It cannot be said that the appearance of the Mongols on the borders of Russia was unexpected. After the defeat at Kalka in 1223, information about Mongol affairs was periodically included in the Russian chronicles. The defeat of the Volga Bulgaria in 1236, an eternal rival and political enemy, finally put Russia before the fact of inevitable confrontation with the Mongol empire. It seems that everyone understood the inevitability of this conflict. However, the centuries-old experience of communicating with the steppe peoples dominated the Russian princes, which showed that the steppe people both come and go, besides, they are not at all interested in forest areas, preferring to move through open, steppe landscapes. Of course, the Russian princes did not represent the full strength of the steppe empire, and they could not even imagine - the numbers of tens of thousands of mounted warriors simply could not fit in the head of the Russian prince, whose squad on average was about 500 people, and the militias of large cities could put up one and a half- two thousand warriors.
The most powerful prince of Russia - Yuri Vsevolodovich, the head of the Vladimir-Suzdal principality, hoped to defend himself within his own land if the Mongols risked attacking it, however, he believed that they would limit themselves to an attack on the southern borders of Russia, and his principality would remain on the sidelines from the main routes of invasion. There was no reconnaissance, no diplomatic preparation for the defense. Even after the Mongols attacked the Ryazan principality, the death of the Ryazan princes in the battle on Voronezh and during the siege and assault of Ryazan, Yuri did not mobilize, but only moved the available troops to the borders of the principality, entrusting their son Vsevolod with leadership. And only after, having plundered Ryazan, Batu moved towards Kolomna, Yuri realized that it was his lands that would undergo the first blow and began to show some kind of activity.
Ryazan fell on December 21, 1237.
At the time of the beginning of the invasion, Yaroslav Vsevolodovich was in Kiev. As soon as it became clear that the Vladimir-Suzdal principality became the main target of Batu, Yaroslav with his small squad went to help his brother. The annals indicate his quick departure to the north. Kiev was left without a leader and almost immediately was occupied by Mikhail Vsevolodovich of Chernigov.
From the point of view of common sense, Yaroslav had to go either to Novgorod (about 1000 km), or to Pereyaslavl (about 900 km) - to collect troops. At the same time, he had to bypass the hostile Chernigov principality, if he went to Novgorod, then from the west, if to Pereyaslavl, then from the east, so, under the most favorable circumstances, such a path should take at least a month, but in reality, in the winter time - at least two. At the same time, by the beginning of January, the Mongols were in Kolomna (the battle with the detachment of Vsevolod Yuryevich and the remnants of the detachments of the Ryazan princes was difficult for the army of Batu, but still successfully), Vladimir was taken by storm on February 7, then during February it was ruined all the Pereyaslavl principality of Yaroslav stretched along the Volga, including its capital, and on February 22 Torzhok was already besieged, thus, the main road to Novgorod was blocked.
With all the desire, Yaroslav could not get ahead of the Mongols and come to the aid of his brother Yuri other than simply with his close squad, although, if he had time, he, theoretically, could gather a very impressive army - Kiev was actually under his hand, Novgorod, where his son Alexander was sitting and Pereyaslavl. The trouble is that no one gave him this time.
In early March, in the battle on the river. Sit died the Grand Duke Yuri Vsevolodovich, having paid in full for his mistakes with his own death and the death of his entire family. At about the same time, Torzhok fell, and the Mongols began their retreat south into the steppe. The complete defeat of the Vladimir-Suzdal principality and the physical destruction of its ruler, to which the Mongols have always paid special attention, took just over three months. True, they were still waiting for the "evil city" Kozelsk, under which they would have to spend seven weeks, waiting for help from the steppe and waiting for the thaw, but in general the invasion for northern Russia was completed in mid-March.
The heroic Kozelsk also resisted, while Khan Batu was waiting for help from the steppe of the tumen of the khans Horde and Kadan, in order to still take the "evil city", and within the borders of the country devastated by the invasion, literally in the footsteps of the Mongols, Prince Yaroslav Vsevolodovich appeared on the still warm ashes and began to restore order and power in the devastated regions. The first thing the prince had to do was the mass funeral of the dead, which, for known reasons, had to be carried out before the spring warming.
Return of Yaroslav Vsevolodovich to Vladimir. Facial annalistic vault
Yaroslav, first of all, plunged headlong into administrative work. It was necessary to restore the princely power on the ground, since almost the entire administrative apparatus of the principality was destroyed, to redistribute the lands that were freed as a result of the death of the princes, to organize work to restore the country, to correctly distribute the surviving resources. No one disputed the supremacy of Yaroslav among the princes, his authority in the Yuryevich clan was too great and his seniority in the family was too indisputable. And Yaroslav did not disappoint the expectations of his relatives and subjects, showing himself to be an energetic, prudent and thoughtful owner. The fact that already in the spring of 1238 the fields were sown again, which made it possible to avoid famine, can be attributed to Yaroslav a great merit. For some time it seemed to people that with the departure of the Mongols back to the steppe, life would again go in the same order, and the Mongol ruin could be forgotten like a bad dream.
It was not so.
Less than a year later, Batu reminded Russia that the Mongol empire was not a bunch of nomadic tribes living from raid to raid, and that this power of Russia would have to be reckoned with like nothing else before.
In March 1239 the Mongols took Pereyaslavl-Yuzhny by storm. After that, the city was restored to its former place in comparable volumes only in the 16th century.
In early autumn 1239, the Mongol army besieges and storms Chernigov. During the siege, Prince Mstislav Glebovich approached the city with a small squad and attacked the Mongols. The attack was suicidal, the forces were too unequal, the princely squad was destroyed, Mstislav himself died, and the city was taken and plundered, forever losing the status of one of the cultural and economic centers of Russia.
Closer to winter, the Vladimir and Ryazan lands were plundered in the lower reaches of the Oka and Klyazma, which were not affected by the first campaign of Batu: Murom, Gorokhovets, Gorodets.
Except for the fight with the squad of Mstislav Glebovich at the walls of Chernigov, nowhere else was there any serious resistance to the invaders.
Yaroslav in 1239, not thinking about open resistance to the Mongols, was engaged in the political arrangement of his land, restraining aggressive neighbors on its western borders and fulfilling allied obligations to Daniel Galitsky.
At the beginning of 1239 the principality of Smolensk underwent a major raid by Lithuania. Lithuania even managed to capture Smolensk itself, from which Prince Vsevolod Mstislavich was expelled, the son of the Kiev prince Mstislav Romanovich the Old who died in 1223 on Kalka, the former as well as Vladimir Rurikovich, who lost Kiev to Yaroslav in 1236, a participant in the battle on Lipitsa in 1216. Yaroslav immediately organized a campaign against Smolensk, took the city and returned it to Vsevolod. It is interesting that the principality, which almost did not undergo the Mongol pogrom, was forced to resort to the help of the principality, which was completely destroyed by the Mongols, thereby becoming dependent on it.
In the same 1239the wedding of Prince Alexander Yaroslavich took place (soon he will lead the Novgorod squad into battle against the Swedes on the banks of the Neva, thus earning his famous nickname "Nevsky" from the descendants), on the Polotsk princess Alexandra Bryachislavna. With this marriage, Yaroslav probably wanted to emphasize his claims to dominance in all the lands of northern Russia, which, if you do not take into account the Mongolian factor, was an objective political reality, since one way or another, all territories from the northern reaches of the Novgorod land to Kolomna in in the meridional direction and from Smolensk to Nizhny Novgorod in the latitudinal direction.
It is interesting that with the attack of the Mongols on the northern lands of Russia, the princely strife in the south did not stop, did not even stop. Despite the fact that with the defeat of the Vladimir-Suzdal principality, the expansion of the Mongol empire into Europe will not end and the land of southern Russia is next, there are no attempts to reconcile and create at least some semblance of a coalition to counter the steppe threat, the power and pressure of which could already be fully assessed clearly, no attempt was made. Moreover, almost immediately after Yaroslav's departure from Kiev, Mikhail Chernigovsky settled in it at the beginning of 1238. At the same time, his son Rostislav, in violation of his father's agreements with Daniil Romanovich, took from the latter the Przemysl, which was transferred to him under the peace agreement of 1237.
The further behavior of Mikhail cannot but surprise at all - having locked himself in Kiev, he sent his family away from the inevitable war and did not take any action, all 1238 and 1239. watching the Mongols ravage first Pereyaslavl-Yuzhny, then his own patrimony of Chernigov.
Yaroslav, having taken the necessary measures to restore the economy of the devastated country and return Smolensk to its rightful owner, again joined the political life in the south. He was not going to forgive Mikhail the capture of Kiev during his absence. Apparently, in the summer of 1239 he managed to get in touch with Daniil Romanovich Volynsky and develop and agree on a joint plan to return Kiev to Daniil Galich and Yaroslav. In the fall of 1239, while the Mongols besieged and stormed Chernigov, Yaroslav and his retinue were four hundred kilometers to the west: acting, apparently, with the same intent with Daniil Romanovich, he laid siege to the Kamenets fortress (present-day Kamen-Kashirsky, Volyn region, Ukraine), took it by storm and captured the wife of Mikhail Chernigovsky, who was there, Princess Alena Romanovna, by the way, the sister of Daniil Romanovich.
Daniel himself, meanwhile, masterfully developed, prepared and carried out an operation to capture Galich, as a result of which the young prince Rostislav Mikhailovich, left by his father in this city as the locum tenens, lost his entire squad without a single battle. Disinformed about the forces and intentions of Daniel, Rostislav left Galich to repel Yaroslav's raid, after which Daniel cut him off from the city with a masterful maneuver. Then, with the help of his supporters in Galich, Daniel captured this city without loss. Rostislav was left without a rear base between the detachments of Daniel and Yaroslav, who had established themselves as decisive and successful commanders, his squad lost its fighting spirit and fled, and part of it returned to Galich to Daniel. Rostislav was forced to flee to Hungary with a small detachment of loyal people. Thus, with the help of Yaroslav, Daniel finally managed to unite in his hands the inheritance of his father and now he could rightfully be called Galitsky, under which name he went down in history.
Meanwhile, already at the beginning of 1240, the ambassadors of the Mongol Empire arrived to Michael, who was sitting in Kiev without a break and did not react in any way to the actions of his opponents. Mikhail ordered the ambassadors to be killed, and, apparently, unable to withstand the psychological stress of recent years, he immediately fled to Hungary to his son, who was at the court of King Bela IV. Kiev was left without a prince, which was immediately taken advantage of by Daniel Galitsky, taking possession of this city (for this he needed to expel Prince Rostislav Mstislavich from it, from the Smolensk Rostislavichs, who had seized the city a little earlier) and put his governor there, a boyar named Dmitry. The fact that Daniel did not try to reign in Kiev himself, but immediately after the capture of this city sent an impressive embassy to the Suzdal land, most likely indicates that he acted, in this case, in the interests of Yaroslav Vsevolodovich, for whom, apparently, according to their agreements, and he freed the Kiev table. This is indirectly confirmed by the fact that Yaroslav handed over to the embassy of Daniel the wife of Mikhail Vsevolodovich, captured in Kamenets, as a bargaining chip in the upcoming negotiations with Mikhail.
Yaroslav himself did not go to Kiev, apparently, on the one hand, the candidacy of Dmitry, whom he could have known from his reign in Kiev before the Mongol invasion, suited him as a governor, and on the other hand, it was necessary to take care of the economy in his ruined land. It was required to restore cities, build new fortresses, return people, instilling in them confidence in their own future. The global arrangement of the land required the constant presence of the prince so much that he did not even take an active part in the affairs of Novgorod, giving his son Alexander the opportunity to deal with them.
In the fall of 1240, the last, finishing stage of the western campaign of the Mongols began - the invasion of central Europe. After a ten-week siege on November 19, Kiev fell, the wounded mayor Dmitry was taken prisoner by the Mongols and later accompanied them on their march to Europe. Further, the cities and lands of southern Russia were devastated, including Galich and Vladimir-Volynsky, the defeat of the Poles and Hungarians by the Mongols, near Legnica and on Shayo, the storming of European cities and castles, the difficult return of the Mongol army to the steppe. Mikhail Chernigovsky and Daniil Galitsky, unlike the Suzdal princes, did not dare to enter into an open armed confrontation with the Mongols, having sat out the entire invasion with their relatives in Europe.
In Northern Russia at this time, the main events developed in Novgorod and Pskov, where instead of the defeated order of the sword-bearers, a new, even more dangerous player appeared on the political field - the Teutonic Order, which included both the remnants of the defeated sword-bearers and new crusading forces. Wishing to use the military defeat of Russia in their own interests, both the Swedes and the Danes became more active. In July 1240, Prince Alexander Yaroslavich defeated the Swedish expeditionary detachment on the Neva, for which he received his historical nickname "Nevsky", by which his descendants know him, although his contemporaries called him "Brave".
In the same year, in September, the combined forces of the Teutonic Order and the Catholic bishoprics of Livonia defeated the Pskov squad near Izborsk and captured Pskov "byahu to take hold of the Germans from the Plskovichi, and brought them up.; ". In the battle of Izborsk and the occupation of Pskov, Prince Yaroslav Vladimirovich, already mentioned in connection with the events of 1233-1234, played an active role. Captured at Izborsk in 1233, he was redeemed no later than 1235 by his German relatives and returned to the service of the Germans, having received from them flax at Odenpe. Nevertheless, apparently, he did not abandon the dream of returning to Pskov.
However, having seized Pskov, the Germans did not take into account his desires and did not transfer this city to him for management, although he was ready to bring, and, according to some reports, even brought a vassal oath to the Riga archbishop for Pskov. The offended Yaroslav did not participate in anti-Russian actions anymore, subsequently, after the victory of Alexander Nevsky in the ice battle, he came to Novgorod to Alexander and asked for his assistance in returning to Russia. Alexander, to whom Yaroslav Vladimirovich was a cousin (Alexander's mother and Yaroslav's father were brother and sister) sent Yaroslav to his father and he gave him, as Rostislavich, an inheritance in his native Smolensk principality. According to other sources, Yaroslav Vladimirovich became the governor of Alexander Nevsky, as a Novgorod prince, in Torzhok. In 1245, Yaroslav Vladimirovich died in another battle near Usvyat when repelling a Lithuanian raid on Russian lands.
At the end of autumn 1240, Alexander and his family unexpectedly left Novgorod for Pereyaslavl. Some researchers explain his departure by the conflict with the Novgorod boyars, caused by the fact that the Novgorodians did not want to go to Pskov to expel the Germans. Supporters of this point of view believe that the Novgorodians believed that the Pskovites had the right to independently choose their political patron, even if it was a German knightly order, especially since it was Yaroslav Vladimirovich who brought the Germans to Pskov. However, when it became clear that the Germans would not do the prince of Pskov Yaroslav, when the persecution of Orthodoxy began in Pskov, when, based on Pskov, the Germans began to carry out raids on the Novgorodian territories proper, the Novgorod gentlemen abruptly changed their mind and began to ask Yaroslav Vsevolodovich to give them son to the princes, and when he proposed Andrey, they again asked Alexander, who, apparently, enjoyed sincere respect in Novgorod.
Yaroslav allows Alexander to return to Novgorod and gives him his brother Andrey with the regiments to help him.
In April 1242, when the Mongols began their return to the steppes from the European campaign, Prince Alexander Nevsky, with the help of the "lower regiments" sent to him by his father and his brother Andrei, managed to expel the Germans from the Novgorod lands and from Pskov, after which he defeated them in the general battle, known to us as the Battle of the Ice.
“On the same day, Prince Yaroslav Vsevolodich was summoned to the Tsarem of the Tatars, Batu, to go to him in the Horde.”
The Mongols did not have time to return from a difficult European campaign, during which they did not suffer a single defeat, but could not win, as Khan Batu summoned the most noble and influential Russian princes, including Yaroslav Vsevolodovich as the obvious head of the Russian princely at home and at the same time, the most influential figure in the political space of Russia.
A new stage began in the history of the ancient Russian state and what the beginning of this stage will be, will it be based on confrontation with the steppe or cooperation with it, the Grand Duke of Kiev and Vladimir Yaroslav Vsevolodovich had to decide.
