Igor’s sons began to rule with great sternness. The king held them as rebels and disturbers; the boyars looked on them as outlaws and as rebels against boyar lordship; but the princes gave no ear to those boyars, showing a contempt which was calculated and unsparing. They hunted boyars and put them to death without mercy; they put magnates to death for the least opposition, and brought back the stern days of Roman. Against boyars a council was created which put to death Yuri Vassilievitch, Ilya Stepanovitch, and other distinguished men. Five hundred in all lost their lives. Many fled from Galitch. Even Volodislav, that boyar who first brought Galitch people to favor Igor’s sons during their boyhood, when their mother, the daughter of Eight Minds, was living, was forced to seek safety in flight, and from being their ally, he now became their worst enemy. With him went Sudislav and Philip, celebrated boyars, and other men like them. These swore on leaving the country that they would return and show who they were to those fellows who had dared to ape Roman.
The rage of those men against Igor’s sons was not to be measured. Volodislav toiled now in Hungary, saying: “Igor’s sons, in clear violation of regal right, and in hostility to the will of their monarch, are ruling as despots.” Volodislav implored Andrei to give him an army and Daniel, then ten years of age, to go with him. “I will bring Galitch to the feet of your Majesty promptly,” said he.
The king wished in one way or another to establish Roman’s heir, whom he was guarding. There were reports that he thought of giving Daniel his daughter, and with her Galitch as dowry. Volodislav’s words pleased the king; he gave a trusty following, and sent with the boyar his so-called son, Daniel.
The first towns, Peremysl and Zvenigorod, were hostile; neither place yielded. Daniel was shown to the people, and they were advised to take the prince born to them, but they clung to Igor’s sons firmly. They saw the king’s banners before them, they heard that voevodas and horsemen had come in large number from Hungary,—still they would not surrender. In Peremysl, they stood resolutely for Sviatoslav, that son of Igor who was with them. Then Volodislav himself went up to the walls of the city and called to the people: “Oh, brothers, why do ye waver? Are the men now managing our country not foreign intruders? Did they not slay [[173]]both your fathers and brothers and bear off your property? Did they not give your daughters to their servants? Do ye wish to lay down your lives for them?” The people listened to these questions, and remembered the evil done in the first reign of Igor’s sons. They hesitated also to dip their hands in blood in a war against Daniel, so at last they opened the gates of the city to him. Igor’s son, Sviatoslav, was captured.
At Zvenigorod the people fought stubbornly. The besieged did not let Volodislav come near the walls, and they made desperate sallies. The prince in that city was Roman, son of Igor, who brought “wild Polovtsi” to help him. Mika, Andrei’s voevoda, was unable to save himself. The “wild ones” took the head from his shoulders. That day the Hungarians were badly defeated.
When the Volynia men heard that “their Daniel” had come, they rose up against the sons of Igor. In Volynia all “the people” favored Daniel and his brother.
Envious, since Galitch was becoming the property of Hungary, Leshko, the guardian of Vassilko, took part in the uprising also. The Poles hastened to war against Hungary. Ingvar of Lutsk went with them, while Vassilko sent men from Bailz to his brother. It was difficult for Zvenigorod to remain independent. Roman, son of Igor, fearing the fate of his brother, declared that he was going for assistance, but he was captured and taken to the camp of the enemy. Then the allies sent this message to the citizens: “Your prince is captured! Surrender!” They could not believe it, and continued to fight for him, but when they saw Roman a captive they yielded. The eldest brother, Vladimir, who was in Galitch, left the city as the enemy approached it, and sought safety in flight. He was pursued and came near being captured, but his swift-footed stallion saved him.
Thus was accomplished in Galitch what Roman’s widow, tortured by waiting and exile, had not dared even to hope for; her firstborn son, Daniel, entered Galitch in triumph, and occupied the throne of his father. She appeared now in Galitch very promptly. Daniel, the boy of ten years, did not know her, but, as the annalist tells us, he expressed all the more feeling when he heard the word “son” from her lips, and saw the tears of delight which fell from her eyes. The boyars did not want that strong-hearted [[174]]mother in the country, for her word might have power there against them, hence she was removed quickly and without ceremony. Daniel was frantic at the parting. The boy had no wish to be in Galitch without his mother, and, while her foes were conducting her out of the city, he rode at her side, and held her robes firmly. One of the boyars seized the bridle of his horse to stop him. Furious at this, the young prince gave a sword-blow which missed the boyar, but wounded the horse on which he was riding. The mother grasped Daniel’s sword-hilt, bidding him to be calm and stay bravely in Galitch. On returning to Bailz, she sent a message to Hungary, complaining bitterly of the boyars, of Sudislav, and of Philip, but, above all, of Volodislav.
The boyars had not got what they wanted. They had overthrown Igor’s sons, who had dared to remind them of Roman, but to overthrow those princes was not enough; they must punish them. Such men as Sudislav and Volodislav were ready to give immense sums in gold for opponents like Sviatoslav and Roman. The voevodas, however, refused to yield up the captives, saying that such traitors should be sent to the sovereign. The boyars now had recourse to gold, and the voevodas, persuaded by great gifts, agreed to surrender the princes. In this way the men got possession of Igor’s sons and then hanged them. While the princes were swinging on gibbets, those boyars pierced them with arrows shot from their own bows by their own hands. That done they gave homage to Daniel, placed on the throne by the King of Hungary, and went home in good humor. Galitch was governed by boyars.
That same year, 1211, the king, touched by the tears of Roman’s widow, went in person to establish her in Galitch, where, to his amazement, he found Daniel’s relatives from Volynia,—Ingvar of Lutsk and others, who were there under pretext of visiting the new prince.