Batu Khan

The Golden Horde, the Mongol state that dominated the western Eurasian steppe and the Rus principalities for more than two centuries, was founded by Batu, a grandson of Genghis Khan. Born around 1207, he was a son of Jochi, the eldest of Genghis Khan's four sons by his chief wife Börte. Questions raised within the family about Jochi's paternity, owing to Börte's captivity before his birth, helped exclude the Jochid line from the imperial succession, but Jochi was assigned the westernmost territories of the empire, and on his death in 1227 Batu inherited the claim.

Batu's standing rests chiefly on the great western campaign of 1236 to 1242, which he led as senior prince alongside the general Subutai under the authority of his uncle, the great khan Ögedei. The Mongol armies subdued Volga Bulgaria and the Kipchak steppe, then conquered the Rus principalities in successive winters, destroying Ryazan and Vladimir and sacking Kiev in 1240. In 1241 the campaign struck Central Europe, defeating a Polish-German force at Legnica and the Hungarian army at Mohi. News of Ögedei's death reached Batu in 1242, and the armies withdrew to the steppe; Europe west of the Rus lands was never invaded again.

Batu established his ordo on the lower Volga, where the city of Sarai grew into the capital of his khanate, known to later tradition as the Golden Horde. The Rus princes, including Alexander Nevsky, traveled there to receive confirmation of their thrones and to render tribute, a relationship that shaped Russian political life into the fifteenth century.

In imperial politics Batu acted as kingmaker rather than claimant. Estranged from Güyük Khan after a quarrel during the western campaign, he declined to attend Güyük's election and, after Güyük's death, allied with Sorghaghtani Beki to secure the great khanship for her son Möngke in 1251. The alliance shifted the empire from the house of Ögedei to the house of Tolui and gave Batu effective autonomy in the west. He died around 1255 and was succeeded in turn by his son Sartaq and his brother Berke, under whom the Horde's rulers adopted Islam and warred openly with their Toluid cousins of the Ilkhanate.