Khan Tokhtamysh remained in our national memory mainly as the one who restored Russia’s dependence on the Golden Horde after the successful Battle of Kulikovo. For some reason, in school textbooks he is called the «legitimate» khan, who led the fight against the «usurper» Mamai, but this is not entirely true.
So what kind of person was he? Why did he become the ruler? How did he die?
In this case, you can’t do without a little background. After the western campaign of the Mongols, all the conquests were divided among the numerous sons of Jochi. At the same time, Batu, not the oldest, but the most talented, was elected the great khan. For the next century, the Golden Horde was ruled by his descendants – for the sake of accuracy, historians call them the Batuid dynasty.
In 1359, a representative of this Berdibek family was overthrown and killed by the impostor Kulpa. A close friend of the khan, commander Mamai, then laid down his life to restore the supreme power of the Batu descendants. Therefore, he was certainly not a usurper. Although in fact his influence was higher than that of the weak khans. But the Genghisids, who were descendants of other sons of Jochi, have since withdrawn from subordination. Many of them have waged their own struggle for lands and the throne.
This is where the story of Tokhtamysh begins. His father Tui-Khoja was not an influential man, but was only the ruler of the island of Mangyshlak. In the late 1360s, he refused to join the army of the ruler of the eastern part of the Horde, Urus Khan, who was going to take away the capital’s Sarai from Mamai.
Tui-Khoja was executed for this, but Tokhtamysh was spared because of his extreme youth. Our hero attacked his overlord several times, was defeated, but was forgiven. Eventually, he found refuge in Samarkand at the court of Tamerlane, who was then at the very beginning of his path to greatness.
It should be clarified that the troubles caused by the Genghisids led to the fact that most of the dynasty died out. Moreover, each new khan, upon his accession, staged another massacre of his relatives. Therefore, Tokhtamysh was by no means a legitimate ruler – the line of Batu’s descendants was suppressed, and in the understanding of that time, each of the remaining Tatar princes was «legitimate.» The only question was whether he had supporters and the necessary military force.
Hearing that Urus Khan’s son and successor was spending his time drinking, and the people wanted Tokhtamysh to rule, Timur provided his protege with an army. The ambitious challenger was defeated at least three times, but in 1379 he defeated the ruler of the eastern wing of the Golden Horde.
He devoted the next year to consolidating his position and gathering strength for his further goal, the Barn. Considering how Mamai was weakened by the Battle of Kulikovo, he surrendered his power almost without a struggle. During the triumphal march to the west, local princes and emirs joined Tokhtamysh, he managed to restore the unity of the state for the first time in 20 years. Not a bad career for a recent fugitive.
The new khan confirmed the trade agreement with the Genoese, which provided him with a stable income. After that, he sent ambassadors to the Russian principalities, with which at first he did not seek conflict. Dmitry Donskoy probably found it difficult to raise a large army again, so he greeted his overlord and sent him rich gifts.
However, the Prince of Moscow delayed the payment of tribute, and an ambassador was sent to him demanding to come to the Horde for negotiations. The commissioner of Tokhtamysh faced such hostility from the population that he was forced to return home before he had made even half the way. And then the Khan had to raise an army.
The princes of Ryazan, Nizhny Novgorod, and Tver immediately sided with him. Tokhtamysh was unable to capture by storm, but after negotiations he was allowed into Moscow. Despite all the promises, he ravaged and burned the city and went into the steppe without any opposition from Dmitry.
Probably, under pressure from his generals, who demanded new campaigns for plunder, Tokhtamysh in the mid-1380s invaded first Khorezm and then Azerbaijan, which the Horde khans once considered as their zone of influence. However, by that time the political situation had changed.
To prevent the expansion of his protege, in 1386 Tamerlane sent an army against the weakened Transcaucasian state of the Jalairids. In the spring of the following year, the Tatars marched through the Caucasus Mountains and attacked the Timurid troops. Thus began the ten-year war, which marked the beginning of the end of the Golden Horde.
Warriors from Central Asia destroyed its main urban centers in the Volga region, and the Genoese colony of Tana was swept away. Decades of wars and anarchy led to trade moving along the southern branch of the Great Silk Road. This deprived the income of the great khans, who now did not exceed their vassals in financial and human resources.
Tamerlane installed one of the remaining Tatar princes on the throne, and Tokhtamysh was forced to flee to Lithuania. Prince Vytautas refused to extradite him, and in 1399 he fought with Khan Timur-Kutluk and Nogai biy Yedigey in the Battle of Vorskla. During it, the Lithuanians were swept away, and Tokhtamysh found himself in the position of a simple adventurer.
To avoid being put in a cage and taken to his own people, he and a small number of his companions made their way through the Eastern European steppes to Siberia. He managed to take control of part of the region, and over the next few years, Edigey tried to capture or at least defeat the fugitive Khan many times.
In the end, he hid and spread the rumor of his death to lure out his opponent. Tokhtamysh believed, came out of the woods, and was killed by the Nogais near Tyumen in 1406.