EUGÈNE EMMANUEL VIOLLET-LE-DUC
The Russian people, composed of diverse elements in which the Sclav predominated at the moment when that vast empire began to be established under great princes and amid incessant struggle, was in too close communication with Byzantium not to have been to a certain extent in submission to Byzantine art; but nevertheless each of these elements was in possession of certain notions of art which we must not neglect.
The Sclavs, like the Varangians, knew scarcely anything but construction by wood, but at a comparatively early period they had already carried the art of carpentry very far, and in many different channels.
The Sclavs (as extant traditions show), proceeded by piles in their wooden buildings: and the Scandinavians resorted to joining and dove-tailing. Thus, the latter early attained great skill in naval construction.
These two methods of construction in wood have persisted till the present day, which fact is easily established on examining the rural dwellings of Russia.
The Sclavs, moreover, as well as the Varangians, possessed certain art expressions which denote an Asiatic origin.
Even in Byzantine art, so far as ornamentation is concerned, there were origins that were evidently common to those that are felt in the Sclav arts; and these original elements are again found in Central Asia.
That ornamentation, composed of interlacings and conventional floral motives, dry and metallic, which was adopted at Byzantium, where it very soon destroyed the last vestiges of Roman art, also appears on the most ancient monuments of the Sclavs, and even on objects that in France are attributed to the Merovingians, that is to say, the Franks who came from the shores of the Baltic.
Thus, Russia was to take her arts, as regards ornamentation, from branches that are far apart from one another in time and distance, but which sprang from a common trunk.
About the Tenth Century, the Russian buildings were of wood; all texts agree on this point, and consequently these constructions could have no part in Byzantine architecture, which does not recall even the traditions of carpentry work.