During the first decades of the thirteenth century, while the princes of Volynia, Chernigov, and Smolensk were disputing the throne of Kiev and the descendants of Vsevolod were concentrating their attention on their principality of Vladimir-Suzdal', developments were occurring far to the east that would have significant consequences for the Riurikid princes and their peoples. A young Mongol chieftain named Temuchin was subordinating and uniting the Turkic and Mongolian tribes of Mongolia. In i206 a quriltai or assembly of military and princely dignitaries from those tribes acclaimed Temuchin their great khan and began to organize what would become the Mongol Empire. By the time Chingis Khan, as Temuchin is known to posterity, died in 1227, he had launched an invasion of northern China (which began in i2ii and would continue to 1234) and extended his empire westward to incorporate the domain of the Khwarezm-shah in Central Asia; reconnaissance units of his armies had also explored the Caucasus Mountains and ventured into the steppe north of the Caspian Sea and south of the Rus' lands.
When Chingis Khan died, the lands ofhis empire were distributed among his heirs, the four sons of his first wife. In accordance with Mongol custom Chingis’ own ulus, the Mongol “heartland,” was left to the youngest son Tolui. The third son, Ogedei, became the great khan. The second son, Chagatai, received Central Asia. And the westernmost lands beyond Chagatai’s ulus and the Aral Sea were assigned to the eldest son, Juchi (Jochi). Because Juchi had died shortly before Chingis Khan, his sons inherited their father’s share or ulus.
The elder son, Orda, received the eastern territories of his father’s ulus, consisting of western Siberia, Kazakhstan, and the area around the lower Syr Darya River. An as yet unconquered portion, located further west, was accorded to a second son, Batu.
Batu’s ulus, to which the lands of Rus' were to be subordinated, has been referred to by many names. All of Juchi’s ulus, the western sector of the Mongol empire, was designated the White Horde. This term has also been used for Batu’s ulus. When referring to Batu’s and Orda’s portions separately, the terms White Horde and Blue Horde have both been used. There is some confusion regarding which term should properly be applied to which half of the ulus, but most scholars consider the White Horde to refer to the western half or Batu’s ulus. His realm, however, has also been referred to by a variety of other names: Desht-i-Kipchak, the Kipchak Khanate, and, most commonly although least accurately, the Golden Horde.
After the conquest of northern China was completed, Khan Ogedei and a quriltai (1235) decided to conquer those western lands that had been assigned to Juchi, but had never actually been possessed by the Mongols. The ensuing military campaigns, which were led by Batu and the general Subodei, resulted in the Mongol defeat of the Rus' lands.
The Mongol invasion of the rus' lands
The Mongol invasion of the Rus' lands was massive; it was devastating; and it had a lasting impact on the Russian lands. The appearance ofthe Mongols should not, however, have come as a complete surprise to the Rus'. Although the Mongols had disappeared after their victory over the combined armies of Kiev, Chernigov, Galicia, and the Polovtsy at the Battle of Kalka in 1223, they resurfaced in 1229 to attack Saksin, Bulgar-on-the-Volga, and the Polovtsy, and in 1232 to invade Bulgar again. All their targets were neighbors of the Rus'. Bulgar had, as noted above, maintained close relations with Suzdalia; the two states had also been involved in disputes over control of trade routes as well as dominance over the Mordva. Thus, when the Bulgars constructed new fortifications and also eagerly concluded a peace treaty with Suzdalia in the wake ofthe i229 attack, their actions if not their discussions certainly alerted Prince lurii of Vladimir to the Mongol menace. Nevertheless, even after 1236, when the Mongol armies launched an offensive that destroyed the main cities of
Bulgar, brought that state as well as its subordinate populations on the mid-Volga into their domain, and stimulated a migration of refugees into the Rus' lands, the Riurikid princes failed to take any extraordinary defensive measures even within Vladimir-Suzdal', much less coordinate a defense for all the Rus' lands.
The Riurikid princes had, of course, dealt with recurrent aggression from steppe populations before. But nothing in their experience with either the Pechenegs or the Polovtsy had prepared them for their encounter with the Mongols. No attack from the steppe had even approached the scale of the Mongol invasion of 1237-40. Unlike previous incursions from the Pechenegs and Polovtsy, the Mongols carried their devastating campaigns well beyond the southern frontier of the Rus' lands to the northern principalities. And, having defeated the Rus' in battle, the Mongols established political suzerainty over the Riurikid princes, drawing them and their lands into the Mongol Empire. As David Morgan put it, “the problem for the Russians was. . . that. . . the Mongols did not go away.”1
In the winter of 1237, the Mongols launched a campaign against northeastern Rus'. Approaching from the south, they demanded that the prince of Riazan' subject himself and pay tribute to them. He responded by calling upon lurii of Vladimir for assistance. But while waiting for that aid Riazan' felt the full impact of the Mongol onslaught. Batu’s army besieged the city, bombarded its walls, and, within one week in December 1237, captured Riazan'. The “Tale of the Destruction of Riazan' by Batu,” recorded in several successive versions long after the events described, reminded its audiences that the Mongols “burned this holy city with all its beauty and wealth. . . And churches of God were destroyed and much blood was spilled on the holy altars. And not one man remained alive in the city. All were dead. . . And there was not even anyone to mourn the dead.”31 32 So swift in fact was the Mongol victory that the city had fallen before Iurii’s reinforcements were able to enter Riazan' territory. The Mongols, however, advancing northward, met the Suzdalian relief force and defeated it near the town of Kolomna, located at the confluence of Moscow and Oka Rivers.
Continuing their sweep northward, the invaders destroyed the fortified outpost of Moscow in January 1238, and reached Vladimir in early February. Prince Iurii, leaving a small force to protect the city, where his wife and two of his sons remained, had departed for the far side of the Volga River, where he was collecting an army. The Mongol forces laid siege to the heavily fortified capital of Suzdalia. Part of the army meanwhile proceeded to the city of Suzdal', which it quickly captured, plundered, and burned. Shortly after it rejoined the main force, the Mongols who had successfully bombarded Vladimir’s walls seized that city and sacked it. The combined forces of Iurii and his brothers were too slow even to attempt to save Vladimir. They were defeated in a battle on the Sit' River on March 4, 1238.
After taking Vladimir, the Mongol army fanned out. While one segment was approaching the Sit' River, two others advanced to the north and northwest, reconverged at Tver', and, almost simultaneously with the battle on the Sit', took Torzhok, the gateway from northeastern Rus' to Novgorod. The Mongols did not, however, follow up that victory with an assault on Novgorod. The army was still divided; it was already March, and the expectation that a spring thaw would turn the frozen earth into mud and impede the swift, easy movement of the Mongols’ horses before the entire army could regroup may well have convinced them to conclude their offensive. In any case the campaign season of 1237-38 was over.
Later in 1238 the Mongol armies focused their attention on the southern neighbors of the Rus' . They subdued the Polovtsy of the steppe and the Circassians and Ossetians of the North Caucasus. In 1239, they suppressed an uprising among the Mordva, neighbors of the Bulgars. In that year they also directed their forces against the southwestern Rus' principalities. Advancing northward from the steppe, they overwhelmed the Rus' defenses first at Pereiaslavl' , which fell in early March 1239, then at Chernigov, which they sacked on October 18, 1239. They directed their final campaign of that year against the Polovtsy in the Crimean peninsula, and in the following spring they focused once again on Derbent in the Caucasian theater.
It was not until the fall of 1240 that the Mongols turned toward Kiev. As noted in the previous chapter, In the years prior to the invasion Kiev had experienced political instability, marked by a rapid succession of princes. The appearance of the Mongols only intensified the crisis stemming from lack of leadership. After the Mongols had taken Chernigov, Prince Mikhail Vsevolodich (of Chernigov’s Ol'govich clan) fled to Hungary. Prince Rostislav Mstislavich (of Smolensk) quickly claimed his position in Kiev, but was expelled in turn by Prince Daniil of Volynia. Despite the persistent competition for the title, none of the contenders remained in Kiev. Thus, when the Mongols arrived in November 1240, there was no Riurikid prince personally present to lead the city’s defense.
The Mongol armies laid siege to Kiev. Their steady bombardment broke through the city’s two sets of fortifications; it took them, according to one chronicle account, written many years after the events, ten weeks to do so. So many residents in their panic sought safety in the Church ofthe Tithe that its upper floors gave way under their combined weight. Kiev surrendered on December 6, 1240.
After taking Kiev, the Mongols continued westward, forcing the submission of both Galicia and Volynia before pushing beyond the lands of Rus' into Poland and Hungary. The collapse of the Rus' principalities was stunning. It has been attributed to a variety of factors, including, predominantly, the division among the Riurikid princes. But it has also been argued that, even if all the Rus' princes had coordinated their efforts, they would have been unequal to the Mongol military might. Unfamiliar with the siege machines that the Mongols had adopted from their Muslim and Chinese subjects and unprepared for their rapid movement and military tactics, the Rus' princes were simply ill equipped to defend their lands against this foe.
The Mongols concluded their westward advance only in September 1242, when word reached Batu that the great khan Ogedei had died the previous December. A quriltai was to be held to select Ogedei’s successor, and Batu had to attend. Political affairs of the empire took precedence over further conquest. Other theories have been proposed to account for the curtailment of the Mongols’ westward drive. One suggests that because there were no more good pasturelands beyond Hungary, the nomadic Mongols lost their capability as well as interest in acquiring more territories. Others argue, dubiously, that the Russian defenses had so exhausted the Mongol forces that the latter were too weak to mount a sustained campaign in Europe. Yet another view holds that with their thrust into central Europe the Mongols had already overextended themselves; unable to control all the lands they had already conquered, they ended their campaign.
Whatever their motives, the undefeated Mongols withdrew from central Europe to establish themselves in the steppe north of the Black and Caspian Seas. On the lower Volga, Batu built his capital city of Sarai, and from there began to consolidate Mongol authority over the territories ofJuchi’s ulus. Those territories stretched across the steppe from the Danube River in the west to Khwarezm in the east; at their southern end they included the Crimean peninsula and the North Caucasus. North of the steppe were the lands ofRus'. Subordinated by the Golden Horde, they too became adjuncts of the vast Mongol Empire, which at its greatest extent spanned an area from eastern Europe and Persia to China and Korea.
The establishment of the golden horde
For the Mongols of the Golden Horde, however, the lands ofRus' were on the geographical periphery of their new domain. They and their sedentary populations were also secondary to the Mongols’ main concerns, which were to consolidate their position in the steppe, develop and maintain an influential role within the Mongol Empire, and establish relations with foreign powers. The lands ofRus' were significant insofar as they provided means with which the Mongols could pursue those aims.
After concluding its military campaigns, the Mongol Horde remained predominantly a nomadic society. The Horde’s social organization and institutions, founded on tribal and kinship structures, reflected and were permeated with the traditions drawn from their nomadic culture. Similarly, its economic strength derived from pastoral occupations, which were traditional among the ethnic Mongols, who made up the political and social elites of the Horde, as well as among the vast majority of its population, which consisted of other steppe populations, mainly Polovtsy or Kipchaks who were conquered and absorbed into the Horde.
The ruler of the Golden Horde was the khan, known as the tsar in Russian documentary sources. He was subordinate only to the great khan or kagan at Karakorum, but by the end of the thirteenth century the practical authority of the kagan over the Golden Horde had diminished. The khans ofthe Horde had to be direct descendants of Juchi and, as such, descendants of Chingis Khan. Thus, when Batu died c. 1255, his son Sartak was selected to be his heir. Sartak’s younger brother Ulagchi succeeded him in 1256. Subsequent khans of the Golden Horde were: Berke (1258—66), Mengu-Timur (Mongka-Temir; 1266/67-81), Tuda-Mengu (1282/83-87), Telebuga (128791), Tokhta (1291-1312), and Uzbek (1313-41).
The society of the Tatars, as the steppe subjects of the Mongols are known, was organized around clans, which were further subdivided into tribes and smaller kinship groupings. The leaders, emirs or beys, of four influential clans served, at least by the first half of the fourteenth century, as the main political advisers to the khan and participated in making policy decisions. Although it is not known precisely when the council of four beys was institutionalized, Charles Halperin has suggested that it replaced the quriltai or assembly made up of the Mongol aristocratic elite, i. e., the heads of clans, military commanders, and dynastic dignitaries, whose functions included the selection of the khan from among all the eligible candidates.33 Assigned grazing lands by the khan, the clan leaders wielded power over their own populations by distributing pasturages among their kin and subordinates. They were also military commanders, responsible for their clans’ contribution of mounted warriors to the khan’s military campaigns.
Even as they organized their nomadic society in the steppe, the Mongols incorporated sedentary agricultural populations into their realm; they also built and settled in cities. Batu himself, while living in tents and moving his headquarters seasonally up and down the Volga River, began the construction of Sarai, his capital city, on the lower Volga. A second city, also known as Sarai, New Sarai, or Sarai-Berke, was later built about seventy-seven miles up the river. Because of its name, its sponsor has been assumed to have been Khan Berke. Archeological and literary evidence, however, has provided the basis for an alternate conclusion, that Sarai-Berke referred to Batu’s Sarai, and that New Sarai was built in the 1330s by Khan Uzbek, who may have died there. Even before these cities began to flourish, older towns within their realm, such as Bulgar-on-the-Volga and Khwarezm in Central Asia, showed signs of recovery. Although the khans themselves continued to live according to their nomadic traditions at least part of each year and to foUow the grazing patterns of their herds, the cities became their administrative and commercial centers. In them there developed cosmopolitan urban populations that included free men and slaves, administrative officials, tradesmen, craftsmen, merchants, and clergy, as well as members of the Tatar elite, who adopted a permanently sedentary, urban manner of living.
One of the chief activities of the cities of the Golden Horde was commerce, which along with animal husbandry became one of the most important elements of the Horde’s economy. The entire Mongol Empire was bound together, at least until 1368, by its Great Silk Road, a caravan route that stretched from China to eastern Europe. The Golden Horde controlled the northwestern segment ofthe route that extended from Urgench in Central Asia through Sarai to Tana (Azov) at the mouth of the Don River, and to Sudak and Caffa on the Crimean coast of the Black Sea. As this commercial pathway became secure, merchant caravans transported silks, spices, gems, ceramics, and other Oriental finery to Sarai. There such goods as well as others obtained along the way were exchanged for slaves, for northern products including luxury fur received from Bulgar and the Russian lands, for locally obtained fish, caviar, salt, and hides, and for goods brought from Constantinople, Europe, and Egypt.
Central to this exchange were Italian merchants, who acquired trading privileges from both the Golden Horde khans and the Byzantine emperors. In 1261 Emperor Michael VIII Paleologus granted trading rights in Constantinople and the Black Sea to the Genoese, who were helping him recover Constantinople. Later in the decade, shortly after he became khan in i266, Mengu-Timur also extended special trading rights to the Genoese, who developed commercial colonies at Sudak and Caffa. The latter became, under the favorable policies of Khan Uzbek, their main market on the northern Black Sea coast. The Genoese, closely followed by their rivals, the Venetians, who centered their trade at Tana, thus provided the key link between the Mongol silk route and Sarai on one end and the Mediterranean world and Constantinople on the other.
In addition to establishing themselves firmly in the steppe, organizing their expanded society and distributing grazing areas among their component clans, building their cities, and developing their commerce, the khans ofthe Golden Horde maintained close ties with the rest of the Mongol Empire, especially with the kagans in Karakorum.
Through the thirteenth century the great khans at Karakorum closely observed and supervised the affairs of the Golden Horde and its tributaries, and probably received a significant portion of the tribute collected from them.
The Golden Horde khans were, similarly, intimately involved in Karakorum court affairs. Just as Ogedei’s death had precipitated the end of Batu’s campaigns and prompted his return to participate in the quriltai, so Batu’s successors continued to be concerned with issues at the Mongol court. After the great khan Mongke died in 1259, for example, a power struggle, lasting five years, developed in Karakorum between Kubilai and his rival Arik-Buka. Berke, who had become khan of the Golden Horde in 1258 and who supported Arik-Buka, was involved in the intrigues and affected by their outcome.
An imperial decision to expand the empire into the Near East also affected the Golden Horde. The result of that decision was the creation of another branch of the empire, known as the Ilkhan Empire, in the territories of Persia and Iraq. The Golden Horde supported the project, which began with a campaign into Persia in 1253. Golden Horde military forces took part in the capture of Baghdad in 1258.
Prior to the conquest of Persia, however, the Golden Horde khans had exercised influence over the Caucasus and Azerbaijan, even though they were not formally part of Juchi’s ulus. When those regions, deemed valuable both for their pastures and for their caravan routes through mountain passes, then became part of the Ilkhan domain, a rivalry developed between the two neighboring sections of the empire. This relationship mirrored the conflict in Karakorum between Kubilai and his rival Arik-Buka since Hulagu, the Mongol khan in Persia, supported Kubilai whereas Berke was loyal to Arik-Buka.
The rivalry was exacerbated by other factors. Berke, who had personally adopted Islam, was disturbed by the fact that during Hulagu’s conquest of Baghdad, the caliph or leader of the Sunni Muslim world had been killed. The establishment of the Ilkhanid branch of the empire, furthermore, created commercial and financial problems for the Golden Horde. The Ilkhans established control over a branch of the silk route that proceeded from Central Asia westward through Persia to the south of the Caspian Sea; it constituted an alternative to the route dominated by the Golden Horde. Transit and customs fees as well as commercial profits derived from trade that had been concentrated in Golden Horde towns were diverted to the
Ilkhans. As he consolidated his position, Hulagu also withheld from the Golden Horde its share of tributary income collected from the newly conquered populations. As a result of all these factors, the two branches of the Mongol Empire were at war with one another by 1262.
Its political and commercial rivalry with the Ilkhans was one motivation for the Golden Horde khans, notably Berke and his successor Mengu-Timur, to make diplomatic overtures to the Mamelukes of Egypt and to the newly restored Byzantine emperor, Michael VIII Paleologus. The Golden Horde had entered into close relations with the Mamelukes by the early 1260s. One common interest was their mutual desire to curb the expansion of the Mongols in Persia. In contrast, Emperor Michael VIII was initially favorably inclined toward the Ilkhans and unfriendly toward the Golden Horde. While Emperor Michael interfered with the passage of some embassies between Egypt and Sarai, Berke and his successor Mengu-Timur ordered raids on Byzantine frontiers. But the Italians, concerned about their commerce, pressured the emperor to alter his policy toward the Golden Horde. The more cordial, cooperative relations they developed were symbolized and cemented by marriages. In 1273, Nogai, a powerful Mongol military commander who controlled the western portion of the Golden Horde’s territories, married an illegitimate daughter of Emperor Michael. Tokhta would similarly marry an illegitimate daughter of Emperor Andronicus II.
The Golden Horde’s diplomatic contacts were extensive. The khans maintained relations with rulers in Europe as well as throughout the Middle East and the rest ofthe Mongol Empire. Sarai became an intercontinental diplomatic center as envoys and ambassadors representing princes and popes sought audiences with the khans. The Golden Horde also sent its own diplomatic dignitaries, often leading caravans bearing precious gifts of silver and gold, horses and camels, falcons and fur, to foreign capitals.
By the reign of Uzbek (1313-41) the Golden Horde had become a strong, wealthy state, dominating the Kipchak steppe and drawing upon the resources of its northern tributaries. Its growing society, while still clinging to traditional nomadic occupations, adopted Islam under Uzbek’s guidance, and absorbed sedentary agrarian cultures and urban activities. Sarai by this time was a cosmopolitan metropolis, enriched by religious ties to the world of Islam, by political and dynastic interests in the remainder of the Mongol Empire, and by diplomatic and commercial intercourse with the Byzantine Empire, Egypt, the Middle East, the Caucasus, Central Asia, the Italian Black Sea colonies, Europe, and the lands of Rus' as well.
Rus' relations with the golden horde Invasion and destruction
In the century following the Mongol military onslaught of 1237— 40, the Rus' also became a part of this political, diplomatic, and commercial world. But in the immediate wake of the attacks, the lands of Rus' were left defeated, their central cities destroyed, their dynasty depleted. It is difficult to assess the degree of destruction the Mongol invasion inflicted on the Russian principalities. Certainly the physical damage to some cities, such as Riazan', Vladimir, and Kiev, was extreme. Despite the assertion in the fourteenth-century “Tale of the Destruction of Riazan' by Batu” that its prince Ingvar' Ingvarevich “renewed the land of Riazan' and built churches and monasteries,” David Miller, who has examined construction records in the postinvasion period, has described Riazan' in the years following the invasion as a “ghost town.”34 The Mongol victory at Vladimir too was accompanied by severe destruction. The Mongol armies broke through the defensive walls, then sacked and burned the city. Among the buildings set afire was the great Cathedral of the Assumption, to which the terrified population, including lurii’s princess and sons, had fled for refuge.
Kiev suffered a similar fate. A Franciscan monk and papal emissary to the great khan in Mongolia, Friar Giovanni de Pian de Carpine (Carpini), left a travel account describing the city five years after its surrender. Although some doubt has been cast on its value as an “eyewitness” statement, Carpine’s account asserts that Kiev had been reduced from a great and populous city to “almost nothing,” that scarcely two hundred houses remained, and that the surviving population was held in “abject slavery.”35 The city’s population, it will be recalled, numbered between 36,000 and 50,000 people. According to one estimate, they had dwelled in 8,ooo homes, and only 2,ooo people survived.6 Although the figures are imprecise, they do offer a sense of the scale of the devastation inflicted on the central cities by the invading Mongol forces.
While there can be no question that these and other towns, e. g., Torzhok in the northwest, Pereiaslavl' and Chernigov in the south, and Galich and Vladimir (in Volynia) in the southwest, which had also been direct targets of the invading armies, were devastated, others fared better. This point was emphasized by both the Soviet historian A. N. Nasonov and the British historian John Fennell, who identified Novgorod, Rostov, Iaroslavl', and Tver' as some of the major centers that escaped undamaged. Fennell, furthermore, while recognizing that damage was inflicted on some cities, expressed doubt that even places like Kiev and Vladimir were harmed as badly as some sources suggest. He argued that the damage was not so great that they were unable to recover relatively rapidly. Other scholars have observed, additionally, that, although the Riurikid princes abandoned Kiev as their political capital, the city remained the ecclesiastical center of the lands of Rus'. Metropolitan Kirill (Cyril; 1242—81), although known to have traveled extensively to the various sectors of his see, was also frequently found at Kiev, and his remains were returned there after his death. It was not until 1299, long after the Mongol invasion, that Metropolitan Maksim (Maximus; 1282-1305) vacated Kiev in favor of Vladimir. The Soviet ethnologist, L. N. Gumilev, noting that in the Vladimir principality Batu’s armies burned only fourteen wooden towns out of a total of around 300, offered concurring evidence that the scale of destruction may not have been as great as is often proposed.7
Although cities were the Mongols’ military objectives, the countryside was not immune to their onslaught. Villages and fields surrounding principal towns were also ravaged. The Soviet historian V. V. Kargalov noted that, as a result of the initial campaigns as well
“Second-Redaction Additions in Carpini’s Ystoria Mongalorum,” HUS, vol. 14 (1990), p. 522.
6 Tolochko, Kiev i Kievskaia zemlia, p. 215.
7 A. N. Nasonov, Mongoly i Rus' [The Mongols and Rus'] (Moscow and Leningrad: Akademiia nauk SSSR, 1940; reprint edn., The Hague and Paris: Mouton, 1969), p. 37; Fennell, Crisis of Medieval Russia, pp. 87—89; L. N. Gumilev, Drevniaia Rus' i velikaia step' [Ancient Rus' and the great steppe] (Moscow: Mysl', 1989), p. 466.
As fourteen subsequent campaigns conducted in northeastern Rus' during the following quarter-century, major sections of the countryside suffered depopulation. For the rural areas, just as for towns, the impact of the invasion was not uniform. The effect was most critical in areas around the devastated cities, e. g., Riazan' and Vladimir. Depopulation was less serious elsewhere, e. g., in the regions surrounding Moscow, Tver', and Iaroslavl'. Such areas were even recipients of refugees from the more heavily damaged areas.36 Thus, David Morgan’s general comments about the Mongol conquest of its entire empire may be applied specifically to the lands of Rus' as well: “[T]he Mongol invasions were a truly awful, frequently a final, experience for those who had the misfortune to be in the way of the armies’ advance; but. . . the impact was patchy, with some areas escaping fairly lightly or even completely.”37
The princes of the dynasty, who survived and succeeded those killed defending the Rus' lands, faced multiple problems of consolidating their own positions, reconstructing their lands, and also developing working relationships with their conquerors. In the first years after the invasion, while the Mongols were pursuing military campaigns elsewhere, the remaining Riurikids were virtually left to their own devices to recover and restore order.
Mongol suzerainty
Nevertheless, the invasion of the Rus' lands, although not followed immediately by any formal treaty or Mongol occupation, constituted for practical purposes a conquest. A new, political relationship had to be forged between the Mongol khans and the Riurikid princes. The khans had to find methods of exercising their authority over the defeated lands; and the Rus' princes and their populations had to accept and adjust to the demands of the Horde. The princes of Rus' recognized Batu and his successors as their overlords. The first evidence of this relationship became manifest almost as soon as the Mongols’ western campaigns ended. According to chronicle accounts, they began the practice of traveling to the Mongol khan or “going to the Horde” to receive the khan’s iarlyk or patent, which was an official appointment or confirmation of each prince’s right to rule his domain.
As early as 1243, Prince laroslav Vsevolodich, who had replaced his brother lurii as prince of Vladimir after the latter’s death at the Battle on the Sit', made such a trip to the Horde. He was awarded not only the title of grand prince of Vladimir, but also that of grand prince of Kiev. Three years later laroslav returned to Sarai. On that occasion he was sent on to the Mongol capital at Karakorum. He did not survive the journey. laroslav’s sons, Andrei, who served as prince of Vladimir from 1249 to 1251/52, and Alexander Nevsky, who replaced him in 1252, also traveled to both Sarai and Karakorum. In subsequent years other princes also repeatedly made the trip to the Horde. The Suzdalian princes alone, according to one count, made nineteen visits between 1242 and 1252.
The princes of southwestern Rus' also made trips to the Horde, but with varying results. Prince Daniil of Volynia, who had briefly held the throne of Kiev before the Mongol invasion, had managed with some difficulty to retain Galicia after Batu’s forces overwhelmed southwestern Rus'. Several years later, after his westward drive had been concluded, Batu evidently made an effort to consolidate his authority over the western Rus' principalities. In a chronicle entry sub anno 1250, but probably referring to events of 1245, Batu demanded that Daniil turn over Galich, which he had recently recovered from Chernigov, to the Tatar officials. Daniil, instead, made a trip to the Horde. The prince submitted to Batu and was confirmed as prince of Volynia and Galicia; he returned to his land, where he reorganized his army along the model of the Mongol forces.
The visit of Prince Mikhail of Chernigov to the Horde was more dramatic and had more tragic results. Mikhail had also been grand prince of Kiev. He assumed that position in 1237, but fled soon afterward (1239 or 1240). He spent the next several years seeking assistance and refuge in Hungary, Poland, and Galicia. After the Tatars sacked Kiev, Mikhail briefly stationed himself outside his former capital, but by 1243, having accepted the Mongols’ recognition of laroslav Vsevolodich as the senior Riurikid prince, he returned to Chernigov.
Shortly after Daniil “went to the Horde,” Mikhail made his journey; he was the last of the major, reigning princes to do so. But when he was ordered to purify himself by walking between two fires and to kowtow before an idol of Chingis Khan, he refused. He is said to have thus aroused Batu’s wrath and was executed in September 1246. He was later recognized as a saint in the Russian Orthodox Church. A. N. Nasonov has suggested that the princes of Vladimir influenced Batu against Mikhail and thus reinforced the Mongol khan’s decision to recognize their line as the senior branch of the dynasty. George Vernadsky, in contrast, interpreted the execution of Mikhail of Chernigov as a boon to Daniil of Volynia, who was left the most powerful prince in southwestern Rus'.10
Another sign of Rus' submission to the Mongols was their payment of tribute to the khans. Initially the Mongols demanded that the Rus' pay a tithe. Upon invading Riazan', according to one chronicle account, the Mongols demanded that the prince turn over a tithe of everything, which meant a tenth of the population, including the princes, of the horses and other livestock, and of other valuables. Carpine made similar observations about Mongol tribute collection in Kiev.
The Rus' whom the Mongols thus removed from their homelands served their new masters in several capacities. Qualified men were drafted into the army, where they were deployed in the most vulnerable forward positions during an offensive. Rus' princes also participated in campaigns of the Golden Horde, although in nobler capacities. Skilled and unskilled laborers were also conscripted. They played significant roles in the construction of cities within the Golden Horde as well as in the production of crafted items for their residents and markets. Some were sent beyond the Golden Horde to Karakorum and China. Other prisoners and conscripts simply served as household slaves or were sold into the thriving slave trade that made up one of the major components of the commerce linking Sarai with the Italian markets at Tana and Sudak, the Caucasian trade centers, and Egypt. The removal of people, including skilled laborers, from the lands of Rus' compounded their economic difficulties, which were occasioned by the invasion but were experienced even in regions that had not been militarily defeated by the Mongols.
Another factor associated with Mongol suzerainty and tribute collection was the census. As the Mongols consolidated their authority,
Nasonov, Mongoly i Rus p. 27—28; George Vernadsky, The Mongols and Russia: A History of Russia, vol. III (New Haven, Conn., and London: Yale University Press, 1953), p. 145.
They took censuses of the Russian population. Such a count may have taken place in the Kievan area in the early 1240s. But there is no record of a similar procedure in Vladimir-Suzdal' until 1257, when the Golden Horde was engaged in the conquest of Persia and Iraq. Using the information they gathered, the Mongols divided the Rus' lands into districts that served as the basis for both drafting military recruits and assessing tribute. There is no scholarly agreement on the timing of this organization; some associate it with the first census, others with changes in Horde administration. Nevertheless, basic units, called tm'y (t'ma in the singular) in the Russian sources, were created. The term, which is related to the number 10,000, may have referred to a district containing i0,000 households or i0,000 men or, possibly, one that could produce i0,000 soldiers. Districts representing subdivisions of the t'ma were associated with units of thousands, hundreds, and tens. The census data defined these districts and enabled the Mongols to gather tribute and military conscripts on a more precise basis than the rough estimates used for the original tithe.
The practices of princely travel to the Horde to receive formal approval to rule and of making tribute payments marked the subordination of the Rus' lands to the Golden Horde. But the Sarai khans were preoccupied with the affairs of the entire Mongol Empire, rooted in nomadic steppe culture, and disinclined to occupy the alien forested, agricultural, and urban zones of the Rus' . The services of native princes, who enjoyed a legitimacy recognized by their subjects but who also acknowledged the authority of the khan, were essential. But even as Batu affirmed the right of Riurikid princes to continue to rule their principalities, he also superimposed his own appointed officials to oversee administration of the Rus' lands.
The officials had several different titles, but details about the range of their duties as well as their relationships with the Rus' princes are not available. It is known, however, that the officials designated to oversee conscription and tribute collection in the Rus' lands during the thirteenth century were known as baskaki (basqaqi). The first indication that such personnel were operating in the lands of Rus' pertained to Kiev where, Carpine observed, a baskak had been appointed to collect a tithe from the remaining population of that city.
Less is known about when baskaki were introduced into northeastern Rus'. If it is understood that, in order for them to conduct their duties, they had to take a census, then it is plausible to consider 1257, the first year in which a Mongol census in Suzdalia was recorded, also as the date of the introduction of baskaki in the region. There is, however, no firm evidence that the census and the appointment of baskaki were interdependent.11 But by 1267, when Khan Mengu-Timur issued a charter exempting the Orthodox Church from the obligations that had been imposed on the rest of Rus' society, baskaki were evidently already functioning; they were advised in the iarlyk to honor the immunities granted by the khan. They are also known to have been in Vladimir in 1269. Baskaki were associated with military campaigns and also used military forces at their disposal to carry out their primary duties, to secure roads for safe transport of tribute and commercial goods, and to assist the Rus' princes.
Other officials exercising Mongol authority were present in the Rus' lands during the thirteenth century. They were tax-farmers, usually Muslims from Central Asia, and their duties appear to have overlapped with those of the baskaki. Some scholars have suggested that tax-farmers represented the great khans at Karakorum, while others have concluded that all tax-collection activities in the lands of Rus' were supervised by the khan of the Golden Horde.38 39 If one accepts the concept, discussed by G. A. Fedorov-Davydov, that revenues gathered from any tributaries of the Mongol Empire in the middle of the thirteenth century were shared among the Chingisid rulers,40 Then the debate becomes less significant. As long as the interests ofthe great khan and the Golden Horde khan coincided and revenues were apportioned according to mutually acceptable patterns, the authority of one reinforced the other. But when the political rivalry between Kubilai and Arik-Buka, paralleled by that between Berke and Hulagu, divided the Chingisids, then the consequences of whom the tax-farmers were serving became more serious. It was under these circumstances that in 1262 several northeastern Rus' towns rebelled against these officials; that episode will be discussed below.
During the fourteenth century the Rus' princes, especially the grand prince of Vladimir, increasingly assumed responsibility, as the khan’s agents, for collecting and delivering tribute and conscripts as well as maintaining order in their lands. They thus replaced the baskaki in the northeastern principalities. Other Mongol officials, known as darugi, continued to supervise them. Unlike the baskaki, however, darugi were not stationed in the Rus' lands, but remained in Sarai where they consulted princes during their visits to the Horde. Special ambassadors also conveyed directives from the khan to the Rus' princes and, when necessary, enforced them. Khan Tokhta, for example, sent Nevrui as his plenipotentiary to oblige the Rus' princes to settle a dispute over Pereiaslavl' in 1296; another emissary was dispatched to the Rus' lands in 1303.
Rus' resistance to Mongol suzerainty
After Prince Mikhail’s execution, the first expressions of resistance to Mongol dominance were made by two other Riurikid princes, Daniil of Volynia and Galicia and Andrei of Vladimir. Prince Daniil appears to have been at the center oftheir opposition. Although he had been given a relatively favorable reception by Batu when he presented himself at the Horde, Daniil soon afterward began to organize an anti-Tatar coalition. In 1251, by then a widower, he married the niece of the Lithuanian king Mindovg, who had recently adopted Christianity and received his title from the pope. His most prominent domestic ally was Prince Andrei of Vladimir, who with the blessing of Metropolitan Kirill married Daniil’s daughter in the same year.
Andrei had traveled with his brother Alexander all the way to Karakorum to receive their princely patents for Vladimir and Kiev, respectively, from the great khan Guyuk. But two years after their return Guyuk died (1251), and the princes were expected to go back to the Horde and receive renewals for their patents from Batu in the name of the new great khan Mongke. Andrei, defiantly, did not make the journey. His decision was received as a challenge to Mongol authority. Khan Batu’s son Sartak authorized a punitive campaign against Vladimir. At the same time a twin expedition was sent against Daniil.
Andrei, defeated in battle, fled through Novgorod to Sweden; his brother Alexander replaced him on the Vladimir throne. Only in 1255 did Andrei return to the Rus' lands to become the prince of Suzdal'. Prince Daniil, however, continued to organize alliances against the Tatars; his efforts to arrange marriages for his children with members of ruling families in Hungary, Austria, and Lithuania are consistent with that policy. Daniil also established close ties with the papacy, and in 1253 received a crown and the title of Rex Russae Minoris from Pope Innocent IV. The pope hoped to attract the southwestern Russian principalities to the Roman Church; Daniil hoped that the pope would mount a crusade against the Tatars. When the latter did not materialize, Daniil broke his ties with the pope. Nevertheless, by 1256 Daniil was at war with the Mongols. Four years later he was finally defeated and forced to flee once again to Poland and Hungary. After Daniil’s death in 1264, his brother and sons and their heirs ruled his domain under Mongol supervision until the 1320s, when the line died out.
The next display of resistance to Mongol authority occurred in 1259 in Novgorod. Shortly after the Tatars conducted censuses in northeastern Rus' in 1257, they extended the practice to Novgorod. When Tatar officials arrived to gather the customs duties (tamga) and a tithe, Novgorodian officials respectfully presented them with gifts for the khan, but refused to cooperate with the tax collection. The Tatars left. But Alexander Nevsky, then the grand prince of Vladimir, who had accompanied the tax collectors to Novgorod, remained after their departure, and punished the Novgorodians for their defiance of the khan’s orders.
Nevsky, along with his brothers and Prince Boris of Rostov, were nevertheless ordered to appear before the khan in 1258. Then, in 1259, Novgorod was issued an ultimatum: submit to a census and pay the assessed taxes or face the consequences. Armed forces led by Prince Alexander Nevsky, his brother Andrei, and Boris of Rostov, and accompanied by Tatars, then appeared before the city. Illustrating the importance for the Mongols of having both their own officials and loyal, reliable, and effective Riurikid princes on the thrones of the Russian principalities, they waited outside the city while the census officials attempted to count the population. When the Novgorodians again refused to cooperate, the combined Tatar and Russian armies entered the city and forced them to comply with the census takers and pay the corresponding tax.
In 1262, there were also popular uprisings in Rostov, Vladimir, Suzdal', and Iaroslavl'. They were directed against tax-farmers licensed by the Mongols. As pointed out above, there is no consensus concerning which khan these officials represented, the great khan Kubilai at Karakorum or Berke, the khan at Sarai. In 1262, the interests of the two clashed. Berke was supporting Kubilai’s rival for power at Karakorum and was also preparing for war against Kubilai’s ally, Hulagu of the Ilkhans. Under these circumstances either side would have welcomed additional troops and revenue, and either side would have had reason to authorize tax-farmers to make the levies that provoked urban riots among the already heavily burdened populace of northeastern Rus'. Although they may well have been prompted by attempts to collect unusually heavy taxes levied as a consequence of the political situation within the Mongol Empire, the uprisings, which resulted in the murder of the tax-farmers, are frequently considered indicators ofmore general and widespread popular discontent with pressures imposed by the new regimen. Despite their display of insubordination and possibly because Alexander Nevsky, shortly after these events, personally presented himself before the khan in what would be his last trip to the Horde (winter 1262-63), no punitive action was taken against the rebellious towns. By the reign of Mengu-Timur, the Golden Horde exercised more autonomy within the empire and regularized the process of tax collection and conscription.
Rus' accommodation to the Golden Horde
One early symbol of Mongol suzerainty was the khan’s right to confirm Russian princes on their thrones. A second mark of Mongol authority over the Rus' lands was the collection of tribute and conscripts. The Mongols used their own officials to oversee the accomplishment ofthese tasks, but gradually during the fourteenth century they transferred that responsibility to the Rus' princes themselves. The interaction between Mongol court officials and Rus' princes involved relatively frequent travel to the Horde. As a result, already in the first decades after the invasion some ofthe princes were visiting the Horde frequently and/or remaining among the Tatars for prolonged periods. Their attendance at the khan’s court enabled them to establish close working relationships with the Mongols.
Alexander Nevsky, who, it has been claimed, developed particularly close ties to Sartak, constitutes a prime example. Virtually every one of the key actions he undertook as grand prince may be associated with a visit to the Horde. It was immediately after such a trip and with the help of Tatar forces, who chased his brother Andrei from the throne, that Alexander achieved power in Vladimir in 1252. He cooperated with the Tatars when they tried to take a census in
Novgorod in 1257; then following another trip to the Horde, he used force against the Novgorodians to make them comply with the khan’s demands (1259). After the riots in the northeastern Rus' towns, he went once more to the Horde, evidently for consultations. He was returning from that visit when he died (1263). Nevsky’s frequent trips to the Horde served his personal political interests; they also reflect his obedience and even loyalty to the khan. Yet especially the last instance suggests that these visits were not simply occasions for the khan to issue orders to a subservient prince, but opportunities for mutual consultation; Nevsky may have by this time wielded some influence with the Mongols, who refrained from taking retribution against the rebellious Rus'.
The princes of the Rostov clan were also frequently at the Horde. By the 1260s and 1270s this branch of the Riurikid dynasty had apparently attained a special position at the khan’s court. In the 1260s the chronicles record their visits to the Horde almost exclusively. Some of those princes remained among their Tatar hosts for extended periods and participated in the Golden Horde’s military campaigns against Lithuania, the Ilkhans of Persia, and even some other Russian principalities. Some took their wives and children with them to the Horde. Others married within the Horde. The most noteworthy match was that of Fedor Rostislavich. Originally the prince of Mozhaisk, a subdivision of the Smolensk principality, Fedor had married into the Rostov clan and become prince of laroslavl'. He retained that position even after his wife died. He nevertheless also lived for a lengthy period at the Horde, participated in Mongol military campaigns in the Caucasus (1278), in Bulgaria (1278), and against Pereiaslavl' (1281), and subsequently married the daughter of Khan Mengu-Timur.41 The Tatars, in turn, assisted Prince Fedor when he met resistance in 1293 while trying to reassume his throne in laroslavl'.
In addition to establishing their administration over the Rus' lands and forging ties with the Riurikid dynasty, the Mongol court developed direct relations with the Orthodox Church. During the first four decades after their invasion, the Mongols dealt with Metropolitan Kirill. Appointed as head of the Russian Church in 1242 with the support of Prince Daniil of Volynia and Galicia, Kirill nevertheless ministered to his entire flock. He traveled frequently, visiting the northern principalities of Novgorod and Vladimir as well as Chernigov and Riazan'. Although he actually spent a great deal of time in Kiev and the southwest as well, many scholars interpret his extended stays in the northeastern principalities as evidence that he was deemphasizing the traditional ecclesiastical center in favor of the northeast and correspondingly withdrew his political allegiance from his early sponsor Daniil, whose daughter he had escorted to Vladimir and whose wedding with Prince Andrei Iaroslavich he had conducted. The new focus of his loyalty was Alexander Nevsky, whom he greeted at the Golden Gates of Vladimir when Alexander returned from the Horde in 1252 to assume the throne, at whose funeral he officiated in 1263, and to whose hagiographic biography he was subsequently the chief contributor. Joseph Fuhrmann argued, additionally, that the perceived shift in Kirill’s support from Daniil and Andrei, who defied Mongol authority, to Alexander, who complied with it, reflected a parallel change in the Church’s posture toward the Golden Horde.42
Interaction between the Church and the Horde became more direct and regular after 1261, when during the reign of Khan Berke a bishopric was established at Sarai. The relations that developed were mutually beneficial. The Mongols demonstrated a respect and tolerance for all religious institutions, including, in the Russian case, the Orthodox Church. Although Khans Berke and Tuda-Mengu personally became Muslims and Uzbek oversaw the conversion of the entire Horde to Islam, they never pressured the Russian population to follow their example. On the contrary, the Russian Church enjoyed special privileges. They were specified in a iarlyk, which was issued by Khan Mengu-Timur in 1267, and which exempted priests, monks, and laymen associated with the Church from Tatar taxation and military conscription. Those exemptions may also have been extended to the general population dwelling on Church and monastery lands.
In exchange for its privileges the Church regularly prayed for the khan. It also cooperated with the Mongols in more mundane matters. Individual Sarai bishops, appointed by Metropolitan Kirill, served as diplomatic agents for the khans. Bishop Feognost (Theognostus), representing both his metropolitan and the Golden Horde, traveled on diplomatic missions to Constantinople at least three times during the 1270s, and contributed thereby to adding Byzantium to the Egyptian-Golden Horde alliance against the Ilkhans. The bishop also acted as an emissary to the Russian princes, and thus reinforced the Mongol khan’s authority with an implied endorsement by the Church. In 1296, for example, the Sarai bishop Ismail joined the Mongol special ambassador Nevrui who, as noted above, brought instructions to the Russian princes and supervised a conference intended to settle their dispute over the disposition of Pereiaslavl' Zalesskii.
From the 1260s through the remainder of the thirteenth century, the political and ecclesiastical elites of the northeastern Rus' lands accommodated themselves, personally and politically, to the Golden Horde khans. In the political framework that developed, the Rus' principalities were significant but not central to the Golden Horde’s primary political objectives. The Rus', as a hinterland, could provide men and livestock for the khan’s army, and silver and luxury goods for his treasury. Golden Horde policies toward the Rus' were geared to facilitating the smooth and reliable provisioning ofthose resources, which contributed to their ability to pursue their objectives toward the rest of the empire and their allies.
Within this framework the relationships and relative roles of khans and princes may be characterized by several features. The khans were recognized as suzerains of the Riurikid princes. Within the Rus' lands, however, they exercised their authority primarily through the dynasty. But the khans appointed and confirmed individual princes within the dynasty for each ruling position. Riurikid princes were, accordingly, required to appear personally before the khans to pay obeisance and receive their patents to rule. The khans also named their own officials to supervise tasks carried out on the Horde’s behalf and to intervene in Rus' affairs if and when necessary. Initially, baskaki representing the Horde were stationed in the Rus' lands. But by the reign of Uzbek, when relations between the Golden Horde and the Rus' principalities had stabilized, darugi and special envoys had replaced baskaki as the chief agents of the Mongols. The tasks for which they were responsible remained constant. It was their duty to ensure that the Rus' paid tribute and other taxes and sent conscripts for service in the khan’s armies. To those ends the Tatars were also involved in conducting censuses, maintaining order, and keeping lines of communication and transportation open and secure.
The presence of Mongol suzerains was burdensome to the Rus' princes and populace alike. But it also afforded some princes opportunities to increase their own stature. And, by constituting a higher authority to which they could appeal their cases, the presence of the Golden Horde khan provided a means for competing members ofthe dynasty to resolve conflicts. As will be discussed in the next chapter, the Daniilovichi of Moscow most successfully took advantage of the opportunities offered by the Horde even as they demonstrated themselves to be the most resourceful and reliable princes in accomplishing the tasks the Mongols set before them.
World History
