When reading about the Rus and their Scandinavian origin, there is something which stand out to me and I am a little confused by it. You have all these princes with Slavic names, like Oleg, Igor, Vladimir, etc. but all those names are also attested in Germanic styles like Helgi, Ingvar and Valdemar. So I am a little confused as to which names they would have used themselves.
I know that Sviatoslav was the the first of these to have a Slavic name according to the Primary chronicle but his mother Olga was described as having a Scandinavian origin and her name is also attested as Helga. But she also converted to Christianity while her son remained Pagan.
So I guess my first question is, did the Rurikids use Norse names or Slavic names, and if so when did it switch?
I have the same question regarding their religion, because I'd assume that the early Rus would have been worshiping the Germanic gods, by Sviatoslav's time they were invoking Perun and Veles, who were Slavic gods. But it could also have been basically believing in Thor with a Slavic name, because those two are basically the same gods but in different faith sysems. Vladimir the great also canonized the faith in a way, basically by affirming that these gods are which we believe in, and build a temple to a variety of Slavic, Iranic, Finnish and Germanic gods before later forcibly converting everyone to Christianity.
Cheers :)
One thing we need to underline here is that Rurik did not conquer the Rus (or rather, Novgorod) - he was invited by the veche (council of nobles) ruling the city, as attested in Nestor's Chronicle. In fact, Novgorodian system actually promoted inviting foreign princes - mostly to assure they won't have any political base of their own and as such would not upset the existing political configuration.
As such, Rurik did not come to Novgorod with an army or any greater number of warriors that could be used to enforce his faith or customs. And, taking into account Varangian lands were separated from Rus by a vast stretch of Finnish peoples and the Baltic, natural cultural or religious diffusion would not have taken place.
A similar situation happened in Bulgaria, though in that case we had a case of a forceful invasion - in both cases, however, the new ruling class was too small and weak to impose their beliefs or culture on the local Slavic population.