How many years did the Mongol yoke last? So was there a Tatar-Mongol yoke in Rus'?

Today we will talk about a very “slippery” topic from the point of view of modern history and science, but no less interesting.

This is the question raised in the May order table by ihoraksjuta “now let’s move on, the so-called Tatar-Mongol yoke, I don’t remember where I read it, but there was no yoke, these were all the consequences of the baptism of Rus', the bearer of the faith of Christ fought with those who did not want, well, as usual, with sword and blood, remember the Crusades hiking, can you tell us more about this period?”

Disputes about the history of the Tatar-Mongol invasion and the consequences of their invasion, the so-called yoke, do not disappear, and probably will never disappear. Under the influence of numerous critics, including Gumilyov’s supporters, new, interesting facts began to be woven into the traditional version of Russian history Mongol yoke that I would like to develop. As we all remember from our school history course, the prevailing point of view is still the following:

In the first half of the 13th century, Russia was invaded by the Tatars, who came to Europe from Central Asia, in particular China and Central Asia, which they had already conquered by this time. The dates are precisely known to our Russian historians: 1223 - Battle of Kalka, 1237 - fall of Ryazan, 1238 - defeat of the united forces of the Russian princes on the banks of the City River, 1240 - fall of Kyiv. Tatar-Mongol troops destroyed individual squads of the princes of Kievan Rus and subjected it to a monstrous defeat. The military power of the Tatars was so irresistible that their dominance continued for two and a half centuries - until the “Standing on the Ugra” in 1480, when the consequences of the yoke were eventually completely eliminated, the end came.

For 250 years, that’s how many years, Russia paid tribute to the Horde in money and blood. In 1380, Rus' for the first time since the invasion of Batu Khan gathered forces and gave battle to the Tatar Horde on the Kulikovo field, in which Dmitry Donskoy defeated the temnik Mamai, but from this defeat all the Tatar-Mongols did not happen at all, this was, so to speak, a won battle in lost war. Although even the traditional version of Russian history says that there were practically no Tatar-Mongols in Mamai’s army, only local nomads from the Don and Genoese mercenaries. By the way, the participation of the Genoese suggests the participation of the Vatican in this issue. Today, new data, as it were, has begun to be added to the known version of Russian history, but intended to add credibility and reliability to the already existing version. In particular, there are extensive discussions about the number of nomadic Tatars - Mongols, the specifics of their martial art and weapons.

Let's evaluate the versions that exist today:

I suggest starting with a very interesting fact. Such a nationality as the Mongol-Tatars does not exist, and never existed at all. The only thing the Mongols and Tatars have in common is that they roamed the Central Asian steppe, which, as we know, is large enough to accommodate any nomadic people, and at the same time give them the opportunity not to intersect on the same territory at all.

The Mongol tribes lived at the southern tip of the Asian steppe and often raided China and its provinces, as the history of China often confirms to us. While other nomadic Turkic tribes, called from time immemorial in Rus' Bulgars (Volga Bulgaria), settled in the lower reaches of the Volga River. In those days in Europe they were called Tatars, or TatAryans (the most powerful of the nomadic tribes, unbending and invincible). And the Tatars, the closest neighbors of the Mongols, lived in the northeastern part of modern Mongolia, mainly in the area of Lake Buir Nor and up to the borders of China. There were 70 thousand families, making up 6 tribes: Tutukulyut Tatars, Alchi Tatars, Chagan Tatars, Queen Tatars, Terat Tatars, Barkuy Tatars. The second parts of the names are apparently the self-names of these tribes. There is not a single word among them that sounds close to the Turkic language - they are more consonant with Mongolian names.

Two related peoples - the Tatars and the Mongols - fought a war of mutual extermination for a long time with varying success, until Genghis Khan seized power throughout Mongolia. The fate of the Tatars was predetermined. Since the Tatars were the killers of Genghis Khan’s father, destroyed many tribes and clans close to him, and constantly supported the tribes opposing him, “then Genghis Khan (Tei-mu-Chin) ordered the general massacre of the Tatars and not leave even one alive until the limit determined by law (Yasak); so that women and small children should also be killed, and the wombs of pregnant women should be cut open in order to completely destroy them. …”.

That is why such a nationality could not threaten the freedom of Rus'. Moreover, many historians and cartographers of that time, especially Eastern European ones, “sinned” to call all indestructible (from the point of view of Europeans) and invincible peoples TatAriev or simply in Latin TatArie.
This can be easily seen from ancient maps, for example, Map of Russia 1594 in the Atlas of Gerhard Mercator, or Maps of Russia and TarTaria by Ortelius.

One of the fundamental axioms of Russian historiography is the assertion that for almost 250 years, the so-called “Mongol-Tatar yoke” existed on the lands inhabited by the ancestors of the modern East Slavic peoples - Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians. Allegedly, in the 30s - 40s of the 13th century, the ancient Russian principalities were subjected to a Mongol-Tatar invasion under the leadership of the legendary Batu Khan.

The fact is that there are numerous historical facts that contradict the historical version of the “Mongol-Tatar yoke.”

First of all, even the canonical version does not directly confirm the fact of the conquest of the northeastern ancient Russian principalities by the Mongol-Tatar invaders - supposedly these principalities became vassals of the Golden Horde (a state formation that occupied a large territory in the southeast of Eastern Europe and Western Siberia, founded Mongol prince Batu). They say that the army of Khan Batu made several bloody predatory raids on these very northeastern ancient Russian principalities, as a result of which our distant ancestors decided to go “under the arm” of Batu and his Golden Horde.

However, historical information is known that the personal guard of Khan Batu consisted exclusively of Russian soldiers. A very strange circumstance for the lackey vassals of the great Mongol conquerors, especially for the newly conquered people.

There is indirect evidence of the existence of Batu’s letter to the legendary Russian prince Alexander Nevsky, in which the all-powerful khan of the Golden Horde asks the Russian prince to take in his son and make him a real warrior and commander.

Some sources also claim that Tatar mothers in the Golden Horde frightened their naughty children with the name of Alexander Nevsky.

As a result of all these inconsistencies, the author of these lines in his book “2013. Memories of the Future” (“Olma-Press”) puts forward a completely different version of the events of the first half and mid-13th century on the territory of the European part of the future Russian Empire.

According to this version, when the Mongols, at the head of nomadic tribes (later called Tatars), reached the northeastern ancient Russian principalities, they actually entered into quite bloody military clashes with them. But Khan Batu did not achieve a crushing victory; most likely, the matter ended in a kind of “battle draw”. And then Batu proposed an equal military alliance to the Russian princes. Otherwise, it is difficult to explain why his guard consisted of Russian knights, and why Tatar mothers frightened their children with the name of Alexander Nevsky.

All these terrible stories about the “Tatar-Mongol yoke” were invented much later, when the Moscow kings had to create myths about their exclusivity and superiority over the conquered peoples (the same Tatars, for example).

Even in the modern school curriculum, this historical moment is briefly described as follows: “At the beginning of the 13th century, Genghis Khan gathered a large army of nomadic peoples, and, subordinating them to strict discipline, decided to conquer the whole world. Having defeated China, he sent his army to Rus'. In the winter of 1237, the army of “Mongol-Tatars” invaded the territory of Rus', and subsequently defeating the Russian army on the Kalka River, went further, through Poland and the Czech Republic. As a result, having reached the shores of the Adriatic Sea, the army suddenly stops and, without completing its task, turns back. From this period the so-called “ Mongol-Tatar yoke"over Russia.

But wait, they were going to conquer the whole world... so why didn't they go further? Historians answered that they were afraid of an attack from behind, defeated and plundered, but still strong Rus'. But this is just funny. Will the plundered state run to defend other people's cities and villages? Rather, they will rebuild their borders and wait for the return of the enemy troops in order to fight back fully armed.
But the weirdness doesn't end there. For some unimaginable reason, during the reign of the House of Romanov, dozens of chronicles describing the events of the “time of the Horde” disappear. For example, “The Tale of the Destruction of the Russian Land,” historians believe that this is a document from which everything that would indicate the Ige was carefully removed. They left only fragments telling about some kind of “trouble” that befell Rus'. But there is not a word about the “invasion of the Mongols.”

There are many more strange things. In the story “about the evil Tatars,” the khan from the Golden Horde orders the execution of a Russian Christian prince... for refusing to bow to the “pagan god of the Slavs!” And some chronicles contain amazing phrases, for example: “Well, with God!” - said the khan and, crossing himself, galloped towards the enemy.
So, what really happened?

At that time, the “new faith” was already flourishing in Europe, namely Faith in Christ. Catholicism was widespread everywhere, and governed everything, from the way of life and the system, to the state system and legislation. At that time, crusades against infidels were still relevant, but along with military methods, “tactical tricks” were often used, akin to bribing authorities and inducing them to their faith. And after receiving power through the purchased person, the conversion of all his “subordinates” to the faith. It was precisely such a secret crusade that was carried out against Rus' at that time. Through bribery and other promises, church ministers were able to seize power over Kiev and nearby regions. Just relatively recently, by the standards of history, the baptism of Rus' took place, but history is silent about the civil war that arose on this basis immediately after the forced baptism. And the ancient Slavic chronicle describes this moment as follows:

« And the Vorogs came from overseas, and they brought faith in alien gods. With fire and sword they began to implant in us an alien faith, shower the Russian princes with gold and silver, bribe their will, and lead them astray from the true path. They promised them an idle life, full of wealth and happiness, and remission of any sins for their dashing deeds.

And then Ros broke up into different states. The Russian clans retreated north to the great Asgard, and named their empire after the names of their patron gods, Tarkh Dazhdbog the Great and Tara, his Sister the Light-Wise. (They called her the Great TarTaria). Leaving the foreigners with the princes purchased in the Principality of Kiev and its environs. Volga Bulgaria also did not bow to its enemies, and did not accept their alien faith as its own.
But the Principality of Kiev did not live in peace with TarTaria. They began to conquer the Russian lands with fire and sword and impose their alien faith. And then the military army rose up for a fierce battle. In order to preserve their faith and reclaim their lands. Both old and young then joined the Ratniki in order to restore order to the Russian Lands.”

And so the war began, in which the Russian army, the land of the Great Aria (tattAria) defeated the enemy and drove him out of the primordially Slavic lands. It drove away the alien army, with their fierce faith, from its stately lands.

By the way, the word Horde translated by initial letters ancient Slavic alphabet, means Order. That is, the Golden Horde is not a separate state, it is a system. "Political" system of the Golden Order. Under which the Princes reigned locally, planted with the approval of the Commander-in-Chief of the Army of Defense, or in one word they called him KHAN (our defender).
This means that there was not more than two hundred years of oppression, but there was a time of peace and prosperity of the Great Aria or TarTaria. By the way, modern history also has confirmation of this, but for some reason no one pays attention to it. But we will definitely pay attention, and very closely:

The Mongol-Tatar yoke is a system of political and tributary dependence of the Russian principalities on the Mongol-Tatar khans (until the early 60s of the 13th century, the Mongol khans, after the khans of the Golden Horde) in the 13th-15th centuries. The establishment of the yoke became possible as a result of the Mongol invasion of Rus' in 1237-1241 and occurred for two decades after it, including in lands that were not devastated. In North-Eastern Rus' it lasted until 1480. (Wikipedia)

Battle of the Neva (July 15, 1240) - a battle on the Neva River between the Novgorod militia under the command of Prince Alexander Yaroslavich and the Swedish army. After the victory of the Novgorodians, Alexander Yaroslavich received the honorary nickname “Nevsky” for his skillful management of the campaign and courage in battle. (Wikipedia)

Doesn’t it seem strange to you that the battle with the Swedes is taking place right in the middle of the “Mongol-Tatars” invasion of Rus'? Rus', blazing in fires and plundered by the “Mongols,” is attacked by the Swedish army, which safely drowns in the waters of the Neva, and at the same time the Swedish crusaders do not encounter the Mongols even once. And the Russians, who defeated the strong Swedish army, lose to the Mongols? In my opinion, this is just nonsense. Two huge armies are fighting on the same territory at the same time and never intersect. But if you turn to the ancient Slavic chronicles, then everything becomes clear.

Since 1237 Rat Great TarTaria began to win back their ancestral lands, and when the war was coming to an end, the losing representatives of the church asked for help, and the Swedish crusaders were sent into battle. Since it was not possible to take the country by bribery, then they will take it by force. Just in 1240, the army of the Horde (that is, the army of Prince Alexander Yaroslavovich, one of the princes of the ancient Slavic family) clashed in battle with the army of the Crusaders, which came to the rescue of its minions. Having won the Battle of the Neva, Alexander received the title of Prince of the Neva and remained to rule Novgorod, and the Horde Army went further to drive the adversary out of the Russian lands completely. So she persecuted “the church and the alien faith” until she reached the Adriatic Sea, thereby restoring her original ancient borders. And having reached them, the army turned around and went north again. Having installed 300 year period of peace.

Again, confirmation of this is the so-called end of the Yoke. Battle of Kulikovo"Before which 2 knights Peresvet and Chelubey took part in the match. Two Russian knights, Andrei Peresvet (superior light) and Chelubey (beating the forehead, Telling, narrating, asking) Information about which was cruelly cut out from the pages of history. It was Chelubey’s loss that foreshadowed the victory of the army of Kievan Rus, restored with the money of the same “Churchmen” who nevertheless penetrated Rus' from the dark, albeit more than 150 years later. It will be later, when all of Rus' is plunged into the abyss of chaos, all sources confirming the events of the past will be burned. And after the Romanov family came to power, many documents will take on the form we know.

By the way, this is not the first time that the Slavic army defends its lands and expels infidels from its territories. Another extremely interesting and confusing moment in History tells us about this.
Army of Alexander the Great, consisting of many professional warriors, was defeated by a small army of some nomads in the mountains north of India (Alexander’s last campaign). And for some reason, no one is surprised by the fact that a large trained army that crossed half the world and redrew the world map was so easily broken by an army of simple and uneducated nomads.
But everything becomes clear if you look at the maps of that time and just even think about who the nomads who came from the north (from India) could have been. These are precisely our territories that originally belonged to the Slavs, and where to this day the remains of the Eth-Russian civilization are found .

The Macedonian army was pushed back by the army Slavyan-Ariev who defended their territories. It was at that time that the Slavs “for the first time” walked to the Adriatic Sea, and left a huge mark on the territories of Europe. Thus, it turns out that we are not the first to conquer “half the globe.”

So how did it happen that even now we don’t know our history? Everything is very simple. The Europeans, trembling with fear and horror, never ceased to be afraid of the Rusichs, even when their plans were crowned with success and they enslaved the Slavic peoples, they were still afraid that one day Rus' would rise up and shine again with its former strength.

At the beginning of the 18th century, Peter the Great founded the Russian Academy of Sciences. Over the 120 years of its existence, there were 33 academic historians in the historical department of the Academy. Of these, only three were Russians (including M.V. Lomonosov), the rest were Germans. It turns out that the history of Ancient Rus' was written by the Germans, and many of them did not know not only the way of life and traditions, they did not even know the Russian language. This fact is well known to many historians, but they do not make any effort to carefully study the history that the Germans wrote and get to the bottom of the truth.
Lomonosov wrote a work on the history of Rus', and in this field he often had disputes with his German colleagues. After his death, the archives disappeared without a trace, but somehow his works on the history of Rus' were published, but under the editorship of Miller. At the same time, it was Miller who oppressed Lomonosov in every possible way during his lifetime. Computer analysis confirmed that Lomonosov’s works on the history of Rus' published by Miller are falsifications. Little remains of Lomonosov's works.

This concept can be found on the website of Omsk State University:

We will formulate our concept, hypothesis immediately, without
preliminary preparation of the reader.

Let's pay attention to the following strange and very interesting
data. However, their strangeness is based only on generally accepted
chronology and the version of ancient Russian instilled in us from childhood
stories. It turns out that changing the chronology removes many oddities and
<>.

One of the main moments in the history of ancient Rus' is this
called the Tatar-Mongol conquest by the Horde. Traditionally
it is believed that the Horde came from the East (China? Mongolia?),
captured many countries, conquered Rus', swept to the West and
even reached Egypt.

But if Rus' had been conquered in the 13th century with any
was from the sides - or from the east, as modern ones claim
historians, or from the West, as Morozov believed, would have to
remain information about the clashes between the conquerors and
Cossacks who lived both on the western borders of Rus' and in the lower reaches
Don and Volga. That is, exactly where they were supposed to pass
conquerors.

Of course, in school courses on Russian history we are intensively
they convince that the Cossack troops allegedly arose only in the 17th century,
allegedly due to the fact that the slaves fled from the power of the landowners to
Don. However, it is known, although this is usually not mentioned in textbooks,
- that, for example, the Don Cossack state existed STILL IN
XVI century, had its own laws and history.

Moreover, it turns out that the beginning of the history of the Cossacks dates back to
to the XII-XIII centuries. See, for example, the work of Sukhorukov<>in DON magazine, 1989.

Thus,<>, - no matter where she came from, -
moving along the natural path of colonization and conquest,
would inevitably have to come into conflict with the Cossacks
regions.
This is not noted.

What's the matter?

A natural hypothesis arises:
NO FOREIGN
THERE WAS NO CONQUEST OF Rus'. THE HORDE DIDN'T FIGHT WITH THE COSSACKS BECAUSE
THE COSSACKS WERE AN COMPONENT PART OF THE HORDE. This hypothesis was
not formulated by us. It is substantiated very convincingly,
for example, A. A. Gordeev in his<>.

BUT WE ARE SAYING SOMETHING MORE.

One of our main hypotheses is that the Cossacks
the troops not only formed part of the Horde - they were regular
troops of the Russian state. Thus, THE HORDE WAS
JUST A REGULAR RUSSIAN ARMY.

According to our hypothesis, the modern terms ARMY and WARRIOR,
- Church Slavonic in origin, - were not Old Russian
terms. They came into constant use in Rus' only with
XVII century. And the old Russian terminology was: Horde,
Cossack, khan

Then the terminology changed. By the way, back in the 19th century
Russian folk proverbs words<>And<>were
interchangeable. This can be seen from the numerous examples given
in Dahl's dictionary. For example:<>and so on.

On the Don there is still the famous city of Semikarakorum, and on
Kuban - Hanskaya village. Let us remember that Karakorum is considered
THE CAPITAL OF GENGIZ KHAN. At the same time, as is well known, in those
places where archaeologists are still persistently searching for Karakorum, there is no
For some reason there is no Karakorum.

In desperation, they hypothesized that<>. This monastery, which existed back in the 19th century, was surrounded
an earthen rampart only about one English mile long. Historians
believe that the famous capital Karakorum was located entirely on
territory subsequently occupied by this monastery.

According to our hypothesis, the Horde is not a foreign entity,
captured Rus' from the outside, but there is simply an Eastern Russian regular
army, which was an integral part of the ancient Russian
state.
Our hypothesis is this.

1) <>IT WAS JUST A WAR PERIOD
MANAGEMENT IN THE RUSSIAN STATE. NO ALIENS Rus'
CONQUERED.

2) THE SUPREME RULER WAS THE COMMANDER-KHAN = TSAR, AND B
CIVIL GOVERNORS SITTED IN THE CITIES - PRINCE WHO WERE DUTY
WERE COLLECTING TRIBUTE IN FAVOR OF THIS RUSSIAN ARMY, FOR ITS
CONTENT.

3) THUS, THE ANCIENT RUSSIAN STATE IS REPRESENTED
A UNITED EMPIRE, IN WHICH THERE WAS A STANDING ARMY CONSISTED OF
PROFESSIONAL MILITARY (HORDE) AND CIVILIAN UNITS THAT DID NOT HAVE
ITS REGULAR TROOPS. SINCE SUCH TROOPS WERE ALREADY PART OF THE
COMPOSITION OF THE HORDE.

4) THIS RUSSIAN-HORDE EMPIRE EXISTED SINCE THE XIV CENTURY
UNTIL THE BEGINNING OF THE 17TH CENTURY. HER STORY ENDED WITH A FAMOUS GREAT
THE TROUBLES IN Rus' AT THE BEGINNING OF THE 17TH CENTURY. AS A RESULT OF THE CIVIL WAR
RUSSIAN HORDA KINGS, - THE LAST OF WHICH WAS BORIS
<>, - WERE PHYSICALLY EXTERMINED. AND THE FORMER RUSSIAN
THE ARMY-HORDE ACTUALLY SUFFERED DEFEAT IN THE FIGHT WITH<>. AS A RESULT, POWER IN Rus' CAME TO PRINCIPALLY
NEW PRO-WESTERN ROMANOV DYNASTY. SHE SEIZED POWER AND
IN THE RUSSIAN CHURCH (FILARET).

5) A NEW DYNASTY WAS NEEDED<>,
IDEOLOGICALLY JUSTIFYING ITS POWER. THIS NEW POWER FROM THE POINT
THE VIEW OF THE PREVIOUS RUSSIAN-HORDA HISTORY WAS ILLEGAL. THAT'S WHY
ROMANOV NEEDED TO RADICALLY CHANGE THE COVERAGE OF THE PREVIOUS
RUSSIAN HISTORY. WE NEED TO GIVE THEM THEM'S DEPENDENCE - IT WAS DONE
COMPETENTLY. WITHOUT CHANGING MOST OF THE ESSENTIAL FACTS, THEY COULD BEFORE
UNRECOGNITION WILL DISTORT ENTIRE RUSSIAN HISTORY. SO, PREVIOUS
HISTORY OF Rus'-HORDE WITH ITS CLASS OF FARMERS AND MILITARY
THE CLASS - THE HORDE, WAS DECLARED BY THEM AN ERA<>. AT THE SAME TIME, THERE IS OWN RUSSIAN HORDE-ARMY
TURNED, - UNDER THE PENS OF ROMANOV HISTORIANS, - INTO MYTHICAL
ALIENS FROM A DISTANT UNKNOWN COUNTRY.

Notorious<>, familiar to us from Romanovsky
history, was simply a GOVERNMENT TAX inside
Rus' for the maintenance of the Cossack army - the Horde. Famous<>, - every tenth person taken into the Horde is simply
state MILITARY RECRUITMENT. It’s like conscription into the army, but only
from childhood - and for life.

Next, the so-called<>, in our opinion,
were simply punitive expeditions to those Russian regions
who for some reason refused to pay tribute =
state filing. Then the regular troops punished
civilian rioters.

These facts are known to historians and are not secret, they are publicly available, and anyone can easily find them on the Internet. Skipping scientific research and justifications, which have already been described quite widely, let us summarize the main facts that refute the big lie about the “Tatar-Mongol yoke.”

1. Genghis Khan

Previously, in Rus', 2 people were responsible for governing the state: the Prince and the Khan. The prince was responsible for governing the state in peacetime. The khan or “war prince” took the reins of control during war; in peacetime, the responsibility for forming a horde (army) and maintaining it in combat readiness rested on his shoulders.

Genghis Khan is not a name, but a title of “military prince,” which, in the modern world, is close to the position of Commander-in-Chief of the army. And there were several people who bore such a title. The most outstanding of them was Timur, it is he who is usually discussed when they talk about Genghis Khan.

In surviving historical documents, this man is described as a tall warrior with blue eyes, very white skin, powerful reddish hair and a thick beard. Which clearly does not correspond to the signs of a representative of the Mongoloid race, but completely fits the description of the Slavic appearance (L.N. Gumilyov - “Ancient Rus' and the Great Steppe.”).

In modern “Mongolia” there is not a single folk epic that would say that this country once in ancient times conquered almost all of Eurasia, just as there is nothing about the great conqueror Genghis Khan... (N.V. Levashov “Visible and invisible genocide").

2. Mongolia

The state of Mongolia appeared only in the 1930s, when the Bolsheviks came to the nomads living in the Gobi Desert and told them that they were the descendants of the great Mongols, and their “compatriot” had created the Great Empire in his time, which they were very surprised and happy about. . The word "Mughal" is of Greek origin and means "Great". The Greeks used this word to call our ancestors – the Slavs. It has nothing to do with the name of any people (N.V. Levashov “Visible and Invisible Genocide”).

3. Composition of the “Tatar-Mongol” army

70-80% of the army of the “Tatar-Mongols” were Russians, the remaining 20-30% were made up of other small peoples of Rus', in fact, the same as now. This fact is clearly confirmed by a fragment of the icon of Sergius of Radonezh “Battle of Kulikovo”. It clearly shows that the same warriors are fighting on both sides. And this battle is more like a civil war than a war with a foreign conqueror.

4. What did the “Tatar-Mongols” look like?

Note the drawing of the tomb of Henry II the Pious, who was killed on the Legnica field. The inscription is as follows: “The figure of a Tatar under the feet of Henry II, Duke of Silesia, Cracow and Poland, placed on the grave in Breslau of this prince, killed in the battle with the Tatars at Liegnitz on April 9, 1241.” As we see, this “Tatar” has a completely Russian appearance, clothes and weapons. The next image shows “the Khan’s palace in the capital of the Mongol Empire, Khanbalyk” (it is believed that Khanbalyk is supposedly Beijing). What is “Mongolian” and what is “Chinese” here? Once again, as in the case of the tomb of Henry II, before us are people of a clearly Slavic appearance. Russian caftans, Streltsy caps, the same thick beards, the same characteristic blades of sabers called “Yelman”. The roof on the left is an almost exact copy of the roofs of old Russian towers... (A. Bushkov, “Russia that never existed”).

5. Genetic examination

According to the latest data obtained as a result of genetic research, it turned out that Tatars and Russians have very close genetics. Whereas the differences between the genetics of Russians and Tatars from the genetics of the Mongols are colossal: “The differences between the Russian gene pool (almost entirely European) and the Mongolian (almost entirely Central Asian) are really great - it’s like two different worlds...” (oagb.ru).

6. Documents during the period of the Tatar-Mongol yoke

During the period of existence of the Tatar-Mongol yoke, not a single document in the Tatar or Mongolian language has been preserved. But there are many documents from this time in Russian.

7. Lack of objective evidence confirming the hypothesis of the Tatar-Mongol yoke

At the moment, there are no originals of any historical documents that would objectively prove that there was a Tatar-Mongol yoke. But there are many fakes designed to convince us of the existence of a fiction called the “Tatar-Mongol yoke.” Here is one of these fakes. This text is called “The Word about the Destruction of the Russian Land” and in each publication it is declared “an excerpt from a poetic work that has not reached us intact... About the Tatar-Mongol invasion”:

“Oh, bright and beautifully decorated Russian land! You are famous for many beauties: you are famous for many lakes, locally revered rivers and springs, mountains, steep hills, high oak forests, clean fields, marvelous animals, various birds, countless great cities, glorious villages, monastery gardens, temples of God and formidable princes, honest boyars and many nobles. You are filled with everything, Russian land, O Orthodox Christian faith!..»

There is not even a hint of the “Tatar-Mongol yoke” in this text. But this “ancient” document contains the following line: “You are filled with everything, Russian land, O Orthodox Christian faith!”

More opinions:

The plenipotentiary representative of Tatarstan in Moscow (1999 - 2010), Doctor of Political Sciences Nazif Mirikhanov, spoke in the same spirit: “The term “yoke” appeared in general only in the 18th century,” he is sure. “Before that, the Slavs did not even suspect that they were living under oppression, under the yoke of certain conquerors.”

“In fact, the Russian Empire, and then the Soviet Union, and now the Russian Federation are the heirs of the Golden Horde, that is, the Turkic empire created by Genghis Khan, whom we need to rehabilitate, as we have already done in China,” Mirikhanov continued. And he concluded his reasoning with the following thesis: “The Tatars at one time frightened Europe so much that the rulers of Rus', who chose the European path of development, in every possible way dissociated themselves from their Horde predecessors. Today it is time to restore historical justice.”

The result was summed up by Izmailov:

“The historical period, which is commonly called the time of the Mongol-Tatar yoke, was not a period of terror, ruin and slavery. Yes, the Russian princes paid tribute to the rulers from Sarai and received labels for reign from them, but this is ordinary feudal rent. At the same time, the Church flourished in those centuries, and beautiful white stone churches were built everywhere. What was quite natural: scattered principalities could not afford such construction, but only a de facto confederation united under the rule of the Khan of the Golden Horde or Ulus Jochi, as it would be more correct to call our common state with the Tatars.”

Most history textbooks say that in the 13th-15th centuries Rus' suffered from the Mongol-Tatar yoke. However, recently the voices of those who doubt that the invasion even took place have been increasingly heard. Did huge hordes of nomads really surge into peaceful principalities, enslaving their inhabitants? Let's analyze historical facts, many of which may be shocking.

The yoke was invented by the Poles

The term “Mongol-Tatar yoke” itself was coined by Polish authors. The chronicler and diplomat Jan Dlugosz in 1479 called the time of existence of the Golden Horde this way. He was followed in 1517 by the historian Matvey Miechowski, who worked at the University of Krakow. This interpretation of the relationship between Rus' and the Mongol conquerors was quickly picked up in Western Europe, and from there it was borrowed by domestic historians.

Moreover, there were practically no Tatars themselves in the Horde troops. It’s just that in Europe the name of this Asian people was well known, and therefore it spread to the Mongols. Meanwhile, Genghis Khan tried to exterminate the entire Tatar tribe, defeating their army in 1202.

The first census of Rus'

The first population census in the history of Rus' was carried out by representatives of the Horde. They had to collect accurate information about the inhabitants of each principality and their class affiliation. The main reason for such interest in statistics on the part of the Mongols was the need to calculate the amount of taxes imposed on their subjects.

In 1246, a census took place in Kyiv and Chernigov, the Ryazan principality was subjected to statistical analysis in 1257, the Novgorodians were counted two years later, and the population of the Smolensk region - in 1275.

Moreover, the inhabitants of Rus' raised popular uprisings and drove out the so-called “besermen” who were collecting tribute for the khans of Mongolia from their land. But the governors of the rulers of the Golden Horde, called Baskaks, lived and worked for a long time in the Russian principalities, sending collected taxes to Sarai-Batu, and later to Sarai-Berke.

Joint hikes

Princely squads and Horde warriors often carried out joint military campaigns, both against other Russians and against residents of Eastern Europe. Thus, in the period 1258-1287, the troops of the Mongols and Galician princes regularly attacked Poland, Hungary and Lithuania. And in 1277, the Russians took part in the Mongol military campaign in the North Caucasus, helping their allies conquer Alanya.

In 1333, Muscovites stormed Novgorod, and the next year the Bryansk squad marched on Smolensk. Each time, Horde troops also took part in these internecine battles. In addition, they regularly helped the great princes of Tver, considered at that time the main rulers of Rus', to pacify the rebellious neighboring lands.

The basis of the horde were Russians

The Arab traveler Ibn Battuta, who visited the city of Saray-Berke in 1334, wrote in his essay “A Gift to Those Contemplating the Wonders of Cities and the Wonders of Travel” that there are many Russians in the capital of the Golden Horde. Moreover, they make up the bulk of the population: both working and armed.

This fact was also mentioned by the White émigré author Andrei Gordeev in the book “History of the Cossacks,” which was published in France in the late 20s of the 20th century. According to the researcher, most of the Horde troops were the so-called Brodniks - ethnic Slavs who inhabited the Azov region and the Don steppes. These predecessors of the Cossacks did not want to obey the princes, so they moved to the south for the sake of a free life. The name of this ethnosocial group probably comes from the Russian word “wander” (wander).

As is known from chronicle sources, in the Battle of Kalka in 1223, the Brodniks, led by the governor Ploskyna, fought on the side of the Mongol troops. Perhaps his knowledge of the tactics and strategy of the princely squads was of great importance for the victory over the united Russian-Polovtsian forces.

In addition, it was Ploskynya who, by cunning, lured out the ruler of Kyiv, Mstislav Romanovich, along with two Turov-Pinsk princes and handed them over to the Mongols for execution.

However, most historians believe that the Mongols forced Russians to serve in their army, i.e. the invaders forcibly armed representatives of the enslaved people. Although this seems implausible.

And a senior researcher at the Institute of Archeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Marina Poluboyarinova, in the book “Russian People in the Golden Horde” (Moscow, 1978) suggested: “Probably, the forced participation of Russian soldiers in the Tatar army later ceased. There were mercenaries left who had already voluntarily joined the Tatar troops.”

Caucasian invaders

Yesugei-Baghatur, the father of Genghis Khan, was a representative of the Borjigin clan of the Mongolian Kiyat tribe. According to the descriptions of many eyewitnesses, both he and his legendary son were tall, fair-skinned people with reddish hair.

The Persian scientist Rashid ad-Din wrote in his work “Collection of Chronicles” (beginning of the 14th century) that all the descendants of the great conqueror were mostly blond and gray-eyed.

This means that the elite of the Golden Horde belonged to Caucasians. It is likely that representatives of this race predominated among other invaders.

There weren't many of them

We are accustomed to believe that in the 13th century Rus' was invaded by countless hordes of Mongol-Tatars. Some historians talk about 500,000 troops. However, it is not. After all, even the population of modern Mongolia barely exceeds 3 million people, and if we take into account the brutal genocide of fellow tribesmen committed by Genghis Khan on his way to power, the size of his army could not be so impressive.

It is difficult to imagine how to feed an army of half a million, moreover, traveling on horses. The animals simply would not have enough pasture. But each Mongolian horseman brought with him at least three horses. Now imagine a herd of 1.5 million. The horses of the warriors riding at the forefront of the army would eat and trample everything they could. The remaining horses would have starved to death.

According to the most daring estimates, the army of Genghis Khan and Batu could not have exceeded 30 thousand horsemen. While the population of Ancient Rus', according to historian Georgy Vernadsky (1887-1973), before the invasion was about 7.5 million people.

Bloodless executions

The Mongols, like most peoples of that time, executed people who were not noble or disrespected by cutting off their heads. However, if the condemned person enjoyed authority, then his spine was broken and left to slowly die.

The Mongols were sure that blood was the seat of the soul. To shed it means to complicate the afterlife path of the deceased to other worlds. Bloodless execution was applied to rulers, political and military figures, and shamans.

The reason for a death sentence in the Golden Horde could be any crime: from desertion from the battlefield to petty theft.

The bodies of the dead were thrown into the steppe

The method of burial of a Mongol also directly depended on his social status. Rich and influential people found peace in special burials, in which valuables, gold and silver jewelry, and household items were buried along with the bodies of the dead. And the poor and ordinary soldiers killed in battle were often simply left in the steppe, where their life’s journey ended.

In the alarming conditions of nomadic life, consisting of regular skirmishes with enemies, it was difficult to organize funeral rites. The Mongols often had to move on quickly, without delay.

It was believed that the corpse of a worthy person would be quickly eaten by scavengers and vultures. But if birds and animals did not touch the body for a long time, according to popular beliefs, this meant that the soul of the deceased had a grave sin.

o (Mongol-Tatar, Tatar-Mongol, Horde) - the traditional name for the system of exploitation of Russian lands by nomadic conquerors who came from the East from 1237 to 1480.

This system was aimed at carrying out mass terror and robbing the Russian people by levying cruel exactions. She acted primarily in the interests of the Mongolian nomadic military-feudal nobility (noyons), in whose favor the lion's share of the collected tribute went.

The Mongol-Tatar yoke was established as a result of the invasion of Batu Khan in the 13th century. Until the early 1260s, Rus' was under the rule of the great Mongol khans, and then the khans of the Golden Horde.

The Russian principalities were not directly part of the Mongol state and retained the local princely administration, the activities of which were controlled by the Baskaks - the khan's representatives in the conquered lands. The Russian princes were tributaries of the Mongol khans and received from them labels for ownership of their principalities. Formally, the Mongol-Tatar yoke was established in 1243, when Prince Yaroslav Vsevolodovich received from the Mongols a label for the Grand Duchy of Vladimir. Rus', according to the label, lost the right to fight and had to regularly pay tribute to the khans twice annually (in spring and autumn).

There was no permanent Mongol-Tatar army on the territory of Rus'. The yoke was supported by punitive campaigns and repressions against rebellious princes. The regular flow of tribute from Russian lands began after the census of 1257-1259, conducted by Mongol “numerals”. The units of taxation were: in cities - yard, in rural areas - “village”, “plow”, “plough”. Only the clergy were exempt from tribute. The main “Horde burdens” were: “exit”, or “tsar’s tribute” - a tax directly for the Mongol khan; trade fees (“myt”, “tamka”); carriage duties (“pits”, “carts”); maintenance of the khan's ambassadors (“food”); various “gifts” and “honors” to the khan, his relatives and associates. Every year, a huge amount of silver left the Russian lands as tribute. Large “requests” for military and other needs were periodically collected. In addition, the Russian princes were obliged, by order of the khan, to send soldiers to participate in campaigns and in round-up hunts (“lovitva”). In the late 1250s and early 1260s, tribute was collected from the Russian principalities by Muslim merchants (“besermen”), who bought this right from the great Mongol Khan. Most of the tribute went to the Great Khan in Mongolia. During the uprisings of 1262, the “besermans” were expelled from Russian cities, and the responsibility for collecting tribute passed to the local princes.

Rus''s struggle against the yoke became increasingly widespread. In 1285, Grand Duke Dmitry Alexandrovich (son of Alexander Nevsky) defeated and expelled the army of the “Horde prince”. At the end of the 13th - first quarter of the 14th century, performances in Russian cities led to the elimination of the Baskas. With the strengthening of the Moscow principality, the Tatar yoke gradually weakened. Moscow Prince Ivan Kalita (reigned in 1325-1340) achieved the right to collect “exit” from all Russian principalities. From the middle of the 14th century, the orders of the khans of the Golden Horde, not supported by a real military threat, were no longer carried out by the Russian princes. Dmitry Donskoy (1359-1389) did not recognize the khan's labels issued to his rivals, and seized the Grand Duchy of Vladimir by force. In 1378, he defeated the Tatar army on the Vozha River in the Ryazan land, and in 1380 he defeated the Golden Horde ruler Mamai in the Battle of Kulikovo.

However, after Tokhtamysh’s campaign and the capture of Moscow in 1382, Rus' was forced to again recognize the power of the Golden Horde and pay tribute, but already Vasily I Dmitrievich (1389-1425) received the great reign of Vladimir without the khan’s label, as “his patrimony.” Under him, the yoke was nominal. Tribute was paid irregularly, and the Russian princes pursued independent policies. The attempt of the Golden Horde ruler Edigei (1408) to restore full power over Russia ended in failure: he failed to take Moscow. The strife that began in the Golden Horde opened up the possibility for Russia to overthrow the Tatar yoke.

However, in the middle of the 15th century, Muscovite Rus' itself experienced a period of internecine war, which weakened its military potential. During these years, the Tatar rulers organized a series of devastating invasions, but they were no longer able to bring the Russians to complete submission. The unification of Russian lands around Moscow led to the concentration in the hands of the Moscow princes of such political power that the weakening Tatar khans could not cope with. The Grand Duke of Moscow Ivan III Vasilyevich (1462-1505) refused to pay tribute in 1476. In 1480, after the unsuccessful campaign of the Khan of the Great Horde Akhmat and “standing on the Ugra”, the yoke was finally overthrown.

The Mongol-Tatar yoke had negative, regressive consequences for the economic, political and cultural development of the Russian lands, and was a brake on the growth of the productive forces of Rus', which were at a higher socio-economic level compared to the productive forces of the Mongol state. It artificially preserved for a long time the purely feudal natural character of the economy. Politically, the consequences of the yoke were manifested in the disruption of the natural process of state development of Rus', in the artificial maintenance of its fragmentation. The Mongol-Tatar yoke, which lasted two and a half centuries, was one of the reasons for the economic, political and cultural lag of Rus' from Western European countries.

The material was prepared based on information from open sources.

There are a large number of facts that not only clearly refute the hypothesis of the Tatar-Mongol yoke, but also indicate that history was distorted deliberately, and that this was done for a very specific purpose... But who and why deliberately distorted history? What real events did they want to hide and why?

If we analyze the historical facts, it becomes obvious that the “Tatar-Mongol yoke” was invented in order to hide the consequences of the “baptism” of Kievan Rus. After all, this religion was imposed in a far from peaceful way... In the process of “baptism”, most of the population of the Kyiv principality was destroyed! It definitely becomes clear that those forces that were behind the imposition of this religion subsequently fabricated history, juggling historical facts to suit themselves and their goals...

1. Genghis Khan

Previously, in Rus', 2 people were responsible for governing the state: Prince And Khan. The prince was responsible for governing the state in peacetime. The khan or “war prince” took the reins of control during war; in peacetime, the responsibility for forming a horde (army) and maintaining it in combat readiness rested on his shoulders.

French engraving by Pierre Duflos (1742-1816)

Reconstruction of the throne of Genghis Khan with the ancestral tamga with a swastika.

2. Mongolia

3. Composition of the “Tatar-Mongol” army

4. What did the “Tatar-Mongols” look like?

Pay attention to the drawing of the tomb of Henry II the Pious, who was killed on the Legnica field.

The inscription is as follows: “The figure of a Tatar under the feet of Henry II, Duke of Silesia, Cracow and Poland, placed on the grave in Breslau of this prince, killed in the battle with the Tatars at Liegnitz on April 9, 1241.” As we see, this “Tatar” has a completely Russian appearance, clothes and weapons. The next image shows “the Khan’s palace in the capital of the Mongol Empire, Khanbalyk” (it is believed that Khanbalyk is supposedly Beijing).

What is “Mongolian” and what is “Chinese” here? Once again, as in the case of the tomb of Henry II, before us are people of a clearly Slavic appearance. Russian caftans, Streltsy caps, the same thick beards, the same characteristic blades of sabers called “Yelman”. The roof on the left is an almost exact copy of the roofs of old Russian towers... (A. Bushkov, “Russia that never existed”).

5. Genetic examination

6. Documents during the period of the Tatar-Mongol yoke

During the period of existence of the Tatar-Mongol yoke, not a single document in the Tatar or Mongolian language has been preserved. But there are many documents from this time in Russian.

7. Lack of objective evidence confirming the hypothesis of the Tatar-Mongol yoke

Before Nikon’s church reform, which was carried out in the mid-17th century, Christianity in Rus' was called “orthodox.” It began to be called Orthodox only after this reform... Therefore, this document could have been written no earlier than the mid-17th century and has nothing to do with the era of the “Tatar-Mongol yoke”...

On all maps that were published before 1772 and were not subsequently corrected, you can see the following picture.

The western part of Rus' is called Muscovy, or Moscow Tartary... This small part of Rus' was ruled by the Romanov dynasty. Until the end of the 18th century, the Moscow Tsar was called the ruler of Moscow Tartaria or the Duke (Prince) of Moscow. The rest of Rus', which occupied almost the entire continent of Eurasia in the east and south of Muscovy at that time, is called Tartaria or the Russian Empire (see map).

In the 1st edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica of 1771 the following is written about this part of Rus':

“Tartaria, a huge country in the northern part of Asia, bordering Siberia in the north and west: which is called Great Tartary. Those Tartars living south of Muscovy and Siberia are called Astrakhan, Cherkasy and Dagestan, those living in the northwest of the Caspian Sea are called Kalmyk Tartars and which occupy the territory between Siberia and the Caspian Sea; Uzbek Tartars and Mongols, who live north of Persia and India, and, finally, Tibetans, living northwest of China..."(see website “Food RA”)…

Where did the name Tartaria come from?

Our ancestors knew the laws of nature and the real structure of the world, life, and man. But, as now, the level of development of each person was not the same in those days. People who went much further in their development than others, and who could control space and matter (control the weather, heal diseases, see the future, etc.) were called Magi. Those Magi who knew how to control space at the planetary level and above were called Gods.

That is, the meaning of the word God among our ancestors was completely different from what it is now. The gods were people who went much further in their development than the vast majority of people. For an ordinary person, their abilities seemed incredible, however, the gods were also people, and the capabilities of each god had their own limits.

Our ancestors had patrons - God Tarkh, he was also called Dazhdbog (the giving God) and his sister - Goddess Tara. These Gods helped people solve problems that our ancestors could not solve on their own. So, the gods Tarkh and Tara taught our ancestors how to build houses, cultivate the land, write and much more, which was necessary in order to survive after the disaster and eventually restore civilization.

Therefore, quite recently our ancestors told strangers “We are the children of Tarkh and Tara...”. They said this because in their development, they really were children in relation to Tarkh and Tara, who had significantly advanced in development. And residents of other countries called our ancestors “Tarkhtars”, and later, due to the difficulty of pronunciation, “Tartars”. This is where the name of the country came from - Tartaria...

Baptism of Rus'

What does the baptism of Rus' have to do with it? – some may ask. As it turned out, it had a lot to do with it. After all, baptism did not take place in a peaceful way... Before baptism, people in Rus' were educated, almost everyone knew how to read, write, and count (see the article “Russian culture is older than European”). Let us recall from the school history curriculum, at least, the same “Birch Bark Letters” - letters that peasants wrote to each other on birch bark from one village to another.

Our ancestors had a Vedic worldview, as I wrote above, it was not a religion. Since the essence of any religion comes down to the blind acceptance of any dogmas and rules, without a deep understanding of why it is necessary to do it this way and not otherwise. The Vedic worldview gave people precisely an understanding of the real laws of nature, an understanding of how the world works, what is good and what is bad.

People saw what happened after the “baptism” in neighboring countries, when, under the influence of religion, a successful, highly developed country with an educated population, in a matter of years, plunged into ignorance and chaos, where only representatives of the aristocracy could read and write, and not all of them. ..

Everyone understood perfectly well what the “Greek Religion” carried, into which Prince Vladimir the Bloody and those who stood behind him were going to baptize Kievan Rus. Therefore, none of the residents of the then Principality of Kyiv (a province that broke away from Great Tartary) accepted this religion. But Vladimir had great forces behind him, and they were not going to retreat.

In the process of “baptism” over 12 years of forced Christianization, almost the entire adult population of Kievan Rus was destroyed, with rare exceptions. Because such a “teaching” could be imposed only on unreasonable children who, due to their youth, could not yet understand that such a religion turned them into slaves in both the physical and spiritual sense of the word. Everyone who refused to accept the new “faith” was killed. This is confirmed by the facts that have reached us. If before the “baptism” there were 300 cities and 12 million inhabitants on the territory of Kievan Rus, then after the “baptism” only 30 cities and 3 million people remained! 270 cities were destroyed! 9 million people were killed! (Diy Vladimir, “Orthodox Rus' before the adoption of Christianity and after”).

But despite the fact that almost the entire adult population of Kievan Rus was destroyed by the “holy” baptists, the Vedic tradition did not disappear. On the lands of Kievan Rus, the so-called dual faith was established. Most of the population formally recognized the imposed religion of the slaves, and they themselves continued to live according to the Vedic tradition, although without flaunting it. And this phenomenon was observed not only among the masses, but also among part of the ruling elite. And this state of affairs continued until the reform of Patriarch Nikon, who figured out how to deceive everyone.

But the Vedic Slavic-Aryan Empire (Great Tartaria) could not calmly look at the machinations of its enemies, who destroyed three quarters of the population of the Principality of Kyiv. Only its response could not be instantaneous, due to the fact that the army of Great Tartaria was busy with conflicts on its Far Eastern borders. But these retaliatory actions of the Vedic empire were carried out and entered modern history in a distorted form, under the name of the Mongol-Tatar invasion of the hordes of Batu Khan on Kievan Rus.

Only by the summer of 1223 did the troops of the Vedic Empire appear on the Kalka River. And the united army of the Polovtsians and Russian princes was completely defeated. This is what they taught us in history lessons, and no one could really explain why the Russian princes fought the “enemies” so sluggishly, and many of them even went over to the side of the “Mongols”?

The reason for such absurdity was that the Russian princes, who accepted an alien religion, knew perfectly well who came and why...

So, there was no Mongol-Tatar invasion and yoke, but there was a return of the rebellious provinces under the wing of the metropolis, the restoration of the integrity of the state. Khan Batu had the task of returning the Western European province-states under the wing of the Vedic empire and stopping the invasion of Christians into Rus'. But the strong resistance of some princes, who felt the taste of the still limited, but very large power of the principalities of Kievan Rus, and new unrest on the Far Eastern border did not allow these plans to be brought to completion (N.V. Levashov “Russia in distorting mirrors”, Volume 2.).

conclusions

In fact, after baptism in the Principality of Kiev, only children and a very small part of the adult population remained alive, which accepted the Greek religion - 3 million people out of a population of 12 million before baptism. The principality was completely devastated, most of the cities, towns and villages were plundered and burned. But the authors of the version about the “Tatar-Mongol yoke” paint exactly the same picture for us, the only difference is that these same cruel actions were allegedly carried out there by “Tatar-Mongols”!

As always, the winner writes history. And it becomes obvious that in order to hide all the cruelty with which the Principality of Kiev was baptized, and in order to suppress all possible questions, the “Tatar-Mongol yoke” was subsequently invented. The children were raised in the traditions of the Greek religion (the cult of Dionysius, and later Christianity) and history was rewritten, where all the cruelty was blamed on the “wild nomads”...

The famous statement of President V.V. Putin about the Battle of Kulikovo, in which the Russians allegedly fought against the Tatars and Mongols...

The Tatar-Mongol yoke is the biggest myth in history.

It is noteworthy that the epithet “established” is most often applied to myths.
This is where the root of evil lurks: myths take root in the mind as a result of a simple process - mechanical repetition.

ABOUT WHAT EVERYONE KNOWS

The classical version, that is, recognized by modern science, of the “Mongol-Tatar invasion of Rus'”, the “Mongol-Tatar yoke” and “liberation from the Horde tyranny” is quite well known, but it would be useful to refresh your memory once again. So... At the beginning of the 13th century, in the Mongolian steppes, a brave and devilishly energetic tribal leader named Genghis Khan put together a huge army of nomads, welded together with iron discipline, and set out to conquer the whole world, “to the last sea.” Having conquered their closest neighbors, and then captured China, the mighty Tatar-Mongol horde rolled west. Having traveled about five thousand kilometers, the Mongols defeated the state of Khorezm, then Georgia, and in 1223 they reached the southern outskirts of Rus', where they defeated the army of the Russian princes in the battle on the Kalka River. In the winter of 1237, the Mongol-Tatars invaded Rus' with their entire innumerable army, burned and destroyed many Russian cities, and in 1241, in fulfillment of the behests of Genghis Khan, they tried to conquer Western Europe - they invaded Poland, the Czech Republic, and reached shores of the Adriatic Sea, however, they turned back because they were afraid to leave Russia in their rear, devastated, but still dangerous for them. And the Tatar-Mongol yoke began. The huge Mongol empire, stretching from Beijing to the Volga, hung like an ominous shadow over Russia. The Mongol khans gave the Russian princes labels to reign, attacked Rus' many times to plunder and plunder, and repeatedly killed Russian princes in their Golden Horde. It should be clarified that there were many Christians among the Mongols, and therefore some Russian princes established rather close, friendly relations with the Horde rulers, even becoming their brothers-in-arms. With the help of the Tatar-Mongol detachments, other princes were kept on the “table” (i.e. on the throne), solved their purely internal problems, and even collected tribute for the Golden Horde on their own.

Having strengthened over time, Rus' began to show its teeth. In 1380, the Grand Duke of Moscow Dmitry Donskoy defeated the Horde Khan Mamai with his Tatars, and a century later, in the so-called “stand on the Ugra” the troops of the Grand Duke Ivan III and the Horde Khan Akhmat met. The opponents camped for a long time on opposite sides of the Ugra River, after which Khan Akhmat, finally realizing that the Russians had become strong and he had every chance of losing the battle, gave the order to retreat and led his horde to the Volga. These events are considered the “end of the Tatar-Mongol yoke.”

VERSION
All of the above is a brief summary or, speaking in a foreign manner, a digest. The minimum that “every intelligent person” should know.

...I am close to the method that Conan Doyle gave to the impeccable logician Sherlock Holmes: first, the true version of what happened is stated, and then the chain of reasoning that led Holmes to the discovery of the truth.

This is exactly what I intend to do. First, present your own version of the “Horde” period of Russian history, and then, over the course of a couple of hundred pages, methodically substantiate your hypothesis, referring not so much to your own feelings and “insights,” but to the chronicles, the works of historians of the past, which turned out to be undeservedly forgotten.

I intend to prove to the reader that the classical hypothesis briefly outlined above is completely wrong, that what actually happened fits into the following theses:

1. No “Mongols” came to Rus' from their steppes.

2. The Tatars are not aliens, but residents of the Volga region, who lived in the neighborhood of the Russians long before the notorious invasion."

3. What is commonly called the Tatar-Mongol invasion was in fact a struggle between the descendants of Prince Vsevolod the Big Nest (son of Yaroslav and grandson of Alexander) with their rival princes for sole power over Russia. Accordingly, Yaroslav and Alexander Nevsky perform under the names of Genghis Khan and Batu.

4. Mamai and Akhmat were not alien raiders, but noble nobles, who, according to the dynastic ties of the Russian-Tatar families, had the right to a great reign. Accordingly, “Mamaevo’s Massacre” and “Standing on the Ugra” are not episodes of the fight against foreign aggressors, but of another civil war in Rus'.

5. To prove the truth of all of the above, there is no need to turn the historical sources we currently have on their heads. It is enough to re-read many Russian chronicles and the works of early historians thoughtfully. Weed out frankly fabulous moments and draw logical conclusions instead of thoughtlessly accepting the official theory, whose weight lies mainly not in evidence, but in the fact that the “classical theory” has simply been established over many centuries. Having reached the stage at which any objections are interrupted by a seemingly iron argument: “For mercy, but EVERYONE KNOWS this!”

Alas, the argument only looks ironclad... Just five hundred years ago, “everyone knew” that the Sun revolves around the Earth. Two hundred years ago, the French Academy of Sciences, in an official paper, ridiculed those who believed in stones falling from the sky. Academicians, in general, should not be judged too harshly: and in fact, “everyone knew” that the sky is not the firmament, but air, where stones have nowhere to come from. One important clarification: no one knew that stones fly outside the atmosphere and can often fall to the ground...

We should not forget that many of our ancestors (more precisely, all of them) had several names. Even simple peasants bore at least two names: one - secular, by which everyone knew the person, the second - baptismal.

One of the most famous statesmen of Ancient Rus', the Kiev prince Vladimir Vsevolodich Monomakh, it turns out, is familiar to us under worldly, pagan names. In baptism he was Vasily, and his father was Andrey, so his name was Vasily Andreevich Monomakh. And his grandson Izyaslav Mstislavich, according to his and his father’s baptismal names, should be called Panteleimon Fedorovich!) The baptismal name sometimes remained a secret even for loved ones - cases were recorded when in the first half of the 19th (!) century, inconsolable relatives and friends only found out after the death of the head of the family , that a completely different name should be written on the tombstone, with which the deceased, it turns out, was baptized... In church books, he was, say, listed as Ilya - meanwhile, all his life he was known as Nikita...

WHERE ARE THE MONGOLS?
In fact, where is the “better half” of the phrase “Mongol-Tatar” horde that has stuck in the teeth? Where are the Mongols themselves, according to other zealous authors, who constituted a kind of aristocracy, the cementing core of the army that rolled into Rus'?

So, the most interesting and mysterious thing is that not a single contemporary of those events (or who lived in fairly close times) is able to find the Mongols!

They simply don’t exist - black-haired, slant-eyed people, those whom, without further ado, anthropologists call “Mongoloids.” No, even if you crack it!

It was possible to trace only the traces of two Mongoloid tribes that undoubtedly came from Central Asia - the Jalairs and Barlases. But they didn’t come to Rus' as part of Genghis’s army, but to... Semirechye (a region of present-day Kazakhstan). From there, in the second half of the 13th century, the Jalairs migrated to the area of present-day Khojent, and the Barlases to the valley of the Kashkadarya River. From Semirechye they...came to some extent Turkified in the sense of language. In the new place they were already so Turkified that in the 14th century, at least in the second half, they considered the Turkic language their native language" (from the fundamental work of B.D. Grekov and A.Yu. Yakubovsky "Rus and Golden Horde" (1950).

All. Historians, no matter how hard they try, are unable to discover any other Mongols. Among the peoples who came to Rus' in the Batu Horde, the Russian chronicler puts in first place the “Cumans” - that is, the Kipchaks-Polovtsians! Who lived not in present-day Mongolia, but practically next to the Russians, who (as I will prove later) had their own fortresses, cities and villages!

Arab historian Elomari: “In ancient times, this state (Golden Horde of the 14th century - A. Bushkov) was the country of the Kipchaks, but when the Tatars took possession of it, the Kipchaks became their subjects. Then they, that is, the Tatars, mixed and became related to them, and they all definitely became Kipchaks, as if they were of the same kind as them.”

The fact that the Tatars did not come from anywhere, but from time immemorial lived close to the Russians, I will tell you a little later, when I explode, honestly, a serious bomb. In the meantime, let us pay attention to an extremely important circumstance: there are no Mongols. The Golden Horde is represented by Tatars and Kipchaks-Polovtsians, who are not Mongoloids, but of the normal Caucasoid type, fair-haired, light-eyed, not at all slanted... (And their language is similar to Slavic.)

Like Genghis Khan and Batu. Ancient sources depict Genghis as tall, long-bearded, with “lynx-like” green-yellow eyes. Persian historian Rashid
ad-Din (a contemporary of the “Mongol” wars) writes that in the family of Genghis Khan, children “were mostly born with gray eyes and blond hair.” G.E. Grumm-Grzhimailo mentions a “Mongolian” (is it Mongolian?!) legend, according to which Genghis’s ancestor in the ninth tribe, Boduanchar, is blond and blue-eyed! And the same Rashid ad-Din also writes that this very family name Borjigin, assigned to the descendants of Boduanchar, just means... Gray-eyed!

By the way, Batu’s appearance is depicted in exactly the same way - fair hair, light beard, light eyes... The author of these lines lived his entire adult life not so far from the places where Genghis Khan allegedly “created his innumerable army.” I’ve already seen enough of the original Mongoloid people - Khakassians, Tuvinians, Altaians, and even the Mongols themselves. None of them are fair-haired or light-eyed, a completely different anthropological type...

By the way, there are no names “Batu” or “Batu” in any language of the Mongolian group. But “Batu” is in Bashkir, and “Basty,” as already mentioned, is in Polovtsian. So the very name of Genghis’s son definitely did not come from Mongolia.

I wonder what his fellow tribesmen in the “real”, present-day Mongolia wrote about their glorious ancestor Genghis Khan?

The answer is disappointing: in the 13th century, the Mongolian alphabet did not yet exist. Absolutely all chronicles of the Mongols were written no earlier than the 17th century. And therefore, any mention of the fact that Genghis Khan actually came out of Mongolia will be nothing more than a retelling of ancient legends written down three hundred years later... Which, presumably, the “real” Mongols really liked - undoubtedly, it was very pleasant to suddenly find out that your ancestors, it turns out, once walked with fire and sword all the way to the Adriatic...

So, we have already clarified a rather important circumstance: there were no Mongols in the “Mongol-Tatar” horde, i.e. black-haired and narrow-eyed inhabitants of Central Asia, who in the 13th century, presumably, peacefully roamed their steppes. Someone else “came” to Rus' - fair-haired, gray-eyed, blue-eyed people of European appearance. But in fact, they came not from so far away - from the Polovtsian steppes, no further.

HOW MANY "MONGOLO-TATAR" WERE THERE?
In fact, how many of them came to Rus'? Let's start finding out. Russian pre-revolutionary sources mention a “half-million-strong Mongol army.”

Sorry for the harshness, but both the first and second numbers are bullshit. Because they were invented by townspeople, armchair figures who saw the horse only from afar and had absolutely no idea what kind of care it takes to maintain a fighting, as well as a pack and marching horse in working condition.

Any warrior of a nomadic tribe goes on a campaign with three horses (the bare minimum is two). One carries luggage (small "packed rations", horseshoes, spare straps for a bridle, all sorts of small things like spare arrows, armor that does not need to be worn on the march, etc.). From the second to the third you need to change from time to time so that one horse is a little rested all the time - you never know what happens, sometimes you have to enter into battle “from the wheels”, i.e. from the hooves.

A primitive calculation shows: for an army of half a million or four hundred thousand soldiers, about one and a half million horses are needed, in extreme cases - a million. Such a herd will be able to advance at most fifty kilometers, but will not be able to go further - the front ones will instantly destroy the grass over a huge area, so that the rear ones will die from lack of food very quickly. Store as much oats for them in toroks (and how much can you store?).

Let me remind you that the invasion of the “Mongol-Tatars” into Rus', all the main invasions unfolded in the winter. When the remaining grass is hidden under the snow, and grain has yet to be taken from the population - in addition, a lot of fodder perishes in burning cities and villages...

It may be objected: the Mongolian horse is excellent at getting food for itself from under the snow. Everything is correct. "Mongolians" are hardy creatures, capable of living the entire winter on "self-sufficiency." I saw them myself, I rode a little once on one, although there was no rider. Magnificent creatures, I am forever fascinated by horses of the Mongolian breed and with great pleasure would exchange my car for such a horse if it were possible to keep it in the city (which, alas, is not possible).

However, in our case the above argument does not work. Firstly, ancient sources do not mention the horses of the Mongolian breed that were “in service” with the horde. On the contrary, horse breeding experts unanimously prove that the “Tatar-Mongolian” horde rode Turkmens - and this is a completely different breed, and looks different, and is not always capable of surviving the winter without human help...

Secondly, the difference between a horse allowed to wander in the winter without any work, and a horse forced to make long journeys under a rider and also participate in battles, is not taken into account. Even the Mongolians, if there were a million of them, with all their fantastic ability to feed themselves in the middle of a snow-covered plain, would die of hunger, interfering with each other, beating each other's rare blades of grass...

But in addition to the horsemen, they were also forced to carry heavy booty!

But the “Mongols” also had rather large convoys with them. The cattle that pull the carts also need to be fed, otherwise they won’t pull the cart...

In a word, throughout the twentieth century, the number of “Mongol-Tatars” who attacked Rus' dried up, like the famous shagreen skin. In the end, the historians, gnashing their teeth, settled on thirty thousand - the remnants of professional pride simply do not allow them to go lower.

And one more thing... Fear of allowing heretical theories like mine into Big Historiography. Because even if we take the number of “invading Mongols” to be thirty thousand, a series of malicious questions arise...

And the first among them will be this: isn’t it enough? No matter how you refer to the “disunity” of the Russian principalities, thirty thousand cavalry is too meager a figure to cause “fire and ruin” throughout Rus'! After all, they (even supporters of the “classical” version admit this) did not move in a compact mass, falling en masse one by one on Russian cities. Several detachments scattered in different directions - and this reduces the number of “innumerable Tatar hordes” to the limit, beyond which elementary mistrust begins: well, such a number of aggressors could not, no matter what discipline their regiments were welded together (and, moreover, cut off from supply bases, as if a group of saboteurs behind enemy lines), to “capture” Rus'!

It turns out to be a vicious circle: a huge army of “Mongol-Tatars”, for purely physical reasons, would not be able to maintain combat effectiveness, move quickly, or deliver those same notorious “indestructible blows.” A small army would never have been able to establish control over most of the territory of Rus'.

Only our hypothesis can get rid of this vicious circle - that there were no aliens. There was a civil war, the enemy forces were relatively small - and they relied on their own forage reserves accumulated in the cities.

By the way, it is completely unusual for nomads to fight in winter. But winter is a favorite time for Russian military campaigns. From time immemorial, they went on campaigns, using frozen rivers as “travel roads” - the most optimal way of waging war in a territory almost entirely overgrown with dense forests, where it would be damn difficult for any large military detachment, especially cavalry, to move.

All the chronicle information that has reached us about the military campaigns of 1237-1238. they depict the classic Russian style of these battles - the battles take place in winter, and the “Mongols,” who seem to be supposed to be classic steppe inhabitants, act with amazing skill in the forests. First of all, I mean the encirclement and subsequent complete destruction on the City River of the Russian detachment under the command of the Grand Duke of Vladimir Yuri Vsevolodovich... Such a brilliant operation could not have been carried out by the inhabitants of the steppes, who simply had no time, and there was no place to learn how to fight in the thicket .

So, our piggy bank is gradually replenished with weighty evidence. We found out that there are no “Mongols”, i.e. For some reason there were no Mongoloids among the “horde”. They found out that there could not have been many “aliens”, that even that tiny number of thirty thousand, on which historians settled, like the Swedes near Poltava, could not in any way ensure the “Mongols” establishing control over all of Russia. They found out that the horses under the “Mongols” were not Mongolian at all, and for some reason these “Mongols” fought according to Russian rules. And they were, curiously enough, blond-haired and blue-eyed.

Not too little to begin with. And I warn you, we are just getting the taste...

WHERE DID THE "MONGOLS" COME WHEN COME TO Rus'?
That's right, I didn't mess anything up. And very quickly the reader learns that the question in the title appears to be nonsense only at first glance...

We have already talked about a second Moscow and a second Krakow. There is also a second Samara - “Samara Grad”, a fortress on the site of the current city of Novomoskovsk, 29 kilometers north of Dnepropetrovsk...

In a word, the geographical names of the Middle Ages did not always coincide with what we understand today as a certain name. Today, for us, Rus' means the entire land of that time inhabited by Russians.

But the people of that time thought somewhat differently... Every time you read about the events of the 12th-13th centuries, you must remember: then “Rus” was the name given to part of the regions populated by Russians - the Kiev, Pereyaslav and Chernigov principalities. More precisely: Kyiv, Chernigov, the Ros River, Porosye, Pereyaslavl-Russky, Seversk land, Kursk. Quite often in ancient chronicles it is written that from Novgorod or Vladimir... “we went to Rus'”! That is, to Kyiv. Chernigov cities are “Russian”, but Smolensk cities are already “non-Russian”.

Historian of the 17th century: "...Slavs, our ancestors - Moscow, Russians and Others..."

Exactly. It is not for nothing that on Western European maps for a very long time Russian lands were divided into “Muscovy” (north) and “Russia” (south). Last title
lasted an extremely long time - as we remember, the inhabitants of those lands where “Ukraine” is now located, being Russian by blood, Catholics by religion and subjects of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (as the author calls the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which is more familiar to us - Sapfir_t), called themselves “Russian gentry."

Thus, chronicle messages like “such and such a year a horde attacked Rus'” should be treated taking into account what is said above. Remember: this mention does not mean aggression against all of Rus', but an attack on a specific area, strictly localized.

KALKA - A BALL OF RIDDLES
The first clash between the Russians and the “Mongol-Tatars” on the Kalka River in 1223 is described in some detail in ancient Russian chronicles - however, not only in them, there is also the so-called “Tale of the Battle of the Kalka, and about the Russian princes, and about seventy heroes."

However, the abundance of information does not always bring clarity... In general, historical science has long no longer denied the obvious fact that the events on the Kalka River were not an attack of evil aliens on Rus', but Russian aggression against their neighbors. Judge for yourself. The Tatars (in the descriptions of the Battle of Kalka the Mongols are never mentioned) fought with the Polovtsians. And they sent ambassadors to Rus', who rather friendly asked the Russians not to interfere in this war. The Russian princes... killed these ambassadors, and according to some old texts, they didn’t just kill them - they “tortured them.” The act, to put it mildly, is not the most decent - at all times, the murder of an ambassador was considered one of the most serious crimes. Following this, the Russian army sets out on a long march.

Having left the borders of Rus', it first attacks the Tatar camp, takes booty, steals cattle, after which it moves deeper into foreign territory for another eight days. There, on Kalka, the decisive battle takes place, the Polovtsian allies flee in panic, the princes are left alone, they fight back for three days, after which, believing the assurances of the Tatars, they surrender. However, the Tatars, angry at the Russians (it’s strange, why would this be?! They didn’t do any particular harm to the Tatars, except that they killed their ambassadors, attacked them first...) kill the captured princes. According to some sources, they kill simply, without any pretense, but according to others, they pile them on tied boards and sit on top to feast, the scoundrels.

It is significant that one of the most ardent “Tatarophobes,” the writer V. Chivilikhin, in his almost eight-hundred-page book “Memory,” oversaturated with abuse against the “Horde,” somewhat embarrassedly avoids the events on Kalka. He mentions it briefly - yes, there was something like that... It seems like they fought a little there...

You can understand him: the Russian princes in this story do not look the best. I’ll add on my own behalf: the Galician prince Mstislav Udaloy is not just an aggressor, but also a downright bastard - however, more on that later...

Let's get back to the riddles. For some reason, that same “Tale of the Battle of Kalka” is not able to... name the Russian enemy! Judge for yourself: "... because of our sins, unknown peoples came, godless Moabites, about whom no one knows exactly who they are and where they came from, and what their language is, and what tribe they are, and what faith. And they call them Tatars , and some say - Taurmen, and others - Pechenegs."

Extremely strange lines! Let me remind you that they were written much later than the events described, when it was supposed to be known exactly who the Russian princes fought on Kalka. After all, part of the army (albeit small, according to some sources - one tenth) nevertheless returned from Kalka. Moreover, the victors, in turn, pursuing the defeated Russian regiments, chased them to Novgorod-Svyatopolch (not to be confused with Veliky Novgorod! - A. Bushkov), where they attacked the civilian population - (Novgorod-Svyatopolch stood on the banks of the Dnieper) so and among the townspeople there must be witnesses who saw the enemy with their own eyes.

However, this enemy remains “unknown.” Those who came from unknown places, speaking God knows what language. It's your choice, it turns out to be some kind of incongruity...

Either the Polovtsians, or the Taurmen, or the Tatars... This statement confuses the matter even more. By the time described, the Polovtsians were well known in Rus' - they lived side by side for so many years, sometimes fought with them, sometimes went on campaigns together, became related... Is it conceivable not to identify the Polovtsians?

The Taurmen are a nomadic Turkic tribe that lived in the Black Sea region in those years. Again, they were well known to the Russians by that time.

The Tatars (as I will soon prove) by 1223 had already lived in the same Black Sea region for at least several decades.

In short, the chronicler is definitely disingenuous. The complete impression is that for some extremely compelling reasons he does not want to directly name the Russian enemy in that battle. And this assumption is not at all far-fetched. Firstly, the expression “either Polovtsy, or Tatars, or Taurmen” is in no way consistent with the life experience of Russians at that time. Both of them, and the others, and the third were well known in Rus' - everyone except the author of the "Tale" ...

Secondly, if the Russians had fought on Kalka with an “unknown” people they saw for the first time, the subsequent picture of events would have looked completely different - I mean the surrender of the princes and the pursuit of the defeated Russian regiments.

It turns out that the princes, who were holed up in a fortification made of “tine and carts”, where they fought off enemy attacks for three days, surrendered after... a certain Russian named Ploskinya, who was in the enemy’s battle formations, solemnly kissed his pectoral cross on what had been captured will not cause harm.

I deceived you, you bastard. But the point is not in his deceit (after all, history provides a lot of evidence of how the Russian princes themselves violated the “kiss of the cross” with the same deceit), but in the personality of Ploskini himself, a Russian, a Christian, who somehow mysteriously found himself among the warriors of the "unknown people". I wonder what fate brought him there?

V. Yan, a supporter of the “classical” version, portrayed Ploskinia as a kind of steppe vagabond, who was caught on the road by “Mongol-Tatars” and, with a chain around his neck, led to the Russian fortifications in order to persuade them to surrender to the mercy of the winner.

This is not even a version - this is, excuse me, schizophrenia. Put yourself in the place of a Russian prince - a professional soldier, who during his life fought a lot with both Slavic neighbors and nomadic steppe people, who went through fires and waters...

You are surrounded in a distant land by warriors of a completely unknown tribe. For three days you have been fighting off the attacks of this adversary, whose language you do not understand, whose appearance is strange and disgusting to you. Suddenly, this mysterious adversary drives some ragamuffin with a chain around his neck to your fortification, and he, kissing the cross, swears that the besiegers (again and again I emphasize: hitherto unknown to you, strangers in language and faith!) will spare you if you surrender. ..

So, will you give up under these conditions?

Yes to completeness! Not a single normal person with more or less military experience will surrender (besides, you, let me clarify, just recently killed the ambassadors of this very people and plundered the camp of their fellow tribesmen to their heart’s content).

But for some reason the Russian princes surrendered...

However, why “for some reason”? The same “Tale” writes quite unambiguously: “There were wanderers along with the Tatars, and their governor was Ploskinya.”

Brodniks are Russian free warriors who lived in those places. Predecessors of the Cossacks. Well, this changes things somewhat: it was not the bound captive who persuaded him to surrender, but the governor, almost an equal, such a Slav and a Christian... One can believe this - which is what the princes did.

However, establishing Ploschini's true social position only confuses the matter. It turns out that the Brodniki managed to come to an agreement with the “unknown peoples” in a short time and became so close to them that they jointly attacked the Russians? Your brothers by blood and faith?

Something doesn't work out again. It is clear that the wanderers were outcasts who fought only for themselves, but all the same, they somehow very quickly found a common language with the “godless Moabites”, about whom no one knows where they came from, what language they are, and what faith they are.. .

As a matter of fact, one thing can be stated with certainty: part of the army with which the Russian princes fought on Kalka was Slavic, Christian.

Or maybe not part? Maybe there were no “Moabites”? Maybe the battle on Kalka is a “showdown” between Orthodox Christians? On the one hand, several allied Russian princes (it must be emphasized that for some reason many Russian princes did not go to Kalka to rescue the Polovtsians), on the other, the Brodniks and Orthodox Tatars, neighbors of the Russians?

Once you accept this version, everything falls into place. And the hitherto mysterious surrender of the princes - they surrendered not to some unknown strangers, but to well-known neighbors (the neighbors, however, broke their word, but it depends on your luck...) - (About the fact that the captured princes were “thrown under the boards” , only “The Tale” reports. Other sources write that the princes were simply killed without mockery, and still others that the princes were “taken captive.” So the story of the “feast on the bodies” is just one of the options). And the behavior of those residents of Novgorod-Svyatopolch, who for some unknown reason came out to meet the Tatars pursuing the Russians fleeing from Kalka... with a procession of the cross!

This behavior again does not fit into the version with the unknown “godless Moabites.” Our ancestors can be reproached for many sins, but excessive gullibility was not among them. In fact, what normal person would go out to honor a religious procession for some unknown alien, whose language, faith and nationality remain a mystery?!

However, once we assume that the fleeing remnants of the princely armies were being chased by some of their own, long-time acquaintances, and, what is especially important, fellow Christians, the behavior of the city residents instantly loses all signs of madness or absurdity. From their long-time acquaintances, from fellow Christians, there was indeed a chance to defend themselves with a procession of the cross.

The chance, however, did not work this time - apparently, the horsemen, heated by the pursuit, were too angry (which is quite understandable - their ambassadors were killed, they themselves were attacked first, chopped down and robbed) and immediately flogged those who came out to meet them with the cross. Let me especially note that similar things happened during purely Russian internecine wars, when the enraged victors cut right and left, and the raised cross did not stop them...

Thus, the battle on Kalka is not at all a clash with unknown peoples, but one of the episodes of the internecine war waged among themselves by Russian Christians, Polovtsian Christians (it is curious that the chronicles of that time mention the Polovtsian khan Basty, who converted to Christianity), and Christian-Russians. Tatars. A Russian historian of the 17th century summarizes the results of this war as follows: “After this victory, the Tatars completely destroyed the fortresses and cities and villages of the Polovtsians. And all the lands near the Don, and the Meot Sea (Sea of Azov), and Taurica Kherson (which, after digging up the isthmus between the seas, today it is called Perekop), and around the Pontus Evkhsinsky, that is, the Black Sea, the Tatars took their hand and settled there."

As we see, the war was fought over specific territories, between specific peoples. By the way, the mention of “cities, and fortresses, and Polovtsian villages” is extremely interesting. We were told for a long time that the Polovtsians are steppe nomads, but nomadic peoples have neither fortresses nor cities...

And finally - about the Galician prince Mstislav the Udal, or rather, about why he deserves the definition of “scum”. A word to the same historian: “...The brave prince Mstislav Mstislavich of Galicia... when he ran to the river to his boats (immediately after the defeat from the “Tatars” - A. Bushkov), having crossed the river, he ordered all the boats to be sunk and chopped , and set fire, fearing the Tatar pursuit, and, filled with fear, reached Galich on foot. Most of the Russian regiments, running, reached their boats and, seeing them sunk and burned to a man, from sadness and need and hunger could not swim across the river , they died and perished there, except for some princes and warriors, who swam across the river on wicker sheaves of meadowsweet.”

Like this. By the way, this scum - I'm talking about Mstislav - is still called Daredevil in history and literature. True, not all historians and writers admire this figure - a hundred years ago D. Ilovaisky listed in detail all the mistakes and absurdities committed by Mstislav as the Prince of Galicia, using the remarkable phrase: “Obviously, in his old age Mstislav finally lost his common sense.” On the contrary, N. Kostomarov, without any hesitation, considered Mstislav’s act with the boats to be completely self-evident - Mstislav, they say, “prevented the Tatars from crossing.” However, excuse me, they still somehow crossed the river, if “on the shoulders” of the retreating Russians they reached Novgorod-Svyatopolch?!

Kostomarov’s complacency towards Mstislav, who essentially destroyed most of the Russian army with his act, is, however, understandable: Kostomarov had only “The Tale of the Battle of Kalka” at his disposal, where the death of soldiers who had nothing to cross is not mentioned at all . The historian I just quoted is definitely unknown to Kostomarov. Nothing strange - I will reveal this secret a little later.

SUPERMEN FROM THE MONGOLIAN STEPPE
Having accepted the classic version of the “Mongol-Tatar” invasion, we ourselves do not notice what a collection of illogicalities, and even outright stupidity, we are dealing with.

To begin with, I will quote an extensive piece from the work of the famous scientist N.A. Morozova (1854-1946):

“Nomadic peoples, by the very nature of their life, should be widely scattered over large uncultivated areas in separate patriarchal groups, incapable of general disciplined action, requiring economic centralization, i.e., a tax with which it would be possible to maintain an army of adult single people. Among all nomads peoples, like clusters of molecules, each of their patriarchal groups pushes away from the other, thanks to the search for more and more new grass to feed their herds.

Having united together in the number of at least several thousand people, they must also unite with each other several thousand cows and horses and even more sheep and rams belonging to different patriarchs. As a result of this, all the nearby grass would be quickly eaten up and the entire company would have to scatter again in the same patriarchal small groups in different directions in order to be able to live longer without moving their tents to another place every day.

That is why, a priori, the very idea of the possibility of organized collective action and a victorious invasion of settled peoples by some widely scattered nomadic people, feeding from herds, such as the Mongols, Samoyeds, Bedouins, etc., should be rejected a priori with the exception of the case when some gigantic, natural catastrophe, threatening general destruction, drives such a people from the dying steppe entirely to a settled country, just as a hurricane drives dust from the desert to the adjacent oasis.

But even in the Sahara itself, not a single large oasis was forever covered with the surrounding sand, and after the end of the hurricane it was again revived to its former life. Likewise, throughout our reliable historical horizon we do not see a single victorious invasion of wild nomadic peoples into sedentary cultural countries, but just the opposite. This means that this could not have happened in the prehistoric past. All these migrations of peoples back and forth on the eve of their appearance in the field of view of history should be reduced only to the migration of their names or, at best, rulers, and even then from more cultured countries to less cultured ones, and not vice versa."

Gold words. History really does not know of cases when nomads scattered over vast spaces suddenly created, if not a powerful state, then a powerful army capable of conquering entire countries.

With one single exception - when it comes to the “Mongol-Tatars”. We are asked to believe that Genghis Khan, who supposedly lived in what is now Mongolia, by some miracle, in a matter of years created from scattered uluses an army that was superior in discipline and organization to any European...

It would be interesting to know how he achieved this? Despite the fact that the nomad has one undoubted advantage that protects him from any quirks of sedentary power, the power that he did not like at all: mobility. That's why he's a nomad. The self-proclaimed khan did not like it - he assembled a yurt, loaded horses, seated his wife, children and old grandmother, waved his whip - and moved to distant lands, from where it was extremely difficult to get him. Especially when it comes to the endless Siberian expanses.

Here is a suitable example: when in 1916, tsarist officials particularly annoyed the nomadic Kazakhs with something, they calmly withdrew and migrated from the Russian Empire to neighboring China. The authorities (and we are talking about the beginning of the twentieth century!) simply could not stop them and prevent them!

Meanwhile, we are invited to believe in the following picture: the steppe nomads, free as the wind, for some reason meekly agree to follow Genghis “to the last sea.” Given Genghis Khan’s complete lack of means of influencing the “refuseniks”, it would be unthinkable to chase them across steppes and thickets stretching for thousands of kilometers (certain clans of the Mongols lived not in the steppe, but in the taiga).

Five thousand kilometers - approximately this distance was covered by the troops of Genghis to Rus' according to the “classical” version. The armchair theorists who wrote such things simply never thought about what it would cost in reality to overcome such routes (and if we remember that the “Mongols” reached the shores of the Adriatic, the route increases by another one and a half thousand kilometers). What force, what miracle could force the steppe inhabitants to go to such a distance?

Would you believe that Bedouin nomads from the Arabian steppes would one day set out to conquer South Africa, reaching the Cape of Good Hope? And the Alaska Indians one day showed up in Mexico, where for unknown reasons they decided to migrate?

Of course, all this is pure nonsense. However, if we compare the distances, it turns out that from Mongolia to the Adriatic the “Mongols” would have to travel about the same distance as the Arabian Bedouins to Cape Town or the Alaska Indians to the Gulf of Mexico. Not just to pass, let us clarify - along the way you will also capture several of the largest states of that time: China, Khorezm, devastate Georgia, Rus', invade Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary...

Are historians asking us to believe this? Well, so much the worse for historians... If you don't want to be called an idiot, don't do idiotic things - it's an old everyday truth. So supporters of the “classical” version are running into insults themselves...

Not only that, the nomadic tribes, who were at the stage of not even feudalism - the clan system - for some reason suddenly realized the need for iron discipline and dutifully trudged after Genghis Khan for six and a half thousand kilometers. The nomads, in a short (damnly short!) timeframe, suddenly learned to use the best military equipment of that time - battering machines, stone throwers...

Judge for yourself. According to reliable data, Genghis Khan made his first major campaign outside the “historical homeland” in 1209. Already in 1215 he allegedly
captures Beijing, in 1219, using siege weapons, takes the cities of Central Asia - Merv, Samarkand, Gurganj, Khiva, Khudzhent, Bukhara - and another twenty years later, with the same battering machines and stone throwers, destroys the walls of Russian cities.

Mark Twain was right: ganders don’t spawn! Well, rutabaga does not grow on trees!

Well, a steppe nomad is not capable of mastering the art of taking cities using battering machines in a couple of years! Create an army superior to the armies of any states of that time!

First of all, because he doesn’t need it. As Morozov rightly noted, there are no examples in world history of the creation of states by nomads or the defeat of foreign states. Moreover, in such a utopian time frame, as official history suggests to us, uttering pearls like: “After the invasion of China, Genghis Khan’s army adopted Chinese military equipment - battering machines, stone-throwing and flame-throwing guns.”

This is nothing, there are even cleaner pearls. I happened to read an article in an extremely serious, academic journal: it described how the Mongolian (!) navy in the 13th century. fired at the ships of the ancient Japanese... with combat missiles! (The Japanese, presumably, responded with laser-guided torpedoes.) In a word, navigation should also be included among the arts mastered by the Mongols over the course of a year or two. Well, at least it’s not flying on heavier-than-air vehicles...

There are situations when common sense is stronger than all scientific constructions. Especially if scientists are led into such labyrinths of fantasy that any science fiction writer would open his mouth in admiration.

By the way, an important question: How did the wives of the Mongols let their husbands go to the ends of the earth? The vast majority of medieval sources describe
"Tatar-Mongol horde" as an army, and not a migrating people. No wives or small children. It turns out that the Mongols wandered in foreign lands until their death, and their wives, never seeing their husbands, managed the herds?

Not book nomads, but real nomads always behave completely differently: they wander peacefully for hundreds of years (occasionally attacking their neighbors, not without this), and it never occurs to them to conquer some nearby country or go halfway around the world to look for the “last sea.” It would simply not occur to a Pashtun or Bedouin tribal leader to build a city or create a state. How can a whim about the “last sea” not occur to him? There are enough purely earthly, practical matters: you need to survive, prevent the loss of livestock, look for new pastures, exchange fabrics and knives for cheese and milk... Where can one dream of an “empire halfway around the world”?

Meanwhile, we are seriously assured that for some reason the nomadic steppe people suddenly became imbued with the idea of a state, or at least a grandiose campaign of conquest to the “limits of the world.” And at the right time, by some miracle he united his fellow tribesmen into a powerful organized army. And over the course of several years I learned how to handle machines that were quite complex by the standards of that time. And he created a navy that fired missiles at the Japanese. And he compiled a set of laws for his huge empire. And he corresponded with the Pope, kings and dukes, teaching them how to live.

The late L.N. Gumilyov (not one of the last historians, but sometimes overly carried away by poetic ideas) seriously believed that he had created a hypothesis that could explain such miracles. We are talking about the “theory of passionarity”. According to Gumilyov, this or that people at a certain moment receives some mysterious and semi-mystical energy blow from Space - after which they calmly move mountains and achieve unprecedented achievements.

There is a significant flaw in this beautiful theory, which benefits Gumilyov himself, but, on the contrary, complicates the discussion to the limit for his opponents. The fact is that “manifestation of passionarity” can easily explain any military or other success of any people. But it is almost impossible to prove the absence of a “passionary blow”. Which automatically puts Gumilyov’s supporters in better conditions than their opponents - since there are no reliable scientific methods, as well as equipment capable of recording the “flow of passionarity” on paper or paper.

In a word - frolic, soul... Let's say, the Ryazan governor Baldokha, at the head of a valiant army, flew into the Suzdal people, instantly and cruelly defeated their army, after which the Ryazan people shamelessly abused the Suzdal women and girls, robbed all the reserves of salted saffron milk caps, squirrel skins and honey supplied , gave a final blow to the neck of an inopportunely turned up monk and returned home victorious. All. You can, meaningfully narrowing your eyes, say: “The people of Ryazan received a passionary impulse, but the people of Suzdal had lost their passionarity by that time.”

Six months passed - and now the Suzdal prince Timonya Gunyavy, burning with a thirst for revenge, attacked the Ryazan people. Fortune turned out to be fickle - and this time the “Ryazan with a squint” broke in on the first day and took away all the goods, and the women and girls had their hems torn off, as for the governor Baldokha, they mocked him to their hearts’ content, shoving his bare backside at an inopportunely turned up hedgehog. The picture for the historian of the Gumilev school is completely clear: “The people of Ryazan have lost their former passionarity.”

Perhaps they did not lose anything - it was simply that the hungover blacksmith did not shoe Baidokha's horse in time, he lost the horseshoe, and then everything went in accordance with the English song translated by Marshak: there was no nail, the horseshoe was gone, there was no horseshoe, the horse went lame. .. And the main part of Baldokhin’s army did not take part in the battle at all, since they were chasing the Polovtsy about a hundred miles from Ryazan.

But try to prove to the faithful Gumilevite that the problem is the nail, and not the “loss of passionarity”! No, really, take a risk for the sake of curiosity, but I’m not your friend here...

In a word, the “passionary” theory is not suitable for explaining the “Genghis Khan phenomenon” due to the complete impossibility of both proving and disproving it. Let's leave mysticism behind the scenes.

There is one more piquant moment here: the Suzdal chronicle will be compiled by the same monk whom the Ryazan people so imprudently kicked in the neck. If he is especially vindictive, he will present the Ryazan people... and not the Ryazan people at all. And by some “filthy”, evil Antichrist horde. Moabites emerged out of nowhere, devouring foxes and gophers. Subsequently, I will give some quotes showing that in the Middle Ages this was sometimes something like the situation...

Let's return to the other side of the coin of the "Tatar-Mongol yoke." The unique relationship between the “Horde” and the Russians. Here it is worth paying tribute to Gumilyov, in this area he is worthy not of ridicule, but of respect: he collected enormous material that clearly demonstrates that the relationship between “Rus” and the “Horde” cannot be described in any other word other than symbiosis.

To be honest, I don’t want to list this evidence. Too much and often was written about how Russian princes and “Mongol khans” became brothers-in-law, relatives, sons-in-law and fathers-in-law, how they went on joint military campaigns, how (let’s call a spade a spade) they were friends. If desired, the reader himself can easily familiarize himself with the details of Russian-Tatar friendship. I will focus on one aspect: that this kind of relationship is unique. For some reason, the Tatars did not behave like this in any country they defeated or captured. However, in Rus' it reached the point of incomprehensible absurdity: let’s say, the subjects of Alexander Nevsky one fine day beat the Horde tribute collectors to death, but the “Horde Khan” reacts to this somehow strangely: upon news of this sad event, no
only he does not take punitive measures, but gives Nevsky additional privileges, allows him to collect tribute himself, and in addition, frees him from the need to supply recruits for the Horde army...

I am not fantasizing, but just retelling Russian chronicles. Reflecting (probably contrary to the “creative intent” of their authors) the very strange relations that existed between Russia and the Horde: a formal symbiosis, brotherhood in arms, leading to such an interweaving of names and events that you simply cease to understand where the Russians end and the Tatars begin. ..

And nowhere. Rus' is the Golden Horde, haven’t you forgotten? Or, more precisely, the Golden Horde is a part of Rus', the one that is under the rule of the Vladimir-Suzdal princes, the descendants of Vsevolod the Big Nest. And the notorious symbiosis is just an incompletely distorted reflection of events.

Gumilyov never dared to take the next step. And I'm sorry, I'll take a risk. If we have established that, firstly, no “Mongoloids” came from anywhere, that, secondly, the Russians and Tatars were on uniquely friendly relations, logic dictates to go further and say: Rus' and the Horde are simply one and the same thing. And the tales about the “evil Tatars” were composed much later.

Have you ever wondered what the word “horde” means? In search of an answer, I first dug into the depths of the Polish language. For a very simple reason: it was in Polish that quite a lot of words were preserved that disappeared from Russian in the 17th-18th centuries (once both languages were much closer).

In Polish "Horda" means "horde". Not a “crowd of nomads”, but rather a “large army”. Numerous army.

Let's move on. Sigismund Herberstein, the "Tsar's" ambassador, who visited Muscovy in the 16th century and left the most interesting "Notes", testifies that in the "Tatar" language "horde" meant "multiple" or "assembly". In Russian chronicles, when talking about military campaigns, they calmly insert the phrases “Swedish horde” or “German horde” in the same meaning - “army”.

Academician Fomenko points to the Latin word “ordo”, meaning “order”, and the German word “ordnung” - “order”.

To this we can add the Anglo-Saxon "order", which again means "order" in the sense of "law", and in addition - military formation. The expression “marching order” still exists in the navy. That is, building ships on a voyage.

In modern Turkish, the word "ordu" has meanings that again correspond to the words "order", "pattern", and not so long ago (from a historical point of view) in Turkey there was a military term "orta", meaning a Janissary unit, something in between between battalion and regiment...

At the end of the 17th century. on the basis of written reports from explorers, Tobolsk serviceman S.U. Remezov, together with his three sons, compiled the “Drawing Book” - a grandiose geographical atlas covering the territory of the entire Moscow kingdom. The Cossack lands adjacent to the North Caucasus are called... "Land of the Cossack Horde"! (Like many other old Russian maps.)

In a word, all the meanings of the word “horde” revolve around the terms “army”, “order”, “law” (in modern Kazakh “Red Army” sounds like Kzyl-Orda!). And this, I am sure, is not without reason. The picture of the “horde” as a state that at some stage united the Russians and Tatars (or simply the armies of this state) fits much more successfully into reality than the Mongol nomads, who were surprisingly inflamed with a passion for battering machines, the navy and campaigns of five or six thousand kilometers.

Simply, once upon a time, Yaroslav Vsevolodovich and his son Alexander began a fierce struggle for dominance over all Russian lands. It was their horde army (which actually contained enough Tatars) that served later falsifiers to create a terrible picture of a “foreign invasion.”

There are several more similar examples where, with a superficial knowledge of history, a person is quite capable of drawing false conclusions - in the event that he is only familiar with the name and does not suspect what is behind it.

In the 17th century In the Polish army there were cavalry units called “Cossack banners” (“banner” is a military unit). There were not a single real Cossacks there - in this case the name only meant that these regiments were armed according to the Cossack model.

During the Crimean War, the Turkish troops that landed on the peninsula included a unit called the “Ottoman Cossacks.” Again, not a single Cossack - only Polish emigrants and Turks under the command of Mehmed Sadyk Pasha, also former cavalry lieutenant Michal Tchaikovsky.

And finally, we can remember the French Zouaves. These parts received their name from the Algerian Zuazua tribe. Gradually, not a single Algerian remained in them, only purebred French, but the name was preserved for subsequent times, until these units, a kind of special forces, ceased to exist.

I stop there. If you're interested, read on here