p The principality of Galich-Volhynia achieved economic, political and cultural heights in the late twelfth and early thirteenth century. The princes of Galich controlled Rus’ trade routes with Europe, opening the gates of Kiev, and held back Hungarian and Polish feudal lords who were eager to control the rich Carpathian land.

p In Galich and Vladimir-Volynsky literature, the fine arts and stone architecture flourished. Unfortunately, out of all the literary works of this principality, only the chronicle has survived, and even it is not complete. We can explain this by the fact that Carpathian Rus was seized by Polish feudal lords, who sowed Catholicism and the Catholic clergy systematically destroyed works of Old Russian culture.

p The Galician-Volhynian Chronicle is extant in the Hypatian Chronicle and consists of two parts: 1) the Galician Chronicle, recording events from 1205 to 1264, and 2) the Volhynian Chronicle—dealing with the period from 1264 to 1292.

p The Galician Chronicle is a unified, artistic tale of the reign of Prince Daniil of Galich. Its compiler did not arrange his work in “yearly entries”, but focused on the historical figure of the prince, writing, in effect, a biography. Political and military events are central to the narrative: Daniil Romanovich’s struggle against the boyars and the Tatar invasion. Church affairs have no interest for this chronicler.

p The narrative style is absolutely secular. There are no religious morals or quotes from Scripture in the Galician Chronicle; instead we find a style characteristic of the military epos and traces of literary rhetoric. This lends the work a vivid poetic flavour. The chronicle begins with a tribute to Prince Roman of Galich: “For he rushed against the pagans like a lion, raged at them like a leopard, and destroyed them like a crocodile, and swept across the land like an eagle, for he was brave as a wild aurochs.”

p The tribute is comprised of a series of poetic similes rooted in the tradition of the military epos.

p In the course of his tribute to Roman, the chronicler reminisces about his grandfather Vladimir Monomakh who had conquered all the Polovtsian land and “drank water out of the Don from a golden helmet”. Then he recounts a legend about Polovtsian khans Syrchan and Otrok. Beaten by Monomakh, Otrok fled to Obeza (Abkhazia). After Vladimir’s death Syrchan sent the singer Or with a bouquet of steppe wormwood to Otrok. The smell of the wormwood made Otrok think of his native land: “For it is better to lay down and die on your own land than to be honoured in an alien country,” he says as he returns to his native steppes. This poetic fragment let Vs. Miller to hypothesise that it was a fragment of a separate heroic epic which did not survive (see his book Vzglyadna ’Slovo o polku Igoreve’ (A View of ’The Lay of Igor’s Host’).

p The Galician Chronicle gives a fairly detailed account of the capture of Kiev in 1240 by Mongol-Tatar hordes. Batu came to Kiev in “heavy force”, “teeming multitudes" surrounded the city, and “nothing could be heard but the creaking of his carts, the roaring of his camels and neighing of his steeds. And the land of Rus was filled with warriors”. Batu employed battering rams to knock down a portion of the wall at the Lyatsky Gate: “...and here one could see the breaking of spears and the cleaving of shields; arrows obscured the light of those defeated.” After a cruel battle, despite the heroism of the populace, the city was seized by the enemy. In admiration for the heroism of the defenders, Batu spared the life of the wounded Dmitry, “for his courage”.

p This tale has no religious tendentiousness, but uses the formulas of military tales to recount the facts of the seige and the storm of Kiev by enemy forces.

p Prince and warrior Daniil of Galich, praised for his valour in battle, is portrayed in the tale about his journey to the Horde in 1250.

p Scholars have repeatedly commented on the resemblance of the Galician Chronicle to The Lay of Igor’s Host: similes based on images from the animal kingdom, the use of military terminology such as “drink water out of the Don from a golden helmet”, “rush on 155 the pagans”, and the like. Like the Lay the Galician Chronicle glorifies military exploits.

p The Volhynian Chronicle describes the reign of Vladimir Vasilkovich using the familiar chronicle arrangement of material. Its religious, literary style abounds in quotations from Scripture. Portraits of princes emphasise religious virtues.

The poetic, heroic style of the Galician Chronicle had a great influence on the narrative style of Northeast Rus and in particular on the style of Alexander Nevsky’s vita.

Sources

p 1. I. U. Budovnitz, “Pamyatnik rannei dvoryanskoi publitsistiki—’Molenie Daniila Zatochnika’" (“An Early Nobleman’s Polemic-Daniel the Exile’s Supplication”), TODRL, vol. 8, 1951.

p 2. I. P. Eremin, “Volynskaya letopis 1289-1290 kak pamyatnik literatury”, Literatura Drevnei Rusi (“The Volhynian Chronicle as Literature”, in The Literature of Old Rus), M.-L., 1966.

p 3. D. S. Likhachev, “Sotsialnye osnovy stilya ’Moleniya Daniila Zatochnika’" (“The Social Background of the Style of Daniel the Exile’s Supplication”), TODRL, vol. 10, 1951.

p 4. B. A. Romanov, Lyudi i nravy Drevnei Rusi (The People and Mores of Old Rus), M.-L., 1966.

5. Khudozhestvennaya proza Kievskoi Rusi XI-XIII vekov (The Fiction of Kievan Rus from the Eleventh to the Thirteenth Centuries), M., 1957.