>>Isn't it true that the actual word "Russia" comes from a viking word (for "red"?), as the vikings sailed right into what is now Russia and settled?
>
>I wouldn't know. The only remaining word in Serbian is "rus" - meaning "blonde" (adj), but it's quite archaic, remained in a single folk song that I know of. But then "belorus" would mean "white blonde", and "malorus" - "little blonde" or "weakly blonde". Don't know whether this has any substance to it, just my conjecture.

These may be of interest, although not derived from a word for "red" (that's what you get for quickly scanning magazine articles whilst waiting to see the dentist) :-)

http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/varangians.shtml
http://www.angelfire.com/empire/egfroth/rus.html