The Mongol Conquests in World History

The Mongol Conquests in World History timothy may The Mongol Conquests in World History globalities Series editor: Jeremy Black globalities is a series which reinterprets world history in a concise yet thoughtful way, looking at major issues over large time-spans and political spaces; such issues can be political, ecological, scientific, technological or intellectual. Rather than adopting a narrow chronological or geographical approach, books in the series are conceptual in focus yet present an array of historical data to justify their arguments. They often involve a multi-disciplinary approach, juxtaposing different subject-areas such as economics and religion or literature and politics. In the same series China to Chinatown: A History of Reading Chinese Food in the West Steven Roger Fischer J.A.G. Roberts A History of Writing Cinemas of the World Steven Roger Fischer James Chapman Landscape and History since Faith and Sword: Ian D. Whyte A Short History of Mining in World History Christian–Muslim Conflict Martin Lynch Alan G. Jamieson Monarchies ‒ Geopolitics and Globalization W. M. Spellman in the Twentieth Century Navies in Modern World History Brian W. Blouet Lawrence Sondhaus The Global Financial System, Sovereign City: ‒ The City-State through History Larry Allen Geoffrey Parker A History of Language Why Wars Happen Steven Roger Fischer Jeremy Black THE MONGOL CONQUESTS IN WORLD HISTORY Timothy May reaktion books For my wonderful and beautiful wife, Michaeline, without whom I would still be writing this book Published by Reaktion Books Ltd Great Sutton Street London ec1v 0dx, uk www.reaktionbooks.co.uk First published Copyright © Timothy May All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers. Printed and bound in Great Britain by MPG Books Group British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data May, Timothy Michael. The Mongol conquests in world history. – (Globalities) 1. Mongols – History – To 1500. I. Title II. Series 950.2-dc22 isbn 978 1 86189 867 8 CONTENTS Introduction part one THE MONGOL CONQUESTS AS CATALYST The Formation of the Mongol Empire Dissolution of the Empire The World of : A Global World part two THE CHINGGIS EXCHANGE Pax Mongolica and Trade New Forms of Warfare The Mongol Administration Religion and the Mongol Empire The Mongols and the Plague Migrations and Demographic Trends Cultural Exchanges appendices Glossary Dynastic Tables references bibliography acknowledgements photo acknowledgements index INTRODUCTION When asked to write this book by the editor of the Globalities series, Jeremy Black, I did not hesitate, as the Mongols always seem to have at least a cameo appearance, if not a starring role, in the discussion of world history. The title of the project could easily have been changed to The Mongol Empire Is World History although it would look odd on the spine of a book. I can think of no period other than perhaps the past years in which the world was more interconnected. The conquests of Alexander? Despite a brief foray to the Indus and the Libyan Desert, the Alexandrian world excluded much of Asia and virtually all of Africa. The Roman Empire? Largely a Mediterranean event except for the more rustic provinces to the north and a few merchants deal- ing with India. Perhaps the Crusades? Again, primarily a Mediterranean event, although more of Europe and North Africa was involved, but it did not impact upon China or India. The Age of Exploration is always a good place to begin, but without the Mongol Empire would Colum- bus have sailed? After all, he was trying to reach the Great Khan in China. In short, the Mongol Empire is the very definition of world history. True, the Mongols did not have a huge impact on Africa or the New World, but for the Eurasian landmass no event or empire had a larger impact in history. The Mongols brought military innovation, international commerce, the spread of world religions and the dif - fusion of technology and ideas together in one crucible – the Mongol conquests. After the dust settled, the world had irrefutably changed and could never return to the way it once was. In the s John Andrew Boyle, the great historian of the Mongol Empire, coined the term ‘Mongol World Empire’ – and he hit the nail on the head. It is unknown if Boyle considered the Mongols through the lens of world history, but he clearly saw the Mongols as an empire that dominated the medieval world and could not be viewed in a strictly regional sense. In his preface to Boyle’s The Mongol World Empire, Owen Lattimore noted that in order to properly understand the place of the Mongols in world history, ‘we need to bring into better balance the enormously rich and Middle Asian sources’. Lattimore alludes to a basic issue of the study of the Mongol Empire – the number of languages involved in the sources often leads to examining the Mongols in a regional rather than a holistic or world perspective. At the same time one should not only consider the Mongol World Empire in a geographical but also a temporally transcendent sense. The Mongol moment is truly a pivotal and perhaps an axial era in history. In many ways it is the dividing point between the pre-modern and the modern ages. This idea of the Mongol Empire as the dividing point, or perhaps even the beginning of modern history, is buttressed by the opinion of esteemed scholar of East Asia Arthur Waldron. In his introduction to Bertold Spuler’s classic work The Mongol Period (), the middle volume of Spuler’s trilogy on the history of the Muslim world, Waldron wrote: Where should one begin the study of modern history? The soundest answer is probably with the Mongols. The great states of Eurasia today – China, Russia, and India, as well as most of the Middle East – all were once incorporated into Mongol empires, and changed by that experience. The modern history of those states, moreover, began when the Mongol empires ended then the component parts reconstituted themselves, emerging as suc- cessor states that, although independent, nevertheless bore an unmistakable Mongol stamp. Study the Mongol empires and their gradual breakdown, then, and you have the basis for an integrated understanding of contemporary Eurasia.3 It is difficult to dispute Waldron’s contention. Indeed, it is only by investigating the Mongol Empire and the changes that it brought to the Eurasian continent that we truly see an integrated Eurasia and indeed an integrated world. While trade routes have connected cul- tures and civilizations for hundreds of years, the view of the world by a particular civilization was compartmentalized. The Romans possessed a clear view of the Roman world as did the empires of Iran and the many dynasties of China of theirs, but their vision of the world outside their respective borders remained murky. Although knowledge of the outside and the Other is always elusive, with the Mongol Empire unprecedented numbers of travellers, merchants, missionaries and others criss-crossed the Eurasian landmass and even beyond. Granted, many other regions remained outside the empire, but the ramifications of the advent of the Mongol Empire created conditions and events that led not only to an integrated Eurasia but an integrated world, which, of course, is what this volume will demonstrate. The Mongol Empire’s importance in world history is most apparent in two fashions. The first is through its immense size at its peak, making it the largest contiguous empire in history – approximately . million sq km ( million sq miles), or roughly the size of the continent of Africa. Although it became divided politically, nonetheless a con siderable amount of interaction existed across Eurasia and beyond through Mongol domains, no matter how one defines them. The second is shown by the sheer number of languages used in the sources related to the study of the Mongol Empire. Perhaps the most important are Chinese and Persian, based on the number of sources in these languages, but the sources also include Mongolian, Russian, Old Slavonic, Arabic, Latin, Old French, Japanese, Italian, Armenian, Georgian, Old Uighur, Tibetan and others. Few people can master all of these. Added to this is the problem of transliterating names from a wide variety of scripts, potentially ending up with a plethora of spellings for any given name. Take Khubilai, for instance. Qubilai, Khubilai, Kublai and Kubla have all been used, and are accept- able depending on which system of transliteration and language one uses. Most scholars have no difficulty keeping track of who is who, but a novice to the history of the Mongol Empire can easily be over- whelmed by the names. Other problems resulting from the variety of languages will be discussed later. Yet evidence of the Mongols’ importance to world history is in many ways best demonstrated by the problem of studying the Mon- gols – where does one begin? Indeed, where does one even place them in Asia? Certainly they were an Asian people and the bulk of the empire existed in Asia, but does Asia include the Middle East? And what of the European domains? The Mongols’ importance to Europe, and by extension to world history, is aptly demonstrated by David Morgan’s classic and still standard introduction to the study of the Mongols, The Mongols (1986). Indeed, The Mongols is actually a part of Blackwell’s Peoples of Europe series. When I received my first copy of this magnificent book as an under- graduate, I remember being perplexed by this odd placement.

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