The Mongol Storm

How the Mongol invasions of the Near East reshaped the balance of world power in the Middle Ages For centuries, the Crusades have been central to the story of the medieval Near East, but these religious wars are only part of the region’s complex history. As The Mongol Storm reveals, during the same era the Near East was utterly remade by another series of wars: the Mongol invasions. In a single generation, the Mongols conquered vast swaths of the Near East and upended the region’s geopolitics. Amid the chaos of the Mongol onslaught, long-standing powers such as the Byzantines, the Seljuk Turks, and the crusaders struggled to survive, while new players such as the Ottomans arose to fight back. The Mongol conquests forever transformed the region, while forging closer ties among societies spread across Eurasia. This is the definitive history of the Mongol assault on the Near East and its enduring global consequences.

Traces the history of the Mongol Empire under Genghis Khan and his descendants, describes their military successes, and discusses the Mongol influence on Europe

From his seat in Xanadu, the great Mongol Emperor of China, Kubla Khan, had long plotted an invasion of Japan. However, it was only with the acquisition of Korea, that the Khan gained the maritime resources necessary for such a major amphibious operation. Written by expert Stephen Turnbull, this book tells the story of the two Mongol invasions of Japan against the noble Samurai. Using detailed maps, illustrations, and newly commissioned artwork, Turnbull charts the history of these great campaigns, which included numerous bloody raids on the Japanese islands, and ended with the famous kami kaze, the divine wind, that destroyed the Mongol fleet and would live in the Japanese consciousness and shape their military thinking for centuries to come.

Cundill Prize Finalist A Financial Times Book of the Year A Spectator Book of the Year A Five Books Book of the Year The Mongols are known for one thing: conquest. But in this first comprehensive history of the Horde, the western portion of the Mongol empire that arose after the death of Chinggis Khan, Marie Favereau takes us inside one of the most powerful engines of economic integration in world history to show that their accomplishments extended far beyond the battlefield. Central to the extraordinary commercial boom that brought distant civilizations in contact for the first time, the Horde had a unique political regime—a complex power-sharing arrangement between the khan and nobility—that rewarded skillful administrators and fostered a mobile, innovative economic order. From their capital on the lower Volga River, the Mongols influenced state structures in Russia and across the Islamic world, disseminated sophisticated theories about the natural world, and introduced new ideas of religious tolerance. An eloquent, ambitious, and definitive portrait of an empire that has long been too little understood, The Horde challenges our assumptions that nomads are peripheral to history and makes it clear that we live in a world shaped by Mongols. “The Mongols have been ill-served by history, the victims of an unfortunate mixture of prejudice and perplexity...The Horde flourished, in Favereau’s fresh, persuasive telling, precisely because it was not the one-trick homicidal rabble of legend.” —Wall Street Journal “Fascinating...The Mongols were a sophisticated people with an impressive talent for government and a sensitive relationship with the natural world...An impressively researched and intelligently reasoned book.” —The Times

“A scholarly, detailed history of how the Mongols created the greatest landlocked empire in history” (Midwest Book Review). The Mongols created the greatest landlocked empire known to history. It was an empire created and sustained by means of conquest. Initially an insignificant tribal leader, Genghis Khan gradually increased his power, overcoming one rival after another. After he had subjugated all tribes of Inner Asia, he struck southward into China and later attacked distant Khwarizm in the Near East. Sübe’etei continued to make significant conquests after Genghis Khan died, conquering central China and leading a large force into the heart of Europe. Between them, Genghis Khan and Sube’etei directed more than 40 campaigns, fought more than 60 battles, and conquered all lands from Korea in the east to Hungary and Poland in the west. This book offers a detailed narrative of the military operations of these two leaders, based on early Mongolian, Chinese, Near Eastern, and European sources. Making full use of Chinese sourced not translated properly into any European language, the account offer details never before given in English works. Detailed maps showing the operations support the text. Many conventional wisdom views of the Mongols, such as their use of terror as a deliberate strategy, or their excellence at siege warfare, are shown to be incorrect. This is a major contribution to our knowledge of the Mongols and their way of warfare. “History is littered with great leaders leading great armies and conquering large swathes of the world—Attila the Hun, Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire . . . but none perhaps as staggering as that of Genghis Khan. I have never heard of Sube’etei, I’m ashamed to say, until now, in this excellent book by Carl Fredrik Sverdrup. Asian history has never particularly appealed to me, but this is big history, and the author’s style makes it compelling and readable.” —Books Monthly “This is a very valuable addition to the literature on the Mongol conquests, giving us a much clearer idea of the detailed course of their campaigns, the world in which they took place, and the methods used to win them.” —History of War

"By far the best modern narrative account of the most extensive land empire in the history of the world."—David Morgan, author of The Mongols

A resource book for teachers of world history at all levels. The text contains individual sections on art, gender, religion, philosophy, literature, trade and technology. Lesson plans, reading and multi-media recommendations and suggestions for classroom activities are also provided.

The Mongols and the West provides a comprehensive survey of relations between the Catholic West and the Mongol Empire from the first appearance of Chinggis (Genghis) Khan’s armies on Europe’s horizons in 1221 to the battle of Tannenberg in 1410. This book has been designed to provide a synthesis of previous scholarship on relations between the Mongols and the Catholic world as well as to offer new approaches and conclusions on the subject. It considers the tension between Western hopes of the Mongols as allies against growing Muslim powers and the Mongols’ position as conquerors with their own agenda, and evaluates the impact of Mongol-Western contacts on the West’s expanding knowledge of the world. This second edition takes into account the wealth of scholarly literature that has emerged in the years since the previous edition and contains significantly extended chapters on trade and mission. It charts the course of military confrontation and diplomatic relations between the Mongols and the West, and re-examines the commercial opportunities offered to Western merchants by Mongol rule and the failure of Catholic missionaries to convert the Mongols to Christianity. Fully revised and containing a range of maps, genealogical tables and both European and non-European sources throughout, The Mongols and the West is ideal for students of medieval European history and the crusades.