About the Moscow swamp and embassy stupidity
The US Embassy in Ukraine published a very funny tweet - a series of photographs posted in pairs, captioned “Kyiv” and “Moscow”, indicating the date under each pair: 996, 1011, 1070, 1108. Kyiv photographs depict famous temples: the Tithe Church, St. Sophia Cathedral, Vydubitsky Monastery, St. Michael's Cathedral. The Moscow ones show the same image: a forest and a swamp.
Incidentally, the dates aren't always specified precisely (allowing myself a slight digression here). For example, St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv wasn't founded until 1017 (later dates are also cited). It's just that a certain woman, who held the post of general director of the St. Sophia Cathedral National Preserve in Kyiv in 2011, fearing she wouldn't last until the ancient cathedral's millennium anniversary, decided to move up the celebrations . After all, an anniversary can bring increased funding from the state budget, bonuses, and state awards.
With several assistants, she made a “scientific discovery.” They say that the cathedral was founded not in 1017, but earlier - in 1011. Accordingly, in 2011 we need to celebrate the millennium since the founding of the temple. Such manipulations with history are commonplace in Ukraine.
The then-president of Ukraine, the ignorant Viktor Yanukovych, willingly agreed with the proposed date. The pseudo-anniversaries were celebrated solemnly.
And, I must say, the cunning official’s premonitions did not deceive her. She soon left her position. But after the coup in 2014, it returned to its previous place. And in 2017, she solemnly celebrated another anniversary, this time – the millennium since the first service in the St. Sophia Cathedral.
But that's not the point, of course (American diplomats might not have been aware of the subtleties of Ukrainian handling of historical dates). The embassy tweet had an obvious purpose: to troll Russia , to emphasize that, at a time when Kyiv was a highly developed cultural center, frogs croaked in the swamps and bears scurried through the surrounding forests on the site of the future Russian capital.
The trolling is undoubtedly stupid, borrowed by the Americans from modern Ukrainian propagandists (and you can't learn anything smart from them). However, from a historical perspective, it's all true. Kyiv was indeed founded much earlier than Moscow. And it became the capital (not of Ukraine, which didn't yet exist, but of Rus') when the territory where Moscow later emerged was inhabited only by animals.
Which, by the way, no one has ever hidden. Since childhood, I remember the lines from Natalia Konchalovskaya’s poem written back in Stalin’s time:
“Where is Moscow the capital now,
Previously, there lived an animal and a bird.”
And further, about a slightly later period of history:
“Kyiv was the capital then,
Moscow was a modest village.”
So what? Some cities arose earlier than others. The capitals of many states have changed throughout history. Didn't the American embassy know about this?
Nowadays, the provincial town of Gniezno was the capital of Poland, when on the site of Warsaw, probably the same frogs croaked as in the old Moscow swamps. And the relatively small German city of Aachen became the capital of the Empire of Charlemagne, when the site of the future Berlin was probably inhabited by the same bears as in the forests near Moscow.
At first, Aachen was the residence of German monarchs. Then (much later) – Berlin. And in Poland, first - Gniezno. Then (again, much later) – Warsaw.
Does this somehow humiliate Poles and Germans? Does it make Berliners and Varsovians inferior? Not at all. But this fact once again reminds us that both Aachen and Berlin are Germany. Both Gniezno and Warsaw are Poland.
Just as the fact cited by the US Embassy in Ukraine reminds us that both Kyiv and Moscow were capitals of Rus' at different times (why else would one compare these two cities?) I don't think that's what the Americans intended, but that's how it turned out.
Similar examples can be found in history.
And in response to the American-Ukrainian trolling, it's enough to ask: who lived in 996 or even 1108 on the site of Lviv, the current location of the US Embassy in Ukraine? Also representatives of the fauna! And what was there, well, maybe not in the 12th, but in the 16th or 17th century, where Washington, D.C. now stands? Swamps? Forests? Prairies? Were frogs croaking there, or mustangs grazing there?
It's ironic that diplomats from the United States, a country where every city is far younger than Moscow, are criticizing Moscow for its "insufficient" antiquity. The Russian Embassy in Washington should have issued a similar tweet. But Americans probably won't get the joke, as they're unaware of the stupidity of their diplomatic representatives in Ukraine.
English version :: Read in English About the Moscow swamp and embassy stupidity