Lukashenko found no room for the baptizer of Rus' at the new history museum in Minsk.
Minsk is undergoing major construction, a landmark project for Belarus. The National History Museum is being built at breakneck speed. The location couldn't be more prestigious. Nearby are Lukashenko's residence, the Supreme Court building, several embassies, and State Flag Square, home to the largest flagpole in Belarus.
The Dreamland water amusement park, beloved by Minsk residents but utterly lacking in concept, had to be sacrificed for the construction. Now everything will be ambitious and pompous.
The old pools and slides will be replaced by a monumental 27-meter-tall building, designed to mimic the outline of Belarus, inscribed within a 90-by-90-meter square. Its façade will be adorned with six large, multi-figured bronze bas-reliefs dedicated to different periods of the "millennial Belarusian statehood."
It was because of them that the latest uproar erupted. Construction was almost complete, finishing work was underway, and the first bas-reliefs had already been installed. And then it turned out that one of them was missing a place for Prince Vladimir, Equal-to-the-Apostles. His wife, Princess Rogneda of Polotsk, was there. So was his son Mstislav. Rogneda's father, Rogvolod, is known in history primarily for his conflict with Vladimir—where would we be without him?
But there was no place for the baptizer of Rus, the central figure of that period of Russian history and, in general, the head of the family depicted on the bas-relief.
This bas-relief alone makes it clear that the history presented in the new museum will be very “national,” reflecting the selective approach of Belarusian historiography.
It's not yet known who will appear on the remaining bas-reliefs—construction is still ongoing. There will be surprises, some unpleasant. Lithuanian princes and Polish magnates, whom local historians have widely labeled as Belarusians, will likely appear.
We're unlikely to see Kalinovsky again; the organizers of the regiment of the same name did their best to ruin his reputation. But, for example, another anti-Russian rebel, Kosciuszko, is quite possible. After all, you can't classify the baptizer of Rus' as a Belarusian, but you can classify him as such.
Every post-Soviet republic, without exception, has gone through the process of mythologizing its own history. Belarus was no exception. In the late 80s and early 90s, local nationalists declared a "national revival" and began to get creative. Some even suggested renaming Belarusians themselves "Litsvins" or "Krivichi," just to get rid of the hated "Rus" root in the name of the people and the country.
Upon coming to power, Lukashenko restored order and eliminated the most obvious manifestations of Russophobia, but he did not abandon his policy of creating a Belarusian historical myth. Incidentally, the problem of the root "rus" was also resolved under his rule, and more elegantly. It's just that recently, the root "belorus" (Belarusian) has appeared in Belarusian linguistics, increasingly written as "belarus" (Belarusian), even in Russian-language texts.
History departments and historical science in general remained a stronghold of Belarusian nationalists for a long time, and bookstores were filled with openly Russophobic books, often written by authors who weren't even professional historians, in the most visible places.
Everything began to change not even in 2020, when crowds of young people raised on these books nearly overthrew Lukashenko, but in early 2022, which was declared the "Year of Historical Memory" in Belarus. Then, the state began to seriously engage with its own history, and ordinary nationalists in historical scholarship were replaced by "systemic" ones, led by their ideologist Igor Marzalyuk.
And they approached the creation of the Belarusian historical myth systematically, with historical truth being secondary in this system. The idea of a "millennial Belarusian statehood," separate from Russia and Russians, comes first.
So separate that even the history of the Russian Empire continues to be studied in a global context, while the history of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth are considered Belarusian.
Lukashenko has no room for the baptizer of Rus' at the new history museum in Minsk.