Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/170

150 THE DECLINE AND FALL and gold would be the recompense of their service. At the same time, the Russian prince admonished his Byzantine ally to disperse and employ, to recompense and restrain, these impetu- ous children of the North. Contemporary writers have recorded the introduction, name, and character of the Varangians : each day they rose in confidence and esteem ; the whole body was assembled at Constantinople to perform the duty of guards ; and their strength was recruited by a numerous band of their coun- trymen from the island of Thule. On this occasion the vague appellation of Thule is applied to England ; and the new Varangians were a colony of English and Danes who fled from the yoke of the Norman conqueror. The habits of pilgrimage and piracy had approximated the countries of the earth ; these exiles were entertained in the Byzantine court ; and they pre- served, till the last age of the empire, the inheritance of spotless loyalty and the use of the Danish or English tongue. With their broad and double-edged battle-axes on their shoulders, they attended the Greek emperor to the temple, the senate, and the hippodrome ; he slept and feasted under their trusty guard ; and the keys of the palace, the treasury, and the capital were held by the firm and faithful hands of the Varangians." Geography In the tenth century, the ffeoeraphv of Scythia was extended a,ixd trade of ^ ^ o cj l j j Russia. A.D. far bcyond the limits of ancient knowledge ; and the monarchy of the Russians obtains a vast and conspicuous place in the map of Constantine."^ The sons of Ruric were masters of the spacious pi'ovince of Wolodomir, or Moscow ; and, if they were confined on that side by the hordes of the East, their western frontier in those early days was enlarged to the Baltic sea and the country of the Prussians. Their northern reign ascended above the sixtieth degree of latitude, over the Hyperborean regions, which fancy had peopled with monsters, or clouded with eternal dark- 62 Ducange has collected from the original authors the state and history of the Varangi at Constantinople (Glossar. Med. et Infimns Grrecitatis, sub voce Bapayyot Med. et Infimse Latinitatis, sub voce V'agri ; Not. ad Alexiad. Annae Comnenas, p. 256, 257, 258 ; Notes sur Villehardouin, p. 296-299). See likewise the annota- tions of Reiske to the Ceremoniale Aulag Byzant. of Constantine, torn. ii. p. 149, 150. Saxo Gramniaticus affirms that ihey spoke Danish ; but Codinns maintains them till the fifteenth century in the use of their native English : UoAuxpoi'i'^oucri o Bctpayyot Kara riji' TraTptOf yAoio'O'ai' aurwi' i^rot 'lyxAijfta'rt. 3 The original record of the geography and trade of Russia is produced by the emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus (de Administral. Imperii, c. 2, p. 55, 56, c. 9, p. 59-61, c. 13, p. 63-67, c. 37, p. 106, c. 42, p. 112, 113), and illustrated by the diligence of Bayer (de Geographia Russias vicinarumque Regionum circiter A.C. 948, in Comment, .^cadem. Petropol. torn. ix. p. 367-422, torn. x. p. 371-421), with the aid of the chronicles and traditions of Russia, Scandinavia, ii!:c.