Rus’ “From Frank’s Origin”: the Isolated Ethnogenetic Motif of Byzantine Historiography

Abstract

The paper presents an attempt of analysis of an isolated ethnogenetic motif of the Byzantine historiography: that the Rus were descendants of the Franks. This motif is present in three texts: in the the Chronography of Theophanes Continuatus, The Chronicle of Pseudo-Symeon, and in one copy of the second edition of the Chronicle of Symeon the Magister and Logothete. According to the treatise De administrando imperio by emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, representatives of the imperial family of the Roman Empire could marry only representatives of the noble kins of the Franks. Therefore, the only possible explanation of the appearance of the idea that the Rus had a prestige decadence from the Franks in Byzantine historical and political thought is an attempt to justify the marriage of the sister of the ruling Byzantine emperors Anna Porphyrogenita with the “archon” of the “northern barbarians” Vladimir Svaytoslavich. The logic of the inventors of this ethnogenetic construction is transparent: if the people of Rus descended from the Franks, Vladimir was also a descendant of the Franks and so could marry a Roman princess, Anna Porphyrogenita, in accordance with the “political testament” of Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus. This idea could have the greatest relevance only after the marriage of Vladimir and Anna between c. 987 and 990, and until the death of Anna in 1011/1012. The possible dates for the compilation of the three codices at our disposal, which contain the texts with this motif, don’t contradict with this time period, but, on the contrary, correspond to it optimally.