White Horde

(also Ak-ordu), one of the two parts of the Golden Horde, led by Batu, son of Jochi, and his descendants. (The second part was led by another son of Jochi, Orda.) This division of the Golden Horde was stable during its entire history of the 13th and 14th centuries. While nominally vassals of the descendants of Batu, the descendants of Orda reduced that dependence to a minimum. Thus, the term “Golden Horde,” which since the rule of Batu was applied to the entire ulus (Tatar settlement) of Jochi, from the early 14th century came to pertain only to the White Horde, consisting of the actual ulus of Batu (Volga region) and the uluses of his brothers: Berke (northeastern Caucasus), Shi-ban (contemporary Kazakhstan and Western Siberia) and Moval (Black Sea region). The uluses of Batu and Berke were later united under the rule of Berke. In the fifteenth century, on the territory of the White Horde, new state formations took place which were heir to the Golden Horde: the Great Horde and the Nogai Horde and the Uzbek, Kasimov, Crimean, Kazan, Siberian, and other khanates.