p. 5 “”In some senses, manufactured objects were luxuries for the nomads, yet the nomads were not frivolous. Long-distance exchange and circulation of manufacturer goods were not essential to subsistence, yet they were the backbone of the social order. Mongol economies relied on the circulation of these goods, in particular their redustribution from the khan to the elites to the commoners, a system that sumulaneously reinforced social rank, created bonds of dependence, and gave even the least in society a reason to feel invested in the success of the regime. Steppenomads further understood circulation as a spiritual necessity. Sharing wealth mollified the spirits of the dead, the sky and the earth.”
p. 10 “Horder when it was applied to the people of Jochi, was an old word for a new regime…To the Mongols themselves, horde had a wide and complex meaning. A horde was an army, a site of power, a people under a ruler, a huge camp. These meanings did not exclude one another: in concert, they captured the sense that the regime was coextensive with its mobile people. A horde did not have to be in one place in order to govern itself or sedentary subjects: hordes migrated, dispersed and gathered anew, all while exercising control.”
p. 12 The Horde was socially diverse and multiethnic, but its leadership came from a core of dominant steppe clans, most of them Mongol subgroups… The heads of these groups bore the title of beg. As the Horde became increasingly oligarchic in the late 13th century, power fevolved from the khan to the begs… The begs acknowledged the khan’s primacy because he was a descendent of Chingiss Khan’s eldest son Jochi. Bu that status did not make the khan all-powerful. To be elecated on the felt rug – the procedure of enthronement – an aspirant had to associate himself with powerful begs. Similarly, to rule effectively, a khan needed the begs on his side. They supported him and, if he failed, deposed him. This was especially the case after the 1350s, during and following a period known as the bulqaq – anarchy.”
p. 13 If the Horde were projected on today’s maps, it would stretch across a region occupied by Ukraine, Bulgaria, Moldavia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Ukbekistan, Turkmenistan and Russia, including Tatarstan and Crimea. … Where nationalisms solidified in opposition to Mogol rule, historians have told one kind of story: where nationalisms presume continuity with the Mongol past, historians have told another kind of story.”
o, 26 In summer 1219 Mongol armies were gathering in the Altai Mountains, near the source of the Irtysh River. Chingiss Khan … sent for Master Qui Chuji, the most respected Taoist leader in northern China. The 71-year-old Qui Chuji was highly influential, and his flock growing as people looked to his guidance amid war and famine. Until this point, Qui Chuji had refused to work with the Mongols, just as he had refused to work with the Chinese emperors. For Chingiss, Taoist support would be priceless, helping the Mongols pacify northern China while they were busy conquoring Central Asia. But there was another reason … the khan was no in his late fifties, while the typical warrior barely reached his forties. Chinggis could no longer take each year for granted, and he hoped to learn from Qiu Chuji the secret of longevity… At their first meeting, the conqueror asked the monk “Have you a medicine of immortality?” Qui Chuji replied “There are means for preserving life, but not medicine for immortality. Satisfied with Qui Chuji’s honesty, Chingiss have him the appeallation shinsen, the immortal, and ordered Qui Chuji’s tents be pitched just each of his own… The Taoist master spent more than a year in Chingiiss Khan’s camp and in Samarkand, which the Mongols had taken in 1220. In conversations, Qui Chuji explained the doctrine of the Tao and addvised Chingiss Khan to avoid cruelty and sensulaity and warned him not to go hunting anymore… helped Chingiss secure the surrender of the northern Chinese and their acceptance of the Mongol order. An able administrator, Qui Chuji knew the Mongols would provide better governance of the region.. In 1224, on his way back to northern China, the monk stopped in Zhongdu, where he ordered his new headquarters built. That same year, he sent his followers throughtout the region to take control of temples and summon the Buddhist and Taoist clergy to submit to the Mongol Empire.”
p. 36 The Birth of the Mogol Ulus In spring 1206, the Year of the Tiger, an assembly of the Felt-Walled Tents, known as a quriltai, gathered near the sources of the Onion River. As they collected for the meeting, Temuhin’s standard was hoisted. The standard was a pole with the tails of nine white-haired horses at the top, symbolising the peace and unity of the Felt-Walled Tents under Mongol rule … According to Rashid l-Din, a Persian historian of the Mogols writing in the early 14th century, the creator of Temuijin’s enthronement ritual might have been Teb Tengri, an influential shaman who also suggested Temuijin’s new title… Chingiss Khan, a term meaning “mighty” or possibly “universal”… This was a clear break from recent political practices.”
p. 84 During the Russian campaign (1235-1242), the Mongols gained control of some 20 cities. They did not destroy all these cities. Rostov, for example, was spared after its inhabitants accepted peace terms. Kiev, on the other hand, rejected an identical offer and was sacked.. The Mongols were experts in siege warfare and had accumulated even more experience throughout their recent operations against the Jin… The Russians were helpless when faced with seige engines they had never seen before. Adapting Chinese technology, the Mongols built catapults 26 feet high and weighing five tons. Such a machine could throw a stone heavier than 132 pounds up to 164 yeards. For a commander like Subotei, who had conquerored more than 30 stone and brick fortresses in China, Central Asia and Iran, the wooden and earthern walls of Russian cities presented no real challenge. What was challenging for the Mongols was the terrain. Muddy and swampy grounds limited their operation to the coldest months and restricted their range of activity. They could move quickly on frozen soil and rivers, but with the snow already melting in March, their armoured troops and heavy seige engines got stuck in the mire.”
p. p. 102 In 1237 Ogodei went a step further and established a preferential marriage system between the male and female descendents of Chingiss Khan and the Qonggirad. Imperial chief wives were thus sipposed to be of Quonggirad origin, although Ogodei’s order was not rigorously followed. The decision probably reflected the fact that Borte, Chinggis Khan’s first wife, was the daughter of Dei Sechen, chief of the Qonggirad. A khan had many khatun because marriage was a political partnership but only few of the women were chief wives, with their own extended households. Secondary wives and concubines often stayed with the chief wives who controlled them. The chief wife could be highly influential: she might have her own court of secretaries, treasurers and traders and sit at the quiriltai.
p. 109 The fattening of horses and camels during periods of calving and milking was crucial to the pastoral economy. During these months, usually from May to September, the herds needed to rest. When the mares were milking, they did not march with the khan’s horde. The Mongols used this five-month long season not only to relax – these were essentially peaceful stretches – but also to organise extensive political meetings and take governing decisions. It was no accident that the Mongols planned enthronements and great quirltai during the drinking festival they held in the summer.
p. 111 The Mongols did not consider humanity superior to nature, and humans were not the masters of the environment. Mongols saw animals, plants, terrain, and insects as lifeforms to be feared and respected. They believed in the “land masters”, the intangible entities of the land, defined by the anthropologist Gregory Delaplace as “localised at a certain place, commanding such diverse phenomena as weather, luck for hunting, and encironmental conditions in general. And the Mongols handled the earth and wildlife with great caution, as these entities could be vengeful and hostile. Mongols worshiped nature and cared for it deeply.”
p. 112 Preparing kumis required experience, skill and patience, for it entailed stirring or chaurning raw mare’s milk for hours. It was also a symbolically loaded task that only men were able to perform. A fizzy drink. kumis typically had an ethyl alcohol content of between 1 and 2.5%, but the level could be raised if the milk fermented longer. … more than a shared tradition. It was also a vital part of the Mongol diet. Shamans knew kumis was an unparalleled energy booster and used it in various rituals… researchers have shown that kumis from animals milked around June, exactly when the drinking festival was in full flow – yields especially high levels of vitamin E, niacin and dehydroascorbic acid, a form of vitamin C… Fresh kumis strengthens the immune system and treats and prevents typhoid, dysentry, and other diseases that were common … also has antibiotic properties and is still used against bacterial infections. The Mongols recognised that kumis was useful in treating kidney stones, which was likely a prevalent ailment. As avid meat eaters, the Mongols probably had elevated levels of uric acid, which leads to painful afflictions such as kidney stones and gout.”
p.118 Around 1250 Batu sponsored the construction of permanent structures at a location the Mongols recorded on their coins as Sarai, meaning palace or city … Not much is known… It is a common mistake to compare Sarai to a classical imperial city, for the khan would neither live within four walls nor have his mausoleum constructed there. He also did not try to impress his people with buildings. Sarai probably served a function similar to that of Qaraqorum, “the sitting city” Ogodei had founded two decades earlier … an enclosed, brick-walled town with two districts, one for Muslim merchants and one for Chinese craftsmen. Next to the great khan’s palace there were a number of palaces for court secretaries, 12 Buddhist temples, two mosques and a church… a meeting point for outsiders. Sarai hosted traders, travelers, secretaries, artisans and religious men, who found there the comforts of sedentary life…. Mongols themselves considered sedentary residences less comfortable than their tents, which were warmer, softer and more intimate… As a centre of trade, religion and craft, Sarai helped to advance the political and economic goals of the Horde and, as it grew, elevated the Khan’s prestige. What Sarai was not was an administrative center. Mongols ruled on horseback.”
p. 128 Since at least the 7th century, Turks, Kiran, Uighurs and other Central Asian rulers had implemented messaging systems. The Mongols merged these regional networks and fit them to their own ambitions. By the mid-13th century, the yam was fully operational. There were hundreds of yam stations, small camps run by Mongols and locals, where official travellers and emissaries could obtain food and fresh mounts. The cost of maintaining the stations fell on the local people, who were required to provide horses, water, food and clothing and to accomodate official travellers foreign emissaries and their escorts. The yamchi, postmen, who staffed the stations, did not give away horses but rather exchanged them for horses that the travelers had received from a previous station. Mongols were selective about horses. They distinguished between pack, post and war horses and between those suited to long distances and sprinters useful for urgent missions across short distances. The army controlled the whole yam system.
In the Qichaq steppe, yam stations were located roughly a half-day’s distance from each other … All the yam horses belonged to the empire; the yam operated like a state-run horse rental company, that covered the whole Mongol territory… The tergen yam, comprising carts pilled by oxen, camels and strong horses, moved heavy loads and only covered portions of territoies. The morin yam, the regular postal route, was limited to riders on horseback, and ran trough th whole empire. And via the narin yam, a secret communication system, a messenger could travel more than 120 miles in a day … The yam made the steppe smaller.
p. 180 Life in the hordes was unusually safe and secure, surprising European visitors. The Jochids tried to ensure similar order in the Russian principalities, so that the people could achieve economic output and population growht that would fuel the khan’s regime. To this end, the Mongols regulated Russian subjects much as they did their own, banning Russians from carrying weapons and riding war horses, while depitizing local rulers to provide security… To confirm the positions of local rulers, the Mongols granted them yarliks – written diplomas, which had long been used across the empire to make formal announcements.
p. 186 the Jochis had to rely on middlement on the coasts, who could connect them to the world beyond Caffa [modern Crimea] was a strategically privleged location … Through the Genoese, the Mongols could control the nearby strait of Kerch, which connects the Black and Azov seas. Whoever controlled the strait controlled Black Sea access to the Horde… the alliance with the Byzantines had strengthened the Jochld’s control over Black Sea access and allowed its people to exit and enter through the Bosporus and Dardanelles, the alliance with the Mamluks gave the Jochids access to the Nile and the Red Sea.”
p. 187 “Another key to Jochid commerce under Mongke-Temur;s reign was southeastern Moldavia… they could watch the end points of the Dniester and Danube rivers, critical trade routes that connected the Black Sea to a galaxy of inland ports. Second, portions – specifically the Bujak steppe and the region of the Danubian lakes – were ideal for winter camps… Since the Bronze Age, it was mostly a nomad’s land.”
p. 217 “In early 1313, with the lunar new year approaching, the hordes converged on the lower Volga for festicities and the entronement of their new khan. But no consensus had been reached. Ozbek learned … his opponents were preparing a coup against him. Upon hearing the news, he rushed out of his tent, gathered his men and allies on the outskirts of the festival site and then returned in full force… slayed Tukel Buqa, while Ozbek’s men killed the begs and princes who opposed him… Soon after taking the throne, Ozbek married his stepmother Bayalun. By doing so, he reestablished his deceased father in the direct lineal succession and tighted his own control over the ruling lineage. As a Muslim, Ozbek was forbidden from marrying his stepmother, but the Khan’s jurists circumvented the issue by claiming that Bayalun’s previous marriages were not valid because her former husnands had not been Muslim. .. She was no passive instrument of legitimation; on the contray, Bayalun had been at the center of power for more than 20 years, and she was keen to maintain her influence.” (reference DeWeese Islamization, 93-4, 120 https://www.jstor.org/stable/164043)
p. 237 By the 1330s continuing economic growth had transformed Sarai into a huge city. It took half a day on horseback to cross from one end to the other. Sarai had open space but also densely populated districts with uninterrupted rows of gardenless houses. They ran along large streets bordered with aryks, deep irrigation ditches, and water pipes most likely serving bathhouses and ceramics workshops … two kinds of pipes ran across the urban settlement: one, made of ceramic, supplied water, while the other, made of wood, carried sewage, which probably discharged into the Akhtuba. The city also had a number of wells that provided water for household use, although not for drinking. Drainage systems were a commonplace in Central Asian cities, likely well before the period of Mongol domination… Central Asian urbanites moved to the Volga region and built there the same infrastructure they were familiar with in their hometowns.”
p. 250 It turned out that the Ilkhanids’ gradual collapse between the 1330s and the 1350s was just a harbringer of the most consequential global political phenomenon of the 14th century, the disintregation of the Mongol Empire. The Horde succumbed to infighting, the ulus of Chagatay split, and the Yuan, the Toluid regime in the far east, was ejected from China. All these changes were hastened by the Black Death, which revealed weaknesses in the larger world system stewarded and relied on by Chingis’s heirs. With the global economy shattered by the pandemic, trade and ciculation – the lifeblood of the Chinggidis regimes, – drained away. By the end of the 14th century there was still a Horde, there was stilla Yuan dynasty, and there was still a people that called themselves the ulus of Chagatay, but all of these looked dramatically different from the sturdy politics of decades earlier.”
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