The Mongols in Russia

by Jeremiah Curtin

On his arrival at Kief, the newly converted prince overturned the ancient idols. Some were cut into pieces, others were cast into the fire, but the statue of Perun (the Vedic Parjana), the god of thunder, the Slavonic Jupiter, was tied to the tails of horses and dragged from its height to the river. Twelve men were sent to beat it with sticks, not because the wood could feel, but to insult the Devil, since by this image he had seduced man. When dragged to the river the image was hurled into the water, and Vladimir commanded men to push it out into the current, should it touch the shore anywhere. It was borne on the stream and carried over the cataracts, and the wind blew it far away toward the Black Sea.

Then heralds were sent through the city saying: “Who will not be baptized, be he rich or poor, he will be hateful to me.” Vladimir went down with all the priests to the Dnieper. Great multitudes stood in the water, and the priests prayed and baptized them. Nestor says: “There was joy upon earth and in heaven, for many souls were saved that day.” After the sacred rite the people went their way, each man to his own home. In a like manner the inhabitants of each village and settlement were brought to Christianity, and Vladimir ordered churches to be built on the places where idols had been. After Kief, the turn came for the tribes east and [[18]]west, as well as north. In Novgorod, where the old beliefs had their stronghold, the opposition was greatest, and when the first church was built the people tore it down straightway, but a skilful mingling of persuasion and force, together with the adhesion of the more important citizens, carried the day, and all Russia in time became Christian. Of course paganism lived on for many a year among the common people, as it did in other countries, and traces of it are still to be found in the folk-songs and different religious beliefs, survivals which are extremely interesting to the historian and philosopher.

This sending of an embassy of wise men to examine and report on various religions, so that prince and people might have means of making the best choice, was a remarkable departure from previous methods, and stands quite alone in the history of European Christianity. It was the exact opposite of the method used south of the Baltic,—a method which gave such great profit to invaders.

All Slav tribes between the Elbe and the Nieman, the Baltic and Bohemia lost independence, language, and race through the method by which Christianity was forced on them by Germans. If there were men among the conquered and Christianized who escaped, they were men who made themselves useful as assistant oppressors, and thus were received into the foreign aristocracy.

Christianity, introduced first into Kief and then into Novgorod, extended later on the east and west of the Dnieper till, after Yaroslav’s day, it occupied all regions held by Russian princes.

Vladimir had what the Russians love in a man: a broad nature. Occupied with serious work, he still found time for feasts. The celebration of victories and the consecration of churches were always accompanied by great banquets. These festivals took the place of pagan holidays. In all the songs of Vladimir’s time the feasts of the “Bright Sun of the Russian land” are ever remembered. So firmly did these ballads fix themselves in the popular mind, that not many years ago Hilferding, the president of the Slavonic Society at St. Petersburg, collected in the course of two months enough to fill an octavo volume of eight hundred double columns.

Vladimir’s rule in Russia was firm and unconquerable; no enemy was able to shake it. On the east he extended his power to all places reached by the princes before him; on the west his possessions touched the river San, and included the Dvina region. It [[19]]is difficult to overestimate the importance of this remarkable man’s activity, but it is by his greatest work that Vladimir is best remembered. Before he introduced Christianity, the different tribes had been held together by merely material bonds; thenceforth they were united by a common faith. There is no tie so strong as the tie of faith, and in no country has it shown more strength than in Russia.

Vladimir died in 1015, leaving twelve sons and also a nephew, or son, namely Sviatopolk. These sons were from various mothers, and great trouble rose quickly among them. Sviatopolk, whom people called “the sinful son of two fathers,” could claim Vladimir’s heritage as a nephew of Vladimir, and son of Yaropolk. He was the only one of the heirs who was in Kief when the prince died, and he claimed the throne at once by virtue of his seniority.

Vladimir had preferred two of his younger sons, Boris and Glaib, to the others, partly it may be because they were better, as he thought, and partly also because they were born of the Greek princess, Anna, to whom he was married as a Christian. Boris was perhaps his favorite, and this son he wished to succeed him as Grand Prince.

Sviatopolk looked on himself no doubt as the son of Yaropolk, whom he had reason to think of as done to death foully by Vladimir. His mother, who not long before his birth had been the betrothed wife of Yaropolk, may have schooled him touching his father. Of this we are not informed, though it seems very probable. In every case, Sviatopolk acted as if moved by keen hatred, though his motive might have been purely ambition. Acting swiftly, he seized the throne of Kief straightway, summoned the people, spoke fairly, and gave presents on all sides; then he found men to slay the sons of Vladimir. First they killed Boris, and then Glaib. Another son fled westward toward Hungary, but was followed and killed in the Carpathians.