The Vikings

by A. Mawer

The story of the founding of the Russian kingdom is preserved to us in the late 10th century chronicle of the monk Nestor, who tells us that in the year 859 'Varangians' came over the sea and took tribute from various Finnish, Tatar and Slavonic peoples inhabiting the forest regions round Lake Ilmen, between Lake Ladoga and the upper waters of the Dnieper. Again he tells us that in 862 the Varangians were driven over seas and tribute was refused, but soon the tribes quarrelled among themselves and some suggested that they should find a prince who might rule over them and keep the peace. So they sent across the sea to the Varangians, to the 'Rus,' for such is the name of these Varangians, just as others are called Swedes, Northmen, Anglians, Goths, saying that their land was great and powerful but there was no order within it and asking them to come and rule over them. Three brothers with their followers were chosen: the eldest, Rurik (O.N. Hrœrekr), settled in Novgorod, the second in Bieloözero, the third in Truvor in Izborsk. Three years later two of the brothers died and Rurik took control of the whole of the settlements, dividing the land among his men. In the same year two of Rurik's followers, Askold (O.N. Höskuldr) and Dir (O.N. Dýri), setting out for Constantinople, halted at Kiev and there founded a kingdom, which in 882 was conquered by Rurik's successor Oleg (O.N. Helgi) and, as the mother of all Russian cities, became the capital of the Russian kingdom.

There is a certain naiveté about this story which is characteristic of the monkish chronicler generally, and it is clear that, after the usual manner of the annalist who is compiling his record long after the events described, Nestor has grouped together under one or two dates events which were spread over several years, but the substantial truth of the narrative cannot be impugned and receives abundant confirmation from various sources.

The earliest evidence for the presence of these 'Rus' in Eastern Europe is found in the story of the Byzantine embassy to the emperor Lewis the Pious in 839 (v. supra, p. [19]), when certain people called 'Rhôs,' who had been on a visit to Constantinople, came in the train of the embassy and asked leave to return home through the empire. Enquiries were made and it was found that these 'Rhôs' were Swedes. This would point to the presence of 'Rus' in Russia at a date earlier than that given by Nestor, and indeed the rapid extension of their influence indicates a period of activity considerably longer than that allowed by him. These 'Rus' or 'Rhôs' soon came into relations, both of trade and war, with the Byzantine empire. We have preserved to us from the years 911 and 944 commercial treaties made between the 'Rus' and the Greeks showing that they brought all kinds of furs and also slaves to Constantinople, receiving in exchange various articles of luxury including gold and silver ornaments, silks and other rich stuffs. The names of the signatories to these treaties are, on the side of the 'Rus,' almost entirely of Scandinavian origin and may to some extent be shown to be of definitely Swedish provenance. About the year 950, the emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus, writing a tractate on the administration of the empire, describes how traders from various parts of Russia assemble at Kiev and sail down the Dnieper on their way to Constantinople. Their course down the Dnieper was impeded by a series of rapids, and Constantine gives their names both in 'Russian' and in Slavonic form, and though the names are extremely corrupt in their Greek transcription there is no mistaking that the 'Russian' names are really forms belonging to some Scandinavian dialect.

The Rus were also well known as warriors and raiders. In 865 they sailed down the Dnieper, across the Black Sea and made their way into the Sea of Marmora. Their fleet was dispersed by a storm, but they were more successful in 907 when Oleg with some 2000 ships harried the environs of Constantinople and was bought off by a heavy tribute. These attacks were continued at intervals during the next century.

We also find a good deal of interesting information about these 'Rûs,' as they are called, in various Arab historians. We hear how they sailed their vessels down the chief waterways and had such a firm hold on the Black Sea that by the year 900 it was already known as the Russian Sea. Often they dragged their vessels overland from one stream to another, and thus they made their way from the upper waters of the Don down the Volga to the Caspian Sea. But not only do we have a description of their journeyings we also learn a good deal of their customs and habits, and, though at times the information given is open to suspicion, archaeological research tends to confirm the statements of these historians and to show that the civilisation of the 'Rûs' closely resembled that of the Scandinavian peoples generally in the Viking age.

The identification of the ancient 'Rus' with the Swedes was long and hotly contested by Slavonic patriots but there is now a general consensus of opinion that the evidence for it is too strong to be overthrown. Not only have we the evidence given above but also the very names 'Rus' and 'Varangian' can be satisfactorily explained only on this theory. The name 'Rus' is the Slavonic, 'Rhôs' the Greek, and 'Rûs' the Arabic form of the Finnish name for Sweden, viz. Ruotsi. This name was originally derived from Roþr or Roþin, the name of certain districts of Upland and Östergötland, whose inhabitants were known as Rods-karlar or Rods-mæn. The Finns had early come into relation with the Swedes and they used the name of those people with whom they were in earliest and most intimate contact for the whole Swedish nationality. When these Swedes settled in Russia the Finns applied the same term to the new colonists and the term came to be adopted later into the various Slavonic dialects.

We are most familiar with the term 'Varangian' or 'Variag,' to use the Slavonic form, as applied to the famous guard of the Byzantine emperors, which seems to have been formed in the latter half of the 10th century and was largely composed of Norwegian, Icelandic and Swedish recruits. In Russian and Arabic historians on the other hand the term is used rather in an ethnographic or geographic sense. We have seen that it was thus used by Nestor, and similarly we find the Baltic commonly spoken of as the 'Varangian' Sea both in Russian and in Arabic records. All the evidence tends to show that this was the earlier sense of the term and we find it gradually displacing the term 'Rhôs' even in Byzantine historians. The word itself is of Scandinavian origin and means 'those who are bound together by a pledge.' The theory which best explains its various uses is that put forward by Dr Vilhelm Thomsen, viz. that it originated among the Northmen who settled in Russia, i.e. among the ancient Russ, and that under that term they denoted those peoples west of the Baltic who were related to them by nationality.

From the Russ the word passed into the Slavonic language as variag[12], into the Greek as barangoi—where it was often used in the restricted sense of members of the imperial guard largely recruited from this nation,—and into the Arabic as varank. Dr Thomsen adduces two happy parallels for the somewhat remarkable history of the terms 'Russian' and 'Varangian.' The term 'Russian' came to be used as their own name by the Slavonic peoples, who were once ruled over by the Russ, in much the same way that the term 'Frankish' or 'French' was adopted by the Gaulish population of France from its Germanic conquerors. The term 'Varangian,' ultimately the name for a nation or group of nations, came to be used of a military force once largely recruited from those nations, much in the same way as the term 'Swiss' was applied to the Papal guard long after that guard had ceased to be recruited from the Swiss nation exclusively.

The belief in the Scandinavian origin of the Russ is amply supported by archaeological evidence. The large number of Arabic coins found in Sweden (more especially in Gothland) and in Russia itself points to an extensive trade with the Orient whose route lay chiefly to the east of the Caspian Sea and then along the valley of the Volga. The dates of the coins point to the years between 850 and 1000 as those of most active intercourse with the East. Equally interesting is the large number of western coins, more especially Anglo-Saxon pennies and sceatts, which have been found in Russia. They probably represent portions of our Danegeld which had come into the hands of the Swedes either in trade or war. Viking brooches of the characteristic oval shape with the familiar zoomorphic ornamentation have been found in Western Russia, and one stone with a runic inscription, belonging to the 11th century and showing evidence of connexion with Gothland, has been found in a burial mound in Berezan, an island at the mouth of the Dnieper. Professor Braun says that no others have been found because of the rarity of suitable stone.