© by Czesław Białczyński

© translation by Katarzyna Goliszek

I quote the following information with no comment. The latest work proves that I was right in ”Aurochs’s Book” („Księga Tura”) – the Slavic nations are not younger brothers of Celts, Greeks and Persians, but they are as old as them and they originate from the very heart of Europe, which they just called a Land – from the Vistula and the Danube Rivers. They did not come suddenly from nowhere, ready for confrontation with the Celts, the power of Rome and Byzantium or with the Scandinavian-Germanic nation. Nor did Slavic people multiply very fast, faster than other nations in the way rabbits multiply, just to tame and colonise nearly all Europe and half of Asia (Masia – Mazia). They were all the time in the same place in the heart of Europe and on steppes, and were known by other names of particular tribes – they were called and written about as Veneti / Venethi (Wenetowie), Scyths (Skołoci), Sarmatians (Sarmaci, Serbomazowie), Nurowie / Neurowie (according to Herodotus’s written  records), or Budynowie (from Herodotus wrote about them as Budinoi), Czarnosiermiężni (called Melanchlanoi by Herodotus), Harowie (Mountain people – from Harat: hara / góra – mountain; in the Czech language Harat means a land of mountains), Oraczowie (Herodotus called them Gelonians), also  Hyperboreans (Hiperborejczycy), or Gargareans (Gargarianie) and Amazons (Amazonki).

You will learn about their oldest times from Volume Two of Slavic Mythology – Ksiega Ruty (The Book of Rue).  You will have a possibility to read an extract from this book on THESE WEBSITES.   

This extract is aboutthe oldest times of Slavic Nations(Veneti – Wenetowie), Ists (Istowie), (Balts –Bałtowie), and Scyths (Skołoci)  who made a community throughages, probably not a state, but an area ruled by a common centre of authoritywith one system of values – Faith of Nature, also making up a common community. The area that we call Ziemica Sis was called varaibly at various moments of history: Venetia (Wenetia), Great Scythia (Wielka Scytia), Sarmatia (Sarmacja), Sistan. In fact, it was the Kingdom of Sis, Sistan – the land of Slavic nations, Ists and Scolots.

We will also present here a description of events relating to Veneti’s fight at Troy and the collapse of Troy-Widłuża –Troja-Widłuża – (Wilusa, Ilion) supported bythe wholeScolotiaandHyperboreya (Hiperboreja), and Small Masia (Mała Mazja). The collapse of Troy had a totally different causes that the ones described by Homer.

Soon, I will also publish here an extract of the Book of Rue (Ksiega Ruty) telling about the oldest history of the tribes of Mazonki and Mazons as well as Harowie –Gargareans and, first of all, Serbs with whom they established one nation of Serbomazowie.The Serbomazowie were known to Greeks as Sarmatians andMazones (Mazonki) as Amazones (Amazonki).

For the time being, let us have a close look at a relatively objective and latest view on the origin of Slavic nations below.

Hypotheses concerning the origin of the Slavic nations.

Since 1745, when Johann Christoph Jordan published his book in Vienna ”De originibus slavicis”, there have been lively discussions about the birthplace of the Slavic peoples and about when the they started to immigrate from there.

Although linguists’ concepts fundamentally differ, they usually agree with the one: Slavic languages were formed as a result of a break-up of the primary pre-Slavic language. There is not an agreed standpoint, however, as to when and where the pre-Slavic language existed and when it broke up. Basically, attitudes in this matter can be divided into two:

1. the pre-Slavic linguistic community existed in distant times (II nd millenium BC is often mentioned here)
2. the pre-Slavic linguistic community lasted in the times close to the occurence of Slavic nations in written antique sources, so probably even as late as about the half of the I st millenium AD.

Furthermore, most linguists presume that there had been a Balto-Slavic community before the pre-Slavic language existed.

Apart from the dispute about the chronology of linguistic changes, there is an argument concerning the location of initial places of Slavic nations. As far as this issue is concerned, two standpoints can be distinguished:

• the indigenous concept which posits that before the stage of their migrations, the Slavic tribes inhabited the areas of central Europe, particularly the area of today’s Poland, between the Odra (Oder) and the Bug Rivers;
• the allochthonous concept which states that before the stage of their migrations the Slavic peoples had lived in the area situated beyond central Europe; usually East Europe is regarded as their primary place.

The discussion about the indigenous and allochthonous concepts was impeded during the last 250 years on account of frequent involvement in politics and ideology. For instance, the question of indigenousness of Slavic nations on the areas of Poland had a significant meaning for the Polish during the times of annexation of their territories; in the period of arising of national socialism in Germany and in the Nazi’s times German archeologists often emphasised proof confirming the allochthonous concept, but, again, after World War II Polish researchers often emphasised archeological evidence about Slavic nations’ indigenousness and about the pre-Slavic character of so called Regained Territories. Up to the present this discussion has not become free from emotions.

Among variable detailed concepts, except for those which do not have any evidence in research data, we can mention, as an example, the following recently suggested locations of the ”pre birthplace” of the Slavic tribes:

ñ on the territory of Poland, or in Volhynia and Podole as well (the concept of archeologists: Józef Kostrzewski, Witold Hensel, Konrad Jażdżewski, or a linguist – Witold Mańczak and also  Jerzy Nalepa, a medievalist and an onomast)

* the latest anthropological research (carried out between 2002 –2004 at the University of Adam Mickiewicz) on the level of anthropological diversity of human populations inhabiting the basin of the Odra and the Vistula Rivers in the period of Roman influences and in the early Middle Ages, shows the truth of the indigenous concept. [1] The research also proved earlier presumptions made by J. Czekanowski, W. Kóčka, and A. Wierciński.

ñ In Central Poddnieprze (the concept of Kazimierz  Moszyński, or archeologists Kazimierz  Godłowski and Michał Parczewski),

ñ this theory is confirmed by the analysis of DNA (YHG3) [2]  which excludes a possibility of placing the aboriginal abode of Slavic nations on the territories of Poland and emphasises the basic role of Central Naddnieprze

ñ according to a linguist Zbigniew Gołąb 

         * aboriginal abode in the upper basin of the Don River from 1000 BC

         * stay on the central Dnieper River

         * after the Scyths’ invasion (700 BC) from the Odra as far as the                     Don

ñ according to Martynov’s concept:

         * the proto-Slavic stage in the western part of the Balkans’ territory            (XII th century BC),

         * interactions of an Italic substratum, formation of the culture of                Lusatia,

         * the pre-Slavic stage: Iranian interactions (V th century BC)

         * reaching the western border on the Odra (V th -VIII th century                BC) contacts with the Celtic nations around the areas of Wroclaw

         (III rd century BC)

         * beginnings of our era: expanding of the Slavic area as far as the              Pripiat (Prypeć) River

ñ according to Trubaczov:

         * Slavic peoples’ aboriginal  abode on the central Danube

Additionally, it is sometimes postulated that:

• tribal groups of Sarmatian nomads (probably the tribes of  Antes, Serbs and Croatians) exercised sovereignty (e.g. by protection against other nomads and taking tribute for that) joined the Slavic nations (who were farmers, infantry) which resulted in formation of an intermingled culture whose relationships were similar to the ones between Fulbe and Hansa in Africa. The pre-Slavic language was to be, in their views, a creolised form.
• no (recognised) Slavic peoples from before AD 400 means that they used to be one of the Baltic groups, most probably extremely southern; In ancient times, the Dnieper basin was inhabited by variable groups speaking Baltic languages  (“Borysthenes”- ”Borystenidzi” ) and their southern periphery was intermingled with Sarmatians about 300-400 AD and a new expansive ethnos known as Slavic nations was formed.

It is noticeable that different concepts have their variable historic depth. It is right to take South Europe as the oldest birthplace of the unequivocally identified ancestors of the Slavic tribes. There, in South Europe, results of the carried out research on genetic genealogy indicated by the R1a1 haplogroup of chromosome Y date back to 10.000 years. It does seem worth mentioning that these are the latest data from the XXI st century, which were unknown at all to earlier historians who could just suppose. Falsification of genetic data is practically impossible beacuse of little likelihood of random crosses of mutations in Y-DNA-.  

Also recently carried out genetic research, which are a genetic curiosity[3],giveevidence for relations between the Polish and the Hungarians. Both the Polish and the Hungarians (also the Serbo-Lusatians) have the highest frequency of the geneticindicator of R1a1 in Europe which flactuates and makes up from 5 to 60%. Furthermore, according to the research both nations have the same factor of the chromosome Y being an indication pointing that it originates from the same father and was formed about 10.000 years ago. 

Sources to the history of the Slavic peoples

One can learn about  the history of the Slavic ethnos from written, genetic, paleoanthropological, legendary, ethnographic, linguistic and archeological sources.

The oldest written sources that tell about tribes who can possibly be identified with the Slavic nations come from the I st century AD and are the works of Greek and Roman ancient historians. Namely, they mention peoples called Venedi or Venethi living, among others, on territories identified with the territory of today’s Poland. Tacitus in his work Germania mentions Venethi among dwellers of East Europe (east of the Vistula), Gaius Plinius Secundus in his work of Natural History, mentions Venedi who inhabit territories between the Baltic and the Black Sea. In the II nd century AD, Ptolemy from Alexandria in his work of Geographia mentions Venedi as those who inhabit Sarmatia, near the Gulf of Veneti (identified with the Gulf of Gdańsk) and in the east of the Vistula River.

Much later, in the middle of the VI th century AD, a Gothic historian Jordanes in his work of Getica, stated that the Slavic nations had been called Venethi before. Basing on that, many scholars have identified Venedi/Venethi with Slavic peoples and that association became the core argument for the indigenous theory.

The oldest records that can be undoubtedly linked to the Slavic nations, contain works of Gothic, Byzantine, Arabic and other historians, starting from the VI th century – among others of Jordanes, Procopius from Caesarea, Pseudo-Maurice, Theophylaktos Simokattes, Teofanes, Konstantine VII Porphyrogenitus, Ibrâhîm ibn Ya`qûb  – and considering the west – of English King Alfred, or so called Bavarian Geographer. One of the first of them, Jordanes, refers to the names of two groups of Slavic peoples: Antes and  Sclaveni or Sclavini (adding that earlier all Slavic peoples had been called Venethi). In Ptolemy’s Geographia there are some references about a nation called  Σουοβενοι (Suobenoi), living in the Volga basin and also sometimes identified with Pre-Slavic peoples.