Word: kiev
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...contaminated regions. His mission: to document the world's worst nuclear-plant catastrophe. "People have the right to know," says Kostin, who devotes a third of his time to covering Chernobyl's aftermath. "The technology of atomic energy is not perfect. This could happen anywhere." Kostin lives in Kiev, 100 km (62 miles) from Chernobyl, and was a successful construction engineer before turning photographer at age 36. His trips to Chernobyl and its environs have deeply disturbed him. The children he saw haunt him the most. "They are the ones who became innocent victims of our so-called civilization...
Somewhat to the north, a people known as the East Slavs began settling in the dense forests in about A.D. 500, finally occupying an area from what is now Leningrad to Kiev. From their forests, they shipped furs and honey down the Dnieper to the imperial capital of Constantinople. In 862, according to a 12th century document known as the Primary Chronicle, there occurred a semi- legendary encounter when the quarreling Slavs sent a delegation to Scandinavia to negotiate with the Vikings, whom they called Varangians, specifically with a tribe known as the Rus. "Our whole land is great...
...Valley but also were soon trying to expand. In 907 Prince Oleg invaded the Eastern Roman Empire with 2,000 ships, "accomplished much slaughter among the Greeks" and supposedly nailed his shield to the imperial gates of Constantinople. From this foray, the Russians brought home to their capital in Kiev an advantageous trade treaty and an even more advantageous contact with the Christian religion and sophisticated culture of Constantinople. Thus emerged the first Russian state, known as Kievan Russia...
...most astonishing creations in history. His cavalry pierced the Great Wall of China and overwhelmed the Chin Empire in what has been described as the conquest of 100 million people by 100,000 soldiers. It was Genghis Khan's grandson Batu who first swept into Russia. When Kiev resisted, Batu besieged the city in 1240, burned it to the ground and massacred all its inhabitants. "When we passed through that land," wrote Archbishop Plano Carpini, a papal legate bound for the new power center in Mongolia, "we found lying in the field countless heads and bones of dead people. This...
Batu charged onward to conquer Poland and Hungary, and it was probably only the death in 1242 of Batu's uncle, the Great Khan Ugedey (he was apparently - poisoned by a jealous woman in his entourage), that saved Western Europe from the fate of Kiev. Batu decided to retrench and consolidate his rule over the khanate of the Golden Horde. Spread thin though they were, the Mongols of the Golden Horde ruled Russia for more than two centuries, and it was a harsh rule. Mongol tax collectors beggared the peasantry, and occupied Russia remained completely isolated from what the West...