THE SLAV PEOPLES NIEDEELE. 601 



making of new nationalities of whose existence, and with full right, 

 others will not even hear. It is in consequence of these conditions 

 that the number of separate Slav groups, and hence the entire Slav 

 classification, varies so much with different authors. 



The best authenticated division of the Slavs to-day is about as 

 follows : 



1. The Russian stem; recently a strong tendency is manifested 

 toward the recognition within this stem of two nationalities, the 

 Great-Russians and the Small-Russians. 



2. The Polish stem ; united, with the exception of the small group 

 of the Kasub Slavs, about whom it is as yet uncertain whether they 

 form a part of the Poles or a remnant of the former Baltic Slavs. 



3. The Luzice- Serbian stem; dividing into an upper and a lower 

 branch. 



4. The Bohemian or Cech and Slovak stem; inseparable in Bohe- 

 mia and in Moravia, but with a tendency toward individualization 

 among the Hungarian Slovaks. 



5. The Slovenian stem. 



6. The Srbo-Chorvat (Serbian-Croatian) stem, in which political 

 and cultural, but especially religious, conditions have produced a 

 separation into two nationalities, the Servian and the Croatian; and 



7. The Bulgarian stem, united. Onty in Macedonia is it still 

 undecided whether to consider the indigenous Slavs as Bulgarians or 

 Servians, or perhaps as an independent branch. 



The following pages contain brief data concerning the above 

 divisions : 



THE RUSI, OR RUSSIANS. 



The beginnings of the Russian nation are hidden in antiquity. 

 There are names of tribes in the works of the old historians, some of 

 which evidently belong to the old Russians, but as yet it is not 

 known positively which can be safely so regarded. 



In the fourth century A. D. there appear some hazy notices of the 

 great tribe of Anti. Under this name, it is now known, were com- 

 prised the southern Russians of the territory between the lower 

 Donau and the Don ; but later this tribal name disappears. 



Some misty mention concerning the Russians exist also in the 

 Arabic notes dating from the tenth century. But it is first from the 

 work of Constantine Porfirogennetes, and especially from the 

 famous first Kiev record, preserved from the beginning of the twelfth 

 century, that we learn that toward the end of the first millenium of 

 our era there lived in what is to-day European Russia, a whole series 

 of Slav tribes existing as more or less independent units. The 

 Kiev record mentions 12 such tribes and at the same time gives 

 for the first time to all these people the collective name of Rusi. 



