Friday, February 28, 2014

"Kiev-upon-Seine" : a wink of the past !

by Jean-Jacques COURTEY, Doctor in Economic Geography, Ph. D
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Once upon a time a very beautiful Princess coming from the East became Queen of France (1044- 1060).
Her name was Anna Iaroslavna of Kiev (c. 1024 - after 1075) : as a matter of fact, she was the fourth daughter of Iaroslav I (? - 1054), Great Prince of Kiev, Prince of Novgorod, and of Princess Ingrid of Sweden (?- 1050). Her armories were carrying a silver sword and a golden shield.
She married Henri I (1008 - 1060), but her great achievement was certainly through her grandson Louis VI the Big (1081 - 1137), the Red King who was so proud of his Grandma in whom he found terrific inspirations, including the one of Magog the Goth behind the Gothic religious triumph. Astonishingly, Gothic architecture recognizable to its diagonal ribs ("ogives" in French), was only accepted under this name because of the far insistance of the Italian painter of Renaissance, Raphaël (1483 - 1520). Did he know about the importance of the word "galaubjan" ("to believe") for the Goths ?
Louis VI was also the creator of the "French Nation", "la Nation Françoise" as he himself proclaimed it for the first time in history. He was also the expander of Paris area (we nicknamed "Kiev-upon-Seine"), the royal domain, at the expenses of the vicious lords he never hesitated to punish for the bad treatment of their serves.

The coming of the Slav Princess Anna of Kiev in Paris lead to the end of dark ages for serves, even it took sometimes before she could see her wishes finally accomplished by her grandson, Louis VI the Big. He even made the son of a serve, Suger of Saint Denis (c. 1081 - 1151), his Prime Minister.
The Ukrainian sculptor Znoba Valentin Ivanovich (1929 - 2006) made a very realistic statue about Anna of Kiev in Senlis (Oise), in 1999 : she looks like a top model on the move from the Middle Age, with her quite lovely shape and her very nice face.
This artist was coming from the region of Dnepropetrovsk, the same one as the Ukrainian heroin of the two Orange revolutions (in 2004, and presently also), Yuliya Tymoshenko (born in 1960) who is free at last after 30 months jail in Kharkiv.
To make a comment about the present revolution in Ukraine, nobody knows exactly where it will lead, especially about Russia and Eurasia, but the world will certainly never be the same from now on, including the Western one. Instead of a war in Crimea (Simferopol and Sebastopol), prelude to a partition of Ukraine, a compromise ought to be finally researched even if difficult, we hope !

In France, people are extremely paradoxical. Openly, they can be fierce Jacobines, but when it comes to dream about a better world nobody is thinking about Maximilian of Robespierre (1758 - 1794), the bloody and dictatorial revolutioneer who secretly wanted to establish his own dynasty, in place of the Capetians by marrying Marie-Thérèse of France (1778 - 1851) , the daughter of Louis XVI (1754 - 1793) and prisoner of the Temple jail in Paris.
Usually, they all dream of an idealized Monarchy, like in the fairy tales of their childhood, even they are from the "Front de Gauche" (Left Front). Sometimes, they have an almost "guilty" glance on the magazine "Point de vue - Images du monde", or they are watching "secrets of History" from Stéphane Bern (born in 1963) on TV, in the discretion of their home.



It is Louis VI the Big who introduced for the first time a permanent appeal to the King, fountain of Justice, for everybody in France, including the most humble serves. And at that time, appeal was free, and nobody was thinking about restraining it, at the difference of nowadays.

The mark of Kiev-upon-Seine (Paris) was love, as Anna of Kiev was a passionate woman and Queen. And she passed this attribute to her beloved grandson, Louis VI. Strangely, when she taught him about Ukrainian history, her who was also a far descendant of Philip II of Macedonia (382 - 336 BC), father of Alexander the Great (356 - 323 BC), she explained that love can overcome everything in life.

And for the demonstration, she took the example of Queen Thalestris who reigned not only over Ukraine, but also the South of Russia, and the North of Turkey along the Black Sea. For love sake towards her great chamberlain ...and hidden father, Magog the Goth, but also regarding Alexander the Great and their son kept secret, this Queen admitted finally men to be equal to women in 322 BC !


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