Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jul 22, 2026

Kuyaba

Kuyaba was one of the three centers of the Rus or Saqaliba described in a lost book by Abu Zayd al-Balkhi and mentioned in works by some of his followers . The two other centers were Slawiya and Arthaniya.

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50°27′N 30°31′E / 50.450°N 30.517°E / 50.450; 30.517 Kuyaba (Arabic: كويابة Kūyāba1) was one of the three centers of the Rus12 or Saqaliba (early East Slavs) described in a lost book by Abu Zayd al-Balkhi (dating from ca. 920) and mentioned in works by some of his followers (Ibn Hawqal, Al-Istakhri, Hudud ul-'alam). The two other centers were Slawiya (Arabic: صلاوية Ṣ(a)lāwiya)12 (tentatively identified with the land of Ilmen Slavs, see Rus' Khaganate) and Arthaniya (Arabic: ارثانية ’Arṯāniya) (not properly explained).12

Soviet historians such as Boris Grekov and Boris Rybakov hypothesized that "Kuyaba" was a mispronunciation of "Kiev". They theorized that Kuyaba had been a union of Slavic tribes in the middle course of the Dnieper River centered on Kiev (now in Ukraine).3

See also

See also

References

References

  1. M. Th. Houtsma, ed. (1993). E. J. Brill's first encyclopaedia of Islam: 1913-1936. Leiden: Brill. p. 1182. ISBN 90-04-09792-9.
  2. Duczko, Wladyslaw (2004). Viking Rus: studies on the presence of Scandinavians in Eastern Europe. Leiden: Brill. p. 123. ISBN 90-04-13874-9.
  3. Magocsi, Paul Robert (2010). A History of Ukraine: The Land and Its Peoples. University of Toronto Press. p. 57. ISBN 978-1-4426-1021-7.