The moment came in 1291. Feigning serious illness, Nogay made what seemed to be a hero’s dying request: he asked that the Jochid leaders gather in a quriltai with him, at which all would lay down their arms and toast to peace within the Horde. As a child of the conquests who had known Batu and Berke and become the Horde’s most revered commander, Nogay could not be refused; the leaders would collect their hordes and meet at the khan’s location along the Volga. En route to the Volga, the supposedly ailing Nogay prevented suspicion by accepting visitors who would report on his condition. He lay in his tent with his guests, spitting congealed animal blood that he had stuffed in his mouth. The plan worked: news spread in advance of Nogay’s horde that the old commander was not long for this earth. Then, when he was close enough to the khan’s camp, Nogay sent word to Toqto’a to assemble his troops and get ready for the onslaught. Their timing had to be perfect.
When Nogay reached the banks of the Volga, he made camp and invited the khan and the councilors to join him at his tent. They entered unarmed, while their guards most likely stayed outside. Still coughing blood, Nogay reminisced about his forty years of service to the khans and insisted on the need for harmony among the descendants of Jochi. Moved by Nogay’s words, the assembled Jochids praised the commander’s wisdom and courage. Then, suddenly, Toqto’a and his men attacked. They killed Töle-Buqa and all the ruling council members apart from Nogay, starting with Toqto’a’s elder brother Toghrilcha.46
This was something new in Jochid history: a political murder with the aim of seizing the throne. To solidify his claim, Toqto’a married Toghrilcha’s chief wife. In the Mongol world, it was not unusual for men to marry their fathers’ or brothers’ wives. This was a way to protect a widow and keep her estate within the family. But there was more at stake in Toqto’a’s case. By appropriating his elder brother’s chief wife, Toqto’a intended to highjack the lineal succession. Toghrilcha’s seniority made him a more legitimate candidate to the throne; to assume Toghrilcha’s claim, Toqto’a had to do more than kill his elder’s physical body. The younger had to replace the elder in the genealogical tree.
Toqto’a got his wish and was soon made khan of the Horde. Once on the throne, he maintained close ties with Nogay. They spent two years purging Töle-Buqa’s keshig and followers, even those who were close relatives. Such a large-scale political purge was also new to the Horde, although not to the Mongols in general. Significant purges had occurred under Great Khan Möngke, for instance. A purge was an extraordinarily violent means of erasing internal resistance, but killing potential enemies all at once was preferable to a lengthy hunt for rebels.
Such actions were bound to provoke resentment, and Toqto’a’s Batuid relatives turned their ire on Nogay. The khan’s inner circle knew that Nogay, seasoned politician that he was, was pulling the strings, and they urged Toqto’a to break off from the supreme commander’s influence. In 1293 the khan did so, demonstrating his autonomy by restoring Kniaz Andrei as grand prince of Vladimir. Ten years earlier, Andrei had been forced out and replaced with his brother Dmitrii, per Nogay’s wishes and against those of Töde-Möngke Khan. Now Toqto’a sent troops to eject Dmitrii. Dmitrii fled to Pskov, in far northwestern Russia, and the troops raided Moscow and thirteen other towns. Russian sources describe a harsh campaign, with widespread terror and a high death toll. These reports may be exaggerated, but the kniazia nonetheless decried Toqto’a’s show of force. The khan was making clear that he intended to rule them closely. He was not going to continue Töde-Möngke’s hands-off approach. Nor would Toqto’a allow Nogay to openly make political decisions in place of the khan.47
The turf war over administration of the Russian principalities was the beginning of the end for Nogay and Toqto’a’s alliance. Their conflict came to a head around 1297, owing to a Mongol familial squabble. The tension began with Nogay and one of his in-laws, Salji’üdai Güregen. Salji’üdai was not a prince, but he was a powerful leader of the Qonggirad, the Jochids’ oldest and most prestigious marriage partners, and he was a member of Toqto’a’s inner circle. Salji’üdai was descended from the uncle of Chinggis Khan’s chief wife, Börte, and was at this point married to Kelmish Aqa, Toqto’a’s grandmother. A highly influential figure herself, Kelmish Aqa was Qubilai’s niece and had family ties and political connections with the Toluids in China, Iran, and Azerbaijan. Salji’üdai was therefore a force to be reckoned with, and his children were desirable marriage partners. But they were not necessarily well suited for their spouses, as Nogay’s daughter discovered soon after marrying Salji’üdai’s son. While Nogay’s daughter converted to Islam, her husband retained his religion, which was likely Buddhism. Rashīd al-Dīn reported that before long the couple were fighting “over religion and beliefs” and could not stand each other.
Mongol ruler on campaign, illustration from an early fourteenth century copy of Rashīd al-Dīn, Jāmi‘ al-tawārīkh. The footman at left appears to carry a gerege, a tablet inscribed with an official notice of safe passage. (Pictures from History / Bridgeman Images)
The daughter complained to her father, who saw an opening to interfere. Pointing out Salji’üdai’s status as a qarachu—an elite, but not a member of the golden lineage—Nogay pressed Toqto’a to banish Salji’üdai from his inner circle and either send him back to his ancestral land in northern Khwarezm or turn him over to Nogay himself. Toqto’a refused. This was unusual for multiple reasons. For one thing, Nogay, unlike Salji’üdai, was both a Jochid and supreme commander: by lineage and by office, Nogay outranked his in-law, in spite of Salji’üdai’s own undoubtedly noble extraction. In addition, Nogay was accustomed to calling the shots, albeit behind the scenes. But this time, instead of carrying out Nogay’s will, Toqto’a went his own way. Toqto’a was firm in his decision. Nogay may have been his protector, a descendent of Jochi, and the most feared and respected Mongol in the west. But the khan had no intention of igniting a quarrel with the Toluids and Qonggirad, who gave him military support.48
With Toqto’a asserting himself, Nogay was facing the very real possibility of consignment to same role he had played under Möngke-Temür: that of an influential commander with great autonomy—but, still, just a commander. Indeed, the present circumstance was worse than that, for Nogay could no longer afford to bide his time. He was in his fifties, possibly older, an advanced age among Mongol warriors. He knew that the end might come soon. So he did something radical: he declared himself khan. To make his claim real and legal, he issued coins bearing his tamga. He also tried to solidify his legacy by choosing his eldest son Cheke as his primary heir.49
There could not be two Jochid khans at the same time. The only question was how the dispute would be settled. Would resolution come via quriltai or war? As a Batuid and the enthroned khan, Toqto’a might have seemed the more legitimate choice of ruler. Certainly there were begs who thought so. But he had numerous enemies among the Jochid families, and several begs sided with Nogay. In the old days, such contests for power inevitably inspired the Jochids to part ways; the western steppe was big enough for many powerful hordes. But this time no consensus was reached, and neither side trusted the other enough to back down. So war it was.
In the winter of 1297–1298, on the lower Don, the two hordes fought their first battle. Nogay emerged the victor, forcing Toqto’a’s army to withdraw toward the Volga. But the battle was not decisive, so Nogay developed a wider strategy. His next step was to take control of Crimea. The peninsula formed an enclave within the Black Sea territory, and Nogay feared that the inhabitants would stay loyal to Toqto’a. Nogay targeted the Genoese of Caffa, whom he accused of holding back his share of tax revenues. To make the Genoese pay, he sent mounted archers under his grandson’s command, but the grandson was killed during his stay in Caffa. Outraged, Nogay called on his warriors and allied begs to punish the culprits. The sources do not mention whether the troops were successful in finding the grandson’s killers, but the sources do indicate that Nogay’s allies killed, robbed, an
d enslaved Muslim, Alan, and Frankish merchants around Crimea.50
Plundering merchants was a lucrative business, and when the begs who fought in the Crimean raid returned to Nogay, their hearts were filled with glory and their carts were loaded with spoils and captives. But then Nogay did something none of his commanders anticipated: the old leader released the prisoners. The Crimeans were not, after all, Nogay’s enemies. Indeed, most of them were his trading and political partners, and he had no intention of undoing his carefully cultivated alliance with the Franciscans. He simply wanted to show who was in charge. Releasing the prisoners was, however, a disastrous miscalculation. The begs who had fought to avenge Nogay’s grandson deserved to be rewarded. Their earnings were taken from them, a humiliation and a violation of Chinggis Khan’s law. The dispossessed begs left Nogay at once and joined Toqto’a’s camp.51
The final battle took place on the Kügenlik River in southeastern Moldavia. This had been the core of Nogay’s territory, but without the begs, he could not hold the area, allowing Toqto’a to move his horde and his warriors in. Toqto’a’s men destroyed Nogay’s army. Nogay managed to escape the battlefield but was soon caught and fatally wounded by a Russian cavalryman fighting for the khan. Nogay’s sons picked up the fight against the Batuids, but his horde nearly disintegrated, its people fleeing to the Balkans, Poland, and Lithuania. His heir was finally killed in Bulgaria. In the meantime, the khan successfully established his authority over Nogay’s former territory. Toqto’a installed one of his son’s hordes at Isaccea, where Nogay’s capital had been.52
The civil war lasted three long years and deeply shook the Horde. When it finally ended in 1300, thousands of skilled horsemen had died and thousands of others had been sold into slavery in the Middle East and Europe. The war made a deep impression on contemporary observers as well. Conflict was in full swing in 1298 when Marco Polo, locked in a Genoese jail, told the writer Rustichello da Pisa of the large numbers involved in the war, the appalling level of violence, the masses of dead bodies. According to Polo, whose Travels ends with Nogay’s initial victory over Toqto’a, the supreme commander was the greatest “Tartar” leader in Europe. After all, for more than thirty years, Nogay had sustained the Mongol imperial order on the western border, and it seemed he was about to emerge triumphant once more.53
After Nogay’s death the Jochids maintained their control over the bordering Bulgarians and Byzantines, but exchanges with the Hungarians and Balkan peoples waned. The descendants of Nogay remained in Eastern Europe, where they slowly lost the authority that Nogay had accumulated. In the early fourteenth century, the great river valleys of the Dniester and Danube were still safe places for nomads, but the command center of the Horde had been moved back to the lower Volga.54
Nogay faced several disadvantages in his war for supremacy over the Horde. For one thing, he was isolated, his territory cut off from the distant Mongol uluses, where he might have found allies. To reach the descendants of Chagatay, Ögödei, and Tolui, Nogay’s envoys had to cross the Jochid or Ilkhanid hordes. Nogay’s interactions with the eastern Mongols were thus sporadic. By contrast, Toqto’a could rely on old partnerships that connected him to nomadic elites across the entirety of Mongol Eurasia.
A second disadvantage lay in Nogay’s comparatively humble position, which constrained his popularity among the begs. The war between Toqto’a and Nogay forced the begs to choose a camp, and Nogay was unable to hold their allegiance. Since the time of Chinggis Khan, top-down diffusion of wealth had been essential to the khan’s maintenance of elite support, but even supportive begs worried that Nogay, with his limited network, could not satisfy them. When he revoked their spoils, he seemed to prove that he was not an able provider.
Nogay faced one more disadvantage: the Qonggirad were on Toqto’a’s side. The Qonggirad were influential and superbly wealthy. Since the rule of Batu, the Qonggirad had been kept away from key keshig positions, but they still had access to the khan through the Jochid princesses whom they married, and the Qonggirad used these connections to amass significant power. Indeed, the Qonggirad were elites in northern Khwarezm, one of the most prosperous regions of the Horde. Endowed with its own coinage, the area was a vital section of the northern trade route. Through their commercial enterprises, the Qonggirad accumulated money and manpower, which was at Toqto’a’s disposal.55
The Power behind the Throne
Supporting the Qonggirad begs over Nogay was a fateful move. It meant that, while Toqto’a had firmly restored the Batuids as the leaders of the Horde, he also had upset age-old rules of governance. By backing the qarachu Salji’üdai over the Jochid Nogay, the khan opened a door that had been closed since the death of Chinggis. For the first time, a direct descendant of Jochi and member of the golden lineage—who was also the highest-ranking commander of the Horde, above even the keshig elders—could not impose his will upon a qarachu. The supremacy of the golden lineage had started to crack.56
The threat to the priority of Chinggis’s house, surely, is one reason why many Jochid princes and begs initially backed Nogay over Toqto’a, only abandoning Nogay after he gave away their rightful spoils. In the world of the Mongols, social and political hierarchy were not just vital, they were also sacred: the supremacy of the golden lineage was acknowledged by Tengri, who had bestowed strength on Chinggis Khan and his heirs. To refuse the laws of social hierarchy, as Toqto’a had when he supported Salji’üdai, was a matter of life and death; doing so endangered the whole community. Nogay is often viewed by historians as rulebreaker, but he was in fact following a conservative impulse: he tried to preserve the larger regime of Mongol law and tradition. In the view of Nogay and his followers, the war stemmed from rivalry between a Jochid leader—Nogay—and the Qonggirad; the choice was between the golden lineage and the qarachu. Underlying social tensions in the Horde were becoming exposed, especially among the begs, who struggled to decide which leader to back given their commitments to the Mongol world order—Toqto’a, their rightful khan, or Nogay, whose rights vis-à-vis the Qonggirad were being denied.
Although Nogay was defeated, he left a deep mark on the political culture of the Horde. Importantly, he showed that the Horde could survive with a weak khan by devolving power. Working through the governing council and as the power behind the throne, Nogay was a genuine leader who enhanced ulus Jochi’s wealth and strength. And Nogay nearly took de jure power himself by mobilizing the begs, a highly unusual maneuver that made clear the increasing power of the aristocracy.
Nogay’s experiments in governance failed in that he never became khan. But the results of his efforts endured. In the wake of the civil war, the begs became that much more forceful. They had elevated Nogay and then destroyed him by coming to Toqto’a’s rescue, with the immediate result being in most respects a return to the status quo ante: Jochid khans asserting their authority. But when the next great succession battle came in the mid-fourteenth century, it would be qarachu begs at the center of the power that emerged. The ever-evolving Horde had more uncharted territory to navigate.57
6
The Northern Road
If you’re traveling from Venice to the great khan’s capital in China to do business, take my advice. First, you must grow a long beard. Once you reach Mongol territory, you will melt into the crowd like a Muslim merchant. Second, in addition to your merchandise, bring several hundred silver bars, which you can exchange when you need local coin. And, finally, never take the southern road.
What you want is the northern road. The entry point is at the harbor of Tana, which stands at the mouth of the Don River. There, hire a drogman, a translator, and choose a good one no matter the cost. You also need at least two male servants who speak Qipchaq, the language one hears most in West Asia. In addition to male servants, you may hire a woman, but make sure she speaks the language too. After Tana, the next stop is Hajji Tarkhan, where the Volga flows into the Caspian Sea. You will need ten to twelve days to get there with a horse-drawn carriage, and
twenty-five if you are traveling with an oxcart. To prepare for this trip, stock up on dry, salted fish and flour, but don’t worry about meat. You will find it everywhere along the way.
The route from Tana to Hajji Tarkhan goes through the steppe. You may see many Mongol warriors. It can be unsafe, and it is wise to walk with other people—ideally a medium-sized caravan of sixty horsemen. Once you arrive at Hajji Tarkhan and the Volga delta, get rid of your carts and take boats: you will go faster and pay less to ship your goods. Sarai, the great Mongol settlement, stands upstream a day or so. The river flows fast and divides into several navigable tributaries; follow the branches eastward, through the next valley and out to Saraijuq—the little Sarai. Saraijuq is the biggest Mongol trade center on the Ural River. It is also where the Mongols come together to worship their ancestors.
In Saraijuq exchange your horses for camels and continue toward the chalky road to northern Khwarezm and the old Muslim cities that once belonged to the sultan Muhammad. From Saraijuq to Urgench, the capital of Khwarezm down in the Amu-Daria Valley, it takes twenty days on camel carts. This is a long, dry road across a high plateau, but Urgench and the surrounding valley are worth the trip. The city is one of the main commercial crossroads of the region, and the crowd is so thick on market days that you can’t ride through on horseback. If you want to sell some of your goods, this is the right place. People come to buy everything, especially silk.
From Urgench, follow the road eastward to the next river valley—a forty-day journey by camel carts. Eventually you will reach Otrar, on the Syr-Daria. The city was half destroyed when the Mongols conquered it in 1220, but now it is blooming again. Otrar stands on the border between the Jochids and Chagatayids; it is the eastern limit of the Horde. You have now traveled a distance of roughly two thousand miles, and you are halfway on your journey. From here, the northern road merges with a branch of the southern and continues to the Chagatayid city of Almaliq, then up to China.
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