Why the Invincible Tamerlane Turned Back from the Russian Borders in 1395
Screex In 1395, the invincible commander Tamerlane set out on a campaign against Rus’. This could have ended disastrously for Rus’ as a whole and for each and every one of…
The Death of Genghis Khan: The Trivial Cause Behind the Great Conqueror’s Demise
August 1227. Somewhere in his headquarters on the banks of the Yellow River, a man is dying—a man whose name had sent tremors across half the world, from China to…
THE NOMADS’ FIELD PROVISIONS
The Diet of a Kazakh Warrior in the 17th–19th Centuries The Kazakhs did not have a standing army. Instead, a popular militia was assembled as needed under the leadership of…
Why the Sultans of the Ottoman Empire Eliminated Their Own Brothers
Imagine this: you arrive in the palace gardens in the morning, pick some roses, and trim the hedges. Then, in the evening, you’re handed a silk cord and told a…
Munkhe – the last khan of the unified empire
A distinctive feature of Mengu’s military and political activities is that his reign marked the final period of unity for the empire founded by Genghis Khan, after which it gradually…
How a Polovtsian Khan with 300 horsemen routed a massive Hungarian army and saved the Russian princes
In 1099, the Polovtsian army stood shoulder to shoulder with the Russian druzhina against a common enemy. And this enemy had come from Central Europe. Hungarian King Coloman I the…
Tamerlane’s Campaign Against the Golden Horde
In 1395–1396, Timur launched his second invasion of the Horde’s territories. This time, he did not march on the eastern uluses, which had been ravaged by his previous invasion, but…
Where did the arrows come from in the open field: what was Genghis Khan’s secret?
When we picture a Mongol horseman, the image is always the same: a horse galloping across the grass, the archer turning back at full speed and showering the enemy with…
What did Genghis Khan do to the mother of the Khwarezmian ruler?
The greatest joy for a man is to defeat his enemies, drive them before him, take their possessions, see their loved ones weep, ride their horses, and hold their daughters…
The last Polovtsian khan. He had a Russian name
The Polovtsian horse hordes, which repeatedly shook the borders of Rus, Byzantium, and Hungary, disappeared from the historical scene after the Mongol invasion. They were partly exterminated and partly assimilated.…