About this book:

Discover the hidden history of Mordovia, a land where ancient Volga riverways, forest-steppe traditions, and imperial power collided for more than a thousand years. From the early Moksha and Erzya communities to the Golden Horde, Muscovy, the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, and today’s Russian Federation, this sweeping history reveals a region long treated as peripheral—but central to understanding the making of Russia itself.

A History of Mordovia brings to life the struggles of a people who preserved their languages, customs, and identity through conquest, conversion, revolution, collectivization, war, and modernization. Richly informed and vividly told, it offers scholars and general readers alike a compelling portrait of cultural survival at the crossroads of Eurasia.