In 1483, the fall of the Golden Horde, the largest state of Eurasia, over the course of two and a half centuries, terrified all the peoples adjacent to it and bound Russia with chains of the Mongol-Tatar yoke. This event, which influenced the entire future fate of our Motherland, was of such great importance that we should dwell on this in more detail.
Ulus Jochi
The works of many Russian historians are devoted to this question, among which the monograph “The Golden Horde and Its Fall” by Grekov and Yakubovsky is very popular. In order to more fully and objectively cover the topic of interest to us, we will, in addition to the works of other authors, use this very interesting and informative book.
From historical documents that have reached us, it is known that the term "Golden Horde" came into use no earlier than 1566, that is, more than a hundred years after the death of this state itself, which had the name of Ulus Jochi. The first part is translated as “people” or “state”, the second is the name of the oldest son of Genghis Khan, and that's why.
Conqueror's son
The fact is that once the territory of the Golden Horde was part of a single Mongol empire with the capital Karakorum. Its creator and ruler was the famous Genghis Khan, uniting various Turkic tribes under his rule and horrifying the world with countless conquests. However, in 1224, sensing the onset of old age, he divided his state between his sons, providing everyone with power and wealth.
He transferred most of the territory to his eldest son, whose name was Jochi Batu, and his name went into the name of the newly created Khanate, which later expanded significantly and went down in history as the Golden Horde. The fall of this state was preceded by two and a half centuries of prosperity based on the blood and suffering of enslaved peoples.
Having become the founder and first ruler of the Golden Horde, Jochi Batu entered our history under the somewhat changed name of Khan Batu, who left his cavalry in 1237 to conquer the vast expanses of Russia. But before venturing into this very risky venture, he needed complete freedom from the care of his formidable parent.
Father's successor
After the death of Genghis Khan, which followed in 1227, Jochi gained independence and a few victorious, but very exhausting campaigns, increased wealth, and also expanded the territories inherited. Only after that Khan Batuy, feeling ready for new conquests, launched a blow on the Volga Bulgaria, and then conquered the tribes of Polovtsy and Alans. Next in line was Russia.
In their monograph The Golden Horde and Its Fall, Yakubovsky and Grekov point out that it was precisely in the battles with the Russian princes that the Tatar-Mongols depleted their forces to such an extent that they were forced to abandon the previously planned campaign against the Duke of Austria and the King of Bohemia. Thus, Russia involuntarily became the savior of Western Europe from the invasion of hordes of Batu Khan.
During his reign, which lasted until 1256, the founder of the Golden Horde made unprecedented conquests in its scale, conquering a significant part of the territory of modern Russia. The only exceptions were Siberia, the Far East and the Far North. In addition, under his authority was Ukraine, which surrendered without a fight, as well as Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Hardly in that era could anyone allow the possibility of a future fall of the Golden Horde, so the empire created by the son of Genghis Khan should have seemed unshakable and eternal. However, in history this is not an isolated example.
Greatness that has sunk into the ages
To match the state was its capital, called Saray-Batu. Located about ten kilometers north of modern Astrakhan, it impressed the foreigners who entered it with the luxury of palaces and the polyphony of eastern bazaars. Alien people, especially Russians, appeared in it often, but not at will. Until the fall of the Golden Horde in Russia, this city was a symbol of slavery. Crowds of captives brought them here to slave markets after regular raids, and Russian princes came here to receive Khan labels, without which their power was considered invalid.
How did it happen that the khanate that conquered half the world suddenly ceased to exist and sunk into oblivion, leaving no trace of its former greatness? The date of the fall of the Golden Horde can hardly be called without a certain amount of conventionality. It is believed that this happened shortly after the death of her last khan, Akhmat, who undertook an unsuccessful campaign in Moscow in 1480. Its long and inglorious standing on the Ugra River was the end of the Tatar-Mongol yoke. The following year he was killed, and the heirs could not keep intact the possessions he had inherited. However, let's talk about everything in order.
The beginning of the Great Troubles
It is generally accepted that the history of the fall of the Golden Horde dates back to 1357, when its ruler from the genus Genghisides (direct descendants of Genghis Khan) Khan Janibek died. After him, the state plunged into the abyss of chaos caused by the bloody power struggle between dozens of applicants. Suffice it to say that over the next four-year period, 25 supreme rulers were replaced.
To top it off, the separatist sentiments that existed among the local khans who dreamed of complete independence on their lands took on a very dangerous character. Khorezm was the first to separate from the Golden Horde, and Astrakhan soon followed suit. The situation was aggravated by the Lithuanians, who invaded from the west and seized significant territories adjacent to the banks of the Dnieper. It was a crushing and, importantly, not the last blow received before by a single and powerful khanate. Following them, other misfortunes followed, after which there was already no strength to recover.
The confrontation of Mamaia and Tokhtamysh
Relative stability in the state was established only in 1361, when as a result of a long struggle and various intrigues, power was seized by a large Horde military leader (temnik) Mamai. He was able to temporarily put an end to strife, streamline the flow of tribute from previously conquered territories and raise the shaken military potential.
However, he also had to wage a constant struggle with internal enemies, the most dangerous of which was Khan Tokhtamysh, trying to establish his authority in the Golden Horde. In 1377, with the support of the Central Asian ruler Tamerlane, he began a military campaign against the troops of Mamaia and achieved considerable success, capturing almost the entire territory of the state right up to the North Azov region, leaving his opponent only the Crimea and the Polovtsian steppes.
Despite the fact that in 1380 Mamai was already, in fact, a “political corpse,” the defeat of his troops in the Battle of Kulikovo dealt a severe blow to the Golden Horde. The militantly successful campaign of Khan Tokhtamysh to Moscow, undertaken two years later, could not rectify the situation. The fall of the Golden Horde, previously accelerated by the separation of many of its remote territories, and in particular by Ulus Orda-Dzhanin, occupying almost the entire territory of its eastern wing, became inevitable and was only a matter of time. But at that time it was still a single and viable state.
Big horde
This picture radically changed in the first half of the next century, when, as a result of the intensification of separatist tendencies, independent states emerged on its territory: the Siberian, Kazan, Uzbek, Crimean, Nogai, and a little later, the Kazakh Khanate.
Their formal center was the last island of a previously boundless state called the Golden Horde. Now that his former greatness has irrevocably gone, he has become the seat of the khan, only conditionally endowed with supreme power. Its formidable name is also a thing of the past, giving way to a rather vague phrase - Big Horde.
The final fall of the Golden Horde, the course of events
In traditional Russian historiography, the final stage of the existence of this once largest Eurasian state is attributed to the second half of the 15th - beginning of the 16th centuries. As can be seen from the above story, it was the result of a long process, the beginning of which was laid by a fierce struggle for power between the most powerful and influential khans, who ruled certain areas of the state. An important role was played by the separatist sentiments, strengthened from year to year in the circles of the ruling elite. All this ultimately led to the fall of the Golden Horde. Briefly describe his "death agony" as follows.
In July 1472, the ruler of the Great (formerly Golden) Horde Khan Akhmat suffered a brutal defeat from the Grand Duke of Moscow Ivan III. This happened in a battle on the banks of the Oka River, after the Tatars plundered and burned the nearby city of Aleksin. Encouraged by the victory, the Russians stopped paying tribute.
Khan Akhmat’s campaign in Moscow
Having received such a perceptible blow to his prestige and, moreover, having lost most of his income, the khan dreamed of revenge and in 1480, having gathered a large army and having previously concluded an allied treaty with the Grand Duke of Lithuania Casimir IV, set out on a campaign against Moscow. The goal of Akhmat was to bring the Russians into former obedience and resume their payment of tribute. It is possible that if he managed to fulfill his intentions, then the year of the fall of the Golden Horde could be postponed for several decades, but fate would have liked to decide otherwise.
Having passed the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with the help of local guides and reached the Ugra River - the left tributary of the Oka River flowing through the territories of the Smolensk and Kaluga Region - the khan, to his chagrin, discovered that he had been deceived by the allies. Casimir IV, contrary to the undertaking, did not send military assistance to the Tatars, and used all the forces at his disposal to solve his own problems.
Inglourious Retirement and Khan's Death
Left alone, Khan Akhmat on October 8 made an attempt to force the river on his own and continue the attack on Moscow, but was stopped by the Russian troops stationed on the opposite bank. The subsequent attacks of his soldiers were not crowned with success either. Meanwhile, it was urgently needed to find a way out of this situation, as winter was approaching, and with it the snow drifts and the inevitable in such cases a feedless, extremely fatal for horses. In addition, food supplies for people were running out, and there was nowhere to replenish them, because everything around was long ago plundered and destroyed.
As a result, the Horde were forced to abandon their plans and shamefully retire. On the way back, they burned several Lithuanian cities, but it was only revenge on Prince Casimir, who deceived them. From now on, the Russians came out of their obedience, and the loss of so many tributaries accelerated the already inevitable fall of the Golden Horde. The date of November 11, 1480 - the day when Khan Akhmat decided to retreat from the banks of the Ugra - entered the history as the end of the Mongol-Tatar yoke, which lasted almost two and a half centuries.
As for Khan Akhmat himself, who, by the will of fate , became the last ruler of the Golden (at that time only Big) Horde, he soon had to leave this mortal world. At the beginning of next year, he was killed during a raid on his headquarters detachment of Nogai cavalry. Like most eastern rulers, Khan Akhmat had many wives and, accordingly, a large number of sons, but none of them could prevent the death of the khanate, which, as is commonly believed, happened at the beginning of the next - XV century.
The consequences of the fall of the Golden Horde
Two major events of the late XV and early XVI centuries. - the complete collapse of the Golden Horde and the end of the period of the Tatar-Mongol yoke - are so closely connected that as a result they led to general consequences for all the peoples subjugated earlier, including, of course, the Russian land. First of all, the reasons that caused them to lag behind in all areas of development from the countries of Western Europe that were not subjected to the Tatar-Mongol invasion have become a thing of the past.
With the fall of the Golden Horde, prerequisites appeared for the development of the economy, undermined by the disappearance of most crafts. Many skilled craftsmen were killed or stolen into slavery without transferring their skills to anyone. Because of this, the construction of cities was interrupted, as well as the production of various kinds of tools and household items. Agriculture fell into decline as farmers left their lands and went to remote areas of the North and Siberia in search of salvation. The fall of the hated Horde gave them the opportunity to return to their former places.
The revival of the national culture, which during the period of the Tatar-Mongol yoke was in the process of degradation, which is eloquently testified by the cultural and historical monuments that have been preserved since then, was also extremely important. And finally, having come out of the power of the Horde khans, Russia and other peoples who received freedom gained the opportunity to resume interrupted international relations for a long period.