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The Tale of Igor's Campaign
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Tale of Igor's Campaign
(Old East Slavic: Слово о плъку Игоревe, Slovo o plŭku
Igorevě; Modern Russian: Слово о полку Игореве, Slovo o
polku Igoreve; Ukrainian: Слово о полку Ігоревім, Slovo o
polku Ihorevim) is an anonymous epic poem written in the Old
East Slavic language. The title is also occasionally
translated as The Song of Igor's Campaign, The Lay of Igor's
Campaign, and The Lay of the Host of Igor.
The poem gives an account
of a failed raid of Igor Svyatoslavich (d. 1202). The
authenticity of the poem is disputed. Prevailing current
opinion is that the poem is authentic and dates to the
medieval period (late 12th century).
The Tale of Igor's Campaign
was adapted by Alexander Borodin into one of the great
classics of Russian opera. Entitled Prince Igor, it was
first performed in 1890.
Argument
The Tale has been compared to other epic poems including
The Song of Roland, the Daredevils of Sasun, and The Song of
the Nibelungs.
The plot of this classic
work is based on a failed raid of Kniaz Igor Svyatoslavich,
Prince of Novgorod-Seversk (of the Chernigov principality of
ancient Rus') against the Polovtsians (Cumans) living in the
southern part of the Don region in 1185.
Other Rus' historical
figures are mentioned, including the bard Boyan, the princes
Vseslav of Polotsk, Yaroslav Osmomysl of Halych, and
Vsevolod the Big Nest of Suzdal. The author appeals to the
warring Rus' princes, pleading for unity in the face of the
constant threat from the Turkic East.
An interesting aspect of
the text is its mix of Christianity and ancient Slavic
religion. Igor's wife Yaroslavna famously invokes natural
forces from the walls of Putyvl. Christian motifs present
along with depersonalised pagan gods in the form of artistic
images. Another aspect, which sets the book apart from
contemporary Western epics, are its numerous and vivid
descriptions of nature, and the role which nature plays in
human lives.
Discovery and
publication
The only manuscript of the Tale, claimed to be dated to
the 15th century, was discovered in 1795, in the library of
a Yaroslavl monastery, where the first library and school in
Russia had been established back in the 12th century. The
monks sold it to a local landowner, Aleksei Musin-Pushkin,
as a part of a collection of ten texts. He realised the
value of the book, and made a transcription for the empress
Catherine the Great in 1795 or '96, and published it in 1800
with the help of leading Russian paleographers of the time,
Alexei Malinovsky and Nikolai Bantysh-Kamensky. The original
manuscript was claimed to have burned in the great Moscow
fire of 1812 (during the Napoleonic occupation), together
with Aleksei's entire library.
The release of this
historical work into scholarly circulation created quite a
stir in Russian literary circles, because the tale
represented the earliest Slavonic writing without any
mixture of Church Slavonic. Ukrainian scholars in the
Austrian Empire declared, upon linguistic analysis, that the
document contained transitional language between a) earlier
fragments of the language of Rus' propria (the region of
Chernihiv, eastward through Kiev, and into Halych) and, b)
later fragments from the Halych-Volynian era of this same
region in the centuries immediately following the writing of
the document.
Vladimir Nabokov produced a translation into English in
1960.
Other notable editions include the standard Soviet edition,
prepared with an extended commentary, by the academician
Dmitry Likhachev.
Authenticity debate
According to the majority view, the poem is a
composition of the late 12th century, perhaps composed
orally and fixed in written form at some point during the
13th century. Some scholars consider the possibility that
the poem in its current form is a national Romanticist
compilation and rearrangement of several authentic sources.
The thesis of the poem being a complete forgery has been
proposed in the past but is widely discredited based on the
poem's language being closer to authentic medieval East
Slavic than practicable by a late 18th century forger before
the discovery of birch bark documents in 1951.
One of the crucial points
of the authenticity controversy is the relationship between
Slovo and Zadonschina, an unquestionably authentic poem,
preserved in six medieval copies and created in the 15th
century to glorify Dmitri Donskoi's victory over Mamai in
the Battle of Kulikovo. It is evident that there are almost
identical passages in both texts where only the personal
names are different. The traditional point of view considers
Zadonschina to be a late imitation, with Slovo being its
pattern. The forgery version claims vice versa that the
Igor's Tale is written using Zadonschina as a source.
Recently, Jakobson's and Zaliznyak's analyses show that the
passages of Zadonschina with counterparts in Slovo differ
from the rest of the text by a number of linguistic
parameters, whereas this is not so for Igor's Tale. This
fact is taken as evidence of Slovo being original with
respect to Zadonschina.
Current dialectology
upholds Pskov and Polotsk as the two cities where the Tale
was most likely written. Numerous persons have been proposed
as its authors, including Prince Igor and his brothers.
Early reactions
When the first modern edition of the Tale was published,
questions about its authenticity were raised, mostly on
account of its language. Suspicion was also fueled by
contemporary fabrications (for example, the "Songs of
Ossian" which were actually written by James Macpherson).
Today, majority opinion accepts the authenticity of the
text, based on similarity of its language with that of other
texts discovered after the Tale.
Proposed as forgers were
Aleksei Musin-Pushkin himself, or the Russian manuscript
forgers Anton Bardin and Alexander Sulakadzev (Bardin was
publicly exposed as the forger of four other copies of
'Slovo'). One of the notable early proponents of the
falsification theory was the notorious journalist and
orientalist Josef Sienkowski.
Soviet period
The problem was politicized in the Soviet Union: any
attempts to question the authenticity of 'Slovo' (for
example, those by French Slavist André Mazon or by Russian
historian Alexander Zimin) as well as the non-standard
interpretations, based on Turkic lexis, such as proposed by
Oljas Suleimenov (who considered Igor's Tale to be an
authentic text), were officially condemned. Mazon and
Zimin's views were opposed, e.g., by Roman Jakobson.
Olzhas Suleimenov in 1975
challenged the mainstream view of Tale in his book Az i Ya.
Suleymenov's research is claimed to reveal that Tale cannot
be completely authentic since it appears to have been
rewritten in the 16th century. Az i Ya was followed by
criticism from mainstream Slavists, including Dmitri
Likhachev, and Turkologists as well, qualifying Suleymenov's
etymological and paleography conjectures as amateurish.
Recent views
Historians and philologists, however, still continue to
question the tale's authenticity, due to an uncharacteristic
modern nationalistic sentiment (cf. Panslavism) contained
therein (Omeljan Pritsak inter alia).
The Tale is sometimes
considered to have an agenda similar to that of Kraledvorsky
Manuscript. For instance, in his article "Was Iaroslav of
Halych really shooting sultans in 1185?" and in his book
Josef Dobrovsky and the origins of the Igor's Tale (2003)
Harvard historian Edward L. Keenan states that Igor's Tale
is a fake, written by Czech scholar Josef Dobrovsky. It has
also been suggested that the Tale is a recompilation and
manipulation of several authentic sources put together
similarly to Lönnrot's Kalevala.
A 2004 book by Russian
linguist Andrey Zaliznyak analyzes the arguments of both
sides and concludes that the forgery theory is virtually
impossible. Only in the late 20th century, when hundreds of
bark documents were unearthed in Novgorod, was it
demonstrated that the puzzling passages and words from the
tale actually existed in everyday speech of the 12th
century, although they didn't find their way to chronicles
and other written documents. Zaliznyak concludes that no
18th century scholar could possibly imitate the subtle
grammatical and syntactical features that are present in the
known text. Nor could Dobrovsky, Keenan's candidate, fulfill
such a task, as his views on Slavic grammar were strikingly
different from the system found in Igor's Tale.
Juri Lotman's opinion
supports the view of authenticity of the Tale, based on the
absence of a number of semiotic elements in the Russian
Classicist literary tradition before the publication of the
Tale, notably "Russian Land ("русская земля")" that becomes
popular only in the 19th century, so a presumed forger of
the 1780s-1790s could not use such elements while composing
the text.
Orality
Robert Mann (1989, 2005) argues that all the leading
studies of the Tale have been mistaken in their view that
the Tale is the work of an ingenious poet working in a
written tradition. Mann maintains that there is no
substantial evidence that the Tale was first composed in
writing, and he points to an array of evidence suggesting
that the Tale first circulated as an oral epic song for
several decades before it was eventually written down - most
likely in the early 13th century.
Among his evidence are the
opening lines of the Tale as they appear to read at face
value: "Was it not fitting, brothers, to begin with the
olden words of the heroic tales about the campaign of
Igor..." That is, the narrator has begun according to the
strains of oral epic tales about Igor's defeat that are
already old and familiar. Mann has found numerous new
parallels to the text of the Tale in wedding songs, magical
incantations, bylinas and other Old Russian sources. Mann
was the first researcher to point out unique textual
parallels in a rare version of the Tale of the Battle
against Mamai (Skazanie o Mamaevom poboishche) published by
N.G. Golovin in 1835, which contains what Mann claims is the
earliest known redaction of the Skazanie, a redaction that
scholars posited but could not locate.
Using his findings in
byliny and Old Russian sources, Mann has attempted to
reconstruct the basic outlines of an early Russian song
about the conversion of the Kievan State. Mann believes that
this early conversion cycle left its imprint on several
passages of the Tale, including the motif sequence in which
the pagan Div warns the Tmutorokan idol that Igor's army is
approaching.
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The field of Igor Svyatoslavich's battle with
the Polovtsy, by Viktor Vasnetsov.
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The Song of Igor's Campaign,
Igor son of Svyatoslav and grandson of Oleg
Translated by Vladimir Nabokov
Might it not become us, brothers, to begin in the
diction of yore the stern tale 5 of the campaign of
Igor, Igor son of Svyatoslav? Let us, however, begin
this song in keeping with the happenings 10 of these
times and not with the contriving of Boyan. For he,
vatic Boyan if he wished to make a laud for 15 one,
ranged in thought [like the nightingale] over the
tree; like the gray wolf across land; 20 like the
smoky eagle up to the clouds. For as he recalled,
said he, the feuds of initial times, 25 "He set ten
falcons upon a flock of swans, and the one first
overtaken, sang a song first"— to Yaroslav of yore,
30 and to brave Mstislav who slew Rededya before the
Kasog troops, and to fair Roman son of Svyatoslav.
35 To be sure, brothers, Boyan did not [really] set
ten falcons upon a flock of swans: his own vatic
fingers he laid on the live strings, 40 which then
twanged out by themselves a paean to princes. So let
us begin, brothers, 45 this tale- from Vladimir of
yore to nowadays Igor. who girded his mind with
fortitude, 50 and sharpened his heart with
manliness; [thus] imbued with the spirit of arms, he
led his brave troops against the Kuman land in the
name of the Russian land.
O Boyan, nightingale of the times of old! If you
were to trill [your praise of] these troops, 55
while hopping, nightingale, over the tree of
thought; [if you were] flying in mind up to the
clouds; [if] weaving paeans around these 60 times,
[you were] roving the Troyan Trail, across fields
onto hills; then the song to be sung of Igor, that
grandson of Oleg [, would be]: 65 "No storm has
swept falcons across wide fields; flocks of daws
flee toward the 70 Great Don"; or you might intone
thus, vatic Boyan, grandson of Veles: "Steeds neigh
beyond the Sula; glory rings in Kiev; trumpets blare
in Novgorod[-Seversk]; banners are raised in
Putivl."
Igor waits for his dear brother Vsevolod. And Wild
Bull Vsevolod [arrives and] says to him: "My one
brother, one bright brightness, 75 you Igor! We both
are Svyatoslav's sons. Saddle, brother, your swift
steeds. As to mine, they are ready, saddled ahead,
near Kursk; 80 as to my Kurskers, they are famous
knights- swaddled under war-horns, nursed under
helmets, 85 fed from the point of the lance; to them
the trails are familiar, to them the ravines are
known, the bows they have are strung tight, 90 the
quivers, unclosed, the sabers, sharpened;
themselves, like gray wolves, they lope in the
field, seeking for themselves honor, and for their
prince glory."
The Eclipse and Igor's speech
Then Igor glanced up at the bright sun and saw that
from it with darkness 95 his warriors were covered.
And Igor says to his Guards: "Brothers and Guards!
It is better indeed to be slain than to be enslaved;
100 so let us mount, brothers, upon our swift
steeds, and take a look at the blue Don." A longing
consumed the prince's 105 mind, and the omen was
screened from him by the urge to taste of the Great
Don: 110 "For I wish," he said, "to break a lance on
the limit of the Kuman field; with you, sons of Rus,
I wish either to lay down my head or drink a
helmetful of the Don."
Igor sets out; accumulation of omens
Then Igor set foot in the golden stirrup and rode
out in the Champaign. The sun blocks his way with
115 darkness. Night, moaning ominously unto him,
awakens the birds; the whistling of beasts 120
[arises?]; [stirring?] the daeva calls on the top of
a tree, bids hearken the land unknown- the Volga,
125 and the [Azov] Seaboard, and the Sula country,
and Surozh, and Korsun, and you, idol of Tmutorokan!
Meanwhile by untrodden roads 130 the Kumans make for
the Great Don; [their] wagons screak in the middle
of night; one might say -- dispersed swans.
Igor leads Donward his warriors. His misfortunes
already are forefelt by the birds in the, oakscrub.
135 The wolves, in the ravines, conjure the storm.
The erns with their squalling summon the beasts to
the bones. The foxes yelp 140 at the vermilion
shields. O Russian land, you are already behind the
culmen! Long does the night keep 145 darkling. Dawn
sheds its light. Mist has covered the fields.
Stilled is the trilling of nightingales; the jargon
of jackdaws has 150 woken. With their vermilion
shields the sons of Rus have barred the great
prairie, seeking for themselves honor, and for their
prince glory.
Early on Friday they trampled the pagan Kuman troops
and fanned out like arrows 155 over the field; they
bore off fair Kuman maidens and, with them, gold,
and brocades, and precious samites. 160 By means of
caparisons, and mantlets, and furred cloaks of
leather they started making plankings to plank
marshes 165 and miry spots with all kinds of Kuman
weaves. A vermilion standard, a white gonfalon, a
vermilion penant of [dyed] 170 horsehair and a
silver hilt [went] to [Igor] son of Svyatoslav.
Night, and dawn of Saturday
In the field slumbers Oleg's brave aerie: far has it
flown! Not born was it to be wronged 175 either by
falcon or hawk, or by you, black raven, pagan Kuman!
Gzak runs like a gray wolf; Konchak lays out a track
for him 180 to the Great Don. On the next day very
early bloody effulgences herald the light. Black
clouds come from the sea: 185 They want to cover the
four suns, and in them throb blue lightnings. There
is to be great thunder, there is to come rain in
[the 190 guise of] arrows from the Great Don.
Saturday: the Kumans counter-attack
Here lances shall break, here sabers shall blunt
against Kuman helmets on the river Kayala by the
Great 195 Don. O Russian land, you are already
behind the culmen! Now the winds, Stribog's 200
grandsons, in [the guise of] arrows waft from the
sea against the brave troops of Igor! 205 The earth
rumbles, the rivers run sludgily, dust covers the
fields. The banners speak: "The Kumans are coming
from the Don and from the sea 210 and from all
sides!" The Russian troops retreat. The Fiend's
children bar the field with their war cries; the
brave sons of Rus bar it with their vermilion
shields.
Fierce Bull Vsevolod! You stand your ground, you
spurt arrows at warriors, you clang on helmets 215
with swords of steel. Wherever the Bull bounds,
darting light from his golden helmet, there lie
pagan Kuman heads: 220 cleft with tempered sabers
are [their] Avar helmets- by you, Fierce Bull
Vsevolod! What wound, brothers, can matter to one
225 who has forgotten honors and life, and the town
of Chernigov -- golden throne of his fathers -- and
of his dear beloved, 230 Gleb's fair daughter, the
wonts and ways!
Recollections of Oleg's feuds
There have been the ages of Troyan; gone are the
years of Yaroslav; there have been the campaigns of
Oleg, 235 Oleg son of Svyatoslav. That Oleg forged
feuds with the sword, and sowed the land with
arrows. He sets foot in the golden 240 stirrup in
the town of Tmutorokan: a similar clinking had been
hearkened by the great Yaroslav of long ago; 245 and
Vladimir son of Vsevolod every morn [that he heard
it] stopped his ears in Chernigov. As to Boris son
of Vyacheslav, 250 vainglory brought him to judgment
and on the Kanin [river] spread out a green pall,
for the offense against Oleg, the brave young
prince. And from that Kayala 255 Svyatopolk had his
father conveyed-- cradled between Hungarian pacers
[tandemwise]- to St. Sophia in Kiev. 260 Then, under
Oleg, child of Malglory, sown were and sprouted
discords; perished the livelihood of Dazhbog's
grandson 265 among princely feuds; human ages
dwindled. Then, across the Russian land, seldom did
plowmen shout [hup-hup to their horses] 270 but
often did ravens croak as they divided among
themselves the cadavers, while jackdaws announced in
their own jargon that they were about to fly to the
feed. Thus it was in those combats and in those
campaigns, but such a battle had never been heard
of.
From early morn to eve, and from eve to dawn,
tempered arrows fly, sabers resound against helmets,
275 steel lances crack. In the field unknown, midst
the Kuman land, the black sod under hooves was sown
with bones and irrigated with gore. 280 As grief
they came up throughout the Russian land. What dins
unto me, what rings unto me? Early today, before the
285 effulgences, Igor turns back his troops: he is
anxious about his dear brother Vsevolod. They fought
one day; 290 they fought another; on the third,
toward noon, Igor's banners fell.
Here the brothers parted on the bank of the swift
Kayala. Here was a want of blood-wine; here the
brave sons of Rus 295 finished the feast- got their
in-laws drunk, and themselves lay down In defense of
the Russian land. The grass droops with 300
condolements and the tree with sorrow bends to the
ground. For now, brothers, a cheerless tide has set
in; 305 now the wild has covered the strong; Wrong
has risen among the forces of Dazhbog's grandson; in
the guise of a maiden [Wrong] has stepped into 310
Troyan's land; she clapped her swan wings on the
blue sea by the Don, [and] clapping, decreased rich
times. 315 The strife of the princes against the
pagans has come to an end, for brother says to
brother: 320 "This is mine, and that is mine too,"
and the princes have begun to say of what is small:
"This is big," while against their own selves 325
they forge discord, [and] while from all sides with
victories the pagans enter the Russian land. 330 O,
far has the falcon gone, slaying birds: to the sea!
But Igor's brave troops 335 cannot be brought back
to life. In their wake the Keener has wailed, and
Lamentation has overrun the Russian land, shaking
the embers in the 340 inglehorn. The Russian women
have started to weep, repeating "Henceforth our dear
husbands cannot be thought of by [our] 345 thinking,
nor mused about by [our] musing, nor beheld with
[our] eyes; as to gold and silver none at all shall
we touch!" 350 And, brothers, Kiev groaned in
sorrow, and so did Chernigov in adversity; anguish
spread flowing over the Russian land; abundant woe
made its way midst the Russian land, while the
princes forged discord against their own selves,
[and] while the pagans, with victories prowling over
the Russian land, took tribute of one vair from
every homestead.
Victories of Svyatoslav III recalled
All because the two brave sons of Svyatoslav, Igor
and Vsevolod, stirred up the virulence 355 that had
been all but curbed by their senior, dread
Svyatoslav, the Great [Prince] of Kiev, [who kept
the Kumans] in dread. He beat down [the Kumans] With
360 his mighty troops and steel swords; invaded the
Kuman land; leveled underfoot 365 hills and ravines;
muddied rivers and lakes; drained torrents and
marshes; and the pagan Kobyaka, out of the Bight of
the Sea, from among the great iron Kuman troops, 370
he plucked like a tornado, and Kobyaka dropped in
the town of Kiev, in the guard-room of Svyatoslav!
Now the Germans, and the Venetians, now the Greeks,
and the Moravians 375 sing glory to Svyatoslavm, but
chide Prince Igor, for he let abundance sink 380 to
the bottom of the Kayala, [and] filled up Kuman
rivers with Russian gold. Now Igor the prince has
switched 385 from a saddle of gold to a thrall's
saddle. Pined away have the ramparts of towns, and
merriment 390 has dropped.
And Svyatoslav saw a troubled dream in Kiev upon the
hills: "This night, from eventide, they dressed me,
"he said, "with 395 a black pall on a bedstead of
yew. They ladled out for me blue wine mixed with
bane. From 400 the empty quivers of pagan tulks they
rolled great pearls onto my breast, and caressed me.
405 Already the traves lacked the master-girder in
my gold-crested tower! All night, from eventide,
demon ravens croaked. 410 On the outskirts of
Plesensk there was a logging sleigh, and it was
carried to the blue sea!"
The Boyars explain their sovereign's dream
And the boyars said to the Prince: "Already, Prince,
grief has enthralled the mind; for indeed two
falcons 415 have flown off the golden paternal,
throne in quest of the town of Tmutorokan -- or at
least to drink a helmetful 420 of the Don. Already
the falcons' winglets have been clipped by the
pagans' sabers, and the birds themselves 425
entangled in iron meshes." Indeed, dark it was on
the third day [of battle]: two suns were murked, 430
both crimson pillars were extinguished, and with
them both young moons, Oleg and Svyatoslav, were
veiled with darkness and sank in the sea. 435 "On
the river Kayala darkness has covered the light.
Over the Russian land the Kumans have spread, like a
brood of pards, 440 and great turbulence imparted to
the Hin. "Already disgrace has come down upon glory.
445 Already thralldom has crashed down upon freedom.
Already the daeva has swooped down upon the land.
And lo! Gothic fair maids 450 have burst into song
on the shore of the blue sea: chinking Russian gold,
they sing demon times; they lilt vengeance for
Sharokan; and already we, [your] Guards, hanker
after mirth."
Then the great Svyatoslav let fall a golden word
mingled with tears, and he said: 455 "O my juniors,
Igor and Vsevolod! Early did you begin to worry with
swords the Kuman land, 460 and seek personal glory;
but not honorably you triumphed for not honorably
you shed pagan blood. Your brave hearts are forged
of hard 465 steel and proven in turbulence; [but]
what is this you have done to my silver hoarness!
"Nor do I see any longer 470 the sway of my strong,
and wealthy, and multimilitant brother Yaroslav —
with his Chernigov boyars, 475 with his Moguts, and
Tatrans, and Shelbirs, and Topchaks, and Revugs, and
Olbers; for they without bucklers, with knives in
the legs of their boots, 480 vanquish armies with
war cries, to the ringing of ancestral glory. "But
you said: Let us be heroes on our own, let us by
ourselves grasp the 485 anterior glory and by
ourselves share the posterior 490 one. Now is it so
wonderful, brothers, for an old man to grow young?
When a falcon has moulted, he drives birds on high:
he does not allow any harm to befall his nest; but
here is the trouble: princes are of no help to me."
The Author apostrophizes contemporaneous
prnces
Inside out have the times turned. Now in Rim
[people] scream under Kuman sabers, 495 and
Volodimir [screams] under wounding blows. Woe and
anguish to you, [Volodimir] son of Gleb! Great
prince Vsevolod! Do you not think of flying here
from 500 afar to safeguard the paternal golden
throne? For you can with your oars scatter in drops
the Volga, 505 and with your helmets scoop dry the
Don. If you were here, a female slave would fetch
one nogata, 510 and a male slave, one rezana; for
you can shoot on land live bolts- [these are] the
bold sons of Gleb! 515 You turbulent Rurik, and
[you] David! Were not your men's gilt helmets afloat
on blood? Do not your brave knights roar 520 like
bulls wounded by tempered sabers in the field
unknown? Set your feet, my lords, in your stirrups
of gold to avenge the wrong of our time, 525 the
Russian land, and the wounds of Igor, turbulent son
of Svyatoslav. Eight-minded Yaroslav of Galich! You
sit high on your gold-forged throne; 530 you have
braced the Hungarian mountains with your iron
troops; you have barred the [Hungarian] king's 535
path; you have closed the Danube's gates, hurling
weighty missiles over the clouds, 540 spreading your
courts to the Danube. Your thunders range over
lands; you open Kiev's gates; from the paternal
golden throne you shoot at sultans 545 beyond the
lands. Shoot [your arrows], lord, at Konchak, the
pagan slave, to avenge the Russian land, and the
wounds of Igor, 550 turbulent son of Svyatoslav! And
you, turbulent Roman, and Mstislav! A brave thought
555 carries your minds to deeds. On high you soar to
deeds in your turbulence, like the falcon that rides
the winds as he strives in turbulence 560 to
overcome the bird. For you have iron breastplates
under Latin helmets; these have made the earth
rumble, and many nations- 565 Hins, Lithuanians,
Yatvangians, Dermners, and Kumans- have dropped
their spears and bowed their heads beneath those
steel swords. 570 But already, [O] Prince Igor, the
sunlight has dimmed, and, not goodly, the tree sheds
its foliage. 575 Along the Ros and the Sula the
towns have been distributed; and Igor's brave troops
cannot be brought back to life! The Don, Prince,
calls you, 580 and summons the princes to victory.
The brave princes, descendants of Oleg, have
hastened to fight. 585 Ingvar and Vsevolod, and all
three sons of Mstislav, six-winged [hawks?] of no
mean brood! Not by victorious sorts did you grasp
your patrimonies. 590 Where, then, are your golden
helmets, and Polish spears, and shields? Bar the
gates of the prairie with your sharp arrows to
avenge the Russian land and the wounds of Igor,
turbulent son of Svyatoslav. No longer indeed does
the Sula flow in silvery streams for [the defense
of] the town of Pereyaslavl; and the Dvina, too,
flows marsh-like for the erstwhile dreaded townsmen
of Polotsk to the war cries of pagans.
Alone Izyaslav son of Vasilko made his sharp swords
ring against Lithuanian helmets- [only] to cut down
the glory 595 of his grandsire Vseslav, and himself
he was cut down by Lithuanian swords under [his]
vermilion shields, [and fell] on the gory grass 600
[as if?] with a beloved one upon a bed And [Boyan]
said: "Your Guards, Prince, birds have hooded with
their 605 wings and beasts have licked up their
blood:' Neither your brother Bryachislav nor your
other one—Vsevolod—was there; 610 thus all alone you
let your pearly soul drop out of your brave body
through your golden gorget.
Despondent are the voices; drooped has merriment;
615 [only?] blare the town trumpets. Yaroslav, and
all the descendants of Vseslav! The time has come
620 to lower your banners, to sheathe your dented
swords. For you have already departed from the
ancestral glory; for with your feuds 625 you started
to draw the pagans onto the Russian land, onto the
livelihood of Vseslav. Indeed, because of those 630
quarrels violence came from the Kuman land.
In the seventh age of Troyan, Vseslav cast lots for
the damsel he wooed. By subterfuge, 635 propping
himself upon mounted troops, he vaulted toward the
town of Kiev and touched with the staff [of his
lance] the Kievan golden throne. 640 Like a fierce
beast he leapt away from them [the troops?], at
midnight, 645 out of Belgorod, having enveloped
himself in a blue mist. Then at morn, he drove in
his battle axes, 650 opened the gates of Novgorod,
shattered the glory of Yaroslav, [and] loped like a
wolf to the Nemiga from Dudutki. On the Nemiga the
spread sheaves 655 are heads, the flails that thresh
are of steel, lives are laid out on the threshing
floor, souls are winnowed from bodies. Nemiga's gory
banks are not 660 sowed goodly- sown with the bones
of Russia's sons. 665 Vseslav the prince judged men;
as prince, he ruled towns; but at night he prowled
in the guise of a wolf. From Kiev, prowling, he
reached, 670 before the cocks [crew], Tmutorokan.
The path of Great Hors, as a wolf, prowling, he
crossed. For him in Polotsk 675 they rang for matins
early at St. Sophia the bells; but he heard the
ringing in Kiev. Although, indeed, he had 680 a
vatic soul in a doughty body, he often suffered
calamities. Of him vatic Boyan once said, with
sense, in the tag: 685 "Neither the guileful nor the
skillful, neither bird [nor bard], can escape God's
judgment." Alas! The Russian land shall moan
recalling her first years and first princes! 690
Vladimir of yore, he, could not be nailed to the
Kievan hills. Now some of his banners have gone to
Rurik and others to David, but their plumes wave in
counterturn. Lances hum on the Dunay. The voice of
Yaroslav's daughter is heard; like a cuckoo, [unto
the field?] unknown, early she calls.
"I will fly, like a cuckoo," she says, "down the
Dunay. I will dip my beaver sleeve 695 in the river
Kayala. I will wipe the bleeding wounds on the
prince's hardy body." Yaroslav's daughter early
weeps, in Putivl on the rampart, repeating: 700
"Wind, Great Wind! Why, lord, blow perversely? Why
carry those Hinish dartlets on your light winglets
705 against my husband's warriors? Are you not
satisfied to blow on high, up to the clouds, rocking
the ships upon the blue 710 sea? Why, lord, have you
dispersed my gladness all over the feather grass?"
Yaroslav's daughter early weeps, in Putivl on the
rampart, 715 repeating: "O Dnepr, famed one! You
have pierced stone hills through the Kuman land. 720
You have lolled upon you Svyatoslav's galleys as far
as Kobyaka's camp. Loll up to me, lord, my husband
that I may not send my tears seaward thus early."
725 Yaroslav's daughter early weeps, in Putivl on
the rampart, repeating: 730 "Bright and
thrice-bright Sun! To all you are warm and comely;
Why spread, lord, your scorching rays on [my]
husband's warriors; [why] in the waterless field
parch their bows with thirst, close their quivers
with anguish?"
The sea plashed at midnight; waterspouts advance in
mists; God [?] points out to Igor the way from the
Kuman land 735 to the Russian land, to the paternal
golden throne. The evening glow has faded: Igor
sleeps; Igor keeps vigil; 740 Igor in thought
measures the plains from the Great Don to the Little
Donets; [bringing] a horse at midnight, 745 Ovlur
whistled beyond the river: he bids Igor heed— Igor
is not to be [held in bondage]. [Ovlur] called, 750
the earth rumbled, the grass swished, the Kuman
tents stirred. Meanwhile, like an ermine, Igor has
sped to the reeds, 755 and [settled] upon the water
like a white duck. He leaped upon the swift steed,
and sprang off it, [and ran on,] like a demon wolf,
and sped to the meadowland of 760 the Donets, and,
like a falcon, flew up to the mists, killing geese
765 and swans, for lunch, and for dinner, and for
supper. And even as Igor, like a falcon, flew, 770
Vlur, like a wolf, sped, shaking off by his passage
the cold dew; for both had worn out 775 their swift
steeds. Says the Donets: "Prince Igor! Not small is
your magnification, and Konchak's detestation, and
the Russian land's 780 gladness." Igor says: "O
Donets! Not small is your magnification: 785 you it
was who lolled a prince on [your] waves; who
carpeted for him with green grass your silver banks;
790 who clothed him with warm mists under the
shelter of the green tree; who had him guarded 795
by the golden-eye on the water, the gulls on the
currents, the [crested] black ducks on the winds.
800 Not like that," says [Igor], "is the river
Stugna: endowed with a meager stream, having fed
[therefore] on alien rills and runners, she rent
between bushes a youth, prince Rostislav,
imprisoning him. 805 On the Dnepr's dark bank
Rostislav's mother weeps the youth. Pined away have
the flowers with condolement, and the tree has been
bent to 810 the ground with sorrow." No chattering
magpies are these: on Igor's trail Gzak and Konchak
come riding. 815 Then the ravens did not caw, the
grackles were still, the [real] magpies did not
chatter; only the woodpeckers, in the osiers 820
climbing, with taps marked [for Igor] the way to the
river. The nightingales 825 with gay songs announce
the dawn. Says Gzak to Konchak: "Since the falcon to
his nest is 830 flying, let us shoot dead the
falcon's son with our gilded arrows." Says Konchak
to Gza [sic]: "Since the falcon to his nest is
flying why, let us entoil the falconet by means of a
fair maiden." And says Gzak to Konchak: "if we
entoil him by means of a fair maiden, neither the
falconet, nor the fair maiden, shall we have, while
the birds will start to beat us in the Kuman field."
Said Boyan, song-maker of the times of old, [of the
campaigns] of the kogans -- 835 Svyatoslav,
Yaroslav, Oleg: "Hard as it is for the head to be
without shoulders bad it is for the body to be
without head," -- 840 for the Russian land to be
without Igor. The sun shines in the sky: Prince Igor
is on Russian soil. Maidens sing on the Danube; 845
[their?] voices weave across the sea to Kiev. Igor
rides up the Borichev [slope] 850 to the Blessed
Virgin of the Tower; countries rejoice, cities are
merry.
After singing a song to the old princes one must
then sing to the young: Glory to Igor son of
Svyatoslav; 855 to Wild Bull Vsevolod; to Vladimir
son of Igor! Hail, princes and knights fighting for
the Christians against the pagan troops! 860 To the
princes glory, and to the knights [glory]-Amen.
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