Talk:Battle of Kulikovo

Incorrect translation removed:
Russian word "kulik" does not mean snipe, but shorebird or wader. Thus calling this battle Battle on the Snipes' Field is incorrect. You may as well call it Shorebird Field, Wader Field, or use many other shorebird names (Godwit, Woodcock, Sanpiper, etc.). The battle is not well known in the west, so calling it Battle of the Snipe Field only adds to confusion. Vitoldus44 18:46, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That is ok. The battle itself carries no particular value. It was just one of the battles during which kniazes of Rus fought either each other or the Tatars. It carries no spiritual value as well and the Rus was not united in the afterwards. So it is impossible to add anymore of confusion. Aleksandr Grigoryev (talk) 14:12, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

A preceding battle is missing
The battle of Kulikovo was not the first Russian victory over the Golden Horde as it is often claimed. In 1378 or 1379 the Moskovites defeated an incursion force led by Begich at Voja or Vodja river. That Tatar failure lead Mamai into gathering a much larger punitive force and meet combined Russian forces at Kulikovo in 1380. Vitoldus44 18:59, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
 * As in my previuos comment, the whole history that is tight to the Moscow state is one big confusion. The yoke itself was not present, but rather was used to justify whole spectrum of wrong doings by kniazes. They simply robbed their own polpulation and then were telling that it was a yoke by the Golden Horde. Aleksandr Grigoryev (talk) 14:20, 14 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Baseless conspirologist crap. 95.32.182.176 (talk) 11:36, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
 * term Russians could not be refered to all lived in Modern western Russia. Im sure that term Russians(Russkije) did not even existed at that time. Term Rus, Russes can be refered to subject of Kiyevian Russ. And even if they where duchies rulled by Russian speaking rullers, no one told that citizens were Russians and that people even spoke in Slavian language. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.109.250.204 (talk) 18:26, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Off course those were udmurts or mordvins, who won this battle. Sick of this revisionist non-sense. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Челдон (talk • contribs) 20:00, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Genovese infantry
I have read that Genovese infantry (pikemen?) were hired by the Tatars and formed center of the Tatar battle order. Interestingly, some source mention the Genovese and other do not. I wonder if there are any Italian sources about this battle? Vitoldus44 18:59, 12 March 2007 (UTC)


 * this Italian source http://www.mondimedievali.net/medioevorusso/battaglia.htm does mention that Genovese infantry indeed formed the Tartar center, but it doesn't say what arms they used. I will translate the sentence where their presence is mentioned: "Il grande contingente genovese a piedi, che avrebbe dovuto affiancare la terribile cavalleria mongola con gli archi lunghi."= The great Genovese contingent, which should have flanked the terrible mongol cavalry with their Long Bows. (as my Italian is not perfect I'm unsure if the mongols or the Genovese are meant by their...) JHope, I could help. --noclador 17:15, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, the Genovese heavy infantry was hired, and it was them who killed Mamai, when he fled to Crimea, for not paying. Aleksandr Grigoryev (talk) 14:23, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

There is no reliable evidence of the participation of the Genoese in the battle. The only mentions in some sources speak of Mamai's attempts to hire mercenaries wherever possible: "That year the godless, impious pagan Prince Mamai of the Horde collected many troops and all the Polovtsian and Tatar and also hired troops of Friazy and Cherkazy and Iasy."

Friazy - is the Italians, not only the Genoese. In chronicles about the battle, no Westerners in the army of Mamai is mentioned. On the contrary, in the The Zadonshchina the Lituanian allies of Dmitriy intended to test their "German javelins" agains the "muslim mails". Muslims (besermens) and "pagans" are only mentioned foes. No sources from Italy, which would confirm the hiring of a large contingent by the Tatars, is unknown. Lev Gumilev is now considered more likely to be a popular writer and philosopher than a historian. Tales of the "Genoese infantry" are very popular with propagandists in order to show the primordial hostility of the West to the "unique Russian civilization". I guess we should remove references to "Genoese mercenaries" from the Infobox.--Nicoljaus (talk) 08:41, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Old talk
Russian affairs are "too west" for me, but I heard that some scholars claim that the Battle of Kulikovo didn't happen or at least it was a trivial incident because it was recorded only in a Russian chronicle and diplomatic documents nerver mentioned to the battle. --Nanshu 00:30, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
 * In fact, in the time when Russia was under Mongols, even few west chronicle mention Russia, no words about russian events. But if you will study the influence of the Battle of Kulikovo, you will drop this claim of "some scholars". Alexandre Koriakine 14:21, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, Alexandre, what influence did it make? Considering the fact that after the battle Tatars burned Moscow down or maybe, I dare you to mention, the religious factor. Yeah, when you read the Russian version everything seems to make a sense, but then try reading analysis of historians those who were not influenced by Russian/Soviet censorship. You might be able catch some things that do not connect.

How true were Vandals for we know of them only from the Romans?
But you can find the info of the Battle in the Timuride hystoriography as well as in polish and Lithuanian history. Though it seems that it was "too east" for the french and germans and obviously none of them were at the Kulikovo to observe the Battle. But there are other interesting ideas about this big event in the Russian hystory. Some evidents say that Prince Dmitry was supported by Tokhtamysh and the Golden Horde establishment while Mamay was blamed in the Horde as the usurper and sort of outlawed there. And Mamay was supported by the Lithuanian Grand Duke Yagailo and the Genoesemoney and forces. So the importance of this event for the Russian hystory may well differ from the view of the world hystory, the Horde hystory or the history of the East Europe. Regards, Dizzie.

>>for the french and germans and obviously none of them were at the Kulikovo to observe the Battle

The Genoese were. There were Genoese mercineries from the Genoese Crimean colonies fighting for the Tatars. Gaidash

Mamai was not a head of Golden Horde, he was rebelled military general opportunist using the split between Golden Horde hairs in his advantage, which had gathered quite significant forces and money in his hands with support of Genoese Traders from Crimea. He was in war with Tohtamich the legitimate khan of the Golden Horde, so Mamai cannot be called the head of Goldern Horde, or having any Golden Horde status as he him self was in war with Golden Horde, and his armies were heavily packed with mercenaries. Armancho

I'm sorry: "Mamai or Mamay was a powerful military commander of the Blue Horde in the 1370s" this is the text from "Mamai" article. And here I read that Mamai was the military leader of Golden Horde. What is correct version? I'm confused 124.32.179.154 00:23, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I believe there was a split in the Gloden Horde into other ones such as the Blue which actually meant the western. The Golden Horde itself was still remaining as the main. Mamai or Mamay (whichever you like) tried to gain the ownership of the Golden Horde to have the influence over some other ones. He was not technically was a leader of the Golden Horde, but in the Soviet history he was portrayed as such. That history never showed a political analysis of Russian neighbors, but only from the Russian perspective and assumption. Aleksandr Grigoryev (talk) 14:43, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

You see, the problem is that there is almost no evidence of mongol rule in parts of Russia which were captured (Novgorod, strongest province, remained outside of anyone's influence), the only things we have is "timewritings" as russians call it. And these might have been written specifically for political purposes by people loyal to Moscow just to justify Moscow's ambitions for rule over the whole region of what would become Russia. This theopry gains more and more strength considering that more and more inconsistencies are found in so-called "timewritings".

That is why I added "supposed" to last paragraph, because it is not yet an established or at least disputed fact whether there was mongol rule over what would become central and southern parts Russia.

why it is "moskovian"??? in this battle were take part all people of rus

English Grammar - not!
Argue about the factual content by all means, but would it not be a good idea to ensure that the article is written in grammatically accurate English first of all? The text is riddled with examples of the characteristic errors that speakers of Slavonic languages make in using the definite and indefinite articles (including the omitted article)in English. Also errors of sentence structure and phraseology are present.

I have spent time on so many occasions in the past trying to render articles into correct English that I don't feel like tackling this one! 86.158.93.52 (talk) 18:06, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Link to article in Pravda on this battle
http://english.pravda.ru/main/18/87/347/16170_Kulikovo.html  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.7.75.77 (talk) 00:35, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

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What to make of National Geographic article?
Here is a 2011 article in Russian National Geographic that says, essentially, that details of the battle or even the battle itself may be myth. According to the article, the location of the battlefield is not known

National Geographic is pretty good source. At least in America... but I doubt they'd let a very unreliable operation exist in Russia under their name. The article's by Andrey Zhuravlev, whoever that is (there is an Andrey Zhuravlev at Moscow State University, probably not the author since his field is Paleobiology, Evolutionary Biology, and Ecology).

Anyway, this directly contradicts the article, which not only says the battlefield location is known but that lots of artifacts have been recovered as proof. There are a lot of refs, but they're all offline so I can't read them, except this one.

So what's the deal? Can National Geographic be that wrong? I mean, the article sounds good. Zhuravlev quotes Andrei Petrov of the Department of History and Philology of the Russian Academy of Sciences... Zhuravlev says there have been no artifacts found... what the heck? It doesn't sound like the kind of thing that National Geographic would just lie about, if they could be easily caught out... What's going on here? Herostratus (talk) 01:38, 16 April 2017 (UTC)


 * The vast majority of scholars, such as experts in the history of medieval Europe, Russia, Mongol conquests, etc., agrees that the battle was as real as any other clash of the time; there are museum collections and scholarly works regarding surviving artifacts of the Kulikovo battle. As Wikipedia is based on generally accepted knowledge and reliable sources, we apparently cannot use dubious pages like the one you have discussed here. SlavonicStudies (talk) 08:12, 16 April 2017 (UTC)


 * The key point made by the Russian National Geographic article is that the details of the battle are open to doubt. The Russian-language Wikipedia article makes similar points.  For example SB Veselovsky's early works estimated the size of the Russian army at Kulikovo to have been between 200,000 and 400,000, whereas he later came to believe that it might only have been 5,000 or 6,000.  Bulychev thought that the Russian army at the battle might have been between 6,000 and 10,000 men.--  Toddy1 (talk) 11:48, 16 April 2017 (UTC)


 * What NG describes is a fringe theory, and, according to Fringe theories, should not be treated on par with the widely accepted one. It deserves a a "Revisionist theories" section near the end of the article, but not in the very introduction. I propose that section to be created after "Legacy", and introduction enhanced with "Details of the battle, such as its exact location and the number of participants, are still a matter of dispute among historians". Beaumain (talk) 16:14, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

С. Б. Веселовский считал в ранних своих работах, что на Куликовом поле было около 200—400 тысяч человек, но с течением времени пришёл к мнению, что в битве русская армия могла насчитывать только 5—6 тыс. человек.

По мнению А. Булычёва, русское войско (как и золотоордынское) могло составлять около 6—10 тысяч человек при 6—9 тысячах лошадей (то есть в основном это было кавалерийское сражение профессиональных всадников).


 * So hmmmm. According to User:SlavonicStudies, there's no question, it's all known, open-and-shut case. But if that's true, then it seems like Russian National Geographic is presenting an obvious and egregious falsehood, which furthermore any person should be able to easily unmask as an obvious and egregious falsehood. This doesn't seem to fit with how I usually perceive National Geographic.


 * So quandary. Since I can't see those off-line sources, let's see... Here, Britannica has a short article. They present all the details of the battle as established fact, with no prevarication. They don't say one way or the other about the precise location, and they do say "Losses: No reliable figures" (which we pretty much also say).


 * Other English language sources don't seem that reliable... even the State Museum of Military History in Tula I don't consider necessarily reliable, because provincial museums sometimes get caught up in boosterism. But all of these sources do seem to present the occurrence, location, and details of the battle as established fact. But even if you discount them, Britannica is usually pretty reliable.... So it looks like National Geographic is an outlier? I wonder what's going on at the Russian National Geographic?


 * Anyway, thank you colleagues for clearing this up. Herostratus (talk) 16:27, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

There was no real battle. this is a falsification of history by Moscow to look "great"
Ukrainian author of historical novels, found no evidence to verify the event. She was most likely not there. Bodia1406 (talk) 00:34, 2 April 2023 (UTC)


 * Here is Volodymyr Bilinsky, telling that this battle is a falsification from the Russians. This is in Ukrainian.
 * https://m.gazeta.ua/articles/history/_bitvi-na-kulikovomu-poli-nikoli-ne-bulo-bilinskij/524498 Bodia1406 (talk) 00:35, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
 * This is not the place to push fringe theories. You were already alerted about CTs. Mellk (talk) 00:51, 2 April 2023 (UTC)