THE INFLUENCE OF THE EAST ON EUROPEAN HISTORY 51 
expenses charters of freedom and privileges were conferred on towns 
in return for a money payment. 
In the thirteenth century nearly all the Tartar hordes were 
united under the great Zingis Khan and under his successors they 
conquered China, Corea, Tonkin and Persia. It is interesting to 
notice that they twice attempted the conquest of Japan and on both 
occasions their fleet suffered shipwreck, the loss of men amounting 
to 100,000. Under Ogdai Khan three armies were sent out. one 
against Corea, another into China and the third into Eastern Kurope. 
This last army under the command of Batu advanced into Europe 
with astonishing rapidity crossed the Volga and appeared before 
Riazan. This city was taken by assault after being battered with 
shot from the balistas for five days. The prince with his family, 
the nobles and inhabitants without regard to age or sex were 
slaughtered with savage cruelty: some were imyaled, some shot at 
with arrows for sport, others were flayed or had splinters of wood 
driven under their nails: the priests were roasted alive. Vladimir 
was then attacked. he imperial family with a vast crowd of 
fugitives sought refuge in the cathedral only to perish by the swords 
of the Mongols or the flames of the barning building. At Kieff 
which was razed to the ground the flat roof of the principal church 
was crowded with fugitives and so vast was the crowd that the roof 
fell in and all, young and old, were buried in the ruins. After 
desolating Southern Russia the Mongols marched in two divisions, one 
into Hungary and the other into Poland, ‘The Hungarians were 
defeated, the King saving himself by flight and for two days journey 
from the field of battle the roads were strewn with the bodies of the 
slain. Near Leignitz the Polish army crumbled under the impetuous 
attack of the Mongols: as usual no quarter was given and the 
massacre was frightful. It was a Mongol habit to cut off an ear from 
the body of each of the slain, and it is stated that on this occasion 
nine sacks were filled with these trophies. | While laying waste the 
territorys of Moravia, Batu was informed of the death of Ogdai Khan 
and turned back eastwards into Mongolia. For two hundred and 
fifty years after this invasion the East of Europe from the Carpathians 
was in the power of the Tartars or Mongols, and for 250 years the 
Russian princes paid tribute to the great Khan. In Southern Russia 
at the present time there is a large number of Tartars or men of 
Tartar descent and the Crimea was for a long time the settlement of 
the Crim Tartars. 
