to continue their sturdy battle against oppression, their steady, ceaseless struggle for right and freedom; and chiefly because the Magyar princes and dukes often marched their armies over it to attack Red Rus. That was the reason why the princes of Halich and Premysl tried to block the route by erecting fortifications along it.
Because fortifications are constructed by political governments in order to preserve and extend their sovereign power, the results were bound to affect both the cultural development and the independent status of the communities involved. The kings of the provinces made grants to their boyars of vast tracts of lands belonging to the various townships along the Duklan route which they were assigned to guard with their armies, their ranks to be composed of men supplied by each community under the boyars’ jurisdiction. In addition, the route was to be strongly fortified by barricades of wood and of stone in order to render it impassable to hostile forces.
Of course the full brunt of these responsibilities was born by the villagers. They were deprived not only of a large portion of their own lands upon which the boyars had come to settle but in addition became their guardians and defenders supplying them with recruits for their armies, servants for their households, provisions of grain and munitions, while at the same time, during sieges of war, they were subject to martial law and the military dictatorship of the boyars. Needless to say, the boyar, conceded such a wide range of authority, naturally exerted a potent influence in the village, doing his utmost to increase this power and thereby ever strengthen his own position.
To augment their wealth the boyars constructed their own private toll gates on the highway even in times of peace and collected duties on all imports and exports of foodstuffs, which in consequence served to slacken the trade over the Duklan route, weakening the communications and the cultural link be-
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