The book by the famous archaeologist L.S. Klein outlines the three-century history of the dispute about the ethnicity of the Varangians and their role in the history of Ancient Rus': were they Normans or not. The positions of two main currents in Russian historiography—Normanists and anti-Normanists—are formulated and the arguments of both are systematized. Three public discussions that became milestones in this history (at intervals of approximately a hundred years) are described in detail - Lomonosov with Miller, Kostomarov with Pogodin, Shaskolsky with Klein. All these discussions took place in St. Petersburg-Leningrad. L.S. Klein, whose opponents call him the leading Russian Normanist, founded the Slavic-Varangian Seminar at Leningrad University almost half a century ago. Many major domestic researchers grew up in this informal scientific community. The author's text, which includes both the book itself and a recording of L.S. Klein's speech in the 1965 discussion and several later articles outlining and arguing his position in the dispute, is supplemented by a joint article by the author and his students - a review of archaeological material on the problem of the discussion. The appendix contains the memories of the seminar participants about his pedagogical principles, as well as the memories of his former Moscow friends and rivals and a bibliography of the seminar participants on Varangian topics. Written in living language, the book is addressed not only to specialists: historians and archaeologists, but to a wide audience of readers interested in Russian history.