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Timur in Russia

Timur, Muslim lord of Samarkand, threw his weight behind the Golden Horde’s subjugation of Christian Russia, with unexpected results.

By Clay Lane

Part 1 of 2

1380-1399

King Richard II 1377-1399

‘The Defence of Moscow from Khan Tokhtamysh’, by Apollinary Vasnetsov (1856–1933)

By Apollinary Vasnetsov (1856–1933), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

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Timur in Russia

By Apollinary Vasnetsov (1856–1933), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain. Source

‘The Defence of Moscow from Khan Tokhtamysh’, by Apollinary Vasnetsov (1856–1933)

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‘The Defence of Moscow from Khan Tokhtamysh’, painted in 1918 by Apollinary Vasnetsov (1856–1933), shows the people of Moscow preparing to rebuff Tokhtamysh, Khan of Crimea, in his assault on Moscow in 1382. The attack, organised by Timur from his capital in Samarkand (in modern-day Uzbekistan), was a reprisal for the defeat of the Golden Horde’s leader Mamai at the hands of Dmitri Donskoy two years before: see Dmitri of the Don. It was one of those ironies of history that Timur, in hoping to exterminate the wretched infidel Christians, succeeded only in helping them to establish a sovereign and Christian Russia.

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Russian History (56) History (955) Russia (52) Timur (Tamerlane) (1)

Introduction

Timur, who succeeded his father as Lord of Samarkand in 1369, traced his ancestry back to Genghis Khan, founder of the Mongol Empire in 1206. By the time of his death in 1405, he had humbled kings and kingdoms from Russia to Iran, India and Egypt, and changed the course of history more than once — though not always as he intended.

TIMUR, Lord of Samarkand, was a Sunni Muslim, and consequently inclined to support his northerly Muslim neighbours. These included Mamai, ruler of the Tartar Horde that held Russia in a tight grip, and also Tokhtamysh, Khan of Crimea, who owed his crown to Timur.

In 1380, Moscow’s Grand Duke Dmitry, a Christian and thus an infidel, had unexpectedly humiliated Mamai and the Horde at the Battle of Kulikovo.* Revenge was swift and bitter. With Timur’s help, Tokhtamysh rallied his army and besieged Moscow; and on August 26th, 1382, treachery within opened Moscow’s gates to the Khan. Some 24,000 inhabitants were slain.

Emboldened, Tokhtamysh set about acquiring an empire of his own, so that Timur felt the need to trim his feathers. “What devil is in thee” he complained, “that thou shouldst pass beyond thy borders? Thou hast witnessed my friendship, and my enmity. Choose between them, and send word of thy choice.” The foolhardy khan chose enmity, and was defeated at the River Terek in April 1395, though Timur was hard put to it. Tokhtamysh fled to the Lithuanians in Vilnius.

But Timur was not the man to leave it there.

Continue to Part 2

* See