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The Mongol Catastrophe For the Muslim east, the sudden eruption of the Mongol hordes was an indescribable calamity. Something of the shock and despair of Muslim reaction can be seen in the history of the contemporary historian Ibn al-Athir (d. 1233). He writes here about the year 1220-1221 when the (“Tartars”) burst in on the eastern lands. Is this a positive, negative, or neutral description of the Mongols? Why might the Mongols be compared to Alexander rather than, say, the ? they eat, [needing] naught else. As for their beasts which they ride, these dig into I say, therefore, that this thing involves the description of the greatest catastrophe the earth with their hoofs and eat the roots of plants, knowing naught of barley. and the most dire calamity (of the like of which days and nights are innocent) And so, when they alight anywhere, they have need of nothing from without. As for which befell all men generally, and the in particular; so that, should 0e say their , the‟ worship the sun when it arises, and regard nothing as unlawful, that the world, since God Almighty created Adam until now, hath not been afflicted for the; eat all beasts, even dogs, pigs, and the like; nor do they recognise the with the like thereof, he would but speak the truth. For indeed history doth not marriage-tie, for several men are in marital relations with one woman, and if a child contain aught which approaches or comes nigh unto it.... is born, it knows not who is its father. Now this is a thing the like of which ear hath not heard; for Alexander, concerning Therefore and the Muslims have been afflicted during this period with whom historians agree that he conquered the world, did not do so with such calamities wherewith no people hath been visited. These Tartars (may God swiftness, but only in the space of about ten years; neither did he slay, but was confound them!) came from the East, and wrought deeds which horrify all who satisfied that men should be subject to him. But these Tartars conquered most of hear of them, and which thou shalt, please God, see set forth in full detail in their the habitable globe and the best, the most flourishing and most populous part proper connection. thereof, and that whereof the inhabitants were the most advanced in character and conduct, in about [a] year: nor did an‟ country escape their devastations which did Source. Edward C. Sachau, Alberiini‟s Indian, Vol. I (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, not fearfully expect them and dread their arrival. Truebner, 1910). pp. 17. 19, 20. Moreover they need no commissariat, nor the conveyance of supplies, for they have with them sheep, cows, horses, and the like quadrupeds, the flesh of which

The Changing World of 's .--Melvyn C. Goldstein and Cynthia M. Beall (This excerpt is taken from a book, describes Mongol culture in the early 1990s) Shelter: We camped at Tsaganburgas for three wonderful weeks. The families can break camp and load all their possessions onto camels in was sunny and mild, the nomads relaxed and leisurely. Both sides of the clear blue roughly an hour. A modular structure is the key to its effectiveness. The 'wall' stream that bisected the steep mountain valley were dotted with bright white yurt consists of four or five wooden, collapsible accordian-like lattice fences resembling and a colorful mix of sheep, goats, yak and horses. Living there gave us our first those Americans use to prevent children from falling down stairs. Spread open and insight into the simple but effective technology the nomads had developed over the lashed together, they form a sturdy circular wall about five feet high. When it is centuries to cope with their harsh environment and to conduct their nomadic time to move on, each section collapses compactly into a flat unit about three feet pastoralism. wide that is easily loaded onto a camel. The roof section is also readily portable since it consists of 40 to 50 detachable broomstick-like wooden about five to Transportable shelters are essential to a pastoral nomadic way of life and, in the six feet long. One end of the pole fits into peg holes in the wooden "wheel" in the frigid cold of Mongolia, are a matter of survival, not just comfort. The Mongolian center of the roof that forms the opening for light and chimney pipes. The lower yurt, as we happily found out by living in one, is superbly adapted to this. It is easy end is threaded with a rawhide thong that loops around a lattice crosspiece in the to put up, take down, and transport, and it is also very warm and windproof. wall section. With these roof struts in place, the yurt has a rigid self-supporting frame, although a large yurt usually has an internal wooden pillar or two for water, milk , butter, and salt are gradually added and blended. The resultant additional stability. Most yurt we saw were about 16 feet in diameter and 72 feet beverage called milk-tea is white and tasty, though strangely neither like milk or high at the center. Insulation and wind protection came from one or two layers of tea. Mongolian nomads keep a warm pot of tea handy and drink bowlfuls felt sections that are about 25 feet long and four to five feet wide. These are throughout the day. The hospitality bowl was piled high with all sorts of goodies - strapped into the wall lattice and the roof and topped by sheets of white canvas, thick chunks of homemade cheeses, sugar cubes imported from the U.S.S.R., tied tightly with straps that circle the yurt like ribbons on a huge birthday gift. When chocolate-covered candies from Ulan Batar, and the staple grain food - bordzig. the herders fire up their metal, yak-dung stoves, the temperature inside the yurt This is a soft pastry made from a rolled out wheat dough that is deep-fried in lard becomes quite comfortable. We could sit five or six feet from the fire without a coat or cooking oil. The nomads make hundreds of these at one time and eat them for when the temperature outside was in the low teens. And after the fire died out at early morning and midday meals together with milk-tea, meat, cheese, and other bedtime, the temperature inside the tent remained 15-20 degrees warmer than dairy products. In the evening, they have a cooked meal, usually a stew. Haltar outside. But we could never forget the cold; when the outside evening temperature had just slaughtered a sheep, so he also set out a big metal basin filled with freshly fell below 0F, the inside temperature dropped well below 32F and froze our water boiled lungs, heart, stomach, intestines, liver, and the Mongol's favorite delicacy - and meat each night. Because the nomads... live in a climate where there is only pieces of solid fat. Mongolians, we quickly learned, love meat and fat, and in fact one growing season a year, they do not make long migrations to new pastures. consider meat without fat unappetizing and inadequate. Once, when we were The longest move we heard of took two days and was only 50 or 60 miles. Most trying to buy meat in town, a young man we knew brought us a leg of mutton but were less, taking only a day. ...There is no advantage to moving hundreds of miles refused payment because he said the meat wasn't good quality. It was lean, and because the district comprises 10,100 square miles of twisting mountains and taking money would be like cheating us. valleys, 99.9% of which is pasture land used by 115,000 head of livestock and The Hair Cutting Ritual: A major ritual event is the "hair-cutting" ceremony where about 4,000 people. Ranging from 7,800 to 11,000 feet above sea level, it is a we experienced Mongolian hospitality on a large scale. Hair cutting is a traditional stark landscape without trees or even shrubs. To an outsider it can seem devoid of nomad rite that has survived socialism. It marks the point at which a child is habitation, but in reality the mountains and valleys contain scores of named considered to have survived the danyurts of infancy - at either three or five years of campsites - neighborhoods - each occupied at a particular time of year, usually by age. Before this, parents do not cut their child's hair. As a consequence, we had a the same households. difficult time telling little boys and girls apart because both sported pigtails tied with bright, fluffy bows. The hair cutting rite normally takes place in the fall when the Hospitality: Halter is a 44 year-old herder whose household included his wife nomads are camped close to each other and the peak work period of summer Badam, his wife's widowed mother Otgon, and five children. We were seated on milking and butter-making is over. Parents invite scores of relatives, neighbors and the tiny foot-high stools called sandl that look like kindergarten furniture and are friends, and their yurt is jam-packed. Outside the scene resembles a suburban found in the guest section of every yurt - the left side away from the door. Haltar party in the U.S., except that instead of shiny parked cars, dozens of elegant began by taking an elegant agate snuff bottle from its bright silk brocade pouch; he horses are tethered alongside a few colorful Czech and Russian motorcycles. At offered it to each of us in turn as tradition dictates. Fortunately, we didn't have to the parties we attended, women were seated on the right side of the yurt and inhale the snuff - loosening the bright coral stopper and sniffing near the opening is males on the left, with the elderly of each sex sitting at the far end of their row in acceptable. Badan, meanwhile, set out the "hospitality bowl" each household the back. The elderly men set on a bed-couch at the back of the yurt. Brightly prepares for guests, and then went about making Mongolian milk-tea for us. painted wooden tables about two feet high were set up in a rectangle around the Mongolians use a type of compressed tea leaf that is called "brick" tea in English stove in the center of the yurt. They were laden with a half dozen big metal because it is rock solid and roughly the shape of a brick. It is made in and hospitality bowls overflowing with food. The tent was full of gifts for the child who from the poorest quality tea by wetting the leaves and pressing them into a was having his (or her) hair cut - bricks of tea, boxes of sugar cubes, packets of mold. These tea bricks eliminate bulk and are convenient to transport and store. biscuits, boots, money and toys. As each guest arrived, the hosts served him/her a They are used throughout Mongolia and . Preparing tea requires first bowl of yogurt, a sip of a unique vodka locally distilled from [mare‟s] milk (called chipping off tea leaves with a knife or hammer. After these leaves are boiled in nirmalike), and then tea. This was followed by the endless succession of meat, guests. The child, or in one instance, twins, moved from guest to guest carrying a noodle soup, borzig, and cheeses. The haircutting ceremony was a festive time scissors and small bag. Each guest took the child into his or her lap and snipped a that lasted all day. Guests talked and laughed, and spontaneous bursts of song small lock of hair with the scissors, stuffing the hair in the bag. The children we filled the yurt with haunting Mongolian folk melodies. Full-scale nomad hospitality, saw were extraordinarily well behaved about all this. "Haircutting" is a major event whether at a celebration or just visiting someone's yurt, involves serving milk- for a household, so the best food is served. Several of the household's fattest vodka and/or regular vodka. These are offered to each person in tiny porcelain sheep are slaughtered, and the guests are served lots of meat. shot glasses or small plastic bowls. The guest accepts the cup with the right hand Source. Goldstein, Melvyn C. and Cynthia M. Beall. The Changing World of outstretched and the left hand held under the elbow of the right, takes a sip, and Mongolia's Nomads. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. 1994. passes it back to the server using the same gesture. The server tops it off and offers it to the next person. Cutting the hair of the child-of-honor involves all the MONGOLS IN CHINA: Li CHI-Ch’ANG AND JOHN K. FAIRBANK The first of the following selections is a Taoist emissary’s impressions of the Mongols under Genghis , as the Mongol invasion of China began. The second is an eminent American historian’s summary of actual Mongol policy in China during what the Chinese called the Yuan regime. Li Chih-Ch’ang, accompanying a Taoist master summoned by the khan into central , had favorable discussions with the khan, who professed interest in the religion. Li’s view, correspondingly, was less jaded than that of Confucian officials later on, but even these Chinese certainly saw the Mongols as very different. How did their reactions predict wider Chinese distaste for Mongol rule? What other problems, according to the wider-reaching historical account by Fairbank, did the Mongols have in consolidating power in China? Could they have adopted more durably successful policies?

Li CHIH-CH’ANG merely wear round their heads a piece of white muslin about six feet long. The The people live in black waggons and white tents; they are all herdsmen and wives of rich or important people wind round their heads a piece of black or purple hunters. Their clothes are made of hides and fur; they live on meat and curdled gauze some six or seven feet long. This sometimes has flowers embroidered on it milk. The men wear their hair in two plaits that hang behind the ears. The married or woven patterns. The hair is always worn hanging down. Some cover it in a bag women wear a head-dress of birch-bark, some two feet high. This they generally of floss-silk which may be either plain or coloured; others wear a hag of cloth or cover with a black woollen stuff; but some of the richer women use red silk. The plain silk. Those who cover their heads with cotton or silk look just like Buddhist end (of this head-dress) is like a duck; they call it ku-ku. They are in constant fear nuns. It is the women of the common people who do so. Their clothes are of people knocking against it, and are obliged to go backwards and crouching generally made of cotton, sewn like a straining-bag, narrow at the top and wide at through the doorways of their tents. the bottom, with sleeves sewn on. This is called the under robe and is worn by They have no writing. Contracts are either verbal or recorded by tokens carved men and women alike. Their carriages, boats and agricultural implements are out of wood. Whatever food they get is shared among them, and if any one is in made very differently from ours. Their vessels are usually of brass or copper; trouble the others hasten to his assistance. They are obedient to orders and sometimes of porcelain. They have a kind of porcelain that is very like our Ting unfailing in their performance of a promise. They have indeed preserved the [delicate] ware. For holding wire they use only glass. Their weapons are made of simplicity of primeval times. steel. In their markets, they use gold without a hole in the middle. There are Both men and women plait their hair. The men‟s hats are often like yüan-shanmao native written characters on both sides. The people are often very tall and strong; [theatrical caps], trimmed with all kinds of coloured stuffs, which are embroidered so much so that they can carry the heaviest load without a carrying-beam. If a with cloud-patterns, and from the hats hang tasseled pendants. They are worn by woman marries and the husband becomes poor, she may go to another husband. all holders of official rank, from the notables downwards. The common people If he goes on a journey and does not come back in three months, his wife is allowed to marry again. Oddly enough some of the women have beards and make the division between conquerors and conquered even more complete, the moustaches. There are certain persons called dashman who understand the recruiting of Southern Chinese talent for the Yuan bureaucracy was impeded by writing of the country and are in charge of records and documents. the heritage of Sung hatred for the plundering “.” Later Chinese chroniclers, who have always had the last word on their conquerors, depicted the

Mongols as primitive savages capable only of destruction and orgiastic excess. CHINA UNDER MONGOL RULE: JOHN K. FAIRBANK One later Chinese account states, “They smell so heavily that one cannot Only gradually did the Mongols face the fact that conquered Chinese villagers, approach them. They wash themselves in urine.” merchants, and city artisans could not be incorporated into the Mongol tribal society. Yeh-lü Ch‟u-ts‟ai, as chief minister in the conquered parts of In the face of native hostility, the Mongols in China as elsewhere employed many after 1230, set up schools and held examinations to recruit Chinese into a foreigners, particularly Muslims from Central and Western Asia. As bureaucracy. But the Mongols . . . found they could not rise the rather simple dual recorded, “You see the Great Khan had not succeeded to the dominion of type of divided Sino-‟‟barbarian” administration. . . . The Yuan therefore continued [China] by hereditary right, but held it by conquest; and thus, having no the administrative structure of the Tang and Sung [], particularly the six- confidence fold division under the Six Ministries at the capital. During the thirteen hundred in the natives, he put all authority into the hands of Tartars, Saracens, or years from the early Tang to 1906, this basic structure remained the same. The , who were attached to his household and devoted to his service, and Yuan also continued a threefold division of central government among civil were foreignors in Cathay.” The Mongols set up a hierarchy of social classes: they administrative, military, and supervisory (censorial) branches. Innovation was were the top class, and their non-Chinese collaborators second, followed by the greater in provincial administration, where they followed the Chin example and Chinese of the North who had capitulated earlier, and, at the bottom, by those of made provincial governments into direct extensions of the central chancellery, an the South, who of course outnumbered all the rest. Meanwhile the Mongol ruling important step in perfecting the Chinese imperial structure. class remained separate from Chinese life with separate systems of law -for Chinese and for Mongols. The Great Khan- kept his summer residence north of The Mongol conquerors faced the age-old problem of how to rule in a Chinese the Wall at Shang-tu (Coleridge‟s “Xanadu,” meaning “Superior Capital”). His alien fashion and still retain power. The Chinese populace had to be persuaded to rule injected a heightened degree of centralized and ruthless despotism into the acquiesce in foreign rule. To accomplish this, an alien had to maintain traditional Chinese . local order, give Chinese talent the opportunity to rise in bureaucratic political life, and lead the scholar-official class by fostering Confucian ideology and culture. For Life under the this exacting task the rank and file of Mongols were unprepared. Much of their Kbubilai on his accession had protected the Confucian temples, and he soon success in the early Yuan era must therefore be ascribed to the commanding revived the state cult of . Later he exempted Confucian scholars from personality of Khubilai and his use of Confucian principles and collaborators. taxation. But on the more fundamental issue of recruitment for government service, Khubilai did not seek out the talent of South China. The examination The Mongols differed from their subjects in very striking ways, not only in system had ceased to function in the North after 1237 and in the South after language and status. For costume, they preferred the leather and furs of steppe 1274. Its revival was delayed until 1315. Chinese clerks of course staffed the horsemen. For food they liked mare‟s milk and cheese, and for liquor the bureaucracy, but Confucian scholars did not often rise to the top. fermented drink made of mare‟s milk. Bred on the almost waterless grasslands, the Mongols were unaccustomed to washing. They lacked even surnames. Their The scholar class was antagonized also by the Mongols‟ patronage of foreign different moral code gave greater (and in Chinese eyes, immoral) freedom to . In Persia many had embraced Islam, and in , Nestorian women. Moreover, the Mongols‟ non-Chinese traits were constantly reinforced by . In China religious establishments of the Buddhist, Taoist, Nestorian, their contact with a vast area outside China. They were the only full nomads to and Islamic faiths, like the Confucian temples, were all exempted from taxation. achieve a dynasty of conquest. The gap between them and the Chinese was thus The Chin and Yuan periods saw many new Taoist monasteries built in North greater culturally to begin with and was more strongly perpetuated politically. To China. This multiple religious growth was a distinct setback for the Neo-Confucian paper currency. Marco Polo, coming from a much less economically advanced doctrines of the Hsi school. , was amazed at this use of paper for money. The superstitious Mongols, with their background of , tended to accept Khubilai moved the Great Khan‟s capital from in Outer Mongolia to the debased form of that had developed in Tibet… . In the thirteenth Peking, where the main entrance through the Great Wall leads down to the North century it spread rapidly into Mongolia and also China, with imperial support. China Plain. There he built a new city called Khanbaligh (Marco Polo‟s „„Cambaluc”), meaning in Turkish, „„city of the Khan.‟‟ Within it was a palace Khubilai was hailed by the Buddhist clergy in China as an ideal Buddhist enclosed by double walls and complete with parks, treasuries, a lake and a big hill . Under his patronage the number of Buddhist establishments, including dredged from it. To feed the new capital, grain was transported from the lower the great mountain retreats at Mount Wu-t‟ai in Shansi, rose to 42,000 with by extending the north to Peking from the Yellow River 213,000 monks and nuns. . . . All this patronage of a religious cult could not be [Huang He]. On the stone embankments of this second Grand Canal system ran a offset, in the eyes of the Confucian scholar class, by the ‟s performance paved highroad horn Hangehow to Peking, a distance of eleven hundred miles, of Confucian ritual. He lacked the personnel and the policies to patronize Chinese which took forty days to traverse. accomplishments in literature, the arts, and thought. Instead of performing this function of upper-class in China, the Mongols maintained a Khubilai‟s grandson Temur, who succeeded him iii 1294, maintained a strong cosmopolitan regime, under which the Chinese bureaucratic class was given little central administration, but after his death in 1307 the Mongols hold on China scope. rapidly weakened. In the next twenty-six years, seven rulers occupied the throne. Open civil began after 1328. Meanwhile paper money, which had earlier In fostering the people‟s livelihood, on the other hand, Khubilai had some stimulated trade, was now issued in increasing quantities without backing, and so temporary success. The landholding element of the Southern Sung was nor paper notes were no longer accepted for payments and steadily depreciated. dispossessed, taxation of land and labor and the usual government monopolies In addition, the Yellow River was causing recurrent floods which ruined the well- were developed, and trade was facilitated by the far-flung contact with the rest of watered productive areas of northern Anhwei and Kiangsu and southern Asia. Arab and Persian seafarers and merchants frequented the great port cities Shantung. Financial, moral, and political bankruptcy thus came hand in hand. like Canton and Ch‟üan-chou (Zayton). Foreign trade by land was chiefly conducted by Muslim merchants of Central Asian origin. Their corporate groups Source. Li Chih Ch‟ang. The Travels of an Alchemist, trans. Arthur Weley not only served as trading associations but also became tax-farmers for their (Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 1976) 67-68, 106-7. Mongol patrons. These “merchant companies,” whose members guaranteed one John K. Fairbank. Edwin O. Reischauer, & Albert Craig. : another, played a key role in collecting the agrarian surplus of the Yuan Empire Tradition and Transformation. Rev. ed.167-70. Copyright 1989 by and channeling some of this accumulated capital into an expanded commerce. Houghton Mifflin Co. They also shared in the inordinate graft and corruption which accompanied Mongol rule. Commerce was aided eventually by a unified nation-wide system of Selections from The Devil's Horsemen - James Chamber

The Mongol War Machine conditions in the camps of campaigning armies were often appalling, Mongol In the the Mongol army was the best army in the world. Its soldiers would live as they had always lived in the yurts of their ordu. To turn organization and training, its tactical principles and its structure of command these reckless into disciplined soldiers required only organization and would not have been unfamiliar to a soldier of the twentieth century. By contrast tactical training. the feudal armies of Russia and Europe were raised and run on the same lines It was Chinggis Khan's genius for organization that was to turn a confederation as they had been for several hundred years and their tactics would have into a nation. It was called Mongol after his own tribe. It was the cohesion and seemed unimaginative to the soldiers of the . persistence that he inspired and the structured military society that he left At the time of Chingis Khan's birth the nomads of the eastern steppes lived in a behind that were to distinguish the Mongol conquerors from the other nomad feudal society. Each tribe was led by its khan, and were divided into clans raiders... which formed an ordu, the Mongol word for a camp (and source of the English who washed the bodies of the dead, were liable for military service. When word horde). Within the ordu each family lived in a yurt, a tent made of felt messengers brought the order to mobilize, trained men would collect their stretched over a wooden frame, and even for the rich families, life was often weapons and equipment from the officer in charge of the armory in their ordu, frugal: at the end of winter when the preservation of the herds was of select a small herd of horses and set out to join their unit. paramount importance they would travel for several days without eating in search of fresh pasture and game. For the many poor, life was always squalid. The bow The men of the clan spent their time hunting, tending their herds and fighting: a The bow was easily the Mongols' most important weapon. The mediaeval man's survival may have depended on his ability as a horseman and an archer, English longbow had a pull of 75 pounds and a range of up to 250 yards, but but his success depended on his strength as a and his cunning as a the smaller bows used by the Mongols had a pull of between 100-150 pounds bandit. Since the easiest way to acquire more horses and cattle was to steal and a range of over 350 yards. The velocity was further increased by the them and the simplest way to look after them was to have it done for you by difficult technique known as the Mongolian thumb lock: the string was drawn slaves, the nomad clans were constantly raiding each other. But the objectives back by a stone ring worn on the right thumb which released it more suddenly of these raids was sometimes even more than the capture of animals and able- than the fingers. A soldier could bend and string his bow in the saddle by bodied men: the nomad warriors were polygamous and tradition forbade them placing one end between his foot and the stirrup and he could shoot in any to marry within their own clan. direction at full gallop, carefully timing his release to come between the paces of his horse, so that his aim would not be deflected as the hooves pounded the Chinggis Khan's genius for organization ground. Once Chinggis Khan had united the tribes by force of arms, he began to suppress those customs that had preserved their poverty and discord. He Whenever possible Mongols preferred to ride mares, since their milk as well as forbade any man to own a Mongol slave, made cattle-theft and kidnaping their blood, and in the last resort their flesh, provided them with everything they punishable by death, and , to spread among all the Mongol people the loyalty needed to survive. The Mongol nomads valued their horses far above all other that had previously been limited to members of the same clan, divided the possessions. Horses played their part in traditional ceremonies and folklore and clansmen among the different units of his new army. It was to be an army for there was a whole period in when all the statues and paintings which the keen-eyed mounted archers were almost perfect raw material. The were of horses, since the Mongol patrons desired nothing else. War horses life that had given them their incomparable powers of endurance had also were treated with the same sentimental respect as any other comrade in arms. made them sullen, fatalistic, phlegmatic and callous. They could suffer without A horse that had been ridden in battle was never killed for food and when it complaint and kill without pity and they were easily led. In an age when became old or lame it was put out to grass, although when a soldier died his favorite horse was killed and buried with him so that their spirits would ride masterpiece of original and imaginative strategy and Mongol commanders together. could not have planned with as much breadth and daring as they did without absolute confidence in their communications. ...The Mongol army was a To their enemies, the inexplicable coordination with which Mongol armies „modern' army and the differences between it and the armies of the twentieth achieved their separate and common objectives was often astounding. century can all be accounted for by progress in science and in technology, but Although their battlefield tactics were no more than the adaptation and not in the art of war. perfection of those that had been developed by nomad archers over the past seven or eight hundred years, each carefully-designed campaign was a Copyright © 2000 The American Forum for Global Education of the (Kipchak)

The Golden Horde is best known as that part of the established in The third ruler was Mongke Temur (1266-1279), who continued much as his Russia. Originally, however, it consisted of the lands (1165-1227) predecessors did: warring against the Il-Khans. In addition, the Golden Horde bequeathed to his son (1184-1225): the territories west of the River increasingly dominated trade and was the most powerful state in Europe, often (modern ) and (consisting of parts of modern exerting its influence with threats of invasion into and , or through and ). Jochi, however, did not have the opportunity to expand his its vassal, . After Mongke Temur's death, many of the khans became realm as he died in 1225, two years prior to his father's death. puppets controlled by generals, such as Nogai (d. 1299). During the reign of the successor of Genghis Khan, Ogodei Khan (d.1240/41), the Between 1313 and 1341 during the rule of Uzbek Khan, the Golden Horde Jochid Ulus or realm greatly expanded in size. In 1237, Jochi's son Batu (1227- reached its pinnacle in terms of wealth, trade, influence, and military might. Uzbek 1255), assisted by the famous Mongol general Subedei, led a large army Khan also forced the conversion of the Golden Horde to Islam, thus the cities of westward. In route they destroyed the Bulgar khanate on the River, pacified and New Sarai emerged as major Muslim centers. During the middle of the the numerous Turkic tribes of the steppes, and conquered the Russian cities. fourteenth century, however, the Golden Horde weakened as it suffered-like much Then in 1240, Mongol armies invaded Hungary and Poland, winning victories over of the world-from bubonic , civil , and ineffectual rulers (between 1357 the knights of Europe at Mohi in Hungary and Liegnitz in Poland. As news spread and 1370, eight khans ruled). It is even thought that spread to of the ferocity of the Mongols, Europe trembled in anticipation of an attack that Europe after the Mongols laid to the port of Kaffa on the Crimean peninsula never came. In 1241 Ogodei Khan died, which forced the Mongol armies to in 1346. After their own forces were stricken with plague, the Mongols catapulted withdraw to Russia in order to elect a new khan. their corpses over the walls into Kaffa. The ships that left Kaffa and returned to Italy carried the disease. Despite an intense rivalry with Güyük Khan, Ogodei's son, Batu established the Golden Horde as a semi-independent part of the Mongol Empire. The origins of In addition to their wars with the Il-Khanate, the Golden Horde dominated the the name Golden Horde are uncertain. Some scholars believe that it refers to the Russian principalities. Although much has been written about an oppressive camp of Batu and the later rulers of the Horde. In Mongolian, Altan refers to Mongol Yoke, the also reaped numerous advantages in terms of trade the golden camp or palace. Altan (golden) was also the color connoting imperial and protection, and eventually supplanted the Golden Horde as the dominant status. Other sources mention that Batu had a golden tent, and it is from this that power in the steppes of Asia. Indeed, even after the initial invasion in the the Golden Horde received its name. While this legend is persistent, no one is thirteenth century, the Russians viewed the Mongols as a preferred alternative to positive of the origin of the term. In most contemporary sources, the Golden the Swedish or German crusaders existing on their western border. While the Horde was referred to as the Khanate of the Qipchaq as the Qipchaq Turks Mongols sometimes exacted onerous demands, they more or less left the comprised the majority of the nomadic population in the region (the Ulus Jochid). Russians to their own devices. The German crusaders, surely would have forced conversion to Catholicism upon the Russians had they prevailed. The Russians' Batu died in 1255, and the next significant ruler was his brother (1255- first victory was against , a general who usurped the throne of the Golden 1267) who had converted to Islam and focused most of his energies against the Il- Horde. Although he sacked in 1380, he was later defeated at the battle of Khans of Persia. His conversion marked the first time an important leader among Kulikovo. The Russians claimed it as a major victory; but, in reality, it the Mongols abandoned the traditional shamanistic religion. Hulegu, the founder accomplished little as Toqtamish (1383-1391) also defeated Mamai in 1383, and of the Mongol Il-Khanate, had sacked in 1258 and killed the Caliph of then proceeded to sack Moscow again. Islam. Berke forged an alliance with the of who were also enemies of the Il-Khans. The war with the Il-Khans lasted until the final collapse of Toqtamish may have been able to restore the Golden Horde to its former glory-he the Il-Khanate in 1334. did reunite it-but he became embroiled in a series of wars with Tamerlane (1369- 1404) who emerged victorious and sacked Sarai and New Sarai. The trade routes never recovered from these disruptions, and Toqtamish died in obscurity in 1391. With the death of Toqtamish, the Golden Horde went into a downward spiral and perceive themselves as descendents of the Golden Horde. Indeed, some eventually fragmented. By the middle of the , the Golden Horde had scholars view the rise of Moscow and the as an heir to the legacy shattered into the , the Astrakhanate, the Sibir Khanate, of the Golden Horde. Khanate, the and the . The final death knell came in Dr. Timothy May, Assistant Professor of History, Young Hall 1480 when the Muscovites on the Ugra River defeated the Great Horde. Although North College and State University the Golden Horde ended, several inner Asian nations still trace their origins to it. The , the , and, of course, the numerous of Kazan and The Golden Horde As a much more powerful and influential Khanate than the Chagatai, the Golden Islam as the Khanate's official religion, his faith caused a serious rift to develop Horde is one of the better known of the Mongol , particularly because of between him and his cousin, Hulegu, the Mongol ruler of the Il-Khanate in Persia. its effect on modern Russian history. For the purposes of this tutorial, however, As we will see later in this chapter, Hulegu's army was responsible for the the Golden Horde is significant not because of its ties to Russia, but to the Islamic collapse of the Abbasid in Baghdad, and the murder of the caliph world. This empire, like the Chagatai, was a product of the division of power that himself. For Hulegu, who was a shamanist with Buddhist sympathies, the sacking followed the death of Genghis Khan in 1227, when several of his relatives of Baghdad was just another military conquest, but the Muslim Berke, watching inherited their own regions to rule. Great Khan Ogodei, Genghis Khan's son, from Sarai, was appalled. The resulting animosity between the two leaders led to ordered the invasion of Russia in 1236, which was led by Ogodei's nephew, Batu. several wars, the first to pit Mongol armies against each other. Russia at this time was not a unified state, but rather a collection of principalities In addition to their religious differences, Berke and Hulegu fought over control of known as Rus. the Mountains, over which both leaders claimed jurisdiction. So intense Between 1236 and 1240, Batu led the invading Mongols through a series of was the rivalry that Berke reportedly ordered the troops he had loaned to Hulegu's attacks on Russian cities, including Moscow and Kiev. By 1241 the Mongols had army years earlier to defect to the Egyptian army following the sack of reached Poland and Hungary, and they were planning an attack on Croatia when Baghdad. The Mamluks then won a decisive victory over Hulegu in 1260. Batu received word that Great Khan Ogodei had died back in Mongolia. Batu Additionally, Berke concluded a peace treaty with the Mamluks in 1261, in order immediately withdrew his army from Europe and retreated to the steppe region for the two groups to ally themselves against Hulegu. It was the first alliance north of the , the home of the Islamic Volga . Batu supported his between a Mongol and non-Mongol state in which both parties were equal. cousin, Mongke, in the struggle for the position of Great Khan against several Also around 1260, Berke removed the Great Khan Kublai's name from the Golden challengers, and after ten years, Mongke finally prevailed in 1251. Batu was Horde's coins. Kublai, Mongke's brother, had succeeded as Great Khan that year, rewarded by the Great Khan for his support during the succession struggle, and after a lengthy struggle with another brother, Arik-Boke. Hulegu had supported his empire enjoyed Mongke's patronage for the duration of his reign. Batu built a Kublai's claim, while Berke supported Arik-Boke. Kublai's victory pushed Berke capital, Sarai, on the Volga River, and he named his empire the Golden Horde. and his Islamic faith further into isolation from his Mongol brethren. Removing The word "horde" is derived from the Turkic-Mongol word, ordu, meaning Kublai's name from the Golden Horde's coins was the ultimate repudiation of "encampment." The Golden Horde became one of the most powerful of Genghis allegiance to the Great Khan. Khan's successor states. Berke died in 1267, only a year after Hulegu, and the feud between the Golden Batu was a shamanist, like most Mongols at this time, which meant that he Horde and the Il-Khans died down. Berke's immediate successors were not acknowledged the existence of one God, but he also viewed the sun, moon, Muslim, and thus they were not as hostile to Hulegu's successors, who also were earth, and water as higher beings. Islam would not influence the Golden Horde's not Muslim. Still, the Golden Horde retained its isolation from the other Mongol rulers until after Batu's death in 1255. After the brief reigns of two of Batu's sons, , and the cultural, linguistic, and religious influence of its mostly Muslim the Khanate passed to his brother, Berke, who took power in 1258. Berke was the Turkish population increasingly affected the Golden Horde's Mongol leaders. By first Muslim ruler of the Golden Horde, and although he was unable to establish the end of the 13th century, Turkish had virtually replaced Mongol as the language of administration, and in 1313, with the ascension of a Muslim, Ozbeg, invasion of 's army in the late added to the destruction. By the to the Khanate, Islam became the official religion of the Golden Horde. mid-15th century, separate Khanates were established in Kazan, , and the Crimea. The Russian , , annexed Kazan and Astrakhan in By assimilating into the Islamic Turkish culture of the south, rather than the 1552 and 1554, while Crimea survived under the protection of the Ottoman Christian Russian culture of the north, the Golden Horde set itself up for its Empire until 1783, when annexed it to the Russian Empire. eventual collapse at the hands of the increasingly powerful Russian principalities. The Islamic Tatars of the Golden Horde, as Europeans have historically called the While the Golden Horde lasted longer than many other Khanates, by the mid-14th Mongols, survive today in small population groups, primarily in southern Russia. century it began to fall apart. The increasingly powerful territories of Moscow and began absorbing pieces of the disintegrating Golden Horde, while the The Golden Horde The Golden Horde of Batu had more time and more room for expansion of its The Mongols' vast contacts opened Russia to new influences, both Eastern and territories than any other Mongol khanate. The Mongols maintained sovereignty Western. The reason the Mongols did not occupy Russia itself, but left its over eastern Russia from 1240 to 1480, and they controlled the upper Volga area, administration to local princes, was not inability to administer a society that was the territories of the former Volga Bulghar state, , the northern Caucasus, both urban and agrarian, or Russian resistance. Rather, some historians believe Bulgaria (for a time), the Crimea, and Khwarizm. By applying the principle of that Russia had little to offer the Mongols in terms of produce or trade routes, and , the Golden Horde Mongols were able to preserve the Mongol ruling even tax revenues were insignificant compared with the wealth of the southern class and the local dynasties for more than 200 years. The influence that the realms under their control. The inability of to operate in forests and Golden Horde Mongols came to have over medieval Russia and other areas was swamps--a factor that limited the northward advance of the Mongols and largely immense and lasting. They played a role in unifying the future Russian state, determined the northern frontier of their empire--was undoubtedly a distinct provided new political institutions, influenced imperial visions, and, through disincentive as well. indirect rule, facilitated the appearance of a Muscovite autocracy. In time the Golden Horde Mongols and the Mongol Tatars, although still nomads, The Golden Horde capital at Sarai became a prosperous center of commerce. lost their original identities and--as happened to Mongols in China and -- Here, as in China, Mongol rule meant free trade, the exchange of goods between became largely synonymous with the local , the Kipchak. Arabic the East and the West, and also broad religious toleration. and Tatar replaced Mongol as the official language of the Golden Horde, and increasing political fragmentation occurred. The power of the Golden Horde khans In the mid-thirteenth century, the Golden Horde was administratively and militarily slowly declined, particularly as a powerful new state rose in central Russia. an integral part of the Mongol empire with its capital at Karakorum. By the early fourteenth century, however, this allegiance had become largely symbolic and Russia and the Golden Horde ceremonial. Although certain Mongol administrative forms--such as census and postal systems--were maintained, other customs were not. The Golden Horde Mongol Invaders Required Grand Princes to Pay Tribute to the Khan embraced Islam as its and, with it, adopted new and more complex Grand Princes of Russia were chosen by khans and paid visits to the Golden administrative forms to replace those of the old regime that had been devised for Horde in exchange for peace with Mongol invaders. conquest. Even though most Mongols remained steppe nomads, new cities were founded, and a permanent urbanized bureaucracy and social structure took shape The first years of the 13th century saw death and destruction throughout Eastern at Sarai. The Golden Horde allied itself with the Mamluks and negotiated with the Europe. The Mongols had worked their way through central Asia, into, Russia and Byzantines to combat the Ilkhans in a struggle to control . Rather than beyond. The Mongol army killed everyone in its path, bringing down cities, isolating Russia, the Mongol presence and extensive diplomatic system brought torturing captives, and striking fear into peasants and noblemen alike. By the envoys to Sarai from central and southern Europe, the Pope, Southwest Asia, middle of the century, most of Russia was under Mongol control. Egypt, Iran, , China, and Mongolia. The Golden Horde's Headquarters in Sarai Although Temuchin, better known as Genghis Khan, was the instigator of the Tribute Money Mongol conquest, other khans followed his lead. The khan set up a headquarters In order to maintain relative peace, Russian princes were forced to pay tribute outside of Mongolia on the lower Volga River in Sarai. This stronghold became money to the khan. Tribute money was collected in the form of taxation. The known as the Golden Horde. It was to Sarai that many Russian grand princes, as poorest peasants dealt with increasing as tribute requirements increased. well as would-be grand princes or those who coveted the title, would go to pay The ensuing unrest created resistance against the Mongols, which lead ultimately tribute and to gain the khan's favor. Yaroslav II was the first Russian to more murder and destruction of property. While legends tell of the residents of to act as vassal of the khan. Russian cities like Ryazin who died rather than give into the demands of the The Khan's Appointment of Grand Princes Golden Horde, it was understood that tribute money was the only way to keep the Mongols from slaughtering the population. was one leader who While the khan appointed the grand prince, Russian princes could rule as they set an example for dealing with the Horde by accepting the khan's terms. chose as long as tribute was paid. The khan favored strong grand princes who could maintain order and encourage or force his people to pay taxes for tribute. References When one grand prince died, those claiming the right to rule would visit the khan Duffey, James P. and Ricci, Vincent L. Czars: Russia's Rulers for Over One Thousand Years. New in hopes of the khan granting him charter. This situation encouraged political York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1995. maneuvering, and intrigue, and murder. Nevertheless, the khan sometimes Massie, Suzanne. Land of the Firebirds: The Beauty of Old Russia. Blue Hill: HeartTree Press, appointed grand princes according to whim. Though traditions of succession were 1980. often followed, the khan had final word in the appointment of Russian grand princes.

The graves in their wake, including that of Harun al-Rashid, the 8th century Abbasid Although the and the Golden Horde both established caliph who was featured in The Thousand and One Nights fables. themselves in regions already inhabited by Muslims, their invasions of Central Asia and Russia, respectively, did not have the catastrophic effect on the native The Muslims inflicted their first defeat on the Mongols in 1221 at the Battle of Islamic faith that the Mongol invasion of Persia and had. Although the faith Parwan, in present-day , under the leadership of Jalal al-Din, son of a prevailed, and the Mongol invaders were eventually converted to Islam, the Central Asian Muslim ruler. The victory provided a temporary morale boost for the Mongol destruction of the Islamic heartland marked a major change of direction Muslim army, but the Mongols soon regrouped and devastated Jalal's troops later for the region. By destroying the Islamic empires that existed before they came, that year. After that initial setback, the Mongols swept through Central Asia into the Mongols instigated a new era for the Islamic world, in which most of the Persia and Iraq. The Persian city of fell in 1237, and the Mongols region's power would fall to three great empires - the Ottoman, the Safavid, and gradually moved closer to Baghdad, the centre of the . the Mughal. The decision to attack the Abbasid caliphate was made at the same time as the The Mongols began their push into Central Asia and Persia in the early 13th election of the Great Khan Mongke in 1251. The Chagatai Khanate and the century under Genghis Khan. The cities of and , later to Golden Horde were already firmly established empires in the Islamic world, and become part of the Chagatai Khanate, fell to Genghis Khan's armies in 1220. the Great Khan disliked the fact that his new Muslim subjects worshipped a man - From there it was not difficult to raid Persia, and by 1221 the Persian cities of the caliph - that they deemed to be in a higher position than the Great Khan. , Nishapur, and Balkh had fallen. In the inevitable pillaging that followed Mongke decided to send his brother, Hulegu, into Iraq at the head of the invading Mongol attacks, the invaders decimated the population of these regions, sparing Mongol army, with the goal of sacking Baghdad and destroying the Abbasid only the artisans they deemed useful. The Mongols also uprooted many Muslim caliphate there. Hulegu set out in 1253, and en route he encountered the Muslim group known as the Assassins, an Ismaili sect that practised an extreme version While Hulegu was distracted by the ensuing succession struggle between his of Shi'ism. The Assassins were based in Alamut, in northwestern Persia, which brothers, Kublai and Arik-Boke, the Mamluks launched an attack on the Mongols Hulegu reached in 1255. The Mongols easily destroyed the small Assassins force, in . It was the first time in almost 50 years that a Muslim army initiated an and the remaining members of the group fled south to the region of attack on the Mongols, and it paid off for the Muslim Mamluks, who defeated the present-day , where they lived as an underground sect for centuries. Mongols and occupied their Syrian base at Gaza. A few months later, a second After this victory, the Mongols had an open path into Baghdad. Great Khan Mamluk attack succeeded in killing Hulegu's commander and driving the Mongols Mongke had instructed Hulegu to attack the Abbasid caliphate only if it refused to out of Syria altogether. The Mamluks continued to defeat Hulegu's army for the surrender to the Mongols. The Abbasids, led by the caliph, Musta'sim, indeed duration of its presence in the region. One reason for the Mamluk success was refused to surrender, making a battle inevitable. their status as professional soldiers. The Mamluk state featured very little cultural, intellectual, or administrative development; its existence was devoted solely to Before the fighting even began, the Abbasids were at a disadvantage. While they military training, and thus the quality of the Mamluk army easily matched that of theoretically had a large enough army to compete with the Mongols, their troops the powerful Mongols. A second reason that has been suggested for the had been neglected by the caliphate and were not prepared for battle at the time Mamluks' success is the fact that the Mamluks had been using horseshoes for of the Mongol invasion. Another problem for the Abbasids was the centuries-old their horses since about 1244. The Mongols did not use horseshoes, and the rift between the Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims. The caliphate was Sunni, as were rocky terrain of Syria reportedly injured the Mongol horses' hooves to the extent most of its subjects, but there was a Shi'ite minority under Abbasid control who that they were unable to fight effectively. Additionally, the Mamluks realised that welcomed the Mongol invaders as a potential means of bringing down the Sunni grasslands were needed to pasture the Mongols' horses. Therefore, the Mamluks caliph. Many Shi'ites in Iraq joined the Mongol forces for that reason. Additionally, often burned grasslands in Syria in their wake, to prevent the Mongol horses from the caliph's , or second-in-command, was himself Shi'ite, and it has been grazing. suggested that he might have also co-operated with the Mongols in attacking the caliphate. The Mongols also had the support of non-Muslims under Abbasid At any rate, the initial Mamluk victories over the Mongols in 1260 were a turning control. Many Christians in the region saw the Mongols as saviours, hoping that point for Hulegu's army, as several challenges arose after that point. Mongke's by decimating Islam's adherents, the faith itself would also be destroyed. Indeed, death had signalled an end to a united Mongol Empire, as the struggle over his in return for Christian support, the Mongols - some of whom were Nestorian successor split the realm. As we saw in the previous section on the Golden Christian themselves - spared Christian churches and communities from their Horde, their Muslim Khan, Berke, had become hostile to Hulegu following the pillaging. latter's destruction of the Abbasid caliphate in 1258. Berke supported Arik-Boke's claim to the Great Khan position, while Hulegu supported Kublai. When Kublai With all these factors working against the Abbasids, the fall of Baghdad and the prevailed in 1260, Hulegu enjoyed the Great Khan's favour for his support, and an destruction of the caliphate in 1258 came rather quickly. The caliph himself, increase in cultural interaction between Hulegu's Persian empire and Kublai's Musta'sim, was captured and killed, and the 500-year-old Abbasid dynasty came Chinese empire ensued, but the unity of the Mongol Empire as a whole was to an abrupt and violent end. With Iraq and Persia thus under Mongol control, destroyed by Berke's refusal to recognise Kublai. This rift deepened as the years Hulegu continued west, towards Syria and Egypt. Ayyubid descendants of Saladin went by. Following Kublai's victory, Hulegu named his empire the Il-Khanate, or held power in Syria at this time, while the European Crusaders had a tenuous "subordinate Khanate," as a sign of his allegiance to Kublai and the greater hold on the Syrian coast. Egypt, meanwhile, was still recovering from the coup Mongol Empire. By 1263, Berke had negotiated an alliance between the Golden that had ousted the Ayyubids and brought the Mamluks, a class of Turkish slave Horde and almost all other states surrounding Hulegu's Il-Khanate: the Mamluks soldiers, to power. As professional soldiers, the Mamluks would present the in Egypt, the Byzantines in , and even the Italian city-state of Mongols with their only serious and continuous challenge. Syria, however, was , which provided a much needed naval link between the Golden Horde and easily defeated, since the Ayyubids and Crusaders refused to join forces in Mamluk Egypt. The Golden Horde was soon fighting a full-scale war with the Il- defending their territory. The major cities of and Damascus fell within a Khanate, which continued after the deaths of Hulegu in 1265 and Berke in 1266. month of each other in 1260, but an immediate invasion of Egypt was halted by the death of the Great Khan Mongke in Mongolia. Shi'ites. He focussed his religious persecution instead on the Buddhists, who had been so intolerant of Muslims for the past 30 years in the Il-Khanate. converted all Buddhist temples to , and he forced the Buddhist priests and monks to either convert to Islam or return to , Tibet, or China. Christians were also persecuted, in retaliation for their special treatment at the expense of the Muslims under the Buddhist rulers of the Il-Khanate. Ghazan reorganised the administration of the Il-Khanate to reflect its new official Islamic faith. He replaced traditional Mongol law with the Sharia, or Islamic code of law, and adopted Islamic military codes for the Mongol army. At Ghazan's death in 1304, virtually all Mongol elements in the Il-Khanate had been absorbed into Islamic culture. Ghazan's successor, his brother, Oljeitu, took the empire in a different direction. Oljeitu was a Shi'ite Muslim, and he embarked on a campaign against the majority Sunnis of the realm. His persecution of Sunnis damaged the Il-Khanate's Hulegu's son and successor, Abaqa, ended the war some years later, and the relationship with the neighbouring Mamluks in Egypt, who were Sunnis. Relations religious reason behind the animosity between the two groups ended when they between the two groups were almost at the point of war when Oljeitu died in 1316. both eventually became Islamic states. Before that happened, however, Islam in Oljeitu's son and heir, Abu Said, was the first Mongol to have an Islamic name the Il-Khanate suffered under a string of Mongol Buddhist Khans. Many Mongols since birth. He restored Sunnism as the state religion of the Il-Khanate and made had adopted Buddhism early in the 13th century, as they were exposed to the peace with the Mamluks. Peace to the west did not mean peace to the north, religion in China, Tibet, and northern India. Hulegu had adopted some Buddhist however, since the alliance between the Mamluks and the Golden Horde had customs, but he is primarily regarded as a traditional Mongol shamanist. The fact dissolved after Berke's death in 1266. Abu Said thus found himself involved in a that he was buried with several young women testifies to this fact, since neither renewed conflict with the Golden Horde over the territory of the Caucasus Buddhism nor Islam would have sanctioned sacrifice. Abaqa, Hulegu's Mountains. Abu Said died in 1335 while at war with the Golden Horde, and his son, was a devout Buddhist who mercilessly persecuted the Muslims of the Il- death marked the beginning of the Il-Khanate's decline and eventual collapse. Khanate. He even promoted Christian interests ahead of Muslim, simply to harass the Muslims. Abaqa's son, , also a Buddhist, was even harder on Muslims A series of succession struggles after 1335 weakened the empire, as did the loss than his father had been. During this period of Buddhist leadership in traditionally of soldiers and civilians to the , which had been ravaging Persia. The Islamic lands, many Buddhist symbols appeared. Numerous Buddhist temples chaos opened the way for foreign invasion, which occurred in 1357 when the dotted the landscape of Persia and Iraq, none of which survived the 14th century, Golden Horde Khan, , attacked , the Il-Khanate capital. Although unfortunately. The Buddhist element of the Il-Khanate died with Arghun, however, the Golden Horde was not successful in annexing the Il-Khanate to its own and Islam soon spread from the population to the ruling classes. empire, it succeeded in adding to the political turmoil of the land. When Timur invaded from Central Asia in 1393, the Il-Khanate was swallowed up into his One instigator for the change was Arghun's brother, , who succeeded rapidly expanding empire. him. Eager to make a name for himself as an Il-Khan, Gaykhatu introduced paper money from China into Islamic trading circles. Islamic merchants in the Il-Khanate The Mongol invasion of the Islamic heartland had mixed effects. On one hand, the refused to accept the unrecognisable new money, however, and trade came to a Islamic world never regained its previous power. Much of the six centuries of virtual standstill. The experiment was such a disaster that Gaykhatu was forced to Islamic scholarship, culture, and infrastructure was destroyed as the invaders abandon it after six months, and the ensuing rebellion ousted him from power in burned libraries, replaced mosques with Buddhist temples, and destroyed intricate 1295. His successor, Arghun's son, Ghazan, was the first Muslim of Mongol irrigation systems. In fact, the irrigation equipment necessary for farming in the heritage to rule the Il-Khanate, and all rulers of Persia since him have been Mesopotamian desert was not rebuilt until the 20th century. Additionally, Muslim. Ghazan adhered to the Sunni form of Islam, but he was tolerant of Gaykhatu's attempt to introduce paper money at the end of the 13th century virtually destroyed trade in the region, from which it was difficult to recover. On the other hand, the Mongol invasion was not entirely negative for the Islamic the in the Seljuk region was used for literary purposes for the world. Perhaps the most significant achievement for the Muslims under Mongol first time, and it received official recognition. rule was their ability to absorb the Mongols into their Islamic culture, rather than The Muslims could also thank the Mongols for introducing them to , allowing its destruction at Mongol hands. This feat can be seen in the triumph of which the Mongols brought from China. While China is generally accepted as the the Islamic faith over Mongol shamanism and Buddhism. It had occurred so empire that invented gunpowder, the Muslims are credited with applying the quickly, in fact, that only 40 years after the fall of the Abbasid caliphate in 1258, invention as a propellant, and thus a weapon. This spread of the native language the Mongols responsible for it had themselves adopted Islam as the official and culture to the Mongol invaders is seen in the Il-Khanate as well as the religion of their empire. Mongol-ruled Yuan Dynasty in China, both of which had rich cultural, linguistic, A similar trend is seen in language. Because the majority of the inhabitants of the and religious traditions that pre-dated the Mongol invasion. By comparison, the Central Asian steppe were Turks, and the Mongol army and administration often Golden Horde in southern Russia, despite converting to Islam and adopting the employed more Turks than Mongols, it did not take long for the Turkish language Turkish language, remained true to its Mongol heritage as pastoral nomads and to replace Mongol in certain regions of the Il-Khanate. The of Azerbaijan warriors. The Mongols of the Golden Horde remained Mongols; in the Il-Khanate in northern Persia, for example, which is an independent country today, has and China, however, the Mongols were so absorbed into the native culture that remained a Turkish-speaking region since Mongol times. Turkish did not become hardly any trace of them remained by the . Their legacy was not the language of administration in the Il-Khanate, as it had in the Golden Horde by easily forgotten, however, particularly in Persia, where the Mongol invasion had 1280, but it was influential nonetheless. The Seljuk Turks in Asia Minor fuelled the age-old Persian nationalism that would eventually result in the particularly benefited from their status as Mongol vassals. Perhaps because of formation of the powerful Safavid Empire there in the 16th century. their fierce determination to retain their Turkish language and culture under the foreign rulers, or perhaps because of the Mongol favouritism towards the Turks,

Khanate were Muslims, indicating that Islam had penetrated the region. It was not The Chagatai Khanate until the ascension of Tarmashirin to the throne in 1326, however, that the After Genghis Khan's death in 1227, his vast empire was divided between two of Chagatai Khanate became an officially Muslim state. All Khans after him were his sons, Ogodei and Chagatai. Ogodei became Great Khan after his father's Muslim, and Central Asia has remained Islamic ever since. With the conversion of death, and thus controlled most of the Mongol Empire. Chagatai, however, was the Chagatai Khanate, all three western Mongol empires, including the Golden also given a small area of Central Asia to control, while maintaining allegiance to Horde and the Il-Khanate - as we will see later in this chapter - were Islamic. It is Ogodei as Great Khan. The region under Chagatai's control was populated mostly rather remarkable, considering the usual pattern in world history of a conquering by Turkish nomads, many of which had already converted to Islam. The great power imposing its culture on its new subjects, that the Mongol conquerors of the Central Asian cities of Bukhara and Samarkand also fell within Chagatai's sphere, Islamic world instead adopted the culture and religion of their subjects. both of which were influential centres of Islamic scholarship. For the most part, The Chagatai Khanate fell to Timur, himself a native of Samarkand, in the mid- however, the Chagatai Khanate ruled non-urbanised communities, thereby 14th century, more about which will come later in this chapter. Timur's successors preserving the traditional nomadic ways of the Mongols while other Khanates were in turn ousted from the Chagatai Khanate by the Sheibanids, descendants of became more settled and urbanised. It is generally agreed that the Chagatai a brother of Batu, the original Khan of the Golden Horde. The Sheibanids later Khanate was the weakest of all Mongol-controlled empires because it was small, called themselves the Uzbeks, the name by which they are still known today. and thus it was easily absorbed into the spheres of influence of more powerful Another Islamic group, known today as the Kazakhs, originated as dissident neighbouring Khanates. Uzbeks during the same period. Both groups became part of the in After Chagatai's death in 1242, the Khanate retained the name of its original 1917, making up two of the five Muslim republics of that country. Today, leader, but it fell into Ogodei's realm under the control of his grandson, . Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan are independent countries, living remnants of the Following Kaidu's death in 1301, a handful of the Mongol rulers of the Chagatai Chagatai Mongol legacy in Central Asia. (alternative spellings Chagata, Chugta, Chagta, Djagatai, Jagatai), Alghu was succeeded as khan by Baraq (Barak), based in . Baraq a son of Genghis Khan (1206—1227), controlled the part of the Mongol Empire was at odds with Abaqa, the or Lesser Khan who ruled in Persia. The which extended from the river (eastern Kazakhstan) and Kashgaria (western Ögedite Kaidu (Qaidu) saw in these troubles an opportunity to re-assert the ) to Transoxiana. He inherited most of what are now the five Central imperial claim of his own line. He made an alliance with the Ilkhanids to make war Asian states and northern Iran after the death of his father which he ruled until his on Baraq, who attacked first but was defeated and became a vassal of Kaidu. The death in 1242. The Empire later came to be known as the Chagatai Khanate, part wars between Baraq and Persia continued until Baraq was finally defeated and of the Mongol Empire. These territories would later become the Mongol-Turkish killed by Abaqa. states. Kaidu joined forces with the Chagatai prince and pretender , who Mongol Successor States recognized the of Kaidu, and together they invaded the Tarim, whose Uigur inhabitants had remained loyal to the line of Genghis (Jenghiz), now Genghis Khan's empire was inherited by his third son, Ögedei, the designated represented by Kublai, who in 1279 had conquered China. This was tantamount Great Khan who personally controlled the lands east of Lake Balkash as far as to a declaration of war and Kublai had to repel the attack mounted by Kaidu and Mongolia. , the youngest, the keeper of the hearth, was accorded the Duwa. The results of these wars was the independence of the Chagatai Khanate, northern Mongolian homeland. Chagatai, the second son received Kasharia, with as well as the separation of the Ilkhanate from Mongolia. his capital at Almarikh in the modern Sinkiang area of western China, and Tranoxania between the and rivers in modern Uzbekistan. When died in 1294, the former Mongol Empire was divided into Apart from problems of lineage and inheritance, the Mongol Empire was independent khanates: Kublai's imperial state continued in Mongolia and China; endangered by the great cultural and ethnic divide between the Mongols the Golden Horde ruled the western steppes; Ilkhanid Persia dominated the themselves and their mostly Islamic Turkic subjects. Middle East; and the Chagatai Khanate covered Central Asia. The Golden Horde contested Azerbaijan with Ilkhanid Persia, but was at peace with the When Ögedei died before achieving his dream of conquering all of China, there Chaghataites, whose independence it had actively encouraged. Ilkhanid Persia was a smooth transition to his son Güyük (1241) overseen by Ögedei's wife faced growing Mameluke power in Syria, following the death of Baraq was no Töregenem who had assumed the regency for the five years following Ögedei's longer threatened from Transoxiana. Persia and the Golden Horde were Islamic, death. It had to be ratified in a quriltai, which was duly celebrated but without the as were the Chagatai domains in Transoxiana and Uiguria. But the Chagatai presence of Batu, the independent-minded khan of the Golden Horde. After Mongols of the steppes clung tenacioulsy to their traditional customs. The Güyük's death, Batu sent Berke, who maneuvered with Tolui's widow, and in the Chagatai Khanate was turbulent and unsafe because of the efforts of Kaidu and next quriltai (1253), the Ögedite line was passed over for Möngke, Tolui's son, his vassal Duwa to integrate the original ulus (dynasties) of Ögedei and Chagatai. who was said to be favourable to Nestorian Christianity. The Ögedites did not immediately go into opposition but they retained their Mongolian domains. In India, the Sultanate was led by war-like, despotic anti-Hindu rulers. Duwa was active in Afghanistan and attempted to extend Mongol rule to India, but there The Chagatai Khanate after Chagatai he was defeated by a formidable foe, Ala-ud-Din, who had ascended to the throne Chagatai died shortly after Ögedei. The Chagataites, who had previously of Delhi in 1296. The Mongols thereafter repeatedly invaded northern India. On at accepted Guyuk, consented to the succession to Möngke as Great Khan with least two occasions, they came in strength. The second time around, they took some reluctance, but on the whole the Mongol Empire did not disgregate. Möngke Delhi but could not keep their hold on the Sultanate. Kaidu persisted in trying to died during his campaign against Song China. Kubai (Qubilai) succeeded him as conquer Mongolia, the key to China, but he died fighting the Kublaids (1301). Great Khan in 1260, but faced a succession crisis. His younger brother, Arigboka (Arigboqa), claimed the great khanate. Kublai brought him to heel with the help of Alghu, the Chagatai Khan. But Alghu began to act independently of Kublai.