
The Uliches or Ugliches ( or ; or , or ; , or ) were a
tribe
The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide use of the term in English is in the discipline of anthropology. The definition is contested, in part due to conflict ...
of
Early East Slavs
The early Slavs were speakers of Indo-European languages, Indo-European dialects
who lived during the Migration Period and the Early Middle Ages (approximately from the 5th to the 10th centuries AD) in Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Ea ...
who, between the eighth and the tenth centuries, inhabited (along with the
Tivertsi)
Bessarabia
Bessarabia () is a historical region in Eastern Europe, bounded by the Dniester river on the east and the Prut river on the west. About two thirds of Bessarabia lies within modern-day Moldova, with the Budjak region covering the southern coa ...
, and the territories along the Lower
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 ...
,
Bug River
The Bug or Western Bug is a major river in Central Europe that flows through Belarus (border), Poland, and Ukraine, with a total length of .[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 ...]
littoral.
Ethnonym
The tribal name comes from a location called Oglos or Onglos by the
Byzantine
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 the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...
chroniclers
Theophanes the Confessor and
Nikephoros I of Constantinople, possibly to be identified with
Peuce Island. The word may derive from Slavic ''âgul'' 'corner', or, according to
Steven Runciman
Sir James Cochran Stevenson Runciman (7 July 1903 – 1 November 2000), known as Steven Runciman, was an English historian best known for his three-volume '' A History of the Crusades'' (1951–54). His works had a profound impact on the popula ...
, from ''agul'' 'enclosure'.
History
They were mentioned as ''Unlizi'' by the
Bavarian Geographer, described as "populus multus" and having 418
gords-settlements.
The Uliches long struggled against the
Kievan prince
A prince is a male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary, in some European states. The ...
s
Oleg,
Igor and
Sviatoslav Igorevich for their
independence
Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state, in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the status of ...
, until a Kievan commander
Sveneld captured their capital,
Peresechen (near
Orhei
Orhei (), also formerly known as Orgeev (), is a city, municipality and the administrative centre of Orhei District in the Moldova, Republic of Moldova, with a population of 21,065. Orhei is approximately north of the capital, Chișinău.
Hist ...
, in present-day
Moldova
Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of and population of 2.42 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. ...
), around 940. In the mid-10th century the Ulich lands paid tribute to
Sveneld. The Uliches were last mentioned in the 970s.
See also
*
Hutsuls
The Hutsuls (Hutsul/; ; ) are an East Slavic ethnic group spanning parts of western Ukraine and northern Romania (i.e. parts of Bukovina and Maramureș).
In Ukraine, they have often been officially and administratively designated a subgro ...
*
List of Medieval Slavic tribes
References
*
Moldova in the Early Middle Ages
Ulich
{{Europe-ethno-group-stub