Talk:Mongols/Archive 1

Counterfactuals

Such scenarios must be viewed keeping in mind knowledge of their origin.

This line confuses me, as it's tacked onto the end of a paragraph with no other explanation. If it cannot be elaborated on, it should be removed. What, precisely, does "knowledge of their origin" refer to - the origin of the counterfactual scenarios, ie., are they from unreliable sources? or the origin of the Mongols? I submit that the counterfactual proposal that Europe would have fallen had not the Great Khan died is so probable as to be nearly unassailable. Subotai was quite possibly the greatest military strategist who ever lived, and he had already handily destroyed the two best armies of Eastern Europe, while the forces of Western Europe were still tied up in their age-old squabbles and weren't paying attention to their danger, ready to be devoured piecemeal. In particular I think the article definitely needs some elaboration on how heavily the Eastern European campaign relied on the genius of Subotai, and how narrowly Europe escaped a ravaging like the one Russia received. Another interesting point is the relatively modern arrangement of the Mongolian military; Subotai was low-born, and yet was allowed to command nobility in the field, in recognition of his superior skill; this sort of sensible organization was largely unknown in Europe at the time, and for long afterwards (witness the blue-blooded buffoons commanding the French at Agincourt two hundred years later).

At this point I don't know whether to simply excise that line or elaborate on the counterfactual theories. I'm tempted to do both. Opinions? -Kasreyn

Can someone reword the phrase and maybe relocate the sentences that I wrote about Genghis tracking down his enemy leader. I think this is true and it was very smart one. For example, the enemy leader can't regather a troop to start a war once the invasion slowed down. It makes sense I think.

Removed the word "more numerous" on Military Innovation. This is pretty much agreed on that the Mongol armies wasn't "numerous" than the other enimies almost in all combats, e.g. China and Europe. For instance, there are instances where Mongol 20,000 defeated 80,000 soldiers. It was much more about quality than quantity

QUOTE They are, by and large, much nicer than their genocidal ancestors... /QUOTE Eurocentric and emotional point of view?

Agreed. Altering. -- April

I've added some detail, and rewrote it to a more NPOV. I'd really appreciate some feedback on my NPOV writing style, I feel it is my weakest point. Thanks.

Dobbs 20:31 Sep 6, 2002 (UCT)

THE MONGOLS WERE LIGHT CAVALRY, WHO WON BATTLES PRIMARILY BY HAVING A SUPERIOR TYPE OF COMPOUND BOW THAT THEY COULD FIRE PROFICIENTLY AT A FULL GALLOP, THEY NEVER EVEN GOT CLOSE TO THEIR ENEMIES UNTIL THE BATTLE WAS A MOPPING UP OPERATION. CHARACTERIZING THEM AS INFANTRY IS COMPLETELY WRONG.

An unknown user put that in on the main page. Hopefully, he'll figure out how to get here to read my reply.

You are completely correct, of course. Mongol armies consisted of something like 2/3rds light cavalry, and 1/3rd heavy cavalry, if I remember correctly. One of the hazards of editing at 2 in the morning, is that you read and re-read some of your own mistakes until they become invisible. Thank you for pointing that out.

However, I still think the sum total of their innovations is more important than the single skill of proficient shooting from the back of a horse. That could of been overcome by any of their opponents by a change in tactics. I feel it was the sum total of what they put into practice that made them unstoppable.

Dobbs 17:54 Sep 9, 2002 (UTC)

I was wondering if anyone knows why the Wikipedia replaced my quotes with question marks in the Mongol article? Or was that intentional on the part of the person who edited it? Look at the differences to see examples. Am I missing something in how I should be formatting my pages? Thanks. Dobbs 15:41 Sep 15, 2002 (UTC)

That typically happens when you bring in text from MS Word or other Microsoft products, or Adobe Pagemaker etc. It's because the character codes used in those programs are non-standard and don't represent anything outside of those programs. To avoid it, you can "save as text," converting e.g. — to --, then paste it into wikipedia. --KQ

Why were large part of my article removed without comment? Dobbs 14:39 Feb 27, 2003 (UTC)

*BEIJING* is north capital, Nanjing/Yanjing is south capital

This may or may not be true, but as a comment I think it belongs on this page. Anyone care to confirm the statement's veracity and edit the main page? Lancevortex 23:19 22 May 2003 (UTC)

hey Folks, first time on wikipedia posting. I was actually under the impression that Mongolians preferred to be called Mongolians. After all Mongol is a Chinese for old-way and is viewed as well not quite racial slang, but basically something along the lines of calling a mexican a wet-back or something. I'm not sure of this, but I'm in Korea and there's several articles advising Koreans to call Mongolians Mongolians and NOT Mongols. The article all state Mongol is considered a bad word in Mongolia.

Hazaras too

The Hazaras of central Afghanistan are descended from Mongol armies and are predominantly Mongol in race. The language must be around 5% Mongol and similar for culture and music. Consider this group and the 10 million mark goes up to 17 million, but then again, other groups like Kyrghiz etc would also beg to be included, even 'mongoloid' people which includes Tibetians and Thai.

The numbers in Inner Mongolia are very hazy now.

Sorghaghtani Beki

A lot of the current page isn't true and I hope to re-write it shortly. My three main complaints would be:

1) From the very beginning (the Xi Hia in 1209) the Mongols would hold states in vassal-ship (as opposed to completely destroying all other people, as the article implies). True they toned down the destruction over time, but the article over-simplifies the matter.

2) Sorghaghtani Beki was not such a super-woman as the article implies. She was not Genghis Khan's advisor. She came of prominence after his death. The idea that she was more famous than the Khans doesn't make sense - of course those in the Mongol empire and the immediate vicinity knew who Kublai Khan was. In Marco Polo, she wasn't mentioned, Kublai was.

3) It's left un-mentioned until the most recent edit that the Mongols mainly sacked cities, as they had been doing throughout their history. Their prominence under the Khan can mostly be seen as them doing what they had always done before, but being more successful at it due to their unified population and weakened neighbors.

change in perspective?

I think some revision of this subject is required. I think the tone of the piece passes judgment on the Mongols as savage barbarians. In particular, I think the following two paragraphs should be reworked to reflect a more nuanced understanding of motivations behind Mongol behavior towards their conquests:

"Conquest, in the Khan's initial viewpoint, did not consist of subordination of competing cultures to the nomadic way of life, but rather in their looting and destruction. As a nomad, Genghis Khan is supposed to not have understood (or cared) of the supposed benefits in the city dwellers' way of life. This contrasts with their dependence on trade with the cities. However, the economic theories of these relationships still lay seven centuries in the future.

The Khan's initial plan of conquest was sacking all that was valuable, and then razing the city and killing the entire population, leaving only artists and human shields (for future campaigns) to survive. Different theories exist for why the Mongols were initially so extreme. Militarily, the Mongols were often far from home territory and greatly out-numbered, and wouldn't want to leave enemies in their rear. Psychologically, the Mongols were a nomadic people, and saw no use for a civilian population. Economically, destroying population centers gave the Mongols more room to graze their herds."''

I would recommend reading "Genghis Kahn and the Making of the Modern World" by Jack Weatherford for a fresh perspective and as support for my following assertions. Weatherford's book suggests that, in accordance with their hunter/ shepherd mindset, the Mongols viewed sedentary agricultural civilizations as a resource to be cultivated in the manner as would a hunter/ gather/ shepherd. They had no inclination to adopt, however, the sedentary lifestyle of their "civilized" neighbors. What was created, then, was a fairly sophisticated system of exploitation, trade and patronage. I think that Genghis Khan was astute enough to fully understand what he had conquered and how to exploit it fully. It is true, however, that Mongols had initiated conquest in order to obtain material wealth through plundering their conquered neighbors, but I think to stop at that without further elaboration of the development of trade within the Mongol empire would be to mischaracterize the subject.

I think you are falling into the trap, recently greatly in vogue, of believing that every ancient culture long reviled as "barbarians" by western scholars, must have not been. The common belief seems to be that western history has been entirely false in every regard! On this topic, I happen to think western scholars were (probably through no merit of their own) correct to a large degree. How do you equate your notion of the Khans as cultivators, with the destruction of the Mesopotamian irrigation system, drastically reducing that land's population carrying capacity? With the reduction of Kiev from a bustling trading port to a burnt-out shell? I have heard claims that the area has still not recovered economically. That the Mongols traded is, of course, undisputable, though much of that economy was based on continuing influx of war spoils. I also think you're trying to whitewash them by saying they "had no inclination" to "adopt... [a] sedentary lifestyle". That's a lot milder, after all, than saying they burnt down cities across Asia. Even if they didn't necessarily raze every single city they encountered, they certainly had little interest in what we call civilization. Genghis, perhaps, had the vision to see more, but his descendants seemed interested in little more than conquest after conquest. (Please note, however, that I do not mean this rebuttal in any acrimonious way, and if you have sources besides Weatherford's book - which I'll try to find a copy of - I'd love to hear about them. :) -Kasreyn

cavalry

I'd just like to point out that the Mongol heavy cavalry did carry bows. In fact, all Mongol cavalrymen carried two bows, one for long-range fighting and one for short-range fighting. They also developed various specialized arrows for different tasks, including but not limited to incendiary arrows, heavy armor-piercing arrows, and fast short-range arrows.

Hopefully somebody would be willing to sit down and do a complete re-write of this page. It's biased, self-contradictory, contains poor grammar, and quite frequently makes no sense. If a small child turned this in as a school project, they'd fail.

Casualty figures

Does anyone have documentation for those casualty figures? They just seem high to me. 80 million is a lot of people. I mean, that's more than all the people that died in World War II. Granted, World War II took place in less than a decade, and the mongolian invasions took place over more than fifty years, but still... Apol0gies 17:48, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

AFAIK it's correct. The Mongols decimated the populations of China and Russia. If a city surrendured, it would be pillaged, burnt, and its people dragged away into slavery. If it resisted, then when it fell, everyone in it was put to the sword. At least, this is what I read in the book "What If?", which is supposedly edited from essays by various historians. The Mongols waged possibly the most destructive campaign in history. Even Alexander the Great didn't cause so much carnage in his wake, preferring live subjects to hacked corpses. -Kasreyn

This page needs some major rewriting

Just a few innacuracies...but i agree that there are MANY errors and contradictions

what immediately struck me

the mongols did not use entirely light cav...they used a contingent of very flexible heavy cav (lances,swords, bows) for breakthrough purposes just like other armies...once the massed archer fire had its cumulative effect

this article makes little reference to the famous use of mongolian feint and retreats...their used of "suicical" vanguards

as for the armor, a %age of the mongols used urine hardened leather armor, and it is believed (although i've yet to find some good sources) that some had armoured horses. Scale/lamillar armor might also have been used

the silk garments could not have miraculously reduced infection, those garments were rarely washed or replaced....what they predominantly did was allow the arrow to be extracted along its entry path, drastically reducing the added trauma of removing when they are simply ripped out. So this had a huge impact on surviving the arrow wound, providing infection didn't set in

also...how often did mongol troops face western knights? rarely

This was an unsigned post by User:Panzerjager88. Ben talk contr 07:55, May 16, 2005 (UTC)

You don't need to face western knights when you can outmaneouver them on faster horses that have been better cared for. ;) Just run rings around them shooting arrows into them until they're all dead. And yes, Mongol composite bows could - easily - penetrate Western armor. -Kasreyn

Was it second to the British Empire in size or not? Could somebody check and correct the contradiction of first or second in the article? Are there references for that? Ben talk contr 07:55, May 16, 2005 (UTC)

It had the largest contiguous empire.

Historical estimates of casualties

It's really interesting that the mongols killed 80 million people in the 1200's. Amazing really. Especially when there were only 300 million people on earth. Do those numbers seem INSANELY high to anyone else? --The Grza 23:15, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

Hello, it was part of their "psychological warfare". They would send people ahead to spread terror and panic in front of them, it was part of their attack strategy. User:Orngjce223

Map

I really think that at 300 pixels, you can't see the map very well. – Quadell ^{(talk) (sleuth)} 03:14, July 17, 2005 (UTC)

I think all you really need to see is just where the red is. --Hottentot

Comment

Latest comment: 20 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I just want to point out a few things.

Mongol usually recruit the beaten enemies to do their fighting (cannon folder?) Therefore, 20,000 Mongol may also mean + a few thousand press gang not counted as human, allies.
Mongol troops wipe out 80,000 Russian knight, similarly equipped as western knights. Mongol emphasise on fast manover mean they can enggage a few group of separated armies at the same time. The slow moving heavy knight would stand no chance even if the mongol let them put on their armour to fight. Most likely, the mongol would dash in before the knight is even ready with all their armour.
There are claims that Mongol even considering to depopulate the whole northern Chinese, as they found the number of Chinese they encounter as too many, before they were persuade to dropped the plan.
Among cities wipe out by mongol Urgenchi, Merv, Herat, Balkh, Bamian.Yosri 06:40, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

Opinion on Current Mongol Culture

I removed this POV - "Contrary to the popular bias based on history, the Mongols of Mongolia, especially those the nomads, are regarded by most Westerners with first-hand knowledge as some of the kindest and warmest people in the world."

I'm sure the Mongols are great people. But this is opinion. I've heard this same thing said about dozens of tribes and nationalities about kindness and generosity. How can we rank the cultures of the world according to what culture is the warmest and kindest? Certainly a culture could be unusually generous or helpful by another culture's standards, but simple opinion without anything to back it up is not needed.

Perhaps some mention of how the Mongols are no longer a warlike tribe in any way shape or form, but I think the previous language is a bit too POV.

You might wanna add Mongolia is a growing tourist desitnation (it's getting quite big) and that Chinese investment is bringing Mongolia into the modern world (they built a power plant etc.) is there a mention of the Chinese-inner-mongolia area? when your on the trans-siberian express is can take hours to wade through the paper work required to go from China to Mongolia.

peace, A

_________

Completely rewrote the Monogl Empire section of the page using scholarly sources. Most of the stuff there was just plain wrong and it needed to be done.

== Anachronisms ==

It is tempting to judge people of the past and what they did when it insults our values, but it does not change what they did or thought. You cannot denounce their values as being wrong based on ours.