Weapons of the Great Powers. From spear to atomic bomb

The Mongols were among the best warriors of their time - they had effective tactics, good equipment and a massive amount of cavalry. They took the best from foreign armies, forming their own, invincible at that time.

Speaking about the weapons of the Mongols, first of all, you remember the bow. The Mongolian bow was composite - made of several layers, usually they were different types of wood and also horns. They covered such a bow with varnish, which protected it from moisture. It is noteworthy that this varnish was invented in China, and the Mongols borrowed it. I shot such a bow much stronger and farther, but the accuracy dropped dramatically, not to mention shooting on horseback - the bow was very tight and it was impossible to hold the bowstring for a long time. However, the Mongols almost always hit the target - many years of training did their job. Arrows were of several types: ordinary, armor-piercing, for long distances. They were carried in different quivers, taking out an arrow from the right one as needed.

The percussion weapon of the Mongolian warrior is a saber. There were few of their own sabers, most often they used captured ones. The blow was made on a gallop from a horse, which gave excellent striking power. A mace was also used - it was frequent.

Axes also took place, but only with a shortage of other impact weapons.

A spear is what every Mongol warrior had. Spears were usually not long, but they could not be short either - they were weapons for equestrian combat. The wealthy Mongols had high-quality spears, most often Chinese, while the poor had broken scythes on the shaft. Rarely did Mongol horsemen have jides. Jid is a throwing spear that was thrown on horseback. Usually they were carried in threes, on the left side in a special quiver. Djids were common in the East, but the Mongol invasion brought these weapons to other territories: first Russians, and then Polish troops began to use these throwing spears.

The shields of the Mongols were round and they were made of wicker wicker, covered most often with leather, less often with fabric. In the center was a metal umbon, on which spear blows were received.

As protection, most of the Mongols wore sheepskin coats with wool outside, as well as made of leather. Carapace armor made of leather parts was common. Nukers, heavy cavalry and just noble warriors had metal armor. Most often, such armor was of the lamellar type, sometimes mirrors were additionally put on it, which were separate equipment. Such armor was called huyag.

During sieges, large shields were used - from the ground to the top of the chest, as well as Chinese siege engines. All this equipment was the best in the East at that time. It was practically impossible to arm the nomadic people in this way, but Genghis Khan was able to do this by creating a huge and well-armed army.

During the Tatar Mongol invasion two medieval concepts of warfare clashed. Relatively speaking - European and Asian. The first is focused on close combat, when the outcome of the battle is decided in hand-to-hand combat. Naturally, the fight was conducted with the use of the entire complex of melee weapons. Throwing weapons and remote combat were auxiliary. The second concept, on the contrary, focused on remote combat. The enemy was exhausted and exhausted by continuous shelling, after which he overturned in hand-to-hand combat. Here the main thing was maneuverable remote combat. The Mongol army of the era of conquest brought this tactic to perfection.

Thus, if the main weapon of a European knight and a Russian warrior was a spear, then the main weapon of a Mongol warrior was a bow with arrows. From a constructive point of view, the Mongolian bow did not fundamentally differ from the Arabic or, for example, Korean. It was complex, made of wood, horns, bones and tendons. The wooden base of the bow was made from flexible and widespread wood species in the area, birch was popular. On the inner (facing the archer) side of the base from the handle to the ends (horns), horn plates were glued. On the outer side (facing the target), tendons were glued to the entire length of the bow. Bone linings were attached to the handle and ends. The wooden base could be made from several types of wood. The use of horn overlays is due to the fact that the horn has a high elasticity in compression. In turn, the tendons have high tensile strength. The length of the bow was 110 - 150 cm.

Many people like to compare the Mongolian bow with the old Russian one. Proving that Old Russian was no worse than Mongolian or, on the contrary, was inferior to it in everything. From a constructive point of view, the main difference between the ancient Russian bow was the absence of horn overlays. This, other things being equal, made him less powerful. Subsequently, under the Mongol influence, the design of the Russian bow underwent changes, and these overlays were added to it. They were called scouts. However, the advantage Mongolian bow was not overwhelming. The Old Russian bow was also complex, made from two types of wood, tendons and bone. Lost, but not much.

The main melee weapon of the Mongol warriors was the saber. Mongolian sabers united, including the sabers of conquered peoples, so it is difficult to single out any specific type of saber and call it Mongolian. In general, Mongolian sabers had a slight bend (like all sabers of that time), could have a guard in the form of a crosshair or in the form of a disk. The length was about a meter.

Along with sabers, broadswords, swords and combat knives were widely used.
Of the short polearms of close combat, the Mongols used battle axes, maces and six-blades.Like bladed weapons, polearms featured a wide variety of designs.

Long pole weapons were represented by spears and a palm tree. Spearheads could be elongated triangular, rhombic, laurel or peaked. Often the tip had a hook to pull the enemy off the horse. The palm was a spear with a long knife-like tip.

Chetvertakov Nikolay

This work was presented at a regional research conference dedicated to the 775th anniversary of the Battle of Sit. The paper analyzes the weapons and tactics of warfare by Russian and Mongolian soldiers, as well as the unusual reasons for the defeat of the Russian rati, the material is accompanied by a presentation that can be used in history lessons in grade 7, when studying the topic: "The fight against foreign invaders"

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Russian and Mongolian

Warriors

(analysis of weapons and combat methods)

Prepared by: Chetvertakov Nikolai

5th grade student

MOU "Litvinovskaya OOSh

Sonkovsky district

Tver region"

Head: Mikhalchenko N.M.

History teacher

MOU "Litvinovskaya OOSh

Sonkovsky district

Tver region"

S.Petrovskoye

year 2013

Introduction……………………………………………………………………………3

Russian warrior, protection of a warrior……………………………………………….. .............................4

Mongolian warrior, battle strategy……………………………………………5-6

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………7

References…………………………………………………………………8

Introduction:

In 1238, two completely different armies converged on the City River: the Mongol and the Russian. The Russian army lost. In my work, I tried to find out why this happened?

They helped me in studying the issue: the children's encyclopedia "History of Russia" - Avanta, the encyclopedia "I know the world", articles from the Internet.

Having studied the material, I came to the conclusion that the Russian army was defeated not because the Mongol troops were a "wild horde" that swept away the "brave Slavs" in numbers. The Mongolian cavalry and infantry had their own attack strategy, strict discipline, and the trained Russian army had to face an unprecedented enemy.

I will begin my report with a story about the weapons of Russian soldiers.

Russian warrior

Wars in Russia have been fought since the 8th century. Russian warriors were well-armed, had a clear, well-thought-out tactics of warfare. In the first quarter of the 13th century, for the princely retinue, knights and boyars, "military affairs" were the only occupation in life.

The Russian army had a clear structure.

The lowest troops are warriors (“army” - war, fight). They were recruited from commoners by voluntary conscription.

The warrior was usually armed with a battle ax, a wide knife, and sometimes a sword. The sword was small, about a meter long, double-edged, with a rounded end. It was very convenient during a fight with a mounted warrior and on foot.

Against the cavalry, the warriors used a short throwing spear. The blade was cast from a soft metal and, if hit, could bend, preventing extraction from the wound.

Battle axes of various shapes were also used, it was used as a throwing weapon, like a dart.

Warrior defense

Although Russian soldiers did not wear heavy armor, chain mail and armor provided high level security.

The chain mail was woven from 1-2 layers of metal rings and was worn over the head, like an ordinary shirt. Under it was a thick quilted vest made of leather and felt. This combination perfectly protected from the Mongolian bows and retained mobility.

The head was protected by either a leather or metal helmet with a soft lining inside.

For protection, a drop-shaped or round shield was used. Covering themselves with such a shield, the warriors put forward the tips of their spears and lined up in a living barrier against the enemy cavalry. After the first blow, the heavy shield and spear were thrown away and the subsequent rows of the enemy attacked with the help of the sword.

A small round shield was a reliable defense in hand-to-hand combat. It was made from boards, sheathed with leather and metal plates - "plaques".

Mongolian warrior

The armament of the light cavalry was very simple: a bow, a quiver of arrows and a saber. Neither the warriors nor the horses had armor, but this, oddly enough, did not at all make them too vulnerable. The reason for this was the uniqueness of the Mongolian combat bow - probably the most powerful military weapon of a warrior before the invention of gunpowder.

The Mongolian bow was relatively small in size, but exceptionally powerful and long-range. Its relatively small size was dictated by the peculiarities of its application. It was simply impossible to shoot from a horse with a longbow.

In addition, many Tatar-Mongolian warriors masterfully wielded a spear.

The Mongols practically did not use chain mail or helmets. Most often, riders wore a wadded or felt vest, and over it a leather caftan with small metal plates sewn on.

The head was covered with a fur or leather hat.
The shield was very light. It was woven from willow twigs and sheathed with thin leather.

The nomadic lifestyle did not provide an opportunity for the development of metallurgy and, accordingly, forging high-quality sabers and armor

Combat strategy.

Nomadic Mongols, this determined the direction of development of weapons.

The infantry made up a small part of the army. The Mongol was small in stature, and the constant stay in the saddle twisted his legs so much that he could not withstand long walks.

Therefore, the nomads delivered the main blows to the opponents with the help of cavalry. The battle was always started by horse archers. They attacked the enemy in several open parallel waves, continuously firing their bows; at the same time, the horsemen of the first ranks, who were out of order or had used up their supply of arrows, were instantly replaced by soldiers from the back ranks. The density of shooting was incredible: according to sources (albeit probably exaggerated), the Mongol arrows in battle "covered the sun." If the enemy could not withstand this massive shelling and turned the rear, then the light cavalry, armed in addition to bows and sabers, itself completed the rout. If the enemy counterattacked, then the Mongols did not accept close combat. A favorite tactic was to retreat in order to lure the enemy into an unexpected ambush. This blow was delivered by heavy cavalry and almost always led to success.

Conclusion:

From all of the above, we can conclude that the weapons of the armies were approximately the same, which means that the cause of the defeat was not weapons, but tactics and speed of movement.

In the campaign, the Mongol army could move for months and even years without transporting food and fodder supplies.

The Mongolian horse was completely grazing. Even from under the snow, he could get his own food.

The endurance and unpretentiousness of the Mongol warrior was amazing. In the campaign, he was content with what he managed to get by hunting or robbery, if necessary, he could eat for weeks on his stone-hard khurut stored in saddlebags. When there was absolutely nothing to eat, the Mongol warrior could feed on ... the blood of his own horses. From a Mongolian horse, without much damage to its health, it was possible to take up to half a liter of blood.

Since there were always a lot of spare horses - in general, three horses per person were the usual norm on a campaign - this method could well ensure survival. Finally, dead or injured horses could also be used as food. Even under favorable conditions in big army the death of horses, based on a simple theory of probability, amounted to several dozen daily. And this already made it possible, albeit meagerly, to feed the army.

Conclusion.

Such features made the Mongolian army the most enduring, the most mobile, the most independent of external conditions of all the armies that have ever existed in the history of mankind. And this was superimposed on a strict order and strict discipline, well-organized management, combat and tactical training. And we can say that such an army was really capable of conquering the whole world: its combat capabilities completely allowed it. Never - neither before nor after the Mongol campaigns - neither the most brilliant commanders nor the greatest powers had such a chance. The Mongolian army had such potential, and this makes it the greatest military phenomenon of all time.

Bibliography:

1. "I know the world" - children's encyclopedia, history / Comp. N.V. Chudakova, A.V. Gromov, M. "AST Publishing House", 1992.
2. History of Russia "From the ancient Slavs to Peter the Great" - Avanta, 2003.

The warrior was usually armed with a battle ax, a wide knife, and a sword. Against the cavalry, the warriors used a short throwing spear

The protection of the warrior The chain mail was woven from 1-2 layers of metal rings and was worn over the head, like an ordinary shirt.

The head was protected by either a leather or metal helmet with a soft lining inside.

For protection, a drop-shaped or round shield was used. Having covered themselves with such a shield, the soldiers lined up in a living barrier against the cavalry.

Targe- reliable protection in hand-to-hand combat. It was made from boards, sheathed with leather and metal plates.

Mongolian warrior Armament of light cavalry: bow, quiver, arrows, saber.

The Mongolian bow is small in size, but exceptionally powerful and long-range. The small size was dictated by the peculiarities of its use: it is impossible to shoot from a long bow from a horse

Chain mail and helmets were rarely used. Most often, riders wore a wadded or felt vest, and over it a leather caftan with small metal plates sewn on. The head was covered with a fur or leather hat.

Combat strategy

Mongols-nomads, this determined the direction of development of weapons. The battle was started by horse archers. They attacked in several open waves, continuously firing their bows at the enemy. The density of shooting is incredible - the arrows "covered the sun."

If the enemy could not withstand the shelling, then the light cavalry, with the help of sabers, completed the rout

If the enemy counterattacked, the Mongols retreated in order to lure the enemy into an unexpected ambush.

Heavy Cavalry The blow was delivered by heavy cavalry and almost always led to success.

The mobility of the Mongolian army The army could move for months without food and fodder; The horse was grazing; Warriors are hardy and unpretentious, they could go without food for a long time, eating khurut and the blood of their horse;

Mongolian horse

Khurut - Mongolian cheese

Strict discipline, well-organized management, combat and tactical training - such an army was really capable of conquering the whole world! Never before or after the Mongol campaigns, neither the most brilliant generals nor the greatest powers had such a chance, which makes it the greatest military phenomenon of all time.

The presentation was made by Nikolai Chetvertakov Pupil of the 5th grade of the municipal educational institution "Litvinovskaya school of the Sonkovsky district of the Tver region"

The book by Jack Coggins is devoted to the history of the formation of the military affairs of the great powers - the USA, Japan, China - as well as Mongolia, India, African peoples - the Ethiopians, the Zulus - from ancient times to the 20th century. The author focuses on the historical conditionality of the appearance of weapons: from the Mongolian bow and samurai sword to the American Spencer carbine, grenade launcher and intercontinental missile.

Coggins identifies the most important stages in the evolution of the development of weapons in each of the countries, which had a significant impact on the formation of tactical and strategic principles of warfare, talks about the types of weapons and ammunition.

The book is of interest both for specialists and for a wide range of readers and impresses with the breadth of its review.

Genghis Khan

By the time of his father's death (perhaps c. 1175), the young Temujin had already established himself as a tribal leader, but many of his fellow tribesmen passed from him under the arm of stronger leaders who could protect them from the continuous raids and attacks of their neighbors. The vicissitudes of tribal clashes soon put the young man at the head of a group of refugees, and in fierce battles he acted as the leader of a few devoted warriors who were forced to wander from one valley to another. It was in these battles that the weapons were forged and tempered, which will be destined to bring half the world to the feet of nomadic pastoralists.

Nothing is more conducive to success than military success, and after several hard-won victories, an ever-increasing number of clans began, little by little, to return to the banner of Temujin. When he felt strong enough, he attacked the neighboring tribes, pursued their leaders, as he himself had once been persecuted, and the nomads he conquered joined his army. His closest associates, those who followed him and fought alongside him in the most bitter and difficult times, now began to command this or that detachment of his ever-growing army. As his fame grew and spread, many of the neighbors voluntarily came under his arm. Those who came to him, he received with honor, those who resisted, could then grumble at their fate as much as they wanted. In the end, at kurultai, that is, at big council khans, he received the title of Genghis Khakan - the great ruler, the ruler of all living.

In his character were the patience and determination of a hunter. To these natural qualities of a nomad were added the inflexibility of intentions and self-discipline, characteristic of the leaders of his level. But above all, he was a born organizer. He turned a loose collection of tribes into an army, a select community of all men, from young men to old men. Tribal gangs of raiders he turned into regiments - banners - consisting of separate tens and hundreds of warriors. Each banner consisted of a thousand people, who were divided into ten squadrons of one hundred people. Each hundred consisted of ten dozen warriors. Ten banners formed a division, or tumen, and a few tumens, usually three, for an army. Selected warriors were part of a separate tumen - the guard of the khan.

All warriors were armed with a long, slightly curved, sharp-pointed saber - similar to the weapons of the cavalry of more recent times - which could deliver both chopping and stabbing blows, and a powerful bow. Some warriors had two bows - one shorter, hunting, and combat - longer and powerful weapon. used different kinds arrows, which are lighter for shooting at long range, and arrows with a thicker shaft and a more powerful iron tip, designed to penetrate armor. A bow or bows were worn in a case - saadake - on the left side, a large quiver with arrows on the right. Saber in leather scabbard hung on the rider's back so that its handle protruded above the left shoulder.

Some nomads were also armed with a spear, on which a bunch of horsehair was attached below the tip, or iron hooks to pull the enemy out of the saddle, but the bow remained the main weapon.

To protect against enemy weapons, Mongolian warriors wore helmets made of iron or leather, covered with a thick layer of varnish and reinforced with sewn iron inserts. A leather collar, also reinforced with iron strips, descended from the helmet down the back to the shoulder blades. Some spearmen also had a small round shield made of leather with iron plaques. To protect the body, breastplates and bracers were made of hard leather, covering the shoulders. Sometimes riders also put on something like cuirasses made of leather, on which iron plates were sewn.

Sometimes horses were also put on armor to protect their chest and sides; leather was also used for this purpose. In the steppes it was the most available material(which cannot be said about iron) and the easiest to work with.

In addition to weapons and protective equipment, each warrior also had a felt hat and a sheepskin jacket - no doubt similar topics, which Mongolian pastoralists still wear - as well as a lasso and a rope, a bag of barley, a cauldron, an ax, salt, needles and tendons for repairing equipment and clothes.

Each rider had at least one riding horse, and sometimes their number reached half a dozen.

Mongolian steppe horses were not particularly beautiful or stout, but they were strong and hardy - they could get food from under the snow in winter and exist on the very minimum of food. It is impossible to suspect the Mongols of even the slightest semblance of compassion for any living being, but as a widely horse-using people, they no doubt took good care of their horses as far as circumstances permitted. Without such a departure, no long-distance cavalry transitions at the speed that the hordes of Genghis Khan developed would have been impossible.

Before the battle, the army lined up in five rows at a considerable distance from one another. Spearmen and archers were combined in such a way as to achieve the maximum effect from shelling and cavalry strikes. The spearmen, who occupied the first two rows, were dressed in full armor, their horses also wore leather protective vestments. The last three rows were occupied by archers. At the beginning of the battle, they moved forward through the gaps in the advanced ranks to shower the enemy with arrows and again take their places behind the spearmen before the attack began.

The strictest discipline reigned in the army. Each warrior had to help his comrades, repulse them if they were tried to be captured, help them if they were wounded, and never turn their backs on the enemy, unless the signal was given to withdraw. Each of the smallest units of ten was thus a closely knit group, formed from people who had lived together for years and fought together, who could always rely on comrades. Contemporaries noted that “if one, or two, or three warriors out of a dozen run away on the day of battle, all the rest will be executed ... and if two or three out of a group of ten people start feigned flight, and the rest do not follow them, those who stray will also be executed.”

The Muslim chronicler wrote: “So great was the fear that Allah instilled in all hearts that it happened like this - a single Tatar drove into a village in which many people lived and killed them one by one, and not a single person dared to resist ". Humility is not inherent in the people of the West, and it is difficult for a European to imagine the state of people who meekly go to the slaughter.

The captives captured by the Mongols were either sent on a long and difficult journey to their homeland - and they died by the thousands along the way - or were used as human shields when taking the next city. When the Mongols returned to their steppes, they usually killed all those whom they had spared a little earlier in order to serve them.

Such was the policy of the Mongols - the foundations of which were laid by Genghis Khan himself - that no people were allowed to survive to organize any kind of resistance. Cities and villages that could become unifying centers were destroyed, and their irrigation systems, gardens and cultivated fields were methodically destroyed. Often, the inhabitants who worked in the fields were spared until the moment when the harvest ripened, and then they and their families were also destroyed.

During their campaigns of conquest, the Mongols observed this principle of total extermination of inhabitants so carefully that they even suddenly appeared in already depopulated areas, checking to see if their inhabitants had survived and returned to the ruins of their dwellings.

The same terror was used by them against the rulers of a country or a tribe - those members ruling house who tried to resist the wave of the Mongol invasion were persecuted and destroyed. Such a fate befell Mohammed, Shah of the great Khorezm Khanate. One of the pillars of Islam, he was eventually able to take refuge on an island in the Caspian Sea, where he soon died, broken and destitute. It is known about his pursuit that the pursuit of him was so furious that several Mongols, inflamed by it, chasing his sailing boat on horseback, rode their horses into the water and rushed after it until they drowned.

Other rulers died in battle or during the flight of their adherents. Bela, the king of Hungary, who managed to escape during the fatal battle for him on the Sayo River (the so-called Mohi battle), when his army and his kingdom were destroyed, was forced to constantly hide, changing shelters, and his pursuers chased him all the way to the coast of Dalmatia . When the king tried to hide on one of the coastal islands, the Mongols took out a boat and followed him. The king was still able to break away from them and return to the mainland, but the chase continued there. The driven monarch hid from his pursuers, moving from city to city, and in the end tried again to hide in the archipelago of islands. There is no doubt that the relentless pursuers, in pursuit of him, were ready to search the entire Adriatic, but were ordered to return and join the general withdrawal of the Mongol troops returning to their homeland.

Once lazy nomads, who have already become experienced warriors, have now gained what they previously lacked - discipline and organization. It was not easy for the inhabitants of the free steppes to learn this, but the iron will of their leader dominated them, and their energy multiplied many times over. Against their combined strength no single tribe could resist, and as their power increased, so did the arrogance and ambition of the indomitable man who led them. They were no longer despicable shepherds who gazed with admiration at the Chinese emperors who ruled outside the Great Wall of China and were doomed to be pitted against each other. Now all these tribes - Oirots, Tanguts, Merkits, Tatars - proudly called themselves Mongols. And as the united army went farther and farther, peace reigned in their native steppes, women and children grazed herds of cattle and played among yurts, firmly knowing that when mounted warriors appeared on the horizon, they would be friends, not enemies. As the former warring tribes merged into the great Mongol army, old divisions and blood feuds were now forgotten. And in order to instill confidence that they would not come to life again, their khan proclaimed that all intertribal disputes should be stopped, and the enmity of the Mongol with the Mongol would henceforth be considered a crime.

For a long time, hostile relations existed between the nomads who lived outside the Great Wall of China and the civilized Chinese who took refuge behind it. Now the forces of the nomads were united. The will of one person forged them deadly dangerous weapon. But, like any such weapon, it was impossible to just swing it endlessly, even to such a person as a khakan. Being naked, it had to be set in motion - and the leader of the nomads did not hesitate to strike them at the mighty Song empire.

Therefore, the tumens turned to the north, and soon the flags with nine tails of white yaks were flying within the Great Wall of China. The task of this wall was to keep out small bands of marauders, but it was not given to stop an invading army led by a commander like Genghis Khan. The initial invasions were nothing more than raids on a large scale - defeating the armies sent against them and wreaking widespread destruction - but leaving the large, high-walled cities untouched. This, however, could not continue for long. As the Mongols gained experience (they also put to good use captured or defected Chinese soldiers and engineers), they began to successfully lay sieges to many cities. Such sieges became more and more frequent, and the weak ruler who occupied the throne of the Chinese emperor was horrified by them and fled (1214). In the ensuing turmoil, the Mongols again invaded China, and the great Song empire was drowned in blood and fire. Fortunately for the inhabitants of the country, the brave and wise Yelü Chutsai, captured by Genghis Khan, made a deep impression on the khakan with his courage and loyalty to his fugitive master. This man soon gained great influence over the Mongol ruler (or rather, the rulers, since he also served Ogudai). His restraining influence on the wild and greedy barbarians was able to save millions of lives. As an adviser and, subsequently, a leading minister of the new Mongol Empire, for thirty years he did a lot to mitigate the destructive policy of the khans towards the peoples of the conquered countries. It was thanks to him that the remnants of the Chin empire were preserved and a control system was created in the newly conquered territories. "You can conquer an empire by sitting in the saddle," he told the khaqan, according to legend, "but you cannot govern it in this way." And it was in the traditions of his teachings that Kubla Khan, the grandson of Genghis Khan, ruled his vast empire, which included all of China, Korea, Mongolia, Tibet and a significant part of Siberia.

The next enterprise of the Khakans (1219) was a campaign against the Khorezm Khanate. Its territory included modern Iran, Afghanistan, Turkestan and part of Northern India. The invading army, estimated at 150,000 strong, advanced in four columns. Shah Mohammed, not taking advantage of his numerical superiority, decided to take up defense along the border along the Syr Darya River.

The famous Mongol commander Jebe Noyon led two tumens across the hilly plain, threatening the Shah's right flank, while the other three columns moved along the northern route. Two of them, under the command of the sons of Khan Jochi and Chagatai, having reached the Syr-Darya, turned south and, taking several border fortresses along the way, connected with Jebe-noyon not far from Samarkand. The Shah barely had time to gather his forces when Genghis Khan appeared in his rear, like a materialized mirage, with four tumens. He crossed the Syr Darya and disappeared into the sands of the vast Kara-Kum desert, through a short time appearing at the very gates of Bukhara. Such a masterfully executed maneuver destroyed all the defensive plans of the Khorezmians to the very foundation. The Shah fled, and Bukhara, one of the strongholds of Islam and the center of Muslim culture, was put on fire and plundered. The same fate befell Samarkand, followed by a number of other cities. Within five months, the main forces of the khanate were defeated, and the cities, numbering hundreds of thousands of inhabitants, were turned into heaps of lifeless ruins. Probably never before or since has a populous country turned into a lifeless desert in such a short time.

Then the most grandiose horse chase in history began, as the khakan ordered Jebe-noyon and the veteran commander Subedei with two tumens to follow the shah and capture him alive or dead. From Samarkand to Balkh, to the foothills of the mountain ranges of Afghanistan, the pursuit of the Shah continued, and from there another five hundred miles to Nishapur. The spring grass was excellent fodder for the horses, and each warrior brought a few more horses with him. This was necessary, for on some days they would travel seventy to eighty miles. The Tumens took Nishapur by storm, but the Shah eluded them, and the Mongols, who did not know fatigue, continued their pursuit. Now they were moving north, taking city after city and defeating the Persian army near what is now Tehran. The Shah rushed to Baghdad, but the Mongols followed on his heels, in one place approaching him within the distance of a bow shot. Then he changed direction and moved north to the Caspian. Here, once again evading almost certain captivity, he took refuge on one of the islands, where he died soon after.

The messenger who arrived at the tumens that had stopped after the chase brought their commanders permission from the khakan to move to Western Europe, and two commanders turned their soldiers to the north, to the mountainous heights of the Caucasus. Passing through the mountains of Georgia, they defeated Georgian kingdom. Having crossed the Main Caucasian Range, they inflicted a crushing defeat on the army of the Alans, Hyrkanians and Kipchaks. Their movement to the north was blocked by the Russian army under the command of princes Mstislav of Kyiv and Daniil of Galicia, which crossed the Dnieper. On the banks of the Kalka River, this army was defeated - thus ended the first clash between the Mongols and the West. However, Russian resistance was apparently so stubborn that the Mongol commanders turned their warriors south to the Crimea, where they won the friendship of the Venetians, taking and ruining the trading posts of their Genoese rivals. And finally, having received the order of the khakan, they headed home. Jebe-noyon died on the way, but Subedei brought his warriors laden with booty to their native steppes. The chase and campaign lasted more than two years, the troops traveled an incredibly long way. In accordance with Mongolian customs, they no doubt supplemented their ranks with nomadic peoples they met along the way, and also received supplies and new horses from them. Most likely, they returned home even stronger than before the start of the campaign. For the Europeans, this was an ominous omen of the fate that threatened them, since the cunning Subedei was obsessed with the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bleading the Mongol conquest of the West.

Meanwhile, the khakan continued to complete his ruthless conquest of Khorezm. The brave Jalal-ad-din, the son of the Shah and his successor, suffered a final defeat in the last battle on the banks of the Indus, managing to escape only thanks to the fact that, together with his horse, he jumped from a ten-meter cliff into the river and swam to the south bank. The pursuit of him continued to the walls of Delhi, but the heat and disease weakened the army of the Mongols, and, having plundered Lahore and Multan, they returned to the north. great empire Khorezm now lay in complete devastation. All centers of resistance, city after city, were systematically destroyed - contemporaries of the events called the number of victims only when Herat was taken at 1,500,000 people.

Apart from the massacre of millions of civilians, the conquest of Khorezm was an outstanding military achievement. The Mongols, having made a bold decision to use widely scattered forces, carried out a strategy of enveloping gigantic proportions, and in the most unfavorable territory for their operations, and demonstrated both skillful planning and audacious execution of military operations, moreover, showing the ability to soberly assess the enemy's capabilities. It seems that the Mongol war machine should have functioned perfectly. Not only the actual military problems, but also the questions of organization and supply were immensely difficult. The distance from the homeland of the Mongols to Bukhara was more than 4,630,000 kilometers in a straight line, and yet the prospect of such a long march of a huge army did not frighten the Mongol military leaders. For them, who lived in a wide expanse of the steppe, distances were not an obstacle; nor were they embarrassed by the need to send their tumens beyond 90 degrees of geographic longitude. It was this disregard for distance, this complete independence from the length of communications, that allowed the Mongols to confuse their opponents with the fantastic ability of their armies to appear where they were least expected. This circumstance, plus the incredible speed with which they moved, gave rise to the myth - once widespread - that the Mongol armies reached incredible numbers. In no other way could the historians of those times explain their stunning victories and the speed of their strikes. In an era of rumbling feudal armies, slow to mobilize, slow to march, and, due to the disorder of command, even slower to concentrate, the well-oiled Mongol war machine must indeed have been presented as something akin to black magic. And if sometimes the inhabitants of the steppes converged on the battlefield with an army equal in number to them, this was because the speed of their movement and maneuverability allowed their commanders to carry out maneuvers that were completely unimaginable for their opponents.

Mongolian heavily armed mounted warrior

The presence of heavily armed mounted warriors in the Mongol army destroys the stereotypical idea that the Mongol army consisted only of lightly armed mounted archers.

On the rider's head is a metal dulga helmet with a ponytail, a visor and an arrow protecting the nose:

By the way, the helmets on the heads of the Mongol warriors are depicted by all sources. This suggests that the helmet was the second most important component of their defense weapons.

Such a helmet was called a duulga and, like all Central Asian samples, it was riveted from several metal plates connected by rivets.

The helmet had a spherical shape 18-22 cm high, a welt and a low pommel topped with a small sharp spire or tube for a plume.

Specifically Mongolian features were horizontal or vertical curly visors and cruciform visors.

The warrior's neck was covered by a wide strip of iron plates attached to the headband or a chain mail cover for the entire face.

The armor of a warrior consists of metal plates connected with leather straps:

The Mongolian hard shell huyag, according to research, had two variants of the structure:

. lamellar - the plates had an elongated rectangular shape, the upper edge of which was rounded;

. laminar - transverse plates:

The laminar shell was heavier and more inconvenient, but it was faster and easier to manufacture.

Sometimes the shells were combined type- lamellar with laminar plates:

Lamellar shells were of two types:

. a kind of "corset" on the straps, with cuts on the sides and less often - in front or on the back, rectangular shoulder pads to the elbows and the same legguards to the middle of the lower leg or to the knees. Weighed 4-5 kg.;

A caftan with slits from the throat to the hem in front and from the sacrum to the hem in the back, with rectangular and less often leaf-shaped mantles to the elbow and below. Weighed up to 16 kg.

Similar was the cut and protective coats made of leather, which was hardened by boiling and glued together in several layers. On top of the strips of leather, the Mongols varnished.

An additional detail of the Tatar-Mongolian armor was also wooden overhead shields, the main functional purpose which was a cover for unprotected body parts of a warrior: legs - from the ankles to the knees, arms - from the hand to the elbow, as well as the chest and shoulders.

Often, Mongolian warriors also wore the so-called soft armor made of multi-layered fabric or thick felt, reinforced with small metal discs, as well as chain mail, which were captured in large quantities from conquered peoples.



On a war horse, horse armor is a mask (mask) and a koyar (shell).

“Koyar” is not a Mongolian word: here we see the Russian translation of the Turkic word yegar “saddle”, “horse covering”.

The lamellar iron and laminar leather horse armor of the Mongols consisted of:

. bib;

. two sidewalls;

. knupnik;

. collar of two parts, hanging on the sides of the neck.