Our Lady’s Mantle
Shortly after Askold and Dir founded Kiev in 862, they launched a brazen but ill-fated assault on the capital of the Roman Empire.
?866
Roman Empire (Byzantine Era) 330-1453
Shortly after Askold and Dir founded Kiev in 862, they launched a brazen but ill-fated assault on the capital of the Roman Empire.
?866
Roman Empire (Byzantine Era) 330-1453
In the 860s, just as the Great Army led by Vikings Ingwaer and Halfdan was swarming over England, Viking warlords Askold and Dir were establishing the great cities of Novgorod and Kiev as the foundations of Rus’. Almost at once the pagan settlers set their sights on the greatest prize of all, Constantinople, capital of the Roman Empire.
IN around 866,* Kiev’s Viking founders, Askold and Dir, crossed the Black Sea with many ships to lay siege to Constantinople, mighty capital of the Roman Empire, while Emperor Michael III was away dealing with an Arab assault on the eastern border. Michael raced back into his capital and his palace, the Blachernae, and at once summoned Patriarch Photius to join him for urgent prayer in the nearby church, where the robe, mantle and belt of the Virgin Mary herself had been kept since the fifth century.
After a long night’s vigil, at which the assembled citizens sang again a hymn to Mary that had helped drive off the Arabs a generation earlier, the Patriarch and his clergy bore her mantle down to the Black Sea, and with the utmost reverence dipped it into the gently lapping waters.* At once, a lively wind picked up, the waters skipped, and soon Askold’s fleet, two hundred strong, was being helplessly tossed and splintered on the shore.
The story and dramatis personae as given here follow ‘The Tale of Past Years’ fairly uncritically; the reader should be aware that scholars today are sceptical. However, some kind of an assault on the City in 866 or so, emanating from Kievan Rus’, seems reasonably well-established.
The sources do not state precisely which item of clothing was used.
Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.
Who ordered the assault on Constantinople in 866?
Askold and Dir, Vikings who founded Kiev.
Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.
Askold wanted Constantinople’s wealth. He had nothing to trade for it. He attacked the city.