Russia before baptism

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The pre-baptismal period of the history of Russia was a big headache for Soviet historians and ideologists, it was easier to forget about it and not mention it. The problem was that in the late 20s and early 30s of the twentieth century, Soviet scientists of the humanities were able to more or less substantiate the natural “evolutionary nature” of the newly minted communist ideology of K. Marx and Lenin-Blank, and divided the whole history into five well-known periods: from the primitive communal formation to the most progressive and evolutionary - communist.

But the period of Russian history before the adoption of Christianity did not fit into any "standard" pattern - it was not similar to either the primitive communal system, or to the slaveholding, or to the feudal one. Rather, it looked like a socialist one. And this was the whole comic nature of the situation, and a great desire not to pay scientific attention to this period. This was also the reason for dissatisfaction with Froyanov and other Soviet scientists when they tried to understand this period of history.

In the period before the baptism of Rus, the Rus undoubtedly had their own state and at the same time did not have a class society, in particular a feudal one. And the inconvenience was that the “classical” Soviet ideology asserted that the feudal class creates the state as an instrument of its political domination and suppression of the peasants. And then it turned out to be a discrepancy …

Moreover, judging by the military victories of the Rus over the neighbors, and that the “queen of the world” Byzantium herself paid tribute to them, it turned out that the “original” way of society and the state of our ancestors was more effective, harmonious and advantageous in comparison with other ways and structures of that period among other peoples.

“And here it should be noted that the archaeological sites of the Eastern Slavs recreate a society without any obvious traces of property stratification. The outstanding researcher of East Slavic antiquities I. I. Lyapushkin emphasized that among the dwellings known to us

Igor kept Russia intact and was able to repel the dangerous raid of the Pechenegs. And judging by the fact that in 941 Igor set off on the third military campaign against Byzantium, one can guess that Byzantium ceased to observe the treaty with Oleg.

This time, the Byzantines prepared thoroughly, did not hang up the chains, but thought of throwing the Russian boats with vessels with burning oil (“Greek fire”) from throwing weapons. The Russians did not expect this, were at a loss, and, having lost many ships, landed on land and staged a cruel slaughter. They did not take Constantinople, suffered serious damage and then within six months the evil ones returned home with various adventures.

And immediately they began to prepare more thoroughly for a new campaign. And in 944 they moved to Byzantium for the fourth time. This time, the Byzantine emperor, anticipating trouble, halfway asked for peace on favorable terms for the Rus; they agreed and loaded with Byzantine gold and fabrics returned to Kiev.

In 945, during the collection of tribute by Igor and his squad, some kind of conflict occurred among the Drevlyans. The Slavs-Drevlyans, led by Prince Mal, decided that Igor and his retinue had gone too far in demands and done injustice, and the Drevlyans killed Igor and killed his warriors. The widowed Olga sent a large army to the Drevlyans and fiercely took revenge. Princess Olga began to rule Russia.

Since the second half of the 20th century, researchers began to receive new written sources - birch bark letters. The first birch bark letters were found in 1951 during archaeological excavations in Novgorod. About 1000 letters have already been discovered. The total volume of the dictionary of birch bark letters is more than 3200 words. The geography of finds covers 11 cities: Novgorod, Staraya Russa, Torzhok, Pskov, Smolensk, Vitebsk, Mstislavl, Tver, Moscow, Staraya Ryazan, Zvenigorod Galitsky.

The earliest letters date back to the 11th century (1020), when the indicated territory was not yet Christianized. Thirty letters found in Novgorod and one in Staraya Russa belong to this period. Until the 12th century, neither Novgorod nor Staraya Russa had yet been baptized, therefore the names of people found in the letters of the 11th century are pagan, that is, real Russians. By the beginning of the 11th century, the population of Novgorod corresponded not only with addressees located inside the city, but also with those who were far beyond its borders - in villages, in other cities. Even the villagers from the most distant villages wrote household orders and simple letters on birch bark.

That is why, the outstanding linguist and researcher of Novgorod letters, the Academy A. A. Zaliznyak, claims that “this ancient writing system was very widespread. This writing was widespread throughout Russia. Reading the birch bark letters refuted the existing opinion that in Ancient Russia only noble people and clergy were literate. Among the authors and addressees of letters there are many representatives of the lower strata of the population, in the texts found there is evidence of the practice of teaching writing - alphabet, formulas, numerical tables, “pen tests”."

Six-year-old children wrote - “there is one letter, where, it seems, a certain year is indicated. It was written by a six-year-old boy. " Almost all Russian women wrote - “now we know for sure that a significant part of women could both read and write. Letters from the 12th century. in general, in various respects, they reflect a more free society, with greater development, in particular, of female participation, than a society closer to our time. This fact follows from the birch bark letters quite clearly”. Literacy in Russia is eloquently indicated by the fact that “the picture of Novgorod in the 14th century. and Florence of the 14th century, according to the degree of female literacy - in favor of Novgorod."

Experts know that Cyril and Methodius invented the verb for Bulgarians and spent the rest of their lives in Bulgaria. The letter called "Cyrillic", although it has a similarity in its name, has nothing to do with Cyril. The name "Cyrillic" comes from the designation of the letter - Russian "doodle", or, for example, the French "ecrire". And the plaque found during the excavations of Novgorod, on which they wrote in antiquity, is called "kera" (sera).

In the "Tale of Bygone Years", a monument of the early 12th century, there is no information about the baptism of Novgorod. Consequently, Novgorodians and residents of neighboring villages wrote 100 years before the baptism of this city, and the writing of the Novgorodians did not come from Christians. Writing in Russia existed long before Christianity. The share of non-ecclesiastical texts at the very beginning of the 11th century is 95 percent of all letters found.

Nevertheless, for the academic falsifiers of history, for a long time, the fundamental version was that the Russian people learned to read and write from newcomer priests. Aliens!

But in his unique scientific work “The Craft of Ancient Rus”, published back in 1948, the archaeologist academician BA Rybakov published the following data: “There is a deep-rooted opinion that the church was a monopolist in the creation and distribution of books; this opinion was strongly supported by the churchmen themselves. It is only true here that monasteries and episcopal or metropolitan courts were the organizers and censors of book copying, often acting as intermediaries between the customer and the scribe, but the executors were often not monks, but people who had nothing to do with the church.

We have calculated the scribes according to their position. For the pre-Mongol era, the result was this: half of the book scribes were laymen; for the 14th - 15th centuries. the calculations gave the following results: metropolitans - 1; deacons - 8; monks - 28; clerks - 19; priests - 10; "Slaves of God" -35; priests-4; parobkov-5. Popovichs cannot be considered in the category of churchmen, since literacy, almost obligatory for them (“the priest’s son does not know how to read, is an outcast”) did not predetermine their spiritual career. Under vague names like "servant of God", "sinner", "dull servant of God", "sinful and daring for evil, but lazy for good", etc., without indicating belonging to the church, we must understand secular artisans. Sometimes there are more definite indications "Eustathius wrote, a worldly man, and his nickname is Shepel", "Ovsey raspop", "Thomas the scribe". In such cases, we no longer have any doubts about the "worldly" character of the scribes.

In total, according to our count, there are 63 laymen and 47 clergymen, i.e. 57% of the artisan scribes did not belong to church organizations. The main forms in the studied era were the same as in the pre-Mongol era: work to order and work on the market; between them there were various intermediate stages that characterized the degree of development of a particular craft. Bespoke work is typical for some types of patrimonial craft and for industries associated with expensive raw materials, such as jewelry or bell casting."

The academician cited these figures for the 14th - 15th centuries, when, according to the stories of the church, she served almost as a helm for the multimillion Russian people. It would be interesting to look at the busy, one and only metropolitan who, together with an absolutely insignificant handful of literate deacons and monks, served the postage needs of the multimillion Russian people from several tens of thousands of Russian villages. In addition, this Metropolitan and Co. were supposed to possess many truly wonderful qualities: the lightning speed of writing and movement in space and time, the ability to simultaneously be in thousands of places at once, and so on.

But not a joke, but a real conclusion from the data given by B. A. Rybakov, it follows that the church has never been in Russia a place from which knowledge and enlightenment flowed. Therefore, we repeat, another academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences A. A. Zaliznyak states that “the picture of Novgorod from the 14th century. and Florence 14th century. according to the degree of female literacy - in favor of Novgorod”. But by the 18th century the church had brought the Russian people into the bosom of illiterate darkness.

Consider the other side of the life of ancient Russian society before the arrival of Christians in our lands. She touches the clothes. Historians are used to us drawing Russian people dressed exclusively in simple white shirts, sometimes, however, allowing ourselves to say that these shirts were decorated with embroidery. Russians appear to be such beggars, barely able to dress at all. This is another lie spread by historians about the life of our people.

To begin with, let us recall that the world's first clothing was created more than 40 thousand years ago in Russia, in Kostenki. And, for example, at the Sungir parking lot in Vladimir, already 30 thousand years ago, people wore a leather jacket made of suede, trimmed with fur, a hat with earflaps, leather pants, and leather boots. Everything was decorated with various objects and several rows of beads. The ability to make clothes in Russia, of course, was preserved and developed to a high level. And silk became one of the important materials of clothing for the ancient Rus.

Archaeological finds of silk on the territory of Ancient Russia of the 9th - 12th centuries were found in more than two hundred points. The maximum concentration of finds is Moscow, Vladimir, Ivanovo and Yaroslavl regions. Just in those in which at this time there was an increase in population. But these territories were not part of Kievan Rus, on the territory of which, on the contrary, the finds of silk fabrics are very few. As the distance from Moscow - Vladimir - Yaroslavl increases, the density of silk finds generally decreases rapidly, and already in the European part they are sporadic.

At the end of the 1st millennium A. D. Vyatichi and Krivichi lived in the Moscow Territory, as evidenced by groups of mounds (at the Yauza station, in Tsaritsyn, Chertanovo, Konkov. Derealev, Zyuzin, Cheryomushki, Matveyevsky, Filyakh, Tushin, etc.). Vyatichi also made up the initial core of the population of Moscow.

According to various sources, Prince Vladimir baptized Rus, or rather, began the baptism of Rus in 986 or 987. But Christians and Christian churches were in Russia, specifically in Kiev, long before 986. And it was not even about the tolerance of the pagan Slavs to other religions, but about one important principle - the principle of freedom and sovereignty of the decision of each Slav, for whom there were no masters, he was a king for himself and had the right to any decision that did not contradict customs community, so no one had the right to criticize, reproach or condemn him, if the decision or deed of the Slav did not harm the community and its members. Well, then the history of Baptized Russia has already begun …