The Uses of Rupture in Medieval Northern Eurasian History

Will Russia’s invasion of Ukraine change bring about a rupture in how we write about and teach the history of medieval Northern Eurasia? Dominant accounts of the region’s medieval history invoke ruptures, such as the Mongol invasion, in the service of state-centred narratives. Such narratives obscure the diversity of the region’s past and its present. This essay explores the uses of rupture in the historiography of medieval Northern Eurasia. It shows how modern readings of chronicles produced within the monasteries of medieval northern Eurasia have used the device of rupture in the service of a variety of different imperial, national, liberal and conservative historical narratives. This tendency has been remarkably resilient, across modern ruptures such as 1917 and 1991. The essay also addresses the problematic legacy of “Eurasianist” ideas, while pointing to a counter-tradition of Northern Eurasian historiography, which could provide rich resources for a less ethnocentric and statist approach to the region today. The essay concludes by considering the opportunities for such an approach, in the light of current academic disciplinary boundaries, and media- and policy-facing commentary on the region.