from Encyclopedia of miracles, mysteries and secrets
GOLDEN HORSES OF KHAN BATYA - legendary treasures, exact location
which are still unknown. The history of horses goes something like this: After
after Batu Khan ravaged Ryazan and Kyiv, he returned to the lower reaches of the Volga and with
with the help of skilled craftsmen gathered in the countries subject to and subjugated by him
(among whom there were Russians) built here, to the surprise of all the neighboring
peoples in the middle of the steppes their capital Sarai - a beautiful city with palaces,
mosques, running water, fountains and shady gardens. Batu ordered all
turn the tribute collected for the year into gold, and from this gold cast two
horses. The order was carried out exactly, but rumors still diverge
the question is whether those horses were hollow or completely golden. Cast
shiny horses with glowing ruby eyes were placed at the entrance to the capital
Golden Horde Khanate at the city gates. Khans changed, but they were golden
the statues continued to represent the power of the state.
When the capital was moved to the new Sarai (near the present village of Tsarev,
Volgograd region), built already by Khan Berke, was then transported and
golden horses. When Mamai became khan, the previous prosperity of the khanate
the end has come. Russian troops defeated Mamaev's army on the Kulikovo field, and
Mamai was forced to flee...
The fate of the golden horses is not reliably known. Legends say that one
the horse was buried along with the body of Mamai, the exact location of the grave
unknown. They say that somewhere on one of the hills near Akhtuba [in the 6th volume
capital historical and geographical work "Russia" it is mentioned that
in the village of Rastegaevka near Prishib there are several “Mamaev mounds”,
in one of which the “living Mamai” sleeps]. In all the many variants
retellings of this legend (which are told by old people in Leninsk, the former
Prishibe, Kharaboly, Sasykolye, Cherny Yar, Selitrenny and other villages
Trans-Volga region) there is only one golden horse (and Mamai is guarding it). But
where is the other one?
As old people in the Trans-Volga Cossack villages used to tell (which is near
Astrakhan Way), pursuing the retreating Horde Cossack troops
the patrols became so bold that they began to penetrate in small groups
deep into the horde's territory, which is shrinking every day. One such squad
Taking advantage of the panic in the enemy camp, he broke straight into the capital Sarai. And How
Cossack Alekseevich once told me that this detachment captured the city for entire
few hours. [Lashilin B. “It was.” Nizhne-Volzhskoe bookstore
publishing house, Volgograd, 1982, p. 12]. Now it is difficult to say whether there were
were the golden horses the real target of the raid or were they accidentally caught by the Cossacks
eyes. In any case, it is pointless to plan such a daring action in advance.
Steal heavy statues, which are the pride of the khan and the entire nation,
tantamount to suicide. However, the daring Cossack patrol broke off
the base of one of the golden horses and turned back. Overloaded convoy
moved very slowly, so the Horde had time to come to their senses and
organize a chase. Sensing something was wrong, the Cossacks turned around and accepted the unequal
the battle. Those who were catching up were hundreds of times more numerous than those who were catching up, so the result of the battle was
a foregone conclusion: all the Cossacks died, no one surrendered, the Horde horsemen
many times more died. But despite the losses suffered, the Horde
and did not return the golden horse.
The Horde never learned the truth, for not one of the Cossacks surrendered and
did not betray his comrades. There was no statue near the mountain of corpses. Far away from her
The Cossacks didn’t have time to take her away, which means they hid her and the rest
the treasure is somewhere nearby. Burying in the steppe - this also takes time.
So they drowned?...
So where is the first and where is the second golden horse? Several centuries later this
question and no answers...
* * * Directions to the search sites for the Golden Horses of Batu: Exact location in
The Astrakhan and Volgograd regions are not yet known. Currently
Members of the
"Cosmopoisk".
The horses of Batu Khan remain the golden dream of treasure hunters. According to “chest hunters,” the Khan’s treasure is buried on the banks of the Akh-Tuba River, just below the city of Leninsk, Volgograd Region. One of the Akhtuba mounds allegedly contains golden horses with ruby eyes. They were cast from gold collected by the Baskaks from the residents of Ryazan and Kiev. The golden horses of Batu were in the capital of the Golden Horde until the army of Khan Mamai was defeated on the Kulikovo Field. After that, the huge golden horses disappeared. They could not take them far, the horses were very heavy. Treasure hunters are therefore inclined to trust the version that one of the Akhtuba mounds became a “stable” for Batu’s horses.
The legend of the golden horses begins after Batu Khan sacked Ryazan and Kyiv. Returning to the lower reaches of the Volga, Batu built a beautiful capital city here with mosques, palaces, fountains, luxurious gardens, and water supply. Skilled craftsmen and builders from different countries conquered by Batu worked on the creation of the city. When the capital of Sarai-Batu was built, the khan ordered all the tribute collected during the year to be turned into gold and two full-length horses were cast from it. Batu's horses with large rubies instead of eyes personified the greatness of the Golden Horde state and stood like guards at the city gates, at the entrance to the capital.
After the death of Batu, his brother Berke, who became khan, moved the horses to his capital - Berke-Saray (near the village of Tsarev, Volgograd region). The power of the Horde state weakened with the accession of Khan Mamai to the throne, and after the defeat of Mamaev’s army on the Kulikovo Field, the Tatar-Mongol yoke came to an end. From this time on, the fate of Batu’s golden horses is unknown. According to legends and stories of local old-timers of the Volga region, one of the horses was buried along with the body of Mamai in one of the many burial mounds of Akhtuba.
Ruins of Berke-Saray
But where is the other horse then?
According to the stories of old people in the Trans-Volga Cossack villages, one day a Cossack detachment, taking advantage of the panic that arose in the enemy’s country, broke straight into the capital of Sarai, and broke off the head of one of Batu’s golden horses, an attempt on which meant signing one’s death warrant. Having turned back, the overloaded Cossack convoy was unable to move quickly, and the Horde had time to come to their senses and give chase. The Cossacks accepted an unequal battle, and all died, preferring death to captivity. However, the Horde could not regain the horse statue, since it was not among the corpses of the Cossacks and the destroyed convoy. Apparently, the Cossacks hid the gold loot somewhere nearby. However, they were unlikely to succeed in burying the statue - it would have taken a lot of time. Probably the second golden horse was drowned.
At different times, rumors appeared and disappeared that Batu’s golden horses had been found. Currently, these valuable artifacts are considered unfound, attracting treasure hunters hungry for gold, jewelry and adventure.
Two horses made of pure gold, weighing 15 tons each, are on the list of the most wanted treasures in Russia
Mentions of giant horse statues, entirely made of precious metal and decorating the entrance to the capital of the Golden Horde, are found in many chronicles. But no one knows where they went. For several centuries, scientists and treasure hunters have been trying to figure out where to look for the famous golden Arabian horses of Batu Khan.
In memory of your pet
Khan of the Golden Horde, Batu, aka Batu Khan, the conqueror of many cities and nations, in the 1240s decided to perpetuate his own achievements. With the help of the best craftsmen, he built the capital of his empire and called it Sarai-Batu. Gardens were laid out in the city and fountains were installed. And when Batu’s beloved Arabian horse died, he ordered his statue to be cast from pure gold.
A bell-maker who was captured during the attack on Kyiv in 1240 was entrusted with making the first statue. According to legend, the life-size figure of a horse took about 15 tons of gold - the entire tribute collected by the Horde in a year. When one statue was already adorning the gates of the capital, the khan decided to erect a second one for symmetry.
Steppe and steppe all around
The first mention of golden horses in literature appears in 1254, in a book by a Frenchman Guillaume de Rubrucka"Journey to Eastern Countries." He writes that the statues blinded everyone approaching the city with their radiance. The horses' eyes were made of rubies. Seeing them for the first time from afar, the ambassador at first even thought that a fire had started in the city.
After Batu's death, horses continued to decorate the entrance to the city until Batu's brother took the place of ruler. Berke Khan built a new capital - also Sarai, which was also called Sarai-Berke. The statues were moved there. And here different sources disagree on what happened next.
According to the first version, one of the horses was placed in the grave along with Khan Berke, under the wall of the city he built. According to the second, the horse rests with Mamaem, whose exact burial place has not been established. But there are several options for the location of potentially “Mamaev” mounds. Their geography is vast: from the steppes between the Volga and Don to the Crimea.
The fate of the second horse is even more mysterious. Legend has it that after numerous military defeats and the weakening of the Golden Horde, small Cossack detachments began to make forays into its borders. It was the Cossacks who allegedly reached Sarai-Berke and stole the remaining statue. But because of its weight, they were unable to move quickly, and they were overtaken by the Horde pursuit. All the Cossacks died, but they did not have a horse with them. As treasure hunters suggest, most likely the golden horse was hidden somewhere in the steppe.
In any case, at the end of the 14th century Saray-Berke was destroyed Tamerlane. And the trace of the golden statues disappeared completely. It is quite possible that they could have been taken as a trophy by the troops of the famous commander.
Underground or underwater?
Although the very fact of the existence of golden horses is quite controversial, modern treasure hunters, armed with technological innovations, do not give up trying to find Batu’s treasures.
Most researchers of the issue believe that the grave of one of the khans, in which lies a golden horse, should be looked for on the banks of the Akhtuba River, downstream from the city of Leninsk, Volgograd region. There are many mounds there.
The second statue is even more difficult to find; perhaps it was sunk by the Cossacks in one of the steppe rivers. But there is a version that Batu’s horse was hidden underground, because water could have eroded the bottom long ago, and the huge golden statue would have attracted attention with its brilliance. Probably, the second figure could be hidden in the dungeons of Tanais, an ancient city at the mouth of the Don River, located several tens of kilometers from modern Rostov-on-Don, not far from the village of Nedvigovka.
In the second half of the 19th century, newspapers even reported about the sensational discovery of “Batu’s gold” in the territory of what is now the Rostov region, in the Nedvigovka area. Workers involved in the construction of the Rostov-Taganrog railway found an underground passage of the ancient city, and in it were gold coins. Unfortunately, Batu Khan’s horses could not be found at that time. And during the war, the Germans were afraid that the partisans would be able to use the underground passages, so they blew them up. Now the territory of Tanais is a museum-reserve and, quite possibly, soon archaeologists will be able to find new treasures there.
I first heard this legend a long time ago. I heard it in Azov and Rostov, Semikarakorsk and Volgograd. I’ve never been to Astrakhan, but I’ve also heard this legend from Astrakhan residents. This is the legend of the Golden Horse of Genghis Khan. Don't get me wrong, but we are not talking about Batu's two horses and not about Kublai's four.
To the east of the ruins of Sarkel, on the left bank of the river, the name of which in Turkic languages is consonant with the name of the Hunnic leader, in a tent town, more like a nomadic camp, there was a holiday. If you can call it a holiday, an event that brought variety to the everyday life of nomads.
Merchants from the East arrived. In addition to the goods, rare and necessary, they put up for sale several girls, each of whom was considered a rare beauty even in their homeland, and to the steppe people the beauties from the Caucasus and Byzantium seemed a real curiosity.
There were about a dozen and a half people willing to buy a bride. Therefore, it was decided to hold a competition in which the “groom” and the puberty of the bride were simultaneously determined.
It was done like this.
At a signal from the senior merchant, the girls rushed to run into the steppe, and a little later, a horde of horsemen in love. It was necessary to hit the bride with a hat. Lamb hats, similar to Turkmen ones, heavy, and even with wire reinforcement, were a serious “projectile” in the hand of a strong warrior.
The girl who ran last fell, knocked down by a heavy blow from her hat. The merchant took her away, rudely consoling her. It’s too early for this one to get married, let her grow up. Three more were taken away by their suitors.
The last green-eyed Slav turned out to be more agile than her friends. It was difficult for the suitors, with their crooked legs of herdsmen, to catch up with her. Then they organized a living “venter” - a crescent, the edges of which were quite close to the river. Two hats hit the girl at the same time, two horsemen grabbed her by the arms.
An ugly fight took place. The grooms were immediately flogged and forced to their knees. And the green-eyed one quietly moved away from the crowd, improving the moment, ran up to the pier and threw herself into the water. They searched for her for a long time, rummaged along the bottom with poles, gradually going downstream. Then they left this activity. They decided that she had drowned. This has happened to Slavic women before. But the fugitive did not drown. Hiding under the pier, she waited until it was dark and swam to the other side of the river, holding on to a sheaf of reeds that she picked up on the shore. Nomads used such sheaves when crossing rivers. They were waiting for her on the right bank. Even when the merchant caravan approached the crossing, she felt the presence of her relatives, the Don Slavs. More precisely, scouts. There must be a gang somewhere nearby. Most likely, it was led by the Slavic woman’s father. Brothers should also be in the gang. And also, she hoped, among her friends there should be one white-headed one with childish eyes, a thin waist and the arms of a hero. That's exactly what happened. Her father brought the gang, hoping to recapture her back in the steppe. However, it is difficult to pursue nomads in their native element. Only the scouts managed to catch up with the merchants, and only at the end of the journey.
From the moment the girl found herself among her own people, the goal of the campaign was achieved, but it was decided to commit an act of retaliation, so that they would remember how to steal girls.
In the second half of the night the Slavs were already on the left bank. We moved towards the Sacred Tent. Lonely Horde members, awakened by the barking of dogs, were slaughtered and chopped down without pity. There was a fierce battle in and around the tent. They pulled out the Golden Horse, cast in honor of the Spirit of Luck by order of Genghis Khan. And they dragged it to the shore. They loaded us onto the raft and set sail into the darkness. The Horde tried to use their famous long-range bows, but it was difficult to do this in the dark.
On the right bank they divided into several groups and began to go in different directions, mounting horses. The horse was loaded onto a cart and headed towards the Kuma-Manych depression. This route was the most dangerous, so the leader of the gang took mainly relatives and friends into the group.
Then there was a hike. There were battles with the traveling Horde. If the Slavs were stronger in hand-to-hand combat, then the Horde could successfully use long-range bows. Most likely, the Slavs who made a diversionary maneuver all died. And those who survived will never know the burial place of the Golden Horse. And the main group reached a system of lakes, rivers, and swamps stretching from the Caspian Sea to the Don.
They sailed on rafts, mostly at night, less often during the day, but when the Horde patrol discovered them, they sank their horse in a small lake, spotted a place and continued on their way lightly.
When I reached the Don, the speed of movement increased, thanks to the current. We went down the river to Green Island. We decided to spend the night on the island and disappear into the coastal forests at dawn.
The Horde discovered the Slavic camp, and an hour before dawn they attacked, swimming across the channel with blades in their teeth. There was a night battle, cruel and bloody. The Slavs all died. And only White-Head, Green-Eyes and one of the brothers were saved. They swam across the Don, obeying their father’s orders, and found their aunt, the elder sister of the leader of the gang. She was a pagan priestess, one of the last. She owned the secret of the underground passages of the Big Hill, a substantial hill on the right bank. The temple was located underground, hidden from the eyes of the Slav brothers wearing crosses, as well as from the Horde living according to the laws of Islam.
After listening to them, the aunt took a terrible oath from them. The young people swore that they would not reveal the secret of the Golden Horse to any children or relatives. She led them underground. At the beginning it was quite tall, the height of a man, then it narrowed, and at the end there was a hole into which only a thin person could crawl. In the room she gave the last instructions: “The Horde jackals have reliably taken the trail and will soon be here. Sit quietly, try to let your eyes get used to the darkness. My niece and I will light candles at Perun’s, it will be easier for you to see the enemy. Don't swing your clubs, don't jingle your sabers. Remove the heads “affectionately” with Arab cleavers. Take off ten or fifteen heads and leave, strictly this turn. We will meet you there.
Don't worry about the rest of the Horde. The khan will give them to the executioner for the loss of the shrine. Either Perun will rejoice, or there will be a bloody funeral feast for his brother and friends, when dozens of Horde members will go under the curved saber. When it's all over, I'll take you out to my people. And remember the oath, keep your mouth shut so as not to unleash the demon called “human greed.”
The candles were lit. The priestess's heated recitation was heard:
- The Wise Raven, the living embodiment of the Spirit of Luck, flew away into the blue of heaven. The Great Batyrs and the Great Clans will come together in a bloody battle. The Lame Warrior will appear from the east, and the banners of Perun’s Grandsons will rise in the north. Many languages will fall and rise again. But there will be no Horde!
The guys talked in the dark:
-What is she talking about?
- It seems that we have desecrated a large temple of the Horde. It’s the same as losing the Holy Banner in battle.
-Who is the Lame Warrior?
- I don't know yet. But my aunt won’t lie.
The aunt had a substantial supply of weapons, which once belonged to people who were trying to discover the secret of the underground passages. They all died of hunger, getting lost, or died after running into their aunt’s dagger. I chose two cleavers with an unconventional sharpening. She handed it to the guys: “I repeat, a dozen and a half, no more. Then the blood will squish underfoot. Place your heads in a row against this wall, and place your bodies against this one.”
When the first head appeared, it was removed “affectionately,” and the body was jerked into the room, grabbed by the shoulders on both sides. It's the same with the rest. Then the guys went to their aunt's along the indicated route. The aunt led them along the passages for a long time, and finally brought them to the surface.
The young people told their relatives that they were making a diversionary maneuver.
The Horde member who saw the “room of severed heads” went crazy. And the rest decided that they were dealing with evil spirits and returned to the Volga, where they were executed, considering their story to be the fantasy of a frightened person.
Rostov students, assessing the preliminary puberty of their miniature girlfriends, are wondering whether it is possible to knock down their girlfriend by suddenly covering her between the shoulder blades with a mink or, say, nutria cap. And they even came up with a formula: “You can’t knock your hat off, it’s time to get married.”
Experts in myths talk a lot about anomalous phenomena in the Kobyakov settlement area. And they connect this with the presence of ancient temples and burials there. Others believe that the ancient inhabitants of the Lower Don chose places for temples and burials precisely in geopathogenic zones. And treasure hunters, not afraid of anything, are looking for the Golden Horse. Why should they actually be afraid? Beast lizard? In the Don, catfish are found much larger than alligators. An ancient spell? In the catacombs, the accumulation of natural gas mixed with hydrogen sulfide is also quite a dangerous phenomenon. I would like to believe that all treasure hunters are quite professional in their field. At least to such an extent that with the help of a metal detector you can distinguish a piece of gold from a WWII era bomb.
And I want the Wise Raven to never fly away from us into the blue of heaven!
Reviews
The legend of the Lower Don “Golden Horse of Genghis Khan” is the “golden horse” of the author, on which he confidently rides into the Don fiction of our time. Having shown himself in tales from Azov as an observant and humorous author, Yuri Evsigneev in this legend seemed to have climbed to the top of the mound, from which not only the expanses of the Lower Don opened before him, but also a system of rivers, lakes and swamps from the Caspian to the Volga and Don . But the main thing is that he clearly showed historical events during the times of the Horde, nomads and Don Slavs. All this, as if in a drop of water, was reflected in the “Golden Horse of Genghis Khan”. We saw the customs of those people, battles, weapons, ingenuity of warriors, fearlessness in rescuing girls from captivity. This legend could decorate a history book
Don region. It captures the events of the search for the Golden Horse, which will wait in the wings. The work of Yuri Evsigneev convinces us of this.
Vladimir Fadeev.
Another “oriental fairy tale” from some shaggy Tsarkon. It’s a pity that this competition was cancelled, I really liked it.
Golden horses of Batu
Sain Khan died slowly and painfully. For many years, invisible shaitans had twisted his fingers, pulled the tendons from his elbows and knees, and hung like an unbearable weight on his arms and legs. And now he didn’t even have the strength to rise from the pillow. The golden embroidery of the carpets blurred before my eyes, mixed, and formed into familiar images and figures. Sain Khan wiped the sweat from his forehead and sighed, driving away the visions.
Vekil, who was waiting for orders behind the tent flap, listened. Sain Khan was talking to someone.
- You take me, and you take the last of my kind. My good ones... - and strange sounds, as if the horse was snoring and shuffling its hooves. - As long as you are here, my city is eternal...
When the vekil looked into the tent, Sain Khan was lying motionless on the carpeted cushions. Swollen yellowish face, completely covered with red spots, closed eyes, heavy breathing. The servant slowly approached, amazed at how thin and weak the majestic and imperious khan seemed frozen on the precious bedspreads. Suddenly the ruler sat up on his bed and looked at him in amazement.
-What is this knocking inside me? - with a sharp movement he threw his swollen, knotty hands forward, digging them into the vekil’s wrists. - Knocking.
It was as if a rockfall had struck the servant along with the touch of the dying khan. Hundreds of devils beat with hammers in the veins of Sain Khan, so quickly and forcefully that the sound deafened the old gatekeeper and echoed in his temples and heart. Vekil pulled his hands out of the tenacious red claws and recoiled, and Sain Khan wheezed and slowly fell back onto the pillows. His eyes rolled back and a thin stream of saliva flowed from the corner of his mouth. He was dead.
Because of the fear experienced by the gatekeeper, because of the indistinct rustling and muttering of the dying man, a legend arose that his golden horses came to Batu Khan before his death. Indeed, only to them could he say “my good ones.”
Batu Khan was the right master. A nomad to the core, he somehow understood that true greatness comes not with military campaigns and victories, but with something more tangible and lasting. Or maybe, while destroying and burning other people's cities, all his life he felt envy of those who once built them, created them, grew them, like shoots in calloused palms. And to those who will raise them from the dust and ruins when his shaggy, wild horde rolls back to their original boundaries, just as the salty surf inevitably returns to the sea.
And then, to the point of pain, to the point of cramping in his clenched jaws, he wanted his own city. Its capital, the greatest and richest of all that existed on earth. Money, stone, slaves - nothing will be denied to the builders. The khan has everything - it’s not for nothing that almost half the world pays him constant tribute. And the khan will spare nothing so that in the lower reaches of Itil his city rises and shines like a fabulous miracle for many centuries.
This is how Sarai-Batu was built - the capital of Batu Khan's ulus - a city that shocked the imagination of contemporaries from other countries. A pearl necklace from mosques, palaces, craft districts, adorned with the diamond of the Khan's palace - a shining diamond, because its walls and roof were covered with thin sheets of pure gold. Maybe then this part of the Great Horde began to be called Golden?
Around 1246, Batu Khan's favorite horse died. Human deaths could neither surprise nor touch the inhabitants of Sarai-Batu, any of whom in the morning did not know whether he would live to see the evening, or, with the light of the first stars, his house would be plundered and burned, his wife would be given to another, and he himself would appear before his forefathers with report on your good and bad deeds. The khan's anger was terrible and swift, his calculation was cruel and merciless, neither one nor the other gave the offender the slightest chance. And those who were far from the khan’s tent faced danger either in military campaigns or in ordinary forays. But there were so many people, they flocked by rivers to the capital of the Golden Horde from Mongolia, the Kipchak steppes, and the Caucasian intermountains; and this Arabian horse was alone, so Batu Khan greatly grieved over his loss. He is too accustomed to control life and death to so easily submit to someone else's decision. He did not want to let go of his horse.
Maybe there is no magic that can revive the dead. But is love and longing really not capable of breathing the soul into a new, golden body? Batu Khan ordered his horse to be cast in life-size from gold. He entrusted this work to a man who already knew the wonders of awakening solid metal. Before the Horde slavery, in another, half-forgotten life, a captive Russian master taught how to speak and sing the Kyiv bells.
“Revive my horse,” said the khan, looking into empty blue eyes and indifferently chewing a fig berry. - Come to life, and if I am satisfied, you will be rewarded. Do my will.
Fifteen tons of gold went into the horse, but it was worth it. The horse turned out to be alive, on high chiseled legs, with a proudly set head and a flowing mane. The ruler ordered rubies to be inserted into his eyes and another one of the same cast. Batu Khan planned to place golden horses at the city gates.
When the horses were ready, the foundry worker was given ninety-nine gifts as a sign of the khan's highest favor. He probably didn’t need so many gifts, he was waiting for only one thing, but the most important thing - freedom. Batu Khan read it in his eyes. He ordered the master to be brought to his golden silk tent.
“I cannot allow you to make such horses for another capital,” he said. And, turning to the senior turgaud: - Kill him!
Turgaud finished off the Russian foundry worker only with the third blow, first cutting off his hands so that he could not repeat his last creation in heaven. Batu Khan frowned; he did not want unnecessary cruelty. However, what did it matter?
Golden horses were installed at the Sarai-Batu gate. They shone so brightly that from afar travelers thought there was a fire in the city. But this was a different fire, the fire of the sun reflected from polished manes and rumps, a symbol of the might and power of the Golden Horde, a symbol of the immortality of the khan and his horse. Batu Khan ordered the word “mine” to be carved on one of the pedestals, and “yours” on the other.
In the last years of his life, Batu Khan received the nickname Sain, which means “fair”. In 1256 he died, leaving his son Sartak in power. Just a year later, Berke, the brother of Batu the Just, sat on the throne of the Golden Horde. To do this, he had to poison both nephews, but the ivory throne with gold inlays was too desirable for anything to stop Berke Khan. He spent too many years in his brother's shadow, lusting for power; only power did not bring him relief from thirst. The glory of Batu, a great warrior and ruler, haunted him even years later. He physically could not stay in Sarai-Batu, live in his brother’s palace, walk on his carpets, sleep on his pillows. Every now and then he imagined that Sain Khan was not dead, that he was somewhere nearby, behind the curtain, that he was about to come in and ask him about his sons. The blood froze in Berke Khan’s veins, his hands froze, like in the frosty wind in winter. How many times could Brother Batu have dealt with him, destroyed him, but he didn’t. But now, after his death, he came to his palace almost every day, forcing Berke to listen to the rustle of silk panels, muffled steps behind him, and melancholy sighs. The new khan, in horror, counted the berries into bunches of grapes on a dish decorated with emeralds and yahonts; measured the level of wine in a chased glass. There weren't enough berries, the wine was melting, and it was unbearable. “Today he eats my grapes, and tomorrow he will plunge a dagger into the jugular vein,” Berke thought, feeling his wrinkled neck. He needed another city, his own, just as Sain Khan once needed his own city.
In 1262, Berke built a new capital, one hundred kilometers north of the old one, and transported golden horses to it. Not wanting to damage the precious sculptures, he ordered them to be taken away along with the pedestals, but one slab, with the inscription “yours,” cracked and still had to be replaced. In Sarai-Berk, golden horses were again placed at the city gates.
After the Russian victory on the Kulikovo field in 1380, the star of Horde luck finally set. Rus' rose from the ashes, raised its head, and marched towards the Mongol army, fearing neither pain nor death. Now the proximity to the Russian lands was not profitable, but dangerous, and this played a bad joke on the Horde capital. One day, a Cossack patrol, intoxicated by the feeling of imminent freedom, decided to make a surprise visit to Sarai-Berk in order to scare the residents and, if possible, plunder the city. This dashing and reckless foray turned out to be surprisingly successful: in those days, the Khan’s troops were in disarray after the Kulikovo field. The security at the gates of the capital was small, the Cossacks easily smashed it to smithereens and, feeling themselves masters of the situation, wanted to take the golden horses with them. With difficulty, they managed to break one sculpture from the old pedestal; the booty was wrapped in sackcloth, loaded onto a wagon train and taken home.
By that time, the remnants of the Horde army, camped at Sarai-Berke, learned about the next shame that had fallen on their heads, and the Mongols rushed after the crazy brave men. They could not move quickly, because the train with the golden horse was too heavy and was moving slowly. Although, perhaps, the Cossacks were not in too much of a hurry: they probably understood that they had signed their own death warrant, and it made no difference whether the Horde would catch up with them a little earlier or a little later.
It was spring. The steppe, fresh and bright, washed by thunderstorms, was decorated with scarlet poppies, glistening in the sun, like the silk robe of Batu Khan. Everything blossomed and grew in the life-giving floodplain of Akhtuba: grasshoppers chirped, lizards and snakes rustled, birds in the heights sang happy songs, and even the air itself seemed to ring with the sun’s rays, as if from stretched strings.
Suddenly a strange silence reigned, as if all sounds remained behind a barrier invisible to the human eye. Even the creaking of the wheels of an overloaded convoy became almost inaudible. A quiet whistle was heard over the steppe. The Cossacks shuddered. They were not afraid of either the Mongol hordes or the prince's wrath, but this whistle frightened them. The horses also shuddered, stopped, neighed quietly, straightening their ears. As if in response, the sackcloth on the wagon train began to move. The horsemen looked at her in horror, not daring to budge, and only quickly crossed themselves. Someone alive was thrashing and kicking where they were placing the golden statue. Finally, the sackcloth slid down, and a dark blinking eye appeared on a silken muzzle, a straightened ear... Swaying, a magnificent Arabian horse of golden color stood on the wagon train, shook its head, fluttering its long mane in the wind. He jumped down, listened slowly and galloped, rushing like a sparkling arrow towards the whistle. The Cossacks saw a horse stop in the distance, and someone saddled it, it seemed like a man in a blue robe or fur coat trimmed with fur. However, none of them could say for sure, and a moment later the horse completely disappeared over the horizon. At this moment, the cotton curtain fell, and the Russians clearly heard the noise and hubbub of the Khan’s army catching up with them.
They didn’t even think about running away or, God forbid, surrendering to the Mongols. After briefly praying for the last time, the Cossacks turned to face the Horde and accepted an unequal battle. They fought to the death, and there were ten times more Horde soldiers than them, so all the dashing daredevils laid down their violent heads there, in the middle of the scarlet steppe. Only when the last of the Russians stopped breathing were the Mongols able to approach the convoy and discover that it was empty! The golden horse was nowhere to be found - neither under the sackcloth, nor nearby, nor under the pile of bloody bodies.
The Horde warriors never found the horse, so a legend was born that the Cossacks threw it on the way into a lake or river, intending to return for it later. There are too many inconsistencies in this assumption. Firstly, would the Cossacks drown their precious horse in Akhtuba? Probably not, because finding him later would be almost impossible. This means they had to choose a small and conspicuous body of water. After all, even being ready for death, a person still hopes that he will survive and, of course, get rich. Especially if it is a Russian who believes in God’s providence.
And what - secondly? At that time, as many centuries later, there were many lakes and rivers in the Volga-Akhtuba floodplain, but after the construction of the Volga hydroelectric station, spring waters, flowing in the usual channel from all over Russia to the fertile Akhtuba fields, stopped behind the iron gates of the dam. The spills were crushed, revealing the depths of the muddy bottom to the curious eye. In addition, hordes of treasure hunters fell on the remains of the ancient Horde, scattering, piece by piece, piece by piece, what remained of both the great capitals and the warriors who had fallen in the steppe. Even if the golden horse had lain peacefully for almost six centuries in a natural cache, it would inevitably have been discovered in the twentieth century. But they didn’t find it.
The legend about the second golden horse, which the Cossacks did not have time or were unable to knock down from the pedestal and take with them, is no more plausible. It is believed that he was placed in a mound along with the murdered Khan Mamai, and this mound is located somewhere in the Volga steppes, and supposedly Khan Mamai will guard this treasure even after death. But who would allow the horse of the great Batu, the founder of the Golden Horde, to be given to a rootless Polovtsian temnik, a loser who lost the future of the Mongol race, who lost the light of primacy from inept hands - which was immediately picked up by the inspired and ardent Slavs? No, after the defeat in the Battle of Kulikovo, Mamai was never able to regain his former power, obtained only because of civil strife and the weakness of the legitimate heirs of the Golden Horde throne. He was almost immediately attacked by Tokhtamysh, a real Genghisid, although not a direct descendant of Batu, and Mamai fled to the Crimea, to Feodosia, for help from his Genoese creditors. But he had nothing to pay with overseas merchants, except perhaps with his own life - and he paid with his life, dying in 1380 in Feodosia, or Cafe, from a thieve’s stab in the back. They buried him there, not far from Kafa, and the village that later grew up next to his burial mound was called Sheikh-Mamai for a long time for a reason. And Sarai-Berke was never Mamai’s headquarters; the Polovtsian khan only from time to time managed to transfer his troops beyond the blue border of the Volga... no, he had no right to this horse. Rather, the horse should have belonged to Tokhtamysh, but, probably, the fate of both of them cracked along with the stone slab on which the magical destiny was inscribed. Who, when and how released the horse is unknown, but in 1395, when Timur’s troops plundered and burned to the ground the capital of the willful Mongol Khan, there was no golden treasure in it.
And so both of Batu’s golden horses disappeared, dissolved in death and battle. True, the old-timers of those regions say that one of them can sometimes be seen in the steppe, especially in the spring: he jumps, as if flying, over the bloody poppies and plaintively, restlessly cries - calling either his lost master, or his more fortunate brother.