The Golden Horde
Ulus Jochi, as contemporaries called the Golden Horde, comprised within its boundaries the steppe expanses of eastern Europe as far as the Danube, and also a great part of the western Siberian steppe and Kazakstan. These areas were called the Desht-i-Kipchak or Kipchak steppe. In addition the Ulus Jochi included a range of settled districts with old centres of trade and industry: the nothern Caucasus, the Crimea, Moldavia, Volga Bolgaria, the Mordvin lands and Khorezm. Rus stood in a position of dependence upon the Horde. Later on, in the XVIth-XVIIth centuries, the Russian sources came to call the Ulus Jochi the Golden Horde. This name became rooted in the historical literature.
After having become fully competent rulers in their own lands and after having separated themselves from Karakorum and its administration in the 1260's, the khans of the Golden Horde speedily built their own cities in the Lower Volga where before the Mongols practically was no settled population and nomadic was extremely sparse. Before the second half of XIVth century khans continued seasonal migrations on the Left bank of Volga, rising summer to north, and winter being lowered in Low Volga.
In the second half of the XIVth century, during continuous internecine and external wars, the Golden Horde cities came in deep decline. The final blow to the cities of the lower Volga was delivered by the invasion of Timur and his forces in 1395 and 1396. But the Golden Horde and some its cities existed till 1420's, when state started to decay on Kazan, Astrakhan, Krimea, Siberia khanates, Nogai and Big hordes.
Middle Volga region in the Golden Horde period,
The Archeological Museum of KSU possesses a significant collection of
articles of the Golden Horde period (the second half of the XIIIth - beginning
of the XVth c).
Among them we should note a vast collection of the Society for
Archeology, History and Ethnography (AKß-2, 85, 87, 94),
There are also materials of the XIIIth - XIVth cc, coming from the territories neighboring the Golden Horde. Thus in the collection from the Minusinskaya hollow (Adler, Teploukhov, 1913, AKß-81) there are numerous arrow heads, details of cast iron cauldrons, etc. In the Museum there are also collections showing the medieval archeology of Kazan. They are the materials of protection works of 1949 and 1990 (AKß-222), excavations by A.Kh.Khalikov in 1977 and 1982 (AKß- 230, 252): ceramics and individual finds. L.F.Nedashkovsky 
© 1995-2011 Kazan Federal University |
The Golden Horde, one of the Chinghizid states, constituted a symbiosis
of two worlds - a town culture and the native steppe element of nomads, with
their special culture and special system of social organization. Highly
developed, classical variant of the Golden Horde culture existed in the Volga
region.
Main urban centers of the Golden Horde in the XIIIth centuries was Volga
Bolgaria, Khorezm and Crimea. However in the 1280th the superiority gradually
passes to the Saray in the delta of Volga.
The greatest flourishing of the Golden Horde and its cities falls to the time
of the reign of the khans Uzbek (1312-1342) and Janibek (1342-1357). In 1312
Islam was accepted in the Golden Horde as state religion.
In the first half of the XIVth century cities, which were built in Lower Volga
region by the Golden Horde khans, achieved a heyday. The largest of cities
were Saray al-Dzedid, Hadji-Tarkhan, Beldzamen and 
as well as in the previous
period, was occupied mainly by Volga bolgars (conquered by Mongols during
campaigns of 1223-1236). Mostly known archaeological sites of the Volga
Bolgaria of the Golden Horde period are Bolgar and Djuketau sites of ancient
cities, Kazan Kremlin, Urmat, Sukhorechenka and III Biliarsk settlements. All
architectural monuments of Bolgar site of ancient city saved to the present
time, concern to period of existence of the Golden Horde. In the second half
of XIIIth century in the Volga Bolgaria appeared the tradition of mounting
above some burials stone grave monuments with inscriptions on Arabian graphics.
coming from the
Volga-Kama region, where nearly all categories of finds from the Golden Horde
settlements are represented: 
Collections from the excavations of the Tsarevskoe site of ancient town
(investigations by G.A.Fedorov-Davyidov in 1961-1962, 1964 and 1966-1967;
AÈß - 193-194, 196, 198-199, -64) - the Golden Horde capital in the XIVth
c - are kept in the Museum funds. They are represented by numerous articles
of non-glazed and glazed ceramics, various individual finds. There is a small
collection from the Vodyanskoe site of ancient town (excavations by
A.G.Mukhamadieva in 1988; AKß-263).