Simeon, most submissive before the Khan, bought over the horde by using his father’s treasure. To his brothers he was haughty and overbearing. As intermediary between the Tartars and Russian states he enjoyed privileges denied to his seniors, and arrogated to himself the title and position of “Prince of all the Russias.” He continued his father’s policy in Moscow, engaging Greek artists to ornament the cathedrals, and many native workmen to enlarge and improve the buildings within the Kremlin, spending upon Moscow the tribute he exacted from Novgorod and other towns.
Ivan II. who succeeded him, 1353, was of quite another sort. Gentle, pacific, lovable—all outraged him; he would have lost his throne had not the church supported him loyally. Moris, a monk, quelled a revolt; a fire destroyed the Kremlin; when he died the succession to the title of Grand Duke, which his three predecessors had made such efforts to keep in the house of Moscow, passed to their kinsmen at Suzdal.
Alexis, the metropolitan, saved the supremacy of Moscow. After crowning Dmitri at Vladimir he returned to Moscow to take charge of the children of Ivan II. and refused to leave the town. Dmitri was in his ninth year when he succeeded his father in Moscow, and remained in the tutelage of the church for many years. It was to the prompting of Alexis even more than to that of his own kinsmen that the breach of the Tartar alliance is due. Dmitri availed himself of a division in the Tartar horde to question the supremacy of either leader. Later he had the courage to visit Mamai—who was then the more powerful—and had the good luck to get back alive. Seven years later he won a battle against Mamai, in Riazan.
In 1635 a fire on All Saints’ Day destroyed the Kremlin wall and, a storm raging at the time, Moscow was almost in ruins. In 1367 the Kremlin was surrounded with a new wall—of masonry—and in the following year this was put to the test when an attack was made on Moscow by some bands of pagan Lithuanians under Olgerd, his brother Kistut and his subsequently famous nephew Vitovt. “Olgerd camped before the walls, pillaged the churches and monasteries in the neighbourhood, but did not assault the Kremlin, the walls of which frightened him.” Two years later he returned to the attack, but his enterprise was unsuccessful. In the meantime Mamai, the Tartar leader, had matured his scheme of revenge. In 1380 he had collected his forces and was marching on Moscow when Dmitri, with the aid of all the neighbouring princes, got together an immense army and determined to give battle.
The confederate troops gathered in the Kremlin included contingents supplied by the princes of Rostov, Bielozersk and Yaroslaf, and the boyards of Vladimir, Suzdal, Uglitch, Serpukhov, Dmitrov, Mojaisk and other towns. After service in the cathedral they left by the Frolovski (Spasski) Nikolski and other gates in the east wall, escorted by the clergy with crucifixes and miracle-working ikons, the troops marching behind a black standard on which was painted a portrait of the Saviour on a nimbus of gold.
Dmitri before advancing against the Tartars went to St Sergius at the Troitsa monastery to ask his blessing, and was there comforted with a prophecy of victory. More, Sergius sent two monks, Osliabia and Peresvet, to encourage the Muscovites. They wore a cross on their cowls and went into the thick of the battle. Peresvet was found dead on the field tightly grasping a Patsinak giant who had slain him. The armies met at Kulikovo on the Don, where Dmitri with his 150,000 men after a hard fight obtained the victory, and Mamai fled. The battle was really won by the troops of Vladimir and Dmitri of Volhynia, whose men remained in ambush until the best moment for attack came.
With historians Dmitri, who, badly wounded, was found in a swoon after the battle, is the hero of the day, and he added the name of Donskoi to commemorate the victory. Sophronius, a priest of Riazan, who wrote an epic of the battle, awards chief honours to the monks, and makes St Sergius, through them, support the courage of Dmitri at critical stages.
Though Mamai was beaten by Dmitri, he fought again before he fell into the hands of his rival Tamerlane, who put him to death. Then Tamerlane sent an envoy to Dmitri acquainting him with the fact that their common enemy had been vanquished and calling upon him and all Russian princes to present themselves to him and make their homage to the Horde.
Dmitri failed to comply, and when the Tartars advanced into his territory he tried to raise an army to oppose them. The princes who had promised him support failed to afford it, and Dmitri, unable to get 40,000 men together, was still waiting reinforcements at Kostroma when the Tartars under Tokhtamysh, a descendant of Khingis Khan, appeared before the walls of Moscow.
The defence of the Kremlin was in the hands of a Lithuanian, Ostei, and the Tartar attack was repulsed; boiling water being thrown from the towers; stones and baulks of timber dropped from the walls upon the assailants in the ditch. For three days the Tartars tried to effect an entrance by force. Then Tokhtamysh stated that it was not with the people of Moscow the Tartars were at war, but only with their prince and his companions, inviting those who had sought refuge in the Kremlin to come out and occupy their dwellings where they would not be molested. The besieged believed him, and, laden with presents and preceded by the clergy, they went out of the Kremlin to meet the enemy as friends. The Tartars at once fell upon them, killed Ostei and the other leaders, and forced a way into the fortress. The defenders were demoralised, “they cried out like feeble women and tore their hair, making no attempt even to save themselves. The Tartars slew without mercy; 24,000 perished. They broke into the churches and treasuries, pillaged everywhere, and burned a mass of books, papers and whatever they could not otherwise destroy; not a house was left standing save the few built of stone.”