Considering Russia as Ancient Rus is like considering Lincoln an Aztec

Yakov Krotov, priest

On August 19, 2022, Literaturnaya Gazeta published the following text:

“Historian and publisher, editor-in-chief of the Regnum portal Modest Kolerov believes that modern Ukraine has no connection with that part of the history of our country:

Obviously, this name was first invented many centuries after the fact, and then, later, legitimized by Stalinist historiography. Only in this sense, conditionally territorially, I use it. It is useful for everyone to know that 90% of the population of this part of Russia was exterminated by the invasion of Batu and then fled and died out. And modern Ukraine has no connection with this part of Russia, except for the territorial one.

The text is not well-written. It is literally said that the population of "this part of Russia" was exterminated, then the exterminated fled, and then the exterminated and those who fled died out.

True, the parents of St. Sergius or the ancestors of Leo Tolstoy in the XIV century, like many others, come from exactly where everything seems to have “died out”.

The question is: whose descendants were Gogol, Smotritsky, Grave? Who settled "this part of Russia"? Where did they come from?

Accurate statistics - 90 percent - can be entirely attributed to mysticism. No source provides any basis for such statistics.

Two more minor remarks. The "territorial connection" is quite enough to consider the history of the country as a continuation of its history in "this territory" in any other era, up to the Paleolithic.

Therefore, in the textbooks of the history of Russia, the temples of Abkhazia, built in the early Middle Ages, were often declared to be the oldest Christian churches in Russia.

The name "Kievan Rus" in the annals, indeed, is not. But there is no name "Rus" - as a geographical or political name. "Rus" is the name of the ethnic group - the Normans ("Varangians"). The name later passed to the territory they ruled. Exactly the same thing happened with Normandy conquered by the same Normans. The name sounded like "Russian Land", that is, it was made exactly according to the model of "Deutschland", "England", etc. However, the name did not last long and in the XII century was replaced by the designations of individual lands - "Ryazan land", "Novgorod land", etc.

In any case, Russia has not the slightest reason to consider itself the successor to the ancient Russian land. Note that "Russia" is not "Rus" and not "Russian land", this is a very late term. Considering Russia as Rus is like considering Lincoln an Aztec.

One way or another, ancient history is attracted to the current situation in vain.