The Lendians (Polish: Lędzianie) were a Lechitic eastern Wends tribe recorded to have inhabited the ill-defined area in East Lesser Poland and Cherven Towns between the 7th and 11th centuries.
Since they were documented primarily by foreign authors whose knowledge of Eastern European geography was often vague, numerous speculations have accrued to their name, which include Lendzanenoi, Lendzaninoi, Lz’njn, Lachy, Landzaneh and Lendizi.
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| Sources mentioning Lendians: Bavarian Geographer (843) – Lendizi – (33) on the map, |
In Latin historiography the Bavarian Geographer (generally dated to the mid-9th century) attests that Lendizi habent civitates XCVIII, that is, that the "Lendizi" had 98 gords, or settlements.
The Lendians are mentioned, among others, by De administrando imperio (ca. 959, as Λενζανηνοί), by Josippon (ca. 953, as Lz’njn), by the Primary Chronicle (ca. 981, as ляхи), by Ali al-Masudi (ca. 940, as Landzaneh).
Max Vasmer reconstructs the original ethnonym as lęděninŭ, deriving it from the Slavic word for "fallow, wasteland", which is cognate to English "land".[1] In this context, lęděninŭ means "a settler of barren lands", referring to the lands vacated by some earlier population, either the Vandals or the Goths.
That the Lendians occupied a considerable territory is evident from the fact their name gave rise to the name for the Poles in a number of languages. From later forms Lęchy:
Directly from Lędzianie, Lendzianie, Lędzice
The Lendians also left their mark in Polish names such as Lachy Sądeckie which was an endonym used by Poles in south-eastern Poland. The north-eastern region of Podlaskie (Podlasie) signifies "near the Poles", with the Lithuanian name for the region Palenkė having the same meaning.
In the early 11th century, Scandinavians referred to the Polish tribe of Polans in the region of Gniezno as Laesar.[3] In High-Icelandic, Poland is known as Læsialand.
In the 11th century chronicles by Nestor, the term Lachy was used to refer to all Western Slavs who were not Czechs or Slovaks. Nestor stated that the Lachy had divided into many tribes, including the Polans, Pomeranians (Slavic tribe), Mazovians, and Lusatians.
The terms Lechites, Lechia and Lechitic languages stem from the latter form. That form was also used in many Middle Eastern languages.
Constantine VII reports that the Lendians were tributaries to the Rus and that their monoxylae sailed downstream to Kiev to take part in the naval expeditions against Byzantium. This may be taken as an indication that the Lendians had access to some waterways leading to the Dnieper, e.g., the Styr River.[4]
Based on Constantine's report, it appears likely that the Lendians occupied the historical region of Chervona Rus, centred around Przemyśl.[5] This conclusion is at variance with the Primary Chronicle which implies that the region was settled by the White Croats. In order to remove the perceived discrepancy, some Polish historians proposed alternative readings of the text in question, which would move the location of the White Croats considerably to the east, for instance, to the Vorskla River basin.[6]
The uncertainty of extant 10th-century descriptions of the upper Dniester and Bug River region makes it plausible to infer that the White Croats, Lendians and probably some other peoples shared this vast territory along the border of modern-day Ukraine and Poland.[4] Attempts to positively identify the Lendians with the Buzhans[5] or Dulebes[7] lose in probability in light of these considerations.[4]
In pre-Slavic times the region was populated by the Lugii and Anarti, associated with the Przeworsk and Puchov cultures. They were followed by East Germanic tribes, the Goths and Vandals. After these vacated the territory, the West Slavs (Lendians and Vistulans) moved in.
Around 833 the land of the Lendians was incorporated into the Great Moravian state. Upon the invasion of the Hungarian tribes into the heart of Central Europe around 899, the Lendians submitted to their authority (Masudi). In the first half of the 10th century, they paid tribute to Igor I of Kiev (Constantine VII).
From the mid-950s onward, the Lendians were politically anchored in the Bohemian sphere of influence. Cosmas of Prague relates that the land of Krakow was controlled by the Přemyslids of Bohemia until 999.[8] His report is buttressed by the foundation charter of the Archdiocese of Prague (1086), which traces the eastern border of the archdiocese, as established in 973, along the Bug and Styr (or Stryi rivers.[9]
Abraham ben Jacob, who travelled in Eastern Europe in 965, remarks that Boleslaus II of Bohemia ruled the country "stretching from the city of Prague to the city of Krakow".[10] At one point in the 970s, the region seems to have been taken over by Mieszko I of Poland. This may be inferred from the Primary Chronicle which reports that Vladimir I of Kiev conquered the "Cherven towns" from the Poles in 981 (actually, in 979).[11]
The region returned to Polish sphere of influence in 1018, when King Boleslaw I took the Cherven towns on his way to Kiev. Yaroslav I of Kiev recovered the borderland in 1031; it remained part of Kievan Rus and its successor state of Halych-Volhynia until 1340 when it was once again taken over by Kingdom of Poland under Casimir III of Poland. It is presumed that the Lendians were assimilated by East Slavs by that period. The most important factors contributing to their fate could be: