Encyclopedia of Russian History

Vladimir’s conversion to Christianity is described at considerable length in the Primary Chronicle, but many details of this account are dubious. However, as the Chronicle suggests, the prince was probably influenced by missionaries and possibly by memories of his Christian grandmother. Political considerations were also important in his decision to convert. Vladimir’s own baptism was certainly a condition for his final marriage (the one that forced him to annul multiple prior marriages) to Anne, sister of the Byzantine emperor Basil II. There is some controversy over the precise date of this baptism, as well as the location (the Greek city of Cherson, according to the Chronicle, or Kiev). In any case, Vladimir’s personal baptism in 987 or 988 was followed almost immediately by the official Chris-tianization of Rus. After baptism the prince seems to have embarked enthusiastically on a program of destroying pagan temples, building churches, and educating new clergy. The latter two projects were to be vigorously continued by his son Yaroslav.

Although there were Christians in the Kievan state before Vladimir’s time, the prince’s official conversion of the land marked a historical turning point. As Christians, Vladimir’s successors had a religion in common with their counterparts in the rest of Europe, fostering communication and political alliances. The conversion also stimulated the development of literacy in Kievan Rus and its successor states. The conversion had problematic aspects as well. Vladimir’s decision to adopt the religion from Byzantium rather than Rome would separate Russia culturally from the West in many respects. The schism between the Western and Eastern churches, already underway in Vladimir’s time, became official in 1204 and continues into the early twenty-first century. Moreover, while literate Westerners of all nationalities would communicate with each other freely in Latin for

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centuries to come, the primary written language of Russia would be Slavic. These factors contributed greatly to the exclusion of Russia (and, to some extent, of Ukraine and Belarus) from many Western European intellectual and cultural developments up to the end of the seventeenth century.

During the Muscovite period Vladimir was regularly represented as the founder of the Russian state. This practice ended with the death of his last ruling descendant through the male line in 1598. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, his reign was romanticized in poems, paintings, and novels. He may also be the prototype of a folkloric ruler named Vladimir in Russia’s oral epic poetry. See also: CHRISTIANIZATION; KIEVAN RUS; OLGA; PRIMARY CHRONICLE; SAINTS; YAROPOLK I; YAROSLAV VLADI-MIROVICH

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Cross, Samuel Hazzard, and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, Olgerd P., trs. and eds. (1953). The Russian Primary Chronicle: Laurentian Text. Cambridge, MA: Mediaeval Academy of America. Hollingsworth, Paul, tr. (1992). The Hagiography of Kievan Rus’. Cambridge, MA: Distributed by Harvard University Press for the Ukrainian Research Institute of Harvard University. Obolensky, Dimitri. (1971). The Byzantine Commonwealth: Eastern Europe, 500-1043. New York: Praeger. Obolensky, Dimitri. (1989). “Cherson and the Conversion of Rus: An Anti-Revisionist View.” Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 13:244-256. Poppe, Andrzej. (1976). “The Political Background to the Baptism of Rus’: Byzantine-Russian Relations between 986-989.” Dumbarton Oaks Papers 30:195-244. Reprinted in his The Rise of Christian Russia (1982). London: Variorum Reprints.

FRANCIS BUTLER

VLASOV MOVEMENT

The Vlasov Movement (Vlasovskoye Dvizhenie), or Russian Liberation Movement, designates the attempt by Soviet citizens in German hands during World War II to create an anti-Stalinist army, nominally led by Lieutenant-General Andrei Andreye-vich Vlasov (1900-1946), to overthrow Stalin. Vlasov gave his name to the movement and died for his role in it. He did not create the situation and had little influence over developments.

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RUSSIAN HISTORY

VODKA

Vlasov has been interpreted both as a patriotic opponent of Communism and as a treacherous opportunist. The Vlasov movement illustrates the way in which Nazi policy towards the USSR was developed by the competing requirements of ideology and military expediency and the various agencies involved in policy.

The outbreak of war witnessed popular disaffection within the territories of the USSR. Many opposed to Stalinism hoped that the Germans would come as liberators. Hitler saw the war in racial terms, and his main aim was to acquire living space (Lebensraum).