likened to the cossack hetmans and to the viking captains as well as to leaders in other military traditions, and the cossack, if not the viking, comparison has a point: Sviatoslav's appearance, dress, and manner of life all remind us of the steppe. In the words of the Primary Chronicle: "Upon his expeditions he carried with him neither wagons nor kettles, and boiled no meat, but cut off small strips of horseflesh, game, or beef, and ate it after roasting it on the coals. Nor did he have a tent, but he spread out a piece of saddle cloth under him, and set his saddle under his head."
In 964 Sviatoslav started out on a great eastern campaign. First he subjugated the East Slavic tribe of the Viatichi, who had continued to pay tribute to the Khazars rather than to Kiev. Next he descended to the mouth of the river Oka bringing the surrounding Finnic-speaking tribes under his authority. From the mouth of the Oka he proceeded down the Volga, attacked the Volga Bulgars, and sacked their capital, the Great Bulgar. But instead of developing his campaign against the Bulgars, he resumed in 965 his advance down the Volga toward the Khazar state, subduing Finnic and Turkic tribes on the way. Sviatoslav's war against the Khazars had a sweeping scope and impressive results: the Russians smashed the Khazar army, captured and sacked the Khazar capital, Itil, reached the Caspian and advancing along its western shore seized the key fortress of Samandar. Next, turning west, they defeated the Alans and some other peoples of the northern Caucasus, came to the mouth of the Don and stormed the Khazar fortress of Sarkil, which dominated that area. The Khazars, although their state lasted for another half century, never recovered from these staggering blows. Sviatoslav returned to Kiev in 967. His remarkable eastern campaign, which led to the defeat of the Volga Bulgars and the Khazars, completed the unification of the East Slavs around Kiev, attaching to it both the Viatichi and other groups to the southeast, notably in the Don area. Also, it brought under Russian control the entire flow of the Volga, and thus the great Volga-Caspian Sea trade route - a more ancient and perhaps more important north-south communication artery than the Dnieper way itself - whereas formerly the Russians had held only the upper reaches of the Volga. Yet the magnificent victory over the Khazars had its reverse side; it weakened decisively their effectiveness as a buffer against other Asiatic peoples, in particular the Pechenegs.
In 968 Sviatoslav became involved in another major undertaking. On the invitation of the Byzantine emperor Nicephorus Phocas, he led a large army into the Balkans to attack the Bulgarian state in the Danubian valley. Once more the Russians achieved notable military successes, capturing the capital of the Bulgarians and taking prisoner their ruler Boris, although they had to interrupt the campaign to defeat the Pechenegs, who in 969 in the
absence of Sviatoslav and his troops had besieged Kiev. Sviatoslav, who thus came to control the territory from the Volga to the Danubian plain, apparently liked the Balkan lands especially well. According to the Chronicle, he declared: "I do not care to remain in Kiev, but should prefer to live in Pereiaslavets on the Danube, since that is the center of my realm, where all riches are concentrated: gold, silks, wine, and various fruits from Greece, silver and horses from Hungary and Bohemia, and from Russia furs, wax, honey, and slaves." One can only speculate on the possible implications of such a change of capital for Russian history.
But the Byzantine state, ruled from 969 by the famous military leader Emperor John Tzimisces, had become fully aware of the new danger. As Sviatoslav would not leave the Balkans, a bitter war ensued. In his characteristic manner the Russian prince rapidly crossed the Balkan mountains and invaded the Byzantine Empire, capturing Philippopolis and threatening Adrianople and Constantinople itself. However, John Tzimisces managed in the nick of time to restore his position in Asia, which had been threatened by both a foreign war and a rebellion, and to shift his main effort to the Balkans. He counterattacked, crossing in his turn the Balkan range and capturing Great Preslav, the Bulgarian capital. The Russian army, its lines of communication endangered, had to retreat to the fortress of Dorostolon on the Danube - present-day Dristra or Silistria - which, after a hard-fought battle, John Tzimisces placed under siege. Following more desperate fighting, in July 971 Sviatoslav was finally reduced to making peace with Byzantium on condition of abandoning the Balkans, as well as the Crimea, and promising not to challenge the Byzantine Empire in the future. On his way back to Russia, with a small retinue, he was intercepted and killed by the Pechenegs. Tradition has it that the Pecheneg khan had a drinking cup made out of Sviatoslav's skull. The great adventure had come to its end. Sviatoslav's Balkan wars attract attention not only because of the issues involved but also because of the sizes of the contending armies and because of their place in military history; Byzantine sources indicate that Sviatoslav fought at the head of 60,000 troops of whom 22,000 remained when peace was concluded.
After the death of his mother Olga in 969, Sviatoslav, constantly away with the army, entrusted the administration of the Kiev area to his elder son Iaropolk, dispatched the second son Oleg to govern the territory of the Drevliane, and sent the third, the young Vladimir, with an older relative to manage Novgorod. A civil war among the brothers followed Sviatoslav's death. At first Iaropolk had the upper hand, Oleg perishing in the struggle and Vladimir escaping abroad. But in two years Vladimir returned and with foreign mercenaries and local support defeated and killed Iaropolk. About 980 he became the ruler of the entire Kievan realm.
Kiev at the Zenith
Vladimir, who reigned until 1015, continued in most respects the policies of his predecessors. Among the East Slavs, he reaffirmed the authority of the Kievan state which had been badly shaken during the years of civil war. He recovered Galician towns from Poland and, further to the north, subdued the warlike Baltic tribe of the Iatviags, extending his domain in that area to the Baltic Sea. Vladimir also made a major and generally successful effort to contain the Pechenegs. He built fortresses and towns, brought settlers into the frontier districts, and managed to push the steppe border to two days, rather than a single day, of travel time from Kiev.
However, Vladimir's great fame rests on his relations with Byzantium and, most especially, on his adoption of Christianity, which proved to be of immense significance and long outlasted the specific political and cultural circumstances that led to the step. Interest in Christianity was not unprecedented among the Russians. In fact, there may even have been a Russian diocese of the Byzantine Church as early as 867, although not all scholars agree on this inference from a particular tantalizing passage in an early document. Whether or not an early Christian Rus existed on the shores of the Sea of Azov, Kiev itself certainly experienced Christian influences before the time of Vladimir. A Christian church existed in Kiev in the reign of Igor, and we know that Olga, Vladimir's grandmother, became a Christian; Vladimir's brother Iaropolk has also been described as favorably inclined to Christianity. But it should be emphasized that Olga's conversion did not affect the pagan faith of her subjects and, furthermore, that, in the first part of the reign of Vladimir, Kievan Russia experienced a strong pagan revival. Vladimir's turnabout and the resulting "baptism of Russia" were accompanied by an intricate series of developments that has been given different explications and interpretations by scholars: Vladimir's military aid to Emperor Basil II of Byzantium, the siege and capture by the Russians of the Byzantine outpost of Chersonesus in the Crimea, and Vladimir's marriage to Anne, Basil II's sister. Whatever the exact import and motivation of these and certain other events, the Kievan Russians formally accepted Christianity from Constantinople in or around 988 and probably in or near Kiev, although some historians prefer Chersonesus.