But it was
still long before the complete collapse. Amidst all that chaos
had emerged a strong and energetic person: Mamai, one of the
highest military commander, often called a khan in the
historical literature, although there is no irrefutable
evidence that he had ever occupied the khan's throne.
Nevertheless, although not a formal ruler, Mamai exercised the
actual power, or rather superpower - he decided about all the
affairs of the Golden Horde for often changing khans, who were
merely pawns on his political chess-board. A skilful intriguer
he was, Mamai promptly realised what danger the ever growing
in power principality of Moscow posed to his rule. Especially
the stronger it was, the lesser were the tributes from Russia.
Mamai resolved to put the end to that process and restore The
Horde's domination over Russia in full, although not in the
territorial sense - he had to reconcile with the thought that
it was impossible to take back the lands lost in course
of the struggle with Lithuania. After all the necessary and
thorough preparations, Mamai with substantial forces struck in
1373 against Ryazan and ravaged its domain. Five years later
he repeated the invasion, having literally desolated not only
the principality of Ryazan, but also the principality of
Nizhny Novgorod. But in his plans all that constituted only a
prelude to the great shrift with Moscow.
Mamai did not
hurry the preparations. First of all he took care of allies.
He found such in persons of Oleg, the duke of Ryazan, and
Jogaila, the grand duke of Lithuania, and would be king of
Poland (as Ladislas Jagiełło). But both had
disappointed him a lot. Oleg was an unbalanced ruler, who
changed his loyalties to Moscow every few years. At that time
he was in hostile terms with Moscow, but evaded active
military actions. As to the Lithuanian army, it was not in
hurry to join the decisive battle when the Russian bands
clashed with the Tartars in so-called Kulikovo Fields - the
plains near the confluence of Nepryadva and the upper Don. It
was risky to fight a battle in the Kulikovo Fields, quite far
from Moscow, but the duke of Moscow, Dimitri, applied that
tactics right in order to prevent the Tartars to join their
allies.
An so, on 8
September 1380 the Kulikovo Fields became the witnesses of one
of the greatest and bloodiest battles of the Middle Ages, and
one of the most significant battles in the history of mankind.
In the beginning of the battle the Tartars prevailed, and it
seemed that their victory was sure, but once again the tactics
decided about the outcome of the contest. Dimitri held
substantial forces in ambush, and at the pivotal moment
engaged fresh Russian reserves against the enemy exhausted in
the bloody battle. The battle ended in total Tartars' defeat;
only few of them, including Mamai, fled for safety. The
Kulikovo Battle has been forever noted in the History as one
of the greatest Russian victories, whereas Dimitri gained the
nickname Donskoy and was elevated to the sainthood. At the eve
of the 140th anniversary of the Tartaro-Mongolian invasion of
Russia the Tartars suffered such a devastating defeat for the
first time. Of course, it became yet another milestone in the
process of decline of the Golden Horde, where struggle for
power and fratricidal wars flared up with previous power.
For Russia
the victory in the Kulikovo Fields became an important factor
in the process of re-unification, first of all in the sense of
display of the national consciousness and manifestation of the
unity of Russian lands. And that came regardless of the fact
that some principalities (for example Novgorod, Tver, Smolensk
or Nizhny Novgorod) did not support Dimitri. The bigger was
then the role of Moscow in the process of re-unification.
It is worth
noticing that the military victory as such did not yet
annihilate Russia's dependency on the Tartars. The more so
that soon after the Kulikovo Battle a new Tartar danger loomed
over Russia, although this time not from Mamai. He survived
the Kulikovo Battle only to be defeated several months later
by the armies of the khan of the White Horde, Toqtamish.
The White
Horde, in old Russian chronicles called the Blue Horde, was an
eastern splinter of the empire of khan Batu. It spread between
the Lake Aral and the Ishim (tributary river of Irtysh).
Originally the power there was in hands of one of Batu's
brothers, who ruled as a governor, but soon the White Horde
produced its own khans, formally dependent on the Golden
Horde, but gradually loosing that dependence. In 1360's the
White Horde, whose capital was in Sygnak (on the Syrdaria),
was at the peak of its prosperity under the rule of khan Urus.
Urus tried to restore the former unity of the Golden Horde
under his leadership, and even undertook some steps towards
that objective, as he conquered some lands on the Volga with
the capital of a local khan, Sarai Berke (New Sarai). But Urus
did not complete his work - he died somewhere around 1377
(details are unknown). After a short turmoil in the White
Horde a new ruler took the power - Toqtamish, the son of one
of the nobles executed by Urus. Toqtamish was very energetic,
but very impatient; in modern language - nervous. When Mamai,
defeated on the Kulikovo Fields, withdrew into his domain to
gather the army for a new expedition, Toqtamish attacked him
and totally crushed in the battle on the River Kalka, exactly
in the same place, which some hundred-fifty years before
witnessed the bloody battle between the Mongols on one side
and the Russo-Polovtsian army on the other. Mamai, now with
just a handful of his bodyguards, fled again and found a
refuge in Kaffa in the Crimea, but just within few days he was
murdered there. At this point it is worth noticing that exact
dates of the events are not known. Historians typically fit
them in the year 1380, but in view of the fact that the
Kulikovo Battle took place on 8 September, it is hardly
possible that so many events took occurred within four months.
After the
battle on the Kalka, Toqtamish of course became the khan of
the Golden Horde. But it was not enough to him. Just like Urus,
he wanted to restore the complete sovereignty over the Russian
lands. Envoys were sent to Moscow with an appropriate demand,
but to no avail. Then Toqtamish gathered a new army and with
substantial forces besieged Moscow in 1381. Prince Dimitri
left the city in time to gather more forces in the north.
Despite of quite unexpected appearance of the Tartars at the
gates of Moscow, Muscovites had delivered a stubborn defence
and did not surrender until negotiators from Nizhny Novgorod
solemnly swore in the name of the khan that the trouble would
be settled by a ransom. In fact everything turned as it used
to in numerous previous cases of the past century - in looting
and pillaging, rapes, killings and destruction. The same fate
was of other towns of the Grand Duchy of Moscow: Vladimir,
Pereyaslavl Zalessky, Mozhaisk and Yuriev Polsky, while the
Tartars took many captives back to the steppes. Dimitri
Donskoy was forced to accept once again the sovereignty of the
Golden Horde, but on the other hand till the end of his reign
he remained in peace with it.
Meanwhile
Toqtamish, contrary, still was lacking something for complete
happiness, and it was a rather important thing. Political
relations of that epoque greatness and dependency on someone
else did not exclude each other, and that was exactly
Toqtamysh's situation. When he started his quest for the power
in the White Horde, he enjoyed, and despite of initial
setbacks kept enjoying till the victorious end the support of
the would-be "conqueror of the world", Tamerlane (Timur-i-Lang).
Since 1370 Tamerlane had been the emir of Transoxiana (the
region of the Central Asia between Amudaria and Syrdaria). On
10 April 1370 he received homage from all the warlords of the
Central Asia. Their dependency on Tamerlane was rather a
rudimentary legal formality of the past epoque, but
nevertheless Toqtamish desired its annihilation whatever the
price. But having risen against Tamerlane he had not expect
that he had risen against a ruler way powerful than himself.
As a matter of fact, Toqtamish stood several years of bloody
wars and managed to find allies. Among them were Jogaila and
his cousin, grand duke of Lithuania, Vytautas, but they did
not bring Toqtamish good luck.
In 1395
Tamerlane crushed Toqtamish, and in pursuit after his
scattered army ventured as far as Russia, where Tamerlane's
army ravaged Yelets in the south of the duchy of Ryazan. Yet
although the way to Russia was open, Tamerlane turned his army
back. His decision has been puzzling historians ever since -
perhaps the military glory of Dimitri Donskoy played here a
similar role to that of Alexander Nevskiy earlier? For sure it
is only known that the Lithuanian army arrived to the aid of
Toqtamish soon enough to help him survive, despite of the
defeat, on the shores of the Black Sea and in the Crimea.
There he, with the usual energy, started preparations for a
new expedition against the Golden Horde, which at that time
already had a new khan. But the fate did not smile to
Toqtamish. In 1398 his army was annihilated, and he himself
fled to Vytautas, who at that time moved his court to Kiev. It
seemed that not everything was lost - Vytautas was also
preparing a military expedition against the Tartars, the
greatest one Lithuania ever managed to launch, and an ally
like Toqtamish was very useful to him. Of course, in case of
success, Toqtamish was promised The Horde's throne.
Yet instead
of the greatest ever victory, Vytautas suffered his greatest
ever defeat. His army, comprised of the Lithuanians, Poles,
Teutons and Tartars, was annihilated in 1399 in the battle on
the Vorskla (left tributary of the Dnieper, to the north of
where is Poltava nowadays). After that Toqtamish lost whatever
else was left to lose. He turned into a highway robber
ransacking the steppes in search of a prey and fleeing the
pursuit, but even that did not last long - in 1406 he was
murdered.
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