--- Sergejus Tarasovas <
S.Tarasovas@...>
wrote:
>
>
>
>
> > I concluded that a case could be
> made that the constant pairing of the two rulers of
> Kyiv(Kiev)mentioned there as "boyars of Rurik", to
> wit, Askold and Dyr (Askold i Dir -->
> Askolt-i-Dir(t),
> killed by Oleg on the Ugrian Hill, might represent
> not
> so much an earlier Norse presence, as a Khazar
> imperial one.
>
> But both names have pluasible Scandinavian
> etymologies (I remember me to
> ask and Piotr to answer some time ago).
*****GK: Yes of course they do. But the overall
context of their recorded activities present
condiderable anomalies which cannot be explained by
Scandinavian references. The hermeneutics of the
undated and of some of the very early dated segments
of the Primary Chronicle are extremely difficult.
Suffice to say e.g. that the well-known "Oleg"
(conventionally assigned dates of 879-912) is actually
a conflation of at least three "Helgis", one of whom
was active ca. 860 [the "expedition against
Constantinople" of 907 is a misdated mention of the
famous assault of June 860], another at the beginning
of the 10th century [when Scandinavian finds truly
become noticeable in the Middle Dnipro region: prior
to this they are sporadic and largely undetectable],
and yet another in 943 A.D.[recent Khazarian finds:
cf. Golb/Pritsak 1982 have confirmed that the story of
this last "Oleg" was used in the Primary Chronicle
with respect to our "traditional Oleg"]. The "Askold i
Dir" stories fall into the same category of
problematic sources. My reconstruction is as tentative
as any other. But it's the one that (so far at any
rate)leaves the least amount of dangling evidence
unaccounted for. Including the incorporation of older
motifs into Scandinavian "songs", eventually their
Slavic versions, eventually their utilization by
Nestor and successors.******
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