! Extra Information & Clarifications ! 0:03 Painting by Tadeusz Popiel. 0:14 If you can pick I would prefer you would support me on Patreon as A. there's more reward tears on there and B. more of that money actually makes it to the creator than on RU-vid. RU-vid takes a much larger cut than Patreon does. If you want to do just a one time donation you can also do that through RU-vid "Thanks". Thank you very much for any support you give. This year I have been struggling with where I want to go with my life and the donations really help me justify spending time on this whole RU-vid thing which is what I would love to be doing if possible. 1:12 It could mean anything from chattel slavery to 'servus Dei' meaning servant of god, which most medieval monks would consider themselves as being but they are, of course, not 'slaves'. 2:30 2:40 Paintings by Sergey Ivanov. 3:20 Cotton MS Julius A VI, f. 6v. 3:24 Sometimes they would also add 'et' in between the words, i.e. 'sclavus et captivus'. 3:58 Munich, Bayerische Stattsbibliothek, Clm.4453, fol. 23-24. 4:52 The variations can be attributed to the fact that there was no standardized way of writing the name and medieval authors where most likely just trying to phonetically spell out, the best way they could, the name 'Slovene' which they heard from the Slavs. 5:53 Slavs most certainly also lived within the Lombardic and Gepid Pannonian kingdoms which is why I put the word slav in that area. 6:45 I misspoke, I meant Carinthia not Thuringia. 7:14 Here I am using the word 'Islamic Caliphate' as a catch all for the Rashidun, Umayyad, and Abbasside Caliphates just to simplify things. 7:47 The star of David that is shown in the Khazar Khaganate is supposed to symbolize the superficial conversion of the Khaganate to Judaism. In reality the conversion was very superficial and was primarily only political rather than actually internal. With that said, this superficial outward conversation did play a role in altering the Slavic slave trade in eastern Europe as, for example, Jewish merchants from Al-Andalus made contact with merchants in Khazaria and tried opening a new trade route from Khazaria to Al-Andalus. That is why I think it was still worth mentioning the Jewish connections of the later Khazar Khaganate despite the actual history of their conversation being very nuanced and largely unsuccessful. 'The Archaeology of Slavery in Early Medieval Northern Europe', p. 133. 8:36 Although, by the time of the 11th century these two main divides in trade routes stopped existing as the new Hungarian and Polish kingdoms connected the east trade routes with the west. However, before then the pagan Avars and also, initially, pagan Hungarians, largely blocked the connection of the wester and eastern trade routes along the Danube, while disunited Poland didn't have major trade ports that could connected the greater flat lands of Poland. 9:00 I meant to say Muslim explorers and geographers as not all of these people where Arabs, some where Persian and other ethnicities. 9:07 Ibn Rusta actually called the Varangians the Rus' in his writings. This was not uncommon because, first, the word Rus' initially meant just Norseman living in Eastern Europe and only later became to be applied to the Slavic population and, second, these geographers and explorers didn't always identify the people with the correct term they would have used. Therefore, the context in which these words are being used is very important in determining who they're supposed to refer to. In this case it is very obvious that the word Rus' was supposed to refer to the raiding Varangians of Eastern Europe hence, for simplicity sake, I changed the word to that. 10:40 I accidentally mixed up West and East Francia on the map, sorry. 13:25 Now this argument is extremely nuanced, after all the book has 1000 pages, so I obviously couldn't talk about everything, therefore, go read the book if you want to know more. 13:39 Painting by Sergey Ivanov. 14:05 Of course, this linguistic change didn't happen all at ones everywhere in Europe. It was a gradual process that started in the 9th century and, in some areas like southern Italy, wasn't fully complete until the early 14th century. 14:45 Saqaliba meant 'white slave' mostly in Al-Andalus, while in the rest of the Muslim world it meant just Slav. 14:55 Cantigas de Santa María, fol-221V. 15:24 Bodleian Library, MS. Douce 195, fol. 76v. 15:29 Santa María de Terena. Miniature of the Cantiga #275. 15:30 What I am doing here, i.e. the comparison I stated, would be a bit disingenuous to do within an academic work because it doesn't help us understand slavery as a spectrum nor does it somehow alleviate the suffering of some by saying it wasn't as bad as the suffering of others. But because this video is supposed to be an "introduction", and because it is intended for a lay audience, I felt the need to make some comparison in order to set up some point of reference, even if not perfect. 15:30 Plantation based chattel slavery did exist but was very uncommon during the middle ages. Vast majority of slaves ended up being guards/soldiers, maids, house workers, etc. Often even with the possibility of buying ones own freedom or being able to assimilate into the society they lived in. After all some Saqaliba even managed to become rulers or appointed into very high political positions, 15:39 Cantigas de Santa María, fol-244R. 16:09 Slavs also were the most numerous ethnic group in eastern Europe so by sheer numbers they would have ended up being the majority of the slaves. I just didn't state this fact because there is a whole debate about ethnicity in the middle ages and to what extend "Slavic" was an identifiable ethnicity and how it coalesced to a point to be the most dominant ethnicity in Europe and, therefore, stating this would have brought about more historiographical arguments which would have had to be addressed and for which there wasn't enough time in the video. If you want to know more look up Vienna School, Toronto School, and Oxford School of thought on ethnicity in the middle ages. 17:43 "Thirst for knowledge" Anti-Czech propaganda postcard from around 1910. A Czech school boy has to copy answers from a "smarter" German school boy while Masaryk in the background oversees it all happening. This is a reference to the alleged inferiority of the Slavs. The card was part of a series that was published by the Federation of Germans in Lower Austria. 18:08 Which sounds very similar to the argument for British colonialism I mentioned in my previous video. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-1Pn8r5gOatg.html 18:34 “Germans learn Czech!” Anti-Czech propaganda postcard from around 1910 A German schoolboy fails to pronounce a Czech tongue twister. This is a reference to the alleged inferiority of the Slav languages. The card was part of a series that was published by the Federation of Germans in Lower Austria. 19:04 Illustration by Tom Lovell, National Geographic Image Collection There is this idea that most slave trading in medieval Europe was conducted by Jews but this is wholly unsupported by academic research and is mostly just part of fascist propaganda. Jews were just as likely as any other people group to be medieval slave traders no more nor less. Sources for all my videos are in the bibliography of my scripts available for free to download on my Patreon. www.patreon.com/mlaser?filters[tag]=script
@@wiwersewindemer4437 The numbers are a footnote in the script. Download the script and you'll get all the sources in there just like in any academic paper.
Don't forget, the Slavic people of today are descended from the Slavs who fought against their enemies who were trying to enslave them, remained free and survived. Also, many Slavic women who were taken as slaves became the mothers of the next generation of the Ottoman elite. I believe this mixing of blood gradually changed the attitude of the Ottomans regarding the Slavs due to the presence of an increasing number of people who recognized their dual heritage. Just my theory and can probably be disputed.
@@user-yo5ee5kx4y good point but the Russian Empire didn't do shit. We freed ourselves and you only started supporting that when you needed us to help you get political power in the Balkans. Get out of my country fake friends. Go back to Russia and suffer economically for attacking Ukraine
We did not. But the thing which struck me the most in this video was the idea that the slav slave trade built up western economy, which was a precursor to later worldwide colonization and tyranny. Evil breeds more evil it seems :)
@@cherylk.2474 The latter years of the Ottoman empire point towards the Janissaries becoming a ruling class of their own; many of which were abducted from Slavic homelands/families and raised to become the formidable soldier group of the Ottoman empire. I'd imagine these abductions caused increasing animosity towards the ruling Turks from the Slavs who have been tributed to become Janissaries. As their political influence grew, it contributed towards instability in the Ottoman Empire which later led to its collapse. Of course, there were many other factors that caused this collapse, but perhaps it wasn't the best idea to steal children from the Slavic territories they occupied and raise them to become elite soldiers of the Ottoman empire.
@@MrEvan1932 As a Turk, I can say that at the time, Ottomans were multicultural muslims and they believed balkan people (serbs especially) were fierce fighters (but ufortunately(!) infidels). So they used them because of this perceived positivd regard and trusted them to be present in capital (living near sultans palace in fierce education of literature, architecture (also siege equipments, remember mercenary christians in 1453 as craftsmen of bombards) or martial arts
If I remember my medieval etymology right "Slava" (glory) and "slovo" (word) has the same root, as slava has its roots in "someone who is spoken of" (someone who is famous, someone who has glory). So slavs basically means "people who speak our language".
it also fun that the slavs called us germanics niemcy (i think thats how you spell it) which i think means something like mute or no word, because the slavs couldn't understand them
@@SimonNissen94 mate you wrote that in past tense. Germans are still called Njemci and Germany Njemacka (like officially) which would translate as "land of those who cant speak" ...too funny :)
@@alexd9735 It varies between different slavic languages. I know the Poles still call them that, where I'm from the country is Germania, but the people are niemcy
That's a good point. Statistically your ancestors are definetly more likely to be Slavic slave traders than the Slavic slaves, since most of them ended up as eunuchs in the middle east. The ones that remained in Eastern Europe where the ones that avoided being captured or took part in the trading.
@@MLaserHistory idk, there is theory that early Polan state was build on trade slave too. Just to said that, there was quite a large number of Varangians which had served under Polan rulers. These rulers must have been paying them somehow.
In Polish word slave is translated as "niewolnik". "Nie-" part means no, and "-wolnik" from "wola" refers to free will. Niewolnik means quite literally, without free will. It's self explianatory we don't have connection between word for Slavs (Słowianie) and slaves (niewolnik).
@@ulfricheiligestern1326 but in Ukranian slave is also "rab/раб", though. But it's interesting that Ukranian language has no word "rabotat'(work), which clearly has some connection to slavery, but russian language does...
When I first read about early Czech history in academic sources, it really surprised me how much slave trade was referenced. Contact with Arabic world seemed preposterous at first glance, and through today's lenses, Czechs selling other Slavs from Poland and beyond seemed a silly idea. I thought about it for a bit and slowly started realising how much political and economical sense it made, and how much today's concept of nationality and old 19th-century-style outlook on 'fellow Slavic nations' were colouring my perception right there. I remember the moment quite clearly as the first instance of bias on my own part I recognised, it was a little eye opening. After all, for a 10th century Czech, what did it matter to him whether he was fighting against a Pole or a German or a Magyar? No matter how much we want to think about it like that, people in the 10th century weren't our grandfather's grandfathers - they were almost entirely foreign to us, their values entirely different, no matter how much we try to identify with them. Some people today don't want to think of their ancestors as this distant though, and easily fall back on "my people just don't do that". Slavery seems to be a concept that modern people know just as a Roman thing, or more likely, as the American plantation system. Enslaving within Europe seems inconceivable while you only think within those boundaries. P.S.: My thoughts kinda meandered there. Great video!
Nationalism gave rise to the nation state of homogeneous ethnicity is a totally foreign concept in those days. I guess selling the pagan tribe across the river to the Muslim traders make sense economically, and they fact that they are not from your village / religion means you have no qualms sleeping at night about it. It's like selling an animal you caught in the forest across the river to the Czechs If it helps I suspect the Slavic tribes sell each other to slavery too
The mentality apparently persisted into relatively modern times, which would be why Europeans so eagerly embraced the African slave trade in the 15th and 16th Centuries, even though the markets were mostly across the Atlantic (for the most part, they weren't employed at home). After all, it wasn't their people being enslaved and sold. Outside of the Iberian Peninsula, the slaves weren't even for the local markets (no need to worry about local consequences). Apparently, Europeans didn't even think much about it until the Eighteenth Century.
@@hkchan1339 You can stop suspecting and start being certain. Slavery and general acceptation of treating another people as some sort of goods/propriety were common concepts among both western and eastern Europeans since antiquity all the way through Middle Ages. It didn't look quite as we imagine it nowadays though: chains, whips, brutal violance, dying in ruined cottages after few months of ardous exploitation etc.. In most cases it came down to taking hostages for ransom or kiddnaping peasant and relocating them to your own land as servants. Many such a people assimilated later and became just another locals in generation or two.
One curiosity: The popular Italian salutation "Ciao" actually means "slave" in ancient Venetian dialect. When two people met, they used to say "sciao vostro", meaning "I'm your slave", as a courtesy display.
so kinda 'your humble servant' and such often nobles ended their letters by? i acutally use the word ciao on daily basis like and did not know that interresting...
@@Sanvone interresting...being of similuare experince as my kind first came to this contry earlie 1500 belived of tatar origin so called us for 'thaatare' or today being 'tattar' that became in daily use asscoiated with negativly and used as a slur not for us as being racial only to one another as insult in sports teams or calling those being of antisocial,criminal or futherst down in rank of society viewed lesser, as our people being it been in 2010s baned for others useing the term as we became a minority people and being seen as hate crime..not for being any real diffrents other than average peasent mind their tounge abit more not that were being seen or treated better cause of banned it, its a synenom with the english word 'gipsy' basically and of same meaning as our people and our 'n-word' being gipsy in general before this one is just another specifik for scandinavia as thought we were tatars as being nomads and 'oriental' hehe...somethings ironic the pc word being insted for us 'romer' being from our word 'rom' as our people here in europe is now going by... acutally its 'romale' as in 'aven romale' - being romani in our language, our relatives in anatolya,iran,egypt etc are known as Domari and speak the same language as us but diffrent dialect as we got european dialectes depending on host nation that we been in historically when it wasent as easy and common to meet other tribal groups if not being very well travelled outside your own contry and territory being historical seperated and isolated from one another as we all got a base since over millenia ago before we even came here that almost being 100% same word and meaing to us just diffrent prouncement or grammar/spell cause use of the host nations not a univerasl as its never been written down before now with soical media and all some even started to create one for the future and our peoples can comunicate like we do now in english... i can understand song lyrics or speak in daily phrases with another even if not meet or same dialect as thanks to our basic necissaerity for being able to comunicate say if would be in a contry which i cant speak their language i could if find one of my kind comunicate essential things... speak a german dialect since being orignated from there and that dialect but informerly known as traveler romani which have same phrasing and being relation with also use jiddish words as its a germanic language were being from same peoples and often share surnames as schwartz,weiss,meyer(in my case)grön-green,neuman/newman/nyman,freiman/freeman/friman,bäckström,lindemann,lind,rosenberg acutally roth and ros has same origin for us rather than the flower, being roosch-roth-ros-roos tho for some solidernames given for those serving or not being later roma from east most names has to do with colours goldsmithing or here trees like björk espcially linden is common as : lind,lindh,lindgren,lundgren,lindbergh,lindholm.. diffrent mixes bäck,ström,forss all being part of smithing pre-industrial age since need running water for the melting...ström-stream,bäck-calmer stream,forss-fast streams often downhills..like a berg find it holm is swedish for island like in novgorod 'holmgård' or the capitol 'stockholm' meaing logisland as example for us are incommon with german jews being romani and from western europe unlike the roma from eastern we speak difrent dialects and such...elvis presely charlie chaplin michael cain are of our people for some publical famous peoples that is common knowledge in household world wide
As an East European Slav, I need to thank you for this video. Convincing people in the West that our perspective is important often feels like bashing my head into a concrete wall. This is the sort of foundation I need, just so they'd stop talking over my head and listen. I'm especially grateful that you stressed the anti-Slavic prejudice in Marxism. My experiences with communism are often invalidated by the western speakers, because Marx supposedly said that "communism couldn't work out in my part of the world". There is a strong 'it didn't count' mindset in the western left when it comes to Slavic experience, and an equally strong conviction that our feelings and opinions on the matter don't count, either. I really wish these people would say what Marx and Engels *actually* had to say about my people. It really shows how 'objective' these claims were. There's one thing I really yearned for at the end of the video, though: A nod to the modern human trafficking and slavery. The idea that Slavs are attractive-yet-exploitable targets for slavery is alive and well - and with the influx of Ukrainian war refugees, Slavic human trafficking is sadly on the rise.
I watched this video and it struck me that modern human traffickers seem to be using the same routes. Particularly Slav women trafficked into the sex industry. There's an estimated 50million slaves in the world in 2023. As soon as you start looking into this stuff it gets dark very fast and you have to wonder why it continues so unopposed.
Concept that the word Slav is the origin of the word slave is accepted in Slavic countries, but often than not, westerners reverse it, and say, that Slav is hailed from slave, this is where Slavic people have problem.
Ditto for this one! Something so simple can be used by people to paint a picture, and in a world where propaganda and bots reign supreme it can be difficult to have straight conversations with people.
As Czech, I do remember being taught at primary school abou adopting christianity en masse around 8th century. But I don't recall them even mentioning slave trade at all. Which is not that surprising, coming from both ends.
the first bohemian state economy was 100% dependent on the slave trade - slaves were sold in Prague (jugoslavske namesti) to the jewish and Arabic traders , the first regular bohemian army was fully financed from slave sales
The fact that so many slavs were enslaved is more of a reflection on the cruelty of their neighbors than on any perceived inferiority of the people. During tumultuous times, anyone can be a victim.
Another part of this denial could be simple fact of education. I am from a slavic country and I can assure you that at least in my school years there was not even a word on slavic slave trade (which is a bit weird to be honest, because we like to self-martyr normally)... We have a strong focus on history post conversion to Christianity. About the period before that, we mostly discussed religious beliefs, some conflicts between tribes and with Western Europe, but nothing about captured people.
Yet another reason why I am disappointed by my Polish education. We covered ancient Egypt like three times, yet there as not a word in all my history lessons about this topic.
Same. Accidentally learned about Slavic slave trade through an Adventure novel(!) that i read for fun. Yet not a single word on the topic in schoolbooks. Was really disappointed in our education system...
Which aspect? The west in general doesnt want to teach about enslavement of slavic peoples. They want to focus on the transatlantic slave trade, and thats it
I as a slav (Ukrainian) always wondered why in English slaves and Slavs were so similiar words but never found a good video of such quality as yours. Big thank you
its been known for rather long time...but i think cause of the modern view on it aswell but its not really like slavic peoples proudly want to aknowledge it...rest just want to hide the fact probaly cause of negative association why its not a higher topic...
The main problem with the identification of the words "Slav" and "slave" is that some people believe that the ethnonym comes from the western word while in fact the reverse story is true.
In Russian, the word for slave is "rab", from what I read it's inherited from Old East Slavic and possibly Proto-Slavic before that. The Russian word for "work" is "rabota", which is a cognate with the word slave and can be interpreted as "slave's activity". In Ukrainian they use "robyty" (робити) and in Polish robić, both have the same root as Russian "rabota" (работа) and come from the word for slave, though from what I understand the meaning of it in Polish and Ukrainian is closer to "to do" rather than specifically for working
In Polish we also use the term "robota" for work. It's less common, and less official, but functions in the language as well. If you want to say "Good work!" in Polish you say "Dobra robota!", and never "Dobra praca". Maybe it's because in Polish "praca"(work) means an activity, and "robota"(work) means more like "a lump of work", or "the sum of done work", it's work made in time.
@@user-on5jn9tn5n It was actually proposed by his brother, as Karel didn't like what he came up with initially. He is still credited as the author although he repeatedly said it was his brother's idea. :)
In Swedish, the two words are spelled and pronounced exactly the same. To the point of it feeling strange to ask someone if they're Slavic in the noun form. Since you're literally asking them if they're a slave. Or the other way around I guess.
There are some words that are way to similar for a coincidence. Like: oganj (fire) Croatian -ugn (oven) Swedish - agni (fire) in Sanskrt. Or: jamrati (to whine, moa) Slovene, jämra sig (moan, whine) Swedish. Pretty freaky if you ask me. But then, proto Indo European is our common ancestor language, so...
I just want to point out how great it is that you drew out all those maps so we can just passively watch how things changed over time. That was a lot of extra work for you, and it makes things so much easier for us viewers! Maybe this seems like an odd thing for me to be so excited about but the main trouble I have when reading history is keeping track of maps. Thanks for another excellent video! I'm not sure why I wasn't already subscribed, but I am now.
Great video! If I may add something, I think that another reason why Slavic people often react negatively to the mentioning of the etymological connection between 'Slav' and 'slave', is that it's often presented in a simplified (like in your thumbnail) or reversed way, implying that Slavs _means_ slaves. As you explained in the video the etymology of the ethnonym Slav and its equivalents in other languages (including the original Slavic endonyms) is different. We are "the people of the word (and/or glory)", while others, like Germans, are "mutes". 😉 Edit: The thumbnail picture was apparently changed. I also think that the early modern Ottoman-related slave trade in the Black Sea region, which you briefly mentioned near the end (and which inspired the painting _Tatar Captives_ by Tadeusz Popiel used in the video) is a large, interesting, complex, and underappreciated topic, which could get its own video. I can recommend the paper _Slave hunting and slave redemption as a business enterprise: the northern Black Sea region in the sixteenth to seventeenth centuries_ by Dariusz Kołodziejczyk as a good source. Finally, I really like that you distinguished between slavery and serfdom. Explaining exactly how and why these systems are not the same thing could easily be the topic of yet another video, maybe combined with explaining why serfdom survived longer and even intensified in much of Eastern (and Central, depending on the definition) Europe while disappearing in the Western part.
Nice explanation of origins of word Slavic. Would also add that in times before Christianity there was a custom of respecting dead ancestors among Slavs - remnant of that is visible in today ortodox Serbs who have custom "Slava" where they venerate saint protector of their family which took origins of venerating ancestors
“Slava” appears to have a parallel etymology to latin “fame” - both are variations of “speak” in respective language branches. (I think it’s safe and easy to see the connection between “famous” and “spoken of”.) In contrast, “gloria” has different origins, and “chwala/chvala/xvala” yet another.
The simple explanation of why serfdom survived longer in yhe east is usually given as 'black death killed more people in the west than the east, creating worker shortage, in turn creating better treatement and rights for those who would work'. I agree that a deeper dive into the subject would be a great video. I'm sure there are also cultural reasons too, and I'm looking here towards Muscovy specifically, where serfdom survived extremly long.
More Americans should see this and take history in account when talking about slavery... When you watch Americans talk about it it look like slavery only happened in Usa
Yes, or even that only sub-Saharan African people were victims of the "white colonizers" (as if the Americans did not originate from them...), when in reality slavery affected everyone and was implemented by anyone.
And, of course we were asshats to you as well, when you wanted to get free. Just as you have forgotten that and tried to take colonies of your own. Everyone has been at it, at one point or another.
The word "slava" is literally translated to "glory", the word "slovo" is literally translated to "a letter" and the word "slaviti" is "to celebrate | to glorify". -> From that you can undeniably see that it is asociated of the glory or the people. And the reason people are defensive is because we know that most of the western audience is not intelligent enough to realize that Slav doesn't really mean slave in the native language (they tend to believe that all languages come from English), which is the only language that matters when discussing root of the word.
words are what we want them to be, there might be that it always hasn't had the same meaning as they have today 'cause as with everything words evolve to.
@@Hejirah It is exactly like I said then. The root of "slovo" is "a letter" or "a word", the root of slava is "glory/celebrate/fame". You may have misunderstood, by letter I don't mean post letter but a character symbol for a voice - things that make up a word.
I feel like ppl get defensive because they somehow flip it in their minds from "Slave comes from Slav" to "Slav comes from Slave" and get offended by that. To me it simply shows either a severe problem with their skill to comprehend whatever it is they're reading/listening to OR they're just bad at English.
The weird thing is, this is (at least in some slavic countries) not discussed in schools. School history books I and many of my slavic friends went through have no mentions of this. Were it not for this video, I probably wouldn't even know this ever happened. As for the defensiveness, I don't think it's as much of an issue as the video states. Either because, like myself, people don't really know about this, or because this was something that happened long ago, and we got over it. But I think it's a good reminder of what our ancestors went through, of the hardships a medieval person faced, and can even be seen as a sort of victory over the anti-slavic propaganda mentioned. I'm not ashamed of being a slav, nor for the things that happened to those before me. The shame should be on those who were responsible for these immoral acts.
The irony here is that while this hardly mentioned in the eastern Slavic countries over at least last hundred years (the only close thing to that is the early soviet propaganda slogan that can be translated as “we’re not the slaves, the slaves are mute” but it was primarily said in context of working class exploitation before the revolution), the Eastern Europe didn’t forget the meaning even though the etymological context may have been lost or distorted over time. The yesterday barbarians who were partially assimilated by Roman culture and claimed that they inherited the Roman Empire (primarily, German and Frankish states) started to think of Slavs as new barbarians and never stopped since. There were reasons, indeed. Like paganism, ferocity of sorts compared to what Roman Empire brought to those “yesterday barbarians” some centuries ago. It also could’ve been a grudge against the fall of the Empire at the time. The Great Migration of Peoples started from the east. Though, huns and climate minimum were the reasons, when it ended, huns were either killed or assimilated (hello, Hungary), and the Slavic population was of the latest ones to come from the east, at the very end of the Great Migration, and they were pagans. It’s hard, probably even impossible to prove or disprove the statement that Slavic people were blamed for the fall of the Empire. In early Middle Ages that event was thought of as an apocalyptic omen, it explains the whole religious propaganda in Christian Church, denying the materialistic stuff in favour of the immortal soul. People were waiting for the second coming, and of course, they needed someone to blame. Again, this is just a speculation, there are no proofs to that (at least known by me). But we have another people who were blamed and discriminated for centuries for another biblical event: Jews. They were blamed at the time, but it all grew into unprecedented hatred that climaxed in the events of Holocaust. But many people forget (or try not to speak about) that Slavic people were marked as the second most hated ones in Hitler’s propaganda. They were tortured and killed alongside Jews in concentration camps. After the fall of Constantinople, the last Byzantine princess Sophia Paleologos made her way to Moscow and married Ivan III, Moscow was called the Third Rome, and Ivan III proclaimed himself tzar, the word is shortened version of Caesar, meaning Emperor of Rome. Sophia denied propositions from catholic priests who traveled with her to marry the emperor of Holy Roman Empire. This event, I think, started the next round of hatred, this time, towards Russia. History shown that since that time Russia has grown bigger and bigger, despite all turmoil that happened in 17 century. But the cultural gap between Russia and other countries to the west was big. Even after what Peter The Great did, bringing European culture straight to Russia, the gap was still big enough. In 19 century the national idea rose, and by that time Russia had united virtually all eastern Slavic peoples under one banner. For western people Russia equaled Slavs. Even after everything that happened in 20 century Slavs are the lesser people. What we see today doesn’t help at all.
Brother your videos are immaculate. I came from Oversimplified, and the first video I watched was the Vienna Coffee House Scene. From that point on, I was hooked. I like that video a lot, I still watch it again and again. And your ethnicity series is my most favourite. Keep going!
As an ethnic Slav, I am glad that someone talks about this subject. It is hardly ever touched upon in Polish historiography - a feeling of shame, perhaps?
It's because of the Catholic church impacting our education and focusing on the mass conversion to Christianity as a good thing, not a means of desperate salvation for the very victims of the brutal Christian west. So all history of our lands is taught more extensively post-conversion. Greetings from Croatia :)
Incredibly well done video. I always wondered why the first Polish Kingdom (I'm Polish) was so empty compared to Germany or anyone in the west and why the west was so much richer right from the start of medieval history. This explains both. But it's extremely upsetting.
Saying that Poland was 'empty' and Western Europe was 'richer' because of slave trade is not factual. Maybe it played some part in Western Europe getting richer, but definetly was not source of the difference. Lands beyond what Romans called Germania were just more isolated form the rest of the world, more forested, less urbanized etc. they did not had any Roman influence which played a major part in Western Europe being more advanced in early and high Middle Ages as well as no direct contact with Byzantine and Arabic worlds. There was less people in the lands that would became Poland and it was poorer before the Slavic slave trade even started.
@@levingoodberg in Slavic tradition the card is past down the father. If the house recognized the offspring as a descendant a name would be given and father's name and clan's name passed down.
this is a very interesting topic imo because we all know about the what the western european did when we talk about slavery but rarely talk about stuff like this
Fun fact: the term 'servus' is also used in (eastern) Austria as a greeting and/or as a goodbye. Sometimes changed to 'serwas' in dialect, it is a greeting for people who know each other or are of about the same social standing. You could greet someone not fitting this criteria (like a policeman in service, student to teacher [though that depends on the teacher], government official, ...) which would be seen as impolite, though not necessarily unfriendly. The background/meaning behind this greeting is to imply to the receiver of the greeting that they would be happy to help/serve if they would need something.
This greeting may have a connection with the hungarian greeting szervus, which basicallly means hello, and usually used between firends. Hungary from the 11 century until 1920 had a big influence in eastern austria mainly in burgerland or in hungarian őrvidék which was under the hungrian crown for 400-500 years and inhabited by hungarians for a millenium
The Italian greeting 'ciao' has the same meaning, only that actually comes from 'slave'. It was originally a Venetian term, from 's-ciavo' (from 'sclavo'). It also means 'at your service, how can I help you', but unlike 'servus' it is the general greeting used for informal circumstances.
@@andraslukacs1344 yeah but could you go to the root of the word and find the Hungarian origin? I think it is still the root is still the Romanic word for slave/slav
Yes, indeed, you *have* introduced me to an interesting topic. Even though I consider myself to be somewhat knowledgeable in history, I didn't even know about the Slavic slave trade! Thanks, great video and a good start to learn about the topic!
Just recently in Poland we started to grasp how the founder of Poland, Mieszko I had gained his wealth and power. He was a slave supplier for the west and Caliphate. Most probably the profits allowed him to gather a personal army to further enslave more other Slavic tribes and to protect those who fell under his rule.
Hands down, one of the best videos every made. I will have it shown in some friends who are history teachers' classrooms. Well researched and the presentation is amazing for those who love and know history. Bravo!
When I started learning English, I was surprised that the Slav (славянин, славянка) and the slave (раб) are spelled similarly, but to be fair, these words are read differently. It is noteworthy that in my Russian language, a Slav is consonant with the word glory, and the Slavs (славяне) can literally be understood as glory guys. And the word slave (раб) in Russian is cognate word with words like work (работа), employee (работник) and mb robot (робот). I want to say that in Russian these two words are not connected in any way, they do not have a common etymology and are not related to each other. In the Russian Empire there was a type of slavery - serfdom (крепостничество). The owner of a serf (крепостной, крепостная) could sell, lose at cards, or marry against the will of his/her serf. But again, these words are also not related to the subject.
I think that slav coming from the word for "word" makes more sense, since it would mean "that which can speak" while the other people, were called non-speaking (even today, the Polish word for Germans is "Niemcy")
Your story may not have such a happy beginning, but that doesn't make you who you are. It is the rest of your story....Who you choose to be. (I love this quote from Kung Fu Panda😀)
Really an informative video. Also, as a Sardinian I didn't know that Sardinians were the slaves of choice for the Genoese in the Middle Ages. And I studied Medieval Sardinian History at the University... sometimes they don't tell you the whole picture. Glad I got this on my notifications.
I´m curious, what tells in sardinia about the andalusian pirates presence? because in spain we learn that the coast of corsica and sardinia were controlles by the raiders from Almeria, were the interior was in control of the sardinian judicati. Some great Taifa kings were saqaliba from sardinia, like Muyahid of denia, who tries to conquer the island.
@@juanbarbosasiguenza5883 We do know about the Saracens from North Africa and the Emirate of Denia and all that. I would say that there are some inaccuracies in some maps about Sardinia being part of the Caliphate (which is not true). But yeah, we talk about how we asked Pisa and Genoa to help us get rid of the "Arabs", but I wouldn't say they had control over the coasts. Yes, it was unsafe, dangerous even, to live close to the sea, but the Muslim raiders never established full control. There is, however proof of Muslim people living in Cagliari because we found inscriptions in Arabic on some tombs...
No worries Słowianie/Slovanský/Cлавянскія , Słowianin/Славян/Slovan an indigenous inhabitant of Europe does not come from Niewolnik/otrok/раб(servus/sclavus....).The evidence for this is simple but not to be groundless(gołoSŁOWNYM) it takes a lot of words(SŁÓW). SAVE YOUR LIFE IT'S NO SŁOWIANIN/Славян/Slovan !.
This is an interesting time, we can now compare stories we’ve been told and weren’t told. Sort of like finally laying the pieces to a massive puzzle that’s been built up for thousands of years
one thing is for certain, the concept of what we today would call slavery has been going on since the dawn of human civilization and is sadly still going on all over the world today....
See my ancestor who came to America had the surname Zerbe and change our family name Servis. Zerbe came from the Zerben area of Eastern Germany where many Sorb lived. Sorbs being relatives to Serbs. My family has always thought themselves german but really we're slavs.
The self-designation Slovani is likely derived from Slovo (word, speech), since Germans in pretty much all of the Slavic languages are called Němci, which literally means mutes or mute people, meaning that Slovani are the ones who speak an understandable language, while Němci (mutes) speak an unknown language. The word Němci may have even been used to refer to anyone who isn't a Slav, but became specifically used for Germans, the most constant and active of the Slavs' neighbors, as well as, historically, their main rivals EDIT: Also, the word Slava (fame, glory) may also derive from Slovo (word), since it may mean something like "being spoken about", just like the word fame itself is derived from the Latin word for rumor, fama. In Czech, there is also a synonym for fame "věhlas", whose root is "hlas" (voice)
@@Pepper0ni You're the very first person I've ever witnessed suggesting that. If that were true, I reckon the word would be formed something like Nemějci or Nemajci, instead of Němci. Not to mention that the word Němec is not actually used for someone who is literally mute (instead you use the core adjective, "němý", to refer to such person), while Němec would be used to emphasize that you're not referring to an actual mute person, but to a member of a tribe(s) of "mutes", and most Slavs probably don't even realize they're calling Germans mutes, since the exonym Němci LOST the meaning "mute", not the other way around, so calling it modern is a bit weird. Where have you learned this? And are you a Slav yourself?
The last thing you say might be the most important one over all - pretending history didn't happend or re-writing it to feel better prevents us from learning from it
Thank you for this video. I also had a pushback towards the idea of "slave" deriving from "slav", but your video changed my mind. I didn't have any prejudice against the etymology itself, but there were a lot of empty spaces, especially with "servus" which you made very clear.
In much of southern Germany "Servus" is still used a greeting to this day. With slightly informal connotation, due to it being percieved as a local dialect/oddity. It´s use like that dates back to the noted High Middle Age, where it entered the general German vocabulary as a formal greeting with the inital literal meaning of "at (your) service".
@@EskalanteIn Hungarian, we also use servus, (szervusz) and ciao (csáó), but that latter is considered very informal, it's almost weird if you are older then 30 and use it
I only had a surface level awareness of this topic before watching the video. Might want to look into this more (once the ongoing cramming period of this uni semester is done ofc). An interesting piece of trivia, since al-Andalus was mentioned here: the (mostly) Slavic Saqaliba slaves there became an important part of the Andalusi army and government, even becoming a political faction / interest group to rival and vie for influence with the existing Mawali (Arabic), Berber and Muwallad (mixed or native Iberian muslim) factions in the establishment. When the caliphate of Cordoba broke apart into the First Ta'ifa Period, some of the new states were ruled by Saqaliba, with those among them who weren't eunuchs (rare) even forming relatively-short-lived dynasties. Most notable were the Amirids of Denia, who had a large fleet, raided their neighbours, and their founder, Mujahid, even tried invading Sardinia (tho ultimately he was rebuffed by a Pisan-Genoese-Papal intervention)
Yes, that's true. It's because Muslims often used slaves as troops, presumably more loyal to their master because of (initial) lack of clan-belonging (cf. Mamluks, Jannisaries, etc.) A variant of that type of slave promotion was also used by Charlemagne, who made many of his slaves into nobles (to the grudge of his established nobles) also because they had no other loyalties and thus were generally more trustworthy.
Very true, also the centralization of th estae under the caliphate mades that the caliph tries to weakened the jund (arab hereditary proffesional army) and iqta'dar (more or less feudal armies) arab and muwalladi armies in favor of a proffesional armies of saqaliba mamluks loyal to their own and berber and galician mercenaries, not related to the power gropus in cordoba. A little side note the mawali were not arabs, but clients of any ethnic origin. For example the conqueror of Cordoba was a sirian-Roman Mawali called Mugith.
As a Slav from Czechia, I don't find the word "slave" offensive at all. I find it rather educative these days. It lets people know that slavery affected Caucasian white people so much that it was actually named after that broad ethnic group. This dismisses the ideology that pushes it as something that affected mostly Black people and that stems from racism. And all this just takes a person looking for etymology of the word "slave". It's all contained there.
It actually brings light on the Black slave trade too - they were targeted because they were not Christians in the same way the Slavs were not Christians too. Not because of racism but because of religion. In the Middle Ages religion was way more important than skin color. Unfortunately skin color became important later in history.
@@flexparachute Quite honestly, even if race was important in some era, today it isn't nearly as important as the far right or far left wants us to believe. For an employer seeking cheap labor, your skin tone is not very important. Your work ethics and your willingness to put up with their s**t is what they care about. And in some cases it's pretty close to slave labor or human trafficking.
And in Czech Republic "servus" is still sometimes used (rarely though) and if I remember correctly it comes from university students who used to use it as greetings around the end of 19th century
This really puts the whole Afroamerican Slave Trade and that 20th century Eugenics movement into context. Even before that bigoted ‘White supremacy’ was a notion, it seems ‘Saxon and Germanic supremacy’ fathered it. Or rather, ‘slavery’ as a whole is as antiquated an system as the cultures that thrived on it. But it’s certainly more complex than expected. History doesn’t always repeat, but it always rhymes…
Thank you for making this video, I actually learned something today (as some historical RU-vid videos feel like shortened versions of longer videos on other RU-vid channels) I could see how some history RU-vid channels would avoid the topic altogether, and being Slavic (Polish) myself, I appreciate an historical video that is based on history Keep up the good work, even if it means taking a risk that the comment section of the video could become a super controversial discussion area I can't wait for the next video!
Very interesting video! I actually knew the etymology of the word "slave" but I didn't know the full story behind it, which you thoroughly described here. As a curiosity, I can add that in Italy we have a lot of last names referring to the meaning of Slav through old Italian "schiavo" or "schiavone": these last names and all their variations are a little ambiguous nowadays cause the word "schiavo" only means "slave" in modern Italian, while Slav or Slavic is translated to "slavo". As family names, they arguably refer to an ethnic origin (Slavic) rather than a social status (slave), just like a lot of Italian last names referring to several ethnic origins (for instance Greco, Albanese, Spagnolo, Tedesco, Franzese, Turco, Ungaro, Saracino, etc.).
So you think that "Schiavo" as surname does not necessarily mean slave origins? I would think that makes sense in the Venetian sphere, where many areas (Friuli but also Istria and Dalmatia) used to be Slavic (are still in the Croatian cases), however elsewhere it's almost certain that it would mean "slave". This should be particularly true in the case of Genoese roots because, for what I've found, they were the most active slave traders (Crimean holdings, which became strangled after the fall of Constantinople to the Turks) and were pivotal in the shift from Medieval Slavic slave trade to the Modern African slave trade, typically via their establishment in Portugal (Columbus is paradigmatic in this).
@@LuisAldamiz I actually assume that both of these two origins merged into the spread of such last names in Italy. If you ask me which one has been more influential though, I think the ethnic one is and not only in the Venetian sphere, which was certainly affected by the Slavic culture and heritage, but also elsewhere in the country. Last names like Schiavo and Schiavone, for example, are common in some Southern Italian regions such Apulia, Campania and Sicily: Schiavone in particular is less ambiguous than Schiavo since it only meant Slavic in old Italian and is widespread in Apulia, which lies just across the Adriatic coastline (close enough to former Yugoslavia). Slavs also founded some towns (Peschici in Northern Apulia is an example), even though they didn't reach the same extent of the Albanian-Italian communities of Southern Italy (so-called Arbereshe communities), which still exist to this day and preserve their own culture.
This is so good! Such underated topic worth exploring and my favourite RU-vid historian just dropped a gem. Thank you as always for a great and well put video and hope you've recovered from your illness. P.S.:Thanks for added anti-Czech posters. I did not have an idea something like that even existed.
Fantastic video, I love that you highlighted which cities were slave trade hubs. In America slave markets get marked on maps these days because chattel slavery was so recent and so horrible. With Europe I'm guessing not even memory remains
I think some place names still hint at it. The Riva degli Schiavoni in Venice (meaning Slavs' Waterfront) comes to mind, it was named after the Slavic merchants that traded there, maybe in slaves. Other than that, I can't say.
It does remain but this video only shallowly touched on that: Prague first and Krakow later were the main slave trading hubs and very related to the expansion of Ashkenazi Jews (who were very active in the slave trade) eastwards (they were originally from France). In the East Byzantium (Constantinople) and the mentioned Crimean holdings (later in Genoese hands) were fundamental, as well as the Rus (Kiev, Novgorod) and Khazar (Saray, Astrakhan) cities. There was also early African slave trade in the Muslim areas, largely provided by the almost never mentioned Kanem-Bornu realm (since the 8th century) in the Chad region with routes heading to Egypt primarily.
It's barely mentioned in history class, instead there is given great importance to specific political conflicts during the middle ages, then when it comes to Nazism, that gets flipped and it's all about guilt-tripping. I vaguely remember hearing that being a serf wasn't good and that many weren't allowed to leave a certain area, but nothing about slavery, be it Vikings or Germanics or Barbary Corsairs.
“Slavs” mean “those who speak” in comparison with “Nemets” than mean “mutes” or “mumblers” to describe anyone who doesn’t speak Slavic language. In the same sense Greeks called “barbarians” to anyone who didn’t speak an Hellenic language (barbar: mumbler) PD: Austrians say “servus” as a greeting, in the sense “at your service”
in Transilvania people ussualy salute each other with "servus", meaning " I am your servant/slave" like a form of generosity and respect, " I want to help you and I want to suport you". Servus is the most popular form of salute among romanians, hungarians, germans and other living in Transilvania even now.
Slavs just just appeared in the wrong part of Europe at a turbulent time. Pagan, more distant from major cultural influences, surrounded by empires and nomads. On the other hand we still managed to not to end up like some celts who got almost completely assimilated.
What is the indigenious Slavic faith? It's also funny how people refer to indigenious faiths as "pagan" when they aren't abrahamic when they ironically were probably closer to understanding the truth than most Muslims/Christians/Jews. Many African and native American indigenious faiths are so deep for example
Servus is used as a greeting by Germans mostly. I am of Slavic origin and this slav = slave thing was on my mind for some time, thanks for covering this topic. :)
an interesting and well researched video that confirms my more shallow investigations. this is a lesser known but significant part of European history. it is my opinion that a quiet/unspoken and more civilized untermensch attitude towards Slavs is still present in Western and Northern Europe, primarily in Germanic countries. long forgotten history has a long perserverance in informal culture. on the other hand, the mentality and governance in most of Eastern Europe still has a significant post-slavery aspect that provides a feedback loop to that. but things are changing via the new big mixing up due to open borders, interaction, peace, freedom and prosperity, thankfully
So true, all of it, I'm sure. As i have been long aware of Slavic Slavery, i was not clued up on the detail. This is highly edifying for me, as a Ukrainian Slav. Many thanks.
I think there's one more reason why some Slavs can be very defensive about Slavic slave trade. I think some of oi comes from school history education, where Slavs often represented as some sort of super warriors, who instilled fear in neighboring nations, and all they did was either raiding Greeks or successfully defended their motherland from hordes of nomads from the East. And I don't recall any mention of slavery in Russian school history books. Note, that I'm talking from a Russian perspective, and it can be different in other countries.
Hey, I'm from Croatia and we were taught this slave thing at school. I remember doing an essay about it. If anything - they actually emphasised/exaggerated on how much we were victimised and forgot to tell us how we also pestered other nations around us. I only later found out that that we pillaged and conquered around (some of our kings even went against Arabs?!). So, a bit of an opposite to your experience! Interesting.
You skipped alot of history lessons, atleast these where was talked 'bout mongol invasion, and fighting with crimean khanate. And later 'bout suppression slave trading on caucasus region.
@@bijelimedved2983 Došao si kenjati krivoj osobi. Mislim da tražiš nekoga poput sebe, bez visokog obrazovanja i/ili ikakvog znanja o povijesti i lingvistici. Njima možeš možda prodati te svoje gluposti.
@@bijelimedved2983 Bijeli medved *dodje na video o tome kako su Slaveni bili hvatani i prodavani kao roblje.* Isto Bijeli medved (na užasnom engleskom): “Slaveni nisu imali roblje!!! Zapadna propaganda!!!” 😂 O čemu ti uopće pričaš, jebo te Perun?
@@FinestFantasyVI E vidiš, nama je 80% gradiva bila internacionalna svjetska povijest. A u srednjoj (MIOC) čak i više. Vjerojatno se to razlikuje od škole do škole, ali definitivno nam nisu zaboravili spomenuti kako su nas svi gazili i uopće nas nisu učili kao Ruse tamo neku propagandu da smo mi kao najbolji.
Interesting video. Also to mention that being a slave as you well mentioned in your video was not based on race or ethnic group but rather about availability, so if you were available to be taken as a slave, no matter your skin color, race or religion you would end up being taken as a slave. cheers!
@@jppj5977 The fact that they were pagans made it easier for them to be taken as slaves but it was not the definitive factor becasue even if you were a christian, muslims could also take you as a slave like happened to Miguel de Cervantes who after fighting in the Battle of Lepanto while travelling back to Aragon he was taken as a slave by the berebers and was taken to Istambul and then to now Morcocco, later he was rescued by Christian monks dedicated to buy christian slaves from the islamed world. So it was more a thing of being available than anything, religion might influence how available you would have been for slavetraders but in the end beign christian or muslims did not save from slavery at all. Later the Anglos, germans, dutch, belgians and french invented race slavery, taking blacks as slaves because they were supposedly lesser beings only meant for servitude and since other africans cooperated in this then it only took a couple of gold coins to convince them to sell their own keen into slavery.
Respect ! As a british black man of Caribbean decent, I'm so glad that the truth of a global trade is smashing the myth that black people were somehow the only or most traded of ethnicities as some of us use this to bash white (loose term), and other ethnicities into somehow feeling guilty of their part in the trade (largely with the complicity of Africans of the time).
It's a really interesting topic. The Finnish word for slave (orja) actually comes from Aryan (arjalainen) because Finnic tribes supposedly took lots of Indo-Aryan speaking people as prisoners and sold them off to slavery.
To be fair slaves were taken from all sides, especially when tribes were at war. The Roman empire also took germanics and gaulic people as slaves. The only thing I would be curious about is why they named it after the Slavs exactly, were they the most slaves or held on to the longest as slaves.
@@Lena-cz6re Absolutely, my mistake. I was trying to convey that Finns captured lots of people speaking Indo-Aryan languages, and Arya (Arja) means “man” in that language. It eventually came to be synonymous in Finnish language with the word slave.
Very interesting indeed! I always suspected my ancestors have slavic roots, even though we are originary of Catalonia in northeastern Spain, since both my mother and grandmother, for example, who traveled a lot worldwide were often taken for russian women. I think that maybe larger scale genetic tests among western and southern europeans will someday probably confirm this.
Great video. That debate about the slave trade and the orgins of the Western European economic boost sounds interesting. Don't know much about it, but like you said, if it is even being discussed in an academic way it is worth taking a look at.
My understanding of Medieval Economic shifts in Europe is that it was much more based on the textile trade first along the Champagne fairs (which linked Provence and thus Italy) with the Frankish heartland in the Low Rhine area, via Lyon and North France, and later around the growth of Flanders and also the Italian city-states of the Renaissance. However, such emphasis on the textiles may be only part of the picture because the slave trade is rather taboo (it does occasionally gets mentioned but not as economic driver, rather as a side-note). Another key issue that is brought up when studying Medieval economic history of Europe is the huge agricultural development of "Northern Europe" (rather mid-Northern, i.e. not so much Scandinavia but around Belgium again) thanks to the heavy plough and the horse collar (both probably invented by the Chinese), which allowed the deep soils of Atlantic Europe to become fully productive, while it had no impact in the shallow Mediterranean soils instead. That's probably why "Northern Europe" became more and more important economically: not so much trade but productive economy, which was largely agricultural and to lesser but growing extent manufacturer (textiles, metallurgy/weapons).
Fun fact, in Bavaria (South Germany) people greet each other by saying "servus" , I belive they also do that in Austria. The barbarians at that time were using that roman word to make fun of people that were allies with the Roman Empire while the romans were using it for slaves and the mocking has prevailed as a general greeting until the present.
Yes, understandable. But, just remember that in ancient times (even) „the best of the best“ (aristos,meaning the best, e.g. princes and the like) could be enslaved after war. Therefore, no reason to be so much enraged. People of nearly every ethnicity could be slaves.
@@nochalnosowski Ha.. talking about descendants what do You think.. Young guys in California would prefer for their great ... great grandpa to be the heroic survivor somewhere in Zambia, Chad, Kongo.. or the looser who got sold overseas.. Feels strange talking to Your native in English..
I've only heard mention of Slavic slave trade in films and series about Vikings. After living in Denmark from a bit a lecturer (not lecturing history) claimed Rus ppl were named what they r by Vikings. I have no idea how true this one is tho. I still find it interesting that Northern Europeans seem to be only ones acknowledging Slav slaves
Yes, the word Rus' comes from Old Norse meaning "to row". It was first used just to refer to the "rowing" Norse people who settled in Eastern Europe but later got appropriated to the entire population of eastern Europe who was primarily Slavic.
@@MLaserHistory ive also heard(not from a very reputable source though) that russ comes from the byzantines calling northern europeans roussoi(like rosie or words like that) because of their skin tones when they arrived in the mediterainian climate
@@MLaserHistory Ono je tých výkladov slova Rus je viac. Asi podľa toho komu o čo ide :) I na Slovensku používame trošku zastaralé na ryšavého, alebo blond s nádychom do ryšavá, muža/ženu je rusý/rusá.
@@greekcomenterperson446 that's fun, because we have word 'rusiy' ('русый') in Russian still, and it means a color of hair that is mostly common in Slavic countries (contrary to brown hair / brunet, 'rusiy' hair is more ashy shade of colors between brown and blonde). And brown with red or orange tint, contatry to ashy shade of 'rusiy', is called 'kashtanoviy' ('каштановый') and it literally means and translates as 'chestnut-like'. I don't know why I wrote this :/
Honestly the medieval slave trade should be talked about more. It seems like an early start on the European practice of making money from slavery by doing it somewhere their own population couldn't see it.
As a Black Man, I will say that this content is highly valuable and needed --- because it all ties into the dominance of Western Civilization on a global scale. And it makes sense, because the U.S. and subsequently Europe, didn't become industrialized until the 18th or 19th Century (give or take). All the European powers did was expand the slave trade into Africa, turned it into "race" for religious and psuedo-scientific purposes, and built on the model they established in Europe. I know you've had this up for a month, but if you get to read this comment, I would like to say thanks, job well done!
@@daniel5730 I never said it was. I said it ties into. Maybe you should read the comment. The point is that slavery wasn't unique to one region or group --- it was the way things were done in ancient times, so it makes sense from that perspective that the European powers would continue that policy into the conquest of the Western hemisphere...
Tnx so much for the clarification. I've heard of this slave- slav connotation, but could not make the ethimology from the slavic roots. It came to me as quite bizarre. Great take!
I always thought it was interessting how the swedish word "slav" had the exact same spelling as the other swedish word "slav". So I looked it up back then, and now this video gave me a more in depth undestanding of the topic, so thanks. I also wonder if the reason that the word for slave doesn't have a K in swedish is because the swedish vikings were the most dominant group in the slavic slave trade, and so while other europeans got their word for slave from a latinisation of slav, we got it directly from the word slav. Either way, the two words conjure up completely different understandings today, it's just an interessting thing to think about.
The Ottoman TURKS were huge slavers. 30% of Turkish population were slaves. Turkey did not abolish slavery until the 1920s. Read `The Slavs and the Slave Trade' Amazon. The main Turkish base for Slave Raiders was Crimea. In one short period Turkish raiders took 1.5 million slaves from Ukraine alone. They took millions of boys from SE Europe ages 8-12 (only the strongest) for the sultan's Slave Army - the Janissary.
