utilize for selfish purposes. Twice during the eleventh century there occurred heavy relapses into
paganism; in 1045, under King Andreas, and in 1060, under King Bela.
§ 37. The Christianization of Russia.
Nestor (monk of Kieff, the oldest Russian annalist, d. 1116): Annales, or Chronicon (from the
building of the Babylonian tower to 1093). Continued by Niphontes (Nifon) from 1116–1157,
and by others to 1676. Complete ed. in Russ by Pogodin, 1841, and with a Latin version and
glossary by Fr. Miklosisch, Vindobon, 1860. German translation by Schlözer, Göttingen,
1802–’9, 5 vols. (incomplete).
J. G. Stritter: Memoriae Populorum olim ad Danubium, etc., incolentium ex Byzant. Script. Petropoli,
- 4 vols. A collection of the Byzantine sources.
N. M. Karamsin: History of Russia, 12 vols. St. Petersburg, 1816–29, translated into German and
French.
Ph. Strahl: Beiträge zur russ. Kirchen-Geschichte (vol. I.). Halle, 1827; and Geschichte d. russ
Kirche (vol. I.). Halle, 1830 (incomplete).
A. N. Mouravieff (late chamberlain to the Czar and Under-Procurator of the Most Holy Synod): A
History of the Church of Russia (to the founding of the Holy Synod in 1721). St. Petersburg,
1840, translated into English by Rev. R. W. Blackmore. Oxford, 1862.
A. P. Stanley: Lectures on the Eastern Church. Lec. IX.-XII. London, 1862.
L. Boissard: L’église de Bussie. Paris, 1867, 2 vols.
The legend traces Christianity in Russia back to the Apostle St. Andrew, who is especially
revered by the Russians. Mouravieff commences his history of the Russian church with these words:
"The Russian church, like the other Orthodox churches of the East, had an apostle for its founder.
St. Andrew, the first called of the Twelve, hailed with his blessing long beforehand the destined
introduction of Christianity into our country. Ascending up and penetrating by the Dniepr into the
deserts of Scythia, he planted the first cross on the hills of Kieff, and ’See you,’ said he to his
disciples, ’those hills? On those hills shall shine the light of divine grace. There shall be here a
great city, and God shall have in it many churches to His name.’ Such are the words of the holy
Nestor that point from whence Christian Russia has sprung."
This tradition is an expansion of the report that Andrew labored and died a martyr in
Scythia,^135 and nothing more.
In the ninth century the Russian tribes, inhabiting the Eastern part of Europe, were gathered
together under the rule of Ruric, a Varangian prince,^136 who from the coasts of the Baltic penetrated
into the centre of the present Russia, and was voluntarily accepted, if not actually chosen by the
tribes as their chief. He is regarded as the founder of the Russian empire, a.d. 862, which in 1862
celebrated its millennial anniversary. About the same time or a little later the Russians became
somewhat acquainted with Christianity through their connections with the Byzantine empire. The
Eastern church, however, never developed any great missionary activity, and when Photius, the
patriarch of Constantinople, in his circular letter against the Roman see, speaks of the Russians as
(^135) Euseb. III. 1.
(^136) The Varangians were a tribe of piratical Northmen who made the Slavs and Finns tributary.