Chapter 12.
Western Europe of the XIV-XVI century as part of the Great = "Mongolian" Empire.
1. The seemingly strange, yet perfectly understandable attitude of the Romanovs to the Russian sources mentioning the Western Europe.
We have already acquainted ourselves with what the West Europeans wrote about the ancient Russia, and witnessed that they contain a great deal of important information concerning Russia, or the Horde, despite the tendentious editing of these sources in the XVII-XVIII century. It is also reported that “researchers have long ago pointed out that in the XV-XVI century . . . the Western countries expressed a very vivid interest in Russia. According to V. O. Klyuchevskiy, ‘no other European country was described by the Western travellers as many times and in so much detail as the faraway Moscovia and its forests’”([344], page 5).
The reasons for such great attention are becoming particularly clear to us today. The conquered countries and the recently colonised territories that became part of the “Mongolian” Empire recognized its authority, which made Russia, or the Horde, a natural object of great attention and respectful apprehension. Quite naturally, the whole range of emotion invoked in the Westerners by Russia, or the Horde, was very wide indeed, and included fear, as we learn from a number of ancient documents, qv above.
It would therefore be interesting to find out about the stance of the other party on this issue – namely, to learn what they wrote about the Western Europe in Russia. However, we instantly find ourselves confronted with a most bizarre circumstance. “The works written about Russia by foreigners have been the subject of many an in-depth research; however, the reverse issue, namely, the information on the Western Europe available to Russians before Peter the Great remains almost a total mystery” ([344], page 5).
Why have the Russian historians of the Romanovian epoch been so “uninterested” in Russian reports concerning the Western Europe? Could they have lacked interest completely? We shall answer in the negative. Lack of interest has got nothing to do with it – the matter is that the Romanovs made their court historians corrupt the data available on the history of the Ancient Russia predating the XVII century in order to demonise the Horde. Historians diligently complied; the reader can find more information on the matter in CHRON4.
Let us see how the Romanovian historians covered the relations between Russia and the Western Europe.
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2. Were the inhabitants of the pre-Romanovian Russia really “afraid of the foreigners”, as the Romanovian historians claim?
Ever since the first Romanovs, historians have been assuring everyone that the Russians were “afraid of the Western Europe” in the XV-XVIII century. Let us quote: “Academician A. I. Sobolevskiy gives a very precise formulation of the viewpoint traditional for the pre-revolutionary historiography on the cultural interaction between the Muscovite State and the Western Europe: ‘The prevailing belief is that the Muscovite Kingdom of the XV-XVII century was afraid of foreigners, remaining cloistered from the Western Europe until the very opening of the gateway to Europe by Peter the Great” ([344], page 5).
One must admit that the image of the “gateway” (or “window”, as the original Russian proverb has it) unhesitatingly hacked in the wall surrounding Russia, worm-ridden and fleeced with moss, by Peter the Great with the noble purpose of finally dragging Russia out of the swamp of ignorance and making it follow the enlightened path of the Western civilization is a very vivid one indeed, and a masterpiece of agitprop created by the Romanovian historians, who were conscientious workers, after all.
A. I. Sobolevskiy continues: “It is difficult to trace the origin of this belief – one must merely state that it is still rooted very firmly” (quoting according to [344], page 5). We can merely state that the belief originated in the depths of the Romanovian court. The court historians of that epoch simply carried out the imperial order in good faith.
N. A. Kazakova adds the following: “The opinion that A. I. Sobolevskiy wrote about in 1903 is still shared by certain Western historiographers” ([344], page 5). Indeed – it would be very odd to expect Western European historians to argue with this opinion, conveniently voiced by Romanovian historiographers, and to deny that the ancient Russia of the XIV-XVII century feared the Westerners.
We see that Scaligerian and Millerian history completely reversed the real posture of things in the XIV-XVII century. The assertion about Russians and their alleged fear of the Western Europe was planted into the minds of both Russian and West European readers instead of the correct description of the situation, which is exactly the opposite. Authentic references to the Tartars, or Gog and Magog (the Great “Mongolian” Empire of the XIV-XVI century, that is), made by many mediaeval Western authors, have deliberately been ignored and misdated to deep antiquity.
It would therefore make sense to quote one of such passages, obviously written in panic and terror.
Quoth Matthew of Paris: “And so it came to pass that the joys of the mortals were not to be permanent, and their state of peace and comfort would not last, for that year an accursed satanic tribe suddenly appeared . . . like demons breaking free from Tartarus (which is why they were called Tartars), they swarmed across the whole of the land like locusts. The borderlands of the East were laid waste and desolate by fire and sword . . . They are an inhumane folk, more like wild beasts of prey, and should be called monsters rather than people, for they thirstily drink blood; they tear apart canine and human flesh to devour it” ([722], page 240).
We feel obliged to make the following disclaimer. The last thing that we want to achieve is to make our learned colleagues in the Western Europe treat our research as an attempt to exalt the East and disparage the West. We honestly pursue no such objective. Our only wish is to get to the heart of what was really written in mediaeval sources, and to find out why the evidence they contain is often interpreted in a biased manner (consumption of human and canine flesh et al).
3. Europe invaded by the Ottoman = Ataman Turks. The reason why they were referred to as “Tartars”.
3.1. The beginning of the invasion.
How did the invasion of the Russians and the Ottomans (Atamans) begin in the late XIII – early XIV century (the moment when Russia, or the Horde, was becoming established as an empire, the Ottomans, or Atamans being an integral part thereof)?
Let us turn to the book of N. A. Kazakova entitles “Western Europe in Russian Literature of the XV-XVI century” ([344]). N. A. Kazakova reports the following: “The state of the Ottoman Turks [Atamans – Auth.], which was formed in Asia Minor at the end of the XIII century A. D., soon became the strongest force in the Middle East, whose influence spread to the very Balkan Peninsula.
Orhan, the son of Osman I, founder of the Ottoman [Ataman – Auth.] State, already conquered the European coast of the Dardanelles in 1354.
Orhan’s successor, Sultan Murad I, conquered Thracia and transferred his capital to Adrianopolis in 1356.
The Turks approached the immediate vicinity of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire.
At the end of the XIV century, Serbia, Bulgaria and Walachia were brought under tribute by the Turks. The Turkish onslaught towards the Balkans was temporarily stopped in the early XV century as a result of the blow dealt to the Turks by Timur [apparently, a reference to the civil wars inside the Great = “Mongolian” Empire – Auth.], but the invasion resumed with new vigour under Sultan Murad II (1421-1451).
In 1422 Murad II lay Constantinople under siege, albeit unsuccessfully. However, it was well understood at the court of John VIII Palaiologos, Emperor of Byzantium, that the cessation of the siege was temporary, and that the days of Byzantium were numbered without external support” ({344], page 7).
The Ottomans (Cossack Atamans) carry on with their expansion persistently. A copy of Francisco de Colla’s diplomatic missive “indicates a list of countries and regions that the Turks had conquered in Asia and Africa [sic! – Auth.] . . . This list correctly includes the entire Asia Minor, a part of Caucasus [sic! – Auth.], Mesopotamia and Judea in Asia, as well as Egypt [sic! – Auth.], Arabia [sic! – Auth.] and Berberia [sic! – Auth.] in Africa” ([344], page 83). Thus, we are told that the Ottomans (Cossack Atamans) conquered Egypt in Africa, apart from other lands.
As a matter of fact, Africa was the name used for certain parts of Europe and Asia, qv in Part 6 of the present book. In this case, the report about the conquest of Berberia (or Scythia, qv in Part 6) simply means that Turkey and Scythia were parts of a united Empire – namely, the Great = “Mongolian” Empire, which is in perfect correspondence with our reconstruction.
The wave of the Ottoman = Ataman conquest sweeps over new territories unabated. “After the conquest of Constantinople in 1453, Mehmet II conquered Serbia, the Greek principalities of Morea, the Duchy of Athens, Albania and the islands of the Aegean Sea.
Bayazid II (1481-1512), the son of Mehmet II, waged long wars against Venice, as well as Hungary and the Austrian Habsburg, and forced Moldavia to recognise the sovereignty of Turkey.
Europe got a short break under Selim I (1512-1520), since the main strikes of the Turks were directed Eastwards (Selim I conquered Syria, Palestine and Egypt), but under Suleiman I Kanuni (1520-1566), the heir of Selim I, the Turks resume their conquest of Europe with new vigour” ([344], page 146).
3.2. Why the Russian “Legend” refers to the Turks as to Tartars. The date of its creation.
The anonymous work entitled “Legend of the Battle between Venetians and the Turkish Czar”, which historians date to the 1520’s, is of tremendous interest to us ([344], page 147). However, it turns out that “the only known Russian copy of the ‘Legend’ dates from the late XVI – early XVII century. However, I. A. Bychkov . . . identifies the text of the copy as mid-XVII century shorthand” ([344], page 154). One must therefore be aware that the text we have in front of us is likely to have been caringly edited by Romanovian historians in the XVII-XVIII century. Nevertheless, the manuscript remains exceptionally interesting.
For instance, the Turks are referred to as Tartars. Modern commentators naturally hurry to correct the mediaeval author, telling us “the Tartars referred to herein are actually Turks” ([344], page 148). The author of the text paints a picture of “the expansion of the Turkish [or Tartar, as the chronicler himself is telling us, qv above – Auth.] rule from Asia Minor to the Caucasus, the Black Sea coast, the Mediterranean and the Balkan Peninsula. It is also emphasised that all attempts of providing military resistance made by European countries proved futile.
The latter is obvious from the description of the two greatest victories of the Turks [or the Tartar Atamans – Auth.] over the united Crusader troops: the defeat of Nicopolis in 1396, when the troops of Hungarian, Czech, German, Polish and French knights were put to complete rout, and their leader, King Sigismund of Hungary, barely managed to flee for his life, as well as the defeat of Varna in 1444, when the Crusader army was also crushed mercilessly, with Ladislas III Jagiellon and the Papal Legate Giuliano Cesarini slain on the battlefield” ([344], page 149).
N. A. Kazakova sums up as follows: “The actions and the intentions of the Turks [Tartar Atamans – Auth.] . . . are represented by its [the Legend’s – Auth.] author as a sequence of the following:
- a cessation of further military advances in the direction of the Venetian kingdom,
- a preparation to an all-out European offence (plans to conquer Italy, France, Spain and Germany; the reports of their armies having free access to the latter),
- a wish to take over the Russians with the assistance of the Tartars to bring these plans to fruition” ([344], page 154).
The last postulation of N. A. Kazakova is based on an incorrect translation of the original passage, which clearly states that although the Turks intended to conquer the Western Europe, they envisaged Russia as a potential ally, and they wanted to arrange a union with the Tartars.
The translation of the mediaeval text is as follows: “The Turks, having given a break to the Italians and the Venetians, will join forces with the Turks to conquer this kingdom and have freedom to conquer Germany and Italy, since the Sultan expects, as per the advice of the Russians, that upon coming to power in Russia he shall find it easier to conquer Italy, France, Spain and Germany” (the original can be found on page 154 of [344]).
Therefore, it is clearly obvious from the text that Turkey and Russia need to get over some discordance between them in order to conquer the Western Europe. The Sultan hopes to win the dynastic struggle against the Russian Czar with the assistance of some Russians from his retinue. The Turks believe such a union with the Russians to be vital for the conquest of Europe.
A complete union never came to pass, since a religious schism was already nascent in that epoch. Nevertheless, friendly relations and a military union between Russia and Turkey were maintained until the very epoch of the Romanovs. As we have witnessed from above, there was a strong Russian party at the Turkish court; also, the Cossack Atamans from Zaporozhye often fought on the Turkish side – possibly, the most frequent alliance of theirs. After the victory of Peter the Great over Mazepa, some part of the Zaporozhye Cossacks with their getman even fled to Turkey for a while ([183], Volume 1, page 167).
We also see that the names of the Russians, the Turks and the Tartars are woven so closely together in the legend that it is very hard to distinguish between them. The reason is obvious – they all stood for the same thing.
Of course, judging by what we know today about the unity of, and the union between Russia, or the Horde, and Tartary/Turkey/Ottomania (the Cossack Ataman state, qv in CHRON4), we cannot help doubting the text in question to be the XVI century original and not a later Romanovian edition.
The matter is that despite the exceptionally friendly relations between Russia and Turkey back in the day (see CHRON4), “the Turkish side of the story is presented from a distinctly anti-Turkish stance: the author [of the “Legend” – Auth.] keeps emphasising the cruelty and the relentlessness of the Turks, conquering lands ‘by fire and sword’, ‘the cruellest weapons’ and ‘without any mercy’ . . .” ([344], page 149). However, this position is characteristic for the Romanovian epoch. The “Legend” ends its account of the Turkish conquests “with a prophecy of retribution for the Turks” ([344], page 149).
This must already be an edited text of the Romanovian epoch, which is when the amiable relations with Turkey deteriorated. The “Legend” is most likely to be based on authentic XVI century evidence that was edited to a large extent under the Romanovs, the resulting narration being coloured in explicitly anti-Turkish hues, which hadn’t existed previously and could not have existed as per our reconstruction, seeing as how it pertains to the epoch when the Great = “Mongolian” Empire, also known as the Horde, or Russia, had still constituted a whole entity with the kingdom of the Ottomans, or the Cossack Atamans. The “prophecies of retribution” are Romanovian slogans and nothing but, and it is for a good reason that certain historians date this manuscript to the middle of the XVII century, qv above.
Moreover, the middle part of the “Legend” is reportedly “derived from a Latin source, constructed in the same manner as the Western chronicles writing about the Turks” ([344], page 157). Historians themselves are telling us that the author of the Russian version “was apparently a native of the Western Russia, which is made obvious by certain dialectal traits of the text . . . the Western origins of the chronicle might also explain the fact that it contains the ethnicon ‘Pole’, uncommon for the Russian language of the XVI century, but widely used in Polish for a long time” ([344], page 157).
As is the case with the “first Russian chronicles”, we see the available manuscripts to be of a West Russian, most likely Polish, origin, and date from the Romanovian epoch – the XVII, or maybe even the XVIII century. Nevertheless, we must repeat that the text of the “Legend” must be based on an authentic Russian text of the XV-XVI century.
3.3. The Venetian Republic paying tribute to the Ottomans = Atamans.
The war of 1499-1502 between the Turks and the Venetians culminated in the “sea battle of Navarino fought on 12 August 1499, which was lost by the Venetians” ([344], page 153). In 1503 Venice signed a truce with the Ottoman = Ataman Empire. One must assure, the Venetian republic was doing its best to pay tribute on time after the defeat.
However, we can say nothing about the tribute paid by the Venetians in 1503 – we have no such data. However, it turns out that some eighty years later, at the end of the XVI century, around 1582, the Venetian Republic does in fact “pay the Turkish Sultan the annual tribute of 300.000 silver Thalers” ([344], page 186).
The obvious thing to suggest is as follows: could it be that Venice was paying tribute to the Ottoman = Ataman Turks for the duration of 80 years at least – with certain breaks, perhaps, but nonetheless?
Let us conclude with a curious detail. In 1582 the Ottoman = Ataman Sultan “demands that the Venetians give him the cities of ‘Carcyra’ and ‘Korfun’, or ‘the Cretan Kandia’ (city of Candia on the Isle of Crete) as a present for the feast of his newborn son’s circumcision; the Venetian ‘Prince’ (Doge) intends to offer money instead . . .” ([344], page 184).
However, at certain times Venetians catastrophically lacked the money necessary to pay tribute to the Atamans, and were forced to pay in kind. According to historians, “Venetians give great gifts to the Sultan each year instead of the Tribute” ([344], page 193).
One needn’t think that the Ottoman Turks, or the Atamans, were always victorious. Far from it – for instance, the great Battle of Lepanto in 1571 resulted in the defeat of the Turkish fleet by the united naval forces of Spain and Venice. However, it appears to have affected the general picture to a very small extent.
Let us however return to the beginning of the XVI century.
3.4. A strike at the centre of Europe. Why Europeans were eager to pay their tribute to the Atamans in advance and not merely on time.
Already in 1520 the Ottoman = Ataman invasion resumed with new power, apparently in order to relieve the tension accumulated between the Imperial centre of the Great = “Mongolian” Empire and the Western Europe governed by “Mongolian” vicegerents. The latter apparently became burdened by the power of the centre, and started to act independently, without the leave of the Czar (Khan) and the Sultan. The frail truce with Venice was broken in 1536 ([344], page 156). “If Selim I directed the spearhead of his conquests to the Orient (Syria, Palestine and Egypt), Suleiman Kanuni, his heir who ascended to the Sultan’s throne in 1520 [or simply ‘Suleiman the Khan’ – Auth.] made Europe the target for his expansion campaign.
In 1521, Belgrade fell under the onslaught of the Turks [Atamans – Auth.], in 1522 the Turks seized Rhodes, and in the second half of the decade they made a few strikes aimed at Central Europe: in 1526 they took Buda, the Hungarian capital, and in 1529 they approached Vienna, the Imperial capital, and laid it under siege” ([344], page 156). Actually, Vienna wasn’t the capital of the whole Empire, but merely one of its provinces in the Western Europe.
After the Battle of Mohacs in 1526, the Turks (Tartars/Atamans) seized most of Hungary, “drawing the border of the Ottoman Empire in close propinquity to Vienna, the capital city of Austria.
In the Mediterranean, the Turks were a menace to the lands belonging to Venice and Spain. There were numerous ‘Holy Leagues’ formed with the objective of holding back the Turks, with the inevitable participation of the Austrian and Spanish Habsburgs, the Pope and Venice” ([344], page 166).
The predominant part of the Western Europe, ruled by “Mongolian” vicegerents, was in vassal dependency on the Great = “Mongolian” Empire, an ally of the Ottoman = Ataman Turkey back in the day, and remained under constant threat of desolation until the end of the XVI century.
3.5. “Mongolian” vicegerent, or the rulers of the Western Europe, still paid tribute to the Ottomans = Atamans at the end of the XVI century.
“Even more details concerning the West European foreign relations can be found in the official copy of the diplomatic missive carried by Y. Molvyaninov and T. Vassilyev to the Emperor [Habsburg – Auth.] and the Pope in 1582.
The envoys paid a great deal of attention to the Turkish issue, justifiably emphasising the threat presented to the Empire [or, rather, its provinces in the Western Europe – Auth.] by the proximity to the Turkish territories: the envoys wrote that two thirds of Hungary were under the Sultan’s rule, whereas the remaining third and the Czech Kingdom were brought under tribute; the Emperor [in reality, the “Mongolian” vicegerent in Europe – Auth.] paid the Sultan the annual tribute of 300 thousand silver Tahlers, trying to send it in advance so as to give the Sultan no reason to get angered . . .
The only power to match the Turkish Sultan is the Spanish King: the Pope pays Philip, King of Spain, the annual tribute of 200.000 golden pieces so that the Spaniard would defend him from the Turks” ([344], page 184).
Would it be too bold to assume that, collecting money from the rest of the European countries, the Spanish “Mongolian” vicegerent Philip also paid tribute to the Ottomans = Atamans at the end of the XVI century, doing his best to avoid delays in payment, just like the others? At the end of the day, paying the Turks tribute in advance could also be called “protection from the Turks” in the sly language of diplomacy.
We raise the issue because of the fact that the second wave of the Ottoman = Ataman conquest reached as far as the Western shores of Europe. “The Portuguese king was ‘killed by the Turks and the Arabs in the land of Indi’, the deceased king was ‘kin of Philip’, the Spanish King” ([344], page 185).
3.6. France, Britain and the Atamans.
What about France and Britain? What were they up to around that time? It turns out they were “interested in expanding their trade with the Turkish Empire” ([344], page 166). All of this after the defeat of the Crusader armies by the Ottomans (Atamans), which were partially comprised of French knights, qv above.
At any rate, it is interesting to learn that at the end of the XVI century Britain did in fact maintain a close amicable relation with Turkey, although reputedly without advertising them too much. For instance, Elisabeth, Queen of England, “denies the rumour about her providing support to the Turkish Sultan, who is at war with Christian monarchs . . . the trade with Turkey has been going on for many years on end” ([344], page 203).
This fact confirms the intrinsic relation between Britain and the Great = “Mongolian” Empire, which was still manifest at the end of the XVI century, dating all the way back to the XIV century, as we realise today, the epoch when the British Isles were colonised by the Horde, or Russia.
A special kind of amicable relations between France and England from one part, and Turkey and the Horde from the other, can even be seen in the history of the XIV century. Even the Scaligerian version of history admits that the Franks of the XV-XVI century, or the ancestors of the French, were very persistent in believing themselves to be the descendants of the Trojans, or, as we understand now, the Goths, the Turks and the “Mongols”, or “Great Ones”, who came to the scarcely populated territory, which later became known as France, in the XIV century ([335], pages 85-86).
According to our reconstruction, the British Isles were also populated by the natives of Byzantium and Russia, or the Horde, in the XIV century – the very name “England” is a possible derivative from the name of the Byzantine imperial dynasty, the Angeli.
All of this clearly indicates that the “Mongolian” = Great Empire, and Ottoman = Ataman Turkey, its ally, had firmly integrated themselves into the history of the Western Europe a long while ago, playing a crucial part in the XIII-XVI century formation of the Western Europe. This part was much greater than Scaligerian history grudgingly admits.
Today it is assumed that the dissension between Russia and Turkey was already beginning in the second half of the XVI century – one must think that the constant work of the Western European diplomacy in this field finally came to fruition. All such attempts were still abortive in the XIV-XV century. See for yourselves.
