Yuri did not urge Andrei to return to Vyshgorod, nor did he insist upon his restoring the holy painting. Andrei could not have done so, in any case, for all people believed that the Mother of God had selected Vladimir as the home of her image.
After Yuri’s death his territory was divided, and Mystislav assumed the title of Grand Prince of Kief, though in reality there ceased to be any Grand Principality of Kief.
Born in the north, the city of Vladimir was dear to Andrei. Only through necessity did he go from it to serve in the various wars waged by his father. From youth, Andrei was famous as a warrior, and was the chief and right hand of Yuri. Prompt, energetic and resolute, he loved to be in the front rank of every battle, and on a mighty horse to tear through the heart of the enemy. He was greatly distinguished in war, excelling in management, in the knowledge of details, and in the power of going at once to the very root of a question. No matter what he undertook, he always proved himself a master.
In 1169 Andrei, becoming greatly dissatisfied with Mystislav’s management in Kief, formed a coalition of eleven princes, and marched with a large force against him. After three days Kief was taken by assault; during three more days the place was pillaged, the victors, in the frenzy of triumph, forgetting that they were Russians and that Kief was a Russian city. Everything of value, including the contents of churches, was carried away.
Through continual civil wars, and the increased power of wandering hordes, a condition of any permanency had become impossible, and the interest which Yuri took in Kief was not shared by Andrei. Yuri had founded Suzdal, but, notwithstanding that fact, he had spent most of his life in an effort to become Grand Prince of Kief. [[95]]Upon the decline of Kief, Suzdal, in the basin of the Volga, became the chief city, but loving neither Suzdal nor Rostoff, Andrei determined to make Vladimir the capital of Russia. The majesty of buildings had always attracted him, and he now invited from every part of Russia, not only skilled workers in stone and in wood, but clever craftsmen of all kinds. In Bogolyuboff he established many artificers; a whole ward was occupied by masters in silver and gold work, and makers of holy images. He brought in not only Russian artists, but artists from other lands, from Tsargrad and Italy. The chroniclers of those days were astonished at the great number of these persons.
Andrei spared neither treasure nor labor in ornamenting Vladimir. Remembering his ancestor, who had adorned Kief with the Golden Gate and the Tithe Church, he determined that his birthplace should equal Kief, the mother of Russian cities, hence he built the Assumption Cathedral, which was esteemed at that time a marvel, and during centuries it served in the North as a model for similar structures. The Assumption Cathedral in Moscow, once the place for crowning the Tsars of Russia, and where the Emperors are now crowned, was built on this model. He erected the Golden, as well as the Silver Gate, called thus because the church dome at one gate was of gold, while at the other it was of silver.
The city of Vladimir, adorned with beautiful buildings, and exalted by the presence of the marvelous image, became Andrei’s residence, and, because of the image and the residence, also the capital city. In spite of the opposition of boyars in Rostoff and Suzdal, the Assumption Cathedral of Vladimir became the main sanctuary of the Russian land, and gave primacy to the city. The North was no longer the land of Rostoff and Suzdal, it was mentioned more and more frequently as Vladimir. This Vladimir country included what are known now as the governments of Vladimir, Kostroma, Yaroslavl, Moscow, Ryazan, Tuer, Nizni-Novgorod, Bailozero, in other words what is really Great Russia.
From time immemorial, in Russia the only place held in high honor was a place with a sanctuary. The people revered Kief, because the Christian faith had first been accepted there. In Kief there were relics and holy places and there also was the monastery in which the great monks Antonio and Fedosia had lived. Till [[96]]Andrei’s day, the immense northern land beyond the forest contained nothing sacred. Now two images, one made by Luke the Evangelist, and known as the Vladimir Mother of God, the other that of the Holy Virgin as she made herself manifest to Andrei in a vision, made Vladimir the first sanctuary in Russia.
Popular belief assigned the founding of the city to St. Vladimir the Apostle and Grand Prince. He had, in fact, come from Kief with the first metropolitan to baptize the pagan people of that region, but the city was founded only during the days when Vladimir Monomach was the ruler. It occupied, however, the spot on which the Apostolic Vladimir had camped, on his way to baptize the people of Rostoff and Suzdal, hence it was said that the city received its name from Vladimir the Apostle, the Purifier. Political power helped the religious idea, and religion gave strength to the policy.
In the mind of Yuri Dolgoruki the plan had been fixed firmly that his northern lands must remain undivided. One reason why he had struggled for Kief so persistently was to satisfy some of his sons in the South, while the North was to remain intact, and be given to his eldest son. Through increase of Vladimir’s descendants, and the separation of property, princes who had little land and no power became numerous. In extreme cases Yuri had divided out towns of Rostoff and Suzdal for the temporary use of those princes. Andrei’s brothers were not treated differently from others.