Rus' (region) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Rus' is an ethno-cultural region in Eastern Europe

Eastern Europe

Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...

inhabited by Eastern Slavs. Historically, it comprises the northern part of Ukraine

Ukraine

Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...

, the north-western part of Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, Belarus

Belarus

Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...

and some eastern parts of Poland

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

and Slovakia

Slovakia

The Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...

.

The name comes from Old East Slavic , and remains the same in modern Belarusian, Russian and Ukrainian. In Greek it is called or , and in Latin or . For more about the etymology, see Rus (name)

Rus (name)

Originally, the name Rus referred to the people, the region, and the medieval states of the Rus' Khaganate and Kievan Rus' polities...

History

The Kievan Rus had its cultural and political height in the 10th and 11th century and later disintegrated into many small principalities. The most powerful successor states were Vladimir-Suzdal

Vladimir-Suzdal

The Vladimir-Suzdal Principality or Vladimir-Suzdal Rus’ was one of the major principalities which succeeded Kievan Rus' in the late 12th century and lasted until the late 14th century. For a long time the Principality was a vassal of the Mongolian Golden Horde...

, Halych-Volhynia and Novgorod Republic

Novgorod Republic

The Novgorod Republic was a large medieval Russian state which stretched from the Baltic Sea to the Ural Mountains between the 12th and 15th centuries, centred on the city of Novgorod...

. The Mongol invasion of Rus' devastated the north-eastern parts in 1237-1238 and the south western parts of Rus in 1239-1240. From this date on the fate of Rus lands began to diverge. The north-eastern parts stayed under the rule of Mongols and the Golden Horde

Golden Horde

The Golden Horde was a Mongol and later Turkicized khanate that formed the north-western sector of the Mongol Empire...

for two more centuries while the western parts together with Kiev were conquered by Lithuania

Lithuania

Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...

(see Battle on the Irpen' River

Battle on the Irpen' River

The Battle on the Irpin River occurred in early 1320s between the armies of Gediminas, the Grand Duke of Lithuania, and Prince Stanislav of Kiev, allied with Oleg of Pereyaslavl' and Roman of Bryansk. On the small Irpin River about south west of Kiev, Gediminas resoundingly defeated Stanislav and...

) and Poland. This political development caused a certain cultural and linguistic split between Eastern Slavs which previously almost didn't exist. However, the Orthodox church which resided in Vladimir and later in Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

remained a common unifying factor of Rus lands. In the Grand Duchy of Lithuania

Grand Duchy of Lithuania

The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a European state from the 12th /13th century until 1569 and then as a constituent part of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth until 1791 when Constitution of May 3, 1791 abolished it in favor of unitary state. It was founded by the Lithuanians, one of the polytheistic...

which had an Eastern Slavic majority of population as well as the official Slavic language the Orthodox Christians started to face discrimination by the ruling Lithuanian elite in the second half of the 15th century. A rivalry between the Grand Duchies of Moscow and Lithuania both of whom considered themselves as centers of Rus and legitimate successors of Kiev (Ivan III called himself the Grand Duke of all Rus) caused several wars and showed Muscovite overweight by the beginning of the 16th century. Lithuania was forced to seek help from Poland and the two states formed the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was a dualistic state of Poland and Lithuania ruled by a common monarch. It was the largest and one of the most populous countries of 16th- and 17th‑century Europe with some and a multi-ethnic population of 11 million at its peak in the early 17th century...

where Poland began to play a dominant role promoting Catholic rule in the Western Rus.

Russia managed to gradually roll back its opponent by the end of 18th century when Catherine the Great initiated the Partitions of Poland

Partitions of Poland

The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...

. By that time, all Rus lands were united under control of Saint-Petersburg, except Galicia which became part of Austria-Hungary

Austria-Hungary

Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...

Ethnonym Рус(ъ)(c)(ь)кие

People of different principalities, be it in the East or in the West, continued to call themselves Русские (Русъские,Руськие, Русины, Руси(ч)ци) which meant belonging to Rus. The languages were also called Руски, Руськый, Русский while the entirety of the region was called Русская земля, Rusish land or Rusland.

The Greeks used to call the lands around Kiev Rossia Mikra (Rus proper) and the entirety of all other lands Rossia Makra (Rus in the broader sense, Greater Rus). Later, this coined the terms Great Russia

Great Russia

Great Russia is an obsolete name formerly applied to the territories of "Russia proper", the land that formed the core of Muscovy and, later, Russia...

and Little Russia

Little Russia

Little Russia , sometimes Little or Lesser Rus’ , is a historical political and geographical term in the Russian language referring to most of the territory of modern-day Ukraine before the 20th century. It is similar to the Polish term Małopolska of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth...

History

Ethnonym Рус(ъ)(c)(ь)кие

See also