Russka (23 page)

It was a modest building.

It had four walls made of brick, stone and rubble that formed, near enough, a cube. Over the centre of the cube was a small, squat octagonal drum, and this was topped with a shallow dome – only a little deeper in shape than an upturned saucer – with a little rim of roof around it. That was all: it was just a cube with a hole in the top.

Had one looked down from the sky at this little building before the roof was on, one could have seen that it contained four pillars, making a smaller square in the middle, and thus dividing the interior into nine equal squares. The drum and dome rested on the four pillars in the middle.

Within the church, however, this simple arrangement of nine squares could be seen another way. It appeared as three sections, dividing the church laterally. First, as one came in from the western end, came the introduction – a sort of vestibule. Then, one passed into the second, central section, under the dome. This was the heart of the church where the congregation stood and worshipped. Lastly, at the east end, came the sanctuary, with the altar in the middle. Upon the altar stood the cross and seven-branched candelabra, like a Jewish menorah; and to the left stood the oblation table on which the bread and wine were prepared for the liturgy.

To relieve the harshness of this design and add a sense of direction to his building, there were three little semi-circular apses on the eastern end.

The roof was made with sets of simple barrel vaults, resting on the walls and central pillars, and open in the centre where the dome rose. There were long, narrow windows in the walls and small windows in the octagonal drum under the dome.

This was the standard Byzantine church. All the great churches and cathedrals of the Orthodox Church, like St Sophia in Kiev, with their many arcades of pillars and their multiple domes, were only elaborations on this simple arrangement.

There was one technical problem to solve. This was how to support the octagonal drum over the square formed by the four central pillars.

Though much brick building could be easily enough accomplished by the skilled wood-builders of Rus, this particular problem was of a different nature. There were two chief solutions, both from the east: the Persian squinch, a kind of fan vaulting; or the one the Russians usually preferred, the pendentive, which had originated eight centuries before in Syria.

This was simply a spandrel – as though one had cut a V shape or triangle on the inside of a sphere. Curving out from the supporting pillar, the top of this V could support a circle or octagon above.

As simple as it was elegant, this arrangement allowed the dome above to seem to float, weightless as the sky, over the congregation.

On the outside of the church, Ivanushka copied the great churches in Kiev, alternating brick and stone, joined by thick layers of mortar mixed with brick dust so that the whole building had a soft, pinkish glow.

At the outer edges of the three curved roofs, with their barrel vaults, he added a little jutting overlap so that the roofline’s triple wave, like a triple eye-brow, was pleasantly accentuated.

Such was the little Russian-Byzantine church the eccentric boyar built. It was very small. There was only room for a small congregation. Indeed, had the inhabitants of the village been Christian, the place would have been full to overflowing. Work was begun in the autumn of 1111 and, pushed ahead vigorously by Ivanushka, it proceeded through the following year.

The first Russian revolution – that is to say, the first organized uprising by the people against an exploitative mercantile class – took place in the year 1113. And it was successful.

The grievances of the people were entirely justified, and were caused by an unpleasant mixture of what amounted to
laissez-faire
capitalism, widespread corruption and cartels – in all of which the ruling princes were involved.

The general speculation which had drawn Sviatopolk into debt
had continued and grown worse. It was led by the Prince of Kiev himself who, with increasing age, had grown not wiser, but lazier and more rapacious.

There was corruption everywhere. Debt, often at crippling interest rates, was positively encouraged. Small artisans and
smerdy
, in considerable numbers, had been thus forced into becoming
zakupy
. It was, after all, a very cheap form of labour for the creditor. And if, on distant estates, the friends of the prince ignored the laws concerning the
zakup
and actually sold him as a slave, the prince turned a blind eye. Because of these widespread abuses, the people were furious.

But worst of all were the cartels. They were organized by the great merchants. Their object was simple – to obtain monopolies on basic commodities and raise their prices. And the greatest of all was the salt cartel.

The Prince of Kiev had been successful. His plan for controlling the Polish supply had been effective and prices had soared.

‘Are we to welcome visitors with bread alone?’ his people demanded ironically. For every Slav, since time began, welcomed a stranger at his door with bread and salt.

But the Prince of Kiev was corrupt and cynical. The abuses continued.

And then, on April 16 1113, he died.

The next day, an almost unheard of event occurred.

Years before, after the troubles of 1068, the Prince of Kiev had moved the meeting place of the
veche
from the
podol
to the square by the palace, where he could keep an eye on it. Nor did the
veche
meet unless summoned by the Metropolitan of the Church, or the boyars. But these safeguards did nothing for the ruling powers now. Without consulting anyone, the
veche
of the people met of its own accord. And their meeting was both stormy and determined.

‘They make slaves of free men!’ they rightly protested. ‘They conspire to ruin the people,’ they said of the cartels.

‘Let us return,’ many demanded, ‘to the laws of Yaroslav.’ Although in fact the
Russkaya Pravda –
the Russian Law – which had been collated by Yaroslav the Wise and his sons was chiefly concerned with the payments due for harming the prince’s servants and boyars, it did contain a provision protecting the
zakup
from being made into a slave.

‘Let us return,’ they cried, ‘to another just prince who will maintain the law.’

There was only one such man in the land of Rus; and so it was that the
veche
of Kiev, in the year 1113, offered the throne of Kiev to Vladimir Monomakh.

‘Praise the Lord!’

It seemed to Ivanushka that at last there would be order in the land of Rus. He had been in Pereiaslav when the news of the Prince of Kiev’s death had come, and without even waiting to summon his sons from the estates, had ridden hard to the capital.

He had long been disgusted by the old prince’s rule. At Russka, and on his estates in the north-east, things were well run and the laws were obeyed. But he knew this was an exception. For the reigning prince’s brothers he had no great regard, and it was good judgement as well as personal loyalty, he believed, that made him declare: ‘Only Monomakh can put things right.’

With admirable good sense, he discovered on his arrival in Kiev, the people’s
veche
had decided the same thing.

Before even going to his brother’s house, he sent one of his grooms with all speed to Monomakh with the message: ‘Ivan Igorevich awaits you in Kiev. Come, take what the
veche
rightly offers you.’

So he was saddened, as he strode into their childhood home, to find his older brother in a gloomy mood, shaking his head.

‘It can’t work,’ Sviatopolk told him.

Since the campaign against the Cumans they had developed a quiet relationship that suited them both. They were not friends, but Sviatopolk’s hatred, having smouldered all his life, had burned itself out. He felt old and tired. Thanks to Ivanushka, he was well provided for. He lived entirely alone. His sons were serving in other cities, but he preferred to remain in Kiev, enjoying the respect due to him as a boyar and a reputation – alas undeserved – as a successful man of affairs. In general, on most subjects, he was pessimistic. ‘And I tell you,’ he reiterated, ‘Monomakh cannot become Grand Prince.’

Two days later, it appeared he was right. For word arrived in Kiev that Monomakh had refused.

In a way, he had no option. By the rules of succession he was not the next in line – there were senior branches of the family who
should precede him. And had he not, all his life, striven to preserve an orderly succession and keep the peace? Why should he throw away his principles now, especially at the bidding of the lower classes whom, as a prince, he knew must be kept in their place? He did not come.

And then the revolution started.

Ivanushka had gone riding in the woods, that fateful morning, across to the Monastery of the Caves and back. He had no idea that anything was amiss until, coming in sight of the
podol
, he suddenly saw a dozen columns of smoke starting to rise over the city. He spurred forward. A few moments later he met a merchant in a cart. The fellow was sweating profusely and whipping his horses along for all he was worth.

‘What are they doing?’ he cried.

‘Killing us, lord,’ the man shouted. ‘Merchants and nobles alike. Turn back, sir,’ he added, ‘only a fool would go in there.’

Ivanushka smiled grimly to himself, and rode forward. He passed into the
podol
. The streets were full of people, running to and fro. The uprising looked spontaneous, and seemed to be universal. Some of the small traders were boarding up their houses, but at the same time others were forming into armed groups in the street. Several times he had difficulty getting through.

In one small street, he came face to face with a group of twenty or so.

‘Look,’ one of them shouted, ‘a
muzh –
a nobleman.’ And they rushed at him with such fury that he only just managed to get away.

The crowds were surging towards the centre. Already he could see flames coming from the citadel of Yaroslav. And a single thought formed in his mind: I must go and save Sviatopolk.

It was as he came towards the Khazar Gate that he saw something that made him go cold, and for a moment drove even thoughts of his brother from his mind.

The crowd numbered at least two hundred. They had entirely surrounded the house. And whereas the people he had seen so far looked either angry or excited, the faces of these rioters had taken on a cruel aspect. A number of them were grinning with obvious pleasure at the punishment they were about to inflict.

The house belonged to old Zhydovyn the Khazar.

An expectant murmur rose from the crowd.

‘Roast them a little,’ he heard a voice cry.

There was a chorus of approval.

‘Roast pig belongs on a spit,’ a large man shouted jovially.

Some of them, Ivanushka noticed, carried flaming torches. They were already preparing to set light to one side of the house; but it was obvious from their faces that their desire was not so much to burn it down as to smoke the inmates out.

‘Villains,’ a man cried.

‘Jews!’ shouted an old woman.

And at once several more in the crowd took up the cry: ‘Come out, Jews, and be killed.’

Ivanushka understood very well. The fact that many of the Jewish Khazar merchants were poor; the more significant fact still that nearly all the leaders of the exploiting cartels had been Slavic or Scandinavian Christians – both these truths had been temporarily forgotten. In the heat of the moment, the angry crowd, looking for scapegoats to attack, had remembered that some of the capitalists were foreign. They were Jewish. There was now a grand excuse for acts of cruelty.

It was just then, scanning the house, that Ivanushka saw a single face at a window.

It was Zhydovyn. He was looking out gloomily, unable to gauge what he should do.

One of the men had pushed his way to the front. He was carrying a long, thin pike. ‘Show us your men,’ he shouted.

‘There are no Jewish men,’ someone replied. And there was a general laugh.

In fact, as far as Ivanushka could tell, old Zhydovyn was probably alone in there except for some servants.

‘Show us your women, then!’ the man bellowed, to a general guffaw.

Ivanushka braced himself and started to push his horse forward, through the crowd. People began to turn. There were cries of anger.

‘What’s this?’

‘A damned noble!’

‘Another exploiter.’

‘Pull him down!’

He felt hands grabbing at his feet; a spear was thrust up at him,
only just missing his face. He wanted to strike at them with his whip, but knew that if he made the slightest angry movement he was lost. Slowly, imperturbably, he coaxed his horse forward, gently nudging his way through the parting crowd to the front. Then he turned.

Ivanushka looked at the crowd, and they stared at him.

And to his surprise, he experienced a new kind of fear.

He had never faced an angry crowd before. He had faced the Cuman horde; he had several times looked at death. But he had never faced a wall of hatred. It was terrifying. Worse than that, he suddenly felt numb. The crowd’s hate came at him like a single, unstoppable force. He felt naked, fearful, and strangely ashamed. Yet why should he feel ashamed? There was no cause for it. True, he was a noble; but he knew very well that he had done these people no harm. Why should their rage make him feel guilty? Yet the force of their united hatred was like a blow to the stomach.

Then the crowd fell silent.

Ivanushka gripped the reins and gently patted his horse’s neck, lest he too take fright. How strange, he thought, to have survived the Cumans only to be killed by a mob.

The man with the pike was pointing at him. Like most of the others, he wore a dirty linen smock with a leather belt; his face was almost wholly covered with a black beard and his hair fell to his shoulders.

‘Well, noble, tell us what you want before you die,’ he called out.

Ivanushka tried to meet his angry eyes calmly.

‘I am Ivan Igorevich,’ he replied in a loud, firm voice. ‘I serve Vladimir Monomakh, whom you seek. And I have sent him a messenger, in my name and in yours, begging him to make haste and come to the
veche
in Kiev.’