Alexander Nevsky

Alexander Yaroslavich Nevsky<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> (Template:Langx; Template:IPA; monastic name: Aleksiy;<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> 13 May 1221<ref name="rozhdenia">Template:Cite journal</ref> – 14 November 1263) was Prince of Novgorod (1236–1240; 1241–1256; 1258–1259), Grand Prince of Kiev (1249–1263), and Grand Prince of Vladimir (1252–1263).<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Commonly regarded as a key figure in medieval Russian history,Template:Sfn Alexander was a grandson of Vsevolod the Big Nest and rose to legendary status on account of his military victories in northwestern Russia over Swedish invaders in the 1240 Battle of the Neva,Template:Efn as well as German crusaders in the 1242 Battle on the Ice.Template:Sfn He preserved Eastern Orthodoxy, agreeing to pay tribute to the powerful Golden Horde. Metropolitan Macarius of Moscow canonized Alexander Nevsky as a saint of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1547.Template:Sfn

Early life

Born in Pereslavl-Zalessky around the year 1220, Alexander was the second son of Prince Yaroslav Vsevolodovich.Template:Sfn His mother was Template:Ill, daughter of Mstislav Mstislavich The Bold. From the Tales of the Life and Courage of the Pious and Great Prince Alexander found in the Second Pskovian Chronicle (Template:Circa) comes one of the first known references to Alexander Yaroslavich:<ref name="Begunov1955p11-15">Begunov, K., translator, Second Pskovian Chronicle, ("Isbornik", Moscow, 1955) pp. 11–15.</ref>

He spent most of his youth in Pereslavl-Zalessky.Template:Sfn Little is known about the activities of Yaroslav's children before the year 1238.Template:Sfn Alexander's eldest brother Fyodor died in 1233 at the age of 14.Template:Sfn

Reign

Prince of Novgorod

In 1236, Alexander was appointed by the Novgorodians to become their prince (knyaz), where he had already served as his father's governor in Novgorod.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Sfn The Novgorod chronicle describes how Yaroslav left his son Alexander in Novgorod and took with him "senior Novgorodians" and a hundred men from Torzhok and "sat in Kiev upon the throne".Template:Sfn

In 1237, the Swedes received papal authorization to launch a crusade, and in 1240, new campaigns began in the easternmost part of the Baltic region.Template:Sfn The Finnish mission's eastward expansion led to a clash between Sweden and the city-state of Novgorod, since the Karelians had been allies and tributaries of Novgorod since the mid-12th century.Template:Sfn The Swedish army was led by Birger Jarl and consisted of Norwegians and Finnish tribes.Template:Sfn After a successful campaign into Tavastia, the Swedes advanced further east.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn According to Russian sources, the Swedish army landed at the confluence of the rivers Izhora and Neva, when Alexander and his small army suddenly attacked the Swedes on 15 July 1240 and defeated them in the Battle of the Neva.Template:Sfn<ref name="Philip">Template:Cite book</ref>

The event was later depicted as being of national importance, and in the 15th century, Alexander received the sobriquet Nevsky ("of the Neva").Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn The Soviet-era historian Igor Shaskolsky suggested that the attack was coordinated, referring to the Life of Alexander Nevsky, the only Russian source besides the First Novgorod Chronicle that mentions the battle, in which it is stated that the Swedes intended to conquer Novgorod.Template:Sfn According to John Fennell: "there is no evidence of any coordination of action between the Swedes, the Germans and the Danes, nor is there anything to show that this was more than a continuation of the Russo-Swedish conflict for mastery over Finland and Karelia".Template:Sfn The battle is not mentioned in Swedish sources, and so was likely part of periodic clashes between Sweden and Novgorod.Template:Sfn

In September 1240, troops of the Bishopric of Dorpat, the Livonian Order and the exiled pretender-prince Template:Ill conducted a campaign in Izborsk and Pskov, successfully overthrowing the pro-Suzdal faction which had supported Alexander.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Shortly thereafter, either in late 1240 or early 1241, the Novgorodians rose up against Alexander and banished him to Pereslavl-Zalessky.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

File:Facial Chronicle - b.06, p.068 - Execution of vod and chud.jpg

Execution of Vots and Chuds by Alexander Nevsky in Koporye, during the 1240–1241 Votia campaign (16th-century miniature)

That same winter, a campaign into Votia was conducted by the Bishopric of Ösel–Wiek, the Livonian Order, as well as Estonians (Chud') with support from local Votian leaders.Template:Sfn It is unclear whether Votia was a tributary of Novgorod at this time, or not.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn According to Anti Selart, the allies likely only intended to acquire pagan lands and convert them to Catholicism, rather than attacking Novgorod, which was already Christianized.Template:Sfn On the other hand, the campaign was "a purely political undertaking which had nothing to do with conversion of pagans".Template:Sfn Although the Northern Crusades were aimed at pagan Balts and Finns, rather than Orthodox Russians, several unsuccessful attempts were made to persuade Novgorod to convert to Catholicism, which were resisted by Alexander.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

The Novgorodian authorities recalled Alexander, and in the spring of 1241, he returned from exile and assembled an army. Alexander managed to retake Pskov and Koporye from the crusaders and drive out the invaders.Template:Sfn He then continued into Estonian-German territory.Template:Sfn The crusaders defeated a detachment of the Novgorodian army.Template:SfnTemplate:Efn As a result, Alexander set up a position at Lake Peipus.Template:Sfn Alexander and his men then faced the Livonian heavy cavalry led by Hermann of Dorpat, brother of Albert of Buxhoeveden, where they met on 5 April 1242.Template:Sfn Alexander's army then defeated the enemy in the Battle on the Ice, halting the eastward expansion of the Teutonic Order.<ref>Riley-Smith Jonathan Simon Christopher. The Crusades: a History, US, 1987, Template:ISBN, p. 198.</ref> Later in the same year, the Germans agreed to relinquish control of any Russian territory still occupied, as well as to exchange prisoners of war.Template:Sfn Later Russian sources would elevate the importance of the battle and portray it as one of the great Russian victories of the Middle Ages.Template:Sfn

The Livonian Rhymed Chronicle narrates the events of the battle:

After the Livonian invasion, Nevsky continued to strengthen the Republic of Novgorod. He sent his envoys to Norway and, as a result, they signed a first peace treaty between Novgorod and Norway in 1251. Alexander led his army to Finland and successfully routed the Swedes, who had made another attempt to block the Baltic Sea from the Novgorodians in 1256.Template:SfnTemplate:Npsn In 1261, Alexander also concluded a treaty with Lithuanian king Mindaugas against the Livonian Order, but the planned attack failed as Alexander was summoned to Sarai by the khan.Template:Sfn

Grand Prince of Vladimir

File:Seal of Alexander Nevsky 1236.png

Seal of Aleksandr Yaroslavich (front and back) with images of the prince himself as a horseman and saint Theodore Stratelates. After 1236.

Upon the conquest of the Grand Principality of Vladimir by the Mongols in 1238,<ref name="Feldbrugge">Template:Cite book</ref> its reigning prince, Yuri II Vsevolodovich, was killed in the Battle of the Sit River; his younger brother, Yaroslav II Vsevolodovich (Alexander's father), requested and received from the Mongol khan his permission to become the new prince. As prince, he assigned Novgorod to his son Alexander. However, while traveling in 1245 to the Mongol capital Karakorum in Central Asia, Yaroslav died. When, in 1248, Alexander and his older brother Andrey II Yaroslavich also traveled to Karakorum to attend upon the Great Khan, Andrey received the title of grand prince of Vladimir and Alexander the nominal lordship of Kiev.<ref name="Feldbrugge"/> The two returned in the autumn of 1249.Template:Sfn

The Rurikid princes of Rus' were obliged to appear before the khans in person, pay homage to them and receive their jarlig (patent) to be affirmed in their principalities.Template:Efn When Möngke became the new great khan in 1251, only two years after Guyuk's death, he demanded another appearance at Sarai on the Volga, but Andrey refused to go.Template:Sfn Thanks to his friendship with Sartaq Khan, the subsequent invasion by the Mongols, their first venture into northeastern Rus' since the initial conquest, saw Andrey exiled to Sweden and Alexander assuming the title of grand prince of Vladimir in 1252,Template:Sfn the most senior of the princes at the time following the fall of Kiev.<ref name="Figes">Template:Cite book</ref> Alexander faithfully supported Mongol rule within his own domains. In 1259, he led an army to the city of Novgorod and forced it to pay tribute it had previously refused to the Golden Horde.Template:Sfn

Family

In 1242, Alexander married Aleksandra, a daughter of Bryacheslav Vasilkovich, the prince of Polotsk.Template:Sfn They had five children:

• Vasily, prince of Novgorod (c. 1239 – 1271), betrothed to Princess Kristina of Norway in 1251 before the marriage contract was broken;
• Eudoxia Alexandrovna, married Konstantin Rostislavich of Smolensk;
• Dmitry (c. 1250 – 1294), prince of Pereslavl and grand prince of Vladimir;Template:Sfn
• Andrey of Gorodets (c. 1255 – 1304), prince of Gorodets and grand prince of Vladimir;Template:Sfn
• Daniel of Moscow (1261–1303), prince of Moscow.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Sfn

Death and burial

On 14 November 1263, while returning from Sarai on one of his frequent visits to the Horde, Alexander died in the town of Gorodets-on-the-Volga. On 23 November 1263, he was buried in the church of the Monastery of the Nativity of the Holy Mother of God in Vladimir.<ref name="oca"/>Template:Sfn

From the Second Pskovian Chronicle:<ref name=Begunov1955p11-15/>

Veneration and sainthood

The veneration of Alexander began almost immediately after his burial, when he reportedly extended his hand for the prayer of absolution.<ref name="oca">Template:Cite web</ref> According to Orthodox tradition, Alexander foresaw his death and before this took strict Orthodox Christian monastic vows, called Great Schema, and took the name Alexey.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In 1380, Alexander's remains were uncovered in response to a vision before the Battle of Kulikovo and found to be incorrupt. The relics were then placed in a shrine in the church. Alexander was canonized as a saint of the Russian Orthodox Church by Metropolitan Macarius in 1547.<ref name="oca"/>

In 1695, a new wooden reliquary was made in Moscow, and the relics were placed in it in 1697.<ref name="oca"/> By order of Peter the Great, the relics were then removed from Vladimir on 11 August 1723 and transported to Shlisselburg, arriving there on 20 September.<ref name="oca"/> There they were kept until 1724, when they were brought to Saint Petersburg and installed in the Annunciation Church of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra on 30 August.<ref name="oca"/>

File:Opening of relics 03.jpg

1922 opening of Nevsky's relics

In 1753, a silver shrine with sarcophagus for the relics, made from 90 pounds of silver, was donated by Empress Elizabeth of Russia. With the completion of the Holy Trinity Cathedral of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in 1790, the shrine and relics were translated there at its consecration on 30 August, one of the saint's feast days.<ref name="oca"/>

In May 1922, during the general confiscation of Russian Orthodox Church property, the sarcophagus was opened and the relics removed;<ref name="RM">Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Bsn and the elaborate silver shrine was transferred to the Hermitage Museum.<ref name="RM"/> The relics were put into storage at the Museum of the History of Religion and Atheism, before being returned to Holy Trinity Cathedral in 1989.<ref name="RM"/> On 10 May 2023, the Hermitage Museum and Alexander Nevsky Lavra signed a contract for the transfer of the shrine to Holy Trinity Cathedral of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra for a period of 49 years.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> On 12 September 2023, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow placed the relics back into the silver sarcophagus.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Alexander's principal feast day is 23 November. A secondary feast day was instituted on 30 August in commemoration of his relics being placed in the Annunciation Church. He is jointly commemorated with other saints of Rostov and Yaroslavl on 23 May.Template:Citation needed

In February 2024, it was announced that the memorial of Saint Alexander Nevsky had been deleted from the synaxarion of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Legacy

Some historians see Alexander's choice of subordination to the Golden Horde as an important reaffirmation of East Slavs' Orthodox orientation (which begun under Vladimir I of Kiev and his grandmother Olga).<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Orlando Figes mentioned that "Nevsky's collaboration was no doubt motivated by his distrust of the West, which he regarded as a greater threat to Orthodox Russia than the Golden Horde (...) But Nevsky's realpolitik caused a problem for the chroniclers, particularly after he was made a saint by the Russian Church in 1547, for in their terms he had colluded with the infidel."<ref name="Figes"/>

Some of Alexander's policies on the Western border were continued by his grandson-in-law, Daumantas of Pskov, who was also beatified in the 16th century. In the late 13th century, a chronicle was compiled called the Life of Alexander Nevsky (Житие Александра Невского), in which he is depicted as an ideal prince-soldier and defender of Russia.Template:Citation needed

On 21 May 1725, the empress Catherine I introduced the Imperial Order of St. Alexander Nevsky as one of the highest decorations in the land. During World War II, on 29 July 1942, the Soviet authorities introduced an Order of Alexander Nevsky to revive the memory of Alexander's struggle with the Germans.<ref name="Haughton">Template:Cite book</ref> There was also an earlier Bulgarian Order dedicated to Saint Alexander which was founded on 25 December 1881, which ceased to exist when the People's Republic was declared on 16 September 1946.Template:Citation needed

In 1938, Sergei Eisenstein made one of his most acclaimed films, Alexander Nevsky, about Alexander's victory over the Teutonic Knights. The soundtrack for the film was written by Sergei Prokofiev, who also reworked the score into a concert cantata. Today the film is renowned for its extraordinary battle on ice sequence, which has served as inspiration for countless other films. In the picture, Nevsky used a number of Russian proverbs, tying Nevsky firmly to Russian tradition.<ref>Kevin McKenna. 2009. "Proverbs and the Folk Tale in the Russian Cinema: The Case of Sergei Eisenstein’s Film Classic Aleksandr Nevsky." The Proverbial «Pied Piper» A Festschrift Volume of Essays in Honor of Wolfgang Mieder on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. by Kevin McKenna, pp. 277–292. New York, Bern: Peter Lang.</ref> The famous proverbial phrase (paraphrasing Matthew 26:52), "Whoever will come to us with a sword, from a sword will perish," is a phrase that is often attributed to Alexander Nevsky, though it was not in fact said by him; it comes from Eisenstein's film, where it was said by actor Nikolai Cherkasov.Template:Citation needed A Soviet evaluation presented Alexander's victories as having "saved the Russian people from sharing the fate of the Baltic tribes and the Slavs of the Elbe who were enslaved by the Germans".Template:Sfn

During World War II, the image of Alexander Nevsky became a national symbol of the struggle against German occupation, and many Soviet historians portrayed him as a Russian bastion against both German and papal aggression.Template:Sfn The government sought historical continuity by referring to the Soviet struggle as the Great Patriotic War.<ref name="Haughton"/> The film Alexander Nevsky was re-released in 1941 following the German invasion;<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Joseph Stalin used the film to mobilize feelings of Russian patriotism.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

File:AlexanderNevskyCathedral-Sofia-6.jpg

Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, Sofia

Alexander Nevsky's fame was spread wherever Imperial Russia had a strong influence; thus numerous cathedrals and churches were dedicated to him, including the Patriarchal Cathedral in Sofia, Bulgaria; the Cathedral church in Tallinn, Estonia; the Cathedral church in Łódź, Poland; the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Ungheni, Moldova.Template:Citation needed

There is a long tradition of Russian naval vessels bearing Nevsky's name, such as the 19th-century propeller frigate Alexander Nevsky and K-550 Alexander Nevsky, a nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine currently in service with the Russian Navy.<ref>The US Liberty ship the S.S. Henry W. Corbett, launched in 1943 in Portland, Oregon, US was lent to the U.S.S.R. during WWII. After the war it was renamed by the Russian navy the Alexander Nevsky.</ref>

On 24 September 2008, Alexander Nevsky was declared the main hero of Russia's history by popular vote, as reported by the Kommersant newspaper. In December 2008, he was voted the greatest Russian in the Name of Russia television poll.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

During the 2021 Moscow Victory Day Parade, a small historical segment of the parade featured Russian soldiers dressed in historical M1945 Red Army uniforms carrying out the Soviet combat banners which received the Order of Alexander Nevsky during the war. This segment coincided with the 800th anniversary since the birth of Alexander Nevsky in 1221.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

See also

• Life of Alexander Nevsky (illuminated manuscript)
• Alexander Nevsky Cathedral – an incomplete listing of Eastern Orthodox cathedrals which bear his name
• Family tree of Russian monarchs
• Chapel of Saint Alexander Nevsky (Fergana)

Gallery

• Saint Alexander Nevsky, 1666 fresco in the Cathedral of the Archangel, Moscow
  Saint Alexander Nevsky, 1666 fresco in the Cathedral of the Archangel, Moscow
• Prince Alexander Nevsky receiving Papal legates, painting by Henryk Siemiradzki (1870s)
  Prince Alexander Nevsky receiving Papal legates, painting by Henryk Siemiradzki (1870s)
• A statue of Alexander Nevsky in Gorodets
  A statue of Alexander Nevsky in Gorodets

Bibliography

Primary sources

• Livonian Rhymed Chronicle (LRC, Template:Circa 1290s).
  • Template:Cite book (Reprint: Hildesheim 1963). Verses 2235–2262.
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• Synod Scroll (Older Redaction) of the Novgorod First Chronicle (NPL, Template:Circa 1315).
  • Template:Cite book

Literature

• Template:Cite book
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Further reading

• Template:Cite EB1911
• Isoaho, Mari. The Image of Aleksandr Nevskiy in Medieval Russia: Warrior and Saint (The Northern World; 21). Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2006 (hardcover, Template:ISBN).
• "Tale of the Life and Courage of the Pious and Great Prince Alexander [Nevsky]" in Medieval Russia's Epics, Chronicles, and Tales, ed. Serge Zenkovsky, 224–235 (New York: Meridian, 1974)

External links

• Repose of Saint Alexander Nevsky Orthodox icon and synaxarion (23 November)
• Synaxis of the Saints of Rostov and Yaroslavl (23 May)
• Translation of the relics of Saint Alexander Nevsky (30 August)
• Saint Alexander on Nevsky Prospekt.
• Kommersant: Russia’s Hero is Grand Prince Alexander Nevsky (24 September 2008)
• Interfax news agency: Orthodox believers found heaven guardians for Russian secret service (22 September 2008)