— Ch. 1 · Origins And Migration Patterns —
East Slavs.
~5 min read · Ch. 1 of 6
In the 8th and 9th centuries, Slavic settlers flooded across the Eastern European Plain. They moved as farmers, beekeepers, hunters, fishers, herders, and trappers. No single scholar agrees on where these people first originated before their great expansion. Between the first and ninth centuries, Sarmatians, Huns, Alans, Avars, Bulgars, and Magyars passed through the Pontic steppe to the west. These foreign tribes left little trace in the lands they conquered or passed through. By the 8th century, the Slavs became the dominant ethnic group on that vast plain. The East Slavs practiced slash-and-burn agriculture which took advantage of extensive forests. This method involved clearing tracts of forest with fire and cultivating it for a few years. Soil exhausted itself quickly after this cycle forced frequent movement. Reliance on this agricultural style explains their rapid spread through eastern Europe. One group settled along the Dnieper river in what is now Ukraine and Belarus. They then spread northward to the northern Volga valley east of modern-day Moscow. Another group moved northeast toward the Varangians of the Rus' Khaganate. They established an important regional center at Novgorod for protection. The same population also settled present-day Tver Oblast and the region of Beloozero. Having reached the lands of the Merya near Rostov, they linked up with the Dnieper group.
Archaeological Cultures And Settlements
The Kyiv culture dates from the 2nd, 3rd centuries AD as the earliest known example. It stood as the northern neighbor of the more developed Chernyakhov culture. Rare settlements appeared in unusual topographic conditions like low places often flooded during floods. By the 5th century, related cultures such as Korchak and Kolochin arose around the Kyiv site. Fortified cities appeared in northern Ukraine and southern Belarus by the 7th century AD. The Ilmen Slovenes and Krivichs did not reach Lake Ladoga until that time. First settlements near the Polans and Severians arose in the region of Kyiv and Chernigov already by the 7th, 8th centuries. In all other East Slavic lands there were no more than two dozen cities before the 10th century. On the Left Bank of the Dnieper alone there were about a hundred of them. Archaeologists classify Prague, Korchak, Penkova, Kolochin, and Kyiv cultures as early Slavic. The Prague-Korchak settlements were sites surrounded by wooden walls with one building part of a common wall. They lacked agricultural tools and likely served to collect military detachments. Penkovsky settlements could hold up to two dozen buildings inside their walls. These became large trade, craft, and administrative centers for their time. The center of territory controlled by dulebs lay in the basin of the Western Bug. The main fortress of the Antes sat near borders of the Byzantine Empire in modern Moldova. Early Slavic settlements were destroyed by Avars in the 7th century after which none rose again until the 10th.