Pax Mongolica
Overview
Pax Mongolica
The Mongol Empire expanded through brutal raids and invasions, but also established relatively secure routes of trade and technology between East and West. In a number of ways it foreshadowed globalization.
Learning Objectives
Identify and assess factors in the rise, decline, and disintegration of the Mongol empire(s).
Identify and assess the impact of the Mongol empire(s).
Keywords / Key Concepts
Genghis Khan: founder of the thirteenth-century Mongol empire in Eurasia
Kublai Khan: Mongol leader of the Yuan dynasty in China, and grandson of Genghis Khan
Pax Mongolica: also known as the Mongol Peace, a system of relationships across Mongol-dominated Asia that allowed trade, technologies, commodities, and ideologies to be disseminated and exchanged across Eurasia
Rise of the Mongol Empire
During Europe’s High Middle Ages, the Mongol Empire began to emerge and ultimately became the largest contiguous land empire in history. The Mongol Empire began in the Central Asian steppes and lasted throughout the 13th and 14th centuries. At its greatest extent, it included all of modern-day Mongolia, China, parts of Burma, Romania, Pakistan, Siberia, Ukraine, Belarus, Cilicia, Anatolia, Georgia, Armenia, Persia, Iraq, Central Asia, and much or all of Russia. Many additional countries became tributary states of the Mongol Empire.
The empire unified the nomadic Mongol and Turkic tribes of historical Mongolia under the leadership of Genghis Khan, who was proclaimed ruler of all Mongols in 1206. The empire grew rapidly under his rule, and then continued to expand under his descendants, through military conquest and invasion. By 1300 the empire controlled much of Asia, including China, and eastern Europe. The vast transcontinental empire connected the east with the west under a Pax Mongolica, or Mongol Peace, through conquest, invasion, and forced displacement of peoples on an unprecedent scale. Although the Pax Mongolica allowed trade, technologies, commodities, and ideologies to be disseminated and exchanged across Eurasia on Mongol terms, the Mongols maintained order through fear and intimidation. Historians regard the Mongol raids and invasions as some of the deadliest and most terrifying conflicts in human history.
Ghenghis Khan and the Mongol Empire
Before Genghis Khan became the leader of Mongolia, he was known as Temujin. He was born around 1162 in modern-day northern Mongolia, into a nomadic tribe with noble ties and powerful alliances. These fortunate circumstances helped him unite dozens of tribes in his adulthood via alliances. He used diplomacy, political manipulation, and military power to expand his Mongol empire. He also forbade looting of his enemies without permission, and he implemented a policy of sharing spoils with his warriors and their families instead of giving it all to the aristocrats. His meritocratic policies, among other tactics, attracted a broader range of followers, but also alienated his uncles and brothers, who competed with him for control of the empire. War ensued from 1203 through 1205. Temujin prevailed, destroying all the remaining rival tribes and bringing them under his sway. In 1206, Temujin was crowned as the leader of the Great Mongol Nation. It was then that he assumed the title of Genghis Khan, meaning universal leader; this marked the start of the Mongol Empire. Khan maintained control over his empire through a combination of violence, surveillance of his subject peoples, and a relative lenient policy toward religious and local traditions. With his death in 1227, his sons and grandsons continued his empire, although dividing it into four smaller empires, or khanates.
Innovations Under Ghenghis Khan
As ruler of a vast and diverse empire, Genghis Khan implement a number of innovations. These innovations allowed him to maintain order, and also facilitated trade and exchanges of information across Eurasia. These innovations included reorganization of the army, elimination of tribal loyalties that threatened his control, establishment of his personal Imperial Guard, commission of a new law code, new taxes, administrative reforms, allowance of a greater voice for women and limited religious and cultural freedom for various groups within the empire, and the encouragement of greater literacy in the empire's Mongolian script. This limited tolerance did not constitute freedom for these subject peoples. For example, Jewish kosher traditions and Muslim halal traditions were also cast aside in favor of Mongol dining and social customs.
Destruction and Expansion Under Ghenghis Khan
Along with his relatively benign policies, Genghis also wreacked havoc and destruction across Asia. Mongol military tactics were based on the swift and ferocious use of mounted cavalry, cannons, and siege warfare, which led to crushing even the strongest European and Islamic forces; these troops left a trail of devastation behind. Cities that resisted the Mongols were subject to destruction, and/or the forced relocation or murder of city residents. For example, after the conquest of the city of Urgench, each Mongol warrior, in an army that might have consisted of 20,000 soldiers, was required to execute 24 people. The dark side of Genghis Khan’s rule also can be seen in the destruction of kingdoms in the Middle East, Egypt, and Poland, along with the replacement of the Song Dynasty by the Yuan Dynasty. Many local populations in what is now India, Pakistan, and Iran considered the great khan to be a blood-thirsty warlord set on destruction.
Impact of the Pax Mongolica
The Pax Mongolica refers to the relative stabilization of the regions under Mongol control during the height of the empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. The Mongol rulers maintained peace and relative stability in such varied regions because they did not force subjects to adopt religious or cultural traditions. However, they still enforced a legal code known as the Yassa (Great Law), which stopped feudal disagreements at local levels and made outright disobedience a dubious prospect. It also ensured that it was easy to create an army in short time and gave the khans access to the daughters of local leaders.
The constant presence of troops across the empire also ensured that people followed Yassa edicts and maintained enough stability for goods and for people to travel long distances along established trade routes. In this environment the largest empire to ever exist helped one of the most influential trade routes in the world, known as the Silk Road, to flourish. This route allowed commodities such as silk, pepper, cinnamon, precious stones, linen, and leather goods to travel between Europe, the Steppe, India, and China.
Ideas also traveled along the trade route, including major discoveries and innovations in mathematics, astronomy, papermaking, and banking systems from various parts of the world. Famous explorers, such as Marco Polo, also enjoyed the freedom and stability the Pax Mongolica provided, and were able to bring back valuable information about the East and the Mongol Empire to Europe.
End of the Mongol Advance
A number of factors brought an end to Mongol expansion into eastern Europe and Asia. In both eastern Europe and Asia Mongol forces were at the limits of their supply system. In addition, differences in the topography and climate of eastern Asia and Europe neutralized the Mongol advantage in mobile warfare. Although one of Genghis' grandsons, Kublai Khan, was able to conquer China and established the short-lived, Mongol-controlled Yuan Dynasty therein, Kublai failed to conquer other east Asian peoples, including the Japanese and the Vietnamese during the last quarter of the thirteenth century. East Europeans also united in their resistance to Mongol expansion, including a number of east European cities and fortresses. One example of such resistance was the Klis fortress in Croatia. In 1242 this east European fortress successfully held out against the Mongols.
Decline and Demise of the Mongol Empire
By the time of Kublai’s death in 1294, the four separate Mongol empires, or khanates, were each pursuing own separate interests and objectives: the Golden Horde Khanate in the northwest, the Chagatai Khanate in the west, the Ilkhanate in the southwest, and the Yuan Dynasty, based in modern-day Beijing. In 1304, the three western khanates briefly accepted the rule of the Yuan Dynasty in name. This weakness allowed the Chinese Ming Dynasty to take control in 1368, while Russian princes also slowly developed independence over the 14th and 15th centuries. With these developments, the Mongol Empire finally dissolved.
Impact of Pax Mongolica
Pax Mongolica left numerous legacies, including cultural, political, religious, and technological exchanges across the empire’s trade routes; the spread of pandemics, such as the Black Death; and resurgent nationalism among peoples subjected to Mongol rule, including the Chinese and the Russians. In China opposition to the Mongol Yuan Dynasty under Kublai Khan fed the rise of the Ming Dynasty in 1368. Finally, Mongol control over much of Asia facilitated additional European exploration of Asia and fed growing European interest in it. The most significant manifestation of this interest was Columbus’s 1492 voyage in search of east Asia, inspired in part by Marco Polo and his alleged travels.
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