CHAPTER V.

WHO ARE THE TATARS?

Origin of the Tatars—Original common stock of the Mongol, Toungous, Turk, and Ugrian groups of nations—Short account of each of these—The Tatars belong to the Turk race—Their royal race, the Gerays, descendants of Zingis Khan, through Tóktamish—Discord in the kingdom of Kiptchak for one hundred years—Kingdom of Crimea founded by Mahomet II.—Held tributary to Constantinople till conquest by the Russians—The conditions—Popular notion that the Gerays are next heirs to the throne of Constantinople—Selim Geray—Constitution of Crimea—Power of the Khans with the Grand Sultan—The Sultans, or royal family, of the Gerays—The wives of the Khans—Character of the Tatars—Their manner of living—Their fidelity.

After the account given in the last chapter of the capital of the Tatars, it will be perhaps interesting to inquire a little into the history of this people, who have established themselves for so many hundred years in the Crimea, who still form the bulk of its population, and, although their former warlike spirit seems quite to have disappeared, are now rendering our army important assistance by bringing it provisions.

To gain a clear idea of their antecedents, we must for a few moments travel back into very early times.

There seems to have been in a prehistoric period of time some common stock from which four great groups of nations have descended, the Mongol, the Tungousian, the Turk, and the Ugrian, called also the Finn, or Tchud. The Mongols occupied a comparatively small territory till the time of their national hero Zingis Khan, when they first occur in history. Even in his armies and those of his successors, most of his soldiers were Turks, while the captains were Mongolians.

They are now confined principally to the country northward of the Great Wall of China, and westward of the Mandshu country.

The Tungusians extend on the east from the Yenisei to the Sea of Okhotsk, and on the north from the coast of the Icy Sea, between the Yenisei and the Lena, to the Yellow Sea on the south-east. Of this race, the only division which has exercised an influence on the history of the world is that of the Mandshus, the present rulers of China.

The Turks, the most widely extended of the four races, and one of the most considerable of the families of the world, occupy as a continuous population the vast extent of country from the neighbourhood of Lake Baikal, in Siberia, near the northern frontier of China, to the eastern boundaries of the Greek and Slavonic countries in Europe, and along the northern coast of Africa to the vicinity of the Pillars of Hercules. One isolated tribe, that of the Yakuts, dwell in the remote east, upon the river Lena, and the coasts of the Icy Sea.

The Ugrians left the great eastern plateau of Asia, and settled in the north-west of Asia and the north of Europe, at a period long antecedent to all historical documents. They extend as a continuous population from the Yenisei on the east to Norway on the west. The eastern branches of this race are the Voguls and the Ostiacks, between the Ural Mountains and the Yenisei, inhabiting the country formerly called Ugrien, Jugrien, or Jugoria, and the most important of the western portions of them are the Finns and the Lappes. The Magyars of Hungary are also members of the Ugrian race, and, in the ninth century of the Christian era, descended from the southern part of the Uralian Mountains, and settled on the plains of the Lower Danube. They called themselves Magyars, but the Russians gave them the name of Ugri, and this is the name which has been corrupted into Ungri and Hungary. The Magyars are the only people of the Ugrian race who have exercised any influence upon the history of the world.

From the third of these races (viz., the Turkish) are sprung the Tatars[68] of Crimea, who are a remnant of the great nation which overran a large part of Asia and Europe in the thirteenth century; and the princes of the House of Geray, who ruled the Crimea down to the time of the Russian conquest, and several branches of which still exist in Russia and Circassia, are the lineal descendants of the great conqueror, Zingis or Gengis Khan. This mighty potentate, who, at the age of thirteen, was left as the chief of a small tribe dependent on the kingdom of the Niu Tchè Tatars in the northern portion of China, and whose name was then Temouchin, commenced his career by defeating the rebellious nobles of his tribe, and boiling the principal malcontents in seventy cauldrons filled with hot water. By his large views, and his skilful use of the superstitious tendencies of his people, he induced the chiefs of the neighbouring tribes to obey him, and a holy hermit saluted him as the master of the world, by the name of Zingis Khan.[69] He conquered China, upset the flourishing kingdom of the Seljuk Turks in Khaurism, and then his generals advanced by Derbend and the shores of the Caspian, and defeated the Russian princes at the battle of the Kalka, near Mariopol, on the Sea of Azof (1224). They pursued the flying Russians to the Dniepr, and then returned to Zingis Khan in Great Bukharía.

Ten years after the death of Zingis Khan in 1227, Batou Khan, his nephew, conquered the whole of Russia (1237), and the country remained subject to the Tatars for about 150 years, till at the celebrated battle of Koulikof on the Don (1380) the Russians made the first step towards throwing off their subjection, and the black standard of Dmitri Donskoi waved over the slaughtered hosts of the Khan Mamai.[70]

The empire of Zingis Khan had been divided at his death, and Tamerlane now ruled over the two Bukharías. Russia depended on the kingdom of Kiptchak, which, soon after the battle of Koulikof, fell to the lot of Tóktamish, a general of Tamerlane,[71] who gained it by defeating Mamai, at another famous battle in the vicinity of Mariopol. The celebrated kingdom of Kiptchak comprehended the Steppes which extend between the Caspian and Black Seas, between the Caucasus and the Don in one part, and between the Volga and the Emba in another.

Tóktamish was conquered afterwards by the Ouzbeg Idekou (1395), another general of the great Tamerlane, against whom the khan of Kiptchak had revolted, and from Tóktamish descend the Gerays of Crimea, and from Idekou the khans of the Nogai Tatars. Nearly a hundred years of civil war followed in Kiptchak after the victory of Idekou, and at the end of it we find Mengli Geray seated on the throne of Crimea (1478), which he consented to hold tributary to Mahomet II., the conqueror of Constantinople. The kingdom of Crimea was therefore the remnant of the kingdom of Kiptchak, as this latter was only a small portion of the vast empire of Zingis Khan. At the time of the interference of Mahomet II. there was terrible disorder in the affairs of Little Tatary, and the state was on the verge of ruin. Three khans reigned at once, and Mengli Geray, who had the best right to the throne, was dispossessed and obliged to retire to Mangoup, which at that time was in the possession of the Goths and the Genoese. Mahomet fearing lest the latter people, who were masters of the greater portion of the Crimea, and the Muscovites, who had already seized several provinces of the empire of Kiptchak, should unite to divide the rest of it, wished to assist the Tatar princes, and to put an end to the dissensions which must have brought about the total destruction of the monarchy. He, therefore, drove the Genoese from the Crimea, took from them the cities of Mangoup and Caffa, and brought prisoner to Constantinople the dethroned khan, Mengli Geray, whom he afterwards restored on the following conditions:

1st. The khan swore for himself and his descendants submission and inviolable fidelity to the Porte; and he consented that the khans should be placed on the throne and removed by the Grand Sultan at his pleasure, and that they should make peace and war for the interests of the Ottoman empire.

On the other hand, the Sultan conceded—1st. That only a prince of the race of Zingis Khan should be placed on the throne of Little Tatary.

2nd. That he would never, under any circumstances, put to death any prince of the house of Geray.

3rd. That the Gerays should never be obliged to deliver up refugees who took shelter in any of their dominions.

4th. That the khutbah or prayer of the khan should be read in the mosques after that offered up for the Grand Sultan.

5th. That, if the khan made a particular request to the Porte, it should not be refused.

6th. That the khan should carry five tails on his standard when he went to battle, which was one less than the Grand Sultan himself, and two more than the highest rank of pashas.

Lastly. That in time of war the Porte should allow 120 purses, or about 12,000_l._, for each campaign, towards the expenses of the khan’s guard; and 80 purses, or nearly 10,000_l._, for the Kapikouli Mirzas, or the immediate vassals of the khan, who were not of noble birth.

There was a fixed opinion in Peyssonel’s time, and it exists down to the present hour, that the family of Geray are the next heirs to the throne of Constantinople, should the family of the Sultan become extinct; but Peyssonel questioned upon this point the khan himself, and his ministers, and the learned men, and they all agreed in saying that no such right existed, and that the opinion took its rise in a vulgar error.

It is probable that it originated in the following manner:—Hadji Selim Geray Khan reigned at the end of the seventeenth century, and was a great prince—great as a king, a general, a soldier, and a man. This prince, having beaten in a single campaign the Germans, the Poles, and the Muscovites, saved the standard of the faith when it was on the point of being taken, and supported the falling fortunes of the Ottoman empire.

Upon this the Janissaries wished to raise him to the throne, but he thanked them, and declared himself incapable of violating the engagements to the Porte, which his ancestors had contracted for him, and that he should consider himself unworthy of them if he mounted the throne of Turkey by treachery. Having appeased the seditious Janissaries, he asked but one favour, and that was to be allowed to visit Mecca. He was the first Tatar prince to whom this favour was accorded, for their birth was considered so illustrious, that the Sultans were afraid of their rousing the people of Arabia, and declaring themselves the successors of the Khalifs.

Selim Geray[72] was so much respected in Turkey, that the Sultan called him his father, and, in gratitude, declared that the throne of Tatary should be filled by princes of his branch of the Geray family alone. The khans of Crimea used to feel the irksomeness of their dependence on the Porte, which kept its ascendant by the favour of the nobles, who were very powerful in Crimea, and by the religious feeling of the people, who recognised the Grand Sultan as the successor of the Khalifs and the depositary of the keys of Mecca.

The power of the khans of Crimea was by no means unlimited, and rather resembled a constitutional monarchy than a despotism. They drew no revenue from the land nor from their subjects, and could not alter the privileges of the nobles; and, by the fundamental constitution of the monarchy, no noble could be punished without the participation of the beys, or heads of the great houses assembled in council. Bengly Geray, after having punished the nobles who were concerned in the revolt of Shireen Bey, and contributed to the expulsion of Seadet Geray, wished to diminish the power of the nobles, and formed a plan for removing the Beys from their great hereditary offices, and making his vizir chief of all the nobility. The nobles of the Crimea and of the Nogais all opposed this proposition, and the khan seeing his danger, abandoned his intentions.

The influence of the khan with the Porte was very great, particularly in time of war. When Devlet Geray was at Adrianople, and had taken leave of the Grand Sultan, and was preparing to mount his horse, he suddenly stopped, with one foot in the stirrup and the other on the stone that helped him to mount, and the Sultan in surprise asked him what delayed his departure. He received for answer, that the khan would not mount his horse till the head of Baltagi Mehemet Pasha, the grand vizir, with whom he was greatly displeased on account of the treaty he had made on the Pruth, was brought to him. The minister, as well as the reis effendi, were executed, and their heads sent to the khan.

The khan was sometimes sent for to Constantinople to consult with on affairs of state, and he was then received like a king. The vizir and all the grandees went out to receive him, he sat down and took his coffee with the Sultan, and, like him, wore the aigrette, and received the homage of the Janissaries.

His forces were very considerable, and he could easily raise an army of 200,000 men. This he could do, although his revenues were very small, and did not exceed 160,000_l._ a year, because as the nobles marched with their vassals, and each soldier carried with him provisions for three months, the support of his army cost him very little.

His style in writing to foreign powers, except the Sultan, was—Geray, by the grace of God, Emperor of the Tatars, the Circassians, and the Daghestan.

All the princes of the reigning house had the title of Sultan, and were not shut up, but enjoyed complete liberty. Some held great charges in the kingdom, and others lived in Roumelia on lands granted to them by the Porte. There were generally some in Circassia, which was the country to which they often fled when they had any cause for discontent, and where, by raising the warlike population of the mountains, and marching against the khan, or making excursions on the Russian territory, they sometimes caused the khan much annoyance. They all received pensions from the Porte, and were greatly respected by the whole nation of the Tatars.

The family was divided into two branches, of which the one are the descendants of the good prince Hadji Selim, and the other are a distant branch, called Tchoban Gerays, or the Shepherd Gerays. It used to be the custom of the khan, and of all the princes of the house of Tatary, always to choose as their wives Circassian slaves, and on this account the mothers of the khans were little respected, even by the prince himself, and after the death of their husbands they lived in the hareems of their sons, and were not admitted to their table, and even remained standing till they received permission to sit down.

The Tatars in the days when they were a formidable people are described by a French officer who served in Poland against them, as of middle stature, strong, with thick limbs, short neck, broad face, their eyes small, but very black, and opening wide, their complexion tawny, hardened to all sort of labour and pains from their very infancy. They were dressed in sheepskins, and carried with them on their journey a steel to strike fire, and a mariner’s compass and a sun-dial to guide them through the desert plains where there is no beaten way or path. “They ride very short,” says the officer, “like all the Eastern nations, and their horses, which they call bac-mates, were long, lean, and ugly, with the hair of their neck thick, and great tails, which hang down to the ground; but they are swift and indefatigable in travelling, being able to carry their riders whole days’ journeys without drawing bit; and they will feed at all times, and when in winter the earth is covered with snow, which is the time when the Tatars make their incursions, they live either upon what is under the snow, or upon the branches or sprouts of trees, pine tops, straw, or anything they can find.”

The Tatars hardly ever used bread, but made a pottage of millet, and ordinarily ate horse-flesh, boiled when they were at leisure, but just heated under their saddles and eaten raw when on a march, and the only sauce they had was the froth of the flesh from this primitive way of cooking it. They always had extra horses with them for food.

They had the highest character for integrity, and very few nations were to be found less vicious. Besides their continence, they were extremely sincere and faithful, and had no thieves or false witnesses amongst them; they did little injustice or violence, and lived in union and great tranquillity. The marvellous fidelity of the captive Tatars in Poland was celebrated. They never failed to return when they were released on their parole, and the Polish gentlemen rather trusted the young Tatars in their service with the keys of their money and jewels than any others of their household.[73]

The Tatars can hardly now be said to form a nation. After the conquest of Crimea by the Russians, all those who did not wish to stay under the Russian sceptre were allowed to emigrate, and many availed themselves of the permission and retired into Turkey, so that there are now scarcely any remaining in the country west of the Dniepr, and their number has much diminished in the Crimea.

The influx of fashionable people to the southern coast of the Crimea, and the wealth they have brought there, has corrupted the lower orders of the Tatars, and made the nobles shrink in haughty seclusion to the mountains. There the poorer classes, unlike the Tatars of the southern coast and the plains, retain their rough and primitive independence, and the rich can peaceably pass their lives without being shocked by the sight of their masters.

I will conclude this chapter by borrowing the account given by Madame Hommaire de Hell of her visit to the Princess Adel Bey, a celebrated Tatar beauty, who still lives near Baktchéserai. She rode for several hours from the latter place through a lovely country, intersected with streams, valleys, and numerous orchards, to Karolez, the village of the princess, lost in the mountains, in the valley of the same name. It is situated near Mangoup, whence there is a glorious view of the mountainous parts of the Crimea and Sevastopol, and Balaclava, and the sea shining beyond them; and the abundance of its waters, and the mountains that encompass the valley with a line of battlemented walls, make it a favourite spot with the lovers of natural beauty.

Here Madame de Hell and her husband were received at the guest-house of the princess by a double line of richly-dressed servants, drawn up in the vestibule to receive them, and they were conducted into a saloon arranged in the fashion of the East, with gaily painted walls and red silk divans.

Thus far an ungrudging hospitality received every distinguished guest alike, but Madame de Hell was allowed an interview with the princess in her own apartments, a favour which has been permitted to very few ladies.

From her account it appears that Eastern beauty still deserves its reputation, and that the ancient manners and dress are still to be found unaltered in the mountains of the Crimea. Admitted into a fairy apartment looking out on a terraced garden, “a curtain was suddenly raised at the end of the room, and a woman of striking beauty entered,” says Madame de Hell, “dressed in a rich costume. She advanced to me with an air of remarkable dignity, took both my hands, kissed me on the two cheeks, and sat down beside me, making many demonstrations of friendship. She wore a great deal of rouge; her eyelids were painted black, and met over the nose, giving her countenance a certain sternness, which nevertheless did not destroy its pleasing effect. A furred velvet vest fitted tight to her still elegant figure, and altogether her appearance surpassed what I had conceived of her beauty. After some time, when I offered to go, she checked me with a very graceful gesture, and said eagerly, ‘Pastoi, pastoi,’ which is Russian for ‘Stay, stay,’ and clapped her hands several times. A young girl entered at the signal, and by her mistress’s order threw open a folding-door, and immediately I was struck dumb with surprise and admiration by a most brilliant apparition. Imagine, reader, the most exquisite sultanas of whom poetry and painting have ever tried to convey an idea, and still your conception will fall far short of the enchanting models I had then before me. There were three of them, all equally beautiful and graceful. Two were clad in tunics of crimson brocade, adorned in front with broad gold lace; the tunics were open, and disclosed beneath them cashmere robes, with very tight sleeves terminating in gold fringes. The youngest wore a tunic of azure blue brocade, with silver ornaments: this was the only difference between her dress and that of her sisters. All three had magnificent black hair escaping in countless tresses from a fez of silver filagree, set like a diadem over their ivory foreheads; they wore gold embroidered slippers, and wide trousers drawn close at the ancle. I had never beheld skins so dazzlingly fair, eyelashes so long, or so delicate a bloom of youth. The calm repose that sat on the countenances of these lovely creatures had never been disturbed by any profane glance. No look but their mother’s had ever told them they were beautiful; and this thought gave them an inexpressible charm in my eyes. It is not in our Europe where women, exposed to the gaze of crowds, so soon addict themselves to coquetry, that the imagination could conceive such a type of beauty. The features of our young girls are too soon altered by the vivacity of their impressions to allow the eye of the artist to discover in them that divine charm of purity and ignorance with which I was so struck in beholding my Tatar princesses. After embracing me they retired to the end of the room, where they remained standing in those graceful Oriental attitudes which no woman in Europe could imitate. A dozen attendants, muffled in white muslin, were gathered round the door, gazing with respectful curiosity. Their profiles, shown in relief on a dark ground, added to the picturesque character of the scene. This delightful vision lasted an hour. When the princess saw that I was decided on going away, she signified to me by signs that I should go and see the garden; but though grateful to her for this further mark of attention, I preferred immediately rejoining my husband, being impatient to relate to him all the details of this interview, with which I was completely dazzled.”[74]