Philip Longworth - Russia

The northward movement of people from what is now Ukraine to colonize territory which is now known as Russia had not been even. Extensive marshlands made access to some areas difficult or impossible. Dense forests had a similar effect. On the other hand, rivers often provided convenient routes for the explorers. Similar factors account for linguistic development. Old Slavonic diversified into a variety of languages just as the physical characteristics of Russians varied in response to geography and ecological conditions. Interestingly, geneticists suggest that linguistic variations are roughly in line with genetic variations. The Russian language and the genes that make Russians what they are physically are evidently inseparable.

Geographical barriers sometimes promoted differences in language. Areas of bog and marsh have tended to be as effective as mountains in keeping societies separate and distinct. The Carpathian Mountains separated the ancestors of the Czechs and Poles from those of the south-Slav Serbs and Croats; the Pripet Marshes constituted a no less effective a barrier between the west Slavs and the east Slavs whose descendants were to become Ukrainians, Belarusans and Russians. Such physical barriers facilitated separate linguistic development. It could even be said that the traditional enmity between Poles and Russians has its origins in geography.

The ancestors of the Russians were not conscious of their genetic makeup, of course, and were still less able to control it. But, though genetic adaptation is unconscious and slow, human intelligence and ingenuity make for a faster track of adaptation. That these people could make tools, use them, and domesticate some animals suggests that they were conscious actors, capable — collectively — of shaping their own culture. The Russians of the future, then, were to be the creation both of their ancestors and of the developing environment of the Russian land. Some characteristics we associate with Russians nowadays originated in the rigours of those prehistoric times: tolerance of cold, endurance of privation, and a readiness to adopt new technology from other peoples they were to encounter. This last we know from the work of archaeologists.

By the year 4000 BCE conditions for civilization were fast being created. Tools had become more varied and sophisticated. People had learned to make nets, hooks and needles as well as awls and scrapers — bows and arrows too. Indeed, the remains in several grave digs of the period suggest arrows to have been a relatively common cause of death. Society was being organized on a larger scale than hitherto; exploitation of the wild was becoming more specialized. A new kind of economy was in the making. It was based largely on farming, of both crops and domesticated animals, including the horse (though wild horses were to survive into the eighteenth century). And, as farming and artisanal skills developed, settlements grew in size — a few of them considerably.

One site, at Talyanky, east of the river Dnieper, is reckoned to have housed as many as 10,000 inhabitants. Yet, despite its size, it could hardly be called a town. Rather, it was an agglomeration of largely self-sufficient farmsteads. The buildings were oblong, timber-framed, clay-and-wattle structures with wooden floors reinforced with baked clay, and with low-pitched roofs. Most structures were divided into three or four rooms, each with a stove or hearth, which suggests what might be termed industrial use. Many of them were certainly used for baking clay objects. Settlements in Ukraine of the so-called Tripolye type, dating from approximately 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, belonged to people who grew wheat, barley, millet and fruit, and raised pigs, sheep, goats and cattle. 5

The size of such settlements suggests that there had been something of a revolution in food production. This had led to a marked improvement in diet, and hence in female fecundity. If the consequent population increase made for larger settlements, it probably also created pressure on resources which, as we have noticed, encouraged migration northward. The hunting bands that had led the way, also pioneered settlement, at first by erecting seasonal encampments, for summer or winter depending on the prey sought: deer, fish or wildfowl or furry animals. Such temporary settlements had similar characteristics to those of Sredny Stog in northern Ukraine, a place associated with the domestication of wild horses, and permanent settlements of later date. They were usually sited on a raised shelf of land above a river, this being convenient for transportation and communication as well as for fresh water and for fishing, yet safe from flooding. 6

One great advantage of the cold times had been the ease with which the meat of hunted creatures could be frozen. The popular Russian dish pelmeni is a reminder of this fact: at the onset of winter (a popular time for slaughtering animals), pasta shells filled with meat are thrown out of the kitchen window to freeze. Then, during the winter months, they are taken inside as needed, a shovelful at a time, to be boiled up for dinner. In warmer conditions, however, people learned to preserve meat, and fish, by air-drying or, more commonly, by salting.

The need for large quantities of salt to preserve both meat and fish was to promote both trade and industry. It encouraged searches for saline lakes and marshes, and the development of evaporation techniques. Excavations of sites in Ukraine have demonstrated that the trade in salt became extensive and far-ranging, and this helped to develop culture contacts with other budding societies.

While late Stone Age society had been developing in what is now southern Russia and Ukraine, hunter-gatherers with stone technology had been developing to the north, towards Finland and the Baltic. A cemetery excavated by Soviet archaeologists in Karelia and dating from about 7,500 years ago tells us quite a lot about these people. Most were Europeoid, though a few had Mongoloid features derived from the climate their ancestors had endured. That most of the buried bodies faced east and were sprinkled with red ochre has persuaded archaeologists that they may have venerated the sun. The knives, fish-hooks and harpoons found along with animal remains show that they lived by hunting elk, beaver and seals as well as red and roe deer and wild pigs. 7Climate as well as the availability of materials dictated the form of clothing they wore.

Human life, even in these early times, was more than a struggle for subsistence and self-preservation, however. The settlers had a taste for pretty things like ivories or amber brought from the Baltic. Archaeologists have found a range of decorative jewellery, some of which rings or rattles beguilingly when the wearer moves, and a variety of primitive musical instruments — pipes, drums and bells — that suggest that these people did not lack amusement, nor noisy means of conjuring up spirits. Other finds suggest a yearning for immortality: the remains of animal sacrifice, for example, and the care taken of the dead. In many cases the bodies of the deceased were ritually positioned and buried together with votive statuettes as well as objects that might be useful in an afterlife, or of which the dead had been fond.

The prevalence of pregnant-woman sculptures — talismans of productivity and growing riches — may suggest a society in which women were valued more than men. Certainly, the women were productive in ways other than child-bearing. They gathered food, made yarns, and engaged in a variety of other handicrafts as well as providing care and comfort. However, any such superior valuation is unlikely to have lasted into times when the men’s brute strength and strategic sense were needed for defence — whether against the elements or against other men. It was this need that put men at a premium and precluded the development of matriarchy, and there is evidence that it coincided with the advent of metal technology. From this period on the idols are of men rather than women.