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Post by symmakhos on Apr 4, 2004 15:22:35 GMT -5
This is, I think, considered as a fact by most historians. The name of Russia comes from Swedish "Ro", which means "row". Roslagen ("the law of the rowers") is the name of a part of Sweden around Stockholm, from where the Vikings made expeditions eastward. The Finns still calls the entire Sweden "Ruotsi". Swedes founded a state centred around Novgorod in the 9th century, the seed of country of Russia.
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Post by Tbilisi on Apr 4, 2004 15:26:35 GMT -5
The name Novgorod = Nygård("New Estate")
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Octavivs
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errare hvmanvm est, in errore perservare stvltvm
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Post by Octavivs on Apr 4, 2004 16:28:24 GMT -5
Yes, that is a fact. The Vikings colonized the region of Russia and later they mixed with the Slavs.
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Post by Tbilisi on Apr 4, 2004 16:32:23 GMT -5
Maybe the lower classes mixed, but the nobility stayed rather pure I beleve for quite some time.
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Octavivs
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errare hvmanvm est, in errore perservare stvltvm
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Post by Octavivs on Apr 5, 2004 7:23:48 GMT -5
Yes, that´s what I said LATER they mixed with the Slavs.
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Post by darksphere on Apr 12, 2004 10:11:05 GMT -5
Yes it is - and should be, I think - considered a fact that Swedish vikings founded Russia as we know it today.
Back in the viking time Scandinavians called Sweden Little Svitjod and Russia Big Switjod. Big Svitjod of course would mean "Greater Sweden".
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Post by symmakhos on Apr 12, 2004 10:46:04 GMT -5
Welcome; you must be the same darksphere as posts on Northern Revolt?
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Post by berschneider on Apr 12, 2004 11:09:27 GMT -5
Yes it is - and should be, I think - considered a fact that Swedish vikings founded Russia as we know it today. Back in the viking time Scandinavians called Sweden Little Svitjod and Russia Big Switjod. Big Svitjod of course would mean "Greater Sweden". That's fascinating but sounds total bullshit, especially because the very term Russia "as we know it today" appeared only in the 17 century.
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Post by symmakhos on Apr 12, 2004 11:19:56 GMT -5
That's fascinating but sounds total bullshit Careful with that... carrot, berschneider.
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Post by berschneider on Apr 12, 2004 11:27:25 GMT -5
This is, I think, considered as a fact by most historians. The name of Russia comes from Swedish "Ro", which means "row". Roslagen ("the law of the rowers") is the name of a part of Sweden around Stockholm, from where the Vikings made expeditions eastward. The Finns still calls the entire Sweden "Ruotsi". Swedes founded a state centred around Novgorod in the 9th century, the seed of country of Russia. Indeed Finns call Sweden Ruotsi and Estonians call it Rootsi. The seafaring expeditions went both way, in early 1000s Novgorodians sacked Sigtuna, then capital of Sweden, and took the bronze gate. Sigtuna Gates are still in Novgorod. Talking of Stockholm. That illustrious city (and I love central Stockholm, but hell, booze is expensive - bring your own) is founded in part thanks to Russians. Earl Birger (Birger Jarl) sailed to Russia via Abo (Turku) and landed in the mouth of Neva near today's St. Petersburg. The pretext for the invasion was alleged assistance to Finnish "militants" whom Swedes tried to subjugate using local version of the coalition of the willing. At the same time, Duke Alexander Nevski (or Nevsky), in charge of the Republic of Novgorod forces, advanced from the town of Ladoga (Aldeigjuborg) and attacked Swedish camp one morning. Invaders were routed and Birger Earl was thrown off his horse by Alexander Nevski's lance (impring grand seal of Novgorod on Birger's face). Some of the Swedes escaped and Birger Jarl had to flee to Sweden (instead of staying on Novgorodian shore where he planned to have something of own duchy) and use his energy elsewhere: he founded the city of Stockholm. So who knows, may be there would be no Stockholm had Birger Jarl been successful in Russian "adventure." Alfred Nicholas Rambaud on the events (in 1911 translation). The Novgorodians found themselves at issue with the Scandinavians on the subject of their possessions on the Neva and the Gulf of Finland. As they had helped the natives to resist the Latin faith, King John obtained the promise of Gregory IX. that a crusade, with plenary indulgences, should be preached against the Great Republic and her Proteges, the pagans of the Baltic. His son- in-law, Birger, with an army of Scandinavians, Finns, and Western Crusaders, took the command of the forces, and sent word to the Prince of Novgorod, "Defend yourself if you can : know that I am already in your provinces." The Russians on their side, feeling they were fighting for Orthodoxy, opposed the Latin crusade with a Greek one. Alexander humbled himself in Saint Sophia, received the benediction of the Archbishop Spiridion, and addressed an energetic harangue to his warriors. He had no time to await reinforcements from Souzdal. He attacked the Swedish camp, which was situated on the Ijora, one of the southern affluents of the Neva, which has given its name to Ingria. Alexander won a brilliant victory, which gained him his surname of Nevski, and the honor of becoming under Peter the Great, the second conqueror of the Swedes, one of the patrons of St. Petersburg. By the orders of his great successor his bones repose in the Monastery of Alexander Nevski. The battle of the Neva was preserved in a dramatic legend. An Ingrian chief told Alexander how, in the eve of the combat, he had seen a mysterious bark, manned by two warriors with shining brows, glide through the night. They were Boris and Gleb, who came to the rescue of their young kinsman. Other accounts have preserved to us the individual exploits of the Russian heroes Gabriel, Skylaf of Novgorod, James of Polotsk, Sabas, who threw down the tent of Birger, and Alexander Nevski himself, who with a stroke of the lance "imprinted his seal on his face" (1240). Notwithstanding the triumph of such a service, Alexander and the Novgorodians could not agree; a short time after, he retired to Peréiaslavl- Zaliesski. The proud republicans soon had reason to regret the exile of this second Camillus.
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Post by darksphere on Apr 15, 2004 7:29:50 GMT -5
That's fascinating but sounds total bullshit, especially because the very term Russia "as we know it today" appeared only in the 17 century. Mind you I don’t think that the “big Svitjod” of the Vikings covered the same area as modern Russia. It probably covered only a part of Western Russia. Of course one can always discuss what founding Russia means. No doubt the gigantic empire we know now a days as Russia wasn’t created until in the 17th century or later. But I still believe that tribes from Sweden founded a kingdom in what is today western Russia and that that kingdom has played a role in the minds of Russians when they created modern Russia. Here is what the eldest Russian chronicle tells about these matters: The chronicle starts with the creation of the world so most of the beginning is biblical. When we come to the year 859(6367 after the creation of the world) we are told that a people called the Vareags came from across the sea and forced taxation upon the Cud(Estonians), Slovenians, the Merja(a subsection of the Finns) and the Crives(a Slavic people). In 862 however these people revolted and drove out the Vareags. The result of this was that the land was cast into a bloody civil war that made the years of Vareag occupation seem like a bliss. So the wise of them said: “We need a king to govern us and judge what is right”. Hence emissaries were send to the Vareags to pick a king amongst them. They sought out the Vareag tribe Rus who was the ones that had conquered them earlier. Other Vareag tribes were: The Swears, the Normans, Anglicans and Gothonions, the chronicle tells. The emissaries complained their need to the Rus who thus send three of their princes: Rurik, Sineus and Trevor along with their families and many Rus to rule over the Cud, Slovenians, Merja etc. Since then, the chronicle says, the country has been called Russia. But Ruslaw*, the old homeland of the Rus, were unable to defend itself after so many Rus had migrated to the new land and fell to the Swedes and has been under Swedish rule ever since. *Roslagen by the Mälar river in Sweden presumably.
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Post by darksphere on Apr 15, 2004 7:46:55 GMT -5
Welcome; you must be the same darksphere as posts on Northern Revolt? Yep that's me. I'm the one and only Darksphere. With the exception of a couple of hackers who are definitely not me (I'd like to make that clear in order not to get slapped with a biiig fine ;D ).
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Post by berschneider on Apr 15, 2004 16:33:39 GMT -5
Mind you I don’t think that the “big Svitjod” of the Vikings covered the same area as modern Russia. It probably covered only a part of Western Russia. Of course one can always discuss what founding Russia means. No doubt the gigantic empire we know now a days as Russia wasn’t created until in the 17th century or later. But I still believe that tribes from Sweden founded a kingdom in what is today western Russia and that that kingdom has played a role in the minds of Russians when they created modern Russia. Here is what the eldest Russian chronicle tells about these matters: The chronicle starts with the creation of the world so most of the beginning is biblical. When we come to the year 859(6367 after the creation of the world) we are told that a people called the Vareags came from across the sea and forced taxation upon the Cud(Estonians), Slovenians, the Merja(a subsection of the Finns) and the Crives(a Slavic people). In 862 however these people revolted and drove out the Vareags. The result of this was that the land was cast into a bloody civil war that made the years of Vareag occupation seem like a bliss. So the wise of them said: “We need a king to govern us and judge what is right”. Hence emissaries were send to the Vareags to pick a king amongst them. They sought out the Vareag tribe Rus who was the ones that had conquered them earlier. Other Vareag tribes were: The Swears, the Normans, Anglicans and Gothonions, the chronicle tells. The emissaries complained their need to the Rus who thus send three of their princes: Rurik, Sineus and Trevor along with their families and many Rus to rule over the Cud, Slovenians, Merja etc. Since then, the chronicle says, the country has been called Russia. But Ruslaw*, the old homeland of the Rus, were unable to defend itself after so many Rus had migrated to the new land and fell to the Swedes and has been under Swedish rule ever since. *Roslagen by the Mälar river in Sweden presumably. Rurik was indeed from Jutland so he was hardly a Swede. In any case, may be I'll try to write more about it tomorrow. The Varangian or Warangian (or Variag or Viking) presence in what later became Russian duchies and then much later a unified Russian State was probably first of mercenary nature. Those people were hired for police and military duties, then settled among their employers, married. From the top of the Varangian class new dynasties emerged. Norse influence is still very strong in Russian names (Olga/Helga, Igor/Ingvar, etc. although weaker than the Greek lineage of course). Although Olga (Helga) of Kiev was behind converstion of Christianity, I think expansion of the Russian state or rather states through war and marriage occurred about 150 years after Warangian influx, by then the descendants of those Vikings were quite assimilated among the natives. From 900 to 1050 Russia or Rus was considered just a normal Northern Christian domain (it ceased to be so in the Mongol conquest and as far as I can see has never recovered since), as this brief record of royal marriages from notes on Charles Cameron : YAROSLAV-THE-WISE (1015-1054), author of the Code, married his sister MARY to the King of Poland, his daughter ELISABETH to KING HAROLD HARDRADA of Norway, his second daughter ANASTASIE to KING ANDREW of Hungary, and his youngest daughter to KING HENRY I of France, where she is known as ANNE DE RUSSIE, REINE DE FRANCE (I'll add that one son of Anne of Russia and Henry I became the King of France and another son Philip led the Crusades against Muslims) His son Vsevolod, who, according to the chronicler, was known as the most enlightened man of his time, knew five languages and "spake with Latins and Greeks in their tongue even as in his own." He married the daughter of CONSTANTINE MONOMACH, Emperor of Byzantium. VLADIMIR MONOMACH (1113-1125) was married to AGATHA, daughter of HAROLD, the last Saxon King of England, and QUEEN EDITH, the widow of HAROLD II, with her court, found asylum in Russia (after Norman conquest. Incidentally Prince Conde de Bourbon, the pretender to the French throne after execution of the king in France almost 700 years later found an asylum in St. Petersburg too although returned to France after Bourbon restoration). Varangian or Warangian or ancient Norse heritage lives on in Russia albeit in a mutated form. Russian cruiser that fought Japanese at Port Arthur in 1904 at the start of Russo-Japanese war was Variag (or Warangian). Russian SS brigade that fought for the Nazi cause, and Variag (Viking, Warangian) missile cruiser is a part of Russia’s nuclear deterrent.
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Post by symmakhos on Apr 15, 2004 19:45:42 GMT -5
Rurik was indeed from Jutland so he was hardly a Swede. How can he have been from Jutland (Jylland) if he was a Varjag? Surely the Varjags were exlcusively of Swedish nation (insofar as that applies in the 9th century). The name is based on ancient Swedish var ("pledge"), which suggests that they were indeed mercenaries, in the sold of local Russian princes. However, the rather incontrovertible proof that Roslagen gentry was "head of State" in the "original" Russia is the name, Russia. Of course Birger Jarl was repelled from his Russian campaign, just as about every other general in history. But do you really think that the Nevskij heroics, placing the "Good Sign of the Phantom" in Birger's forehead, should be represented as an historical fact...? Sigtuna was not "capital of Sweden" in the early 11th c. It was founded around 1000, when the Swedish nation was not yet a unified state, no more than that Greece in classical Antiquity. Sigtuna did replace Birka as a sort of major trading-centre in the 11th century, but if Nevskij "sacked" it at that time (which is doubtful) the loot cannot have been all that much. Anyway, to get to my point (apart from chauvinism ): history shows that Scandinavians, in particular we Swedes, have ancient ties with Holy Russia. I am disgusted with the fact that our opportunistic politicians keep fawning to America and secretly plot to join NATO. Let's enter oracular mode: we will pay for this policy if we keep it up, perhaps not within decades, but within centuries. America is falling apart, Russia is slowly regaining its old strength. And she should be on our side against China. [Exit oracular mode]. Do get on with the Russian history, Berschneider, that was really interesting and inspiring.
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Post by berschneider on Apr 16, 2004 4:13:03 GMT -5
How can he have been from Jutland (Jylland) if he was a Varjag? Surely the Varjags were exlcusively of Swedish nation (insofar as that applies in the 9th century). The name is based on ancient Swedish var ("pledge"), which suggests that they were indeed mercenaries, in the sold of local Russian princes. However, the rather incontrovertible proof that Roslagen gentry was "head of State" in the "original" Russia is the name, Russia. Of course Birger Jarl was repelled from his Russian campaign, just as about every other general in history. But do you really think that the Nevskij heroics, placing the "Good Sign of the Phantom" in Birger's forehead, should be represented as an historical fact...? Sigtuna was not "capital of Sweden" in the early 11th c. It was founded around 1000, when the Swedish nation was not yet a unified state, no more than that Greece in classical Antiquity. Sigtuna did replace Birka as a sort of major trading-centre in the 11th century, but if Nevskij "sacked" it at that time (which is doubtful) the loot cannot have been all that much. Anyway, to get to my point (apart from chauvinism ): history shows that Scandinavians, in particular we Swedes, have ancient ties with Holy Russia. I am disgusted with the fact that our opportunistic politicians keep fawning to America and secretly plot to join NATO. Let's enter oracular mode: we will pay for this policy if we keep it up, perhaps not within decades, but within centuries. America is falling apart, Russia is slowly regaining its old strength. And she should be on our side against China. [Exit oracular mode]. Do get on with the Russian history, Berschneider, that was really interesting and inspiring. I often work in Russia and have Russian relations on my mother's side and I have no illusions about Russia. I think present day Russian state is an abomination. As of NATO, I guess it's feature would be similar to that of its master, the United States, it will be brutish and tragically bleak. (exit the oracular mode - as you say). Birger Jarl contest with Nevsky story may be fraud albeit much repeated one. In this case the reference was given to narration by Alfred Rambaud. Some of Alfred Rambaud’s writings on Russian history are available on the Internet such as stuff on paganism in what later became Russia (http://www.shsu.edu/~his_ncp/PagKiev.html) but otherwise he is much quoted. Sigtuna gate in Novgorod may have been stolen from a town other than Sigtuna. Is Swedish var (pledge) etymologically related to German wahr (true, veritable) or Russian ver (truthful, loyal, - verny, vera - faith)? Origins of Rurik. According to one credible theory Rurik or Roerick or Rörik or Röhrig or Roerik was quite possibly a part “Frenchman” or rather Frank with possessions up north and in Jutland. The link between Russian Rurik and Jutland is quite convincing through comparison of written reference (Frankish, German and late Novgorodian chronicles) and archeological data (Russia’s first “capital”, of Ladoga, dates from around year 750, if Rurik’s folks arrived there 100 years later they should be some traces left, supposedly there is a change in both nature of imported items and some pottery styles which are traceable to Jutland). Here are a few stories – (copy paste artistry): Find people fast: RURIK • Ruler Rurik was the Viking (or Varangian) leader who ventured from Jutland to found what is considered to be the first Russian monarchy, a dynasty that lasted from 862 until the death of Feodor I in 1598. Rurik established a fortress east of the Baltic Sea at Novgorod and ruled an area as far south as Kiev until 873. According to early chronicles, Rurik and his fellow Scandanavian warriors were invited to rule the Slavs, who had fallen into political chaos (- I guess that’s a native tradition). Rurik's achievements remain a historical mystery, but it is said that he left Russia in 873 to manage land in Friesland left to him by his father. He turned his land over to the Viking Oleg, who moved the seat of power to Kiev in 882 and extended his domain to challenge the Byzantine Empire. Subsequent Russian princes in Kiev and Moscow claimed descent from Rurik until the 17th century. (my note, I personally know a duke whose family owned – and still legally owns since Russian nationalization was illegal – a nice palace on Nevsky Prospekt in St. Petersburg – those who know that street can guess the name of the palace there are not too many palaces in that commercial thoroughfare. He claims credible direct descent from Roerik) Who was Rurik? “Roerik of Dorestad was born about 810/20. Frankish chroniclers mention that he received lands in Friesland from the Emperor Louis I. This was not enough for him, and he started to plunder neighbouring lands: he took Dorestad in 850, captured Haithabu in 857, looted Bremen in 859. The Emperor was enraged and stripped him of all his possessions in 860. The first Russian chronicle, that of Nestor, says that in 862 Rurik arrived to Slavic lands Wikipedia on Rurik’s origins: Rurik, Riurik or Rörek was a Varangian (Viking) who gained control of Novgorod in 862. Nationality of Rurik is disputed: he is often considered Swede, but there are many good reasons to suppose the Rurik and Danish Rörek of Jutland is the same person; due to close ties between Varangians and Slavs, there are also theories that he was ethnically Slav and Scandinavian. ----
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