In 1102 the Novgorodians again opposed Kiev's planned replacement of Mstislav by a Kievan client. An analysis of the archaeological evidence relating to imports shows that the city's opposition to Kiev was accompanied by a trade blockade: Kiev cut off the routes by which goods from the south reached Novgorod.
The Novgorodians' concern for Mstislav was accompanied by the introduction during his minority of the most important political institution of boyar rule - the posadnichestvo (governorship). If previously the term posadnik had been used for the governors sent from Kiev, now the posadnik was elected from among the boyars and governed Novgorod jointly with the prince.[11] It was at this time, too, that a second major restriction was placed on the power of the prince - the invited prince was forbidden to own land on a private-property basis anywhere on the territory which was subject to Novgorod. That right was granted only to the Novgorodians themselves.
In addition, the prince and his court returned to Gorodishche, where the prince's residence was restored; it remained there right up until the sixteenth century.
In 1117 Mstislav Vladimirovich, on the instructions of Vladimir Monomakh, departed from Novgorod for Smolensk, leaving his son Vsevolod as prince of Novgorod in his place. In order to make material provision for Vsevolod, Mstislav transferred to Novgorod extensive border territories from his principality of Smolensk, and these became Vsevolod's domain. These lands were transferred on condition that the income derived from them should be placed at the disposal of the prince of Novgorod only if the invited prince was a direct descendant of Mstislav. If a member of another princely line was summoned, the domain's revenues were to be sent to Smolensk.[12]
During Vsevolod's reign the Novgorod boyars introduced yet another restriction of the prince's rights. Originally the prince had performed the functions of the supreme judge of Novgorod. Now a joint judicial court was set up, comprising the prince and the posadnik, the head of the boyars. The prince formally retained the main role (he ratified decisions with his seal), but he did not have the right to make a final decision without the posadnik's sanction. In the course of excavations in 1998 the meeting-place of this court was discovered. It had been established in the middle of the II20s and had functioned for five or six decades, as was shown by more than 100 birch-bark documents which were found there, relating to various types of judicial disputes.[13]
In II36 a major uprising against the prince led to a complete victory for the boyars, who reorganised the political system and in effect turned the prince into an official of the boyar republic. The prince retained the function of the judge; his decisions, however, acquired force only after they had been definitively confirmed by the posadnik. As a result of this uprising Prince Vsevolod was driven out of Novgorod, and Sviatoslav Olegovich was invited from Chernigov to replace him. This turnaround, of course, meant that the issue of the material remuneration of the prince and his retinue had to be resolved again. Sviatoslav was allocated lands in the north, in the region of the Northern Dvina and Pechera rivers. These lands were, however, soon returned to the jurisdiction of the boyars, and the princes were apportioned less prosperous territories.
From the beginning of the twelfth century onwards, problems associated with landholding became the central issues in the economic and political history of Novgorod. The Novgorod lands were deficient in minerals. Iron was found in the region only in the form of marsh ores. All other types of raw material for craft production were obtained by trade: precious and non- ferrous metals were imported from various European countries; amber from the Baltic; valuable types of wood from the Caucasus; and precious and semiprecious ornamental stones from the Urals and from Oriental lands.
In exchange for these imports, Novgorod was able to bring to the international market those resources of the Novgorod lands which were obtained by hunting, fishing and bee-keeping: expensive furs, valuable fish, wax and honey. Their possession of lands which were rich in these valuable export commodities provided the basis of the economic prosperity of the Novgorod boyars. It was precisely in the twelfth century that the system of patrimonial estates (votchiny) began to be created in the Novgorod lands.[14]
The layout of every urbanboyar homestead included not only living quarters and outhouses, but also the workshops of the craftsmen who were dependents of the householder. The products obtained on the boyar's lands were processed by these craftsmen and taken to the city market, where merchants could sell them in exchange for raw craft materials brought in from abroad. As a result, the main revenue was obtained by the landowners who owned the original products.
In this connection, a major preoccupation of Novgorod's military policy in the twelfth century was the defence of its northern possessions from attacks on them by the Vladimir-Suzdal' principality. Historical chronicles mention numerous military clashes between Novgorod and the Suzdalian claimants to these possessions. The most significant of these was the campaign of the Suzdalians against Novgorod in 1169-70, which resulted in victory for the Novgorodians, whose success was ascribed to a miracle caused by the icon of the 'Mother of God of the Sign', which thereafter became Novgorod's most sacred possession.
The internal politics of the Novgorod boyars was greatly influenced by the rivalry among the territorial groupings which went back to the ancient rivalry among the three original settlements which had formed the basis of Novgorod. Competing with one another for the post ofposadnik, these groups found allies in the princes of Smolensk, Chernigov and Suzdal', and as a result their internal squabbles were combined with the conflicts among the princes of Rus' for influence in Novgorod. A graphic example of this incessant struggle was the uprising of 1207, in the course of which the boyar grouping of the Liudin end, which was then in power, was expelled from Novgorod; its property, including its landholdings, was distributed among the participants in the uprising; its mansions were burned; and the post of posadnik passed into the hands of the rival boyar grouping which had organised the uprising in alliance with the prince of Suzdal'.
A major landmark in the development of the boyar state was the establishment at the end of the twelfth century of the post of republican 'thousander', as a result of which the 'hundreds' system passed out of the jurisdiction of the prince into the jurisdiction of the boyar republic.[15]
In the course of the twelfth century, Novgorod developed its own school of art and architecture. At the beginning of the century the cathedral churches of the monasteries of St Anthony and St George were built and decorated with frescos, and the church of the Annunciation was constructed in princely Gorodishche. These churches served as models for the architects of the entire twelfth century. Among the most significant masterpieces was the church of the Saviour on the Nereditsa, which was built near Gorodishche in 1198 and painted with frescos in 1199. These paintings, which were considered by art historians to be the most significant example of such work in medieval Russia, survived until the twentieth century. Tragically, they were largely destroyed during the Second World War. In the 1960s the church was restored in its original form, but most of its fresco paintings have been preserved only in copies and photographs.[16]
11
V L. Ianin,
12
V L. Ianin,
14
V L. Ianin,