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“Is this city yours or mine?” Political Sovereignty and Eurasian Urban Centers in the Ninth through Twelfth Centuries

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 September 2013

Lyuba Grinberg
Lyuba Grinberg*
Affiliation:
New York University
*
li250@nyu.edu
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Abstract

Numerous scholars have emphasized the “centrality” of Inner Asia to furthering our understanding of global, or cross-cultural phenomena, and the role of such phenomena in the preservation, modification, and transmission of historical experience. Yet the research has almost exclusively been carried out by specialists in Chinese civilization, and as one moves further away from the Chinese sphere of influence the notion of Eurasia as an integrated socio-political unit of historical analysis becomes more problematic. Here I attempt to bridge the western and eastern edges of the great steppe by focusing on a specific aspect of Inner Asian political culture—the phenomenon of shared sovereignty between military-based ruling dynasties and their urban constituencies—in the principalities of Rus' and the oases of Transoxiana, between the ninth and twelfth centuries. I propose that the dual administrative structure that developed in the two regions was an autochthonic, Eurasian state-formation, distinct from the city-state and imperial models, which emerged as a result of what Joseph Fletcher identified as “horizontal continuities.”

Type
Research Article
Information
Comparative Studies in Society and History , Volume 55 , Issue 4 , October 2013 , pp. 895 - 921
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 2013 

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References

1 On “Inner” and “Outer” Eurasia, see Christian, David, A History of Russia, Central Asia and Mongolia (Oxford: Blackwell, 1998)Google Scholar. For convenience, I use “Eurasia” and “Inner Asia” interchangeably.

2 For example, DiCosmo, Nicola, “State Formation and Periodization in Inner Asian History,” Journal of World History 10, 1 (1999): 1–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Biran, Michal, “The Mongol Transformation: From the Steppe to Eurasian Empire,” Medieval Encounters 10, 1–3 (2004): 339–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Non-Sinologists tend to take a broader approach: Christian, History of Russia; and Lieberman, Victor, Strange Parallels, vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 This is primarily because the movement of people and goods across the continent has traditionally been from east to west, and historians tend to follow their sources. A notable exception is Peter Golden's work on pre-Mongol Eurasia and the Khazar Empire, some of which is cited later in this paper.

4 “Political culture” is an “activity through which individuals and groups in any society articulate, negotiate, implement and enforce the competing claims they make upon another and upon the whole.… [It is] the set of discourses or symbolic practices by which these claims are made”; Baker, K. M., Inventing the French Revolution (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 4–5CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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9 Bartold's, V. V., Turkestan—Down to Mongol Invasion (London: Luzac, 1977)Google Scholar remains the best overview of the region. A more recent and brief introduction is Fedorov's, M. “Farghana under the Samanids,” Iran 42 (2004): 119–29CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Kochnev, Boris, Numizmaticheskaia istoriia Karakhanidskogo Kaganata (991–1209) (Moscow: Sofia, 2006)Google Scholar.

10 The Rus' chroniclers moved the Gog and Magog further to the north, but the legend itself most likely entered Russian chronicles via Muslim channels. Karpov, A. Iu., “Zaklepannye cheloveky” v letopisnoi stat'e 1096 g,” Ocherki Feodal'noi Rossii 3 (1999): 3–24Google Scholar. Also of interest: van Donzel, Emeri and Achmidt, Andrea, Gog and Magog in Early Eastern Christian and Islamic Sources: Sallam's Quest for Alexander's Wall (Leiden: Brill, 2010)Google Scholar.

11 Russian libraries could not compete with those of Bukhara; see Stoliarova, L. V. and Kashtanov, S. M., Kniga v Drevnei Rusi (XI–XVI vv) (Moscow: Universitet Dmitriia Pozharskogo, 2010)Google Scholar. However, literacy spread quickly in daily use; see Kovalev, Roman K., “Zvenyhorod in Galicia: An Archaeological Survey, Eleventh-Mid-Thirteenth Centuries,” Journal of Ukrainian Studies 24, 2 (1999): 7–36Google Scholar; Franklin, Simon, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, c. 950–1300 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

12 Numismatic data leaves little doubt that contacts between Rus' and Samarqand, Balkh, and Bukhara existed as early as the tenth century. According to Thomas S. Noonan and Roman K. Kovalev, more than 75 percent of all silver deposited in eastern Europe during the tenth century was struck by the Samanid rulers of Transoxiana and was intended for the northern trade. Kovalev, Roman K., “Dirham Mint Output of Samanid Samarqand and Its Connection to the Beginnings of Trade with Northern Europe,” Histoire & Mesure 17, 3/4 (2002): 197–216CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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16 Christian, History of Russia, 281, 327.

17 Polnoe Sobranie Russkikh Letopisei [henceforth PSRL], (Lavrent'evskaia letopis'), vol. 1, pt. 2 (Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1927)Google Scholar, 375.

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19 This general description is from Golden, Peter B., Central Asia in World History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011)Google Scholar, esp. 51–62. For a case study, see Esin, E., “Tarkhan Nīzak or Tarkhan Tirek? An Enquiry Concerning the Prince of Badhghīs, who in A.H. 91/A.D. 709–710 Opposed the ‘Omayyad Conquest of Central Asia,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 97, 3 (1977): 323–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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21 A “horizontal” continuity must be distinguished from “parallel” continuity, which denotes a survival of institutions through time, such as taxation, or imperial title. Fletcher, J., “Integrative History: Parallels and Interconnections in the Early Modern Period, 1500–1800,” Journal of Turkish Studies 9, 1 (1985): 37–58Google Scholar, here 38.

22 I will not join the debate on whether Rus' owes its existence to trade. Such an assumption implies that the emergence of Gardariki was an event rather than a process. Although the first Slavic raids into Byzantine territories and migration into the Balkans in the 580s may be linked to the reopening of the northern Silk Road by the Gök Türk, I would consider the eighth-century revival of the route a catalyst that sped up the transition of early Slavic and Finno-Ugric communities into commercial urban centers. See Christian, History of Russia, 281. For Slavic movements, see Vasary, I., Cumans and Tatars: Oriental Military in the Pre-Ottoman Balkans, 1185–1365 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

23 I am paraphrasing Raymond, André, “Economy of the Traditional City,” in Jayyusi, Salma K., general ed., Holod, Renata, Petruccioli, Attilio, and Raymond, André, special eds., The City in the Islamic World, vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 2008)Google Scholar, 750. For an analysis of cultural dialogue across the Eurasian landmass, see Elverskog, Johan, Buddhism and Islam on the Silk Road (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania University Press, 2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

24 In medieval Russian studies, “dual administration” has been generally evoked in the context of the Mongol influences debate. See Ostrowski, Donald, “The Mongol Origins of Muscovite Political Institutions,” Slavic Review 49 (1990): 525–42CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Muscovy and the Mongols: Cross-Cultural Influences on the Steppe Frontier, 1304–1589 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998)Google Scholar; and a critique by Halperin, Charles J., “Letter to the Editors,” Kritika 1, 4 (2000): 83CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For an overview of “dual administration” in the Türk and Khazar empires, see Golden, Peter B., An Introduction to the History of the Turkic Peoples (Wiesbaden: O. Harrassowitz, 1992)Google Scholar. In Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies the concept has been considered at length by Hodgson, Marshall, Venture of Islam, vol. 2 (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1974)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For China, see Biran, Michal, The Empire of the Qara Khitai in Eurasian History: Between China and the Islamic World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 93–131Google Scholar; and Endicott-West, E., “Imperial Government in Yuan Times.” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 46: 2 (1986): 523–49CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For Iran, see Aigle, Denise, “Iran under Mongol Domination: The Effectiveness and Failings of a Dual Administrative System,” Bulletin d'études orientales 57 (2006–2007): 65–78Google Scholar. For Central Asia and Eastern Iran, see Manz, Beatrice, “Nomad and Settled in the Timurid Military,” in Amitai, Reuven and Biran, Michal, eds., Mongols, Turks and Others: Eurasian Nomads and the Sedentary World (Leiden: Brill, 2005): 425–57Google Scholar; and Subtelny, Maria E., Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden: Brill, 2007): 41CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 128.

25 Ssu-Ma Ch'ien, The Records, 2: 269, in Christian, History of Russia, 211. Also see Holt, Frank Lee, Alexander the Great and Bactria: The Formation of a Greek Frontier in Central Asia (Leiden: Brill, 1989)Google Scholar.

26 Obviously, a diachronic analysis of the government is not feasible here. In his Herrscher, Gemeinwesen, Vermittler: Ostiran und transoxanien in vormongolischer zeit (Beirut: In Kommission bei Franz Steiner, Stuttgart, 1996)Google Scholar, Jürgen Paul concluded there was significant overlap between the functions performed by the aʻyān and the state bureaucracy, especially in assessing and collecting taxes. Paul argues that the reach of the government never truly extended beyond the Diwan and relied on local “notables” to serve as intermediaries. While this reinforces my own contention about the role of the aʻyān, the study does not frame the region's administration within the amīr- aʻyān paradigm, and privileges the “indirect rule” thesis. It would follow that in Transoxiana the state had no “monopoly of the legitimate use of violence.” I would suggest that we are instead simply dealing with a different model of “state,” which cannot and should not be juxtaposed to Max Weber's. It must also be said that the final judgment is necessarily clouded by the lack of sources, a problem that Paul acknowledged.

27 Petruccioli, Attilio, “Bukhara and Samarkand,” in Jayyusi, Salma K., general ed., Holod, Renata, Petruccioli, Attilio, and Raymond, André, special eds., The City in the Islamic World, vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 491–524CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Also, Heinz Gaube, “Iranian Cities,” in idem, 159–80. Said Amir Arjomand discusses Samanid sources, but these, as is so often the case, are concerned with the rulers rather than the ruled; “Evolution of Persianate Polity and Its Transition to India,” Journal of Persianate Studies 2, 2 (2009): 115–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

28 For water management, see Paul, Herrscher, 41–66.

29 Dodkhudoeva, L. N., Epigraficheskie Pamiatniki Samarkanda XI–XIV vv. (Dushanbe: Donish, 1992)Google Scholar, esp. 94–95, and inscriptions 49, 52, 112, and 114 on pages 151, 153, 207, and 209, respectively. The waqf document was published by Chekhovich, O. D., Bukharskii Vakf XIII v. (Moscow: Nauka, 1979)Google Scholar, esp. 24. For civil administration, see Bartold, Sochineniia, vol. I, 294; Maria E. Subtelny, Timurids in Transition, 136–41; and Bulliet's, Richard W.The Patricians of Nishapur (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972)Google Scholar; and his “Local Politics in Eastern Iran under the Ghaznavids and Seljuks,” Iranian Studies 11 (1978): 35–56CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

30 Arjomand, “Evolution,” 128–29. The “sheikhs” of Samarqand are also reported to have mounted three hundred ghulams for the city's defense in 1004 (Bartold, Sochineniia, vol. I, 331). The question of military slavery is interesting, since the institution, thought by many to have originated in Central Asia, played a key role in the regional history and in Islamic history generally. But it did not develop in Gardariki. For an overview of current scholarship, see Rueven Amitai, “Military Slavery in the Islamic World: 1000 Years of a Social-Military Institution,” a lecture delivered at the University of Trier, Germany, 27 June 2007, available at: http://www.medievalists.net/2009/10/15/military-slavery-in-the-islamic-world-1000-years-of-a-social-military-institution/. I thank Charles Halperin for drawing my attention to the issue.

31 The city-countryside connection was also reinforced by the fact that many urban “notables” owned land in the nearby villages. According to the aforementioned waqfiyya, the sadr of Bukhara bought a village in the suburbs and built another small settlement right next to it. The land adjacent to his possessions also belonged to a city resident, a certain Sheikh Hasan Kashebaf, manufacturer of straw mats and sacks for wheat transport; Chekhovich et al., Bukharskii Vakf XIII, 18, 21–22.

32 Scott Levi, C. and Sela, Ron, Islamic Central Asia: An Anthology of Sources (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2010)Google Scholar, 25.

33 Bartold, Sochineniia, vol. I, 247, 249.

34 Ibid., 440.

35 Ibid., 264–65. On the Ghitrīfi coins, see Davidovich, E. A. and Dani, A. H., “Coinage and the Monetary System,” in Asimov, M. S. and Bosworth, C. E., eds., History of Civilizations of Central Asia (Delhi: Molital Banarsidass, 1999), 391–420Google Scholar.

36 Bulliet, “Local Politics,” 41, 42–44, for Maqdisi; Ibn Hawqal, The Oriental Geography of Ebn Haukal (Ketab-i Masalek ve Mu'alek) (London: Printed at the Oriental Press by Wilson & Co., for T. Cadell, jun. and W. Davies, 1800). Local currency was also used in the city of Yarkand; see Şınası, Tekin, “A Qarakhanid Document of AD 1121 (AH 515) from Yarkand,” Harvard Ukrainian Studies 3/4 (1979–1980): 872Google Scholar. This reference is particularly valuable here because it supports my thesis about a shared “Eurasian” or Silk Road urban culture, since Yarkand is in Eastern Turkistan.

37 Changes certainly did occur. Jean Aubin observed some time ago that in the city of Bayhaq, for example, ancient noble families were replaced by a new urban ruling oligarchy, which had emerged from the rural landed nobility, in the tenth–eleventh centuries (cited in Pourshariati, “Local Historiography in Early Medieval Iran and the Tārīkh-ī Bayhaq,” Iranian Studies 33 (2000): 133–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar, here 156. Another transformation occurred in the meaning of the term dihqan, which in the pre-Islamic times denoted high-ranking notables but after Muslim conquest was applied to urban artisans and/or free peasants; Golden, Central Asia, 70–71.

38 Levy and Sela, Islamic Central Asia, 13.

39 Bartold, Sochineniia, vol. I, 282.

40 Ibid., 300.

41 Ibid., 300.

42 Ibid., 318.

43 Historians credit the Samanids with creating a “new type of polity,” seen “as the evolution of a distinct type of political organization in a period of dialogue and confluence of civilizations [Persianate and Islamic]” (Arjomand, “Evolution,” 115). I wonder, though, if the cultural boom was in fact a consequence of political fragmentation, as was the case with the later Timurid “renaissance”; see Subtelny, Maria E., “Socioeconomic Bases of Cultural Patronage under the Later Timurids,” International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 20 (1988): 479–505CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The Samanids may have defined themselves as a “wall against the steppe,” but their policies brought an age of ever-increasing Turkic presence in the region, as recently noted by Stride, S., Rondelli, B., and Mantellini, S., “Canals vs. Horses: Political Power in the Oasis of Samarkand,” World Archaeology 41, 1 (2009): 73–87CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

44 Hodgson, Venture of Islam, vol. 2, 54. The issue also looms large in Chinese, Persian, and Central Asian studies. See Khazanov's, AnatolyNomads and the Outside World (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1984)Google Scholar, for a general overview; and DiCosmo, Nicola, ed., Warfare in Inner Asian History (Leiden: Brill, 2002)Google Scholar; Melville, Charles, The Fall of Amir Chupān and the Decline of the Ilkhanate, 1327–37 (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999)Google Scholar; and Subtelny, Timurids in Transition, among others.

45 On “nomadic” state and post-Mongol Transoxiana, see Jürgen Paul, “The State and the Military—a Nomadic Perspective,” Mitteilungen des SFB 586, “Differenz und Integration,” at http://www.uni-leipzig.de/~diffint/index.php.

46 Arjomand, “Evolution,” 115, 130, 134. Also, Gaborieau, Marc, “Indian Cities,” in Jayyusi, Salma K., general ed., Holod, Renata, Petruccioli, Attilio, and Raymond, André, special eds., The City in the Islamic World, vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 181–204CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

47 Gernet, Jacques, “Marchands et Artisans dans les villes de l'epoque des Song,” in l'Art de la Chine des Song (Paris: Musée des Arts de l'Asie, 1956)Google Scholar; and “Note sur les villes chinoises au moment de l'apogée islamique,” in Hourani, Albert and Stern, S. M., eds., The Islamic City: A Colloquium (Oxford: Cassirer, 1970), 77–87Google Scholar. But see Hartwell, R., “Markets, Technology and the Structure of Enterprise in the Development of the Eleventh-Century Chinese Iron and Steel Industry,” Journal of Economic History 26, 1 (1966): 29–58CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

48 DiCosmo, Nicola, “Ancient City-States of the Tarim Basin,” in Hansen, Mogens Herman, ed., A Comparative Study of Thirty City-State Cultures (Copenhagen: C. A. Reitzels Forlag, 2000), 393–407Google Scholar; Bulliet, “Local Politics.”

49 Manz, “Nomad and Settled,” 447.

50 Sanjar regretted his outburst later and was relieved to hear that his wise Persian vezir did not communicate the message to the Nishapurians; Bulliet, “Local Politics,” 48.

51 The strategy worked in Mamluk Egypt. See Broadbridge, Ann F., Kingship and Ideology in the Islamic and Mongol Worlds (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008)Google Scholar.

52 Paul, Jürgen, “The Histories of Herat,” Iranian Studies 33, 1/2 (2000): 93–115CrossRefGoogle Scholar, here 104, fn. 52. He answers some of these questions in Herrscher.

53 PSRL, vol. 3, (Novgorodskaia pervaia letopis' mladshego Izvoda) (Moscow-Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1950), 106.

54 For an introduction to the chronicles, see Tolochko, P. P., Russkie letopisi i letopistsy X–XIII vv. (St. Petersburg: Slavianskaia Biblioteka, 2003)Google Scholar.

55 Yet Vsevolod's shortcomings did not stop the Novgorodians from inviting his son, Vladimir; PSRL, vol. 3, (Novgorodskaia pervaia letopis') (Moscow-Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1950), 24.

56 In 1132, the Novgorodians expelled Vsevolod, but the chronicle does not specify why, nor does it mention when and how he was able to return, since five years later the city forced him to leave again (PSRL, vol. 3, p. 22).

57 For Igor's murder, see Dimnik, Martin, The Dynasty of Chernigov, 1146–1246 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 47. Also, Froianov, I. Ia., Kievskaia Rus': Ocherki sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii (Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo leningradskogo Universiteta, 1980), 175–76Google Scholar.

58 In 1210, the boyars of Halych expelled Daniil Romanovich. With Daniil out of the picture, three Riurikid brothers—Roman, Vladimir, and Svyatoslav Igorevichi—occupied Halych and purged five hundred of Daniil's supporters and their families. Shortly thereafter, the people invited Daniil back, who enlisted the help of Kievan urban militia and reclaimed Halych. Roman, Vladimir, and Svyatoslav recruited Turkic Cumans and plundered the countryside and Halych itself, where Daniil and city boyars were preparing for a battle. Daniil and Halychians won and captured the three brothers and expelled them to Hungary. The Halychians, however, eager to avenge the deaths of their comrades, intercepted the Igorevichi and brought them back to the city where they were hanged. See Dimnik, Dynasty, 263.

59 Quoted in ibid., 33.

60 Froianov, Kievskaia Rus', 155.

61 Edward L. Keenan proposed that Muscovite references to the urban independence are just nostalgic projections, which had no place in Moscow itself; see his “ΒЕЧΕ.” Russian History 34, 1–4 (2007): 83–99Google Scholar. It is nevertheless important that the Muscovite sources do not dispute or gloss over the issue.

62 Although the precise nature of titles and ranks mentioned in the sources remains obscure and is debated, no one seems to deny the existence of a hierarchy as such. See Froianov, Kievskaia Rus', 216–43. Also, Langer, Lawrence N., “The Posadnichestvo of Pskov: Some Aspects of Urban Administration in Medieval Russia,” Slavic Review 43, 1 (1984): 46–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

63 The best analysis of the veche to date is Vilkul, T. L., Liudi i kniaz' v drevnerusskikh letopisiakh serediny XI–XIII vv (Moscow: Kvadriga, 2008)Google Scholar, though the present study challenges Vilkul's conclusions.

64 Langer, “Posadnichestvo of Pskov,” 58. For an outline of the debate, see Froianov, Kievskaia Rus', 150–55; Iu. Krivosheev, V., Rus' i Mongoly. Issledovanie po istorii severo-vostochnoi Rusi XII–XIV vv (St. Petersburg: Izdatel'stvo St. Peterburgskogo Universiteta, 2003), 4–84Google Scholar, 334–402. Both works argue that the veche was a pan-Rus'ian phenomenon, a remnant of tribal composition of Slavic society, all-inclusive, and performed a function parallel to that of the princes. While it would appear that popular assemblies were indeed present throughout Rus', the validity of the tribal theory has been challenged by Kisterev, S. N., “Zamechaniia k otsenke “plemennoi” teorii vozniknoveniia drevnerusskikh gorodov,” Ocherki feodal'noi Rossii 3 (1999): 247–56Google Scholar. That the term veche is commonly found in reference to the northern cities of Novgorod, Pskov, and Vyatka (which, incidentally, are better documented), has led some to deny the existence of the veche in the cities of Rus', and to suggest that since Novgorod and Pskov were involved in trade with the Hanseatic League, the institution of veche was a development parallel to the west European and Italian city-republics. But as Lawrence N. Langer demonstrated in his analysis of Pskov and Novgorod, the complexity of urban administration in these cities does not allow for the positioning of medieval Russian commercial centers among the examples of western communitas; “Posadnichestvo of Pskov,” 60.

65 For a discussion of both the treaties in English and problems associated with chronicle's data, see Lind, John H., “The Russo-Byzantine Treaties and the Early Urban Structure of Rus',” Slavonic and East European Review 62, 3 (1984): 362–70Google Scholar.

66 Krivosheev, Rus' i Mongoly, 68–69, 35–42.

67 The chronicles concentrate on the Riurikids, but fragmentary references to local Slavic and Scandinavian rulers of Rus' cities imply strong initial opposition to the clan, which developed a number of legitimation techniques in response. The earliest known Rus' chronicle, entitled The Tale of Bygone Years, mentions Rogvolod of Polotsk, whose daughter Rogneda was forcefully taken by Vladimir the Great. One of the sons born of this union was Yaroslav the Wise, the celebrated ruler of Kievan Rus. Rogvolod, as his name suggests, was a non-Riurikid prince of Scandinavian origin, a status recognized by Vladimir. See Butler, F., Enlightener of Rus': The Image of Vladimir Sviatoslavovich across the Centuries (Bloomington: Slavica Publishers, 2002)Google Scholar. In the ninth century Riurikid Oleg treacherously murdered Askol'd and Dir, the Varangian rulers of Kiev. There are also references to Slavic tribal leaders, such as Mal and Khodata. Even later legends, such as that recounting the foundation of Moscow, convey difficulties faced by the Riurikids. A seventeenth-century account reports that prince Yurii Dolgorukii murdered a certain Kuchka, who owned the site of future Moscow, and married his son Andrei to Kuchka's daughter. A certain “Kuchkovich” (“son of Kuchka”) was among those accused of assassinating Andrei. Tikhomirov, M. N., Drevnerusskie goroda, 2d ed. (Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel'stvo politicheskoi literatury, 1956)Google Scholar, 408.

68 PSRL (Lavrent'evskaia letopis'), vol. 1, pt. 2 (Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1927), 348.

69 Dimnik, Dynasty, 48.

70 “You are the only prince we have. Go [hide] within the city and we will go [out] to fight Izyaslav. If we manage to stay alive, we will come back to you [and prepare for the siege]. PSRL, XXV (Moscow: Iazyki slavianskoi kul'tury, 2004)Google Scholar, l, 70, p. 58.

71 Cited in Tolochko, Russkie letopisi, 40.

72 “Novgorodtsi ne sterpiache bezo kniazia sideti,” quoted in Vilkul, Liudi i kniaz', 170.

73 I have borrowed Masashi Haneda's term; Haneda, Masashi and Miura, Toru, eds., Islamic Urban Studies: Historical Review and Perspectives (London: Kegan Paul International, 1994)Google Scholar, 267.

74 For writing, see Franklin, Simon, “Literacy and Documentation in Early Medieval Russia,” Speculum 60, 1 (1985): 1–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Archaeological data suggests the existence of extensive documentation related to wealth management, indicating the high level of socio-political development of the Rus' cities. See Kovalev, Roman and Noonan, Thomas, “What Can Archaeology Tell Us about Debts in Kievan Rus?” Russian History 27, 2 (2000): 119–54Google Scholar; and Kovalev, “Zvenyhorod.”

75 We should keep in mind the composite nature of this source. See Kisterev, S. N., “Spornye voprosy Russkogo denezhnogo obrashcheniia,” Ocherki feodal'noi Rossii (1997): 197–220Google Scholar.

76 On lateral succession, see Golden, Peter B., “Nomads in the Sedentary World: The Case of Pre-Chinggisid Rus' and Georgia,” in Khazanov, Anatoly M. and Wink, Andre, eds., Nomads in the Sedentary World (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon, IIAS Asian Studies Series, 2001)Google Scholar, 29, 37–43; Martin, Janet, Medieval Russia, 980–1584 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995): 22Google Scholar, 26–27, 29. For tamga and Riurikid signs, see Fetisov, Alexander, “The Riurikid Sign from the B3 Church at Basarabi-Murfatlar,” Apulum: Arheologie. Istorie. Etnografie 44, 1 (2007): 299–314Google Scholar; Rybakov, B. A., “Znaki sobstvennosti v kniazheskom khoziaistve kievskoi Rusi X–XII vekov,” Sovetskaia Arkheologiia 6 (1940): 227–57Google Scholar; Soboleva, N. A., Ocherki istorii Rossiiskoi simvoliki: Ot tamgi do simvolov gosudarstvennogo suveriniteta (Moscow: Iazyki slavianskikh kul'tur, 2006)Google Scholar.

77 Woodworth, Cherie, “The Birth of the Captive Autocracy: Moscow, 1432,” Journal of Early Modern History 13 (2009): 49–69Google Scholar, here 55.

78 Nestor, the author of the first Rus' chronicle, begins his composition with two questions: “What is the origin of Rus' Land and who was its first ruler?” As P. P. Tolochko noted, the organic relationship between the land and the ruler (kniaz') is self-evident; see his Russkie letopisi, 58.

79 Compare the following two references: In 1146, when Izyaslav Mstislavich of Kiev attacked the base of the Ol'govichi, the chronicler lamented the loss of one thousand stallions, three thousand horses, five hundred measures of mead, eighty measures of wine and a number of silver bowls—hardly the inventory of an agrarian-based polity. See PSRL II, p. 334. In 1487, Polish-Lithuanian ambassador to the Grand Prince of Moscow, Ivan III, complained that the prince's men plundered the estates of several [Riurikid] princes who pledged their loyalty to the Polish king, Kazimir. In the latter case, wealth is measured in peas, grain, hemp, rye, wheat, and oats. See Sbornik Imperatorskago russkago istoricheskago obshchestva, vol. 35, no. 1 (Pamiatniki diplomaticheskikh snoshenii moskovskago gosudarstva s Pol'sko-litovskim gosudarstvom, vol. 1 (1487–1533) (St. Petersburg: Imperatorskoe russkoe istoricheskoe obshchestvo, 1892), 1–12.

80 Woodworth, “Birth of Captive Autocracy,” 55.

81 That this transition coincided with the decline of international trade enabled by the Pax Mongolica is significant and needs further study. This is not to say that agriculture was not practiced in Gardariki, or that tenth- and twelfth-century cities were the same, but rather to highlight the need for revising the older views regarding the medieval East Slavic economy. See Grekov, B. D., Kievskaia Rus' (Moscow: Akademiia Nauk SSSR, 1944)Google Scholar; and Krest'iane na Rusi: s drevneishikh vremen do XVII veka (Moscow: Akademiia Nauk SSSR, 1952–1954)Google Scholar.

82 Keenan, “ΒЕЧΕ,” 95.

83 I do not mean to downplay the role of agriculture in Transoxiana, but rather to emphasize that both commerce and agriculture were important, and that they could, and did, facilitate different patterns or alliances of political interests. Available evidence points to a sustained and expansive use of land. In addition to the wheat, barley, and grape cultivation mentioned in the waqfiyya published by O. Chekhovich, vineyards, planted lands, fields, gardens, and so forth are recorded in the villages around Samarqand in the eleventh-century waqfiyya from Samarqand. Khadr, Mohamed and Cahen, Claude, “Deux Actes de Waqf d'un Qarahānide d'Asie Centrale,” Journal Asiatique CCLV (1967): 305–34Google Scholar, here 332. Yet it is curious that, unlike the later Bukharan document in which the lands adjacent to the sadr's possessions are also referred to as waqf, the much earlier and more relevant one from Samarqand does not label lands in that way. Instead, it simply lists the names of the neighbors. Still another waqfiyya, also from Samarqand, in which the land within the city proper was reserved for the support of a hospital, three out of four adjacent properties are defined as waqf (ibid., 322). This suggests that during the period under discussion the city, with its stores, markets, workshops, and the like, was the locus of economic activity. After all, the throne of the “Lord of Bukhara” was camel-shaped, referring to the importance of the caravan trade (Golden, Central Asia, 53). Overall, though, without additional and specific data, it is hard to evaluate agriculture's role in Transoxiana's economy before the Mongol invasion.

84 Subtelny, Timurids in Transition. These attempts may in fact, go back to the Samanid era. According to Narshakhi, Ismail endowed all lands (ziya'at) and estates (‘akārāt) in the village of Shargh as a waqf for support of the fortress he built in Bukhara near the Samarqand gates (in Chekhovich et al., Bukharskii Vakf XIII, 88).

85 An important exception was I. P. Petrushevskii, who as early as the 1940s drew parallels between medieval Iranian cities and Russian Novgorod and Pskov, but then abandoned the idea because it was believed at the time that Novgorod and Pskov were “democratic” exceptions within Gardariki. For an English summary of Petrushevskii's article, see Haneda and Miura, eds., Islamic Urban Studies, 286. Tikhomirov also mentioned that medieval Kievan cities had more in common with the commercial centers of Central Asia than with those in the West, but he did not, to my knowledge, develop this idea (Drevnerusskie goroda, 242). Finally, Maria E. Subtelny compared Timurid princes to the medieval Russian izgoi, a term used for the Riurikids who, following the lateral succession system, were forever “expelled” from the pool of the potential candidates to rule. See her Timurids in Transition, 42.

86 Froianov, Kievskaia Rus', 218–19, 222–23, 230, 232. The veche has also been compared to the Germanic t(h)ings and linked to the largely undocumented tribal past, but this similarity remains unexplained, especially when we consider that in Gardariki these assemblies were specifically urban phenomena (see Keenan, “ΒΕЧЕ,” 98).

87 For differences between ancient Greece and Gardariki, see the corresponding essays in Hansen, Mogens Herman, ed., A Comparative Study of Thirty City-State Cultures (Copenhagen: C. A. Reitzels Forlag, 2000)Google Scholar.

88 Riurikid assets are often described as tovar—goods for sale. See for example, PSRL, vol. 25 (Moskovskii letopisnyi svod kontsa XV veka), entries for years 1127/6635, 1140/6648, and 1159/6667. We know little about princes' involvement in commerce, but the accusation of money-lending thrown at Vladimir Monomakh by Kievan Metropolitan Nikifor is revealing. See Tikhomirov, Drevnerusskie goroda, 105. For landed property, see Bushkovitch, Paul, “Towns and Castles in Kievan Rus': Boiar Residence and Landownership in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries,” Russian History 7, 3 (1980): 251–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kivelson, Valerie, “Merciful Father, Impersonal State: Russian Autocracy in Comparative Perspective,” Modern Asian Studies 31, 3 (1997): 635–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar, here 646.

89 Lateral succession certainly reinforced the importance of lineage and dynasty, but it did not render the Riurikids impervious to change. The princes responded to the internal and external challenges with a number of experiments in ideology. Yet modification of the tamga and currency, radical alliances with Rome, intermarriages with foreign ruling families, and even outright usurpation did not result in long-lasting changes, and dual administration appears to have been the only viable form of government during this stage of East Slavic history. The reign of Yaroslav the Wise, traditionally referred to as the “golden age” of Kievan Rus', came as a result of a brutal fratricide; the attempt to consolidate power in the northeast by Andrei Bogoliubskii ended in his assassination; and so on.

90 An exception is Bartold, V. V., Bulliet, Richard W., and Cahen, Claude, Mouvements Populaires et Autonomisme Urbain dans L'asie Musulmane du Moyen Âge (Leiden: Brill, 1959)Google Scholar.

91 Komatsu, Hisao, “Central Asia,” in Haneda, Masashi and Miura, Toru, eds., Islamic Urban Studies: Historical Review and Perspectives (London: Kegan Paul International, 1994), 281–328Google Scholar.

92 Regarding transmission of historical knowledge among the Ilkhanid, Timurid, and Safawid historians, also instructive are Wood, John E., “The Rise of Timūrid Historiography,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 46, 2 (1987): 81–108CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Ayalon, David, “The Great Yāsa of Chingiz Khān: A Reexamination,” Studia Islamica, 33 (1971): 97–140CrossRefGoogle Scholar; 34 (1971): 151–80; 36 (1972): 113–58; and 38 (1973): 107–56. Richard Bulliet's use of biographical dictionaries of Nishapur proved very effective, but so far no such sources from Mawera'n-Nahr have surfaced, with the exception of the incomplete al-Nasafī's al-qand fī ḏikr-i ‘ulamā’-i Samarqand (Tehran: Daftar-i Nashr-i Mīrās-i Maktūb, 1999)Google Scholar; and a more recent Uzbek edition (Tashkent: Ŭzbekiston Millij Ėnciklopedijasi Davlat Ilmij Našriëti, 2001). This does not, of course, mean that these did not exist. Shahab Ahmed examined al-Faryabi's bibliography and was able to reconstruct the intellectual and geographical borders of Transoxianian intellectuals, in “Mapping the World of a Scholar in Sixth/Twelfth Century Bukhāra: Regional Tradition in Medieval Islamic Scholarship as Reflected in a Bibliography,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 120, 1 (2000): 24–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar. With the exception of the three waqf documents mentioned, sources on land tenure and religious endowments that provide a vivid picture of everyday life in Central Asia are not available until about the sixteenth century. See Ivanov, P. P., Khoziaistvo Dzhuibarskikh sheikhov (Moscow: Akademiia Nauk SSSR, 1954)Google Scholar.

93 For “urban” aspects of Islam, see Elverskog, Johan, Islam and Buddhism on the Silk Road (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Two important works that sketch the main lines of the debate on the Islamic city are: The City in the Islamic World, Jayyusi, Salma K., general ed., Holod, Renata, Petruccioli, Attilio, and Raymond, André, special eds., vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 2008)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Bonine, M. E., Ehlers, E., Krafft, T., and Stöber, G., eds., The Middle Eastern City and Islamic Urbanism: An Annotated Bibliography of Western Literature (Bonn: Ferd. Dümmlers Verlag, 1994)Google Scholar.

94 See Chekhovich, O. D., “Gorodskoe samoupravlenie v Srednei Azii feodal'nogo perioda,” in Tovarno-denezhnye otnosheniia na Blizhnem i Srednem Vostoke v epokhu srednevekov'ia. (Moscow: Nauka, 1979)Google Scholar; Bol'shakov, O. G., Srednevekovyi gorod Blizhnego Vostoka, VII–seredina XIII v.: Sotsial'no-ekonomicheskie otnosheniia (Moscow: Nauka, 1984)Google Scholar.

95 Hourani, Albert, “Recent Research,” in Hourani, A. and Stern, S. M., eds., The Islamic City: A Colloquium (Oxford: Cassirer, 1970), 13–15Google Scholar. Some major architectural and structural differences between the “Iranian” (that is Eastern Iranian and Central Asian) and Mediterranean cities are emphasized by Attilio Petruccioli, Lisa Golombek, and Heinz Gaube, in City in the Islamic World, vol. 2.

96 Tsugitaka, Sato, ed., Islamic Urbanism in Human History: Political Power and Social Networks (London: Kegan Paul International, 1997)Google Scholar, particularly the essays by Toru Miura, James A. Reilly, and Diane Singerman. Also see the critique of the “Muslim” city by Raymond, André, “The Spatial Organization of the City,” in Jayyusi, Salma K., general ed., Holod, Renata, Petruccioli, Attilio, and Raymond, André, special eds., The City in the Islamic World, vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 47–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

97 Hodgson, Venture of Islam, 65–66.

98 It is unclear if the pattern of converting one's possessions into waqf was a widespread practice outside the Seljuq domains. An absence of written evidence from Transoxiana prevents an unconditional extension of the paradigm to Central Asia. But, since it is precisely there that the amīr-a'yān system emerged in the first place, one must ask if other forces were in play.

99 Hodgson, Venture of Islam, 45–52. See also Lambton, Ann, Continuity and Change in Medieval Persia (Albany: Bibliothca Persica, 1988), 223–25Google Scholar.

100 According to Hodgson, this was due to cultural differences between the Persian and Semitic populations of the two regions (Venture of Islam, 70). Although he warned against the tendency to view the accomplishments of Islamic culture through a lens of “Persian” genius, the notion of Turkic inferiority continues to inform historical research. See Safi, Omid, The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam: Negotiating Ideology and Religious Inquiry (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006)Google Scholar; and the review by DeWeese, Devin in Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76, 3 (2008): 806CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

101 Dalewski, Z., “Vivat princeps in eternum! Sacrality of Ducal power in Poland in the Earlier Middle Ages,” in ‘Azīz ‘Azmah and Bak, Jànos M., eds., Monotheistic Kingship: The Medieval Variants (Budapest: Central European University, 2004), 215–31Google Scholar; E. Nemerkényi, “The Religions Ruler in the Institutions of St. Stephen of Hungary,” in ibid., 231–49. The importation of Magdeburg laws to Poland must be kept in mind, of course, but this development took place during the fourteenth century. It also must be noted that violent popular outbursts were not limited to Rus’ and Transoxiana. The participation of city mobs in politics is a well-known phenomenon in world history, particularly during times of famine, epidemics, and the like. Just as grain crises of the first half of the tenth century led to crowd movements and looting in Baghdad, the disillusioned population of Constantinople forced emperor Andronikos Comnenus out of the city and replaced him with Isaac Angelos in 1185. But these examples, cited here for their geographical proximity to the regions under consideration, were not part of a pattern and are not representative of a coherent and organized force strong enough to rival rulers and influence their decisions on a regular basis. Or, as R. Bulliet put it, “…the legal status of the city is not a point of departure as it is in the study of medieval European towns. The city was not subject to the ruler's law nor the ruler to the city's; both were subject to God's law. What is a point of departure is the question of who was empowered to apply God's law” (Patricians of Nishapur, 62).

102 The irrigation systems of Transoxiana have been cited as evidence of state structures. But recent research has confirmed that the digging of the canals had little to do with the ruling dynasties. See Stride, Rondelli, and Mantellini, “Canals vs. Horses.” Jürgen Paul came to a similar conclusion by demonstrating that with the rare exception of “imperial” dams, the government did not control or even maintain irrigation systems (Herrscher, 64).

103 “Then, when the town has been built and is all finished, as the builder saw fit and as the climatic and geographical conditions required, the life of the dynasty is the life of the town. If the dynasty is of short duration, life in the town will stop at the end of the dynasty. Its civilization will recede, and the town will fall into ruins.” The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, Rosenthal, Franz, trans. (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1958)Google Scholar, vol. 2, 235–36.

104 Porphyrogenitus, Constantine, De Administrando Imperio, Moravscik, J., ed., Jenkins, R.J.H., trans., Dumbarton Oaks Texts, vol. I (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Center for Byzantine Studies, 1967), 124–25Google Scholar. Similarly, Scandinavian sources do not mention kings or princes of Rus', with the exceptions of Vladimir and Yaroslav, and refer instead to “Gardariki,” meaning “the land of the cities.” The principal urban centers are Holmgard, Kǽnugard, Palteskia, Moramar, Rostofa, and Surdalar—standing for Novgorod, Kiev, Polotsk, Murom, Rostov, and Suzdal', respectively. Lind, “Russo-Byzantine Treaties,” 366–67.

105 Franz Rosenthal, for example, wrote, “The Iranian east possessed a flourishing secular, local historiography … [which is] an impressive monument to Iranian patriotism”; quoted in P. Pourshariati, “Local Historiography,” 138.

106 Andrew Humphrey, cited in Melville, Charles, “Persian Local Histories: Views from the Wings,” Iranian Studies 33, 1–2 (2000): 7–14CrossRefGoogle Scholar, here 12. Charles Halperin addressed the issue indirectly in his discussion of the “land” and its meanings in medieval Rus' chronicles. See his, “The Concept of the Russian Land from Ninth to the Fourteenth Centuries,” Russian History 2, 1 (1975): 29–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and “Novgorod and the “Novgorodian Land,” Cahiers du Monde Russe 40, 3 (1999): 345–64Google Scholar; and his more recent, “National Identity in Premodern Rus.”

107 Pourshariati, “Local Historiography,” 138.

108 Shahab Ahmed addressed these questions in relation to Transoxiana; see his “Mapping the World.”

109 Charles Melville, “Persian Local Histories,” 12–13. Another influential theory was developed by Roy Mottahedeh in relation to the shu'ūbīya debate. He proposed that one should distinguish between a group of people linked together by their place of residence (sha'b) and those claiming common ancestry (qabīlah). It would then follow that the former developed in the ‘Ajam, or among the non-Arabs, and the latter specifically among the Arabs. In some ways, this argument may be extended to the western edge of the Eurasian steppe and used to distinguish between the genealogical claims of the Riurikids and the urban population that expressed its identity in territorial terms. On the other hand, the distinction also echoes earlier “ethnic” divisions with all their derivatives between “Persian” and “Semitic” cultural heritages. For a good summary of Mottahedeh's thesis, see Pourshariati, P., “Local Historiography,” 139–40. For the full argument, see Mottahedeh's “The Shu'ubiyah Controversy and the Social History of Early Islamic Iran,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 7, 2 (1976): 161–82Google Scholar.

110 Fedorov-Davydov, G. A., The Silk Road and the Cities of the Golden Horde (Berkeley: Zinat Press. 2001)Google Scholar, 37. For introductory remarks on the Golden Horde's conflicting historiographies, see Schamiloglu's, U. “The Golden Horde,” The Turks 2 (2002): 819–34Google Scholar.

111 Abu-Lughod, Janet, Before European Hegemony: The World System AD 1250–1350 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 58–59Google Scholar, 70, 79–81.

112 For an excellent overview of the Italian “city-states,” see Tabak, Faruk, The Waning of the Mediterranean, 1550–1870: A Geohistorical Approach (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008)Google Scholar.