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The Prince in Medieval Russia

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The Prince in Medieval Russia chapter 13 The Prince in Medieval Russia Introduction Opinions may differ as to the impact of princely power on the law of Kievan Russia, but there can be no doubt that an understanding of the latter is impos- sible without a reasonably clear idea of the centralizing and organizing role of the former. The governance of towns and of the activities of their inhabit- ants, the use of land and the life of the rural population, the significant pres- ence of the Church and its servants in legal affairs, all of these are intimately connected in one way or another with the position and the functions of the prince. It is therefore convenient to examine first of all the place occupied by the prince in Kievan society and its law. The earliest, foreign, written sources on the Eastern Slavs stress the absence of unified rule. Procopius, writing in the 6th century, states that “these nations, the Sclaveni and the Antae, are not ruled by one man, but have lived of old un- der popular power and therefore all affairs, good and ill, are conducted by all of them together.”1 The Byzantine emperor Mauricius expressed himself in simi- lar terms around 600: “Finding themselves in a state of anarchy and mutual hostility, they [the Slavs and the Antae] have no idea of an order of battle, nor do they attempt to fight an orderly battle …”; “As there are many chiefs among them and they do not agree among themselves …”.2 The Arab historian Masudi echoed these statements several centuries later (around 956) when he wrote: “They form a numerous people, not subject to a ruler or to legislation.”3 Similar indications of the persistence of a certain democratic tradition in the earliest historical period can be observed in the Primary Chronicle, for instance in its reporting on the activities of the veche, the Old-Russian urban assembly (see Chapter 15, on Towns). Simultaneously, reports concerning proto-historical tribal leaders or princes among the Eastern Slavs occur in the works of contemporary authors. Jordanes, who wrote about the same time as Procopius, mentioned a king of the Antae, 1 Quoted from Drevniaia Rus’ v svete zarubezhnykh istochnikov, Tom ii: Vizantiiskie istochniki (M.V. Bibikov, comp.), Moskva, 2010, 72. 2 Ibidem, 96. 3 Drevniaia Rus’ v svete zarubezhnykh istochnikov, Tom iii: Vostochnye istochniki (T.M. Kalinina & others., comp.), Moskva, 2009, 114. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi �0.��63/978900435��48_0�4 <UN> 332 chapter 13 called Bozh.4 Arab authors also refer to various Slavic kings or rulers.5 The early Russian “Life of Stephen of Surozh” refers to a Novgorod prince Bravlin, active in the first half of the 9th century.6 The Frankish Annales Bertiniani reported the presence of messengers from the nation called Rhos in a Byzantine mission to the court of Louis the Pious; they were said to be ruled by their chacanus (from the Turkic kagan, the ruler of the Khazars and other Turkic nations).7 The existence of local or tribal rulers or princes is well-documented by the Primary Chronicle. The evidence is intertwined with the narrativ e of the establishment of the Rurikid dynasty in Russia. The main line of this story is as follows (see also the section on “The Viking Question” in Chapter 12, Setting the Stage). Under the year 859 it is related how the Varangians (Vikings) had im- posed tribute upon the Finnish (Chud’, Meria, and Ves’) and Slav (Slovene and Krivichi) populations of Northern Russia, and the Khazars upon the Slav ( Poliane, Severiane, and Viatichi) population of Southern Russia. Then the 860 entry reports that the tributaries of the Varangians drove the latter out and started to rule themselves (pochasa sami v sobe volodeti). This led to chaos and they decided to invite a prince from the Varangians to rule over them: “our land is great and abundant, but there is no order in it; come and reign and rule over us” (… da poidete kniazhit’ i volodeti nami). A Viking chief, Rurik, came over with two brothers and many followers. Rurik established himself in Novgorod; his brothers went to Beloozero and Izborsk, where they died soon afterwards. Although part of the story may be literary embellishment or mere legendary tradition, the central core is clear, especially in light of subsequent develop- ments. Rurik and the dynasty he created did not have their roots in the na- tive population, as most contemporary West-European dynasties did, but were invitees, whose rule was based on an agreement with the population inviting them. As we shall discuss in more detail below, princes continued to be invited 4 Quoted by Froianov, KRsp, 14 and Nachala, 494. Jordanes stressed that the Antae, together with the Veneti and the Sclaveni, made up a tribal complex known also as Veneti. Cf. Drevnaia Rus’ v svete zarubezhnykh istochnikov, Tom i: Antichnye istochniki (A.V. Podosinov, comp.), Moskva, 2009, 273. 5 E.g. Al-Bakri in “The Book of Roads and Kingdoms”, quoted from Drevnaia Rus’ v svete zaru- bezhnykh istochnikov, Tom iii: Vostochnye istochniki, 126. 6 Cf. V.G. Vasil’evskii, Trudy, T.iii, Petrograd, 1915, 95. This volume contains the texts of the Lives of the Saints George of Amastrida and Stephen of Surozh, together with Vasil’evskii’s introductions. 7 This event took place at some time in the period of 829–840; more detail in the section on for- eign sources in Chapter 2. On the (pre-Rurikid) Russian kagan, see S.N. Temushev, “Problema lokalizatsii «Russkogo kaganata» ix veka”, A.Iu. Dvornichenko (ed.), Russkoe Srednevekov’e. Sbornik statei v chest’ professora Iuriia Georgievicha Alekseeva, Moskva, 2012, 213–232. <UN>.
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