At the turn of the 12th -13th centuries, Genghis Khan, the commander and first great khan of the Mongol Empire, united the Mongol and Turkic tribes and conquered vast territories from the Sea of Japan to the Black Sea. The Mongol Empire turned into the largest state that existed on Earth in the entire known history of mankind. It united Central Asia and Southern Siberia, China and Tibet, the Middle East and most of Eastern Europe.
Mongol conquests in the 13th century
The emergence of the Golden Horde
Shortly before his death, in 1224, Genghis Khan divided his empire into uluses (countries), putting his son at the head of each. His eldest son, Jochi, inherited the richest and most extensive territories, including the south of the East European Plain and the western part of the Eurasian Steppe. The Mongols called this territory the Jochi Ulus, the Russians called it the Horde.
Khan Jochi did not rule his ulus for long. He died in 1227, and the leadership of the Jochi ulus passed to his second son– Batu, or Batu, as he was called in Russia. Genghis Khan bequeathed to his sons to continue his work and conquer the whole world. His grandson, Khan Batu, began to fulfill his grandfather’s testament.
Batu in a 14th-century medieval Chinese drawing
In the 30-40s of the 13th century, Batu, with his brother Orda-Egen and the military commander Tsubodai, made several campaigns to the west, thereby further expanding the borders of the Mongolian state.
In 1236-1237, the Mongol army conquered the Polovtsians and the Volga peoples. In the winter of 1237-1238, Batu’s army defeated the troops of the Ryazan and Vladimir-Suzdal principalities. In 1239, the capture of the Volga region was completed, as a result, the Southern Urals, the North Caucasus, the Volga region, and the Crimea became part of the Jochi Ulus. The Russian principalities were conquered, ravaged, and taxed. Continuing their conquests, the Mongol army invaded Europe. Serbia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and other countries were looted. The Mongol army stopped only at the Adriatic Sea in 1242.
Attack of the Mongol horsemen
Not a single army could withstand the onslaught of thousands of horsemen firing at full gallop, and the walls protecting cities and fortresses collapsed under the powerful stone blocks thrown by siege engines designed according to Chinese drawings.
As a result of the invasion of Batu’s army in Eastern Europe, a new state emerged — the Horde, which formally remained dependent on the Mongol Empire. Since the second half of the XVI century, in Russian chronicles it became known as the «Golden Horde».
The territory of the Golden Horde in the second half of the 13th century
The Russian princes were forced to recognize their vassalage to the Horde. This further aggravated the split of the Russian principalities: the western and southwestern principalities, which did not fall under the rule of the Horde, ended up under the control of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Poland.
Separation of the Golden Horde from the Mongol Empire
In 1257, after Batu’s death, his brother Khan Berke became the ruler of the Golden Horde. During his reign, there was a surge in the development of culture and economy in the state. Berke became the first khan to convert to Islam. This step had not only religious, but also cultural significance. He helped Berke attract scientists and poets, as well as artisans and merchants from Iran, Egypt and other Muslim countries to the Horde. Berke established trade and cultural ties with both European and Eastern states. In the capital of the Jochi Ulus, Sarai Batu (Old Sarai, about 130 km north of Astrakhan), luxurious palaces and mosques, as well as caravanserais, began to be built.
Prince Roman Olgovich of Ryazan comes to pay homage to Khan Meng-Timur in the Barn. Miniature of the Front Chronicle vault, 1568
The nomadic tribes of the Mongols and Turks that formed the backbone of the Horde gradually began to move towards a sedentary lifestyle. Since they had no developed culture of their own, they began to adopt the achievements of the conquered peoples. There was a gradual mixing with local peoples, and the Horde itself became more and more like a feudal state.
In 1266, Mengu-Timur became the ruler of the Jochi Ulus. In 1269, a kurultai was held with the khans of other uluses, at which they declared the independence of their possessions, recognized each other as independent sovereigns, and even formed an alliance against the Mongol Empire in case it decided to challenge their independence. Thus, the Ulus of Jochi — the Golden Horde officially became an independent state.
The Rise of the Golden Horde
In the first half of the 14th century, during the reign of Khan Uzbek (1312-1342) and his son Janibek (1342-1357), the Golden Horde reached its heyday.
Uzbek Khan was a tough ruler and kept his vassals at bay. During the 30 years of his reign, nine Russian princes were killed, who were summoned to the khan’s Horde. Therefore, before leaving for the khan, the Russian princes wrote spiritual wills and gave instructions to their children and the closest boyars in case of their death.
The Russian Prince of the Khan of the Golden Horde
Uzbek Khan carried out a reform of the state apparatus, which made it easier to manage the country and collect taxes. He was the sole ruler at the head of the state apparatus. The executive authority was the divan Council, which included representatives of the most prominent aristocracy. The vizier was at the head of the divan, and he also supervised the collection of taxes.
The Horde was divided into four uluses, each of which was divided into 70 tumens, smaller formations. The uluses were headed by ulusbeks, or beklarbeks (governors). In the hierarchy of the state administration, he was the second person after Khan. Beklyarbek led the army and was in charge of foreign policy, and was the highest judicial authority in the Ulus.
The Ulusbeks were subordinated to the temniks (chiefs of tumens), those, respectively, were subordinated to the minbashi (thousandths), those yozbashi (centurions), and so on. The Ulusbeks and temniks formed the kurultai, an advisory body at which important decisions were made.
Uzbek Khan was actively involved in the development of infrastructure and trade. Under him, not only new roads were laid, but also pit stations were established where messengers and ambassadors could rest and change horses — later it was from the Horde that the Russian Yamskaya system was borrowed. Thanks to the pits, the messengers could travel more than 400 km per day to deliver the message.
The Yamskaya system was used not only for government, but was also in demand among merchants, and gradually caravanserais appeared nearby. Thus, trade routes developed, became more convenient and safer, and active trade was conducted with Europe and the Middle East, China and India.
The Uzbek also strengthened diplomatic ties, including through marriages. He married the daughter of the Byzantine Emperor, married his niece to the Sultan of Egypt, and his sister to Prince Yuri Danilovich of Moscow.
Uzbek Khan moved the capital of the Horde to a new city built by him — Sarai al-Jedid, or New Sarai, located in the lower reaches of the Volga. His contemporaries called him one of the richest and most beautiful in the East. Trade, crafts and sciences flourished in it.
Under Uzbek rule, Islam became the state religion, which all officials and military leaders were required to accept, and the khan dealt harshly with dissenters. At the same time, the demand for a change of faith did not apply to the population of the Golden Horde and the vassal states, including those who professed Orthodoxy. The Horde tolerated other religions, and temples and monasteries were not even taxed.
The «Great Confusion» and decline
In 1359, the conspirators killed Khan Berdibek, the grandson of Khan Uzbek. He was the last descendant of Batu. A power struggle began in the Horde — both distant relatives of the dynasty and impostors began to fight for the khan’s title. In fact, until the end of the 1370s, the Horde was ruled by the Crimean prisoner Mamai, who was not a Genghisid and had no rights to the title of khan.
Khan Mamai. Artist Victor Matorin
This period of struggle for power, which was called the «great zamyatnya» in Russian chronicles, weakened the state of the Jochi Ulus and its disintegration began. Several uluses declared themselves independent khanates and seceded from the Horde. The Lithuanians seized the lands on the Dnieper, and the Moscow Principality refused to pay tribute. Mamai decided to restore order in his vassal lands and went on a campaign against Russia, but in 1380, in the Battle of Kulikovo, his army was defeated by Moscow Prince Dmitry Ivanovich.
Mamai was finished off by a descendant of Genghis Khan, Tokhtamysh, who, with the support of Tamerlane, arrived in the Horde, seized power and executed Mamai. And although the Golden Horde had a legitimate ruler, Tokhtamysh failed to regain his former power.
Khan Tokhtamysh
In 1382, Tokhtamysh attacked Moscow and forced the Russian principalities to pay tribute to the Horde again. Then he went to war against Tamerlane, his former ally, attacking Samarkand and Bukhara – and this was his big mistake. Tamerlane defeated Tokhtamysh’s troops, destroyed several Volga cities, including the capital, Novy Sarai, and plundered Crimean cities. After such a blow, the Golden Horde could no longer recover – its disintegration continued with renewed vigor. The following were distinguished from the Golden Horde: the Siberian Khanate (1420), the Uzbek Khanate (1428), the Kazan Khanate (1438), the Crimean Khanate (1441), the Nogai Horde (1440s), the Astrakhan Khanate (1459), the Kazakh Khanate (1465).
The collapse of the Golden Horde into khanates
The Great Horde, which became the successor of the Golden Horde, was considered the main state that emerged from the Jochi Ulus. In 1480, her khan Akhmat tried to restore power over Ivan III, but as a result of the battle, called «Standing on the Ugra,» the Moscow Principality was finally freed from the Horde yoke. At the beginning of the 16th century, the Great Horde ceased to exist. All the territories of the Golden Horde eventually became part of Russia.
That’s how a huge medieval state with the most powerful army, which terrified everyone, disappeared. There was practically nothing left of the Golden Horde – the cities were destroyed, historical buildings were not preserved. The Golden Horde remained in the notes of Western travelers and on maps compiled by European medieval cartographers, in Russian chronicles and the folk epic.