The Russians offer their goods (squirrel furs) to the clerk of the St. Peter in Novgorod. Carved panel from the church of St. Nicholas in Stralsund. Around 1400.
According to legend, the first tavern on the territory of modern Russia appeared under Ivan the Terrible in Moscow. In reality, the most ancient drinking establishment existed in the XIV-XV centuries in Novgorod. The pub was located on the territory of the German fortress - the courtyard of St. Peter, where the Novgorodians sold squirrel skins to the Hanseaticans.
There is a mass of literature and research about ancient Novgorod; archaeologists are constantly digging something in the city. Meanwhile, the popular Russian myth “to sell the Motherland for Bavarian beer” is actually much older than our patriots imagine. And its roots go back to the Novgorod antiquity.
In the very center of Novgorod, on the Torgovaya side, next to the prince's court - the so-called court of Yaroslav, in the 13th-15th centuries (possibly earlier) there were two well-fortified German fortresses at once. The history of their appearance is vague, in the Russian chronicles (describing the events of the XII-XV centuries) there is practically no mention of them. Which looks rather strange for the Novgorod chronicle, which often described the events in the city in sufficient detail. But about one of these fortresses (the courtyard of St. Peter), a lot of evidence has been preserved from Hanseatic sources, which is not surprising, since it was the center of a fairly large German colony in Novgorod.
The first fortress was created - according to the conclusions of Soviet scientists E. A. Melnikova and E. A. Rybina, somewhere in the late XI - early XII centuries. The evidence base is the "Tale of the mayor Dobryna", which was found by N. M. Karamzin in the first third of the 19th century, and which Karamzin himself considered just a literary work, a fairy tale, as well as a couple of runic inscriptions found in Sweden.
The common name for this fortress is the Gothic Court. Soviet and Russian historians believe that there was a certain "Varangian church" (that is, Catholic) in the Gothic court, allegedly it was called the Church of St. Olaf. Russian chronicles contain 4 scant mentions of this church:
- 1152. The 1st Novgorod Chronicle informs about a fire "on Wednesday Turgu", in which "the churches of the congregation are 8, and the ninth is Varyaz."
- 1181. Fire message again. "The byst of the churches was lit by the thunder of Varyazsk on Targovischi."
Promotional video:
- 1217. "In the Varyazkaya goddess he warmed the goods in the Varyazsky beschisla". This, by the way, is the only message that is at least somewhat informative. In the Middle Ages, church buildings were often used as warehouses. Actually, in Novgorod, they were mainly used in this way.
- 1311. In Novgorod, 7 stone churches burned down, including the same long-suffering one, "Varangian".
Soviet archaeologists once made an attempt to unearth the remains of the Gotha court, the area of which was determined to be approximately 2,500 square meters. The excavations were carried out for three seasons in a row - in 1968-1970. At the excavation, the foundations of a powerful stone watchtower, the remains of a tyna (made of logs with a diameter of 40-50 centimeters) and log walls (very powerful, consisting of logs with a diameter of up to 50 centimeters) were uncovered, which was uncharacteristic for typical Russian buildings, consisting of logs half as small in size. diameter), a well and a number of other buildings. Archaeologists never dug it to the mainland (more precisely, it was simply not identified because of quicksand), and since, according to E. A. Rybina, the stratigraphy of the layers was difficult, then the estimated dating of the excavated - XIV - XV centuries (EA Rybina. Gotsky excavation. / Archaeological study of Novgorod. M., 1978).
Worse, the famous Novgorod dendrochronology could not stand the test of "German" logs:
“The dating of all stages of the Gothic excavation is extremely difficult. The dendrochronological method gave no results. Remains of 1-3 different structures discovered in tiers A, B, C, D, from which cuts were taken for dendrochronological analysis, have not yet received the dates. The logs, of which log buildings 4 and 5 are built, although well preserved, have anomalous variation in tree rings, and therefore the dendrochronological graphs of these logs do not find a place on the general dendrochronological scale of Eastern Europe. (EA Rybina. Gotsky excavation. / Archaeological study of Novgorod. M., 1978).
In another work by E. A. Rybina already complains about the lack of wood material. This is strange: after all, the remains of several log cabins, a powerful tyna, etc. were found at the excavation site. wood material. In addition, E. A. Rybina claims an “individual anomaly” of tree rings found at the Gothic excavation site.
“A dendrochronological dating of the Gotha excavation is currently impossible, since only a small number of log samples were taken for analysis. The curve of their annual growth is abnormal and has an individual variation of annual rings, which is explained by the special growing conditions of the trees used in the construction of the Gothic court (EA Rybina. Archaeological sketches of Novgorod trade in the X-XIV centuries. M., 1978). In his later work, E. A. Rybina no longer mentions an unsuccessful attempt at dendrochronological analysis (EA Rybina. Foreign courtyards in Novgorod in the XII-XVII centuries. M., 1986).
Photos of the excavations at the Gothic Court. (EA Rybina. Gotsky excavation. / Archaeological study of Novgorod. M., 1978).
As a result, Soviet archaeologists and historians did not even undertake any more attempts to unearth foreign trading yards that existed in Novgorod, which lived off trade with the Hansa. The remains of the "Gotsky" yard were destroyed by the hotel "Russia".
There is no information about the Gothic court in German documents. Apparently, it was part of the well-known courtyard of St. Peter - curia sancti Petri. Only one image of the courtyard has come down to us (see the first illustration for the post) - it is clear that the Germans perceived it as a fortress. The courtyard included a church, which also served as a warehouse, a hospital, residential and outbuildings (including a brewery and a tavern). The yard was fenced in with a tynom consisting of powerful logs up to 50 centimeters in diameter. The entrance to the courtyard of St. Peter was the only gate, which was locked at night. The night watch consisted of two armed merchants guarding the church (formally, Russian access was prohibited there even during the day), and guard dogs were lowered inside the courtyard at night. Only merchants from Hanseatic cities could stop at the courtyard. It is believedthat this German fortress was founded in Novgorod at the end of the XII-beginning of the XIII centuries.
The first charter of the court of St. Petra (skra) dates back to 1225 (a ban on trade in the church, the protection of the courtyard by merchants, etc.). In 1265, the first treaty between German merchants and Prince Yaroslav was ratified (the treaty was introduced into scientific circulation by the German historian Goetz only in 1916 ((Goetz KL Deutsch-Russische Handelsvertraege des Mittelalters, 1916). In Russian historiography, up to 1808, the existence of this farmstead in the XIII-early XV centuries nothing was known.
In 1801-1808 in Hamburg, the historian Sartorius published in a small print run two volumes containing mainly some texts of the "hidden" (statutes of the courtyard of St. Peter), in 1830 in Hamburg their second edition was published (naturally, in German). In 1808, the Russian author Bolkhovitinov published a small work Historical Talks about the Antiquities of Veliky Novgorod (SPB), where the German Court is mentioned for the first time in Russian historiography. In 1838 S. Stroyev published on the basis of the same Sartorius a couple of articles on the Novgorod-Hanseatic trade, where there is also a mention of this court, plus in 1847 an article by S. Slavyansky was published.
In fact, detailed material about the life of the German court (the court of St. Peter) in Novgorod appears after the publication of documents from the medieval archives of Reval, Dorpat, and partly Lubeck and Riga. They began to be published by the researcher F. G. von Bunge from 1853 (Liv-Est-Curlaendisches Urkundenbuch). These documents covered the period from the middle of the 14th century to the beginning of the 16th century. Their publication (publications in German were printed in Revel and Riga) stretched for almost 70 years. In 1870, in Munich, the Bavarian Academy of Sciences began a multivolume publication of the acts of the Hanseatic conventions from 1256 to 1430. Most of the volumes were published before the First World War, and the last in 1970. Also in the 70s and 80s of the XIX century, the Hanseatic Society, created at the same time in Germany, began to publish letters of the Hanseatic cities. The first edition came out in 1876, the last in 1916.
Hunting and bee-keeping in the Novgorod forests. The carved panels of St. Nicholas in Stralsund, 1400.
In fact, the courtyard of St. Peter was the trading post of the Hansa - the German trade union of cities in the Baltic, which was finally formed only in the middle of the XIV century.
The Hansa trading post (courtyard) was administered by elected elders (oldermanne / olderlude), and from the end of the 14th century, the clerk of the courtyard, on which the current administrative work lay and who lived permanently in the courtyard, began to play an increasing role. Hanseatic merchants stayed not only in the courtyard, but also in the houses of Novgorodians. In particular, this was due to the fact that Petrov Dvor did not always accommodate visitors.
The merchants were conventionally divided into several categories. Meistermann is a merchant who concludes transactions on his own behalf, Geselle is a merchant-commissioner acting on behalf of a surety, Lerekinder is a young merchant, apprentices, and Knapen is a merchant's servants. It is noteworthy that in Novgorod there was always a high proportion of young merchants who studied trade and the Russian language (while they lived in Novgorod families to study the Russian language). The Russians themselves, as German documents show, showed no inclination or interest in learning foreign languages.
The number of only this category of foreigners at times reached over 200 people. So, the clerk of the courtyard complained to the Dorpathian council of the city that "we can no longer support our young people, there are 125 of them, and some of them have already spent their money." In another document, more than 200 young merchants are already mentioned, who have also pretty much “spent money” (ER Squires, SN Ferdinand. Hansa and Novgorod: linguistic aspects of historical contacts. M., 2002, p. 25).
The number of large merchants who visited Petrov Dvor was gradually decreasing - by the 15th century, serious merchants worked mainly in their own offices, and commission agents and merchant servants performed trade operations on their behalf. The literacy level of the German merchants, judging by the documents that came down, was quite low in the 13th-first half of the 14th century (many merchants could not read), but by the 15th century the situation was improving. Although there was a clerk on the staff at Petrov Dvor, a secretary was chosen from among the elders. Some assistance in the preparation of correspondence was also provided by the vicar of the church of St. Peter (he was usually appointed from Lubeck).
It is difficult to calculate the total number of the colony of foreign merchants in Novgorod, but taking into account the fact that in addition to the Hanseaticans, merchants from Narva, Vyborg, as well as emissaries from the Order and representatives of the archbishops of Riga and Dorpat, the number of foreigners was not so small. In peak years, it could be about 400 - 600 foreigners. On average, up to 200-250 foreigners lived in Novgorod annually.
German documents contain a lot of interesting things about the real relationship between Russians and Germans in the XIV-XV centuries. After reading them, one can understand where the roots of the famous Russian bribery, drunkenness, laziness and aggressiveness grow from.
So, in one report of the trading station it is said that a Novgorodian Zakhar with his students beat up two of his other students. One of them died. The payment for the murdered was 17 hryvnia, plus Zakhar paid the doctor another 10 hryvnia (ER Squires, SN Ferdinand. Hansa and Novgorod: linguistic aspects of historical contacts. M., 2002, p. 60). In addition to studying and living directly in the houses of the Novgorodians themselves, Russians and Germans contacted during gambling. The game of dice was popular in Novgorod, and it was necessary to make a special provision in the charter of the trading post (skra) prohibiting the Hanseatic from playing dice with Novgorodians under the threat of a fine of 50 marks.
The popularity of the courtyard of St. Peter was also brought by the tavern - Kroch. The documents of the trading station unequivocally indicate that the drinking establishment often simply could not cope with the influx of Russians eager to taste German beer. The clerk's letter says that the influx of Russians led the elders even to the idea of closing the tavern. However, since the business was profitable, the drinking establishment continued to work. The popularity of German beer is also supported by the fact that Novgorodians often demanded bribes from the Hanseatic people with beer (there are complaints that this was abused by Russian weighers). (ER Squires, SN Ferdinand. Hansa and Novgorod: linguistic aspects of historical contacts. M., 2002. S. 63).
Another area of contact between foreigners and natives was the laying of pavements: the Hanseatic people, at their own expense, paved the factory yard and the adjacent streets. In addition, scandals and legal proceedings were constantly in full swing around the trading post. Here is how one of them describes the clerk of the courtyard:
"In the morning the Russians with an armed detachment came to the courtyard, began to cut down the gates and the fence, as well as the cages above, and take everything they found there." The sphere of contacts between the Hanseatic people and the administration of Novgorod is especially interesting: by its nature it resembles the current realities. “You should also know that the mayor and voivode fixes more and more obstacles to us every day, they want to receive promises and gifts from us, and they prohibit building …. R. Squires, SN Ferdinand. Hansa and Novgorod: linguistic aspects of historical contacts. M., 2002. P. 136).
Hunting and bee-keeping in the Novgorod forests. The carved panels of St. Nicholas in Stralsund, 1400.
In Russian and Soviet historiography, Novgorod is considered to be a developed city that is a full participant in international trade in the Baltic. In reality, the city was a remote trading post of the Hansa, located very far from the normal shipping trade routes. At the same time, the city itself was extremely poorly developed as a craft center, and Novgorod's foreign trade was seriously limited by the Hanseatic people. To make it completely clear, the economy of ancient Novgorod was not much different from the economies of later Muscovy, tsarist and modern Russia: the export of raw materials and the import of finished products from the West.
Unlike other commercial cities of the Baltic region, located either on the sea coast or along a navigable river, Novgorod had an extremely inconvenient location. Moreover, for all the centuries of its independent existence, Novgorod has not been able to create even a fortress or port in the lower reaches of the Neva. According to German documents, foreign merchants sailing to Novgorod stop at Kotlin Island in the Gulf of Finland and reload their goods from sea cogs into river boats. Then they, led by pilots, climb up the Neva, pass along Lake Ladoga (where they often drowned due to frequent storms) and climb up the Volkhov. On this way, merchants make two stops. In front of the Volkhov rapids, the boats are partially unloaded, and the cargo is carried overland. The first stop there is Gostinodvorie. Then, 20 kilometers from Ilmen, there is another stop - Kholopiy town. At the beginning of the 15th century, the vicar of the Novgorod trading post of the Hansa, Bernhard Brakel, described the journey to Novgorod as "an awfully long journey" (de vruchtliken langen reyze). As a rule, merchants entered Novgorod twice a year (the so-called "summer" and "winter guests"). In addition, sometimes merchants came overland from the Baltic.
In time, the road from the Gulf of Finland to Novgorod could take on average from 7-10 to 15-20 days under unfavorable conditions (for example, a storm on Ladoga). It is known that the embassy of Adam Olearius, which sailed in 1634 from Oreshk to Novgorod, in good weather, spent about 7 days on this route, making only forced stops mainly due to the lack of a tailwind and to replenish food. Of these, two days sailing took place along Ladoga (about 50 kilometers per day) and 5 days along Volkhov (about 45 kilometers per day).
Nevertheless, foreign merchants still traveled to Novgorod. The reason for their interest was some varieties of squirrel fur (the so-called "shoneverk"), as well as wax, although here Riga and Scandinavia created competition for Novgorod. Due to the lack of its own seaport and merchant fleet, Novgorod did not receive a serious margin that arose after the Hanseatic people exported goods from it, first to Livonia, and then further to the West - to Lubeck, Rostock and up to Bruges in Flanders. According to the calculations of the Soviet historian I. E. Kleinenberg, the Hanseatic margin on trade in Novgorod goods averaged about 30-50 percent (when exported to Livonian cities - Riga, Derpt).
The Hansa tried by all means to limit the contacts of Novgorod with other potential buyers from the West, therefore it was forbidden to transport Novgorod goods on the ships of the Union. Sometimes it came to the point that pirates and Hanseaticans robbed the ships of Novgorodians. In addition to the Hansa, another important trading partner of Novgorod was the Order, as well as the archbishops of Dorpat and Riga.
The volume of export of squirrel skins from Novgorod could be hundreds of thousands of pieces annually. Researcher of Novgorod trade A. L. Khoroshkevich mentions that in 1458, from 150 to 210 thousand skins were taken from two Reval merchants in Amsterdam, which they took from Reval. It is known that about 355-360 thousand squirrel skins were exported annually through Arkhangelsk in the middle of the 17th century - in addition to a large number of sables, martens, beavers, etc. If we assume that the annual export of squirrel from Novgorod (which, in fact, specialized in it) in the XIV-XV centuries was approximately equal to this figure, then the total revenue of the city was from the sale of approximately 7-11 thousand marks of silver (excluding the fall in prices for furs in the 15th century). This is if we take the average cost of a thousand skins (regardless of the type) at 25-27 marks (the protein of the Schoenwerk variety cost a little more). A rough estimate will give us 1.4 to 4.4 tonnes of silver annually (taking into account the money and weight marks).
The export figure may well be real. According to A. L. Khoroshkevich and M. P. Lesnikov, the Teutonic Order in 1399-1403 alone exported more than 300 thousand pieces of squirrel skins from Novgorod - 50-60 thousand on average annually. The orders spent up to 200-210 kilograms of silver on these and other (wax) purchases. True, such trade was rather an exception. As a rule, German merchants traded with Novgorodians, exchanging their goods (cloth, salt, iron, wine, etc.) for furs and wax. So, in the trading book of the large Hanseatic merchant of the early 15th century, Fekingusen, there is not a single indication of settlements with Novgorodians in silver. Therefore, the real income of Novgorodians in silver equivalent was orders of magnitude lower, of course.
However, it is worth noting the archaism and marginality of the Novgorod fur trade. According to A. L. Khoroshkevich, “During the 14th-15th centuries Novgorod exported mainly unprocessed skins,” and this practice was standard for the 16th century as well. But the earliest direct references to furriers and furrier craft in Russia refer only to the very end of the XIV century (in the Kirillo-Beloozersky monastery), although, as A. L. Khoroshkevich, “engaging in furrier's craft provided a relatively easy transition from craft to trade”. This is due to the fact that by selling untreated skin, the Novgorodian lost a significant share of the margin that would have arisen from the sale of goods with “added value”. The German merchants understood this, and in 1376 the Novgorodians were forced to sign an agreement not to trade in squirrel furs in the summer.and also their skins were not processed in any way. According to A. L. Khoroshkevich, this agreement was "formal", but, nevertheless, in fact, the overwhelming majority of furs from Novgorod were exported in "raw" form.
As a result, “raw material” export played a cruel joke with Novgorod. The city did not develop its own crafts, moreover, the Novgorodians were too lazy to even develop the rich salt mines that were literally under their noses - in Staraya Russa. Salting here began only in the second half of the 15th century, and before that Novgorod bought tens of tons of salt annually from … Lübeck (Luneburg).
It is known that Novgorod merchants purchased large quantities of salt that came from Germany to Livonia. So, in 1384 the merchant Matvey Drukalov bought almost 10 salt flakes (about 19 tons) in Revel. At the beginning of the 15th century, merchants Perepetitsa and Fyodor Bezborody bought almost 35 tons of salt there.
For the same reasons, Novgorod did not develop its own cloth production either. The scribes of 1583 recorded only 6 cloth makers in the city. And in the XIII-XV centuries, the city did not produce cloth at all. It was entirely imported. According to German documents, tens of thousands of meters of cloth from Flanders were imported to Novgorod every year.
The trade itself by the Novgorodians was also archaic in nature. The Hanseatic documents do not contain any mention of any trade guilds, corporations, etc. associations of Novgorod merchants. Not a single trade book has come down to us, not a single account book of Novgorodians, which would indicate a noticeable level of trade on their part. No data on trade has been preserved in the monastery documents. The birch bark letters of the XI-XV centuries, which were found in Novgorod, also do not contain a single mention of trade with the Germans, whose large colony lived in this city. Moreover, in the opinion of a number of Soviet and Russian scientists, trade in Novgorod in the XIV-XV centuries was massive.
Fur processing in Novgorod was at a low level, the Hanseatic people constantly complained about the poor dressing of skins. Own leather production in Novgorod began only in the second third of the 15th century. In addition to cloth, salt and leather, large quantities of wine, beer, fish, iron (own production was scanty), ceramics, and from Livonia - horses (the so-called clippers, work horses), copper and silver were also imported to Novgorod.
If we look at the history of Novgorod from this point of view, we will see only a primitive, undeveloped village, which was engaged in the resale of squirrels obtained in the forests in the form of untreated skins and wax. Today's Russia as a whole differs little from this Novgorod model, which is based only on the export of primitive "raw" goods with a minimum added price and the import of "finished" products from the West.