The Grand Principality of Moscow or “Muscovy”—referring to an area that would eventually stretch from Western Ukraine to Central Asia in the period before 1700—rose to regional power in the 14th century following the weakening of the Mongol empire. Ivan IV (1533-1584) demonstrated a renewed interest in territorial expansion and methods of governing a vast territory, methods learned in part from their suzerains, the Mongol Khans. The contested area known as the Khanate of Sibir represented a territory beyond the space known as Rus in the medieval period but had been partly integrated into the commercial networks of the northern Eurasian fur trade.
Under the Mongols, the Khanate of Sibir became a prosperous region and the northernmost Muslim khanate of the Mongol Empire. This project represents a departure from the common narrative of the early conquest period; namely, that Muscovy expanded into Siberia following the steady decline of the Mongol Empire, beginning in the 14th century and accelerating in the 16th century. Muscovite texts narrativized the idea of empire, laying out an ideological framework for imperial legitimation, before the material conditions were in place to organise any such venture beyond the territory of Muscovy.
The project seeks to establish a working group comprising scholars of Russian history, Mongol history, linguistics, philology, ethnology, and anthropology, which will form an interdisciplinary base for a European Research Council-funded project.
