Transcript The Bridge Builders

Genghis Kahn and the Mongols
Dan McDowell
West Hills High School
[email protected]
AP World History. 600-1450
Where did they come from?
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Nomads
Superb riders – even infants
Centralized decision-making
Khan = leader
Acquired iron area and stations….
Conquered more land in 25 years than
Romans in 400 – incredible spread of
knowledge
Genghis Kahn - Temujin
- A professional, skilled, mobile army
– A commitment to global commerce
– Secular, unified laws
– Religious tolerance (shamanistic)
Genghis Khan’s Tax Laws:
– If you do not pay homage,
we will take your prosperity.
– If you do not have prosperity,
we will take your children.
– If you do not have children,
we will take your wife.
– If you do not have a wife,
we will take your head.
Military Might
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Three choices: (slaughter, starve, surrender)
Leveled Baghdad (Muslim backlash)
18.4 million estimated killed in China
Women strong – take notes
Military Might
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Superior military tactics
Extreme discipline and loyalty
Used advanced weapons from defeated
Focus on intelligence gathering, geography
After Genghis’ death…
FOUR KHANATES:
Golden Horde (Russia)
Il Khan (Middle East)
Jagadai (Central Asia)
Yuan/Great Khan (China)
OGODEI and KHUBILAI
• Ogodei took over, died before he took
Europe…Mongols went back to
Karakorum
• Khubilai took over Yuan Empire in China
(Khubla Khan)
• China scholars lost prestige, Beijing built
& population loss
YUAN DYNASTY
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Adapted some Chinese ways
Chinese scholars lost prestige
Beijing and Forbidden City built
Population loss was huge – 40% gone
Fails to take Japan
Marco Polo
• More Asian products available
to Europe – travel = stories
• Marco Polo: 17 years in Mongol
court
• His book inspires European
imagination…
How might the Mongols have influenced
explorers such as Columbus?
Trade and Tax
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Protected merchants, gave them higher status
Controlled trade routes – allowed safe passage
Spread ideas, inventions of others, disease
Demanded tribute and tax farming
Kiev destroyed, but Moscow spared: Alexander
Nevskii
• Mongols collected tribute =
serfdom in Russia
Arts &Sciences: Pax Mongolia
• People materials, ideas from different
cultures come together?
CULTURAL DIFFUSION!
• Rashid-al-Din – first history of world
• Nasir al-Din – mathematics, cosmology
• Islamic scholars used Greek ideas and
created the heliocentric model (before
Copernicus)
• Calendar work, astronomy
DECLINE OF MONGOLS
• Too many taxes – resentment
• Many rebellions and MING take over in
China
• Such powerful conquerors – but they
don’t have a strong enough political
system to sustain themselves
• Not great leaders