Talk:Conversion of Vladimir the Great

Publications

I think the article is very well done. If you want to add a secondary source, where the primary is, I read a very close text here: Golubinsky and Petrukhin. Nikolay Omonov (talk) 15:31, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

@Nikolay Omonov Thanks, but I haven't really done much yet. ;) This is just the beginning.

Golubinsky and Petrukhin look like a good source for you to cite from, if you like? You are better at Russian-language sources, I prefer to stick to English-language ones. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 17:03, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

Evgeny Golubinsky lived more than a hundred years ago, but he is still considered a good historian and he is quoted by contemporary historians.

Vladimir Petrukhin is a contemporary historian quoted by other historians; he wrote some books on the history of Rus', many articles in peer reviewed journals and he was the editor of some encyclopedias and dictionaries. Nikolay Omonov (talk) 18:19, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

Spelling

In case anyone might wonder about the spelling of the name Volodimer: it follows the spelling as used in each of the scholarly WP:RS sources cited or directly quoted. The great majority of modern scholars spell it as Volodimer (especially after 1970), a small minority (usually older ones from before 1970) as Vladimir, very few as Volodymyr, and none that I could find as Uladzimir. Therefore, I do not follow the spelling used by main article Vladimir the Great, because this article is an analysis of the historical texts (which virtually unanimously call him Володимѣръ), not about the historical person, and this is what the scholarly sources say.

About the name of the capital city, the text is fully aligned with WP:KIEV/WP:KYIV: whenever a quote calls the city Kyiv or Kiev, the spelling of the quote is followed; whenever there is no direct citation of any quote, the default spelling is Kiev. Spellings in quotes should never be changed, but all names of the city outside of quotes should be Kiev.

Just saying this up front, because I'm not looking for any pointless, silly, spelling-related editwars. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 18:31, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I think the title of the article should follow Vladimir the Great per WP:CONSUB. Your claims about the spelling 'Volodimer' do not match my experience at all. I also don't think an article like this can be about texts. It must be about the conversion of Vladimir. In that vein, I think the first sentence is problematic. Why would "Conversion of Volodimer" refer to "a narrative" rather than "how Volodimer I of Kiev converted from Slavic paganism to Byzantine Christianity"? Srnec (talk) 01:09, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

WP:CONSUB states: An exception to this rule is where a specific subtopic has its own common name, which is therefore likely to be the more natural or recognizable title. That is the case with the conversion of Volodimer as a subtopic. Scholarly RS such as Ostrowski and Poppe name him Volodimer. Occasionally someone writing specifically about the conversion narrative may call him "Vladimir" or "Volodymyr", but not "the Great".

Why would "Conversion of Volodimer" refer to "a narrative" rather than "how Volodimer I of Kiev converted from Slavic paganism to Byzantine Christianity"?

Because that is what the scholarly RS are calling it. It is a narrative, or story, which has been transmitted in multiple different versions. (Ostrowski argues that 5 different traditions have been combined into the PVL account, but several more at Sylvester's disposal were discarded, including the traditions in which Volodimer was baptised in Kiev, Vasilev, or elsewhere other than Chersonesus). The jury is still out what actually happened. The purpose of this article is not to say what happened, because we don't know. What the article does do is a critical analysis of the primary sources on the basis of scholarly secondary sources. It shows that these scholars also disagree amongst themselves what happened. Shepard 1992, for example, believes parts of Marwazi's account "strongly corroborate" the PVL, while Ostrowski 2006 rejects such assertions, saying neither is particularly credible. The earliest sources are probably more credible, but even those contradict each other, such as on the sequence of events, why the baptism happened etc. I haven't studied Poppe 1988 extensively yet, but he examined those more thoroughly.

While I personally do believe Volodimer was baptised at some point, it seems to have been primarily for the purpose of marrying Anna the Byzantine princess as part of a marriage alliance. Conversion for marriage purposes happens all the time throughout history whenever the prospective partners have a different religion. The conversion doesn't necessarily have to be particularly impactful, influential or sincere; it's just a necessary prerequisite for the marriage to take place in a certain house of worship under the blessing of a certain cleric of a certain denomination before a certain deity (or group of deities). All other elements of these traditions (all written by clerics promoting their own religious denominations) are less credible, and contain various hagiographic commonplaces, which are often copied from or inspired by existing stories that had already been in circulation for centuries earlier (as Poppe and Ostrowski have shown). Cross 1930 already pointed out that the Great Schism of 1054 hadn't happened yet, and later scholars also observed that there seems to be anti-Roman Catholic rhetoric against "the Germans" in the PVL account which we don't find in earlier sources. Obviously, Thietmar was a German bishop himself, but still called Anna "a decent wife from Greece" who converted Volodimer to "the Holy faith of Christianity". He saw no difference between "Latin" and "Byzantine" Christianity yet. Of course not. He died decades before the 1054 East-West Schism happened.

So, I don't think we can say "how", nor "Byzantine" Christianity, nor that Volodimer was necessarily particularly serious about the conversion other than a symbolic baptism for marriage purposes. But that is what I think. Scholars continue to debate this, and this article is about that scholarly examination and debate of what we can say about the primary sources. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 05:53, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

That is the case with the conversion of Volodimer as a subtopic. Scholarly RS such as Ostrowski and Poppe name him Volodimer. Occasionally someone writing specifically about the conversion narrative may call him "Vladimir" or "Volodymyr", but not "the Great". I disagree. "Conversion of Volodimer" is not the name of the subtopic. I get less hits in GScholar for it than for "Conversion of Vladimir the Great". Your own remark shows that you are not talking about the subtopic, but about the name of the individual in a particular subset of sources. Again, more hits for "Vadimir's conversion" than "Volodimir's conversion".

Most things in history are preserved as narrative. Many are doubtful. Scholars are often in disagreement. What makes this one special? I think the encyclopedic approach is to state what the conversion of Vladimir was and only then move on to source analysis. We are written for a general audience. I think a first sentence like the current one is rather offputting for the average reader, is probably more interested in (1) did it happen? (2) when? (3) by whom? (4) what did it mean at the time? And so on.

Also, if there are multiple independent contradictory accounts, doesn't that suggest we are dealing not with a single narrative but with several narratives with a single event at the core? Srnec (talk) 20:48, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

You're making some good points. How would you phrase the first sentence? Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 15:57, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps we could speak of narratives, plural, but I'm not sure if there was a single event at the core. Unless you want to make that event the baptism itself, but that is usually described in a single sentence (e.g. The Bishop of Kherson, together with the Princess's priests, after announcing the tidings, baptized Vladimir, and as the Bishop laid his hand upon him, he straightway received his sight. in the Cross & SW PVL translation of 1953). Scholars such as Poppe, Ostrowski, Shepard etc. look at the whole context and speak of 'conversion', from the moment Volodimer receives the first missionaries on page 84.6 of th PVL until he finally gets baptised on page 112, and the whole conversion story ends at 121.24 (6497 (989) After these events, Volodimer said: I live in the law of Christianity. I think about building a church of the Holy Mother of God....). Similarly in Marwazi, the story doesn't start and end with a baptism (there is no "baptism" in Islam in the first place); it starts with an introduction about who the Rus' are, that they used to be pagans, then converted to Christianity, then yearned to be Muslims, then V.ladmir sent out messagers to Khwarezm etc. The stories about missionaries, messengers, the siege of Chersonesus, Volodimer being struck by blindness and then cured through baptism all play a part in the PVL account, and some of those stories/elements can be found back in other accounts. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 16:28, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Support moving to Conversion of Vladimir the Great or Baptism of Vladimir the Great. There is no such common name. "Volodimer" and "Volodimerovichi" is rarely used in comparison that it is pushing a POV. Even "Volodymyr" is more commonly used. Mellk (talk) 06:07, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

Requested move 13 February 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Silikonz💬 03:21, 20 February 2024 (UTC)

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Conversion of Volodimer → Conversion of Vladimir the Great – Per WP:CONSUB and the section above. Srnec (talk) 01:01, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

• Support per consistency. Walrasiad (talk) 18:35, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
• Support per above. Mellk (talk) 03:42, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.