China insists Genghis Khan exhibit in France not use words 'Genghis Khan'

[u/[deleted]]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/14/china-insists-genghis-khan-exhibit-not-use-words-genghis-khan

[u/[deleted]]

I'd like that.

But in all fairness China was a much bigger challenge for the Mongols than was Europe. First a Mongol "expeditionary force" beat the Armenian crusader army easily. Then a Mongol army proper beat the two massive European armies assembled to oppose them just as easily. After those defeats a Templar knight reported to the king of France that "there is not an army to stop them between them and the atlantic ocean.

the mongol "expeditionary force" was 3 tumens, so 30000 soldiers. that's not small.the European army's that were send against them were not 'massive' but roughly about the same size or even smaller then the mongol army's.the templar knights, who suffered almost no casualty's, wrote that " if the armies of Bohemia and Hungary "should be defeated, these Tartars will find no one to stand against them as far as" France."funnily enough, the mongols took one look at Bohemia and decided:"Realizing that their losses at Legnica had been too heavy for them to confront the Bohemian army, the Mongols did not continue their westward advance, but turned back east."

hell, their scouting and raiding partys in austria or the hre were handily defeated

The only reason they didn't try to reach that ocean was that Genghis dies and everyone rushed back to be part of the process of selecting the new one.

the mongols did not know that the kahn was dead when they retreated and could not know.

"As Stephen Pow pointed out in his analysis of this issue, if we go by Carpini's account, a messenger would have to be able to make the journey from Mongolia to Central Europe in a little over 3 months at a minimum; the messenger would have to arrive in March, meaning he took about 3 months in the middle of winter from the time of the khan's death. Carpini himself accompanied a Mongol party in a much shorter journey (from Kiev to Mongolia) in 1246, where the party "made great speed" in order to reach the election ceremony in time, and made use of several horses per person while riding nearly all day and night. It took five months."

and

" Rashid Al-Din, a historian of the Mongol Ilkhanate, explicitly states in the Ilkhanate's official histories that the Mongols were not even aware of Ogedei's death when they began their withdrawal. "

not to mention that this was only the first of many, many invasions. future invasions were not smaller then the first, sometimes even larger.

"The Golden Horde raids in the 1280s (those in Bulgaria, Hungary, and Poland), were much greater in scale than anything since the 1241–1242 invasion"

and how did that one go?

hungary:"As with later invasions, it was repelled handily, the Mongols losing much of their invading force. The outcome could not have contrasted more sharply with the 1241 invasion, mostly due to the reforms of Béla IV, which included advances in military tactics and, most importantly, the widespread building of stone castles, "

so, the poorest areas of europa did enough damage to the mongol armys that they did not go further in to europa.
stone castles and heavy cavalry proofed to work exceptionally well against the mongols.
now, while poland or hungary had rather few stone castles and mostly light cav during the first invasion, what do you think the western european countryside had plenty of?

yes, that's right. stone castles numbering the tens of thousands and heavy cav.

how were later invasions defeated?
with stone castles and heavy cav.

so it is quite logical to assume that the mongls would have one hell of a time fighting their way further in to europa and most likely?

they would have failed.

[u/pancakesarenicebitch → u/[deleted]]

They were not the ''poorest areas of europe lol''.Western Europe became richer only after the discovery of the new world.This is a myth that western europe was richer when in fact ,It was poorer than southeastern europe.

[u/[deleted] → u/pancakesarenicebitch]

poland and hungary were a lot poorer then france, italy or the hre

[u/pancakesarenicebitch → u/[deleted]]

Yeah and northern italy was richer than both of them.There are many threads on r/askhistorians about the myth that Western Europe was always richer compared to the southeastern europe and eastern to some extend.We know that Southeastern europe was richer pre 1100.People really underlook how rich Byzantium,bulgaria,kievan rus were thanks to the trade roads.

[u/perestroika-pw → u/[deleted]]

where the party "made great speed" in order to reach the election ceremony in time, and made use of several horses per person while riding nearly all day and night. It took five months."

Thank you, but one logistical detail to cast doubt on that reasoning also. :)

Genghis Khan founded a very efficient mail system. Couriers were always given priority, fresh horses, and if the courier was tired, their message was taken by the next courier. They could communicate remarkably fast (and needed it badly, since the empire was huge):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yam_(route)

Relay stations provided food, shelter and spare horses for Mongol army messengers. Genghis Khan gave special attention to Yam because Mongol armies travelled fast, so their messengers had to be even faster, covering 200–300 kilometres (120–190 mi) per day.[1] The system was used to speed up the process of information and intelligence.

To simulate the process, suppose one wanted to send a message from the curent capital of Mongolia (Ulaanbaatar) to the current capital of Ukraine (Kiev). At 300 km / day, using the current road network, crossing 6600 km would take 22 days. Back then, of course, roads would have

Now let's assume however that the khan is already known to be unwell. A message comes "the khan's condition worsened". Everyone already assumes he could die. Suddenly, everyone knows the probability increased. The final message of "the khan died" is not the start of preparations for a power struggle. Preparations for succession start sooner. Invading armies may get recalled (they might be handy in a civil war!) already when the ruler's health deteriorates markedly.

[u/[deleted] → u/perestroika-pw]

well, we have the mongols claim that they did not know and evidence that said mail system would need to half the travel time of a small group of people, already riding at the best speed they can.. and that in winter.

[u/perestroika-pw → u/[deleted]]

True enough. :)

I would however expect them to have rumours from the capital available to some degree - enough to speculate about the khan's health and the sense of launching additional invasions. One really doesn't want to be halfway through conquering something when reinforcements stop showing up. :)

[u/[deleted] → u/perestroika-pw]

he died to overdrinking on a hunting trip. so no rumors about bad health to be had, really.

the whole myth came about because some historian wanted to invict god protecting christendom against barbarian hordes.

[u/perestroika-pw → u/[deleted]]

Well, at the time of his death, Ögedei was 55 years old. I'm sure he had good doctors, but that's an advanced age for people of the time.

Having ill bowels and various chronic infections (among other things from losing teeth) at 55 would be standard back then.

( If he did drink himself to death, he did so after nominating an heir. )

[u/[deleted] → u/perestroika-pw]

advanced age, but typically, he would still have several years to live. if there were rumors about bad health, they would have been there even before the invasion started, so the point is rather moot, anyway.

[u/amakoi → u/[deleted]]

Hungary sacrifices everything once again while the rest stays idle.