(05-01-2024, 07:34 AM)727Sky Wrote: I enjoyed this story and maybe you will too.

Quote:This wedding was out of the ordinary – in 1317, Moscow Prince Yuri Danilovich married Konchaka, the sister of the Khan of the Golden Horde, Uzbek Khan. At the same time, both spouses changed their status – Konchaka was baptized into Orthodoxy and became Agafia, while Yuri Danilovich, according to the laws of the Horde, received the title of gurgan – brother-in-law of the Khan himself. The dynastic marriage was probably meant to strengthen relations between the Horde and the Russian princes, but the life of Yuri and Agafia together didn’t last long.

In the same year of 1317, Prince Yuri went with a campaign to the Tver land and took his wife with him. After Yuri was defeated in the Battle of Bortenev, Agafia was captured by Tver prince Mikhail Yaroslavich and soon died in captivity in Tver. There were rumors that she was poisoned.

Nothing more is known of her life, but her death was the first link in the chain of great events. In a rage at his sister’s death, Khan Uzbek summoned Mikhail of Tver to the Horde, tortured him and, finally, executed him, with the people of the Moscow Prince Yuri taking part in the execution. These events shattered the Tver principality and it soon surrendered its positions to Moscow. It turns out that Moscow princes owe their ascendancy partly to the late Tatar princess.

4 Golden Horde princesses who lived and died in Russia

Quote:Moscow's eventual dominance of northern and eastern Rus' was in large part attributable to the Mongols. After the prince of Tver joined a rebellion against the Mongols in 1327, his rival prince Ivan I of Moscow joined the Mongols in crushing Tver and devastating its lands. By doing so he eliminated his rival, allowed the Russian Orthodox Church to move its headquarters to Moscow, and was granted the title of Grand Prince by the Mongols.[23]
As such, the Muscovite prince became the chief intermediary between the Mongol overlords and the Rus' lands, which paid further dividends for Moscow's rulers. While the Mongols often raided other areas of Rus', they tended to respect the lands controlled by their principal collaborator. This, in turn, attracted nobles and their servants who sought to settle in the relatively secure and peaceful Moscow lands.[21]

Although Rus' forces defeated the Golden Horde at the Battle of Kulikovo in 1380, Mongol domination of parts of Rus' territories, with the requisite demands of tribute, continued until the Great stand on the Ugra river in 1480.[23]

Historians argued[by whom?] that without the Mongol destruction of Kievan Rus', the Rus' would not have unified into the Tsardom of Russia and, subsequently, the Russian Empire would not have risen. Trade routes with the East went through Rus' territory, making them a center of trade between east and west. Mongol influence, while destructive to their enemies, had a significant long-term effect on the rise of modern Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine.[24]
Decline of cities[edit]

Mongol invasion of Kievan Rus'