Origins of Mongolian Urbanization and the Role of Towns in the Golden Horde

Research objectives: To characterize the features of Mongolian urbanization in the first half of the 13th century, to identify the continuity in urban development and to determine the functions and role of towns in the Golden Horde in the second half of the 13th–14th century. Research materials: materials of archaeological research in the towns of Avarga, Karakorum, Sarai-Batu, Sarai-Berke, Sarai-Jük, a complex of written sources, including “The Secret History of the Mongols”, Compendium of Chronicles by Rashid al-Din, Ystoria Mongalorum by Plano Carpini, works of Arabic and Persian authors collected by V.G. Tiesenhausen. Results and novelty of the research: The construction of Chings Khan’s urban residence of Avarga was caused by the need to protect the wealth obtained as a result of conquests and to accommodate his family next to the ruler as well as his close associates and guards, who had increased in number by the early 1220s. The transfer of the capital to the Orkhon Valley, where Karakorum was built from 1235, allowed the imperial authorities to solve new problems including information exchange thanks to the horseman-employing post service and trade routes, the management of remote territories of the empire, the demands of the nobility for prestigious goods, an increase in the intensity of international trade and profitability of selling goods in Karakorum, and the development of handicraft production. With the emergence of the Golden Horde, the Jochids did not declare any of the already existing towns of the subordinate peoples as their capital, but in accordance with the traditions of the Mongol-speaking nomads, they built their own capital cities of Sarai-Batu and Sarai al-Dzhedid in the conventional centre of their ulus (the Lower Volga region). The concentration of enormous wealth and the development of crafts in the old and new towns of the Jochi ulus contributed to their rapid inclusion in trade relations with Central Asia, the Middle East and the Mediterranean in the last third of the 13th century and the 14th century. Within the framework of Mongolian globalization, the combined economic potential of the urban centres of the Golden Horde were able to cause the transformation of the ulus into one of the world-system centers of that era’s oecumene. However, internal conflicts, and especially, the devastating invasions of Timur’s troops, reduced the role of the urban economy of the Golden Horde to the level of semi-peripheral exploitation of dependent territories.