Battle of the Novgorodians with the Suzdalians
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Battle of the Novgorodians with the Suzdalians | |||||||
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Part of the 1167–1169 Kievan succession crisis[2] | |||||||
Battle as shown on a Novgorodian icon from the mid-15th century | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Iziaslavichi of Volhynia:[1]
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Coalition[2]
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Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Roman "the Great" Mstislavich[2] |
Andrey Bogolyubsky[2] Sviatoslav Rostislavich[2] |
The Battle of the Novogorodians with the Suzdalians (битва новгородцев с суздальцами) was a 1169 siege of the city of
After the
Nevertheless, a subsequent Suzdalian economic blockade of the city prompted the Novgorodians to expel Roman Mstislavich in 1170, after which Andrey selected first Rurik Rostislavich of Smolensk (1170) and then his own son Yury Bogolyubsky of Suzdalia (1171) to become the next princes of Novgorod.[2]
Some time after the siege, a belief sprung up that Novgorod had been miraculously delivered, giving rise to a legend. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the episode became the basis for several hagiographic tales in the Russian church,[4] as well as two large icons executed in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries (and now housed respectively in the Novgorod Museum and the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg.)[5]
The battle in history
The episode took place in 1169 when
The Novgorodians delivered a crushing defeat upon the Suzdalians and their allies.[2]
Bogolyubsky was, in fact, able to place his candidate on the Novgorodian throne the following year. The Novgorodians dismissed Sviatoslav in 1170. Bogolyubsky was, by then, the most powerful prince in Kievan Rus'. He had conquered Kiev and placed his candidate, Gleb, on the grand princely throne there. Andrei then remained the most powerful prince in Rus until his assassination in 1174. Thus, while the Novgorodians felt it had been miraculously delivered from Bogolyubsky's clutches in 1169, their policy of independence from him failed, and they gave in to his policies the following year.[6]
Legend of the icon
According to a later legend (first written doen almost three centuries after the battle),during the siege,
The legend surrounding Ilya and the Icon of the Mother of God of the Sign probably survived in oral form for some time. It appears to have been first committed to writing during the archiepiscopate of
In addition to the tales surrounding the event, Evfimii II also patronized the painting of an icon which shows three scenes from the episode: Ilya taking the icon from the Church of the Transfiguration, processing over the bridge with it, and displaying it on the city walls as the Novgorodians sallied out (led by military saints) to drive off the Suzdalians. A copy of this icon was painted in the sixteenth century as well.[citation needed]
The Icon of the Mother of God of the Sign which Ilya brought to the Detinets in 1169, was long kept in the Church of the Transfiguration on Ilin Street. A new church (The Church of the Sign) was built next to it in the seventeenth century. It was kept in the Novgorod Museum during the Soviet period and is now on display in the Cathedral of Holy Wisdom in Novgorod. Archbishop Ilya's sarcophagus is also to be seen in the cathedral in the western gallery.[citation needed]
See also
- Blessed Be the Host of the Heavenly Tsar
References
- ^ a b c Martin 2007, pp. 124–127.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Martin 2007, p. 127.
- ^ Martin 2007, p. 124.
- ^ “Povest’ o pobede Novgorodtsev” nad” Suzdal’tsami,” in Grigorii Aleksandrovich, graf Kushelev-Bezborodko,, and N. I. (Nikolai Ivanovich) Kostomarov, eds. Pamiatniki starinnoi russkoi literatury. 4 Vols. (St. Petersburg: Tipografii P. A. Kulish, 1860-1862), vol. 1, pp. 241-2; “Skazanie o bitve Novgorodtsev s Suzdal’tsami,” in L. A. (Lev Aleksandrovich) Dmitriev and D. S. (Dmitrii Sergeevich) Likhachev, eds. Pamiatniki literatury drevnei Rusi XIV-seredina XV veka. (Moscow: Khudozhestvennaia literatura, 1981), 448-53. See also, Michael C.Paul, A Man Chosen by God: The Office of Archbishop in Novgorod Russia 1165-1478. Ph.D. dissertation. University of Miami, 2003, p. 258.
- ^ Lazarev, Novgorodskaia ikonopis’, 35-6. The fifteenth century version is in the Novgorod Museum. The sixteenth century version is now in the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg.
- ^ Michael C. Paul, "Was the Prince of Novgorod a 'Third-Rate Bureaucrat' after 1136?" Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas, Vol. 56, No. 1 (2008): 89.
- ^ See Slovo o znamenii, in I. Kuprianov, Obozrenie pergamennykh rukopisei Novgorodskoi Sofiiskoi biblioteki (St. Petersburg: N.p., 1857), 71-75 and L. A. (Lev Aleksandrovich) Dmitriev’s modern translation in L. A. (Lev Aleksandrovich) Dmitriev and D. S. (Dmitrii Sergeevich Likhachev), eds., Pamiatniki literatury drevnei Rusi XIV-seredina XV veka, 3 vols., (Moscow: Khudozhestvennaia literatura, 1981), 448-453; Janet Martin, Medieval Russia 980-1584 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 114-115; E. S. (Engelina Sergeevna) Smirnova, “Novgorodskaia ikona Bogomater’ ‘Znamenie’: Nekotorye voprosy Bogorodichnoi ikonografii XII v.” in A. I. (Aleksei I.) Komech and E. O. Etingof, eds., Drevnerusskoe iskusstvo. Balkany. Rus’ (St. Petersburg: Dmitrii Bulanin, 1995), 288-309.Elisa Aleksandrovna Gordienko, Vladychnaia Palata Novgorodskogo Kremlia (Leningrad: Lenizdat, 1991), 49; Gail Lenhoff, “Novgorod’s Znamenie Legend in Moscow’s Steppennaia Kniga,” in Moskovskaia Rus’: Spetsificheskie cherty razvitiia. (Budapest: Lorand Eotvos University Press, 2003): 178-186.
- ^ G. M. Prokhorov, “Pakhomii Serb,” in D. S. Likhachev, Slovar’ knizhnikov i knizhnosti Drevnei Rusi, vol. 2, Pervaia polovina XIV-XVI v., pt. 2, pp. 167-177.
- ^ Michael C. Paul, “Continuity and Change in the Novgorodian Archiepiscopal Office, 1478-1591," Orientalia Christiana Periodica, Vol. 5, No. 2 (2009) pp. 273-317.
Bibliography
- Martin, Janet (2007). Medieval Russia: 980–1584. Second Edition. E-book. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-511-36800-4.