History of Russia

History of Russia

by

Nathan Dole

Original Copyright 1899

All rights reserved. This book and all parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form without prior permission of the publisher.

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Table of Contents

Front Matter

Ancestors of the Russians

Coming of the Northmen

Expeditions to Constantinople

Princess Saint Olga

Sviatoslav, Pagan Warrior

Vladimir, Sun of Kief

Kief Under Iaroslaf

Quarrels Among the Princes

How Andrew Destroyed Kief

Rival Princes

The Coming of the Tartars

Alexander, Hero of the Neva

Novogorod, Commonwealth

Moscow Triumphs over Tver

The Hero of the Don

Russia Almost Crushed

Donski's Grandchildren

Ivan the Great and Novgorod

The Fate of Viatka and Tver

Ivan Marries a Greek Princess

Ivan and the Tartars

Ivan and his Son-in-law

Ivan and Western Europe

Basil and Lithuania

Basil and the Tartars

A Many-winged Eagle

Basil, Prince of Moscow

Ivan and his Guardian

How Ivan became the Tsar

A Cloud over Kazan

Defeat and Conquest

English Discover Russia

Ivan Writes his Name in Blood

Dynasty of Andrew Perished

False Prince and the Usurper

Ashes of a Russian Tsar

Brigand, Prince, and Butcher

How the Tsar Regained a City

A Riot and a Regent

Peter the Great and the Sea

The Royal Shipwright

Peter and the Iron Head

Peter Knouts his Son

Russian Throne Passes Hands

Catherine Dispatches Husband

Catherine's Glory and Shame

The Russian Hamlet

How Wolf Entered the Kennel

The Invasion of Russia

The Revolution of 1848

The Crimean War

The Beginning of Freedom

The Nihilists and the Tsar

The Reign of Alexander III

The Ancestors of the Russians

In Central Asia there is a vast table-land surrounded by lofty, sheltering mountains, watered by noble The early rivers, and so fertile that it might well be called home of the Garden of Eden. Perhaps this was the cradle Aryans of the human race.

The people who dwelt there in earliest times tilled the soil, tended their flocks and herds, fished in the wide streams, worshipped the heaven and "our mother the dank earth," and, living quiet and happy lives, increased and multiplied until at last there was no more room for them all. Then the young men, taking their families and their goods, joined themselves into little bands and turned their faces toward the south and the west and the north.

Some settled on the lands between the Indus and the Ganges; some reached the beautiful islands of the Mediterranean, and peopled the sunny vales of Greece and the balmy shores of Italy; others, more adventurous, wandered across the never-ending plains into the cold, wind-swept regions of Russia and the rocky coasts of Scandinavia.

ISLAND OF LIPARL.

The Hindu throwing himself under the wheels of Juggernaut, the wild robber-chief lurking in the caves of Olympos, the Italian beggar proud of his name, the peasant starving in the swamps of Ireland, the serf in his sheepskin coat crouching on top of his huge oven, the farmer guiding his oxen over the stony hills of New England, are all kith and kin. Our common ancestors dwelt in that morning land and spoke one language, which was the parent of a hundred tongues,—Sanskrit and Greek and Latin, Keltic and Russian, German and English. Hence all over the world are found the same superstitions, the same customs of seed-time and harvest, the same rites of marriage and death, the same strange myths and fairy tales: Jack the Giant Killer and Cinderella were natives of the Garden of Eden thousands of years ago.