Timothy May - The Mongol Conquest in World History

When asked to write this book by the editor of the Globalities series, Jeremy Black, I did not hesitate, as the Mongols always seem to have at least a cameo appearance, if not a starring role, in the discussion of world history. The title of the project could easily have been changed to The Mongol Empire Is World History although it would look odd on the spine of a book. I can think of no period other than perhaps the past 200 years in which the world was more interconnected. The conquests of Alexander? Despite a brief foray to the Indus and the Libyan Desert, the Alexandrian world excluded much of Asia and virtually all of Africa. The Roman Empire? Largely a Mediterranean event except for the more rustic provinces to the north and a few merchants dealing with India. Perhaps the Crusades? Again, primarily a Mediterranean event, although more of Europe and North Africa was involved, but it did not impact upon China or India. The Age of Exploration is always a good place to begin, but without the Mongol Empire would Columbus have sailed? After all, he was trying to reach the Great Khan in China. In short, the Mongol Empire is the very definition of world history. True, the Mongols did not have a huge impact on Africa or the New World, but for the Eurasian landmass no event or empire had a larger impact in history. The Mongols brought military innovation, international commerce, the spread of world religions and the diffusion of technology and ideas together in one crucible the Mongol conquests. After the dust settled, the world had irrefutably changed and could never return to the way it once was.

In the 1970s John Andrew Boyle, the great historian of the Mongol Empire, coined the term Mongol World Empire and he hit the nail on the head. Lattimore alludes to a basic issue of the study of the Mongol Empire the number of languages involved in the sources often leads to examining the Mongols in a regional rather than a holistic or world perspective. At the same time one should not only consider the Mongol World Empire in a geographical but also a temporally transcendent sense. The Mongol moment is truly a pivotal and perhaps an axial era in history. In many ways it is the dividing point between the pre-modern and the modern ages.

This idea of the Mongol Empire as the dividing point, or perhaps even the beginning of modern history, is buttressed by the opinion of esteemed scholar of East Asia Arthur Waldron. In his introduction to Bertold Spulers classic work The Mongol Period (1994) , the middle volume of Spulers trilogy on the history of the Muslim world, Waldron wrote:

Where should one begin the study of modern history? The soundest answer is probably with the Mongols. The great states of Eurasia today China, Russia, and India, as well as most of the Middle East all were once incorporated into Mongol empires, and changed by that experience. The modern history of those states, moreover, began when the Mongol empires ended then the component parts reconstituted themselves, emerging as successor states that, although independent, nevertheless bore an unmistakable Mongol stamp. Study the Mongol empires and their gradual breakdown, then, and you have the basis for an integrated understanding of contemporary Eurasia.

It is difficult to dispute Waldrons contention. Indeed, it is only by investigating the Mongol Empire and the changes that it brought to the Eurasian continent that we truly see an integrated Eurasia and indeed an integrated world. While trade routes have connected cultures and civilizations for hundreds of years, the view of the world by a particular civilization was compartmentalized. The Romans possessed a clear view of the Roman world as did the empires of Iran and the many dynasties of China of theirs, but their vision of the world outside their respective borders remained murky. Although knowledge of the outside and the Other is always elusive, with the Mongol Empire unprecedented numbers of travellers, merchants, missionaries and others criss-crossed the Eurasian landmass and even beyond. Granted, many other regions remained outside the empire, but the ramifications of the advent of the Mongol Empire created conditions and events that led not only to an integrated Eurasia but an integrated world, which, of course, is what this volume will demonstrate.