In fact, was there the "Tatar-Mongol yoke" in Russia? And what was it?

Speaking about that hard period one shouldn't forget about another important circumstance - Moscow acted as Horde's agent among the northern principalities. Its western neighbors wrote about its customs as follows: "That nation (the Moscovites) is sly and treacherous, insincere and inconstant; having returned to its motherland and having become (our) rulers there, they impudently devastated our regions". But Russia had the reasons to act in that way: it was protected by the Mongolians, which gave confidence to it. The Moscovites had to show themselves. And they did.

Hence - from the support of the Horde! - are all the successes: remote small town of Vladimir principality turned into an important and expanding town of the Mongolian Empire. Governing methods used there were absolutely the same as those the Mongols had. As a matter of fact, it was created in accordance with it and with assistance of the Mongols… Horde's traditions have become strongly established there for centuries. The town was supposed to collect levy and suppress the neighboring nations.

In order to rule, suppress, collect, take away Moscow needed new people - the officials. They were formed of the nobles - serving, intelligent, nimble - enticed from the Horde for the most part.

These were not the wages but unrestricted opportunities of personal power that made the nobles willing to be engaged in Moscow bureaucracy. They made their living not with a plough or a saber but stealing and taking bribes. Bureaucracy is normal for Russian life; it survived everyone and everything. It is over the nationalities and out of politics - and thus it is eternal.

In case of each change of the rulers the Moscovites solemnly swore an oath: not to attempt tsar's life, "not to wish somebody else in the Moscow State", not to get in contact, not to betray, to suppress, to denounce… And many other things included the secret ritual fixed in the formulas of Russian allegiance.

It originated in XVI century. Under Alexei Mikhailovich it reached its climax and under Peter it was perfect which hasn't changed in future: serving people were changed in Russia but their habits remained the same.

No one has ever taught a Russian bureaucrat anything bad or nasty, he gained an understanding in everything by himself demonstrating excellent self-organization. He could disfigure any undertaking so that good becomes evil; but the evil which is advantageous for the Moscovite. And that is another peculiarity of the Moscovites. As a matter of fact it is a profession of execution of orders and regulations which reach the remote corners of the country and cover them with the Kremlin's power.

Authorities have always estimated service higher than nationality or parentage of the officer. "History of Russia is the history of nobility", - historians would say about that epoch… In a word, the Turki had a longing to come to Moscow - certain were invited, and certain came themselves.

"That is a sly person, - thus was written bout Ivan the Terrible in the treatise "About the Customs of the Tatars, Lithuanians and the Moscovites", - he granted an award to returning deserters, even the empty and useless ones: freedom to a slave, nobility to a commoner, forgiveness of debts to a debtor, remission of fault to a scoundrel". They simply had to serve to the tsar… But it is hard to call a service what the deserters were doing: they didn't get wages for their deeds! What kind of service is that?

At first it was important for them to please the prince - to learn to serve, endure any offences. "And if they do everything according to his wish they are awarded not with money but with an office of a master…" Fantastic slyness! There are no limits for actions of an "office personnel". Two candidates were appointed to one office at the same time: one hade to displace another through eagerness and denunciation. And in case of suit, it was settled by fisticuffs. There was a clublaw. They fought for an office in Moscow. A looser paid a penalty to the treasury…

Expanding capital of Russia enticed many Kipchaks. First of all they became "the Moscovites" - they went to serve, abase themselves and fight for the right to abuse others. A good half of Russia nobility are the Turki, the natives of the Steppe. Which is witnessed by academic researches, for example "Russian Family Names of the Turkic Origin" by N.A. Baskakov.

Horde's traditions appeared in Moscow together with the Turki. Appearance of the city was changing rapidly: Turkic architecture was becoming firmly established there.

To tell the truth, similarity in architectures is not surprising: the migrants, according to a tradition of all the colonists of the world, took the names of left abodes and their appearance to new places. Moscow borrowed many Mongolian institutions it didn't have: tax authorities, communication, repression instruments.

Repression instruments were a prison, manacles, servitude and others. Those words also came from the Golden Horde…

Considering the position of Moscow as an agent of the Horde in Russia, the whole Russian history should be read otherwise. For example, why was Ivan the Terrible willing to defeat the Kazan khanate? Why did he conquer the Astrakhan khanate which had nothing to do with Russia and the Slavs? As well as the Western Siberia? Or why did he choke the metropolitan Philip? Why did he appropriate the name "tsar"? Many things are put into their right places.

Just because the Greeks suggested the Moscow prince should regard himself as an heir of the Mongol khan! No, that wasn't by accident when Sophia Paleologus and her numerous suite appeared in Moscow. The West started to act. And it succeeded… Ivan the terrible was so enamored he completely lost his head, he didn't wish to be the heir of the Byzantine emperor although he could have been with a certain reserve. But he saw himself only a new khan. He was attracted not by mythical power in dead Byzantium but actual one in living Steppe.

According to contemporaries he "hatched out of the Mongol khan like a baby bird out of shell". "Baby bird" regarded Kazan and Astrakhan as his patrimonies that didn't pay levy to him - their master. Preparations for the campaign against Kazan began.

In 1545 the Russians, having no military experience, were beaten. After that they were beaten several times again. Finally, having hired Don Cossacks, they took Kazan by storm and drowned the town in blood. Mutilated bodies of women, children and old men were floating down Itil which has been already called Volga - the great Russian river - to frighten.

It seems Kharadavan, the Mongolian historian, discussing Mongolian political culture in this connection, is right asserting that it has played a "wholesome part in Russian history". In pre-Peter Moscow the "way of life" had a mark of Horde s impact while "that was what old Russia was based on, what gave steadiness and strength to it", the author draws a conclusion.

Gregory Kotoshikhin, the officer of Moscow Embassy Department, who has escaped to Sweden, also left some information about political culture in Moscow State when Ivan the Terrible called himself "the white tsar", i.e. the tsar who has accepted the crown from the Mongols.

Why was he "white"? Here is another simple story. Giving the lands "up to those places which Mongolian horses can reach" to his elder son Dzhuchi, Chingis-Khan ordered to rise a white flag, to call Desht-I-Kipchak Dzhuchi s Kingdom and its master - the White Khan.

Russian rulers, following that tradition, started to call themselves white tsars or white khans in the beginning of XVI century, which was directly connected with "white bone" (Twist of fate. The expression "white bone" is the word-for-word (loan) translation from Turkic: "ak" means white, "suek" means bone, which means "grateful".). In other words, they boasted about cognation with Chingis-Khan! Moscow emphasized its domination in Russia even in that way.

And Moscow demonstrated its domination, it was gathering an army of officials - its main and terrible force. As Kotoshikhin marked, before he started his service there were about one hundred of clerks and about a thousand of their assistants, by the end of the century their number increased up to 4657 persons. About three thousand of them had offices in Moscow departments. They used to stir up trouble. They had the force everybody was afraid of. This Moscow army would confuse anyone with its paper maelstrom.

Moscow copied Sarai-Berk - the capital of the Horde - not only in its deeds but also in its architecture. Radial planning was made there - each street began from the Kremlin and reached the remotest building not missing anything big or small. The streets led from the city turning into the roads connecting the capital with remote areas… There were no obstacles for a look cast from the Kremlin. Bureaucratic cobweb covered the city and the whole country.

The stone Kremlin was built in a Turkic style widespread in Desht-I-Kipchak (By the way, the word "kremlin" could also be interesting for toponymy. In Turkic it means "fortress", "fortress wall". And in Russian?.. However, it isn't unlikely that the word appeared in the Turkic language from Mongol.). And that wasn't by accident either. Moscow of that time had almost no differences from Kazan or any other big city of the Steppe: its hip (!) architecture was the same with one described by the Byzantine messenger Prisk in Attila s times.

However, they didn't think about architectural look of Moscow those days: they didn't have time for it and it was formed by itself, by analogy with the known. And the arrived Turki knew only Turkic, "Desht-I-Kipchak" methods. And they built according to them. Departments, boards - that's what city authorities were interested in. Not their appearance, but their inside essence. Everything was like that - anxious and rapid at the same time.

The Kremlin wanted to apply new "control and compulsion methods" in Russian territories; it wanted to tie everything to Moscow. It was important to strengthen in the position of the ruler at any cost, to show its force and necessity.

Notes by Possevino, Pope s ambassador with Ivan IV, are indicative. The tsar was sure, wrote the ambassador, that he was "the most powerful and wise ruler in the whole world", "the heir of the Mongolian Empire"… (Moscow was regarded as an heir of the Mongols before the tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, i.e. from almost one hundred years) (That historical fact hasn't been considered in Russian historiography, apparently, while it contains an answer to the question why Rome has started to meddle in Russian policy. Or rather why did the dynasty of Ryurikoviches was that unexpectedly over and the dynasty of Romanovs, who turned to the West and not to the East, began. Apart from the Church problems Rome had several other ones: Europe didn't want Russia to be strengthened, it was afraid of new invasion from the East and did everything in order to tame the possible conqueror and chain it… And it succeeded in it completely.).

At that time that humiliating name - "Tatars" - was assigned to the Turki not to mix them up with "white Mongols". There was a great deal of the Tatars - Volga, Tula, Crimean, Siberian, Ryazan, Don, Belgorod, Caucasian and others. All the Kipchaks were called "Tatars". Or rather not all of them but those not willing to serve Moscow, those hoping to keep their faces and retain the honor of their ancestors. Deserting Kipchaks were called in another way - "the Russians". They are those Russians into whom the Tatar-Mongols have turned.

Jerome Gorsay, the Englishman, wrote as follows: "The tsar and his cronies, unmerciful Tatars…" New Russians led a free life in Russia, they were the robbers and the judges simultaneously.

And the Russians, having proclaimed themselves the Slavs some time, were openly turning into the Mongols. And again they "succeeded" in it. Especially under the new tsar Simeon Beckbulatovich, when even Ivan the Terrible (New Russia tsar Simeon Beckbulatovich (? - 1616) was the son of the Kazan khan. Ivan the Terrible invited him supposedly to divide the throne; while actually a swindle was planned - they wrote off the debts and obligations of Russia before other countries at the cost of Sain-Bulat. Moscow treasury was increased by untold wealth. And the new tsar obtained Tver Principality for participation in the swindle. And everyone hated the insidious "Tatars" a hundred times more… Poor Bulats, Akhmats and Murats; they were to remember their Russian names very soon. ) was concealing his routes in 1575. Fyodor turned into Bulat, Peter - into Akhmat, Matthew - into Murat. Family names remind of those reckless days in Russia.

In "Collection of Materials Relating to History of the Golden Horde" there is the translation of the work by Ibn abdez-Zakhir, the man versed in politics; he was the secretary of the Egyptian sultan Beibaras. So he is supposed to know the rulers Egypt was dealing with.

However, before analyzing that extract, it is necessary to introduce sultan Beibaras -the sublime person. He is one of those Turkic children who were sold for slavery to the Middle East by the Mongols. There those little slaves were brought up as warriors - the Mamelukes. By the way, the ancestors of marshal Murat were the Mamelukes. Boys were excellent in the military skills.

As a result of one of the battles Beibaras got power and proclaimed himself the founder of the Empire of the Mamelukes which reigned over the Middle East for two and a half centuries. As a real Turki, he has been always seeking for relations with his motherland. And only due to nostalgic burst. Once he defeated the Mongolian army which encroached on the lands of the Mamelukes; and at that time he was trying to establish the relations with the Mongols by himself.

Notes of the sultan's secretary are interesting due to the fact they lift the veil of secret from spiritual life of the Horde - it troubled the Moslem sultan. He wrote a letter to Berki-Khan who was the first among Chingis-Khan descendants who has accepted Islam.

It is evident from the reports of Ibn abdez-Zakhir that things were changing rapidly in the Golden Horde in relation to politics. Fear, curiosity and longing for changes shattered peace and quite of the khan. He was rushing about wishing to find a calm bay in the ocean of life.

Having been dreaming to strengthen himself in the Steppe for centuries, Berki was looking for the way to the souls of the Kipchaks who didn't feel themselves conquered (the army was fully controlled by the Turki and was able to get out of subordination at any time). Baty-Khan, his predecessor, believed that if they accepted the spiritual values of the Steppe inhabitants, the Kipchaks would recognize him as their legal ruler. Also Baty was thinking about Christianity in the Steppe but he didn't know whether it should be Roman or Greek.

It surprised him that there were several branches in Christianity and they were in contradiction with each other. Who was right?.. That reason was enough not to unite the Great Steppe, not to suppress it. Tengirchilik also had its "inconveniences" in the opinion of the Buddhist Mongols.

Baty-Khan didn't find a way out. Berke did: to enter Allah's world for both - the Mongols and the Turki. He even founded the capital of the Golden Horde in new place acting with the feeling of "innovation". As a matter of fact, his decision was absolutely right.

But the Kipchaks wouldn't have given their relics without a fight. The strain in society was increasing - the idea of the sacred war was present. Wise Beibars supported the Mongolian ruler. He induced him to the "sacred war against the infidels, although they were his relatives".

By sultan's persistence it was evident that he was the first who needed that war. A troop from Egypt was sent to the Horde to help the khan (and for reconnaissance of his forces!). But Beiberas was over-diligent, which, however, is very likely for the Kipchak having no sense of proportion.

The Mongols estimated the provoking generosity of the sultan in the right way. They subtly felt that Beibar's interest to the Horde lay not only in his love to religion. After all, he is a warrior not a mullah.

Sultan's gifts surprised with luxury, the main was "the Koran in the cover of red satin embroidered with gold, in a leather case padded with silk; the lectern for it made of ivory and ebony lined with silver". They also sent "arrows of amazing decoration in leather cases; black servants; surprising parrots, wild donkeys, several swift-footed horses, rare Nubian camels, a giraffe" and many other items regardless of loads of jewelry from the sultan's storerooms. That was all accepted by Berke. But, having thought a little, he added that he didn't believe in Islam yet.

"The sultan again sent the messengers to Berke trying to make him come over to the side of Islam". A political intrigue set in, the Greeks and the Romans were engaged in it for they didn't want Egypt to become stronger and were afraid of "Islamization" of the Western Europe. Once the Greeks even caught up the messengers of Berke-Khan and were inclining them to the Greek Christianity during a long time.

Everything witnessed of the fact that a conflict between the Bible and the Koran was about to happen. But delay took place due to desperate ignorance of the Mongols. One can judge about it by the following example: during the negotiations Berke asked the Egyptian ambassadors about Nil, explaining: "I heard that a human bone is put over Nil and people walk on it". Well-educated ambassadors exchanged glances and politely said they hadn't seen it.

Also observant ambassadors didn't notice any signs of Islam with the Mongols. Following ambassadors didn't notice them either. There were mosques in the town but those were the people from Persian and Arab quarters who went there…