The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 5

E >> Edward Gibbon >> The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 5

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[Footnote 31: Hungarorum gens, cujus omnes fere nationes expertae
saevitium &c., is the preface of Liutprand, (l. i. c. 2,) who
frequently expatiated on the calamities of his own times. See l.
i. c. 5, l. ii. c. 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7; l. iii. c. 1, &c., l. v. c.
8, 15, in Legat. p. 485. His colors are glaring but his
chronology must be rectified by Pagi and Muratori.]

[Footnote 32: The three bloody reigns of Arpad, Zoltan, and
Toxus, are critically illustrated by Katona, (Hist. Ducum, &c. p.
107 - 499.) His diligence has searched both natives and
foreigners; yet to the deeds of mischief, or glory, I have been
able to add the destruction of Bremen, (Adam Bremensis, i. 43.)]

[Footnote 33: Muratori has considered with patriotic care the
danger and resources of Modena. The citizens besought St.
Geminianus, their patron, to avert, by his intercession, the
rabies, flagellum, &c.

Nunc te rogamus, licet servi pessimi,
Ab Ungerorum nos defendas jaculis.

The bishop erected walls for the public defence, not contra
dominos serenos, (Antiquitat. Ital. Med. Aevi, tom. i. dissertat.
i. p. 21, 22,) and the song of the nightly watch is not without
elegance or use, (tom. iii. dis. xl. p. 709.) The Italian
annalist has accurately traced the series of their inroads,
(Annali d' Italia, tom. vii. p. 365, 367, 398, 401, 437, 440,
tom. viii. p. 19, 41, 52, &c.)]

[Footnote 34: Both the Hungarian and Russian annals suppose, that
they besieged, or attacked, or insulted Constantinople, (Pray,
dissertat. x. p. 239. Katona, Hist. Ducum, p. 354 - 360;) and
the fact is almost confessed by the Byzantine historians, (Leo
Grammaticus, p. 506. Cedrenus, tom. ii. p. 629: ) yet, however
glorious to the nation, it is denied or doubted by the critical
historian, and even by the notary of Bela. Their scepticism is
meritorious; they could not safely transcribe or believe the
rusticorum fabulas: but Katona might have given due attention to
the evidence of Liutprand, Bulgarorum gentem atque daecorum
tributariam fecerant, (Hist. l. ii. c. 4, p. 435.)]

[Footnote 35: - Iliad, xvi. 756.]

The deliverance of Germany and Christendom was achieved by
the Saxon princes, Henry the Fowler and Otho the Great, who, in
two memorable battles, forever broke the power of the Hungarians.
^36 The valiant Henry was roused from a bed of sickness by the
invasion of his country; but his mind was vigorous and his
prudence successful. "My companions," said he, on the morning of
the combat, "maintain your ranks, receive on your bucklers the
first arrows of the Pagans, and prevent their second discharge by
the equal and rapid career of your lances." They obeyed and
conquered: and the historical picture of the castle of Merseburgh
expressed the features, or at least the character, of Henry, who,
in an age of ignorance, intrusted to the finer arts the
perpetuity of his name. ^37 At the end of twenty years, the
children of the Turks who had fallen by his sword invaded the
empire of his son; and their force is defined, in the lowest
estimate, at one hundred thousand horse. They were invited by
domestic faction; the gates of Germany were treacherously
unlocked; and they spread, far beyond the Rhine and the Meuse,
into the heart of Flanders. But the vigor and prudence of Otho
dispelled the conspiracy; the princes were made sensible that
unless they were true to each other, their religion and country
were irrecoverably lost; and the national powers were reviewed in
the plains of Augsburgh. They marched and fought in eight
legions, according to the division of provinces and tribes; the
first, second, and third, were composed of Bavarians; the fourth,
of Franconians; the fifth, of Saxons, under the immediate command
of the monarch; the sixth and seventh consisted of Swabians; and
the eighth legion, of a thousand Bohemians, closed the rear of
the host. The resources of discipline and valor were fortified
by the arts of superstition, which, on this occasion, may deserve
the epithets of generous and salutary. The soldiers were
purified with a fast; the camp was blessed with the relics of
saints and martyrs; and the Christian hero girded on his side the
sword of Constantine, grasped the invincible spear of
Charlemagne, and waved the banner of St. Maurice, the praefect of
the Thebaean legion. But his firmest confidence was placed in
the holy lance, ^38 whose point was fashioned of the nails of the
cross, and which his father had extorted from the king of
Burgundy, by the threats of war, and the gift of a province. The
Hungarians were expected in the front; they secretly passed the
Lech, a river of Bavaria that falls into the Danube; turned the
rear of the Christian army; plundered the baggage, and disordered
the legion of Bohemia and Swabia. The battle was restored by the
Franconians, whose duke, the valiant Conrad, was pierced with an
arrow as he rested from his fatigues: the Saxons fought under the
eyes of their king; and his victory surpassed, in merit and
importance, the triumphs of the last two hundred years. The loss
of the Hungarians was still greater in the flight than in the
action; they were encompassed by the rivers of Bavaria; and their
past cruelties excluded them from the hope of mercy. Three
captive princes were hanged at Ratisbon, the multitude of
prisoners was slain or mutilated, and the fugitives, who presumed
to appear in the face of their country, were condemned to
everlasting poverty and disgrace. ^39 Yet the spirit of the
nation was humbled, and the most accessible passes of Hungary
were fortified with a ditch and rampart. Adversity suggested the
counsels of moderation and peace: the robbers of the West
acquiesced in a sedentary life; and the next generation was
taught, by a discerning prince, that far more might be gained by
multiplying and exchanging the produce of a fruitful soil. The
native race, the Turkish or Fennic blood, was mingled with new
colonies of Scythian or Sclavonian origin; ^40 many thousands of
robust and industrious captives had been imported from all the
countries of Europe; ^41 and after the marriage of Geisa with a
Bavarian princess, he bestowed honors and estates on the nobles
of Germany. ^42 The son of Geisa was invested with the regal
title, and the house of Arpad reigned three hundred years in the
kingdom of Hungary. But the freeborn Barbarians were not dazzled
by the lustre of the diadem, and the people asserted their
indefeasible right of choosing, deposing, and punishing the
hereditary servant of the state.

[Footnote 36: They are amply and critically discussed by Katona,
(Hist. Dacum, p. 360 - 368, 427 - 470.) Liutprand (l. ii. c. 8,
9) is the best evidence for the former, and Witichind (Annal.
Saxon. l. iii.) of the latter; but the critical historian will
not even overlook the horn of a warrior, which is said to be
preserved at Jaz-berid.]

[Footnote 37: Hunc vero triumphum, tam laude quam memoria dignum,
ad Meresburgum rex in superiori coenaculo domus per Zeus, id est,
picturam, notari praecepit, adeo ut rem veram potius quam
verisimilem videas: a high encomium, (Liutprand, l. ii. c. 9.)
Another palace in Germany had been painted with holy subjects by
the order of Charlemagne; and Muratori may justly affirm, nulla
saecula fuere in quibus pictores desiderati fuerint, (Antiquitat.
Ital. Medii Aevi, tom. ii. dissert. xxiv. p. 360, 361.) Our
domestic claims to antiquity of ignorance and original
imperfection (Mr. Walpole's lively words) are of a much more
recent date, (Anecdotes of Painting, vol. i. p. 2, &c.)]

[Footnote 38: See Baronius, Annal. Eccles. A.D. 929, No. 2 - 5.
The lance of Christ is taken from the best evidence, Liutprand,
(l. iv. c. 12,) Sigebert, and the Acts of St. Gerard: but the
other military relics depend on the faith of the Gesta Anglorum
post Bedam, l. ii. c. 8.]

[Footnote 39: Katona, Hist. Ducum Hungariae, p. 500, &c.]

[Footnote 40: Among these colonies we may distinguish, 1. The
Chazars, or Cabari, who joined the Hungarians on their march,
(Constant. de Admin. Imp. c. 39, 40, p. 108, 109.) 2. The
Jazyges, Moravians, and Siculi, whom they found in the land; the
last were perhaps a remnant of the Huns of Attila, and were
intrusted with the guard of the borders. 3. The Russians, who,
like the Swiss in France, imparted a general name to the royal
porters. 4. The Bulgarians, whose chiefs (A.D. 956) were
invited, cum magna multitudine Hismahelitarum. Had any of those
Sclavonians embraced the Mahometan religion? 5. The Bisseni and
Cumans, a mixed multitude of Patzinacites, Uzi, Chazars, &c., who
had spread to the Lower Danube. The last colony of 40,000
Cumans, A.D. 1239, was received and converted by the kings of
Hungary, who derived from that tribe a new regal appellation,
(Pray, Dissert. vi. vii. p. 109 - 173. Katona, Hist. Ducum, p.
95 - 99, 259 - 264, 476, 479 - 483, &c.)]

[Footnote 41: Christiani autem, quorum pars major populi est, qui
ex omni parte mundi illuc tracti sunt captivi, &c. Such was the
language of Piligrinus, the first missionary who entered Hungary,
A.D. 973. Pars major is strong. Hist. Ducum, p. 517.]

[Footnote 42: The fideles Teutonici of Geisa are authenticated in
old charters: and Katona, with his usual industry, has made a
fair estimate of these colonies, which had been so loosely
magnified by the Italian Ranzanus, (Hist. Critic. Ducum. p, 667 -
681.)]

III. The name of Russians ^43 was first divulged, in the
ninth century, by an embassy of Theophilus, emperor of the East,
to the emperor of the West, Lewis, the son of Charlemagne. The
Greeks were accompanied by the envoys of the great duke, or
chagan, or czar, of the Russians. In their journey to
Constantinople, they had traversed many hostile nations; and they
hoped to escape the dangers of their return, by requesting the
French monarch to transport them by sea to their native country.
A closer examination detected their origin: they were the
brethren of the Swedes and Normans, whose name was already odious
and formidable in France; and it might justly be apprehended,
that these Russian strangers were not the messengers of peace,
but the emissaries of war. They were detained, while the Greeks
were dismissed; and Lewis expected a more satisfactory account,
that he might obey the laws of hospitality or prudence, according
to the interest of both empires. ^44 This Scandinavian origin of
the people, or at least the princes, of Russia, may be confirmed
and illustrated by the national annals ^45 and the general
history of the North. The Normans, who had so long been
concealed by a veil of impenetrable darkness, suddenly burst
forth in the spirit of naval and military enterprise. The vast,
and, as it is said, the populous regions of Denmark, Sweden, and
Norway, were crowded with independent chieftains and desperate
adventurers, who sighed in the laziness of peace, and smiled in
the agonies of death. Piracy was the exercise, the trade, the
glory, and the virtue, of the Scandinavian youth. Impatient of a
bleak climate and narrow limits, they started from the banquet,
grasped their arms, sounded their horn, ascended their vessels,
and explored every coast that promised either spoil or
settlement. The Baltic was the first scene of their naval
achievements they visited the eastern shores, the silent
residence of Fennic and Sclavonic tribes, and the primitive
Russians of the Lake Ladoga paid a tribute, the skins of white
squirrels, to these strangers, whom they saluted with the title
of Varangians ^46 or Corsairs. Their superiority in arms,
discipline, and renown, commanded the fear and reverence of the
natives. In their wars against the more inland savages, the
Varangians condescended to serve as friends and auxiliaries, and
gradually, by choice or conquest, obtained the dominion of a
people whom they were qualified to protect. Their tyranny was
expelled, their valor was again recalled, till at length Ruric, a
Scandinavian chief, became the father of a dynasty which reigned
above seven hundred years. His brothers extended his influence:
the example of service and usurpation was imitated by his
companions in the southern provinces of Russia; and their
establishments, by the usual methods of war and assassination,
were cemented into the fabric of a powerful monarchy.

[Footnote 43: Among the Greeks, this national appellation has a
singular form, as an undeclinable word, of which many fanciful
etymologies have been suggested. I have perused, with pleasure
and profit, a dissertation de Origine Russorum (Comment. Academ.
Petropolitanae, tom. viii. p. 388 - 436) by Theophilus Sigefrid
Bayer, a learned German, who spent his life and labors in the
service of Russia. A geographical tract of D'Anville, de
l'Empire de Russie, son Origine, et ses Accroissemens, (Paris,
1772, in 12mo.,) has likewise been of use.

Note: The later antiquarians of Russia and Germany appear to
aquiesce in the authority of the monk Nestor, the earliest
annalist of Russia, who derives the Russians, or Vareques, from
Scandinavia. The names of the first founders of the Russian
monarchy are Scandinavian or Norman. Their language (according to
Const. Porphyrog. de Administrat. Imper. c. 9) differed
essentially from the Sclavonian. The author of the Annals of St.
Bertin, who first names the Russians (Rhos) in the year 839 of
his Annals, assigns them Sweden for their country. So Liutprand
calls the Russians the same people as the Normans. The Fins,
Laplanders, and Esthonians, call the Swedes, to the present day,
Roots, Rootsi, Ruotzi, Rootslaue. See Thunman, Untersuchungen
uber der Geschichte des Estlichen Europaischen Volker, p. 374.
Gatterer, Comm. Societ. Regbcient. Gotting. xiii. p. 126.
Schlozer, in his Nestor. Koch. Revolut. de 'Europe, vol. i. p.
60. Malte-Brun, Geograph. vol. vi. p. 378. - M.]

[Footnote 44: See the entire passage (dignum, says Bayer, ut
aureis in tabulis rigatur) in the Annales Bertiniani Francorum,
(in Script. Ital. Muratori, tom. ii. pars i. p. 525,) A.D. 839,
twenty-two years before the aera of Ruric. In the xth century,
Liutprand (Hist. l. v. c. 6) speaks of the Russians and Normans
as the same Aquilonares homines of a red complexion.]

[Footnote 45: My knowledge of these annals is drawn from M.
Leveque, Histoire de Russie. Nestor, the first and best of these
ancient annalists, was a monk of Kiow, who died in the beginning
of the xiith century; but his Chronicle was obscure, till it was
published at Petersburgh, 1767, in 4to. Leveque, Hist. de Russie,
tom. i. p. xvi. Coxe's Travels, vol. ii. p. 184.

Note: The late M. Schlozer has translated and added a
commentary to the Annals of Nestor;" and his work is the mine
from which henceforth the history of the North must be drawn. -
G.]

[Footnote 46: Theophil. Sig. Bayer de Varagis, (for the name is
differently spelt,) in Comment. Academ. Petropolitanae, tom. iv.
p. 275 - 311.]

As long as the descendants of Ruric were considered as
aliens and conquerors, they ruled by the sword of the Varangians,
distributed estates and subjects to their faithful captains, and
supplied their numbers with fresh streams of adventurers from the
Baltic coast. ^47 But when the Scandinavian chiefs had struck a
deep and permanent root into the soil, they mingled with the
Russians in blood, religion, and language, and the first
Waladimir had the merit of delivering his country from these
foreign mercenaries. They had seated him on the throne; his
riches were insufficient to satisfy their demands; but they
listened to his pleasing advice, that they should seek, not a
more grateful, but a more wealthy, master; that they should
embark for Greece, where, instead of the skins of squirrels, silk
and gold would be the recompense of their service. At the same
time, the Russian prince admonished his Byzantine ally to
disperse and employ, to recompense and restrain, these impetuous
children of the North. Contemporary writers have recorded the
introduction, name, and character, of the Varangians: each day
they rose in confidence and esteem; the whole body was assembled
at Constantinople to perform the duty of guards; and their
strength was recruited by a numerous band of their countrymen
from the Island of Thule. On this occasion, the vague
appellation of Thule is applied to England; and the new
Varangians were a colony of English and Danes who fled from the
yoke of the Norman conqueror. The habits of pilgrimage and piracy
had approximated the countries of the earth; these exiles were
entertained in the Byzantine court; and they preserved, till the
last age of the empire, the inheritance of spotless loyalty, and
the use of the Danish or English tongue. With their broad and
double-edged battle-axes on their shoulders, they attended the
Greek emperor to the temple, the senate, and the hippodrome; he
slept and feasted under their trusty guard; and the keys of the
palace, the treasury, and the capital, were held by the firm and
faithful hands of the Varangians. ^48

[Footnote 47: Yet, as late as the year 1018, Kiow and Russia were
still guarded ex fugitivorum servorum robore, confluentium et
maxime Danorum. Bayer, who quotes (p. 292) the Chronicle of
Dithmar of Merseburgh, observes, that it was unusual for the
Germans to enlist in a foreign service.]

[Footnote 48: Ducange has collected from the original authors the
state and history of the Varangi at Constantinople, (Glossar.
Med. et Infimae Graecitatis, sub voce. Med. et Infimae
Latinitatis, sub voce Vagri. Not. ad Alexiad. Annae Comnenae, p.
256, 257, 258. Notes sur Villehardouin, p. 296 - 299.) See
likewise the annotations of Reiske to the Ceremoniale Aulae
Byzant. of Constantine, tom. ii. p. 149, 150. Saxo Grammaticus
affirms that they spoke Danish; but Codinus maintains them till
the fifteenth century in the use of their native English.]

In the tenth century, the geography of Scythia was extended
far beyond the limits of ancient knowledge; and the monarchy of
the Russians obtains a vast and conspicuous place in the map of
Constantine. ^49 The sons of Ruric were masters of the spacious
province of Wolodomir, or Moscow; and, if they were confined on
that side by the hordes of the East, their western frontier in
those early days was enlarged to the Baltic Sea and the country
of the Prussians. Their northern reign ascended above the
sixtieth degree of latitude over the Hyperborean regions, which
fancy had peopled with monsters, or clouded with eternal
darkness. To the south they followed the course of the
Borysthenes, and approached with that river the neighborhood of
the Euxine Sea. The tribes that dwelt, or wandered, in this
ample circuit were obedient to the same conqueror, and insensibly
blended into the same nation. The language of Russia is a
dialect of the Sclavonian; but in the tenth century, these two
modes of speech were different from each other; and, as the
Sclavonian prevailed in the South, it may be presumed that the
original Russians of the North, the primitive subjects of the
Varangian chief, were a portion of the Fennic race. With the
emigration, union, or dissolution, of the wandering tribes, the
loose and indefinite picture of the Scythian desert has
continually shifted. But the most ancient map of Russia affords
some places which still retain their name and position; and the
two capitals, Novogorod ^50 and Kiow, ^51 are coeval with the
first age of the monarchy. Novogorod had not yet deserved the
epithet of great, nor the alliance of the Hanseatic League, which
diffused the streams of opulence and the principles of freedom.
Kiow could not yet boast of three hundred churches, an
innumerable people, and a degree of greatness and splendor which
was compared with Constantinople by those who had never seen the
residence of the Caesars. In their origin, the two cities were
no more than camps or fairs, the most convenient stations in
which the Barbarians might assemble for the occasional business
of war or trade. Yet even these assemblies announce some
progress in the arts of society; a new breed of cattle was
imported from the southern provinces; and the spirit of
commercial enterprise pervaded the sea and land, from the Baltic
to the Euxine, from the mouth of the Oder to the port of
Constantinople. In the days of idolatry and barbarism, the
Sclavonic city of Julin was frequented and enriched by the
Normans, who had prudently secured a free mart of purchase and
exchange. ^52 From this harbor, at the entrance of the Oder, the
corsair, or merchant, sailed in forty-three days to the eastern
shores of the Baltic, the most distant nations were intermingled,
and the holy groves of Curland are said to have been decorated
with Grecian and Spanish gold. ^53 Between the sea and Novogorod
an easy intercourse was discovered; in the summer, through a
gulf, a lake, and a navigable river; in the winter season, over
the hard and level surface of boundless snows. From the
neighborhood of that city, the Russians descended the streams
that fall into the Borysthenes; their canoes, of a single tree,
were laden with slaves of every age, furs of every species, the
spoil of their beehives, and the hides of their cattle; and the
whole produce of the North was collected and discharged in the
magazines of Kiow. The month of June was the ordinary season of
the departure of the fleet: the timber of the canoes was framed
into the oars and benches of more solid and capacious boats; and
they proceeded without obstacle down the Borysthenes, as far as
the seven or thirteen ridges of rocks, which traverse the bed,
and precipitate the waters, of the river. At the more shallow
falls it was sufficient to lighten the vessels; but the deeper
cataracts were impassable; and the mariners, who dragged their
vessels and their slaves six miles over land, were exposed in
this toilsome journey to the robbers of the desert. ^54 At the
first island below the falls, the Russians celebrated the
festival of their escape: at a second, near the mouth of the
river, they repaired their shattered vessels for the longer and
more perilous voyage of the Black Sea. If they steered along the
coast, the Danube was accessible; with a fair wind they could
reach in thirty-six or forty hours the opposite shores of
Anatolia; and Constantinople admitted the annual visit of the
strangers of the North. They returned at the stated season with a
rich cargo of corn, wine, and oil, the manufactures of Greece,
and the spices of India. Some of their countrymen resided in the
capital and provinces; and the national treaties protected the
persons, effects, and privileges, of the Russian merchant. ^55

[Footnote 49: The original record of the geography and trade of
Russia is produced by the emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus,
(de Administrat. Imperii, c. 2, p. 55, 56, c. 9, p. 59 - 61, c.
13, p. 63 - 67, c. 37, p. 106, c. 42, p. 112, 113,) and
illustrated by the diligence of Bayer, (de Geographia Russiae
vicinarumque Regionum circiter A. C. 948, in Comment. Academ.
Petropol. tom. ix. p. 367 - 422, tom. x. p. 371 - 421,) with the
aid of the chronicles and traditions of Russia, Scandinavia, &c.]

[Footnote 50: The haughty proverb, "Who can resist God and the
great Novogorod?" is applied by M. Leveque (Hist. de Russie, tom.
i. p. 60) even to the times that preceded the reign of Ruric. In
the course of his history he frequently celebrates this republic,
which was suppressed A.D. 1475, (tom. ii. p. 252 - 266.) That
accurate traveller Adam Olearius describes (in 1635) the remains
of Novogorod, and the route by sea and land of the Holstein
ambassadors, tom. i. p. 123 - 129.]

[Footnote 51: In hac magna civitate, quae est caput regni, plus
trecentae ecclesiae habentur et nundinae octo, populi etiam
ignota manus (Eggehardus ad A.D. 1018, apud Bayer, tom. ix. p.
412.) He likewise quotes (tom. x. p. 397) the words of the Saxon
annalist, Cujus (Russioe) metropolis est Chive, aemula sceptri
Constantinopolitani, quae est clarissimum decus Graeciae. The
fame of Kiow, especially in the xith century, had reached the
German and Arabian geographers.]

[Footnote 52: In Odorae ostio qua Scythicas alluit paludes,
nobilissima civitas Julinum, celeberrimam, Barbaris et Graecis
qui sunt in circuitu, praestans stationem, est sane maxima omnium
quas Europa claudit civitatum, (Adam Bremensis, Hist. Eccles. p.
19;) a strange exaggeration even in the xith century. The trade
of the Baltic, and the Hanseatic League, are carefully treated in
Anderson's Historical Deduction of Commerce; at least, in our
language, I am not acquainted with any book so satisfactory.

Note: The book of authority is the "Geschichte des
Hanseatischen Bundes," by George Sartorius, Gottingen, 1803, or
rather the later edition of that work by M. Lappenberg, 2 vols.
4to., Hamburgh, 1830. - M. 1845.]

[Footnote 53: According to Adam of Bremen, (de Situ Daniae, p.
58,) the old Curland extended eight days' journey along the
coast; and by Peter Teutoburgicus, (p. 68, A.D. 1326,) Memel is
defined as the common frontier of Russia, Curland, and Prussia.
Aurum ibi plurimum, (says Adam,) divinis auguribus atque
necromanticis omnes domus sunt plenae .... a toto orbe ibi
responsa petuntur, maxime ab Hispanis (forsan Zupanis, id est
regulis Lettoviae) et Graecis. The name of Greeks was applied to
the Russians even before their conversion; an imperfect
conversion, if they still consulted the wizards of Curland,
(Bayer, tom. x. p. 378, 402, &c. Grotius, Prolegomen. ad Hist.
Goth. p. 99.)]