Gumelev V.Yu. About the origin of the Mongols of Genghis Khan

Ph.D. tech. Sciences Gumelev V.Yu.

The first clash between the Russians and the Mongols - the Mongol expeditionary force under the command of the military leaders Jebe and Subedei, who made a daring reconnaissance campaign to the West in 1221 - 1224, was the Battle of the Kalka River on May 31, 1223. The battle ended with the complete defeat of the united Russian-Polovtsian army and the death of at least twelve Russian princes. The Mongols did not miss the opportunity to massacre the Rurikovichs with impunity, as well as representatives of the ruling dynasties in other countries.
But the Mongol commanders did not take advantage of their victory, since the supreme ruler of the empire, Genghis Khan, set them other tasks. They returned to their native steppes.

Before the Battle of Kalka, the Russians were encouraged to take joint action against the Mongols by the Cumans (Kypchaks or Cumans). Since the 11th century, this Turkic-speaking people became the master of the Great Steppe from the Danube to the Irtysh. Many Polovtsian khans were related to Russian princes. The Russians called the Kipchaks Polovtsians for their yellow hair color (sexual, that is, straw-yellow). Although S.A. Pletneva believes that the bulk of the Polovtsians were still black-haired and brown-eyed.

According to the frightened Polovtsian khans, they told their relatives - the Russian princes - about the atrocities of the visiting Mongols. From their stories:

“The Russians were horrified and asked each other in amazement, who are these aliens, unknown until that time? Some called them Taurmen, others Pechenegs, but generally Tatars.”

And they agreed to set out on a joint campaign with the Polovtsians, which ended extremely unsuccessfully for the Russians and their allies. But N.M. Karamzin, talking about the appearance of the Mongols in the North Caucasus and their first clashes with the Cumans, reports:

“Seeing the danger, the Military Leader of Genghis Khan resorted to cunning, sent gifts to the Cumans and ordered them to be told that they, being fellow tribesmen of the Mughals, should not rebel against their brothers and make friends with the Alans, who are of a completely different kind.”

It turns out that the Mongols and Cumans understood each other, so negotiations took place between them. And the trick worked - the Polovtsians betrayed the Alans. This means that they had reasons to consider the Mongols their brothers. The Polovtsian khans are not children to trust the commanders of the enemy detachment they drove into a mountain gorge. In such circumstances, the Mongols were ready to call anyone their brothers and sisters. Just to be saved...

The Russians knew the Polovtsians well, among whom there were Christians, and actively became related to them. Therefore, in Rus' there should have been "in amazement" It didn’t take long to get away from the aliens - it was enough to ask your Polovtsian relatives about them. For example, the daughter of the Polovtsian khan Yuri Konchakovich was married to Yaroslav, the son of the Vladimir prince Vsevolod the Big Nest, in 1205. Under certain circumstances, she could become the mother of Prince Alexander Nevsky.

So, according to logic, it follows - the Mongols, whom N.M. Karamzin also calls the Tatars, they were related to the Polovtsians. Therefore, their customs and methods of warfare should have been completely understandable to the Russians. Go ahead.

In the Battle of Kalka, Brodniks fought in the ranks of the Mongol corps.

The Byzantine historian Niketas Choniates (Acominatus) stated:

“And those wanderers who despise death, a branch of the Russians”.

This means that the Mongols were able to come to an agreement with the wanderers, and obviously not in the Mongolian language. But they could agree in one of the Turkic languages. Brodniki in line with "terrible foreigners" They crushed and killed their half-blooded co-religionists. Some scientists conclusively consider the Brodniks (Figure 1, a) to be one of the ancestors of the Cossacks. These certainly were volunteers in the ranks of the Mongol army - they were settling their old scores with the Polovtsians (at the same time the Russians also suffered - Figure 1, b). It was impossible to intimidate or deceive the wandering Mongols - the wrong people. The local Polovtsians were unable to subdue them.

A b

a – wanderer. Reconstruction by artist I. Dzysya; b – betrayal of Ploskini: miniature from the Radziwill Chronicle, fragment of text from the Tver Chronicle (PSRL, Volume 15)

Figure 1 – Brodniki

But let's return to the Mongols. The creator of the Mongol Empire was Genghis Khan. According to the legendary ancestor of Temujin (Genghis Khan is the imperial title of Temujin) was Alan-Goa. She gave birth to five sons, three of them after the death of her husband. The widow honestly explained how she managed to do this:

“But every night, it happened, through the chimney of the yurt, at the hour when it was shining inside[extinguished] , a light-blond man used to come in to see me; he strokes my womb, and his light penetrates my womb. And he leaves like this: at the hour when the sun and the moon converge, he scratches and leaves like a yellow dog. Why are you talking all this nonsense? After all, if you understand all this, it turns out that these sons are marked with the seal of heavenly origin.”

Alan-Goa was, apparently, an authoritative woman, so all her sons and relatives were forced to agree with the version proposed to her. By the way, the widow's name meant Beautiful (or Red-haired) Alanka.

At different times, various authors called the Scythians and Slavs Alans . Conclusions E.I. Klassen, when compared with information about the origin of the Mongols, set out in, makes us think that among the ancestors of Genghis Khan and his fellow tribesmen there were Alans. People with such an ethnonym exist in our time. Alans are the self-name of modern Ossetians.

The family name of Genghis Khan, a descendant of one of the miraculously born sons of the Beautiful Alanka, was Burjigin.

Rashid ad-din (1247 - 1318) - Iranian statesman, doctor and encyclopedist explained the meaning of the family name of Genghis Khan:

“The meaning of “burjigin” is “blue-eyed”, and, oddly enough, those descendants who have so far descended from Yesugei-bahadur, his children and his urug are mostly blue-eyed and red-haired.”.

Yesugei-bahadur is the father of Genghis Khan. Genghis Khan, according to descriptions of his appearance by various authors, summarized in the work, was a tall, strong, red-bearded man with green “cat-like” eyes.

In accordance with :

"R and sy human (French, singular race), historically established areal groups of people connected by a unity of origin, which is expressed in common hereditary morphological and physiological characteristics, varying within certain limits.”

Modern scientists distinguish three main groups of human races - Negroid, Caucasoid and Mongoloid. But only among representatives of the Caucasian race are there individuals with blue eyes and red hair.

Rashid ad-din reports:

“Kubilai Kaan is the fourth son of Tului Khan... When Genghis Khan’s gaze fell on him, he said: “All our children are red-haired, and this boy is black, obviously he looks like[their] uncle, let them tell Sorkuktani-run, so that she gives him to a good nurse to feed.”

Kublai (1215 - 1294) and Batu (1209 - 1255/1256) are the grandchildren of Genghis Khan. Then, following elementary logic, Batu was red-haired.

There is such a Russian saint - St. Peter, Tsarevich of Ordynsky. Icons with his image are presented according to Figure 2.

He was the great-grandson of Genghis Khan and the nephew of Khan Berke, Batu's brother (Batu and Berke had different mothers).

Orthodox icon painting has always adhered to a strict canon. But the original national features of the saints on the icons were preserved. The Monk Peter is clearly not a representative of the Mongoloid race. His descendant was Dionysius (circa 1440 - 1502), a leading Moscow icon painter of the late 15th century.

Figure 2 – Venerable Peter, Tsarevich of Ordynsky

Perhaps the Burjigins were a rare exception among the Mongols - sort of mutants. What did ordinary Mongolian people look like, so to speak from the depths of the masses?

This man of simple origin from the Mongolian Barlas tribe was the son of a bek, a low-ranking military commander. But he managed to become the head of the empire he created. This great commander was born in 1336 (almost two hundred years after the birth of Genghis Khan) in the village of Khoja-Ilgar on the territory of modern Uzbekistan (note, in a village, not in a steppe nomad), and died in 1405 in the city of Otrar (modern Kazakhstan) at the beginning of his planned campaign against China. By the end of his reign, his power included all of Central Asia, the Middle East and part of the Middle East. His name was Timur (Tamerlane, Timurleng) or Timur-Askak (Timur the Lame). He was buried in the city of Samarkand in the Gur-Emir mausoleum. In an Iranian miniature of the 15th – 16th centuries (Figure 3, a) Timur is depicted wearing a crown with a white thick beard and external signs of the Caucasian race.

The author of a unique method for restoring a person’s external appearance based on skeletal remains (the so-called “Gerasimov method”) M.M. Gerasimov (1907 - 1970) - Russian Soviet anthropologist, archaeologist and sculptor, Doctor of Historical Sciences, was personally present at the opening of Timur’s tomb on June 21, 1941. He gave a detailed description of the remains of the great commander. Mikhail Mikhailovich Gerasimov was initially convinced that Timur did not belong to the Caucasian race.

A b

a – Iranian miniature of the 15th – 16th centuries depicting Timur; b – Timur’s appearance, recreated by M.M. Gerasimov based on the results of the opening of the Gur-Emir tomb

Figure 1.10 – Timur (Tamerlane, Timurleng) or Timur-Askak

But Gerasimov was a real scientist. Despite all his prejudices, he gave an objective description of the remains of Timur:

“Timur’s hair is thick, straight, gray-red in color, with a predominance of dark chestnut or red.

... Timur wore a long mustache ... . ...they hung loosely over the lip...

Timur's small thick beard was wedge-shaped. Her hair is coarse, almost straight, thick, bright brown (red) in color, with significant gray streaks. ... this reddish color is her natural color, and not dyed with henna, as historians described. “Many hairs are only partially bleached, while some are completely white and gray.”

This strange image of a Mongol, red-haired, mustachioed and bearded, was recreated by the scientist (Figure 3, b). Let us remind you that Only among representatives of the Caucasian race are there redheads, and red-haired people very often have blue eyes.

But
Giovanni Plano Carpini, an Italian Franciscan monk, the first Western European to visit the Mongol Empire in 1245 - 1247, reports on the Mongols of his time as typical representatives of the Mongoloid race:

“The appearance of individuals is different from all other people. It is between the eyes and between the cheeks that they are wider than in other people, while the cheeks protrude very much from the cheekbones; their nose is flat and small; the eyes are small and the eyelashes are raised to the eyebrows. They are generally thin at the waist, with the exception of a few, and a few, almost all of whom are short in stature. Almost everyone grows a very small beard, yet some have small hairs on their upper lip and beard, which they do not cut at all.”

There is a clear contradiction in the description of the appearance of the Mongols by Plano Karpini and Rashid ad-din. But the contradiction is only apparent. Rashid ad-din described the Mongolian family of the Burjigins and related tribes, and Plano Karpini described the peoples allied to the Mongols.

Some peoples, for example, the Uyghurs, are undoubtedly the product of a mixture of two races, Caucasian and Mongoloid. The Uyghurs are the indigenous people of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China. Uyghur language is To Turkic language group
Altai language family. Figure 4 shows a fresco from the ancient city of Kocho depicting a Uyghur idikut (ruler). He has pronounced European facial features, and on the head of the ruler is a crown similar to Timur’s crown.

Figure 4 – Uyghur idikut (ruler), Kocho state,

Fresco from the 9th – 13th centuries

It is possible that the Uyghurs were related to the Mongols of Genghis Khan. According to his support for the Mongols, the Uyghur ruler demanded the daughter of Genghis Khan as his wife. And I got what I wanted right away. By the way, the Mongols conducted all official paperwork in their empire using the Uyghur script.

The Mongols were not primitive savages roaming the steppe. The level of military art of a particular state or people reflects the general level of its socio-economic development. Suffice it to recall Alexander the Great and the Greeks, the people of Ancient Rome and its great commanders. So, the Mongols defeated almost all of their “civilized” opponents, fighting simultaneously on several fronts. And their empire, after the death of its founder, did not crumble like a house of cards, but existed for more than a century.

The Mongols had very highly professional tactical (combined arms) and strategic intelligence. Before and during hostilities, they made extensive and competent use of diplomacy. Diplomats of all nations of the world should erect a monument to Genghis Khan– it was he who subjected specific people, cities, and even entire nations to the most severe repressions for the murder of his ambassadors. The Mongols always considered the murder of an ambassador as a sufficient reason for war. Yes, of course, times were harsh, and Genghis Khan himself began his career as a “field” commander. Therefore, often the severity of revenge and its scale did not correspond to the crime and was carried out using the most barbaric methods.

But now the principle of personal integrity of diplomats is generally recognized.

At the same time, many “civilized” opponents of the Mongols in the East and West for some reason considered punishment for the murder of ambassadors to be savagery.

To manage their empire, the Mongols widely recruited specialists from other nations. For example, Genghis Khan’s advisor was Yelu Chutsai, who came from the imperial Khitan family. Yelu Chutsai is a scientist, writer and at the same time a statesman of the Mongol Empire. Foreigners also served conscientiously in the Mongol army. Among them were many different military specialists. Therefore, there were practically no impossible tasks for the Mongol troops. If necessary, the Mongols could storm or blockade any fortress.

The Mongol Empire twice conducted naval landing operations against island Japan in 1274 and 1281, but were unsuccessful - a typhoon destroyed the Mongol fleet.

The Mongols landed an amphibious assault in Vietnam in 1282 (they failed to land again in 1287), and on the island of Java in Indonesia in 1292.

Before that, in 1237 - 1238, they built two hundred river ships, for one hundred soldiers each, on the Volga River and defeated the Kipchak troops of Bachman, who offered them fierce resistance. The Mongols fought successfully in the mountains of Tibet, the Balkans and Iran, in the deserts of Central Asia and the Middle East, in the tropics of Southern China and Indonesia and in the Russian winter snow-covered forests.

Not every modern great power can fight so many successful wars simultaneously in so many different theaters of war.

But the Mongols knew how not only to capture fortresses and destroy cities. They founded new trading cities in the territories under their control and, moreover, in large numbers.

Could all this really be accomplished by illiterate, but very cr-rr-thirsty steppe savages?

What religion were the Mongols? The following is known about this:

“Since Genghis Khan did not obey any faith and did not follow any confession, he avoided fanaticism and preference for one religion over another, and from exalting some over others...

His children and grandchildren, several of them, chose one of the faiths according to their attraction...”

Juvaini (1226 - 1283) was a contemporary of the Mongol conquests and an Iranian statesman. He and a number of other authors who lived during the era of the Mongol conquests claim that there were quite a lot of Christians among the Mongols. It is likely that Batu himself and his son Sartak were Nestorian Christians.

Nestorianism is an ancient eastern branch of Christianity condemned as a heresy at the Third Ecumenical Council in 431. Currently, Nestorianism is professed only by parishioners of the Assyrian Church in Iraq.

Monk Rubruk, who traveled to the Mongols in 1253-1255 on behalf of the French king Louis IX, reports:

“Our guide turned to a certain Nestorian named Koyaku, who is considered one of the elders at the court[Sartakha] ».

“As for Sartakh, I don’t know whether he believes in Christ or not. I only know that he does not want to be called a Christian, but rather, it seems to me, he ridicules Christians.”

Naturally, the authenticity of the faith of the Nestorian Sartak should have raised strong doubts among the Catholic monk, especially since Batu’s son, despite the Christian faith, had six wives. Rubruk also visited the capital of the Mongol Empire, the city of Karakorum. There he was received by the Great Khan Mongke himself. Nestorianism flourished in the capital of the empire and directly at the court of the emperor.

A little more about the religion adhered to by part of the ruling Genghisid clan in the Mongol Empire. In 1252, troops under the command of Nevryuy, a Horde prince, fought on Russian soil against the Grand Duke of Vladimir Andrei Yaroslavich. Nevryuya's name was Oleksa.

Among the Mongols there were adherents of various religions: Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, shamanists etc. And in other countries during the time of Batu, real obscurantism flourished - people of other faiths were destroyed in various brutal ways.

It can be assumed that the ancestors of Genghis Khan and his fellow tribesmen at one time belonged, like the Slavs, to the Scythian superethnos.
A superethnos is a stable system consisting of several peoples or nations that arose simultaneously in one region with a similar landscape, interconnected by economic, ideological and political communication, and manifested in history as a mosaic integrity [ 13]. The successor of the Scythian superethnos on the same territory is currently the great Russian superethnos.
But this is a completely different topic.

The Scythian peoples were Caucasians who spoke Indo-European (Aryan) languages. The descendants of the Scythians are the modern Alans-Ossetians. But the Alan ancestors of the Mongols (remember Alan-Goa) were probably subject to strong Turkic influence.

According to the work of the Russian historian A.I. Lyzlov (1655–1697):

“But from five hundred years and more, when the Scythian people, having left the country spoken by their language Mongal, its inhabitants were called Mongails or Mongaili, having settled some states [as will be discussed below], they changed their name, calling themselves Tartar, from the river Tartarus or from his many peoples, who themselves more kindly receive or hear.

And the smaller half of Scythia, even above the Sea of ​​Assia, is called Tartaria the Great. Great Tartaria is separated from Scythia by Imaus, a great and famous mountain[apparently the Ural Mountains] “The hedgehog from one country is Tartaria, and the hedgehog from this country is Scythia.”

Lyzlov should be trusted - he could have possessed such primary sources that in our time have long been lost without a trace and irretrievably.

Those who are currently called Mongols call themselves Khalkhas or Khalkhas, Oirats, etc., but not Mongols.

The Mongols, fellow tribesmen and contemporaries of Genghis Khan, were most likely one of the many Turkic peoples who had a centuries-old tradition of state building.

LITERATURE:

1 Khrapchevsky R.P. Military power of Genghis Khan [Text] / R.P. Khrapchevsky - M.: AST: LUX, 2005. - 557 p.

2 Gumilevica website. L.N. Gumilev. Ancient Rus' and the Great Steppe. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://gumilevica.kulichki.net/ARGS/index.html

3 S.A. Pletneva. Polovtsy. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://annales.info/step/pletneva/index.htm

4 Materials of Russian history. N.M. Karamzin. History of Russian Goverment. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://www.magister.msk.ru/library/history/

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7 Vernadsky G.V. Mongols and Rus' [Electronic resource] – URL: http://www.erlib.com/Georgy_Vernadsky/Mongols_and_Rus/0/

8 Grousset, R. Genghis Khan: Conqueror of the Universe [Text] / R. Grousset. – M.: Young Guard, 2007. – 285 p.

9Klassen, E.I. The ancient history of the Slavs. Issues 1-3. 1854-1861. [Text] / E.I. Klassen - St. Petersburg: Leningrad Publishing House, 2011. - 336 p.

10 Website “Oriental Literature”. Rashid ad-din Collection of chronicles of Jami at-tawarikh. The story is about Bartan-bahadur, the son of Kabul Khan, and it is in two parts. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://www.vostlit.info/Texts/rus16/Rasidaddin_2/kniga2/frametext3.html

11 TSB. Races. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://slovari.yandex.ru/~books/TSB/Races/

12 Website “Oriental Literature”. Rashid al-din. Collection of chronicles of Jami at-tawarikh. The story is about Kubilai Kaan, the son of Tului Khan, the son of Genghis Khan, and it is in three parts. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://www.vostlit.info/Texts/rus16/Rasidaddin_3/text8.phtml

13 Tree. Open Orthodox Encyclopedia. Peter Ordynsky. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://drevo-info.ru/articles/15483.html

14 Soviet military encyclopedia. Timur, Tamerlane, Timurleng. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://www.hrono.ru/biograf/bio_t/tamerlan.php

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17 Website “Oriental Literature”. Rashid al-din. Collection of chronicles of Jami at-tawarikh. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://www.vostlit.info/Texts/rus16/Rasidaddin_2/kniga2/frametext8.html

18 Vadim Leonidovich Egorov. Historical geography of the Golden Horde in the XIII – XIV centuries. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://annales.info/volga/egorov/egorov.htm

19 Shirokorad A.B. Tatars and Russians in unified formation. A.B. Shirokorad. – M.: Veche, 2012. – 368 p.

20 Website “Oriental Literature”. Ala ad-din Ata-Melik Juvaini. The history of the conqueror of the world [Electronic resource] – URL: http://www.vostlit.info/Texts/rus3/Juweini/otr1.phtml?id=454

21 Website “Oriental Literature”. William de Rubruk. Journey to the eastern countries of William de Rubruck in the summer of goodness 1253. [Electronic resource] - URL: http://www.vostlit.info/haupt-Dateien/index-Dateien/R.phtml?id=2057

22 Konstantin Penzev. Great Tartary. History of the Russian land. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://lib.rus.ec/b/185109/read

23 Gumilevica website. L.N. Gumilev. Ancient Mongolian religion. Published // VGO Reports. Vol. 5. L., 1968. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://gumilevica.kulichki.net/articles/tibet11.htm

24 Lyzlov, A.I. Scythian history [Text] / A. I. Lyzlov. – M.: Nauka, 1990. – 327 p.

Genghis Khan's will was clear and unambiguous and did not lose its force with his death, as is often the case. The enormous authority of the Mongol ruler among his comrades, faith in the divine inspiration of all his actions, devotion to the memory of the leader of the nukers and the army made any political games on the bones of the deceased impossible. After quite a long period of mourning for the great conqueror, in the spring of 1229 a grandiose kurultai was held, which brought together all the significant figures of the Mongolian steppe. And in the presence of a huge mass of people, Jagatai, Tuluy and Genghis Khan’s brother Temuge-otchigin elevated Ogedei to the khan’s throne and swore boundless allegiance to him nine times. All the assembled Noyons swore the same oath. Regent Tuluy transferred the corps of the khan's keshikten under the rule of Ogedei and renounced rule in the central ulus in his favor. Whatever the ambitions of this talented commander, he was forced to fulfill the will of his already deceased father.

At the kurultai of 1229, a number of other important issues were raised. All laws and regulations of Genghis Khan were approved in full. Yasa was declared for all eternity to be the unshakable law of all Mongols (that is, essentially all nomads). Priority foreign policy tasks were outlined - within the framework of the same political testament of Genghis Khan. The priority goal was the final destruction of the Jin. Therefore, the Jin ambassador, who arrived with mourning offerings, was not received by the new khan, and the gifts from the Chinese emperor were disgustedly rejected. The question of a new Mongol-Chinese war - a war to a victorious end - was a foregone conclusion.

They did not forget about the Western theater of military operations. Ogedei confirmed the powers of Chormaghan in Iran, setting the goal of finally putting an end to Jalal ad-Din and annexing the remnants of the Khorezmshah power to the Mongol Empire. The new khan asked brother Jaghatai to provide all possible assistance to Chormagan in this matter. Looking ahead, let's say that during the period of Ogedei's reign, despite the lack of military forces among the Mongols, the main tasks were completed. In 1231, Jalal ad-Din died, and Western Iran and Azerbaijan soon conquered. By the end of 1236, all of Transcaucasia was captured; Georgia and Armenia recognized Mongolian rule. The Mongols moved further west, inflicting a heavy defeat on the Rum Sultanate in Asia Minor. The death of Chormaghan in 1241 briefly slowed down the Mongol advance, which resumed after Ogedei's death.

The third major front of the Mongol conquests was the northwestern direction, where the Volga Bulgars and Kipchaks-Polovtsians continued active resistance. In the fall of 1229, the Mongols under the command of Subedei-bagatur defeated the Bulgars, but their Volga cities held out. And in 1230, Subedei was recalled by the khan to the war with Jin, and a precarious balance was established in the northwest.

In addition to foreign policy tasks, the kurultai of 1229 also resolved a number of pressing internal problems. The main act was the establishment of the Khan's office - in fact, the central government of the Mongol Empire (according to other sources, this happened in 1231). Yelü Chutsai, already known to us, was appointed Supreme Chancellor, or, in modern terms, Prime Minister. This outstanding representative of the Khitan royal family held his position throughout the entire period of Ogedei's reign, and his power, in essence, was not much inferior to that of the khan. Yelu Chutsai enjoyed the khan's boundless trust and, admittedly, justified this trust to the fullest. Under him, taxation was streamlined, and Ogedei himself was shocked by the huge flow of valuables that began to flow into the Khan's headquarters. Also, at the prompting of Yelu Chutsai, Ogedei appointed his authorized representatives - tanmachi and darugachi - to their places, with a detailed definition of their rights and responsibilities. Thus, under Ogedei, the gradual transformation of the Mongol Empire from a purely military power into a classic bureaucratic state began, albeit with an unusually large military component.

Finally, after a year-long break dedicated to streamlining affairs in the state, Ogedei began to solve the main task bequeathed by his great father: the war with Jin was resumed. The Mongol troops attacked from two directions: the northern army, operating in the area of ​​the Yellow River, was commanded by the khan himself; southwestern, which was faced with the task of breaking through to Jin through Sichuan and the Song lands - Subedei-bagatur, called from the Volga. Subedei, however, suffered a relative setback in December 1230 at the Tongguan outpost, a key Chinese fortress blocking the route to the east, and was replaced as commander by the khan's brother, Tului. Soon, Tuluy managed to defeat a large Jin army and, after a difficult and grueling campaign, by the beginning of 1232, broke into the unconquered Jin regions. The northern army also operated successfully, managing to cross the Yellow River and inflict a number of serious defeats on the Chinese troops. In the summer, however, the offensive stalled. Ogedei decided to wait out the hot time in his native northern steppes, and Tului unexpectedly fell seriously ill (according to some reports, he was poisoned by Chinese monks). In the fall of 1232, he dies, and command again passes to Subedei, who, in fact, brings the matter to an end.

Portrait of Ogedei Khan

In parallel to this, curious events took place in the northeast. In 1231, Ogedei sent a Mongol tumen led by Saritai and a significant group of auxiliary troops assigned to him to Korea. The assassination of the ambassador again became the pretext for war, but it was here that Ogedei first announced that the main goal of the Mongol power was the conquest of all surrounding peoples. Korea offered serious resistance to the Mongols, and in 1231 the task of conquering it could not be solved. The following year, Saritai again invades Korea with even greater forces, and, despite the death of the commander himself from an accidental arrow, the Mongols eventually achieve their goal. The ruler of Korea recognizes the supremacy of the Mongol Khan and agrees to pay a huge tribute.

Meanwhile, the war with Jin enters a decisive phase. While Tului was still alive, Subedei-bagatur began the siege of the southern capital of the Jin, the city of Kaifeng. The death of Tuluy finally frees his hands. In addition, despite very strained relations, the troops of the southern Chinese Song dynasty, for which the Jurchens of the north are an ancient blood enemy, come to the aid of the Mongols. By the spring of 1233, Kaifeng's position became hopeless. On March 9, the Jin emperor fled from the capital to the Guidefu fortress, and a few days later the Chinese commander surrendered the southern capital to the Mongols. It's Guidefu's turn, and soon the last Jurchen ruler flees from there too. He locks himself in the Caizhou fortress, which becomes the only active center of resistance to the dying dynasty. Subedei, meanwhile, crushes the last remaining troops loyal to the Jurchen emperor and tightens a complete blockade around Caizhou, using both Mongol and Song troops. In February 1234, a decisive assault followed. The Jin Emperor Ninyasu, not wanting to fall into the hands of the Mongols alive, hanged himself and his body was burned (according to other sources, he himself threw himself into the fire in despair). The only remaining stronghold of the Mongol-Jurchen confrontation fell; The Jin Empire ceased to exist, Genghis Khan's covenant was fulfilled.

The fall of Caizhou and the death of the Jin dynasty became an important milestone in the history of the Mongol Empire of the Genghisids. The most important foreign policy task for many years has been finally resolved, and Genghis Khan’s successor is fully faced with the question of determining further strategic priorities. By this time, the main goals had been achieved in the southwest, where Chormagan was slowly but surely extinguishing the last pockets of resistance in Iran and Transcaucasia. But it is too early to talk about the conquest of the Islamic world - neither the Baghdad caliph nor the sultans of Egypt are going to submit to the Mongols. In the north-west, a fragile balance of power has developed: neither the Mongol tumens of Kokoshai, nor their opponents the Bulgars and Polovtsians have sufficient forces for a decisive victory. And in such a situation, Ogedei assembles a new great kurultai, which should determine the future strategy of the Mongols.

In the spring of 1235, thousands of noyons, bagaturs, khan's relatives and simply distinguished warriors arrived in the steppe area of ​​Talan-daba. After a whole month of non-stop feasting - in commemoration of the great victory over Jin - the time had finally come for serious decisions. And the kurultai of 1235 was marked by truly important, truly fateful decisions, which sharply distinguishes it from a series of largely similar meetings of the Mongolian nobility and brings it closer in importance to the great kurultai of 1206.

Reception of ambassadors by Ogedei Khan. Chinese miniature of the 14th century.

The most important dilemma facing Ogedei, and in a certain sense, the entire Mongol Empire, was the question of whether it was worth continuing unbridled expansion, or whether it made sense to be satisfied with what had already been achieved. As a rule, historians describing the kurultai of 1235 do not consider this problem at all. It is believed that the kurultai only determined the direction of the main blow of further Mongol conquests, and only this was its most important goal. Judging by the results of this all-Mongolian meeting, one gets the impression that this was exactly the case. However, if we analyze the situation, previous I hear from the Kurultai, it becomes clear that everything was not so simple.

By 1235 the situation had a number of serious features in comparison with previous years. The main thing was that by this time the two main wars started by Genghis Khan were actually completed. The ancient enemy of the Mongols, the Jin Empire, was crushed and disappeared from the face of the earth; in 1231 the power of the Khorezmshahs also ceased to exist. The last remnants of resistance were easily suppressed by ordinary “police” operations, which by no means required the exertion of all forces. And in this continuous tension, the Mongol people lived for almost forty years, having almost no respite between the wars that followed one after another. And despite the constant victories, psychological fatigue gradually accumulated in society: in fact, how long can you fight - sometimes somewhere on the edge of the earth... The wealth looted by the Mongol warriors was more than enough for their families to live a comfortable life, and taking into account their unpretentiousness nomadic life, for which it was now worth fighting - so that the head of the family, after a long and dangerous campaign, would bring ten more pieces of silk to the ten already available? Or another silver cup no one needs? Not the highest payment for a family left for many years without men's hands, which are so necessary in the household. A person always remains a person, and it is safe to say that such views were becoming increasingly popular in Mongolian society.

The taxation system established by Ögedei also played a certain role in the widespread dissemination of such views. The main tax burden fell on the conquered sedentary peoples, and very soon it became clear that tax revenues were quite comparable in volume to the military booty captured during campaigns. In addition, Ögedei established a rule according to which a significant part of taxes went to support the Mongolian poor, who were provided with everything they needed from public funds. So tens of millions of Chinese and Muslims made it possible for a million (or slightly more) Mongols to live very comfortably. And, what is especially important to note, it was the extraordinary military taxes that fell precisely on the Mongolian people: both the “blood” tax and the transfer of livestock for military needs. So, logically speaking, the continuation of a continuous war is objectively worsened the position of an ordinary steppe family. And one should not think that, due to their savagery and lack of education, the Mongols did not understand this. If the owner of a Mongolian yurt is told: “We are going to war and therefore we are taking away your husband, three horses, ten sheep and supplies for the winter,” it is unlikely that a higher education is required to understand the situation. Society felt less and less the need to wage a permanent war under extreme strain of forces: in fact, where is the enemy that threatens the empire - after all, the main opponents have been defeated? And only the will of the khan and the habit of subordinating power forced ordinary Mongols to put up with a war that was no longer necessary for them.

But with the will of the khan, everything was not so simple. Ogedei, who had fought a lot in his life, was by no means a military man by his character. He was forced to fight first by the harsh will of his father, and then by the need to bring the war to a victorious end. But even in this situation, whenever possible, he shirked participation in hostilities, citing either the heat or illness. Ogedei did not like to fight and believed that a quarter of a century of participation in military campaigns was more than enough for him, and the time had come to relax and enjoy wealth and life. A jug of good wine was much dearer to him than the severed head of an enemy - and in this he differed sharply from his father. The khan's love of peace was fully supported by his first minister, Yelu Chutsai, who always believed that the main thing was not to fight, but to govern.

So, the main military tasks have been completed, society and even the khan himself are tired of the war, the loot and constantly arriving new wealth is quite enough to maintain a well-fed and prosperous life for all Mongols for decades to come. Is it time for peace? The kurultai's response turned out to be negative.

This decision of the all-Mongolian assembly of nobility was due to several fairly compelling reasons. Firstly, the kurultai was by no means a forum for the entire Mongolian people, who were truly tired of many years of wars. It was just a gathering nobility whose interests did not at all coincide with the aspirations of the Mongol commoners. It is known that, upon reaching a certain level of well-being, increasing wealth often turns into an end in itself. A similar metamorphosis occurred with a significant part of the Mongolian noyons. Gone are the days when the life of an aristocratic family was not much different from the life of ordinary nomads. During the years of victorious wars, the Mongol nobility acquired a taste for wealth, and the increase in this wealth became a self-sufficient value for them. In addition, the burden of war taxes hit the poor much harder than the rich. It’s one thing when a family gives three out of ten available horses for military needs, and quite another when these three (even ten) are taken from a herd of thousands. The Noyons were also attracted by the enormous power that they, as commanders, enjoyed in a combat situation. And everything turned out according to the saying: “To whom is war, and to whom mother is dear.”

The second and, perhaps, no less important reason that the kurultai decided to continue expansion, and the rather peace-loving Ogedei without hesitation supported it with his khan’s authority, was the notorious will of Genghis Khan. The great conqueror on his deathbed demanded that with his death the Mongol conquests should not stop, and that the expansion of the empire should go to the last limits of the world. These words were addressed, among other things, to Ogedei himself, who vowed to fulfill his father’s will. And the death of the Universe Shaker did not change anything. The authority of Genghis Khan remained colossal, and his program for many years determined the life of the Mongolian state and society. Of course, the further into the past the era of Genghis Khan went, the smaller this impact was, but under Ögedei, the words of the founder of the power were still perceived exclusively as a guide to action.

It is worth noting one more important point. The death of the Jin Empire and the power of the Khorezmshahs, the strongest states in Asia, and, perhaps, the whole world, created the impression that the most difficult thing for the Mongols was already over. The Song Empire, itself a vassal of the Jin for a long time, was not considered a serious military force. The same was the attitude towards the still independent Islamic states, and towards the Kipchaks-Polovtsians, who were beaten more than once by the Mongols. Perhaps only the states of Europe were perceived by the Mongols as a truly serious adversary, and this, apparently, is one of the reasons that Europe was chosen as the priority direction for the further Mongol offensive.

It must be said that the decision of the kurultai to march on Europe was not at all inevitable. All three main directions were seriously considered: Islamic, European and Chinese. The capture of Southern China, known for its incalculable riches, seemed especially attractive. This direction was also supported by its comparative proximity to Mongolia - in contrast to distant Europe or Egypt. In addition, already in the second half of 1234, several major skirmishes occurred between Mongol and Sung troops. In these clashes the Mongols achieved easy victories, which seemed to confirm the view that taking over the Song Empire would be child's play for the iron Mongol tumens. But it seems that this apparent ease played a cruel joke on the successors of Genghis Khan’s work (and for Rus' this “joke” turned out to be much worse!). The Noyons and the Khan convinced themselves that Song China was unable to offer serious resistance, and therefore one Mongol corps would be enough to conquer it. Such a corps of two or three tumens, under the overall command of Kuchu, son of Ogedei, was sent to China. Life very quickly showed the fallacy of such a decision. The Mongols still easily defeated the Sung troops, but these victories were clearly not enough to conquer a huge country. In addition, in Song China there was practically no “fifth column”, which played such a big role in the fight against the Jin Jurchens. In the end, the Mongols were satisfied with a peace treaty in 1238, under which the Song agreed to pay an annual tribute, and southern China received a respite for another fourteen years.

The situation was similar in the southwestern, Muslim, theater of military operations. Significant reinforcements were sent to Chormagan, which allowed him to finally conquer Transcaucasia in the next year, 1236. However, these troops turned out to be too few for an all-out attack on the Islamic world, and the war became protracted. The new and last all-Mongol campaign took place only twenty years later.

As a result, at the kurultai it was decided to deliver the main blow in the west, where the troops of Subedei-Baghatur were actively resisted by the Bulgars, as well as the Polovtsians, who by that time had almost recovered from the defeat on Kalka. The entire flower of the Mongol army was sent to this Great Western Campaign. Jochi’s successor, his son Batu, was appointed general leader of the campaign, and the highly experienced Subedei, whose powers were hardly inferior to the Batuevs, became his “uncle.” A dozen more Chingizid princes also set off on the campaign, the most influential among whom were Ogedei’s eldest son Guyuk, Jagatai’s grandson and potential heir Buri, and Tuluy’s precocious son Mengu. Ogedei himself did not take part in the campaign, preferring to stay in the newly rebuilt Karakorum and enjoy life.

But we will return to the Great Western Campaign later. For now, let’s look at how things were in the Mongolian state in the second half of Ogedei’s reign, and evaluate the role and place of this successor of Genghis Khan in Mongolian and world history.

The years 1235–1241 became a time of further strengthening and development of Mongolian statehood. Under the influence of Yelu Chutsai and with the full approval of the khan, a management system was streamlined, which was increasingly oriented towards Chinese models. Moreover, the foundations for building a state model were based on the ideals of Confucianism - the Great Khan Ogedei himself was an ardent admirer of this famous Chinese philosopher and statesman. By decree of the Mongol ruler, temples dedicated to Confucius were built; a system of examinations for holding bureaucratic positions gradually began to be introduced. It has not yet acquired a comprehensive character under Ogedei, but a trend of this kind can be traced quite clearly. Within the framework of the same Confucian model, other changes took place within the Mongol power. Tax relations were finally regulated, which in conquered Jin China largely copied the Jurchen system, which, in turn, was based on earlier, time-tested models. In 1236, by decree of Ogedei, paper money was introduced into the empire, parallel to the monetary system. For Mongolia and Islamic countries, this was a serious innovation, which, we note, in the end did not take root here, including due to a misunderstanding of their role by the Mongol rulers - the successors of Ogedei. (After the death of Ogedei, during the regency of his widow Turakina- Khatun and then, during the reign of Guyuk, the issue of paper money exceeded all possible limits and hit hard the overall imperial monetary system, which soon virtually ceased to exist.)

During these same years, Buddhism, also imported from China, began to spread among the Mongols, with the tacit support of Ogedei. It is far from acquiring the character of a state religion, and in the next half century the majority of Mongols remain faithful to their native Bon religion. However, the well-known indifference of the Mongols to religious issues and their pronounced religious tolerance greatly facilitated the path to Buddhism. The thousand-year-old philosophical system, quite carefully thought out, had a very significant influence on the souls of people. Its impact on the Mongol elite was especially serious, and primarily in the new Khan’s headquarters - Karakorum. Hundreds, if not thousands, of Chinese Buddhist officials lived and worked here. Through them, Buddhism spread throughout the new bureaucratic environment. It is no coincidence, although at a slightly later time, already under Mengu-kaan, Rubruk notes that four-fifths of all the temples of Karakorum were Buddhist. The Great Khan Ogedei himself favored Buddhism, generally distinguished by his kindness and generosity, completely in the spirit of Buddhist morality. He himself, however, did not become a Buddhist and repeatedly emphasized that for him all religions are good if they benefit people. Moreover, as for any Mongol, religion was by no means in the first place for him. Much more important was the fulfillment of the behests of Genghis Khan, maintaining order in the colossal power or, finally, the construction of the great steppe capital - Karakorum.

The construction of Karakorum generally occupies a special place in the actions of Ogedei. He paid great attention to this issue. To build the capital, tens of thousands of people from conquered peoples were rounded up. Most of them were very skilled artisans - the practice of stealing the best craftsmen to Mongolia is well known. Thanks to this, Karakorum grew by leaps and bounds and immediately acquired a truly metropolitan appearance. Already in 1235, the walls around the city were completed, and in the next year, 1236, the construction of the grandiose Khan's palace was completed, which from then on became the almost permanent residence of the first successor of Genghis Khan. Ogedei in general, it seems, did not like nomadic life, and he tried to turn Genghis Khan’s famous covenant about compulsory nomadism into only a necessary but unpleasant formality. Later, he even repented of this sin - the desire for a sedentary life - in front of his comrades. However, for the normal administration of the empire, the constant presence of the khan in the capital or near it was certainly a benefit. And indeed, under Ogedei, this clarity of control and speed of execution of the khan’s orders is simply amazing.

Karakoram rock turtle. Modern photo

Another important innovation played an important role in establishing such a strict order in the empire - the establishment by the khan of an all-empire yam service. Already under Genghis Khan, the institution of khan's messengers arose and developed - a very important element of the state structure. However, the growth of the empire required a much clearer design and maximum streamlining of this key service. Ögedei carried out a similar large-scale reform. In the “Secret Tale” his own words are quoted on this matter: “Wouldn’t it be more expedient, therefore, to establish a firm order in this regard once and for all: everywhere from thousands, there are guardians of postal stations - yamchins and mounted postmen - ulagachins; in certain places, pit stations are established, and the ambassadors henceforth undertake, with the exception of emergency circumstances, to follow the stations without fail, and not drive around the ulus” (§ 279). Immediately began the massive construction of pits and the laying of routes to the most remote borders of the Mongolian state. As a result, the speed of transmission of the khan's decrees and the speed of movement of messengers, ambassadors and traders increased sharply. For such a huge state this was extremely important. Thus, just by streamlining the structure, with the same means of transportation, it was possible to achieve an increase in mobility several times. Later, this unprecedented speed of movement across the steppe impassable terrain greatly amazed the European envoys to the khan - Plano Carpini and Guillaume de Rubruck.

Among Ogedei’s other affairs, it is worth noting the construction, on his orders, of wells in waterless lands, as well as a significant number of state granaries. In times of famine, such granaries were often opened to supply the poor with free grain and other food products. Numerous wells made it possible to include significant areas of previously abandoned land into nomadic circulation. If we add to this that during the entire period of Ogedei’s reign the empire did not experience serious internal turmoil, then his time can well be called the “golden age” (only a very short one) of Mongolian history. What was this clearly extraordinary man and ruler like?

Coral mask of the Buddhist deity Zhamsran

There is a famous saying: “Nature rests on the children of geniuses.” In other words, the descendants of brilliant people usually do not shine with any talents. In general, human history really confirms this rule. But there are no rules without exceptions - and we know that the brilliant Philip of Macedon was succeeded by his equally talented son Alexander. It seems that the well-known rule did not fully work in the Genghis Khan-Ogedei pair. Of course, it is hardly possible to compare the extremely versatile genius of Genghis Khan with the abilities of his third son. But he clearly passed on one of his talents to Ogedei - the talent of a statesman. In this sense, Ogedei rose to the occasion, actually completing the building of Yeke Mongol Ulus, which Genghis Khan began to build.

Ogedei possessed an extremely important quality for any major politician: the ability to reconcile the most diverse opinions and the most exorbitant ambitions and force their bearers to work for power. And it is no coincidence that he enjoyed great respect both among the members of the “Altan Uruga” and among the old associates of Genghis Khan - people, as we know, are also not devoid of talents. This authority could not be shaken even by his well-known drunkenness (and Ogedei drank heavily) and some, to put it mildly, strange actions directly related to this bad habit. In the main, Ogedei retained the necessary firmness and, despite individual excesses, on the whole quite confidently led the Mongol Empire along the path bequeathed by his great father. One can even say that it was precisely such a figure as Ogedei that the emerging Mongol power needed: after creating a powerful state at the cost of incredible efforts, calm and thoughtful work was now required to improve it. Restrained and good-natured, but when necessary, firm and stern, Ogedei was suitable for this like no one else.

A big plus for the new state was even the unprecedented generosity, sometimes turning into extravagance, that distinguished Genghis Khan’s successor. Rashid ad-Din tells us dozens of stories telling about the unparalleled generosity of the khan. Officials of the Khan's office often reproached him for the senseless “squandering of state property” and cited the example of the kings of the past who accumulated countless treasures. Ogedei answered this simply: “Those who are zealous in this (accumulating treasures - author) are deprived of a share of reason, since there is no difference between the land and the treasure closed [in the treasury] - they are both identical in [their] uselessness. Since when the hour of death approaches, [treasures] do not bring any benefit, and it is impossible to return from the other world, we will keep our treasures in our hearts, and we will give away everything that is in hand and that has been prepared, or [what else] arrives subjects and the needy, in order to glorify the good name.” (Rashid ad-Din. Collection of chronicles. Vol. II. P. 49.) And he continued to distribute money from the khan’s treasury to numerous petitioners and simply poor people. The case in history is almost unique, but one can imagine the impression it made on the numerous subjects of the Mongolian kaan. Truly, this kindness and generosity of Ogedei was no less a binding element of the power than the yam service he organized.

Mask on the facade of the palace in Karakorum. XIII century

It is worth citing one more story by Rashid ad-Din, which perfectly characterizes Ogedei’s other qualities - intelligence, resourcefulness, and statesmanship. One day, a certain Arab from among the ardent opponents of Islam came to the khan and told the ruler a dream he allegedly saw. “I saw Genghis Khan in a dream, and he said: “Tell my son to kill more Muslims, since they are very bad people.” Ogedei thought for a moment, and then asked: “Did he tell you this himself or did he pass it on to you through someone?” He, without any hesitation, declared - of course, he said, with his own lips. - “Do you know the Mongolian language?” – Kaan asked. “No,” answered the Arab. - “Then you are, without a doubt, lying, for I know for sure that my father did not speak any language other than Mongolian.” And Ogedei ordered the death of the narrow-minded hater of Muslims.

Without a doubt, this story, like many others, characterizes the khan as an intelligent statesman who understood the interests of the power he led better than his officials. But one cannot help but add a fly in the ointment to the ointment. We are talking about the same unbridled drunkenness of Ogedei, which often pushed him to inappropriate actions, which he himself later regretted, and in the end brought him to his grave. A number of historians, unfortunately, absolutize these sins of Ogedei, and in their presentation he turns into a weak and worthless ruler. All merit in this case is attributed to Yelu Chutsai, who, allegedly, was the true ruler of the empire. Without in any way trying to throw a stone at the truly talented prime minister of the Mongol Empire, we must still firmly say: such an opinion is complete nonsense. Neither the structure nor the very essence of the Mongol power made it possible to accept the leadership of the empire from anyone other than the natural khan. Yelu Chutsai was a very intelligent and competent assistant to Ogedei, he could, if necessary, influence his decisions, but he never tried to challenge the power of the khan, much less encroach on his place in the state system. Essentially, their relationship can be called a symbiosis, in which Ogedei played the first violin.

Fate did not give Ogedei a very long life. He outlived his father by fourteen years (He died on December 11, 1241, apparently from alcohol poisoning.) but even in this rather short period of time he managed to significantly strengthen the foundations of the Mongol state and introduced important elements that streamlined the system. Although Ogedei himself was not distinguished by his love for military affairs, it was under him that grandiose military successes were achieved: the defeat of Jin was completed, the victorious Great Western Campaign was carried out, expanding the boundaries of the “Mongolosphere” to the shores of the Adriatic. At that time, calm reigned in the country; civil strife had not yet begun to corrode the body of the Mongolian state. And Ogedei’s merit in this state of affairs is undeniable.

And now let’s move on to the description of the most important act during Ogedey’s reign - the Great Western Campaign. Since this campaign itself is one of the most studied in Russian historiography, it is worth limiting ourselves to describing only the main events, moreover, from the point of view of the place occupied by this campaign in Mongolian, and not Russian history. Alas, most of the works of Russian authors suffer from a kind of “Russocentrism”, which obscures both the goals of the campaign and the actions of the Mongols in it. Rus', Russia is declared to be perhaps the main goal of the Mongol invasion. Meanwhile, the Mongols themselves called this campaign “Kipchatsky”; the conquest of the Russian principalities at that moment was almost a purely preventive measure, one of several elements of the overall strategic task.

The campaign began in the spring of 1236, when the troops of Batu and his brothers stationed near the Volga were joined by numerous armies of other Genghisid princes. The first blow was dealt to Volga Bulgaria, a large trading state whose cities were located along the banks of the Volga in its middle reaches, south of Nizhny Novgorod. Twelve years earlier, the Bulgars inflicted a heavy defeat on the Mongol corps of Subedei and Jebe, returning from their famous raid. Five years later, Subedey managed to partially avenge the defeat - the Bulgars were defeated in a field battle. However, all attempts of the Mongols to take the Bulgar cities were unsuccessful: the lack of military strength affected them. But in 1236 this power increased many times over - and the last hour of the Bulgar people came.

When taking the Great Bulgar - the capital of Volga Bulgaria - and other cities of the country, the Mongols showed cruelty that far exceeded even their own, far from the most philanthropic, norms. All the captured cities were burned, and their population was mostly killed. According to the Russian chronicle, the Mongols “beat with weapons from the old to the young to the mere babe... and the whole land of their captivity.” Only a small part of the rural population survived; Several hundred master craftsmen, sent to Karakorum to the Khan's court, also survived. A state with a centuries-old history ceased to exist.

After the fall of the Bulgar, the Mongols began to conquer other peoples of the Volga region - the Mordovians, Burtases, and Bashkirs. By the fall of 1237, the resistance of these peoples was largely broken. At the same time, a powerful Mongol corps under the command of Guyuk and Mengu began active operations against the Cumans in the area between the Volga and Don rivers. The leader of the Volga Polovtsians at that time was a certain Bachman, who organized desperate resistance. The Mongols could not capture him for a long time: Bachman masterfully used the methods of guerrilla warfare. Only in 1239 was he caught by one of the troops of Mengu's army and executed. However, by that time the opposition of the Volga Polovtsians had faded away, and the armies of Mengu and Guyuk operated far to the west and south - in the North Caucasus and Don steppes.

After the defeat of the Bulgarian kingdom and the conquest of the Volga peoples, in the fall of 1237, a “small kurultai” of the Genghisid princes who participated in the campaign was convened. It was decided to go to war with the Russians, since these potential allies of the Kipchaks created a serious flank threat. The combat capabilities of the Russians were well known to the “old fox” Subedei, and he was not going to leave such a formidable force in the Mongolian rear, which was quite capable of changing the strategic position and casting doubt on the success of the entire campaign. Not least important in the decision-making process was probably the desire to plunder rich areas: the Mongols had been well aware of the riches of the Russian lands since the Battle of Kalka. According to the testimony of the Hungarian monk Julian, who wrote about the events immediately preceding the Mongol campaign against Rus', the Mongol military leaders were only waiting for the arrival of winter so that the earth, and most importantly, the rivers and swamps, would freeze. This would allow the Mongol cavalry to operate successfully in any direction: there were no other natural barriers on the Russian Plain. Moreover, Julian directly points out that the Suzdal princes (and the monk himself was in Suzdal at that time) knew about the intentions of the Mongols, and there was no talk of any surprise attack, as “jingo-patriots” often write. The Russians could only hope that the Mongols would not attack exactly this winter, but these hopes were not realized. The Russian “maybe” didn’t work this time.

By the winter of 1237-38, the entire Mongol army was gathered into a single fighting fist east of the upper reaches of the Don. Here the steppe ended and the zone of continuous forests began. However, unknown guides showed the Mongols passages in these forests, which made it possible for their equestrian tumens to easily reach the borders of the Ryazan principality. Here the first (after Kalka) major clash between the Russian and Mongol armies took place: the Mongols stumbled upon the Ryazan guard army. The people of Ryazan fought extremely courageously, which is understandable, because the best warriors were appointed to the “watchman”; however, the enormous superiority in forces allowed the Mongols to achieve complete victory. The entire Ryazan army was killed on the battlefield. The path to the capital of the principality was open. On December 16, 1237, a huge Mongol army approached the walls of Ryazan. (Now this is the settlement of Old Ryazan, fifty kilometers down the Oka River from modern Ryazan, which was then called Pereyaslavl of Ryazan.) It must be emphasized that the Mongols really threw into Rus' All their forces, even the tumens of Guyuk and Mengu came up. Ryazan, of course, could not resist such power. The city resisted for five days, while being subjected to continuous fire from stone-throwing and flame-throwing siege mechanisms. After such powerful preparation, a decisive assault followed on the sixth day, and Ryazan fell. Both her defenders and almost the entire population were killed, and Prince Yuri and the princess died. The Ryazan principality as an active force of resistance was over. (The most famous legend about the military operations of the Ryazan squad under the leadership of Evpatiy Kolovrat is considered by most modern historians to be a later invention. However, it is likely that small groups of Ryazan residents could wage an active guerrilla war, which, however, was of little ability influence the overall strategic situation.)

From Ryazan, the Mongolian tumens moved to Kolomna, the most important fortress of the Vladimir-Suzdal land, standing at the confluence of the Moscow River and the Oka. There was a border squad of Suzdal residents in the city, and in early January, significant reinforcements from Vladimir, led by the son of the Grand Duke Vsevolod Yuryevich, approached it. By the way, it is likely that the Mongols deliberately let this large army pass - so that the Russians would become bolder and decide to give a field battle. In such battles, the Mongols were invincible, which the Russians did not know or did not want to know. In any case, the probable expectations of the Mongols were justified: the young and ardent prince led the army to battle.

The battle, apparently, turned out to be very fierce and bloody. Genghis Khan's youngest son, Kulkan, died in this battle, which suggests a major Russian breakthrough during the battle. However, these Russian exploits were in vain: the Mongols' superiority in strength and tactics allowed them to win another brilliant victory. The Mongols managed to completely encircle the Russian army, and most of its soldiers died. Only Vsevolod and his “small squad” managed to escape from the ring. After this, the Mongols took Kolomna quite easily: the remnants of the garrison demoralized by defeat, of course, could not hold back the onslaught of the gigantic army.

After this, the Mongol troops moved towards Moscow, which was taken by surprise. Its inhabitants, apparently, were waiting for news from Kolomna, but not a single messenger informed them of the defeat - the Mongols acted unusually quickly. The city, however, put up quite stubborn resistance and held out for five whole days against Batu’s entire army. This resistance was followed by the usual punishment: all the inhabitants, young and old, were killed. This happened on January 20, 1238 - a black day in the history of the modern capital of Russia.

Russian wooden fortress of the 13th century.

From Moscow, the Mongols, having replenished food supplies in rich estates and monasteries near Moscow, headed to the capital of the principality. They acted so quickly that the city actually did not have time to properly prepare for defense. News of the defeat at Kolomna overtook the advanced Mongol guards by only a few days. On February 2, Grand Duke Yuri Vsevolodovich left Vladimir for Yaroslavl to gather troops, and the very next day the Mongol tumens blocked Vladimir. Only the sons of the prince remained in the city - the same Vsevolod with the “small squad” and Mstislav. After a three-day assault, accompanied by incessant bombardment from hundreds of stone-throwing guns, Vladimir fell. On these same days, Suzdal was also taken, where the Mongols sent a significant army, hoping to capture the Grand Duke himself there.

After the capture of Vladimir and Suzdal, the Mongols were divided into several large formations; The “raid” stage, usual for their tactics, began. The task of one of the groups was to search for the Grand Duke, others moved in different directions: east to Gorodets, north to Yaroslavl, and the main forces led by Batu - to the northwest, to Tver, with a further aim at Novgorod. The actions of their troops were very successful: after previous heavy defeats, there was simply no one to resist the Mongols. Only in Torzhok, which already belonged to the Novgorod possessions, were they given a sufficiently serious rebuff, but at the beginning of March the city fell and its defenders were killed. At the same time, the corps of the Mongol temnik Burundai discovered the location of the assembled army of Yuri Vsevolodovich. Russian troops stood on the Sit River waiting for reinforcements, but the latter, with some exceptions, never arrived.

On March 4, 1238, Burundai's army (perhaps just one tumen) completely suddenly attacked the camp of the Russian army. The guard did not have time to report the attack of the Mongols - perhaps it was destroyed, and according to some information, the prince, confused by the troubles that befell him, completely “forgot” to set up a military guard. Only at the very last moment did the regiments begin to be alerted, but it was too late. The Mongols quickly took the camp fortifications, and after an hour it was all over. Almost the entire Russian army and Grand Duke Yuri Vsevolodovich himself perished. Rus' suffered a severe defeat, which determined its difficult fate for many years.

After the defeat of the Russians on the City River and the capture of Torzhok, the Mongol military leaders again gather for a military council. At this meeting, a decision was made (no doubt under the influence of the highly experienced Subedei-bagatur) to abandon the campaign against Novgorod due to the approaching spring thaw. The Mongols were very afraid of being cut off from their native steppes, and thanks to this, Mister Veliky Novgorod was saved. (Now it is often written that the Mongol army turned south from the Ignach Cross, not reaching only a hundred kilometers to Novgorod. This is incorrect. It reached the Ignach Cross only one relatively small (no more than Tumen) detachment, which was moving north either in pursuit of people fleeing from it (raid), or for reconnaissance purposes. Of course, this detachment was not tasked with taking one of the largest cities in Europe.) And the army The conquerors then turned south, and went to new, not yet captured places, spreading their wings widely (two hundred to three hundred kilometers). In April 1238, its central tumens, under the command of Batu himself, approached Kozelsk.

A lot has been written about the heroic defense of Kozelsk; even entire books are dedicated to it. This fortress really turned out to be an “evil city” for the Mongols: the losses suffered by the invaders here are comparable to all their losses during the conquest of North-Eastern Rus'. However, it is still necessary to dispel two extremely persistent myths that exist in the mass consciousness. Myth one: Kozelsk held back the onslaught for seven weeks Total huge Mongol army. This is not so: in fact, almost all this time Kozelsk was besieged by two, maximum three tumens, and when the corps of Kadan and Buri came to the aid of Batu, the city was able to resist for only three days. Myth two: Kozelsk was a very small fortress with a small number of defenders. This is also incorrect: in reality, Kozelsk was a fairly large princely city with a powerful fortress that was of great strategic importance - it protected Rus' from the Steppe and was well prepared for defense. The number of defenders of the city and fortress was considerable: several thousand people, and the difficult life of the steppe borderlands quickly turned even ordinary townspeople into real warriors. But, let us emphasize, all these clarifications do not in any way detract from the feat of the defenders of Kozelsk, who heroically resisted the superior Mongol forces. Their courageous rebuff to the enemy is worthy of all admiration; soldiers and townspeople of Kozelsk saved the honor of Russian weapons.

After the capture of Kozelsk, the Mongol troops retreated to the Polovtsian steppe. In 1238, military operations were carried out rather sluggishly by them - the tension of the Russian campaign affected them. Basically, the Mongols limited themselves to police operations using the forces of individual tumens. But already in the winter of 1238-39, a large corps of four tumens fell first on the rebel Mordovians, and then on the eastern lands of Rus'. The Mongols took and burned Murom, Gorokhovets, and, according to some reports, Nizhny Novgorod. Another corps, operating in the south and west against the Polovtsy, in March 1239 defeated the lands of the Pereyaslavl principality, bordering the steppe.

In 1239–40, the main efforts of the Mongols were aimed at the final conquest of the North Caucasus and Black Sea steppes. Along the way, they struck at other targets: in the fall of 1239, the brothers Batu and Berke captured Chernigov, and in the winter of the same year, their third brother, Sheybani, conquered Sudak in the Crimea. The tumens of Mengu and Guyuk operated successfully in the North Caucasus. In 1239, the last Polovtsian khan who did not submit, Kotyan, already known to us, hiding from the Mongols, left with his entire horde for Hungary. This action of his largely determined the future strategy of the Chingizids and pushed Batu and Subedei to the decision to move towards Europe.

The Western European campaign was preceded by the famous quarrel between Guyuk and Buri and Batu. Dissatisfied with the fact that Batu was the first to be served a bowl of kumis at the feast, envious and ambitious relatives refused to obey the leader of the campaign appointed by the khan. Batu immediately complained about the willfulness of the princes to Ogedei, who reprimanded the obstinate people in the harshest terms, and with a special label confirmed the unlimited powers of Batu, and at the same time Subedei-Bagatura. The scandal was hushed up, but from that time on Batu and Guyuk became irreconcilable enemies.

A new stage of the Great Western Campaign began in the fall of 1240, when Batu’s huge army (replenished by a considerable number of warriors from the conquered steppe peoples) moved to Southwestern Rus'. Its first and main goal was Kyiv, one of the largest and richest cities in Europe. Genghis Khan had already heard about the wealth of Kyiv: in determining the route of the campaign of Subedei and Jebe Khan, he ordered them to reach Kyiv. But then it was not possible to take the city due to lack of strength; now the Mongol forces were enormous. The entire Mongol army also approached Kyiv, as it once did to Ryazan - that is, more than a hundred thousand soldiers. However, the ancient capital of Rus' put up desperate resistance, and the city held out for almost a month, despite constant bombardment and repeated assaults. In the end, Kyiv was taken piecemeal, and its last defenders died in the Tithe Church. On December 6, 1240 the city fell. There is a well-known legend that for his heroism in the defense of Kyiv, Batu saved the life of the Galician governor Dmitry. However, most likely, Dmitry stayed alive because he knew a lot about the military capabilities of the Galicia-Volyn principality, which became the next target of the Mongols. And saving the lives of valiant defenders for the Mongols was nonsense - on the contrary, the Mongols killed such people mercilessly.

The prince of the Galicia-Volyn lands was the famous Daniil Romanovich, nicknamed Galitsky. As a young man, he took part in the ill-fated battle of Kalka and only miraculously escaped Mongol captivity and death. He, like no one else, understood that there was no chance of victory in a field battle for the Russian army. Therefore, the prince dispersed his army among the fortress garrisons in the hope of fighting off the enemy. It cannot be said that this tactic was successful: the Mongols managed to capture both capitals of the principality - Vladimir-Volynsky and Galich. Nevertheless, Daniil managed to preserve a significant part of the army: Batu was unable to take a number of fortresses, including Kremenets, Danilov and Kholm. Subsequently, this seriously helped Daniil Romanovich in the fight for the royal crown. So his strategy, by and large, paid off.

The capture of Vladimir-Volynsky ended the next stage of the Western Campaign. Apparently, here in Vladimir, a meeting of the leaders of the Mongolian troops was held again. Under pressure from Batu, it was decided to continue the campaign until the “last sea.” Buri and Guyuk, however, refused to submit to this verdict: by this time it became clear that the death of the Great Khan Ogedei was just around the corner, and the princes, especially Guyuk, sought to quickly return to Mongolia in order to be “in the right place at the right time.” Mengu's corps also departed to the east with them: subsequent events suggest that this happened on the orders of Batu himself. Mengu was a friend of Batu and could well fulfill his request to “monitor” the overly zealous Guyuk.

However, it should be recognized that the Mongol army set off on its campaign against Western Europe seriously weakened - it was reduced by no less than a third. The number of troops remaining with Batu can be estimated at eighty to ninety thousand people - not too large a number for such a large-scale plan. Even more surprising is that this army was divided into three parts during the invasion of Europe. Three tumens, led by Jaghatai's son, Baydar, headed to Poland; two tumens of Kadan, son of Ogedei, fell on Wallachia and Southern Hungary; three or four tumens of Batu himself moved through the Carpathians to Central Hungary. But what is even more striking is that these relatively small armies almost everywhere prevailed over the enemy, except that the Czechs won a local victory at Olomouc.

The Baydar Corps achieved serious success in Poland. Near Tursk and Khmilnik, the Mongols alternately defeated both the Polish militia and the regular troops (druzhina). On March 22, they took the then Polish capital of Krakow. On April 9, the largest battle of the Polish stage of the campaign took place. Near the town of Liegnitz, the Baidar tumens completely defeated the Polish-German knightly army under the command of Prince Heinrich. The prince himself also died. After this important victory, Baydar’s army moved south to join Batu’s army. In May 1241, she was already plundering Moravia.

The Mongol offensive against Hungary ended with even greater achievements. Batu and Subedei managed to impose a general battle here on the Hungarian army of King Bela. It took place on the Chaillot River and turned out to be extremely bloody. The Mongols themselves lost more than four thousand people killed, but in the end they managed to encircle and almost completely destroy the main Hungarian army of about sixty thousand people. King Bela managed to escape from the battlefield, but the Hungarian resistance was broken after this battle. To be fair, it must be said that Kadan’s corps, which arrived on time, also took part in this battle, so the Mongol army may have been superior to the Hungarian one.

Be that as it may, the Mongol victory at Chaillot was of great strategic importance. It brought all of South-Eastern and part of Central Europe under Mongolian rule and plunged the rest of the European countries into terrible panic. The Pope, the German Emperor and even the French King expected the inevitable invasion of the victorious nomads. Fear of the Mongols, largely irrational, gripped both the population and the armies of these states. The Mongols, however, were not in too much of a hurry, doing their usual thing - robbery, but by the spring of 1242, Kadan's corps, having thoroughly combed the Adriatic coast of Croatia, reached Trieste. And beyond Trieste lay Italy.

Europe was saved from further advance by the steppe inhabitants by chance. In December 1241, the great Khan Ogedei died in his palace in Karakorum. News of this comes to Europe in the spring of 1242. For Batu, this news became truly black - after all, the main contender for the vacated throne was his ardent opponent Guyuk. Therefore, after some thought and on the advice of the highly experienced Subedei, Batu decides to abandon the continuation of the campaign. He also abandons his plans to make the fertile Hungarian Pashta a personal ulus and a base for further conquests and begins the withdrawal of troops to the Volga steppes. Having finally plundered Bulgaria, in 1243 the Mongol armies of Batu retreated to the area between the Volga and Don rivers. Europe could finally breathe a sigh of relief. The Great Western Campaign of the invincible Mongol army was over.

A clear religious doctrine adhered to by the Mongols in the 12th – 13th centuries. It did not reach us for a very simple reason - it was not written down anywhere. This gives some historians the right to say that Genghis Khan himself professed shamanism.

This means faith in spirits that live around and plot various intrigues for a person. And his whole religiosity consisted in sometimes inviting shamans to his tent to pray. This was the opinion, for example, of the Russian linguist Prince Nikolai Sergeevich Trubetskoy, who wrote that only “formless shamanism” could justify the power of Genghis Khan as the protege of the sky deity Tengri.

Some modern researchers believe that Genghis Khan adhered to monotheistic “Tengrism.” Others suggest that he was a supporter of the even more ancient Bon cult, which emerged from the terrible Iranian cult of Mithras, famous for its human sacrifices.

As for shamanism, the efforts of the supreme shaman of the Mongols, Teb-Tengri, to strengthen his power, unite the priests and bring Genghis Khan under control ended in failure - he was killed.

Is Temujin a supporter of monotheism?

Who the founder of the Mongol empire really worshiped can be judged from the memoirs of rare European travelers and from the letters of his immediate descendants and entourage.

For example, the Persian scholar Rashid ad-Din ad-Tabib describes the behavior of the khan after receiving news of the death of the Mongol ambassadors: “the angry Temujin climbed to the top of the hill, untied his belt and threw it around his neck, took off his hat and fell prostrate on the ground. For three days he did not leave his place and prayed, asking some great god, the creator of the Mongolian people, to grant him the strength to take revenge.”

Based on this passage from the chronicle, scientists conclude that Temujin adhered to a kind of “monotheistic Tengrism,” honoring only one god out of many.

Is power from heaven?

This is allegedly confirmed by the letters of the great khans, which are cited by the Franciscan monk Guillaume de Rubruk, who visited the Mongols in the middle of the 13th century. The Great Khan Munke (grandson of Genghis Khan) in his letter to King Louis IX of France wrote in 1254 that “in heaven there is only one god, and on earth there is one master - Genghis Khan.”

To Rubruk himself, the khan made the following statement: “The Mongols believe that there is only one god, he gave man many fingers and gave him many paths...”, which clearly indicates the Mongols’ attempt to justify earthly power with divine will.

A few years before Munke, Guyuk Khan (another grandson of Genghis Khan), who was the Great Khan from 1246 to 1248, in his letter to the Pope, indicated that the power of the Mongols was from God and called on the Pope to come to bow together “with all the kings”: “by will God, all lands from east to west are under our rule. If it weren’t for God’s will, how could this happen?”

Does everything depend “on the god Tengri”?

Soviet historian Lev Nikolayevich Gumilyov also believed that the “Shaker of the Universe” professed a monotheistic religion, which was based on the veneration of the Eternal Sky - the god Tengri. He believed that this religion was very ancient and had been supported by all the steppe tribes of Eurasia and the Kipchaks for thousands of years.

The common thing that existed in monotheistic Tengrism was highlighted by a researcher from Kazakhstan N. G. Ayupov - the presence of a certain impersonal god Tengri, the spiritualization of nature, belief in life force and sacralization of power, as well as the cult of ancestors. Simply put, Genghis Khan believed that heaven itself gave him power, and it also gave him the strength to maintain this power. Tengri Khan - in Tengrism, was the supreme deity and performed earthly affairs, sometimes together with the Earth (Yer), sometimes together with other spirit deities. The deity Umai decided people's destinies and determined the duration of life, and the god Erlik was in charge of the kingdom of the dead.

As for monotheism, Mongolian Tengrism of the imperial era is most likely closer to Slavic polytheism, in which warriors and princes worshiped Svarog, often depriving other deities of attention as less significant. This is supported by the very name of the khan - Genghis Khan, the name of one of the heavenly deities, which Temujin accepted after the victory over China and declaring himself the Great Khan.

"Universe Shaker" was a Bon follower?

Historian Konstantin Aleksandrovich Penzev believes that Genghis Khan could have been a follower of the ancient Aryan religion Bon, which came to Tibet from Iran and was borrowed from there by the Mongol tribes. According to Bon philosophy, the world consists of three spheres - the sphere of gods, the sphere of people and the sphere of water spirits; in the world of people there is a white deity “he who loves all things” and there is a black deity - the creator of grief and war.

In favor of the theory, Penzev cites the same arguments that other scientists cite as evidence of the khan’s faith in Tengri - the testimony of Rashid ad-Din ad Tabib, for example, before the campaign against Altan Khan, Genghis Khan climbs a hill, kneels, and throws the belt of his caftan on neck, obviously as a sign of submission to the creator, he prays for the granting of strength to tame the turmoil.

Was he even an atheist?

The 13th-century Persian historian Ala Juvaini, whose family occupied leadership positions under the Mongols, testified that the Great Khan was generally an atheist and did not adhere to any faith. That is why he avoided fanaticism and was loyal to all religions of the conquered peoples, maintaining the prestige of the elders and sages, and that is why in his Great Yasa he indicated that his descendants should respect all religions equally and show no preference for any of them.

Some believe in Mohammed, others in Buda

One way or another, it is no longer possible to find out for sure, but it is reliably known that the khan, who was fierce towards his enemies, was an excellent organizer, encouraged such character traits as loyalty, bravery and courage, executed traitors to his enemies and elevated people who remained faithful to their princes or khans . Temujin always kept his word and hated cowards, traitors and liars.

After his death, his sons and grandsons became supporters of different religions - some returned to shamanism, others married Nestorian Christians from the Kerait tribe and themselves became Christians, others accepted Buddhism. And the Golden Horde khans, a hundred years later, under Khan Uzbek, converted to Islam, and very quickly the Great Mongol Empire ceased to exist.

E. S. Kulpin

Of all that we know about the Mongol invasion of Europe, perhaps the most incomprehensible still remains the unexpected end of the invasion. The lack of understanding of the reasons is associated with the traditional idea of ​​the conquerors as a single whole, although it is known that they were not homogeneous either socially or ethnically and, accordingly, had different interests. In particular, the fundamental statement of the patriarch of Golden Horde studies German Fedorov-Davydov regarding the forced role of the Turks in the Mongol Empire turned out to be forgotten. If we consider processes and events through the prism of this forgotten constant, we can see that the divergence of interests of the Turks and Mongols could force the latter to stop their attack on Western Europe

Key words: Mongol conquests, nature, ethnic groups, politics, economics.

Of all that we know about the Mongol invasion of Europe, perhaps the most incomprehensible still remains the unexpected end of the invasion. Historians are still arguing why Batu, having reached the Adriatic and being literally a stone's throw from the Eternal City - Rome, violated the covenant of Genghis Khan, stopped walking and left Western Europe forever. The formal reason is the need for Batu to participate in the elections of the new khan of the Mongol Empire. This reason was hardly decisive, since he did not go to the elections. Another compelling reason is the large losses of the Mongols after the conquest of Rus', but the thesis is not sufficiently reasoned. Are there other possible reasons that historians have not yet considered?

What do we know about the events of the 1230–1250s? from historical documents?

The fact that the beginning of the Jochid state in Eastern Europe and Siberia has its own background. It was founded during the life of Genghis Khan. In 1207–1208 After the conquest of the Siberian peoples, he allocated the area of ​​​​rule - ulus - to the eldest son of Jochi. At the same time, Genghis ordered a small possession in Southern Siberia to expand in a western direction “up to those places where the hoof of a Tatar horse reaches” (Tiesenhausen 1941: 150, 204). Two tumens were sent to the west, led by the best Mongol commander Sudebe, who victoriously passed through Iran, Transcaucasia, and the North Caucasus, defeated the united Russian-Polovtsian army on Kalka in 1223, was defeated by the Volga Bulgars and returned to the Mongolian steppes. After the death of Jochi in 1227, at the kurultai of 1227–1229. the rights of his son Batu to the lands of Siberia, Bulgaria, Dasht-i-Kipchak (the steppe zone of Eurasia from Altai to the Carpathians), Bashkiria, Rus' and Circassia to Derbent were confirmed. At the same time, Genghis Khan’s successor, the great Kaan Ogedei, “in pursuance of the decree given by Genghis Khan in the name of Jochi, entrusted the conquest of the northern countries to the members of his house” (Ibid.: 22). At the kurultai in 1235, “a decision was made to take possession of the countries of the Bulgars, Ases and Rus', which, being located in the vicinity of the Batu camps, had not yet been completely conquered and were proud of their numbers” (Ibid.).

The fact that in order to conquer Eastern Europe to help Batuhan, the great Kaan Ogedei allocated 12 princes with their troops, and in the spring of 1236 Batu’s army from the Irtysh region began its movement to the west. In the autumn of the same year, Batu’s troops entered the Volga Bulgaria and conquered it by the end of the year, destroying cities and exterminating part of the population who did not have time to hide in the forests and escape to Rus'. Then in 1237–1241. the Mongols devastated Rus', the Polovtsian field and Taurida. After that, having overcome the Carpathians, they passed through the lands of Poland, Hungary, and Serbia. At the same time, as the historian of the 15th century wrote. al-Aini, the Mongols “captured what they could grab and destroyed those they were able to destroy,” because of which “the lands were deserted and the countries depopulated” (He 1884: 503), and stopped on the Adriatic coast. In 1241, Kaan Ogedei died. There was a threat of dynastic strife and internecine wars. Batu's troops returned to the steppes of Eastern Europe.

After the campaign to the West, a period began without wars and uprisings of the defeated peoples of Eastern Europe. It was only in 1249/1250 that Alexander Nevsky’s brothers Andrei and Yaroslav rebelled against the Mongols, hoping that a change of khan in Karakorum would allow them to get rid of the Horde’s interference in Russian affairs. A punitive expedition of Nevryuy was sent against Andrei, and Khurrumshi (Kuremsy in Russian chronicles) against Daniil Galitsky. In North-Eastern Rus' the uprising was suppressed in 1252, in South-Western Rus' - in the 1250s.

Although the political history of the Ulus of Jochi - the Golden Horde - begins in 1243, when Batu returned from a campaign in Europe, Grand Duke Yaroslav was the first of the Russian rulers to arrive at the headquarters of the Mongol Khan for a label to reign. By 1244, all Russian princes received khan's labels (letters) to reign. The eastern and southern borders of the Ulus of Jochi were outlined, which included the steppes of Western Siberia, Kazakhstan and Eastern Europe to the Danube, the North Caucasus, Crimea, Moldova, Volga Bulgaria, Mordovian lands, Rus' and the left bank of Khorezm. However, not Western ones.

For ten years, Ulus Jochi did not have a capital, although large cities destroyed during the conquest, such as Urgench (Khorezm), Bolgar (the former capital of Volga Bulgaria), and Derbent, were quickly restored. Power was concentrated in the khan's headquarters, and the khan roamed the steppe from spring to late autumn, wintering in the early years, possibly in Bolgar. Only around 1250 did he begin to spend the winter in the lower reaches of the Volga, where the construction of palaces for him and the nobility began by artisans of different tribes from conquered peoples. Based on the Khan's palace, the city that subsequently emerged was called Sarai, the first mention of which dates back to 1254.

We do not know what Batu thought before the campaign against Western Europe, we do not know what his considerations were in the Adriatic in 1242, but we can confidently say that in the 1250s. he definitely no longer thought about conquering new lands. The indicator is Khan’s bet, or more precisely, its state. The Khan's headquarters - the center of the Ulus - is an invisible, but accurate reflection of the sentiments of the Mongol elite in relation to the fulfillment of Genghis Khan's covenant. The mobile state meant that the task of continuing the conquest was not removed from the “agenda”. After all, depending on how far the Mongols intended to move to the west, the administrative center of Ulus should have been located just as far in the west. The general historical pattern in the creation of such a center is associated with a number of prerequisites and consequences. The famous historian of the 20th century wrote accurately and briefly about the main consequence. William McNeil: “If the capital was so vitally necessary and if the presence of the ruler in the capital (part of the year or constantly) was just as important, then expanding the borders (of the state - E.K.) became difficult” (Makil 2008: 29 ). To maintain power in the conquered territory, it was desirable to locate the administrative-political center of the state in a place equidistant from the enclaves of dense settlement located on the outskirts of the state. If this is not done, then the efficiency of managing the distant periphery with the means of communication of that time would become extremely low. The middle of the state is the khan’s domain, his personal land ownership. It is known that Batu distributed and redistributed territories (uluses) among his closest relatives. For himself, he chose the left bank of the Volga, then added the North Caucasus (for the distribution of the possessions of the Ulus of Jochi, see: Egorov 2009: 162–166). The location of the capital - in the center of the domain - was determined after the addition of the North Caucasus to the domain.

We do not know how the final decision was connected with the uprisings in North-Eastern and Western Rus', but the fact is that it was made during the uprisings or immediately after them. However, even if there was a connection, this fact cannot yet clearly support the assumption that the Mongols were bled dry in the first campaign against Rus' and that is why they could not conquer Western Europe. Of course, specific figures for army size and casualties could clarify the situation. But the data in written sources of that time are very conditional and subjective. Perhaps, among modern historians, only N.N. Kradin tests “harmony with algebra”: the data of narratives - with biological limitations. Thus, he introduces into scientific argumentation the concept of the ecological productivity of the Mongolian steppes, which at that time made it possible to feed a maximum of 800 thousand people (Kradin, Skrynnikova 2006: 426). This means that with simple demographic reproduction, when a family consists of 5 people, there cannot be more than 160 thousand adult men, and the army cannot exceed this limit; moreover, naturally, for various reasons, not all adult men can be drafted for "active service". “Judging by the “Secret Legend,” writes a researcher of nomads (Ibid.: 425–426), “Genghis Khan in 1205 had at least one hundred thousand horsemen... At the time of the death of the founder of the state, the left wing consisted of 38 thousand. , the right - from 62 thousand. Taking into account a thousand personal bodyguards, called gols, as well as 40 thousand, which were distributed to close relatives, the total number of troops was 141 thousand horsemen (Rashidaddin 1952: 266-278).” Moreover, it is known that Jochi received 4 thousand (Ibid.: 274). Therefore, the Mongols couldconquerthe world with such a maximum population size, and only having conquered it, remove the limit limit.

Next, you need to clearly understand the physical space of the Mongol conquests. In the first half of the 13th century. it made up more than half of the entire Eurasian continent - from the Far East to Europe. In China, Central and Western Asia, in the Middle East, 140-160 thousand Mongol warriors were dispersed in a territory that was not only huge, but also densely populated, keeping newly conquered countries and peoples in obedience and conquering new ones. Specifically, in the 30s and 40s. In the 13th century, in addition to Rus', Mongol troops conquered individual Iranian regions, and in 1243 they defeated the Seljuk Sultan Giyasaddin Keykubad II in Asia Minor. However, most of the Mongols, presumably, were involved in China at that time. There the Mongols were confronted by the largest army that could have existed in those days, namely more than 1 million in number (History...1974: 106). There, in 1234, a victorious, but difficult, exhausting 43-year war with the Song Empire began. There, the steppe inhabitants were faced with the task of conquering a hundred million people (Fitzgerald 2004: 219) and the most developed country of the then world. (For comparison: there were apparently 5.4 million Russians at that time [Nefedov 2001].)

N.N. Kradin, following Khrustalev, states: “We should also not forget that the losses of the Mongols were great, which in no way justifies their cruelty. According to some assumptions, during the first campaign against Rus' alone, the Mongols lost approximately 25 thousand killed out of 70 thousand soldiers” (Kradin, Skrynnikova 2006: 481). V. L. Egorov writes: “The size of the army that marched to Europe can only be determined extremely approximately from indirect data. Recent research materials allow us to assert that about 65 thousand people were gathered under the banner of Batu Khan” (Egorov 2003). With all the unique capabilities of the Mongols at that time to quickly concentrate troops in one place, it is difficult to imagine that the Mongols sent almost half of their available soldiers to conquer Rus', then (according to the residual principle) they could send the same amount to China, while losing almost a fifth of all soldiers . If the losses corresponded to reality, then no more than 45 thousand remained for the conquest of Western Europe. Although other historians also talk about significant losses after the conquest of Rus' (He 2009: 26), they provide other quantitative data: in the campaign of 1241, a total of up to 60 thousand soldiers: 50 thousand against Hungary, 10 thousand against Poland (Gekkenyan 2009: 161, 162). If 60 thousand really went to Western Europe, then losses in Rus' are reduced to 5 thousand people.

To understand what, in principle, the losses of the Mongols could have been, we need to turn to qualitative characteristics. N. N. Kradin, referring to W. McNeil (McNeil 2004: 645, note 16), writes: “From the point of view of W. McNeil, the Mongols significantly surpassed their opponents in mobility and coordination of actions at very long ranges distances. They could move in dispersed columns across any terrain, maintaining constant communication, so they could unite into battle formations at the right time and in the right place... European armies did not reach this level of coordination until the end of the 19th century. The Mongols had excellent messengers and excellent deep and flank reconnaissance. The amazing endurance of both warriors and horses, raised in harsh conditions, also played a role.” Further, the scientist notes the following points: “The Mongolian army was based on the so-called decimal system.... The discovery of the principle of hierarchy (including the decimal system) at one time played no less important role in the history of military affairs than, for example, the invention of the wheel for technical progress.<...>A rigid military hierarchy presupposes strict discipline.<...>The decimal system and mutual responsibility do not imply the need for special controllers.<...>Such a system was very convenient for managing large masses of people.<...>(But it. - E.K.) did not always reflect the actual number of soldiers, but showed the military-political status of the unit... It is no coincidence that the Mongolian word tumen simultaneously means “ten thousand” and “countless multitude”” (Kradin, Skrynnikova 2006 : 424–425, 430). The Mongols borrowed from the Chinese gunpowder shells, vessels with oil and quicklime, rockets on bamboo sticks, a smoke screen to hide maneuvers on the battlefield and psychologically intimidate opponents, and the first cannons (Ibid.; Fitzgerald 2004: 189, 191). Once “catapults and gunpowder weapons became truly powerful, the Mongols demonstrated their ability to both destroy and defend fortress walls,” writes W. McNeil (2008: 62).

“There is no doubt,” notes S. A. Nefedov (2008: 194–195), “that the Mongols had military superiority over their opponents, but what was the scale of this superiority? Let's give one example. In September 1211, the Mongols met the army of the powerful Jin Empire in battle at the Huihephu fortress. It was a regular army, consisting of professional warriors at arms. In the vanguard are spearmen who are called “ying” - “steadfast,” the Song historian Xu Mengxin wrote about the Jin people. – The soldiers and their horses are dressed in armor. The spearmen, who made up about half the army, were followed by archers dressed in light armor. The spearmen rammed the enemy's formation, and the archers fired a volley, bursting into it to a depth of one hundred paces. The size of the Jin army was about 500 thousand soldiers - these were the best troops collected from throughout the vast empire. There were no more than 100 thousand Mongols - nevertheless, the Jin army was completely defeated and practically destroyed. ...In hundreds of battles throughout the 13th century. The Mongols were commanded by different (and not always talented) commanders - nevertheless, they almost always won.” Their main advantage was their new weapons.

The Mongolian bow, small in size, was fast-firing and had a penetrating power twice that of other bows of that time. The bow was not inferior in power to arquebuses, and in terms of rate of fire it was much superior to them. "YU. S. Khudyakov compares the military effect of the appearance of the Mongolian bow with the effect of another fundamental discovery - the appearance of automatic weapons in the 20th century. The rate of fire of the Mongolian bow was no less important than its power; it allowed Mongolian warriors to reduce the battle distance, giving them confidence that the enemy would not be able to resist the “rain of arrows”” (Nefedov 2008: 197). “... A powerful bow required special physical and psychological qualities from the shooter... It was extremely difficult, and sometimes impossible, for warriors of other nations to learn to shoot well from a Mongolian bow, even if they got it as a trophy” (Ibid.: 199 ).

Nefedov further states the following. The new weapon required the use of tactics that would ensure the use of all its advantages. The effect of the new bow was the same as the effect of the appearance of firearms: it caused most warriors to take off their armor. In some battles the Mongols had no heavy cavalry at all. “The Mongol commanders sought a decisive clash with the enemy,” Nefedov quotes Yu. S. Khudyakov. “The belief in their invincibility was so great that they entered into battle with superior enemy forces, trying to suppress their resistance with massive shooting” (Ibid.: 202). The effectiveness of the shooting was so great that R.P. Khrapachevsky compares it with the firepower of the regular armies of the New Age. R.P. Khrapachevsky and Yu.S. Khudyakov believe that only the development of firearms put a limit to the dominance of horse archers (Ibid.: 199–200, 202). These conclusions are indirectly confirmed by the authors who talk about the large losses of the Mongols in the Russian campaign: “Throughout the entire time the Mongols were in Western Europe, they did not suffer a single defeat. Such significant armies as the united Polish-German-Moravian in the battle of Legnica or the 60,000-strong Hungarian in the battle of the river. Shayo, were defeated by the Mongol troops, who did not even act in these battles in full force” (Egorov 2009: 26). The Russians did not have Mongolian discipline, strategy and tactics, or new types of weapons. The question arises: how were the scattered squads of the Russian princes, who even among the senior princes formed a detachment of 700–800 people (Pushkarev 1991: 48), able to offer such strong resistance to the Mongols that they lost almost a fifth of the entire military force of the empire (25 thousand killed out of 140 thousand - this is 18%)? What could the Russians really oppose to the Mongol invasion? Only courage and dedication. But, as Nefedov rightly writes, “the history of wars shows that courage and boldness are constantly forced to retreat before the all-conquering new weapon” (Nefedov B.G.). The quantitative data is questionable, but one should not rush to conclusions.

It is difficult or impossible to determine the real number of Mongols on the campaign to Europe and their losses for two reasons. One is that different authors borrow quantitative data from narrative sources, the objectivity of which is questionable. And at the same time, no one, except N.N. Kradin, is trying to verify them with information from objective sources in the natural sciences. The second reason is due to the fact that the Mongols everywhere established military service among the conquered peoples and formed units from them. The Turks came to Rus' with the Mongols, to Western Europe - the Turks, Russians and representatives of the peoples of the North Caucasus. We do not know how many “allies” were involved. But we know that in the eyes of the Russians, the Turks and the Mongols were alike - the Tatars. We know that the conquered peoples were often used by the Mongols as “cannon fodder” (especially when storming fortresses) and could suffer huge losses, which the Mongols themselves avoided: otherwise they would not have conquered half the world, but would have shared the fate of Pyrrhus. The tactics of the Mongols consisted in the fact that they shot the enemy at a safe distance, often without engaging in contact combat at all, but entered into it only after the enemy was extremely weakened, wounded by arrows (see: Nefedov 2008).

Let us assume that we know the total number of conquerors of Rus'. The method for calculating it was given by A. N. Tyuryukanov, based on the maximum size of the hay train (racehorses can only be fed with hay) during the winter campaign of 1237–1238. per 100 thousand soldiers. Such a convoy, occupying the entire width of the frozen rivers along which the horde moved, would have stretched, according to the scientist’s calculations, for tens of kilometers (Tyuryukanov 2001: 243–258). If we take into account a number of circumstances of the campaign that were not taken into account by Tyuryukanov, then the real total number of conquerors of Rus' - the Mongols and Turks - was no more than 65 thousand (see: Kulpin 2005). As the leading researcher of the Golden Horde, V.L. Egorov, now writes, “12 Genghisids took part in the campaign against Eastern Europe, who acted together until the end of 1240. After the capture of Kiev in December 1240, the army under the command of Batu Khan completed all the tasks set before her the All-Mongol Kurultai of 1235. However, Batu was not satisfied with what had been achieved and decided to continue the campaign further to the west. Most of the princes, led by Guyuk and Munke, did not agree with this and left with their troops to Mongolia. This fact is also noted in the Ipatiev Chronicle...” (Egorov 1996: 56–57). From this we can assume that history would have developed differently if, after the capture of Kyiv, his closest relatives who accompanied Batu - the 12 Chingizids - had not returned back to the steppes of Asia. But it is important to once again note not only the victoriousness of the Mongols, who brought the vast majority of the population of the entire Old World under their rule, but also their extreme small number. We do not know how many soldiers in Batu’s army were from the main military contingent of the empire, who considered the task of the kurultai after the capture of Kyiv completed, how many of the total number of 40 thousand nukers for all Genghisids were with the princes who left after the wars of Rus'. We only know that Jochi’s “quota,” which was inherited by his grandchildren and great-grandsons—Batu, Berke, and their sons—was 4 thousand and that these warriors went on a campaign against Western Europe. We know that the real number in thousands and thousands could be greater, and sometimes less. But the most important thing that we know is that in Batu’s army, in addition to the Mongols, there were Turks, Russians and Caucasians, and also that the presence of a large number of Mongols is not necessary for a campaign in Europe (two Tumen managed to conquer Iran, Transcaucasia, the North Caucasus and defeat Polovtsians and Russians on Kalka). Further, we can confidently assume that the main support of the Mongols could only be the Turks, whose weapons and tactics were identical to the Mongol ones, and also that there were clearly more Turks on the campaign to Europe than the Mongols. And in this fact you can try to look for those reasons for violating the covenant of Genghis Khan, which have not yet been considered by historians.

Riot of the people's militia

The Ulus of Jochi was part of the empire created by Genghis Khan, the basis of which was an army consisting of Mongols and Turks. The Mongols were the dominant and decision-making ethnic group, the Turks were the subordinate and the instrument for carrying out decisions. Although the number of Mongols in the Ulus, it seems, did not exceed 5% of the total nomadic population of the Ulus, this did not prevent the Mongols from being not just the dominant, but also the guiding force of society *(* There are many examples of this in history. In particular, in Russia in the 18th century The nobility that carried out radical transformations did not exceed 2% of the total population of the empire (for the dynamics of the growth of the nobility in Russia, see: Mironov 1999, vol. 1: 130; vol. 2: 208). In the course of development, it was these two different peoples who were initially destined to become one. But were they a single entity at the initial stage or did consolidation occur much later?

Consolidation is not always facilitated by common traditions, language and way of life. History is full of examples of how former comrades, relatives, and fellow tribesmen become the most irreconcilable enemies. And different people, not relatives, not fellow tribesmen, if they have common interests, become closer, and over time they develop common traditions, language and way of life. This is facilitated by common cause, the most important consolidating factor, if it exists and remains unchanged for a long time. Such an initially unifying common cause is most often joint defense against an external enemy, but there may also be a common cause for the joint arrangement of current and future internal life.

The Batu warriors, who conquered Eastern Europe and plunged Western Europe into a state of horror, in addition to plundering the inhabitants of cities taken by storm, had one common task, one common cause - the conquest of new lands. During the conquests, new “empty” land was created due to the expulsion of the aborigines. However, there were also differences in the goals of the Mongol nobility and ordinary warriors - Mongols and Turks. Although M. G. Safargaliev argued that “the main reason for the Mongol conquest was the desire to acquire large uninhabited spaces of land, as an indispensable condition for the nomadic mode of production” (Safargaliev 1996: 93), one can only partially agree with this statement.

Indeed, the conquest of new lands was the goal of both ordinary soldiers and the Mongol nobility. The nobility sought to be able to receive permanent tribute from the conquered agricultural peoples. Only during the conquest of Northern China did the Mongol nobility consider the possibility of exterminating the conquered peoples. One of the most authoritative researchers of the Golden Horde, Vadim Egorov, writes: “First Minister Yelü Chutsai, who was active during the life of Genghis Khan and his successor Udegei, developed imperial principles for imposing tribute on conquered lands. At the same time, he had to overcome the resistance of the conservative part of the steppe aristocracy, which called for the total extermination of the conquered population and the use of the subsequently vacated spaces for the needs of nomadic cattle breeding. With the help of digital calculations, Yelu Chutsai proved many times the greater profitability of imposing tribute on conquered peoples, rather than exterminating them” (Egorov 1996: 55).

The interests of the Mongol nobility could lie in the conquest of all of Europe in order to receive tribute from all European peoples. What would await ordinary nomads if they remained in Western Europe? They would have to become a new class of warriors and live in cities. But did they want this? Their ancestors, and they themselves, did not know how to live in cities, and they did not want to know. They wanted to lead a familiar nomadic lifestyle, which was physically impossible in Western Europe. They could risk their lives to storm Western European cities and castles only to have trophies. But after the conquest of Rus', trophies already lost the attractiveness of novelty. The nomads abandoned them on the way from one city to another or after taking the next city. It must be assumed that the brilliant victories in Western Europe were achieved by Batu’s army, figuratively speaking, with little bloodshed due to a “carefully thought out strategic plan” and its implementation with “astonishing accuracy” (for this see: Gekkenyan 2009) and undoubted tactical superiority a steppe warrior over a European knight (about this, see: Kadyrbaev 2006). Although the demonstrative massacre of the knightly militia near Legnica plunged Western Europe into a state of horror that paralyzed the will to resist, the victorious army did not consolidate the victory. Why? The answer may be unexpected, that is, not where it has been sought until now, not in politics, but in the ethnic and social structure of society, in the fact that the victorious army of Batu, consisting of Mongols and Turks, is professional in fighting qualities, in social In respect, it was not a professional army at all, but a national militia. In defensive wars, this type of army is natural; in offensive wars, it is a rare phenomenon in the history of nations.

The army was not only a national militia, it was the people themselves, who, together with the entire economy, moved in herds on campaigns as one indivisible whole. Army units - tens and hundreds - were built according to clan and tribal principles. Each dead and maimed out of a dozen was not only a comrade in arms, but also a close relative, and out of a hundred, a distant relative. Such a structure meant a trusting relationship with each other even in a totalitarian army, where dissent was unacceptable, where for any violation there was one penalty - the death penalty. And if so, it is impossible to imagine that they did not think about and discuss the question: what are the sacrifices for? The victims were not just comrades, but close and distant relatives. It is amazing that historians have not yet asked the question: was it necessary for ordinary soldiers – the mass of Batu’s army – to conquer Western Europe? Why get injured and risk your own life? The answer is known: not for the sake of one’s own interests, but for the sake of the interests of the Mongolian nobility. In Western Europe it is impossible to lead a nomadic lifestyle, which meant, in the understanding of the nomads, the impossibility of life itself. During the campaign against Western Europe for almost three years - from 1239 to 1242 - the Batu warriors fought incessantly for no one knows why, and in the last two years they did not see their families at all. It must be assumed that, first of all, the aimlessness and psychological fatigue (precisely psychological, since the army was victorious) was enormous. It is known that Batu Khan’s Western European campaign began and ended in the steppes of Desht-i-Kipchak. What does this fact tell us? The fact that the families - mothers and fathers, wives and children - of the warriors during the campaigns were not just anywhere, but in the steppes of Dasht-i-Kipchak. Perhaps for the first time during a long march, families were left behind. And the Turkic masses (families, it is possible, as before, accompanied the Mongolian nobility), naturally wanted to return to their families, which, not by chance, were not present on the campaign to the West. In Western Europe, with the exception of the small Hungarian Pushta, there are no steppes where families - women and children - could graze cattle. Only in Asia and Eastern Europe was there a huge steppe zone, and in Eastern Europe there were the best steppes of all of Eurasia. Only there was the best place for nomads to live. The Mongol offensive against Western Europe was carried out simultaneously in three directions, figuratively speaking, along the maximum width of the front. Such a significant dispersion of troops testified to the strategic confidence of the Mongols in their strength. “The southern column was led by the Horde, Kadan and Subedey. They marched through Transylvania, captured the cities of Rodna, Besterce, Varadin, Sibiu and others. The northern column of Baidu and Kaidu occupied Sandomierz, defeated the united Polish-Krakow army at Khmilnik (March 18, 1241), and then captured Krakow (March 28 ). On April 9, near Legnica, Baydar destroyed the flower of the German Ko-Polish knighthood. The central column, led by Batu, moved through the Veretsky Pass; April 11 at the river Shayo, she destroyed the army of Bela IV (the king himself fled), and Pest fell on April 16. Esztergom capitulated in January 1242” (Tartarica 2005: 278). Three streams of Batu's army gathered in 1242 on the shores of the Adriatic. We do not know how the Mongol nobility summed up the results of the campaign, what the military leaders thought about the death of Kaan in distant Mongolia, what discussions the ordinary soldiers had about their past, present and future. The bottom line is known: for the first time, the Mongols violated the covenant of Genghis Khan - to move to the West as long as there was land on which the hoof of a Mongol horse could step. Moreover, after Batu's western campaign, a decade of peace began, and this was the only period of rule, as Vadim Egorov emphasizes, when the Golden Horde did not wage any wars (Egorov 1995: 52).

Batuhan marched against Europe at the head of a multi-tribal army, the mass core of which were Turks. Any leader is obliged to feel the desires of the masses and take them into account.

Mongol nobility and Turks

Having violated the covenant of Genghis Khan, the Mongols clearly yielded to the desires of ordinary soldiers and limited their interests, but did not lose the initiative and only redirected their role as a leading force not to new conquests, but to consolidating what had already been won. Whether this was a temporary concession or a fundamental change in the development strategy depended on further changes in the balance of forces and interests of the various ethnic groups of the conquerors.

At the stage of completing the campaign to the West in relation to Eastern Europe, the goals of the Mongols and Turks, if not the same, did not contradict each other. The Mongols received power and with it property: the right to own the natural and human resources of the conquered peoples. The Turks received land.

At the same time, for the history of the people and the names of their tribes, it is important to know how they received it. We received, so to speak, according to army distribution. The Mongol army was formed according to ails - seven pits. Ten ails – ten warriors. Hundred - clan - a hundred warriors. Tribe - a thousand, ten thousand ails - 10 thousand warriors (darkness). Thousands and thousands of Mongols were formed according to the tribal principle. New lands could only be distributed according to the same principle.

At the head of the hundred, formed from the Turks, were the centurions - the Mongols, but the Turks could also stand, and at the head of the thousands - only, or as a rule, the Mongols. When the Mongol thousands went home, the Mongol Turkic commanders remained. Since thousands and darkness were called by thousands and temniks, this is where the Mongolian names of the Turkic clans of the Golden Horde originate. In other words, the Mongolian names of Turkic clans at all indicate that these Turks were originally Mongols.

After the campaigns of conquest, ordinary Mongols left for Mongolia, and the Turks had their own business - organizing their lives in new pastures. Simply put, their job was to live peacefully, although they were forced to bear duties and fight when the Mongols obliged them to crush pockets of resistance among the agricultural peoples who became part of the empire.

In relation to the defeated peoples, the Mongols and Turks acted as a single whole. Therefore, V.L. Egorov’s statement that after the conquest of Eastern Europe “the feudal lords and simple warriors with their families who remained subordinate to Batu formed the basis of the state apparatus and army” (Egorov 2005: 6) is correct. But with such a generalization, the difference in the functions and roles of the Mongol nobility and ordinary soldiers remains in the shadows. Traditionally, historians consider the conquerors as a single whole; no one studies the relationship between the Mongols and the Turks. One of the most important provisions of German Fedorov-Davydov, the founder of Golden Horde archeology, remains outside the field of view of Russian historians. It was first expressed back in 1966 (Fedorov-Davydov 1966), repeated in 1994. The scientist argued that the Turks were not the rightful owners of their land, but, like the inhabitants of the conquered lands, were a forced people. Moreover, “the nomadic population initially turned out to be the most convenient, natural object of oppression and exploitation for the Golden Horde elite. She plundered and ruined settled lands, took people away from there, and imposed heavy tribute. But she did not interfere in the management of the economic life of settled peoples. The local feudal lords remained the direct exploiters” (He 1994: 8).

After the campaign in Europe, the Turks simply wanted to live peacefully, while the Mongols had to develop their state. They continued the process of creating a powerful world empire, and if they did not seek to exercise total leadership of this process, then they made efforts to have the most complete control over its execution. We know exactly how they did it. Vadim Egorov characterizes the state structure of the Golden Horde this way: “The administrative division of the state completely repeated the structure of the Mongol army. In accordance with this, the entire territory was divided into two wings - left and right. The right one was called Ak-Orda (White Horde) - this color, according to Mongolian tradition, denoted the west; the left was called Kok-Orda (Blue Horde), which was synonymous with the east. Smaller administrative units made up the temnik uluses, which were once given by the khan to the largest feudal lords. There were about 70 of them in total, and from each ulus at least a ten-thousandth detachment, fully armed and on horseback, was deployed for the national army. The temnik uluses were divided into the possessions of thousanders, and those, in turn, into centurions and tens. And each of them, for the right to own an ulus with the corresponding population, was obliged to field a certain number of soldiers according to the first order of the khan or beklyaribek. Each ulus owner knew well the boundaries of his own possessions and the nomadic routes prescribed for him with flocks of sheep and herds of horses” (Egorov 2005: 5–6).

Let's summarize the first result. After the conquest was consolidated, the Mongol nobility and the ordinary Turkic conquerors had different specific interests. Moreover, only for the Mongols the arrangement of the state was literally a matter of life and death. The Turks are a different matter. The system of self-organization of the steppe Turkic society allowed it to do without a state, the main value of which in the eyes of society was maintaining order. In general, history does not know a single case when a state arose spontaneously in the steppe. Nomads usually do not strive for political unification. Khans are not elected or invited. Only under special, extraordinary circumstances do khans appear and seize power (on this, see Golden 2004: 111–112).

After their campaign to the West, the Turks could graze cattle on lands from which the previous owners had been expelled (or deprived of ownership rights), without a state, as had happened many times in the history of both the Turks and the Mongols. As was the case with the Polovtsians, who lived in the Russian steppes in a tribal system and did not have strong incentives to create a state. There were no incentives for the creation of a state from the environment, there were no “challenges” not only from neighbors - countries and peoples, but, which is extremely important, from nature.

In comparison with other eras, the time of change of the first seven demographic generations of the Golden Horde as a whole was marked by exceptionally favorable climatic conditions, contributing to an increase in the number of livestock, an increase in the well-being of nomads and expanded demographic reproduction. Throughout the entire period of life of the first seven demographic generations of conquerors in Eastern Europe, although winters were cold, there was no drying summer heat, and the amount of precipitation was within the centuries-old norm or above it. Here we should turn to the research of V.V. Klimenko and A.M. Sleptsov (see: Sleptsov, Klimenko 2005; Klimenko 2005), carried out under the Russian Foundation for Basic Research project “Theoretical and experimental modeling of socio-ecological processes in the history of Russia” (director Kulpin E.S.). As a result of the research, the accuracy of knowledge of the climate of the past tripled: for the first time, instead of thirty year cycles, ten-year cycles were obtained. Of the interrelated climatic indicators, the most important for the life of the steppe biocenosis was the last one, since “in arid and semiarid regions, moisture is the limiting factor” (see: Ivanov, Lukovskaya 1997: 33–35). In general, until the middle of the 14th century. climatic conditions for nomadic cattle breeding are favorable: summers are cool, winters are warm, precipitation is normal, and in the first third of the 14th century. precipitation is above normal. Only in the second half of the 14th century. The climate is changing for the worse - it is becoming arid, the amount of precipitation is sharply decreasing, the summer months of the first decade of the second half of the century are excessively hot, and the winter months are frosty.

The Mongols were primarily interested in creating and maintaining an information and transport network. This network was at first a necessary condition for the viability of the empire. Only the rapid transfer of information could guarantee a rapid reaction of troops, the suppression of separatist uprisings, and if the Ulus of Jochi was unable to manage on its own, receiving help from the entire Mongol Empire. As G.S. Gubaidullin wrote, “... the roads were constantly being repaired, and a lot of new roads were being built. Bridges were built across some rivers. At the crossings of large rivers there were special boats and boatmen; right there on the banks of the rivers there were houses where the guides lived... Roadside residents were charged with the duty of accompanying government officials, travelers and merchants, providing them with horses if necessary, feeding them, and arranging for them to spend the night and rest... On the main roads, special houses were built - pits in which post horses were kept, always ready for the needs of travelers" (Gaziz 1994: 65). Even in the difficult natural climatic conditions of the semi-desert, “on the section of this route from Khorezm to the Volga, caravanserais with wells were built every 25–30 km (the day’s journey of the camel caravan), and a white stone crossing was built across the Emba River” (Egorov 2005: 8) .

Of course, in the transport system created by the Mongols, crossings were served not only by the Turks. M.V. Elnikov, who studied the Dnieper region, writes: “The need to maintain water transportation across the Dnieper and obtain agricultural products contributed to the preservation of a sedentary population in the region, the basis of which was the Slavs, Alans and Bulgarians” (Elnikov 2005: 58). However, the inns - pits, presumably, were maintained only by the Turks who owned the required amount of livestock and enjoyed the trust of the Mongols.

The construction of the transport network required enormous material and human resources. In Europe at that time, the usual daily journey was from 20 to 60 km per day, in Rus' - 25–30 km, the rider covered a distance from 50 to 85 km. In the Mongol Empire, information was transmitted from yam to yam at maximum relay speed. “Against this background,” states Nikolai Kradin, a leading modern researcher of the Mongol Empire, “the Mongolian postal service looks almost like a super-sonic fighter in comparison with an airplane of the early 20th century.” (Kradin, Skrynnikova 2006: 469).

As Kradin writes, “the Mongol khans realized the need to create special institutions that could quickly and easily transfer information over very long distances. For these purposes, the Yamsk service was created.<...>It was decided to locate the Yam stations along the route to Batu Khan’s headquarters. After discussion, the decree was promulgated in the following form: “§ 280. The positions of Unguchins, Balagachins and Amuchins are established. Aratsyan and Tokhuchar were placed in charge of the establishment of the yams, who, in accordance with local conditions, will establish station points and staff them with yamchins (postal station supervisors) and ulaachins (high postmen). At the same time, there should be twenty Ulaachins in each pit. From now on, we set for each yam a certain number of ulaachins, horses, rams for food for travelers, milk mares, draft oxen and carts. And if in future anyone is missing a short rope against the set set, he will pay with one lip, and whoever is missing even a wheel spoke will pay with half his nose” (Ibid.: 468–469). Postal stations provided messengers with comfort unimaginable for Europeans of that time, about which Marco Polo wrote with undisguised amazement and admiration, generalizing and idealizing: “No matter what road the Great Khan’s messenger took from Kanbalu, after twenty-five miles (about 40 km) he arrives at the station, in their name yanb, but in ours, horse mail; at each station there is a large, beautiful house where messengers pester... In deserted places, where there is no housing or inns, and there the great khan ordered to build stations, palaces and everything necessary for the messengers, as at other stations, and horses, and harness; chasing only further away; there are stations of thirty-five miles, and in other places more than forty” (quoted in: Ibid.: 469–470).

The pits were located at a distance of one day's walking - about 25–30 kilometers. (For comparison: the establishment of regular postal routes in Russia dates back to 1707, with a distance between camps of 15 kilometers and maintenance of 10 horses at each inn. At the end of the third quarter of the 17th century, from Moscow to Tobolsk camps of several houses, that is, families, were established at a distance of 55 km. Each house had to contain three horses for travelers. [Vigilev 1979: 50, 80–81].) The size of the Ulus of Jochi was enormous and exceeded in size all other uluses of the Mongol state. From west to east, the Ulus extended for five thousand kilometers, from north to south - for three thousand. There were many roads. And there were many inns. We don’t know how many messengers there were, how many people were additionally involved in servicing communications. In the Russian Empire, there were only 2 thousand messengers in the first quarter of the 17th century, when its territory was equal to approximately half of the Golden Horde (Ibid.: 40). It is clear that the Yam duty in the Jochi Ulus extended to many clans of nomads, perhaps to most of them. The system of inns was supposed to provide travelers, primarily messengers, with shelter, food, draft power (horses and camels) and vehicles (carts). Each inn, as the experience of the Russian postal service shows in the same natural conditions, could be served by at least three families, or for nomads - one large family, clan. Since all activities in the Mongol Empire were distributed according to the military principle - tens, hundreds, and the latter were compiled according to the principle of a large family, clan, the clan had to decide who and how to maintain this or that inn. Maintenance can be done in two ways: on a shift basis or on a permanent basis, when members of the clan had to take upon themselves the obligation to support relatives performing public service.

If we take into account that in the first generation who came to Eastern Europe there were, apparently, only 50–55 thousand Turkic families (for the calculation see: Kulpin 2005: 14–24), then the duty of maintaining inns had to be distributed among all Turkic giving birth

Yamskaya conscription is always difficult for all countries and peoples. For example, the living conditions of postal workers in the Moscow state of the 17th century. were, which is typical for this service, so difficult that historians write like this: “When you look through the papers about the Akhtyrka post office in the files of the Discharge Order of the Central State Administrative Academy, you get the impression that the postmen, apart from fighting with messengers, did nothing else - the number of petitions was so great on this topic" (Vigilev 1979: 55). Order on the roads was established only in the 18th century. There were cases of attacks on postmen, and robberies of messengers occurred (Ibid.: 65–67, 74–75). In the pits of the Mongol Empire, no matter how difficult the duty of maintaining them was, there was nothing like this, although, it is possible, for one reason: for any violation of order there was one punishment - the death penalty.

Unlike settled peoples, for the nomads the Yam conscription was not just heavy, but opposed the entire way of life. Nomads cannot stay in one place where the cattle will quickly eat all the grass in the area and will starve, and people will starve along with them. To live, nomads must roam. Permanent residence in one place is in irreconcilable contradiction with the economic practice of transhumance and means the forced settlement of some of the Turks on the land. But was the contradiction irreconcilable in this case?

How exactly the issue was resolved in families: who had to stay in one place and maintain an inn, who went with their herds tens, hundreds of kilometers from the pits, we do not know. We only know that subsequently many of the inns turned into villages, and then cities. However, what was most important in this process of settling the nomads on the earth? The fact that for the first one to three demographic generations of the Turks there was no point of no return, or a situation where it was impossible to return to nomadic life. It seems that for subsequent generations the possibility of a return was not excluded. The need and possibility of a temporary settled life, as well as military service in the army, made it possible to carry out a natural selective voluntary selection of families who wanted to live on the land permanently, just as today conscript soldiers remain to serve in the army under a contract. At the same time, children who did not want a sedentary lifestyle, like their fathers, could go to close nomadic relatives. In other words, for the first generations of conquerors, and apparently for subsequent ones, there was the possibility of returning to a nomadic way of life, which removed the traditional psychological rejection of settled life by nomads.

In the army of the conquerors, the few Mongols were the dominant ethnic group, the Turks were the forced ones. Before the conquest of Eastern Europe, the interests of the Mongols and the Turks coincided only partially: the Mongols wanted new pastures for their huge herds and sought to extend their power to as many peoples as possible in order to impose tribute on them, the Turks wanted to find a new living space. An objective analysis of the possibilities of fulfilling the desires of the Mongols and Turks in Western Europe shows that the Turks could become convinced that Western Europe and their ideas about a normal life are incompatible, that they can live comfortably only in the southern Russian steppes of Eastern Europe. The campaign against Western Europe probably revealed for the first time a fundamental divergence of interests between the Mongols and the Turks. It is possible that the question that has tormented historians for so long, why Batu did not establish himself in Western Europe, has a simple answer: Western Europe was not needed by the bulk of the conquerors. The Turks, having received a new accommodating feeding landscape in Eastern Europe, “voted with their feet” stopped further expansion of the Mongols into Western Europe.

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The world-famous name Genghis Khan is, in fact, not a name - it is a title. After all, military princes were called khans in Rus'. The real name of Genghis Khan is Timur, or Timur Chin (in a distorted pronunciation Temujin or Temujin). The prefix Chinggis denotes rank, position, rank, in other words, rank and title.

Temujin received the high title of a major military leader thanks to his military merits, his desire to support and protect a strong united Slavic state with a large and reliable army.

The discrepancy in the name Temujin - Temujin is now explained by transcription problems in translations from different foreign languages. Hence the discrepancy in the title: Genghis Khan or Genghis Khan, or Genghis Khan. However, the Russian version of the sound of the name - Timur, which for some reason is least used by historians and scientists, does not fit into this system of explanations at all, as if they do not notice his name. For historians, in general, the problems that arise with the spelling and pronunciation of famous names of figures whose lives belong to that period are easily explained with the help of false statements that at that time there was no written language in all countries of the world.

And the deliberate distortion of the name of the people “Moguls” and turning them into “Mongols” cannot be explained by anything other than a large-scale organized system of distortion of the facts of the past.

Genghis Khan. Strong personality in world history

The main source by which historians study the life and personality of Temujin was compiled after his death - the “Secret Legend”. But the reliability of the data is not obvious, although it was from him that classical information about the appearance and character of the ruler of the Mongol tribes was obtained. Genghis Khan had a great gift as a commander, had good organizational skills and self-control; his will was unyielding, his character was strong. At the same time, chroniclers note his generosity and friendliness, which retained the affection of his subordinates for him. He did not deny himself the joys of life, but was alien to excesses incompatible with the dignity of a ruler and commander. He lived a long life, retaining his mental abilities and strength of character into his old age.

Let historians argue today about which letter to write in a given name, what is important is that Temujin lived a bright, charismatic life, rose to the level of a ruler, and played his role in world history. Now he can be condemned or praised - perhaps his actions are worthy of both, a controversial issue, but it is no longer possible to change anything in historical development. But finding the truth among the imposed sea of ​​distortions of real facts is very important, as well as exposing the lie itself.

Disputes about the appearance of Genghis Khan are the field of historians

The only portrait of Genghis Khan (Emperor Taizu), recognized and authorized by historians, is kept in Taiwan in the National Taipei Palace Museum.

An interesting portrait of the Mongol ruler has been preserved, which historians obsessively insist on considering as the only authentic one. It is kept in the National Taiwan Museum, Taipei Palace. It is prescribed to assume that the portrait (590*470 mm) has been preserved since the time of the Yuan rulers. However, modern research into the quality of fabrics and threads has shown that the woven image dates back to 1748. But it was in the 18th century that a global stage of falsification of the history of the whole world, including Russia and China, took place. So this is another falsification of historians.

The justifying version states that such images belong to the works of authorship, and the author has the right to his own vision of the face and character. But the portrait was clearly woven by the hands of a skilled craftswoman; the fine lines of wrinkles and folds on the face, the hair in the beard and braid are depicted in such detail that there is no doubt that a real person is depicted. Just who? Genghis Khan died in 1227, that is, five centuries before the process of mass falsification began.

Miniature by Marco Polo “The Crowning of Genghis Khan.” The great commander is crowned with a crown with trefoils - an attribute of European rulers.

Undoubtedly, from the time of the reign of the Manchus, historical and cultural treasures have survived to this day. From the Middle State they were handed over to subsequent conquerors and transported to Beijing. The collection contains more than 500 portraits of rulers, their wives, sages and great people of the era. Portraits of eight khans of the Mongol dynasties and seven wives of khans are identified here. However, again, skeptical scientists have a question of authenticity and reliability - are they the same khans, and whose wives?

The hieroglyphic writing of China was radically “modernized” by several rulers in a row. And who needed such labor costs? All to the same figures from the Torah, who brought order to the chronicles and destroyed “extra” traces.

During the alphabet change, manuscripts were brought from all over the Chinese Empire and completely rewritten. Were the “outdated” originals sent to the archives for storage? No, they were simply destroyed as they did not comply with the new rules!
This is where there is room for distortion...

Is this the Khan, and is this the Khan?

Until recently, the drawing was considered “medieval”; now it is a confirmed fake, one of many claiming that Chigis Khan is a Mongoloid.

There are many similar reproductions of Genghis Khan from different eras and authors. A fairly common drawing by an unknown Chinese master, made in ink on silk fabric. Here Temujin is depicted in full growth, with a Mongolian cap on his head, a Mongolian bow in his right hand, a quiver of arrows behind his back, and his left hand resting on the hilt of a saber in a painted sheath. This is the same typical image of a representative of the Mongolian race.

What did Genghis Khan look like? Other sources

A Chinese drawing from the 13th to 15th centuries depicts Genghis Khan at a falconry. As you can see, Genghis Khan is not a Mongoloid at all! A typical Slav, with a gorgeous beard.

In a Chinese drawing of the 13th-14th centuries, Temujin is depicted hunting with falcons; here the master depicted him as a typical Slav with a thick beard.

Not a Mongoloid!

M. Polo in miniature “The Crowning of Genghis Khan” depicts Temujin as a pure Slav. The traveler dressed the entire retinue of the ruler in European clothes and crowned the commander with a crown with trefoils, a clear attribute of European rulers. The sword in the hands of Genghis Khan is truly Russian, heroic.

The Borjigin ethnic group has not survived to this day.

The famous Persian encyclopedist Rashid ad-Din in his “Collection of Chronicles” presents several images of Genghis Khan with truly Mongolian facial features. However, a number of historians have proven that the Borjigin tribe, from which Genghis Khan came, have other facial features that are fundamentally different from the Mongoloid group of peoples.

“Borjigin” translated into Russian means “blue-eyed.” The eyes of the ancient Mughal family are “dark blue” or “blue-green”, the pupil is edged with a brown rim. In this case, all the descendants of the clan should look different, which is not visible in the available archival images of Temujin’s alleged family, permitted for general use.

Genghis Khan.

Russian researcher L.N. Gumilyov in the book “Ancient Rus' and the Great Steppe” describes the disappeared ethnic group as follows: “The ancient Mongols were... a tall, bearded, fair-haired and blue-eyed people...”. Temujin stood out for his tall stature, majestic posture, had a wide forehead, and wore a long beard. L.N. Gumilev coined the concept of passionarity, and it is to it that he attributes the complete disappearance of small ethnic nationalities, many of which have not survived to this day in their pure form, including the Borjigins
http://ru-an.info/%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%B8/%D1%81%D0%BD%D0% B8%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%B5%D0%BC-%D0%BE%D0%B1%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%B5%D0%BD%D0%B8 %D1%8F-%D1%81-%D0%BC%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B3%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%BE-%D1%82%D0%B0%D1% 82%D0%B0%D1%80/

Death of Genghis Khan

Death of Genghis Khan.

Several “plausible” versions have been invented, each with its own adherents.

1. From falling from a horse when hunting wild horses - the official option.
2. From a lightning strike - according to Plano Carpini.
3. From an arrow wound to the knee - according to the story of Marco Polo.
4. From the wound caused by the Mongolian beauty Kyurbeldishin-Khatun, the Tangut Khansha - a Mongolian legend.
One thing is clear - he did not die a natural death, but they tried to hide the true cause of death by launching false versions.

The burial place is classified. According to legend, the body rests on Mount Burkhan-Khaldun. The youngest son Tului, with his children Kublai Khan, Munke Khan, Arig-Buga and other children, were also buried there. There are no grave markers in the cemetery to prevent it from being looted. The secret place is overgrown with dense forest and is protected from European travelers by the Uriankhai tribes.

Conclusion

It turns out that the Mongol Genghis Khan was a tall, fair-haired Slav with blue eyes!!! These are the Mughals!

In addition to the “official” false evidence recognized by science, there are others, not noticed by the “luminaries”, according to which Timur - Genghis Khan is completely different from the Mongoloid. Mongoloids have dark eyes, black hair and short stature. No similarity with the Slavic-Aryans. However, it is not customary to talk about such a discrepancy.

After such unexpected results, I would like to check what other figures of Mogul nationality looked like during the era of the three-hundred-year Mongol-Tatar yoke.