of the Pechenegian
princes embraced the gospel of salvation together with his subjects, and
rejoiced to be admitted to holy baptism.

The pious Prince wished to see in his own capital a magnificent temple
in honor of the birth of the most holy Virgin, to be a likeness and
memorial of that at Cherson, in which he himself had been baptized; and
the year after his conversion he sent to Greece for builders, and laid
the foundation of the first stone cathedral in Russia, on the very same
spot where the Varangian martyrs had suffered. But the first
metropolitan was not to live to its completion; only his holy remains
were buried in it, and were thence translated afterward to the Pechersky
Lavra. Another metropolitan, Leontius, a Greek by birth, sent by the
same patriarch Nicholas, consecrated the new temple, to the great
satisfaction of Vladimir, who made a vow to endow it with the tenth part
of all his revenues; and from hence it was called "the Cathedral of the
Tithes."

These tithes, according to the ordinance ascribed to Prince Vladimir,
consisted of the fixed quota of corn, cattle, and the profits of trade,
for the support of the clergy and the poor; and besides this there was a
further tithe collected from every cause which was tried; for the right
of judging causes was granted to the bishops and the metropolitan, and
they judged according to the Nomocanon. The canons of the holy councils
and the Greek ecclesiastical laws, together with the Holy Scriptures,
were taken, from the very first, as the basis of all ecclesiastical
administration in Russia; and together with them there came into use
some portions also of the civil law of the Greeks, through the influence
of the Church. The care of the new temple and the collection of tithes
for its support were intrusted to a native of Cherson named Anastasius,
who enjoyed the confidence of Vladimir and his successors.

The light of Christianity had now been diffused throughout the whole of
Russia; but still the faith was nowhere as yet firmly established,
because there were no bishops regularly settled in the towns. The
metropolitan Leontius formed the first five dioceses, and appointed
Joachim of Cherson to be Bishop of Novgorod, Theodorus of Rostoff,
Neophytus of Chernigoff, Stephen the Volhynian of Vladimir, and Nicetas
of Belgorod. Assisted by Dobrina, the uncle of the "Great Prince," who
had long governed in Novgorod, the new bishop Joachim threw the statue
of Peroun