Birch-Bark Documents of Novgorod, Russia

choi

David M Herszenhorn, Where Mud Is Archaeological Gold, Russian History Grew on Trees. New York Times, Oct 19, 2014 (front page)
www.nytimes.com/2014/10/19/world ... -grew-on-trees.html
(“a collection of more than 1,000 birch-bark documents uncovered here after being preserved for hundreds of years in the magical mud * * * Experts say the wet, clay soil that lies under Novgorod, and contains little or no oxygen, has the unusual chemical quality that preserves both hard artifacts made of metal and items made of softer material like leather” and bark)

Note:
(a) "A boy left a message and drawing on a birch scroll in Old Novgorod language, a precursor to Russian. The scroll was dug from the preservative mud of Veliky Novgorod."
(i) Old Novgorod dialect
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Novgorod_dialect
("The first birch bark letter was found on July 26, 1951 by Nina Fedorovna Akulova")
(A) For Russian name, see Eastern Slavic naming customs
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Slavic_naming_customs
(section 2 Patronymic; section 3.3 Social features)
(B) Fyodor
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyodor
(“Fyodor or Fedor or Feodor is the Russian form of the name "Theodore." Fedora is the feminine form”)
(ii) “Old Novgorod language, a precursor to Russian”

upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/Slavic_languages_tree.svg

In the scheme, a language with green shade is live, whereas one with red shade is dead.


(b) "Written in conversational language, on everyday topics, the birch-bark documents provide a remarkable human soundtrack * * * 'Marry me,' a man named Mikita wrote to a woman named Anna in a birch-bark letter dated to between 1280 and 1300. 'I want you, and you me.'”
(i) The surname: Ukrainian (Mykyta), Slovak, and Polish (in the latter two spelled Mikita); "from the personal [or given] name Mykyta or Mikita, Greek Niketas (see Nikitas)"
(ii) The Greek surname Nikitas: "from the personal name Niketas, a derivative of nikan ‘conquer.’ This name was popular among early Christians as an allusion to Christ’s victory over death, and was borne by several saints"

Both (i) and (ii) are from Dictionary of American Family Names, published by Oxford University Press.
(iii) Nikita (given name)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikita_(given_name)

choi

(c) "Nestled in a curve of the Volkhov River, with the crenelated brick walls of its Kremlin-fortress and the sparkling gold and silver domes of its churches, Veliky Novgorod * * * was founded, according to legend, by Rurik, a Varangian chieftain, in 859. It is a place where democracy once flourished, where benevolent princes ruled with the consent of a parliament of local elites called the Veche * * * It was a place where children began attending school around the year 1030. * * * In the 12th century, the city was flourishing, with evidence of large wooden buildings."
(i) Volkhov River
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkhov_River
(The etymology of the name is unclear)
(ii) kremlin
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kremlin
(Russian for fortress)
(iii) Veliky Novgorod
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veliky_Novgorod
("At its peak during the 14th century, it was one of Europe's largest cities, with a reported population of 400,000")

Quote:

“The Varangian name of the city Holmgård/Holmgard * * * the town itself [now the city] dates only from the end of the 10th century; hence the name Novgorod, ‘new city,’ from Old Church-Slavonic Nov and Gorod * * * First mention of this Nordic or Germanic etymology to the name of the city of Novgorod (and that of other cities within the territory of the then Kievan Rus') occurs in the 10th-century policy manual De Administrando Imperio by Byzantine emperor Constantine VII

"In 1999, the city was officially renamed Veliky Novgorod (literally, Great Novgorod), thus partly reverting to its medieval title 'Lord Novgorod the Great.' This reduced the temptation to confuse Veliky Novgorod with Nizhny Novgorod, a larger city [on] the other side of Moscow

(A) “Lord Novgorod the Great” is 擬人化 anthromorphization.
(B) Footnote 17 in this Wiki page, shortly following the first sentence in the quotation, states: “The name Holmgard is a Norse toponym meaning Islet town or Islet grad, and there are various explanations for why they gave this name. According to Rydzevskaya, the Norse name is derived from the Slavic ‘Holmgrad’ which means ‘town on a hill’ and may allude to the ‘old town’ preceding the ‘new town,’ or Novgorod.”

* The English and Scottish surname Holme (of which Holmes is a variant) is "from northern Middle English holm ‘island,’ Old Norse holmr."
(C) Nizhny Novgorod
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nizhny_Novgorod
(Its name literally means Lower Newtown to distinguish it from the older Veliky Novgorod)

Look at the map, compare its location relative to Moscow, and you will apprehend “a larger city [on] the other side of Moscow.”
(D) Czech English dictionary
veliký (adj):
"1: great (very big, large scale)
2: great (title referring to an important leader)"
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/veliký
(iv) Rurik
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rurik
(the Old East Norse form of the name Roderick; c 830 – c 879; was a Varangian chieftain who gained control of Ladoga in 862, built the Holmgard settlement near Novgorod, and founded the Rurik Dynasty, which ruled Kievan Rus (and later Grand Duchy of Moscow and Tsardom of Russia) until [1598])
(A) Varangians
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varangians
(was the name given by Greeks and East Slavs to Vikings, who between the 9th and 11th centuries ruled the medieval state of Rus'; section 1 Etymology; "Varyags [plural of varyag], in Old East Slavic")

The noun Varangian has the accent on the second syllable.
(B) Varyag (ship)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varyag_(ship)
(after the Varangian people, the Viking ancestors of the Rus)

Varyag is Russian spelling for “Varangian,” according to both en.wikipedia.org and www.m-w.com.
(C) Rurik dynasty
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rurik_dynasty
(862-1598; section 1 Origins)

included
* Vladimir the Great (c 958 – 1015; ruler of Kievan Rus' 980-1015; converted to Christianity in 988 and Christianized the Kievan Rus'), and
* Ivan IV or Ivan the Terrible (1530 – 1584; Tsar of All the Russias 1547-1584)

The dynasty ended when the last tsar, Fyodor I died childless. Following “Time of Troubles” (in which tsar-less, a 1601-1603 famine killed one-third of the Russian population, about two million), Romanov Dynasty was established in 1613.
(v) Veche
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veche
(section 1 Etyology: Russian noun 'soviet' meaning 'council, assembly')

choi

(d) “the city’s [Novgorod’] mayor, Yuri I Bobryshev, glowed with pride as he described its history as a major trading post of the medieval Hanseatic League, with strong ties to the European centers of Lubeck, Bruges, Ghent and London.”
(i)( Yuryen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yury(or Yuri; is the East Slavic--Russian, Ukrainian or Belarusian--form of the masculine given name George)
(ii)
(A) Hanseatic League
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanseatic_League
(also known as the Hanse or Hansa; Establishment  1358, when "Lübeck sent letters to all Hansa members about a trade-boycott of Flanders;" The legacy of the Hansa is remembered today in several names, for example the German airline Lufthansa (ie, "Air Hansa"); a map with legend that says, “Main trading routes of the Hanseatic League”)

* German English dictionary
luft (noun feminine) "air"
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Luft
(B) hansa (n; Hansa [“meaning ‘guild’"--Wikipedia] from Medieval Latin, from Middle Low German hanse)
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Hansa
(iii)
(A) Lübeck
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lübeck
(capital of Hanseatic League; founded as Liubice ("lovely") [by Slavs, specifically prince Kruto, in late eleventh century])
(B) Colum Hourihane (ed), The Grove Encyclopedia of Medieval Art and Architecture. Oxford University Press, 2012, Vol 2, page 148
books.google.com/books?id=FtlMAgAAQBAJ&pg=RA3-PA148&lpg=RA3-PA148&dq=Liubice++founded&source=bl&ots=zZO_MT5c7b&sig=zdmRS0lyHb7y9h6rmMy7htTWcbw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=FTBVVNHXNOLZsAS8hYHABw&ved=0CEgQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=Liubice  founded&f=false
(“Lübeck * * * The first small Slavic settlement ('Liubice'), with a church, a castle with ramparts, and a mercantile quarter, was founded on the lower Trave [river] by the Wendish Prince Kruto (reg 1066-93) but was destroyed in 1138. In 1153 a new commercial settlement was established on a better protected site(an oval enclosed by the Trave and the Wakenitz) by Count Adolf II of Schauenburg, a vassal of Henry the Lion")
(iv) Bruges
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruges
(English and French spelling: Bruges; Dutch and German spelling: Brugge; a port)

choi

(e) “He [mayor Bobryshev] then boasted about Novgorod’s role, along with Kiev, as one of the two principal cities of Kievan Rus — the original Russian Federation — adding that Moscow could lay no claim to national prominence until Ivan III made it the capital in the 15th century.”
(i) Kievan Rus'
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kievan_Rus'
(882-1240; Kievan Rus' begins with the rule (882–912) of Prince Oleg, who moved his capital [from Novgorod] to the more strategic Kiev; section 1 Name; section 2.1 Origins: Controversy persists over whether the Rus’ were Varangians (Vikings) or Slavs; destroyed by Mongols in 1420)
(ii) Rus' people
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rus'_people
("an ancient people who gave their name to the lands of Russia and Belarus. Their origin and identity are much in dispute"/ section 1 Etymology)
(iii) Oleg of Novgorod
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oleg_of_Novgorod
(According to the Primary Chronicle, Oleg was a relative (likely brother-in-law) of the first ruler, Rurik)
(iv) Ivan III of Russia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_III_of_Russia
(also known as Ivan the Great; 1440-1505; Grand Prince of Moscow 1462-1505; section 1 Gathering of Russian lands: In 1470, defeated Novgorod; [in 1472] married second wife Sophia Paleologue and later adopted double-headed eagle of Byzantine Empire; [in 1480] ended the dominance of the Golden Horde [Mongols and Tatars] over the Rus)
(A) Ivan III’s father and predecessor was Vasily II.
(B) Ivan III was born and died in Moscow. His nexus with Veliky Novgorod was he conquered it.
Richard Cavendish, Ivan the Great Becomes Grand Prince of Moscow. History Today, Mar 27, 2012
www.historytoday.com/richard-cav ... grand-prince-moscow

the first two paragraphs:

“Ivan became Grand Prince on March 27th 1462, following the death of his father.

"Moscow was the capital of a small state which paid tribute and provided forced labour to the Khans of the Golden Horde, Tatar masters of a an area stretching from eastern Europe to Siberia. Over time the Muscovite princes gradually expanded their territory until they gained independence under Ivan III, known as the Great.
(C) Moscow
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow
(The city [Moscow] ceased to be Russia’s capital in 1712 (except for a brief period from 1728 to 1732 [Peter II, grandson of Peter I or the Great, moved the capital back to Moscow, but Peter II died in 1730 at age 15]) [until 1918], after the founding of Saint Petersburg by Peter the Great near the Baltic coast in 1703)
(iv)
(A) Ivan (name)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_(name)
(B) Vasily
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasily
(of Greek origin and corresponds to Basil)
(C) Basil (name)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basil_(name)
([cognate with the present-day] male Greek name Vassilios; is derived from "basileus[,]" a Greek word of pre-Hellenic origin meaning "king", from which words such as basilica (via Latin), as well as the eponymous herb (via Old French) derive)

choi

(f) “‘That’s why we speak of Novgorod as the motherland of Russia,’ Mr Bobryshev said. ‘In Novgorod, the first customs office appeared. The ruble appeared in Novgorod. The first school was in Novgorod, in 1030 by Yaroslav the Wise, our Novgorod prince. It was founded not only for the children from rich families, but for everyone. So Novgoroders were absolutely literate people in the Middle Ages. * * * The birch-bark documents date from the 1000s through the 1400s, when paper became more readily available.”
(i) I can find nothing about customs house.
(ii)
(A) Ruble
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruble
(section 1 Etymology; section 1.1 Origins)
(B) Lawrence N Langer, Historical Dictionary of Medieval Russia. Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press, Inc, 2002, pages 56-57
books.google.com/books?id=DlWPEH3dF38C&pg=PA57&lpg=PA57&dq=ruble+novgorod&source=bl&ots=sAW_IoBHgt&sig=BLkRWfRTNvSrPgD4FZd9RdrqS78&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ez5VVKHxCqrPsQSQ54DYBQ&ved=0CCoQ6AEwAjgK#v=onepage&q=ruble novgorod&f=false
(“GRIVNA * * * In the 11th century silver ingots, called silver grivnas, were imported. In Novgorod between the 12th and 15th centuries the grivna weighed 204 grams and in Kiev between the 11th and 13th centuries it weighed 163 grams. During the 13th century in Novgorod the grivna was sometimes called a ruble, which also corresponded to a measure of weight (the grivenka) of about 204 grams of silver")
(iii) Yaroslav the Wise
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yaroslav_the_Wise
(or Yaroslav I; c 978 – 1054; Christian name was George (Yuri)); father was Vladimir the Great)