Against my better instincts, I\u2019m going to start this with a tired old bromide: \u201cHell hath no fury like a woman whose husband got ripped in half by birch trees.\u201d<\/p>\n
I know, I know\u2014the saying is so trite at this point that its wisdom often feels lost. But there\u2019s a true story behind this chestnut.<\/p>\n
See, in 945 CE a princess named Olga suffered this very scenario and made it her motherf*cking mission to prove this maxim by killing more people than I\u2019ve even heard of. And for her bloody efforts, she was ultimately . . .sainted? <\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n Huh. I guess it was a different time.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Aye, that I did, gentle reader. But first, let\u2019s back it up, just a little.<\/p>\n This story takes place in Kievan Rus\u2019, in the 10th century (or the 900s, if you like). Kievan Rus\u2019, for simplicity\u2019s sake, was an area covering what is now Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. It was a loose tribal federation with some shared, pagan culture, ruled by the Rurik dynasty\u2014named after Olga\u2019s father in law. Some historians think these people descended from Nordic tribes, others think Slavic. And hey, it could be both.<\/p>\n Princess Olga was born around 900 CE, give or take a decade. Aside from the bit about her being a princess, history doesn\u2019t pay much attention to Olga for the first 45ish years of her life.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a quick rundown of Olga\u2019s life, pre-revenge porn: She was pagan, born in Pskov, maybe (a city that still exists, by the way). Then she married Igor I, Prince of Kiev. They had a son. See? Quick rundown.<\/p>\n Kievan Rus\u2019 was a growing empire in the mid-10th century, but you don\u2019t grow an empire without putting the squeeze on all your neighbors, and you don\u2019t squeeze your neighbors without making them resent you so bad they can\u2019t even sleep at night.<\/p>\n The Drevlians were a neighboring tribe that had a complicated relationship with Kievan Rus\u2019. They\u2019d done some work together, mostly in military campaigns against the Byzantine Empire, and they\u2019d paid tribute to Kievan Rus\u2019.<\/p>\n Tribute is, functionally, protection money. You pay it to a more powerful warlord so that they \u201cprotect\u201d you, mainly from their own forces, and I guess sometimes from a third party. It was seen as a \u201crespect\u201d thing\u2014granted, not a sincere respect, but the kind you might have for the violent mafia don who\u2019s extorting your business.<\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n The Drevlians had paid tribute to Igor\u2019s predecessors, but they quit in 912 after the last prince died. Rather than pay out to Big Kievan Rus\u2019, they started shopping local and paid tribute to a nearby warlord.<\/p>\n Igor needed to get his tribute back, not just for the furs, but for respect. A prince who loses tribute is a prince who\u2019s lost his perceived legitimacy, and that sort of prince doesn\u2019t last too long. So, in 945, Prince Igor checked his privilege and realized it wasn\u2019t high enough. He decided to pay a visit to the Drevlian capital, Iskorosten (modern-day Northern Ukraine), to reassert his entitlement.<\/p>\n It turns out that was the wrong move. The Drevlians saw this Kievan Rus\u2019 bastard riding into town to demand tribute after 33 years of not getting it. To Drevlian eyes, that looked like some bullsh*t.<\/p>\n So, they did what I\u2019d like to call the \u201chuman hammock\u201d to Igor. The Drevlians bent two birch trees to the ground, and tied them to each of Igor\u2019s legs. Then, they let the trees go. The trees straightened out, but Igor didn\u2019t\u2014the poor bastard was torn apart.<\/span>3<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n Yeah, but she didn\u2019t let on to the Drevlians that she was\u2014and don\u2019t ask me why they didn\u2019t assume she would be. Instead, they figured they\u2019d take over Kievan Rus\u2019 in Igor\u2019s place, so they sent 20 of their best and brightest (well, maybe not their brightest) to Olga to convince her to marry the Drevlian Prince Mal, which would give the Drevlians control over Kievan Rus\u2019.<\/span>4<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n Meanwhile, Olga was acting as regent for her son, who was too young to take over just yet, and she had the full might of the Kievan Rus\u2019 at her disposal. And she must have really liked Igor because, well, she put together a four-stage magnum opus of revenge.<\/p>\n Olga, playing nice, welcomed the 20 Drevlian ambassadors who had been sent to negotiate her next marriage.<\/p>\n Olga sent messengers to summon the Drevlians to her hall, but the pompous ambassadors demanded that they\u2014along with their boats\u2014be carried to Olga\u2019s court. The Kievan Rus\u2019 response: \u201cSure, no prob!\u201d They carried the finely robed Drevlians in their boats to Olga\u2019s hall.<\/p>\n What the Drevlians didn\u2019t know was that, before they arrived, Olga had ordered her men to dig a great trench. Her men carried the boats filled with Drevlian divas over to the trench and dumped them in, boats and all.<\/p>\n Olga peered into the trench and asked if this \u201chonor\u201d was to the Drevlians\u2019 taste. The Drevlians, who I assume saw the writing on the wall at this point, said that this was worse than Igor\u2019s death by birch tree. Olga rubbed her index finger and thumb together to play the world\u2019s tiniest slavic lute, then ordered her men to bury the Drevlians alive.<\/span>5<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n Oh, by the way: \u201cvivisepulture\u201d is the act of burying someone alive.<\/p>\n Olga wasn\u2019t finished. Shockingly, the buried-alive Drevlian ambassadors never sent word back to Prince Mal, but Olga did. She would marry him, but she wanted an escort: Mal would need to send some of his most important people to travel with her to Iskorosten. It would serve as an act of goodwill that would acknowledge the importance of a union with the Kievan Rus\u2019.<\/p>\n Mal was thirsty to be king, so he obliged and sent a group of Drevlian chieftains to Olga. She rolled out the red carpet and took her guests in, offering them some bathhouse time to clean up after their journey. If you can\u2019t guess what happened next, here\u2019s a hint: the bathhouse doors locked from the outside.<\/p>\n You gettin\u2019 it? She locked those poor bastards in the bathhouse, then set it on fire, burning all the chieftains alive. It just wouldn\u2019t be a Russian revenge story without any bathhouse murders.<\/span>6<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n After the bathhouse burning, Olga sent Mal a request: marriage still sounded good, but she\u2019d like to visit Iskorosten to hold a funeral feast and proper burial for her deceased husband, Igor. Mal still didn\u2019t know what happened to his last two diplomatic parties, so he figured why not? Whatever greased Olga\u2019s wheels and got him on the Kievan Rus\u2019 throne.<\/p>\n Olga and her soldiers arrived for the funeral feast and the mead was flowing. But, while the Drevlians were blacking out, Olga\u2019s men had been ordered to teetotal and keep their wits. When the time was right and the Drevlians were good and sloshed, Olga brought down the hammer, killing 5,000 of the Drevlians. Well, 5,000 might be a bit of hyperbole, to tell the truth, but she killed a bunch of Drevlian revelers.<\/span>7<\/sup><\/a><\/span> <\/span>8<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n This final step was truly Olga\u2019s crowning achievement.<\/p>\n Olga had gathered an army to wipe the Drevlians out, once and for all. The surviving Drevlians\u2014those whom Olga hadn\u2019t buried, burned, or put to the sword at the funeral feast\u2014begged for mercy. \u201cPlease, Olga, we\u2019ll give you so many furs you\u2019ll be sweating your ass off in February,\u201d they (probably) said.<\/p>\n \u201cYou know what,\u201d Olga said, \u201cfine. But I don\u2019t sweat sh*t. So instead of furs, I\u2019m going to let you Drevvies off easy. We\u2019ve impoverished you with our siegin\u2019 and a-killin\u2019, so all I ask of you are three pigeons and three sparrows from each house.\u201d<\/p>\n Olga of Kiev: animal lover.<\/p>\n \u201cLady,\u201d the Drevlians said, thinking they were getting off easy, \u201cyou got it.\u201d<\/p>\n The Drevlians made good, but Olga didn\u2019t. The birds were given to Olga, and she gave each of her soldiers a pigeon or sparrow, along with an order: tie a thread to each bird\u2019s feet. On the end of that thread, tie some cloth-bound sulfur.<\/p>\n Once it was dark, Olga\u2019s soldiers released the pigeons and sparrows, who naturally flew back to their nests in the houses, coops, and haystacks of Iskorosten. The whole city was set aflame at once and the Drevlians fled. Olga\u2019s army captured the survivors. Some she killed, some she kept as slaves, and the rest she left to pay tribute.<\/p>\n Now, this might be a myth from the Kievan Rus\u2019Primary Chronicle (the Russian equivalent of the Norse Sagas, if you will). It does seem to be an outlandish tactic. That said, the United States Army tested a similar tactic in World War II, where they would send flaming bats to burn down Japanese cities. The tests went so well that the testing base was burned down. So Olga\u2019s army of fire birds? Not impossible.<\/span>9<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n Now that you know what Olga may have done in her quest for vengeance against the Drevlians, you might be asking, \u201cHow\u2019d she get sainted, and why?\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s a good question. Christianity is, in theory, not quite as into revenge as some of the pagan religions were. You might even say Christianity was supposed to be about forgiveness\u2014revenge\u2019s great enemy.<\/p>\n But Christianity, especially during the medieval period, had another priority: conversion. While Olga of Kiev was a pagan for much of her life, and particularly in her approach to epic poem-style revenge, she later converted to Christianity\u2014receiving baptism between 945 and 957\u2014and encouraged her people to do the same.<\/p>\nOlga Kiev and Birch Trees, You Say?<\/h3>\n
Oh, Shit! Was Olga of Kiev Pissed?<\/h3>\n
Olga of Kiev Plan for Revenge Phase 1: Vivisepulture<\/h3>\n
Olga of Kiev Plan for Revenge Phase 2: Immolation<\/h3>\n
Olga of Kiev Plan for Revenge Phase 3: Party Foul<\/h3>\n
Olga of Kiev Plan for Revenge Phase 4: Bird Fyrd<\/h3>\n
Olga of Kiev Inducted into Sainthood, Somehow<\/h3>\n