The Russian power began by the Scandinavian leaders obtaining, in the latter half of the ninth century, the dominion of the most northern members of the Slavonic race, the Slaves of Novgorod on the Ilmen. Thence they pushed their dominion southwards. ♦Extent of the eastern Slavonic lands.♦ East and north-east of the Lechs and Chrobatians lay a crowd of Slavonic tribes stretching beyond the Dnieper as far as the upper course of the Oka. Cut off from the Baltic by the Fins and Letts, they were cut off from the Euxine by various Turanian races in turn, first Magyars, then Patzinaks. To the south-east, from the Dnieper to the Caspian, lay the Chazar dominion, to which the Slaves east of Dnieper were tributary. To the north-east lay a crowd of Finnish tribes, among which is only one Finnish power of historic name, the kingdom of Great or White Bulgaria on the Volga. ♦Union of the eastern Slaves. 862-912.♦ Within this region, in the space of fifty years, the various Slavonic tribes joined in different degrees of unity to form the new power, called Russian from its Scandinavian leaders. ♦Advance against Chazars and Fins.♦ The tribes who were tributary to the Chazars were set free, and the Russian power was spread over a certain Finnish area on the Upper Volga and its tributaries, nearly as far north as Lake Bielo. ♦Second centre at Kief.♦ The centres of the new power were, first Novgorod, and then Kief on the Dnieper.
♦The rulers of Russia become Slavonic.
957-972.♦
How early the Scandinavian rulers of the new Slavonic power became themselves practically Slavonic is shown by the name of the prince Sviatoslaf, of whom we have already heard in the Danubian Bulgaria. ♦Russian enterprise. Euxine.♦ Already had Russian enterprise taken the direction which it took in far later days. It was needful for the developement of the new Russian nation to have free access to the Euxine. From this they were cut off by a strange fate for nine hundred years. But from the very beginning more than one attempt was made on Constantinople, though the Tzargrad, the Imperial city, could be reached only by sailing down the Dnieper through an enemy’s country. ♦Conquests on the Caspian.
Vladimir takes Cherson.♦ Sviatoslaf also appears as a conqueror in the lands by the Caucasus and the Caspian, and Vladimir, the first Christian prince, won his way to baptism by an attack on the Imperial city of Cherson.
♦Isolation of Russia.♦
The oldest Russia was thus, like the oldest Poland, emphatically an inland state; but it was far more isolated than Poland. Its ecclesiastical position kept it from sharing the history of the Western Slaves. Its geographical position kept it from sharing the history of the Servians and Bulgarians. ♦Russian lands west of Dnieper.♦ And it must not be forgotten that the oldest Russia was formed mainly of lands which afterwards passed under the rule of Poland and Lithuania. Little Russia, Black Russia, White Russia, Red Russia, all came under foreign rule. The Dnieper, from which Russia was afterwards cut off, was the great central river of the elder Russia; of the Don and the Volga she held only the upper course. The northern frontier barely passed the great lakes of Ladoga and Onega, and the Gulf of Finland itself. It seems not to have reached what was to be the Gulf of Riga, but some of the Russian princes held a certain supremacy over the Finnish and Lettish tribes of that region.
♦Russian principalities. 1054.
Supremacy of Kief;♦
In the course of the eleventh century, the Russian state, like that of Poland, was divided among princes of the reigning family, acknowledging the superiority of the great prince of Kief. ♦of the Northern Vladimir, 1169.♦ In the next century the chief power passed from Kief to the northern Vladimir on the Kiasma. ♦Susdal Russian.♦ Thus the former Finnish land of Susdal on the upper tributaries of the Volga became the cradle of the second Russian power. ♦Commonwealths at Novgorod and Pskof.♦ Novgorod the Great meanwhile, under elective princes, claimed, like its neighbour Pskof, to rank among commonwealths. Its dominion was spread far over the Finnish tribes to the north and east; the White Sea, and, far more precious, the Finnish Gulf, had now a Russian seaboard. It was out of Vladimir and Novgorod that the Russia of the future was to grow. ♦The principalities.♦ Meanwhile a crowd of principalities, Polotsk, Smolensk, the Severian Novgorod, Tchernigof, and others, arose on the Duna and Dnieper. ♦Commonwealth of Viatka. 1174.
Halicz or Galicia. 1186.♦ Far to the east across the commonwealth of Viatka, and on the frontiers of Poland and Hungary arose the principality of Halicz or Galicia, which afterwards grew for a while into a powerful kingdom.
♦The Cumans. 1114.♦
Meanwhile in the lands on the Euxine the old enemies, Patzinaks and Chazars, gave way to the Cumans,[63] known in Russian history as Polovtzi and Parthi. They spread themselves from the Ural river to the borders of Servia and Danubian Bulgaria, cutting off Russia from the Caspian. ♦1223.
Mongol invasion.♦ In the next century Russians and Cumans—momentary allies—fell before the advance of the Mongols, commonly known in European history as Tartars. Known only as ravagers in the lands more to the west, over Russia they become overlords for two hundred and fifty years. ♦Russia tributary to the Mongols.♦ All that escaped absorption by the Lithuanian became tributary to the Mongol. ♦1240.♦ Still the relation was only a tributary one; Russia was never incorporated in the Mongol dominion, as Servia and Bulgaria were incorporated in the Ottoman dominion. ♦Russia represented by Novgorod.♦ But Kief was overthrown; Vladimir became dependent; Novgorod remained the true representative of free Russia in the Baltic lands.
♦The earlier races on the Baltic.♦