What is ethnogenesis? Ethnogenesis of the Eastern Slavs

Where did the Slavic people come from? There are a lot of theories on this score. In this article, we will try to understand what ethnogenesis is. We learn what hypotheses about the origin of the Eastern Slavs exist.

What is ethnogenesis?

Peoples did not arise at one time. Different people united in small groups, which gradually expanded. Small communities grew into whole tribes. In a joint life, they had their own customs, habits, rules and traditions that distinguished them from other groups.

What is ethnogenesis? This is the initial stage of the formation of peoples. The process of transition from individual people to a group with the same device of life, one culture. The formation of the ethnos, that is, the people, was due to various reasons and factors.

Each people has a different history of origin. The appearance and formation of the nation, the nation can be influenced by the geographical environment, religion, neighboring groups of people. The settlers and invaders also contribute to the development of the people. Some peoples, for example, Germans, Americans, Swiss, arose as a result of an external challenge.

Slavs

In the cultural and ethnological sense, the people arecommunity of people, which unite certain characteristics. Previously, they were blood relatives, but over time such signs began to be considered language, religion, historical past, traditions and culture, territory.

In Europe, there are about 70 peoples, some of themwhich belongs to the Slavs. They represent the largest ethnic community. Settled in Central, South, Eastern Europe, the Far East and the Asian part of Russia. Globally, there are approximately 350 million people.

There are eastern, southern and western branchesSlavs. Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians are referred to the Eastern Slavs because of a closer cultural and linguistic connection. According to some researchers, the ancestors of these peoples were the main population of the Old Russian state in the Middle Ages, representing one nationality.

Ethnogenesis of the Eastern Slavs

Under the name of the Venedian Slavs appear in variouswritten sources in the I millennium BC. Before that, there existed several pre-Slavic ethnic cultures (for example, Pshevorskaya), which, most likely, gave rise to these peoples. However, the problem of ethnogenesis of the Slavs is still open. And now the opinions of scientists on this issue are different.

It is believed that the Slavs areIndo-European language family, which includes many other peoples. And the ancestors of the Slavs come from the central and eastern regions of Europe. According to different hypotheses, the ancestral home of the Slavs is the territory between the Oder and the Vistula, the Middle Danube, the Pripyat Polesye, and so on.

It is assumed that they lived smalltribes, after the first millennium began to unite in larger formations - tribal unions. Gradually, they were divided into the western and eastern branches, and eventually came the southern one. Eastern Slavs are often called antas. They lived near the tribes of the Avars, ready, Khazars, Pechenegs, Polovtsians.

All these tribes had a significant impact on theethnogenesis of the Eastern Slavs. Between them, often there were wars, raids. The Khazars even managed to impose a tribute on the Slavs. The researchers do not exclude the possibility that the modern East Slavic peoples may be descendants of joint marriages between the Slavs and the Eastern European tribes.

Theories of the origin of the Eastern Slavs

There are various hypotheses about the origin andthe spread of Slavic tribes. Thus, the autochthonous theory of ethnogenesis reports that the tribes of the Eastern Slavs did not come from other territories, but arose in the valleys of the Dnieper and the Dniester.

According to the migration theory, during the Greatresettlement of peoples in the III-VII centuries, they settled on the territory between the Dnieper and Dniester, in the eastern valleys of the Dnieper. Later, part of them spread to the territory of southern Ukraine, the Southern Bug and modern Moldova. The other part, faced with the Varangians, stopped in the north-west of Russia and founded Veliky Novgorod, also occupied the territory of Beloozero and the Tver region.

There is also a mixed theory thatsuggests that migration among the Slavs was taking place. Only not all moved, some remained in the territory of the historical homeland, continuing the usual way of life.

Conclusion

What is ethnogenesis? This is the process of the birth and formation of the people. Although the term includes its further development. The study of ethnogenesis includes the study of the linguistic, cultural, historical features of a certain people, its way of life, geographical location and movement throughout existence.

The origin of the Eastern Slavs so far leavesmore questions than answers. On the formation tells a lot of theories, historical and semi-legendary documents, but there is no unified opinion in scientific circles.

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