SLAVS, the largest group in Europe related peoples. The total number of Slavs is about 300 million people. Modern Slavs are divided into three branches: eastern (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians), southern (Bulgarians, Serbs, Montenegrins, Croats, Slovenes, Muslim Bosnians, Macedonians) and western (Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Lusatians). They speak languages of the Slavic group of the Indo-European family. The origin of the ethnonym Slavs is not clear enough. Apparently, it goes back to a common Indo-European root, the semantic content of which is the concept of “man”, “people”, “speaking”. In this meaning, the ethnonym Slavs is registered in a number of Slavic languages (including in the ancient Polabian language, where “slavak”, “tslavak” meant “person”). This ethnonym (Middle Slovenes, Slovaks, Slovinians, Novgorod Slovenes) in various modifications is most often traced on the periphery of the settlement of the Slavs.
The question of ethnogenesis and the so-called ancestral home of the Slavs remains controversial. The ethnogenesis of the Slavs probably developed in stages (Proto-Slavs, Proto-Slavs and the Early Slavic ethnolinguistic community). By the end of the 1st millennium AD, separate Slavic ethnic communities (tribes and tribal unions) were taking shape. Ethnogenetic processes were accompanied by migrations, differentiation and integration of peoples, ethnic and local groups, assimilation phenomena in which various, both Slavic and non-Slavic, ethnic groups took part as substrates or components. Contact zones emerged and changed, which were characterized by ethnic processes of various types in the epicenter and on the periphery. IN modern science The most widely recognized views were those according to which the Slavic ethnic community originally formed in an area either between the Oder (Odra) and the Vistula (Oder-Vistula theory), or between the Oder and the Middle Dnieper (Oder-Dnieper theory). Linguists believe that speakers of the Proto-Slavic language consolidated no later than the 2nd millennium BC.
From here began the gradual advance of the Slavs in the southwestern, western and northern directions, coinciding mainly with the final phase of the Great Migration of Peoples (V-VII centuries). At the same time, the Slavs interacted with Iranian, Thracian, Dacian, Celtic, Germanic, Baltic, Finno-Ugric and other ethnic components. By the 6th century, the Slavs occupied the Danube territories that were part of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire, crossed the Danube around 577 and in the middle of the 7th century settled in the Balkans (Moesia, Thrace, Macedonia, most of Greece, Dalmatia, Istria), penetrating partially into Malaya Asia. At the same time, in the 6th century, the Slavs, having mastered Dacia and Pannonia, reached the Alpine regions. Between the 6th-7th centuries (mainly at the end of the 6th century), another part of the Slavs settled between the Oder and the Elbe (Laba), moving partially to the left bank of the latter (the so-called Wendland in Germany). From the 7th-8th centuries there was an intensive advance of the Slavs into the central and northern zones of Eastern Europe. As a result, in the 9th-10th centuries. A vast area of Slavic settlement developed: from North-East Europe and the Baltic Sea to the Mediterranean and from the Volga to the Elbe. At the same time, there was a collapse of the Proto-Slavic ethnolinguistic community and the formation of Slavic language groups and, later, the languages of individual Slavic ethnosocial communities on the basis of local prodialects.
Ancient authors of the 1st-2nd centuries and Byzantine sources of the 6th-7th centuries mention the Slavs under different names, then calling them generally Wends, then singling out among them the Antes and Sklavins. It is possible, however, that such names (especially “Vends”, “Antes”) were used to designate not only the Slavs themselves, but also neighboring or other peoples associated with them. In modern science, the location of the Antes is usually localized in the Northern Black Sea region (between the Seversky Donets and the Carpathians), and the Sklavins are interpreted as their western neighbors. In the 6th century, the Antes, together with the Sklavins, took part in the wars against Byzantium and partially settled in the Balkans. The ethnonym "Anty" disappears from written sources in the 7th century. It is possible that it was reflected in the later ethnonym of the Eastern Slavic tribe“Vyatichi”, in the generalized designation of Slavic groups in Germany - “Vendi”. Beginning in the 6th century, Byzantine authors increasingly reported the existence of the Slavinii (Slavius). Their occurrence has been recorded at different ends Slavic world- in the Balkans (“Seven clans”, Berzitia among the Berzite tribe, Draguvitia among the Draguvites, etc.), in Central Europe (“the state of Samo”), among the eastern and western (including Pomeranian and Polabian) Slavs. These were fragile formations that arose and disintegrated again, changing territories and uniting various tribes. Thus, the state of Samo, which emerged in the 7th century for protection from the Avars, Bavarians, Lombards, and Franks, united the Slavs of the Czech Republic, Moravia, Slovakia, Lusatia and (partially) Croatia and Slovenia. The emergence of the “Slavinia” on a tribal and inter-tribal basis reflected the internal changes of the ancient Slavic society, in which the process of formation of the propertied elite was underway, and the power of the tribal princes gradually developed into hereditary power.
The emergence of statehood among the Slavs dates back to the 7th-9th centuries. The founding date of the Bulgarian state (the First Bulgarian Kingdom) is considered to be 681. Although at the end of the 10th century Bulgaria became dependent on Byzantium, as shown further development, the Bulgarian people by this time had already acquired a stable identity. In the second half of the 8th - first half of the 9th centuries. Statehood is being established among the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. In the 9th century, the Old Russian statehood took shape with centers in Staraya Ladoga, Novgorod and Kyiv (Kievan Rus). By the 9th - early 10th centuries. refers to the existence of the Great Moravian Empire, which had great importance for the development of pan-Slavic culture - here in 863 it began educational activities the creators of Slavic writing, Constantine (Cyril) and Methodius, continued by their students (after the defeat of Orthodoxy in Great Moravia) in Bulgaria. The boundaries of the Great Moravian state at the time of its greatest prosperity included Moravia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, as well as Lusatia, part of Pannonia and the Slovenian lands and, apparently, Lesser Poland. In the 9th century, the Old Polish state emerged. At the same time, a process of Christianization took place, with the majority of the South Slavs and all East Slavs ended up in the sphere of the Greek Orthodox Church, and the Western Slavs (including Croats and Slovenes) - in the Roman Catholic Church. Some Western Slavs in XV-XVI centuries Reformation movements arose (Husism, the community of Czech brothers, etc. in the Czech Kingdom, Arianism in Poland, Calvinism among the Slovaks, Protestantism in Slovenia, etc.), which were largely suppressed during the period of the Counter-Reformation.
The transition to state formations reflected a qualitatively new stage in the ethnosocial development of the Slavs - the beginning of the formation of nationalities.
On the character, dynamics and pace of folding Slavic peoples the determining influence was exerted by social factors (the presence of “complete” or “incomplete” ethnosocial structures) and political (the presence or absence of their own state legal institutions, the stability or mobility of the boundaries of early state entities and so on.). Political factors in some cases, especially in initial stages ethnic history, acquired decisive importance. Thus, the further process of development of the Great Moravian ethnic community on the basis of the Moravian-Czech, Slovak, Pannonian and Lusatian Slavic tribes that were part of Great Moravia turned out to be impossible after the fall of this state under the blows of the Hungarians in 906. There was a severance of economic and political ties between this part of the Slavic ethnic group and its administrative-territorial disunity, which created a new ethnic situation. On the contrary, the emergence and consolidation of the Old Russian state in eastern Europe was the most important factor in the further consolidation of the East Slavic tribes into a relatively unified Old Russian nation.
In the 9th century, the lands inhabited by tribes - the ancestors of the Slovenes, were captured by the Germans and from 962 became part of the Holy Roman Empire, and at the beginning of the 10th century, the ancestors of the Slovaks, after the fall of the Great Moravian Empire, were included in the Hungarian state. Despite long-term resistance to German expansion, the bulk of the Polabian and Pomeranian Slavs lost their independence and were subjected to forced assimilation. Despite the disappearance of this group of Western Slavs of their own ethnopolitical base, individual groups of them in different regions Germany remained for a long time - until the 18th century, and in Brandenburg and near Luneburg even until the 19th century. The exceptions were the Lusatians, as well as the Kashubians (the latter later became part of the Polish nation).
Around the 13th-14th centuries, the Bulgarian, Serbian, Croatian, Czech and Polish peoples began to move to a new phase of their development. However, this process among the Bulgarians and Serbs was interrupted at the end of the 14th century by the Ottoman invasion, as a result of which they lost their independence for five centuries, and the ethnosocial structures of these peoples were deformed. Croatia, due to danger from outside, recognized the power of the Hungarian kings in 1102, but retained autonomy and an ethnically Croatian ruling class. This had a positive impact on the further development of the Croatian people, although the territorial separation of the Croatian lands led to the conservation of ethnic regionalism. By the beginning of the 17th century, the Polish and Czech nationalities reached high degree consolidation. But in the Czech lands, included in 1620 as part of the Habsburg Austrian monarchy, as a result of the events of the Thirty Years' War and the policies of the Counter-Reformation in the 17th century, ethnic composition ruling layers and the townspeople have undergone significant changes. Although Poland before the partitions late XVIII centuries maintained independence, the general unfavorable domestic and foreign political situation and the lag in economic development slowed down the process of nation formation.
The ethnic history of the Slavs in Eastern Europe had its own specific characteristics. The consolidation of the Old Russian people was influenced not only by the closeness of culture and the relatedness of the dialects used by the Eastern Slavs, but also by the similarity of their socio-economic development. The uniqueness of the process of formation of individual nationalities, and later ethnic groups, among the Eastern Slavs (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians) was that they survived the stage of Old Russian nationality and common statehood. Their further formation was a consequence of the differentiation of the Old Russian people into three independent closely related ethnic groups (XIV-XVI centuries). IN XVII-XVIII centuries Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians again found themselves part of one state - Russia, now as three independent ethnic groups.
In the 18th-19th centuries, East Slavic peoples developed into modern nations. This process occurred among Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians at different rates (the most intense among Russians, the slowest among Belarusians), which was determined by the unique historical, ethno-political and ethnocultural situations that each of the three peoples experienced. Thus, for Belarusians and Ukrainians, an important role was played by the need to resist polonization and Magyarization, the incompleteness of their ethnosocial structure, formed as a result of the merger of their own upper social strata with the upper social strata of Lithuanians, Poles, Russians, etc.
Among the Western and Southern Slavs, the formation of nations, with some asynchrony of the initial boundaries of this process, begins in the second half of the 18th century. Despite the formational commonality, in terms of stages, there were differences between the regions of Central and South-Eastern Europe: if for the Western Slavs this process basically ended in the 60s of the 19th century, then for the southern Slavs - after the liberation Russian-Turkish war of 1877-78.
Until 1918, Poles, Czechs and Slovaks were part of multinational empires, and the task of creating national statehood remained unresolved. At the same time, the political factor retained its importance in the process of formation of the Slavic nations. The consolidation of the independence of Montenegro in 1878 created the basis for the subsequent formation of the Montenegrin nation. After the decisions of the Berlin Congress of 1878 and changes in borders in the Balkans, most of Macedonia was outside the borders of Bulgaria, which subsequently led to the formation of the Macedonian nation. At the beginning of the 20th century, and especially in the period between the first and second world wars, when the Western and Southern Slavs gained state independence, this process, however, was controversial.
After the February Revolution of 1917, attempts were made to create Ukrainian and Belarusian statehood. In 1922, Ukraine and Belarus, together with other Soviet republics, were the founders of the USSR (in 1991 they declared themselves sovereign states). Established in Slavic countries In Europe in the second half of the 1940s, totalitarian regimes with the dominance of the administrative-command system had a deforming effect on ethnic processes (violation of the rights of ethnic minorities in Bulgaria, ignorance by the leadership of Czechoslovakia of the autonomous status of Slovakia, aggravation of interethnic contradictions in Yugoslavia, etc.). This was one of the most important reasons for the national crisis in the Slavic countries of Europe, which led here, starting from 1989-1990, to significant changes in the socio-economic and ethnopolitical situation. Modern processes democratization of the socio-economic, political and spiritual life of the Slavic peoples creates qualitatively new opportunities for expanding interethnic contacts and cultural cooperation that have strong traditions.
The Slavs are perhaps one of the largest ethnic communities in Europe, and there are numerous myths about the nature of their origin.
But what do we really know about the Slavs?
Who the Slavs are, where they came from, and where their ancestral home is, we will try to figure it out.
Origin of the Slavs
There are several theories of the origin of the Slavs, according to which some historians attribute them to a tribe permanently residing in Europe, others to the Scythians and Sarmatians who came from Central Asia, and there are many other theories. Let's look at them sequentially:
The most popular theory is about the Aryan origin of the Slavs.
The authors of this hypothesis are the theorists of the “Norman history of the origin of Rus',” which was developed and put forward in the 18th century by a group of German scientists: Bayer, Miller and Schlozer, for the substantiation of which the Radzvilov or Königsberg Chronicle was concocted.
The essence of this theory was as follows: the Slavs are an Indo-European people who migrated to Europe during the Great Migration of Peoples, and were part of some ancient “German-Slavic” community. But as a result of various factors, having broken away from the civilization of the Germans and finding itself on the border with the wild eastern peoples, and becoming cut off from the advanced Roman civilization at that time, it fell so far behind in its development that the paths of their development radically diverged.
Archeology confirms the existence of strong intercultural ties between the Germans and the Slavs, and in general the theory is more than respectable if you remove the Aryan roots of the Slavs from it.
The second popular theory is more European in nature, and it is much older than the Norman one.
According to his theory, the Slavs were no different from other European tribes: Vandals, Burgundians, Goths, Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Gepids, Getae, Alans, Avars, Dacians, Thracians and Illyrians, and were of the same Slavic tribe
The theory was quite popular in Europe, and the idea of the origin of the Slavs from the ancient Romans, and Rurik from the Emperor Octavian Augustus, was very popular with historians of that time.
The European origin of peoples is also confirmed by the theory of the German scientist Harald Harmann, who called Pannonia the homeland of Europeans.
But I still like it more simple theory, which is based on a selective combination of the most plausible facts from other theories of the origin of not so much the Slavic as the European peoples as a whole.
I don’t think I need to tell you that the Slavs are strikingly similar to both the Germans and the ancient Greeks.
So, the Slavs came, like others European peoples, after the flood, from Iran, and they landed in Illaria, the cradle European culture, and from here, through Pannonia, they went to explore Europe, fighting and assimilating with the local peoples, from whom they acquired their differences.
Those who remained in Illaria created the first European civilization, which we now know as the Etruscans, the fate of other peoples depended largely on the place they chose for settlement.
It’s hard for us to imagine, but virtually all European peoples and their ancestors were nomads. The Slavs were like that too...
Remember the most ancient Slavic symbol, which fit so organically into Ukrainian culture: the crane, which the Slavs identified with their most important task, exploration of territories, the task of going, settling and covering more and more new territories.
Just as cranes flew into unknown distances, so the Slavs walked across the continent, burning out forests and organizing settlements.
And as the population of the settlements grew, they collected the strongest and healthiest young men and women and sent them on a long journey, as scouts, to explore new lands.
Age of the Slavs
It is difficult to say when the Slavs stood out as one people from the pan-European ethnic mass.
Nestor attributes this event to the Babylonian pandemonium.
Mavro Orbini by 1496 BC, about which he writes: “At the indicated time, the Goths and Slavs were of the same tribe. And having subjugated Sarmatia, the Slavic tribe was divided into several tribes and received different names: Wends, Slavs, Ants, Verls, Alans, Massetians... Vandals, Goths, Avars, Roskolans, Polyans, Czechs, Silesians....”
But if we combine the data of archaeology, genetics and linguistics, we can say that the Slavs belonged to the Indo-European community, which most likely emerged from the Dnieper archaeological culture, which was located between the Dnieper and Don rivers, seven thousand years ago during the Stone Age.
And from here the influence of this culture spread to the territory from the Vistula to the Urals, although no one has yet been able to accurately localize it.
Around four thousand years BC, it again split into three conditional groups: the Celts and Romans in the West, the Indo-Iranians in the East, and the Germans, Balts and Slavs in Central and Eastern Europe.
And around the 1st millennium BC appeared Slavic language.
Archeology, however, insists that the Slavs are carriers of the “culture of subklosh burials,” which received its name from the custom of covering cremated remains with a large vessel.
This culture existed in the V-II centuries BC between the Vistula and the Dnieper.
The ancestral home of the Slavs
Orbini sees Scandinavia as the original Slavic land, referring to a number of authors: “The descendants of Japheth, the son of Noah, moved north to Europe, penetrating into the country now called Scandinavia. There they multiplied innumerably, as St. Augustine points out in his “City of God,” where he writes that the sons and descendants of Japheth had two hundred homelands and occupied the lands located north of Mount Taurus in Cilicia, along the Northern Ocean, half of Asia, and throughout Europe all the way to the British Ocean."
Nestor calls the homeland of the Slavs the lands along the lower reaches of the Dnieper and Pannonia.
The prominent Czech historian Pavel Safarik believed that the ancestral home of the Slavs should be sought in Europe in the vicinity of the Alps, from where the Slavs left for the Carpathians under the pressure of Celtic expansion.
There was even a version about the ancestral home of the Slavs, located between the lower reaches of the Neman and Western Dvina, and where the Slavic people themselves were formed, in the 2nd century BC, in the Vistula River basin.
The Vistula-Dnieper hypothesis about the ancestral home of the Slavs is by far the most popular.
Her in sufficiently confirmed by local toponyms, as well as vocabulary.
Plus, the areas of the Podklosh burial culture already known to us fully correspond to these geographical characteristics!
Origin of the name "Slavs"
The word “Slavs” came into common use already in the 6th century AD, among Byzantine historians. They were spoken of as allies of Byzantium.
The Slavs themselves began to call themselves that in the Middle Ages, judging by the chronicles.
According to another version, the names come from the word “word”, since the “Slavs”, unlike other peoples, knew how to both write and read.
Mavro Orbini writes: “During their residence in Sarmatia, they took the name “Slavs”, which means “glorious”.
There is a version that relates the self-name of the Slavs to the territory of origin, and according to it, the name is based on the name of the river “Slavutich”, the original name of the Dnieper, which contains a root with the meaning “to wash”, “to cleanse”.
An important, but completely unpleasant version for the Slavs states that there is a connection between the self-name “Slavs” and the Middle Greek word for “slave” (σκλάβος).
It was especially popular in the Middle Ages.
The idea that the Slavs, as the most numerous people in Europe at that time, made up the largest number of slaves and were a sought-after commodity in the slave trade, has a place to be.
Let us remember that for many centuries the number of Slavic slaves supplied to Constantinople was unprecedented.
And, realizing that the Slavs were dutiful and hardworking slaves in many ways superior to all other peoples, they were not just a sought-after commodity, but also became the standard idea of a “slave.”
In fact, through their own labor, the Slavs ousted other names for slaves from use, no matter how offensive it may sound, and again, this is only a version.
The most correct version lies in a correct and balanced analysis of the name of our people, by resorting to which one can understand that the Slavs are a community united by one common religion: paganism, who glorified their gods with words that they could not only pronounce, but also write!
Words that had a sacred meaning, and not the bleating and mooing of barbarian peoples.
The Slavs brought glory to their gods, and glorifying them, glorifying their deeds, they united into a single Slavic civilization, a cultural link of pan-European culture.
SLAVS, Slavs (Slavs outdated), units. Slav, Slav, husband. A group of peoples living in eastern and central Europe and the Balkans. East Slavs. Southern Slavs. Western Slavs. “Leave it alone: this is a dispute among the Slavs among themselves.” Pushkin... ... Ushakov's Explanatory Dictionary
SLAVS, a group of peoples in Europe: Eastern Slavs (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians), Western Slavs (Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Lusatians), Southern Slavs (Bulgarians, Serbs, Croats, Slovenians, Macedonians, Bosnians, Montenegrins). They speak Slavic... ...Russian history
Ancient, a group of Indo-European tribes. First mentioned in the 1st and 2nd centuries. in ancient Roman sources under the name of the Wends. According to the assumption of a number of researchers, the Slavs, along with the Germans and Balts, were descendants of pastoralists and agriculturalists... Art encyclopedia
Slovenian Dictionary of Russian synonyms. Slavs noun, number of synonyms: 1 Slovenes (2) ASIS Dictionary of Synonyms. V.N. Trishin. 2013… Synonym dictionary
Modern encyclopedia
Group of peoples in Europe: eastern (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians), western (Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Lusatians), southern (Bulgarians, Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Macedonians, Bosnians, Montenegrins). 293.5 million people (1992), including in the Russian Federation... ... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary
SLAVS, yang, unit. Yanin, ah, husband. One of the largest groups in Europe of peoples related in language and culture, making up three branches: East Slavic (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians), West Slavic (Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Lusatians) and... ... Ozhegov's Explanatory Dictionary
Slavs- (Slavs), group of peoples of the East. Europe, known in Ancient. Rome as the Sarmatians or Scythians. It is believed that the word S. comes from slowo (well-spoken; the word Slovenian has the same root). After the collapse of the Hunnic state in the 5th century. S. migrated to 3 ... The World History
Slavs- SLAVS, a group of related peoples with a total number of 293,500 thousand people. Main regions of settlement: countries of Eastern Europe (about 290,500 thousand people). They speak Slavic languages. Religious affiliation of believers: Orthodox, Catholics,... ... Illustrated Encyclopedic Dictionary
The largest group of peoples in Europe, united by the proximity of languages (see Slavic languages) and common origin. The total number of glory. peoples in 1970 about 260 million people, of which: Russians over 130 million, Ukrainians 41.5 million... Big Soviet encyclopedia
Books
- Slavs, their mutual relations and connections T. 1-3, . Slavs, their mutual relations and connections / Op. Joseph Pervolf, order. prof. Warsaw. un-ta. T. 1-3A 183/690 U 62/317 U 390/30 U 238/562: Warsaw: typ. Warsaw. textbook okr., 1893: Reproduced in...
- Slavs in European history and civilization, Frantisek Dvornik. The proposed publication is the first monographic publication in Russian by one of the largest Byzantinists and Slavists in the 20th century, Frantisek Dvornik (1893-1975). Book `Slavs…
The Slavs today are the largest ethno-linguistic community in Europe. They inhabit vast territories and number about 300-350 million people. In this article we will look at what branches are divided into Slavic peoples, let's talk about the history of their formation and division. We will also touch a little on the modern stage of the spread of Slavic culture and the religious views that the tribes adhered to during their development and formation.
Origin theories
So, according to medieval chroniclers, our peoples come from common ancestor. He was Japheth. This character, according to the chronicles, gave birth to such tribes as the Medes, Sarmatians, Scythians, Thracians, Illyrians, Slavs, British and other European peoples.
The Arabs knew the Slavs as part of the community of peoples of the West, which included the Turks, Ugrians and Europe. In their military records, historians associate this conglomerate with the word "Sakalib". Later, deserters from the Byzantine army who converted to Islam began to be called this.
The ancient Greeks and Romans called the Slavs “Sclavinians” and correlated them with one of the Scythian tribes - the Skolots. Also, the ethnonyms Wends and Slavs are sometimes brought together.
Thus, the three branches of the Slavic peoples, the diagram of which is given below, have a common ancestor. But later, the paths of their development diverged significantly, due to the vast territory of settlement and the influence of neighboring cultures and beliefs.
History of settlement
Later we will touch upon each group of tribes separately, but now we should understand into which branches the Slavic peoples are divided and how the settlement process took place.
So, for the first time these tribes were mentioned by Tacitus and Pliny the Elder. These ancient Roman historians spoke in their notes about the Wends who inhabited the Baltic territories. Judging by the period of life of these statesmen, the Slavs existed already in the second century AD.
The next who spoke about these same tribes were Procopius of Caesarea and Priscus, a Byzantine writer and scientist. But the most complete information that relates to the pre-chronicle period is available from the Gothic historian Jordan.
He reports that the Sklavens are an independent tribe that separated from the Venets. In the territories north of the Vistula River (modern Vistula), he mentions the “numerous people of the Veneti,” who are divided into Antes and Sklavens. The first lived along the Pontus Euxine (Black Sea) from Danaster (Dniester) to Danapra (Dnieper). The Sklavens lived from Novietun (the city of Iskach on the Danube) to Danastra and Vistula in the north.
Thus, in the sixth century AD, the Sklavens already lived in the lands from the Dniester to the Vistula and the Danube. Later, various chroniclers will mention a much wider area of settlement of these tribes. It covered the lands of Central and Eastern Europe.
How did the three branches of the Slavic peoples split? The diagram we gave above shows that the movement went north, south and east.
Initially, the tribes moved towards the Black and Baltic Seas. It is precisely this period that is described by the Gothic historian Jordan. Then the Avars invade these lands and split the unified area of the tribes into parts.
Over the course of two centuries (from the sixth to the eighth) they settled in the eastern foothills of the Alps and fell under the rule of Emperor Justinian II. We know this from references in the chronicles, which spoke of the campaign of the Byzantine army against the Arabs. Sklavins are also mentioned as part of the army.
In the eighth century, these tribes reached the Balkan Peninsula in the south and Lake Ladoga in the north.
Southern Slavs
Western and southern Slavs, as we see, were formed in different time. First, the Antes separated from the conglomerate of tribes and went east, towards the Black Sea and the Dnieper. Only in the eighth century did this people begin to populate the Balkan Peninsula.
The process went as follows. Some East and West Slavic tribes moved in search of better lands to the southwest, towards the Adriatic Sea.
Historians identify the following groups in this migration: Obodrites (in European chronicles known as Pre-Denicents), Severtsy (possible connection with the Northerners), Serbs, Croats and others. Basically, these are tribes that lived along the Danube River.
Later it was replaced by the Penkovsky archaeological community. There is a gap of two centuries between these cultures, but it is believed that such a gap is caused by the assimilation of some tribes with others.
Thus, the origin of the Slavic peoples was the result of the authentic formation of larger communities from a number of small tribal associations. Later chroniclers Kievan Rus will give names to these groups: Polyans, Drevlyans, Dregovichi, Vyatichi and other tribes.
According to ancient Russian chronicles, as a result of the unification of fifteen groups of Eastern Slavs, such a powerful medieval power as Kievan Rus was formed.
Current situation
So, we discussed what branches the Slavic peoples are divided into. In addition, we talked about how exactly the process of resettlement of tribes to the south and east took place.
Modern Slavic peoples are slightly different from their direct ancestors. In their culture they combine the imprints of influences from both neighboring peoples and many alien conquerors.
For example, the bulk of the regions of the western Russian Federation and Ukraine, which were once part of Kievan Rus, were under the Mongol-Tatar yoke for several centuries. Therefore, many borrowings from Turkic languages are included in the dialects. Also some traditional ornaments and rituals preserve the imprints of the culture of the enslavers.
South Slavs in to a greater extent were influenced by the Greeks and Turks. Therefore, at the end of the article we will have to talk about religious issues. The once pagan tribes today are adherents of different denominations of the Abrahamic religions.
Descendants may not know in detail what branches the Slavic peoples are divided into, but, as a rule, everyone easily recognizes their “countryman”. The Southern Slavs are traditionally darker-skinned, and their dialect contains specific phonemes that are characteristic only of this region. A similar situation exists with the descendants of Western and Eastern tribal associations.
So, what countries today have become the homeland for different branches of the Slavic people?
States of the South Slavs
Modern Slavic peoples are spread across much of Eastern and Central Europe. However, in the context of globalization, their representatives can be found in almost every country in the world. Moreover, the peculiarity of our mentality is such that after a short time our neighbors begin to understand Slavic languages. The Slavs have always sought to introduce foreigners to their culture, while giving in little to the process of their own assimilation.
Modern southern Slavs include Slovenes and Montenegrins, Macedonians and Bulgarians, Croats, Bosnians and Serbs. Basically, these peoples live on the territory of their national states, which include Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Serbia and Croatia.
That is, in fact, this is the territory of the Balkan Peninsula and the northeastern part of the Adriatic Sea coast.
The southern Slavic peoples today are increasingly moving away from the idea of the community of these peoples, joining new family European Union. True, several decades ago there was an attempt to create one common country with a population consisting only of southern Slavs, but it failed. This state was once called Yugoslavia.
Outside the national states, representatives of this branch of the Slavic peoples, according to official statistics, live quite a lot in Italy, Hungary, Austria, Romania, Turkey, Albania, Greece and Moldova.
Countries of the Western Slavs
Since the ethnogenesis of the Slavic peoples mainly took place initially on the territory of modern Poland and Germany, representatives of Western tribes practically did not leave their homes.
Today their descendants live in Poland, Germany, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Traditionally, ethnologists distinguish five peoples that belong to the West Slavic branch. These are Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Kashubians and Lusatians.
The first three ethnic groups live mainly in states with corresponding names, and the last two live in separate regions. Lusatian Serbs, to whom the Vends, Lugians and Sorbs also belong, inhabit Lusatia. This territory is divided into Upper and Lower parts, which are located in Saxony and Brandenburg, respectively.
The Kashubians live on a land called Kashubia. It is part of the modern Polish People's Republic. The unofficial capital of this people is the city of Kartuzy. There are also many representatives of this nationality found in Gdynia.
Kashubians consider themselves an ethnic group, but they recognize Polish citizenship. In their environment, they are divided into several formations depending on their place of residence, characteristics national costume, activities and class differences. So, among them there are zaboriaks, parchan gentry, gburs, taverns, gokhs and other groups.
Thus, we can say with confidence that the majority of Western Slavic peoples have preserved their customs as much as possible. Some of them are even still engaged in traditional trades and crafts, although more to attract tourists.
East Slavic powers
The modern territory belongs to countries such as Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Today, these states can be said to be at a crossroads. Their peoples are faced with a choice: to remain committed to traditional ways of life or to follow the path of their southern brothers, adopting Western European values.
The once powerful power - Kievan Rus over time transformed into three countries. The Muscovite kingdom was formed around Moscow, and after that Russian empire. Kyiv united around itself the lands of many tribes from the Carpathians to the Don. And Belarus was formed in the forests of Polesie. Based on the name of the territory, the main part of the country is inhabited by descendants of Poleschuks and Pinchuks.
Religions of different branches of the Slavs
The Russian Federation, Ukraine and Belarus are the modern territory of the Eastern Slavs. Here the majority of the population is Orthodox Christians.
In principle, the official departure from paganism occurred in the tenth century, when the Kiev prince Vladimir the Great baptized Rus'. But in 1054 there was a great schism, when separate Orthodox and Catholic faiths appeared in Christianity. The eastern and southeastern tribes remained loyal to the Patriarch of Constantinople, while the western and southwestern ones became supporters of the Roman Catholic Church.
At a certain stage in history, certain groups of southern Slavs converted to Islam. This is explained by the fact that their lands were under oppression Ottoman Empire. The Turks made many concessions for their co-religionists. Today, Muslims include Gorani, Bosniaks, Pomaks, Kuchis and Torbeshis.
Thus, in this article we studied the ethnogenesis of the Slavic peoples, and also talked about their division into three branches. In addition, we figured out which modern countries belong to the territory of settlement of the southern, western and eastern tribes.
The Slavs are Europe's largest ethnic group, but what do we really know about them? Historians still argue about who they came from, where their homeland was located, and where the self-name “Slavs” came from.
Origin of the Slavs
There are many hypotheses about the origin of the Slavs. Some attribute them to the Scythians and Sarmatians who came from Central Asia, others to the Aryans and Germans, others even identify them with the Celts. All hypotheses of the origin of the Slavs can be divided into two main categories, directly opposite friend to a friend. One of them, the well-known “Norman” one, was put forward in the 18th century by German scientists Bayer, Miller and Schlozer, although such ideas first appeared during the reign of Ivan the Terrible.
The bottom line was this: the Slavs are an Indo-European people who were once part of the “German-Slavic” community, but broke away from the Germans during the Great Migration. Finding themselves on the periphery of Europe and cut off from the continuity of Roman civilization, they were very behind in development, so much so that they could not create their own state and invited the Varangians, that is, the Vikings, to rule them.
This theory is based on the historiographical tradition of the Tale of Bygone Years and famous phrase: “Our land is great and rich, but there is no harmony in it. Come reign and rule over us." Such a categorical interpretation, which was based on obvious ideological background, could not but arouse criticism. Today, archeology confirms the presence of strong intercultural ties between the Scandinavians and Slavs, but it hardly suggests that the former played a decisive role in the formation ancient Russian state. But the debate about the “Norman” origin of the Slavs and Kievan Rus does not subside to this day.
The second theory of the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, on the contrary, is patriotic in nature. And, by the way, it is much older than the Norman one - one of its founders was the Croatian historian Mavro Orbini, who wrote a work called “The Slavic Kingdom” at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th centuries. His point of view was very extraordinary: among the Slavs he included the Vandals, Burgundians, Goths, Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Gepids, Getae, Alans, Verls, Avars, Dacians, Swedes, Normans, Finns, Ukrainians, Marcomanni, Quadi, Thracians and Illyrians and many others: “They were all of the same Slavic tribe, as will be seen later.”
Their exodus from the historical homeland of Orbini dates back to 1460 BC. Where did they not have time to visit after that: “The Slavs fought with almost all the tribes of the world, attacked Persia, ruled Asia and Africa, fought with the Egyptians and Alexander the Great, conquered Greece, Macedonia and Illyria, occupied Moravia, the Czech Republic, Poland and the coasts of the Baltic Sea "
He was echoed by many court scribes who created the theory of the origin of the Slavs from the ancient Romans, and Rurik from the Emperor Octavian Augustus. In the 18th century, the Russian historian Tatishchev published the so-called “Joachim Chronicle,” which, as opposed to the “Tale of Bygone Years,” identified the Slavs with the ancient Greeks.
Both of these theories (although there are echoes of truth in each of them) represent two extremes, which are characterized by a free interpretation historical facts and archaeological information. They were criticized by such “giants” national history, like B. Grekov, B. Rybakov, V. Yanin, A. Artsikhovsky, arguing that a historian should in his research rely not on his preferences, but on facts. However, the historical texture of the “ethnogenesis of the Slavs”, to this day, is so incomplete that it leaves many options for speculation, without the ability to definitively answer main question: “Who are these Slavs anyway?”
Age of the people
The next pressing problem for historians is the age of the Slavic ethnic group. When did the Slavs finally emerge as a single people from the pan-European ethnic “mess”? The first attempt to answer this question belongs to the author of “The Tale of Bygone Years” - monk Nestor. Taking the biblical tradition as a basis, he began the history of the Slavs with the Babylonian pandemonium, which divided humanity into 72 nations: “From these 70 and 2 languages the Slovenian language was born...”. The above-mentioned Mavro Orbini generously gave the Slavic tribes a couple of extra millennia history, dating their exodus from their historical homeland to 1496: “At the indicated time, the Goths and Slavs left Scandinavia... since the Slavs and Goths were of the same tribe. So, having subjugated Sarmatia, the Slavic tribe was divided into several tribes and received different names: Wends, Slavs, Ants, Verls, Alans, Massetians... Vandals, Goths, Avars, Roskolans, Russians or Muscovites, Poles, Czechs, Silesians, Bulgarians ...In short, the Slavic language is heard from the Caspian Sea to Saxony, from the Adriatic Sea to the German Sea, and within all these limits lies the Slavic tribe.”
Of course, such “information” was not enough for historians. Archeology, genetics and linguistics were used to study the “age” of the Slavs. As a result, we managed to achieve modest, but still results. According to the accepted version, the Slavs belonged to the Indo-European community, which most likely emerged from the Dnieper-Donets archaeological culture, in the area between the Dnieper and Don rivers, seven thousand years ago during the Stone Age. Subsequently, the influence of this culture spread to the territory from the Vistula to the Urals, although no one has yet been able to accurately localize it. In general, when speaking about the Indo-European community, we do not mean a single ethnic group or civilization, but the influence of cultures and linguistic similarity. About four thousand years BC it broke up into conventional three groups: the Celts and Romans in the West, the Indo-Iranians in the East, and somewhere in the middle, in Central and Eastern Europe, another one emerged language group, from which the Germans, Balts and Slavs later emerged. Of these, around the 1st millennium BC, the Slavic language begins to stand out.
But information from linguistics alone is not enough - to determine the unity of an ethnic group there must be an uninterrupted continuity of archaeological cultures. The bottom link in the archaeological chain of the Slavs is considered to be the so-called “culture of podklosh burials”, which received its name from the custom of covering cremated remains with a large vessel, in Polish “klesh”, that is, “upside down”. It existed in the V-II centuries BC between the Vistula and the Dnieper. In a sense, we can say that its bearers were the earliest Slavs. It is from this that it is possible to identify the continuity of cultural elements right up to the Slavic antiquities of the early Middle Ages.
Proto-Slavic homeland
Where, after all, was the Slavic ethnic group born, and what territory can be called “originally Slavic”? Historians' accounts vary. Orbini, citing a number of authors, claims that the Slavs came out of Scandinavia: “Almost all the authors, whose blessed pen conveyed to their descendants the history of the Slavic tribe, claim and conclude that the Slavs came out of Scandinavia... The descendants of Japheth the son of Noah (to which the author includes the Slavs ) moved north to Europe, penetrating into the country now called Scandinavia. There they multiplied innumerably, as St. Augustine points out in his “City of God,” where he writes that the sons and descendants of Japheth had two hundred homelands and occupied lands located north of Mount Taurus in Cilicia, along the Northern Ocean, half of Asia, and throughout Europe all the way to the British Ocean."
Nestor called ancient territory Slavs - lands along the lower reaches of the Dnieper and Pannonia. The reason for the resettlement of the Slavs from the Danube was the attack on them by the Volokhs. “After many times, the essence of Slovenia settled along the Dunaevi, where there is now Ugorsk and Bolgarsk land.” Hence the Danube-Balkan hypothesis of the origin of the Slavs.
The European homeland of the Slavs also had its supporters. Thus, the prominent Czech historian Pavel Safarik believed that the ancestral home of the Slavs should be sought in Europe in the neighborhood of related tribes of Celts, Germans, Balts and Thracians. He believed that in ancient times the Slavs occupied vast territories of Central and Eastern Europe, from where they were forced to leave beyond the Carpathians under the pressure of Celtic expansion.
There was even a version about two ancestral homelands of the Slavs, according to which the first ancestral home was the place where the Proto-Slavic language developed (between the lower reaches of the Neman and Western Dvina) and where the Slavic people themselves were formed (according to the authors of the hypothesis, this happened starting from the 2nd century BC era) - the Vistula River basin. Western and Eastern Slavs had already left from there. The first populated the area of the Elbe River, then the Balkans and the Danube, and the second - the banks of the Dnieper and Dniester.
The Vistula-Dnieper hypothesis about the ancestral home of the Slavs, although it remains a hypothesis, is still the most popular among historians. It is conditionally confirmed by local toponyms, as well as vocabulary. If you believe the “words”, that is, the lexical material, the ancestral home of the Slavs was located away from the sea, in a forested flat zone with swamps and lakes, as well as within the rivers flowing into the Baltic Sea, judging by the common Slavic names of fish - salmon and eel. By the way, the areas of the Podklosh burial culture already known to us fully correspond to these geographical characteristics.
"Slavs"
The word “Slavs” itself is a mystery. It firmly came into use already in the 6th century AD; at least, Byzantine historians of this time often mentioned the Slavs - not always friendly neighbors of Byzantium. Among the Slavs themselves, this term was already widely used as a self-name in the Middle Ages, at least judging by the chronicles, including the Tale of Bygone Years.
However, its origin is still unknown. The most popular version is that it comes from the words “word” or “glory,” which go back to the same Indo-European root ḱleu̯- “to hear.” By the way, Mavro Orbini also wrote about this, albeit in his characteristic “arrangement”: “during their residence in Sarmatia, they (the Slavs) took the name “Slavs”, which means “glorious”.
There is a version among linguists that the Slavs owe their self-name to the names of the landscape. Presumably, it was based on the toponym “Slovutich” - another name for the Dnieper, containing a root with the meaning “to wash”, “to cleanse”.
At one time, a lot of noise was caused by the version about the existence of a connection between the self-name “Slavs” and the Middle Greek word for “slave” (σκλάβος). It was very popular among Western scientists of the 18th-19th centuries. It is based on the idea that the Slavs, as one of the most numerous peoples Europe, made up a significant percentage of captives and often became objects of the slave trade. Today this hypothesis is recognized as erroneous, since most likely the basis of “σκλάβος” was a Greek verb with the meaning “to obtain spoils of war” - “σκυλάο”.
