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North Slavs

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North Slavs
     Countries with a North Slavic-speaking majority      Countries with a South Slavic-speaking majority
Total population
265+ million[citation needed]
Regions with significant populations
Majority: Central and Eastern Europe, North Asia Minority: Western Europe and Northern America
Languages
North Slavic (West Slavic and East Slavic) tongues:
Belarusian, Czech, Kashubian, Polish, Russian, Rusyn, Silesian, Slovak, Sorbian, Ukrainian
Religion
Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Protestantism, Irreligion
Related ethnic groups
Other Slavs (namely the South Slavs)

The North Slavs are a subgroup of Slavic peoples who speak the North Slavonic languages,[1][2] a classification of both the East Slavic and West Slavic groups together that has been in use for several centuries, but is not universally accepted.[3][4][5][6][not in citation given] They separated from the common Slavic group in the 7th century CE, and established independent polities in Central and Eastern Europe by the 8th and 9th centuries.[7]

North Slavic peoples today include the Belarusians, Czechs, Kashubians, Poles, Silesians, Rusyns, Russians, Slovaks, Sorbs, and Ukrainians.[2][6][8] They inhabit a contiguous area in Central and Eastern Europe stretching from the north of the Baltic Sea to the Sudetes and the Carpathian Mountains in the south (historically also across the Eastern Alps into the Apennine peninsula and the Balkan peninsula); from the west in the Czech Republic to the east in the Russian Federation.[7] There is also a significant share of North Slavic population in North Asia (Eastern Russia), and significant diaspora groups throughout the rest of the world.[9]

East and West Slavs[edit]

"Northern Slavs" and "Southern Slavs" grouping marked in a map of Austria-Hungary from the 19th century

Although the use of the East and West Slavonic categories is often the standard model, some theorists claim that these two groups share enough of the same or similar linguistic and cultural characteristics to be classed together as one North Slavic branch.[1][page needed][2][page needed][10][page needed][11] The crux of this argument is that there is a northern ethos and a southern ethos of the Slavs (a North Slavic and a South Slavic dialect continuum, a Northeastern European and a Southeastern European cuisine, etc.).[12] This split was caused by migrations of Slavonic tribes and reinforced by the Hungarian invasions of Europe at the end of the first millennium CE, causing the Slavic societies to gradually grow into two separate cultures.[7] The term "North Slav" itself has been used in academic works as early as 1841[13][3][14] and the concept continued to appear in publications in the centuries that followed.[4]

In terms of language, the greatest contrasts are evident between South Slavic tongues and the rest of the family.[1][2][15] Moreover, there are many exceptions and whole dialects that break the division of East and West Slavic languages. Thus the Slavs are clearly divided into two main linguistic groups: the North Slavs and the South Slavs, which can then be further categorised as the Northwest tongues (Czech, Kashubian, Polish, Silesian, Slovak, and Sorbian) and the Northeast ones (Belarusian, Russian, Rusyn, and Ukrainian) – whereas the Southern branch is split into the widely accepted groups of the Southwest languages (Serbo-Croatian and Slovene) and the Southeast tongues (Bulgarian and Macedonian). This model is argued as being more appropriate than the triple dissection of east, west and south.[1] O.T. Ford also writes of the Slavs being "conventionally" divided into three sub-branches (West, East, South), but "in reality" divided only by isolation into two bands that form two dialect continua: North and South.[8]

North Slavic cuisine features some Central European and some Near Eastern influences.[12] The South Slavs have a considerably more Mediterranean gastronomy because of the difference in climate and close proximity of Italy and Greece.[12] Due to centuries of interaction with the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires, Byzantine and Ottoman cultural influences in the region of South Slavs are significant.[16] There is a cultural split of the North Slavonic family into two separate categories according to religion: the West Slavic languages are of mostly Catholic countries (who use versions of the Latin alphabet) and the East Slavic languages are of primarily Orthodox territories (that mostly use the Cyrillic script).[1] The great majority of all Orthodox believers are North Slavonic.[8]

Population[edit]

There are an estimated 265,000,000 North Slavs worldwide,[citation needed] mostly within Eastern Europe and through Russian expansion into Asia.[8]

Nation Native State[citation needed] Numbers
Russians  Russia c. 150,000,000 (2003)[17][better source needed]
Poles  Poland 57,393,000[18][better source needed]
Ukrainians  Ukraine c. 46.7~51.8 million (2001)[19]
Czechs  Czechia c. 12,000,000[20][not in citation given]
Belarusians  Belarus c. 10,000,000[21][not in citation given]
Slovaks  Slovakia 6,940,000[22][better source needed]
Silesians  Czechia
 Germany
 Poland
c. 2,000,000[23]:6[not in citation given]
Rusyns  Serbia
 Slovakia
 Ukraine
c. 92,000[24][not in citation given]
Sorbs  Germany c. 70,000[25][better source needed]
Kashubians  Poland c. 500,000[26][better source needed][27][dead link]

Significant minorities of North Slavic populations exist in Western Europe (primarily Germany, the United Kingdom, and Ireland) as well as Northern America (mostly the United States and Canada. The oceanside neighbourhood of Brighton Beach in New York City's Brooklyn borough is known for its high Russian-speaking population; likewise, Chicago is home to a large number of Polish Americans and Polish immigrants. Chicago is also the city with the third largest Czech population, after Prague and Vienna.[28][29] Since the 2004 enlargement of the European Union, Germany and the UK have gathered considerable amounts of migrant Poles. In England, Polish has become the second most spoken native language after English – with over 500,000 speakers, according to the 2011 census.[30] In Ireland, over 120,000 Poles make up the largest minority in the country according to 2016 figures.[31] Lusatia, mostly in Germany, is the original homeland of the Sorbs living there who speak the Sorbian languages; since they did not migrate there and are native to this territory, they are also known as the "Lusatian Sorbs". They are descendants of the Polabian Slavs who have retained their identity and culture over centuries of living under Germanic rule, despite German colonisation and Germanisation.[32]

Languages[edit]

North Slavic tongues in Europe
  Polish
  Polabian


† extinct
  Czech
  Slovak

  Rusyn

The North Slavonic tongues today are:

Much overlap can be found between the Northwest and Northeast branches. Ukrainian and Belarusian have both been hugely influenced by Polish in the past centuries due to their geographic and cultural proximity, as well as to the Polonization of the Ruthenian population of the Polish Commonwealth.[12]

According to Kostiantyn Tyshchenko [uk], Ukrainian shares 70% common vocabulary with Polish, 66% with Slovak, and 62% with Russian.[33] Furthermore, Tyschenko identified 82 grammatical and phonetic features of the Ukrainian tongue – Polish, Czech and Slovak share upwards of 20 of these characteristics with Ukrainian, and 11 are shared with Russian.[34]

A number of now extinct tongues once existed within these groups, such as Slovincian in the Lekhitic subgroup or the Old Novgorod dialect within the Northeast section.[35]

In contrast to other dialects of Slovak, Eastern dialects (so-called Slovjak) are less intelligible with Czech and more with Polish and Rusyn.[36]

History[edit]

Wedding breads kolach and korovai, kvass fermented beverage, and kefir milk drink are examples of traditional dishes common among many North Slavic countries
Many of the North Slavonic nations used to be part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Russian Empire

The first written use of the name "Slavs" dates to the 6th century, when the Slavic tribes inhabited a large portion of Central and Eastern Europe. By that century, native Iranian ethnic groups (the Scythians, Sarmatians, and Alans) had been absorbed by the region's Slavic population.[37][38][39][40] Over the next two centuries, the Slavs expanded southwest toward the Balkans and the Alps and northeast towards the Volga River.[41]

Beginning in the ninth century, the Slavs gradually converted to Christianity (both Byzantine Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism) – beginning with the southern regions and ending at the eastern reaches.[42] By the 12th century, they were the core population of a number of medieval Christian states: the Northwest Slavs in Poland, the Holy Roman Empire (Pomerania, Bohemia, Moravia), Kingdom of Hungary (Nitria), and the Northeast Slavs in Kievan Rus'. During the Late Middle Ages, the main polities of the North Slavs were the Kingdom of Bohemia, Kingdom of Poland, Duchy of Masovia, Grand Duchy of Moscow, the Pskov Republic, and the Novgorod Republic. Lands of the former Kievan Rus' had become fragmented due to the Mongol invasion of the 13th century and would remain so until the first half of the 16th century, culturally affected in numerous ways by the Mongol Empire.[43]

In the early modern period, two major European powers – the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Tsardom of Russia – had large populations that consisted primarily of North Slavonic nations and North Slavic language speakers (primarily Poles, Ruthenians, Russians, Cossacks). Polish and Russian became the lingua franca of wide stretches of Catholic and Orthodox lands in Eastern Europe respectively.[44][45][46][47] Politically, Russia has dominated the region beginning with the fall of the Polish Kingdom in 1795. The Russian Empire continued to rule almost all of Eastern Europe and parts of Central Europe for the entirety of the 19th century up until the outbreak of World War I, which resulted in the overthrow of the tsarist autocracy during the October Revolution. The success of the USSR and establishment of the Eastern Bloc followed. All North Slavonic territories were part of the Eastern Bloc.[8]

While the Czech lands have never been as much of a military or political power during the region's history as Poland and Russia have, it was arguably seen by some as one of the most cultured of the North Slavic lands and the first to accept their new religion.[42] The Czechs were the first in the east to be Christianised in the 9th century, they later became arguably the most religiously tolerant of the Slavonic nation-states thanks to the Bohemian Reformation. However, today, the Czech Republic is one of the most irreligious countries in the world.[48] Presently, after the fall of the Eastern Bloc, North Slavonic nation-states are split among two different factions: the NATO and EU members of the Visegrád Group (the Czech Republic, Poland, and Slovakia) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (Belarus and Russia).[citation needed] Ukraine is currently a partner of both the CIS and NATO, while also taking part in the EU's Eastern Partnership initiative as part of the European Neighbourhood Policy.[49]

Religion[edit]

The Basilica of Our Lady of Licheń is an example of Northwest Slavic Catholic architecture[citation needed]
Saint Basil's Cathedral is an example of Northeast Slavic Orthodox architecture[citation needed]

In the present day, Christianity dominates among the North Slavic peoples, with Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism being the most popular denominations. In 2011, 48.3% of Belarusians living in their home country declared themselves as Orthodox.[50] A 2012 study in Russia placed the number of Orthodox Russians at 41%,[51][52] whereas a 2016 survey tells us that 65.4% of Ukrainians share these beliefs.[53] 87.5% of Poland's population declared Roman Catholic faith.[54][55][56] 65% of Polish believers attend church services on a regular basis.[57] 62% of Slovakia's inhabitants are Catholic.[58] Among Czechs, 34.5% claim to have no religion, 44.7% undeclared, and only 10.5% Roman Catholics.[59][60][61] Muslim Slavs are a minority, as they are found mostly among the South Slavs (particularly in Bosnia and Herzegovina).[62][63][64]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Živković, Tibor; Crnčević, Dejan; Bulić, Dejan; Petrović, Vladeta; Cvijanović, Irena; Radovanović, Bojana (2013). The World of the Slavs: Studies of the East, West and South Slavs: Civitas, Oppidas, Villas and Archeological Evidence (7th to 11th Centuries AD). Belgrade: Istorijski institut. ISBN 978-8677431044. Search this book on
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Kamusella, Tomasz; Nomachi, Motoki; Gibson, Catherine (2016). The Palgrave Handbook of Slavic Languages, Identities and Borders. London: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 9781137348395. Search this book on
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  17. "Нас 150 миллионов -Русское зарубежье, российские соотечественники, русские за границей, русские за рубежом, соотечественники, русскоязычное население, русские общины, диаспора, эмиграция". Russkie.org. 29 September 2003. Retrieved 29 April 2013.
  18. including 36,522,000 single ethnic identity, 871,000 multiple ethnic identity (especially 431,000 Polish and Silesian, 216,000 Polish and Kashubian and 224,000 Polish and another identity) in Poland (according to the census 2011) and estimated 20,000,000 out of Poland Świat Polonii, witryna Stowarzyszenia Wspólnota Polska: "Polacy za granicą" (Polish people abroad as per summary by Świat Polonii, internet portal of the Polish Association Wspólnota Polska)
  19. Paul R. Magocsi (2010). A History of Ukraine: The Land and Its Peoples. University of Toronto Press. pp. 10–. ISBN 978-1-4426-1021-7. Search this book on
  20. "Tab. 6.2 Obyvatelstvo podle národnosti podle krajů" [Table. 6.2 Population by nationality, by region] (PDF). Czech Statistical Office (in čeština). 2011. Archived from the original (PDF) on 31 January 2012. Unknown parameter |url-status= ignored (help)
  21. Karatnycky, Adrian (2001). Freedom in the World: The Annual Survey of Political Rights and Civil Liberties, 2000–2001. Piscataway, NJ: Transaction Publishers. p. 81. ISBN 978-0-7658-0884-4. Retrieved 7 June 2015. Search this book on
  22. including 4,353,000 in Slovakia (according to the census 2011), 147,000 single ethnic identity, 19,000 multiple ethnic identity (especially 18,000 Czech and Slovak and 1,000 Slovak and another identity) in Czech Republic (according to the census 2011), 53,000 in Serbia (according to the census 2011), 762,000 in the USA (according to the census 2010 Archived 2020-02-12 at Archive.today), 2,000 single ethnic identity and 1,000 multiple ethnic identity Slovak and Polish in Poland (according to the census 2011), 21,000 single ethnic identity, 43,000 multiple ethnic identity in Canada (according to the census 2006)
  23. "The Institute for European Studies, Ethnological institute of UW" (PDF). Retrieved 2012-08-16.
  24. Paul Magocsi (1995). "The Rusyn Question". Political Thought. 2–3 (6).
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  27. "Kaschuben heute: Kultur-Sprache-Identität" (PDF) (in German). pp. 8–9. Retrieved 2016-01-03.CS1 maint: Unrecognized language (link)
  28. Cozine, Alicia (2005). "Czechs and Bohemians". The Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicago. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Unknown parameter |url-status= ignored (help)
  29. Czech and Slovak roots in Vienna Archived 2014-05-12 at the Wayback Machine, wieninternational.at
  30. QS204EW – Main language, ONS 2011 Census. Retrieved 21 July 2015.
  31. Census 2016 Archived April 20, 2017, at the Wayback Machine
  32. Zaroff, Roman (1998). "Germanization of the Land Between the Elbe-Saale and Oder Rivers. Colonisation or assimilation". Proceedings of The University of Queensland History Research Group (9): 1–19.
  33. Tyschenko, Kostiantyn. "Мови Європи: відстані між мовами за словниковим складом". Archived from the original on May 1, 2015. Retrieved April 29, 2017. Unknown parameter |url-status= ignored (help)
  34. Tyshchenko, K. (2012). Правда про походження української мови. In: Lytvynenko, S (ed.) Український тиждень, Iss. 39, p. 35.
  35. Журавлев, А. Ф. (1994). "Лексико-статистическое моделирование системы славянского языкового родства": 64.
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  38. Adams, Douglas Q. (1997). Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture. Taylor & Francis. p. 523. [...] In their Ukrainian and Polish homeland the Slavs were intermixed and at times overlain by Germanic speakers (the Goths) and by Iranian speakers (Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans) in a shifting array of tribal and national configurations. Search this book on
  39. Atkinson, Dorothy; Dallin, Alexander; Warshofsky Lapidus, Gail, eds. (1977). Women in Russia. Stanford University Press. p. 3. [...] Ancient accounts link the Amazons with the Scythians and the Sarmatians, who successively dominated the south of Russia for a millennium extending back to the seventh century B.C. The descendants of these peoples were absorbed by the Slavs who came to be known as Russians. Search this book on
  40. Slovene Studies. 9–11. Society for Slovene Studies. 1987. p. 36. [...] For example, the ancient Scythians, Sarmatians (amongst others), and many other attested but now extinct peoples were assimilated in the course of history by Proto-Slavs. Search this book on
  41. "[B]etween the sixth and seventh centuries, large parts of Europe came to be controlled by Slavs, a process less understood and documented than that of the Germanic ethnogenesis in the west. Yet the effects of Slavicization were far more profound". Geary (2003, p. 144)
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  47. Thomas Lane. Lithuania stepping westwards. Routledge, 2001. p. 24. [verify]
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    Sample of 2,018 respondents aged 18 years and over, interviewed 25–30 March 2016 in all regions of Ukraine except Crimea and the occupied territories of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions.
  54. GUS, Narodowy Spis Powszechny Ludnosci 2011: 4.4. Przynależność wyznaniowa (National Survey 2011: 4.4 Membership in faith communities) p. 99/337 (PDF file, direct download 3.3 MB). ISBN 978-83-7027-521-1 Search this book on . Retrieved 27 December 2014.
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External links[edit]


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