the golden horde and the black sea 147
before their invasion. here William of rubruck’s testimony confirms Ibn
al-athīr, the older source, in every respect.16
In turn, the relative scarcity of constantinopolitan trade with the
Northern Black Sea region under the Latins continued into the era of the
first khan of the Golden horde. the friar mentions no commercial activ-
ity other than some Western merchants buying salted fish from the Sea
of azov, while he is noticeably much more impressed by the intensity of
trade on the Soldaia-Sinope axis.
according to this well-informed witness, even the system of gather-
ing tax from Black Sea trade by levying customs in the crimean ports
remained unchanged, save in one detail: the prefects of these cities now
sent their tributes to Batu Khan, instead of to the cuman potentates.
the khan on the Volga also shared his predecessors’ attitude to the ques-
tion of the Straits, though after his death Sarai would be deeply interested
in the matter. according to rubruck, the Latin empire of constantinople
was not among the subject states, which certainly indicates no failure of
Batu’s but simply a lack of interest in the Bosphorus on the part of the
man who was justly considered the most powerful figure in the Western
half of the Mongol empire at the time.17
Bringing together all of the above, we reach the conclusion that the
first Jochid khan introduced no particular innovations in Black Sea com-
merce. We might suppose that the inherent virtues of the Pax Mongolica
stimulated trade even in these peripheral regions, but this is impossible to
prove from the available documentary evidence: there is certainly noth-
ing to suggest that Batu was anything but utterly uninterested in such
matters.
the reason for his neglect of Black Sea trade becomes clear once this
is seen as part of his wider commercial policy, which was truly transcon-
tinental in scale. Batu was single-minded in his concentration on con-
solidating Jochid claims to tabriz, and conquering the fertile crescent,18
and could not see the Black Sea as anything but a secondary problem, a
side-issue, in relation to the great currents of east-West trade.
proof that the Black Sea was a victim of tabriz’s importance during
Batu’s reign comes in the time of his successors, for whom the loss of that
16 See p. 142 ff.
17 See above, p. 52.
18 See chapter 2.1.2.
