Unit 2: Networks of Exchange Study Cards

The Mongol Empire as a Eurasian Network The Plague:A Eurasian Pandemic

-A mutation of the Yersinia Pestis, or bubonic plague, spread quickly and killed large numbers in areas of dense populations. The death spread during the increase of trade, from fleas that lived on rats. Carried by rodents and transmitted by fleas to humans, the plague erupted initially in 1331 in northeastern China and had reached the Middle East and Western Europe by 1347. Some estimate that 50 percent of Europeans may have perished. The Middle East generally had lost perhaps one-third of its population by the early fifteenth century. The intense first wave of the plague was followed by periodic visitations over the next several centuries, although India and sub-Saharan Africa were much less affected than other regions of the eastern hemisphere. -In a prescientific era of high religiosity, some in the Christian and Islamic worlds saw it as the end days. With so many dead, there were labor shortages that provided new opportunities for skilled workers, women, and peasants. This mass death set in motion several important social changes. There was also a rise in laborsaving devices, spurring new technological innovations in Europe. A series of peasant revolts in the fourteenth century reflected this tension, which also undermined the practice of serfdom. That labor shortage also may have fostered a greater interest in technological innovation and created, at least for a time, more employment opportunities for women.Thus a resilient European civilization survived a cataclysm that had the power to destroy it. In a strange way, that catastrophe may have actually fostered its future growth. -The biggest victim of the Black Death was the Mongol Empire itself. With trade disrupted, the economic heart of the empire failed. Mongol wealth decreased and rebellions increased. Ironically, that human disaster, born of the Mongol network, was a primary reason for the demise of that network in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Population contracted, cities declined, and the volume of trade diminished all across the Mongol world. By 1350, the Mongol Empire itself was in disarray, and within a century the Mongols had lost control of Chinese, Persian, and Russian civilizations.The Central Asian trade route, so critical to the entire Afro-Eurasian world economy, largely closed.

Encountering the Mongols: Comparing Three Cases Persia and the Mongols/ Ilkhanate Persia

-A second great civilization conquered by the Mongols was that of an Islamic Persia. Two brutal attacks(A first invasion (1219-1221), led by Chinggis Khan himself, was followed thirty years later by a second assault (1251-1258) under his grandson Hulegu, who became the first il-khan (subordinate khan) of Persia.) brought down the Persian Empire, falling much faster than China. These attacks were much more intense and devastating than earlier assaults from Turkic invaders. They were also more psychologically devastating, because unlike the Turks, the Mongols were not Muslims but pagan barbarians. The Mongols, however, were infidels in Muslim eyes, and their stunning victory was a profound shock to people accustomed to viewing history as the progressive expansion of Islamic rule. The sacking of Baghdad in 1258, which put an end to the Abbasid caliphate, was accompanied by the massacre of more than 200,000 people, according to Hulegu himself. -Out of a lack of respect for agriculture the damage caused by the Mongols' herds, caused serious damage to the region's farmland. Important underground irrigation systems fell apart, leading to desertification of some areas. Heavy taxes, sometimes collected twenty or thirty times a year and often under torture or whipping, pushed large numbers of peasants off their land. In general, though, even more so than in China, Mongol rule in Persia represented "disaster on a grand and unparalleled scale." -The Persians had a much more significant impact on the Mongols than the Chinese did. The invaders quickly realized the importance of the Persian bureaucracy and used it for their own purposes(leaving the greater part of government operations in Persian hands). During the reign of Ghazan (1295-1304), they also began to rebuild damaged cities and road systems. Most important, the Mongols who conquered Persia became Muslims, following the lead of Ghazan, who converted to Islam in 1295. No such widespread conversion to the culture of the conquered occurred in China or in Christian Russia. Members of the court and Mongol elites learned at least some Persian, unlike most of their counterparts in China. A number of Mongols also turned to farming, abandoning their nomadic ways, while some married local people. When the mongol dynasty of Hulegu's descendants fell in the 1330s, the Persians did not expel the Mongols but rather assimilated them into Persian culture. From a Persian point of view, the barbarians had been civilized.

The Mongol Empire as a Eurasian Network Cultural Exchange in the Mongol Realm

-Accompanying these transcontinental economic and diplomatic relationships was a substantial exchange of peoples and cultures. Mongol policy forcibly transferred many thousands of skilled craftsmen and educated people from their homelands to distant parts of the empire, while the Mongols' religious tolerance and support of merchants drew missionaries and traders from afar. The Mongols forced some people, such as artisans and engineers, to move from one place to another where their skills were needed. Others moved freely as part of religious travel tolerated by the Mongols or as part of commercial activity encouraged by the Mongols. The Mongol capital at Karakorum was a cosmopolitan city with places of worship for Buddhists, Daoists, Muslims, and Christians.Actors and musicians from China, wrestlers from Persia, and a jester from Byzantium provided entertainment for the Mongol court. Persian and Arab doc- tors and administrators were sent to China, while Chinese physicians and engineers found their skills in demand in the Islamic world. -Technology transfer and the spread of crops: Technology, especially from China, moved freely and quickly within the Mongol domain, as did medical knowledge. Various crops were carried from one region to another. This movement of people facilitated the exchange of ideas and techniques, a process actively encouraged by Mongol authorities.A great deal of Chinese technology and artistic conventions such as painting, printing, gunpowder weapons, compass navigation, high-temperature furnaces, and medical techniques—flowed westward. -Poor, backwards, and isolated Europe gained the most from these exchanges. As it had the least to offer, it had the most to gain. This may have set Europe on the path toward expansion. Europeans arguably gained more than most from these exchanges, for they had long been cut off from the fruitful interchange with Asia, and in comparison to the Islamic and Chinese worlds, they were less technologically developed. Now they could reap the benefits of much new technology, new crops, and new knowledge of a wider world. And almost alone among the peoples of Eurasia, they could do so without having suffered the devastating consequences of Mongol conquest.-

Encountering the Mongols: Comparing Three Cases China and the Mongols/ Yuan Dynasty

-As the primary target for nomadic steppe-dwellers in search of agrarian wealth, China proved the most difficult and extended of the Mongols' many conquests, lasting some seventy years, from 1209 to 1279. The invasion began in northern China, which had been ruled for several centuries by various dynasties of nomadic origin, and was characterized by destruction and plunder on a massive scale. Southern China, under the control of the native Song dynasty, was a different story, for there the Mongols were far less violent and more concerned to accommodate the local population. After a series of campaigns lasting some seven decades, the Mongols were victorious. While the Mongols were brutal and destructive in the north of China, they were much more accommodating in the south. By whatever methods, the outcome was the unification of a divided China, a treasured ideal among educated Chinese.This achievement persuaded many of them that the Mongols had indeed been granted the Mandate of Heaven and, despite their foreign origins, were legitimate rulers. -The Mongols did adopt some aspects of Chinese culture and governing in order to rule the region more effectively and withdraw as much wealth as possible. They went so far as to establish a Chinese-style dynasty(That accommodation took many forms. The Mongols made use of Chinese administrative practices, techniques of taxation, and their postal system. They gave themselves a Chinese dynastic title, the Yuan, suggesting a new beginning in Chinese history. They also transferred their capital from Mongolia to modern day Beijing called Khanbalik, the "city of the khan."). Kublai Khan, the grandson of Chinggis Khan, listened to the council of his favorite wife Chabi and adopted policies that encouraged agricultural production in order to generate more wealth. The Mongols adopted some aspects of Chinese ancestor veneration, lowered taxes, and built roads, canals, and other forms of infrastructure to promote commerce. Mongol khans also made use of traditional Confucian rituals, supported the building of some Daoist temples, and were particularly attracted to a Tibetan form of Buddhism, which returned the favor with strong political support for the invaders. -Despite these accommodations, Mongol rule was still harsh, exploitative, foreign, and resented. The Mongols did not become Chinese, nor did they accommodate every aspect of Chinese culture.While the Mongols did try to accommodate their Chinese subjects, they were foreign occupiers who were there to extract as much wealth as possible and were thus resented by the Chinese. Mongols' disregard of the exam system and their reliance on foreigners such as Muslims from Central Asia and the Middle East to administer the empire irked many. The Mongol elite kept many of their traditional practices such as sleeping in tents even when in the capital. Few Mongols learned Chinese, Mongol law discriminated against the Chinese, reserving for them the most severe punishments. In social life, the Mongols forbade intermarriage, prohibited Chinese scholars from learning the Mongol script, Mongol women never adopted foot binding and scandalized the Chinese by mixing freely with men at official gatherings. Furthermore, the Mongols honored and supported merchants and artisans far more than Confucian bureaucrats had been inclined to do. Factionalism among the Mongols, rising prices, a series of natural disasters, peasant rebellions, and furious epidemics of the plague weakened the their hold on power and allowed some space for rebels to challenge their authority. The Yuan Dynasty was overthrown in 1368, and the new Ming Dynasty sought to eliminate the memory of the Mongols. Mongol rule was brief lasting little more than a century and thousands of Mongols returned to their homeland in the steppes.

Sea Roads as a Catalyst for Change: East Africa

-In east Africa the transformative process of long-distance tase gave rise to an East African civilization known as Swahili. Which took shape as a set of commercial city-states stretching all along the East African coast, from present day Somalia to Mozambique. While they were of bantu descent, they created a new identity thanks to their participation in the Indian Ocean trade. Swahili cities grew as more commerce picked up in the Western Indian Ocean following the rise of Islam. Local people and rulers like in Southeast Asia found opportunity for wealth and power un the growing demand for East African products like gold, ivory, and leopard skins. Because of this a merchant class developed, villages turned into towns and clan chiefs became kings. Swahili merchants exported goods and sometimes slaves of the African interior to the markets of India, Southeast Asia, and china and imported goods like Chinese porcelain and Indian gold art. The civilization flourished into a very different society from farming and pastoral cultures of East African interior. Thoroughly urban and situated in its of 15,000-18,000 people. Each Swahili city was politically independent, governed by its own king, and competed with other cities. Despite a common language and culture there was no political unity. No imperial system of larger territorial states unified the world of Swahili civilization. Long distance trade vital to these societies also caused intense social stratification between mercantile elite's and commoners. -The Swahili cities were home to a rich fusion of cultures from Africa the Middle East, and Asia. Arab, Persian, and Indian merchants were welcome visitors, and some settled permanently. The Swahili language for example is of Bantu origin(grammatically an African tongue) but incorporated Arabic script and has many Arabic loan words. -Swahili civilization rapidly became islamic. Introduced by arab traders islam beacame widely accepted and adopted voluntarily. When Ibn battuta a widely traveled Arab scholar, merchant, and public offical visited the Swahili coast in the early 14th century he found altogether muslim societies in which religious leaders often spoke arabic, and were eager to welcome a learned islamic visitor. With the spread of islam the east coast of Africa was home to a large population of muslims. Though they were African muslims, not muslims who traced their roots back to the Arabian peninsula, they still saw themselves a part of larger islamic community. As muslims they saw fellow black Africans who did not practice islam as outsiders. They thus felt they had more in common with Arabs and Persians than animist Africans. -The Swahili merchants forged links with peoples of the interior of the continent as well further south solely for economic reasons because of the cultural barrier of islam. The coastal cities acted as intermediaries between the interior producers of valued goods and the arab merchants who carried them to distinct markets. To the south and inland from the coast was the impressive kingdom of Great Zimbabwe with large stone buildings in its capital, incidcating much wealth and social organization. it seemed clearly connected to the growing trade in gold to the coast as well as to the wealth embodied in its large herds of cattle. This was another example of the reach and transforming power of Indian Ocean commerce.

The Silk Roads and the Growth of the Silk Roads

-Land-based trade routes linked pastoral and agricultural peoples as well as the large civilizations on Eurasia's outer rim. "relay trade" in which goods were passed down the line, changing hands many times before reaching their final destination. One of the worlds most extensive and sustained networks of exchange among its diverse peoples. -The silk roads covered the vast areas of inner and outer Eurasia that represented very distinct environments. Outer Eurasia consists of relatively warm, well-watered areas, suitable for agriculture and home to the great civilizations of China, India, the Middle East, and the Mediterranean. Inner Eurasia a little more north and has a harsher and drier climate, not conductive to agriculture and land of Eastern Russia and Central Asia. Products of the forest and of semi-arid northern grasslands known as steppes- like furs, hides, livestock, wool, and amber- were exchanged for the agricultural products and manufactured goods of adjacent civilizations. Pastoral people began carrying products from one place to another -Security for merchants and travelers provided by large and powerful states allowed the Silk Road to prosper most. Such as when the Roman and Chinese empires anchored long-distance commerce at the western and eastern ends of Eurasia. And again in the 7th and 8th centuries during the Byzantine empire, the muslim abbasid dynasty, and the Tamg dynasty China created an almost continuous belt of strong states across Eurasia. -Various technological innovations made the use of horses, camels, and oxen more effective means of transportation across the vast distances of the Silk Roads. Like the invention of yokes, saddles, and stirrups.

Explaining the mongol moment

-Like the Roman Empire but far more rapidly, the Mongol Empire grew of its own momentum without any grand scheme or blueprint for world conquest. Each fresh victory brought new resources for making war and new threats or insecurities that seemed to require further expansion. The Mongols created objectives, strategy, and ideology as they expanded. What made the mongols great work possible was their luck of good timing for when they encountered their enimies they were weak at the moment and the mongols had the stronger army.The Mongols were lucky in that both the Chinese and Arab empires were in a weak and divided condition when they attacked. The key to their success was by organizing a superior army with a clear command and control structure."Mongol armies were simply better led, organized, and disciplined than those of their opponents." In an effort to diminish a divisive tribalism, Chinggis Khan reorganized the entire social structure of the Mongols into military units of 10, 100, 1,000, and 10,000 warriors, an arrangement that allowed for effective command and control. Conquered tribes especially were broken up and their members scattered among these new units, which enrolled virtually all nomadic men and supplied the cavalry forces of Mongol armies. -An impressive discipline and loyalty to their leaders characterized Mongol military forces, and discpline was reinforced by the provision that should any members of a unit desert in battle, all were subject to the death penalty. Loyalty was greatly rewarded. More positively, loyalty was cemented by the leaders charisma and willingness to share the hardships of their men eating and fighting with their troops."I eat the same food and am dressed in the same rags as my humble herdsmen," wrote Chinggis Khan. The Mongol people also became very wealthy from the loot of the empire. -To compensate for their own small population, the Mongols incorporated huge numbers of conquered peoples into their military forces."People who lived in felt tents"—mostly Mongol andTurkic nomads—were conscripted en masse into the cavalry units of the Mongol army, while settled agricultural peoples supplied the infantry and artillery forces.The Mongols also made good use of useful conquered people who had skills, such as artisans and technicians. They demanded that their conquered people serve as laborers, building roads and bridges and ferrying supplies over long distances. Artisans, craftsmen, and skilled people generally were carefully identified, spared from massacre, and often sent to distant regions of the empire where their services were required. -A further element in the military effectiveness of Mongol forces lay in a growing reputation for a ruthless brutality and utter destructiveness. When attacking or taking revenge against an insult, the Mongol army was ruthless, terrifying, and engaged in huge massacres and the enslavement of women and children. This had a clear psychological impact on cities faced with a coming Mongol horde(a practical inducement to surrender for those who knew of the Mongol terror). City after city was utterly destroyed, and enemy soldiers were passed out in lots to Mongol troops for execution, while women and skilled craftsmen were enslaved. Unskilled civilians served as human shields for attacks on the next city or were used as human fill in the moats surrounding those cities. "Extremely conscious of their small numbers and fearful of rebellion, Chinggis often chose to annihilate a region's entire population, if it appeared too troublesome to govern." Their reputation for unwavering harshness proved a military asset. Despite their ruthlessness in battle, the Mongols showed excellent administrative skills after the conquest. With a system of riders for communication and well-organized taxation, the Mongol Empire had the resources and infrastructure to govern itself. Strong administration and systematic taxation and an impressive ability to mobilize both the human and material resources of their growing empire. Elaborate census taking allowed Mongol leaders to know what was available to them and made possible the systematic taxation of conquered people. An effective system of relay stations, about a day's ride apart, provided rapid communication across the empire and fostered trade as well. -Other policies appealed to various groups among the conquered peoples of the empire. Interested in fostering commerce, Mongol rulers often offered mer- chants 10 percent or more above their asking price and allowed them the free use of the relay stations for transporting their goods.Recognizing the value of a vibrant economy, the Mongols ensured profits and safe conduct for merchants(favorable conditions for merchants). -With no interest in religious imperialism, the Mongols tolerated various religions and even improved the conditions of some minorities such as Christians. In religious matters, the Mongols welcomed and supported many religious traditions—Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Daoist—as long as they did not become the focus of political opposition. This policy of religious toleration allowed Muslims to seek converts among Mongol troops and afforded Christians much greater freedom than they had enjoyed under Muslim rule.

Long-Distance Trade Importance

-Linked and shaped distant societies and peoples -Altered consumption and shaped daily life, for example west africans imported scarce salt, necessary for human diets and useful for preserving food, from distant mines in the Sahara in exchange for the gold of their region. -Diminished the economy self-sufficiency of local societies, even as it altered the structure of those societies as well. For example merchants became a distinct social group. In some societies it became a means of social mobility for example Chinese merchants were able to purchase landed estates and establish themselves within the gentry class. Also enabled elite groups in society to distinguish themselves from commoners by acquiring prestigious good from a distance -silk, jade, tortoise shell, rhinoceros horn, or particular feathers. Association with faraway or powerful societies, signaled by the possession of their luxury goods, often conveyed status in communities more remote from major civilizations. -Had the capacity to transform political life because the wealth available from controlling and taxing trade motivated the creation of states in various parts of the world and sustained those states once they had been constructed. -Became a vehicle for the spread of religious ideas, technological innovations, disease-bearing germs, and plants and animals to regions far from their places of origin. Because of trade Buddhism made its way from India to Central and East Asia and Islam crossed the Sahara into West Africa and the pathogens that devastated much of Eurasia during the Black Death.

Goods, Cultures, and Diseases in Transit

-Most of the goods that made their way across the Silk Roads were luxury products, destined for an elite and wealthy market, rather than staple goods. Only the great value of the luxurious products compensated for the long and forbidding distances and high costs of transportation that merchants and travelers traveled. Trade products that contributed to silk road commerce included bamboo, mirrors, gunpowder, silk(most significant and what the silk roads were named after), spices, paper, furs, hides, slaves, cotton textiles, herbal medicine, precious stones, dyes, swords, dried fruit, gold coins, jewelry, artworks, perfume, olive oil, ebony, and more coming from China, forest lands of Siberia and grasslands of Central Asia, India, the Middle East, and the Mediterranean basin. -Buddhism, like other major religions, spread along the Silk Roads by it appeal to merchants(because of its universal message), Indian traders, and Buddhist monks. Gaining converts among pastoral peoples to the east and in the oasis towns of Central Asia such as Merv, Samarkand, Khotan, and Dunhuang. Conversion to Buddhism in the oasis cities was a voluntary process, without pressure of conquest or foreign rule. Many monasteries were established that became centers of wisdom and learning, as well as serving ecumenic functions. To the west Persian Zoroastrianism largely blocked the spread of Buddism. The Sodigans, a central asian people, whose merchants established an enduring network of exchange with china were useful in translating Sanskrit Buddhist texts into Chinese. As Buddhism spread across the silk roads from there places of origin India to Central Asia, China, and beyond it also changed. For example the original faith had shunned the material world, but Buddhist monasteries in the rich oasis towns involved themselves in secular affairs. Some became quite wealthy. Doctrines changed as well, it was the more devotional Mahayana form of Buddhism- featuring the Buddha as a deity, numerous bodhisattvas, an emphasis on compassion, and the possibility of earning merit- that became predominant on the silk roads. Buddhism also picked up elements of other cultures while on transit on the silk roads. For example Zoroastrian fire rituals from the Sogdian city Samarkand became a part of Buddhist practice. Likewise Greek culture influenced Buddhist art and culture as seen through the appearance of statues of the Buddha and the use of gods of other peoples incorporated into Buddhist practice. -Disease too traveled the trade routes of Eurasia. During the Han Dynasty and Roman Empire diseases such as smallpox and measles devastated the populations of both empires, contributing to their political collapse. The Silk Roads prompted contact all across Eurasia. Epidemics often brought suffering and death to the rich and poor alike. The most famous case od epidemic disease was the Black Death. Spread during the Mongol control of the Silk Roads, it moved from China to Europe and the Middle East. Its consequences were enormous, killing 1/3 of the European population between 1346-1350. A similar death toll afflicted china and parts of the Islamic world. Many nomadic peoples including the mongols suffered terribly undermining mongol rule and permanently altering the balance between pastoral and agricultural peoples to the advantage of settled farmers. Disease carried by long distance trade shaped the lives of millions and altered their historical development.

Sea Roads as a catalyst for change: Southeast Asia

-Oceanic commerce in Southeast Asia stimulated political change as ambitious or aspiring rulers used the wealth derived from the commerce to construct larger and more central governed states or cities and caused cultural change as local people were attracted to foreign religious ideas from confucian, Hindu, Buddhist, or Islamic sources. During third wave era, a series of cities and states or kingdoms emerged on both the islands and the mainland of Southeast Asia. Many of those new societies were stimulated and decisively shaped by their interaction with the sea-based trade of the Indian Ocean. A case in point is the Malay kingdom of Srivijaya, this Sumatra-based kingdom owed its power to the control over the flow of trade through the straits of Malacca. With access to supplies of gold and spices and the taxes it collected from ships passing through this crucial choke point in trade between the Indian Ocean and East Asia, Srivijaya became a fabulously wealthy and cosmopolitan place. Both mainland and island Southeast Asia were centrally involved in the commerce of the Indian Ocean asian, and both were transformed by that experience. The state of Funan an inland state on the mainland of Southeast Asia hosted merchants from both India and China. The Khmer kingdom of Angkor exported exotic forest products in return for Chinese and Indian handicrafts and welcomed many Chinese merchants. Traders from Champa operated in China, Java, and elsewhere, practicing piracy when trade dried up. -Commercial connections also served to spread elements of Indian culture across Southeast Asia. India alphabets like Sanskrit's and Pallava were used to write a number of Southeast asian languages. Indian artistic forms also provided models for southeast asian sculpture and architecture. Rulers and elites even found attractive Indian beliefs like leaders were god-kings and the idea of karma conveyed legitimacy to the rich and the powerful based on their moral behavior in earlier lives. For example Srivijayan monarchs employed Indians as advisers, clerks, or officials. Rulers also made use of imported Indian political ideas and buddhist religious concepts. Srivijaya grew into a major center of Buddhist observance and teaching attracting thousands of monks and students from throughout the Buddhist world. Elements of Indian culture made its way in Southeast Asia. The Sailendra kingdom in Central Java mounted a massive building program featuring Hindu temples and buddhist monuments. Borobudur most famously known as the largest buddhist monument in the world, represents the process of Buddhism becoming culturally grounded in a new place. In the Khmer kingdom of Angkor, Hinduism(though not an explicitly missionary religion) found its most stunning architectural expression in the temple complex known as Angkor wat. -Because of the strong economic, religious, and cultural influences from south asia, one can see that a process of indianization occurred in Southeast Asia. However not accompanied by imperial control. It was a matter of voluntary borrowing by independent societies that found Indian traditions and practices useful and were free to adapt those ideas to their own needs and cultures. Southeast Again cultures blended imports from India with their own ideas, traditions, and practices with little conflict. And much that was distinctly Southeast Asian persisted despite influences from afar. For example, Southeast Asian women had more opportunities like fewer restrictions and a greater role in public life than woman in China and India.

The Long History of Pastoral Peoples

-On the arid margins of agricultural lands in Eurasia, where productive farming was difficult or impossible, an alternative kind of food-producing economy emerged around 4000 B.C.E, focused on the breeding, caring, and raising of livestock named pastoralism. Pastoralists learned to use the milk, blood, wool, hides, and meats of their animals, allowing them to occupy lands that could not support agricultural societies. Horses, camels, goats, sheep, cattle, yaks, and reindeer were the primary animals that separately or in some combination enabled the construction of pastoral or herding societies. Such took shape in the vast grasslands of inner Eurasia and sub-saharan Africa, in Arabian or saharan deserts, subarctic regions of the northern hemisphere, and in the high plateau of Tibet. Pastoral societies less productive economies and their need for large grazing areas meant that they supported far smaller populations than did agricultural societies. People lived in small and widely scattered encampments or seasonal settlements made up of related kinfolk rather than in the villages, towns, or cities. -With low population density and relatively simple social structures, these societies enjoyed much greater social equality than their settled neighbors. Women engaged in most of the same tasks as men in terms of raising the herd and riding horses, had fewer restrictions, and a greater role in public life than their counterparts in agricultural civilizations. Everywhere women were involved in productive labor as well as having domestic responsibility for food and children. Many from agrarian civilizations such as in China noticed the freedom granted to pastoral women and disapproved, they thought these pastoral societies were women governed and made no distinction between man and women. -The most characteristic feature of pastoral societies was their mobility, as local environmental conditions largely dictated their patterns of movement. In some favorable regions, pastoralists maintained seasonal settlements, migrating, for instance between highland pastures in the summer and less harsh lowland environments in the winter or others would move their herds frequently in regular patterns to systematically follow seasonal changes in vegetation and water supply. While they were a mobile population that lived off their animals, they still needed the products of settled societies. Thus, even though they might disdain the agriculturalists, they were frequently in conduct with them and exchanged their animal products for the manufactured goods of the towns and cities(a form of dependency). The desire for fruits of civilization periodically stimulated the creation of tribal confederations or states that could more effectively deal with the powerful and agricultural societies on their borders and example being the mongol empire of the 13th century. -Without urban centers, it was very difficult to sustain a state system. Societies lacked the surplus wealth needed to pay for professional armies and bureaucracies that everywhere sustained the states and empires of agricultural civilizations. And the fierce independence of widely dispersed pastoral clans and tribes as well as their internal rivalries made any enduring political unity difficult to achieve. A few charismatic individuals could forge alliances, but the strength of the union was dependent on wealth coming in(through raiding, trading, or extortion from agricultural civilizations) and would fall apart when their economic fortune turned. -Pastoral people also interacted with agricultural neighbors culturally as they became familiar with many world and universal religions. Pastoral elites adopted a foreign religion for political purposes sometimes changing religious alliances as circumstances altered. Pastoralists mastered how to live in environments unsuitable for agriculture, through creative use of animals. The art of horseback riding changed their society dramatically as they could get and tend to larger herds of animals and move faster over wider territory. New technology invented or adapted added to mastery of environment, innovations like complex horse harnesses, saddles, with iron stirrups, a small compound bow, various forms of armor, and new kinds of swords.

Pastoralists in History

-Pastoralists mastery of mounted warfare made possible a long but intermittent series of pastoral empires across the steppes of inner Eurasia and parts ofm Africa. For 2,000 years, those states played a major role in Afro-Eurasian history and represented a standing challenge to and influence upon the agrarian civilizations on their borders. -The Xiongnu, an early large-scale pastoral empire who lived in the Mongolian steppes north of China in the 3rd and 2nd centuries B.C.E created a huge military confederacy that stretched from Manchuria deep into Central Asia after being provoked by Chinese penetration of their territory. Under the charismatic leader of Modun, the Xiongnu empire effected a revolution in pastoral life as he unified a diverse group of tribes, introduced a military, and forced the Han Chinese to negotiate with the Xiongnu as equals(also exacting tribute from other pastoral peoples and china which sustained the empire). It created a model that later Turkic and Mongol empires emulated. -During the era of 3rd wave civilizations Arabs, Berber, Turks, and mongols(all of them of pastoral origin) created the largest and most influential empires of that millennium. The most expansive religious tradition of the era, Islam, derived from a largely pastoral people , the Arabs, and was carried to new regions by the turks another pastoral people. All in all pastoralists were profoundly changed as they entered and shaped agrarian civilizations such as Byzantium, Persia, India, and China. -The first of these experiences came from the Bediuin arabs. In the Arabian peninsula, the development of a reliable camel saddle enabled these Arabs to fight effectively from atop their enormous camels. They came to control trade in incense running through Arabia. More importantly these nomadic Arabs made an alliance with the urban-based merchants led by Muhammad and served as the main military power for the prophet. They also helped spread Islam as they moved about the Arabian peninsula providing many of the new religion's earliest followers. The Arab empire was in some respects a pastoralist creation that subsequently became the foundation of a new and distinctive civilization. -On the other hand a variety of turkic speaking clans and tribes came out of the steppes of Central Asia migrated from their homeland generally westward and created a series of empires between 552 and 965 C.E. threatening the settled agricultural empires of China, Persia, and Byzantium. Raiding them, allying with them against common enemies, trading with them, and extolling tribute payments from them. Soon aspects of Turkic language and culture spread widely over much of Inner Asia. The turks conversion to islam between 1oth and 14th centuries represented a major expansion of the faith and made the turks the third major carrier of Islam following arabs and Persians. It brought the turks into an important position within the heartland of an established islamic civilization as they migrated into the Middle East. There the served first as slave soldiers within the Abassid caliphate, and then, as the caliphate declined, they increasingly took political and military power themselves. In the Seljuk turkic empire of the 11th and 12th centuries , turkic rulers began to claim the muslim title of sultan rather than the turkic kaghan . Although the abbasid caliph remained the formal ruler, real power was exercised by turkic sultans. -Turkic peoples became muslims and carried islam to new areas as well. Such as to Northern India and Anatolia(formerly ruled by christian Byzantium)where they brought islam and a massive infusion of turkic culture, language, and people even as they created the Ottoman Empire which by 1500 became one of the great powers of Eurasia. In both places turkic dynasties governed and would continue to do so into the modern era. Turkic people, had transformed themselves from pastoralists to sedentary farmers, from creators of steppe empires to rulers of agrarian civilizations, and from polytheistic worshippers of their ancestors and various gods to followers of a monotheistic islam. -In northern africa and the Sahara, the introduction of the camel gave rise to pastoral societies. Like the turkic-speaking pastoralists of Central Asia, many of these peoples later adopted islam but at least initially has little formal instruction in the religion. In northwest Africa, the berber people converted to islam but were superficial in their practice. After 1039, Ibn Yasin(sparked the movement) a scholar who returned from the Hadj, launched a reform campaign to make the practice of the faith more orthodox. Soon the movement became an expansionist state that moved into Spain and controlled much of present-day Morocco(where it offered vigorous opposition to christian efforts to conquer the region). Like other examples, the Almoravids became urbanized and enjoyed impressive art and architecture brought from southern Spain. For a time the almoravid state enjoyed considerable prosperity because of its control of much of the west african gold trade and the grain-producing Atlantic plains of Morocco. By the mid-twelfth century, that empire had been overrun by its longtime enemies, Berber farming people from the Atlas Mountains. But for a century, the Almoravid movement represented an african pastoral people, who had converted to islam, came into conflict with their agricultural neighbors, built a short-lived empire, and had a considerable impact on neighboring civilizations in both North Africa and Europe.

Sand Roads: Exchange across the Sahara Gold, Salt, Slaves: Trade and Empire in West Africa

-The introduction of the camel changed the course of trade in Africa. This remarkable animal, which could go for ten days without water, finally made possible the long trek across the Sahara. Now massive caravans of hundreds of people and thousands of camels could bring salt and other goods from the north across the dangerous Sahara in exchange for gold and other goods from the south. Soon Arab merchants would bring the news of the Islamic revelations to West Africa. Several empires such as Ghana, Mali, and Songhay developed into wealthy states thanks to their monopoly control over the Sahara trade routes and their access to plentiful gold deposits. As in Southeast Asia and East Africa, long-distance trade across the Sahara provided both incentive and resources for the construction of new and larger political structures. It was the peoples of the western and central Sudan, living between the forests and the desert, who were in the best position to take advan- tage of these new opportunities. Between roughly 500 and 1600, they constructed a series of states, empires, and city-states that reached from the Atlantic coast to Lake Chad.All of them were monarchies with elaborate court life and varying degrees of administrative complexity and mili- tary forces at their disposal. All drew upon the wealth of trans-Saharan trade, taxing the merchants who conducted it. In the wider world, these states soon acquired a reputation for great riches -While men generally enjoyed positions of patriarchal power, women played important roles in court and in the workforce as agricultural laborers and the makers of craft goods such as pottery. -As in all civilizations, slavery found a place in West Africa. Early on, most slaves had been women, working as domestic servants and concubines. Slaves were generally taken from stateless societies further to the south, but some wealthy men had women from the eastern Mediterranean as slaves. Slaves were also exported to the Islamic slave markets of the north. As West African civilization crystallized, however, male slaves were put to work as state officials, porters, craftsmen, miners harvesting salt from desert deposits, and especially agricultural laborers producing for the royal granaries on large estates or plantations. Most of these slaves were used within this emerging West African civilization, but a trade in slaves also devel-oped across the Sahara. Between 1100 and 1400, perhaps 5,500 slaves per year made the perilous trek across the desert. -The wealth of the West African cities made them centers of trade and manufacturing but also culture, education, and religion. These states of Sudanic Africa developed substantial urban and commercial centers—such as Koumbi-Saleh, Jenne, Timbuktu, Gao, Gobir, and Kano—where traders congregated and goods were exchanged. Some of these cities also became centers of manufacturing, creating finely wrought beads, iron tools, or cotton textiles, some of which entered the circuits of commerce. Visitors described them as cosmopolitan places where court officials, artisans, scholars, students, and local and foreign merchants all rubbed elbows.

The Mongol Empire

-The mongols 13th century breakout from Mongolia gave rise to the largest land-based empire in all of human history, stretching from the Pacific coast of Asia to Eastern Europe. This empire joined the nomadic peoples of the inner Eurasian steppes with the settled agricultural civilizations of outer Eurasia more extensively and more intimately than ever before. It also brought the major civilizations of Eurasia — Europe, China, and the Islamic world — into far more direct contact than in earlier times. For all of its size and fearsome reputation, the Mongol Empire left a surprisingly modest cultural imprint on the world it had briefly governed. Unlike the Arabs, the Mongols bequeathed to the world no new religion or civilization. Whereas the Islamic community offered a common religious home for all converts—conquerors and conquered alike—the Mongols never tried to spread their own faith among subject peoples. There was little in their traditions to attract outsiders, and in any event the Mongols proved uninterested in religious imperialism. The Mongols offered the majority of those they conquered little more than the status of defeated, subordinate, and exploited people, although people with skills were put to work in ways useful to Mongol authorities. Unlike the Turks, whose languages and culture flourish today in many places far from the Turkic homeland, Mongol culture remains confined largely to Mongolia. Furthermore, the Mongol Empire, following in the tradition of Xiongnu and Turkic state building, proved to be "the last, spectacular bloom of pastoral power in Inner Eurasia."Some Mongols themselves became absorbed into the settled societies they conquered. After the decline and disintegration of the Mongol Empire, the tide turned against the pas- toralists of inner Eurasia, who were increasingly swallowed up in the expanding Russian or Chinese empires. Nonetheless, while it lasted and for a few centuries thereafter, the Mongol Empire exercised an enormous impact throughout the entire Eurasian world.

From Temujin to Chinggis Khan: The rise of the mongol empire

-The rise of the mongol empire can be correlated to a man named Temujin later known as Chinggis Khan(universal ruler). The twelfth-century world into which he was born found the Mongols an unstable and fractious collection of tribes and clans, much reduced from a somewhat earlier and more powerful position in the shifting nomadic alliances in what is now Mongolia. The early life of Temujin showed few signs of a prominent future. After his father was murdererd when he was 10, his resourceful mother led the immediate family through a marginal existence(as social outcasts without livestock they were forced to abandon pastoralism living instead by hunting, fishing, and gathering wild foods.But in these desperate circumstances Temijins character came into play. His personal magnetism and courage and his inclination to rely on trusted friends rather than ties of kinship allowed him to build up a small following and to ally with a more powerful tribal leader. As he won a series of battles and forged alliances based on loyalty and not kinship, Temujin steadily built up a powerful force. Temujin's rise to power amid the complex tribal politics of Mongolia was a surprise to everyone. It took place among shifting alliances and betrayals, a mounting string of military victories, the indecisiveness of his enemies, a reputation as a leader generous to friends and ruthless to enemies, and the incorporation of warriors from defeated tribes into his own forces. In 1206, a Mongol tribal assembly recognized Temujin as Chinggis Khan, supreme leader of a now unified Great Mongol Nation. -Chinggis Khan started five decades of expansionist wars to build more power but to also hold onto the mongol alliance. Starting in 1209, the first major attack on the settled agricultural societies south of Mongolia set in motion half a century of a Mongol world war, a series of military campaigns, massive killing, and empire building without precedent in world history. In the process, chinggis khan, followed by his sons and grandsons (Ogodei, Mongke, and Khubilai), constructed an empire that contained China, Korea, Central Asia, Russia, much of the Islamic Middle East, and parts of Eastern Europe. The empire was only checked in Eastern Europe, the Levant, the jungles of Southeast Asia, and the Sea of Japan. He set in motion the building of the world's largest land based empire and it was run by a population of only 1,000,000.

Sand Roads: Exchange across the Sahara Commercial Beginnings in west Africa

-This type of long distance trade occurred across the vast reaches of the Sahara. Linking North Africa and the Mediterranean world with the land and peoples of interior West Africa. Varied and diverse environments in and around the Sahara produced a different set of goods which provided the economic incentive for the exchange of those goods. To the north on the shores of the mediterranean were communities that produced goods such as weapons, tools, books, clothes, and glassware. The Sahara had deposits of copper and salt as well as oases with date palms. Farther south lived agricultural peoples who grew a variety of crops produced their own textiles and metal products, and mined a considerable amount of gold. In the agricultural regions of sub-Saharan Africa: To the immediate south in the savanna grasslands, there were millet and sorghum farmers(produced gain crops); further south in the forest areas, root and tree crops such as yams and kola nuts grew. -The earliest long-distance trade within this huge region was among agricultural peoples themselves in the lands south of the Sahara known by Arabs as the "Sudan" or "land of the blacks". Peoples of Sudanic West Africa since the first millennium B.C.E began to exchange metal goods, cotton textiles, gold, and various food products across long distances using boats along the Niger River and donkeys overland. On the basis of this trade, a number of independent urban clusters emerged by the early centuries of the common era along the Niger River that were key hubs of trade.

Sea Roads:Exchange across the Indian Ocean

-Until the creation of genuinely global oceanic system of trade after 1500, the Indian Ocean represented the worlds largest sea-based system of communication and exchange, stretching from southern china to eastern Africa. The sea roads grew out of the vast environmental and cultural diversities. The desire for various goods not available at home- scum as porcelain from china, spices from the islands of Southeast Asia, cotton goods and pepper from India, ivory and gold from the East African coast, incense from southern Arabia- provided incentives for Indian Ocean commerce. Sea roads eventually carried more bulk goods and products destined for a mass market- textiles, pepper, timer, rice, sugar, wheat- since transportation costs were lower because ships could accommodate larger and heavier cargoes. -It began with local maritime trade in the Indian Ocean for an unknown time in the Persian gulf between Mesopotamia and the Indus valley. In the first millennium B.C.E., until Malay sailors from the islands of present day Indonesia began to make long distance travel across the Indian Ocean to the East African island of Madagascar. They introduced their language and crops- bananas, taro, and coconuts- which soon spread to the mainland and enriched the diets of African peoples. -It wasn't until the era of second wave civilizations during the early centuries of the common era, that Indian Ocean commerce picked up as mariners learned how to ride the monsoons and developed new technologies for shipbuilding and navigation to facilitate Indian Ocean trade. Improvement in sails, new kinds of ships called junks with stern rudders, keels that gave more stability, the astrolabe, and the compass. India became the fulcrum of tase in the Indian Ocean basin because of its geographic location and its vibrant economy. Its ports bulged with good from both west and east. -The economic and political revival of china during the Tang and Song Dynasty( due to an effective and unified state which actively encouraged maritime trade.) between 500-1500 gave a huge economic boost to the Indian Ocean trade. China produced a variety od goods for export to the rest of the world, increasing the volume of trade on the sea routes. China also served as a market for a variety of Indian and Southeast Asian goods. -Another transformation in the world of Indian Ocean commerce involved the sudden rise of islam in the 7th century. Islam was friendly to commercial life as the prophet Muhammad had been a merchant, he served as a positive role model for other merchants( in contrast to china where merchants we deemed to be of dubious moral quality.) The realm of islam expanded rapidly, it created a single political system that incorporated a number of different economic center. In the Indian Ocean, the expansion of islam created an international maritime culture by 1000. The immense prestige, power and prosperity of the islamic world stimulated widespread conversion which in turn facilitated commercial transactions.

Encountering the Mongols: Comparing Three Cases Russia and the Mongols/ Khanate of the Golden Horde

-Using technology such as catapults and battering rams gained from campaigns in China and Persia, the brutal invasion of the Kievan Rus(1237-1240) was an impressive assault on a weak and disunited people. The devastation wrought by the Mongol assault matched or exceeded anything experienced by the Persians or the Chinese, city after city fell to Mongol forces. -The Khanate of the Golden Horde was the Russian term for Mongol rule. To the Mongols, it was the Kipchak Khanate, named after the Kipchak Turkic-speaking peoples north of the Caspian and Black seas, among whom the Mongols had settled. To the Russians, it was the "Khanate of the Golden Horde." -Russia's incorporation into the Mongol Empire was very different, the mongols did not occupy it as they had China and Persia. While the invasion was impressive and devastated some areas, the Mongols chose not to occupy the relatively poor and isolated Rus(Russia had little to offer). Its economy was not nearly as devel- oped as that of more established civilizations; nor was it located on major international trade routes. It was simply not worth the expense of occupying. Instead they settled nearby on the steppes and pastoral lands north of the Caspian and Black Seas. They put them within striking distance of the cities from which they extorted tribute. They could dominate and exploit Russia from the steppes. Some cities chose to resist and faced brutal retaliation. Kiev, for example, was razed. Others collaborated and helped the Mongols collect tribute and taxes and wound up doing very well for themselves(Moscow in particular emerged as the primary collector of tribute for the Mongols, and its princes parlayed this position into a leading role as the nucleus of a renewed Russian state when Mongol domination receded in the fifteenth century). Russian princes received appointment from the khan and were required to send substantial tribute to the Mongol capital at Sarai, located on the lower Volga River.A variety of additional taxes created a heavy burden, especially on the peasantry, while continuing border raids sent tens of thousands of Russians into slavery. The Mongol impact was highly uneven, however. Some Russian princes benefited considerably because they were able to manipulate their role as tribute collectors to grow wealthy.The Russian Orthodox Church likewise flourished under the Mongol policy of religious toleration, for it received exemption from many taxes. Nobles who participated in Mongol raids earned a share of the loot. -The absence of direct Mongol rule had implications for the Mongols themselves, for they were far less influenced by or assimilated within Russian cultures than their counterparts in China and Persia had been. There "the Mongols of the Golden Horde were still spending their days in the saddle and their nights in tents."26 They could dominate Russia from the adjacent steppes without in any way adopting Russian culture. Even though they remained culturally separate from Russia, eventually the Mongols assimilated to the culture and the Islamic faith of the Kipchak people of the steppes, and in the process they lost their distinct identity and became Kipchaks. -Moscow rose as the core of a new Russian state that adopted Mongol weapons, diplomacy, taxation, court system, and a draft(Mongol policies facilitated, although not intentionally, the rise of Moscow as the core of a new Russian state). The Russian Orthodox Church enjoyed Mongol tolerance and tax exemption and spread its reach deeper into the countryside(expansion of the church). -Divisions among the Mongols and the growing strength of the Russian state, centered now on the city of Moscow, enabled the Russians to break the Mongols' hold by the end of the fifteenth century.

The Mongol Empire as a Eurasian Network Diplomacy on a Eurasian Scale

-When the Mongols made their way into Eastern Europe in a 1241- 1242 campaign, they seemed poised to take the region of Central and Western Europe. However, the death of Great Khan Ogodei required the Mongol leaders to return home and Western Europe lacked adequate pasture for Mongol herds anyways. Thus Western Europe was spared the trauma of conquest, but fearing the possible return of the Mongols, both the pope and European rulers dispatched delegations to the Mongol capital, mostly led by Franciscan friars. Aware of the threat the Mongols posed, European kings and the Pope sent emissaries(European envoys) east to negotiate with the Mongols. These efforts were largely in vain, for no alliance or widespread conversion occurred. In fact, one of these missions came back with a letter for the pope from the Great Khan Guyuk, demanding that Europeans submit to him. -These missions provided the previously isolated Europeans with a wealth of knowledge about the rest of the world. Perhaps the most important outcome of these diplomatic probings was the useful information about lands to the east that European missions brought back. Those reports contributed to a dawning European awareness of a wider world. Mongol linkage of China and Persia: As these two great empires were part of a larger Mongol system, communications between the two increased. Thus, the -Mongols created an unprecedented level of international communication. They regularly exchanged ambassadors, shared intelligence information, fostered trade between their regions, and sent skilled workers back and forth. Thus political authorities all across Eurasia engaged in diplomatic relationships with one another to an unprecedented degree.

The Mongol Empire as a Eurasian Network Toward a World Economy

-While the Mongols did not make anything or engage in trade(not producers or traders), they did promote production and commerce in the regions they controlled, providing tax breaks for merchants and sometimes paying high prices to attract commerce to their cities. The Great Khan Ogodei, for example, often paid well over the asking price in order to attract merchants to his capital of Karakorum. The Mongols also provided financial backing for caravans, introduced standardized weights and measures, and gave tax breaks to merchants. -In providing a relatively secure environment for merchants making the long and arduous journey across Central Asia between Europe and China, the Mongol Empire brought the two ends of the Eurasian world into closer contact than ever before. An unprecedented security on the Silk Roads allowed for a dramatic increase in trade throughout Central Asia, with many individuals making the entire journey from west to east and back. Marco Polo was the most famous( European merchant, from an Italian city, who made his way to China through the Mongol Empire) but many others used guidebooks on their trips.Merchants returned with tales of rich lands and prosperous commercial opportunities, but what they described were long-established trading networks of which Europeans had been largely ignorant. -The Mongol trade circuit connected to other trade networks throughout the rest of Asia, the Indian Ocean, the Middle east, Africa, and Europe, doing much to forge a global economy. Connected to the larger world system.