Authors

Discussion

The Primary Chronicle (Kyiv, AD 1110s) presents an abundance of information about the languages of the peoples of Rus’ and their neighbors, as well as of passages that feature characters who speak different languages. This paper explores the chronicle text from two perspectives. On the one hand, it examines how languages helped weave the story of the past of Rus’. On the other, it analyzes how the languages of the diegesis were treated in the legendary passages. Without losing from sight the extant evidence on multilingualism in Rus’, the results of this study will seek to understand why language was thematized or, alternatively, erased from annalistic narratives, and what that reveals about the making of the Primary Chronicle.