The Problem with Russia (in Crusader Kings)

The Varangian family of the Rurikids ruled what later became known as the Kyivan Rus' throughout the high middle ages. In today's video, we are examining the portrayal of this region in our favourite strategy game Crusader Kings 3.
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Sources:
Michael S. Flier, Henrik Birnbaum: “Medieval Russian Culture”
brewminate.com/the-rise-of-ru...
Florin Curta: "Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages (500-1300)"
A.D Stokes: "The Balkan Campaigns of Svyatoslav Igorevich"
www.mgh-bibliothek.de/dokumen...
Ekaterina Brancato: “Markets versus Hierarchies: A Political Economy of Russia from the 10th Century to 2008”
Janet Martin: “Medieval Russia: 980-1584”
Jacqueline Dauxois: "Anne de Kiev. Reine de France."
#crusaderkings3 #paradoxinteractive #crusaderkings

[@090giver090]

In my opinion CK2 did much better job at depicting the Rus than CK3. Firstly, as you correctly noted, all other Rurikid princes are set to be "tributaries" to the Grand Prince in Kiev. That gives them somewhat more autonomy than standard feudal vassalage but still makes them subservient to the Kiev authority. Secondly CK2 get their very peculiar succession laws much closer to what it was historically. In CK3 it's basic partition (Karling or early Spain style), but in CK2 it's agnatic seniority, where your heir is not your son, but your second eldest sibling. Although actual historic "lestvitsa succession" (called "ladder" or "rota" succession in English translations) was even more nuanced: the throne passed not linearly from father to son (agnatic primogeniture), but laterally from brother to brother (usually to the fourth brother) and then to the eldest son of the eldest brother who had held the throne (that looked like advancing up the succession ladder, hence the name). When the grand prince died, the next most senior prince moved to Kiev and all others moved to the principality next up the ladder. Only those princes whose fathers had held the throne were eligible for placement in the ladder; those whose fathers predeceased their grandfathers were known as izgoi, "excluded" or "orphaned" princes. Some historians argue that it's that complicated system that regularly skipped entire generations of potential successors and generated entire bloodlines of disinherited "izgois" have led to the dissolution and century of feudal warfare in the Rus before Mongol invasion.

[@bewawolf19]

The method of inheritance and more specifically the overthrow of that tradition by Muscovy is also important. It was kickstarted by the mongols using their power to frequently intervene in succession to support a specific candidate in exchange for greater tribute or when they viewed the legimiate heir as disloyal (The Mongols also required the new ruler to travel to what we call the Golden Horde to confirm their succession), but admittedly that is bleeding out of what Crusader Kings covers and more into Europa Universallis.

[@Dmcfar423]

Was thinking about the tributary thing when I saw OPB go back to Ck2 the other day! I think a comparison could have benefitted this video. I’m not sure tributaries should come back in the way they were, but if they come back in some form hopefully they use them to amend the situation in the Rus. The note about succession is very interesting! It’s similar to what went on with Vikings, correct? Like with Cnut’s former kingdoms going to a bunch of brothers back and forth. I wonder if mods remedy either problem. I know Culture Expanded fixes the culture issues, I don’t know if succession expanded has anything like the ladder system or if they’d even like to implement that given the gameplay and immersion challenges. I haven’t played the CCMH playlist in a while but I wonder if there’s anything there for tributaries as well (there used to be I think but it got deprecated) and if it’s used to change the Rus. May ask in the discord at some point about it

[@ziggytheassassin5835]

Its kept watered down in ck3 so they can inevidably make a rus focused dlc to fix it.

[@rvd5014]

@@Dmcfar423 The system of succession to the throne was broken even before the Mongols, and only idiots who listen to Ukrainian fairy tales talk about some Muscovy that ruined something there

[@JosephineMaKoala-ig3yb]

Wow ❤🎉such #GGreat_№🥇#FACT⚡

[@Apollo1989V]

The game files have 3 other East Slavic cultures that should exist in place of Rus culture in 867.

[@No.00000]

Cant wait for "Easter european bogaloo" DLC where they just add them

[@user-yy5di3qg5u]

@@No.00000 It's probably leftovers from Charlemagne start date cultures in CK2. But I doubt Paradox would add 769 start date (they even throw out entire bookmark selection option in nearly all newly grand strategy games, because most players would just only use the first bookmark and nothing else).

[@historyinbits]

Ah wow, very interesting!

[@keltongillanders5736]

​@@user-yy5di3qg5u well why would i start in 1066 when i can start in 867 and have like 200 more years IG to build my empire and experience the game

[@Bantorc]

What cultures?

[@miquelnadal9962]

I fear the problem is the lack of written sources, that being the main reason for the lack of depth in those regions... Although I feel is a missed opportunity for the 867 start not to have something similar to the Norman culture formation, reflecting the Viking influence in the region

[@historyinbits]

Very true..

[@XVlove]

they MIGHT do it if you play the game and probably require Royal Court, emphasize in might.

[@Someone-lr6gu]

I mean, historically it is pretty known where tribes lived in Eastern Europe

[@miquelnadal9962]

@@Someone-lr6gu but probably not at the level of Iberia or France at 867 I guess... and I refer mainly to the 'Russian' part... but I may be wrong

[@ericaeleodora9787]

​@@XVlovenot, saddly You can hibrid with them but either You get a generic culture name or You try diverse norse culture there as gardraki or something like that... By the way is something You must do by royal coirt mecánics, so feel like they didn't think about it enough.

[@illiaboiko7354]

The worst part is, that many Rus tribes are coded in the game since day one. You, for example, can play as Severians. But only if you create a ruler through the designer. It has been like this since day one, and it is still not fixed.

[@brotherrussia9691]

that seems to be the case with a lot of dead or dying cultures in ck3 unfortunately :/

[@battlez9577]

That depends if it needs to be fixed or not

[@BioTheHuman]

They most likely copied the files from CK2 but never implemented on

[@tabinekoman]

Paradox be like : Mistake, I spell it DLC opportunity. "Struggle for Rus" DLC

[@theultimatefreak666]

As your german-speaking writer stressed we do use regions to identify which usually are based on Holy roman-empire era entities far smaller than the cultures in ck3, those cultures are probably based on dialectal groups... Which makes it infuriating that franconian and Saxon aren't split into high- and low- Low-franconian is also the language-family of dutch and Afrikaans quite far from high-franconian which is the one usually thought of when just saying Franconian today. The rhine would make more sense as dutch than as Franconian the way paradox linked culture and language now 😅

[@historyinbits]

Danke fürs Bestätigen :)

[@XVlove]

If you play the game a bit later, the rhine, the mainz, and other german cultures will separate on their own on the later date.

[@sebe2255]

Dutch itself also makes no sense though, as Frisian is very much not a part of the Dutch culture of the game and the Eastern Netherlands should be Saxon. Funnily enough making the Eastern Netherlands Saxon, the Rhineland Dutch and then renaming it Low Franconian would basically fix everything (if you don’t want to add Frisian as a separate culture)

[@BiglerSakura]

Some more remarkable historical characters: Vsevolod who rules in Pereyaslavl has a son, Vladimir, the future Vladimir Monomachos, as Vsevolod's wife is from a Byzantine, sorry, Eastern Roman princely family. The future wife of Vladimir is Gytha, a daughter of king Harold who lost the battle of Hastings. There is a possibility she was the mother of Jury Dolgoruky ('The Long Reach'), the legendary founder of the city of Moscow. In my playthroughs I sometimes try to arrange that marriage.

[@shashwatsinha2704]

You're quite knowledgeable

[@lettucearsebiscuits8375]

In the More Bookmarks mod, Yuriy Long-Arm and plenty other Rus characters from dates ranging from 1081 to 1337 you might like are present in all their glory.

[@andrewmtula]

The issue with changing Ruthenia to Kievan Rus is that Ruthenia is, although late and foreign, a term used in times depicted by CKIII. Kievan Rus is a term invented by Russian historians in XIX century. It has its pros since Russian princes wouldn't use Latin name for their realm, but the situation is difficult. The only terms used in the Russian chronicles are Rus and Russkaya Zemlya (the Russian land), but this fits much more to the imperial title instead of a kind of anachronistic Russia, not to the kingdom with the capital in Kiev. Interesting fact: in XXI century Russian historians tend to avoid the Kievan Rus term, prefering Drevnerusskoye gosudarstvo (ancient Russian state) because... You know.

[@user-yq6ct6mr1y]

No problem with usage of term "Byzantine Empire" detected

[@historyinbits]

Thank you for the input! We are aware the historiographic debate on this one is quite partisan apparently, even or especially when it comes to the naming. Maybe just “Rus” would be the best solution?

[@n1flung]

@@historyinbits The best option IMO is for Kingdom-tier Principalities to be named according to the "capital city" (i.e. Principality of Kyiv, of Polotsk, of Novgorod etc.) with the one controlled by dynasty head to be called "Grand Principality of ...". Thus, the name "Rus" would be left for Empire-tier title de-jure containing all Kingdom-tier Principalities

[@BiglerSakura]

Or, if that artificial historiographic name of 'Kievan Rus' is used (why not, if they use the 'Byzantine Empire'), then 'Vladimir Rus', 'Novgorodian Rus' etc. should be used in the same context together.

[@benismann]

@@n1flung that's true. Galicia-volhynia can stay as it is, but ruthenia being ruthenia and not kiev/kyiv is weird and inconsistent with all the other kingdoms

[@elizabethplatz1992]

I believe the reason that Iziaslav's brothers are referred to as "Prince of Ruthenia" rather than referencing their own primary titles has to do with how CK3 generally handles titles and not something specific to the Rurikid situation. Since Iziaslav has a King-tier title and his brothers are only Dukes, they are referred to as "Prince of [Kingdom]". As another example, I started playing as Dyre the Stranger inspired by this video and his brother Sigfrid Halfdansson formed the Kingdom of the Danelaw, at which point my own title changed to "Prince Dyre of the Danelaw" rather than Jarl of Konugardr. This presumably is also why Anna is referred to as "Queen Mother of France" rather than Countess of Valois. Basically, it seems that characters are referred to by their association to the highest tier title possible.

[@historyinbits]

Yes, good point!

[@artmish3213]

Well, there WAS an empire-rank state of Rus in CK2 There was even a decision that if you conquered Nenetsia, Perm, Volga Bulgraia, Crimea, Khazaria, and Alania, you could reform Rus to Russia Also, the Kingdom of Ruthenia in the same CK2 is called like that only in 769 and 867 starts

[@historyinbits]

Yep, good old times!

[@BiglerSakura]

There is a mod, something like 'Cultures expanded'..., that somehow corrects the cultural situation there at the early start. There is a bunch of Eastern Slavic tribe cultures (Drevlian, Polian, Krivich, Ilmen etc.). A merger of Norse with them should result in the Rus culture.

[@kamilszadkowski8864]

Sounds great, thanks for recomendation.

[@user-destr]

Rurik dynasty of Western Slavs in northern Germany. Rurik's ancestors are Obodrits, not Norwegians. Varangians are a profession, pirates of the North Sea. The Slavs in northern Germany imposed tribute on all surrounding tribes, including the Danes. The displacement of the Slavs from the north of Germany is combined with the arrival of the Rurik's dynasty in Novgorod.

[@BiglerSakura]

@@user-destr a nice idea for a playthrough, actually. An anti-Normannist version. Create a character named Rurik (or Rarog?) in Obodritia, go to Novgorod and kick the Swedish impostor out of there.

[@user-destr]

Piracy in the North Sea attracted many at that time, so it is not surprising that in a gang of pirates on boats there could be many Scandinavian mercenaries, but this does not mean that all Varangians are Scandinavians. the dynasty was Slavic and only the Slavic dynasty could be invited to the Slavic city of Novgorod. The Rurik dynasty did not capture Novgorod, it was the dynasty that was invited to Novgorod. Only relatives can be invited. Rurik's father, the prince of the Obodrits, was married to the daughter of the Novgorod prince Gostomysl. The Gostomysl had no male heirs and they called Rurik and the entire tribe to Novgorod as the LEGAL heir in the female line.

[@Basileus1453]

A hegemony system for empires that would allow HRE in 867 and Kievan Rus' for 1066 would actually be a great feature. The historical inaccuracy of these things not existing makes me mad.

[@historyinbits]

Yes, agreed!

[@fnansjy456]

Ireland too for both dates

[@Apollo1989V]

Culture shouldn’t even by called “Russian” but “Rus”.

[@usernameredacted8857]

Ehh. Rus is also probably an exonym for the people of the region as well. I recommend Dr. Jackson Crawford's interview with Dr. Vicki Grove on the linguistic origins of the Kyivan Rus' names.

[@user-yy5di3qg5u]

Why not "East Slavic"?

[@usernameredacted8857]

In-game, that's already the "culture group" that Russian belongs to. East Slavic would be too broad to describe a single culture in my opinion. The More Bookmarks+ mod has a much better variation of known Slavic tribes in the region before the turn of the 9th century.@@user-yy5di3qg5u

[@historyinbits]

Interesting debate, thank you!

[@usernameredacted8857]

I'm not sure if my first response actually posted but in my opinion, it would be too broad of a classification. East Slavic is the cultural family Russian belongs to in game. The More Bookmarks+ mod has a very good depiction of the regional tribes at the turn of the 9th century. @@user-yy5di3qg5u

[@battlez9577]

Having all of Rus be one culture in ck3 lets rurikids inherit each others titles more easily, whether elective or seniority

[@historyinbits]

Good point from a gameplay perspective!!

[@stanislavmegued554]

The Rurikids also added a spin on seniority succession. According to the congress of Liyubech in 1096 there was established a hierarchical system of thrones. The most prestigious being the one in Kiev. The thrones would be distributed between siblings according to their seniority and upon succession they would all move up a throne. Rough example would be the knyaz of Chernigov being the first in line to inherit Kiev, but he would not keep Chernigov. Instead, knyaz of, let's say, Smolensk would move to rule Chernigov, vacating his own throne for someone lower in the hierarchy. It was like a totem pole, where upon vacation of the upper slot, everyone would move up a slot.

[@Paganovich]

Prince Vseslav of Polotsk is a very interesting character, he is the most distant relative among all the Rurikovich. He fought wars with the rest of the family, conquering most of Russia. He is also called the Sorcerer Prince, the werewolf and the last pagan. He himself is the great-grandson of Vladimir and Rogneda, whom Vladimir married by force, killing her relatives. It was possible to make a VERY interesting character out of him.

[@mr.morningstar9906]

As always, love you guys and your work! Great listens for my commute

[@exter9384]

I find it sad that you never mentioned the principality of Polotsk. It's not that historically important but it's the part of the Rus that Belarus sees as it's medieval "predecessor". So I think it's strange that you mentioned every Rus principality in the game except for Polotsk.

[@historyinbits]

We might have to do a part 2!

[@BiglerSakura]

And it should be Polotsk rather than 'White Rus' for the time of the game start.

[@battlez9577]

Belarus also claims descent from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with how russified the nobles were becoming prior to the union with Poland

[@yamisa8059]

Žywie Biełaruś!⬜🟥⬜

[@FlyLoriens]

@@yamisa8059 as part of mother Russia!

[@Bantorc]

Don’t get me wrong, but it’s important to remember in context of video that the state itself wasn’t called “Kievan Rus”, but just “Rus” (I am not using the Kyiv variant because T9 doesn’t know word “Kyivan” and there was practically no academic use for that variant until recent events) Kievan Rus is just a term introduced by historians to differentiate eras of the state. So as author mention in video. The first lawbook was called “Russian Truth” but not “Kievan Russian Truth” Tho it’s not a bad term or anything, it was used for a long time and there is no need to change that. So speaking of cultural names, it is in same way incorrect to call 867 starting date tribes as Russians as calling state as “Kievan Rus”. But if we examine the subject closer we will found out that they are in fact people that would later on call themselves as Russians and we will found out that it is in fact Rus state with capital in Kiev so it is Kievan Rus. I think in both cases it’s is acceptable to call something the way that it wasn’t called in discussed times. So as for example Byzantium wasn’t called Byzantium but Roman Empire, but we all widely use that term bc we are used to it and that makes us understand the subject we are talking about. Rus as a term is a much wider than Kievan Rus, it includes more territories and much longer time periods. Later on “grad prince of Moscow and all Rus” will accept the title of tsar and official name of the state will be Tsardom of Russia where Russia will be Rus spelled on the Greek manner. It was done so Russian tsars could claim Byzantium heritage. So the the term Rus is alive by this day in a form of a Greek word for it.

[@adamsubotsky7014]

I'm from Biełaruś - White Rus in sk3 - and I have no problem with naming. But I think pdx could also call Galicia Volhynia "Red Rus". But name Russia for empire so awfully fucking stupid, bc the word itself appeared only in 16-17 centurie. It's should also called Kievan Rus or just Rus, but not Russia. And culture should called rusynian/rusinian because people called themselves rusyny/rusiny

[@alliova]

угу, мене це теж просто неймовірно бісить

[@kamilszadkowski8864]

I would vote for calling the culture Ruthenian just to avoid making it confusing for English speakers as it is an already established term. As for the name Russia for the Empire-level title... it's bad but not even half as bad as "West-Slavia" which is just down right retarded. In the case of Russia, you just have a chance to establish it before it historically happened. But West-Slavia? What the fuck is this shit?

[@fgkuv5232]

​@@alliovaпохрюкай

[@baileygregory9192]

Idk russia not the best name. It should just be rus, as well it makes sense to call it what is the best know historical name (even if not used by the people of the area), ie byzantium. Considering they were called the rus, it makes sense that their empire would be the land of the rus (russia) or another devatipn of it like u suggest

[@artmish3213]

Well, there WAS an empire-rank state of Rus in CK2 There was even a decision that if you conquered Nenetsia, Perm, Volga Bulgraia, Crimea, Khazaria, and Alania, you could reform Rus to Russia Also, the Kingdom of Ruthenia in the same CK2 is called like that only in 769 and 867 starts

[@000Dragon50000]

Huh, that also explains the similarities between the Druzhina and the House Guard unit you can unlock in the dynasty legacies tree.

[@historyinbits]

Right!

[@benismann]

Unexpected little bone from pdx

[@kamilszadkowski8864]

Yep, unlocking the House Guard from the dynasty legacies is the only way to have something resembling druzhina while playing a Western Slavic ruler. Hopefully, Paradox will address that in the future since usually by the time you unlock the house guard you are outside the timeframe for the western Slavic druzhinas.

[@000Dragon50000]

@@kamilszadkowski8864 Or just conquer your way over there and hybridise, but stay west slavic.

[@kamilszadkowski8864]

@@000Dragon50000 That sir, would be an abomination.

[@N3rdDak]

Another fantastic video, friends!

[@historyinbits]

Thank you 🤗

[@iliastephnadze]

There aren't many rulers or at all many characters in caucasia but would be very interesting for you to review it

[@historyinbits]

Good idea!

[@georgek2317]

You are making crazy good videos. Please keep doing that.

[@historyinbits]

Thank you, we appreciate the positive feedback! Glad to have you as a viewer!

[@Ciech_mate]

Hi there I actually mentioned this in my first Rus video, thank you for making sure this gains traction.

[@CoffeeSuccubus]

Love how the "mass researchers" were Byzaboos.

[@PSYCHOpaty4]

Another problem that I have with portraiting Rus is that Galicia-Volunia is a part of Westslavia. It dosen't make sense really, because it was a part of Rus people living there were eastern slavs. In fact, as far as I know, eastern slavs always were here even after collapse of Rus

[@zheka7691]

Never in its history kyivan rus was a monoethnic state. Having just one cultire for the entire thing and naming it russian is not only historically wrong, its very vague oversimplification and also weird since during character creation you can chose actual eastern Slavic cultures like vohlynian, polesian, tyverian etc.

[@user-je4nq6he5o]

This is a very controversial statement. According to this logic, we should divide the inhabitants of all states into cultures according to the city or region where they live. But I agree that for that historical period, it is a mistake to use exclusively Russian culture until at least 1066 of the starting date. Still, if you divide them according to your logic, then into tribes that are already in the game as dead cultures like Ilmen or Seversky.

[@konplayz]

There is no historical evidence for these “cultures” existing

[@mytiliss682]

​@@user-je4nq6he5oRussian historians often refer to Kulikovo battle as consolidation point of Russians in political view. When it happened on cultural level is debatable. I find It pointless since people of those time used their tribe and later religion for self-identification. Though they shared, or at least pretended to share same language, which is basis of any culture.

[@user-je4nq6he5o]

@@mytiliss682 Russian Russian culture had long been folded by the time of the Kulikovo Battle, and this battle is rather the unification of all Russian principalities near Moscow into more or less one state.

[@hlibushok]

I was pretty surprised when despite mispronouncing a bunch of stuff you managed to pronounce "Russkaya Pravda" as perfectly as a non-native speaker can. Rather than complain about all the mispronunciation I will give some tips: For pronouncing East Slavic words correctly you should first beak them down by syllables instead of immediately trying to pronounce the whole word and likely missing several sounds. The "ia" in East Slavic languages is a single sound (Cyrillic letter "я"). In "Iziaslav" you pronounce the "i" and "a" separately, which makes it sound more like "I-za-yah-slav". You make the same mistake when pronouncing the name "Sviatoslav". The "zh" in transliteration of Slavic languages makes a sound that most English speakers are not familiar with. In Cyrillic it's represented by the letter "ж" and in IPA by the letter "ʒ". Wikipedia has an example of this sound in English as the "si" in "vision" and "allusion". The two o's in "Beloozero" make two separate sounds (Since it's a combination of two words - "Belo" and "Ozero" meaning White Lake), so it would be "Be-lo-o-ze-ro". The "Vse" in "Vsevolod" is a single syllable, but you accidentally add another vowel after the first "V" making it into "Ve-se-vo-lod". Similarly, you make the syllable "Tmu" in "Tmutarakan" into two by splitting off the letter "T". All these corrections probably make me sound very snobbish, but... well... I don't really have a justification for this. Anyways, I can't add much to the history in this video, but from the knowledge I received while Wikipedia rabbit hole diving it seems pretty solid. HOWEWER: I feel like you're wrong about "Kingdom of Ruthenia" being the game's representation of Kievan Rus'. If you go into the De Jure Empires map mode you will immediately notice that the real-life Kievan Rus' borders match perfectly with the borders of the in-game "Tsardom of Russia" (which uses the double-headed eagle as it's CoA). To me it seems that, for some reason, Paradox decided to replace the real historic Rus' with a terribly anachronistic "Russia". That would also explain the usage of the term "Ruthenia" instead of "Rus'" for Iziaslav's kingdom, since in the Early Modern era that term was applied only to Ukraine (and sometimes Belarus), which is the land Iziaslav rules over in the game.

[@benismann]

nah you're fine for correcting them, nothing wrong with that

[@Aeg0r]

Kiev was conquered by Rurikids who came from the modern day Russian territory. Rus' was never been applied to Ukraine, cause it didn't exist back then.

[@danikt2610]

I agree however the borders of the Empire title "Russia" (according to the game) are NOT accurate as it included the kingdom of Galicia-Volhynia as well. Sorry if I misspelled the kingdom title, it was a while since I played CK3

[@benismann]

@@danikt2610 it used to include that before pdx spilled up the abomination that was the Southern Baltic Sea empire

[@vladprus4019]

@@benismann Honestly, stuff like that is imo the reason why whole Empire-tier title system should be rethinked and heavily limited. The "Empire is just a collection of kingdoms just like kingdom is collection of duchies" is clearly not working for the period and serves more like a gameplay tool to allow rulers of vast realms having larger vassals.

[@oluzanforanium3734]

18:54 - Его сын - THE Владимир Мономах. Он даже получает претензию на Византийскую Империю после смерти его матери

[@Ma_ksi]

Very interesting

[@historyinbits]

Glad you think so!

[@JiriBacak]

The last Ryurikovichi ruler was Vasiliy IV from the Shujskiy house. It is just writen down weird in the internet especially on wikipedia bc Fyodor was just the last Ruler of the moscow house. You forgot to mention one of the most important character in the 1066 start. Vladimir II "Monomach" ( son of Vsevolod of pereyaslavl)He was one of the most important Rulers from the Kievan Rus.

[@Virkand]

"Kieven Rus" is NOT a country, its a time period. The country was called Rus Lands or the Lands of the Rus.The slavic people there spoke "proto Russian" or "old Russian tongue" and shared nearly the same culture.

[@XVlove]

I don't know if it is locked behind Royal Court or not, but if you play the game on either start date, there is a chance the culture might diverge itself at a later date, and popped cultures like Ruthenian and I forget what else in Russia, or in Germany, Rhenish, Mainz, etc and many other cultures. If you decided to hybrid or diverge, you might get a "unique" default name for the culture.

[@historyinbits]

Well that could be a feature for an alt-hist special :)

[@jjohnson1680]

Florin Curta was my professor in college, one of the classes I took from him was on medieval Russian history.

[@historyinbits]

Fascinating, where and when was that?

[@Noobmaster-of3xk]

Something that is very ineresting is just how influcence the Scadinavias had in the region for a long time with helping to overthrow and help ivade as vangarigias agaist their foes or for a bit of cash And how many Scadinavian kings needed to get support in Russia in order to reclaim or claim their throne in Scadanivaia I orther words they were very good at trolling each other

[@bolshie_yaytsa]

Good video actually

[@lennito5]

you should play with the expanded culture mod. it ads all the cultures your missing in eastern Europe...

[@BlueHawkPictures17]

15:06 Oh man these pronunciations, that one is basically a russified version of "Elizabeth" but using russian letters it sounds like (Е -> ye)liza(В -> ve)(no 'th' sound -> t)(female -> a)

[@abrvalg321]

Pretty much it. In 1066 you can talk about 14 (or how many tribes I forgot), Unified russian culture didn't exist. Earlies you can point at would be 1480 or so. Same thing about polish culture, czech, south slavic.

[@TAKE_BACK_BRITAIN]

Yes, technically Ruthenia is an exonym for the rest of the Rus, but in practice, it was actually the name for the newly formed catholic kingdom formed in the west of Ukraine at the time. The fact that an exonym is used refers to the fact that it joined the catholic sphere of influence rather than the orthodox one, so the name that catholic Europe referred to it as is the one that stuck.

[@Saufs0ldat]

Like many areas about which we don't know all that much, it's just not terribly fleshed out. In another timeline, this may have been addressed in a future update or DLC, but given the current political situation, they're probably not going to touch that area until CK4.

[@mytiliss682]

Or make It blatant anti-Russian propaganda

[@dhruvagc6487]

Can you try the duchy of champagne next, please? I absolutely love your videos!

[@nicbahtin4774]

There's a history video on the russian language by Arzamas that goes in depth on this period if that helps.

[@vedranbileta8346]

That article at the very beginning is not saying that Turkification of Anatolia occured before Manzikert. But that the Seljuks started raiding forty years earlier. Raiding and changing ethnic structure are two different things. The Huns were raiding the Roman Empire decades before Attila's invasion... If you are not historians, then perhaps you should find some to join your team

[@historyinbits]

How are “migratory Turkish groups” raiding?

[@ryanrusch3976]

Usually when there is no source listed for a wikipedia article there is no source

[@hollandsgloriepotverdorie9605]

this is why culture and ethinicities expanded exist 👍

[@blinkrush6101]

Could you do one for the Maghreb?

[@DaveSkylark111]

Perhaps the locals moved away from the rivers circa 800 ad because they didn’t like getting raided by Vikings anymore.

[@douglasgabriel5228]

For me the problem is the succession, they didnt make the "rotation between the princes"

[@user-lu6ff5lo2b]

Great video! I have always been surprised by the inheritance system in Russia in the game, in fact, we see the Confederate Partition system, when the eldest son inherits the main title, just like in ordinary European states of that time, but this is completely wrong. Since a huge number of civil wars were connected with the fact that Rurikovich, the eldest in the entire family, inherited, that is, it would be more logical to introduce House Seniority. It also seems inappropriate to me that the three Yaroslavich brothers are in terrible relations with each other. Of course, the brothers were in a difficult relationship, but it is difficult to say about some kind of hatred for the brothers of the younger Vsevolod Pereyaslavsky, it is assumed that this was introduced for a greater balance of the game. Nevertheless, the political configuration of the region in fact always leads to the fact that the descendants of Iziaslav unite Russia in their hands. I would also like to see more independence of the Novgorod land in politics, of course, it will receive its more or less independence much later, namely in 1136, but even then, the veche in the city played a huge role, For example, Gleb Svyatoslavich was kicked out of the reign by the Novgorodians. So, it would be much cooler if elections were already working in the game there, as in Scandinavia. And of course, the presence of the Polovtsians in the game as one single state surprised me back in Crusader Kings 2, in the game they become a more formidable force that is able to conquer the whole of southern Russia, which does not correspond to reality at all, there are too many dangerous neighbors in the game. Nevertheless, despite all these and other disadvantages, I like the work the game developers have done, for example, the characters got into the characters brilliantly.

[@Bravebear333]

Rus' in fact was never Kievan, it's a historiographic term no one used back then. It was referred as simply Rus' with a center in Kyiv. Rus' mostly consisted of territories inside the triangle of Kyiv, Chernigov and Pereyaslavl, and other lands like Novgorod were called differently, not as Rus'.

[@moledaddy]

It's possible the lack of homogeneity required using a higher level of abstraction for the Russian area than was used in the Spanish area. In otherwords it may not have been feasible to split the Russian culture into only 7 or 8 cultures, so they opted to use a higher level of abstraction.

[@user-gu1mj7iu4x]

Why? If it was so, I don't see a reason.

[@moledaddy]

@@user-gu1mj7iu4x I don't know if it is this way, but if there were 100 ways to split the Russian culture but no way to logically group them into 20 intermediate groups then you may have to go up to the next level of abstraction.

[@BiglerSakura]

The Paradox' approach with renaming cities into the modern local languages is quite superficial as it is just an homage to the current political agenda. The modern Ukrainian language has undergone vowel shifts etc. since the times of the medieval eastern Slavic language and doesn't reflect the original pronunciation of the name 'Kiev' any better than the modern Russian.

[@zheka7691]

'doesn't reflect the original pronunciation of the name 'Kiev' any better than the modern Russian" Well, that means that russian variants doesnt represent the original prononciation any better than ukrainian since russian language undergone vowel shifts etc. So why should it not be the ukrainian one?

[@BiglerSakura]

@@zheka7691 It's not just about the 'Kiev/Kyiv' choice, there is e.g. 'Lvov/Lviv' in which 'o' is definitely closer to the original if we check it with other Slavic languages. However, the recent switch from the long-established traditional historical terminology (like 'Kievan Rus' being in use in the English-speaking academic circles) is driven by politics rather than linguistics. Anyways, the room for discussion in this topic is practically infinite. Like why 'Constantinople' is not 'Istanbul' in the game :)

[@zheka7691]

​@@BiglerSakura Hey, i respect your opinion. I'm all for discussion, but both arguments you used aren't convincing. What I'm saying is that long-established traditional historical terminology is a vague argument, Traditional historical terminology in case of mentioned Lviv is what? it was not long ago when long established name for this city was German "Lemberg". And everyone was fine with accepting its changed names in the past, but for some reason oppose accepting Ukrainian name today. Not to mention that "close to original pronunciation" is also weird argument considering that Ukrainian language is direct descendant of Ruthenian and mentioned development is natural. Besides, we cannot be sure what was the original name of Lviv at the moment of its foundation by Ruthenians because we cannot tell when exactly Ruthenians replaced old sound with "i" in genitive case of the word "lev". You should also know that it was not "o" that was replaced, it was a different sound that was more similar to "e" in case of Lviv, so I'm not sure if "o" in Polish would be closer to possible original variant than Ukrainian "i". However, it is believed that this process of merging old vowel with "i" begun around 13century between Carpathians and Prypiat river (western Ukraine) and later slowly spread to other dialects to the east. Lviv was founded during the same period in 13century so it very well might have been called "Lviv" by local people back then, before Poles took control of Galicia. It is also interesting that this feature is not unique to Ukrainian language, it is also common in south-western Belarussian dialect, in the area which was part of Galicia-Vohlyina in the past. We do not have any document which can prove what was the "original pronunciation", so all of it is just speculation. To conclude, i think all this is quite irrelevant. History changes all the time and there is no reason to stick to "long-established" or "traditional" variants or dig down to find the one and only original name when you have modern name used by local people who are descendants of those who founded the city. Thinking about this and about your Constantinople remark, i wonder if any British counties have old English names, which definitely closer to original pronunciation but definitely different from long-established traditional terminology. Could`ve been a great argument to show how these things can easily contradict each other thus - irrelevant and aren't necessary to follow.

[@user-gu1mj7iu4x]

​@@BiglerSakura>'Lvov/Lviv' is closer to 'o' if we check other Slavic languages Well, if we do check other Slavic languages, we would learn that -ів (-iv), -ów are possessive adjectives, and ó in polish represents [u] the same sound that that developed into i in Ukrainian, like in Kraków/Krakiv, Kijów/Kyiv as towns of Krak or Kyi, and it transforms into [o] when conjugated into some cases. When in Russian possessive adjectives formed with -ov/-ev, and they did not preserved this alteration of a vowel under conjugation.

[@Mihail_Blagodarny]

1:04 a good excuse... it would be if you didn’t find fault with the moments of non-historicity in СК; 3.

[@amelgicic7588]

To fix the abomination in eastern Europe and Byzantium, I recommend the mod "Culture Expanded". It adds many new and accurate eastern Slavic cultures. It also adds more cultures in the British Isles and other areas.

[@purpledevilr7463]

Start in an unorthodox way. Heh.

[@FeszVelry]

Unrelated to the video but can you make a video about Cumania? I always wanted to know how accurate they are

[@historyinbits]

Will look into it!

[@FeszVelry]

@historyinbits Awesome, thanks for replying! Your videos are really well done and you deserve every view.

[@mementomori771]

The Rus are one of the parts of the map that have always kinda bugged me i really think it needs to be reworked slightly.

[@historyinbits]

Agreed.

[@AaSs-ln9mm]

Strange question about why call it Rutenia and not Kievan Rus. You see, word "Kievan Rus" was invented way later, than Rutenia. Like centuries later. By Russian historian, who use it to name not a state, but specific time frame. It is like Victorian England. Did you have Carolingian France in this game? No. Did it bother you?

[@borginburkes1819]

Please do France 🇫🇷 next.

[@yernat.ali1453]

I find the heir of the Grand Prince Of Pereyaslavl very interesting, for some reason he has the Genius trais, which is not present either of his parents. And plus, The Grand Prince Himself has claims for Sweden and that heir has claims for The Byzantine Empire, Thrace and Constantinople through his bastard mother. I am going to try play as him and form Tsardom. Wish me luck

[@kamilszadkowski8864]

Unfortunately, Western Europe is always portrayed with much more detail in comparison to Central and Eastern Europe. Not just in CK3. I guess it's just how things are and it is not going to change anytime soon. When it comes to cultures I don't think I would even portray Polabians Slavs as one culture as different Polabian states and tribes were vastly different from each other despite being so similar at the same time. But I guess that is where the divergent and hybrid cultures step in as in-game mechanics. Regarding the video, I am a bit surprised that you didn't bring up the elephant in the room. Namely that Ruthenia/Kievan Rus was not a feudal state. Definitely not feudal in a Western style. Even a short description of how the ruling system looked like or what were the names of the most important offices would be very interesting. 11:52 *"Russkaya Pravda does not reflect Roman law, but rather bears visible similarities to the Norse jurisprudence"* --- This sentence seems to imply that the Russkaya Pravda was influenced by the Norse founders of Kievan Rus, and although this very much could be the case I just have to point out that all the "barbaric" legal codes from Lex Burgundionum through Lex Ripuaria, Lex Longobardi to Lex Saxonum and finally ending on Russkaya Pravda they are all surprisingly similar to each other despite the difference in time of publishing. Pravda seems even a bit archaic in certain parts in comparison to the earlier barbaric codifications. It seems that Barbaric Europe outside of the Midetrenian influences was much more similar in terms of laws and customs than we are willing to admit. This is however a topic for a different discussion. Also, this raised my eyebrow: *"This is a cool homage to the medieval russian concept of druzhina"* (8:04). Druzhina definitely isn't a strictly Ruthenian concept (sorry using the term "Russian" when referring to medieval Eastern Slavs seems wrong to me). Druzhinas can be found all over the Slavic world. Also contrary to what you've said in the video druzhina doesn't just refer to a ruler's entourage or retinue. Druzhinas existed in many forms some even served as elite guards dedicated to the gods themselves. Like the druzhina of Svatevit consisting of 300 armed horsemen guarding the temple of Arkona on the Rugia (Rugen) island. You will have to dig deeper into the topic of druzhina if you ever plan to cover Poland, the Pomeranians, or the Polabians. But otherwise a great video as always guys. Love your work.

[@benismann]

"Namely that Ruthenia/Kievan Rus was not a feudal state." So are we making it a clan? Or tribal? There're not that many gov types in ck3, and if u were to mention that every time u talk about anything outside of western europe in the game... that would be kinda ew

[@kamilszadkowski8864]

@@benismann Well, this channel is just as much about history as it is about gaming. I don't see anything wrong with digging a little bit deeper and evaluating how compatible a country/region is with the way CK3 portrays feudalism. I personally think that even the little quirks and differences are very interesting. And yes, it goes without saying that CK3's gov types are limited, and even the feudal government type doesn't fit the larger picture in general. It doesn't have to be explained every single time. But I would love if History in Bits when evaluating countries made space (if possible) for a little section on how the CK3 gov types had to be modified or what additions would it take to portray the government system of a particular political entity more accurately. I mean this specific topic is were history and gameplay meet and makes room for interesting discussion in the comment section which I and I am sure many others enjoy just as much as watching the video.

[@historyinbits]

Hey man, we are working right now on a video on “east central europe” talking about Poland and Hungary (and a little bit about Bohemia) - seeing as you are a regular member of the community, I wanted to ask if you’d like to contact us on Discord so you can give your opinion on what we have so far on Poland :)

[@historyinbits]

And thanks for the valuable input as always!!

[@kamilszadkowski8864]

@@historyinbits Wow, what can I say? It would be a pleasure!

[@sigmaballs2004]

I think we need to bring back the mechanics of cultural groups like in eu4...

[@sigmaballs2004]

By the way, in ck 2 russian culture Fragmented...

[@hagymascsiposgyros5780]

me when the video about russia starts unorthodox (based catholic russia O_O?)

[@jacobtrebilcock2070]

I’ll say the big elephant in the room. DLC or MODS

[@ryanfu3016]

the eldest son of the ruler of preyaslav is a genius iirc. Idk who he is

[@IronWolf123]

Why are they all rivals?

[@benismann]

Im pretty sure everyone pointed it out already but pronunciations of names specifically are oh so off in this video. Most of everything else is fine, somehow.

[@mikexstad1121]

I think there need to be more cultural pillars, same with religion too

[@viorp5267]

2:00 Silesians not being their own culture is a bit odd as they always kinda were. Also I feel how there should be regions which lack empire titles you can unite just by conquering. The hell is west-slavia supposed to be? If this is a consequence of how the game is coded then they could have coded it differently, this was a complaint back in CK2 days too.

[@CanalWolfy]

As a russian it is so painful to hear you butchering all these names)

[@IgorS.]

7:31, realy strange pronunciation. "Druzhina" shouldn't be pronounced as "druZina". "Zh" is pronounced like the first letter in "Geneva" or like Czech ž and Polish ż, ź.

[@historyinbits]

Thanks for the tip!

[@nicbahtin4774]

Why is it bad it's just means forming Russia in CK3 is just Easier

[@inspector_beyond]

I do hope Paradox would update this region in future, but it does show that it's mostly comprised of leftover from CK2 (especially that in game files there are Ilmenian, Severian and Volhynian cultures). As Russian myself, here's what I think: -Russian culture as it stands out in this game would de facto exist only after formation of Kyivan Rus and after Christinisation by Vladimir The Great (also know as Krasnoye Solntse, aka The Red Sun in folklore stories, although that's a bit debatable if it's representation of him or not). Before that though, the culture map should be splintered in various tribes, that's shown in many pictures that was shown in the video. The reason being is that modern Russian culture, speaking in game terms and mechanics, diverged from Kyivan Russian as Moskovite (same thing happened with modern Ukrainian and Belarussian cultures, but they diverged when ruled Poland-Lithuania, not Mongols) when Principality of Moscow was a tributary vassal under Mongols, like many other similar Principalities, in exception of Novgorod, which had it's unique form of government. So, Paradox should splinter the cultures in earliest start date, but remain Russian after Vladimir converted Rus to Christianity. Of cource, things that I mentioned are oversimplified, but I did it as to fit it more into CK3 gameplay, but keep it more historical. Also, I have to note the pronounciations. For a german-speaker, you did pretty well. THe only note I can really criticize is the reading of "zh" combo. It's suppose to be read as "J" in French or "Ž" in Western Slavic languages. I know it's kinda a low priortiy thing, but I wonder how a reasearched topic wouldn't had notations on how to pronounce the names. Most modern butchering of a name by English speakers would be Khruschev. Khruschev would actually be [Hrushchyov], while it usually degrades to Kruschev in English speaking world. (Sorry for the rant, just kinda angers me)

[@gabrielgodwin2241]

Trying to claim you're being historical why naming Kievan Rus as Kyivan Rus is funny... You're claiming that Paradox combining of the Rus culture is too early for 867 but you're using a name for a kingdom that people only started using bcos of a war that started less than 10 years ago.. FUNNY

[@foxdavion6865]

CK2 did a far better job depicting the region than CK3 has; In my opinion this comes down to a combination of laziness during the development of CK3, low priority and Paradox's bigotry showing... See, in the time between the development of CK2 and CK3, let's just say the Finn studio has developed a bias against Slavs. Don't believe me? Well, look it up, there is a lot of evidence, especially from their Grand LANs. I say this because: A) Many of the tribes existed early on in CK3's development. B) The other cultures in the region aside "Russian" exist in the game files. C) If you create a custom ruler, you can pick both of these. CK2 also from a very early stage introduced historical succession laws. CK3 had all the infrastructure there from the start to have historical succession laws at launch, but the devs intentionally left it out to then be put back in with paid DLC - of which they have yet to even implement and I'll tell you why, it is because after Royal Courts released, a new dev team took over and they seem to be doing the same thing the Stellaris team does, stealing mods and using them as grounds for developing DLC as opposed to re-introducing content from CK2 which should of been there at launch. It took them 3 YEARS to introduce the upcoming Plagues, Legends and Legitimacy DLC, a series of features which should of been in the game at launch.

[@Hello-vl6vt]

I wrote about the Kyivan Rus' for school once, and after that, the big Russian culture blob in CK3 kinda bugged me. The mod “Cultures Expanded” really helps make everywhere more culturally accurate, so I always play with that. Great video covering this topic - I always watch whenever you upload, your videos are so interesting and informative! A suggestion for another video: The Sami or just Finnic cultures in general.

[@S.Gamedev-zc2wp]

I think the concept of culture itself in this game is not very well portrayed, at least according to my knowledge

[@mateksi27]

ale akcja

[@Neversa]

So the Steppe region in both start dates are complete bs and do not reflect reality at all. Provided we don't know much about what was happening there in reality either.

[@bolshie_yaytsa]

10:00 Rurik is a legendary character, and archeology can help us find out that there was no Novgorod in the 800s, but there are actually several Scandinavian places in the territory of the game's kingdom of Novgorod. But in reality these are not cities

[@mytiliss682]

But varangians themselves called these place Gardarika = land of cities.

[@somedesertdude1308]

"bro kiev is russian not english but kyiv is english just like turkiye n shiet"

[@boogerthief3547]

Kiev*

[@tequt]

9:10 "Kievan Rus'" is a modern exonym for Rus like how "Byzantium" is a modern exonym for the (Eastern) Roman Empire, Rusia or Ruthenia being latin exonyms that were used at the time and the endonym being Rus. Though I would agree that Rus should be seperated into smaller cultures.

[@Clabilinus]

Ah, westerns… it’s so fun to see a critique of russian (for the moment in the game) stuff in CK3. It’s hard to explain but actually it’s historically correct decision to name that’s culture and Empire Title as Russian and Russia. Also it’s very difficult with the naming and translating through centuries of Rus. You see, originally in the chronicles our old land (in these good old bloody feudal times) was called as a «Русская/Руськая/Роуськая земля» - “Russian land/Land of the Rus”, anytimes just calling «Русь». It’s very matter fact that is originally (in our East Slavic languages) “Rus” not a name of country or region, it’s an plural form for name of people who live in the Rus-land/land of the Rus. And a land which called on the base of its people getting -ia ending. Like Estonia, Latvia, Czechia, Mongolia and more more more… I don’t exactly know but it seems a Greek manner to name countries like this. And yeah, the name of Russia was taken by greek missionaries in the 12 or 13 centuries. The Ruthenia it’s a Latin variation of greek one. The long rivalry between Poland/Lithuania and Moscow leave a mark on this discussion. The polish “figures” made a propaganda that a Ruthenia in their own and forget about Moscow, it’s not Rus, it’s asian state. While technically Moscow principality was the only one survived Russian (in old meaning) formation with Rurikid dynasty on the throne. Is there Galician Rus survived? Ukraine pretending to be successor of this principality. No it’s not survived. Moscow conquered Russian ones surround her. So the name of “Russia” for other globe moved more northern and eastern. As a Russian, it’s not simple to translate this language, take this in attention, i made my best. Hope I did not introduce me like an idiot

[@historyinbits]

Thank you for your perspective!

[@shacklock01]

I always have to move down to Kyiv during late Rurik or early Oleg, do the capital of the Rus event then hybridize norse with Rus to make Rus' then spread that. its irritating how they removed the old cultures from Ck2 to replace with a weird monolithic ahistoric Rus culture. Especially when often in vanilla (best to play with Historic Invasions mod with 867) the Rurikids dont even take over much and native slavs form kingdoms instead.

[@JonStormr]

A worthwhile mention is that the Ruthenian (Ukrainian), White Rus (Belarusian) and Red Rus (Galacia Volhynia) cultures can be created as divergences from the Russian or rather Rus culture in game and all 3 are based in the duchies upon which the in-game capitals for the kingdom titles of Ruthenia, White Rus and Galicia-Volhynia are located. Even the Novgorodian culture that is also in EU:IV can be created in the kingdom of Novgorod. My assumption is that the Russian culture in CK3 exists as a way to allow for the early modern cultures of the region to form while also allowing for the base culture to also represent the future Muscovite culture of EU:IV.

[@user-je4nq6he5o]

Ukrainian and Belarusian cultures began to fully separate from Russian only after the Mongol invasion and the seizure of Ukrainian and Belarusian lands by the Polish-Lithuanian state. It could also have been with Novgorod culture, but the capture of Novgorod by Moscow did not allow it to get away from Russian culture much. In addition, there was no such thing as Moscow culture, and people living in the Moscow Principality always called themselves Russians or Russ.

[@JonStormr]

@@user-je4nq6he5o I'm referring to the Muscovite and Novgorodian cultures of Europa Universalis IV. When Paradox added in the divergent and hybrid culture features they added a great number of both real and fictitious cultures that could be hybridized or* diverged from existing cultures. Though I personally know little of the history of the Russian region from 11th to 14th century I do know that Paradox likes to make nods to their other games with easter eggs. The Novgorodian culture in CK3 is likely an easter egg culture going by your description. Additionally, although I am certain and agree that the Ukrainian and Belarusian cultures did not form into their early modern forms until after the Mongol invasion I did want to mention that their cultures were, in fact, creatable through the cultural divergence feature in the game. I witnessed Ruthenian (though it was in Belarus strangely enough) appear in my ongoing CK3 megacampaign save. You can correct me if I am wrong but my assumption of the Muscovite culture (in EU:IV. There is no Muscovite culture in Crusader Kings) is that it is just an exonym to refer to the regional cultural values held within Muscovy/Principality of Moscow. Culture works slightly different between games. In CK3 it represents the overall culture while in EU:IV it seems to be presented as regional cultures to a hegemonic culture (such as the many provincial cultures of France being under French).

[@gabrielgodwin2241]

It was not Kyivan Rus but Kievan Rus...

[@bolshie_yaytsa]

It was Rus, not Kievan, not Kyivan, just Rus. But, if u using "K--van Rus", than it's correct to use KYIV.

[@MattiavonSigmund]

@@bolshie_yaytsa Nope, the english term for Kiev is Kiev, since always, just because a nationalist goverment currently rule that city it doesn't man english has to change its name for that city

[@bolshie_yaytsa]

@@MattiavonSigmund if nationalist government rule Polotskas, it doesn't means that we need to call it Polotsk Or, if nationalist government rule Danzig, should we call it Gdańsk?

[@MattiavonSigmund]

@@bolshie_yaytsa unlike Kiev with ukrainians, Gdansk/Danzig was an historical polish city and the polish people are an unique and distinct people from others

[@bolshie_yaytsa]

@@MattiavonSigmund and Ukrainians not? XD Using chauvinism and denying the existence of a nation of 40 million is of course a very cool argumentation, but I prefer not to be a fascist.

[@Angel-sh7mn]

You misspelled Kiev

[@seamusfinnegan1164]

To be fair regarding the earlier Greek argument, at the very least Anatolian Greeks could be separated into its own cultural subgroup out of the various "byzantine" cultures the same way the various cultural differences in southern France is highly abstracted into a united Occitan culture. Similarly at the very least id divide the Russian culture at LEAST in two mostly along east or west of the Dnieper as I feel its a good both geographic and historical cultural regional dividing line and if you have to abstract somewhere that's as good a point as any with many princes even useing the river as a borderland.

[@steelofthealloys1081]

Was that a joke in the start of the video?

[@makb_the_striker]

Russia was created in 1547 when Ivan IV officially changed international name to "Rossia". Before that country name was Rus.

[@Vindikarr]

Kiev. not kyiv.and Kievan Rus did not yet exist. this is a misnomer. it was just Rus'

[@dendrag92]

The main problem with russia in CK3 is that name "russia" only appeared in 18 century. In 1066 russian culture and this name itself simply didnt exist.

[@jason8077]

Well if you can cook hummus you are a greek 😂

[@user-bu9og8jn6s]

I want to give an English -speaking friends some points and to notice some inaccuracies in the video, as a person from this information field and who researched this issue with other people. The author really understood moments such as the cultural void of Eastern Europe and the problem of translation "Russian", "Rusyn" and "Ruten" in Western languages. The only thing I would like to add that Novgorod was never the "capital" of Russia, it is rather a long -standing fake, invented by the elites of Russia, would have a supportive gravity to Russia. It is like historical figures in the past, kings, have attributed themselves to famous people by blood. In fact, Novgorod was simply a transshipment point and any archaeological excavations proved that there was no big city there at that time. Speaking of cultural is diverse - I cannot say exactly why the developers decided to put the name "Russian" on the whole culture of the Eastern Slavs of that time. Most likely, it is all because of a very small number of true sources and popular so that people can learn about this situation. In fact, the situation is as follows: many different Slavic tribes lived in these parts. For example, the most famous were white Croats, which are relatives of modern Croats. They lived in the territory of present -day Galicia and Transcarpathia. It is well known now that they had their own state (tribal union) and several major cities (at that time they were one of the most populated in Eastern Europe). Their capital (probably Stilsko) numbered up to 40,000 people. And trs clear that they, like the rest of the tribes at the time (Drevlyany, Polyany, Dregovichi, Tivertsi, Krivichi) were captured by Rus, and the postfactum of the Russian culture was stamped to them, and rather, it was placed the culture Russian. Personally, I found favors because even after the conquest of the Croats - reminiscent of them and their ethnonyms. That is, to understand the example, if the developers were denoted by the regions that won the Mongols that they automatically moved to the Mongolian culture. Speaking for the language - the myth of "common Eastern Slavic" has long been debunked. Yes, we can talk about something in common, as a "Proto-Slavic language", from which Polish, Czech and Soviet Slavic languages have already departed, but we are dealing with completely different diapers of this "Proto-Slavic language", or what from which from She remained. They were completely independent idiomic units that only at the end of the 14th centuries began to merge into modern languages. According to Shevelyov it is: Galicia-Podilsky, Kyiv-Polissya, Polotsk-Razian and Novgorod-Suzdal dialect of language. So yeah I personaly think that developers just didn't care about that part of continet

[@user-cy3bb2gq2e]

it's written Kievan Russia

[@ivan200804]

Kiev is the proper name for that period and in the English language. Now, "Ukrainians" came about the 15-17th centuries, so Kiyv is a transliteration from Ukrainian to English, which did not exit in lands of Rus, which was inhabited by many Slavic and Finno-Ugric tribes in 9th century BC.

[@black_lake3382]

Not really. The spelling “Kiev” comes from the Russian language. Which is just as modern as the Ukrainian language. “Kyiv” is used recently because Ukraine specifically requested it. It’s why we don’t call Zimbabwe “Rhodesia” anymore

[@Amadeus_Balbus]

@@black_lake3382 The spelling “Kiev” comes from the Primary Chronicle in this exact spelling. -iv ending is actually a modern ukranian ending, while the old Russian one (and the modern) is -ev

[@lockrime]

​@@Amadeus_Balbus Actually, the most period accurate name would probably be "Kyev", though, mind you, Old East Slavic typically had like four different spellings for each city which would be pronounced differently

[@user-gu1mj7iu4x]

​@@lockrimeif there was four different spelling, there is none inherently correct.

[@user-gu1mj7iu4x]

'Kiev' wasn't the name of the city in English until the XIX century. Early English sources rendered the city's name as Kiou, Kiow, Kiew, and-as in Latin-Kiovia. None of thia would a proper use for the game, thus Kyiv is the most adequate one.

[@ttgfddfgjvcfyj]

The big Russian blob culture could work on 1066 start date with some exceptions as the dialects still were very intelligible (even western and southern slavic languages were intelligible east slavs in many cases back then) and the culture was transformed relatively recently with christianity and political unification. An exception here is Novgorodian, which had a very distinct language with archaic traits not preserved in any other Slavic language and which could probably form an own branch of Slavic if it wasn't absorbed into Russian dialects. Also Novgorodian could make use of these CK3 republican traditions to represent later Pskovian and Novgorodian republics. With political unification it is a bit tricky. Rus had rota succession and the closest thing CK3 can offer is seniority. Individual princes had wide autonomy but the states were tied together by a single line of succession, a queue that ends in Kiev, and if you did not get to Kiev, your line is excempt from succession. This thing was saving Rus from separatism as the princes ruled different lands and all had a chance and was ultimately decentralizing it and lead to its decomposition. By the time when Mongols came Kiev was more a chairs game than a succession line with princes couping each other and sometimes sending representatives instead of moving to the city themselves (Rurik II ruled it about 7 separate times for example). Sadly I don't know how to represent rota and power of veche (that deposed Izyaslav in 1068 and estabilished the northern republics) in CK3 and if it is even possible without torturing existing code For the name of Rus I don't like calling it Kyivan or Kievan Rus for two reasons. Firstly, there is a decision where you determine the capital of Rus and you can do it anywere in the de-jure empire and it makes no sense to have Kyivan Rus with capital in Novgorod. Secondly, people didn't call it like that back then. Yeah, I get that Byzantine and dynastic states are also like that but Rus doesn't have same problems if you just call it other medieval names like Rus/Russia/Ruthenia/Rucia/Ruzi/Ruzzi/Ruzzia(yes, Kyivan Ruzzia)/Ruszia, there is no formable with name conflicts for example (as with calling Byzantine Roman empire) Imho I would give Jaroslav the imperial title of Rusĭ, call the kingdom of Ruthenia Kyjevŭ (there was no distinction between Russia and Ruthenia), make the imperial title NOT HAVE MODERN RUSSIAN COAT OF ARMS WITH MOSCOW'S COA ON TWO-HEADED EAGLE, make the imperial title unstable and desintegrating after Izyaslavs deposing or similar events with ability to diplomatically reestabilish it and another decision to formalize it

[@historyinbits]

Good points! Thank you!

[@TheR00k]

Moscow CoA is based though

[@ttgfddfgjvcfyj]

@@TheR00k Not for the time when Moscow didn't exist

[@TheR00k]

@@ttgfddfgjvcfyj true, but it still is hella cool