The third son of Yaroslav the Wise and Swedish Princess Ingigerda (Iryna); got from his father Kyiv, Turov, and Drevliany lands, as well as Novgorod. The progenitor of the princely dynasty that possessed the Turov Principality. In 1042 he married
In the summer of 1068 the Polovtsians crushed the brothers’ army in the battle at the River Alta in Pereyaslav land. In the autumn of 1068, when Iziaslav Yaroslavych returned to Kyiv, Kyivites rose against him and he with his brothers were banished from Kyiv. Iziaslav turned for assistance to Poland, bringing “great wealth” with him. However, Polish King Bolesław II theBold did not help him and in 1075 concluded a political alliance with his rivals – Sviatoslav and Vsevolod. Then Iziaslav appealed for aid to the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire Henry IV and came to him to the town of Mainz, however he did not get support there as well. Having lost Kyiv for the second time, he established relations with the enemy of Henry IV, Pope Gregory VII (1073–1085) through the Markgraf of the Ostmark (Niederlausits)Dedo II. In Rome, the Pope crowned him with the royal crown and granted him the Rus Kingdom as a feoff of the Holy See (the Pope’s bull of April 17, 1075, according to which the power in Kyiv should belong to Iziaslav and his son Yaropolk).
In the summer of 1077 Iziaslav got Kyiv back with the succour of Polish troops, but on October 3, 1078 was killed in the battle at Nezhatyna Nyva near Chernihiv (now the town of Nizhyn), where the united troops of the Yaroslavychi (Iziaslav and Vsevolod) crushed their rebellious nephews: Prince Oleh Sviatoslavych of Tmutorokan and Prince Borys Vyacheslavych of Chernihiv. The battle at Nezhatyna Nyva and the death of Iziaslav and Borys are mentioned in The Lay of Ihor’s Host. Under Iziaslav Yaroslavych, The Yaroslavychi Truthwas adopted (1072), the first codification of Rus law, which came to our time in the “brief” version of The RusTruth (Justice).
Portrait (imaginary) of
