Czersk: A Tale of Bygone Years
It's been a week since Kościuszko and I were out on the open road. We cycled indoors on our VR trainer three days this past week (in France, Belgium and the Netherlands), but there's nothing like being outside. Moreover, I've been waiting for this particular ride for some weeks. We are going with friend Wiktor K. to the village of Czersk, which is about 30 km south of here. As you will see from this post, Czersk is an interesting little place, especially for historians, archaeologists, and linguists. If you don't like these subjects, well, it's a beautiful ride too, so keep reading.
The first historical mention of Czersk is, oddly enough, in a chronicle (yearly report) called the Laurentian Codex compiled by a monk in what is now Northern Russia back in 1377. The Laurentian Codex is a collection of earlier chronicles and is a comprehensive document that gives us insight into the history of the Eastern Slavs. This collection also includes the still much older Primary Chronicle, better known as A Tale of Bygone Years (Повѣсть времѧньныхъ лѣтъ). Since it is not just a compilation, but also a recopied and re-edited version of earlier manuscripts, this codex gives us evidence into linguistic changes over time in the Eastern Slavic languages. These documents were required study when I was in graduate school and it was one aspect of my education that I really got into. And here it is, again, after more than 35 years, reminding me of the fun that is to be had with old texts!
Today Kościuszko and I pushed off earlier than usual. I typically love early starts (Kościuszko couldn't care less), but this morning was somewhat chilly (42F, 5C) as we headed out the door and I don't really have cold weather gear in Poland yet. The sun was just rising and the crisp, autumn air was invigorating. We met Wiktor at 7:15 at the predesignated spot and headed south for this morning's anticipated adventure. It was so great to be out!
To the right is an image of page 103 of the Laurentian Codex. Isn't it beautiful? I love studying these old texts. You'll note that there are no spaces between words and no punctuation to speak of. This makes reading all the more challenging, but that's the fun, isn't it?
In the right-hand column is the entry for the year Anno Mundi 6650, which is equivalent to our year of 1142 AD. You may not be aware that there are many different types of calendars and in some parts of Medieval Europe they were still using the Byzantine dating system, in which time (year zero) begins at the moment of creation.
Naturally, there was (still is) a great deal of dispute about the exact date of creation. Some people used the equivalent of 5779 BC, some 3750 BC, some 5500 BC. In the case of the Primary Chronicle and these subsequent codices, these Eastern Orthodox monks put the year zero at what we would call 5509 BC. The rest is pure math: 6650-5509 = uh oh, 1141. How do we get the year 1142 AD? Well, the New Year in the Byzantine calendar begins on September 1st and in the text we get clues to anchor us in 1142 AD. You like math puzzles? Did the events occur before or after September 1, 6650? Have fun thinking about this.
But let's not get caught up in the peculiarities of calendars. The point is, that a monk named Laurentius living in Nizhny Novgorod (in current Russia) compiled and edited older codices into a larger volume that covered the history of the Eastern Slavs from 850 AD to about 1305 AD. Remarkably, included in these texts is an event that happened in 1142 in the Kingdom of Poland at Czersk, more than 1600 km (1000 miles) away from a monastery in Nizhny Novgorod! Amazing, isn't it? Are you as interested in this as I am? I am absolutely a-titter! The actual reference to Czersk is at the very top of the next page, in the left-hand column. Here it is below. Can you find the word Czersk in the first line? Hint: it appears as чьрньска. I'm sure the hint made it too easy, but then there's the entire rest of the AM 6650 entry to decipher, if you want. We'll talk about just what happened in 1142 a bit later.
Czersk sits largely atop a small hill overlooking the Vistula, which flows a few kilometers to the East. In its earliest days Czersk was an important trading community and the inhabitants built protective wooden walls around the town, complete with moat in the 11th Century. This structure is referred to in German as a burgwall. In English we might say hillfort, but the Slavs had their own word: gord. Remember that.
The winds this morning were relatively gentle out of the south-southeast. If they maintained, they would provide a nice push home along the river. In the meantime, southeast we went--into the wind. Along the way we made one important stop at the American School of Warsaw. My friend Grzegorz T. works there and I had to pick up some special batteries that he tracked down for me. It is very nice to have such a good friend who can help you when you are new to a place. We had a nice, but short conversation; I introduced Wiktor to Grzegorz as scores of student shuffled into the building.
Wait! Students? Saturday? No, today is the October SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) day, for those of you who remember going to college in the United States. I don't miss the SAT, that's for sure, and I tried to hide my great satisfaction that I didn't have to participate in any way. I stuffed the batteries into my jersey, bade farewell and Kościuszko and I along with Wiktor and his Bianchi continued south. Thanks, Grzegorz!
The word gord is quite interesting and worth an extensive tangent. The word comes to us from the Proto-Indo-European root *gʰerdʰ-, meaning to enclose or grasp. This root became *gordъ in Common Slavic, with a slight shift in meaning to settlement or enclosure. This root is easy to study because the words in other European languages are easy to see. In English we have a lot of words related to the root; here are some of them: garden, yard, and girdle. If you know German, Dutch or the Scandinavian languages you'll find words, easily, too. Have you heard of the German city, Stuttgart? That -gart suffix is the same root. The Old Norse word Ásgarðr, referring to the home of the Æsir gods is related. (There were two tribes of Norse gods, the Æsir, living in Ásgarðr and the Vanir, living in Vanaheimr, at least until their war, but let's not get started on that.)
There are other, less obviously related English words, like: court, choir, hangar and horticulture. Our word choir comes from the Greek χορός, an enclosed place to dance. Horticulture comes from the Latin word hortus, meaning 'garden'. Kindergarten (children's garden) we borrowed from German, and is also related.
Descendants of the root exist in Polish, naturally: gród 'castle, city', ogród 'garden' and grodzisko 'settlement, small fort' being the three obvious ones. Incidentally, in the picture to the left you can see one of the many abandoned gords in Poland. The walls are gone, but the little hill remains with trees engulfing the location of the old structure. Finally, the suffixed form -grad that you find in some Russian city names, is directly related: Petrograd, Leningrad, Stalingrad, Kaliningrad.
Interesting to me is that in the Slavic languages the vowel in the root and the 'r' are switched in position compared to the original Indo-European root. In linguistic terminology this change is called metathesis and, in particular, this process of the sound 'r' switching places is called liquid metathesis and it happens with the 'l', too. In the East Slavic languages (Russian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian) an extra vowel was sometimes inserted to break up a consonant cluster after the metathesis. Linguistically this is called pleophony or full vocalization. As a result of pleophony you get very clean and neat correspondences of words across languages. Check out these English, Polish and Russian words (left to right respectively):
milk -- mleko -- moloko
Karl -- król -- korólʹ (These all mean 'king'.)
beard -- broda -- boroda
Less obvious, perhaps, due to other changes, but examples nonetheless:
raven -- wrona -- vorona
dear -- drogi -- dorogój
birch -- brzoza -- berjóza
gold -- złoto -- zoloto
worþ -- wrota --vorota
Do you see how the pattern works? In the case of the last example, the Polish and Russian words mean 'gate'. The word worþ is from Old English and means a 'gated enclosure'. I am not sure that there is a modern descendant. Sometimes that happens! But, if there happens to be one, Dear Readers, let me know!
If you speak Polish or Russian, you might be able to come up with scores of other words that fit this pattern! I love this stuff! Once you understand how languages change over time and how these changes correspond to other languages, it is fun to play with words and to learn new ones. Well, I've spent enough time on etymology; there are more important things to write about!
We continued south. It was an uneventful trip, as trips go, but the morning air and the views were both superb. Wiktor kindly lead the way and I drafted a few close inches behind, conserving my energy for the return trip. As we cleared Góra Kalwaria we could see in the distance, atop a hill, the remains of a castle dominating the landscape. It was Czersk! I wondered what the views from the top of the towers might be like.
So back to our tale of bygone years. Just what happened in 1142 that merited the attention of Medieval Chroniclers? It begins in 1138. In that year the King of Poland, Bolesław III Krzywousty died, leaving the Kingdom to his first-born son Władysław II. Władysław II, as the oldest son, was in charge, but the lands of the Kingdom had actually been divided somewhat equally among Bolesław's sons and his widow, Salomea. This was the first recorded instance in Poland of a King leaving lands to his widow, by the way.
Władysław's mother, however, was not Salomea, but Zbyslava of Kiev, a Rurikid Princess. What does Rurikid mean? It means that she was from the Rurik dynasty, which were descendants of the Varangians. Who were the Varangians? You'd call them Swedes, I suppose. As I mentioned in my last post, the "Eastern Vikings" settled along the rivers in what are now Russia, Poland, Byelorussia and Ukraine. You had to guess that there was intermarriage. Blond, blue-eyed Poles, Russians, Ukrainians and Byelorussians probably carry the recessive genes characteristic of those Varangians. Watch for it.
Anyway, Princess Salomea of Berg (born not far from Stuttgart, by the way), now the Dowager Duchess of Poland, didn't care much for her stepson Władysław II, and plotted unmercifully to undermine his authority to the benefit of her own sons. This sets the stage for year 1142; I hope you're following this tale of intrigue and are ready for its conclusion.
Salomea tried to recruit a powerful ally for her own sons by attempting to marry her daughter to a son from the house of the Grand Prince Vsevolod II of Kiev. But wait! The Grand Prince was directly related to Władysław through his mother, Zbyslava! Władysław got wind of the situation and got word of the true situation to the Grand Duke, with the result that the Grand Duke allied himself with Władysław. So, instead, Władysław's son married the Grand Duke's daughter, and the Grand Duke sent soldiers to help Władysław exert control over the realm. The plan worked. And so it is written:
"...[Władysław and his allies] met at [Czersk] and, having fought, returned, leaving behind more peaceful Poles rather than warriors." (Eric's very loose translation)
At least the plan worked for a while. Ultimately, things did not end well for Władysław II. He earned the nickname "The Exiled" (Władysław II Wygnaniec) when his political fortunes soured and he was banished from Poland. His father, Bolesław III Krzywousty, ended up having had created quite a mess! For the next two hundred years in Poland the period would be referred to as the Fragmentation of the Realm (Okres rozbicia dzielnicowego).
The original wooden gord in Czersk was destroyed by the Lithuanians in the 14th Century and so a proper castle was constructed in its place, with two towers and a nice gate. Alas, the castle and town were largely destroyed in 1656 as the Swedes retreated after the nearby Battle of Warka. This battle, patriots might know, was the first Polish-Lithuanian victory against the Swedes in that long war! Still, even in defeat the Swedish Deluge did its damage.
The picture to the left shows the gate from the outside. Note the cobbled path to the interior. The picture further above is a panorama view from within the castle, showing the gate (right) and one tower (left). The shadow of the second tower can be seen crossing the inner field, where once the important structures of the city stood.
Despite the military victory and subsequent attempts to restore the castle, the town never recovered from the events of the Deluge. A further, final blow was dealt to Czersk in 1869 when, as punishment for the inhabitants' participation in the January Uprising against the Russians, the town charter was permanently revoked, reducing Czersk permanently to the small village it is today (you can't do much without a town charter).
The castle is but a ruin now. Today there were medieval re-enactors within the walls, preparing for a private event that was to be held later. In Czersk, during the late Spring and Summer there many are reenactments, exhibitions, markets and other events at the ruins. The thriving city that was a seat of power is, however, no more. Wiktor and I stood in the middle of the circular enclosure, surrounded by the crumbling walls and mindfully surveyed the farms and fields beyond, and just beyond, the Vistula river, the Polish river. For a few moments we both went back in time.
"What time do you have to be home?" I asked.
"I said I'd be back around 10:00," Wiktor said in a matter of fact tone.
"You won't make it..."
We liingered a few more minutes and then walked across the castle green, collected our steeds, and headed back into reality.
There is nothing quite like this. It was a beautiful ride to Czersk and the way back home--to reality--was equally so. And for us, we had already visited the 13th Century and were well headed home by the time other cyclists were out and about for their own Saturday adventures.
Until next time, Dear Readers, Ride On!
The first historical mention of Czersk is, oddly enough, in a chronicle (yearly report) called the Laurentian Codex compiled by a monk in what is now Northern Russia back in 1377. The Laurentian Codex is a collection of earlier chronicles and is a comprehensive document that gives us insight into the history of the Eastern Slavs. This collection also includes the still much older Primary Chronicle, better known as A Tale of Bygone Years (Повѣсть времѧньныхъ лѣтъ). Since it is not just a compilation, but also a recopied and re-edited version of earlier manuscripts, this codex gives us evidence into linguistic changes over time in the Eastern Slavic languages. These documents were required study when I was in graduate school and it was one aspect of my education that I really got into. And here it is, again, after more than 35 years, reminding me of the fun that is to be had with old texts!
Today Kościuszko and I pushed off earlier than usual. I typically love early starts (Kościuszko couldn't care less), but this morning was somewhat chilly (42F, 5C) as we headed out the door and I don't really have cold weather gear in Poland yet. The sun was just rising and the crisp, autumn air was invigorating. We met Wiktor at 7:15 at the predesignated spot and headed south for this morning's anticipated adventure. It was so great to be out!
 |
| Laurentian Codex, page 103. Source. |
In the right-hand column is the entry for the year Anno Mundi 6650, which is equivalent to our year of 1142 AD. You may not be aware that there are many different types of calendars and in some parts of Medieval Europe they were still using the Byzantine dating system, in which time (year zero) begins at the moment of creation.
Naturally, there was (still is) a great deal of dispute about the exact date of creation. Some people used the equivalent of 5779 BC, some 3750 BC, some 5500 BC. In the case of the Primary Chronicle and these subsequent codices, these Eastern Orthodox monks put the year zero at what we would call 5509 BC. The rest is pure math: 6650-5509 = uh oh, 1141. How do we get the year 1142 AD? Well, the New Year in the Byzantine calendar begins on September 1st and in the text we get clues to anchor us in 1142 AD. You like math puzzles? Did the events occur before or after September 1, 6650? Have fun thinking about this.
But let's not get caught up in the peculiarities of calendars. The point is, that a monk named Laurentius living in Nizhny Novgorod (in current Russia) compiled and edited older codices into a larger volume that covered the history of the Eastern Slavs from 850 AD to about 1305 AD. Remarkably, included in these texts is an event that happened in 1142 in the Kingdom of Poland at Czersk, more than 1600 km (1000 miles) away from a monastery in Nizhny Novgorod! Amazing, isn't it? Are you as interested in this as I am? I am absolutely a-titter! The actual reference to Czersk is at the very top of the next page, in the left-hand column. Here it is below. Can you find the word Czersk in the first line? Hint: it appears as чьрньска. I'm sure the hint made it too easy, but then there's the entire rest of the AM 6650 entry to decipher, if you want. We'll talk about just what happened in 1142 a bit later.
 |
| Laurentian Codex detail, page 103B. Source. |
Czersk sits largely atop a small hill overlooking the Vistula, which flows a few kilometers to the East. In its earliest days Czersk was an important trading community and the inhabitants built protective wooden walls around the town, complete with moat in the 11th Century. This structure is referred to in German as a burgwall. In English we might say hillfort, but the Slavs had their own word: gord. Remember that.
The winds this morning were relatively gentle out of the south-southeast. If they maintained, they would provide a nice push home along the river. In the meantime, southeast we went--into the wind. Along the way we made one important stop at the American School of Warsaw. My friend Grzegorz T. works there and I had to pick up some special batteries that he tracked down for me. It is very nice to have such a good friend who can help you when you are new to a place. We had a nice, but short conversation; I introduced Wiktor to Grzegorz as scores of student shuffled into the building.
Wait! Students? Saturday? No, today is the October SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) day, for those of you who remember going to college in the United States. I don't miss the SAT, that's for sure, and I tried to hide my great satisfaction that I didn't have to participate in any way. I stuffed the batteries into my jersey, bade farewell and Kościuszko and I along with Wiktor and his Bianchi continued south. Thanks, Grzegorz!
The word gord is quite interesting and worth an extensive tangent. The word comes to us from the Proto-Indo-European root *gʰerdʰ-, meaning to enclose or grasp. This root became *gordъ in Common Slavic, with a slight shift in meaning to settlement or enclosure. This root is easy to study because the words in other European languages are easy to see. In English we have a lot of words related to the root; here are some of them: garden, yard, and girdle. If you know German, Dutch or the Scandinavian languages you'll find words, easily, too. Have you heard of the German city, Stuttgart? That -gart suffix is the same root. The Old Norse word Ásgarðr, referring to the home of the Æsir gods is related. (There were two tribes of Norse gods, the Æsir, living in Ásgarðr and the Vanir, living in Vanaheimr, at least until their war, but let's not get started on that.)
 |
| Grodzisko in Stara Rawa, Poland. Source. |
Interesting to me is that in the Slavic languages the vowel in the root and the 'r' are switched in position compared to the original Indo-European root. In linguistic terminology this change is called metathesis and, in particular, this process of the sound 'r' switching places is called liquid metathesis and it happens with the 'l', too. In the East Slavic languages (Russian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian) an extra vowel was sometimes inserted to break up a consonant cluster after the metathesis. Linguistically this is called pleophony or full vocalization. As a result of pleophony you get very clean and neat correspondences of words across languages. Check out these English, Polish and Russian words (left to right respectively):
 |
| Birch trees. |
Karl -- król -- korólʹ (These all mean 'king'.)
beard -- broda -- boroda
Less obvious, perhaps, due to other changes, but examples nonetheless:
raven -- wrona -- vorona
dear -- drogi -- dorogój
birch -- brzoza -- berjóza
gold -- złoto -- zoloto
worþ -- wrota --vorota
Do you see how the pattern works? In the case of the last example, the Polish and Russian words mean 'gate'. The word worþ is from Old English and means a 'gated enclosure'. I am not sure that there is a modern descendant. Sometimes that happens! But, if there happens to be one, Dear Readers, let me know!
If you speak Polish or Russian, you might be able to come up with scores of other words that fit this pattern! I love this stuff! Once you understand how languages change over time and how these changes correspond to other languages, it is fun to play with words and to learn new ones. Well, I've spent enough time on etymology; there are more important things to write about!
We continued south. It was an uneventful trip, as trips go, but the morning air and the views were both superb. Wiktor kindly lead the way and I drafted a few close inches behind, conserving my energy for the return trip. As we cleared Góra Kalwaria we could see in the distance, atop a hill, the remains of a castle dominating the landscape. It was Czersk! I wondered what the views from the top of the towers might be like.
 |
| Panorama from the interior of Czersk castle. |
So back to our tale of bygone years. Just what happened in 1142 that merited the attention of Medieval Chroniclers? It begins in 1138. In that year the King of Poland, Bolesław III Krzywousty died, leaving the Kingdom to his first-born son Władysław II. Władysław II, as the oldest son, was in charge, but the lands of the Kingdom had actually been divided somewhat equally among Bolesław's sons and his widow, Salomea. This was the first recorded instance in Poland of a King leaving lands to his widow, by the way.
Władysław's mother, however, was not Salomea, but Zbyslava of Kiev, a Rurikid Princess. What does Rurikid mean? It means that she was from the Rurik dynasty, which were descendants of the Varangians. Who were the Varangians? You'd call them Swedes, I suppose. As I mentioned in my last post, the "Eastern Vikings" settled along the rivers in what are now Russia, Poland, Byelorussia and Ukraine. You had to guess that there was intermarriage. Blond, blue-eyed Poles, Russians, Ukrainians and Byelorussians probably carry the recessive genes characteristic of those Varangians. Watch for it.
Anyway, Princess Salomea of Berg (born not far from Stuttgart, by the way), now the Dowager Duchess of Poland, didn't care much for her stepson Władysław II, and plotted unmercifully to undermine his authority to the benefit of her own sons. This sets the stage for year 1142; I hope you're following this tale of intrigue and are ready for its conclusion.
Salomea tried to recruit a powerful ally for her own sons by attempting to marry her daughter to a son from the house of the Grand Prince Vsevolod II of Kiev. But wait! The Grand Prince was directly related to Władysław through his mother, Zbyslava! Władysław got wind of the situation and got word of the true situation to the Grand Duke, with the result that the Grand Duke allied himself with Władysław. So, instead, Władysław's son married the Grand Duke's daughter, and the Grand Duke sent soldiers to help Władysław exert control over the realm. The plan worked. And so it is written:
"...[Władysław and his allies] met at [Czersk] and, having fought, returned, leaving behind more peaceful Poles rather than warriors." (Eric's very loose translation)
 |
| Kościuszko and I at the Czersk castle gate. |
The original wooden gord in Czersk was destroyed by the Lithuanians in the 14th Century and so a proper castle was constructed in its place, with two towers and a nice gate. Alas, the castle and town were largely destroyed in 1656 as the Swedes retreated after the nearby Battle of Warka. This battle, patriots might know, was the first Polish-Lithuanian victory against the Swedes in that long war! Still, even in defeat the Swedish Deluge did its damage.
The picture to the left shows the gate from the outside. Note the cobbled path to the interior. The picture further above is a panorama view from within the castle, showing the gate (right) and one tower (left). The shadow of the second tower can be seen crossing the inner field, where once the important structures of the city stood.
Despite the military victory and subsequent attempts to restore the castle, the town never recovered from the events of the Deluge. A further, final blow was dealt to Czersk in 1869 when, as punishment for the inhabitants' participation in the January Uprising against the Russians, the town charter was permanently revoked, reducing Czersk permanently to the small village it is today (you can't do much without a town charter).
The castle is but a ruin now. Today there were medieval re-enactors within the walls, preparing for a private event that was to be held later. In Czersk, during the late Spring and Summer there many are reenactments, exhibitions, markets and other events at the ruins. The thriving city that was a seat of power is, however, no more. Wiktor and I stood in the middle of the circular enclosure, surrounded by the crumbling walls and mindfully surveyed the farms and fields beyond, and just beyond, the Vistula river, the Polish river. For a few moments we both went back in time.
"What time do you have to be home?" I asked.
"I said I'd be back around 10:00," Wiktor said in a matter of fact tone.
"You won't make it..."
We liingered a few more minutes and then walked across the castle green, collected our steeds, and headed back into reality.
There is nothing quite like this. It was a beautiful ride to Czersk and the way back home--to reality--was equally so. And for us, we had already visited the 13th Century and were well headed home by the time other cyclists were out and about for their own Saturday adventures.
Until next time, Dear Readers, Ride On!
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