Kiev in the Golden Horde period () is the chapter in the history of Kyiv from the 1240 Mongol siege and conquest of Kiev until the 1362/3 Battle of Blue Waters, which saw the Grand Duchy of Lithuania emerge as the new hegemon in central Ukraine (see History of Kyiv (1362–1657)). The Mongol invasion of 1237–1242 destroyed the Kievan Rus' state and disrupted traditional economic ties. This had a negative impact on the socio-economic, political and cultural development of Kiev. The Mongol army commander Batu Khan established the Khanate of the Golden Horde, with its capital city of Sarai on the Lower Volga, replacing Kiev as the political centre of the Rus' principalities. However, Kiev remained the de jure and de facto metropolitan see, and thereby the religious centre of Rus', until at least 1299.
Political significance (1240–1300)
The siege and capture of Kiev by the Mongol Horde army was accompanied by massive destruction of Kievans and significant damage to most of the city's buildings. As a result, Old Kiev (the Upper City) declined, and all life in Kiev was concentrated on Podil (the Lower City). As a result of the invasion, the population of Kiev decreased from about 40,000–50,000 to just 2,000 people.
Between 1240 and 1273, no chronicles written in Kiev, if any, are known to have survived, while Rus' chronicles compiled in other cities rarely or never mentioned Kiev (or its princes) during this time, sometimes through the 1290s. Observing this lack of transmitted sources, earlier historians were prone to make arguments from silence to argue against the political and religious significance of Kiev (usually paired with an increased importance of Vladimir (Volodimir) on the Klyazma) during the second half of the 13th century. Modern scholars have been more cautious, especially where the enduring ecclesiastical centrality of Kiev is concerned. On the other hand, it is probable that Kiev had no autonomous princes, but that the city was administered by governors (voivodes) until about 1300.
After the invasion of 1240, there were no Horde troops in Kiev. In 1241, after confirming with Daniel of Galicia his right to Kiev, Grand Prince Michael of Chernigov returned to the city from Hungary. Therefore, Michael had to go Sarai in order to receive from Batu Khan the jarlig for the Principality of Kiev. However, Batu had Michael executed in 1246. Realising the importance of Kiev as a symbol of the unity of Rus', Batu Khan did his best to prevent the revival of its political significance. By provoking conflicts between various Rus' princes (particularly Daniel of Galicia, Michael of Chernigov, and Yaroslav II of Vladimir), the khan's diplomacy created a situation of lack of authoritative political leadership in Kiev.
In 1243, Batu Khan transferred ownership of the city to Yaroslav II Vsevolodovich of Vladimir-Suzdal. The first known governor, boyar Dmytro (Dmitry) Yeykovych, was in the service of Yaroslav by 1245, when Daniel of Galicia reportedly visited the Vydubychi Monastery. It is uncertain whether or not he was the same person as voivode Dmytro, whom Daniel had appointed over Kiev in 1239, and who (unsuccessfully) led the city's defence in 1240. By 1245, the Golden Horde conducted the first census of Rus' population in the Kievan region, in order to collect tribute. This is reported by Giovanni da Pian del Carpine (Carpini) and is also mentioned in the first redaction of the vita of Michael of Chernigov (as preserved in the Novgorod First Chronicle).
When Yaroslav II died in 1246, the khan confirmed the right to Kiev and all Rus to his sons Alexander Nevsky (1249–1263) and Yaroslav of Tver (1263–1271), who did not come to reign in Kiev, but had their residence in the north. During this time, Kiev was administered by governors appointed by the princes of Vladimir-Suzdal. After the death of Yaroslav of Tver in 1271/2, the title of grand prince of Kiev was claimed by the Romanovichi monarch Leo I of Galicia–Volhynia (styling himself "King of Ruthenia"), as well as the Olgovichi of Chernigov and the Rostislavichi of Smolensk, while the Yurievichi of Suzdalia abandoned their claim to the Kievan inheritance. In practice, however, the Principality of Kiev was probably controlled directly by khan of the Golden Horde through basqaqi from 1272 until about 1300. Presumably, during this period the city was governed by representatives of the emerging local Ruthenian nobility, controlled by the basqaqi. or managed by the city's hromada (municipality).Ольга Придибайло Хто побудував київський замок? on the website Україна — це ми! Mentions of the basqaqi in the northeastern Rus' principalities disappear at the turn of the 13th–14th centuries, while a basqaq under prince Fedor (or Fedir) in Kiev is mentioned as late as 1331. Nothing is known for certain about this reference, such as who this basqaq and prince Fedor were, and whether Kiev owed allegiance to the Golden Horde of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania at the time.
Religious and cultural centre (1240–1299)
Kiev continued to be the traditional ecclesiastical centre of Rus', and thus was an important factor influencing the political life of the Rus' lands. Peter Akerovich appears to have served as metropolitan of Kiev from at least 1241 to 1245; on behalf of Michael of Chernigov, he participated in the First Council of Lyon (1245), before fading from historical records.
In 1250, the patriarch ordained Daniel of Galicia's pechatnyk (chancellor) Cyril (Kyrylo) II as metropolitan of Kiev (died 1280–1282). Kiev remained the de jure and de facto metropolitan see, and the primates continued to be called Metropolitans of Kiev and all Rus'. Metropolitan Cyril often travelled to other Rus' cities such as Vladimir (Volodimir) on the Klyazma, Veliky Novgorod, Chernigov, Ryazan, Smolensk or Halych, but returned to Kiev after making such trips, convened councils of Rus' bishops in Kiev, ordained or confirmed Rus' bishops in Kiev, and when he died in Pereslavl-Zalessky while on a journey, his remains were brought back and buried in Kiev.
Cyril advocated a rapprochement between Rus', Nicaea and Sarai against the Catholic papacy and Crusaders. The metropolitan held a council of Rus' bishops, either in the year 1273 in Kiev, or according to other sources, in 1274 in Vladimir. The next metropolitan, Maximos (Maksim, Maksym), held another council of Rus' bishops in Kiev in either 1282 or 1284, as the Nikon Chronicle reports: "all the bishops of Rus' were summoned to Kiev to Maksim."
By the early 1260s, book writing was restored in Kiev. In particular, at the see of Metropolitan Cyril, the Bulgarian calligrapher John Dragoslav copied from the originally Serbian Kórmchaia Book, which was written out of Bulgaria in 1262. In the early 1280s, another one with important additions was created in Kiev on the basis of this Kórmchaia Book. In 1280 or 1284, Cyril's successor, Metropolitan Maxim, convened another council of Rus' bishops in Kiev, where a new version of the Kievan Kórmchaia Book was approved. And on the basis of the latter in 1286, on the instructions of Prince Volodymyr Vasylkovych, the Volyn Kórmchaia Book was written in Volodymyr in Volyn'.
Toqta–Nogai conflict (1298–1299)
There was a during the war between Toqta (Tokta) against Nogai Khan and the Cumans (Polovtsi). After the 1280 death of khan Mengu-Timur of the Golden Horde, a de facto dual power structures was established between the Sarai khan Toqta and the general Nogai. The territory west of the Dnieper (Right-bank Ukraine) belonged to Nogai's power. The first military clash between Nogai and Toqta on the verge of 1298–1299, which happened somewhere around the Northern Donets river, ended in the defeat of Toqta's army. According to Arabic authors, a second decisive battle soon took place, which ended in the complete defeat of Nogai's troops and the death of the general himself. The Khan's troops devastated Nogai's former possessions, including the Kievan region, and presumably Kiev itself.
Ecclesiastical reorganisation (1299–1317)
In 1299 or 1300, Maximos moved the see of the Kievan metropolitans to the city of Vladimir (Volodimir) on the Klyazma in Suzdalia. The reasons and circumstances for this relocation are still debated. Traditional interpretations put a lot of weight in the phrases "Tatar oppression" () and "all of Kiev fled" () in the Laurentian Codex under the year 6808 (1300). Nikolay Karamzin (1826) concluded that Maximos moved because found 'Mongol tyranny intolerable', leading Donald Ostrowski (1993, 2015) to wonder: "If that is the reason the metropolitan left Kiev, then it is not clear why he would wait until 1299, when Mongol control in the area was declining and the Lithuanians were moving into the area."
Based on the same chronicle entry stating that "all the city of Kiev did flee also" or "all Kiev fled (razbězhesia)", Vasily Klyuchevsky (died 1911) asserted that the entire population of Kiev fled to Vladimir due to the Mongol invasion, taking the metropolitan with them. Ostrowski noted that these entries do not indicate the direction where the Kievans fled towards, while some of them stayed in the city according to other entries, and remarked: "Kliuchevskii makes no effort to account for the apparent time delay between the Mongol sack of Kiev in 1240 and the move of the metropolitan fifty-nine years later. If conditions in Kiev were so bad, one would think that the metropolitan would have moved sooner."
Nevertheless, until 1461, the metropolitans who lived in Vladimir held the title Metropolitans of Kiev and all Rus. For a long time, the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople did not recognise the metropolitan residential transfer from Kiev to Vladimir, and later Moscow. In response, the Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia requested the Patriarch of Constantinople a separate Metropolis of Halych for the southwestern Rus' principalities, which was established in 1303. The Metropolis of Lithuania, headquartered in Navahrudak and encompassing large parts of present-day Belarus that had been acquired by the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, was established in or around 1317; another reduction of the nominal jurisdiction of the Metropolis of Kiev.
Dynastic and military evolution (1300–1363)
Meanwhile, in 1300/1301, with the help of Khan Tokta, representatives of the Olgovichi clan (of Chernigov and Novhorod-Siverskyi) appear to have obtained possession of Kiev. The mentions the names of princes and Stanislav of Kiev.
A number of relatively late and questionable chronicles record that in the early 1320s (traditionally dated 1321), a Battle on the Irpin River took place between the Gediminas, Grand Duke of Lithuania, and prince Stanislav of Kiev; Gediminas' victory would have made the city dependent on the Grand Duchy of Lithuania for 10 years. As his governor over Kiev, Gediminas reportedly appointed Mindaugas (Mindovg) Holshanski, "who was baptised into the Rus' faith".Maciej Stryjkowski's Story of the Conquest of Kiev by Lithuanian Duke Gediminas : source , translation The historicity of this battle is contested; some anachronisms in the texts, and its absence in other sources, have led many scholars (from Karamzin in 1817 onwards) to conclude this military clash did not take place, at least not as narrated. In that case, Golden Horde hegemony over central Ukraine including the Kievan region probably persisted until 1362/3.
In 1331, a Kievan prince named Fedir-Hlib Ivanovych (or Fedor), was first mentioned. Given that his name is also connected with the last mention of a basqaq in Kiev, it has been surmised by some scholars that Fedir was a vassal of the Golden Horde, although an allegiance to Lithuania cannot be ruled out.