In the policy of collaboration, no one excelled the branch of Nevsky's family ensconced in what in the thirteenth century was the insignificant
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Moscow appanage carved out in 1276 for Nevsky's son, Danil Aleksan-drovich. Danil's son, Iurii, managed in 1317 to secure for himself the hand of the khan's sister and the title to Vladimir to go with it. Eight years later he was murdered by the son of the prince of Tver, whom the Mongols had executed at his, Iurii's, instigation, whereupon Moscow (without Vladimir and the Grand Princely title, however) passed to his younger brother, Ivan Danilovich, later designated Ivan 1 of Russia. The new ruler proved an extraordinarily gifted and unscrupulous political manipulator. By one scholar's estimate, he spent most of his reign either at Sarai or en route to or from it, which gives some idea how busy he must have been intriguing there.1 An astute businessman (the population nicknamed him 'Kalita' or 'the Moneybag') he amassed what by the standards of the time was a sizable fortune. Much of his income came from tolls which he imposed on people and goods crossing his properties, which happened to straddle several trade routes. This money not only enabled him promptly to deliver payments of his share of the tribute, but also to make up the arrears of other princes. To the latter he lent money against the security of their appanages, which he sometimes foreclosed. The poverty of Russian agriculture and its uncertainties made the life of the average tribute-paying appanage prince very precarious, placing him at the mercy of the richest of his relatives.
Ivan's most serious rival for Mongol favour was the prince of Tver, who, after Ivan's elder brother Iurii's death, had succeeded in wresting from Moscow the title of Great Prince. In 1327, the population of Tver rose against the Mongols and massacred a high-level deputation sent from Sarai to oversee the collection of the tribute. After some hesitation, the prince of Tver sided with the rebels. As soon as this news had reached him, Ivan left for Sarai. He returned as the head of a combined Mongol-Russian punitive force which so devastated Tver and a great deal of central Russia besides that the region was not yet fully recovered half a century later. As a reward for his loyalty, the Mongols invested Ivan with the title of Great Prince, and appointed him Farmer General of the tribute throughout Russia. This was undoubtedly an expensive privilege since it made Ivan responsible for the arrears and defaults of others, but one that offered him unique opportunities for meddling in the internal affairs of rival appanages. Control of the tribute meant in effect monopoly of access to the khan's court. Taking advantage of it, Ivan and his successors forbade the other princes to enter into direct relations with any other state, the Horde included, except through the agency of Moscow. In this manner, Moscow gradually isolated its rivals, and moved to the forefront as the intermediary between the conqueror and his Russian subjects. The Mongols had no cause to regret the favours they had heaped on Ivan. In the twelve remaining years of his life, he
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served them no less ably than his grandfather Alexander Nevsky had done, keeping in line, with force when necessary, Novgorod, Rostov, Smolensk and any other city that dared to raise its head. Karl Marx, whom the communist government of Russia regarded as an authoritative historian, characterized this first prominent representative of the Moscow line as a blend of 'the characters of the Tartar's hangman, sycophant and slave-in-chief'.2
Moscow profited in many ways from Sarai's favour. The Mongols, who frequently raided other parts of Russia to loot and take prisoners, tended to respect the properties of their principal agent, with the result that the principality of Moscow became an island of relative security in a country torn by violence. Boyars with their retainers readily entered the service of the Moscow prince to benefit from the protection which the principal collaborator alone was able to provide. Pax mongolica, whatever its dark aspects, placed a good part of Asia and the Near East under the sovereignty of a single dynasty, of which Russia was a tributary. This political unity opened considerable commercial opportunities. It was under Mongol domination that Russian merchants first began to venture to the Caspian and Black seas to trade with Persians and Turks, and it is then that the north-eastern principalities began to develop a rudimentary mercantile culture.
Moscow also profited greatly from support of the church. The Metropolitan of Kiev, Russia's highest ecclesiastic, finding himself in a deserted city, transferred in 1299 his see to Vladimir. He had excellent reasons for maintaining close relations with the Horde, because under Mongol rule the church and the monasteries enjoyed exemption from the tribute and all the other obligations imposed on the Russian populace. This valuable privilege was granted by charters which every new khan had to reconfirm on his accession. To preserve its advantages, the church obviously required effective representation at Sarai. In 1299, the contest between Tver and Moscow was not yet resolved, and although the Metropolitan favoured Moscow, he preferred formally to assume a neutral stance by establishing himself in Vladimir. But after Tver's uprising in 1327 and its sacking by Ivan 1 the outcome could no longer remain in doubt. The very next year (1328), the Metropolitan see was moved from Vladimir to Moscow which became henceforth the centre of Russia's Orthodoxy and a 'Holy City'. In all subsequent rivalries over the title of Great Prince, the church loyally supported Moscow's claim. In gratitude, Moscow bestowed on it large landholdings backed by immunity charters.
Although all the appanage princes had a keen acquisitive spirit, the princes of Moscow seem to have inherited an outstanding business acumen, which proved a great asset at a time when political power was
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largely conceived and measured in terms of property. They accumulated villages, towns and promysly with the single-minded determination of modern monopolists bent on cornering some commodity. They spurned no opportunity to turn a profit, trading in oriental rugs, precious stones, furs, wax or any other merchandise which had a ready market. They continued to do so even after having laid claim to the imperial title, a fact which never ceased to astonish foreign visitors to the Kremlin. As will be shown later (Chapter 8), during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the tsars of Muscovy enjoyed a virtual monopoly in the country's wholesale commerce as well as in its manufacturing and mining. The penury of some of them went to extraordinary lengths: Ivan in, for example, insisted on foreign ambassadors returning to him the skins of sheep which he had sent them for food.3 They grew rich, minded their fortunes and took every precaution to prevent their descendants from squandering what they had accumulated. Fortunately for them, the princes of Moscow tended to be long-lived; during nearly two hundred years separating the accession of Basil I (1389) from the death of Ivan iv (1584), Muscovy had only five rulers; a remarkable record of longevity for the age.