The first history of the nomadic empire called the Golden Horde, from its origins to its decline as a powerful force of the Central Asian steppe. 

The Golden Horde was a powerful nomadic state that shaped Eastern Europe and Central Asia from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century. Masters of the Earth traces its rise within the Mongol Empire, its period of independence and prosperity, and its eventual decline in the face of continual civil conflict. Roman Hautala introduces the administrative and ethnic structures of the Horde, its religious policies, and its wide-ranging commercial ties with both East and West. The Golden Horde emerges not only as a military force but as a dynamic society whose influence reached far beyond the steppe. Understanding this history offers a richer sense of Eurasia’s past and the connections that shaped it.