That’s wierd, I thought Veliky Novgorod was the ‘birthplace of old russia’, and it’s nowhere near Ukraine:
https://www.visitnovgorod.com/novgorod/discover_novgorod/The_birthplace_of_Russia.html
Ah, yes. Novgorod the Golden, as they called it.
True, that clown gets the basic facts wrong and I’m supposed to consider what he says seriously?
You know this -
Kiev was the capital of Kiev-n-Rus from the 6th Century to the 16th Century, and the jurisdiction went roughly from the North Sea to the Urals, down to the Black Sea.
Ivan the Terrible reduced Ukraine (borderland), to the borders we see roughly today. Granted it has been disputed and taken, and retaken several times.
From two of my Russian History pro’s in Moscow, between Lenin/Stalin to Khrushchev, approximately 12.5 Million Ukrainian people were either killed, or intentionally starved to death, excluding WWII.
THAT IS BAD -
Many were sent to Siberia and replaced with “White Russians”.
Ukraine wasn’t alone in thos strategy. Much of the Warsaw Pact experienced the same in varying degrees.
You know this -
Kiev was the capital of Kiev-n-Rus from the 6th Century to the 16th Century, and the jurisdiction went roughly from the North Sea to the Urals, down to the Black Sea.
Ivan the Terrible reduced Ukraine (borderland), to the borders we see roughly today, while creating Russia.
So yes, simplified, a common history, but two countries historically.
Granted it has been disputed and taken, and retaken several times.
From two of my Russian History prof’s in Moscow, between Lenin/Stalin to Khrushchev, approximately 12.5 Million Ukrainian people were either killed, or intentionally starved to death, excluding “The Great War (WWII).
THAT IS BAD -
Many were sent to Siberia and replaced with “White Russians”.
Ukraine wasn’t alone in thos strategy. Much of the Warsaw Pact experienced the same in varying degrees.
It is ludicrous for Russia to claim and attack Ukraine on that basis. It would be like England claiming and then attacking and seizing Denmark and Norway because, after all, in the same era, England's King Alfred the Great defeated the Vikings, thereby giving England a claim in perpetuity to all their lands and territories.
Or, in the Middle East context, it would be like modern Egypt claiming Israel on the basis that the Jews, as Egypt's runaway slaves, owed themselves and their territories to Egypt.
Kyiv was the birthplace of the Rus as a people - and the "Rus" include the later daughter countries of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine
The Slav populated the Ukraine region
The reference is to the Kievian Rus of which Novgorod was the second largest city. Oleg of Novgorod conquored Kiev in the early 10th century, and became ruler of the Kievian Rus, consolidating it into a “state”, previously a looser domain, and is often considered the founder of the “state”, though the Rus predated it by around a century. Novgorod remained the second largest city. Lots of legend here. Of course these were Norse, not slavs. Rus which evolved to Russia generally translated as Swedish or northmen. As elsewhere the Norse population becoming absorbed. Both are reasonably termed “birthplace”, though culturally Russia is Slavic not Norse, thus both incorrect in a cultural sense.