In the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, the Volga trade route connected

Northern Europe The northern region of Europe has several definitions. A restrictive definition may describe northern Europe as being roughly north of the southern coast of the Baltic Sea, which is about 54th parallel north, 54°N, or may be based on other ge ...

and Northwestern

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

with the

Caspian Sea The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, described as the List of lakes by area, world's largest lake and usually referred to as a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia: east of the Caucasus, ...

and the

Sasanian Empire The Sasanian Empire (), officially Eranshahr ( , "Empire of the Iranian peoples, Iranians"), was an List of monarchs of Iran, Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651. Enduring for over four centuries, th ...

, via the

Volga River The Volga (, ) is the longest river in Europe and the longest endorheic basin river in the world. Situated in Russia, it flows through Central Russia to Southern Russia and into the Caspian Sea. The Volga has a length of , and a catchment ...

. The

Rus Rus or RUS may refer to: People * East Slavic historical peoples (). See Names of Rus', Russia and Ruthenia ** Rus' people, the people of Rus' ** Rus, a legendary eponymous ancestor, see Lech, Czech and Rus * Rus (surname), a surname found in Ro ...

used this route to trade with

Muslim countries The terms Islamic world and Muslim world commonly refer to the Islamic community, which is also known as the Ummah. This consists of all those who adhere to the religious beliefs, politics, and laws of Islam or to societies in which Islam is p ...

on the southern shores of the Caspian Sea, sometimes penetrating as far as

Baghdad Baghdad ( or ; , ) is the capital and List of largest cities of Iraq, largest city of Iraq, located along the Tigris in the central part of the country. With a population exceeding 7 million, it ranks among the List of largest cities in the A ...

. The powerful

Volga Bulgars Volga Bulgaria or Volga–Kama Bulgaria (sometimes referred to as the Volga Bulgar Emirate) was a historical Bulgar state that existed between the 9th and 13th centuries around the confluence of the Volga and Kama River, in what is now Europea ...

(cousins of today's

Balkan The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...

Bulgarians Bulgarians (, ) are a nation and South Slavs, South Slavic ethnic group native to Bulgaria and its neighbouring region, who share a common Bulgarian ancestry, culture, history and language. They form the majority of the population in Bulgaria, ...

) formed a

seminomadic Nomads are communities without fixed habitation who regularly move to and from areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the population of nomadic past ...

confederation and traded through the Volga river with

Viking Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

people of Rus' and Scandinavia (Swedes, Danes, Norwegians) and with the southern

Byzantine Empire The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived History of the Roman Empire, the events that caused the ...

(Eastern Roman Empire) Furthermore, Volga Bulgaria, with its two cities Bulgar and Suvar east of what is today

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

, traded with Russians and the fur-selling

Ugrians Yugra or Yugor Land (; also spelled ''Iuhra'' in contemporary sources) was a collective name for lands and peoples in the region east of the northern Ural Mountains in modern Russia given by Russian chroniclers in the 12th to 17th centuries. D ...

Chess Chess is a board game for two players. It is an abstract strategy game that involves Perfect information, no hidden information and no elements of game of chance, chance. It is played on a square chessboard, board consisting of 64 squares arran ...

was introduced to Medieval Rus via the Caspian-Volga trade routes from Persia and Arabia. There was a second route from the Baltic Sea to the

Dnieper The Dnieper or Dnepr ( ), also called Dnipro ( ), is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. Approximately long, with ...

, which ran along the Western Dvina (

Daugava The Daugava ( ), also known as the Western Dvina or the Väina River, is a large river rising in the Valdai Hills of Russia that flows through Belarus and Latvia into the Gulf of Riga of the Baltic Sea. The Daugava rises close to the source of ...

) between Lovat and

in the Smolensk region and along the

Kasplya The Kasplya (Belarusian language, Belarusian and ) is a river in Smolensky District, Smolensk Oblast, Smolensky, Demidovsky District, Demidovsky, and Rudnyansky District, Smolensk Oblast, Rudnyansky Districts of Smolensk Oblast of Russia and in Vit ...

River to

Gnezdovo Gnezdovo or Gnyozdovo () is an archeological site located near the village of Gnyozdovo in Smolensky District, Smolensk Oblast, Russia. The site contains extensive remains of a Slavic-Varangian settlement that flourished in the 10th century as ...

. The Volga trade route functioned concurrently with the

trade route, better known as the

trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks The trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks was a medieval trade route that connected Scandinavia, Kievan Rus' and the Eastern Roman Empire. The route allowed merchants along its length to establish a direct prosperous trade with the Empire ...

, and lost its importance in the 11th century.

Establishment

The Volga trade route was established by the

Varangians The Varangians ( ; ; ; , or )Varangian
," Online Etymology Dictionary were

Volkhov River The Volkhov ( ; ; ) is a river in Novgorodsky District, Novgorodsky and Chudovsky Districts of Novgorod Oblast and Kirishsky District, Kirishsky and Volkhovsky Districts of Leningrad Oblast in northwestern Russia. The Volkhov River, Volkhov, whi ...

entry into

Lake Ladoga Lake Ladoga is a freshwater lake located in the Republic of Karelia and Leningrad Oblast in northwestern Russia, in the vicinity of Saint Petersburg. It is the largest lake located entirely in Europe, the second largest lake in Russia after Lake ...

, they established a settlement called Ladoga (Old Norse: ''

Aldeigjuborg Staraya Ladoga ( rus, Ста́рая Ла́дога, p=ˈstarəjə ˈladəɡə, r=Stáraya Ládoga, t=Old Ladoga), known as Ladoga until 1704, is a rural locality (a '' selo'') in Volkhovsky District of Leningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the Vol ...

'').Brøndsted (1965), pp. 64–65 Archaeological evidence suggests Rus trading activities along the Volga trade route as early as the end of the 8th century. The earliest and the richest finds of Arabic coins in Europe were discovered on the territory of present-day Russia, particularly along the

Volga The Volga (, ) is the longest river in Europe and the longest endorheic basin river in the world. Situated in Russia, it flows through Central Russia to Southern Russia and into the Caspian Sea. The Volga has a length of , and a catchment ...

, at

Timerevo Timerevo (, ) is an archaeological site near the village of Bolshoe Timeryovo, seven kilometers southwest of Yaroslavl, Russia, which yielded the largest deposits of early medieval Arabic coins in Northern Europe. Description and history The s ...

in the district of

Yaroslavl Yaroslavl (; , ) is a city and the administrative center of Yaroslavl Oblast, Russia, located northeast of Moscow. The historic part of the city is a World Heritage Site, and is located at the confluence of the Volga and the Kotorosl rivers. ...

. A hoard of coins found at

Petergof Petergof (), known as Petrodvorets () from 1944 to 1997, is a administrative divisions of Saint Petersburg, municipal town in Petrodvortsovy District of the federal cities of Russia, federal city of Saint Petersburg, St. Petersburg, located ...

, near

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

, contains twenty coins with graffiti in

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

Khazar The Khazars ; 突厥可薩 ''Tūjué Kěsà'', () were a nomadic Turkic people who, in the late 6th century CE, established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia, southern Ukraine, Crimea, an ...

runic,

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

, and

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

runic, the latter accounting for more than half of the total. These coins include

Sassanid The Sasanian Empire (), officially Eranshahr ( , "Empire of the Iranian peoples, Iranians"), was an List of monarchs of Iran, Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651. Enduring for over four centuries, th ...

Arab Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world. Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of years ...

, and Arabo-Sassanid

dirham The dirham, dirhem or drahm is a unit of currency and of mass. It is the name of the currencies of Moroccan dirham, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates dirham, United Arab Emirates and Armenian dram, Armenia, and is the name of a currency subdivisi ...

s, the latest of them dated to 804–805. Having examined major finds of Arabic coins in Eastern Europe,

Valentin Yanin Valentin Lavrentievich Yanin (; 6 February 1929 – 2 February 2020) was a leading Russian historian who authored 700 books and articles. He had also edited a number of important journals and primary sources, including works on medieval Russian ...

conclusively demonstrated that the earliest monetary system of early Russia was based on the early type of dirham minted in Africa. Furthermore, Iranian lusterware was already discovered in the Oka and Upper Volga regions (more precisely, it is spread in

Rostov Rostov-on-Don is a port city and the administrative centre of Rostov Oblast and the Southern Federal District of Russia. It lies in the southeastern part of the East European Plain on the Don River, from the Sea of Azov, directly north of t ...

Suzdal Suzdal (, ) is a Types of inhabited localities in Russia, town that serves as the administrative center of Suzdalsky District in Vladimir Oblast, Russia, which is located along the Kamenka tributary of the Nerl (Klyazma), Nerl River, north o ...

Tver Tver (, ) is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and the administrative centre of Tver Oblast, Russia. It is situated at the confluence of the Volga and Tvertsa rivers. Tver is located northwest of Moscow. Population: The city is ...

and

Ryazan Ryazan (, ; also Riazan) is the largest types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and administrative center of Ryazan Oblast, Russia. The city is located on the banks of the Oka River in Central Russia, southeast of Moscow. As of the 2010 C ...

). Expensive ceramics were imported to Moscow from the Transcaspian region and Crimea. Fragments of Syrian, Egyptian and Mesopotamian vessels have been found in Novgorod.

Functioning

From Aldeigjuborg, the

could travel up the Volkhov River to

Novgorod Veliky Novgorod ( ; , ; ), also known simply as Novgorod (), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, being first mentioned in the 9th century. The city lies along the V ...

, then to

Lake Ilmen Lake Ilmen (, ) is a large lake in Novgorod Oblast, Russia. A historically important lake, it formed a vital part of the medieval trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks. The city of Veliky Novgorod, which is a major trade center of the ro ...

and further along the

Lovat River The Lovat (, ; ) is a river in Vitebsk Oblast of Belarus, Usvyatsky, Velikoluksky, and Loknyansky Districts, as well as of the city of Velikiye Luki, of Pskov Oblast and Kholmsky, Poddorsky, Starorussky, and Parfinsky Districts of Novg ...

. Taking their boats around 3 kilometers over a portage, they reached the sources of Volga. The traders brought furs, honey, and slaves through territory held by Finnic and

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years, from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.902 Mya. It is the s ...

tribes down to the land of the

. From there, they continued by way of the Volga, to the

Khazar Khaganate The Khazars ; 突厥可薩 ''Tūjué Kěsà'', () were a Nomadic empire, nomadic Turkic people who, in the late 6th century CE, established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia, southern Ukra ...

, whose capital

Atil Atil, also Itil, was the capital of the Khazar Khaganate from the mid-8th century to the late 10th century. It is known historically to have been situated along the Silk Road, on the northern coast of the Caspian Sea, in the Volga Delta region of ...

was a busy entrepot on the shore of the Caspian Sea. From Atil, the Rus merchants traveled across the sea to join the caravan routes leading to Baghdad. In 9th and 10th centuries the river was also major trade route between

Russians Russians ( ) are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group native to Eastern Europe. Their mother tongue is Russian language, Russian, the most spoken Slavic languages, Slavic language. The majority of Russians adhere to Eastern Orthodox Church ...

Khazars The Khazars ; 突厥可薩 ''Tūjué Kěsà'', () were a nomadic Turkic people who, in the late 6th century CE, established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia, southern Ukraine, Crimea, a ...

and Volga Bulgars. Furthermore, the Volga connected merchants from Volga Bulgaria with people from

Scandinavia Scandinavia is a subregion#Europe, subregion of northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. It can sometimes also ...

and the southern

, as well with Russians and Ugrians. Many experts believe that the Volga trade route provided the Vikings with valuable crucible steel from the Middle East. Around 885–886,

ibn Khordadbeh Abu'l-Qasim Ubaydallah ibn Abdallah ibn Khordadbeh (; 820/825–913), commonly known as Ibn Khordadbeh (also spelled Ibn Khurradadhbih; ), was a high-ranking bureaucrat and geographer of Persian descent in the Abbasid Caliphate. He is the aut ...

wrote about the Rus merchants who brought goods from Northern Europe and Northwestern Russia to Baghdad: In ibn Khordadbeh's account, the Rus are described as "a kind of the ''Saqaliba''", a term usually used to refer to

Slavs The Slavs or Slavic people are groups of people who speak Slavic languages. Slavs are geographically distributed throughout the northern parts of Eurasia; they predominantly inhabit Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Southeastern Europe, and ...

, and anti-Normanist scholars have interpreted this passage as indicative of the Rus being Slavs rather than

ns. In the interpretation of the Normanist scholars, the word ''Saqaliba'' was also frequently applied to all fair-haired, ruddy-complexioned population of Central,

Eastern Eastern or Easterns may refer to: Transportation Airlines *China Eastern Airlines, a current Chinese airline based in Shanghai * Eastern Air, former name of Zambia Skyways *Eastern Air Lines, a defunct American airline that operated from 192 ...

, and Northeastern Europe, so ibn Khordadbeh's language is ambiguous here (see

Rus' (people) The Rus, also known as Russes, were a people in Early Middle Ages, early medieval Eastern Europe. The scholarly consensus holds that they were originally Norsemen, mainly originating from present-day Sweden, who settled and ruled along the Rout ...

for details of the dispute between Normanists and Antinormanists). The Arabs had only a very vague notion of the ethnic characteristics of the populations with which they were not neighbors. It is likely that the term Saqaliba designated a disparate group of Balkan, Caucasian, Turkic and Slavic peoples living between the Baltic Sea and the Black and Caspian Seas. Ahmad ibn Fadlan, for example, describes Almis, king of the Volga Bulgars, as "king of the Saqaliba", while Al-Biruni calls the Baltic Sea the "sea of the Saqaliba". Modern scholars have also clashed over the interpretation of ibn Khordadbeh's report that the Rus used ''Saqlab'' interpreters. Anti-Normanists construed this passage as evidence that the Rus and their interpreters shared a common Slavic mother tongue. Slavic, however, was a

lingua franca A lingua franca (; ; for plurals see ), also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, link language or language of wider communication (LWC), is a Natural language, language systematically used to make co ...

in the Eastern Europe at that time. The

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

geographer

ibn Rustah Ahmad ibn Rusta Isfahani (), more commonly known as ibn Rusta (, also spelled ''ibn Roste''), was a tenth-century Muslim Persian explorer and geographer born in Rosta, Isfahan in the Abbasid Caliphate. He wrote a geographical compendium known ...

described the Rus communities living along Volga: In 921–922,

ibn Fadlan Ahmad ibn Fadlan ibn al-Abbas al-Baghdadi () or simply known as Ibn Fadlan, was a 10th-century traveler from Baghdad, Abbasid Caliphate, famous for his account of his travels as a member of an embassy of the Abbasid caliph al-Muqtadir to the king ...

was a member of a diplomatic delegation sent from Baghdad to

, and he left an account of his personal observations about the Rus of the Volga region, who dealt in furs and slaves.

Johannes Brøndsted Johannes Balthasar Brøndsted (5 October 1890 - 16 November 1965) was a Danish archaeologist and prehistorian. He was a professor at the University of Copenhagen and director of the National Museum of Denmark. Biography Brøndsted was born at ...

interpreted ibn Fadlan's commentary as indicating that these Rus retained their Scandinavian customs regarding weapons, punishments, ship-burials, and religious sacrifices.Brøndsted (1965), p. 267 Ibn Fadlan's account includes a detailed description of the Rus praying and making sacrifices for success in trade: On the other hand, the Rus came under foreign influence in such matters as dead chief's costume and in the habit of overloading of their women with jewelry:

Connection to the slave trade

During the raids, the Vikings often captured and enslaved militarily weaker peoples they encountered through raids or conquests across Europe. This slave trade lasted from the 8th through the 11th centuries. Slavery was a deeply entrenched institution in Viking society which was hierarchical, and the lowest social class consisted of

thralls A thrall was a slave or serf in Scandinavian lands during the Viking Age. The status of slave (, ) contrasts with that of the freeman (, ) and the nobleman (, ). Etymology Thrall is from the Old Norse , meaning a person who is in bondage o ...

and slaves, which made up the main source of hard labor in Norse society. The Samanid slave trade in Bukhara constituted one of the two great furnishers of slaves to the Muslim market in the Abbasid Caliphate; the other being the

Khazar slave trade The Khazar slave trade took place in the Khazar Khaganate in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. The Khazar Khaganate was a buffer state between Europe and the Muslim world and played a major part in the trade between Europe and the Middle Ea ...

Background

Slavery was common in the Viking age period, and one of the main reasons for the

Viking expansion Viking expansion was the historical movement which led Norsemen, Norse explorers, traders and warriors, the latter known in modern scholarship as Vikings, to sail most of the North Atlantic, reaching south as far as North Africa and east as fa ...

was the search for slaves in other countries. One of the reasons

Kievan Rus Kievan Rus', also known as Kyivan Rus,. * was the first East Slavic state and later an amalgam of principalities in Eastern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical Atlas of Russ ...

came to be was that Scandinavian settlers established themselves and traded with captured slaves. During the eighth to tenth centuries, slaves from Eastern Europe and the Baltic Sea were traded to elite households in Byzantium and the Islamic world via the Dnieper and Volga river systems, the Carolingian Empire and Venice. Arabic merchants from the Caspian Sea and Byzantine merchants from the Black Sea bought their goods to the trade markets in Rus, where they met the Viking traders and warriors known as

Varangians The Varangians ( ; ; ; , or )Varangian
," Online Etymology Dictionary were

Korpela, J. (2018). Slaves from the North: Finns and Karelians in the East European Slave Trade, 900–1600. Nederländerna: Brill. 242 However, both Christians and Muslims approved of enslaving Pagans, who came to be a preferred target of the slave trade in the Middle Ages, and Pagan war captives were sold by Pagan enemies into the slave trade. Pagans from Eastern Europe came to be the most popular targets for slavery in both the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic Arab world during the Early Middle Ages, where they were forced to convert to Christianity and Islam respectively after their enslavement.

The Viking slave trade

The Vikings trafficked European slaves captured in Viking raids in Eastern Europe in two destinations from present day Russia via the Volga trade route; one to

Slavery in the Abbasid Caliphate Chattel slavery was a major part of society, culture and economy in the Abbasid Caliphate (750–1258) of the Islamic Golden Age, which during its history included most of the Middle East. While slavery was an important part also of the pr ...

in the Middle East via the Caspian Sea, the Samanid slave trade and Iran; and one to the

and the Mediterranean via

and the

Black Sea slave trade The Black Sea slave trade trafficked people across the Black Sea from Eastern Europe and the Caucasus to slavery in the Mediterranean and the Middle East. The Black Sea slave trade was a center of the slave trade between Europe and the rest of t ...

. Until the 9th-century, the Vikings trafficked European slaves from the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by the countries of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden, and the North European Plain, North and Central European Plain regions. It is the ...

in the North or the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. A sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian Se ...

in the West via the Wisla or the

Donau Donau may refer to: *Danube (German: ''Donau''), Europe's second-longest river * Donau (horse) (1907–1913), American thoroughbred racehorse * SS ''Donau'', the name of several steamships *, a modern German replenishment ship * RC Donau, an Austri ...

rivers South East through Europe to the Black Sea.Korpela, Jukka Jari (2018). Slaves from the North – Finns and Karelians in the East European Slave Trade, 900–1600. Studies in Global Slavery, Band: 5. Nederländerna: Brill. p. 35 The Viking slave route was redirected in the 9th-century, and until the 11th-century the Vikings trafficked European slaves from the

via Ladoga,

and the

Msta The Msta () is a river in Tver and Novgorod Oblasts of northwestern Russia, a tributary of Lake Ilmen. It is long, and the area of its basin . The principal tributaries of the Msta are the Berezayka (left), the Uver (right), the Peretna (left ...

river via the

Route from the Varangians to the Greeks The trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks was a medieval trade route that connected Scandinavia, Kievan Rus' and the Eastern Roman Empire. The route allowed merchants along its length to establish a direct prosperous trade with the Empir ...

to the

via the

, or to the

Abbasid Caliphate The Abbasid Caliphate or Abbasid Empire (; ) was the third caliphate to succeed the Islamic prophet Muhammad. It was founded by a dynasty descended from Muhammad's uncle, Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib (566–653 CE), from whom the dynasty takes ...

via the Caspian Sea (and the

Bukhara slave trade The Bukhara slave trade refers to the historical History of slavery, slave trade conducted in the city of Bukhara in Central Asia (present-day Uzbekistan) from antiquity until the 19th century. Bukhara and nearby Khiva were known as th ...

) via the Volga trade route. The so-called

saqaliba Saqaliba (, singular ) is a term used in medieval Arabic sources to refer to Slavs, and other peoples of Central, Southern, and Eastern Europe. The term originates from the Middle Greek '' slavos/sklavenos'' (Slav), which in Hispano-Ara ...

, which was the term for white slaves in the Islamic Middle East (often provided by the Vikings), is not likely to stand for exclusively Slavic ethnicity in practice, since many victims of the Vikings' saqaliba slave trade was in fact other ethnicities such as Baltics, Lithuanians, and Finno-Ugric people.Korpela, J. (2018). Slaves from the North: Finns and Karelians in the East European Slave Trade, 900–1600. Nederländerna: Brill. 242 Archbishop

Rimbert Saint Rimbert (or Rembert) (''c.'' 830 - 11 June 888 in Bremen) was archbishop of Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen, Hamburg-Bremen, in the northern part of the East Francia, Kingdom of East Frankia from 865 until his death in 888. He most famously wr ...

of Bremen (d. 888) reported that he witnessed a “large throng of captured Christians being hauled away” in the Viking port of

Hedeby Hedeby (, Old Norse: ''Heiðabýr'', German: ''Haithabu'') was an important Danish Viking Age (8th to the 11th centuries) trading settlement near the southern end of the Jutland Peninsula, now in the Schleswig-Flensburg district of Schleswig ...

in Denmark, one of whom was a woman who sang psalms to identify herself as a Christian nun, and who the bishop was able to free by exchanging his horse for her freedom. People taken captive during the Viking raids across Eastern Europe could be sold to

Moorish Spain Al-Andalus () was the Muslim-ruled area of the Iberian Peninsula. The name refers to the different Muslim states that controlled these territories at various times between 711 and 1492. At its greatest geographical extent, it occupied most o ...

via the Dublin slave trade or transported to

or Brännö and from there via the Volga trade route to Russia, where Slavic slaves and furs were sold to Muslim merchants in exchange for Arab silver ''

'' and

silk Silk is a natural fiber, natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be weaving, woven into textiles. The protein fiber of silk is composed mainly of fibroin and is most commonly produced by certain insect larvae to form cocoon (silk), c ...

, which have been found in

Birka Birka (''Birca'' in medieval sources), on the island of Björkö, Ekerö, Björkö (lit. "Birch Island") in present-day Sweden, was an important Viking Age trading center which handled goods from Scandinavia as well as many parts of Continent ...

Wollin Wolin (; ) is a Polish island in the Baltic Sea, just off the Polish coast. Administratively, the island belongs to the West Pomeranian Voivodeship. Wolin is separated from the island of Usedom (Uznam) by the Strait of Świna, and from mainlan ...

and

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

; initially this trade route between Europe and the Abbasid Caliphate passed via the Khazar Kaghanate, but from the early 10th-century onward it went via Volga Bulgaria and from there by caravan to

Khwarazm Khwarazm (; ; , ''Xwârazm'' or ''Xârazm'') or Chorasmia () is a large oasis region on the Amu Darya river delta in western Central Asia, bordered on the north by the (former) Aral Sea, on the east by the Kyzylkum Desert, on the south by th ...

, to the Samanid slave market in Central Asia and finally via Iran to the Abbasid Caliphate. This trade was the source of the Arab ''

'' silver hoards found in Scandinavia and functioned from at least 786 until 1009, when such coins have been found there, and it would have been so lucrative that it contributed to the continuing Viking raids in Europe, which was used by the Vikings as a slave supply source for this trade with the Islamic world. Among such hoards can be mentioned the

Spillings Hoard The Spillings Hoard () is the world's largest Viking silver treasure, found on Friday 16July 1999 in a field at the Spilling farm northwest of Slite, on northern Gotland, Sweden. The silver hoard consisted of two parts with a total weight of bef ...

and the Sundveda Hoard. One of the only accounts describing Norse slave practices in detail and first person is the Arabic merchant

Ibn Fadlan Ahmad ibn Fadlan ibn al-Abbas al-Baghdadi () or simply known as Ibn Fadlan, was a 10th-century traveler from Baghdad, Abbasid Caliphate, famous for his account of his travels as a member of an embassy of the Abbasid caliph al-Muqtadir to the king ...

meeting Volga Vikings. Describing

Vikings Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

using the Volga trade route using

Saqaliba Saqaliba (, singular ) is a term used in medieval Arabic sources to refer to Slavs, and other peoples of Central, Southern, and Eastern Europe. The term originates from the Middle Greek '' slavos/sklavenos'' (Slav), which in Hispano-Ara ...

or Slavic slaves as translators when trading. There he describes the Norse

ship burial A ship burial or boat grave is a burial in which a ship or boat is used either as the tomb for the dead and the grave goods, or as a part of the grave goods itself. If the ship is very small, it is called a boat grave. This style of burial was pr ...

s only known in Norse society before the Viking expansion in 800 AD into Russia and Ukraine and that a slave girl was sacrificed to follow her master. Norse burials found in Sweden and Norway indicate that slaves were sacrificed in Sweden to follow their masters to the afterlife. However, Swedish archaeology shows that mostly male slaves were killed to follow their master into the afterlife and not females. Sacrificed female slaves have however been found sacrificed in Norway, where a woman found in the grave showed signs of having her throat slit in a similar manner to the execution described by Ibn Fadlan. During the 11th-century, the Viking nations of Denmark, Norway and Sweden became Christian, which made it infeasible for them to continue to conduct slave raids toward Christian Europe and sell Christian Europeans to Islamic slave traders. The establishment of

likely also decreased the number of slaves taken in raids and limited it to the local market for slaves in Scandinavia, according to Lena Björkman.

Decline

The Volga trade route lost its importance by the 11th century due to the decline of silver output in the

Abbasid The Abbasid Caliphate or Abbasid Empire (; ) was the third caliphate to succeed the prophets and messengers in Islam, Islamic prophet Muhammad. It was founded by a dynasty descended from Muhammad's uncle, Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib (566–653 C ...

caliphate A caliphate ( ) is an institution or public office under the leadership of an Islamic steward with Khalifa, the title of caliph (; , ), a person considered a political–religious successor to the Islamic prophet Muhammad and a leader of ...

, and thus, the

, which ran down the

to the

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

and the Byzantine Empire, gained more weight. The

Iceland Iceland is a Nordic countries, Nordic island country between the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between North America and Europe. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the regi ...

saga Sagas are prose stories and histories, composed in Iceland and to a lesser extent elsewhere in Scandinavia. The most famous saga-genre is the (sagas concerning Icelanders), which feature Viking voyages, migration to Iceland, and feuds between ...

''Yngvars saga víðförla'' describes an expedition of Swedes into the Caspian launched around 1041 from Sweden by

Ingvar the Far-Travelled Ingvar the Far-Travelled (Old Norse: ''Yngvarr víðfǫrli'', Swedish: ''Ingvar Vittfarne'') was a Swedish Viking who led an expedition that fought in the Kingdom of Georgia. The Rus' undertook several Caspian expeditions in the course of t ...

(''Ingvar Vittfarne'' in Norse), who went down the Volga into the land of the

Saracens file:Erhard Reuwich Sarazenen 1486.png, upright 1.5, Late 15th-century History of Germany, German woodcut depicting Saracens ''Saracen'' ( ) was a term used both in Greek language, Greek and Latin writings between the 5th and 15th centuries to ...

(''Serkland'').Thunberg, Carl L. (2011). ''Särkland och dess källmaterial''. Göteborgs universitet. CLTS. pp. 20-22. . The expedition was unsuccessful, and afterwards, no attempts were made to use the route between the

Baltic Baltic may refer to: Peoples and languages *Baltic languages, a subfamily of Indo-European languages, including Lithuanian, Latvian and extinct Old Prussian *Balts (or Baltic peoples), ethnic groups speaking the Baltic languages and/or originatin ...

and Caspian seas by the Scandinavian Norsemen.

Notes

References

* Brøndsted, Johannes (1965). ''The Vikings''. (transl. by Kalle Skov). Penguin Books. * Golden, P.B. (2006) "Rus." ''

Encyclopaedia of Islam The ''Encyclopaedia of Islam'' (''EI'') is a reference work that facilitates the Islamic studies, academic study of Islam. It is published by Brill Publishers, Brill and provides information on various aspects of Islam and the Muslim world, Isl ...

'' (Brill Online). Eds.: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel and W.P. Heinrichs. Brill. * Logan, Donald F. (1992). ''The Vikings in History'' 2nd ed. Routledge. * Noonan, Thomas Schaub (1987–1991). "When Did Rus/Rus' Merchants First Visit Khazaria and Baghdad?" ''Archivum Eurasiae Medii Aevi'' 7, pp. 213–219. * Thunberg, Carl L. (2010). ''Ingvarståget och dess monument''. Göteborgs universitet. CLTS. , * Thunberg, Carl L. (2011). ''Särkland och dess källmaterial''. Göteborgs universitet. CLTS. , {{Trade route 2 Economic history of Russia Water transport in Russia Sea lanes Varangians Medieval economic history Asian slave trade Black Sea slave trade Trade routes Slavery in the Abbasid Caliphate Viking Age economy

Trade route A trade route is a logistical network identified as a series of pathways and stoppages used for the commercial transport of cargo. The term can also be used to refer to trade over land or water. Allowing goods to reach distant markets, a singl ...

Establishment

Functioning

Connection to the slave trade

Background

The Viking slave trade

Decline

See also

Notes

References