The true history of Ukraine

 

A map of Kievan Rus' after the death of Yaroslav I in 1054
By Vitaliyf261 - Own work.Compare: Plokhy, Serhii (2006) The Origins of the Slavic Nations: Premodern Identities in Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus, Category:New York: Cambridge University Press, p. xiv ISBN: 978-0-521-86403-9., CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=93773078

Borrowed from Facebook today.  Posted by Robert Pitts.

Robert Pitts

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The idea that Ukraine as a cultural, political, and historical entity predates Russia rests on the fact that the medieval state known as Kyivan Rus (Ки́ївська Русь) was centered in Kyiv centuries before the rise of Moscow or anything called “Russia.”

Here’s the condensed historical backbone, based on primary chronicles and later scholarship:

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1. The Rise of Kyivan Rus (9th–13th centuries)

• Earliest records: The Primary Chronicle (Повість временних літ, c. 1113) describes the foundation of a polity under the Varangian prince Oleg in 882, who moved the capital to Kyiv.

• Kyiv as the center: From roughly 882–1240, Kyiv was the political, cultural, and religious capital of a federation of East Slavic and Finnic peoples.

• Christianization: In 988, Grand Prince Volodymyr the Great adopted Christianity from Byzantium, making Kyiv the heart of Orthodox East Slavic civilization.

• At this time, the territories of present-day Russia (e.g., Moscow) were remote forest frontiers, not yet politically significant.

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2. Moscow’s Late Emergence (13th–14th centuries)

• The city of Moscow was first mentioned in 1147, more than 250 years after Kyiv’s political establishment.

• After the Mongol invasion of 1237–1240, Kyiv was devastated, while northeastern principalities like Vladimir-Suzdal and later Moscow rose under Mongol oversight.

• The “Grand Duchy of Moscow” (Muscovy) became powerful only in the late 14th–15th centuries — nearly 500 years after Kyivan Rus began.

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3. Names and Identity

• The medieval polity was called Rus — not “Russia.”

• After the fall of Kyiv, Muscovy began claiming the heritage of Rus in the 15th–16th centuries, eventually adopting the name “Russia” in 1547 when Ivan IV (Ivan the Terrible) became “Tsar of All Rus’.”

• Ukraine’s regions (Kyiv, Chernihiv, Volhynia, Galicia) preserved continuous local governance and culture tied to the Kyivan Rus tradition, even under Polish-Lithuanian or Cossack rule.

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4. Key historical sources showing Ukraine’s seniority

• The Primary Chronicle (Повість временних літ, c. 1113) — describes the founding of the Kyivan state, long before Moscow’s existence.

• Byzantine records — Emperor Constantine VII’s De Administrando Imperio (mid-10th century) describes the “Rus” and their capital at Kyiv.

• Arab chronicles (e.g., Ibn Fadlan, al-Masudi) mention the Rus centered along the Dnipro, centuries before Moscow appears in records.

• Western European sources — Medieval Latin chronicles (e.g., Helmold of Bosau) note Kyiv as a major Christian capital in the 12th century.