Just Finished Reading: The Mongols – A Very Short Introduction by Morris Rossabi (FP: 2012)

Seemingly appearing from nowhere in the 13th and 14th centuries the Mongols carved out the largest contiguous empire the world has ever seen covering the whole of China and stretching from Korea to Russia in the north and Syria in the south. For a time they washed up on the edges of Western Europe and even threatened Christendom itself. All the more surprising considering their humble beginnings and their ultimate demise.

In this fascinating and detailed short book (a mere 124 pages) the author unearths the Mongols origins as a wild, disconnected and unorganised disparate group of warring tribes eking out a subsistence existence on the wild open spaces of Asia. Reliant on their horses for almost everything they needed they supplied the rest by occasional raiding of the more settled farming areas and with trading any surpluses they had in times of plenty. This is likely to have been their entire (largely unrecorded) history if it wasn’t for the emergence of a leader of one small band of nomads who had much greater ambitions – Chinggis (or Ghenkis) Khan. Slowly accumulating power by defeating tribe after tribe in combat or absorbing them into his super-tribe through marriage or treaty the great Khan eventually became a regional power to be reckoned with. With increased wealth and the power that came with it even walled cities could not stand against him – initially safe behind their fortifications they failed to account for the Mongols hiring mercenaries adept in siege craft. As their power increased so did their wealth, as their wealth increased so did their power. Whole provinces fell before them or paid tribute. Local tax collectors made sure that the money kept rolling in and the Mongols themselves kept their empire expanding ever outward. Of course things couldn’t last. No empire expands forever and no statesman, no matter how gifted, lives forever. When Chinggis died the infighting began over a successor and the great empire descended in to a period of civil war.

When a strong leader finally appeared it was already too late. The empire had become a federation of tribes made up of traditional nomads, new city dwellers, Muslims, and much else besides. Periodic warfare between the various Khanate's became endemic and the Mongols disappeared from history.

One of the many interesting asides in this intriguing little book is the idea, floated by several European powers, that sections of the Mongol Horde could be persuaded to attack the largely Muslim Middle East either in co-ordination with the Western Crusade or on their own in the pay of the West thereby eliminating an enemy of both. Obviously the plans, possibly naïve, came to nothing as the Western Kingdoms squabbled amongst themselves and no real consensus appeared. It is however interesting to speculate what the world might have looked like after Islam had been destroyed by the Mongol invasion of the Middle East. I’m sure there’s an Alternate History novel/series in there somewhere! Detailed, with a wide scope and a decent bibliography this is definitely a good place to start if you want to find out more of this enigmatic, violent and surprisingly cultured group of peoples who have a huge influence on Eastern and Far Eastern cultures – and luckily not on Western Europe.