Lot 34A
Northern Europe/Central Asia, Viking period, Russia (Kievan Rus), ca. 10th to 11th century CE. A pair of bronze rings from after the period of conversion in Viking Russia. One has, cast as part of the band, a figure of crucified Christ. The other, which is white bronze, with a high tin alloy, has a slight widening of the band into a square face with a relief cross on it. Size: 0.85" W (2.2 cm); Christ ring is US size: 8.25; Cross ring is US size: 6.25.
These rings are relics from one of the most momentous events in northern European history: the conversion of Germanic peoples from paganism to Christianity. The Vikings were some of the last holdouts in an increasingly Christian Europe, and the Vikings who had settled in western Russia saw many missions throughout the 9th and 10th centuries. Christian Slavonic sources somewhat hysterically decried the entrenched paganism of these people, and further contact between members of the Rus and Christians were recorded throughout the early 10th century, with members of the Byzantine court taken by the ruling regent of Rus, Olga of Kiev, who came to visit the Emperor Constantine VII and left with a bishop and priests from Rome. Paganism was once again brought to the forefront by Olga's grandson, Vladimir the Great, who had an idol to the chief deity, Perun, placed on a hill by his palace. However, he was a final holdout, and in the year 986 or 987, he spoke with representatives of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (supposedly rejecting the latter because of their restriction on alcohol) and, in exchange for a Byzantine bride and a military alliance, he was baptized as a Christian and exhorted his people into the Dnieper River at Kiev for a mass baptism. This is marked as the true end of paganism for the people who were once Vikings in Russia, and this cross is a beautiful reminder of their new devotion.
Provenance: private Orange County, California, USA collection
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#129929
- Condition: Both have dark patina. The band of the one with the cross has an area of corrosion, but it is stable and the ring is very wearable, as is the other.
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