ЗОЛОТООРДЫНСКОЕ ОБОЗРЕНИЕ / GOLDEN HORDE REVIEW. 2019, 7 (3) 545 УДК 930:39=512.1"11/15" DOI: 10.22378/2313-6197.2019-7-3.545-567 “NATIONES QUE SE TARTAROS APPELLANT”: AN EXPLORATION OF THE HISTORICAL PROBLEM OF THE USAGE OF THE ETHNONYMS TATAR AND MONGOL IN MEDIEVAL SOURCES Stephen Pow Central European University Budapest, Hungary
[email protected] Abstract: Objective: An attempt is made to explain why Mongols were so often re- ferred to as Tatars in thirteenth-century primary sources and to offer a new interpretation of how the usage of both ethnonyms evolved over the course of the Mongol Empire’s expan- sion and dissolution. Research materials: Primary sources were used which originated from Russian, Mon- golian, Latin, Persian, Arabic, Chinese, and Korean authors. The Russian Novgorod and Galicia-Volhynia Chronicles, Secret History of the Mongols, Rashid al-Din, the Yuan Shi, and the Mengda Beilu were the most significant in formulating an argument. Secondary literature by leading figures in the field of Mongol history was consulted. Research results and novelty: The main finding is that the different explanations found in primary source texts composed under Mongol governments for how these names were used in the pre-imperial period and for the double-naming phenomenon seem implausible when compared to the broader body of primary sources whose authors were not directed by an evolving Mongol imperial ideology. Furthermore, the various explanations cannot be combined into some workable model for how the double-naming phenomenon happened in the thirteenth century, since they contradict one another on fundamental issues such as whether Tatars still existed or were an extinct nation.