Who did the ancient Slavs fight with? Military traditions of the ancient Slavs and Rus'
“They began to kill the prisoners”... When you begin to study the materials that have reached us, you immediately come across an obvious contradiction.
Thus, the Byzantine court chronicler Procopius of Caesarea, describing the new enemies of the empire, notes: “When entering battle, the majority go to the enemy on foot, having small shields and spears in their hands, but they never put on armor; some have neither a cloak nor chiton..."
The Byzantine commander Mauritius gives a similar assessment of the enemy: “Each man is armed with two small spears, and some with strong but difficult to carry shields. They also use wooden bows and small arrows smeared with poison.” So, the main striking force of the Slavs, according to the unanimous opinion of ancient authors, was infantry.
) However, it is difficult to imagine how this poorly equipped, almost half-naked and, moreover, foot army could quickly and deeply penetrate the territory of the defending state and defeat the army of the empire, which then quite rightly claimed the role of a superpower. A contemporary of the shameful defeats complained in bewilderment: “And they learned to fight better than the Romans (Byzantines), they, simple people who did not dare to appear from the forests and did not know what weapons were, except for two or three lonchidia (throwing spears).” Sharing similar amazement, let's try to shed some light on this mystery.
The main thing is that the Slavs perfectly mastered military tricks. Almost all ancient authors note this: “after all, these barbarians are the most skilled at fighting in difficult terrain,” and they like to stage attacks on the enemy “in wooded, narrow and steep places. They take advantage of ambushes, surprise attacks and tricks.. "
An excellent description of this tactic has come to us in the “History of the Longobards” by Paul the Deacon, which talks about the Slavic attack on the Duchy of Benevento, and this is no less than Italy. The deacon notes that the Slavs set up their camp on the shore, surrounding it with hidden pits. The local Duke of Ayo, who rushed with his squad to the attack, fell into such a hole along with his horse and was killed.
An even more tragic fate awaited the Duke of Liguria. In order to gain the glory of conquering the Slavs, he came up with nothing better than to bribe some of them in order to organize an attack... on his own country! The ambitious man's wish was fulfilled - a small detachment of Slavs, having crossed the line, set up camp at a commanding height. When the army of the ambitious duke attacked the Slavs “head-on” on the move, they, “fighting more with stones and axes than with weapons,” killed almost everyone.
The Duke should have familiarized himself in advance with the treatise “Strate-gikon” of the same Mauritius, which warned: it is necessary to attack the Slavs not only from the front, but also from other sides, and if, “occupying a more fortified place and being protected from the rear, they allow the possibility of being surrounded or attacked from the flanks or from the rear, it is necessary for some to set up an ambush, and for others to pretend to flee in full view of them, so that, overwhelmed by the hope of pursuit, they leave the fortification.”
The treatise of the Byzantine commander indirectly confirms that our ancient ancestors had their own tactics and a certain battle formation, because a randomly fighting crowd of barbarians could have neither a front nor flanks. Apparently, they had a well-organized army, so fighting them was far from easy. Even the Byzantines, who had thoroughly studied Slavic military habits, were not always successful. Thus, near Adrianople, the large army of Emperor Justinian was unable to lure the Slavs out of their fortified camp on the mountain, and the assault turned into a complete defeat.
The Slavic army never acted in a stereotyped manner. If the Slavs who devastated the imperial lands did not have the time or conditions to create permanent fortifications, they built their defense differently.
There is a description of how a thousand Byzantine soldiers encountered 600 Slavs returning from a raid with large booty. A huge number of carts carried trophies and prisoners. The source (Theophylact Simokatta) reports: “As soon as the barbarians saw the approaching Romans, they began to kill the prisoners. Of the male prisoners, all those capable of carrying weapons were killed.” The step is cruel, but justified from a military point of view. Then the Slavs made a fortification of carts, placing children and women in the middle. For a long time the Byzantines did not dare to go into hand-to-hand combat: they were afraid of the darts that the Slavs threw at their horses. When the Romans finally began to destroy the fortification, the Slavs massacred all the remaining prisoners - women and children.
"They prepared huge stone throwers."
But let's leave aside the shocking fact of cold-blooded massacre. What is important for us is that already in ancient times, Slavic warriors were fluent in the techniques of constructing fortifications from carts. It is enough to recall the “Wagenburgs” of the Czech Hussites or the Cossack kurens to understand: a valuable tactical technique has survived centuries. But the ancient Slavic siege technique, alas, was forgotten over time. Meanwhile, Roman legionnaires might once have envied her. Describing the siege of the city of Thessaloniki by several Slavic tribes, the Byzantine chronicler writes: “They prepared helepoles (siege towers on wheels), iron “rams” (rams), huge stone throwers and “turtles” (shelters for infantry), covered for protection from fire skins of freshly skinned bulls." Moreover, the fleet was actively involved in the siege - having linked their ships in pairs in some resemblance to atamarans, the Slavs managed to install throwing machines on them too!
The attacks began with a battle cry - “they unanimously uttered a cry that the earth shook.” After such psychological treatment of the enemy, the troops, divided by type of weapon: spear throwers, shield bearers and swordsmen, went on the attack, supported by the fire of archers, whose arrows the chronicler poetically compares with “winter blizzard” or “snow clouds”. It seems involuntarily that the coordinated actions of the Roman legions are being described, but we are talking about barbarians who emerged from their forest wilds almost yesterday!
“They took many fortresses by siege.” Thanks to their military skill, the Slavs in ancient times won numerous victories over the professional units of the Byzantines. What is interesting here is this: it is impossible to wage successful wars of conquest relying solely on the ability to defend and besiege. Someone had to attack first! Meanwhile, the author who described the siege of Thessalonica noted the presence of selected warriors among the Slavs, who, in fact, launched a “bestial attack” in “animal madness” without the support of the main forces.
The Scandinavians also had such warriors. They were called berserkers (warriors in bearskins), and they used to “howl angrily and bite their shield” before battle, thus falling into a combat trance, it is believed, not without the help of hallucinogenic mushrooms, which allowed them to mobilize into critical moment the psycho-physical reserves of the body. It looked pretty creepy. (By the way, similar transformations are described in the Celtic epic. This is how the hero of the Irish sagas Cuchulainn transforms before the fight: “All his joints, joints and ligaments began to tremble... His feet and knees turned out... All the bones shifted, and the muscles swelled, becoming the size of a fighter's fist. The tendons from the forehead were pulled to the back of the head and swelled, becoming the size of the head of a month-old baby... The mouth stretched to the ears..." One gets the impression that the saga describes in detail the transformation of a man into a beast.)
But let's return to the ancient Slavs. Procopius of Caesarea has preserved a vivid description of the abilities and habits of the bestial Slavic “guards,” who fought not with numbers, but with skill. So: “An army of Sklavins numbering no more than three thousand crossed the Istrian (Danube) River; having immediately crossed the Gebr River (the modern Maritsa River in Bulgaria. Ed.), they split in two. The archons of the Roman army in Illyricum and Thrace entered into battle both were defeated, and when the commanders shamefully fled from both barbarian camps, although they were much inferior to them in numbers, one enemy unit grappled with Aswad.
This man was the bodyguard of Emperor Justinian and commanded numerous and selected detachments of cavalry. And their sklavins were overturned without any difficulty, but at that moment they took Asvad alive, and then burned him, throwing him into the flames of a fire, having first cut belts from the man’s back. Having done this, they besieged many fortresses, although they had not previously stormed the walls. Those who defeated Aswad reached the sea and stormed the city of Topir, although it had a military garrison."
Interestingly, these warriors did not require any siege technology to take the fortifications. The capture of the Ax clearly illustrates their tactical acumen and physical abilities: leaving the strike force in ambush, a small group of barbarians teased the garrison commander with the possibility of an easy victory. The soldiers who left the city were slaughtered, the townspeople, who did not have time to come to their senses, were swept from the walls by a cloud of arrows, the Slavs climbed onto the parapet on ropes and...
Here it is appropriate to return to the source again: “They immediately killed all the men, up to 15 thousand in number, and enslaved children and women. However, at first they did not spare any age, but killed everyone without exception. They did not kill with a sword or a spear and not in any other usual way, but by firmly driving stakes into the ground, with great force they impaled the unfortunates on them. In addition, they dug four thick pillars into the ground, tied the hands and feet of the prisoners to them, and then, continuously pounding them with clubs head, these barbarians killed people like dogs... And they, locking others in barns... burned them without any pity.”
But here's what's strange. On the one hand, we have before us “pros” who can easily deal with elite imperial units, on the other hand, we have a pack of blood-drunk thugs who practically do not care about their own profit (one could get a good ransom for Asvad alone). This strange contradiction disappears if you understand who exactly the imperial bodyguard was unlucky to encounter.
"They call to each other like wolves."
Here we come to the most interesting point, since in numerous sources the best Slavic troops are called not just beasts, but are defined as “wolves”. And here it is worth remembering the mythology, primarily of the Indo-European peoples. From the unknown depths of primitiveness, myths about werewolves, directly associated among the Slavs with the mysterious cult of the wolf, have reached the present day. Probably, the wolf was revered as a totemic ancestor - the ancestor of the tribe. The leader of the tribe had to have the ability to incarnate into his totem animal. (Similar religious ideas existed in ancient times among many Indo-European peoples, in particular the Balts, Germans, Celts, Indo-Iranians, etc.) It is curious that berserkers were also considered werewolves: during the battle they were psychologically reborn into a wolf).
Ethnographic data suggests that among the Slavs the “animal” cult was closely associated with initiation rites, that is, trials and secret initiation of young men entering adulthood. During the sacraments, the subject experienced a ritual death, was “reborn” into a wolf and became a warrior - a member of a secret male union, after which he had to live for some time away from the settlements of his relatives in a “wolf life”, that is, shedding blood, killing. It is not surprising that the Byzantines did not have the most flattering impression of our ancestors: “they live in obstinacy, willfulness, anarchy, killing all the time,” “calling to each other like wolves.” And their most delicious dish was supposedly women's breasts.
The “transformation” into a ferocious werewolf was accomplished when a person put on a wolf skin and a special belt with magical amulets. Apparently, in order to fall into a ritual frenzy, the warriors consumed hallucinogens - mushrooms or plants like henbane. The story that has come down to us about the interrogation of the Slavs by the Byzantine commander is extremely interesting: “Having arranged the interrogation, Alexander began to find out where the captives were from. But the barbarians, having fallen into a dying madness, seemed to rejoice in the torment, as if someone else’s body was suffering from scourges.”
It is not surprising that with such a brutal spirit and such a military organization, the Slavs captured vast territories, which would later be called the word “Rus”.
HOW THE SLAVS FIGHTED! Nowadays, when the whole world is trying to imitate the Americans, from uniforms to tactics and daily dry rations, our soldiers need to more often look into the rich treasury of Russian military traditions and use the centuries-old experience of Russian soldiers. No, I don’t call for putting on bast shoes, growing beards and picking up swords and bows. The main thing is to skillfully highlight and generalize those principles with the help of which they defeated a stronger and numerically superior enemy. The foundations and philosophy of the Russian military school are set out in “The Science of Victory” by A. V. Suvorov. Unfortunately, not many modern commanders, as they say, get around to reading this book. But in order to see and understand the essence of the principles set forth by Suvorov in his immortal work, it is worth taking an excursion into the depths of centuries and see how the ancient Russians fought. The land on which our distant Ancestors lived was rich and fertile and constantly attracted nomads from the east, Germanic tribes from the west, and our ancestors also tried to develop new lands. Sometimes this colonization took place peacefully, but... often accompanied by hostilities. Soviet military historian E.A. Razin in his book “History of Military Art” talks about the organization of the Slavic army during the 5th-6th centuries: Among the Slavs, all adult men were warriors. The Slavic tribes had squads that were staffed according to age with young, physically strong and dexterous warriors. The organization of the army was based on the division into clans and tribes. The warriors of the clan were headed by an elder (elder), at the head of the tribe was a leader or prince. Further in his book, the author cites statements of ancient authors who note the strength, endurance, cunning and courage of the warriors of the Slavic tribes, who , besides. mastered the art of camouflage. Procopius from Caesarea in his book “The War with the Goths” writes that the warriors of the Slavic tribe “were accustomed to hiding even behind small stones or behind the first bush they encountered and catching enemies. They did this more than once near the Istr River.” Thus, the ancient author in the above-mentioned book describes one interesting case of how a Slavic warrior, skillfully using improvised means of camouflage, took a “tongue”. And this Slav, early in the morning, got very close to the walls, covered himself with brushwood and curled up into a ball, hid in the grass. When the Goth approached this place, the Slav suddenly grabbed him and brought him alive to the camp. Another ancient author, Mauritius, in his book “Strategikan” draws attention to the art of the Slavs to hide in water. They courageously endure their stay in the water, so that often some of those remaining at home, being caught by a sudden attack, plunge into the abyss of the waters. At the same time, they hold specially made large reeds in their mouths, hollowed out inside, reaching the surface of the water, and themselves, lying supine at the bottom of the river, breathe with the help of them; and they can do this for many hours. So it is absolutely impossible to guess their presence. The terrain on which the Slavs usually fought was always their ally. From dark forests, river backwaters, and deep ravines, the Slavs suddenly attacked their opponents. Here is what the previously mentioned Mauritius writes about this: The Slavs like to fight their enemies in places covered with dense forest, in gorges. on the cliffs, they take advantage of ambushes, surprise attacks, tricks, and day and night, inventing many different methods... Having a lot of help in the forests, they head towards them, since they know how to fight well among gorges. Often they abandon the prey they are carrying, as if under the influence of confusion, and run into the forests, and then, when the attackers rush at the prey, they easily get up and harm the enemy. They are masters of doing all this in a variety of ways they come up with in order to lure the enemy. Thus, we see that the ancient warriors prevailed over the enemy primarily through the absence of a template, cunning, and skillful use of the surrounding terrain. In engineering training, our Ancestors were also recognized specialists. Ancient authors write that the Slavs were superior to “all people” in the art of crossing rivers. While serving in the army of the Eastern Roman Empire, Slavic troops skillfully ensured the crossing of rivers. They quickly made boats and used them to transport large military detachments to the other side. The Slavs usually set up a camp at a height to which there were no hidden approaches. If necessary, to fight in an open field, they built fortifications from carts. Feofinat Siompatt reports on the campaign of one Slavic detachment, which fought with the Romans: Since this clash for the barbarians (Slavs) was inevitable (and did not foretell success), they, having made up carts, built them into a kind of fortification of the camp and in the middle of this Women and children were placed in the camps. The Slavs tied the carts, and it turned out to be a closed fortification, from which they threw spears at the enemy. The fortification of carts was a reliable defense against cavalry. For a defensive battle, the Slavs chose a position that was difficult for the enemy to reach, or they built a rampart and created embankments. When storming enemy fortifications, they used assault ladders and siege engines. In deep formation, with their shields on their backs, the Slavs launched an assault. From the above examples, we see that the use of terrain in combination with improvised objects deprived the opponents of our ancestors of the advantages that they originally possessed. Many Western sources claim that the Slavs did not have a formation, but this does not mean that they did not have a battle order. The same Mauritius recommended building a not very deep formation against them and attacking not only from the front, but from the flanks and from the rear. From this we can conclude that for the battle the Slavs were located in a certain order. Mauritius writes: ... sometimes they occupy a very strong position and, guarding their rear, do not allow them to engage in hand-to-hand combat, or to surround themselves or attack from the flank, or go to their rear. The above example makes it clear that the ancient Slavs had a certain battle order, that they fought not in crowds, but in an organized manner, lined up by clans and tribes. The clan and tribal leaders were the commanders and maintained the necessary discipline in the army. The organization of the Slavic army was based on a social structure - division into clan and tribal units. Clan and tribal ties provided the necessary cohesion of warriors in battle. Thus, the use of battle formation by Slavic warriors, which gives undeniable advantages in battle with a strong enemy, suggests that the Slavs only carried out combat training with their squads. After all, in order to quickly act in combat formation, it was necessary to practice this until it became automatic. Also, it was necessary to know the enemy with whom you would have to fight. The Slavs could not only skillfully fight in the forest and field. To capture fortresses they used simple and effective tactics. In 551, a detachment of Slavs numbering more than 3,000 people, without encountering any opposition, crossed the Ister River. An army of great strength was sent to meet the Slavs. After crossing the Maritsa River, the Slavs were divided into two detachments. The Roman commander decided to defeat their forces one by one in the open field. Having well-organized tactical reconnaissance and being aware of the enemy’s movements. The Slavs forestalled the Romans and, suddenly attacking them from two directions, destroyed their enemy. Following this, Emperor Justinian sent a detachment of regular cavalry against the Slavs. The detachment was stationed in the Thracian fortress Tzurule. However, this detachment was defeated by the Slavs, who had cavalry in their ranks that was not inferior to the Roman one. Having defeated the regular field troops, our ancestors began the siege of fortresses in Thrace and Illyria. Of great interest is the capture by the Slavs of the seaside fortress of Toyer, which was located 12 days’ journey from Byzantium. The fortress's garrison of 15 thousand people was a formidable force. The Slavs decided first of all to lure the garrison out of the fortress and destroy it. To do this, most of the soldiers lay in ambush near the city, and a small detachment approached the eastern gate and began to fire at the Roman soldiers. The Romans, seeing that there were not many enemies, decided to go outside the fortress and defeat the Slavs in the field. The besiegers began to retreat, pretending to the attackers that, frightened by them, they fled. The Romans, carried away by the pursuit, found themselves far ahead of the fortifications. Then those in ambush rose up and, finding themselves in the rear of the pursuers, cut off their possible routes of retreat. And those who pretended to retreat, turning their faces to the Romans, attacked them. Having exterminated their pursuers, the Slavs again rushed to the walls of the city. Theuer's garrison was destroyed. From what has been said, we can conclude that the Slavic army had good cooperation between several units, reconnaissance, and camouflage on the ground. From all the examples given, it is clear that in the 6th century our ancestors had perfect tactics for those times; they could fight and inflict serious damage on the enemy, who was much stronger than them, and often had numerical superiority. Not only the tactics were perfect, but also the military equipment. So, during the siege of fortresses, the Slavs used iron rams and installed siege engines. The Slavs, under the cover of throwing machines and archers, moved the rams close to the fortress wall, began to shake it and make gaps. In addition to the land army, the Slavs had a fleet. There is much written evidence of their use of the fleet during military operations against Byzantium. The ships were mainly used for transporting troops and landing troops. Over many years, the Slavic tribes, in the fight against numerous aggressors from Asia, the powerful Roman Empire, the Khazar Khaganate and the Franks, defended their independence and united into tribal alliances. In this centuries-old struggle, the military organization of the Slavs took shape, and the military art of neighboring peoples and states arose. It was not the weakness of their opponents, but the strength and military art of the Slavs that ensured their victories. The offensive actions of the Slavs forced the Roman Empire to switch to strategic defense and create several defensive lines, the presence of which did not ensure the security of the empire’s borders. The campaigns of the Byzantine army beyond the Danube, deep into the Slavic territories, did not achieve their goals. These campaigns usually ended in the defeat of the Byzantines. When the Slavs, even during their offensive actions, met superior enemy forces, they usually avoided battle, achieved a change in the situation in their favor, and only then went on the offensive again. For long campaigns, crossing rivers and capturing coastal fortresses, the Slavs used a boat fleet, which they built very quickly. Large campaigns and deep invasions were usually preceded by reconnaissance in force by large detachments that tested the enemy’s ability to resist. The tactics of the Russians did not consist in inventing forms of constructing battle formations, to which the Romans attached exceptional importance, but in a variety of methods of attacking the enemy, both during the offensive and during the defense. To apply this tactic, a good organization of military reconnaissance was necessary, to which the Slavs paid serious attention. Knowledge of the enemy made it possible to carry out surprise attacks. The tactical interaction of units was skillfully carried out both in field battles and during the assault on fortresses. For the siege of fortresses, the ancient Slavs were able to quickly create all the modern siege equipment. Among other things, Slavic warriors skillfully used psychological influence on the enemy. Thus, in the early morning of June 18, 860, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, Constantinople, came under an unexpected attack by the Russian army. The Russians came by sea, landed at the very walls of the city and besieged it. The warriors raised their comrades on outstretched arms and they, shaking their swords sparkling in the sun, plunged the Constantinople citizens standing on the high walls into confusion. This “attack” had enormous meaning for Rus' - for the first time the young state entered into confrontation with the great empire, for the first time, as events would show, it presented its military, economic and territorial claims to it. And most importantly, thanks to this demonstrative, psychologically precisely calculated attack and the subsequent peace treaty of “friendship and love,” Rus' was recognized as an equal partner of Byzantium. The Russian chronicler later wrote that from that moment “the nickname Ruska land began.” All the principles of warfare listed here have not lost their significance today. Have camouflage and military cunning lost their relevance in the age of nuclear technology and the information boom? As recent military conflicts have shown, even with reconnaissance satellites, spy planes, advanced equipment, computer networks and weapons of enormous destructive power, you can bomb rubber and wooden dummies for a long time and at the same time loudly broadcast to the whole world about enormous military successes. Have secrecy and surprise lost their meaning? Let us remember how surprised European and NATO strategists were when, quite unexpectedly, Russian paratroopers suddenly turned up at the Pristina airfield in Kosovo, and our “allies” were powerless to do anything.
All over the world we find strange artifacts that, barring the possibility of a nuclear war in the past, are simply inexplicable. These are tektites (glasses of unknown origin) from the Libyan desert, the Sinneara desert and other places...
Atlanteans vs Hyperboreans
13 thousand years ago, as Plato narrates from the words of the ancient Egyptian priest Maneto, overnight, beautiful Atlantis, the center of civilization, suffered a catastrophe and disappeared into the water column. At the same time, the city, called today by its location, Mohenjo-Daro, on the other side of the world - in the Indus River valley - suffered an equally strange and unexpected catastrophe. It ceased to exist immediately, and its inhabitants, huge skeletons of which were discovered in great numbers by archaeologists, were not buried either then or centuries later for some reason.
An analysis of thousands of stones also dotting the streets of Mohenjo-Daro showed that they are fragments of pottery, sintered by instant heating to 1400-1600 degrees Celsius. Experts believe that there were three destructive waves in the city, spreading two kilometers from the epicenter (judging by the absence of skeletons lying everywhere, people who were near the epicenter simply evaporated). What is most important is that the possibility of a volcanic eruption or meteorite fall is completely excluded.
All over the world we find strange artifacts that, barring the possibility of nuclear war many years ago, are simply inexplicable. These are tektites (glasses of unknown origin, similar to baked sand at the sites of ground-based nuclear tests) of the Libyan desert, the Sinneara desert and many other places.
More recently, in March 2001, Richard B. Firestone, a scientist at the famous Berkeley Atomic Research Center, made a sensational announcement. In his opinion, the radiocarbon dating of many monuments and finds already on the American continent is incorrect due to the fact that some areas, according to his research, were subjected to... bombardment by streams of neutrons and other particles that, as is known, arise during a nuclear explosion.
“These neutrons converted residual nitrogen in the dated charcoals into radiocarbon, thus producing the anomalous dates. Some North American dates are thus given with an error of at least 10,000-plus years downward.”
As evidence of this, he cites examined specimens from Janey in Michigan, Fedford and Zandra in Ontario, Shoup in Pennsylvania, Elton in Indiana, Leavitt in Michigan and the northern tip of Grant Lake, as well as in southwestern Baker, New Mexico. He also points to anomalous abundance ratios of uranium and plutonium in the areas he studied.
And, although the scientist carefully explains these anomalies as “radiation from a nearby supernova that exploded approximately 12,500 years ago (same date! - Yu.Ch.),” the supernova explosion does not explain traces of plutonium, an element that is not found in nature at all, and arising only in nuclear reactions of uranium produced by man under special conditions - in a nuclear reactor. All this suggests that 13,000 years ago a global nuclear war occurred on Earth. The war, I dare say, is between Hyperborea and Atlantis.
The gods and demons of the ancients are the people and leaders of Atlantis and Hyperborea!
Legends all over the world say that once upon a time there was a war on Earth and in the sky using fantastic weapons, aircraft and deadly rays, when cities disappeared and mountains exploded with giant lightning, traces of which are still visible. But they speak somehow vaguely, and here’s why. When the past civilization was destroyed and cold weather set in, most people died. The few survivors descended into barbarism. Over centuries of savagery, science was lost, although memories of ancient wisdom were preserved from generation to generation by priests who passed on secret knowledge within their corporations in all countries and on all continents.
At first these were real memories - epics, but over the centuries there were fewer and fewer details, more and more layers, naive aspirations and beliefs were intertwined, aggravated by the constantly declining level of existence and consciousness of people of the post-Hyperborean era.
Distorted memory represented the heroes and leaders of the lost world as gods and demons with supernatural power, but they were just people who controlled aircraft and had weapons and technology, in some ways similar to ours, in some ways superior to us. And the hardships of existence gave birth to dreams of a serene, blissful life, projected into the distant past. And as a result, we have what we have - vague memories, interesting only for their amazing details, which must be sifted out of thousands of pages of text, like golden grains of sand from tons of empty rock of religious nonsense.
But what grains of sand!
For example, the work of the ancient Indian astrologer Bhashar “Siddhanta-shiromani” was recently introduced into scientific circulation, in which, among other units of time measurement, the “trutti” appears, which is 0.3375 seconds, and in an even earlier Sanskrit text, “Brihath Sakatha” , there is a unit of measurement of time “kashta”, equal to one three hundred millionth of a second! Specialists studying the works of ancient Indian scientists are at a loss: for what purpose was such a unit needed in those days, and how was it measured? After all, “kashta,” like any other unit of measure, can only have meaning if there is a practical need for it and there are means to measure it with such accuracy.
No need to rack your brains! Everything is very simple. And those who stored and transmitted knowledge from the previous civilization that could not be useful for the last 12 thousand years knew this very well.
The American writer Andrews, while in Madras, heard the following confession from the yoga teacher, Pandit Kaniakhi: “From time immemorial, Brahmin scientists were obliged to preserve a lot of information, the meaning of which they themselves did not understand. Their distant ancestors also knew that matter consists of countless atoms, that most of the space in the atoms themselves is not filled with matter.”
The task of the Brahmins, like other occultists of all continents from time immemorial, from the beginning of their esoteric traditions, was simply not to lose the heritage passed on to them, to preserve it for future generations, to pass it on from generation to generation, even if you don’t understand a single thing about what is being passed on. But, unfortunately, they handled this poorly, stuffing what was transmitted with piles of religious and magical nonsense.
On the other hand, the ancient memory was spoiled by “the eternal human desire to settle down universally,” as Dostoevsky wrote. And to her - as an eternal shadow - is the constant horror of death. Unpreparedness and unwillingness to accept the evidence that with death everything ends, and that we are alone in the Universe. The first does not require proof: “the flesh is separated from the bones,” although so many hallucinations have been created by those who cannot accept this. Proving the second is also easy. Although there are about 10 valid proofs, the most obvious is this.
If we know that the laws of nature are the same throughout the Universe, this means that any other civilization, whatever it may be, even talking dogs from Sirius, will be obliged to use radio waves for long-distance communication and, in the necessary way - and very soon - a large Some of the wave range used will be ultra-short, which has the advantages of low cost, quality and accuracy, but also the disadvantage of going into space through the ionosphere. This means that such a planet in the radio range will look from the outside like a huge, powerful star, no less than Vega in volume, while being completely invisible in the optical range.
This is exactly what our planet looks like from space. Moreover, the modulations of this radiation will be complex and non-periodic - because we are a planet not of beeping radio beacons, but of thousands of television and radio stations. There is nothing like it anywhere else. Radio astronomers since the 60s. of the last century listen to the Universe and come across only natural cosmic “beacons” - like quasars. We are alone!
So where did this secret knowledge come from, these amazing tales about the last war, especially confirmed by archaeological finds? And out of nowhere - these are our legends and our history. It’s just that we are not the first civilization on Earth, and if we don’t have enough intelligence, then we won’t be the last.
The lack of direct evidence of the existence of an ancient machine civilization does not disprove this existence. We know so little about what lies under our feet that it’s simply amazing. Troy was lost for millennia until Schliemann dug up the Trojan walls, and before that, for 30 centuries, illiterate cattle breeders grazed their goats over this wealth. Nebuchadnezzar's shining Babylonia was buried under the sand of Sinnear, just as Pompeii was buried under volcanic ash until its excavations began. How many cities are eroding today on the ocean floor and how many once populous metropolises lie beneath the desert sands?
And when brave individuals begin their search, they are either mocked, like Schliemann, or crowds of schizophrenics flock to them, seeing in the evidence of antiquity confirmation of their religious mania, although archaeological finds least of all confirm the “transmigration of souls,” “the existence of God,” or “ necessity" of vegetarian nutrition. For they were abandoned by people who subordinated (and subordinated) physical nature to their will, and therefore - by materialists.
If the “nuclear summer” takes place, in a few thousand years cavemen may crawl out of their underground holes near the ruins of Moscow or New York and build new cities above them, having no idea about our lost world.
Future historians will ask the question: could there ever have been an arrogant “global” civilization, whose arrogant leaders are about to gather in St. Petersburg to decide, as it seems to them, questions of the world order, and from our “enlightened” century there will be nothing left except distorted memories of flying machines and fantastic magical weapons that will be told like fairy tales to children for centuries until culture rises again. Only adherents of the Secret Wisdom will keep in their secret teachings, gradually degenerating into a parody of themselves, the legends of our lost age...
We are not the first...
The ancient Indian epic Mahabharata describes an 18-day war between Duryodhana, the son of Master Drona or, in Sanskrit, Drona-Acharya, and his “cousin” Yudhishtira, which allegedly occurred 14 centuries BC. It is hard to believe that this magnificent epic actually describes the civilization of 1400 BC, because the nomadic Aryans invaded the Indian plain through the northern passes, possessing only horse-drawn vehicles, arrows and bronze swords, and songs tell aircraft duels and the use of nuclear weapons.
In fact, the Mahabharata contains pieces of much older legends, once memorized by the singers of the Vedas and turned into temple records only with the invention of the Devanagari alphabet in the 1340s. BC - that is, precisely at the time when the battle allegedly took place on the Kuru field. Here are examples of such descriptions.
“Drona Parva”: “Noticing this mountain in the sky, releasing countless charges, the son of Drona (Duryodhana - Y.C.) did not flinch and called for the help of the Vajra cannon. The stricken Prince of the Mountains was quickly destroyed. And the rakshasa turned into a mass of blue clouds in the sky, decorated with a rainbow, and began to fall as a rain of stones.” Why don't you like a description of a bomber that was shot down by a surface-to-air missile?
“Mahabharata” also talks about more interesting things, identified as heavy missiles: “This Brahma-danda, or Brahma’s Rod, is incomparably more powerful than even Indra’s arrow (tactical non-nuclear missiles? - Yu.Ch). The latter can strike only once, but the former can strike entire countries and entire races from generation to generation.”
For thousands of years it looked like a play of poetic imagination. We are struck by the ominous resemblance to our nuclear bombs, the radiation from which causes hereditary diseases and stillbirths in unborn future generations.
“Once, being attacked by the Valadevas, the enraged Jarasandha, in a desire to destroy us, threw a rod capable of killing all living things. Sparkling with fire, this rod headed towards us, cutting out the sky like a line that separates the pigtails on a woman’s head (a jet trail! - Yu.Ch.) with the speed of lightning launched by Shukra. Noticing the rod flying in our direction, Rohini's son threw his stunakarma weapon to throw it away. The energy of the rod was extinguished by the energy of Valadeva’s weapon, and it fell to the Earth, splitting it and causing even the mountains to tremble” (“Bhisma Parva”). Missiles and anti-missiles...
But the description, also considered poetic nonsense. To Hiroshima. A description of the destruction of the Triple City, the same one that today is almost confidently identified by archaeologists with Mohenjo-Daro, which was mentioned at the beginning.
“...The murderous Arrow of Brahma, spewing streams of flame (its size is three cubits and six feet; its power is like a thousand lightnings of Indra, and it destroys all living things around) was released. The flame, devoid of smoke, spread in all directions with all-destructive force. A red-hot column of smoke and flame as dazzling as 10,000 suns rose into the sky in all its terrifying grandeur, opening up like a beach umbrella... It was Iron Lightning, the messenger of death, turning all the people of Vriskhni and Andhak into ashes. Their bodies were burned. Those who survived lost their hair and nails, pottery cracked for no apparent reason, and all the birds in the area turned white in their feathers. A few hours later, all the food turned out to be poisoned... Fleeing from this fire, the warriors threw themselves into the river to wash themselves and their equipment..."
And again: “The hero Advattaman refused to leave his ship when it touched the water, and resorted to the weapon Agni (god of fire - Y.C.), which even the gods could not resist. Son of the teacher (Drona) - this destroyer of enemy heroes aimed a blazing spear spewing smokeless fire at all his visible and invisible enemies, and released it in all directions. Thick sheaves of arrows burst out of him into the sky. Enveloped in bright flames, these arrows engulfed Parthi from all sides. Suddenly, thick darkness enveloped Pandava. All directions of the world also plunged into darkness. The winds blew. Clouds thundered in the sky, raining down blood. Birds, animals, cows and vowed souls fell into extreme anxiety. It seemed that the elements themselves became agitated. Elephants and other animals, scorched by the energy of this weapon, fled in horror, trying to hide from this terrible force. Even the water began to boil, and the creatures living in this element became worried and seemed to be boiling.
From all directions of the world, from the sky and the Earth itself, sheaves of fierce arrows flew at the speed of Garuda. Burnt and struck down by these lightning-fast arrows, the enemies fell like trees burned by an all-consuming fire. Elephants, scorched by these weapons, fell to the ground, uttered terrible screams, others rushed back and forth, roaring loudly in fear, as if they were in a burning forest. The horses, O King, and the carts, scorched by the force of this weapon, looked like the tops of trees burned by a forest fire. Thousands of carts crumbled to dust. Indeed, O Bharata, it seemed that the divine Lord Agni burned the Pandava army in that battle, just as the fire of Soma-Vartya destroys everything at the end of the Yuga ... "
In general, the epic “Mahabharata” contains more than 230 stanzas containing detailed and very real descriptions of the design of missiles, aircraft, as well as other vehicles and devices, including what we would call today unmanned vehicles and combat robots.
The stone soldiers of Hyperborea are waiting in the wings
This is what the most authoritative Russian researcher of the monuments of ancient Hyperborea, the head of the Scientific Tourism Commission of the Russian Geographical Society, Sergei Vadimovich Golubev, thinks about the possibility of such a war in the distant past. Let me emphasize once again - the real, and not the mythical, fabricated heritage of Hyperborea, confirmed by its numerous finds of prehistoric monuments of this ancient continent.
– I do not exclude the possibility of such a war, but I want to emphasize that one should not expect any finds that directly confirm it: too much time has passed. Neither metal, nor, especially, composite materials last that long, especially organics. And the evidence available and known to you suggests that in ancient times a lot of what we make today from metal was “made” from living or almost living matter. By the way, our technologies are rapidly approaching this. It’s not for nothing that there are now so many scientific fantasies around so-called “cyborgs.” You and I will talk about this in detail sometime. Now I would like to say that nuclear weapons were hardly the only powerful weapons of that war. You, of course, know that the earth’s crust, the firmament on which we walk, is incredibly thin.
If we imagine the Earth in the form of a school globe and mentally “cut” it, we will not even be able to see its dense crust even with a strong magnifying glass - it is so thin. Science can only speculate what is underneath it, but most scientists agree that beneath it is the molten mass on which our continents float. This, if not more, could have been known to the ancients; it was not for nothing that in their treatises, which came down to us through thousands of generations, they compared the earth to an egg. Already today we have access to the so-called “geophysical weapons”, which have been talked about a lot in recent years.
The geological record of the planet also speaks about the possibility of its use - about 13,000 years ago there was an unexpectedly powerful outbreak of volcanism and geological activity, which, as it seems today, cannot be caused by the process of gradual cooling of our planet. Something awakened this volcanism - or indeed some kind of cosmic intervention, or earthly events, the human factor. Just as in the 60s, the military departments of nuclear powers were alarmed by a message received from geophysical monitoring services that a nuclear bomb had exploded in the Atlantic - this is what their instruments showed. In fact, there was no atomic bomb; during an experiment, British geophysicists detonated a 200-kilogram charge on the oceanic crust, and the effect was the same as the detonation of a high-power nuclear warhead, which was detected by surveillance services.
It turned out that when a powerful explosion occurs on the continental crust, it dampens the caused seismic wave, but the thin oceanic crust does not, and the resulting resonance leads to strong geological displacements. The military became interested in the effect, as the prospect of creating geophysical weapons loomed.
Hyperborean cities, if they existed, are today under water - on the shelf of the Arctic Ocean, which sank to the bottom precisely in that era - about 9-11 thousand years BC, when that very incomprehensible catastrophe occurred, associated with drowning Atlantis. One can, very cautiously, assume that the Atlanteans and Hyperboreans exchanged geophysical blows. This is evidenced, by the way, by the shape of the geoid, which has specific concavities in the northern hemisphere, which is not observed in other planetary bodies of the Solar System. If we assume that an exchange of such blows took place, then Atlantis found itself in a deliberately losing position - its metropolis was on an island, in a zone of geoactivity, as evidenced by Plato, describing hot springs in Atlantis, and colonies on the coasts of Africa, Europe, and both Americas.
At one time, by the way, the Americans were first very surprised and then extremely irritated by the fact that the USSR’s atomic missiles, when there were still very few of them, were aimed not at launch silos, but generally at sea, where no one could shoot them down assumed. In fact, our military then expected to bury America, at least its coastal cities, in a gigantic geophysical cataclysm. Likewise, Hyperborea was located mostly in the coastal zone, but it also had extensive possessions on the mainland. So Atlantis was completely destroyed, and Hyperborea was preserved on that part of the continent that did not sink to the bottom as a result of the impact, and we have the opportunity to find preserved monuments of that era on the Kola Peninsula and in the White Sea region. Although, of course, the cataclysm was supposed to destroy a lot on the continent too...
– You know, Sergei, I am amazed by the art of Hyperborea. Time after time, looking through the photographs you took, I am amazed at the ideological nature of this art. The monuments of Hyperborea are militaristic monuments, the faces depicted on them are the faces of warriors. Except for one thing. On the only monument that was already carved lying down, defeated. I'm talking about a gigantic face, surprisingly reminiscent of the faces of the statues of Central America - those places where the colonies of Atlantis were, while the faces of other statues are completely Aryan. That’s what I call him – “defeated Atlas.” Also an ideology, also monumental propaganda... Are we really doomed to fight and destroy the achievements of civilization, acquired with such labor over so many centuries?
Shortly before the Nativity of Christ, dominion over the entire ancient world passed to the Romans. Among the most powerful enemies of the Roman Empire was the king of Asia Minor, Mithridates the Great. Having inflicted a heavy defeat on the Scythians, Mithridates concluded peace and alliance with them. In this world, the Scythian troops were supposed to march together with Mithridates against Rome, which they did successfully, terrifying the Roman legionnaires.
Mithridates was prouder of his victory over the Scythians than his other victories:
“Of mortals, I alone conquered Scythia, that Scythia which before no one could pass safely or approach. Two kings, Darius of Persia and Philip of Macedon, dared not to conquer, but only to enter Scythia, and fled in disgrace from where a great army has now been sent to us against the Romans.”
After the defeat of the Scythians, the glory of the invincible warriors passed to their half-blooded Slavic tribe, the Sarmatians. The name “Sarmatians” became so famous that for many centuries the Russian land was called Sarmatia.
The war with the Romans ended unsuccessfully for Mithridates the Great. He was defeated and committed suicide. His empire collapsed and was absorbed by Rome. The Slavic tribes, who, thanks to Mithridates, learned about the wealth of the Roman lands and learned all the approaches to them, often began to disturb the Roman borders. In the first century after the Nativity of Christ, our ancestors already took the Greek city of Olbia on their shield.
The Romans found themselves in a difficult situation. They could not tame the Slavs - they easily hid in their forests and steppes. They did not have states or large cities; each tribe acted at its own peril and risk and often, seeing the right moment, attacked Roman lands, ruining them.
Under Emperor Marcus Aurelius, a formidable Slavic invasion of the Roman Empire occurred, which lasted for fourteen years (166–180). In addition to the united Slavic tribes, the Germans also fought with Rome, and only with great difficulty did Marcus Aurelius manage to defeat the Germans. The Slavic tribes fought with Rome for a long time. The Roxalan Iazyg tribes were especially famous for their courage. This war, called Sarmatian by the Romans, was remembered by all coastal peoples for many centuries.
We can judge its size only by the fact that the Iazyges alone, after the end of the war with Rome, returned one hundred thousand prisoners to him.
The Slavs invaded the Roman Empire by both land and water. Gathering on their nimble boats at the mouths of the Dnieper and Don, they boldly set out to sea and reached not only Byzantium, but sometimes reached Athens itself and even Rome.
The Roman Emperor Diocletian, also known for his fierce persecution of Christians, decided to quarrel the Slavs with the Germanic tribes who bore the common name Goths. The Romans called this method of action “divide and conquer.” In this case, it was completely successful, and the Slavs and Goths, inflamed with hatred, began to fiercely exterminate each other, leaving the Roman Empire alone for many years.
The conqueror Germanrich, who united all the Germanic tribes under his rule, greatly pressed the Slavs, seizing their lands and imposing heavy tribute on all Slavic settlements. The first to rise up against the Goths were the warlike inhabitants of the lower reaches of the Don and Dnieper - the Huns. The Huns were a tribal formation consisting of the Turkic-speaking Xiongnu, who were joined by the Ugrians and Sarmatians. The Slavic tribes, conquered by Germanrich, rebelled against him, going over to the side of the Huns. Defeated by the Huns, Germanrich threw himself on his sword in despair.
The next Gothic king, Vinitar, fought desperately with the Huns, but was killed by Valamir, the Hun ruler, a Slav, as one can judge by his name. Having married Vinithar's niece, Valamir conquered all the Gothic peoples almost without resistance.
The Hunnic rule strengthened even more under the rule of one of their next rulers - Attila. After the death of Attila, under his youngest son, part of the Slavic tribes, significantly mixed by the great migration of peoples, settled on the Danube and formed the Bulgarian people, while the other part went beyond the Dnieper and Dniester - to the Russian land and settled all the way to the Caucasus Mountains.
Shortly before the invasion of the Huns, in 395, the Great Roman Empire was divided in two. This happened under Theodosius the Great, one of the successors of Constantine Equal to the Apostles, called Equal to the Apostles because he was the first of the Roman emperors to receive holy baptism.
In his will, Theodosius handed over the Roman Empire to his two sons, dividing it into eastern and western. Since then, Western emperors lived in Rome, while the Eastern ones chose Constantinople as their capital.
Even then, the first seed of discord was sown, which later led to the fragmentation of churches and the separation from the Church of the true Latin Orthodox Church, whose cardinals, having made a number of changes to the liturgical rite and unreasonably recognizing that the Holy Spirit proceeds not only from the Father, but also from the Son, became choose a separate head - the Pope.
The collapsed empire now became more vulnerable and continued to be attacked by our Slavic ancestors. Slavic boats went to Constantinople almost every year, ravaging its surroundings and then quickly sailing to Rus', although it often happened that they were overtaken by warships and burned with pots of oil, which were also called Greek fire.
In 558, a countless army of Slavic peoples crossed the Danube. Some of them went to fight Greece, while others approached Constantinople and besieged it. The Slavic army was so large that the city could easily be taken. Our ancestors had already poured earthen ramparts under its walls so that they could easily be used to climb the fortifications.
With great difficulty, the Greeks managed to convince the leader of the Slavs, Zavergan, not to take the city for his shield. Having received a huge ransom for the return of prisoners, the Slavs lifted the siege and retreated to the Danube.
From that time on, the Greeks hated the Slavs for a long time and began to take all measures to quarrel between them. By sending rich gifts to the elders of the Slavic tribes, the Greeks skillfully pitted individual tribes and clans of our ancestors against each other. The Slavic custom of blood feud, when a clan took revenge on another clan for anyone killed, made the internecine war between Slavic tribes endless. So, despite their undeniable courage, belligerence and contempt for death, the Slavs were almost destroyed by these qualities, directed, alas, against their own half-brothers. The chronicler writes: “The Slavs do not tolerate any power and hate each other.” The best men died in battles with their own brothers, and their enemies successfully took advantage of this.
Having waited until the Slavs had bled each other dry, the Greeks called from distant Asia a tribe of Avars, or Obras, and persuaded them to go against the Slavs. “The Slavs are rich. You will take many treasures from them!” - the Greeks said to him. The Obras crossed the Volga and Don and, after a bloody struggle, conquered the Slavic tribes, weakened by infighting.
When the Avars finally gained a foothold on the Black Sea coast, they began to take tribute not only from the Slavs themselves, but also to receive rich gifts from the Greeks, against whom they went to war together with the Slavs they had conquered.
Soon, power among the Avars gradually passed to the Jewish merchant elite, which won over all the Avar nobility and their kagan himself to their faith. Since then, the Obras, who adopted Jewish customs, began to be called the Khazars, who for almost two hundred years turned into the worst enemies of our Slavic ancestors. The capital of the Khazar Khaganate was in the city of Itil, at the mouth of the Volga.
There, along with tribute, the Khazars brought Slavic boys and girls for sale, who were often captured during their raids, and prudent Jewish merchants, who knew how to charge a price for everything, sold them as slaves to Greece, as well as to the Mohammedans.
According to a number of sources - Arab, Persian, Byzantine - the warriors of the Rus and Slavs were a threat to vast regions in the pre-Christian period of Rus-Russia: from the westernmost parts of Europe to the southern countries lying beyond the Mediterranean and Black (then called Russian) seas. So, in 844, “the pagans who are called Ar-Rus” broke into and sacked Seville, in Arab Spain. In 912, a Russian fleet of 500 boats swept along the shores of the Caspian Sea like a tornado of fire.
What is known about the military techniques of the Rus at that time?
1. The Rus and Slavs were excellent sailors, their flotillas and fleets felt great both on the rivers and at sea. They were masters of the Caspian, Black, Varangian (Baltic), and North seas, and made trips to the Mediterranean Sea. Their ships - longships (ladyas) could accommodate from 40 to 100 fully armed soldiers and several horses, if necessary. Therefore, it is completely unclear why, the history of the Russian fleet dates back to Peter I. The Russian fleet is at least one and a half thousand years old. Moreover, the tradition was not interrupted - Russian ushkuiniki and Cossacks completely repeated the routes of their ancestors. The use of boats gave our ancestors greater mobility, allowing them to deliver unexpected attacks directly into the heart of enemy possessions and transport large groups of troops if necessary. The flotillas were supplemented by ground forces that moved overland.
2. According to the Roman author Mauritius the Strategist, the Slavic warriors were armed with: a bow and arrows (and the bows were complex, not simple, they had a long range - the average "shoot" was 225 meters, and penetrating power - an arrow pierced at the same distance a 5-centimeter oak board; for comparison: modern athletes aim at 90 m; the record of medieval Western Europe was set by Henry VIII - about 220 meters; the average shot of an Asian shooter was 150 meters), and the skill of archery was taught almost from the cradle . Already at the age of 8-9, or even earlier, the boy walked and went hunting with his father and older brothers. We can conclude that the Rus were the best “streltsy” (“archers” were the craftsmen who made bows) in Eurasia at that time. In addition, the weapons included two spears - a throwing spear (like a dart) and a heavy one for fighting in the “wall”; a “hard-to-carry” shield that covered the fighter’s entire body from his legs; leather armor in the early period, then chain mail appeared; conical and semicircular helmets. Everyone had knives - “shoemakers” and long combat knives of the “akinaks” type. Some warriors could fight with axes and maces; in the early period only the nobility and distinguished knights had swords.
3.Unlike the Scandinavians, the Rus, the Slavs knew and used horse combat. The heavily armed cavalry squads of the princes were a powerful striking force that could make a difference in the battle, as in the Battle of Kulikovo. Their power was strengthened by the allied lightly armed detachments of nomadic tribes - Pechenegs, Torks, Berendeys, they were also called “black hoods” (after their headdress). One should not think that Rus' only fought with the tribes of the steppe; wise princes, such as Svyatoslav, successfully used them in the fight against enemies. Open hostility began only after the baptism of Rus' - right up to the “crusades” of Vladimir Monomakh in the steppe.
4. The Russians used the “wall” in battle, which they had been taught since childhood. Wall-to-wall fights are an echo of that practice. To understand what a “wall” is, one must recall the images of the Spartan or Macedonian phalanx. All the men of Rus' were trained in this battle: the “wall,” covered with “hard-to-carry” shields, bristling with spears, took the main blow of the enemy, and archers showered the enemy with arrows from the back rows. The flanks and rear were covered by the heavy cavalry of the princely squad and detachments of the allied steppe inhabitants. The “Wall” withstood the blow, and then began to push back the enemy step by step, the cavalry struck from the flanks, completing the rout of the enemy.
5.Rus and Slavs were considered specialists in the so-called. “guerrilla warfare” - ambush attacks, various sabotages. Thus, Byzantine sources describe a case when a Slavic intelligence officer from the army of Belisarius (commander of Emperor Justinian) penetrated the enemy camp and kidnapped one of the Gothic leaders, delivering him to Belisarius. In fact, this is the first mention of the so-called. “Plastuns”, military intelligence of Rus'-Russia at that time.
6. Apparently, our ancestors also knew the basics of the so-called. “combat trance”, combat psychotechnics. Cases are described when they entered into battle in “divine nakedness”, or only in trousers. In the North of Europe, such warriors were called “berserkers” (in a “bear shirt”), and the myths about werewolves were not born out of nowhere. We are talking about a combat trance, when a warrior “transforms” into a wolf, a bear and, without feeling fear or pain, sharply increases the limits of the human body. The enemy, faced with such warriors, feels mystical horror, panic, and loses his fighting spirit. The Zaporozhye Cossacks called such warriors “characterniks.” There was also collective psychotechnics: the warriors of the Rus and Slavs were direct descendants of the “gods”, therefore they had no equal in battle. We can say that this military tradition is very tenacious: Suvorov turned his soldiers into “miracle heroes” who could do almost anything. You can also mention the principle of the Airborne Forces - “Nobody but us.”
7. The Rus, the Slavs were the best masters of hand-to-hand combat, unfortunately, Christianization, the prohibitions of the kings and emperors almost interrupted the traditions of the mass martial culture of the Rus. But currently there is an intensive search and gradual reconstruction of many types of Russian hand-to-hand combat.
1) wooden bow base:
a - ends with a cutout for the bowstring
b – tendons
c - birch plank
g - juniper plank
and - the knot or junction of ends, laths and tendons
k - a node or junction of the tendons and bone linings of the bow handle
2) view of the wooden base of the bow from the inside and the layout of the bone plates:
d - end plates with a cutout for the bowstring
e - side handle linings
g - lower grip pads on the inside of the bow
3) layout of the bone plates on the bow (side view):
d - end plates
e – lateral
g – lower
and - the junction at the ends of the bow
k - connection point at the bow handle
4) securing the joints of the bow parts by wrapping tendon threads over glue and gluing the bow with birch bark
5)bow with string after pasting
6) onion in cross section:
a - birch bark lining
b – tendons
c - birch plank
g - juniper plank;
Sources:
Mandzyak A. S. Battle magic of the Slavs. M., 2007.
Sedov V.V. Slavs in ancient times. - M., 1994.
Selidor (Alexander Belov). Fist fighting in Great Rus'. 2003.
Serebryansky Yu. A. Battle magic of the Slavs. The path of the sorcerer. M., 2010.
http://silverarches.narod.ru/bow/bow.htm
