18 chapter one
elsewhere.57 however hard the Jochid khans tried to squeeze their vassals
and their own subjects, the horde’s resource-hungry economy was far too
fragile a base to support the crushing burden of their rule.
the reputation which the khans of the Golden horde enjoyed as protec-
tors of long-distance trade necessarily resulted from the same fatal flaw.58
the results obtained by efforts to redress this structural infirmity in the
Golden horde’s economy were nevertheless remarkable; the scarcity of
resources was a problem from the very beginning of the state’s existence.59
the Pax Mongolica not only led to a greater volume of trade in the estab-
lished goods on the north-South axis; the Jochid rulers also succeeded in
connecting the Golden horde to the trunk roads of trade linking china
and central asia to the Mediterranean-Black Sea economic area via their
own route, developed under their rule.60
Such trade links, developed by mutually advantageous cooperation
between the khan and the merchants, prove that despite appearances
the Golden horde was never an autarchy. Like the Khazar empire, it had
a more diversified economy than is commonly believed, but for all that it
drew its lifeblood from the arteries of eurasian trade. here, far more than
in other chinghizid territories, the merchant truly deserved to be called
the foundation of the state.
the Jochid state’s extreme dependence on trade harboured the same
dangers as in the Mamluk sultanate and the Khazar empire. the suc-
cess of timur Lenk’s campaign in 1395–1396, which destroyed the Golden
horde’s commercial centres (Sarai, astrakhan and tana), paralysed com-
mercial activity in the cuman steppe and brought on the horde’s true
death throes (c. 1430)61 but his victories were certainly made easier by
the material losses incurred once Janibek had launched the war against
57 the heavy taxes in the Golden horde furnish conclusive proof here. a Syrian
merchant visiting the horde at the peak of its development during the reign of Özbek
remarked on unusual and excessive taxation: the whole population was obliged to pay
taxes to the khan, and these were collected even in bad years when there was pestilence
among the flocks, heavy snow had fallen, or when there had been a hard frost, so that
some were forced to sell their children into slavery to pay what they owed (‛Umarī/Lech,
p. 140). evidently, the khan demanded payment in coin even from the nomads—another
sign of the financial difficulties which he faced. We should also remark here the way the
state exchequer tapped, albeit indirectly, into the stream of profit from one of the most
important export wares, slaves.
58 the first khans, Batu and Berke, started a long-lasting tradition in this regard
(cf. Grekov, Yakubovskiy, Orda, pp. 62–64).
59 allsen, Imperialism, p. 58.
60 See chapter 3.4.1.
61 See chapter 4.2.7.