Golden Horde - Name

Name

The origin of the name Golden Horde is uncertain. But Yellow (Sarı/Saru) means Center/Central in Old Turkic and Mongolic languages. The term ordu is in origin a Turkic word for the palace, camp or headquarters. In modern Turkish the word "ordu" refers to either army or army base, headquarters. The "golden" may just have been applied by the Slavic tributaries to express the great wealth of the khanate. But it has been suggested that it may also have been due to an actual golden tent used by Batu Khan or by Uzbek Khan. Not until the 16th century did Russian chronicles begin explicitly using Golden Horde to designate this successor khanate of the Mongol Empire. The term Golden Horde (Russian: Золотая Орда) initially only designated the Ulus of Batu (Russian: Улуса Батыя) centered on Sarai when the terminology first appeared in the History of Kazan in 1565.

In Persian and Muslim contemporary sources, the Golden Horde was referred to as the "Ulus of Jochi", "Dasht-i-Qifchaq" (Qipchaq Steppe) or Khanate of the Qipchaq. The khanate was called the Ulus of Jochi ('realm of Jochi' in Mongolian) in the records of the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries such as the Yuanshi and the Jami' al-tawarikh.

Its left wing or "left hand" (in official Mongolian-sponsored Persian sources) was called Blue Horde in Russian chronicles but White Horde in Timurid sources (e.g. Zafar-Nameh). While western scholars favored the second to designate the left wing, the use of Blue Horde by Ötemish Hajji (fl.1550), a historian of Khwarezm familiar with oral traditions of the khanate, indicates the Russian usage is correct. Batu's house held control over the ulus and was seated in Sarai, constituting the right wing or White Horde. The designations, Golden Horde, Blue Horde, and White Horde are not encountered in the sources of the Mongol-period.