A HISTORY OF INNER ASIA

chapter seven
The conquering Mongols
Few historical events can illustrate the unpredictability of the future as
vividly as the sudden rise of Genghis Khan’s Mongol empire in the
second and third decades of the thirteenth century.The energy and
genius of the relatively small number of people who were at the core of
this enterprise have baffled all historians trying to explain the phenomenon,
just as the effects, ranging from horrifying massacres and devastations
to periods of admirable cross-cultural exchange and stimulation,
have never ceased repelling and attracting them.
The effects of the Mongol invasion and rule were complex and, as we
have implied, of varying type and degree across the vast swath of
Eurasia they covered.Three areas and civilizations, however, can be
singled out as having been affected far more radically than the rest:
China, Central Asia, and Russia.In all three, history can be broken
down into two periods, pre-Mongol and post-Mongol.
The first enigma of the Mongol phenomenon is the relative
insignificance of the tribes and territories where Genghis Khan had
arisen.We have dwelt on Mongolia during its “Turkic” period, the sixth
through tenth centuries; a contemporary observer could with some legitimacy
have characterized Mongolia as the real and original Turkestan,
land of the Turks, whether Kök Turks, Uighurs, Kyrgyz, or an amorphous
conglomerate of contending tribes.Once the Kyrgyz had lost
interest in Mongolia and withdrawn to their homeland in southern
Siberia, and the Khitan lost theirs thanks to their transformation into a
Chinese dynasty – both of which developments took place in the tenth
century – Mongolia became a country of nomads, mainly Turkic,
grouped into tribes but lacking any larger political cohesion or cultural
dynamism.The script of the Orkhon valley was forgotten, the
Manichaeism of the Uighurs was gone, and the incipient cities and agriculture
had receded.Nevertheless, the very fluidity of the situation
exposed the tribes living there to external influences.Trade was not
103