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Nomads as Agents of Cultural Change edited by reuven amitai michal biran The Mongols and Their Eurasian Predecessors This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:23:41 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsNOMADS AS AGENTS OF CULTURAL CHANGE This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:23:41 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms Perspectives on the Global Past Jerry H. Bentley and Anand A. Yang SERIES EDITORS Interactions: Transregional Perspectives on World History Edited by Jerry H. Bentley, Renate Bridenthal, and Anand A. Yang Contact and Exchange in the Ancient World Edited by Victor H. Mair Seascapes: Maritime Histories, Littoral Cultures, and Transoceanic Exchanges Edited by Jerry H. Bentley, Renate Bridenthal, and Kären Wigen Anthropology’s Global Histories: e Ethnographic Frontier in German New Guinea, 1870‒1935 Rainer F. Buschmann Creating the New Man: From Enlightenment Ideals to Socialist Realities Yinghong Cheng Glamour in the Paci c: Cultural Internationalism and Race Politics in the Women’s Pan-Paci c Fiona Paisley e Qing Opening to the Ocean: Chinese Maritime Policies, 1684‒1757 Gang Zhao Nomads as Agents of Cultural Change: e Mongols and eir Eurasian Predecessors Edited by Reuven Amitai and Michal Biran This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:23:41 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsNomads as Agents of Cultural Change The Mongols and Their Eurasian Predecessors Edited by Reuven Amitai and Michal Biran University of Hawai‘i Press Honolulu This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:23:41 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms© 2015 University of Hawai‘i Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America 20 19 18 17 16 15 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data Nomads as agents of cultural change : the Mongols and their Eurasian pre de ces sors / edited by Reuven Amitai and Michal Biran. pages cm — (Perspectives on the global past) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978- 0- 8248- 3978- 9 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Mongols— History. 2. Nomads— Eurasia—History. 3. Eurasia— History. I. Amitai, Reuven, editor of compilation. II. Biran, Michal, editor of compilation. III. Series: Perspectives on the global past. DS19. N653 2015 305.9'06918095—dc23 2014012570 University of Hawai‘i Press books are printed on acid- free paper and meet the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Council on Library Resources. Composition by Westchester Publishing Services. Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc. This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:23:41 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsContents Acknowledgments vii Notes on Dates and Transliterations ix 1 Introduction: Nomadic Culture Michal Biran 1 2 Steppe Land Interactions and eir E ects on Chinese Cultures during the Second and Early First Millennia BCE Gideon Shelach-Lavi 10 3 e Scythians and eir Neighbors Anatoly M. Khazanov 32 4 From Steppe Roads to Silk Roads: Inner Asian Nomads and Early Interregional Exchange William Honeychurch 50 5 e Use of Sociopo liti cal Terminology for Nomads: An Excursion into the Term Buluo in Tang China İsenbike Togan 88 6 Population Movements in Mongol Eurasia omas T. Allsen 119 7 e Mongols and Nomadic Identity: e Case of the Kitans in China Michal Biran 152 8 Persian Notables and the Families Who Underpinned the Ilkhanate George Lane 182 9 e Mongol Empire and Its Impact on the Arts of China Morris Rossabi 214 This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:24:37 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsvi Contents 10 e Impact of the Mongols on the History of Syria: Politics, Society, and Culture Reuven Amitai 228 11 e Tatar Factor in the Formation of Muscovy’s Po liti cal Culture IstvÆn VÆsÆry 252 12 Mongol Historiography since 1985: e Rise of Cultural History David Morgan 271 Bibliography 283 Contributors 331 Index 335 This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:24:37 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsvii Acknowledgments e present volume has bene ted enormously from the support of the In- stitute of Advanced Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, which hosted the 2006 conference on Eurasian nomads that underpins this vol- ume and provided a variety of technical and nancial assistance to us in its preparation. We are also grateful to the Israel Science Foundation for help- ing to fund the conference and for providing us with signi cant support for our work over the past few years, including the writing of our chapters and other tasks involved in editing the volume. Our colleague Professor Gideon Shelach- Lavi has been a key collabo- rator throughout and helped us with the editing of certain chapters, for which we are very grateful. It is a pleasant task to express our appreciation and thanks to Dr. Leigh Chipman and Mr. Avi Aronsky, who assisted with language editing, and to our students Or Amir, Ishayah Landa, and Yang Qiao, who helped with technical matters, not least in preparing the bibliography. We are grateful to all of our contributors for their goodwill, forbearance, and coop- eration throughout the preparation of this volume. This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:25:25 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsThis content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:25:25 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsix Notes on Dates and Transliterations 1. Dates are generally given according to the Gregorian calendar. Hijr ī and Chinese dates are given only when they have a special relevance in a par- tic u lar article. When both hijr ī and Gregorian dates are given, the hijr ī comes rst, followed by a slash and the Gregorian date. In Persian books, occasionally the shams ī year is given: if so, this is marked before the Gre- gorian date, and followed by the abbreviation S. and a slash. 2. Chinese names and terms have been transliterated according to the Pin- yin system. 3. Arabic words, titles, and names have been transliterated according to the system used in the International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. Words and names of Persian origin have usually been transliterated as if they were Arabic (e.g., Juwayn ī, not Juvayn ī; n āmah, not n āme). Common words and place-names, such as sultan, mamluk, Bukhara, Baghdad, are written without diacritical points. Well- known place-names are given in their accepted En glish forms (e.g., Jerusalem, Damascus). 4. Rus sian has been transliterated according to the system of the Library of Congress. 5. Names and terms of Mongolian origin have been transliterated according to Antoine Mostaert’s scheme as modi ed by F. W. Cleaves, except for these deviations: č is rendered as ch; š as sh; γ as gh; and ǰ as j. This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:26:19 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/termsFigure 1.1. Eurasia. Adapted from R. Amitai and M. Biran (eds.), Mongols, Turks and Oth- ers: Eurasian Nomads and the Outside World (Leiden, 2005). This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sat, 25 Jun 2016 17:26:19 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms1 ONE Introduction Nomadic Culture Michal Biran W hen looking at the global past, one of the reoccurring phenom- ena from the late second millennium BCE and up to the eigh- teenth century CE is the po liti cal and military power of pastoral nomads on the fringes of the Eurasian civilizations, and— notably under the Mongol empire (thirteenth– fourteenth centuries)— at their hearts as well. e nomads’ impact in the cultural eld, however, is much less apparent. Representatives of the sedentary civilizations bordering the steppe— whether Chinese, ancient Ira ni an, Muslim, medieval Slavs, or other Europeans— often portrayed them either as a violent force that left no mark on their culture or as a source of negative in uence that was responsible for “all that went wrong” with their civilizations. If the nomads received some credit, it was for the pax that was created when they ruled over vast lands, allegedly enabling the sedentary civilizations to exchange goods, ideas, and technolo- gies from one end of Eurasia to the other. Some of these approaches arose as early as the mid- nineteenth century, after the nal demise of the nomads’ po liti cal power, and coincided with the rise of colonialism and nationalism, which often portrayed the nomads as either an empire’s primitive subjects or as the past enemies of a certain nation- state. Recent research, rst and foremost due to the works of our colleague and contributor Tom Allsen, has presented a much more complex picture of the relations between nomads and the societies over which they ruled or to which they were contemporaries. Concentrating on the Mongols, the largest and most documented nomadic empire— with which a large part of the chapters included in this volume also deals— Allsen showed that the nomads signi cantly contributed to cross- cultural exchange, not only as a passive medium who transferred elements from one sedentary civilization to another, but as active participants, who initiated much of the intercul- tural exchange and whose norms and priorities had been the lter and This content downloaded from 165.190.89.176 on Fri, 19 Feb 2016 22:23:01 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions2 Michal Biran catalyst that determined which cultural elements would be transmitted along Eurasia. Moreover, Allsen demonstrated that the nomads played a dominant role not only with regard to practical domains, such as trade and military technology, but also in spheres connected with high culture (e.g., science, art, historiography). is argument is the point of departure for this volume. Despite the barbarian image often created by sedentary peoples, and the almost total lack of nomadic literary production, it can be argued that a sophisticated nomadic culture exists, which has had an impressive continu- ity over both time and space. is culture was mainly po liti cal, since po- liti cal interests (sometimes backed by real or mostly ctitious kinship and ethnic ties) had been the main glue that held the nomads together, whether in the framework of tribes or in larger po liti cal units. Nomadic po liti cal culture had both religious- ideological components and practical or gan i za- tion al means. Its main aim was to win the subjects’ ac cep tance of a single legitimate po liti cal authority. is was especially required for legitimizing the formation and the continued existence of a supratribal unit such as a no- madic empire. Overall, the tribal level su ced for conducting most aspects of the nomads’ everyday life, including small- scale raiding into their neigh- bors’ realms. A supratribal unit, therefore, usually developed as a result of a crisis— ecological, natural, or po liti cal (among the nomads or their seden- tary neighbors)— and was thus temporary in nature. Its utility was therefore questioned on nearly a daily basis, and for its successful maintenance its ruler had to be able to assure his followers that it was worthwhile for them to stay with him, especially since they could easily decamp to greener pastures. e salient components of this Inner Asian po liti cal culture from the time of the Scythians and the Xiongnu onward included both religious- ideological aspects and practical means for governing an empire: the notion of the divine mandate to rule bestowed upon a chosen clan by the sky- heaven, or even of the divine origin of the clan; the notion of charisma— the Ira ni an farnah, the Turkic qut, and the Mongolian suu, the heavenly or- dained good fortune and the aura connected with this fortune; a highly developed system of royal and administrative titles; royal symbolism, in- cluding color; elaborate status and rank distinctions and practices associated with dressing and decoration; special investiture and funeral ceremonies; sacred territories and cult centers; the notion of collective or joint sover- eignty, according to which a state and its populace belong not to an indi- vidual ruler but to all members of a ruling clan, or an extended family, as their corporate property; and convocations composed of members of the ruling clan and other nobles and worthies. On the administrative side, no- madic po liti cal culture included a patrimonial mode of governance that im- This content downloaded from 165.190.89.176 on Fri, 19 Feb 2016 22:23:01 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and ConditionsIntroduction 3 plied the practice of redistribution; that is, the sharing out of the booty, tribute, and cultural wares extracted from subject populations, which was both a means of rewarding followers and, at the same time, a mechanism of cultural exchange; a partial overlapping of the administrative system with the military or ga ni za tion; the importance of the aristocracy as a po liti cal sys- tem; and the signi cance of laws. Such po liti cal culture supported di erent po liti cal entities established by people with similar economies, from the centralistic Yeke Monggol Ulus under Chinggis Khan and his immediate successors (1206– 1260), through more decentralized empires such as the Turks (sixth– eighth centuries CE) or the Xiongnu (third century BCE– third century CE) and up to the much looser framework of several tribal confederations or “headless states” typical to Mongolia in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries or to the Qipchaq tribes in the pre- Chinggisid period. is po liti cal culture had a signi cant religious component, since Heaven (the Turkic and Mongol “Tenggeri”), the supreme sky god of the steppe, was the one conferring the right to rule on earth on a single clan, and thereby be- came the focus of steppe ideology and the primary source of supratribal unity in the steppe world. Unlike the Chinese case, Tenggeri did not bestow his mandate on every generation; that is, the steppe world was often left without a unifying ruler, but even during the periods of disunion the notion of the mandate remained as “an ideology in reserve,” ready to be revived if the cre- ation of a supratribal empire were to be attempted again. e possession of the mandate from Tenggeri was con rmed by the ruler’s success in battle on the one hand and by shamanic ceremonies on the other, and was reinforced by the ruler’s control of the sacred territory (in the case of the Turks, Uighurs, and Mongols the Otüken Mountains near the Orkhon River in central Mongolia). e rulers, many of whom also enjoyed prestige due to an animal ancestor (wolf, deer, etc.) or even the virginal con- ception of an ancestor, also had certain shamanic functions of their own, which enabled them to dismiss or eliminate sham