Principality of Pereyaslavl
The Principality of Pereyaslavl was a Rus lordship based on the city of Pereyaslavl (now Pereiaslav-Khmelnytskyi) on the Trubezh river[1] and straddling extensive territory to the east in what are now parts of the Ukraine, on the southern frontier of Rus'ian civilization with the steppe.
The Primary Chronicle dates the foundation of the city of Pereyaslavl' to 992; the archaeological evidence suggests it was founded not long after this date.[2] In its early days it was the third city in seniority in Kievan Rus behind the Principality of Chernigov and that of Kiev. The city was located at a ford where Vladimir the Great fought a battle against the nomad Pechenegs.[3]
The principality can be traced as a semi-independent dominion from the inheritance of the sons of Yaroslav the Wise, Svyatoslav receiving Chernigov, Vsevolod getting Pereyaslavl, Smolensk going to Vyacheslav and Vladimir-in-Volhynia going to Igor; this ladder of succession.[4] Vsevolod's appanage included the northern lands of Rostov and the lighly colonised north-eastern zone of Rus'.[5]
The Primary Chronicle had recorded that in 988 Vladimir had assigned the northern lands (later associated with Pereyaslavl) to Yaroslav.[6] The town was destroyed by the Mongols in March 1239, the first of the great Rus' cities to all.[7]
See also
- Prince of Pereyaslavl, for list of rulers
Notes
References
- Franklin, Simon; Shepard, Jonathan (1996), The Emergence of Rus, 750-1200, Longman History of Russia, London & New York: Longman, ISBN 0-582-49091X
- Martin, Janet (1995), Medieval Russia, 970-1584, Cambridge Medieval Textbooks, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-36832-4