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Virgin-O-Logy
Virginity and Society, Page 8. Go to Page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12 During
the Mongol invasion of Europe, the grandson of Genghis Khan, Kadan,
(also Qadan) led the Mongol diversionary force that attacked Poland. In
early 1241, Kadan's forces sacked the Polish towns of Lublin, Zawichost
and Sandomierz. Kadan then attacked Masovia, while Baidar burned the
evacuated Polish capital, Kraków and then Bytom, and Orda Khan ravaged
the southwestern border of Lithuania and the Polish Baltic coast.
The
memories of the Mongol invasion are still vivid in Poland. The Heynal
(Polish: Hejnał Mariacki, "St. Mary's dawn", pronounced hey-now
mah-ryah-tskee), also known as the Cracovian Hymn, is a traditional
five-note Polish tune closely tied to the history and traditions of the
city of Krakow. It is played by a trumpeter four times consecutively
each hour from the highest tower of St. Mary's Church (in Polish,
Kościół Mariacki) in Krakow. When Krakow was attacked by Tatars in
1241, the guard watching from the top of Mariacki church saw the enemy
and started playing to warn the inhabitants. Then he was shot through
his throat by a Tatar archer, and that's why the trumpet tone stops so
abruptly.
The three Mongolian leaders were then to
attack the Silesian capital Wroclaw. Baidar began to besiege the town,
but marched north with Kadan and Orda to Legnica to defeat the forces
of the direct descendant of Bolesław I Chrobry (the first King of
Poland, see above) - Henry II the Pious, Duke of Silesia. The Christian
army was crushed in the ensuing Battle of Legnica at Legnickie Pole of
April 9, 1241. Then Baidar and Kadan turned away from Bohemia and
Poland and went southward. The Germans who had colonized till that time
the primordial West Slavic territories between Elbe and Odra rivers,
were saved from devastation. The Mongols never again seriously looked
westward for conquest, only raiding for loot. The Mongols successfully
raided Poland in 1259 and 1286 and unsuccessfully in 1287. Because
these raids were not aimed at conquest, Poland and Hungary were not
seriously threatened again after 1241, although the Russian lands to
their east remained under the rule of the Golden Horde for the
following two centuries.
Mongols were called Tatars in
Europe.The name Tatar initially appeared amongst the nomadic Turkic
peoples of northeastern Mongolia in the region around Lake Baikal in
the beginning of the 5th century. The Chinese term is Dada (韃靼) and is
a comparatively specific term for nomads to the north, emerging in the
late Tang. Other names include Dadan and Tatan. As various of these
nomadic groups became part of Genghis Khan's army in the early 13th
century, a fusion of Mongol and Turkic elements took place, and the
invaders of Rus and the Pannonian Basin became known to Europeans as
Tatars (or Tartars). The original Tatars (Tatarlar/Татарлар)
inhabited the north-eastern Gobi in the 5th century and, after
subjugation in the 9th century by the Khitans, migrated southward. In
the 13th century, they were subjugated by the Mongol Empire under
Genghis Khan. Under the leadership of his grandson Batu Khan, they
moved westwards, driving with them many stems of the Turkic
Ural-Altayans towards the plains of Russia. After the break up of the
Mongol Empire, the Tatars became especially identified with the western
part of the empire, which included most of European Russia and was
known as the Golden Horde. The Mongol subjugation of Russia was brutal
and humiliating and contributed greatly to that sense of tragedy that
so deeply imbues Russian culture and art.
After Uzbeg
(Öz-Beg) mounted the throne in 1313, he adopted Islam as the state
religion. He allowed the Genoese to settle in Crimea after his
accession. But the Mongols sacked Sudak under the Khan in 1322 when the
Christians defied the Muslims in the city. The Genoese merchants in the
other towns were not molested. Pope John XXII requested Uzbeg to
restore Roman Catholic churches destroyed in the region. Thus, the Khan
signed a new trade treaty with the Genoese in 1339 and allowed them to
rebuild the walls of Kaffa. In 1332 he had allowed the Venetians to
establish a colony at Tanais on the Don. A decree, issued probably by
Mengu-Timur, allowing the Franciscans to proselytize, was renewed by
Uzbeg in 1314. Under Uzbeg and his successor Janibeg, Islam, which
among some of the Turks in Eurasia had deep roots going back into
pre-Mongol times, gained general acceptance, though its adherents
remained tolerant of other beliefs. In order to successfully expand
Islam, he built a mosque and other "elaborate places;" requiring
baths—an important element of Muslim culture.
The slave trade
flourished due to strengthening ties with the Mamluk Sultanate. The
Black Death of the 1340s was a major factor contributing to the Golden
Horde's economic downfall. Janibeg abandoned his father's Balkan
ambitions, and backed Moscow against Lithuania and Poland. The Polish
King, Casimir III the Great, submitted to the Horde and undertook to
pay tribute in order to avoid more conflicts. The seven Mongol princes
were sent by Janibeg to assist Poland. In the summer of 1470, the last
prominent Khan, Ahmed, organized an attack against Moldavia, the
Kingdom of Poland, and Lithuania. By August 20, the Moldavian forces
under Stephen the Great defeated the Tatars at the battle of Lipnic.The
Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (which possessed
much of the Ukraine at the time) were attacked in 1487-1491 by the
remains of the Golden Horde. They reached as far as Lublin in eastern
Poland before being decisively beaten at Zaslavl. The Crimean Khanate
became a vassal state of the Ottoman Empire in 1475 and subjugated what
remained of the Great Horde. The Crimean Tatars wreaked havoc in
southern Russia, Ukraine and even Poland in the course of the 16th and
early 17th centuries, but they were not able to defeat Russia or take
Moscow. Under Ottoman protection, the Khanate of Crimea continued its
precarious existence until Catherine the Great annexed it on April 8,
1783. It was by far the longest-lived of the successor states to the
Golden Horde.
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