Talk:Garðaríki

Old talk

You should perhaps not forget to mention GUTAGARD in connection with Gardarike. Gutagard was the name on one of the bigger estates near today's Novgorod. Gutagard was the trading post of the vikings from Gotland (the largest island in the Baltic sea and a county of Sweden). These "gutar" in Swedish, were prominent in trading with Russia. For example, when the Germans (or Gothic people) started to trade with the Russians, they always sailed via Gotland to bring with them pilots from there as it was the Gotlanders that indeed had established early contacts with Novgorod. (Later, when the Germans got more known to the area, they set up a main tradig post in Visby on the island of Gotland and this became the start of the later to become the HANSA union, but that is another story). Best regards Bo Johansson Singapore

Icelandic

Why is the name in Icelandic mentioned? Icelandic is NOT the same as Old Norse although it's descended from it. The Swedish name is also quite irrelevant since the Varangians language differed a lot from contemporary Swedish.Aaker 22:22, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Actually, Icelandic is a dialect of Old Norse. In fact, modern Icelandic is closer to Old Norse than modern Norwegian. By contempory Swedish do you mean modern Swedish? The Varangians at the time were mostly Swedish. --Grimhelm 22:35, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, Icelandic is derived from and still close to Old Norse but it is not considered to be the same language. By contemporary Swedish i mean what we in Sweden call "Nusvenska", i.e modern Swedish. The Varangians came predominantly from the eastern parts of the Scaninavian peninsula, which nowadays belongs to Sweden, but in those days no Swedish state or nation existed so it would be quite incorrect to call them Swedish.Aaker 18:43, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Sigh! Ethnic labels are always so controversial. I won't even get started here on the use of the word "Swedish" in English which is not identical to the use of the word "svensk" in Swedish.--Berig 08:17, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Icelandic lake Kendur 66 km to the ist from Moscow, village Hemalda near Cherepovets, river Yemtsa in North Dvina else 176.65.113.153 (talk) 17:59, 28 January 2023 (UTC)

heff, it hurts

who wrote this "article"? is the author driven by a panslavistic ideology or is he/she just inconscious? "Gardar contains the same root as Slavic gord ("town") and English garden. Garðr refers to a wall or fortification but came to primarily mean what it contained." complete chaos here (b.t.w where is that scientifically noted?) Scandinavian "garder/garda" means "armoured, guarded" and was (under different circumstances) also the root for gorad, t.i. "town", the so called slavic word. Also the english pendant is "guard" , not garden! (t.i. the guy standing in front of the fortress, not the fortress itself. so obviously there was a common scandinavian / GERMANIC root of the word, which was carried up to England (Anglo-Saxons - ever heard of?) and to the East. By GERMANIC tribes. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.108.98.124 (talk) 20:41, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Do you have any 'scientific' resources to back up your assertions, or is this your own WP:OR? We're always appreciative of contributions based on reliable sources, but using this talkpage as WP:SOAPBOX is neither constructive nor appreciated. The only thing I've managed to establish from your comment is that you WP:JUSTDONTLIKEIT. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 03:26, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

There are lot of words in Russian which have a root "gard" : grad, gorod - city/town, ograda - fence, ograzhdeniye - fencing, grazhdanin - citizen etc, ogorod - garden (a fenced place) etc. So a "gard" is common root for all Slavic and German languages.

Title

Since there is an article on the subject of Kievan Rus', this should probably have an article that identifies its subject as a name, per the WP:CRITERIA (cf. Name of Ukraine, Names of Rus', Russia and Ruthenia, &c.).

• Name of Garðaríki
• The name Garðaríki
• Old Norse name of Kievan Rus'

 —Michael Z. 04:16, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure. For example, there is Karduniaš as the Kassites' name for Babylonia during the Middle Babylonian period. Most articles in the Category:Exonyms also do not have "name(s) of" in the title, although some do.

We could make a case for merging it into Names of Rusʹ, Russia and Ruthenia, where it is currently not even mentioned (it is mentioned in Rus' people#Scandinavian sources though), but because Garðaríki is probably not etymologically related to Rus' , but an exonym, a merger could be problematic because Garðaríki could be out of its scope. But if we want this to remain a standalone article, the current title is fine. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 13:50, 27 January 2023 (UTC)

It is not related to Rus/Russia, because there was no Cyrillic script yet, only Old Norse. Thus, nothing written in Old Russian.

Maybe Novgorod Land? Kiev was a later acquisition by Igor of Kiev. Rurik ruled from Novgorod. Thus, it should really be Rus, not Kievan Rus (specific period of Rus' history when Kiev was the capital) Muchandr (talk) 19:08, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

This is an article on pre-Kievan Rus! Kievan is really a period in Rus' history when Kiev was the capital. This did not happen before Igor of Kiev moved the capital from Novgorod. Also see Novgorod Land Muchandr (talk) 18:59, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

Map

The map File:Early Rus.png

@Alexschneider250: in response to your question on my talk page about the map I removed from Garðaríki, let's discuss it over here. My full edit summmary was: WP:SYNTH map. Nobody knows whethere there ever was a Rus' Khaganate, let alone where. The literature selected all just so happens to favour the Upper Volga, Oka, and Volkhov river regions, but we could all draw a bazillion more maps based on handpicked combos from Rus' Khaganate#Possible locations. This tells us nothing.

You objected to this by saying However, this map doesn't even refer to the "Rus' Khaganate" at all. Instead it shows Early Rus settlements as well as other neighboring territories relevant to the content of the article. Fair enough, neither the map nor the description mentions the term "Khaganate", but they don't mention "Garðaríki" either. Keep in mind that Garðaríki is the Old Norse term used in the Middle Ages for the Kievan Rus' state (...), which first appeared in Icelandic sagas in the twelfth century. The map, however, shows Kiev (Sambat) outside the control of this alleged "Early Rus'", so this is not Kievan Rus' (which likely originated in the late 9th century, with Oleg/Helgi the Wise as its probable "founder" around 880), but some other earlier alleged state, which in literature is commonly described as "Rus' Khaganate" (per the Annales Bertiniani sub anno 839 and some other sources that are extremely vague and heavily disputed). So if you're claiming this map is relevant to Garðaríki, which refers to the later Kievan period (after circa 880), it is even more relevant to Rus' Khaganate (hypothesised to have existed in the 830s), but likewise only indirectly, because neither name/term is mentioned in the map nor the description.

We can discusss the location question later, but first let's get the relevance question out of the way. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 20:48, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

@Nederlandse Leeuw: this map shows the location of the Varangian settlements constituting the original Garðaríki or early Rus' with its capital in Novgorod (Holmgarðr). Initially, Kiev (Kœnugarðr) was not part of that state, so it is perfectly correct to show Kiev "outside the control" of that state in its early stages of development.

Norsemen knew this territory from ancient times and called it Garðar - their presence in Old Ladoga is archaeologically dated to the 760s (T. Jackson, The Image of Old Rus in Old Norse Literature, p. 39), a century before the arrival of Rurik to the lands of Ilmen Slavs. Scandinavian sagas, rune stones and scaldic poetry primarily refer to the area around Novgorod on the map as Garðar or Garðaríki and actually call Novgorod its capital (G. Vigfússon, C. C. Rafn and J. G. Liljegren wrote about this). Surely you know that even Rurikids started to rule over Rus' lands first in Novgorod, not in Kiev. Prince Oleg captured Kiev only in 882, thus making the town with its surrounding territories a part of his realm. So Garðaríki started with the settlements shown in red on the map and then expanded over time - this makes the map absolutely relevant to the subject.

Alexschneider250 (talk) 14:24, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Those are all very interesting claims, but not what File:Early Rus.png#Summary actually says. None of the authors and books you mention are mentioned in File:Early Rus.png#Sources either.

Let's deal with your claims in chronological order.

• You're not accurately representing Jackson 2003. She wrote on p. 37–38 that the earliest evidence of the toponym Garðar in Old Norse texts dates from the late tenth century, not ancient times. By the time Garðar shows up in Old Norse texts, the Kievan Rus' state at Kiev had already existed about a hundred years.
• On p. 39 Jackson wrote: The Scandinavian name for Russia had to have originated in the ninth century, as, according to the archaeological date, Scandinavians in Rus can be traced in the second half of the ninth century[66], with the exception of Old Ladoga where their traces go back to the 760s.[67] When you check that source, it is Stalsberg 1982 p. 283 saying that some smith's tools, found in one bulding in Old Ladoga, and dated to the 760s, were looking very Scandinavian. It's quite a stretch to then claim Norsemen [had] presence in Old Ladoga. Those tools could have gotten there any number of ways; the easiest explanation is that some local trader purchased them in Scandinavia and brought them home to Old Ladoga where the smith bought them, not that the whole town was a Varangian settlement. Occam's razor favours the easiest explanation that makes the fewest assumptions.
• Surely you know that even Rurikids started to rule over Rus' lands first in Novgorod, not in Kiev. No, we don't know that. The Primary Chronicle (and Novgorod First Chronicle) cannot be taken at face value, and the so-called "Invitation of the Varangians" is generally considered an origin myth. Scholars widely dispute whether Rurik even existed, whether he was Igor's "father", and whether Oleg was his "kinsman/relative", because the earliest surviving sources never mention any "Rurik". All we know is that Kievan Rus' probably began with Oleg taking control of Kiev around 880. See Ostrowski, Donald (2018). "Was There a Riurikid Dynasty in Early Rus'?". Canadian-American Slavic Studies. 52 (1): 30–49. doi:10.1163/22102396-05201009.
• The second source actually mentioned in the map's description, Dolukhanov, P.M. The Early Slavs (1996) says on p. 187 (as I recently wrote at Rus' Khaganate#Volkhov river sites): However, Nosov (1990) stated that archaeological evidence recovered at Rurikovo Gorodische puts the terminus post quem for the hill-fort's establishment decades later: dendrochronological analysis showed that trees used in construction at the site were felled between the years 889 and 948, and radiocarbon dating of charcoal samples collected from a ditch at the site of "Holmgard" trace back to 880(±20). That is after Oleg is said to have conquered Kiev in 882 (though that date is also uncertain, because Old East Slavic chronicles contradict themselves and each other on this point). How could "Holmgard"/"Novgorod" have been the "capital" of some "early Rus' state" if it didn't even exist before Oleg founded Kievan Rus' at Kiev? For more information about how Kievan Rus' began in Kiev, was always regarded as the capital and centre of the realm and Novgorod the tribute-paying periphery, not that Novgorod was somehow the "original capital", I would refer you to Plokhy 2006.
• So Garðaríki started with the settlements shown in red on the map and then expanded over time - this makes the map absolutely relevant to the subject. No, Garðaríki is an Old Norse word invented in the 12th century for Kievan Rus', which began in Kiev around 880 (and then later expanded in other directions). The map doesn't mention Garðaríki, the description doesn't mention Garðaríki, and none of the sources you mention as referring to Garðaríki are mentioned in File:Early Rus.png#Sources; thus, the map and Garðaríki are not directly related.

So, all your arguments that they do have something to do with each other are incorrect. So no, this map is not relevant to Garðaríki at all. Including the map in this article is WP:SYNTH, a form of WP:OR. That is why I removed the map. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 20:52, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@Nederlandse Leeuw: Let me address your points in chronological order.

1) I am not trying to represent Jackson 2003 – I referred you to that article solely on account of Scandinavian traces found in Old Ladoga. I've been reading about the Northern European history and literature for several years, and my own research on Garðaríki is surely not limited to following Jackson's articles only, and surely my opinion on the subject does not coincide with hers. "Ancient times" was rather a figure of speech, I didn't use it in the strict scientific sense of the word, stop nitpicking please. Yes, Jackson and other scholars date the first mentioning of Garðar to 996, in the poem Óláfsdrápa by Hallfreðr Vandræðaskáld. But I believe this toponym is much older, given the amount of evidence about historical ties between Scandinavia and Novgorodian Rus'.

Try to get the whole picture and take into account everything: geography, economics, politics and culture of the Baltic region. Novgorod and Ladoga were located at the crucial spot of the major trade routes securing the flow of silver from Islamic countries to Scandinavia (Hugh R. Whinfrey, "An Inquiry into a Scandinavian Homeland for the Rus", 1993). This is supported by numerous archaeological findings, including hoards of silver coins (Kaupang from Afar. Aspects of the Interpretation of Dirham Finds in Northern and Eastern Europe between the Late 8th and Early 10th Centuries by Christoph C L Kilger, 2008) and cubo-octahedral weights found in particularly high numbers (compared to other places in the former Old Rus' territory) around Staraya Ladoga and Veliky Novgorod (Trade and Trust in the Baltic Sea Area During the Viking Age by Ingrid Gusting, 2015, p. 33, fig. 3-4). Of all the places in Eastern Europe, the highest number of dirham hoards associated with the earliest phase of their circulation was discovered in Staraya Ladoga (Kilger, 2008, p. 211, Table 7.4 and p. 243, fig. 7.23). Also, if you look at the distribution map of dirham hoards t.p.q. 790–825 (Kilger, 2008, p. 216) you will realize, that the overwhelming majority of them were found along the Baltic-Volga/Don trade routes, where Scandinavian merchants started to travel around the end of the 8th century, according to the assumption of the American historian Thomas Noonan (Gusting, 2015, p. 26). The oldest paths of the silver flow went most likely through Volga and Don, not through Dnieper, which was blocked by Avars up until ca. 800 (Whinfrey, 1993). This makes it highly unlikely that Kiev was of any particular importance to Varangian merchants prior to Ladoga or Novgorod.

Whinfrey assumed that those Varangians who founded Rus' were Gotlandic traders (Whinfrey, 1993), whose island played the role of a trade hub in the Baltic already during the Late Iron Age (Gusting, 2015, p. 28). Very clear traces of their "abroad activity" are found, for example, in a former Swedish colony Grobin, which is presumed to have existed from ca. 650 to ca. 800 in modern-day Latvia (Whinfrey, 1993). After Russia, Sweden has the highest quantity of hoarded Islamic dirhams in Europe, and particularly high number of silver hoards were found exactly on Gotland (Kilger, 2008, p. 203, Gusting, 2015, p. 28), which would be in line with the assumption regarding the oldest trade ties between Gotland and Garðaríki. Also, a lot of Scandinavian female jewellery artefacts were found in the North-West of present-day Russia, esp. oval brooches, which indicates a large presence of Scandinavian women there (Gusting, 2015, p. 27). Ingmar Jansson argues that this could only be explained by the migration of Scandinavian farmers (not only warriors) with their families towards European Russia, and that the special function of those brooches in the Scandinavian costume implies that they were worn as a token of ethnic affiliation (Vikings, Rus, Varangians. The "Varangian Problem" in View of Ethnicity in Archaeology by Charlotta Hillerdal, 2006, p. 101). I hope you don't think that the renowned Swedish archaeologist was "semi-scholarly" in his assumption.

Scholars generally date runic stones mentioning "Garðar" back to the 11th century, but this seems to be the latest possible date, since at least 4 of those stones have the dating range of 725–1100 in the runic inscriptions database: Sö 148, Sö 338, U 209, Vs 1. This toponym even appears as "austr i Garðum" ("austr í Gǫrðum") in these and nearly all other related runic inscriptions, which means "east in Garðar" with respect to Scandinavia, i.e. where Ladoga or Novgorod used to be (not "south in Garðar" or "southeast in Garðar").

Since this article is about a toponym used in Old Norse texts, it makes sense to mention a couple of more sagas, where Garðaríki appears, either directly or as "the East Country". King Ivar Vidfadme, who presumably lived ca. 650-700, is mentioned in Ynglinga Saga (chapt. 45: "Ívarr víðfaðmi lagði undir sik alt Svíaveldi; hann eignaðist ok alt Danaveldi ok mikinn hlut Saxlands ok alt Austrríki ok hinn fimta hlut Englands.") as well as in Hervarar saga (chapt. 16: "Ívarr hinn víðfaðmi lagði þá undir sik allt Svíaveldi; hann vann ok Dana­veldi ok Kúrland, Saxland ok Eystland, ok öll Austrríki allt til Garðaríkis") as a king who conquered many lands including Garðaríki.

It is absolutely natural to regard Garðaríki as something Garðar gradually evolved into: first only Garðar appears in poetry, runic inscriptions and sagas, then both of these toponyms appear interchangeably for some time (e.g. in Oláfs saga Tryggvasonar and Morkinskinna), and finally only Garðaríki is used. And it was exactly Novgorodian Rus' (or Northern Rus), which was originally called Garðar and then expanded to Garðaríki or the Rus' encompassing Kiev too, which then became the capital at a certain time - Pritsak (The Origin of Rus', p. 366) and Jackson (The Image of Old Rus in Old Norse Literature, p. 43) wrote about that.

2) Regarding the traces of Scandinavians in Old Ladoga: first of all, in her article of 1982, Anne Stalsberg mentions not just "some smith's tools", but one whole smithy together with a lot of equipment, ironware, jewellery, pagan cult objects which could not be of any use to other, non-Scandinavian ethnic groups. She referred to the findings of an expedition led by the Russian archaeologist A. N. Kirpichnikov in the 1970s. An illustrated summary (in Russian) of that expedition's results was prepared by another Russian archaeologist, E. A. Ryabinin. In his description you can see, that scientists performed comparison of those things with similar things (i.e. typical tools, jewellery, forge facilities and technology) from various places in Scandinavia. E.g. the tools found in Ladoga and in Gotland were similar not only in their purpose (gold-work and ironwork, used in particular for ship repairs) but were nearly identical in their shape and even small details, despite of their dating 200-250 years apart from each other (funnily enough, the toolkit from Ladoga was the oldest of these two). That smithy had also beautiful cult-related objects like this one, known as "the singing Odin":

Singing Odin from Staraya Ladoga 01

Such things could only be made either by a Scandinavian smith or by some other smith for a Scandinavian client.

Besides, the Russian toponym "Ladoga" actually comes from the Old Norse toponym Aldeigja (with a methathesis ald > lad), which itself stems from the Finnish river name *Alode-joki (Jackson, 2003, p. 43). This means that Scandinavians came to Ladoga earlier than Slavs.

3) Sure, almost none of the texts composed in those times can be taken at face value, so we have to live with what we have and try to find more evidence. Oleg's authenticity can be also called into question, let alone the time when he came to Kiev, because this information is taken from the Primary Chronicle too. And what "taking control of Kiev" by Oleg actually was can be disputed too, because it looks like Oleg was not buried there after dying from a snakebite in 912, as the Primary Chronicle says. It would have been natural for a Russian prince to remain in Kiev after making it his capital, rule from there and be buried there after his death, which didn't happen to Oleg, according to the Novgorod First Chronicle saying that Oleg died in 922 and was buried in Ladoga. This "Novgorodian" version of his biography is more in agreement with what the Arab historian al-Masudi wrote about the Caspian expedition of Rus' troops, which was led by Oleg and took place around 913-914 (The Apex of the Pechenegs’ Political Importance by Aleksander Paroń, 2021, p. 266, p. 282). So if two unreliable sources contradict each other, I would rather trust more to the one supported by some other source, and thus believe that Oleg was buried in Ladoga, where most likely Rurik was buried too, according to the version of the Russian historian Dmitry Machinsky (D. A. Machinsky, 2002). Machinsky also reports about a chronicle, whose copy survived at least until the end of the 18th century, mentioning that Rurik died in a war in Korjela.

I find it strange to cast incessantly doubt on something so many good scientist were working on - to me it looks very suspicious and most likely motivated by politics. For example, the Russian scientist of German descent Gerhard Müller, who essentially developed the Normanist theory, suffered a lot from that kind of bias: he was forced to change the description of his research on that topic under the pressure of Russian patriotic circles which didn't like the idea that the first official ruler of Russia was "invited from abroad". Although Müller managed to publish a modified summary of his research, I believe some more documents proving the existence of Rurik could have been lost as a result of that persecution (Der Normannenstreit als Gründungsschlacht der russischen Geschichtsschreibung von Konstantin Kaminskij, 2012, p. 555, in German). Ostrowski seems to be strongly politically engaged, since nearly all of his works look like some kind of an attack on the official history of Russia or something like that. This makes his books and articles look very doubtful for me, and I actually find his views almost bordering racism - suffice it to mention the name of his book "Europe, Byzantium, and the "Intellectual Silence" of Rus' Culture".

4) Regarding the radiocarbon dating of those charcoal samples mentioned in the article by E. Nosov in 1990: the results of a 30-year-old archaeological research cannot be trusted without comparing them with the modern data related to the matter. The excavations around Rurikovo Gorodische have been going on and some newer results are available now. For example, Russian archaeologists have found 6 different layers with traces of fortified settlements there, with the layers 1-5 containing something of the IX century and older (The planigraphy and chronology of the most ancient stages of the life of Rurikov hillfort according to research materials 2013–2016 by Ivan Igorevich Eremeev, 2019, p 87, in Russian). Also, the Russian archaeologist N. V. Khvoshchinskaya have found 8 elements of a defensive installation whose dendrochronological analysis gave the range of dates from 858 to 861 (Fortifi cations of Ryurik Gorodishche near Novgorod in the light of the last archaeological explorations by N. V. Khvoshchinskaya, 2021, p. 119, in Russian).

"Oleg founded Kievan Rus' at Kiev" - this statement sounds kind of shaky to me, because at the time of the capture of Kiev by Oleg, that place could be only regarded as a distant and relatively dangerous southern outpost of the Old Rus', populated by possibly hostile citizens (whose élite was killed by Oleg simply because they were not related to Rurik) and close to the border with territories controlled by nomadic people. It would be logical to assume that Novgorodian Rus' played a central role in the life of all lands of Rus' at least for some years after capturing Kiev, esp. in the light of what I have written above. And it doesn't even matter where exactly that Holmgard was - it could be elsewhere around the modern Veliky Novgorod, not necessarily in Rurikovo Gorodische.

I'm not denying the role of Kiev in Garðaríki - it clearly was the capital for a long time, but what modern scholars call "Kievan Rus'" seems to be a very loose confederation of principalities, often hostile to each other, which means Norsemen simply couldn't regard it as one coherent political entity. Just the whole bulk of data available, in my opinion, points precisely to Novgorod and its surrounding territories as the original Garðar or Garðaríki for Scandinavians.

5) What is gone is gone, we already have a new map now, but I just didn't want to leave your statements about all my arguments being incorrect without answer. In my opinion, this article must be edited much more carefully, taking all points of view into account and trying first to collect as many references to reliable sources as possible. I don't know, maybe it makes sense to create special subsections, mentioning various stages of development of Garðaríki, its possible capitals etc.

Alexschneider250 (talk) 21:37, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Hi Alex, I must say that the amount of writing you have done here in order to respond to my comment is rather impressive, but I must say I'm not sure what you're trying to prove. What are you trying to achieve, especially when you concede we already have a new map now? If you thought I was trying to insult you by saying all your arguments that they do have something to do with each other are incorrect, then I'm sorry, that wasn't my intention (as I already said below on 14:22, 28 March 2023). I was saying that your arguments of 14:24, 26 March 2023 were irrelevant to showing that the old map was relevant to Garðaríki (most points you're making now also appear to be irrelevant to the old map). I wasn't saying you don't know anything or that you're stupid, because you're not; it's clear that you know a lot about this topic, but are relatively new to Wikipedia and unfamiliar with its rules. I'm very much willing to cooperate with you to make this article better, and if you'd like me to explain how the rules work, I'd be happy to help. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 23:40, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

I just wanted to answer, because what you have written seems to attack not only that map, but also the relation of Novgorodian Rus' to Garðaríki, the legitimacy of the Rurikid dynasty, and the well developed Normanist theory, which was endorsed by many good scientists. Please, take into account the huge research work done on this subject before removing anything from here. It's only the tip of the iceberg. Alexschneider250 (talk) 20:03, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

This is an OK map for Novgorod Land before it included Kiev. There was no writing system for Old Russian yet, hence Old Norse. I don't see any Rus' Kaganate on there. I see Khazars, or Khazar Kaganate. Which certainly did exist, and supposedly included Kiev before Rus' Muchandr (talk) 19:18, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

New map

The map File:GardarikiTownsEngRusFirst.png

@Alexschneider250: I really like your new map! It's based on a good source and doesn't go beyond the source. It illustrates what scholars know to be probable (although there remains some doubt about the identification of Hólmgarðr, I'll accept it for the sake of this map). I do think we could make the map even more informative if we took the original Rus' names in both Cyrillic and Latin, and put the Old Norse names first, as the map is meant to illustrate Old Norse topography of Garðaríki (if I understand you correctly?). I would therefore propose the following sets of names. I based the original Rus' names on the earliest forms I could find in sources (mentioned in brackets), which are usually closer to the Old Norse names than the modern names, e.g. Полотескъ / Poloteskŭ is closer to Pallteskja than Polotsk is. This way the map could be even more immersive, bringing us even closer to how things probably were at the time.

• Hólmgarðr Новугородь Novugorod' (Laurentian Codex)
• Pallteskja Полотескъ Poloteskŭ (Laurentian Codex)
• Aldeigjuborg Ладога Ladoga (Hypatian Codex)
• Rostofa Ростовъ Rostovŭ (Laurentian Codex)
• Smaleskia Смоленскъ Smolenskŭ (Laurentian Codex)
• Kænugarðr Кꙑевъ Kyevŭ (Novgorod First Chronicle)
• Súrdalar Соужъдал Souzhŭdal (Novgorod Codex)
• Móramar Муромѣ Muromѣ (Hypatian Codex)

Please let me know what you think. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 18:08, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

@Nederlandse Leeuw: Regarding adding Old Rus' names in Cyrillic: I don't think it's a good idea, because the map with three names around each town looks cluttered and much less readable - I have already tried that only to make sure such a map really looks overloaded with text. Besides, many readers would not be able to understand Cyrillic text, which would contradict the main purpose of the map - to be illustrative and graphically convey the information from the article. However, since the Cyrillic script looks quite beautiful, maybe it could show up in some kind of logo or decoration, maybe as just one single letter, I don't know. Regarding placing Old Norse names first: that sounds reasonable, since the article is about a toponym from Old Norse texts, after all. I will think about that.

Alexschneider250 (talk) 09:31, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm glad you are willing to consider it. Indeed, three names per city might be a bit much, especially with Rostov, Suzdal and Murom being relatively close together, but otherwise there is plenty of room to spare on this map. And although many people reading English Wikipedia might not be familiar with Cyrillic, isn't that a good reason to put their Old East Slavic names both in Cyrillic and Latin script? That way the map can also teach them a little more Cyrillic. And we'd also make the map more usable for other language versions of Wikipedia as well. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 14:03, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Please, be respectful to editors and readers of Wikipedia

@Nederlandse Leeuw: please, stop destroying the content created by other Wikipedians here and elsewhere. I believed you were just a meticulous editor who wanted to improve the quality of information until I noticed the recent harm you have done to this article.

1) Look what you did in the revision at 22:38, 26 March 2023: you put "These are all 19th-century sources containing outdated semi-scholarly views" around 4 references, most of which refer to the texts of two sagas ( Flateyjarbók and Fornaldar sögur Nordrlanda), not to anyone's "view". Let me repeat it for you: 3 out of 4 of those references point to excerpts from sagas, to support the statement "sagas regard the city of Holmsgardr (Holmgarðr, Veliky Novgorod) as the capital of Garðaríki". Vigfússon and Rafn were the editors of those collections of sagas, those are not their "views". Even if those were their views, it would be perfectly acceptable, since both Rafn and Vigfússon were famous Scandinavian scholars and it's not you who can label their work as "semi-scholarly". Only the 4th reference doesn't point to sagas directly. It points to a commentary of a renowned Swedish archivist Johan Gustaf Liljegren regarding those sagas he published in the respective edition. He read the sagas and summarized the information about the towns mentioned there in his commentary. So what exactly is "outdated" or "semi-scholarly" here? The ability of a literate human to read and recap? Besides, a lot of books, scholarly articles and even theses are using 19th-century sources. Who are you to proclaim a source outdated?

2) In the same revision, you put a similar commentary around another reference to Liljegren's book, which supports the text about the towns of Garðaríki along with a more modern reference to the Jackson's article of 2003. It would be understandable if you placed "better source needed" around a lonely questionable reference, in order to substantiate the respective statement better. But in this case the reference is not alone, so it could be regarded at least as a supplementary confirmation of the more modern neighboring one. So what should I do now, in your opinion? Should I urgently replace that "supplementary reference" with a newer one (although it is not needed since the statement is already supported by a modern source)? Should I simply remove it, thus depriving Wikipedia readers of a more deep and versatile view on the matter? This is ridiculous!

3) In the following revision you removed quite useful footnotes, helping the reader to understand the philological context of the matter a bit deeper. Yes, it was WP:CIRC, my fault, but you could transform those footnotes e.g. into simple text, wihtout those links. Besides, you were so much in a hurry while removing the stuff you don't like, that you accidentally removed two curly braces from the footnote about "rike", thus making the article's text looking ugly in a few of the following revisions, until you completely removed the text "and the archaic English term rike" together with the remaining surplus curly braces, without even providing any edit summary. This is simply barbaric.

All in all, your behaviour looks very uncooperative and destructive: you either eagerly remove a lot of useful content without trying to fix it, or label quite well sourced content as less credible (without bothering about actually checking the sources), apparently because you don't like this content. This is already looking pretty sick, like as if you were politically engaged or something. Now it's hard to believe you are an experienced user. Maybe you strongly dislike the idea that the Novgorod region played a crucial role in the emergence of Garðaríki, and are trying to get rid of this "Novgorod connection" completely. I don't want to believe that, but right now it looks pretty much like that thing.

Anyway, I appeal to your better nature: let us be cooperative and create something useful here, without nitpicking. If you find some sourced data presented here doubtful, you can always add alternative data with references to sources you regard as reliable. In this way the readers will be able to see a wide spectrum of opinions, instead of looking at scarce content, which is constantly shrinking even more due to some "edit wars" or the like.

I spend a lot of time reading various literature, verifying sources and choosing as neutral definitions as possible before adding any content here. I want it to be readable, illustrative and unbiased, which is in line with the spirit of Wikipedia. If I stumble upon some low-quality or unsourced material, I'm always trying to improve it, to search for missing sources. Please, respect my contribution. Alexschneider250 (talk) 11:34, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

@Alexschneider250 I'm sorry, evidently I have upset you, which wasn't my intention. I strive to be a meticulous editor who wanted to improve the quality of information, but I can of course make mistakes sometimes. You're right that I should respect your contributions in general, and that in cases where there might be something wrong with your text, that deletion is not always the best option. We can review a few times that you have mentioned here, and see if a better solution can be found than how I dealt with the issues in question. I'm very much open to criticism, because we humans make mistakes all the time, and often only someone else can point out our mistakes.

However, before we do so, I would like you to understand and acknowledge that you should also assume good faith on my part. That is, that I can make mistakes despite having good intentions. I don't much appreciate the WP:ASPERSIONS that I am destroying the content created by other Wikipedians here and elsewhere, that my editing is simply barbaric, that my behaviour looks very uncooperative and destructive and pretty sick, like as if you were politically engaged or something. On the other hand, I find it quite funny that you say it's hard to believe you are an experienced user; I don't mean to brag, but because you are questioning my experience now, I'll tell you I have been active on Wikipedia almost non-stop since 2008/2009. Meanwhile, you only did 2 edits in 2015, before starting to edit regulary in February 2022. (The first time you edited this specific article was on 18 June 2022, 10 months ago.) So if anyone lacks experience of how things are done around here, it is you. But I can't blame you; I also had to learn everything over the course of years, and I keep learning new things every day. I don't expect you to figure it all out in just a few months, and you're allowed to make as many mistakes as I am. I will still assume good faith as long as I have no reason to doubt your good intentions.

I much appreciate you saying I appeal to your better nature: let us be cooperative and create something useful here, which reassures me that you still assume at least some good faith on my part. We share the goal of making Wikipedia readable, illustrative and unbiased. I'm very willing to cooperate with you, explain the rules, and also admit any mistakes I may have made in editing this article in pursuit of those rules (such as WP:CIRC, WP:SYNTH, WP:OR, WP:UNSOURCED which I have invoked explicitly to justify my edits, and other rules such as WP:FAIL and WP:RS which I have invoked implicitly). I don't expect a relatively new editor like you to understand all these rules very well immediately (it also took me years). I can understand the confusion and frustration it can cause when someone applies these rules in practice in a way that you find difficult to follow, so perhaps it's fair of you to get upset and question what I'm doing. In cases such as you asking Who are you to proclaim a source outdated?, I'm not the one doing the "proclaiming"; there is an answer in a rule that Wikipedia has established, and that I'm following. To tell you the truth, the Template:Better source needed that I used for the "proclaiming" redirects to WP:QS, but in this case a more relevant rule turns out to be WP:OLDSOURCES, which until today I didn't even know existed! That just goes to show I also learn new things every day . Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 14:22, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Capital

Alright, let's tackle the capital question. The second sentence of this article has been for some time the unsourced sentence As the Varangians dealt mainly with Northern Kievan Rus' lands, their sagas regard the city of Holmsgardr (Hólmgarðr, Veliky Novgorod) as the capital of Garðaríki. In 2022, you (Alexschneider250)) added the following 4 sources:

1. Vigfússon 1862 p. 133: "Hon segir Jarizleifi konungi at hann skal bafua hinn æzsla hlut Gardarikis en þat er Holmgard… Jarizleifr konungr skal vera yfir Gardariki"
2. Rafn 1830 p. 237: "…hann átti at ráða fyrir Hólmgarðaríki, er sumir menn kalla Garðaríki…"
3. Rafn 1830 p. 362: "Hólmgarðaborg er mest alsetr Garðakonúngs, þat er nú kallat Nogarðar"
4. Liljegren 1818 p. 204: "Holmgard eller Holmgardaborg, en stad, som af fremlingar mycket besöktes, var deruti hufvudstad och Gardarikes Konungasäte"

Earlier today you said 3 out of 4 of those references point to excerpts from sagas, to support the statement "sagas regard the city of Holmsgardr (Holmgarðr, Veliky Novgorod) as the capital of Garðaríki" (...) Only the 4th reference doesn't point to sagas directly.

I just ran into Jackson 2003 p. 42 stating: Better known than any other name (it occurs more than hundred times in all types of Old Norse sources, with the exception of skaldic poetry) is Hólmgarðr (Novgorod). It is presented as the capital of Garðaríki (Rus), where there is the main seat of the king of Garðar (‘I Hólmgarðaborg er mest atsetr Garðakonúngs’).[84] [84] is invoking Rafn 1830 p. 362. You have already been so kind as to link to a Google Books copy of it; the exact page URL is https://books.google.com/books?id=wlYPAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA362. We find ourselves in Rafn's edition of the Göngu-Hrólfs saga (spelt Gaungu-Hrólfs saga by Rafn), but the quote we are looking for is not in the text itself, but in footnote no. #4 of editor Rafn:
⁴) í Hólmgarðaborg er mest atsetr Garðakonúngs, þat er nú (allt C.) kallat Nógarðar (ok Rúðzaland, C.) b. v. B. C.
It roughly means ⁴) In Hólmgarðarborg is the [fore]most residence of the Garða king, it is now (all C.) called Nógarðar (and Rúðzaland, C.) for example B, C.
So it's not the saga itself saying this, but the editor. The letters B. and C. designate surviving manuscripts which preserve versions of the Göngu-Hrólfs saga. On pages viii and ix, Rafn explains that B is Skinnbókin [Parchment] Nr. 343 í 4blf. (dated 1450-1475; in modern sources, this manuscript [handrit] is called AM 343 a 4to, and you can actually read it online here), and that C is Skinnbókin [Parchment] Nr. 510 í 4blf. (dated 1540-1560; in modern sources, this manuscript [handrit] is called AM 510 4to, and you can actually read it online here). We might have to check these original texts to see what they really say. But so far, it seems that Jackson has been a little sloppy in suggesting that this quote is found in Old Norse sources, because this is a footnote written by Rafn in Icelandic in 1830. The saga text itself, in front of footnote no. #4, actually says:
Þriðjúngr Garðaríkis er kallaðr Kænugarðar, þat liggr með fjallgarði þeim, er skilr Jötunheima ok Hólmgarðaríki, [þar er ok Ermland ok fleiri önnur smáríki.
In 1850, Rafn translated this sentence into Latin as:
Tertia pars regni Gardensis dicitur Kænogardi, sita secundum juga montium, quæ Jotunheimos et regnum Holmgardorum disterminant; ibidem est terra Ermionum pluraque alia regna minora...
This allows us, with some help from Google Translate, to render the sentence as follows:
The third part of Garðaríki / the Gardum kingdom is called Kænugarðar [Kyiv], it lies with the mountain range / yoke that separates Jötunheimr and Hólmgarðaríkí / the kingdom of the Holmgards; there is also Ermland and several other small kingdoms.
So the sentence is about the location of Kænugarðar [generally identified as Kyiv], which is supposedly located in a mountain range that separates Jötunheimr from Hólmgarðaríkí. I'm not sure, but last time I checked, Kyiv is located in the East European forest steppe / Dnieper basin, Novgorod lies in the Neva basin, Jötunheimr is a mythological place in the north that doesn't exist, and Ermland lies in the Polish lowlands. None of these places are particularly famous for mountain ranges. Be that as it may, there is no indication in this sentence at all that Hólmgarðr was the "capital" of Garðaríki. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 17:09, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Looking at the preceding sentence in the saga, it says Sigldi Hrólfr af Danmörk austr til Hólmgarða með 10 skipum, ok Íngigerðr með honum; var Hrólfr þar til konúngs tekinn ufir allt Garðaríki með ráði konúngsdóttur ok annarra ríkismanna. Hrólfr sailed from Denmark east to [the land?] of the Hólmgarða [accusative/genitive plural, see en:wikt:garðr ] with 10 ships, and Íngigerðr with him; until then Hrólfr was taken over as the king of all Garðaríki with the advice of the king's daughter and other statesmen. Rafn's Latin translation puts it slightly differently, Rolvus ex Dania orientem versus Holmgardos navigavit (....) hic Rolvus, consensu filiæ regiæ et procerum, rex totius Gardorum imperii creatus est. Rolvus sailed from Denmark to the east towards/against the Holmgardos [accusative plural] (...); here Rolvus, with the consent of the king's daughter and high [people], was made the king of the entire empire of the Gards. So it seems like in both cases, Holmgards and Gards are used in plural, interchangeably, and especially in the Latin translation as an ethnonym, the name for a people rather than a country or city. Literally, Hólmgarðar means "the island towns", Hólmgarðaríkí / regnum Holmgardorum "the kingdom of the island towns", and ufir allt Garðaríki / totius Gardorum imperii "of the entire empire of island towns". There is no indication here that Hólmgarðar refers to a specific city (let alone capital city); it wouldn't make grammatical sense, because it is plural. It's a mystery why Rafn speaks of Hólmgarðaborg [singular, adding -borg that isn't found in the text] when the text only says Hólmgarða and Hólmgarðaríkí [plural, without -borg]. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 17:48, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

PS: Tatjana Jackson 1984/2003/2015 isn't the first to mistakenly think that Rafn 1830's footnote asserting that "Hólmgarðaborg is the [fore]most residence of the Garða king" is part of the saga text itself. Moritz Haupt 1865 p. 346 says the same thing: "In manuscripts of the Göngu-Hrólfs saga it is expressly declared [selectively quotes footnote no. #4 in Rafn 1830 p. 362]". People seem to have a tendency to ignore the difference between the source text and footnote, and omit sigla they don't understand. I wouldn't have understood what B. and C. meant either if I didn't know about textual criticism, and looked up Rafn's critical apparatus on pages viii and ix of his book, where I found out he is referring to manuscripts. Haupt, Jackson and others have all missed that. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 07:02, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I should point out it's possible for an exonym (foreign name) of a state to be based on the name of a city that isn't actually the capital of that state. Example: The name Morocco in European languages is derived from the city of Marrakesh, but its actual capital is Rabat, and the native names are lmeɣrib (Tamazight) and al-maḡrib (Arabic), both of which mean "West" and are unrelated to Marrakesh. Similarly, Hólmgarðaríki could be derived from Hólmgarðr without it being the capital; even if its early capital may be uncertain, Kiev/Kyiv (native names) was certainly the capital of Rus' (native name) in later times. It's still possible for Hólmgarðr (and/or Novgorod) to have been the Rus' capital at a very early date, but the name itself can't tell us that. For example, Switzerland is named after Schwyz, which has never been its capital; the Old Swiss Confederacy never had a "capital" to begin with. Due to its apparent proximity to Scandinavia, Hólmgarðr may just have been the city that Norsemen were most familiar with, and so Hólmgarðaríki is an extension of the name of the city they knew to the state it was in. That fact alone doesn't make it its capital. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 07:37, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

• Reference no. 2#, Rafn 1830 p. 237: "…hann átti at ráða fyrir Hólmgarðaríki, er sumir menn kalla Garðaríki…", is the opening sentence of the Göngu-Hrólfs saga. Here we've got the same situation as I described in my previous comment: Hólmgarðaríkí (Refn's Latin: regno Holmgardorum, "in the kingdom of the Holmgards") and Garðaríki (Refn's Latin: regnum Gardorum, "the kingdom of the Gards") are used interchangeably. As a matter of fact, that they are synonyms is exactly what the opening sentence claims: he had ruled over Hólmgarðaríki, which some men call Garðaríki. Refn's Latin: is regno Holmgardorum, quod regnum Gardorum a quibusdam appellatur, praefuit he had ruled over the kingdom of the Holmgards, which was called the kingdom of the Gards by some people. In fact, if we search through a digitised version of the saga, the letter combination "Hólmgarð-" only occurs 5 times, in 3 cases in the form of Hólmgarðaríki, once as Hólmgarða (accusative/genitive plural) and once as Hólmgarði (dative singular, in chapter 32). That last one seems the only viable candidate for a city named Hólmgarðr. Let's look at it more closely. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 18:18, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Reading Jackson 1984 paper "O nazvanii Rusi Garðar" now.... Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 19:42, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Nothing special. She says the same as she wrote in English in 2003 and again in Russian in 2015. The passage in question doesn't reveal anything about Holmgarði being a city. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 20:24, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

1. Reference no. 1#, Vigfússon 1862 p. 133: "Hon segir Jarizleifi konungi at hann skal bafua hinn æzsla hlut Gardarikis en þat er Holmgard… Jarizleifr konungr skal vera yfir Gardariki", is two selective quotes from Eymundar þáttr Hringssonar (Flateyjarbók). The whole text mentions a "Holmgard" (not Hólmgarðr) 3 times. The 1944/45 version of Eymundar þáttr Hringssonar is probably closest to the Old Norse original. This is the first passage:

• Eymundr mælti: „Ef þér vilið þat ráð upp taka, sem mér er í skapi, ok mun ek segja yðr mína ætlan, ef þér vilið þat. Ek hefi frétt andlát Valdimars konungs austan ór Garðaríki, ok hafa nú þat ríki synir hans þrír, hinir ágætustu menn. En hann skipti með þeim ríkinu varla at jafnaði, því at nú hefir einn meira ríki en hinir tveir, ok heitir einn Búrizlafr, er mest hefir af föðurleifðinni, ok er hann þeirra elztr. Annarr heitir Jarizleifr, hinn þriði Vartilafr. Búrizlafr hefir Kænugarðr, ok er hann bezt ríki í öllu Garðaríki. Jarizleifr hefir Hólmgarðr, en hinn þriði Palteskju ok þat ríki allt, er þar liggr til.
  • (Google Translated) Eymundr said: "If you want to take the advice that is in my mood, and I will tell you my plan, if you want it." I have heard of the death of King Valdimar from the east of Garðaríki, and now his three sons, the best men, have the kingdom. But he divided the kingdom with them hardly equally, because now one has more kingdom than the other two, and one is called Búrizlafr, who has most of the inheritance from his father, and he is the eldest of them. Another is called Jarizleifr, the third Vartilafr. Búrizlafr has Kænugarðr, and it is the best kingdom in all Garðaríki. Jarizleifr has Hólmgarðr, but the third is Palteskja and all the kingdom that lies there.
    • That seems pretty clear: Valdimar (Volodimer I of Kiev) has divided his kingdom unequally between his three sons, giving the largest portion, Kænugarðr [Kyiv], "the best kingdom in all Garðaríki", to his oldest son Búrizlafr (who can't easily be identified with any of Volodimer's sons, but would fit the position of Sviatopolk_I_of_Kiev#Biography_according_to_foreign_sources), the second-largest portion, Hólmgarðr, to his second son Jarizleifr (easily identifiable as Yaroslav the Wise), and the last portion, Palteskja [Polotsk], to his youngest son Vartilafr (who is difficult to identify; it might be Bryachislav of Polotsk, who was actually a grandson rather than son of Volodimer I). It's evident that Kænugarðr, Hólmgarðr and Palteskja are meant to be capital cities of some of the most prominent principalities within Kievan Rus', although which one Hólmgarðr is supposed to be is unclear. According to the Primary Chronicle and Novgorod First Chronicle, the most prominent three principalities of Kievan Rus' in the 11th century are Principality of Kiev, Principality of Pereyaslavl, and Principality of Chernigov. We can already see Palteskja/Polotsk is not in that group, even though Kænugarðr/Kiev is. Identifying Hólmgarðr with Chernigov or Pereyaslavl also seems difficult. It could still be Novgorod, but the text doesn't give us a reason to assume that. What is clear, however, is that Kænugarðr is the most important city within Garðaríki, before Hólmgarðr. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 20:57, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

@Nederlandse Leeuw:, so far I will answer regarding the first reference.

1) Pieces of text varying from manuscript to manuscript are often placed in footnotes in modern editions of sagas, and the footnote no. 4 on page 362 of that Rafn's edition of Göngu-Hrólfs saga is not an exception: it contains text fragments from the saga word for word, along with auxiliary letters denoting manuscript versions (A, B, C etc.) and special abbreviations like b.v., i.e. bæta við, meaning "add", in order to instruct the reader to add the fragment (written in this footnote) right after the place where the footnote's number appears in the main text, to make it look like the text in the respective versions. Also, smaller fragments within parenthesis should be appended on top of that, where indicated, to get the text from a specific version (whose letter appears nearby). That is

⁴) í Hólmgarðaborg er mest atsetr Garðakonúngs, þat er nú (allt C,) kallat Nógarðar (ok Rúðzaland, C,) b. v. B, C.

should be perceived as "Add this fragment after ⁴) in the main text to make it look like the versions B and C. Besides, add allt after nú and ok Rúðzaland after Nógarðar to see the text from the version C." Note that those auxiliary letters and abbreviations showing up in footnotes are written in italics as well as the editor's own comments (like in the footnote no. 5: hèr endar öldúngis). So this footnote helps you reconstruct exactly what the versions B and C of the saga are saying, not Rafn.

Please, don't call a renowned scholar "sloppy". Tatjana Jackson can read Old Norse texts in the original and she doesn't nead any intermediary to learn what is actually written there. Perhaps she resorted to the authority of Carl Christian Rafn solely to supply her readers with a reliable source which could be checked (a common practice in the scientfic community). The Rafn's book contains clearly readable text unlike the original manuscripts after all.

2) You mistakenly refered me to some other manuscripts (Nr. 343 and Nr. 510), related to SAGAN AF HERRAUDI OK BOSA mentioned by Rafn on pages viii and ix of his book. Pages ix and x actually contain the Rafn's commentary on GAUNGU-HROLFS SAGA (Göngu-Hrólfs saga), where he mentions four related manuscripts: Nr. 152 (A), Nr. 2845 (B), Nr. 589f (C), and Nr. 592e (D). We are interested in checking the versions B and C since they mention Hólmgarðaborg and Nógarðar.

If you look at page 54v of the version B, at the end of the 5th line from the bottom, you will see: "holmg(ar)ða", and then, on the next line (i.e. the 4th from the bottom): "b(or)g". The following "e(r) mest(r) atset(r)" is much less readable, but still you can guess the content of that part of the line. Then you see: "g(ar)ða k(onung)s þ(at) er nu kallað nog(ar)ðar". I noticed only two small things, making this fragment different from what Rafn wrote in that footnote:

• there is no "í" before "Hólmgarðaborg" - instead of that letter you can see something like rⁱ, which is an abbreviated form of "ríki", i.e. a part of the preceeding word "smáríki" in the saga's text
• the word "kallað" ends with "ð", not with "t" as in the Rafn's book

I think these differences are negligible, they don't change the meaning of the text. The text fragment looks like this in the manuscript B:

If you look at page 36r of the version C, in the last line at the bottom of the page, you will see: "i holmg(ar)ða b(or)g er mest(r) atset(r) garða k(onun)gs þ(at) er nu allt" and on the next page (36v) it will take some effort to see "kallat nog(ar)ðar ok ruðzala(n)d" (probably you will need to play with the contrast settings of the picture). The text fragment looks like this in the manuscript C:

The abbreviations are slightly different in this manuscript, e.g. some special symbol is used as "er". But, anyway, the text is the same as in the Rafn's book.

In order to understand the Old Norse scribal abbreviations I used the following sources:

• Hreinn Benediktsson: 1965. Abbreviations, Word division and Punctuation. Early Icelandic Script as Illustrated in Vernacular Texts from the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries. (Reykjavík, 1965), pp. 85–95.
• Roberto Luigi Pagani: 2019. Icelandic abbreviations, a small reference list. (Háskóli Íslands, 2019)
• Driscoll, M. J.: Marking up abbreviations in Old Norse-Icelandic manuscripts, Medieval texts – contemporary media: The art and science of editing in the digital age, ed. M. G. Saibene & M. Buzzoni (Pavia, 2009), pp. 13-34.
• Brendan Swalm: 2017. A Prototype Digital Edition of the Old Norse Hreiðars þáttr heimska. Thesis presented in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Digital Humanities (Leuven, 2017)
• The Menota handbook: Guidelines for the electronic encoding of Medieval Nordic primary sources. Chapter 6. Gen. ed. Odd Einar Haugen. Version 2.0. Bergen: Medieval Nordic Text Archive, 2008

3) For the moment it doesn't matter where exactly Jötunheimr or Ermland was, since what we are talking about now is a saga mentioning Hólmgarðr/Hólmgarðaborg as the capital of Garðaríki. So the usage of the respective quotation is justified here: it comes from a renowned scholar, it closely follows the manuscript originals, and it simply supports the text of this Wikipedia article. Alexschneider250 (talk) 19:02, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

@Alexschneider250 Absolutely fascinating!! I am astonished. I stand corrected, I made a few mistakes in understanding Rafn's footnote and his critical apparatus, and so I referred you to the wrong manuscripts. You are right that this phrase does show up in at least two manuscripts of the saga, B. (GKS 2845 4to) and C. (AM 589 f 4to), although not in A. (AM 152 1-2 fol.?), which Rafn appears to have used for his reconstruction of the text (if I understand it correctly?). The question then is whether this phrase about Hólmgarðaborg and Nógarðar was present in the original saga's text, but omitted from A. (written in Iceland ca 1300-1525. according to handrit.is), or whether the original text didn't have this phrase, A. faithfully copied it, but it was interpolated at some point and showed up in B. (1440-1460 according to handrit.is) and C. (dated to the second half of the 15th century (cf. ONPRegistre , p. 456), but to the 15th century in Katalog I according to handrit.is). That's not something you and I can conclude merely on the basis of how old each manuscript is, or the fact that B & C versus A is 2 versus 1. I know that both possibilities exist. Tatjana Jackson implies that we should believe B. and C. to be original, but Rafn omits them from his (apparently A-based) edition and notes them as textual variants in a footnote. (It looks like digitised editions such as Bjarnason at snerpa.is and Jonsson/Vilhjálmsson at heimskringla.no also base themselves on some critical edition that doesn't mention Hólmgarðaborg and Nógarðar, and they don't mention it in any footnotes either). The only thing we now know is that Hólmgarðaborg is called the Garðar king's foremost residence in at least two 15th-century copies of the saga, which is significant whichever way we look at it, even if this phrase might turn out to be a later interpolation.

I do think that means we have to treat this passage a bit more carefully in our Wikipedia article here. Something like two 15th-century copies of the Göngu-Hrólfs saga state that the city of Hólmgarðr (Hólmgarðaborg) was the "foremost residence of the king of Garðar", while a (probably earlier) copy does not contain this phrase.?

But would we need to find a secondary source stating this? Because we are very close to personally interpreting the primary sources (which is very interesting, but which Wikipedians shouldn't do). I'll leave it here for now. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 19:59, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

This is the second passage:

• Þeir Eymundr létta nú eigi fyrr sinni ferð en þeir koma austr í Hólmgarð til Jarizleifs konungs.
  • (Google Translated) The Eymunds ease their journey no sooner than they come east to Hólmgarð to King Jarizleif.
    • This is again probably identifying Hólmgarð as a city (although we still don't know which), and the residence of King Jarizleif (but his kingdom is less important than that of his elder brother Búrizlafr in Kænugarðr/Kiev). Apart from that, this tells us nothing new. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 21:03, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

The third and final passage mentioning Hólmgarð needs some context. Jarizleifr kills his brother Búrizlafr, and then the family gets together to solve the situation and Jarizleifr says he has brought dishonour upon himself by killing his brother:

• Eymundr konungr mælti: „Ekki latta ek, at yðvarr sómi væri görr.“ Þá var blásit til móts ok sagt, at Ingigerðr drottning vill tala við konunga ok liðsmenn þeirra, ok er liðit kom saman, þá sjá menn, at Ingigerðr drottning er í flokki þeirra Eymundar konungs ok Norðmanna. Er nú boðit af hendi Vartilafs konungs, at drottning skuli gera. Hon segir Jarizleifi konungi, at hann skal hafa hinn æðsta hlut Garðaríkis, en þat er Hólmgarð, - „en Vartilafr skal hafa Kænugarð. Þat er annat bezt ríki með sköttum ok skyldum. Þat er hálfu meira ríki en hann hefir áðr haft. En Palteskju ok þat ríki, er þar liggr til, skal hafa Eymundr konungr ok vera þar konungr yfir ok hafa allar landskyldir óskerðar, þær er þar liggja til, því at vér viljum hann eigi í brott ór Garðaríki. Ef Eymundr konungr á erfingja eftir sik, þá sé þeir erfingjar eftir hann at því ríki, en ef hann á engan son eftir sik, þá skal hverfa aftir til þeirra bræðra. Eymundr konungr skal ok hafa landvörn fyrir þeim bræðrum ok öllu Garðaríki, en þeir skulu efla hann at liði ok sínum styrk. Jarizleifr konungr skal vera yfir Garðaríki.
  • (Google Translated) King Eymund said: "I don't care that your honour is bad." Then a meeting was held and it was said that Queen Ingigerðr wanted to speak with the kings and their relatives, and when the group gathered, people saw that Queen Ingigerðr was in the party of King Eymund and the Norsemen. It is now offered by King Vartilafs that the queen should act. She tells King Jarizleif that he shall have the highest part of Garðaríki, which is Hólmgard, - "but Vartilafr shall have Kænugard." It is the second-best kingdom with taxes and duties. It is half as much power as he had before. But Palteskja and the kingdom that lies there shall be owned by King Eymund and he shall be king over it and shall have all land obligations intact, which lie there, because we do not want him to leave the kingdom of Garðaríki. If King Eymund has heirs after him, then they shall be heirs after him in that kingdom, but if he has no son left, then it shall return to those brothers. King Eymund shall also have the defence of the land against those brothers and the entire Garðaríki, but they shall strengthen him with their troops and their strength. King Jarizleifr shall be in charge of Garðaríki.
    • So what we have here is a rearrangement of the balance of power. At the beginning of the story, Búrizlafr has Kænugarðr, and it is the best kingdom in all Garðaríki. Jarizleifr has Hólmgarðr, but the third is Palteskja [for Vartilafr]. At the end, Jarizleifr still has Hólmgarðr, but that is now the highest part of Garðaríki, Vartilafr shall have Kænugard, now the second-best kingdom, and king Eymund, an external party, receives Palteskja. According to this saga, at the end Hólmgarðr is indeed the capital of Garðaríki, but until the end it was Kænugard. Although it contains some elements of historical truth, obviously this story is largely fictional. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 21:27, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

@Nederlandse Leeuw: I am checking your assumptions. It will take some time.

Alexschneider250 (talk) 22:57, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi Alex, that's fine. It took me several hours to read and write all this down, so take your time. :-) Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 23:31, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Textual criticism

@Alexschneider250 Hi, it's been a while since we last discussed the Old Norse sagas here. You seem to have a lot of knowledge of the study of Old Norse sagas / Icelandic manuscripts; the kinds of things you explained to me on this talk page could be very valuable to readers of Wikipedia as well.

Do you think it may be a good idea to create an article on Textual criticism of Icelandic manuscripts, Textual criticism of Old Norse sagas or Textual criticism of Old Norse literature? (We'll have to come up with a good title; I've based the first on P. M. W. Robinson (1989). "Collation and Textual Criticism of Icelandic Manuscripts (1): Collation". Literary and Linguistic Computing. Retrieved 4 May 2023.). This could be along the lines of Textual criticism of the New Testament and Textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible (and the book Textual Criticism and Qurʼān Manuscripts). Earlier this morning I also suggested at Talk:Rus' chronicle to create an article called Textual criticism of the Rus' chronicles for the same purpose.

There is so much interesting knowledge and information to be shared about the textual study of these ancient and medieval sources that they should probably have their own dedicated Wikipedia articles. Please let me know what you think. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 09:12, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi, it sounds reasonable, however I doubt whether I can actively participate right now, due to the lack of time. So far I would rather focus on improving already existing articles (adding pictures, references, etc.), and on translating them into other languages.

One more thing, I'm not particularly fond of the topic of criticising literature (esp. sagas), since it seems to be about some kind of faultfinding rather than enjoying the stretch of imagination, the beauty of someone's mind creation. Surely sagas or other literature shouldn't be regarded as the ultimate tool to support some historical facts (let alone politically loaded ones). But, in general, creating an article about that seems to be reasonable, and the title "Textual criticism of Old Norse literature" sounds the best, in my opinion, since it gives you more freedom in case you want to add some information not specifically related to Icelandic manuscripts or to sagas, although it would not match the article about Rus' chronicles well (as far as I understand, you want these two articles to be "of the same kind").

So it's up to you, it depends on what you want to write about. I would just keep in mind that the terms "manuscripts", "sagas", "chronicles" cannot be really used interchangeably, nor can "Icelandic" and "Old Norse" be used interchangeably, nor can be "Rus'" as a particular polity and "Rus'" as a vast ethno-cultural region be used interchangeably. Alexschneider250 (talk) 18:45, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

References

Just passing by, Alexschneider250 is it possible to merge the references? I think 12 in a row for one thing is WP:OVERKILL. Thanks. Mellk (talk) 20:50, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I totally agree, there are too many references around some sentences right now, which makes the article text less readable. But, as far as I know, merging them will make it impossible to keep the respective quotations, which I consider to be important, taking into account how sensitive this topic is, and how many people are going to doubt every word of the article.

So I will try to split those references into groups, leaving only a few most important ones in a particular sentence, while placing the rest in an explanatory footnote together with some accompanying text. For example, I can leave only 3 or 4 references to scholars' opinions regarding the capital of Garðaríki in the article text, while moving the direct references to sagas to a special footnote with suitable explanation. Would it be all right? Alexschneider250 (talk) 21:46, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes I think that works. Thanks. Mellk (talk) 21:51, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

@Mellk: I have finally accomplished that. Now there are only 4 references and one footnote with the rest of them around each of those sentences (ending with "Veliky Novgorod" and "the capital of Garðaríki"). Could you please check and say your opinion. Alexschneider250 (talk) 20:36, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Looks like an improvement, thanks. Mellk (talk) 19:54, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Also, should it say "Ladoga" rather than "Old Ladoga"? As "Old" was added later. Mellk (talk) 19:05, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it should be "Ladoga", thank you for pointing that out. But I will keep "Old Ladoga" in quotes translations where appropriate. Alexschneider250 (talk) 19:07, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

For the map, what is meant by "Rus' names"? Are these the modern names in English applied to the settlements? Mellk (talk) 10:48, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

@Alexschneider250 Hey, also just passing by, I wanted to thank you for your many recent contributions, especially the etymology of Garðaríki infographic. That must've been a lot of work, I'm impressed! Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 11:03, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

No, these are not their modern names. These are the names of the respective historical towns mentioned in the bulk of literature in English about Old Rus'. Alexschneider250 (talk) 23:24, 20 July 2023 (UTC)