realm ruled by the great Mongol khans in the 13th and 14th centuries; uniting almost all of western and eastern Asia, it was one of the largest land empires in history.

The original homeland of the Mongols, situated in the eastern zone of the Asian steppe, was bounded by the Hinggan Mountains on the east, the Altai and Tien Shan mountains on the west, the Shilka River and the mountain ranges by Lake Baykal on the north, and the Great Wall of China on the south. Today this region comprises approximately the Chinese Autonomous Region of Inner Mongolia, the Republic of Mongolia, and the southern fringes of Siberia. Consisting for the most part of fertile prairies and wooded mountains in the north, the Gobi Desert in the central zone, and vast grasslands in the south, the entire region lies about 1000 m (about 3000 ft) above sea level. With the exception of the northernmost extremities, the region is extremely arid.

In this environment Mongolian-speaking tribes developed a pastoral economy based on the sheep and the horse, the latter supplemented by the camel in the most arid regions. Certain commodities, such as grain, textiles, tea, and metals, were obtained through trade with the adjacent agricultural civilization of China. Other than tending the flocks, hunting was the foremost occupation. The way of life was nomadic and the social organization was tribal. Tribal warfare was endemic, and individuals of great personal prowess moved easily to positions of leadership. The political-military hierarchy of the tribe was bound together by personal bonds of mutual protection and loyalty extending downward from the chieftain, to subordinate chiefs, to individual warriors.

Establishment of the Empire by Genghis Khan.

The first flowering of the Mongol Empire occurred in the 13th century. At a convocation of tribes in 1206, the powerful conqueror Temujin, then master of almost all of Mongolia, was proclaimed universal ruler with the title Genghis Khan, or Great Khan. The city of Karakorum was designated his capital. Genghis’s army, although not particularly large for its day, was distinguished by its superb horsemanship and expert archery, the discipline and control of its aristocratic leaders, and the khan’s own brilliant military strategy and tactics. The neighboring Chinese Empire and the Central Asian states, both militarily weak and fragmented, inevitably surrendered, as did the decaying Arab-Turkish society of the Middle East, to the Mongol hordes racing over Asia. It was thus a foregone conclusion that the empire Genghis subsequently welded together should achieve a degree of centralization and power unprecedented among the earlier domains of Mongol-speaking tribes. Genghis presided by virtue of self-asserted divine right, acknowledging as his only superior authority, the Great Yasa, an imperial code that he drew up and that remained the permanent basis for Mongol rule. Genghis’s vast empire stretched from the China Sea to the Dnepr River and from the Persian Gulf virtually all the way to the Arctic Ocean.

After the death of Genghis, his empire in accordance with tribal custom was divided among the sons of his primary wife and their heirs. The khanate of East Asia was ruled directly by the third son, Ogadai (1185–1241), who succeeded Genghis as the great khan. The khanate included Outer Mongolia, Manchuria, Korea, much territory in China, Tibet, and the northern fringes of Indochina.

Although Ogadai was in turn succeeded by his son and his grandson, the next great leader of the khanate was his nephew, Mangu Khan (1208–59). Together with his brother Kublai, Mangu Khan succeeded in conquering nearly all of China.

Empire of Kublai Khan.

In 1279 Kublai Khan, grandson of Genghis, defeated the Southern Sung dynasty, bringing the remainder of China under his control. Kublai transferred the capital to Beijing, which he called Khanbalik. There he ruled as emperor of the Chinese Yüan dynasty as well as great khan of the Mongols. Rather than attempting to amalgamate the sedentary agricultural society into tribal units, he successfully followed the bureaucratic system through which Chinese dynasties since the T’ang had ruled. The Mongols carefully guarded, however, their cultural identity and ruling-class prerogatives; Chinese talent was systematically excluded from positions of authority, and discriminatory social and legal codes were followed. For the domestic and foreign military exploits of the great khan, see KUBLAI KHAN. See also CHINA.

The Mongol emperors who ruled after Kublai succumbed to the decadent life of the Chinese court and became intrigued with the superstitions of Lamaism. When disaster struck with flooding of the Yellow River and severe famine in northern China during the middle decades of the 14th century, the Mongol leadership was unable to meet the administrative challenge. In 1368, while the Mongols’ Asian empire was torn by internal dissension, the great khans in China were replaced by the Ming, a native dynasty.

Empire of Jagatai.

Upon the division of the Mongol Empire at Genghis’s death (1227), the khanate of Turkestan was ruled by Jagatai (d. 1242), his second son, and subsequently by Jagatai’s successor. This khanate extended from what is today the Xinjiang Uygur (Sinkiang Uighur) Autonomous Region of China westward south of Lake Balkhash to the area southeast of the Aral Sea and was bordered on the south by Tibet and the Kashmir region of India and Pakistan. The western reaches were inhabited largely by sedentary Muslims, but the remainder of the populace were nomadic Mongols. A strategic central communications zone of the Mongols’ Asian empire, it became the focus of political rivalry among the descendants of Genghis, and it required the constant attention of the Great Khan Kublai to keep it under control.

In the 14th century the authority of the khans of Turkestan over their Muslim subjects diminished sharply. After 1370 the western portion of the khanate became part of the empire of Tamerlane, a Mongol leader not descended from Genghis. The khans’ rule was thereafter confined to the eastern region of the original khanate.

Empire of Il-khan.

By 1231 Mongol armies had overrun Iran, Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Georgia. In 1258 Baghdad, the seat of the Abbasid caliphate, was captured. The Iranian khanate was established by Hulagu (1217–65), grandson of Genghis and brother to Mangu and Kublai. Hulagu styled himself Il-khan and ruled over the areas that today comprise Iran, eastern Iraq, western Afghanistan, and Turkmenistan. The khans of Iran eventually accepted the faith of Islam. Under the Ghazan Khan (1271–1304), who succeeded in 1295, the ruling house became independent of the great khan. New systems of taxation were introduced; the armed forces were reformed and communications reorganized. Iranian culture was promoted, although new Mongol elements were infused in both art and architecture. Along with Mongolian, the Turkish, Persian (Farsi), and Arabic languages were employed. The administration of the later khans, however, was poor, and when the khan Abu Said died without a male heir in 1395, the khanate broke up into small states ruled mainly by Iranians.

Empire of the Golden Horde.

While Ogadai and his successors were completing their conquest of eastern Asia, the Mongols under Batu, grandson of Genghis Khan, surged westward toward Europe. In 1237 they sacked most of the cities in the Vladimir-Suzdal region and Kiev in 1240, continuing westward into Poland, Bohemia, Hungary, and the Danube River valley. Batu established the GOLDEN HORDE (q.v.), also known as the khanate of Kipchak. By 1241 his armies had reached the coast of the Adriatic Sea, poised for the invasion of western Europe. Disunited and ill-prepared to resist the Golden Horde, Europe was spared only by the death of the Great Khan Ogadai in 1241. Batu then withdrew his forces to southern Russia in order to participate in the selection of a successor. See BATU KHAN; RUSSIA,.

The Golden Horde ruled the area that is now southern Russia until the late 15th century. The Mongols imposed a bureaucratic system and methods of tax collection that showed the influence of the Chinese methods adopted by their east Asian kinfolk. In the late 14th century, the Russians seemed on the verge of overthrowing the Golden Horde. The victory of the grand duke of Moscow, Dmitry Donskoy (1350–89), over the Mongols in 1380 marked the turning point of Mongol power, although, for a time, the balance was tipped in favor of the Mongols by the intervention of the conqueror Tamerlane. In 1395, however, he began the conquest of the Golden Horde, which after his death broke into four independent khanates: Astrakhan, Kazan, Crimea, and Sibir, thereby removing a major obstacle to the rise of the Muscovite principality. In 1480, by refusing to continue to pay tribute to the Horde, Ivan III Vasilyevich, grand duke of Moscow, ended Mongol domination of southern Russia.

Strengths and Weaknesses of the Mongol Empire.

The Mongol Empire had done much to bind eastern and western Asia together. A system of mounted couriers, somewhat like a pony-express network, was established through the grasslands and deserts of Central Asia, linking the capital of the great khan in China with the far-flung outposts of the empire. The Central Asian trade routes were made more secure than they had ever been previously. Consequently the traffic by traders and missionaries back and forth over these routes increased notably, and China became known in the West chiefly through the accounts of one of these travelers, the Venetian merchant Marco Polo. Although improved communications helped the Mongols maintain their vast and diverse empire, common lineage also played an important role. The great khan was always selected by a convocation of the nobles of the whole empire, and, in general, all four khanates shared in the plunder of each.

Nevertheless, good communication and kinship ties proved inadequate to counteract the centrifugal forces that tore at the empire. Religious differences appeared early; the Mongol rulers in western Asia tended to accept Islam, while those in China were converted to Buddhism or Lamaism. In political life, the Mongols in China followed the sociopolitical teachings of Confucianism, stressing the universality of the ruler’s authority; those in western Asia became absorbed in the confused politics and warfare of eastern Europe and the Middle East. China, Russia, and Iran each had its own language, culture, and system of rule, and each tended to influence its Mongol overlords. Perhaps most significant was the fact that each of these areas was the home of a sedentary agricultural civilization. In each location the imposition of Mongol rule seems to have led to a revival of local bureaucratic regimes more concerned with domestic problems and therefore less susceptible to Mongol domination.        T.L.K., THOMAS L. KENNEDY, M.A., Ph.D.

For further information on this topic, see the Bibliography, sections 1066. Modern Asia–1067. Central Asia.