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In-Depth Information
Kulikovo, Battle of
(1380)
A battle ending in a Russian victory over Mongol
forces that has traditionally been celebrated as a
turning point in the Russians' attempt to free
themselves from Mongol rule but whose impor-
tance was more symbolic than real. The show-
down at Kulikovo followed a series of clashes
between
MOSCOW
and the
GOLDEN HORDE
during
the 1370s, including a minor Muscovite victory
near the Vozha River in 1378. The battle of
Kulikovo itself was fought on September 8, 1380,
in an area known as Kulikovo Field (Kulikovo
Pole), where the Nepriadva River flows into the
Don. The Russian armies, led by Grand Prince
Dmitrii of Moscow, son of
IVAN II
, chose to fight
on a hilly terrain intersected by streams that min-
imized the Mongol cavalry's ability to simply sur-
round the Russians. Later, highly embellished
accounts of the battle estimated as many as hun-
dreds of thousands on each side, but a more real-
istic estimate places the numbers of each army at
less than 10,000 soldiers. By the end of the day,
the Mongol armies led by Khan Mamai had been
routed. Their Lithuanian allies reached the battle
site two days later and chose not to fight. For his
leadership in battle, Dmitrii was henceforth
known as
DMITRII DONSKOI
, in remembrance of
the site by the Don River where his armies had
first defeated the Mongols. The Russian victory at
Kulikovo was the first major defeat of the Mon-
gols since they had conquered the lands of
KIEVAN
RUS
in 1240-42. It strengthened the claims of the
rulers of Moscow to an ascendancy over the
other Russian principalities. But it marked only
the beginning of the end of Mongol rule over
Russia. In 1382, only two years after the battle,
Mongol armies led by Khan Tokhtamysh entered
Moscow and sacked and burned the city. It was
only in 1480 that a later Muscovite prince,
IVAN
III
, was able to successfully shake off Mongol rule
after the battle of the
UGRA RIVER
.
Urals. He was educated at Tauride University in
Simferopol, the Crimea, graduating in physics.
After graduation he taught in Baku before mov-
ing to Leningrad (St. Petersburg), where he
taught at Leningrad University and the Lenin-
grad Physico-Technical Institute. Kurchatov's
research in the 1930s on nuclear chain reactions
under neutron bombardment and artificial radio-
activity and his theory of nuclear isomerism
established him as a major authority on nuclear
energy. In 1943 he was elected to the USSR
ACADEMY OF SCIENCES
and to its Presidium, and
provided with a laboratory in Moscow, which
subsequently became the Kurchatov Institute of
Atomic Energy. He was also appointed director
of the Soviet attempt to build an atomic bomb.
During these years Kurchatov skillfully handled
administration and research while having the
unenviable job of working directly under secret
police chief Lavrenty
BERIA
. Kurchatov joined
the
COMMUNIST PARTY
in 1948. He supervised the
first Soviet atomic test in 1949 and the first
hydrogen bomb test in 1953. After
STALIN
's death
in 1953, he tried to promote collaboration with
Western scientists and protected geneticists (the
discipline had been banned as a bourgeois pseu-
doscience in 1948), informing
KHRUSHCHEV
that
Trofim
LYSENKO
was a charlatan. However,
Khrushchev was deaf to reason where Lysenko
was concerned. Kurchatovium, the 104th ele-
ment of the periodic table, is named after him.
Kursk, Battle of
(July-August 1943)
Kursk, in southwestern Russia, was the site of
the largest tank battle in World War II, involving
about 6,000 tanks and 4,000 airplanes on both
sides. The stage for a major confrontation was set
when German forces, already defeated at Stalin-
grad, decided to prevent Soviet forces from rein-
forcing by attacking the salient near the city of
Kursk. German plans called for the concentra-
tion of the German Ninth Army and the Fourth
Panzer Army to form two pincers that would
encircle Soviet forces. For this operation all
available German armor was to be concentrated.
Together the Germans had 35 divisions with
Kurchatov, Igor Vasilievich
(1903-1960)
physicist
Considered the father of Soviet nuclear power,
Kurchatov was born near Chelyabinsk in the
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