Prince Alexander Nevsky. Becoming a commander and a diplomat

Abstract

The years of adolescence, youth and early youth of Prince  Alexander Nevsky are practically unknown or known only to a narrow circle  of historians. This topic is of considerable interest and has become the subject  of discussion at the regular XXIXth International Educational Christmas  Readings: “Alexander Nevsky: West and East, the historical memory of the  people.”  

Prince Alexander was a representative of the second generation of the  “Big Nest” baby birds – of Yuri Vsevolodovich, the Grand Duke of Vladimir[1] Suzdal. In his adolescence, Prince Alexander went through a difficult school  of government in Veliky Novgorod. Together with his elder brother Theodor,  he went through a difficult time of hunger, pestilence, disease and helped the  Novgorodians cope with the consequences of these hardships. After the untimely  death of Prince Theodore in June 1233, the young 15-year-old Prince began  to rule alone in Novgorod the Great, pursuing the policy of the Grand-Ducal  Vladimir-Suzdal dynasty in the North-West of the Russian land. In 1234, at the  age of 16, Prince Alexander received his first baptism of fire. During the Mongol[1] Tatar campaign to Europe in 1237 – 1242 and the crusading encroachment on  the lands of Pskov and Novgorod, he pursued the political course adopted by his  father Yaroslav Vsevolodovich, the Grand Duke.