Силсила в политике и идеологии (постордынский мир)

In the era of the collapse of the Golden Horde, representatives of non-dynastic nobility, leaders of Turkic tribes, gained access to power in some polities. In the Nogay Horde, these were the leaders of the Manghyt tribe. Since they did not belong to the descendants of Genghis Khan as the only basis for legitimate rule, they had to invent other ways to legitimize their managerial prerogatives. Inside the court environment of Manghyt leaders, a genealogical combination was compiled regarding the pedigree of the founder of the Nogay ruling dynasty, Bek Ӓdigü. His origin was artificially erected to the Sufi preacher of the 14th century Khoja Ahmad Baba Tükles, and he, in turn, was declared a direct descendant of the first caliph Abu Bakr al-Siddiq. In this pedigree, there was a mixture of purely Sufi silsila (as a succession of pious sheikhs) and a succession of purely secular rulers, including clearly legendary ones.В эпоху распада Золотой Орды доступ к власти в некоторых политиях получили представители нединастической знати, предводители тюркских племен. В Ногайской Орде это были лидеры племени мангытов. Поскольку они не принадлежали к потомству Чингисхана как единственному основанию для легитимного правления, им пришлось изобретать иные способы узаконения своих управленческих прерогатив. В окружении мангытских вождей была составлена генеалогическая комбинация в отношении родословной основателя ногайской правящей династии — бека Эдиге. Его происхождение было искусственно возведено к суфийскому проповеднику XIV в. Ходжа-Ахмаду Баба-Туклесу, а тот, в свою очередь, объявлялся прямым потомком первого праведного халифа Абу Бакра ас-Сиддика. В данной родословной наблюдается смешение истинно суфийской силсилы (как череды благочестивых шейхов) и последовательности чисто светских правителей — в том числе явно легендарных

Kasimov Tsardom in the Tatar Memory of the 19th century

In August 1834, the mullah of the cathedral mosque in the town of Kasimov addressed to parishioners with a solemn speech on the occasion of majority of the successor of a throne. In this speech he made short digression to the history of Kasimov Tsardom focusing on the listing of its rulers with short characteristic of some of them. At that time, there were no professional studies on the Kasimov Tsardom, while it was almost completely ignored in general works on Russian history (of Karamzin, Polevoy, Tatishchev, Shcherbatov). Some Tatar families kept genealogies-shedzheres, but in the absolute majority, they did not record the ancestors and especially events before the 18th century. An indirect evidence about the life in Kasimov during the 15th–18th centuries contained in the eastern books (for the most part, of an apparent religious and didactic content) do not give grounds for the claim that there existed a written fixation of the local history events. Tombstone inscriptions were illustrative but hardly informative evidence of the events of the 16th–17th centuries. They provide minimal information about past rulers. The writing of a Kasimov Tatar chronicler Qadyr Ali-bek of the 1830s obviously was not yet known. Researches of local ethnographers (I. Gagin, I. Krasnov) could serve as a source of knowledge of the Tatars interested in history. These studies rarely appeared on the pages of periodicals including the journal “Otechestvennye zapiski” (Domestic Notes). Comparison of these publications with the speech of Abdulwahid Smailev discovers their interrelation or the use of a common source. An analysis of the mullah’s speech shows that the fragmentary information from some Russian sources published at that time and the deaf echoes of the long-standing history in Tatar oral and written tradition of the first half of the 19th century developed, in the end, in a fairly consistent picture. In general, this picture was chronologically correct, but it was not full of details and abounded in factual errors

The “Father’s Sons”: The Elite of the Kazan Khanate in the Lithuanian Metrica

Research objective: Analysis of the phrase otetskie deti (“father’s sons”) in the Register Book of the Lithuanian metrics (Lithuanian Metrica) as designations of the military service class of the Kazan khanate. Research materials: The 7th Register Book of the Lithuanian Metrica, Russian chronicles, the chronicles of Kïrïmi and Ötemish-Hajji, the works of S. Herberstein, A. Kurbsky, Maciej of Miechów, Mahmud al-Kashgari, A. Olearius. Results and novelty of the research: The 7th Register Book of the Lithuanian Metrics contains a translation of a message from the Crimean khan, Muhammad Giray, to the Polish King and Lithuanian Grand Duke Sigizmund I. In this letter, there is a reiteration of the requests of the inhabitants of the Kazan Khanate addressed to Muhammad Giray to send them one of his relatives to reign over them. The Kazanians wrote that they had twenty thousand otetskie deti (“father’s sons”) and countless Mordovians and Cheremisses, all of whom were ready to submit (to be “slaves”) to the ruler of the Crimea. The author of the article seeks the meaning of this term and looks for a putative Turkic equivalent to the exp­ression otetskie deti as well as the reasons for the presence of the Mordovians and Cheremisses in this document. The word “otetskii” (paternal) had a wide range of usages in the Russian language of the 16th century – in the State of Muscovy and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. One of its meanings was “belonging to an ancient, noble family”. The instances quoted by the author show a socio-cultural universality, which combined paternity, noble origin and elite status in a single notion. The author hypothesizes that the phrase “otetskie deti” in the Russian translation could replace the concept of “Tatars” in its social meaning, as a symbol of the military strata of the population of the Kazan khanate. Mention of the Mordovians and the Cheremisses in the Kazan message reflected the positive image of these peoples – namely, their high military reputation in neighboring countries. The Kazanians’ assurances to be ready to put two tumens of elite troops and crowded militia at the disposal of Crimea served as one of the stimuli for Muhammad Giray to assent to their request by dispatching Prince Giray to Kazan

Review of the Book by S.S. Averkiev “Tatar Influence on the Life of the Russian People”

The article contains a review of the book by S.S. Averkiev (1886–1963), which remained unpublished during the Soviet period, since such a topic was at that time unpopular, questionable, and therefore “inadmissible” for Soviet publishers. S.S. Averkiev saw the influence of the Tatars on various aspects of the social and cultural life of the Russian people in an extremely wide spectrum. This can even be judged by the chapters’ titles: “The Influence of Tatars on Administrative Management, Finances”, “The Influence of Tatars on Trade and Industry”, “Everyday Life”, “Manners and Customs”, “People’s Literature”. The author’s research enthusiasm often encouraged him to seek the Tatar “connection”, where borrowings actually took place from Persia and the Arab countries, from the peoples of Central Asia. Perhaps, the obsolete, pre-revolutionary general designation of Turkic-speaking peoples as Tatars to some extent affected the author in this respect. Averkiev does not insist that all selected cases and examples of borrowings were certainly associated with the Golden Horde and the later Tatar khanates. The topic of Averkiev’s book is not new at all. Attempts to identify the various manifestations of the civilizational connection between Russia and the East have been repeatedly made in historiography. As a rule, borrowings from the Golden Horde of the 13th–15th centuries and from the earlier Turkic states are considered a clear indicator of such a connection. Of course, indisputable examples exist: first of all, in the Russian titulature and social terminology, financial system of medieval Rus’, organization of the yam-service, and so on

Beglerbegi in the Structure of the Mongol and Turkic State System »

This article is first to discuss the position of beglerbegi as one of the highest elite ranks in the system of traditional Turkic-Mongolian statehood. The author proposes some assumptions about its genesis analyzing information from medieval written and folklore sources. The study of this institution can contribute to the understanding of the peculiarities and regularities of social development of Turkic peoples throughout the long historical period. The beglerbegi institution (i.e. of the supremacy among the military elite) was formed among the Turkic Oghuzes not earlier than in the 11th century, but had a lengthy background in ancient societies of the proto-State stage. It became one of the matrix forms for the functioning of the Turkic nomadic polities and was revived in the Ulus of Jochi as a result of the social strengthening of nomadic aristocracy. It was introduced, firstly, due to the favorable economic and demographic conditions of the 13th century; and secondly, with the crisis and repressions in the ruling house of Batu during the reign of khan Tokhta and early reign of Uzbek khan, when Jochids, fighting for power, lost a support of their relatives and members of the dynasty and found it among the nomadic begis. The revival of Turkic institution of beglerbegi was stimulated both by Turkization of the Golden Horde court and bureaucracy and by penetration of the Iranian and Oghuz-Seljuk elements into a state system. The latter phenomenon was promoted both by a temporary reconciliation between traditionally hostile uluses of Jochi and Hulagu as well as by adoption of Islam as State religion in the Golden Horde. A typological correspondence between the Golden Horde beglerbegi and archaic leader of druzhina allows us to see in this institution the element of ancient Turkic legacy. The logic of historical development of the Golden Horde led to an excessive increase in the competence of chief begi, although he did not replaced the khan. By the weakening of Jochid statehood, the beglerbegis’ impact on the life of post-Horde States significantly increased since the late 14th century. In some of them, this position was monopolized by begis from the Turkic tribe of Manghyt

The Takht Eli Khanate: The State System at the Twilight of the Golden Horde

Résumé : La structure administrative du khanat de Takht Eli (nom donné dans les sources à la Grande Horde au xve-xvie siècle) était largement calquée sur celle de la Horde d’Or. Cependant, au xve siècle, les rouages et les institutions étatiques furent affaiblis et simplifiés dans la mesure où les espaces agricoles, situés en périphérie, dans les régions du Dniepr et du Caucase nord, étaient restreints et offraient un rendement trop faible pour constituer une base économique suffisante à la continuation de l’empire nomade. Le khanat de Takht Eli vivait au rythme de la Maison du khan et avait la charge de son administration, une caractéristique essentielle des empires nomades d’Eurasie. A la différence de la Horde d’Or, le khanat ne disposait plus de moyens de coercition efficaces pour canaliser ses sujets récalcitrants. Du fait de l’amoindrissement continu des revenus agricoles, rendant problématique la subsistance des populations du khanat, et de la déliquescence des leviers de contrôle et de pouvoir de l’État, l’organisation politique de Takht Eli peut donc difficilement être considérée comme un État à part entière. On ne peut pour autant comparer le khanat de Takht Eli à une structure sociale primitive du type « chefferie complexe ». La hiérarchie sophistiquée des tribus et des begs du khanat, et les divisions territoriales qui en découlaient, ainsi que de la persistance de la civilisation urbaine de la Horde d’Or – l’Islam étant à l’origine de la culture urbaine en Basse Volga – montre que la Grande Horde pourrait être comparée au khanat Uzbek et définie comme un État embryonnaire, à une étape transitoire entre une chefferie complexe et une forme d’État en devenir.Abstract: The administrative structure of the Takht Eli (Great Horde) was inherited from the Jochi Ulus (the Golden Horde). However, the historical circumstances of the 15th century led to a simplification and contraction of the Takht Eli’s state apparatus, because the agricultural periphery of the Dnieper and the Northern Caucasus was too small to provide the economic foundation of the nomadic empire. The internal life of the Takht Eli was controlled by the administration of the khan's headquarters, as was typical for nomads in Eurasia. The main difference between the Takht Eli and the Golden Horde was the former’s lack of effective means of coercion to control disloyal subjects. With the almost complete loss of the agricultural foundation of the economy and without effective power structures, the khans of the Takht Eli found themselves leading a polity that could barely be considered a state. However, at the same time, the complex hierarchy of els and their leaders, the supra-tribal territorial division, and the remnants of the urban Islamic civilisation of the Golden Horde, especially in the Lower Volga, do not allow us to describe the Great Horde as a primitive social structure, such as a complex chiefdom. Perhaps, similar to the Uzbek khanate, the Great Horde can be defined as an inchoate state that occupied the intermediate stage between a complex chiefdom and a typical early state

Non-Russians at Royal Coronations: The Ethnic Politics of the Empire in Ceremonies

The article was submitted on 03.09.2019.This article considers the participation of representatives of the non-Slavic population of the Russian Empire in the coronation ceremony of the monarch. The author of the article refers both to published and archival sources from the funds of the Russian State Historical Archive and the Russian State Archive of Ancient Acts. On the basis of these documents, it is demonstrated how “alien” deputations were compiled for participation in the “sacred coronation” ceremony; how officials in the centre and periphery selected deputies who they thought were worthy; in which capacity they attended the ceremony; and what value it had for the internal policy of the state. The cooperation with the elites of the peoples that made up the Russian Empire was one of the leading principles of ethnic politics. An important means of involving ethnic elites (as well as the non-Slavic population in general) in the life of the state and implementing government policies was to form a cult of the Russian monarch. The convocation of multiethnic masses in the Kremlin and other Moscow celebrations not only marked the national diversity of Russia but was also meant to demonstrate the unity of all its inhabitants around the new autocrat. The research methodology is based on the analysis of the symbolic capital of supreme power. The article reveals how it was maintained and supported in the eyes of different ethnic subjects. Participation in a series of coronation rituals was also important for the non-Russian subjects themselves. It was an opportunity to represent one’s people. Gradually, an algorithm was developed for the selection of people invited to the celebration. Representatives of the ethnic elite, aristocracy, and highest clergy were seen as the most desirable, although by the end of the nineteenth century, it was considered reasonable to invite commoners. The participation of representatives of the country’s peoples in the ceremony of enthronement was an important element of imperial ethnic policy.Рассматривается привлечение представителей неславянского населения Российской империи к участию в торжественной церемонии коронации монарха. Использованы опубликованные и архивные источники из фондов РГИА и РГАДА. На основании документов показано, каким образом составлялись «инородческие» депутации для участия в церемонии «священного коронования», как чиновники в центре и на местах отбирали достойных, по их мнению, членов депутаций, в каком качестве они присутствовали на этой церемонии, какое значение это имело для внутренней политики государства. Сотрудничество с элитами народов, включенных в состав Российской империи, составляло один из ведущих принципов этнической политики. Важным средством вовлечения этнических элит (как и неславянского населения в целом) в участие в жизни государства, в осуществление правительственной политики было формирование культа российского монарха. Собрание разноэтничной массы в Кремле и прочих московских пунктах торжеств знаменовало не только многообразие национального состава России, но было направлено на демонстрацию единения всех ее жителей вокруг самодержца. Методология исследования основана на анализе феномена символического капитала верховной власти. В нем выясняется, каким образом он сохранялся и поддерживался в глазах разноэтничных подданных. Участие в череде коронационных ритуалов было важно и для самих подданных«инородцев». Это давало возможность репрезентовать свой народ. Постепенно вырабатывался алгоритм подбора людей, приглашаемых на торжество. Наиболее желательными виделись представители этнической элиты - аристократии и высшего духовенства, хотя к концу XIX в. власти сочли разумным приглашать и простолюдинов. Участие представителей российских народов в царской интронизации представляло собой важный элемент имперской этнической политики