friendship and said: “These terrible strangers have taken our country, and to-morrow they will take yours if you do not come and help us.” In response to this call some Russian princes formed a league and went out eastward to meet the foe, but they were utterly defeated in a great battle on the banks of the Kalka (1224), which has remained to this day in the memory of the Russian common people. Now the country was at the mercy of the invaders, but, instead of advancing, they suddenly retreated and did not reappear for thirteen years, during which the princes went on quarrelling and fighting as before, till they were startled by a new invasion much more formidable than its predecessor. This time the invaders came to stay, and they built for themselves a capital, called Sarai, on the lower Volga. Here the commander of “the Golden Horde,” as the western The Golden Horde. section of the Mongol empire was called, fixed his headquarters and represented the majesty of his sovereign the grand khan who lived with the Great Horde in the valley of the Amur. About the origin and character of these terrible invaders we are much better informed than the early Russian chroniclers. The nucleus of the invading horde was a small pastoral tribe in Mongolia, the chief of which, known subsequently to Europe as Jenghiz Khan (q.v.), became a mighty conqueror and created a vast empire stretching from China, across northern and central Asia, to the shores of the Baltic and the valley of the Danube—a heterogeneous state containing many nationalities held together by purely administrative ties and by an enormously military force. For forty years after the death of its founder it remained united under the authority of a series of grand khans chosen from among his descendants, and then it began to fall to pieces till the various fractions of it became independent khanates.
The khanate closely connected with the history of Russia was that of Kipchak or the Golden Horde, the khans of which settled, as we have seen, on the lower Volga and built for themselves a capital called Sarai. Here they had their headquarters and held Russia in subjection for nearly three centuries.
The term by which this subjection is commonly designated, the Mongol or Tatar yoke, suggests ideas of terrible oppression, Character of Tatar rule. but in reality these barbarous invaders from the Far East were not such cruel, oppressive taskmasters as is generally supposed. In the first place, they never settled in the country, and they had not much direct dealings with the inhabitants. In accordance with the admonitions of Jenghiz to his children and grandchildren, they retained their pastoral mode of life, so that the subject races, agriculturists and dwellers in towns, were not disturbed in their ordinary avocations. In religious matters they were extremely tolerant. When they first appeared in Europe they were idolaters or Shamanists, and as such they had naturally no religious fanaticism; but even when they adopted Islam they remained as tolerant as before, and the khan of the Golden Horde (Berkai) who first became a Mussulman allowed the Russians to found a Christian bishopric in his capital. One of his successors, half a century later, married a daughter of the Byzantine emperor, and gave his own daughter in marriage to a Russian prince, These represent the bright side of Tatar rule. It had its dark side also. So long as a great horde of nomads was encamped on the frontier the country was liable to be invaded by an overwhelming force of ruthless marauders. These invasions were fortunately not frequent, but when they occurred they caused an incalculable amount of devastation and suffering, In the intervals the people had to pay a fixed tribute. At first it was collected in a rough-and-ready fashion by a swarm of Tatar tax-gatherers, but about 1259 it was regulated by a census of the population, and, finally, the collection of it was entrusted to the native princes, so that the people were no longer brought into direct contact with the Tatar officials.
By the princes the “yoke” was felt more keenly, and it was very galling. In order to reply to accusations brought against them, or in order to be confirmed, in their functions, they had to travel to the Golden Horde on the Volga or even to the camp of the grand khan in some distant part of Siberia, and the journey was considered so perilous that many of them, before setting out, made their last will and testament and wrote a parental admonition for the guidance of their children. Nor were these precautions by any means superfluous, for not a few princes died on the journey or were condemned to death and executed for real or imaginary offences. Even when the visit to the Horde did not end so tragically, it involved a great deal of anxiety and expense, for the Mongol dignitaries had to be conciliated very liberally, and it was commonly believed that the judges were more influenced by the amount of the bribes than by the force of the arguments. The grand khan was the lord paramount or suzerain of the Russian princes, and he had the force required for making his authority respected. Ambitious members of the Rurik dynasty, instead of seeking to acquire territory by conquest in the field, now sought to attain their ends by intrigue and bribery at the Mongol court.
Of all the princes who sought to advance their fortunes in this way the most dexterous and successful were those of Moscow. The princes of Moscow. Dimitri Donskoi, 1362-1389. They made themselves responsible for the tribute of The other principalities as well as of their own, and gradually they became lieutenants-general of their Mongol suzerain. So long as the Mongol empire remained united and strong, they were most submissive and obsequious, but as soon as it was weakened by internal dissensions and began to fall to pieces, they assumed airs of independence, intrigued with the insubordinate Tatar generals, retained for their own use the tribute collected for the grand khan, and finally put themselves at the head of the patriotic movement which aimed at throwing off completely the hated Mongol yoke. For this purpose Dimitri Donskoi formed in 1380 a coalition of Russian princes, and gained a great victory over Khan Mamai of the Golden Horde on the famous battlefield of Kulikovo, the memory of which still lives in the popular legends. For some time longer the Tatars remained troublesome neighbours, capable of invading and devastating large tracts of Russian territory and of threatening even the city of Moscow, but the Horde was now broken up into independent and mutually hostile khanates, and the Moscow diplomatists could generally play off one khanate against the other, so that there was no danger of the old political domination being re-established.
Having thus freed themselves from Tatar control, the Moscow princes continued to carry out energetically their traditional policy of extending and consolidating their dominions at the expense of their less powerful relations. Already Dimitri of the Don was called the grand-prince of all Russia, but the assumption of such an ambitious title was hardly justified by facts, because there were still in his time principalities with grand princes who claimed to be independent. The complete suppression of these small moribund states and the creation of the autocratic tsardom of Muscovy were the work of Ivan III., surnamed the Great, his son Basil and his grandson Ivan IV., commonly known as Ivan the Terrible, whose united reigns cover a period of 122 years (1462-1584).
III. The Tsardom of Muscovy.—What may be called the home
policy of these three remarkable rulers consisted in absorbing
Ivan III. 1462-1505.
the few principalities which still remained independent,
and in creating for themselves an uncontrolled
monarchical authority. In the pursuit of both of these
objects they were completely successful. When Ivan III.
came to the throne the remaining independent principalities
were Great Novgorod, Pskov, Tver, Ryazan and Novgorod-Seversk.
He first directed his attention to Novgorod, and by
gradually undermining and then destroying the ancient republican
liberties he reduced the haughty city, which had long
styled itself Lord Novgorod the Great, to the rank of a provincial
town. Then he annexed its colonies and thereby extended his
dominions to the Polar Ocean and the Ural Mountains. At the
same time he took possession of Tver, on the ground that the
Basil III. 1505-1533.
prince had allied himself with Lithuania. His
successor Basil followed in his footsteps, and dealt with the municipal republic of Pskov was Ivan had dealt
with Novgorod. Finding the inhabitants too much attached to
