Sviatoslav I or Svyatoslav I Igorevich (; Old Norse: Sveinald; – 972) was Prince of Kiev from 945 until his death in 972. He is known for his persistent campaigns in the east and south, which precipitated the collapse of two great powers in Eastern Europe, Khazaria and the First Bulgarian Empire. He conquered numerous East Slavic tribes, defeated the Alans and attacked the Volga Bulgars,A History of Russia: Since 1855, Walter Moss, pg 29Khazarian state and its role in the history of Eastern Europe and the Caucasus A.P. Novoseltsev, Moscow, Nauka, 1990. and at times was allied with the Pechenegs and Magyars (Hungarians).
Following the death of his father Igor in 945, Sviatoslav's mother Olga reigned as regent in Kiev until 962. His decade-long reign over the Kievan Rus' was marked by rapid expansion into the Volga River valley, the Pontic steppe, and the Balkans, leading him to carve out for himself the largest state in Europe. In 969, he moved his seat to Pereyaslavets on the Danube. In 970, he appointed his sons Yaropolk and Oleg as subordinate princes of Kiev and Drelinia, while he appointed Vladimir, his son by his housekeeper and servant Malusha, as the prince of Novgorod.
In contrast with his mother's conversion to Christianity, Sviatoslav remained a staunch pagan all of his life. Due to his abrupt death in an ambush, his conquests, for the most part, were not consolidated into a functioning empire, while his failure to establish a stable succession led to a fratricidal feud among his three sons, resulting in the deaths of Yaropolk and Oleg, while Vladimir emerged as the sole ruler.
Name The Primary Chronicle records Sviatoslav as the first ruler of the Kievan Rus' with a name of Slavic origin, as opposed to his predecessors, whose names had Old Norse forms. Some scholars see the name of Sviatoslav, composed of the Slavic roots for "holy" and "glory", as an artificial derivation combining the names of his predecessors Oleg and Rurik,See (Moscow, 1970). but modern researchers question the possibility of such a translation of names from one language to another.Anna Litvina. Fyodor Uspensky. The choice of the name of the Russian princes in the X–XVI centuries. Dynastic history through the prism of anthroponymy. – Moscow, 2006 .– 904 p. – 1000 copies. – ISBN 5-85759-339-5. – P. 41.Elena Rydzevskaya. Ancient Russia and Scandinavia in the 9th–14th centuries Moscow: Nauka, 1978. Pp. 203 Sveinald or Sveneld is identical to Sviatoslav, as the Norse rendition of the Slavic name.Paul R. Magocsi (2010) A History of Ukraine: The Land and Its Peoples, University of Toronto Press, p. 68, . The 10th-century Eastern Roman Emperor Constantine VII's Greek-language work De Administrando Imperio ("On the Governance of the Empire") records his name as Σφενδοσθλάβος ("Sfendostlabos").
Early life and personality Almost nothing is known about Sviatoslav's childhood and youth, which he spent reigning in Novgorod. Sviatoslav's father, Igor, was killed by the Drevlians around 945, and his mother, Olga, ruled as regent in Kiev until Sviatoslav reached maturity (ca. 963).If Olga was indeed born in 879, as the Primary Chronicle seems to imply, she should have been about 65 at the time of Sviatoslav's birth. There are clearly some problems with chronology. Sviatoslav was tutored by a Varangian named Asmud.Primary Chronicle entry for 968 The tradition of employing Varangian tutors for the sons of ruling princes survived well into the 11th century. Sviatoslav appears to have had little patience for administration. His life was spent with his druzhina (roughly, "company") in permanent warfare against neighbouring states.Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, Primary Chronicle, p. 84.
According to the Primary Chronicle, he carried neither wagons nor kettles on his expeditions, and he boiled no meat, rather cutting off small strips of horseflesh, game, or beef to eat after roasting it on the coals. Nor did he have a tent, rather spreading out a horse-blanket under him and setting his saddle under his head, and all his retinue did likewise.Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, Primary Chronicle, p. 84.
Sviatoslav's appearance has been described very clearly by Leo the Deacon, who himself attended the meeting of Sviatoslav with John I Tzimiskes. Following Deacon's memories, Sviatoslav was a bright-eyed man of average height but of stalwart build, much more sturdy than Tzimiskes. He had a bald head and a wispy beard and wore a bushy moustache and a sidelock as a sign of his nobility.For the alternative translations of the same passage of the Greek original that say that Sviatoslav may have not shaven but wispy beard and not one but two sidelocks on each side of his head, see e.g. Ian Heath "The Vikings (Elite 3)", Osprey Publishing 1985; , p.60 or David Nicolle "Armies of Medieval Russia 750–1250 (Men-at-Arms 333)" Osprey Publishing 1999; , p.44 He preferred to dress in white, and it was noted that his garments were much cleaner than those of his men, although he had a lot in common with his warriors. He wore a single large gold earring bearing a carbuncle and two pearls.Vernadsky 276–277. The sidelock is reminiscent of Turkic hairstyles and practices and was later mimicked by Cossacks.
Religious beliefs Sviatoslav's mother, Olga, converted to Orthodox Christianity at the court of the Byzantine Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus in 957.Based on his analysis of De Ceremoniis, Alexander Nazarenko hypothesises that Olga hoped to orchestrate a marriage between Sviatoslav and a Byzantine princess. If her proposal was peremptorily declined (as it most certainly would have been), it is hardly surprising that Sviatoslav would look at the Byzantine Empire and her Christian culture with suspicion. Nazarenko 302. Sviatoslav remained a pagan all of his life. In the treaty of 971 between Sviatoslav and the Byzantine emperor John I Tzimiskes, the Rus' swore by the gods Perun and Veles. According to the Primary Chronicle, he believed that his warriors (druzhina) would lose respect for him and mock him if he became a Christian.Primary Chronicle _____. The allegiance of his warriors was of paramount importance in his conquest of an empire that stretched from the Volga to the Danube.
Family Very little is known of Sviatoslav's family life. It is possible that he was not the only (or the eldest) son of his parents. The Rus'-Byzantine treaty of 945 mentions a certain Predslava, Volodislav's wife, as the noblest of the Rus' women after Olga. The fact that Predslava was Oleg's mother is presented by Vasily Tatishchev. He also speculated that Predslava came from the Hungarian nobility. George Vernadsky was among many historians to speculate that Volodislav was Igor's eldest son and heir who died at some point during Olga's regency. Another chronicle relates that Oleg (? – 977?) was the eldest son of Igor. At the time of Igor's death, Sviatoslav was still a child, and he was raised by his mother or under her instructions. Her influence, however, did not extend to his religious observance.
Sviatoslav had several children, but the origin of his wives is not specified in the chronicle. By his wives, he had Yaropolk and Oleg.Shared maternal paternity of Yaropolk and Oleg is a matter of debate by historians. By Malusha, a woman of indeterminate origins,She is traditionally identified in Russian historiography as Dobrynya's sister; for other theories on her identity, see here. Sviatoslav had Vladimir, who would ultimately break with his father's paganism and convert Rus' to Christianity. John Skylitzes reported that Vladimir had a brother named Sfengus; whether this Sfengus was a son of Sviatoslav, a son of Malusha by a prior or subsequent husband, or an unrelated Rus' nobleman is unclear.Indeed, Franklin and Shepard advanced the hypothesis that Sfengus was identical with Mstislav of Tmutarakan. Franklin and Shepard 200–201.
Children
Predslava
Oleg of Drelinia (died 977?) Yaropolk I of Kiev (952–978)
Malusha
Vladimir the Great (c. 958 – 1015) Sfengus?
Eastern campaigns Shortly after his accession to the throne, Sviatoslav began campaigning to expand Rus' control over the Volga valley and the Pontic steppe region. His greatest success was the conquest of Khazaria, which for centuries had been one of the strongest states of Eastern Europe. The sources are not clear about the roots of the conflict between Khazaria and Rus', so several possibilities have been suggested. The Rus' had an interest in removing the Khazar hold on the Volga trade route because the Khazars collected duties from the goods transported by the Volga. Historians have suggested that the Byzantine Empire may have incited the Rus' against the Khazars, who fell out with the Byzantines after the persecutions of the Jews in the reign of Romanus I Lecapenus."Rus", Encyclopaedia of Islam
Sviatoslav began by rallying the East Slavic vassal tribes of the Khazars to his cause. Those who would not join him, such as the Vyatichs, were attacked and forced to pay tribute to the Kievan Rus' rather than to the Khazars.Christian 345. It is disputed whether Sviatoslav invaded the land of Vyatichs that year. The only campaign against the Vyatichs explicitly mentioned in the Primary Chronicle is dated to 966. According to a legend recorded in the Primary Chronicle, Sviatoslav sent a message to the Vyatich rulers, consisting of a single phrase: "I want to come at you!" (Old East Slavic )Russian Primary Chronicle (ПСРЛ. — Т. 2. Ипатьевская летопись. — СПб., 1908) for year 6472. The chronicler may have wished to contrast Sviatoslav's open declaration of war to stealthy tactics employed by many other early medieval conquerors. This phrase is used in modern Russian and Ukrainian (usually misquoted as ) to denote an unequivocal declaration of one's intentions. Proceeding by the Oka and Volga rivers, he attacked Volga BulgariaSviatoslav’s alleged campaign against Volga Bulgaria in 965 remains a matter of debate. A. P. Novoseltsev denied it, citing the absence of archaeological evidence of destruction and emphasizing that Volga Bulgaria, having adopted Islam and oriented itself toward Muslim Central Asia, was not an ally of the Khazars and maintained strained relations with them; M. Kotlyar, however, considered a conflict possible due to trade restrictions along the Volga route. He employed Oghuz and Pecheneg mercenaries in this campaign, perhaps to counter the superior cavalry of the Khazars and Bulgars.For Sviatoslav's reliance on nomad cavalry, see, e.g., Franklin and Shepard 149; Christian 298; Pletneva 18.
Sviatoslav destroyed the Khazar city of Sarkel around 965, possibly sacking (but not occupying) the Khazar city of Kerch on the Crimea as well.Christian 298. The Primary Chronicle is very succinct about the whole campaign against the Khazars, saying only that Sviatoslav "took their city and Belaya Vezha". At Sarkel he established a Rus' settlement called Belaya Vyezha ("the white tower" or "the white fortress", the East Slavic translation for "Sarkel").The town was an important trade center located near the portage between the Volga and Don Rivers. By the early 12th century, however, it had been destroyed by the Kipchaks. He subsequently destroyed the Khazar capital of Atil.See, generally Christian 297–298; Dunlop passim. A visitor to Atil wrote soon after Sviatoslav's campaign: "The Rus' attacked, and no grape or raisin remained, not a leaf on a branch."Logan (1992), p. 202 The exact chronology of his Khazar campaign is uncertain and disputed; for example, Mikhail Artamonov and David Christian proposed that the sack of Sarkel came after the destruction of Atil.Artamonov 428; Christian 298.