Kievan Rus' (1015-1125)
SIMON FRANKLIN
The period from 1015 to 1125, from the death of Vladimir Sviatoslavich to the death of his great-grandson Vladimir Vsevolodovich (known as Vladimir Monomakh), has long been regarded as the Golden Age of early Rus': as an age of relatively coherent political authority exercised by the prince of Kiev over a relatively coherent and unified land enjoying relatively unbroken economic prosperity and military security along with the first and best flowerings of a new native Christian culture.[29]
One reason for the power of the impression lies in the nature of the native sources. This is the age in which early Rus', so to speak, comes out from under ground, when archaeological sources are supplemented by native writings and buildings and pictures which survive to the present. From the mid-eleventh century onwards, in particular, the droplets of sources begin to turn into a steady trickle and then into a flow. Before c.1045 we possess no clearly native narrative, exegetic or administrative documents. By 1125 we have the first sermons, saints' lives, law codes, epistles and pilgrim accounts, as well as a rapidly increasing quantity of brief letters on birch bark and of scratched graffiti on church walls and miscellaneous objects.[30] Before the death of Vladimir Sviatoslavich no component of our main narrative source, the Primary Chronicle (Povest' vre- mennykh let) is clearly derived from contemporary Rus' witness; by the early twelfth century, when the chronicle was compiled, its authors could incorporate several decades of contemporary native narratives and interpretations. No building from the age of Vladimir Sviatoslavich or earlier survived above ground into the modern age. Monumental buildings from the mid-eleventh to early twelfth centuries can still be seen today - in varying states of completeness - the length of Rus', from Novgorod in the north to Kiev and Chernigov in the south. Still more survived until the mid-twentieth century, when they were destroyed either by German invaders or by Stalinist zealots.[31] These early writings and buildings came to acquire - and in some cases were clearly intended to convey - an aura of authority, a kind of definitive status as cultural and political and ideological models, as the foundations of a tradition.
Between 1015 and 1125, then, for subsequent observers Rus' emerged into the light, and immediately contemplated and celebrated its own enlightenment. Such perceptions are real and significant facts of cultural history. However, their documentary accuracy is debatable and our own retelling of the period is necessarily somewhat grubbier than the image.
Dynastic politics
Political legitimacy in Rus' resided in the dynasty. The ruling family managed to create an ideological framework for its own pre-eminence which was maintained without serious challenge for over half a millennium. To this extent the political structure was simple: the lands of the Rus' were, more or less by definition, the lands claimed or controlled by the descendants of Vladimir Sviatoslavich (or, in more distant genealogical legend, by the descendants of the ninth-century Varangian Riurik). But the simplicity of such a formulation hides its potential complexity in practice. It is one thing to say that legitimacy resided in the dynasty, quite another to determine how power should be defined and allocated within it. Legitimacy was vested in the family as a whole, not in any individual member of it. Power was distributed and redistributed, claimed and counter-claimed, among members of a continually expanding kinship group, not passed intact and by automatic right from father to son. The political history of the period thus reflects, above all, the interplay of two factors, the dynastic and the regionaclass="underline" on the one hand the issue ofprecedence or seniority within the ruling family; on the other hand - as a consequence of the distribution of power - the increasingly entrenched and often conflicting regional interests of its local branches.
The changing patterns of internal politics are most graphically shown at moments of strain resulting from disputes over succession. Succession took place both 'vertically' from an older generation to a younger, and 'laterally' between members ofthe same generation, from brother to brother or cousin to cousin. Three times between 1015 and 1125 the dynasty had to adjust to 'vertical' succession: in 1015 on the death of Vladimir himself; in 1054 on the death of his son Iaroslav, and in 1093 on the death of his grandson Vsevolod (see Table 4.1). On each occasion the adjustment to 'vertical' succession introduced a fresh set of 'lateral' problems among potential successors in the next generation, and on each occasion the solutions were slightly different. Through looking at the sequence of adjustments to changes ofpower we can followthe development of a set of conventions and principles which, though never neat or fully consistent in their application, are the closest we get to a political 'system'.[32]
In 1015 Vladimir's sons were scattered around the extremities ofthe lands, for it had been his policy to consolidate family control over the tribute-gathering areas by allocating each of his sons to a regional base. One was given Turov, to the west, on the route to Poland; another had the land of the Derevlians, the immediate north-western neighbours of the Kievan Polianians; one was installed at Novgorod in the north, another at the remote southern outpost of Tmutorokan', beyond the steppes, overlooking the Straits of Kerch between the Black Sea and the Azov Sea. There were a couple of postings in the northeast, at Rostov and Murom, and one in Polotsk in the north-west. This was Vladimir's framework for ensuring that each of his sons had autonomous means of support and that the family as a whole could establish and maintain the territorial extent of its dominance.
On Vladimir's death this structure collapsed. Despite their remoteness from each other, the regional allocations were clearly not regarded as substitutes for central power (if we regard the middle Dnieper region as the 'centre'). The only exception was Polotsk, where Vladimir's son Iziaslav had already died and had been succeeded by his own son Briacheslav: there is no indication that Briacheslav competed with his uncles, and this is the first recorded example of a regional allocation coming to be treated as the distinct patrimony of a particular branch of the family. Relations between Vladimir's surviving sons, however, were more turbulent. Three were murdered (two of them, Boris and Gleb, went on to become venerated as saints),[33] and three more - Sviatopolk of Turov,
Table 4.1. From Vladimir Sviatoslavich to Vladimir Monomakh (princes of Kiev underlined)
Iaroslav of Novgorod, and Mstislav of Tmutorokan' - emerged as the principal combatants. From their widely dispersed power bases each used his own regional resources and contacts to reinforce the campaign for a secure place at the centre. Sviatopolk formed an alliance with the king of Poland, whose multinational force occupied Kiev for a while; Iaroslav augmented his local Nov- gorodian forces with Scandinavian mercenaries who helped him eventually to defeat and expel Sviatopolk; Mstislav gathered conscripts from his tributaries in the northern Caucasus, with whose aid he was able (in 1024) to negotiate an agreement with Iaroslav: he (Mstislav) would occupy Chernigov and would control the 'left-bank' lands (east of the Dnieper), while Iaroslav would control the 'right bank' lands including Kiev and Novgorod. Only on Mstislav's death (in 1034 or 1036) did Iaroslav revert to his father's status as sole ruler.6
29
On this as the 'Golden Age' see e.g. Boris Rybakov,
30
On written sources see Simon Franklin,
31
See e.g. William Craft Brumfield,
32
On the political conventions of the dynasty see Nancy Shields Kollmann, 'Collateral Succession in Kievan Rus",
33
On the early cult see Gail Lenhoff,The