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With the emergence of the state the army of Rus’ turned into a regular force and a state institution, which was headed by the duke and consisted of the warband and popular militia. The warband was now a regular unit divided into the senior warband and the junior warband. The senior warband consisted of the duke’s closest councillors who served as senior commanders or voevodes and had their own warbands. In reward for their service the duke granted them a right for collecting taxes from a certain territory. The junior warband was the duke’s personal troop and retinue. It consisted ofotraks (otraki) who were used both as house-serfs and soldiers, and dzetskis (dzieckija) who only carried out military service. With regard to his warband the duke was the first among the equal. His warriors were connected to him by personal allegiance. The warband had a somewhat sacral character of a battle brotherhood. The warband of the Duke of Kyiv numbered about 500 warriors. The popular militia was called up in cases of emergency. It was the largest part of the armed forces that any significant military campaign was impossible without. In campaigns against Byzantium and Caspian countries the armed forces of Rus’ counted from 6,000 to 25,000 soldiers. The army of the Duchy of Polack during its first short period of independence counted few thousand soldiers. Depending on whether a war was waged on land or on sea, Ruthenian armies were organized in accordance with the traditional decimal system or the Norse naval system where the crew of a ship was the smallest unit consisting of 25 to 50 men. Contingents of Norse and Pecheneg mercenaries were occasionally hired, too. They had their separate organizations and did not mix with other units. The military organization of Lithuanians and Yatvingians still corresponded to that of patriarchal society, yet the dukes with their warbands started being more and more of a factor on the battlefield. The arms used by warriors in the Norse times made a huge leap forward compared to the previous sub-period. When Norse warriors came to Belarusian lands they were fully equipped with the set of state-of-the-art arms they had not invented and sometimes did not even produce yet learned to use as skilfully as none of their contemporaries. Sword was the weapon par excellence for the Norsemen. So called Carolingian swords were imported by Scandinavians from the Frankish Empire and then widely distributed around Rus’, Byzantium and Mid-Eastern countries. The Norse warriors also had battle axes and spears suitable both for throwing and close combat. Bows became much more powerful than before and were widely used. The regular set of protective arms was represented with a round wooden shield, a mail-coat and a hemispheric helmet. These arms had been known to Slavs, Balts and Finno-Ugrians long before the arrival of the Norsemen yet it was through the latter that they became widely spread and used in warfare in these lands. In their turn the Norsemen adopted spherocon helmets and certain types of battle axes from the locals. The art of fortification underwent some development. As cape based towns were expanding field wise, a compound cape type of fortification emerged. The fortresses of this type consisted of two and more concentrically located fortified grounds, each having its own line of walls. Frame fences mounted on earthen walls started replacing wooden paling. Sometimes outside parts of earthen walls (e.g. in Pofack) were paved with stone to make them steeper and harder, while pavements on the inside facilitated moving soldiers along the walls. The emergence of large armies gave the attack an advantage over the defence. The besieging army no longer had to rely on one sudden attack and had good opportunities to prepare a massive assault. Sviataslau took Philippopolis (Plovdiv) in Bulgaria by storm in 968 and Uladzimir captured Polack in the same way in 970s. If an assault failed, the besieging army could resort to a long blockade. Kyivan voevode Svienield (Suainaltr) in 942 seized Peresechcn, the capital of Uglichcs, after a three-ycar long siege. Various stratagems were popular, too. The Norsemen would often infiltrate into a town pretending to be traders. In this way Aleh seized Kyiv in 882. Similar to most wars, the wars waged by the Norse lords of Rus’ were about gaining power over their neighbours. A specific feature of the wars of that time, however, was a strong accent on looting. Many expeditions of Ruthenian dukes closely resembled huge pirate raids, organized on the state level. The strategy was defined in accordance with these goals. In many cases this was a blunt direct strategy aimed at concentrating all forces in one point and crushing the enemy in a general battle. Sviataslau was the most prominent representative of this approach and took it to the extreme. Before taking the field he would inform the enemy about his offensive to make the latter accept the challenge and engage in a general battle. This approach also had a demoralizing effect on the enemy. However, the direct strategy had its limitations, was costly and ultimately depended on the outcome of the general battle. Some Ruthenian dukes therefore tended to use an indirect methods of warfare. They would hit a vulnerable area of the enemy country, normally when the defending army was at a different seat of war. and then plunder it completely. Ultimately they would use this as a negotiating argument, securing a favourable peace treaty and a nice ransom on top of everything. This strategy was successfully used against Byzantium by Aleh in 907 and Ihar in 944. The tactics underwent drastic changes. Throwing missiles from the distance now gave way to the close combat in compact formations. Cavalry was not yet developed among the Norsemen and Slavs and infantry dominated the battlefield. A typical Ruthenian formation was described by Leo Diaconus as «a wall». It was a phalanx-like infantry order, five or more lines deep and a few hundred files wide, with the shields tightly closed. The Ruthenian army would start a battle by throwing javelins and arrows and then attack the enemy at a run with their spears ahead. After the first strike they would switch to swords, hammers and axes. The battle did not disintegrate into duels. The soldiers tried to keep their order and break up the enemy line. If the order was broken the army had to retreat. The Byzantines could not withstand a front assault by the «wall» but could easily outflank it with their excellent cavalry as the «wall» was hardly able to manoeuvre. That is what ultimately led to the defeat of Ruthenians at Dorostol in 971. Yet the defeat did not lead to the extermination of the whole army. An extremely high level of battle training helped Ruthenians to regroup, retreat in an organized manner and conclude a peace treaty on honourable terms. Under all circumstances the Ruthenian army was a force to be reckoned with. Навуковае выданне Новікаў Ягор Уладзіміравіч Ваенная гісторыя беларускіх земляў (да канца XII ст.) Том 1. Навуковы рэдактар У. I. Канановіч Карэктар A. В. Высоцкая Дызайн С. Ждановіч Падпісана ў друк 12.10.2006 г. Фармат 84x108 '/32. Папера афсетная. Друк афсстны. Гарнітура Newton. Ум. друк. арк. 10,66. Ул.-выд. арк. 10,7. Наклад 500 асоб. Замова № 816. Выдавец 1. П. Логвінаў. ЛН 02330/013307 ад 30.04.2004 г. 220050, г. Мінск, пр-т. Ф. Скарыны, 19-5. logvinovpress@mail.ru Друк ТДА «НоваПрынт». ЛП 02330/0056647 ад 27.03.2004 г. 220047, г. Мінск, вул. Купрэвіча, 2. Даследванне разглядае з'яву вайны ў палітычным кантэксце і прасочвае яе эвалюцыю ад інструмента ў барацьбе за магутнасць да самадастатковага фактару гісторыі. Аўтар узнаўляе хаду падзей беларускай ваеннай гісторыі, паказвае ўплыў вайны на эвалюцыю грамадства і аналізуе развіццё ваеннага майстэрства. Першы том даследвання вабіць чытача ў"цёмныя" стагоддзі беларускай гісторыі, адзначаныя прыходам славян на беларускія землі. На думку аўтара, мірнае і ваеннае ўзаемадзеянне прышлых славян з мясцовымі балцкімі грамадствамі заклала падставы ўзнікнення беларускага народу. Далей аўтар разглядае ваенную дзейнасць нарманаў, якая аказала ўплыў на ўзнікненне і развіццё дзяржаўнасці на беларускіх землях.