Modern Slavic peoples have been forming over time. They had many ancestors. These include the Slavs themselves and their neighbors, which significantly influenced the life, culture and religion of these tribes when they still lived according to the principles of the tribal community.
Ants and Slaves
Until now, historians and archaeologists have put forward a variety of theories about who the Slav ancestors could be. The ethnogenesis of this people occurred in an era from which almost no written sources remained. Specialists had to restore the earliest history of the Slavs bit by bit. Of great value are the Byzantine annals. It was the Eastern Roman Empire that had to experience the pressure of the tribes, which eventually formed the Slavic nation.
The first evidence of them dates back to the 6th century. Ancestors-Slavs in Byzantine sources were called Ants. The famous historian Procopius of Caesarea wrote about them . At first, the Ants lived in the interfluve of the Dniester and the Dnieper in the territory of modern Ukraine. During their heyday, they lived in the steppes from the Don to the Balkans.
If the Ants belonged to the eastern group of Slavs, then to the west of them lived their kindred sklavs. The first mention of them remained in Jordan’s book “Getics,” written in the middle of the VI century. Sometimes, the sklavins were also called venets. These tribes lived on the territory of modern Czech Republic.
Social order
The inhabitants of Byzantium believed that the Slav ancestors were barbarians who did not know civilization. It really was like that. Both sklavins and antes lived under democracy. They did not have a single ruler and statehood. Early Slavic society consisted of many communities, the core of each of which was a certain kind. Such descriptions are found in Byzantine sources and are confirmed by the finds of modern archaeologists. The settlements consisted of large dwellings in which they lived in large families. In one village there could be about 20 houses. The center was widespread among the Sklavins, and the furnace was spread among the Ants. In the north, the Slavs built log cabins.
Customs corresponded to cruel patriarchal customs. For example, ritual murders of wives were practiced at the grave of a spouse. Slav ancestors engaged in agriculture, which was the main source of food. Wheat, millet, barley, oats, rye were grown. Cattle were bred: sheep, pigs, ducks, hens. The craft was poorly developed compared to the same Byzantium. It mainly served domestic household needs.
Army and slavery
Gradually, the social layer of warriors stood out in the community. They often organized raids on Byzantium and other neighboring countries. The goal has always been the same - robbery and slaves. Ancient Slavic squads could include several thousand people. It was in the military environment that the governors and princes appeared. The first ancestors of the Slavs fought with spears (less often with swords). Throwing weapons were also common - the ulitsa. It was used not only in battle, but also on the hunt.
It is known for certain that among the Ants slavery was widespread. The number of slaves could reach tens of thousands of people. They were mainly prisoners captured in the war. That is why among the Antian slaves there were many Byzantines. As a rule, ants kept slaves in order to get a ransom for them. However, some of them were employed in the household and crafts.
Invasion of Avars
In the middle of the VI century, the lands of the Ants were hit by Avars. These were nomadic tribes whose rulers bore the title of Hagan. Their ethnicity remains a subject of controversy: some consider them to be TĂĽrks, others - speakers of Iranian languages. The ancestors of the ancient Slavs, although they were in a dependent position, noticeably crowded the Avars in their number. This ratio led to confusion. The Byzantines (for example, John of Ephesus and Konstantin Bagryanorodny) completely identified the Slavs and Avars, although such an assessment was a mistake.
The invasion from the east led to a significant migration of the population, who had previously lived in one place for a long time. Together with the Avars, the Ants first moved to Pannonia (modern-day Hungary), and later began to invade the Balkans that belonged to Byzantium.
The Slavs became the backbone of the Kaganate army. The most famous episode of their confrontation with the empire was the siege of Constantinople in 626. The history of the ancient Slavs is known for short episodes of their interaction with the Greeks. The siege of Constantinople became just such an example. Despite the assault, the Slavs and Avars never managed to take the city.
Nevertheless, the onslaught of the pagans continued in the future. Back in 602, the Lombard king sent his masters in shipbuilding to the Slavs. They settled in Dubrovnik. The first Slavic ships (monoxyls) appeared in this port. They took part in the already mentioned siege of Constantinople. And at the end of the VI century, the Slavs first besieged Thessaloniki. Soon, thousands of pagans moved to Thrace. Then the Slavs appeared on the territory of modern Croatia and Serbia.
East Slavs
The unsuccessful siege of Constantinople in 626 undermined the forces of the Avar Haganate. Slavs everywhere began to get rid of the yoke of strangers. In Moravia, Samo raised an uprising. He became the first known by the name of the Slavic prince. Then his fellow tribesmen began their expansion to the east. In the VII century, the colonialists became neighbors of the Khazars. They managed to penetrate even into the Crimea and get to the Caucasus. Where the ancestors of the Slavs lived and their settlements were founded, there was always a river or lake, as well as land suitable for cultivation.
The city of Kiev appeared on the Dnieper, named after Prince Kiy. A new tribal union of the Polyans was formed here, which, among several other such unions, replaced the antam. In the 7th – 8th centuries, three groups of Slavic peoples finally formed that exist today (western, southern and eastern). The latter settled on the territory of modern Ukraine, Belarus, and between the Volga and Oka rivers, their settlements were within the borders of Russia.
In Byzantium, Slavs and Scythians were often identified. This was a serious Greek fallacy. Scythians belonged to Iranian tribes and spoke Iranian languages. During their heyday, they populated, including the Dnieper steppes, as well as the Crimea. When Slavic colonization arrived there, regular conflicts began between the new neighbors. The cavalry, owned by the Scythians, posed a serious danger. The ancestors of the Slavs for many years restrained their invasions, until, finally, the nomads were swept away by the Goths.
Tribal unions and cities of the Eastern Slavs
In the northeast, the neighbors of the Slavs became numerous Finno-Ugric tribes, including the whole and Meria. Here appeared the settlements of Rostov, Beloozero and Staraya Ladoga. Another city of Novgorod has become an important political center. In 862, the Varangian Rurik began to reign in it. This event was the beginning of Russian statehood.
The cities of the Eastern Slavs appeared mainly in the places where the Path from the Varangians to the Greeks ran. This trade artery led from the Baltic Sea to Byzantium. Along the way, merchants transported valuable goods: ambergris, whale skin, amber, marten and sable furs, honey, wax, etc. The goods were delivered on boats. The path of the ships ran along the rivers. Part of the route lay on the ground. In these sections, the rooks were transported by dragging, as a result of which the cities of Toropets and Smolensk appeared on the places of the roaming.
East Slavic tribes for a long time lived apart from each other, and often completely at war and fought among themselves. This made them vulnerable to neighbors. For this reason, at the beginning of the 9th century, some East Slavic tribal unions began to pay tribute to the Khazars. Others depended heavily on the Varangians. The Tale of Bygone Years mentions a dozen such tribal unions: Buzhan, Volyn, Dregovich, Drevlyan, Krivichi, Polyana, Polotsk, Northerners, Radimichi, Tivertsy, White Croats and streets. A single Slavic writing and culture for all of them developed only in the XI – XII centuries. after the formation of Kievan Rus and the adoption of Christianity. Later, this ethnos was divided into Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians. This is the answer to the question of whose ancestors are the Eastern Slavs.
Southern Slavs
The Slavs who settled the Balkans gradually separated from their other tribesmen and made up the South Slavic tribes. Today their descendants are Serbs, Bulgarians, Croats, Bosnians, Macedonians, Montenegrins and Slovenes. If the ancestors of the Eastern Slavs settled mainly in empty lands, then their southern brethren got the land in which there were many settlements founded by the Romans. From ancient civilization there were also roads along which the pagans quickly moved through the Balkans. Before them, Byzantium owned the peninsula. However, the empire had to give way to strangers because of the constant wars in the east with the Persians and internal turmoil.
On the new lands, the ancestors of the southern Slavs intermingled with the indigenous (local) Greek population. In the mountains, the colonialists had to face the resistance of the Vlachs, as well as the Albanians. Also, strangers clashed with Greek Christians. The resettlement of the Slavs in the Balkans was completed in the 620s.
Neighborhood with Christians and regular contacts with them had a great influence on the new owners of the Balkans. The paganism of the Slavs in this region was eradicated the fastest. Christianization was both natural and encouraged by Byzantium. First, the Greeks, trying to understand who the Slavs were, sent embassies to them, and then preachers followed them. The emperors regularly sent missionaries to the dangerous neighbors, hoping in this way to strengthen their influence on the barbarians. So, for example, the baptism of the Serbs began under Heraclius, who ruled from 610-641. The process went gradually. A new religion established itself among the southern Slavs in the second half of the 9th century. Then the princes of Raska were baptized, after which they converted their subjects to the Christian faith.
Interestingly, if the Serbs became a flock of the eastern church in Constantinople, then their Croat brothers turned their eyes to the west. This was due to the fact that in 812 the Frankish emperor Charlemagne concluded an agreement with the Byzantine king Michael I Rangava, according to which, part of the Adriatic coast of the Balkans was dependent on the Franks. They were Catholics and during their short sovereignty in the region they baptized the Croats according to their Western custom. And although in the 9th century the Christian church was still considered united, the great schism of 1054 markedly estranged Catholics and Orthodox from each other.
Western Slavs
The western group of Slavic tribes settled vast territories from the Elbe to the Carpathians. It laid the foundation for the Polish, Czech and Slovak people. Bodriches, Lutichs, Luzhichans and Pomeranians lived to the west of all. In the VI century, this Slav group of Slavs occupied about a third of the territory of modern Germany. Conflicts between different ethnic groups were permanent. The new colonialists forced the Lombards, Varins and Rugs (who spoke Germanic languages) from the shores of the Baltic Sea .
A curious evidence of the presence of the Slavs on present German soil is the name of Berlin. Linguists figured out the nature of the origin of the word. In the language of the Slavic Slavs, “burlin” meant a dam. There are many of them in northeast Germany. That's how far the ancestors of the Slavs penetrated. As early as 623, these same colonists joined Prince Samo in his rebellion against the Avars. Periodically, under the successors of Charlemagne, the Slavic Slavs entered into an alliance with the Franks in their campaigns on the Kaganate.
German feudal lords launched an attack on strangers in the 9th century. Gradually, the Slavs who lived on the banks of the Elbe obeyed them. Today, only small isolated groups have remained of them, including several thousand people each, who have retained their own unique dialect, unlike even Polish. In the Middle Ages, the Germans called all neighboring Western Slavs Wends.
Language and Writing
To understand who the Slavs are, it is best to turn to the history of their language. Once, when this nation was still one, it had one dialect. It received the name of the Pre-Slavic language. No written monuments were left of him. It is only known that he belonged to a vast Indo-European family of languages, which makes him related to many other languages: Germanic, Romance, etc. Some linguists and historians put forward additional theories about its origin. According to one hypothesis, the Proto-Slavic language at some stage of its development was part of the Prabaltoslav language, until the Baltic languages ​​were isolated in their own group.
Gradually, every nation had its own dialect. On the basis of one of these dialects, spoken by the Slavs who lived in the vicinity of the city of Soluni, the brothers Cyril and Methodius in the 9th century created Slavic Christian writing. Enlightenment did this by decree of the Byzantine emperor. Writing was necessary for the translation of Christian books and sermons among the Gentiles. Over time, she became known as the Cyrillic alphabet. This alphabet is today the basis of the Belarusian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, Serbian, Ukrainian and Montenegrin languages. The remaining Slavs who converted to Catholicism use the Latin alphabet.
In the XX century, archaeologists began to find many artifacts that became monuments of ancient Cyrillic writing. The key place for these excavations was Novgorod. Thanks to finds in its vicinity, experts learned a lot about what the ancient Slavic writing and culture represented.
For example, the so-called Gnezdovskaya inscription made on a clay jug in the middle of the 10th century is considered to be the oldest Eastern Slavic text in Cyrillic. The artifact was found in 1949 by archaeologist Daniil Avdusin. A thousand kilometers from there, back in 1912, a lead seal with a Cyrillic inscription was found in the ancient Kiev church. Archaeologists who deciphered it decided that it means the name of Prince Svyatoslav, who ruled in 945-972. It is interesting that then in Russia paganism remained the main religion, although Christianity and the same Cyrillic were already in Bulgaria. Slavic names in such ancient inscriptions help to more accurately identify the artifact.
The question of whether the Slavs had their own written language before the adoption of Christianity remains open. Fragmentary references to it are found in some authors of that era, however, these inaccurate evidence is not enough to compile a complete picture. Perhaps the Slavs used cuts and traits to transmit information using images. Such letters could be ritual in nature and used in fortune telling.
Religion and Culture
Pre-Christian paganism of the Slavs developed over several centuries and acquired independent unique features. This belief consisted of the spiritualization of nature, animism, animatism, the cult of supernatural powers, veneration of ancestors and magic. Original mythological texts that would help lift the veil of secrecy over Slavic paganism have not survived to this day. Historians can judge this faith only from chronicles, chronicles, testimonies of foreigners, and other secondary sources.
In Slavic mythology, traits are characteristic of other Indo-European cults. For example, in the pantheon there is a god of thunder and war (Perun), a god of the other world and cattle (Veles), a deity with the image of the Father-Heaven (Stribog). All this in one form or another is also in Iranian, Baltic and German mythology.
Gods for the Slavs were the highest sacred creatures. The fate of any person depended on their complacency. In the most important, responsible and dangerous moments, each tribe turned to its supernatural patrons. Sculptures of gods (idols) were widespread among the Slavs. They were made of wood and stone. The most famous episode related to idols was mentioned in the annals in connection with the Baptism of Russia. Prince Vladimir, as a sign of the adoption of a new faith, ordered the idols of the old gods to be thrown into the Dnieper. This act was a clear demonstration of the beginning of a new era. Even despite the Christianization that began at the end of the 10th century, paganism continued to live, especially in the remote and bearish corners of Russia. Some of its features were mixed with Orthodoxy and preserved in the form of folk customs (for example, calendar holidays). Interestingly, Slavic names often appeared as references to religious beliefs (for example, Bogdan - “given by God”, etc.).
To worship pagan spirits there were special shrines called temples. The life of the ancestors of the Slavs was closely connected with these sacred places. Temple rooms existed only among western tribes (Poles, Czechs), while their eastern brethren did not have such buildings. Old Russian sanctuaries were open groves. On the temples they worshiped the gods.
In addition to idols, the Slavs, like the Baltic tribes, had sacred boulder stones. Perhaps this custom was adopted from the Finno-Ugric peoples. The cult of the ancestors was associated with the Slavic funeral rite. During the funeral, ritual dances and chants were held (chanting). The body of the deceased was not interred, but burned at the stake. The dust and the remaining bones were collected in a special vessel, which was left at the stake on the road.
The history of the ancient Slavs would be completely different if all the tribes did not accept Christianity. Both Orthodoxy and Catholicism included them in a single European medieval civilization.