THE SECOND RUSSIAN ATTACK ON CONSTANTINOPLE
A. A. Vasiliev
Remember now firmly the words of my tongue;
The warrior delighteth in glory;
On the Gate of Byzantium the buckler is hung,
Thy conquests are famous in story.
The Lay of the Wise Oleg by A. S. Pushkin *
Translation by Thomas B. Shaw, in The Works of Alexander Pushkin, selected and edited, with an introduction, by Avrahm Yarmolinsky, New York, 1936.
FOREWORD
In 1946, in the Foreword to my book The Russian Attack on Constantinople in 860,1 have explained why, dealing with a single episode, I have not confined myself to a mere article but have instead written a book. Although my Second Russian Attack on Constantinople is being published not in the form of a book but in the more modest shape of a monograph, the same question, however, may arise again, and I feel that to justify writing a monograph on such a subject I should allege my reasons. In this monograph I have the same aim and the same plan as in the previous book, i.e., to examine the attack in connection with the Viking incursions in Western Europe. Then, with the secondary works, as in my previous book, I have not limited myself to mere statements of titles or to a few words of summary, but I have reproduced exact quotations, having in view that these works are seldom at the disposal of the reader, and that many of them are written in Russian, a language which, unfortunately, for the time being is not generally known. I have also had to discuss several questions which are connected with the central subject of the study only indirectly, but which contribute to our better understanding and confirmation of the fact of the second Russian attack, which has been recorded in the Russian Chronicles only. Unfortunately I had no time to use and discuss the commentary on Oleg's campaign by D. S. Likhachev published in the second part of "The Tale of Bygone Years9 (Povest Vremennykh Let), ed. by V. P. Adrianova-Peretz (Moscow- Leningrad, 1950), pp. 262-281 (in Russian).
I wish to tender my warm gratitude to Professors Sirarpie Der Nersessian and Milton V. Anastos, of Dumbarton Oaks, Harvard University, as well as to Mrs. Nathalie Scheffer, for their help and suggestions which have been of great value to my work. I express my warm thanks to Miss Lois Hassler, Assistant to the Librarian and to the Research Staff, who, with her usual conscientiousness, has revised my manuscript and corrected inadequacies in my English.