Turks, Tatars and Russians in the 13th-16th Centuries. Variorum Collected Studies Series, 884 by István Vásáry (review)

Abstract

reviews 739 narrative, whiledistinct, are notso weirdafter all. This finding resonates far beyond medieval Russia with much of recentanthropological literature on religion, whichhas long givenup measuring local variationagainsta supposedly puretype. As can bejudgedfrom theprice,thepublisher has considered thistobe a highly specializedmonograph. This maybe true,butRock has written in a waythatmakesthetextaccessibleto a muchbroaderaudiencepassages in Church Slavonic are translated, the argumentstructure is clear, and thebook is succinctat only160 pages oftext.If availableas an affordable paperback,it would make an ideal book forupper level undergraduate courseson Russianhistory, culture and historiography. SchoolofHumanities The University ofWestern Australia M. Edele Vásáry,István.Turks, Tatars andRussians in theijth-i6thCenturies. Variorum Collected Studies Series, 884. Ashgate Variorum, Aldershotand Burlington, VT, 2007. x + 352 pp. Maps. Illustrations. Tables. Notes. Bibliography. Index.£65.00. IstvánVásáry is Professor ofTurkicStudiesat ELTE, Budapest,and editor oftheleadingjournal,ActaOrientalia. In theearly1990s,he was Hungarian ambassadortoTurkeyand,subsequently, ambassadorto Iran.He isperhaps best knownamong Britishand Americanhistorians forhis path-breaking and controversialCumansand Tatars:Oriental Military in thePreOttoman Balkans, 1183-1365 (Cambridge, 2005)in whichhe soughtto treatmedievalHungary, Serbia and the Romanianprincipalities as a singleunitthatalso included thesteppeand CentralAsia. In so doing,Vásáryposited(withpredictable consequences)the importance of the Cumans in the emergenceand early history ofWallachia. The presentvolumebringstogether twenty-one of his essays,originally published between1976and 2005,and hitherto often confined to obscureor hard-to-find journals.The first ofthese,'The role ofTurkicpeoplesin the ethnichistory ofEasternEurope' (first publishedin 1993)is notonlytypical oftheapproachthatVásárywouldlaterfollow in Cumans andTatars butalso a succinct introduction to thestate-forming roleofthenomadsin medieval EasternEurope. Other contributions considerthe Cuman contribution to the foundation of the Second BulgarianEmpire,the survivalof the Old Hungariansor Molars in the Middle Volga region,the institutions and documentary production of the Golden Horde, the Tatar contribution to Muscovitehistory, and the CodexCumanicus. Reviewingthe Codex, Vásáry arguesthatitscontent and organization indicatetheroleofTurkicCuman as, alongsidePersian, thelingua franca oftheMongolempire. UCL SSEES Martyn Rady ...