On July 11, the Orthodox Church honors St. Equal-to-the-Apostles Princess Olga.
Olga was a Kievan princess, wife of Prince Igor I and mother of Prince Svetoslav I, as whose governess she ruled between 945 and 969. After her baptism, she took the Christian name Elena.
In the 19th century, Russian historians proposed a theory that Olga of Kiev was the granddaughter of the Bulgarian prince Boris I. The goal was to verify the aspiration of Tsarist Russia to become a pan-Slavic empire. However, it is much more likely, as her name suggests, that Olga is of Scandinavian origin. This is the Slavic variant of Swedish Helga or Finnish Oili.
Also, if she was a granddaughter of Boris I, she would have been a Christian, which would make it pointless to change her name to Elena after her baptism.
According to the legend, after the murder of her husband by the Slavic Drevlyani tribe, Olga took over the rule of Kievan Rus. She took cruel revenge on the murderers, burning their cities, and many of the Drevlians were sacrificed to the pagan gods.
In 957, Olga went to Constantinople, in search of an alliance against the Khazars, who were attacking Kievan Rus from the east. There she accepted Christianity and the name Elena, as was the name of the wife of Constantine VII Bagryanorodni. The ceremony is described in detail by the Byzantine emperor himself in “On the Rites or Ceremonies in the Byzantine Court”. Olga was personally baptized by the Patriarch of Constantinople Polyeuctus.
It is believed that after her return to Kievan Rus, the princess laid the first stone of the cathedral church “Sofia” in Kyiv in 960
In 965, with the help of Byzantine diplomacy, her son Prince Svetoslav I managed to defeat the Khazars and capture their most important fortresses and the capital Itil.
St. Olga was the first Christian ruler of Kievan Rus. The country was finally baptized in 988 by her grandson Vladimir I the Great.
Today Olga, Olya and Oleg are celebrating their name day. The names originate from the Old Norse “Hailaga”, which meant “dedicated to the gods” and later changed to “Helgi”, meaning “blessed”.