, and retreated to Scandinavia. So Iaropolk senthis men to Novgorod and became an autocrat of Rus’.64 Two years later(980) – as discussed above, the chronology of the RPC is artificial – PrinceVladimir returned to Novgorod with the Varangians and sent Iaropolk’smen back to their master. The last act in the drama of Sviatoslav’s sons wasthe conquering of Kiev by Vladimir, and Iaropolk’s murder.65 The son ofMalusha became the autocrat of Rus’. However, before the decisive fightwith Iaropolk, Vladimir had won another ‘battle’: the story inserted in thechronicle of his ‘matchmaking’ with Rogneda. We see here anotherstriking piece rich with parallels from several traditions and rooted infolklore. Vladimir proposed marriage to the daughter of the ruler ofPolotsk. She refused as he was ‘a son of the slave’, and so the angryVladimir conquered Polotsk, killed Rogneda’s parents and brothers, andmarried her anyway.66 We have some close parallels to this in Scandina-vian sources: the stories of Asa in the Ynglinga saga; and of Gudrun, thedaughter of Iarnsneggi, in the saga about Olav Trygvasson in Heimskrin-gla.67 Reading this account there are several questions that naturally arise.First of all, why have such a narrative in the chronicle? Rogneda (OldNorse Ragnheithr) was the mother of Iaroslav and Iziaslav, Vladimir’ssons, whose descendants were Russian princes of the late eleventh andearly twelfth centuries. Again, as in Malusha’s case, it was essential for theauthor to show Rogneda’s origin and her ancestors. Her father, Rogvolod

63=?>9, I, 74–5 (text): ‘=\OSQflTS <YjQa _ P\V _P\VZV Ph Q^NRh ^SX\ZiV 0âeVV. /mfS

eS^S_j Q^\OYlZ\_‘h X\ P^N‘\Zh Q^NR[iZh. @S_[meS_m RâQh RâQN, ]VcNca Ph Q^\OYl,V _]Sc[afN <YjQN _ Z\_‘a P RSO^j, ]NRNca YlRjS Z[\UV, V aRNPVfN X\[V eSY\PSdV. 6PhfSRh M^\]\YXh Ph Q^NRh<YjQ\Ph, ]S^Sm PYN_‘j SQ\, V ]\_YN V_XN‘j O^N‘N _P\SQ\_6

^SeS SRV[h2S^SPYm[V[h: ‘‘.Uh PVRSch, mX\ PeS^N _]Sc[afN _ Z\_‘a’’.6 ]\_YN M^\]\YX

V_XN‘j O^N‘N, V PYNeVfN ‘â]jS VUh Q^\OYV \‘ a‘^N V R\ ]\YaR[S, V [NYSU\fN <YjQN

Pi_]\RV ‘â]jm, [S_\fN V, V ]\Y\TVfN V [N X\P^S. 6 ]^VRS M^\]\YXh [NRh [SZh

]YNXN_m_ 6 ]\Q^SO\fN <YjQN [N ZS_‘S a Q\^\RN 0âeSQ\, V S_‘j Z\QVYN SQ\ V R\ _SQ\

R[S _ 6 ]^Vm PYN_‘j SQ\ M^\]\YXh.’64

=?>9, I, 75 (text).65

=?>9, I, 76–8 (text).66

=?>9, I, 75–6 (text).67

@.;. 2TNX_\[, 6_YN[R_XVS X\^\YSP_XVS _NQV \ 0\_‘\e[\W 3P^\]S (_ R^SP[SWfVc

P^SZS[ R\ 1000 Q.): @SX_‘i, ]S^SP\Ri, X\ZZS[‘N^VW (Moscow, 1993).



(Old Norse Ragnvaldr), was the ruler of Polotsk, a Scandinavian. It wassurprising enough to find Polotsk as Rogvolod’s city because we know thatit had been given by Riurik to ‘his own man’ a century before; here thedetails of the RPC ’s account perhaps shed dubious light on its claims ofRiurikid autocracy. Another important detail that the chronicler stressedwas that Vladimir killed ‘Rogvolod and his two sons’: that is, Rogneda’smale relatives. Polotsk was united with Kievan Rus’, and Vladimir andRogneda’s descendants governed there. But it remains very significant thatthe chronicler emphasized the murder of Rogneda’s male relatives. Inother words, no one had the right to pretend to the Riurikovichi’s powerover all Rus’, and no alternative lines or alternative claims even toindividual cities were to be acknowledged.

Conclusion

Rereading the RPC as a literary work that took its final shape in the 1110’s,composed by the hegumen, Silvestr of Vydubichi, and commissioned bythe Kievan prince, Vladimir Monomakh, gives a new dimension to thestudy of early Russian history. We can observe how the political situationat the beginning of the twelfth century influenced the work of thechronicler. The Russian lands were the sole possession of the Riurikids:the members of the clan had absolute power over this territory on the veryedge of Christendom. As his brothers died, this power was given by theSlavic and the Finno-Ugrian tribes to the progenitor of the dynasty,Riurik, and was transmitted to his only son, Igor. All pretenders to thispower were murdered (as were Askold and Dir), or ‘disappeared’ (as didMal). Local ruling families were destroyed (like Rogvold and his sons) andtheir possessions were absorbed into the lands of the Riurikids (as wasPolotsk). Kiev, the centre of Vladimir Monomakh’s territories in the mid-1110’s, was proclaimed the capital (Metropolis) of all Russian lands by OlegVeshii, and was at the centre of all family disputes after that. Thus we cansee how the contemporary concerns of the beginning of the twelfthcentury were projected onto the past; and the rights of the Riurikids toabsolute power over Rus’, and the central importance of Kiev, weresubstantiated by the RPC.

We can also see how the chronicler elaborately used oral memories. Theinvestigation of the careers of Oleg, Igor and Olga shows that they havemuch in common, suggesting that oral memories were flexible and couldbe adapted to fit into the narrative.We cannot actually be sure that Riurik,Oleg and Igor were even relatives, as more than 150 years separates theirtime from the chronicler’s own. Their stories might or might not besubstantially corrupted, and we will never know to what degree. Oral‘memories’ might even be the author’s own invention, and such visible



signs as the princes’ graves or bones might be a ‘fiction’ as well. However,the role of these stories in shaping family memory (in our case that of theRiurikids), and cohering kin into a single unit, was a very important one –especially for a family as large as were the Riurikids at the beginning of thetwelfth century.

Finally, the recognition and nonrecognition of kin is central to thecreation of family memory. This is connected with the transmission ofpower and the substantiation of the Riurikids’ sole rights to be absoluterulers. A vivid example is the story of Riurik’s kinsman, Oleg, and theKievan rulers, Askold and Dir. Oleg killed both because they were not ofRiurik’s kin. The chronicler in the body of the RPC did not list all of Igor’srelatives mentioned in the treaty of 944. They were omitted from thenarrative because only descendants of St Vladimir had come to rule ineleventh- and twelfth-century Rus’. Thus we have a select number ofRiurikids in the history. All others fell into oblivion. Oral and familymemory are selective, and so too was the author of the RPC.

Moscow Lomonosov State University



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