The Mongols

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The Mongols

• Mongol Origins
• The Rise of the Mongol Empire
• The Decline and Fall
• Early period of nomadism
• (struggle for dominance in the region by the
  Turkic and Mongol tribes)
• 2. The period of unified Mongolian State
• Pax Mongolica
• 3. Adoption of Buddhism

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Genghis Khan

• Mans highest joy is victory to conqueror ones
  enemies, to pursue them, to deprive them of their
  possessions, to make their beloved weep, and to
  embrace their wives and daughters.

From tent to palace
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32 million square kilometers
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1.5 million people (Yurt, Ger, Gur)
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positive aspects of the Mongol conquests

• Made possible and promoted commercial and
  cultural exchanges between global civilizations
  of Eastern Hemisphere
• brought stable government based on precedents in
  Islamic and Chinese administration and religious
  toleration to much of Asia
• provided lengthy period of peace predicated on
  establishment of unified law code (Yasa) at least
  until 1260

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Mongol Origins

• Nomadic horse people
• N. China Grasslands
• Raised horses, tended sheep
• Felt tents Yerts, Ger
• Language Altaic (Rel. To Turkic, Manchurian)
• Could not marry between tribes and clans

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Organization

• Families--Clans--Tribes--
• Tribes gathered during annual migration
• Chiefs elected. Based on nobility, military
  ability, wisdom, leadership skills
• Religion Shamanism
• Nature deities, but key God is the Sky God
• Sacred color blue

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Temujin Ghengis Khan

• b. 1167, son of tribal chief
• Father poisonedfled as youth
• Returned as adult, avenged father, Eventually
  chief
• By age forty had unified all Mongol tribes
• Battles, alliances, ability to survive
• Elected as the Great Khan
• Amazing talents along with sons and grandsons

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Some Questions to consider

• Why did such a remarkable family, gifted and
  competent, arise from such an isolated area at
  this time?
• How did the Mongols, with a total population of
  less than 1.5 million, conqueror such a large
  area and hold it for a century?

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Mongol Army Tactics

• All males 15-70 served in army all as calalry
• Organized army in Myriads (10,000s)
• Units within each of 1000, 100, and 10
• No one in the army was paid, though all shared to
  varying degrees in the booty. All contributed to
  a fund to take care of those too old, hurt, or
  sick.
• Elaborate signals every part can move in concert
  in battle. Flags, hand signals
• Had to supply their own bows and other military
  equipment
• Tactics retreat, turn, flank, destroy
• Armaments horsemanship, compound bow
• Reputation created paralyzing fear
• By 1241 reached Poland and Hungary

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Conquest

• Gathering intelligence had high priority
• Foreign experts and advisors, in particular
  Persian and Chinese
• Every man carried their own supplies and had 2
  horses. Ate horse blood and milk
• Thousands of vassals took loyalty oaths became
  commanders, ran army, ran government
• Took walled cities by using Chinese siege
  technology
• Brought Chinese engineers with them
• Conquered most of Asia, Middle East, Russia

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Creation of Law

• Yasa

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The Conquest of China

• Genghis Khan wanted the riches of China
• First secured his back conquered Tibetan State
  of NW China, Manchu State (N)
• Took land all the way to Peking by 1227
• Ghengis Khan died 1227
• Successors reached the Yellow River 1234
• Took all of China by 1241

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Divisions at Genghis Khans Death

• Four Khanates
• Kipchak Khanate (Golden Hoarde)
• Russia
• IlKhanate
• Persia
• Chagatai Khanate
• Mongolia
• Great Khanate
• China, Outer Mongolia, Border States, to which
  the others owed allegiance. Later became the Yuan
  Dynasty

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Territory of the Mongols
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Kublai Khan

• Grandson of Genghis Khan
• Moved capital to Peking 1261
• N. enough to stay in contact with other Khanates
• S. enough to control most of China
• Conquered the S. Sung by 1279

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Building Projects

• Too far from prosperous south to easily collect
  taxes
• Built the Grand Canal to Beijing
• Palace of the Khan designed by Arab architects.
• Summer palace Shangtu (Xanadu)
• Where a Mongol can be a Mongol
• Developed hereditary succession

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Chinese Rule of China Yuan Dynasty

• Originally, plundered and robbed
• Learned the art of taxation
• Mongols ruling elite Highly centralized
• Emperor--Secretariat-- Roving Secretariat
• Ruling minority segregated
• Majority ranked according to ethnicity

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Ethnic Ranking

• Mongols Top military, civilian posts
• Persians, Turks, Non-Chinese nomad stock High
  civil posts
• N. Chinese, border people, Manchurians Next
  highest posts
• S. Chinese Lowest civil posts
• All records and proceedings in Uighur Turkic,
  than translated word by word into Chinese
  (sounded barbaric)

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Foreign Contact

• Large, multi-ethnic empire facilitated diffusion
• Subject states Persian, Arab, Russian, Turkic
• Goods, art, technology and ideas spread
• Chinese communities found as far west as Moscow
• Printing, gunpowder, medicine diffuse west
• Marco Polo

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Role of Religion in Yuan China

• Policy of toleration
• Christianity
• Kublai Khans mother was a Nestorian Christian
• Papal Mission created Peking Archbishop and
  cathedral, complete with Mongol and Turkic sermon
  and Mongol choir boys
• Wanted 100 learned Catholics to be sent by the
  Pope
• Buddhism
• Tibetan Buddhism gained 500,000 converts
• Islam
• Islam gained many converts.
• A mosque was built in a new Islamic quarter of
  Peking and others built in SW China
• Confucianism survived Considered a tax free
  religion.
• No real influence at court
• Most of China in the South remained unchanged

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Decline and Fall

• Yuan Dynasty Shortest lived major Chinese
  dynasty (1264-1368)
• By the death of Kublai Khans son, series of weak
  rulers
• The Khanates lose cohesion due to religious and
  cultural differences
• Yuan Dynasty becomes more isolated

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Decline and succession

• Chinese never really accepted as legitimate
• Succession wars between heirs and generals
• High Taxes, Corrupt officials
• Paper money controversy
• Yellow River changed course and flooded Grand
  Canal among other natural disasters
• Decentralization Rise of Warlords
• Last Khan fled to Mongolia in 1368 after the Red
  Turbans Buddhist led revolts
• Zhu Yuanzhang, a Buddhist monk and member of the
  secret sect within the Red Lotus called the White
  Lotus, led the peasant rebellion
• Zhu Yuanzhang razed the palaces of the Mongolians
  in Beijing and became the first emperor as Hongwu
  (great martial) and named his dynasty Ming or
  brilliant

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impact of the Mongol conquests of Russia the
Islamic heartland similar

• In both cases the traditional political structure
  was removed and the path was smoothed for new
  political organization to take place.
• In Russia, Kievan superiority was forever
  destroyed and Moscow was able to achieve
  political dominance among the petty kingdoms
  through its control of tribute and by becoming
  the seat of Russian Orthodoxy.
• Brought the 3 areas together in the defeat of the
  Golden Horde
• Serfdom institutionalized as tribute had to be
  paid
• In Islamic Empires, the Abbasid dynasty was ended
  and the Seljuk Turks who had ruled through its
  appurtenances was devastated
• opening the way for the rise of the Mameluks in
  Egypt and the Ottoman Turks in Asia Minor
• Mameluks gained dominance after they slowed the
  advance of the Mongolians