Theories of the origin and ancestral home of the Slavs. The ancestral home of the Slavs

The ancestral home of the Slavs

Ethnogenesis of the Slavs- the process of formation of the ancient Slavic ethnic community, which led to the separation of the Slavs from the conglomerate of Indo-European tribes. Currently, there is no generally accepted version of the formation of the Slavic ethnic group.

The Slavs as an established people were first recorded in Byzantine written sources from the mid-6th century. Retrospectively, these sources mention Slavic tribes in the 4th century. Earlier information refers to peoples who could take part in the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, but the degree of this participation varies in different historical reconstructions. The earliest written evidence of Byzantine authors of the 6th century deals with an already established people, divided into Sklavins and Antes. Mentions of the Wends as the ancestors of the Slavs (or a separate Slavic tribe) are retrospective. Evidence from authors of the Roman era (I-II centuries) about the Wends does not allow us to connect them with any authentically Slavic archaeological culture.

Archaeologists identify as credibly Slavic a number of archaeological cultures dating back to the 5th century. In academic science there is no single point of view on ethnic origin carriers of earlier cultures and their continuity in relation to later Slavic ones. Linguists also do not have a consensus on the time of appearance of a language that could be considered Slavic or Proto-Slavic. Existing scientific versions suggest the separation of the Proto-Slavic language from the Proto-Indo-European (or from the language family of more low level) in a wide range from the 2nd millennium BC. e. until the turn of eras or even the first centuries AD. e.

The origin, history of formation and habitat of the ancient Slavs are studied using methods and at the intersection of various sciences: linguistics, history, archeology, paleoanthropology, genetics.

Linguistic data

Indo-Europeans

In Central Europe during the Bronze Age, there was an ethnolinguistic community of Indo-European tribes. The attribution of certain groups of languages ​​to this community is controversial. The German scientist G. Krahe came to the conclusion that while the Anatolian, Indo-Iranian, Armenian and Greek languages ​​had already separated and developed as independent ones, the Italic, Celtic, Germanic, Illyrian, Slavic and Baltic languages ​​existed only as dialects of a single Indo-European language. The ancient Europeans, who lived in central Europe north of the Alps, developed a common terminology in the field of agriculture, social relations and religion. The famous Russian linguist, academician O. N. Trubachev, based on an analysis of the Slavic vocabulary of pottery, blacksmithing and other crafts, came to the conclusion that the speakers of early Slavic dialects (or their ancestors) at the time when the corresponding terminology was being formed were in close contact with the future Germans and Italics, that is, Indo-Europeans of Central Europe. Approximately, the separation of the Germanic languages ​​from the Baltic and Proto-Slavic occurred no later than the 7th century. BC e. (according to the estimates of a number of linguists - much earlier), but in linguistics itself there are practically no precise methods of chronological reference to historical processes.

Early Slavic vocabulary and habitats of the Proto-Slavs

Attempts were made to establish the Slavic ancestral home by analyzing early Slavic vocabulary. According to F.P. Filin, the Slavs as a people developed in a forest belt with an abundance of lakes and swamps, far from the sea, mountains and steppes:

“The abundance in the lexicon of the common Slavic language of names for varieties of lakes, swamps, and forests speaks for itself. The presence in the common Slavic language of various names for animals and birds living in forests and swamps, trees and plants of the temperate forest-steppe zone, fish typical for reservoirs of this zone, and at the same time the absence of common Slavic names for the specific features of the mountains, steppes and sea - all this gives unambiguous materials for a definite conclusion about the ancestral home of the Slavs... The ancestral home of the Slavs, at least in the last centuries of their history as a single historical unit, was located away from the seas, mountains and steppes, in a forest belt of the temperate zone, rich in lakes and swamps...”

The Polish botanist Yu. Rostafinsky tried to localize the ancestral home of the Slavs more accurately in 1908: “ The Slavs transferred the common Indo-European name yew to willow and willow and did not know larch, fir and beech.» Beech- borrowing from the Germanic language. In the modern era, the eastern border of the distribution of beech falls approximately on the Kaliningrad-Odessa line, however, the study of pollen in archaeological finds indicates a wider range of beech in ancient times. In the Bronze Age (corresponding to the Middle Holocene in botany), beech grew throughout almost the entire territory of Eastern Europe(except for the north), in the Iron Age (late Holocene), when, according to most historians, the Slavic ethnic group was formed, the remains of beech were found in most of Russia, the Black Sea region, the Caucasus, Crimea, and the Carpathians. Thus, the probable place of ethnogenesis of the Slavs may be Belarus and the northern and central parts of Ukraine. In the north-west of Russia (Novgorod lands) beech was found back in the Middle Ages. Beech forests are currently widespread in Western and Northern Europe, the Balkans, the Carpathians, and Poland. In Russia, beech is found in the Kaliningrad region and the northern Caucasus. Fir does not grow in its natural habitat in the territory from the Carpathians and the eastern border of Poland to the Volga, which also makes it possible to localize the homeland of the Slavs somewhere in Ukraine and Belarus, if the assumptions of linguists about the botanical vocabulary of the ancient Slavs are correct.

All Slavic languages ​​(and Baltic) have the word Linden to designate the same tree, which suggests that the distribution area of ​​the linden tree overlaps with the homeland of the Slavic tribes, but due to the extensive range of this plant, the localization is blurred over most of Europe.

Baltic and Old Slavic languages

Map of Baltic and Slavic archaeological cultures of the 3rd-4th centuries.

It should be noted that the regions of Belarus and northern Ukraine belong to the zone of widespread Baltic toponymy. A special study by Russian philologists, academicians V.N. Toporov and O.N. Trubachev showed that in the Upper Dnieper region Baltic hydronyms are often formalized with Slavic suffixes. This means that the Slavs appeared there later than the Balts. This contradiction is removed if we accept the point of view of some linguists regarding the separation of the Slavic language from the common Baltic language.

From the point of view of linguists grammatical structure and other indicators, the Old Slavic language was closest to the Baltic languages. In particular, many words not found in other Indo-European languages ​​are common, including: roka(hand), golva(head), lipa(Linden), gvězda(star), balt(swamp), etc. (close ones are up to 1,600 words). The name itself Baltic are derived from the Indo-European root *balt- (standing waters), which has a correspondence in Russian swamp. The wider spread of the later language (Slavic in relation to Baltic) is considered by linguists to be a natural process. V.N. Toporov believed that the Baltic languages ​​are closest to the original Indo-European language, while all other Indo-European languages ​​moved away from their original state in the process of development. In his opinion, the Proto-Slavic language was a Proto-Baltic southern peripheral dialect, which turned into Proto-Slavic around the 5th century. BC e. and then developed independently into the Old Slavic language.

Archaeological data

The study of the ethnogenesis of the Slavs with the help of archeology encounters the following problem: modern science It is not possible to trace until the beginning of our era the change and continuity of archaeological cultures, the bearers of which could confidently be attributed to the Slavs or their ancestors. Some archaeologists accept some archaeological cultures at the turn of our era as Slavic, a priori recognizing the autochthony of the Slavs in a given territory, even if it was inhabited in the corresponding era by other peoples according to synchronous historical evidence.

Slavic archaeological cultures of the V-VI centuries.

Map of Baltic and Slavic archaeological cultures of the 5th-6th centuries.

The appearance of archaeological cultures, recognized by most archaeologists as Slavic, dates back only to the 6th century, corresponding to the following similar cultures, separated geographically:

• Prague-Korczak archaeological culture: the range stretches in a strip from the upper Elbe to the middle Dnieper, touching the Danube in the south and capturing the upper reaches of the Vistula. The area of ​​the early culture of the 5th century is limited to the southern Pripyat basin and the upper reaches of the Dniester, Southern Bug and Prut (Western Ukraine).

Corresponds to the habitats of the Sklavins of Byzantine authors. Characteristic features: 1) dishes - hand-made pots without decorations, sometimes clay pans; 2) dwellings - square half-dugouts with an area of ​​up to 20 m² with stoves or hearths in the corner, or log houses with a stove in the center 3) burials - corpse burning, burial of cremation remains in pits or urns, the transition in the 6th century from ground burial grounds to the mound burial rite; 4) lack of grave goods, only random things are found; brooches and weapons are missing.

• Penkovskaya archaeological culture: range from the middle Dniester to the Seversky Donets (western tributary of the Don), capturing the right bank and left bank of the middle part of the Dnieper (territory of Ukraine).

Corresponds to the probable habitats of the antes of Byzantine authors. It is distinguished by the so-called Ant treasures, in which bronze cast figurines of people and animals are found, colored with enamels in special recesses. The figurines are Alan in style, although the technique of champlevé enamel probably came from the Baltic states (earliest finds) through the provincial Roman art of the European West. According to another version, this technique developed locally within the framework of the previous Kyiv culture. The Penkovskaya culture differs from the Prague-Korchak culture, in addition to the characteristic shape of the pots, in the relative wealth of material culture and the noticeable influence of the nomads of the Black Sea region. Archaeologists M.I. Artamonov and I.P. Rusanova recognized the Bulgar farmers as the main carriers of culture, at least at its initial stage.

• Kolochin archaeological culture: habitat in the Desna basin and the upper reaches of the Dnieper (Gomel region of Belarus and Bryansk region of Russia). It adjoins the Prague and Penkovo ​​cultures in the south. Mixing zone of Baltic and Slavic tribes. Despite its proximity to the Penkovo ​​culture, V.V. Sedov classified it as Baltic based on the saturation of the area with Baltic hydronyms, but other archaeologists do not recognize this feature as ethnically defining for the archaeological culture.

In the II-III centuries. Slavic tribes of the Przeworsk culture from the Vistula-Oder region migrate to the forest-steppe areas between the Dniester and Dnieper rivers, inhabited by Sarmatian and Late Scythian tribes belonging to the Iranian language group. At the same time, the Germanic tribes of the Gepids and Goths moved to the southeast, as a result of which a multi-ethnic Chernyakhov culture with a predominance of Slavs emerged from the lower Danube to the Dnieper forest-steppe left bank. In the process of Slavicization of the local Scythian-Sarmatians in the Dnieper region, a new ethnic group was formed, known in Byzantine sources as the Antes.

Within the Slavic anthropological type, subtypes are classified that are associated with the participation of tribes of various origins in the ethnogenesis of the Slavs. Most general classification indicates the participation in the formation of the Slavic ethnos of two branches of the Caucasian race: southern (relatively broad-faced mesocranial type, descendants: Czechs, Slovaks, Ukrainians) and northern (relatively broad-faced dolichocrane type, descendants: Belarusians and Russians). In the north, participation in the ethnogenesis of Finnish tribes was recorded (mainly through the assimilation of Finno-Ugrians during the expansion of the Slavs to the east), which gave some Mongoloid admixture to East Slavic individuals; in the south there was a Scythian substrate, noted in the craniometric data of the Polyan tribe. However, it was not the Polyans, but the Drevlyans who determined the anthropological type of future Ukrainians.

Genetic history

The genetic history of an individual and entire ethnic groups is reflected in the diversity of the male sex Y chromosome, namely its non-recombining part. Y-chromosome groups (outdated designation: HG - from the English haplogroup) carry information about a common ancestor, but as a result of mutations they are modified, due to which the stages of development can be traced by haplogroups, or, in other words, by the accumulation of a particular mutation in a chromosome humanity. A person’s genotype, like his anthropological structure, does not coincide with his ethnic identification, but rather reflects the migration processes of large groups of the population during the Late Paleolithic era, which makes it possible to make probable assumptions about the ethnogenesis of peoples at their earliest stage of formation.

Written evidence

Slavic tribes first appear in Byzantine written sources of the 6th century under the name Sklavini and Antes. Retrospectively, in these sources the Antes are mentioned when describing the events of the 4th century. Presumably the Slavs (or ancestors of the Slavs) include the Wends, who, without defining their ethnic characteristics, were reported by the authors of the late Roman period (-II centuries). Earlier tribes noted by contemporaries in the supposed area of ​​formation of the Slavic ethnos (middle and upper Dnieper region, southern Belarus) could have contributed to the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, but the extent of this contribution remains unknown due to the lack of information on both the ethnicity of the tribes mentioned in the sources, and along the exact boundaries of the habitat of these tribes and the Proto-Slavs themselves.

Archaeologists find a geographical and temporal correspondence to the neurons in the Milograd archaeological culture of the 7th-3rd centuries. BC e., whose range extends to Volyn and the Pripyat River basin (northwestern Ukraine and southern Belarus). On the issue of the ethnicity of the Milogradians (Herodotus's Neuros), the opinions of scientists were divided: V.V. Sedov classified them as Balts, B.A. Rybakov saw them as Proto-Slavs. There are also versions about the participation of Scythian farmers in the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, based on the assumption that their name is not ethnic (belonging to Iranian-speaking tribes), but generalizing (belonging to barbarians).

While the expeditions of the Roman legions revealed Germany from the Rhine to the Elbe and the barbarian lands from the middle Danube to the Carpathians to the civilized world, Strabo, in describing Eastern Europe north of the Black Sea region, uses legends collected by Herodotus. Strabo, who critically interpreted the available information, directly stated that there was a white spot on the map of Europe east of the Elbe, between the Baltic and the Western Carpathians mountain range. However, he reported important ethnographic information related to the appearance of bastarns in the western regions of Ukraine.

Whoever ethnically the bearers of the Zarubintsy culture were, their influence can be traced in the early monuments of the Kyiv culture (at first classified as late Zarubintsy), early Slavic according to most archaeologists. According to the assumption of archaeologist M. B. Shchukin, it was the Bastarns, assimilating with the local population, who could play a noticeable role in the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, allowing the latter to stand out from the so-called Balto-Slavic community:

“Part of [the Bastarns] probably remained in place and, along with representatives of other “post-Zarubinets” groups, could then take part in the complex process of Slavic ethnogenesis, introducing into the formation of the “common Slavic” language certain “centum” elements, which separate the Slavs from their Baltic or Balto-Slavic ancestors."

“Whether the Pevkins, Wends and Fennes should be classified as Germans or Sarmatians, I really don’t know […] The Wends adopted many of their customs, for for the sake of robbery they scour the forests and mountains that exist between the Pevkins [Bastarns] and the Fennes. However, they can rather be classified as Germans, because they build houses for themselves, carry shields and move on foot, and with great speed; all this separates them from the Sarmatians, who spend their entire lives in a cart and on horseback.”

Some historians make hypothetical assumptions that perhaps Ptolemy mentioned among the tribes of Sarmatia and the Slavs under distorted stavan(south of the ships) and sulons(on the right bank of the middle Vistula). The assumption is justified by the consonance of words and intersecting habitats.

Slavs and Huns. 5th century

L. A. Gindin and F. V. Shelov-Kovedyaev consider the Slavic etymology of the word to be the most justified strava, pointing to its meaning in Czech "pagan funeral feast" and Polish "funeral feast, wake", while allowing the possibility of Gothic and Hunnic etymology. German historians are trying to derive the word strava from Gothic sûtrava, meaning a pile of wood and possibly a funeral pyre.

Making boats using the hollowing method is not a method unique to the Slavs. Term monoxyl found in Plato, Aristotle, Xenophon, Strabo. Strabo points to gouging as a method of making boats in ancient times.

Slavic tribes of the 6th century

Noting the close kinship of the Sklavins and Antes, Byzantine authors did not provide any signs of their ethnic division, except for different habitats:

“Both of these barbarian tribes have the same life and laws [...] They both have the same language, which is quite barbaric. And by appearance they do not differ from each other […] And once upon a time even the name of the Sklavens and Ants was the same. In ancient times, both these tribes were called spores [Greek. scattered], I think because they lived, occupying the country “sporadic,” “scattered,” in separate villages.”
“Starting from the birthplace of the Vistula [Vistula] river, a populous tribe of Veneti settled across immeasurable spaces. Although their names now change according to different clans and localities, they are still predominantly called Sclaveni and Antes.”

The Strategikon, whose authorship is attributed to Emperor Mauritius (582-602), contains information about the habitats of the Slavs, consistent with the ideas of archaeologists on early Slavic archaeological cultures:

“They settle in forests or near rivers, swamps and lakes - generally in places that are difficult to access […] Their rivers flow into the Danube […] The possessions of the Slavs and Antes are located along the rivers and touch each other, so that there is no sharp border between them. Due to the fact that they are covered with forests, or swamps, or places overgrown with reeds, it often happens that those who undertake expeditions against them are immediately forced to stop at the border of their possessions, because the entire space in front of them is impassable and covered with dense forests.”

The war between the Goths and the Antes took place somewhere in the Northern Black Sea region at the end of the 4th century, if we relate to the death of Germanarich in 376. The question of the Ants in the Black Sea region is complicated by the point of view of some historians, who saw in these Ants the Caucasian Alans or the ancestors of the Circassians. However, Procopius expands the habitat of the antes to places north of Sea of ​​Azov, although without precise geographical reference:

“The peoples who live here [Northern Azov Sea] in ancient times were called Cimmerians, but now they are called Utigurs. Further, to the north of them, countless tribes of Ants occupy the lands.”

Procopius reported the first known Ant raid on Byzantine Thrace in 527 (the first year of the reign of Emperor Justinian I).

In the ancient German epic “Widside” (the content of which dates back to the 5th century), the list of tribes of northern Europe mentions the Winedum, but there are no other names of Slavic peoples. The Germans knew the Slavs under the ethnonym Venda, although it cannot be ruled out that the name of one of the Baltic tribes bordering the Germans was transferred by them to the Slavic ethnic group during the era of the Great Migration (as happened in Byzantium with the Rus and the ethnonym Scythians).

Written sources about the origin of the Slavs

The civilized world learned about the Slavs, who had previously been cut off by the warlike nomads of Eastern Europe when they reached the borders of the Byzantine Empire. The Byzantines, who consistently fought off waves of barbarian invasions, may not have immediately identified the Slavs as a separate ethnic group and did not report legends about its occurrence. The historian of the 1st half of the 7th century Theophylact Simocatta called the Slavs getae (“ that's what these barbarians were called in the old days"), apparently mixing the Thracian tribe of the Getae with the Slavs who occupied their lands on the lower Danube.

Old Russian chronicle the beginning of the 12th century, “The Tale of Bygone Years” finds the homeland of the Slavs on the Danube, where they were first recorded by Byzantine written sources:

“A long time later [after the biblical Pandemonium of Babylon], the Slavs settled along the Danube, where now the land is Hungarian and Bulgarian. From those Slavs the Slavs spread throughout the land and were called by their names from the places where they sat. So some, having come, sat down on the river in the name of Morava and were called Moravians, while others called themselves Czechs. And here are the same Slavs: white Croats, and Serbs, and Horutans. When the Volochs attacked the Danube Slavs, and settled among them, and oppressed them, these Slavs came and sat on the Vistula and were called Poles, and from those Poles came the Poles, other Poles - Luticians, others - Mazovshans, others - Pomeranians. Likewise, these Slavs came and settled along the Dnieper and were called Polyans, and others - Drevlyans, because they sat in the forests, and others sat between Pripyat and Dvina and were called Dregovichs, others sat along the Dvina and were called Polochans, after the river flowing into the Dvina , called Polota, from which the Polotsk people took their name. The same Slavs who settled near Lake Ilmen were called by their own name - Slavs."

The Polish chronicle “Greater Poland Chronicle” follows this pattern independently, reporting on Pannonia (the Roman province adjacent to the middle Danube) as the homeland of the Slavs. Before the development of archeology and linguistics, historians agreed with the Danube lands as the place of origin of the Slavic ethnic group, but now they recognize the legendary nature of this version.

Review and synthesis of data

In the past (Soviet era), two main versions of the ethnogenesis of the Slavs were widespread: 1) the so-called Polish, which places the ancestral home of the Slavs in the area between the Vistula and Oder rivers; 2) autochthonous, influenced by the theoretical views of the Soviet academician Marr. Both reconstructions a priori recognized the Slavic nature of the early archaeological cultures in the territories inhabited by the Slavs in the early Middle Ages, and some of the original antiquity of the Slavic language, which independently developed from Proto-Indo-European. The accumulation of data in archeology and the departure from patriotic motivation in research led to the development of new versions based on the identification of a relatively localized core of the formation of the Slavic ethnic group and its spread through migrations to neighboring lands. Academic science has not developed a single point of view on exactly where and when the ethnogenesis of the Slavs took place.

Genetic research also confirms the ancestral home of the Slavs in Ukraine.

How the expansion of the early Slavs from the region of ethnogenesis occurred, the directions of migration and settlement in central Europe can be traced through the chronological development of archaeological cultures. Typically, the beginning of expansion is associated with the advance of the Huns to the west and the resettlement of Germanic peoples towards the south, associated, among other things, with climate change in the 5th century and the conditions of agricultural activity. By the beginning of the 6th century, the Slavs reached the Danube, where their further history is described in written sources of the 6th century.

The contribution of other tribes to the ethnogenesis of the Slavs

The Scythian-Sarmatians had some influence on the formation of the Slavs due to their long geographical proximity, but their influence, according to archaeology, anthropology, genetics and linguistics, was mainly limited to vocabulary borrowings and the use of horses in the household. According to genetic data, common distant ancestors of some nomadic peoples, collectively called Sarmatians, and the Slavs within the Indo-European community, but in historical times these peoples evolved independently of each other.

The contribution of the Germans to the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, according to anthropology, archeology and genetics, is insignificant. At the turn of the era, the region of ethnogenesis of the Slavs (Sarmatia) was separated from the places of residence of the Germans by a certain zone of “mutual fear”, according to Tacitus. The existence of an uninhabited area between the Germans and the Proto-Slavs of Eastern Europe is confirmed by the absence of noticeable archaeological sites from the Western Bug to the Neman in the first centuries AD. e. The presence of similar words in both languages ​​is explained by a common origin from the Indo-European community of the Bronze Age and close contacts in the 4th century after the start of the migration of the Goths from the Vistula to the south and east.

Notes

1. From the report of V.V. Sedov “Ethnogenesis of the early Slavs” (2002)
2. Trubachev O. N. Craft terminology in Slavic languages. M., 1966.
3. F. P. Filin (1962). From the report of M. B. Shchukin “The Birth of the Slavs”
4. Rostafinski (1908). From the report of M. B. Shchukin “The Birth of the Slavs”
5. Turubanova S. A., Ecological scenario of the history of the formation of living cover in European Russia, dissertation for the competition scientific degree Ph.D., 2002:

Introduction to Slavic philology.

Question No. 9. The problem of the ancestral home of the Slavs. Indo-Europeans and Slavs.

The formation of Slavic tribes occurs in the process of separating them from the numerous tribes of a large language family - the Indo-European. But scientists cannot give a definite answer to the question of what the Indo-European family was. The idea was expressed about the relationship of Indo-European languages ​​with the Uralic, Altaic, Hamitic, Iberian-Caucasian and some other languages. It is traditionally believed that all Indo-European languages ​​were formed as a result of the collapse of the Indo-European proto-language. Indo-European linguistic community by the end of the 4th - beginning of the 3rd millennium BC. disintegrates. Tribes who speak Indo-European dialects are spread across the vast territories of Europe and Asia. The ancestors of the future Slavs with the ancestors of other peoples are isolated from the Indo-European linguistic unity, and by the beginning of the third millennium BC. the Indo-European community no longer exists.

There are many hypotheses about the ancestral homeland of the Indo-Europeans and Slavs.

The ancestral home of the Indo-Europeans.

There is a traditional view that the Indo-Europeans were located in central and southeastern Europe. There are debates about whether to include the Balkans and where the eastern border lies - along the Don or along the Volga. In the 80s of the 20th century, the monumental work of T.V. was written. Gankrelidze and V.V. Ivanov “Indo-European language and Indo-Europeans”, in which a reconstruction and historical and typological analysis of the proto-language and proto-culture were carried out.

In 5-4 millennia BC. Indo-Europeans lived in the territory from the Balkans, including the Middle East and Transcaucasia, all the way to southern Turkmenistan.

The question of the ancestral home of the Slavs.

There is no single view on the localization of the Proto-Slavic language continuum from the Indo-European one. There are a number of hypotheses according to which we can talk about the Slavs from a certain time:

Since the 3rd millennium BC.

Starting from the middle (beginning) of the 2nd millennium BC.

Starting from the 4th century. BC.

The first evidence is presented in the Russian chronicle - the Tale of Bygone Years.

The earliest scientific hypotheses about the Slavs can be found in the works of Russian historians: Karamzin, Soloviev, Klyuchevsky, who refer to the PVL and consider the Danube and the Balkans to be the ancestral homeland of the Slavs.

This hypothesis was clarified at the end of the 20th century in his works by O.N. Trubachev, who is the creator of the Neodanubian hypothesis.

Most modern scientists consider the ancestral home of the Slavs to be the territory between the Vistula, Oder and Dnieper rivers; the differences are expressed in the fact that some scientists shift the territory closer to the east, others - closer to the west. Currently, 2 hypotheses are most preferred:

1) Vistula-Oder hypothesis. Between the Vistula and Oder (northern border – Baltic Sea). Approximately corresponds to modern Poland. Hence the settlement to the Danube and Dnieper. The author of this hypothesis is T. Lehr-Splavinsky (“On the origin and ancestral home of the Slavs”)

2) Vistula-Dnieper (Middle Dnieper) theory . The most preferred hypothesis now. Supported by modern scientists - Vasmer (Germany), S.B. Bernstein (USSR), Muszynski (Poland). The ancestral home of the Slavs is between the middle reaches of the Dnieper and the middle reaches of the Vistula. In the north the border is Pripyat, in the south there are right-bank forest-steppe areas. The territory of modern Ukraine (northwest), southern Belarus, southeastern Poland.

Shakhmatov's hypothesis. Shakhmatov A.A. indicates 2 (or even 3) ancestral homelands of the Slavs. He was a supporter of a single Balto-Slavic proto-language. The Balts did not change their place of residence, so some scientists position the ancestral home of the Slavs to where the modern Balts live. Shakhmatov denies the Danube as the first ancestral home. If this were so, then the Slavs appeared on the historical arena earlier than the Germans; the Slavs could not have been further south than the Germans, otherwise there would have been more ancient features. The Proto-Slavs were localized between the lower reaches of the Neman and the western Dvina, the coast of the Baltic Sea. Shakhmatov calls the Vistula River region the second ancestral home of the Slavs. Movement of the Slavs in the first centuries AD. was stopped by the invasion of the Huns. Some of the Slavs remained in the Vistula region, they gave rise to the western branch of the Slavs, the other part moved south. Part went a more western route and reached the Danube (later - the southern Slavs), 2 part went the eastern route (later - the eastern Slavs), and both of them did not pass the third ancestral home according to Shakhmatov - the Danube.

Sedov's hypothesis. Sedov believed that there was no reason to place the ancestral home of the Slavs between the Neman and the western Dvina (in the Baltic Sea region). The ancestral home of the Slavs is in the area of ​​the Vistula River. In the 4th century AD Climate change occurs in eastern Europe, resulting in swamping of the traditional places of residence of the Slavs. For this reason, the Slavs begin to move to other territories from the Vistula River region towards the northeast, towards the Balts and Finns, the other part - towards the south, towards the Danube.

Trubachev's neo-Danubian hypothesis. Trubachev intensified the theory associated with the Danube. There is also a different view of the ancestral homeland of the Indo-Europeans than in the works of Gankrelidze and Ivanov. The ancestral home of the Indo-Europeans is central Europe and the Balkans.

The ancestral home of the Slavs according to Trubachev. The middle course of the Danube (modern Austria, the Czech Republic, southern Germany and Pannonia (modern Hungary). In his hypothesis, Trubachev relies on the analysis of hydronymics and on the ancient legends of the Slavs about the Danube.

Before considering the numerous versions of the origin of the Slavs, it should be noted that all medieval authors until the 9th century did not know such a people as the Slavs and report only sklavs or sklavins, although when translating their works into Russian, translators universally use the form “Slavs”.

The people under the name “Sklavina” became known from the 6th century, although some historians believe that ancient authors were engaged in the search for the Slavic ancestral home. At the same time, the Slavs included peoples whose residence was associated with the territories of the future Slavic states formed at the end of the 1st millennium AD. e.

1 Scythian-Sarmatian theory

According to this theory, the Slavs are Scythians, Sarmatians and Roxolans

The Scythian-Sarmatian theory of the origin of the Slavs suggested that the ancestors of the Slavs came from Western Asia and settled in the southern part of Eastern Europe under the names of Scythians, Sarmatians and Roxolans. First appearing in the Bavarian Chronicle in the 13th century, Scythian-Sarmatian theory developed by Western European historians until the 18th century. One of the adherents of the origin of the Slavs from the Sarmatians (Sauromatians) was the English historian E. Gibbon, who created a voluminous work on the history of Europe.

In Russia, the idea of ​​​​the origin of the Slavs directly from the Scythians and Sarmatians was shared by M.V. Lomonosov (1711-1765) in his “Brief Russian Chronicle” and “Ancient Russian history" A Russian scientist wrote that “ monogeniture of the Slavs with the Sarmatians, the miracles with the Scythians are indisputable for many clear proofs” (34, 25). Nowadays, this theory is not seriously considered, although it still has its adherents.

2 Danube theory

This is the most common theory of the origin of the Slavs

The Danube theory of the origin of the Slavs suggested that the ancestors of the Slavs formed their ethnic group in the territory adjacent to the Middle Danube, and then settled throughout Central, Southern and Eastern Europe. This is the most widespread theory, especially among Russian historians, since in the main Russian historical source – the Laurentian Chronicle says, that after the destruction of the Pillar of Babylon and the division of peoples, “after a long time, the Slavs settled along the Danube, where now the land is Hungarian and Bulgarian. From those Slavs the Slavs spread throughout the land and were called by their names from the places where they sat” (72, 25). Supporters of this theory include such prominent West Slavic authors as

• Kadlubek,
• Bogufal,
• Dalimil,
• Safarik,

as well as Russian historians

• S.L. Solovyova,
• IN AND. Klyuchevsky,
• M.N. Weather,
• HE. Trubachev.

3 Danube-Balkan theory

Adjacent to this theory is the Danube-Balkan theory of the origin of the Slavic ancestral home, one of the oldest in terms of origin, but then for a long time did not find supporters due to allegedly impossibility in ancient times of the resettlement of the Proto-Slavs to the Vistula-Oder region of the future spread of the Slavs through the Sudeten-Carpathian barrier. At the end of the 20th century, the Polish archaeologist W. Hensel suggested that it was not quite the Proto-Slavs who crossed this mountain range from south to north, whose language did not have time to take shape and stand out as Proto-Slavic, and only here in Povislenie were these people able to form their original language.

Because the in "The Tale of Bygone Years" Traditionally for the time of its creation, the narrative begins with biblical characters - Noah and his sons; it is customary to consider the “historical past” of not only the Proto-Slavs, but also their Proto-Slavic predecessors. Some authors (V.M. Gobarev and others) extend the history of the Slavs with their predecessors until the 2nd millennium BC. e., considering the ancestors of the Slavs to be the Scythians-Skolots. Others (A.I. Asov) call the ancestors of the Slavs the people of the Hittites from Asia Minor, whose descendants came along with Aeneas and Antenor from Troy to Italy and Illyricum.

In general, the desire to consider the origin of one’s people from the heroes of Troy is inherent not only in Russian historians; it was stubbornly supported in the historiography of other European nations. So, back in the mid-19th century, the English historian G.T. Buckle, criticizing this centuries-old legend, said that “it never occurred to anyone to doubt this fact. The only dispute was about from whom exactly did individual nations originate?. However, a certain unanimity arose regarding this issue: so - not to mention the minor peoples - they believed that the French descended from Frank, and everyone knew that this was the son of Hector; in the same way it was then known that the Britons descended from Brutus, whose father was none other than Aeneas himself” (75, 48).

A V.N. Demin leads the Slavs away from the Aryans who came in ancient times from Hyperborea. Yu.A. Shilov, based on his excavations of mounds of the 4th-2nd millennium BC. e., concluded in accordance with the myths of the ancient Aryans that the territory of Southern Ukraine was the birthplace of the Indo-European ancestral ethnic group in general and the Aryan peoples in particular. It is here, according to Yu.A. Shilov, the Vedas were compiled, later recorded in the Book of Veles, and the Slavs were the direct descendants of the Aryans. B.A. Rybakov believes that “the dissociation of the Proto-Slavic tribes from their related neighboring Indo-European tribes occurred approximately 4-3.5 thousand years ago, at the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC.” e." (53, 14).

4 Vistula-Oder theory

This theory of the origin of the Slavs originated in Poland

The Vistula-Oder theory of the origin of the Slavs, which arose in the 18th century among Polish historians, suggested that Slavic people arose on the territory between the Vistula and Oder rivers, and brought out the Proto-Slavs from tribes of the Lusatian culture Bronze or early Iron Age. Among the Russian adherents of this theory, one can note the archaeologist V.V. Sedov, who believes that the Proto-Slavic culture originated in the 5th-6th centuries BC. e. in the basin of the middle and upper reaches of the Vistula and later spread to the Oder. V.V. Sedov proposed to correlate the culture of the Podklosh burials with the culture of the Proto-Slavs.

5 Oder-Dnieper theory

The Oder-Dnieper theory of the origin of the Slavs suggests that the Proto-Slavic tribes almost simultaneously appeared in the vast expanses from the Oder in the west to the Dnieper in the east, from Pripyat in the north to the Carpathian and Sudeten mountains in the south. At the same time, they are considered to be Proto-Slavic following types crops:

• Trzyniec culture XVII-XIII centuries. BC e.,
• Trzyniec-Komarovka culture XV-XI centuries. BC e.,
• Lusatian and Scythian forest-steppe cultures of the 12th-7th centuries. BC e.

The adherents of this theory include the Poles T. Ler-Splawinsky, A. Gardavsky, and in Russia P.N. Tretyakov, B.A. Rybakov, M.I. Artamonov. However, there are significant differences in the versions of these authors.

6 Carpathian theory

Based on a high concentration of Slavic place names, especially hydronyms

The Carpathian theory of the origin of the Slavs, put forward in 1837 by the Slovak scientist P. Safarik and revived by the efforts of the German researcher J. Udolf in the 20th century, is based on super-dense concentrations of Slavic place names, especially hydronyms in Galicia, Podolia, Volyn. Among Russian authors we can mention A.A. Pogodin, who made a great contribution to the development of this theory, systematizing the hydronyms of these areas.

7 Pripyat-Polesie theory

This theory is based on the linguistic characteristics of the peoples from these regions

The Pripyat-Polesie theory of the Slavic ancestral home is divided into two movements:

1. Pripyat-Upper Dnieper and
2. Pripyat-Middle Dnieper theory

and is based on the linguistic characteristics of the peoples living in these regions. Adherents of this theory, one of whom was the Polish archaeologist K. Godlewski, believe that in the Vistula-Oder interfluve the Slavs advanced from Polesie.

The Pripyat-Middle Dnieper version of the Pripyat-Polesie theory became much more widespread in Poland and Germany than in Russia. One of the founders of this version is the Polish ethnologist K. Moshinsky, who, in addition, extended the existence of the Proto-Slavs on the Middle Dnieper until the 7th-6th centuries. BC e., considering that then Proto-Slavs, i.e. ancestors of the Proto-Slavs, who had not yet separated from the Indo-European unification, lived somewhere in Asia in the neighborhood of the Ugrians, Turks and Scythians.

Proto-Slavs are the ancestors of the Proto-Slavs

Among Russian scientists who support the location of the ancestral home of the Slavs in the interfluve of the Middle Dnieper and Southern Bug, it is necessary to note F.P. Filin and B.V. Gortunga. Moreover, B.V. Gortung, in contrast to K. Moshinsky, believed that Proto-Slavs of the Trypillian culture lived in this area 4th-3rd millennium BC e., who then, moving to the area between the Upper Vistula and the Dnieper, turned into the Proto-Slavs already in the Trzyniec-Komarovka culture of the 2nd millennium BC. e.

Another adherent of this theory was at the beginning of the 20th century. Czech Slavist L. Niederle, who located the Proto-Slavs in the middle and upper reaches of the Dnieper.

8 Baltic theory

The Baltic theory, the creator of which is the largest researcher of Russian chronicles A.A. Shakhmatov, suggests that the ancestral home of the Slavs was on the coast the Baltic Sea in the lower reaches of the Western Dvina and Neman, and only subsequently did the Slavs go to the Vistula and other lands. In confirmation of this, he identified a layer of ancient Slavic hydronymy between the Neman and the Dnieper.

According to one theory the Slavs were a large people, which did not have a common place of settlement for all. Allegedly, this people initially, when they appeared in Europe, were scattered in many places among other peoples, more numerous in a given place and better known to historians. That's why for a long time the Slavic people were unknown in history, and sometimes mentioned under other names.

It is believed that in the Middle Danube the Slavs acted under the names of Illyrians and Celts, in the Vistula and Oder basins - Venetians, Celts and Germans, and in the Carpathians and the Lower Danube - Dacians and Thracians. Well, in Eastern Europe the Slavs, naturally, performed under the names of Scythians and Sarmatians. Therefore, ancient and medieval authors did not have the idea of ​​the Slavs as a single people. This theory is also associated with the version that all European peoples descended from the Proto-Slavs, who were the core of the Indo-European community.

All European peoples descended from the Proto-Slavs

V.P. Kobychev, in his book “In Search of the Ancestral Home of the Slavs,” after analyzing a significant number of versions, came to the conclusion that “by denying Slavic affiliation to the Neurs, as well as in the early days to the Wends and disputes, we put ourselves in an extremely difficult position regarding the issue of the origin of the Slavs. There is literally no place left for them on the ethnic map of Eastern Europe. Lower Povislenie and Ponemenie disappear, since the Slavs were not familiar with the sea, the more southern regions also disappear, because the Neuroi lived there, who...were, perhaps, Balts, Celts, or anyone else, but not Slavs. In the Carpathians and along the Danube lived...the Getae and Dacians; Northern Black Sea region occupied by Iranian-speaking Scythians. The upper, and partly the Middle Dnieper region and the adjacent part of the Oka basin were inhabited by Letto-Lithuanian tribes, and even more northern and eastern regions by Finno-Ugric peoples...” (53, 17).

Indeed, with such contradictory versions and theories of the origin of the Slavs, it is difficult to come to a consensus, much less to substantiate and prove it. Or maybe it doesn’t make sense to continue this centuries-long search for a black cat in a dark room, especially since it most likely wasn’t there? After all numerous Germanic-speaking tribes At first, by the will of the Romans, they were named by one name of the Germans, and only centuries later they began to represent a single whole.

The Slavs, on the contrary, first received the common name Sklavins, and then divided into many Slavic tribes with their own names. Herodotus knew nothing about the peoples north of the Danube, although in Eastern Europe his knowledge of the localization of various peoples was much more extensive. But it was precisely from the northern reaches of the Danube that some of the most numerous ethnic entities - Germans and Slavs. If the origin of the Germans, at least from the beginning of our era, is considered to be sufficiently known and resolved, then the origin of the Slavs becomes more and more confusing with each new generation of historians, archaeologists, and linguists.

Each new generation of scientists becomes more and more confused about the origin of the Slavs

There is also a version of the origin of the Slavs from numerous slaves, who during the era of the slave system were the basis for the production of agricultural products and material assets. M. Gimbutas gives the following explanation for this version: “Many linguists and historians have tried to explain the origin of the root slav. Based on "sklavins" and "sklavens", mentioned by Jordanes and Procopius, some associated it with the Latin word "sclavus", meaning "slave". This may explain why sk- was replaced by sl- in these sources, but, of course, does not explain the origin of the word “Slovene” (22, 69). Nevertheless, this version remains one of the most undeveloped for several centuries, and remains so, most likely due to its possible unpopularity among historians, and, most likely, due to the lack of support for it among the political elites of the Slavic countries.

Therefore, despite the abundance of versions about the location of the ancestral home of the Slavs and their origin, supported by relevant theories and volumes of research in this area, this question still remains open. This means that either these theories are not true, or before the 6th century no Slavs as a people existed. And the prehistory of the Slavs should probably be sought not among these many versions of their origin, but, on the contrary, moving away from them, and taking a closer look at their origins from the numerous slaves of the Hunnic state, especially since such a version has been studied too superficially. It is quite possible that this happened due to the “false patriotism” of historians of the Slavic countries. However, in order to reject this version, it is necessary to study it more thoroughly.

On globe Today there are about 200 million people who speak thirteen Slavic languages, and yet, for historians, it is still a mystery where the Slavic language originated and where the ancestral home of the Slavs is located, from where they dispersed throughout Central, Southern and Eastern Europe.

Where is the ancestral home of the Slavs? What versions do scientists put forward about this? Read the article and you will find out the answers to these questions. The ethnogenesis of the Slavs is the process of formation of the ancient Slavic ethnic community, which led to the separation of this people from the mass of Indo-European tribes. Today there is no generally accepted version of the maturation of the Slavic ethnic group.

First evidence

The ancestral home of the Slavs is of interest to many specialists. This people was first attested in Byzantine documents of the 6th century. Retrospectively, these sources mention the Slavs in the 4th century. Earlier information refers to the peoples who participated in the ethnogenesis of the Slavs (Bastarns), but the degree of their involvement in different historical restorations varies.

Written confirmations from 6th century authors from Byzantium speak of an already established people, divided into Antes and Sklavins. The Wends are mentioned in retrospect. Evidence from authors of the Roman era (I-II centuries) about the Wends does not allow them to be connected with any old Slavic culture.

Definition

The ancestral home of the Slavs has not yet been precisely determined. Archaeologists call some archaic cultures starting from the 5th century Russian originals. In academic teaching, there is no single point of view on the ethnic ancestry of the bearers of earlier civilizations and their connection with later Slavic ones. Linguists also have different opinions about the time of the emergence of a language that could be called Slavic or Proto-Slavic. Current scientific versions suspect the separation of Russian speech from Proto-Indo-European in a colossal range from the 2nd millennium BC. e. until the first centuries AD e.

The history of formation, origin and area of ​​ancient Rusyns are studied using special methods at the intersection of various sciences: history, linguistics, genetics, paleoanthropology, archaeology.

Indo-Europeans

The ancestral home of the Slavs today excites the minds of many. It is known that in the Bronze Age in Central Europe there was an ethnolinguistic community of the Indo-European race. The attribution of individual speech groups to it is controversial. The German professor G. Krahe concluded that while the Indo-Iranian, Anatolian, Greek and Armenian languages ​​had already separated and developed independently, the Celtic, Italic, Illyrian, Germanic, Baltic and Slavic languages ​​were only dialects of a single Indo-European language. The ancient Europeans, who inhabited central Europe north of the Alps, created a common terminology in the areas of agriculture, religion and social relations.

Eastern race

And where was the ancestral home of the tribes of this people, who managed to merge into a single whole (according to many scientists), made up the main population of the medieval Ancient Rus'. As a result of the subsequent political stratification of these people, to XVII century Three nations were formed: Belarusian, Russian and Ukrainian.

Who are the Eastern Rusyns? This is a cultural and linguistic society of Russians who use East Slavic languages ​​in their speech. The designation "Russian Slavs" was also used by some early researchers. Eastern Slav... Few people know about his history. The reason for this is not only the lack of their own written language, but also the remoteness from the civilized centers of that period.

The Eastern Slav is described in Byzantine, Arabic and Persian written sources. Some information about him was found using comparative analysis Slavic languages ​​and in archaeological data.

Expansion

The ancestral home of the Slavs and their settlement are discussed by many researchers. Some believe that the expansion occurred due to a population explosion caused by climate warming or the advent of new farming techniques, while others believe that it was due to the Great Migration of Peoples, which devastated part of Europe in the first centuries of our era during the invasions of the Sarmatians, Germans, Avars, Huns, Bulgars and Russians.

Presumably the origin and ancestral home of the Slavs are associated with the population of the Przeworsk culture. This people bordered on the Celtic and Germanic tribal world in the west, on the Finno-Ugric and Balts in the east, and on the Sarmatians in the southeast and south. Some researchers think that during this period there was still a continuous Slavic-Baltic population, that is, these tribes had not yet completely fragmented.

At the same time, there was an expansion of the Krivichi in the Smolensk Dnieper region. The Tushemlin civilization previously existed in this area, the ethnicity of which is viewed differently by archaeologists. It was replaced by a purely Slavic old culture, and the Tushemlin settlements were destroyed, since at that time the Slavs did not yet live in cities.

conclusions

It was not possible to create a convincing version of the ethnogenesis of Russians on the basis of information from just one scientific subject. Current theories try to combine the information of all historical disciplines. In general, it is assumed that the Slavic ethnos appeared due to the merger of ethnically different Indo-European communities at the border between the Scythian-Sarmatians and the Balts with the participation of Finnish, Celtic and other substrates.

Scientists' hypotheses

Scientists are not sure that the Slavic ethnic group BC. e. existed. This is evidenced only by the contradictory assumptions of linguists. There is no evidence that the Slavs descended from the Balts. Using various sources, professors build hypotheses about the roots of Russians. However, they not only define the place of the Slavic ancestral home differently, but also name different times for the separation of the Slavs from the Indo-European community.

There are many hypotheses according to which the Rusyns and their forefatherland existed already from the end of the 3rd millennium BC. e. (O. N. Trubachev), from the end of the 2nd millennium AD. e. (Polish academicians T. Lehr-Splawiński, K. Yazhdrzewski, J. Kostrzewski and others), from the middle of the 2nd millennium BC. e. (Polish professor F. Slavsky), from the 6th century. BC e. (L. Niederle, M. Vasmer, P. J. Safarik, S. B. Bernstein).

The earliest scientific guesses about the ancestral homeland of the Slavs can be found in the works of Russian historians of the 18th-19th centuries. V. O. Klyuchevsky, S. M. Solovyov, N. M. Karamzin. In their research, they rely on the “Tale of Bygone Years” and conclude that the ancient fatherland of the Rusyns was the Danube River and the Balkans.

Ethnogenesis of the Slavs according to archaeological data- the formation of the ancient Slavic ethnos on the basis of the continuity of successive archaeological cultures from the 1st millennium BC. e. until the 6th century, when the ancient Slavs were recorded in epigraphic monuments as an already formed cultural and linguistic community.

The appearance of archaeological cultures, recognized by most archaeologists as Slavic, dates back only to the 5th-6th centuries. The Prague-Korchak, Penkovo ​​and Kolochin cultures are structurally close and separated geographically. It is proposed to distinguish the earlier so-called post-Zarubinets monuments (II-IV centuries) into a separate Kyiv culture, on the basis of which, according to some archaeologists, the above-mentioned cultures developed. The study of the ethnogenesis of the Slavs with the help of archeology encounters the following problem: modern science is unable to trace back to the beginning of our era the change and continuity of archaeological cultures, the bearers of which could confidently be attributed to the Slavs or their ancestors. Some archaeologists accept some archaeological cultures at the turn of our era and earlier as Slavic, a priori recognizing the autochthony of the Slavs in a given territory, even if it was inhabited in the corresponding era by other peoples according to synchronous historical evidence.

Pre-Slavic and Proto-Slavic cultures

The subject of discussion among archaeologists continues to be the problem of identifying the cultures of the preliterate period that existed in the future Slavic territory (between the Oder and the Dnieper). The main one is the problem of distinguishing between pre-Slavic cultures (genetically related to peoples who are reliably non-Slavic) and proto-Slavic (that is, presumably speakers of languages ​​ancestral to modern Slavic).

These are the Trzyniec culture of the Bronze Age, the Chernolesk culture of the early Iron Age, the Przeworsk culture of the turn of the century. e. and Chernyakhov culture of late antiquity. Without denying the contribution of these cultures to the formation of the Slavs, researchers nevertheless notice the presence of non-Slavic components in them: Thracians, Celts, Germans, Balts and Scythians.

Several approaches have developed in domestic and foreign archeology. If until about the middle of the 20th century, including for political reasons, autochthonism was popular, that is, classifying these cultures as Slavic by default, then starting from post-war period these views are increasingly losing popularity. The most influential late supporters of autochthonism include Academician B. A. Rybakov. In modern archeology, the question of the archaeological reflection of the genesis of the Slavs is considered in the context of their interaction with the speakers of neighboring cultures (Celtic, Germanic, Baltic, Finno-Ugric, etc.) and the reflection of this interaction in linguistic factors.

Kiev archaeological culture of the 2nd–4th centuries.

There is no consensus among historians and archaeologists on the early history and geography of the Proto-Slavs; views evolve as new archaeological material accumulates. In the 2nd half of the 20th century, monuments of the Kiev type of the late 2nd-4th centuries were identified and classified as a special culture, found in the Middle Dnieper region (from the mouth of the Ros in the south to Mogilev in the north) and the basin of the left tributaries of the Dnieper, Desna and Seim, up to the origins of the Seversky Donets. Some archaeologists (Tretyakov P.N., Terpilovsky R.V., Abashina N.S., Shchukin M.B.) see direct continuity between the Kievan archaeological culture and the following Slavic cultures of the 5th-6th centuries (Sclavinians and Antes). O. M. Prikhodnyuk even proposed to abandon the term “Kiev culture” altogether and consider the early monuments also to be Penkov’s. Currently, archaeologists are inclined to the following version of cultural continuity:

• The Kolochin culture developed directly from the Kyiv culture as its northern version.
• The Penkov culture developed from the Kyiv culture with the participation of the ethnos of the multi-ethnic Chernyakhov culture, defeated by the Huns at the end of the 4th century. Both latter cultures existed simultaneously and partially overlapped geographically, but belonged to different levels of civilization. However, V.V. Sedov believed that the Penkovo ​​culture was developed by descendants primarily of the Chernyakhov culture with some participation of settlers from the Kyiv area, and V.N. Danilenko suggested that the Penkovo ​​antiquities arose on the basis of the Kolochin culture.
• The Prague-Korchak culture is believed to have originated initially in the Pripyat basin, where the earliest monuments of the Prague type from the first half of the 4th century have recently been discovered. According to this version, the Prague-Korchak culture developed as a result of the expansion of the Slavs to the west along the outer Carpathians to the sources of the Vistula, then the Elbe and south from the headwaters of the Oder to the Danube along its tributaries (towards Pannonia). However, archaeologists note that this culture is not derived from the Kyiv one.
• The Ipoteshti-Kindeshti culture on the lower and middle left bank of the Danube arose as a result of the expansion of the bearers of the early Penkov culture to the west and the bearers of the Prague-Korchak culture to the south into the region of the present-day. Romania. The cultures developed simultaneously, but the formation of the Hypotesti-Kindesti culture was influenced by the local Thracian population and proximity Byzantine Empire. It was in its area that Byzantine authors first recorded the Slavic ethnic group.
• The Sukovsko-Dziedzicka culture in the area between the Oder and Elbe rivers adjoins in the south the area of ​​the Prague-Korchak culture. Geographically and chronologically, the Sukow-Dziedzicka culture looks like an expansion in the 6th century of the bearers of the early Prague-Korczak culture down first along the Oder towards the Baltic, then down the Elbe and east towards the middle Vistula. Slavic tribes occupied lands that were depopulated by the 6th century, and apparently assimilated the local population that remained in some places. The Slavs reached the Baltic coast in the lower reaches of the Elbe around the beginning of the 7th century. The northern area of ​​the Sukovo-Dziedzicka culture and the craft and household traditions of the local population caused noticeable differences in the nature of the monuments from the Prague-Korczak culture, but in general it corresponds to the structure of the latter.

Recognition of the Kyiv culture as Slavic does not resolve the issue of the ethnogenesis of the Slavs. Among the possible candidates preceding the Kyiv culture, the Zarubintsy, Milograd and Yukhnovskaya, the earlier Chernolesskaya and other archaeological cultures are indicated, but their role in the formation of the Slavic ethnos cannot be accurately established.

Reliably Slavic archaeological cultures of the V-VI centuries

• Prague-Korczak archaeological culture: the range stretches in a strip from the upper Elbe to the middle Dnieper, touching the Danube in the south and capturing the upper reaches of the Vistula. The area of ​​the early culture of the 5th century is limited to the southern Pripyat basin and the upper reaches of the Dniester, Southern Bug and Prut (Western Ukraine).

Corresponds to the habitats of the Sklavins of Byzantine authors. Characteristic features: 1) dishes - hand-made pots without decorations, sometimes clay pans; 2) dwellings - square half-dugouts with an area of ​​up to 20 m² with stoves or hearths in the corner, or log houses with a stove in the center; 3) burials - corpse burning, burial of cremated remains in pits or urns, the transition in the 6th century from ground burial grounds to the mound burial rite; 4) lack of grave goods, only random things are found; brooches and weapons are missing.

• Penkovskaya archaeological culture: range from the middle Dniester to the Seversky Donets (western tributary of the Don), capturing the right bank and left bank of the middle part of the Dnieper (territory of Ukraine).

Corresponds to the probable habitats of the antes of Byzantine authors. It is distinguished by the so-called Ant treasures, in which bronze cast figurines of people and animals are found, colored with enamels in special recesses. The figurines are Alan in style, although the technique of champlevé enamel probably came from the Baltic states (the earliest finds) through the provincial Roman art of the European West. According to another version, this technique developed locally within the framework of the previous Kievan culture. The Penkovskaya culture differs from the Prague-Korchak culture, in addition to the characteristic shape of the pots, in the relative wealth of material culture and the noticeable influence of the nomads of the Black Sea region. Archaeologists M.I. Artamonov and I.P. Rusanov recognized the Bulgar farmers as the main carriers of culture, at least at its initial stage.

• Kolochin archaeological culture: habitat in the Desna basin and the upper reaches of the Dnieper (Gomel region of Belarus and Bryansk region of Russia). It adjoins the Prague and Penkovo ​​cultures in the south. Mixing zone of Baltic and Slavic tribes. Despite its proximity to the Penkovo ​​culture, V.V. Sedov classified it as Baltic based on the saturation of the area with Baltic hydronyms, but other archaeologists do not recognize this feature as ethnically defining for the archaeological culture.

Versions of archaeologists on cultural continuity:

V.V. Sedov

The famous Slavic archaeologist Academician V.V. Sedov (1924-2004) identified several early archaeological cultures, which he considered Slavic. In his opinion, the Slavs are a culture of under-klesh burials of 400-100 BC. BC e. in the area between the Oder and Vistula rivers (central and southern Poland). As a result of migration, the Celtic tribes came into contact with the Proto-Slavs, and the culture of subkleshevy burials was transformed into the Przeworsk culture (II-IV centuries), and the Celts in Poland were assimilated by the Slavs, whom Sedov associated with the Wends.

In the II-III centuries. Slavic tribes of the Przeworsk culture from the Vistula-Oder region migrate to the forest-steppe areas between the Dniester and Dnieper rivers, inhabited by Sarmatian and Late Scythian tribes belonging to the Iranian language group. At the same time, the Germanic tribes of the Gepids and Goths moved to the southeast, as a result of which a multi-ethnic Chernyakhov culture with a predominance of Slavs emerged from the lower Danube to the Dnieper forest-steppe left bank. In the process of Slavicization of the local Scythian-Sarmatians in the Dnieper region, a new ethnic group was formed, known in Byzantine sources as the Antes.

At the end of the 4th century, the development of the Przeworsk and Chernyakhov cultures was interrupted by the invasion of the Huns. In the southern part of the area of ​​the Przeworsk culture, where the Celtic substrate participated in the ethnogenesis of the Slavs, the Prague-Korchak culture developed, spread to the south by the migrating Slavs. In the 5th century, between the Dniester and Dnieper rivers, the Penkovo ​​culture took shape, the carriers of which were the descendants of the Chernyakhov population - the Ants. Soon they expanded their range to the left bank of the Dnieper.

Close to this concept is the concept of archaeologist I.P. Rusanova, who speaks out for the belonging of the Przeworsk culture to the Slavs on the basis that Slavic ceramics of the Prague-Korchak culture have direct prototypes in Przeworsk ceramics. The concept of V.D. Baran unites all of the above cultures into different branches of Proto-Slavic cultures.

G. S. Lebedev

In a number of articles, famous Leningrad archaeologists G.S. Lebedev and D.A. Machinsky formulated their concept on the ethnogenesis of the Slavs. Linguistic ancestors of the Slavs by the middle of the 1st millennium BC. were a collection of related groups, scattered by clan groups throughout the forest zone of Eastern Europe and speaking similar dialects of the Proto-Balto-Slavic language, the differences in which increased with geographic distance from each other. Possible archaeological equivalent of the Balto-Proto-Slavs in the 8th-4th centuries. BC e. is the Milograd-Podgortsev cultural community (correlated to the neurons of Herodotus) in the region of northern Ukraine and southern Belarus, as well as the culture of lined ceramics (KShK) in Central Belarus. These closely related cultures of the Early Iron Age are characterized by: settlement on permanent ancestral fortified settlements, dwellings slightly recessed into the ground with a hearth in the corner of the room, pit graves with cremation without implements, high molded pots, narrow-bladed axes, weakly curved sickles, bone arrowheads.

By the 3rd century. BC e. the Milograd culture disappears as a result of the crushing advance of the Sarmatians to the West, but the more northern KShK continues its development without visible upheavals until the 4th century.

Archaeologically empty area of ​​the Milograd people from the 2nd century BC. e. it is partially filled with monuments of the Zarubintsy culture, which arose as a result of the arrival of a new population from the west (probably the Bastarns), who included the remaining inhabitants. By the beginning of the 2nd century, the Zarubintsy culture was dying under the pressure of another wave of nomads (Sarmatians and Alans) and the expansion of the Goths from the Baltic coast. In the Middle Dnieper region are being replaced by the so-called post-Zarubinets monuments (or monuments of the Kyiv type), corresponding to the new way of life of the local population, which is forced to frequently change habitats. Structurally, the Kievan culture is very close to the Milograd culture: a similar economic structure, type of housing, set of tools, jewelry and utensils. At the same time, the Chernyakhov culture (usually associated with the migration of the Goths) appeared in the Middle Dnieper region, the monuments of which do not mix, but rather coexist with post-Zarubinets antiquities.

In the I-IV centuries. The proto-Slavic tribes, which were part of a conglomerate of related tribes of the Balto-Slavic community, were known to Roman authors under the name Wends. These Wends lived in the forest zone of the Dnieper basin between the Dniester in the west and the upper reaches of the Oka in the east. To the north of the Wends, around Lake Ilmen, there was a sparsely inhabited (according to archaeological sites) border zone, where clashes with Finno-Ugric tribes took place. In the south and west, the Wends opposed nomads (Sarmatians, Alans) and migrating Germanic tribes (Bastarns, Goths, Vandals). Archaeologically, the area of ​​settlement of the Wends corresponds to the Kyiv culture and the Belarusian version of the KShK.

To the south of the borders of the Kyiv culture, where forest areas turn into forest-steppe areas, from the 3rd century. BC e. until the 5th century there was a so-called “zone of archaeological elusiveness” (where supporting archaeological sites are not found). In this border area, the Wends came into contacts and conflicts with other, more clearly defined ethnic groups, which contributed to the development of Proto-Slavic identity and the formation of a special ethnic group in the southern part of the settlement of the Balto-Slavic ethnomass.

In the 1st half of the 4th century, some part of the Wends was included in the Gothic union; their southern part, after the defeat of the power in Germanaric (c. 375), took shape in the Antic union of tribes, which is reflected in the emergence in the 5th century of a truly Slavic Penkovskaya culture on the basis of Kyiv. The Penkovsky monuments were left by a population that moved from the forest zone to the south into the forest-steppe and steppe areas of the Chernyakhov culture and began to lead a sedentary lifestyle under the conditions of Hun-Avar rule. In the 7th century, the Penkovo ​​culture was replaced by monuments of the late version of the Prague culture, which was seen as the consolidating basis for the formation of the Slavic ethnos.

Monuments of authentically Slavic Prague-Korchak culture appeared in the 5th century on the borders with the Celto-Germanic world in the upper reaches of the Prut, Dniester, and Vistula. This culture is associated with the powerful migration movement of the Proto-Slavs during the era of the Great Migration of Peoples to the west and southwest to Central Europe and the Balkans from the depths of the forests of Eastern Europe. Structurally, Prague monuments are very close to Kyiv ones. At the same time, the evolutionary expansion of the area of ​​the Proto-Slavs also occurs to the east and north, which is reflected, in particular, in the Kolochin culture.

In contacts with the more developed Celto-Greco-Germanic world, the ethnic identity of the Slavic ethnos finally took shape and passed into the epic memory of the ancient Russian and Polish chronicles about the ancestral home of the Slavs on the Danube. In the VI-VII centuries. among the Slavs on the Danube and in Central Europe, a new, more progressive economic structure was being formed, based on arable farming using iron arable tools. Since the 8th century, this household complex has become an ethnographic marker of the Slavic ethnos. On its basis, the consolidation of the linguistically related Proto-Slavic-Baltic tribes in the forest zone of Eastern Europe subsequently took place into a single ethnic group, from where the expansion of the Proto-Slavs to the southwest began.

M. Gimbutas

American archaeologist Maria Gimbutas (1921-1994) believed that by the beginning of the new era the Proto-Slavs were already a significant people, who, however, being an autochthonous population of the northern Carpathian region, lived under the yoke of aliens, first from the east and then from the west. After the departure of the Goths, who are associated with the comparatively more developed Chernyakhov culture, in this region there is a return to the traditions of the early Iron Age, which were traced during the rule of the Goths and other alien tribes only in some isolated territories. Turning to the predecessors of the Slavs, M. Gimbutas saw traces of their ancestors in the local Chernoles culture of the early Iron Age, which flourished in the Carpathian region before the invasion of the Sarmatians and then the Germans.

**********************************************************************************

From the history course we know that people entered Eastern Europe from the south during the Early Stone Age, that is, about 3 million years ago. In Crimea, on the Dniester, in the Zhitomir region, in Abkhazia, in Armenia and in the south of Kazakhstan, archaeologists find traces of the most ancient human sites. Concerning written sources, by which scientists could accurately determine the ancestral home of the Slavs, they are scarce. Here archeology, comparative historical linguistics, toponymy, geography, and anthropology come to the aid of scientists. There are several theories about when and where the Slavs came to the territory of the East European Plain: the autochthonous origin of the Slavs (supporter B.A. Rybakov, for example), the Baltic theory and the Carpathian.

It is important that it is known for sure that in the V-VII centuries AD. The territory of the East European Plain was populated. The estimated maximum territory of settlement of the ancestors of the Slavs in the north reached the Baltic Sea (Varangian), in the south their border was a strip of forest-steppe (from the left bank of the Danube to the east towards Kharkov), in the west it reached the Elbe (Laba), and in the east to the Seim and Okie. Several hundred Slavic tribes lived there. L. Niederle writes that “autochthonous theories that place the Proto-Slavs on the territory of all Central Europe east of the Rhone and Rhine” are scientifically unfounded (L. Niederle, “Slavic Antiquities”, Chapter II, p. 22). L. Niederli does not share the Balkan theory, since, for example, geographical names indicate the spread in the period BC. in the Balkans in the Danube region other languages. Although the Danube theory (Balkan) was defended in the 19th century. Many scientists: V. Klyuchevsky, M. Pogodin, A. Veselovsky. The main source of this theory was the Kiev Chronicle, the evidence of which, according to Niederli, cannot be considered “neither authentic nor truthful,” since it is based on myth.

Based on materials from twenty volumes of “Archaeology” edited by B.A. Rybakova, “Archaeology Western Europe» A.L. Mongait and works on the archeology of Asia V.I. Sarianidi, the author of the article “...Or the civilization of cities?”, published in the magazine “Rodina” No. 5 for 1997, A. Gudz-Markov, identifies the ancestral home of the Slavs with the ancestral home of the Indo-Europeans. He writes that in the expanses from the Carpathians to Altai, the beginning of meaningful life activity can be dated back to the 5th millennium BC. Then the Dnieper-Donetsk archaeological culture began to develop between the Don and the Dnieper. Its creators, according to archeology and anthropology, were Indo-Europeans. They populated Europe many times in I V-I millennia BC, each time destroying the previous culture and establishing its own. “The invasion of the Indo-Europeans in northern Europe and Asia was preceded by a change of archaeological cultures in the Lower Volga and Don basins. In the XXII-XIX centuries BC. e. representatives of the Yamnaya culture were scattered or absorbed by the creators of the catacomb archaeological culture, who advanced to the lower reaches of the Don from the shores of the Caspian Sea.” The territory of the Indo-Europeans was vast, and its borders moved in different eras. Therefore, a “local history” approach to the topic is insufficient. In the V-I millennia BC. e. The Slavs appeared in the space of the Indo-Europeans, limited from the west by the Laba and Saale rivers, and from the east by the middle reaches of the Don and Volga. The Carpathians and Pripyat swamps served as protection for the Indo-Europeans, whom the author considers Proto-Slavs.

True, as for the eastern boundary, it can be moved to the east, including the Oka basin (this is confirmed by the discovery of the Zaraisk site on the banks of the Osetr River, one of the major tributaries of the Oka). That is, the ancestral home of the Slavs had different outlines at different times: sometimes the eastern border advanced, sometimes the southern one.

From time to time, the Proto-Slavs came into contact with the northeastern Finno-Ugric tribes and with the Celtic-Italic ones in the west. There is still no consensus among scientists about what is considered the ancestral home of the Slavs, where they came from, when this happened, what their economy was like. Archaeological sites of the late Stone Age - Neolithic - are represented in the forest zone of Eurasia by “seasonal sites, long-term settlements, burials, burial grounds, as well as rock carvings” (Motherland magazine, 1997, No. 3-4, p. 13, article “In the wilds Neolithic", author A. Emelyanov). Remains of canoe boats have been found at many Neolithic sites. Approximately 700 thousand years ago, during the Old Stone Age, primitive man appeared on the territory of Eurasia. Settlement came from the south. Proof of this is the findings of archaeologists: in the region of Zhitomir and on the Dniester, sites of ancient people (500-300 thousand years BC) were found, in the Middle and Lower Volga - sites of people of the Middle Paleolithic (100-35 thousand years BC) .).

A unique monument of the Late Paleolithic era is the Sungir site, which is located on the territory of the Vladimir region. In the State Historical Museum There is an exhibit in Moscow: a copy of a double burial (of a boy and a girl), which was discovered precisely at the Sungir site. They have beads on their foreheads and wrists. Scientists have come to the conclusion that the burial is unique and has global significance, since based on the arrangement of the decorations, the costume of the children was restored, which turned out to be similar to the clothing of the ancient peoples of the North... So, the border of the ancestral home of the Slavs can be shifted in the northern direction. Starting from the 7th-6th centuries BC. e. The future Slavic space was occupied and conquered by various tribes: Greeks, Scythians (although they were not the direct ancestors of the Slavs), Cimmerians, Sarmatians, Goths, Huns, Avars (according to the Old Russian chronicle - Obry), Khazars. All these peoples were not only the predecessors of the Slavs, but also their active neighbors. Already in the 5th century BC. e. The ancient Greek historian Herodotus contains information about the Slavs (Skolots). Other ancient authors contain information about the Slavs called Wends, who lived among the Scythians and Sarmatians in the Vistula region. More information about the Slavs is presented in Gothic historian Jordan (VI century). Jordan distinguishes the Slavic tribes of the Sklavens, Antes and Wends. According to his information, the Sklavens lived in the north, in the Ladoga region and Lake District; Ants - in the south along the Black Sea coast, in the lower reaches of the Dnieper and Danube; Wends - the ancestors of the Western Slavs - in the northwest to the Vistula and in the southeast to the Dniester. From archaeological excavations it is known that near the mouth of the Southern Bug River there was a city of Olbia, founded at the beginning of the 6th century BC. e. Greeks from the Asia Minor city of Miletus. Olbia traded with the Scythians and Greek cities of Asia Minor. Olvia was subjected to severe trials. By the 4th century. N. e. life in her completely froze. Already in the 3rd century. BC e. a strong Scythian state appears in the Northern Black Sea region. Ancient Scythian tribes in the 7th-3rd centuries BC. e. inhabited the vast expanses of steppes between the mouth of the Danube and the Don. Incomplete, fragmentary information about the Scythians is found in Herodotus and ancient Greek and Roman authors. On the banks of the Dnieper near the city of Nikopol, the royal mounds of the Scythians still rise. Chertomlyk, Solokha and Melitopolsky are the most famous of them. A settlement was found on the left bank of the Dnieper on the land of the modern Zaporozhye region. By the end of the 3rd century BC. e. from the west, the Scythians were pushed back by the Thracian tribes that came from the Balkans. The Sarmatians came to the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region from beyond the Don. The territory of the Scythians shrank. Crimea became their center. This Scythia Minor existed until the end of the 3rd century AD. e. At this time, the Scythian kingdom was conquered by Germanic tribes who came from the Baltic states. In the V-VI centuries AD. e. Slavic tribes appeared on part of the Scythian territory. IN. Klyuchevsky writes that “the chronicle does not remember the time of the arrival of the Slavs from Asia to Europe” and that “it finds the Slavs already on the Danube.” (V.O. Klyuchevsky, “Russian History”, book one, lectures I-II).

History and archeology provide fairly reliable facts, but philology and sciences such as hydronics (studies the names of water bodies), toponomics, and linguistics can even more accurately determine who lived in a particular territory. Language remembers what no one alive remembers.

In the article “Arctic Cradle?” (Rodina magazine, 1997, No. 8, p. 82) doctor historical sciences N. Guseva writes that “the so-called Arctic theory looks the most plausible. According to it, the ancestors of the Indo-European peoples once began to economically develop the extreme northern lands.” The author refers to the book by K. Warren “Paradise Found, or the Cradle of Humanity at the North Pole.” Further, N. Guseva writes that “the ancient Iranian Avesta reflects the same northern realities, as well as the gradual departure of the Aryan tribes of the Circumpolar region.” Referring to the work of geologists, zoologists and botanists, who proved that in the 13th millennium BC. e. the glacier from the territory of Eastern Europe slid into the Arctic Ocean, and the Subpolar region, covered with dense grasses and forests, had a warm climate in that era, the author proves that “scattered tribal groups that came here from all the edges of the glacier, economically settled these areas and were inevitably forced to enter into mutual contacts; Here the first tribes were formed and, naturally, the first circle of similar concepts and words should have been developed. This process took at least 5 thousand years.” The cold snap forced people south to the Baltic - Black Sea line, which opened three routes: to the east (to the Ural Mountains), to the west and southwest, to the south (to the Caspian and Black Seas, where the Aryans, also known as Indo-Iranians, reached ). The Aryans should not be identified with the Slavs, since the ancestors of the Slavs were closest neighbors or even tribes mixed with them, the author concludes.

The Swedish anthropologist A. Retzius created a system by which it is possible to unite the ancient Germans, Celts, Romans, Greeks, Hindus, Persians, Arabs, Jews, into a group of long-headed (dolichocephalic), and the ancient Albanians, Basques, Ugrians, European Turks, ancient Etruscans, Latvians and Slavs into the group of short-headed (brachycephalic). These groups traced their origins to different races. Ancient Slavic burials contained skulls, approximately 88.5% of which were dolichocephalic and mesocephalic (medium size).

Let's summarize. The ancestral home of the Slavs should not be sought in the Carpathians (the theory is based on myth). The autochthonous origin of the Slavs seems to be refuted by linguistics, therefore it is doubtful... This means that the ancestral home of the Slavs should be sought in the lands from the Baltic states to the northern Carpathians between the Vistula and the Dnieper. The closest languages ​​are Slavic and Lithuanian. The connection between the Slavs and Arivarta remains mysterious ( ancient name India). The Sanskrit “dehi me agni” sounds completely Russian: give me fire (article “Aryan Rus'?”, Rodina magazine, 1997, No. 8, p. 77). The problem of the Slavic ancestral home still remains controversial issue. Wandering is the most accurate definition of the location of the ancestral home of the Slavs.