[REQUIRED READING]
FOR THE
Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle for 1882-83.
JANUARY.
[HISTORY OF RUSSIA.]
By Mrs. MARY S. ROBINSON.
CHAPTER V.
THE GRAND PRINCIPALITY—VLADIMIR MONOMAKH.
One of the illustrious successors of Iaroslaf the Great upon the throne of Kief, was his grandson Vladimir, grandson also of the Greek emperor Constantine Monomachus, whose surname he bore;[A] a man of wisdom, of valor, and of integrity—a singular instance of elevation of character in an age and among a people but partly emerged from barbarism. He waited long for his right to rule, having respect to the national law that gave precedence to the oldest member of the deceased sovereign’s family. “His father was older than mine, and reigned first in Kief,” he said, deferring to his cousin Sviatopolk Isiaslavitch.[B] Certain of Monomakh’s kinsmen had been wrongfully deprived of their lands by Vsevolod and Isiaslaf, respectively father and uncle of Monomakh. The latter accepted Tchernigof as his share of the spoil; for beyond the right of the strongest, no right was seriously considered in the Russia of that age. Oleg, one of the injured princes, called the Polovtsui barbarians to his aid, and harried the lands of those who had robbed him. Monomakh, moved by the distress of the people, offered to restore the wrested lands that had fallen to his share. To his efforts was due the assembling of the more powerful princes in Congress at Lübetch (1090), on the Dnieper, to effect means for the suppression of the civil wars that afflicted the realm. Seated on a carpet, the princes drew up a treaty, each prince taking oath and kissing the cross, as he declared that thereafter “the Russian land shall be held sacred and dear, as the country of us all. Whoso shall dare to arm himself against his brother, becomes our common enemy.” As nearly as is known, this treaty is the first written assertion of the unity that was incipient in the administration of Ruric, that took form and strength from the administrations of Vladimir and Iaroslaf, and that has been steadily developing through a thousand years of national existence: a unity that holds in an apparently inviolable bond a hundred tribes and nationalities.
The good faith of the members of the congress was soon put to the test by David, Prince of Volhynia, who made war upon his nephews, Vasilko and Volodar, to whom the assembled princes had apportioned certain lands, coveted by their uncle. The latter went to Sviatapolk, Grand Prince of Kief—for Vladimir Monomakh had not yet come to his throne—and represented that Vasilko had designs upon Sviatapolk’s lands and life. The latter lent an ear to David’s calumnies, and joined with him in a plot to seize the person of Vasilko. The youth in fetters was brought before an assembly of Kievan boyars (nobles) and citizens, to be sentenced as the enemy of their prince. To this arrangement the boyars replied with embarrassment: “Prince, thy tranquillity is ours, and it is dear to us. If Vasilko is thine enemy, he merits death; but if David has calumniated him, God will avenge upon David the blood of the innocent.” Sviatapolk hesitating to do violence to the youth, delivered him to his uncle, who wickedly burned out his eyes. The crime aroused the wrath of Monomakh, and of the other kinsmen of the victim. These formed an alliance, in which Sviatapolk was compelled to join, for the punishment of David, who fled first to the Poles, and later to the Hungarians, but was ultimately deprived of his principality.
Monomakh conducted successful wars against the Polovtsui, the Petchenegs, the Torki, the Tcherkessi, and other pagan nomads. In one engagement with the Polovtsui, seventeen of their chiefs were among the captured or the slain. One of the khans offered enormous ransom, but the prince refused the gold, and cut the khan in pieces. These khans were brigands, who subsisted on the booty obtained from the Russian merchants and travelers. Monomakh deeply felt these injuries to his Christian subjects, nor would he treat with princes who kindled civil wars. To the end of his days he remained “the guardian of the Russian lands.” In his reign, the Slavs were established in Suzdal, and founded there a city called in his honor, Vladimir; a city of renown in the subsequent history of the empire. The magnanimity of this prince was shown in his giving refuge to the remnant of the Kazarui.[C] In the construction of fortifications and other buildings, and in other industrial arts, these people were more skilled than their conquerors. They had also numbers of flourishing schools. In the seventh century their empire included the regions of the lower Dnieper, the Don, the lower Volga, the shores of the Caspian and Azof seas; an area of 765,000 square miles.
The commercial importance of this empire gave it high rank in Byzantium, Arabia, and other Mohammedan countries, these being the only civilized states of the world in that era.