World History AP expectations

Major Developments

1.  Questions of periodization – 600 C.E. – 1450

• Continuities and breaks within the period (e.g., the effects of the Mongols on international contacts and on specific societies)

2.  Interregional networks and contacts

• Development and shifts in interregional trade, technology, and cultural exchange – Silk Road
• Impact of the Mongol empires

Demographic and environmental changes

1. Impact of nomadic migrations on Eurasia e.g., Mongols
2. Growth and role of cities e.g.,

Examples of the type of information students are expected to know contrasted with examples of what students are not expected to know for the multiple-choice section:

1. Mongol expansion and its impact, but not details of specific khanates.

               

The Last Great Nomadic Changes:  From Chinggis Khan to Timur

 

The nomads of central Asia returned to center stage in world history during the thirteenth century.  The Mongols ended or interrupted the great postclassical empires while extending the world network.  Led by Chinggis Khan and his successors, they brought central Asia, China, Persia, Tibet, Iraq, Asia Minor, and southern Russia under their control and dominated most of the sedentary civilize civilizations since the first century C.E.  The Mongols are often portrayed as barbarians and destructive conquerors, but generally in their vast possessions peoples lived in peace, enjoyed religious tolerance, and a unified law code.  Peaceful contacts over long distances opened.  Mongol territory was a bridge between the civilizations of the Eastas (China’s) products and ideas moved among civilized and nomadic peoples. 

The Mongol Empire of Chinggis Khan

The Mongols were nomadic herders of goats and sheep who lived off the products of their animals.  Boys and girls learned to ride as soon as they could walk.  The basic unit of social organization, the tribe, was divided into kin-related clans.  Great confederations were organized for defensive and offensive operations.  Men held dominant leadership positions; women held considerable influence within the family.  Leaders were elected by free men. They gained their positions through displays of courage and diplomatic skills and maintained power as long as they were successful.

The Making of the Great Warrior:  The Early Career of Chinggis Khan

Mongolian people established kingdoms in north China in the fourth and tenth centuries C.E.  In the twelfth century, Kabul Khan defeated a Qin army, but Mongol organization declined after his death.  His grandson, Chinggis Khan, originally named Temujin, was a member of one of the clans disputing Mongol leadership at the end of the twelfth century.  Temujin gained strength among the Mongols through alliances with more powerful groups.   After defeating his rivals, he was elected supreme ruler (khagan) of all Mongol tribes in 1206. 

Building the Mongol War Machine

Mongol males were trained from youth to ride, hunt, and fight.  Their powerful short bows, fired from horseback, were devastating weapons.  The speed and mobility of Mongol armies made them the world’s best.  The armies, divided into fighting units of 10,000 (tumens), included both heavy and light cavalry.  Harsh discipline, enforced through a formal code, brought punishments and rewards for conduct.  Another unit, employing spies, secured accurate information for campaigns.  New weapons, including gunpowder and cannons, were used.

Conquest: The Mongol Empire under Chinggis Khan

Chinggis Khan set forth to conquer the known world.  In 1207, the Mongols defeated the northwestern China Tangut kingdom of Xi Xia.  They next attacked the Qin empire established by the Jurchens.  In these first campaigns, the Mongols developed new tactics for capturing fortified urban centers.  Cities that resisted were utterly destroyed; their inhabitants were killed or made slaves.  Cities that submitted avoided this fate; tribute ensured safety.

First Assault on the Islamic World: Conquest in China

After China, the Mongols moved westward.  Victory over Khwarazm brought many Turkic horsemen into Chinggis Khan’s army.  The Mongol leader spent the rest of his life fighting in China.  The Xi Xia kingdom and the Qin empire were destroyed.  At the death of Chinggis Khan in 1227, the Mongols ruled an empire stretching from Persia to the North China Sea.

This map reflects the Mongol Empire in 1227, when Genghis Khan died. His descendants expanded into Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and all of China.

Life under the Mongol Imperium

The Mongols were both fearsome warriors and astute, tolerant rulers.  Chinggis Khan, though illiterate, was open to new ideas and wanted to create peaceful empire.  He established a new capital in the steppes at Karakorum and hired talented individuals from all conquered regions.  Chinggis followed shamanistic Mongol beliefs but tolerated all religions.  He used the knowledge of Muslim and Chinese bureaucrats to build an administrative structure for the empire.  A script was devised for the Mongolian language, and a legal code helped end old quarrels.  The Mongol conquests brought peace to much of Asia.  In urban centers, artisans and scholars freely worked.  Commerce flourished along secure trade routes.

The Death of Chinggis Khan and the Division of the Empire

When Chinggis died in 1227, the vast territories of the Mongols were divided among three sons and a grandson.  His third son, Ogedei, a talented diplomat, was chosen as grand khan.  He presided over further Mongol conquests for nearly a decade.

The Mongol Drive to the West

The armies of the Golden Horde moved westward.  By the thirteenth century, Kiev was in decline and Russia was divided into many petty kingdoms.  They were unable to unite before the Mongols (called Tatars or Tartars by Russians).  Batu, Chinggis Khan’s grandson, invaded in 1236 and defeated Russian armies one by one.  Resisting cities were razed.  In 1240, Kiev was taken and ravaged.  Novgorod was spared when its ruler, Alexander Nevskii, peacefully submitted, at least temporarily.

Russia in Bondage

The Russians became vassals of the khan of the Golden Horde, a domination lasting two and a half centuries.  Russian princes paid tribute.  Peasants had to meet demands from both their own princes and the Mongols.  Many sough protection by becoming serfs.  The decision inaugurated a major change in rural social structure: serfdom endured until the middle of the nineteenth century.  Some cities, especially Moscow, benefited from the increased commercial possibilities brought by Mongol rule.  It grew at the expense of nearby towns and profited as tribute collector for the khans.  When the power of the Golden Horde declined, Moscow led Russian resistance to the Mongols.  The Golden Horde was defeated at Kulikova in 1380.  Mongols remained active in the region through most of the fifteenth century, but from the end of the fourteenth century, Moscow was the center of political power in Russia.  Although much of their effect was negative, the Mongol occupation was very important in Russian history.  Their example influenced military and political organization.  Most significantly, the Mongols isolated Russia from developments in western European civilization like the Renaissance and the Reformation.

 Mongol Incursions and the Retreat from Europe

Christian western Europe initially had been pleased by Mongol successes against Islam.  Many in the west thought the Mongol khan was Prester John.  When the Mongols moved westward into Hungary, western Europeans had real reason for concern.  However, Europe escaped more serious invasions when the death of Ogedei and the resulting succession struggle forced Batu to withdraw.  Satisfied with their rich conquests in Asia and the Middle East, the Mongols did not return to Europe.

The Mongol Assault on the Islamic Heartland

Hulegu, a grandson of Chinggis Khan, moved westward against Mesopotamia and North Africa.  Baghdad was destroyed in 1258.  With the fall of the Addasid dynasty, Islam had lost its central authority; consequently much of its civilization was devastated.  A major Mongol victory over the Seljuk Turks in 1243 opened Asia Minor to conquest by the Ottoman Turks.  The Mongol advance halted in 1260 when the Mamluks of Egypt defeated the Mongols.  Hulegu, faced with other threats to his rule, including the conversion of the khan of the Golden Horde to Islam, did not resume the campaign.

The Mongol Interlude in Chinese History
The Mongol advance into Chinese resumed after Ogedei’s election.  Kubilai Khan, another grandson of Chinggis Khan, during the middle of the thirteenth century led the Mongols against the Song.  In 1271, Kubilai’s dynasty became the Yuan.  As his conquests continued, Kubilai attempted to preserve the distinction between Mongols and Chinese.  Chinese were forbidden from learning the Mongol script and intermarriage was prohibited.  Mongol religious ceremonies and customs were retained.  Kubilai refused to reestablish exams for the civil service.  Despite the measures protecting Mongol culture, Kubilai was fascinated by Chinese civilization.  He adopted much form their culture into his court; the capital at Tatu (Beijing) was in Chinese style.  A new social structure emerged in China.  The Mongols were at the top; their nomadic and Islamic allies were directly below them.  Both groups dominated the highest levels of the administration.  Beneath them came first the north Chinese, and then ethnic Chinese and peoples of the south. 

Gender Roles and the Convergence of Mongol and Chinese Culture

Mongol women remained aloof from Confucian Chinese culture.  They refused to adopt foot binding and retained rights to property and control in the household, as well as freedom of movement.  Some Mongol women hunted and went to war.  Chabi, wife of Kubilai, was an especially influential woman.  The Mongol interlude in China was too brief, and Mongol numbers too small, to change Confucian patterns.  The freedom of women declined under Kubilai’s successors.

Mongol Tolerance and Foreign Cultural Influence
The openness of Mongol rulers to outside ideas, and their patronage, drew scholars, artists, artisans, and office seekers from many regions.  Muslim lands provided some of the most favored arrivals; they were included in the social order just below the Mongols.  They brought much new knowledge into the Chinese world.  Kubilai was interested in all religions; Buddhists, Nestorian and Latin Christians, Daoists, and Muslims were all present at court.  He welcomed foreign visitors. The most famous was the Venetian Marco Polo. 

Social Policies and Scholar-Gentry Resistance

The ethnic Chinese, the vast majority of Kubilai’s subjects, were never reconciled to Mongol rule.  The scholar-gentry regarded Mongols as uncouth barbarians with policies endangering Chinese traditions.  The refusal to reinstate the examination was especially resented.  The Mongols also bolstered the position of artisans and merchants who previously not had received high status.  Both prospered as the Mongols improved transportation and expanded the supply of paper money.  The Mongols developed a substantial navy that helped conquest and increased commerce.  Urban life flourished.  Mongol patronage stimulated popular entertainment, especially musical drama, and awarded higher status to formerly despised actors and actresses.  Kubilai’s policies initially favored peasantry.  Their land was protected from Mongol cavalrymen turning it into pasture, and famine relief measures were introduced.  Tax and labor burdens were reduced.  A revolutionary change was formulated – but not enacted – for establishing elementary education at the village level.

The Fall of the House of Yuan

By the time of Kubilai’s death, the Yuan dynasty was weakening.  Song loyalists in the south revolted.  Mongol expeditions of 1274 and 1280 against Japan failed.  Other Mongol forces were defeated in Vietnam and Java.  Kubilai’s successors lacked talent, and the Yuan administration became corrupt.  The suffering peasantry was called upon by the scholar-gentry to drive out the “barbarians.”  By the 1350s, the dynasty was too weak to control all of China.  Famines stimulated local risings.  Secret societies dedicated to overthrowing the dynasty formed.  Rival rebels fought each other.  Many Mongols returned to central Asia.  Finally, a peasant leader, Ju Yuanzhang, triumphed and founded the Ming dynasty.

In Depth: The Eclipse of the Nomadic War Machine

The incursions of small numbers of military skilled nomads into the civilized cores have had a major effect on world history.  Nomads destroyed entire civilizations, stimulated great population movements, caused social upheavals, and facilitated cultural and economic exchanges.  The Mongol and Timurid invasions were the high point of nomadic success.  During the fourteenth century, the effect of the Black Death on nomads gave sedentary peoples numerical superiority.  Sedentary civilizations became better able to centralize political power and to mobilize resources for developing superior military organization.  With the Industrial Revolution, sedentary dominance became permanent.

Aftershock: The Brief Ride of Timur

Just when the peoples of Eurasia began to recover from the effects of Mongol expansion, a new leader, the Turk Timu-I-Lang, brought new expansion.  Timur, a highly cultured individual from a noble, landowning clan, moved form his base at Samarkand to conquests in Persia, the Fertile Crescent, India, and southern Russia.  Timur is remembered for the barbaric destruction of conquered lands – his campaigns outdid even the Mongols in their ferocity.  His rule did not increase commercial expansion, cross-cultural exchanges, or internal peace.  After his death in 1405, Timur’s empire fell apart, and the last great challenge of the steppe nomads to Eurasian civilizations ended.

Global Connections: The Mongol Linkages

The legacy of the Mongol period was both complex and durable.  The Mongols brought the Muslim and European worlds new military knowledge, especially the use of gunpowder.  Trade and cultural contact between different civilizations throughout Eurasia became much easier.  The trading empires established in their dominions by Venetians and Genoese provided experience useful European expansion.  An unintended consequences was the transmitting of the fleas carrying the bubonic plague – the Black Death – from China and central Asia to the Middle East and Europe.

Key Terms:
Chinggis Khan:  Grandson of Kabul Khan; born in 1170’; elected supreme Mongol ruler (khagan) I 1206; began the Mongols’ rise to world power; died 1227.

Tumens: Basic fighting units of Mongol forces; made up of 10,000 cavalrymen divided into smaller units.

Tangut: Rulers of Xi Xia kingdom of northwest China during the southern Song period; conquered by Mongols in 1226.

Muhammad Shah II: Turkic ruler of Muslim Khwarazm; conquered by Mongols in 1220.

Karakorum: Capital of Mongol empire under Chinggis Khan.

Shamanistic religion: Mongol beliefs focused on nature spirits.

Batu: Grandson of Chinggis Khan and ruler of the Golden Horde; invaded Russia in 1236.

Ogedei or Ogodei: Third son of Chinggis Khan; succeeded him as Mongol khagan.

Golden Horde: One of four regional subdivisions of the Mongol Empire after the death of Chinggis Khan; conquered and ruled Russia during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

Prester John:  A mythical Christian monarch whose kingdom supposedly had been cut off from Europe by the Muslim conquests: some thought he was Chinggis Khan.

Ilkhan khanate: One of four regional subdivisions of the Mongol Empire after the death of Chinggis Khan; eventually included much of Abbasid Empire.

Hulagu or Hulegu:  Grandson of Chinggis Khan and ruler of Ilkhan khanate; captured and destroyed Abbasid Baghdad.

Mamluks: Muslim slave warriors; established dynasty in Egypt; led by Baibars; defeated Mongols at Ain Jalut in 1260.

Kubilai or Kublai Khan: Grandson of Chinggis Khan; conquered China; established Yuan dynasty in 1271.

Tatu:  Mongol capital of Yuan dynasty; present-day Beijing.

Chabi: Influential wife of Kubilai Khan; demonstrated refusal of Mongol women to adopt restrictive social conventions of Confucian China. 

Nestorians: Asian Christian sect; cut off from Europe by Muslim invasions.  Nestorianism is the Christian doctrine that Jesus existed as two persons, the man Jesus and the divine Son of God, rather than as a unified person.

Romance of the West Chamber: Famous Chinese dramatic work written during the Yuan period.

White Lotus Society: Secret religious society dedicated to overthrow of Yuan dynasty.

Ju Yuanzhang: Chinese peasant who led successful revolt against Yuan; founded Ming dynasty.

Timur-i Lang: Last major nomad leader; fourteenth century Turkic ruler of Samarkand; launched attacks in Persia, Fertile Crescent, India, southern Russia; empire disintegrated after his death in 1405. 

Fill in the blank

 

• The _______________________ was one of the four regional subdivisions of the Mongol Empire after the death of Chinggis Khan and covered much of what is today south-central Russia.

2.  One of the four regional subdivisions of the Mongol Empire after Chinggis Khan’s death, the __________ khanate eventually conquered much of the Abbasid Empire.

 

3. Prince __________ saved the city of Novgorod from the Mongols by submitting to Mongol demands.

4. ________________________ was the name given to a mythical, rich, and powerful Christian monarch whose kingdom had supposedly been cut off from Europe by the Muslim conquests.

 

5. ___________________, ruler of the Ilkhan khanate, was responsible for the capture and destruction of Baghdad.

6. The Mongols were finally defeated in the Middle East by the armies of the ____________________, a slave dynasty of Egypt.

 

7. The influential wife of Kubilai Khan, ____________________________, promoted the interests of Buddhists in China.

8. The most famous dramatic work of the Yuan period was _______________________, indicative of the continued literary vitality of China during Mongol rule.

 

9. Secret religious sects, such as the ______________________, were dedicated to the overthrow of the Yuan dynasty.

10. A man from an impoverished peasant family_______________________________, emerged to found the Ming dynasty.

 

 

True or False

1. The Mongol armies incorporated the technological capability to make use of gunpower and cannons.

 

2. Chinggis Khan was converted by Buddhist monks from China to the “pure land” Buddhist interpretation.

3. The Mongol invasion of the Islamic heartland resulted in the defeat of the  Ottoman Turks, paving the way for the creation of the Seljuk Empire.

 

4. The Mongol conquest of Song China was so difficult that it required more than 35 years to accomplish.

5. The more rapid recovery of the sedentary agricultural civilizations from the ravages of the Black Death is one of the most important reasons for the subsequent eclipse of nomadic cultures.

 

6. Chinggis Khan was commander of the Mongol forces responsible for the conquest of China and the founder of Yuan Dynasty.

7. Though the empire was divided after Chinggis Khan death in 1227, the four khnates that emerged in the struggles for succession ruled most of Asia.

 

8. The supreme ruler of the Mongol tribes was chosen by automatic, patrilineal succession.

9. Chinggis Khan refused to live in the cities of conquered peoples and built a new capital at Karakorum on the steppes.

 

10. Kubilai, the third son of Chinggis Khan, was elected Grand Khan of the Mongols after his father’s death.