In one line: One of the best biographies I have read…it’s hard to go wrong trying to better understand the influences of how the world has evolved over time
In one more line: Genghis Khan’s Mongolian Empire has had some of the most meaningful impacts on how we got to where we are today.
Introduction:
⁃ Alexander the Great died under mysterious circumstances at age 33 in Babylon and his family was murdered
⁃ Julius Caesar’s fellow aristocrats stabbed him to death in the chamber of the Roman senate
⁃ Napoleon was a solitary prisoner in one of the most remote and inaccessible islands on the planet
⁃ Genghis Khan died in 1227 at 65 (born 1162 — the year of the horse) in peace with his family, friends and soldiers ready to protect him
⁃ The last ruling descendant of Khan, Alim Khan of Bukhara in Uzbekistan was killed by the Soviets in 1920
⁃ “Ikh Khorig” (the great taboo) is where Genghis Khan was supposedly buried, remained closed off deep in Asia for 800 years in Ulaanbaatar
⁃ Mongols eventually converted to Buddhists
⁃ The only permanent structures GK built were bridges
⁃ The Mongols were cultural connectors, bringing everything from science and philosophy to firearms, new products, and innovative thinking to the places they conquered
⁃ Every aspect of European life — technology, warfare, clothing, commerce, food, art, literature and music — changed during the Renaissance as a result of Mongolian influence
⁃ “Hurray” — cry of bravado and mutual excitement — comes from Mongolians
⁃ BOOK: The Canterbury tales — written by Geoffrey Chaucer — the first author in the English language
⁃ GK never allowed any portraits of him to be painted, engravings on coins, sculptures of his image etc.
⁃ There are no proven records or notes about GK’s life and history
⁃ ‘The Age of Enlightenment’ — the 1700s — a Voltaire play about GK was made called ‘The Orphan of China’
⁃ Mogul — Persian name for Mongols
⁃ “Mongoloids” — 1800’s scientists wanted to show the inferiority of Asian and Indian populations, they classified them as this
⁃ “The secret history of the mongols” — documents recorded that used Chinese characters to represent Mongolian sounds of the 13th century — not translated to English until 1970s by Francis Woodman Cleave
⁃ Mongolia was admitted to the UN in 1961
⁃ GK has a statue where he was born near the Onon River
⁃ Some scientists consider GK the most powerful shaman in history and say that if the “secret history” could be unlocked it would give the power to a shaman to again rise and conquer the world
⁃ Burkhan Khaldun — mountain that protracted GK in death
⁃ GK treated hostile civilians as animals to be herded, but hostile soldiers as game to be hunted
⁃ “Zud” — animal famine in Mongolia when animals literally drop dead or freeze to death standing up
⁃ Mongol nation founded in 1206 after GK united all the tribes
Chapter 1 — The Blood Clot:
⁃ Bukhara — emotional position throughout Muslim world known as noble Bukhara, the center of the religious piety — the ornament and delight of all Islam — possibly the greatest surprise attack ever in history
⁃ GK used surprise as a method to get enemies to surrender before war began; those who surrendered were free from terror and disgrace; those who did not were treated exceptionally harsh
⁃ GK used siege warfare — psychological attacks creating fear, terror and surprise while also attacking through the air, ground, and underground attacks combining the ferocity and speed of a steppe warrior with the highest technological innovation of Chinese civilization — they use accumulated knowledge and weapons from all cities they conquered
⁃ “Victory did not come to the one who played by the rules; it came to the one who made the rules and imposed them on his enemy.”
⁃ GKs descendants ruled Bukhara for 700 years from 1220 to 1920 until the Soviets came in
⁃ LEGEND OF THE MONGOLS: originated in the mountain forest when blue-Gray wolf mates with beautiful red doe on the shores of a Great Lake. Because the mongols permanently closed this homeland to outsiders when GK died, we have no historical descriptions of it. The names of its rivers and mountains are virtually unknown in historical literature and even modern maps give conflicting names to its features
⁃ Surrounded by Siberia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Khentii mountains, gobi desert, yellow river on southern side of the gobi, the onon river (GK born near this)
⁃ GKs mother was Hoelun — kidnapped by solitary horseman (originally married to Chiledu) named Yesugei
⁃ In steppe culture — smell holds great value, your smell has deep emotional meaning and is thought to have part of your soul
⁃ According to an often repeated account, Hoelun first baby struggles into the world tightly clutching a large black blood clot in his right hand the size of a knuckle bone that he had pulled from his mother’s womb into the world — his name was Temujin
⁃ Mongols closest relatives were Tatar’s and Khitan, Manchus, and Turkic tribes
⁃ “Hun” — Mongolian word for human being and they called their Hun ancestors Hun-nu meaning people of the sun
⁃ The “Silk Route” — ran south of the Gobi and was the main trade route through Europe and Asia connecting Chinese and Muslim societies
⁃ For the Mongols, success in battle was only about the goods, not about the kills
⁃ Mongol culture — kinship has more value than everything else; families had strict hierarchy by age; talking about death or blood was taboo
⁃ “Andas” — Mongolian word for a bond that was supposed to be stronger even then that between biological brothers because andas freely chose their tie
Chapter 2 — Tale of Three Rivers:
⁃ Mongols are animists — pray to the spirits that surround them — the eternal blue sky, golden sun and spiritual forces of nature; they divide the world into two parts, the earth and the sky
⁃ Burkhan Khaldun — “God Mountain” (sacred heart of the Mongol world), surrounded by 3 rivers — Onon, Kherlen and Tuul
⁃ GK’s name as a kid was Temujin, his andas Jamuka
⁃ Kinship hierarchy — each lineage known as the “bone”; no intermarriage allowed black-boned; intermarriage allowed white-bone
⁃ Temujin’s father was Bodonchar the Fool (he kidnapped his mom after killing husband)
⁃ 1181 Temujin broke away from Jamuka and began conquest
⁃ Ordu/horde — Khans ordu consists of relatives and serves as a sort of aristocracy over the tribe
⁃ “Khurlitai” — voting — showing up counts as a vote
⁃ GK war story — arrow hit him in neck and one of his men sucked the blood out of his neck all night in case it was poisonous and he did not awake until the next day
⁃ GK rise to power: 1) appointed loyal allies to positions of power over family members; 2) held khurlitai after defeating an enemy and would redistribute the follower households into his clan and adopt one of the kids into his family to better unite followers and kill the remaining leaders, taking them in as part of the tribe and not slaves; 3) never punished or harmed any of his generals in 6 decades; 4) realized looting allowed for incomplete victories because warriors would escape, reorganize and counterattack, he decided to only have looting done after complete victory
⁃ Avarga served as GK primary operation base
⁃ Arban — squads of 10
⁃ Zagun — 10 squads of 10
⁃ Mingan — 10 squads of 100 (battalion)
⁃ Tumen — 10 squads of 1000
⁃ In 1203, said to have had 95 Mingans
⁃ This method of organizing was the same as Athenian lawgiver Cleisthenes 2,000 years earlier
⁃ GK ordered camp setup at source of the three rivers to establish what would eventually become known as the Mongol River so no outsiders were allowed
⁃ Referred to tribe as People of the Felt Walls, later Yeke Mongol Ulus (Great Mongol Nation)
Chapter 3 — War of the Khans:
⁃ Horses are the most important and honored animal to Mongols
⁃ Baljuna Covenant — horse appears from nowhere at Baljuna Lake after Ong Khan betrays Temujin, they drink the muddy horse water in toast and pledge eternal allegiance that transcended kinship, ethnicity, and religion
⁃ Final battle for control of Mongols against Jamuka in 1204 — hit and run skirmishes like US in Revolutionary War
⁃ GK defeated every tribe on the steppe, united them and eliminated the aristocratic lineage system
⁃ “Naadam” — traditional Mongol games of wrestling, horse racing, archery
⁃ GK controlled land the size of modern day Western Europe and population of 1MM people
⁃ GK comes from Chinggis khan, the western translation of Persian spelling of Genghis; Mongolian word Chin means strong, firm, unshakeable and fearless, and close to the word for wolf (chino), the ancestor whom they claimed descent
⁃ GK created new law that rather than focus on daily life, set out to regulate troublesome aspects of life (like kidnapping women); declared religious freedom to all to avoid religious conflicts, and provided tax exemptions to all religious leaders doing public service
⁃ Codified group responsibility and group guilt so that families and tribes held individuals accountable; the law applied to the highest ranking same as to everyone else
⁃ “Nom” — Mongolian word for book; Greek word nomos — meaning law — first form of writing for Mongols was keeping track of supreme law and enforcement of it
Chapter 4 — The Mongol World War (1211-1261); Spitting on the Golden Khan:
⁃ In a span of 30 years, the Mongols would conquer every army, fort and city starting in 1211
⁃ Marco Polo alleged Mongol warriors could travel 10 days without stopping to make fire or heat food, they drank horses blood and carried 10 pounds of dried milk paste mixing 1 ound each day with water to mix w dried meat and curd to chew while riding
⁃ Mongols used fixed melodies and poetic styles since they were illiterate and to ensure accurate memorization
⁃ GK never asked his men to die for him, he waged war with a purpose: to preserve Mongol life; they did not find honor in fighting, they found honor in winning and didn’t care how it was done, whether by trickery or by blood; they were not concerned with killing if it preserved Mongol life
⁃ Put villagers to strategic use vs rape, kill, or dispense of
⁃ “Trebuchet” — catapult that three objects even faster than torsion catapult
⁃ Aim to create as much confusion as possible and spread war propaganda and instill fear in their enemies
⁃ Fire lance — bamboo tube that sprayed fire, sparks and smoke developed from firecrackers
⁃ The wars that were originally for goods, silk, baubles and access to silk route turned into 3 decades of the most extensive war in world history that he bequeathed to survivors for 2 more generations; his life requires constant conquest because his people would not settle for simple goods anymore
⁃ Despite his accumulation of wealth and power, he always lived a simple life and attributed his success to the inabilities and excesses of his enemies
Chapter 5 — Sultan vs. Khan:
⁃ When GK took down the Sultan and the entire Muslim civilization, he destroyed the most sophisticated in astronomy, mathematics, agronomy, linguistics and virtually all areas of learning along with the highest levels of literacy among the general population — this caused more damage than any other war campaign
⁃ GK almost always offered surrender to come into their tribe as relatives and for the enemies to provide goods and food, and if they declined then war would begin; inspired fear through speed, efficiency and disdain for the rich and powerful
⁃ After the Jurched and Tangut betrayals, always killed the aristocrats immediately to avoid future wars, they were not trustworthy and the rest of the citizens rarely cared about the rich and powerful
⁃ Byzantine emperor Basil defeated the Bulgarians in 1014, had 15000 war captives blinded and left one out of 100 with one eye to spread the terror
⁃ Christian crusaders in 1098/1099 take Antioch and Jerusalem slaughtered the Jews because of their religion regardless of age or gender
⁃ Holy Roman emperor Frederick Barbarossa plays sport with prisoners heads, catapulted children prisoners in the besiege war machines and hung prisoners from top of city walls
⁃ GK cried many times in public out of anger or sadness but when those closest to him died he did not allow for himself or sons to show pain and anguish through mourning, rather funneled energy into combat and killing
⁃ Persian chronicles report battle of Nishapur the Mongols slaughtered 1,747,000; 1,600,000 in city of Herat; later conservative scholars put central Asian invasion deaths at 15MM total in 5 years but this is apocryphal, even though they were often outnumbered as much as 50:1
⁃ GK better described as destroyer of cities vs slayer of people; unlike many other rulers he knew he was mortal and prepared his empire for transition
⁃ Conquest stopped in the middle of Pakistan in 1222
⁃ GK did not spend enough time with his sons nor did he train them to replace him because of conquest
⁃ The first key to leadership was self-control, particularly the mastery of pride “if you can’t swallow your pride you can’t lead.”
⁃ Second, don’t talk too much, only say what needs to be said; demonstrate thoughts and opinions through actions not thru words “He can never be happy until his people are happy.”
⁃ Third, have a vision, goals and a plan; “without the vision of a goal, a man cannot manage his own life, much less the lives of others.”
⁃ Fourth, keep life simple and do not pursue a colorful life filled with material things
⁃ Fifth, conquering a nation only by conquering the hearts of the people
⁃ Sixth, develop strong relationships based on agreement of principles and mutual affection vs origin or other superficial things
⁃ “Naadam” — homecoming celebration
⁃ He sought to unite the whole world in one peaceful empire
Chapter 6 — The Discovery & Conquest of Europe:
⁃ After GK death, Son Ogodei took over the throne, released all the riches and set a precedent or excess and rapid destruction of wealth; he did not accompany his armies on conquest; unlike GK he didn’t believe in the mobile center of power (which was one of their primary factors to success), he tried to create a fixed center of power in his short reign; they quickly began to lose power As many parts of central and Muslims stop remitting goods; the center of power chosen was Karakorum (black stone/wall), it failed since it required a fixed flow of food and goods from hundreds of miles south of the gobi and lacked shelter from the winter winds
⁃ He paid extremely high prices for good regardless of quality or need
⁃ They created a system of paper money exchange since bullion and coins were so difficult to transport over such long distances, backed by silk and precious metals
⁃ GK died in 1227, by 1235 Ogodei had squandered most of his wealth
⁃ 1224 marked the first attack in Europe by an Asian army since the Huns almost a thousand years earlier in which a European army was slaughtered, this was the genesis for the later conquest of Europe
⁃ In 1235 the Mongol army set out on conquest in all directions spreading almost 5,000 miles, a feat not replicated again until WW2 when the US and Allies were fighting in Europe and Asia at the same time; this was because the families could not agree on consensus of where to attack
⁃ The conquest was tremendously successful under GKs best war general, Subodei and smartest surviving grand son Batu — their power and prowess likely exceeded that of GK’s armies
⁃ They built wooden walls around the outside of the city in Riazan after forcing everyone and all troops to retreat, cutting off all sources of food and goods and eliminating any chance for escape
⁃ Tartarus is Greek name for hell, lowest cavern beneath Hades, where the titans had been condemned after creating war amongst the gods
⁃ By 1242 they had conquered virtually all of Russia and Eastern Europe
⁃ The expression of “lightning warfare” coined during the Mongol conquest to Western Europe was the genesis for what later acquired the German name “Blitzkrieg”
⁃ Ogodei died in a drunken stupor in 1241 and within 14 years all of GK’s sons had died
⁃ The European conquests yielded little loot and so the Mongols struck a deal with the Italians selling the Slavs as slaves for goods, who were then sold to the Sultan of Egypt, who then used them in his slave army which would prove detrimental to the Mongols 20 years later when they would meet this army and they’d have extensive knowledge of their war tactics (in modern Israel)
Chapter 7 — Warring Queens:
⁃ After Ogodei’s death, a group of women controlled the largest empire in world history until 1251
⁃ First Mongol World war lasted from 1212 – 1241
⁃ Talmud texts were those of the Jews
⁃ Created standardized unit of account and system for currency exchange in 1250s
⁃ People called the Ismailis hashshashin, meaning hashish users, which would later evolve into assassin (it was said hashish was used to manipulate and inspire confidence in young martyrs to assassinate high ranking officials of anyone who opposed them)
⁃ Baghdad founded in 762
⁃ Tigris and Euphrates rivers had historically served as barriers of protection for Mesopotamia
⁃ The Mongol empires accomplished the conquest of Baghdad in 2 years what European crusaders and Seljuk Turks couldn’t accomplish in two centuries of sustained efforts
⁃ The Sultan of Egypt’s army of sold slaves defeated the Mongol army in 1260, which would end up being the limits of its Western empire
⁃ Mongke khan was the last descendant of GK to rule the Mongol empire and died in 1259
Chapter 8 — Khubilai & the Nee Mongol empire:
⁃ Formation of ties with Chinese; name changed to Yuan dynasty and Mongolian empire now broken up into 4 sections
⁃ Created capital in what is modern day Beijing, at the time was called “Dadu”, meaning great capital
⁃ “The forbidden city” was a Mongol steppe in the center of the capital with gers where the Mongols preferred to live
⁃ Rule by council, consensus and local administrators was lost after the Ming dynasty took over
⁃ Paper money system was in full operation by the 1270s made from mulberry bark
⁃ Mongolians were the first country to develop and endorse public education systems for the masses and focus on literacy
⁃ 160 plays created during this time survive today
⁃ The Mongols both united and bequeathed the Chinese nation of what it is today, they united all the different language dialects
⁃ The Mongols and Chinese immigrants brought created a hybrid culture later called Indo-Chinese because Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand were largely Indian in culture, religion, architecture and mythology
⁃ Many of the foods and recipes still survive from the Khans today
⁃ Kubhilai drank tea with orange peel, kudzu flowers, ginseng, sandalwood and cardamom that cured his hangovers
Chapter 8 — Their Golden Light:
⁃ Mongols created the basis of the intercontinental system of communication, commerce, technology, religion, and politics between what is modern day Asia and Europe
⁃ 1300’s referred as Pax Mongolica or Tatarica as they set out in creating a century of peace
⁃ Marco Polo was in the Mongol court during Kubhilai’s reign
⁃ They created the first forms of passports (called paiza’s) and credit cards to be used in trade and along trade routes to be worn on a chain around the neck (gold, silver or wooden tablets)
⁃ Feudal systems — peasants provide all goods and necessary goods; having to rely on imported goods considered a failure
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