Russia

The archaeologists’ finds are puzzling, because they comprise the remains of not one settlement but two. Like the first scraps of information found in the Latin and Arabic sources of the period, these have been seized on by scholars, who like few things better than a good dispute. The result has been a sizeable literature on the origins of towns in Russia, and an impressive variety of theories. Did towns develop from tribal centres or from fortified strong-points? Or were they created from scratch because of a sudden need? Were they formed by nobles, or by traders and artisans? The consensus seems to be that most of these elements played a part. Still, the fact that Novgorod boasted two such settlements within a mile or so of each other by the river Volkhov is intriguing, and excavations at Kiev and Smolensk have revealed that these cities also grew from two distinct but associated settlements. Perhaps the two settlements had different functions. At any rate ‘Riurik’s town’ or hill settlement (gorodishche in Russian, or holmgarthr in Scandinavian), sited close to the point where the river Volkhov flows out of Lake Ilmen, was much the more important of the two. Twenty-five acres in area, Riurik’s town was the more easily defensible site and stood clear of the spring floodwaters (which persuaded an Arab visitor that it was in fact an island in the river). ²⁴

If the cities of the Russian south originated as tribal headquarters and agricultural centres, the city of Novgorod owed its origins to trade and was associated with the Vikings. The Vikings had been trained in a hard school. They knew that they must expand their trade, their settlements and their conquests or perish. And they represented the commercial world at its most ruthless and greedy. ‘Even the man who has only modest wealth,’ remarked the tenth-century Arab writer Ibn Rusta, ‘is…envied by his brother, who would not hesitate to do away with him in order to steal it.’ ²⁵ Their intelligence system was well developed. They had learned of the Khazars and of the Russians who were taking their cue as traders from them. And they had soon found their way to both.

Since their natural element was water, they searched for — and found — water routes to where they wanted to go. Since they now wanted to cross the great land mass of Russia, they followed the rivers. Their first important settlement in Russia, at what was to become known as Novgorod, provided access to the river Volkhov, and this eventually gave them access to other rivers. Local knowledge and information extracted from men who had made the journey, or part of it, served as their maps. They also knew how to build the boats they needed — boats capable of negotiating shoals and rapids, or of construction light enough to be hauled on to the shore and dragged around the obstacle or over portages, those hopefully short stretches of land which separated the headwaters of one river from another that flowed in a different direction.

At first such journeys tended to be slow and hazardous, but, as the commercial tempo picked up and the traffic became somewhat heavier, settlements appeared at the more popular landing points; people offered the venturers food, and sold them their services as guides, carriers and hauliers. By such means a trading system was established, and the country began to be opened up to the international commerce of the day. The most important axis was between Kiev and Novgorod. According to legend, the first Vikings to rule there were the adventurers Askold and Dir, though they were soon dispatched by local Russians. In fact co-operation, not conflict, was to be the mark of Viking—Russian relations. Mutual interest and dependence evidently outweighed natural caution and resentment of outsiders. The Vikings were to leave their imprint on Russia. Yet, rather than replacing or absorbing the Russian elites, within a very few generations they themselves were to be absorbed by them. Perhaps the Russians were already developing the capacity to control and integrate peoples of different language and culture which was to help them build empires in later ages.

The Russians themselves had already acquired definition. Fundamentally European in their genetic structure, they had been shaped by climatic and ecological conditions in their wooded steppe and forest habitat. These conditions helped to feed the Russian imagination and religious sensibility, and the dependence on agriculture in seasonally demanding, harsh conditions also contributed to the Russians’ distinctive ‘national’ profile. ²⁶