The origin of the Russian people, brief summary. Where did the Russians come from? The origin of the word "Rus" and the literary heritage of the Russian people

Many modern researchers believe people of Rus' alien people in the East Slavic lands and only Soviet researchers for a long time tried to prove its local (autochthonous) origin.

According to Western scientists, the Varangians, who gave the name to the people of Rus', came from the North-West from Sweden. About this in Soviet, and in modern times it is even written in school textbooks. Let's try to figure it out - is this really so?

In the 18th century, a hypothesis appeared that traces the history of Ancient Rus' to one famous event. IN 862 in the legendary "Tales of Bygone Years" the fact is given about how a big war broke out between the tribes of the Novgorod Slovenes, Finno-Ugric peoples and Krivichi people. It ended with the fact that its parties, in order to stop the strife, decided to invite themselves a new prince who would lead them and judge them by right. At their request, three brothers appeared with their squad: Rurik, Truvor and Sineus. Rurik began to reign in Novgorod, Sineus - in Beloozero, and Truvor - in Ladoga.

In the legendary “Tale of Bygone Years”, in the section “The Legend of the Calling of the Varangians” there is the following text: “And the Novgorod Slovenes said to themselves: “Let us look for a prince who would rule over us and judge us by right.” And they decided to go to the Varangians.” And those Varangians were called Rus, just as others are called Svens (Swedens), and others are called Normans or Angles, and still others Germans and Gotlanders - that’s what these were called." Please note that the Varangian Rus were not Swedes (Svens) or Germans. So who were the Rus?

The first hypothesis of the origin of the people and state of Rus' - Norman (Normanist, Scandinavian). The “Norman theory” was put forward at the beginning of the 18th century by German scientists Gottlieb Siegfried Bayer and Gerard Friedrich Miller. Both historians moved to Russia during the reign of Empress Anna Ioannovna, the wife of Duke Friedrich Wilhelm of Courland. During for long years Bayer and Miller worked at the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences and, according to their contemporary Mikhailo Lomonosov, were pronounced Russophobes. They hated everything Russian, but they enjoyed the support of the then Academy of Sciences, in which more than 90% were Germans. Now Western historians are actively promoting this hypothesis. The Normanists leave no shadow of doubt that the name of the people Rus is of Scandinavian or Germanic origin and in every possible way deny that the Rus belong to the Slavs.

The second hypothesis of the origin of the people of Rus' - Balto-Slavic. Supporters of this hypothesis believe that the people of Rus' are of Slavic or Balto-Slavic origin, and they appeared and lived in the southern part of the Baltic (Varangian) Sea, in the territory of the modern Kaliningrad region (Prussia), Poland and East Germany. One of the main ideologists of this hypothesis is the famous satirist Mikhail Zadornov, who made an interesting historical film "Rurik. Lost True". I advise everyone to watch it. This film is easy to find on YouTube.

The third hypothesis of the origin of the people of Rus' - autochthonous. Adherents of this hypothesis (Soviet and modern Ukrainian scientists) who believe that the people of Rus' arose on the territory of modern Ukraine in the Dnieper region. However, so far this hypothesis has not been able to find any scientific archaeological or linguistic evidence.

The fourth hypothesis of the origin of the people of Rus' - eastern. In a famous publication by the German scientist F. Knauer, he discovered that the ancient Indian hymns of the Rig Veda mention the mythological river Rasa, the “Great Mother,” which flows in the distant North-West, in the old homeland. And in holy book the ancient Persians "Avesta", speaks of the river Ra, which separated Europe from Asia (in the distant past, the border of Asia and Europe, as is known, ran along the bed of the Volga, which in ancient times was called Ra). With the help of detailed scientific analysis, the scientist proves the identity of all these names with the ancient name Volga - Ra, which subsequently received from different nations such forms as Ros among the Greeks and Arabs, Ros, Rus, Rosa, Race among the Slavs and Balts. This was reflected in the names of numerous western rivers in new places of settlement of peoples who came to their own in ancient times. historical paths from the Volga River. The Indo-Europeans who moved to the distant southeast named one of the tributaries of the great Indus after the same ancestral river Rasa. The scientist also suggested that in ancient times not only people from Baltic Sea, but also squads of “ushkuinik”, who traded in robbery on large rivers. Knauer believes that the name of the people "Rus" in accurate translation the word means nothing more than “Volga people”.

We'll look at the pros and cons of each of these hypotheses shortly. Follow our publications.

For many centuries, scientists have been breaking their spears, trying to understand the origin of the Russian people. And if research in the past was based on archaeological and linguistic data, today even geneticists have taken up the matter.

From the Danube

Of all the theories of Russian ethnogenesis, the most famous is the Danube theory. We owe its appearance to the chronicle “The Tale of Bygone Years”, or rather to the centuries-old love of domestic academics for this source.

The chronicler Nestor defined the initial territory of settlement of the Slavs as the territories along the lower reaches of the Danube and Vistula. The theory about the Danube “ancestral home” of the Slavs was developed by such historians as Sergei Solovyov and Vasily Klyuchevsky.
Vasily Osipovich Klyuchevsky believed that the Slavs moved from the Danube to the Carpathian region, where an extensive military alliance of tribes arose led by the Duleb-Volhynian tribe.

From the Carpathian region, according to Klyuchevsky, in the 7th-8th centuries the Eastern Slavs settled to the East and Northeast to Lake Ilmen. The Danube theory of Russian ethnogenesis is still adhered to by many historians and linguists. The Russian linguist Oleg Nikolaevich Trubachev made a great contribution to its development at the end of the 20th century.

Yes, we are Scythians!

One of the most vehement opponents of the Norman theory of the formation of Russian statehood, Mikhail Lomonosov, leaned toward the Scythian-Sarmatian theory of Russian ethnogenesis, which he wrote about in his “Ancient Russian History.” According to Lomonosov, the ethnogenesis of the Russians occurred as a result of the mixing of the Slavs and the “Chudi” tribe (Lomonosov’s term is Finno-Ugric), and he named the place of origin of the ethnic history of the Russians between the Vistula and Oder rivers.

Supporters of the Sarmatian theory rely on ancient sources, and Lomonosov did the same. He compared Russian history with the history of the Roman Empire and ancient beliefs with the pagan beliefs of the Eastern Slavs, revealing a large number of coincidences. The ardent struggle with the adherents of the Norman theory is quite understandable: the people-tribe of Rus', according to Lomonosov, could not have originated from Scandinavia under the influence of the expansion of the Norman Vikings. First of all, Lomonosov opposed the thesis about the backwardness of the Slavs and their inability to independently form a state.

Gellenthal's theory

The hypothesis about the origin of Russians, unveiled this year by Oxford scientist Garrett Gellenthal, seems interesting. Having done a lot of work studying DNA various peoples, he and a group of scientists compiled a genetic atlas of migration of peoples.
According to the scientist, two significant milestones can be distinguished in the ethnogenesis of the Russian people. In 2054 BC. e., according to Gellenthal, trans-Baltic peoples and peoples from the territories of modern Germany and Poland migrated to the northwestern regions modern Russia. The second milestone is 1306, when the migration of Altai peoples began, who actively interbred with representatives of the Slavic branches.
Gellenthal's research is also interesting because genetic analysis proved that the time of the Mongol-Tatar invasion had virtually no effect on Russian ethnogenesis.

Two ancestral homelands

Another interesting migration theory was proposed at the end of the 19th century by Russian linguist Alexey Shakhmatov. His “two ancestral homelands” theory is also sometimes called the Baltic theory. The scientist believed that initially from Indo-European group stood out Balto-Slavic community, which became autochthonous in the Baltic states. After its collapse, the Slavs settled in the territory between the lower reaches of the Neman and Western Dvina. This territory became the so-called “first ancestral home”. Here, according to Shakhmatov, a Proto-Slavic language, from which all Slavic languages ​​originated.

Further migration of the Slavs was associated with the great migration of peoples, during which at the end of the second century AD the Germans went south, liberating the Vistula River basin, where the Slavs came. Here, in the lower Vistula basin, Shakhmatov defines the second ancestral home of the Slavs. From here, according to the scientist, the division of the Slavs into branches began. The western one went to the Elbe region, the southern one - divided into two groups, one of which settled the Balkans and the Danube, the other - the Dnieper and Dniester. The latter became the basis of the East Slavic peoples, which include the Russians.

We are locals ourselves

Finally, another theory different from migration theories is the autochthonous theory. According to it, the Slavs were an indigenous people inhabiting eastern, central and even part of southern Europe. According to the theory of Slavic autochthonism, Slavic tribes were the indigenous ethnic group of a vast territory - from the Urals to the Atlantic Ocean. This theory has quite ancient roots and many supporters and opponents. This theory was supported by the Soviet linguist Nikolai Marr. He believed that the Slavs did not come from anywhere, but were formed from tribal communities living in vast territories from the Middle Dnieper to Laba in the West and from the Baltic to the Carpathians in the south.
Polish scientists - Kleczewski, Potocki and Sestrentsevich - also adhered to the autochthonous theory. They even traced the ancestry of the Slavs from the Vandals, basing their hypothesis, among other things, on the similarity of the words “Vendals” and “Vandals”. Of the Russians, the autochthonous theory explained the origin of the Slavs Rybakov, Mavrodin and Greeks.

in the discipline "History"

on the topic: “The Emergence of Ancient Rus'”

Introduction

The European peoples of our country, including the Eastern Slavs, went towards the creation of statehood in their own special way. In the second half of the 1st millennium, they created political formations of a transitional nature - states during the formation of feudalism. These were primitive, poorly organized systems, but they prepared the foundation for the creation of other more developed states. This work will analyze the process of the emergence of the Old Russian state.

The history of the Slavs goes back to the depths of time, and the first information about them is recorded in the most ancient written sources. All of them, with reference to a certain territory, record the Slavs only from the middle of the 1st millennium AD. e. (most often from the 6th century), that is, when they appear on the historical arena of Europe as a large ethnic community.

The places of residence of the ancient Slavs, called “ancestral homelands,” are defined ambiguously.

The first who tried to answer the questions: where, how and when the Slavs appeared was the chronicler Nestor, the author of The Tale of Bygone Years. He defined the territory of the Slavs along the lower Danube and Pannonia. The process of settlement of the Slavs began with the Danube, that is, we are talking about their migration. The Kiev chronicler was the founder of the migration theory of the origin of the Slavs, known as the “Danube” or “Balkan” theory. The Danube “ancestral home” of the Slavs was recognized by S.M. Soloviev, V.O. Klyuchevsky and others. According to V.O. Klyuchevsky, the Slavs moved from the Danube to the Carpathian region. It was here, according to the historian, that an extensive military alliance was formed led by the Dulebo-Volhynians. From here the Eastern Slavs settled east and northeast to Lake Ilmen in the 7th-8th centuries.

The emergence of another migration theory of the origin of the Slavs, the “Scythian-Sarmatian” one, dates back to the Middle Ages. According to their ideas, the ancestors of the Slavs moved from Western Asia along the Black Sea coast to the north and settled under the ethnonyms “Scythians”, “Sarmatians”, “Alans” and “Roxolans”.

The third option, close to the Scythian-Sarmatian theory, was proposed by Academician A.I. Sobolevsky. In his opinion, the names of rivers, lakes, and mountains within the location of the ancient Slavic settlements allegedly show that they received these names from another people who were here earlier. Such a predecessor of the Slavs, according to Sobolevsky, was a group of tribes of Iranian origin (Scythian root).

The fourth version of the migration theory was given by academician A.A. Shakhmatov. In his opinion, the first ancestral home of the Slavs was the basin of the Western Dvina and Lower Neman in the Baltic states.

In contrast to migration theories, the autochthonous - local origin of the Slavs is recognized. According to the autochthonous theory, the Slavs formed over a vast territory, which included not only the territory of modern Poland, but also a significant part of modern Ukraine and Belarus.

In the VIII-IX centuries. The period of Slavic history proper begins, the formation of unions, the formation of states.

The first state in the lands of the Eastern Slavs was called “Rus”. By the name of its capital, the city of Kyiv, scientists subsequently began to call it Kievan Rus, although it itself never called itself that.

The first mentions of the name “Rus” date back to the same time as information about the Ants, Slavs, Wends, i.e. to the V-VII centuries. Describing the tribes that lived between the Dnieper and the Dniester, the Greeks call them acts, Scythians, Sarmatians, Gothic historians call them Rosomans (fair-haired, fair people), and the Arabs call them Rus. But it is quite obvious that we were talking about the same people. Years pass, the name “Rus” increasingly becomes a collective name for all tribes living in the vast spaces between the Baltic and the Black Sea, the Oka-Volga interfluve and the Polish borderland.

At the same time, it should be noted that the word “Rus” is used ambiguously. This gave rise to the researchers being divided into two groups. Some believe that “Rus” was originally a social concept, others believe that this term from the very beginning bore ethnic connotations.

Most researchers are inclined to the point of view about the ethnic origin of the term “Rus”, as well as about its ethnic meaning during the times of Kievan Rus. It should be said that supporters of the first concept do not deny that over time the social meaning of the term turned into an ethnic one. The whole question is whether the word “Rus” was ever a term designating a social group.

Supporters ethnic origin the words “Rus”, in turn, make up several groups. In pre-revolutionary literature, the opinion arose that Russia should be understood as the Varangians. This concept, in one modification or another, is still promoted in the West. IN latest literature it can be found in the works of the American professor R. Pipes and in the book of the Cambridge teacher X. Davidson.

Modern researchers usually derive the term “Rus” from the name of the Ros River, a tributary of the Dnieper, which flowed in the land of glades. By the name of this river, they say, first the glades, and then the inhabitants of the entire Kyiv state, began to be called Rus. However, there are several other rivers within our land that bore similar names, including the Volga, also called Ros. There was also the city of Russia at the mouth of the Don. Hence the opposite thought: all this toponymy came from the name of the people of Rus', which is a self-name.

Western and eastern sources note in the 6th and even 4th centuries. the presence of strong leaders among the Eastern Slavs, reminiscent of monarchs. The presence of unity of laws, i.e., a certain legal order, is also noted. In the 8th century sources speak of the existence of three East Slavic associations: Kuyavia, Slavia, Artania. The first was located in the Kyiv land area, the second in the area of ​​Lake Ilmen, the location of the third is controversial. Some identify Artania with Tmutarakan, located on the Taman Peninsula, while other researchers place it on the Volga.

Of course, the statehood of the Eastern Slavs during the formation of feudalism was very primitive. However, it created the foundation for the emergence of the Old Russian feudal state.

According to the Tale of Bygone Years (early 12th century), the creation of a powerful Russian state on the territory of Eastern Europe began from the north. For 859, there is a message in the chronicle that the Slavic tribes in the south paid tribute to the Khazars, and in the north the Slavs and Finno-Ugric people paid tribute to the Varangians. The chronicle reports that in 862 the Novgorodians expelled the Varangians overseas, but among the multilingual tribes, and even in Novgorod itself, there was no peace and they had to invite a prince, “...who would rule and judge by right.” And they went overseas to the Varangians, to Rus', and invited the three brothers Rurik, Sineus and Truvor. Rurik began to reign in Novgorod, Sineus - in Beloozero, and Truvor - in Izborsk.

After the death of his brothers, Rurik began to reign alone, and distributed Polotsk, Rostov, and Beloozero to his warriors. When Rurik died (879), the governor Oleg, together with Rurik’s young son Igor, raised the peoples along the trade route “from the Varangians to the Greeks” on a large campaign to the south. The campaign included Scandinavians, Northern Slavs and Finno-Ugric peoples; in 882 they captured Kyiv. This is how the northern and southern lands were united, and a state was formed with its center in Kyiv. This is the so-called Norman theory of state formation.

This interpretation raises at least two objections. Firstly, the factual material presented in The Tale of Bygone Years does not provide grounds for the conclusion that the Russian state was created by calling the Varangians. On the contrary, like other sources that have come down to us, it says that statehood among the Eastern Slavs existed even before the Varangians. Secondly, modern science cannot agree with such a primitive explanation complex process formation of any state. The state cannot be organized by one person or several even the most outstanding men. The state is a product of complex and long development social structure society. However, the chronicle mention was adopted back in the 18th century. a certain group of historians who developed the Varangian version of the formation of the Russian state. At this time, a group of German historians worked at the Russian Academy of Sciences and interpreted the chronicle legend in a certain sense. This is how the notorious Norman theory of the origin of the Old Russian state was born.

Already at that time, Normanism met with objections from advanced Russian scientists, among whom was M.V. Lomonosov. Since then, all historians involved in Ancient Russia, divided into two camps - Normanists and anti-Normanists.

Modern domestic scientists predominantly reject the Norman theory. They are joined by the largest researchers of the Slavic countries. However, a certain part of foreign authors still preach this theory, although not in such a primitive form as was done previously.

The main refutation of the Norman theory is quite high level social and political development Eastern Slavs in the 9th century. The Old Russian state was prepared by the centuries-old development of the Eastern Slavs. In terms of their economic and political level, the Slavs were higher than the Varangians, so they could not even borrow state experience from the newcomers.

The chronicle story contains, of course, elements of truth. It is possible that the Slavs invited several princes with their squads as military specialists, as was done in later times in Rus', and even in Western Europe. It is reliably known that the Russian principalities invited squads not only of the Varangians, but also of their steppe neighbors - the Pechenegs, Karakalpaks, and Torks. However, it was not the Varangian princes who organized the Old Russian state, but the already existing state that gave them the corresponding government posts. However, some authors, starting with M.V. Lomonosov, they doubt the Varangian origin of Rurik, Sineus and Truvor, believing that they could also be representatives of some Slavic tribes. In any case, there are practically no traces of Varangian culture left in the history of our Motherland. Researchers, for example, calculated that per 10 thousand square meters. km of Russian territory, only 5 Scandinavian geographical names can be found, while in England, which the Normans conquered, this number reaches 150.

We do not know exactly when and how exactly the first principalities of the Eastern Slavs arose, preceding the formation of the Old Russian state, but, in any case, they already existed before 862, before the notorious “calling of the Varangians.” In the German chronicles, already from 839, Russian princes were called Khakans - kings.

But the moment of unification of the East Slavic lands into one state is known with certainty. In 882, the Novgorod prince Oleg captured Kyiv and united these two most important groups of Russian lands; then he managed to annex the rest of the Russian lands, creating a huge state for those times.

Russian Orthodox Church tries to link the emergence of statehood in Rus' with the introduction of Christianity. Of course, the introduction of Christianity had great importance to strengthen the feudal state, fortunately the church sanctified the subordination of the Orthodox to the exploitative state. However, the baptism of Rus occurred no less than a century after the formation of the Kievan state, not to mention the earlier East Slavic states.

In addition to the Slavs, the Old Russian Kievan State also included some neighboring Finnish and Baltic tribes. This state was thus ethnically heterogeneous from the very beginning. However, its basis was the Old Russian people, which was the cradle of three Slavic peoples - Russians (Great Russians), Ukrainians and Belarusians. It cannot be identified with any of these peoples separately. Even before the revolution, bourgeois Ukrainian nationalists tried to portray the Old Russian state as Ukrainian. This idea has been picked up in our time in nationalist circles, trying to quarrel the three fraternal Slavic peoples. Meanwhile, the Old Russian state did not coincide either in territory or in population with modern Ukraine, they only had a common capital - the city of Kyiv. In the 9th and even 12th centuries. It is still impossible to talk about specifically Ukrainian culture, language, etc. All this will appear later, when, due to objective historical processes, the Old Russian people split into three independent branches.

The moment of the emergence of the Old Russian state cannot be determined with sufficient accuracy. Obviously, there was a gradual outgrowing of the existing political entities to the feudal state of the Eastern Slavs - the Old Russian Kiev State. In the literature, this event is dated differently by different historians. However, most authors agree that the emergence of the Old Russian state should be attributed to the 9th century.

The question of how the Old Russian state was formed is also not entirely clear. The oldest chronicle, The Tale of Bygone Years, gives reason to believe that in the 9th century. The Old Russian state was created by the Varangians, although it does not say this directly. It's about only that three Varangian princes came to Rus' and in 862 sat on the thrones: Rurik - in Novgorod, Truvor - in Izborsk (not far from Pskov), Sineus - in Beloozero. This chronicle mention was adopted back in the 18th century. a group of German historians who worked at the Russian Academy of Sciences and developed the Varangian version of the formation of the Russian state.

Already at that time, Normanism met with objections from advanced Russian scientists, among whom was M.V. Lomonosov. Modern domestic scientists and major researchers of Slavic countries predominantly reject the Norman theory. However, a certain part of foreign authors still preach this theory, although not in such a primitive form as was done previously.

The main refutation of the Norman theory is the fairly high level of social and political development of the Eastern Slavs in the 9th century. The Old Russian state was prepared by the centuries-old development of the Eastern Slavs.

1. Gordienko NS. “The Baptism of Rus'”: facts against legends and myths. L., 1986.

2. Grekov B. D. Kievan Rus. M., 1953.

3. Lovmyansky H. Rus' and the Normans. M., 1985.

4. Mavrodina P.M. Kievan Rus and nomads (Pechenegs, Torques, Polovtsians). L., 1983.

Preamble
Hypotheses on the topic - where did the Russian land come from?

Each of us is interested in where the Russian land came from? Historians have created many hypotheses about its origin. If we summarize all the existing hypotheses about the origin of statehood among the Eastern Slavs and the name “Rus,” then we can single out eight from the set.

First hypothesis: Norman or Varangian

Its “godfathers” were German scientists G.3. Bayer (1694–1738) and G.F. Miller (1705–1783), who were in academic service in Russian Empire. They argued that the Old Russian state was founded by immigrants from Scandinavia - the Normans, who in Rus' were called Varangians. They first came to the Slovenes and established the city of Ladoga. And the eldest Rurik sat in Ladoga, and the second, Sineus, sat on White Lake, and the third, Truvor, in Izborsk. And from those Varangians it received the name Russian Land.

The main argument of the Normanists is as follows: Rus' got its name from the Finnish word “ruotsi”, which the Finns used to call the Swedes in the middle of the 9th century. And they still call it to this day. The Finnish "Ruotsi" means "Sweden". Estonians call Sweden Rootsi.

Second hypothesis: Slavic

The founder of the Slavic (anti-Norman) theory of the origin of the Old Russian state was the Russian scientist M. V. Lomonosov (1711–1762). In the Varangian version, he saw a blasphemous allusion to the “defectiveness” of the Slavs, to their inability to independently organize a state in their northeastern European lands.

Third hypothesis: Iranian-Slavic

According to this hypothesis, there were two types of Rus - the Obodrit Rus or Rugs, inhabitants of the island of Rügen (they are called the Baltic Slavs), and the Black Sea Rus, descendants of Slavic and Iranian tribes. The Ilmen Slovenes invited the Obodrit Rus to reign. When the East Slavic tribes united into a single state - Rus', there was a rapprochement between two types of Rus.

Fourth hypothesis: Celto-Slavic

According to Academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine V.G. Sklyarenko, the Novgorodians turned for help to the Varangian Slavs (Baltic Slavs), who were called Rutens or Rus. The name Ruten (Rus) comes from one of the Celtic tribes, since the Ruten Celts took part in the ethnic formation of the Slavs of the island of Rügen.

Fifth hypothesis: Compromise or Slavic-Varangian

One of the first attempts to connect the Norman theory with the ideas of anti-Normanists about the local, Slavic roots of the Old Russian state was made by the famous Russian historian V. Klyuchevsky. He considered the earliest local political form, formed in Rus' around the middle of the 9th century, to be “an urban region, that is, a trading district governed by a fortified city, which at the same time served as an industrial (craft) center for this district.” The second local political form, in his opinion, was the “Varangian principalities.” From the combination of the Varangian principalities and the city regions that retained their independence, a third political form emerged - the original form of the “Russian state”.

Subsequently, this theory was developed by the Russian-Soviet academician M.N. Pokrovsky called “merchant capitalism”.

Sixth hypothesis: Indo-Iranian

This hypothesis insists that the ethnonym “ros” has a different origin than “rus”, being much more ancient - Sarmatian. Supporters of this opinion, also originating from M.V. Lomonosov, note that the people “grew up” were first mentioned in the 6th century in “Church History” by Zechariah the Rhetor, where they are placed next to the peoples of “dog people” and Amazons, which many authors interpret as the Northern Black Sea region. From this point of view, it is traced back to the Iranian-speaking (Sarmatian) tribes of the Roxalans or Rosomons, mentioned by ancient authors.

Seventh hypothesis: Khazar

The Russian-American historian G.V. Vernadsky put forward a hypothesis about the founding of Kyiv by the Khazars no earlier than the 830s, when, as a result of a great war, the Khazars conquered the Vyatichi, Northerners and Radimichi. According to this hypothesis, the three brothers Kiy, Shchek and Horiv were Khazars. The name "Kiy" may have come from the Turkic word kiy ("river bank"), since the ruling Jewish clan of the Khazar state was of Turkic origin.

The idea of ​​G.V. Vernadsky was developed by Harvard University (USA) professor E. I. Pritsak, author of the historical six-volume study “The Origin of Rus'”.

In his opinion, the Old Russian state was not founded by either the Varangians or the Slavs. It was a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual trading union that, in the process of establishing its control over trade routes between the Baltic, Mediterranean and Caspian seas, created a political entity in Eastern Europe called Rus. In other words, “Rus” was originally called not an ethnic community (not a tribe or people), but a special mobile social group (corporation), consisting of professional warrior-merchants. The synthesis of a corporation of sea and river nomads (Vikings, Varangians) with steppe nomads (Khazars) contributed, according to Pritsak, to the emergence in the 9th–10th centuries. Volga-Russian Kaganate.

The eighth hypothesis was composed by the Austro-Hungarian-Ukrainian historian M.S. Grushevsky (at the end of his life a Soviet academician). This is where we will end our historical journey.

How do the emergence of Kyiv and Veliky Novgorod and the birth of Rus' fit into these hypotheses? This will be discussed in the following chapters of this book.