In the ninth century, the Volga trade plied by the Khazars attracted the attention of the Normans. The ninth century was for the Normans a period of extraordinary expansion. Scattering far and wide from Scandinavia, they roamed with impunity in central and western Europe, conquering in the process, Ireland (820), Iceland (874), and Normandy (911). During this initial phase of their expansion, some of the Normans turned east and founded settlements on territory of what later became Russia. The first Norse colony on Russian soil was Aldeigjuborg, a fortress on the shores of lake Ladoga. This was an excellent base from which to launch exploration of the water routes leading south, towards the great centres of Levantine wealth and civilization. Routes connecting northern Europe with the Near East by way of Russia acquired special value at this particular time, because Muslim conquests of the eighth century had closed the Mediterranean to Christian trade. From Aldeigjuborg and other fortresses built near by and to the south, the Normans explored in their flat, capacious boats the rivers leading to the Near East.
* This early mir must not be confused with the repartitional commune, known by the same name, but created much later, (see above, p. 17).
THE GENESIS OF THE PATRIMONIAL STATE IN RUSSIA
They soon discovered what medieval Russian sources call 'the Saracen route', the network of rivers and portages connecting the Baltic Sea with the Caspian by way of the Volga, and entered into commercial relations with the Khazars. Hoards of Arabic coins dating from the ninth and tenth centuries discovered throughout Russia and Sweden attest to the wide reach and intensity of these commercial activities of the Normans. The Arab traveller Ibn Fadlan left a vivid description of a ship burial of a Norman ('Russian') chieftain which he had witnessed on the Volga early in the tenth century.
In the long run, however, the 'Saracen route' proved to the Normans of lesser importance than the 'Greek route' leading down the Dnieper to the Black Sea and Constantinople. Utilizing this road, they carried out several raids against the capital of the Byzantine Empire, compelling the Byzantines to grant them commercial privileges. The texts of the treaties in which these privileges are enumerated, recorded complete in the Primary Chronicle, are the oldest documents bearing on Norman rule in Russia. In the ninth and tenth centuries, regular commercial relations developed between the Russian forest and Byzantium, the management of which was in the hands of Norman merchant-soldiers.
In most of Europe under their control, the Normans settled down and assumed the role of territorial sovereigns. In Russia they behaved differently. For reasons enumerated before, they had little inducement to bother with agriculture and territorial claims, preferring to concentrate on foreign trade. They gradually gained control of all the principal riverways leading to the Black Sea, along which they built fortresses. From these bases they extracted as tribute from the Slavs, Finns and Lithuanians commodities most in demand in Byzantium and the Arab world: slaves, furs and wax. It is precisely in the ninth century that tliere began to appear in Russia populated centres of a new type; no longer the tiny earthern or wooden stockades of the Slavic settlers, but regular fortress-cities. These served as habitations for the Norman chieftains, their families and retainers. Around them there often grew up suburbs populated by native artisans and shopkeepers. Each of these fortress-cities had near by its burial grounds. Normans and Slavs were often buried in the same mounds, but the tombs of the two were quite different, the Norman ones containing weapons, jewels and home implements of a distinctly Scandinavian type, and on occasion entire boats. Judging by archaeological evidence, the Normans maintained in Russia four major settlement areas: one along the Gulf of Riga; a second around lake Ladoga and the Volkhov river; a third to the east of Smolensk; and a fourth in the mesopotamia between the upper Volga and the Oka. In addition, they had isolated settlements, of which Konugard (Kiev) was by far the largest. All four of the major Norman settlement areas lay
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along the trade routes connecting the Baltic with the Caspian and Black seas. In their sagas, the Normans called Russia 'Gardariki', 'the country of strongholds'.
Since only a part of the tribute levied on the native population was required for support of the garrisons, and its most valuable portion was intended for export to distant markets reached by a route full of hazards, the Norman fortress-cities had to organize. This process, begun around 8oocEwhen the first Norse settlements were formed around lake Ladoga, was completed around 882 when Prince Helgi (Oleg) united under his authority the two terminal points of the 'Greek Route', Holmgard (Novgorod) and Kiev. Kiev became the headquarters of the central trade organization. The choice of Kiev was dictated by the fact that the Normans experienced no difficulty shipping the goods collected as tribute all over Russia and destined for Constantinople as far south as that city, being in full control of western Russia to that point. It was the next leg of the journey, from Kiev to the Black Sea, that presented the greatest problems, because here the merchandise had to traverse a steppe infested with nomad freebooters. Every spring, as soon as the ice on the rivers had broken, the tribute was floated from its scattered collection points to Kiev. May was devoted to the task of outfitting the great annual flotilla. In June, the ships laden with slaves and produce sailed under heavy guard from Kiev down the Dnieper. The most dangerous segment of the journey was a stretch of granite rapids twenty-five to sixty-five miles south of Kiev. As Emperor Constantine vn Porphy-rogenitus describes it, the Normans learned how to navigate the first three of the cataracts, but upon reaching the fourth they had to unload the merchandise and proceed on foot. The boats were partly dragged, partly carried. Some of the Normans helped bear the merchandise, others guarded the slaves, others yet were on the look-out for the enemy and, if attacked, beat him off. The flotilla was reasonably safe only after it had passed the last cataract, and the personnel with the goods could be reloaded on the boats. The importance of Kiev and the reason why it was chosen as the capital of the Norman trade organization in Russia thus becomes apparent. Kiev functioned in a double capacity: as the main depot of the tribute collected in all parts of Russia, and as the port from where it was transhipped under guard to its ultimate destination.
It is in this manner, almost as a by-product of international trade between two alien peoples, Normans and Greeks, that the first East Slav state came into being. Sovereign power over the fortress-cities and the territories adjoining them was assumed by a dynasty claiming descent from the semi-legendary Norse prince Hroerekr or Roderick (the Riurik of Russian chronicles). The head of the dynasty, the Great Prince, officiated in Kiev, while his sons, relatives, and leading retainers man-
THE GENESIS OF THE PATRIMONIAL STATE IN RUSSIA