TheGrand Prince of Kiev (sometimesgrand duke) was the title of the monarch ofKievan Rus', residing in Kiev (modernKyiv) from the 10th to 13th centuries.^{[citation needed]} In the 13th century, Kiev became anappanageprincipality first of thegrand prince of Vladimir and theMongolGolden Horde governors, and later was taken over by theGrand Duchy of Lithuania.^{[citation needed]}

Rus' chronicles such as thePrimary Chronicle are inconsistent in applying the title "grand prince" to various princes in Kievan Rus'.^[3] Although most sources consistently attribute it to the prince of Kiev,^[3] there is no agreement which princes were also "grand prince", and scholars have thus come up with different lists of grand princes of Kiev.^[4]

According to a founding myth in thePrimary Chronicle,Kyi, Shchek and Khoryv and their sister Lybid co-founded the city of Kiev (Kyiv), and the oldest brotherKyi was "chief of his kin" (Old East Slavic:кнѧжаше в родѣ,romanized: knyazhashe v rodie).^[6] Some western historians (i.e., Kevin Alan Brook) suppose that Kiev was founded byKhazars orMagyars. Kiev is a Turkic place name (Küi = riverbank +ev = settlement).^[7] At least during the 8th and 9th centuries Kiev functioned as an outpost of the Khazar empire (a hill-fortress, calledSambat, "high place" inOld Turkic). According toOmeljan Pritsak,Constantine Zuckerman and other scholars, Khazars lost Kiev at the beginning of the 10th century.^[8][9]

At some point,Rurik, aVarangian prince, allegedly founded the "Rurik dynasty" (named after him in the 16th century) in 862 through the "calling of the Varangians", but he is considered to be a legendary, mythical and perhaps even entirely fictional character by modern scholars.^[a] ThePrimary Chronicle never calls Rurik a prince of Kiev; the passage wherein Oleg "sat in Kiev" (Old East Slavic:понелѣже сѣде въ Кыевѣ,romanized: ponelězhe sěde vŭ Kyevě) makes no mention of Rurik, suggesting the author was 'more interested in the first Rus' ruler to reside in Kiev than with any founder of a dynasty'.^[12]

Kiev was captured byAskold and Dir, whose existence is also debatable, and are called "boyars" who "did not belong to [Rurik's] family" by thePrimary Chronicle.^[13][1] According to some Russian historians (i.e., Gleb S.Lebedev), Dir was achacanus of Rhos (Rus khagan).^[14]Thomas Noonan asserts that one of the Rus "sea-kings", the "High king", adopted the title khagan in the early 9th century.^[15]Peter Benjamin Golden maintained that the Rus became a part of the Khazar federation, and that their ruler was officially accepted as a vassal khagan of the Khazar Khagan of Itil.^[16]

Before the mid-15th century, no historical source claims that Rurik founded a dynasty;^[17] theHypatian Codex ofc. 1425 began its list ofknyazi of Kiev with "Dir and Askold", then "Oleg", then "Igor", up to 1240, and does not mention Rurik anywhere.^[18] Similarly, theKhlebnikov Codex starts with a regnal list stating: 'In Kiev, the first to begin reigning together were Dinar and Askold, after them came Olga, after Olga Igor, after Igor Sviatoslav, (...)'.^[5] There is no mention of a "Rurik"; instead, the list starts with "Dinar and Askold".^[19] UnlikeHypatian's second place for Oleg the Wise,^[18] however,Khlebnikov appears to assertOlga of Kiev succeeded them, and preceded her own husbandIgor of Kiev.^[5]

Askold and Dir are narrated to have been killed in 882 byOleg, the first "prince" (knyaz) of Kiev according to thePrimary Chronicle, but not yet a "grand prince" (velikiy knyaz).^[1][12] His relation to Rurik is debatable, and has been rejected by several modern scholars.^[20] Although later Muscovite chroniclers would call Oleg a "grand prince" and Kiev a "grand principality" (Old East Slavic:великое княжение,romanized: velikoe knyazhenie), the earliest sources do not.^[21] Whereas the reconstructed original Greek text of theRusʹ–Byzantine Treaty (907) calls Oleg a μεγας ἄρχων or "greatarchon" ("ruler"), theOld East Slavic translations found in theLaurentian Codex andHypatian Codex do not.^[22] On the other hand, only when the Byzantine emperorsLeo VI the Wise,Alexander andConstantine VII are called "the Great", Oleg is also called "the Great".^[22] Dimnik (2004) argued it should thus be read as "the Rus' prince Oleg the Great" instead of "Oleg the grand prince of Rus'".^[22] Similarly, the only occasionsIgor of Kiev is ever calledvelikiy knyaz in thePrimary Chronicle (six times) are all found in theRusʹ–Byzantine Treaty (945), where the Greek emperors are also calledk velikiy tsesarem Grech'-skim ("to the great Greekcaesars").^[22] The same happens when, afterSviatoslav's invasion of Bulgaria, the 971 peace treaty is recorded; it is the only place in thePrimary Chronicle whereSviatoslav I is named avelikiy knyaz.^[22] Most significantly, theNachal'nyy svod (found only in theNovgorod First Chronicle) never mentions any of these peace treaties, and never calls Oleg, Igor or Sviatoslav avelikiy knyaz.^[23] According to Dimnik (2004), this means that Greek scribes added the word "great" to the princely title, whereas the Rus' themselves did not, except when translating these three treaties from Greek into Slavic.^[23]

Yaropolk I of Kiev andVolodimer I of Kiev are both steadily referred to as just aknyaz by theNovgorod First Chronicle and the Laurentian and Hypatian Codices.^[24] There is one exception: the Hypatian Codex writesVolodimir knyaz velikii ("Volodimir the grand prince") when reporting the latter's death; because the Hypatian Codex is the latest source of the three (compiledc. 1425), this is probably a laterinterpolation.^[24] APaterik of theKyiv Pechersk Lavra of the early 13th century also calls Volodimer avelikiy knyaz, but that was written two centuries after his death, and may not necessarily describe how he was known while alive.^[25] The oldest surviving source available isHilarion of Kiev'sSermon on Law and Grace (c. 1040s), which calls Volodimer akagan (aKhazar title) rather than aknyaz.^[25] Some scholars have suggested that this indicates Kievan Rus' had won its independence from the Khazars in the early 10th century, and had inherited the title ofkagan from them, before exchanging it forknyaz later.^[25] TheChurch Statute of Prince Volodimir starts with "Behold, I, Prince Vasilii, called Volodimir," (Old East Slavic:Се аз, князь Василий, нарицаемыи Володимир,romanized: Se yaz, knyaz' Vasilii, naritsayemy Volodimir,^[26]), but later in the text he interchangeably calls himselfknyaz andvelikiy knyaz, and the earliest copy of this document is from the 14th century, so it is difficult to say what the lost original text said.^[26] Since chroniclers also regularly referred to Volodimer asvelikiy without mentioning his title – the reason why he has become known to history as Volodimer "the Great" – suggests that this adjective was not part of his title, but asobriquet ornickname, that was also applied to other monarchs or clerics around him.^[27]

Sviatopolk I of Kiev was never calledvelikiy knyaz ("grand prince") in any source.^[28] Moreover, he has been stigmatised by chroniclers with the nickname "the Accursed" or "the Damned" (okayannyy) because of how he violently rose to power in the war of succession following Volodimir's death in 1015.^[28] On the other hand,Yaroslav the Wise is the first widely attestedvelikiy knyaz ("grand prince") in virtually all sources of the second half of the 11th century, and surviving copies of theChurch Statute of Prince Yaroslav also strongly suggest he applied the title to himself while he was alive.^[29] Dimnik (2004) concluded that by the end of Yaroslav's reign in the third quarter of the 11th century, he was regularly calling himself and being called thevelikiy knyaz of Kiev, and the competing titles ofkagan andtsar had decisively lost in favour ofvelikiy knyaz as the preferred appellation of the Kievan monarch.^[30] Thevelikiy knyaz wasdesignated by genealogical seniority and given the right to reign from Kiev – the grand principality superior to all other principalities in the realm – over all other princes descended from Yaroslav.^[31] The reason why the system of succession did not always work as Yaroslav intended was because some princes simplyusurped power through acoup d'état at the court in Kiev.^[32] The 1097Council of Liubech upgraded the dynastic capitals of the inner circle of senior princes to grand principalities as well, but still acknowledged the superiority of Kiev.^[32]

It was not until theSack of Kiev (1169) byAndrey Bogolyubsky ofVladimir-Suzdal that thegrand princes of Vladimir launched a fierce competition with the grand princes of Kiev over who had primacy over the entire realm.^[32] Since then, the phrase "velikiy knyaz of Kiev" was merelytitular, and chroniclers applied the symbolic title ofvelikiy knyaz to Kiev orVladimir on the Klyazma according to whomever they favoured.^[32] In practice, the military supremacy of any particular prince – especially fromVsevolod the Big Nest onwards – would determine whether the other princes would or would not acknowledge him as "grand prince".^[33] After theMongol invasion of Kievan Rus' andSack of Kiev in the late 1230s and 1240s, the khans of theGolden Horde "in effect, terminated the office of thevelikiy knyaz' of Kiev and conferred political supremacy on their puppet in Vladimir."^[34]

Due to theMongol invasion of Kievan Rus' 1240, Michael of Chernigov left Kiev to seek military assistance from KingBéla IV of Hungary. During that time, Prince Rostislav of Smolensk occupied Kiev, but was captured the same year byDaniel of Galicia who placed his voivode Dmytro to govern Kiev on his behalf while he resided inHalych. Being unsuccessful in Hungary, Michael visitedKonrad I of Masovia. Receiving no results in Poland, he eventually asked Daniel of Galicia for asylum due to the Mongol invasion. Since the 14th century, the principality of Kiev started to fall under the influence ofGrand Duchy of Lithuania. In 1299, theMetropolitan of KievMaximus moved his metropolitan see from Kiev toVladimir-on-Klyazma. In 1321, after thebattle on the Irpin River,Gediminas installed Mindgaugas, one of his subjects from the house ofOlshanski, a descendant of the family ofVseslav of Polotsk that was exiled to theByzantine Empire. In 1331, Kiev was once again taken by a member of the Siverski house (Olgovichi branch), the prince of Putivl. After Grand DukeAlgirdas defeated the Golden Horde at theBattle of Blue Waters in 1362, he incorporated Kiev and its surrounding areas into theGrand Duchy of Lithuania.

• Cross, Samuel Hazzard; Sherbowitz-Wetzor, Olgerd P. (1930).The Russian Primary Chronicle, Laurentian Text. Translated and edited by Samuel Hazzard Cross and Olgerd P. Sherbowitz-Wetzor (1930)(PDF). Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Mediaeval Academy of America. p. 325. Retrieved26 January 2023. (primary source)
• Dimnik, Martin (January 2004)."The Title "Grand Prince" in Kievan Rus'".Mediaeval Studies.66:253–312.doi:10.1484/J.MS.2.306512. Retrieved27 February 2023.
• Halperin, Charles J. (2022).The Rise and Demise of the Myth of the Rus' Land(PDF). Leeds: Arc Humanities Press. p. 107.ISBN 9781802700565. Retrieved5 March 2023.
• Jusupović, Adrian (2022).The Chronicle of Halych-Volhynia and Historical Collections in Medieval Rus'. Leiden: Brill. p. 268.ISBN 9789004509306.
• Martin, Janet (2004).Medieval Russia: 980–1584. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.ISBN 9780521368322. (digital printing 2004)
• Ostrowski, Donald (2018)."Was There a Riurikid Dynasty in Early Rus'? ".Canadian-American Slavic Studies.52 (1):30–49.doi:10.1163/22102396-05201009.{{cite journal}}:no-break space character in|title= at position 44 (help)