this is Crash Course: World History

and today we’re going to talk about Russia,

which means we get to talk about this guy again!

We haven’t talked about Russia much so far because

1. It’s complicated, and

2. Ya actually gavarou pa russki a little bit,

because I had some Russian in college and that makes it difficult to mispronounce things,

which is my thing!

Mr. Green, Mr. Green!

Why’d you take Russian?

Well, because I had this big crush on a Russian major.

But, anyway,

I’m sure I’ll still mispronounce everything.

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So,

today we’re going to talk about persistent stereotypes about Russia,

and how Russia came to take its current shape,

a turn of events we owe largely

to the Mongols.

[Savage, brassy swarm of Mongol-tage doom calls…]

But before we discuss the Mongol conquest of Russia,

let’s discuss exactly what got conquered.

So before there was a Russian empire,

or even a Russian kingdom,

there was the Kievan Rus.

We know Kiev was a powerful city-state, but who exactly founded it is a subject of debate.

Most historians now believe that the settlers of Kiev were Slavic people who migrated from

around the Black Sea. But there’s an older theory that the settlers of Kiev were actually,

like, Vikings.

That theory goes that Vikings came down to Kiev from rivers like the Dnieper and founded

a trading outpost similar to ones they’d founded in Iceland and Greenland.

Which is an awesome idea and everything,

but Russian,

the language that developed from what the Rus spoke, sounds a lot more Slavic than it

sounds,

you know, Swedish.

To illustrate,

here is a Swede fighting with a Russian

over who founded Kiev.

[Russian: Kiev was founded by the slavic ancestors of the Rus.]

[Swede: No. Clearly Kiev was founded by Swedes.]

Right, okay,

so trade was hugely important to Kiev.

Almost all of their wars ended with trade concession treaties, and their law codes were

unusually devoted to the subject of commerce.

The Rus traded raw materials like fur, wax, and also slaves—

We’re not gonna venture into the astonishingly intense etymological debate over whether the

word slav derives from the Latin word for slave

because there's nothing more terrifying and verbose

than an etymologist flame war.

But, yeah, the Rus traded slaves.

They also relied on agriculture—

and your relationships to the land determined both your social status and your tax burden.

And if you fell into tax debt, which a lot of peasants did,

then you became bonded to the land you farmed for the rest of your life,

I guess that slave-like dynamic is okay as a model for social organization,

but if you step on the proletariat for too long,

you might end up with a Communist revolution.

But I’m getting way ahead of myself.

Couple more things about Kiev:

First, the ruler of Kiev was called the Grand Prince, and he became the model for future

Russian Kings. Also, the early grand princes made a fateful decision:

They became Byzantine Christians.

According to legend,

prince Vladimir chose to convert the Rus to Byzantine Christianity in the 11th century.

He purportedly chose Christianity over Islam because of Islam’s prohibition on alcohol

saying:

“Drink is the joy of the Russian.”

Anyway, the Kievan Rus eventually fell in 1240

when these guys

[Mongol-tage horns horn it up]

showed up and replaced them.

By that time the Rus had been at war with pastoral nomads for centuries; from the Khazars

to the Pechengs to the Cumans,

and they were tired.

Which made them easy targets. The period of Mongol “rule” over Russia is also known

as Appanage Russia.

An Appanage is princedom,

and this period basically featured a bunch of Russian princes vying for control over

territory, which is not a recipe for political stability or economic growth,

another theme that will re-emerge in Russian history.

By the way,

I’m describing all of this as Russia even though if you did that in the 13th century,

people would look at you funny.

They’d be like,

“What do you mean, Russia? Also,

where’d you get those pants?

And all those teeth?”

“MMMM...YOU SMELL PRETTY.”

Right.

So, to discuss how important the Mongols were to Russia,

let’s go to the Thought Bubble.

The Mongols did set up the Khanate o f the Golden Horde in Russia,

but it didn’t leave much lasting impact on

the institutions of the region,

which had already been set up by the Kievans.

But they did bring about a population shift—

away from the South, where Kiev was,

toward the Northeast.

This was partly to get away from

the Mongols and their massacring,

but that noted, the Mongols were comparatively light rulers:

They were happy to live in their yurts and collect tribute from

the ever-bickering Russian princes.

And all the princes had to do in exchange for their relative freedom

was recognize the Mongol khans as their rulers and allow the Mongols to pick the Grand Prince

from among the Russians.

Perhaps most importantly,

Mongol rule cut the Russians off from the Byzantines

and further isolated them from Europe, leaving Russia

not Byzantine,

not European,

and not really Mongol either,

since they hated the Mongols and generally believed the Mongols were a scourge sent from

God to punish them for their sinfulness and everything.

But the Mongols did help propel Moscow to prominence and in doing so, created the idea

that this was Russia.

And as an aside, they also did what

Napoleon, Hitler, and many others couldn’t:

The Mongols successfully conquered Russia in the winter.

Thanks, Thought Bubble.

So how did the Mongols help catapult Moscow and its princes to prominence?

Well, first,

they named Muscovite princes The Grand Prince on more than one occasion.

More importantly, the Muscovite princes won—

that is to say purchased—

the right to collect tribute on behalf of the Khan from other princes.

That’s a good gig because it’s easy to skim a little bit off the top before you send

it down the line to

[Mongol-taging a bit more for good measure]

the Mongols.

Which is precisely what the Muscovites did to enrich themselves—

in fact,

one prince who was particularly good at this was known as Ivan Kalita.

Using my Russian, I can tell you that that translates to

“Johnny Moneybags.”

As my Russian professor would tell you,

I’m a “creative” translator.

All this extra loot helped Moscow expand their influence and buy principalities.

The Mongols also helped them more directly by attacking their enemies.

Plus Moscow was at the headwaters of four rivers

which made it well-positioned for trade.

And because they were kind of the allies of the Mongols- the Mongols rarely attacked them-

which meant that lots of people went to Moscow because it was relatively safe.

Including “churchy” people.

In fact,

Moscow also became the seat of the Eastern Orthodox church in 1325,

when the Metropolitan Peter moved there.

So you might think that the Muscovites would be grateful for all this help from the Mongols,

but you would be wrong.

As the Mongols’ position weakened in Russia in the latter half of the 14th century,

one of Moscow’s princes Dmitrii Donskoi

made war on them and inflicted the first major defeat of Mongols in Russia

at battle of Kulikovo Field.

This showed that the Mongols weren’t invincible, which is always really bad for an imperial

force.

Plus it made Moscow look like the hero of the Russians.

And that helped strengthen the idea of a unified Russia,

just as you’ll remember the Persians helped unify the Greeks a long time ago.

Aiding this growth was stability, which Moscow owed largely to luck:

Muscovite princes usually had sons which allowed them to have successors.

In fact,

there was only one major succession struggle and it was between

two blind guys named Basil.

That’s not a joke by the way.

Oh, it’s time for the Open Letter?

[Swoodilyscoots by globey to get his fireside chat on]

An Open Letter to Basil and Basil:

But first,

let’s see in the Secret Compartment.

Oh, it’s Grizzlor!

Yeah, I guess that is kind of how the Russians saw the Mongols.

Dear Basils,

The 15th century Muscovite civil war was insanely complicated,

but it culminated with you guys

essentially blinding each other.

First,

Basil II, the eventual winner of the civil war,

had Basil the cross-eyed blinded.

Because being cross-eyed wan’t bad enough.

And that was seen as the end of the political career of

Basil the Cross-Eyed.

But then Basil the Cross-Eyed’s brother

tracked down Basil II and he was like

“I’ma blind you back!”

And of course,

everybody thought that would end Basil II’s political career,

but they were wrong.

It turns out you can rule Russia like a boss even if you’re blind.

Best Wishes, Johnny Green.

After Basil the Blind came the real man who expanded Moscow’s power,

Ivan III,

later known as Ivan the Great.

First,

he asserted Russian independence from the Mongols

and stopped paying tribute to the khan--

after the khan had named him Grand Prince, of course.

Then,

Ivan purchased, negotiated for or conquered multiple appanages,

thus expanding Muscovite power even more.

Ivan later declared himself sovereign of all Russians and

then married the niece of the last Byzantine emperor,

thus giving him even more legitimacy.

And he took titles autocrat and tsar, which means Caesar.

Basically,

Ivan created the first centralized Russian state and for doing that

he probably deserves title “the Great.”

And that would be a good place to stop,

except then we won’t see the type of absolute rule that characterized Russia

for most of the rest of its history,

even unto Putin.

OH GOD.

JUST KIDDING PUTIN!

YOU’D NEVER RIG AN ELECTION..

N-NO...PLEASE DON’T PUT ME IN JAIL!

While Ivan III consolidated Muscovite power,

the undeniable brutal streak in Russian governance comes not

from the Mogols,

but from Ivan IV.

Better known as Ivan the Terrible.

Ivan IV ruled from 1533 to 1584,

taking the throne at age 16,

yet more evidence that adolescents should

not be trusted with emerging empires.

Ivan the Terrible’s reign

represents the end of princely power

and the beginning of the autocracy that Russia is famous for.

But in the beginning, he was really an innovative leader.

As a young king, he worked with a group of advisers called

the Chosen Council, which certainly sounds like a good thing.

He also called the very first meeting of the zemskii sobor,

a grand council of representatives similar to the estates general that

would become so important in France two hundred years later.

And also reformed the army, emphasizing the new technology of muskets.

But in the second part of his reign,

Ivan earned his nickname, the Terrible—

which can mean either bad or just awe-inspiring,

depending on your perspective.