I’m Dr. Roman Hautala, author of Masters of the Earth: A History of the Golden Horde, 1219–1502 (Reaktion Books, 2026). AMA!
Hi everyone. I’m Roman Hautala, a historian of the Mongol Empire and the author of [Masters of the Earth: A History of the Golden Horde, 1219–1502] (https://reaktionbooks.co.uk/work/masters-of-the-earth). If in the US, you can find the book at the [University of Chicago Press website] (https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/M/bo280184987.html).
In this book, I trace the dramatic history of the Golden Horde, which dominated Eastern Europe and modern-day Qazaqstan for nearly three centuries. The history of the Golden Horde can be roughly divided into two equal periods: before and after 1360.
During the first period, the Golden Horde rulers received the support of the Mongol Empire’s main military potential to seize their vast territories. After the period of conquest ended, they seized the first opportunity to gain independence from the Mongol emperors during the empire’s disintegration in 1260. Having become an independent state, the Golden Horde abandoned the previous imperial ideology of world domination and permanent territorial expansion. Local khans focused on the prudent and moderate exploitation of subject peoples, as well as on establishing relatively peaceful relations with neighbors and beneficial ties with natural allies and trading partners. The Golden Horde’s security was not subject to serious external threats from its inception, and only internecine strife among local rulers could end its prosperity.
The Golden Horde’s prosperous period was irrevocably interrupted by the onset of endless internal strife among the Golden Horde’s rulers, exacerbated by an economic crisis and territorial losses beginning in 1360. The Golden Horde never again regained its former level of prosperity and internal stability. Attempts by various rulers to centralize power and reassert dominance in the region led either to the disastrous invasion of Amir Timur (also known as Tamerlane) or to the disintegration into several independent khanates. The protracted crisis led to the final decline of the Golden Horde’s former power and its disappearance from the map of Eastern Europe in the early sixteenth century.
I’m here to answer questions about the book and the Golden Horde, so AMA!