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The Viking Age Laval University From the SelectedWorks of Fathi Habashi March, 2020 The iV king Age Fathi Habashi Available at: https://works.bepress.com/fathi_habashi/615/ The Viking Age INTRODUCTION The Viking Age (793-1066) is a period in history during which the Scandinavians expanded and built settlements throughout Europe. They are sometimes referred to as Norsemen and known to the Greek as Varangians. They took two routes: the East - - the present-day Ukraine and Russia, and the West mainly in the present-day Iceland, Greenland, Newfoundland, Normandy, Italy, and the British Isles. The Viking were competent sailors, adept in land warfare as well as at sea. Their ships were light enough to be carried over land from one river system to another. Viking ships The motivation of the Viking to invade East and West is a problem to historians. Many theories were given none was the answer. For example, retaliation against forced conversion to Christianity by Charlemagne by killing any who refused to become baptized, seeking centers of wealth, kidnapping slaves, and a decline in the profitability of old trade routes. Viking ship in Oslo Museum The Vikings raids in the East and the West of Europe VIKINGS IN THE EAST The Dnieber The Vikings of Scandinavia came by way of the Gulf of Finland and sailed up the Dvina River as far as they could go, and then carried their ships across land to the Dnieper River, which flows south to the Black Sea. They raided villages then they became interested in trading with the Slavs. Using the Dnieper, they carried shiploads of furs, honey, and wax south to markets on the Black Sea, or sailed across that sea trade in Constantinople. Rurik There was much quarreling among the villages, and this often led to battles and bloody vengeance. Each village was independent of the others, and was ruled by elders elected by the people. There was nothing to hold the villages together. The people of Novgorod sent a message to the Vikings asking for help. A Viking chief named Rurik and his people did come in a fleet of ships to live in Novgorod where he became the chief there and ruled over the scattered towns of the northern rivers. Detailed map of Dnieper and Volga Rurik ( ?- 879) Oleg (?-912) Kiev Two of the Vikings, Askold and Dir left Novgorod and sailed south down the Dnieper. They came to the town of Kiev where they settled and became its rulers. Later, other Vikings joined them. At that time Kiev was paying tribute to the Khazars that flourished in the region between the Byzantine Empire and the Persian Empire. Although these peoples seem to have ploughed the earth and cultivated the land almost all were nomads occupied with hunting, fishing, and warring. They were considered barbarians by the Greek and Romans. Rurik died in Novgorod, leaving his close friend Oleg to rule until his son Igor (ca. 878-945) came of age. About the year 878 Oleg gathered a large army of Finns, Varangians, and Slavs and set sail down the Dnieper. At the town of Smolensk, he went ashore and told the people that Igor the son of Rurik was the Prince of all Russians. The people thus swore to be loyal to him. Oleg left a few of his men to rule the town and continued southward. Oleg In 907, young Prince Igor was old enough to take charge at Kiev. Oleg organized a large army and sailed down the river to Byzantium. He raided the villages along the Bosporus. The emperor sent out ambassadors to him with offers of peace and gifts. Oleg made a trade treaty with them and returned to Kiev with his ships loaded with fine clothes, gold, sweet wines, and fruits, linen, grain, flax, and slaves. Oleg was recognized as the grand prince. The states paid taxes to Oleg mainly because they needed his help. Igor (ca. 875-945) Olga (890-969 Sviatoslav (942-972) Kiev Expands Oleg died and Igor became the grand prince of Kiev. The towns were constantly at war with each other during his rule, for almost every prince wanted to enlarge his territory. Igor dreamed of taking Constantinople and in 944 he attacked it with a fleet of a thousand ships. The fleet of Byzantine warships that sailed out to fight him was not nearly so large. But it carried one of the most closely guarded secrets of Byzantium. A secret weapon known as Greek fire. Flaming tongues of fire shot out of tubes and landed on enemy ships, burning them. Most of the Russian fleet was ablaze. Igor and a few ships managed to escape and return to Kiev. Greek fire Olga Upon Igor's death a few years later, his wife Olga took his place as ruler, calling herself the grand princess of Rus. She sailed to Constantinople for a social visit in the year 955. She was so impressed by the churches that she became a Christian and was baptized by the patriarch of Constantinople. But she could not convert her son Svyatoslav who followed his father's example and became a great warrior. He was fighting the Bulgars, the Byzantines,, and the Pechenegs. The Pechenegs finally trapped and killed him. Vladimir In the 10th to 11th centuries Kievan Rus' became one of the largest and most prosperous states in Europe. The reigns of the Grand Prince of Kiev Vladimir the Great (960-1015) from 980 to 1015 son of Svyatoslav and his son Yaroslav the Wise (978–1054) constitute the Golden Age of Kiev, which saw the acceptance of Orthodox Christianity from Byzantium to repel the Moslems. Christianity brought fundamental changes in the life of these peoples like marriage which did not exist before. By 980 Vladimir had consolidated the Kievan realm from modern-day Ukraine to the Baltic Sea and had solidified the frontiers against incursions of Bulgarian, Baltic, and Eastern nomads. Vladimir spent much of his time on the problems of Christianity. Churches had to be built and more priests had to be brought in from Constantinople to teach the new religion. Since the Russians did not have an alphabet or a written language, the priests from Byzantium gave them the alphabet they had invented for the Goths and the Slavs long ago. Then the Bible had to be translated into the Russian language. Yaroslav This work was continued by Yaroslav, the son of Vladimir, after his father death. Yaroslav was the most successful and probably the most powerful of all the rulers of Kievan Russia. During his rule, the first code of Russian laws was begun. Yaroslav brought in priests, artists, scholars, architects, and craftsmen from Byzantium. They helped him build Kiev into a beautiful city with a library, several churches, a monastery, and one large cathedral which was a small copy of St. Sophia in Constantinople. The Byzantine churches in Kiev served as models for churches built in other communities. With the introduction of Christianity came Byzantine art and culture, Byzantine law, church schools, and the idea of a strong central government under an absolute ruler. The church organization brought new unity to the country and gave the grand princes of Kiev more power than they had ever had before. But Kievan Russia remained a loose federation of city-states. Vladimir the Great (980–1015) Cyril (826-869) and Methodius (815-885) The destruction of Kiev After the death of Yaroslav in 1045, the country was divided among his five sons, and Kiev lost much of its influence as the leading city. The princes were far more interested in getting more territory and increasing their own power. Civil wars and treachery became the normal state of life in Russia. Some states came to hate their neighboring states so bitterly that they even joined forces with their old enemies, the Cuman nomads of the steppe, to fight against their own kinsmen. The Cumans had conquered the grassy plains from the Pechenegs. They waged constant warfare against the Slavic towns, including Kiev. They raided, burning, and killing and sometimes carrying off whole populations to be sold into slavery. The Cumans struck again and again, for one hundred and fifty years. Kiev was particularly hard hit. Her trade fell off. People of Kiev and of all the other towns in the southern border regions began leaving for safer places to live in the southwest and in the northern forests. Many of these people went as far into the northwest as Novgorod on the banks of the Volkhov River. The northeast territory came under the rule of the prince of Suzdal, Andrey Bogoliubsky. He moved his capital from Suzdal to the town of Vladimir and built it into a great city with strong walls and a Golden Gate like the one at Kiev. In his territory lay a small settlement called Moscow, which had no importance at the time. Andrey soon became a powerful prince. In 1169 he sent an army against Kiev and captured it. Andrey left his younger brother to rule over that city. The city of Vladimir prospered while Kiev grew weaker and weaker. Kiev had to use much of its strength fighting off raids of the Cuman nomads. Kiev's foreign trade was suffering too, for the needs of the country were changing. With the steady increase in population, fields had to be enlarged to grow more food. Forest lands were cleared to make more room for fields. Wild animals of the forest were disappearing in many areas. VIKINGS IN THE WEST England Most of the English kingdoms could not stand against the Vikings, but King Alfred of Wessex defeated Guthrum's army at the Battle of Edington in 878.
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