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RUSSIA Kieff. His reign was long and glorious. He inflicted terrible defeats upon the Petcheneghi, the Lithuanians, and the Finnish tribes, but sought in vain to take Constantinople. His far-sighted policy led him to seek intermarriages with the Kings of Poland, Norway, France, and Hungary. Kieff (adorned with its splendid Cathedral of St. Sophia) became the artistic and intellectual center of Russia.

From 1054, however, the political conditions of Russia went from bad to worse, and the want of political unity remained a constant cause of internal weakness. In less than two centuries, according to Pogodin, there were sixty-four independent principalities, 293 princes, and 83 civil wars, to which must be added the continual incursions of the barbarians. The history of Russia during this period is a mass of discordant notices. The chief principalities of that time were Smolensk, Tchernigoff, Northern Novgorod, Ryazan, Murom, Tver, Suzdal, Rostoff, Vladimir, Yaroslaff, Pereiaslaff-Zalieski, Volhynia, Galicia, and others; and these states, upon the death of each of their respective princes, were subdivided into new fiefs. Yaroslaff was succeeded upon the throne of Kieff by his son Iziaslaff, who died in 1078. The son of Iziaslaff, Sviatopolk reigned from 1093 to 1113, during which period questions of the succession to the Principalities of Tchernigoff and Volhynia brought the horrors of civil war upon Russia. Sviatopolk was succeeded by the prudent Vladimir Monomacus (1113-25), who obtained important victories over the Polovcy, Petcheneghi, and Tcherkessi. When he died he left as his testament to his sons an instruction, which is to some extent an autobiography, and which contains wise advice for government. His sons and his grandsons, however, did not profit by it, for their rivalry contributed to the decadence of Kieff, which in 1169 was besieged and taken by the armies of Rostoff, Vladimir, and Suzdal, commanded by Mstislav, son of Andrew Bogoljubski. The city was sacked and its churches profaned. In 1203 it was again sacked by the Polovcy, and Kieff ceased to be the political center of Russia.

After the fall of Kieff, the Principalities of Suzdal, Galicia, Novgorod, and Pskof had a rapid but ephemeral development. The most famous of the princes of Suzdal was Andrew Bogoljubski (1157-74), who owed his fame to his ambition, his military enterprises, his love for the fine arts, and his attachment to the Orthodox Church. The city of Vladimir owes to him the splendid monuments that place it in the front rank of the cities of Russia from an archeological standpoint. Autocracy found in him its staunchest supporter, which, however, cost him his life, for he was assassinated by the boyars at Bogoljubovo, where he had built a monastery. His death was followed by turbulence, caused by the rivalry of the cities of Rostoff, Suzdal, and Vladimir, the last of which was victorious, and developed its power still more under Prince Vsevolod (1176-1212). Further wars of succession led in 1215 to the terrible battle of Lipetsk, in which the troops of Novgorod, Pskof, and Smolensk massacred the army of Suzdal and Murom. Their prince, George II, at the death of his brother Constantine, Prince of Vladimir, fought furiously against the Bulgarians of the Volga, and in 1220, at the confluence of the Oka with the Volga, laid the foundation of Nizhni-Novgorod.

In Galicia, Romano, Prince of Volhynia (1188-1205), assisted by the Poles, established himself at Galitch, became famous through his cruelty and his military enterprises, and died in battle against the Poles. He was succeeded by his son Daniel (1205-1266); this prince allowed the Jews, the Armenians, and the Germans to enter his dominions, and thereby greatly promoted industry and commerce. During this period the free cities of Novgorod, Pskof, and Vyatka, like the Italian republics of the Middle Ages, reached a high degree of splendor, and of economic and artistic development; but, torn by internal dissensions, their power waned, while the power of the German military order of the Brothers of the Militia of Christ, or Sword-Bearers, and that of the Teutonic Order increased; these two orders were formed into a single society in 1237, and subjected the Letts, the Livonians, and the Finns to their influence.

B. Russia under the Tatars.—After uniting all the Tatar tribes under his scepter, Jenghiz Khan (1154-1227) extended his conquest to China, Turkestan, Great Bokhara, and the plains of Western Asia as far as the Crimea; and his successors, continuing the advance, with their hordes crossed the steppes of Southern Russia, and reached the frontiers of the Polovcy; these turned to the Russian princes for assistance. The latter responded to that appeal, and met the Asiatic hordes (1224) at the Kalka, a rivulet that flows into the Sea of Azoff. The princes Mstislav the Rash, Daniel of Galitch, and Oleg of Kursk performed prodigies of valor at the head of their troops; but the numerical superiority of the Tatars and the cowardice of the Polovcy brought defeat upon the Russians, costing them the lives of six princes and seventy boyars. In 1237, led by Baty, the Tatars returned to Russia, burned and destroyed the capital of the Bulgarians in the region of the Volga, and assailed Ryazan, whose princes opposed a desperate resistance, without however being able to save the city from pillage and ruin. Having secured the possession of Ryazan, the Tatars invaded the Principality of Suzdal (1238), and burned Suzdal, Rostoff, Yaroslaff, and many other cities and villages. The Prince of Suzdal, George II, died on the battlefield. In 1239-40, the Tatars continued their devastations through Southern Russia, took Pereiaslaff, Tchernigoff, and Kieff, sowed death and ruin broadcast, and entered Volhynia and Galicia, Novgorod alone escaping the fate of the other Russian cities. In the region of the lower course of the Volga, Baty established his residence (Sarai, the castle), which became the capital of a great Tatar empire, called the Kingdom of the Golden Horde, extending from the Urals and the Caspian Sea to the mouth of the Danube. About 1272 the Tatars of Russia embraced Mohammedanism, became its fanatical preachers, and on this account refrained from mixing with the Russians. At the death of George II his dominions, devastated and pillaged, were inherited by Yaroslaff (1238-46), who was forced to traverse the whole of Russia and Asia to pay homage to the Grand Khan of the Tatars, Oktai. He died of want in the desert, and was succeeded by his son Alexander Nevski, whose name is famous in the national history of Russia on account of his victories over the Teutonic Knights, the Swedes, and the Finns (1246-52).

Following a policy of toleration the very opposite of the Turkish policy towards Christian peoples, the Tatars respected the dynasties and the political institutions of the Russian principalities. Suzdal, Galicia, Volhynia, Tchernigoff, Polotsk, and Novgorod continued to live and to govern themselves as in the past. The Russians were not tatarized, chiefly because differences of religion raised insurmountable barriers between them and the Tatars. The khans of the Golden Horde limited themselves to requiring the external homage of the Russian princes, to acting as arbiters in their quarrels, to imposing a poll-tax, to exacting a military contingent, to reserving the right of investiture over them, and to forbidding them to carry on war without permission. This subjection of the Russians to the Tatars exercised a great influence on Russia. For