REGIONS
What the Ban on Commemorating the Capture of Kazan Means for the Tatar Nation
October 15, 2024
- Sergey ChernyshovRuhr University Bochum
Historian Sergey Chernyshov outlines how Ivan the Terrible’s capture of Kazan in the 16th century has been viewed throughout the centuries and reflects on what Tatarstan’s recent ban on events to mark the exact date mean for Tatar identity.
The Tatarstan authorities have finally banned any public events for Remembrance Day (the so-called “Day of Remembrance and Sorrow of the Tatar People,” or Xäter köne) on October 15, when Kazan fell to Ivan the Terrible in 1552. From the late 1980s until this year, the day was used in the region to commemorate the defenders of Kazan, with some even considering them martyrs (“shahids”) who died for their faith. Yet even more importantly, the public events held on this day symbolized the region’s desire for independence from Russia.
The ban on rallies and marches on Remembrance Day symbolizes the destruction of the last remnants of federalism in Tatarstan. And therefore, in all of Russia, since Tatarstan remained the last symbol of this federalism (in particular, the title of regional “president” had been retained in Tatarstan, even after being eliminated across the rest of the country; in Tatarstan, it was abolished only in 2023).
At the same time, the ban on public commemoration of the defenders of Kazan in 1552 provides an opportunity to rethink decolonization practices in the region – at least among those who dream of Tatar sovereignty outside of the Russian state. This is because, for Tatarstan, 1552 is a symbol of Moscow’s colonial dominance in the region.
The capture of Kazan and Russia’s transformation into a Eurasian empire
The 1552 capture of Kazan by the army of Muscovite Tsar Ivan IV is considered one of the most significant events not only in Russian history but also in the that of Eurasia. Firstly, Kazan thus became the first Muslim region included into the Muscovite tsardom, establishing the multicultural nature of the Russian state. Secondly, it cast the die for Russia’s territorial expansion – generally not toward the West, but into the East. Half a century after the capture of Kazan, the Russian conquest of Siberia got underway, followed another century and a half later by the colonization of what is today Kazakhstan, and so on.
Historian Andreas Kappeler points to 1552 as the turning point when the northern European Muscovite state, with its still predominantly East Slavic population, definitively transformed into a multireligious and multiethnic empire.
In modern Russia in general and in Tatarstan in particular, the events of 1552 are depicted as follows: the Orthodox army of Ivan the Terrible took the bravely defended independent, Muslim Kazan. In reality, everything was more complicated.
First of all, this was far from the first “capture of Kazan” by a Muscovite army. For example, in 1487 Kazan was captured by Ivan the Terrible’s grandfather, Grand Prince Ivan III (the Great). From then on, the so-called “period of Russian protectorate” began in Kazan, when the Muscovite government appointed the khans there.
Ivan the Terrible’s army, which took Kazan by siege in 1552, was also not entirely Orthodox. It included up to 500 Tatar murzas and princes (i.e., high-ranking officials of the khanate), who had earlier joined the Muscovites. During the siege itself, as Tatar writer and philosopher Rafis Salimzhanov claims, more Tatars actually fought for Ivan the Terrible than defended Kazan.
In other words, 1552 marked an internal armed conflict in the Khanate of Kazan, weak and long dependent on Muscovy, whereby Tsar Ivan the Terrible threw his weight behind one of the sides. Moreover, without any particular military implications: the faction in the khanate striving for independence from Muscovy hardly gave up in 1552, raising mass uprisings for at least another half century.
From a civil war to the triumph of Ivan the Terrible
The ban on rallies and marches on Remembrance Day symbolizes the destruction of the last remnants of federalism in Tatarstan. And therefore, in all of Russia, since Tatarstan remained the last symbol of this federalism (in particular, the title of regional “president” had been retained in Tatarstan, even after being eliminated across the rest of the country; in Tatarstan, it was abolished only in 2023).
At the same time, the ban on public commemoration of the defenders of Kazan in 1552 provides an opportunity to rethink decolonization practices in the region – at least among those who dream of Tatar sovereignty outside of the Russian state. This is because, for Tatarstan, 1552 is a symbol of Moscow’s colonial dominance in the region.
The capture of Kazan and Russia’s transformation into a Eurasian empire
The 1552 capture of Kazan by the army of Muscovite Tsar Ivan IV is considered one of the most significant events not only in Russian history but also in the that of Eurasia. Firstly, Kazan thus became the first Muslim region included into the Muscovite tsardom, establishing the multicultural nature of the Russian state. Secondly, it cast the die for Russia’s territorial expansion – generally not toward the West, but into the East. Half a century after the capture of Kazan, the Russian conquest of Siberia got underway, followed another century and a half later by the colonization of what is today Kazakhstan, and so on.
Historian Andreas Kappeler points to 1552 as the turning point when the northern European Muscovite state, with its still predominantly East Slavic population, definitively transformed into a multireligious and multiethnic empire.
In modern Russia in general and in Tatarstan in particular, the events of 1552 are depicted as follows: the Orthodox army of Ivan the Terrible took the bravely defended independent, Muslim Kazan. In reality, everything was more complicated.
First of all, this was far from the first “capture of Kazan” by a Muscovite army. For example, in 1487 Kazan was captured by Ivan the Terrible’s grandfather, Grand Prince Ivan III (the Great). From then on, the so-called “period of Russian protectorate” began in Kazan, when the Muscovite government appointed the khans there.
Ivan the Terrible’s army, which took Kazan by siege in 1552, was also not entirely Orthodox. It included up to 500 Tatar murzas and princes (i.e., high-ranking officials of the khanate), who had earlier joined the Muscovites. During the siege itself, as Tatar writer and philosopher Rafis Salimzhanov claims, more Tatars actually fought for Ivan the Terrible than defended Kazan.
In other words, 1552 marked an internal armed conflict in the Khanate of Kazan, weak and long dependent on Muscovy, whereby Tsar Ivan the Terrible threw his weight behind one of the sides. Moreover, without any particular military implications: the faction in the khanate striving for independence from Muscovy hardly gave up in 1552, raising mass uprisings for at least another half century.
From a civil war to the triumph of Ivan the Terrible
“The idea that in 1552 Orthodox Muscovy defeated a proud and independent Muslim Kazan emerged due to a series of historical accidents.”
The Millennium of Russia, a bronze monument in the Novgorod Kremlin erected in 1862. Source: Wiki Commons
At the time, Ivan the Terrible was in dire need of recognition by other European rulers of his legitimate autocratic (samoderzhavny) status. Kazan, unlike Muscovy, was recognized as an independent kingdom in Europe, so after capturing Kazan, Ivan the Terrible swiftly informed everyone in Europe that he was now the “khan of Kazan.”
In addition, he suddenly had allies: an expected one, the Orthodox Church, was quick to present this as a triumph of Christianity, while an unexpected one, the first Russian political emigrant, Andrey Kurbsky, generally critical of Ivan the Terrible, supported the campaign against Kazan and actually took part in it.
As time went on, this version became the dominant one in Russian historiography. It is this interpretation that underlies monuments about 1852. For example, in Kazan itself a monument erected in 1823 depicted the Tatar khanate as a hydra with growing heads – an expression of the danger that the Tatars represented for Russia. The same meaning is conveyed by the famous Millennium of Russia monument, opened in Veliky Novgorod in 1862.
Even the Bolsheviks found this version of history convenient. In 1944, the party’s Central Committee adopted a resolution in which 1552 was designated as the watershed between “barbarism” and “civilization.” At that time, the state’s line held that the incorporation of peoples and territories into Russia was quite progressive – because the Russian people was said to have exerted a “civilizing influence” on them.
In short, the idea of the dramatic significance of 1552 for the history of Tatarstan is entirely colonial, invented in the metropolis for its own benefit and upheld by symbolic and repressive actions of the metropolis for the next three and a half centuries.
When was restored sovereignty lost?
The myth of 1552 was not rethought during perestroika and the “parade of sovereignties,” and the Tatar elite eagerly exploited it. The Declaration on the State Sovereignty of Tatarstan, adopted in 1990, spoke of “restoring” and “taking” sovereignty. Some historical event had to be found that had ended that once-existing sovereignty, and the capture of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible in 1552 fit the bill. Thus, the colonial agenda turned out to be useful for formally independent post-Soviet Tatarstan as well. Only the assessment of that event saw a one-eighty, shifting from positive (as heralding “civilization” in imperial and Soviet times) to sharply negative.
It is not often that the interests of the authorities and the radical segment of society converge in Russia, yet this is what happened in Tatarstan in the early 1990s, when those advocating for sovereignty compared Ivan the Terrible with Hitler, and the sacking of Kazan to the planned destruction of Moscow and Leningrad by the Nazis. It was then that the date of the capture of Kazan was declared the “Day of Remembrance and Sorrow of the Tatar People.” On that day, the All-Tatar Public Center NGO held marches for independence, which were stopped only this year.
Between the Golden Horde and Volga Bulgaria
The ban on public events around the day is more than an infringement on the right to freedom of assembly; it is also an opportunity to rethink the colonial discourse about 1552 as one imposed on Tatarstan from the outside.
Important in this regard is the long-standing debate, raging in the region for more than a century, about which historical state in the Volga region should be considered the predecessor to today’s Tatarstan – the Golden Horde or Volga Bulgaria. This question, though it seems purely historical, is in fact fundamental, as the primacy of Kazan or Moscow in Russian statehood as a whole depends on the answer.
A curious meeting with the mayor of Madrid in the late 1990s features in the memoirs of Mintimer Shaimiev, the first president of Tatarstan:
“[The mayor] says: ‘you are representatives of a great nation that almost conquered the entire West.’ And the late Flyura Ziyatdinova was responsible for the minutes, having previously handled ideology in the city committee… suddenly butts in and says: ‘it was not us!’ I whisper to her in Tatar: ‘what are you talking about?! There was such a moment… some are proud, some are ashamed.’”
What are the implications if we say that today’s Tatarstan is the successor of the Golden Horde? In the 13th century, the Golden Horde conquered the Russian principalities and had a significant impact on the character of the Muscovite tsardom that later separated from it; so, if Tatarstan is the successor of this Golden Horde, then it follows that Kazan, as a representative of the conquerors, is more important than Moscow, which had been conquered by the Golden Horde. Even in the 21st century, Russia could not abide such an interpretation.
Therefore, since the early 2000s, a new idea has been promoted in Tatarstan – that today’s “republic” is the successor of Volga Bulgaria, a state that existed in the Volga region and was destroyed by the Golden Horde – that is, like Moscow, it suffered from foreign invasion. For the Kremlin, this has proven to be a much more palatable version.
In addition, he suddenly had allies: an expected one, the Orthodox Church, was quick to present this as a triumph of Christianity, while an unexpected one, the first Russian political emigrant, Andrey Kurbsky, generally critical of Ivan the Terrible, supported the campaign against Kazan and actually took part in it.
As time went on, this version became the dominant one in Russian historiography. It is this interpretation that underlies monuments about 1852. For example, in Kazan itself a monument erected in 1823 depicted the Tatar khanate as a hydra with growing heads – an expression of the danger that the Tatars represented for Russia. The same meaning is conveyed by the famous Millennium of Russia monument, opened in Veliky Novgorod in 1862.
Even the Bolsheviks found this version of history convenient. In 1944, the party’s Central Committee adopted a resolution in which 1552 was designated as the watershed between “barbarism” and “civilization.” At that time, the state’s line held that the incorporation of peoples and territories into Russia was quite progressive – because the Russian people was said to have exerted a “civilizing influence” on them.
In short, the idea of the dramatic significance of 1552 for the history of Tatarstan is entirely colonial, invented in the metropolis for its own benefit and upheld by symbolic and repressive actions of the metropolis for the next three and a half centuries.
When was restored sovereignty lost?
The myth of 1552 was not rethought during perestroika and the “parade of sovereignties,” and the Tatar elite eagerly exploited it. The Declaration on the State Sovereignty of Tatarstan, adopted in 1990, spoke of “restoring” and “taking” sovereignty. Some historical event had to be found that had ended that once-existing sovereignty, and the capture of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible in 1552 fit the bill. Thus, the colonial agenda turned out to be useful for formally independent post-Soviet Tatarstan as well. Only the assessment of that event saw a one-eighty, shifting from positive (as heralding “civilization” in imperial and Soviet times) to sharply negative.
It is not often that the interests of the authorities and the radical segment of society converge in Russia, yet this is what happened in Tatarstan in the early 1990s, when those advocating for sovereignty compared Ivan the Terrible with Hitler, and the sacking of Kazan to the planned destruction of Moscow and Leningrad by the Nazis. It was then that the date of the capture of Kazan was declared the “Day of Remembrance and Sorrow of the Tatar People.” On that day, the All-Tatar Public Center NGO held marches for independence, which were stopped only this year.
Between the Golden Horde and Volga Bulgaria
The ban on public events around the day is more than an infringement on the right to freedom of assembly; it is also an opportunity to rethink the colonial discourse about 1552 as one imposed on Tatarstan from the outside.
Important in this regard is the long-standing debate, raging in the region for more than a century, about which historical state in the Volga region should be considered the predecessor to today’s Tatarstan – the Golden Horde or Volga Bulgaria. This question, though it seems purely historical, is in fact fundamental, as the primacy of Kazan or Moscow in Russian statehood as a whole depends on the answer.
A curious meeting with the mayor of Madrid in the late 1990s features in the memoirs of Mintimer Shaimiev, the first president of Tatarstan:
“[The mayor] says: ‘you are representatives of a great nation that almost conquered the entire West.’ And the late Flyura Ziyatdinova was responsible for the minutes, having previously handled ideology in the city committee… suddenly butts in and says: ‘it was not us!’ I whisper to her in Tatar: ‘what are you talking about?! There was such a moment… some are proud, some are ashamed.’”
What are the implications if we say that today’s Tatarstan is the successor of the Golden Horde? In the 13th century, the Golden Horde conquered the Russian principalities and had a significant impact on the character of the Muscovite tsardom that later separated from it; so, if Tatarstan is the successor of this Golden Horde, then it follows that Kazan, as a representative of the conquerors, is more important than Moscow, which had been conquered by the Golden Horde. Even in the 21st century, Russia could not abide such an interpretation.
Therefore, since the early 2000s, a new idea has been promoted in Tatarstan – that today’s “republic” is the successor of Volga Bulgaria, a state that existed in the Volga region and was destroyed by the Golden Horde – that is, like Moscow, it suffered from foreign invasion. For the Kremlin, this has proven to be a much more palatable version.
“Symbols of Volga Bulgaria as the predecessor of modern Tatarstan have been proliferating in the region since the early 2000s.”
The Bulgar Mosque in Kazan, opened in 1993, was built to commemorate the 1100th anniversary of the adoption of Islam in Volga Bulgaria. Source: Wiki Commons
For example, the Bulgar Mosque was built in Kazan, a monument to the Bulgar poet Qul Gali was erected, and malls, restaurants and hotels are named after Bulgar cities (“Bilär,” “Suar Plaza,” “Bilär Palace,” etc.). Mintimer Shaimiev headed the specially created Revival Foundation to restore the towns of Bolgar and Sviyazhsk.
Public opinion surveys in Tatarstan show that propaganda about Volga Bulgaria has been effective. That version of the region’s history is at least twice as popular in Tatarstan today as that about the Golden Horde. Volga Bulgaria is recognized as the “most interesting” era in the history of Tatarstan by 34.3% of the region’s residents (including 40.0% of Tatars), versus only 20.0% (including 20.9% of Tatars) for the Golden Horde era.
If someone needs a square one for the Tatar nation, there are much better options than the date used by Ivan the Terrible to legitimize his power and institutionalized by repressive decrees of the Bolshevik Central Committee. For example, the Golden Horde or the Idel-Ural State, which was slated to be a state integrating all Muslims of the Volga region and Western Siberia – had it not been defeated by the Bolsheviks and their “divide and rule” strategy that artificially carved out the entities of Tatarstan, Mari El, Bashkortostan and Chuvashia.
Ultimately, true decolonization (if it is really needed by anyone in Russia and beyond) is not a battle over dates imposed by colonizers, but rather a critical reflection on the entire body of imperial historical myths.
Public opinion surveys in Tatarstan show that propaganda about Volga Bulgaria has been effective. That version of the region’s history is at least twice as popular in Tatarstan today as that about the Golden Horde. Volga Bulgaria is recognized as the “most interesting” era in the history of Tatarstan by 34.3% of the region’s residents (including 40.0% of Tatars), versus only 20.0% (including 20.9% of Tatars) for the Golden Horde era.
If someone needs a square one for the Tatar nation, there are much better options than the date used by Ivan the Terrible to legitimize his power and institutionalized by repressive decrees of the Bolshevik Central Committee. For example, the Golden Horde or the Idel-Ural State, which was slated to be a state integrating all Muslims of the Volga region and Western Siberia – had it not been defeated by the Bolsheviks and their “divide and rule” strategy that artificially carved out the entities of Tatarstan, Mari El, Bashkortostan and Chuvashia.
Ultimately, true decolonization (if it is really needed by anyone in Russia and beyond) is not a battle over dates imposed by colonizers, but rather a critical reflection on the entire body of imperial historical myths.
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