Weis' "Ancestral Roots . . ." (147:23), (241:4). Known as Saint Vladimir. Illigitimate; his mother was a servant of his father. Also referred to as "The Great".

In spite of his grandmother's conversion to Christianity, Vladimir was raised a heathen and indulged in the excesses which were available to a Russian prince at that time. Historians record that he engaged in "unbridled dissipation," and they name him a "flagrant polygamist." In addition to his wife, Ragnilda, he had five other wives and many female slaves. By these women he had ten sons and two daughters. As a reward for helping to defend against the advance of Bulgarian armies and an uprising in Asia Minor, Vladimir asked for Emperor Basil II's sister Anna in marriage. A threat to march on Constantinople was made if his proposal was refused. The Emperor replied that his sister was a Christian and could not marry a heathen, but if Vladimir were a Christian prince, he would sanction the marriage. Vladimir agreed to be baptized and received the Sacrament in the year 988.
The Christianization of Russia is reckoned from that year. Upon arriving back at Kiev, Vladimir saw to the conversion of his subjects and ordered the destruction of the statues of the gods. The wooden statue of the god Perum (the god of thunder and lightning) was torn from its pedestal and was dragged through the mud to the River Knieper, where it was thrown into the water. The destruction of the idols was so impressive that the people readily followed the example of their monarch and accepted Christianity. In the Russian Orthodox and Ruthenian Greek Catholic calendars, St. Vladimir's feast is celebrated on July 15. Because he was canonized before the Great Schism, he is also recognized by Rome as a saint of the Universal Church."

It was early in the time of Vladimir that a new element of enormous significance entered the life and culture of Kiev: Christianity. The new Christian civilization of Kievan Russia produced impressive results as early as the first half of the 11th century, adding literary and artistic attainment to the political power and high economic development characteristic of the age.166

After the death of his mother Olga in 969, Sviatoslav, constantly away with the army, entrusted the administration of the Kiev area to his elder son Iaropolk, dispatched the second son Oleg to govern the territory of the Drevliane, and sent the third, the young Vladimir, with an older relative to manage Novgorod. A civil war among the brothers followed Sviatoslav's death. At first Iaropolk had the upper hand, Oleg perishing in the struggle and Vladimir escaping abroad. But in two years Vladimir returned and with foreign mercenaries and local support defeated and killed Iaropolk. About 980 he became the ruler of the entire Kievan realm.166

Vladimir, who reigned until 1015, continued in most respects the policies of his predecessors. Among the East Slavs, he reaffirmed the authority of the Kievan state which had been badly shaken during the years of civil war. He recovered Galician towns from Poland and further to the north, subdued the warlike Baltic tribe of the Latvigs, extending his domain in that area to the Baltic Sea. Vladimir also contained the Pechenegs. He built fortresses and towns, brought settlers into the frontier districts, and managed to push the steppe border to two days, rather than a single day, of travel time from Kiev. However, his great fame rests on his relations with Byzantium, and most especially, on his adoption of Christianity, which proved to be of immense significance and long outlasted the specific political and cultural circumstances that led to the step.166

In the first part of Vladimir's reign, Kievan Russia experienced a strong pagan revival. Vladimir's turnabout and the resulting "baptism of Russia" were accompanied by a series of developments: Vladimir's military aid to Emperor Basil II of Byzantium, the siege and capture by the Russians of the Byzantine outpost of Chersonesus in the Crimea, and Vladimir's marriage to Anne, Basil II's sister in 989. The Kievan Russians formally accepted Christianity from Constantinople in or around 988.166

There is a legendary account of how the Russians selected their religion, spurning Islam because it prohibited alcohol-for "drink is the joy of the Russian"- and Judaism because it expressed the beliefs of a defeated people without a state.166

In choosing Christianity, the Russians opened wide the gates for the highly developed Byzantine culture to enter their land. Kievan literature, art, law, manners, and customs experienced a fundamental impact of Byzantium. Christianity did not remain confined to the Church, permeating instead Kievan society and culture. In politics too, it gave the Kievan prince and state a stronger ideological basis. Russian allegiance to the Byzantine Church rather than the Roman Church helped to determine much of the subsequent history of Russia. It meant that Russia remained outside the Roman Catholic Church, and this in turn not only deprived Russia of what that church itself had to offer, but also contributed in a major way to the relative isolation of Russia from the rest of Europe and its Latin civilization. It helped to inspire Russian suspicions of the West and the tragic enmity between the Russians and the Poles. Vladimir was canonized by the Church as the baptizer of the Russians. His death in 1015 led to another civil war.166

Only after the Christianization of Russia in 988 or 989 by Sviatoslav's son, Vladimir, did literacy and literature appear among these Slavs, and only from that time can historians observe the first blossoming of early Russian culture.167

After the Russians' conversion to Christianity at the insistence of the Kievan Prince Vladimir (ruled 980-1015), Byzantine culture in its Slavicized forms won the dominant position for the next seven centuries. Kiev itself, became one of the wealthiest and most animated cities of medieval Europe, richer and more brilliant than Paris or London of the time. It was adorned with innumerable churches.167