This woman is a favorite character in Russian story. Many old romances hung about her and many ballads were tuned to her praise. She is represented as having been a very beautiful peasant girl, whom Igor met while traveling through the country in disguise, and who managed to win her without disclosing his true rank. It was during her reign that Russia became Christian, she being the first sovereign to renounce paganism.
She publicly embraced Christianity at Constantinople, being baptized into the Greek-Catholic church. The country at that time, however, would not accept Christianity and Queen Olga's efforts were unavailing. The people clung tenaciously to their old idols, and the stone gods of the ancient Scythians were still worshipped. The chief of the Russian deities was called Perune and about this divinity hung all sorts of grotesque superstitions to which the people were wedded.
Queen Olga's heir and son, Sviatoslav, to his mother's grief and disgust, remained a true pagan. He was a chivalrous and valiant prince, however, and the idol of his army. He was emphatically a soldier monarch, succeeding to the crown in the year 957. He was ever at the front with his forces, whose dangers and privations he shared, living in all respects like the humblest soldier in the ranks. He won fame as a sovereign in war and conquest, and, under his administration, Russia grew in territory and power. At his death, however, which occurred in the year 972, there was a war over the succession.
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From General Nelson A. Miles
Thrilling Stories of The Russian-Japanese War, 1904
