Eastern Slavs and places of their settlement. The division of the Slavs into three branches. Resettlement of the Eastern Slavs on the Russian Plain. Resettlement of the Eastern Slavs

The question of the origin of the Eastern Slavs in historiography arose long ago. But the lack of direct written sources makes it extremely difficult to solve this problem. The most important of the surviving chronicles is the "Tale of Bygone Years", the author of which is considered to be the monk of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra Nestor (end of 1113). But even this chronicle does not provide accurate data on the origin of the Slavs. Therefore, archaeological data and linguistics, as well as ethnographic material, are of great importance for solving this problem. An analysis of folklore and folk art showed that the evolution of primitive consciousness did not occur by replacing the old with a new one, but by layering the new onto the preserved old form, preserving the remnants of all previous centuries.

Linguistics of the 18th - 19th centuries conditionally divided all peoples inhabiting the Earth into 13 large groups or families - these are Indo-European, Finno-Ugric, Tibeto-Chinese, Turkic-Mongolian, Semitic, etc. Each includes languages ​​related by origin. Indo-European includes Slavic, Germanic, Letolitic, Indo-Iranian, Greek, Armenian, etc. In ancient times they were very close. The most ancient among those known in the 19th century were considered to be the dead ancient Iranian languages ​​- Sanskrit and the language of the ancient hymns of the Avesta. The homeland of the Indo-Europeans was initially sought within the Iranian plateau. The settlement of Europe, in their view, proceeded in waves, as a result of which the Indo-European community was split. First - into several parts, which gave the basis for the division into Indo-European languages, and they, in turn, also continued to divide and acquire differences. Among the Slavs, the same process of dismemberment of the tribe, the bearer of a single language, was going on. In Russia, this theory was supported by the prominent historian Shakhmatov. He believed that the Slavs, after the collapse of the Indo-European community, entered the Slavic-Lithuanian family, lived on the Neman and Daugava, then separated from the Lithuanians and moved to the Vistula basin. There they lived through the common Slavic period of their history. Then there was their resettlement to the west, south and east. He considered the Carpathian region and the territory within the Russian Plain to be the homeland of the Eastern Slavs. Not earlier than the 1st millennium, moving east and northeast, they occupied the Dniester region and drove out the autochthonous (local) tribes, capturing the northern regions. By the 8th - 9th centuries they reached the upper reaches of the Dnieper, Volkhov and the ancient Volga region.

The theory of resettlement of the Slavs was revised by Soviet historians: Eastern Slavs are local residents of Eastern Europe... In their opinion, the process of the formation of peoples is a consequence of the enlargement of the ethnos, and not of fragmentation. The dismemberment of the Indo-Europeans is indeed characteristic of the primitive communal system, and with the transition to a class society, the process of consolidation begins on the basis of the language of the nationality, the language of the nation is formed.

Soviet historians first determined the homeland of the Indo-Europeans in Asia, since they considered them to be herders who roamed east of Sea of ​​Azov and brought Indo-European languages ​​to Asia. Later this point of view changed; in connection with archaeological discoveries, agriculture began to be considered the main occupation. The earliest agricultural farms arose in the Balkans, in Asia Minor, therefore they began to look for the homeland of the Indo-Europeans there.

One thing is clear - the homeland of the Indo-Europeans is the southeast of Asia. It is believed that they lived in Europe at the end of the Stone Age, were cattle breeders and farmers, by the end of the 1st millennium BC. settled from the south throughout Europe. Their neighbors in the west were speakers of the Proto-Basque language in the Pyrenees and the Finno-Ugric language in northeastern Europe. In the 1st millennium BC. a group of Proto-Slavic tribes emerged from the Indo-European tribes, they occupied the territory of the Czech Republic, Poland and up to the Dnieper. They are characterized by communities: 1) territories; 2) language; 3) culture; 4) burial fields.

The Slavs were divided into three groups: western (Wends), southern (Slavs on the Danube) and eastern (Antes). They were known to the ancient Greek scientist Herodotus. He wrote: "Enets live in the north, ... amber comes in."

Pliny speaks of the Wends living north of the Danube. The neighbors of the Wends in the north were the Finno-Ugrians, in the south - the Sarmatians (I-II centuries). Moving eastward, the Slavs assimilated with the Scythians and Sarmatians. Sources of those years called them a great people.

By the 6th-7th centuries, the Slavs settled the territory from the Elbe (Laba) and the Rhine to Lake Ladoga, Neva, Narva to the Volga. In the "Tale of Bygone Years" Nestor indicates the territory of settlement of the Eastern Slavs. According to the chronicle, the first Slavic settlements on our land are the settlements of the Polyans and Drevlyans.

The glades were engaged in agriculture and were distinguished by a great culture in everyday life in comparison with the Drevlyans. Nestor was also well aware of the settlement of another thirty large tribal formations, on the basis of which the state of Rus was formed. He believes that the state received such a name because in his time the glades were called Rus. The neighbors of the glades in the east were northerners who lived along the Desna, Seim, Sule and Northern Donets rivers. In the lower reaches of the Dnieper, to the south of the meadows, there lived the uliches; in the west were the lands of the Volynians, Buzhanians and Dulebs. On the Dniester (Tiras) and on the Danube - Tivertsy; white Croats - in Transcarpathia; on the left bank of the Pripyat were the lands of the Dregovichi; and to the east of them, along the river So - radimichi; on the Oka River and the Moskva River - Vyatichi; in the upper reaches of the Volga, Dnieper and Dvina - Krivichi; around Lake Ilmen - Polotsk and Slovenia. Some of them were tribal unions and territorial associations (Polotsk, Buzhan).

A tribal union is a federation of tribes. A tribe is a set of related clans that occupied an area of ​​about 60 km. To address basic issues public life the veche was gathering; a military leader (prince) was elected only during military campaigns; there was a youth squad and a militia.

The tribe had its center (city), in which the veche gathered, the court was held and there was bargaining. There was a common tribal sanctuary in the city.

The process of disintegration of primitive communal relations in tribal unions began long ago among the Eastern Slavs, but it went unevenly. Tribal associations of the middle Dnieper and Dniester regions, which were on the verge of creating a state, were more economically developed. The emergence and development of new tools of labor contributed to the disintegration of the patriarchal consanguineous community and its fragmentation into neighboring and territorial ones. Relatives were remembered and honored, but in the field of rights, the economic connection between them disintegrates. In the neighboring community, the process of social and property stratification and differentiation is progressing, caused by the appearance of surpluses of vital products, which were the result of more productive tools of labor (metal) and the presence in the family of workers, labor and practical skills in agriculture and cattle breeding.

In the 6th-9th centuries, productive and non-productive types of activity were intertwined in the economic life of the Eastern Slavs. Even in antiquity, they experienced the first social division of labor, that is, the separation of agriculture from cattle breeding. Until the 7th century, the activities of the Slavs were hunting, fishing, gathering, beekeeping (collecting honey from wild bees), slash farming.

In agriculture, new big changes have arisen: a) fallow and transfer system of cultivation of the land; b) two- and three-field farming system; c) there is an increase in the number of crops grown: rye, barley, wheat, oats, hemp, flax, cabbage, onions, turnips, radishes, peas.

At the turn of the 8th - 9th centuries, the Eastern Slavs had a second social division of labor, that is, the separation of handicrafts from agriculture and the centers of handicrafts - cities - emerged.

There were the following types of craft: weaving, blacksmithing, pottery, carpentry, weapons, jewelry, etc. Often the Slavs went to the western lands, so under Charlemagne (768 - 814) the trading Slavs visited the French state. By the 9th century, the Eastern Slavs had formed ethnic associations-proto-states, in which there was private property and early forms of exploitation.

Cit. Quoted from: Resettlement of the Eastern Slavs in the VI - IX centuries. Social system and occupations // History of Russia from ancient times to 1917: Textbook / Ed. V.Yu. Khalturin. Ivanovo, 2003.S. 8 - 11.

1. EASTERN SLAVS: SETTLEMENT AND LIFESTYLE.

The origin of the Eastern Slavs is a complex scientific problem, the study of which is difficult due to the lack of reliable and complete written evidence about the area of ​​their settlement and economic life, everyday life and customs. The first rather scanty information is contained in the works of ancient, Byzantine and Arab authors.

Ancient sources. Pliny the Elder and Tacitus (1st century AD) report about the Wends living between the Germanic and Sarmatian tribes. At the same time, the Roman historian Tacitus notes the belligerence and cruelty of the Wends, who, for example, destroyed captive foreigners. Many modern historians see the ancient Slavs in the Wends, who still retain their ethnic unity and occupy approximately the territory of present-day South-Eastern Poland, as well as Volhynia and Polesie.

Byzantine historians of the 6th century were more attentive to the Slavs, because they, having grown stronger by this time, began to threaten the Empire. Jordan raises contemporary Slavs - Wends, Sklavins and Ants - to the same root and thereby fixes the beginning of their division that took place in the 1st-1st centuries. tribes, and interactions with the multi-ethnic environment in which they settled (Finno-Ugrians, Balts, Iranian-speaking tribes) and with which they contacted (Germans, Byzantines). It is important to take into account that representatives of all groups recorded by Jordan participated in the formation of the three branches of Slavism - eastern, western and southern.

Old Russian sources. We find data on the East Slavic tribes in the "Tale of Bygone Years" (PVL) of the monk Nestor (early 12th century). He writes about the ancestral home of the Slavs, which he defines in the Danube basin. (According to the biblical legend, Nestor associated their appearance on the Danube with the "Babylonian pandemonium", which led, by the will of God, to the separation of languages ​​and their "dispersion" throughout the world). He attributed the arrival of the Slavs to the Dnieper from the Danube by an attack on them by their warlike neighbors - the "Volokhs", who ousted the Slavs from their ancestral homeland.

The second path of advancement of the Slavs to Eastern Europe, confirmed by archaeological and linguistic material, passed from the Vistula basin to the region of Lake Ilmen.

Nestor tells about the following East Slavic tribal unions:

1) glades, who settled in the Middle Dnieper "in the fields" and therefore were called so;

2) the Drevlyans, who lived from them to the north-west in dense forests;

3) the northerners who lived to the east and north-east of the meadows along the Desna, Sule and Seversky Donets rivers;

4) Dregovichi - between Pripyat and Western Dvina;

5) Polotsk - in the basin of the river. Cloths;

6) Krivichi - in the upper reaches of the Volga and Dnieper;

7-8) Radimichi and Vyatichi, according to the chronicle, descended from the "Poles" (Poles) clan, and were brought, most likely, by their elders - Radim, who "came and sat down" on the river. Sozhe (a tributary of the Dnieper) and Vyatko - on the river. Oke;

9) Ilmen Slovenes lived in the north in the basin of Lake Ilmen and the Volkhov River;

10) Buzhanians or Dulebs (from the 10th century they were called Volynians) in the upper reaches of the Bug;

11) white Croats - in the Carpathian region;

12-13) Uchiha and Tivertsy - between the Dniester and the Danube.

Archaeological data confirm the boundaries of the settlement of the tribal unions indicated by Nestor.

Activities of the Eastern Slavs ... Agriculture. The Eastern Slavs, mastering the vast forest and forest-steppe areas of Eastern Europe, carried with them an agricultural culture. Slash (slash-and-burn) farming was widespread. On the lands freed from forests as a result of deforestation and burning, agricultural crops were grown for 2-3 years, using the natural fertility of the soil, enhanced by ash from burnt trees. After the depletion of the land, the plot was abandoned and a new one was developed, which required the efforts of the entire community. In the steppe regions, shifting agriculture was used, similar to undercutting, but associated with the burning of field grasses, not trees.

From U111 century. in the southern regions, field arable farming is spreading, based on the use of draft animals and a wooden plow, which has survived until the beginning of the twentieth century.

The basis of the economy of the Slavs, including the Eastern ones, was arable farming. Activities of the Eastern Slavs

1. Slash and burn agriculture. Rye, oats, buckwheat, turnips, etc. were grown.

2. Cattle breeding... They bred horses, bulls, pigs, poultry.

3. Bortnichestvo- collecting honey from wild bees

4. Military campaigns to neighboring tribes and countries (primarily to Byzantium)

Other activities. Along with cattle breeding, the Slavs were also engaged in their usual trades: hunting, fishing, beekeeping. Crafts are developing, which, however, have not yet separated from agriculture. Of particular importance for the fate of the Eastern Slavs will be foreign trade, which developed both on the Baltic-Volga route, along which Arab silver was supplied to Europe, and on the route "from the Varangians to the Greeks" linking the Byzantine world through the Dnieper with the Baltic region.

The lowest link social organization served as a neighboring (territorial) community - the rope. The basis of the ruling stratum was formed by the military service nobility of the Kiev princes - the squad. By the 9th century. the druzhina layer moved up to the leading positions. The prince and his squad, who participated in military campaigns and returned with booty, were in a privileged position

Social structure. "Military Democracy". It is more difficult to "restore" the social relations of the Eastern Slavs. The Byzantine author Procopius of Caesarea (U1 century) writes: "These tribes, Slavs and Antes, are not ruled by one person, but since ancient times they have lived in the rule of the people, and therefore decisions are made jointly with them regarding all happy and unhappy circumstances." Most likely, we are talking here about the meetings (veche) of the community members, at which the most important issues of the life of the tribe were decided, including the choice of leaders - "military leaders". At the same time, only male warriors took part in the veche meetings. Thus, during this period, the Slavs experienced the last period of the communal system - the era of "military democracy", preceding the formation of the state. This is also evidenced by such facts as the acute rivalry between military leaders, recorded by another Byzantine author of the 1st century. - Mauritius the Strategist, the emergence of slaves from prisoners, raids on Byzantium, which, as a result of the distribution of the stolen riches, strengthened the prestige of the military leaders and led to the formation of a squad consisting of professional military, associates of the prince.

The transition from a tribal community to an agricultural one. In addition, there were changes in the community: a community of large patriarchal families who were united by a common territory, traditions, beliefs and independently disposed of the products of their labor came to replace the collective of relatives who own all the lands together.

Tribal reigns. Information about the first princes is contained in the PVL. The chronicler notes that tribal unions, though not all of them, have their own "princes". So in relation to the glades, he wrote down a legend about the princes, the founders of the city of Kiev: Kie, Scheke, Khoriv and their sister Lybid.

More reliable are the data of the Arab encyclopedist al-Masudi (10th century), who wrote that long before his time the Slavs had a political association, which he called Valinana. Most likely we are talking about the Volhynian Slavs (chronicle Dulebs), whose union was crushed, according to the PVL, by the Avar invasion in the beginning. U11 century. The writings of other Arab authors contain information about three centers of the Eastern Slavs: Kuyavia, Slavia, Artania. Some Russian historians identify the former with Kiev, the latter with Novgorod or its more ancient predecessor. The location of Artania continues to be controversial. Apparently they were pre-state formations that include a number of tribal unions. However, all these local reigns were little connected with each other, competed with each other and therefore could not resist powerful external forces: the Khazars and the Varangians.

Beliefs of the Eastern Slavs ... The world outlook of the Eastern Slavs was based on paganism - the deification of the forces of nature, the perception of the natural and human world as a whole. The origin of pagan cults took place in ancient times - in the era of the Upper Paleolithic, about 30 thousand years BC. With the transition to new types of management, pagan cults were transformed, reflecting the evolution of human social life. At the same time, the most ancient layers of beliefs were not displaced by newer ones, but layered on top of each other. Therefore, the restoration of information about Slavic paganism is extremely difficult. In addition to this circumstance, the reconstruction of the picture of the paganism of the Slavs is also difficult because to this day there are practically no written sources preserved. For the most part, these are Christian anti-pagan writings.

Gods. In ancient times, the Slavs had a widespread cult of the Family and women in labor, closely associated with the worship of ancestors. Rod - the divine image of the tribal community contained the entire universe - heaven, earth and the underground dwelling of ancestors. Each East Slavic tribe had its own patron god.

Priesthood (magi, sorcerers) who perform sacrifices and other religious ceremonies. Paganism is the worship of the animate forces of nature. It takes the form of polytheism (polytheism)

The main gods of the Slavs were:

Rod - the progenitor of gods and people

Yarilo - the sun god

Stribog - god of the wind

Svarog - the god of the sky

Perun - the god of thunder and lightning

Mokosh - the goddess of moisture and the patroness of spinning

Veles - "cattle god"

Lel and Lada - gods who patronize lovers

Brownies, kikimors, goblin, etc.

Sacrifices were made in special places - temples

In the future, the Slavs increasingly worshiped the great Svarog - the god of heaven and his sons - Dazhdbog and Stribog - the gods of the sun and wind. Over time, Perun, the god of thunderstorms, the "creator of lightning", who was especially revered as the god of war and weapons in the princely squad environment, began to play an increasing role. Perun was not the head of the pantheon of gods, only later, during the formation of statehood and the strengthening of the value of the prince and his squad, the cult of Perun began to strengthen. The pagan pantheon also included Veles or Volos - the patron saint of cattle breeding and the keeper of the underworld of their ancestors, Makosh - the goddess of fertility and others. Totemic ideas associated with belief in a kindred mystical connection of the genus with any animal, plant, or even object were also preserved. In addition, the world of the Eastern Slavs was "inhabited" by numerous bereginas, mermaids, goblin, etc.

Priests. There is no exact information about the pagan priests, apparently they were the chronicle "wise men" who fought in the X1 century. with Christianity. During cult rituals, which took place in special places - temples (from the Old Slavonic "kap" - image, idol) sacrifices were made to the gods, including human sacrifices. A funeral feast was arranged for the dead, and then the corpse was burned on a large fire. Pagan beliefs determined the spiritual life of the Eastern Slavs.

State of the art. In general, Slavic paganism could not satisfy the needs of the states that were nascent among the Slavs, for it did not have a developed social doctrine that could explain the realities of a new life. The fractional nature of mythology hindered the Eastern Slavs from a holistic understanding of the natural and social environment. The Slavs did not have a mythology explaining the origin of the world and man, telling about the victory of heroes over the forces of nature, etc. By the 10th century, the need to modernize the religious system became obvious.

Thus, migrations, contacts with the local population and the transition to settling in new lands led to the formation of the East Slavic ethnos, consisting of 13 tribal unions.

The basis economic activity the eastern Slavs became agriculture, the role of crafts and foreign trade increased.

In the new conditions, in response to changes taking place both within the Slavic world and in external environment a transition from tribal to military democracy, from a tribal community to an agricultural one is outlined.

The beliefs of the Eastern Slavs are also becoming more complex. The deification of individual forces of nature comes to replace the syncretic Family - the main god of the Slavs-hunters with the development of agriculture. However, the inconsistency of existing cults with the needs of the development of the East Slavic world is increasingly felt.

So, the Slavs U1-ser. 1X centuries, preserving the foundations of the communal system (communal ownership of land and livestock, arming all free people, regulation social relations with the help of traditions, i.e. customary law, veche democracy), underwent both internal changes and pressure from external forces, which in its totality created the conditions for the formation of the state.

The emergence of statehood among the Slavs belongs to the era of the early Middle Ages. This was the time (IV-VIII centuries) when, as a result of the migration of "barbarian" tribes living in the north and east of Europe, a new ethnic and political map of the continent was formed. The migration of these tribes (Germanic, Slavic, Baltic, Finno-Ugric, Iranian) was called the Great Migration of Peoples.

The Slavs became involved in the migration process in the 6th century. AD Before that, they occupied the territory from the upper Oder to the middle reaches of the Dnieper. The settlement of the Slavs took place in the IV-VIII centuries. in three main directions: to the south - to the Balkan Peninsula; to the west - to the Middle Danube and the interfluve of the Oder and Elbe; east - north along the East European Plain. Accordingly, there was a division of the Slavs into three branches - southern, western and eastern. The Slavs settled a vast territory from the Peloponnese to the Gulf of Finland and from the middle Elbe to the upper Volga and the upper Don.

In the course of settling among the Slavs, the tribal system was decomposing and a new feudal society began to form gradually.

On the territory that became part of Kievan Rus, 12 Slavic unions of tribal principalities are known. It was inhabited by glades, Drevlyans, Volynians (another name is Buzhan), Croats, Tivertsy, Uchiha, Radimichi, Vyatichi, Dregovichi, Krivichi, Slovene Ilmensky, and northerners. These unions were communities that were no longer consanguineous, but territorial and political in nature.

The social structure of the pre-state Slavic societies is military democracy. The political side of the emergence and development of feudalism among the Slavs in the VIII-X centuries. was the formation of early medieval states.

The state of the Eastern Slavs was named "Rus".

The beginning of Russian history. From ancient times to the reign of Oleg Tsvetkov Sergei Eduardovich

Chapter 4 DISTRIBUTION OF THE EASTERN SLAVS

Chapter 4

SETTLEMENT OF EASTERN SLAVS