§32. THE CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE SLAVS. 125
lived along the frontiers of the Roman empire. In the era of Charlemagne the Slavs occupied the whole of Eastern Europe from the Baltic to the Balkan; the Obotrites and Wends be tween the Elbe and the Vistula; the Poles around the Vistula, and behind them the Russians; the Czechs in Bohemia. Fur ther to the South the compact mass of Slavs was split by the in vasion of various Finnish or Turanian tribes ; the Huns in the fifth century > the Avars in the sixth, the Bulgarians in the seventh, the Magyars in the ninth. The Avars penetrated to the Adriatic, but were thrown back in 640 by the Bulgarians; they then settled in Panonia, were subdued and converted by Charlemagne, 791-796, and disappeared altogether from history in the ninth century. The Bulgarians adopted the Slavic lan guage and became Slavs, not only in language, but also in cus toms and habits. Only the Magyars, who settled around the Thciss and the Danube, and are the ruling race in Hungary, vindicated themselves as a distinct nationality.
The great mass of Slavs had no common political organization, but formed a number of kingdoms, which flourished, some for a shorter, and others for a longer period, such as Moravia, Bul garia, Bohemia, Poland, and Russia. In a religious respect also great differences existed among them. They were agricultu rists, and their gods were representatives of natural forces; but while Radigost and Sviatovit, worshipped by the Obotrites and Wends, were cruel gods, in whose temples, especially at Arcona in the island of Rtigen, human beings were sacrificed, Svarog worshipped by the Poles, and Dazhbog, worshipped by the Bohemians, were mild gods, who demanded love and prayer. Common to all Slavs, however, was a very elaborate belief in fairies and trolls; and polygamy, sometimes connected with sutteeism, widely prevailed among them. Their conversion was attempted both by Constantinople and by Rome; but the cha otic and ever-shifting political conditions under which they lived, the rising difference and jealousy between the Eastern and West ern churches, and the great difficulty which the missionaries
126 FOUETH PERIOD. A. D. 590-1049.
experienced in learning their language, presented formidable obstacles, and at the close of the period the work was not yet completed.
§ 33. Christian Missions among the Wends.
ADAM of BREMEN (d. 1067) : Gesta Hammenb. (Hamburgensis] Eccl. Pont.,
in Pertz: Monumenta Germ., VII. HELMOLDUS (d. 1147) and ARNOLDUS LUBECENSIS : Chronicon Slavorum
sive Annales Slavorum, from Charlemagne to 1170, ed. H. Bangert.
Lubecae, 1659. German translation by Laurent. Berlin, 1852. SPIEKER : Kirchengeschichte der Mark Brandenburg. Berlin, 1839. WIGGERS : Kirchengeschichte Mecklenburg*. Parchim, 1840. GiESEBRECHT : Wendische Geschichten. Berlin, 1843.
Charlemagne was the first who attempted to introduce Chris tianity among the Slavic tribes which, under the collective name of \Yends, occupied the Northern part of Germany, along the coast of the Baltic, from the mouth of the Elbe to the Vistula : Wagrians in Holstein, Obotrites in Mecklenburg, Sorbians on the Saxon boundary, Wilzians in Brandenburg, etc. But in the hands of Charlemagne, the Christian mission was a political weapon; and to the Slavs, acceptation of Christianity became synonymous with political and national subjugation. Hence their fury against Christianity which, time after time, broke forth, volcano-like, and completely destroyed the work of the missionaries. The decisive victories which Otto I. gained over the Wends, gave him an opportunity to attempt, on a large scale, the establishment of the Christian church among them. Episcopal sees were founded at Havelberg in 946, at Altenburg or Olden burg in 948, at Meissen, Merseburg, and Zeitz in 968, and in the last year an archiepiscopal see was founded at Magdeburg. Boso, a monk from St. Emmeran, at Regensburg, who first had translated the formulas of the liturgy into the language of the natives, became bishop of Merseburg, and Adalbert, who first had preached Christianity in the island of Rtigen, became arch bishop.
But again the Christian church was used as a means for poll-