KIEVAN RUS 882–1240 - Russia: A Reference Guide from the Renaissance to the Present - page 9

the descendants of a ruling prince. Yaroslav's death was followed by almost
three decades of intermittent strife among his sons for control of Kiev. The
Cumans in the east and Teutonic Knights, Lithuanians, Swedes, and Magyars,
or Hungarians, from the north also began to threaten Kiev. One common
response by Kievans was to flee toward the forest of the northeast, establishing
towns that would later pick up the torch of emerging Russian culture as Kiev
declined.
Kiev's decline was also linked to broader changes that affected the hereto
profitable trade route from the Baltic to the Black Sea, especially the creation of
new maritime trade routes to the Black Sea from Venice or the overland route
to Constantinople by way of Bohemia. The city of Constantinople itself, to
which Kiev's economic and cultural fortunes had been linked, began to decline
in the 11th century, and in 1204 it was conquered by Latin Crusaders who held
it for the next half-century.
As Kiev declined, three other areas of Rus increased in importance: the
north, the northeast, and the west. These areas had always maintained some
independence from Kiev, because they were remote, had separate economies,
and in large part resented paying tribute to Kiev. In fact, many aspects of Kiev
society had shown differences based on geography.
To the north, Novgorod had always been a challenger to Kiev. In the early
12th century, it became an independent polity, adopting an oligarchic republi-
can system centered on its veche, an assembly that some scholars have seen as
the prototype of a parliamentary system, but was in actuality controlled by a
small group of boyars. As Kiev's power declined, Novgorod took over Rus trade
around the Baltic, focusing on new growing trade with German merchants who
displaced the earlier Varangian influence in the region. In Novgorod, the
Hanseatic League, an association of merchants in Germany and Germans
abroad played an increasing role in the town's commercial life until 1478, when
Ivan III of Moscow captured Novgorod and expelled the Hanseatic merchants
who were living there.
To the northeast a number of principalities arose, such as Vladimir, Rostov,
and Suzdal to challenge Novgorod and more distant Kiev. The city of Moscow,
founded in 1147 by Yuri Dolgorukii, a son of Vladimir Monomakh, was a rela-
tive latecomer to the roll of 12th-century Russian cities, but it was destined to
play an immense role in shaping Russian history in later centuries. To the west,
the territory of Galicia also gained in importance, especially with the develop-
ment of a land trade route to the East. Its location, bordering Poland, Hungary,
and the Russian towns, gave it important strategic advantages but also exposed
it to threats from many sides. In its politics and religion, Galicia reflected its
Western exposure, with a system in which the prince's powers were limited by
the boyars and a greater Roman Catholic influence than elsewhere in Kievan
Rus, where Eastern Orthodoxy dominated.