Campaign of Russia against Byzantium (830s)

In Paflagonia, Russia attacked the Byzantine city of Amastrida , located on the southern coast of the Black Sea:

What follows is even more surprising. There was an invasion of barbarians, Rus [βαρβάρων τῶν ῾Ρῶς], a people, as everyone knows, extremely wild and rude, not bearing any traces of humanity. Brutal manners, inhuman deeds, revealing their bloodthirstiness by their very appearance, in nothing else that is peculiar to people, not finding such pleasure as in murder, they are this destructive in deed and by name people, having begun the ruin from Propontis and having visited the rest of the coast, finally reached the saint’s homeland, mercilessly cutting every gender and every age, not sparing the elders, not ignoring the babies, but opposing everyone with the same arsenal of a murderous hand and hurrying to bring about death everywhere, no matter how much It was power. The temples are overthrown, the shrines are desecrated: in place of their wicked altars, lawless libations and sacrifices, then the ancient Taurian massacre of foreigners, which they retain in force. The murder of girls, husbands and wives; and there was no one helping, no one ready to confront. Meadows, springs, trees are worshiped. The supreme providence allows this, perhaps, in order to increase the iniquity that, as we know from the Scriptures, Israel has experienced many times. The good shepherd was not present in body, but in spirit with God and, in incomprehensible courts, reading it, as an initiate, face to face, he delayed intercession and put off help. But finally, he could not despise, and here he is miraculous no less than in other cases. When the barbarians entered the temple and saw the tomb, they imagined that there was a treasure, as indeed it was a treasure. Rushing to unearth it, they suddenly felt relaxed in their arms, relaxed in their legs and bound by invisible bonds, remaining completely motionless, miserable, full of surprise and fear and not having the strength to do anything else, as soon as they made the sounds of a voice. (Vasilievsky. T. 3.P. 64).

Thus, in the church of Amastrid, Russia tried to open the coffin of St. George in search of treasures, but this could not be done, the soldiers and arms allegedly were taken away. According to the same legend, having learned from one of the captured citizens that the soldiers were struck by the wrath of the Christian God, the leader ordered the release of all Christians and the return of church values ​​to the temples, and this saved the soldiers.

The life of George is preserved in the only manuscript of the tenth century. ^[2] which is part of the Greek Minea in February. The life was placed on February 8th. The manuscript entered the Royal Library of Paris as part of the collection of Cardinal N. Ridolfi , nephew of Pope Leo X (1475-1521). In the Greek service mines and sinaxars, the memory of George is under February 21, and there is also a short version of the Life ^[3] .

At the initial stage of the study of the text in the middle of the XIX century, it was suggested that in the lives of George and St. Stephen, the archbishop. Surozhsky , we are talking about the same event ^[4] , however, modern researchers reject this hypothesis.

The first publisher of the Russian translation of the text (1893), academician V. G. Vasilievsky , relying on the style of presentation, believed that the author of the monument was the famous hagiographer Ignatius Deacon (770/780 - after 845). Based on this, he dated the raid between 820 and 842 years , that is, the 2nd iconoclastic period . Scientists who adhere to this point of view, note the stylistic proximity of life to other works of Ignatius and the organic passage about the dew in the text. The text of life is not considered in the form of separate phrases that find analogies in other monuments, but is studied in comparison with the tradition of Byzantine hagiography of that time. In addition to the stylistic proximity of the Life with the works of Ignatius, historians see another characteristic sign of the era - silence about the icons. The iconoclastic period continued until the death of Emperor Theophilus in 842, which defines the upper boundary of the writing of the Life.

Other researchers suggest the story of the invasion of the Rus in the Life of St. George of Amastrid by a later insert, designed to describe the miracle from the tomb of St. George. The description of the raid indicates that the barbarians began the ruin of Propontis , that is, from places near Constantinople , and these events relate to the raid of Russia in 860 . Researchers note that the fragment about dews contains a phraseological and ideological similarity with the sermons of Patriarch Photius in the year 860.

A. A. Vasiliev ^[5] , as well as the Byzantinists of the school of A. Gregoire ^{[6] [7] [8]} and other researchers, considered the story of the invasion of Russia on Amastrida as a later interpolation. They associated this event with the campaign of Russia on Constantinople in 860, which is mentioned in 2 homilies of the Patriarch of Constantinople St. Photius ^[9] , or with the campaign on Prince Byzantium in 941 of Prince Igor .

The point of view of Vasilievsky was shared by domestic scientists ^{[10] [11]} .

In 1979, A. Makropoulos presented arguments in favor of the fact that the Russian episode of the Life is a late insertion “in the style of Photius” .

In 1977 and 1982, I.I. Shevchenko published a detailed refutation of the arguments of the supporters of the late dating of the raid, in particular, the arguments of A. Makropoulos. I.I.Shevchenko believed that there was a stylistic proximity of life, including the passage about the invasion of Russia, to other works of Ignatius the Deacon, and named a number of signs by which the text can be attributed to the monuments of the iconoclastic era. If the last assumption is true, then the mention of the ethnonym "Russia" (῾Ρῶς) in the Life of George is the oldest in all known Greek sources ^{[12] [13]} .

In 1997, Cyril Mango in a source study ^{[14] of the} writings of Ignatius the Deacon challenged the arguments of I. I. Shevchenko , proving that the Life belongs to the authorship of Ignatius the Deacon and the iconoclastic era, indicating that Ignatius the Deacon hardly showed interest in such a little-known person as George Amastridsky whose veneration did not go beyond the vicinity of Amastrida herself. In addition, he points out that the combination of iconoclastic and iconophilic passages in the text of Life can easily be explained by the fact that the author had the task of compiling a biography of the figure who lived during the triumph of iconoclasm and belonged to this movement (according to I.I.Shevchenko and Cyril Mango , George Amastridsky belonged to the iconoclastic movement ^{[12] [14]} ), but retaining sympathy for icon veneration. In addition, in the introduction to the Life, the author says that he does not have experience in hagiographic works, while Ignatius wrote the Life of St. Nicephorus is still approx. 830 g ^[14] .

K. Zuckerman attributes the attack to the beginning of the 830s . The Embassy of the Rus in Constantinople in the year 838 , known from the Bertin annals , interprets it as a subsequent peace treaty. The diplomatic correspondence reproduced in this source by the emperors Theophilos and Louis the Pious testifies to the desire of the Byzantine emperor to protect the delegation of the “Roses” from any dangers and ensure its successful return to their homeland. Such a caring attitude of the Byzantines is interpreted by Zuckerman as their desire to maintain peace with the barbarians, representing a serious military threat to the empire.

• Russia (people)
• Bravlin
• Russian-Byzantine wars
• Caspian hikes of the Rus
• Russian Kaganate

• Sergius (Spassky ). Monthly. T. 3.P. 79-80.
• Janin . Grands centers. P. 438.
• in the same place . Giorgio, vescovo di Amastri in Paflagonia // BiblSS. T. 6. P. 533.
• Ševčenko I. Hagiography of the Iconoclast Period // Iconoclasm. Birmingham, 1977. P. 121-125.
• Νόβακ Γ. Γεώργιος ὁ ᾿Αμάστριδος // ΘΗΕ. Τ. 4. Σ. 461-462.
• Aubert R. Georges d'Amastris // DHGE. T. 20. P. 584.
• Σωφρόνιος (Εὐστρατιάδης). ῾Αγιολόγιον. Σ. 92.
• Pritsak O. At the Dawn of Christianity in Rus' // Proc. of the Intern. Congr. Commemorating the Millenium of Christianity in Rus'-Ukraine. Camb. (Mass.), 1990. P. 94-95. (HUS; Vol. 12/13).
• Bibikov M. V. “An unknown tribe, countless tribe, tribe from the ends of the earth”: Name of Russia in the Byzantine tradition IX - ser. X centuries // He is. Byzantinorossica: Code of Byzantine evidence of Russia. M., 2004.V. 1. Ch. 2, pp. 41–44.
• Vasiliev AA The Russian Attack on Constantinople in 860. Camb. (Mass.), 1946. P. 70-89.
• Grégoire H. L'histoire et la légend d'Oleg prince de Kiev // La Nouvelle Clio. Brux., 1952. Vol. 4. N 5-8. P. 280-287.
• Da Costa-Louillet G. Y eut-il des invasions Russes dans l'Empire Byzantin avant 860? // Byz. 1941. Vol. 15. P. 231-248.
• in the same place. Saints de Constantinople aux VIII-e, IX-e, Xe siecles // Byzantion. 1954.Vol. 24. P. 479-492.
• Nikitin P. About some Greek texts of the lives of saints // ZIAN. Ser. 8. 1895. T. 1, No. 1. S. 27-51.
• Levchenko M.V. Essays on the history of Russian-Byzantine relations. M., 1956. S. 46–55.
• Sevcenko I. Hagiography of the Iconoclast Period // Iconoclasm. Birmingham, 1977. P. 121-127. Sevcenko I. Ideology, Letters and Culture in the Byzantine World. - London, 1982. - # 5.

• Life: Parisin. gr. 1452. Fol. 57r — 75r.
• Short edition of life: SynCP. Col. 481-482.
• Vasilievsky V.G. Life of George Amastrid. Life of Stefan Sourozhsky // Chronicle of classes of the Archaeographic Commission. Issue 9. 1893.
• Translation of Life in English from the ed. V. G. Vasilievsky (University of Notre Dame 2001).
• Vasilievsky V. G. Transactions. Pg., 1915. T. 3. S. I — CXLI.
• Enter in the Life of St. George Amastrid. S. 1-71.
• The Life of St. George of Amastrid, Greek text and Russian. per.
• BHG, N 668-668e.
• ActaSS. Febr. T. 3. P. 269.
• ZhSv. Feb S. 365-366.
• Vasilievsky V. Analecta byzantinorussica, vol. iii, 1893, pp. 1-73 (publ. Lives and comm.).

• Ancient Russia in the light of foreign sources , part 2, chap. 2 - a manual for students of historical faculties of universities
• Kartashov A.V. Essays on the History of the Russian Church , vol. 1 - Ch.: The oldest evidence of the acquaintance of Russians with Christianity.
• Zuckerman K. Two stages of the formation of the Old Russian state - Archeology, No. 1, Kiev, 2003.