John Emerson

At g mail dot com, emersonj

www.idiocentrism.com

HYPOTHESES ON THE RISE OF CHINGGIS QAN

It is seldom informative to speak of “the cause” of any major historical event, and I would not claim either that any one of the below, or all of them together is the cause of the rise of Chinggis to power. Nonetheless, history is not totally unintelligible and I am tentatively proposing the below for consideration. Criticism and additional information is solicited.

ONE: A FAILURE OF JIN STRATEGY?

Certainly we can say that the Jin strategy on its northern frontier was a failure. My understanding of this strategy is as follows. When the Jurchen Jin, a primarily Manchurian people, wrested northern China from the Khitan Liao, they did so with the help of Mongol allies, as shown by the presence of Qabul Qan at the installation of the first Jin empire. As a result they lost control of considerable areas of the steppe northwest which had been under Liao control. The Jin made aggressive attempts to regain control, abandoning their Mongol and Kereit steppe allies (and crucifying their leaders) in favor of the Tatars, and building walls deep in Mongol territory. In 1196, however, they switched allies again, defeating the Tatars with the help of Ong Qan and Temujin.

Their dispute with the Tatars was apparently the result of a dispute over booty. It can be explained by any or all of three ways: excessive demands on the part of the Tatars, stinginess (possibly as the result of a budget crisis) on the part of the Jin, or else a decision by the Jin to rely more on force and less on tribute in the northwest.

In any case the Jin seem to have lost their Tatar allies without replacing them with reliable Mongol or Kereit allies. Whether this was a foregone conclusion (the result of Jin bungling or even their intent), or a decision by Temujin is uncertain to me. It seems, though, that it was mostly the outcome of Jin actions, as shown by the willingness of the Uighur and Onggut affiliates of China to switch loyalties in 1206 and by the 1207 revolt by the Juyin borderers against the Jin (Buell).

TWO: THE STEPPE LEARNING CURVE?

MacNeill speaks of the beginning of the first millenium as a period of Chinese dominance in the Eurasian world. This is rather odd, because during the whole period of which he speaks Northern China was under foreign rule, and at the end of the period the Mongols dominated all of China. His theory may be redeemable if you regard the Jin, Liao, and Yuan dynasties as simultaneously Sinified steppe peoples and steppified Chinese.

There was no period when the Chinese northwester frontier was impermeable. Steppe fugitives and mercenaries always played a role in the Chinese military and sometimes in government, and often rose to high positions, and Chinese fugitives and renegades likewise played a role in steppe society. Temujin himself was reported to have lived as a captive in Jin China – perhaps not too long before his alliance with Ong Qan and the Jin against the Tatar -- and various of his contemporaries spent time in Xi-Xia, Qara-Qitai, or the Uighur cities. Chinese governed steppe peoples and steppe peoples governed Chinese. So at all times the steppe peoples had access to information about China, and we cannot be sure that this information was not quite sophisticated. Thus it is not unthinkable to me that, for example, Chinggis Qan’s strategy was informed by some awareness of the Turk, Toba, Xiung-nu, and other precedents.

The Xiung-nu mostly confined themselves to raiding and the extortion of tribute. They were dependent on a strong Chinese economy and when Han collapsed there were no steppe armies to take advantage of the collapse, since opportunities for plunder and tribute had disappeared from ravaged north China. (Cao Cao rather easily defeated the Xiung-Nu and Xian-pei and co-opted them into his coalition.) The Xiung-nu can be regarded as the archetypal steppe barbarians in the East, and in effect they were also the first. Cavalry armies from the steppe were not an age-old phenomenon, but an innovation -- before the Han dynasty the peoples of the Chinese northwest fought primarily on foot.

The first advance for the steppe peoples was to occupy and hold extensive lands in China for a lengthy period, which was done by the Toba Wei, a pioneering hybrid people with strong Buddhist influence.

The second advance was made by the Turks, a primarily steppe people whose Eastern and Western branches between them made direct contact simultaneously with Byzantium and with China, briefly bypassing the Middle-Eastern middlemen and anticipating the continental policy of the Mongols. (Waldron seems to say that the T’ang dynasty, contemporary with the Turkish empires, could be regarded as a hybrid dynasty: pp. 47-8).

Finally the Khitan, the Jurchen, and the Tanggut developed the Toba model (consciously in the case of the Tanggut) into the Liao, Jin, and Xi-Xia hybrid dynasties. According to Buell, agriculture was encroaching on steppe pasture during the Jin period. This indicates a successful Jin pacification of the area (at first), rather than weakness, and supports the hypothesis that the Jin strategy was an unsuccessful aggressive strategy rather than a weak defensive strategy. (Some pasture land is unsuitable for agriculture, but much of the steppe is cultivable if not continually raided by cavalry, so agricultural development on the steppe indicates stable political control).

While the struggle with the non-Chinese peoples of the Northwest is a constant of Chinese history, neither the Chinese nor their steppe neighbors were unchanging. By my hypothesis, each of these steppe and hybrid steppe peoples added something new to the mix, learning from the successes and failures of their predecessors. (There is evidence for learning in the Orqon Turkish inscriptions, which warn the Turks about strategy vis-a-vis the Chinese, and probably also in the Tanggut identification with the Toba.)

By 1125 AD, between Sung China and Khwarizm three hybrid states stretched between Sung China and Khwarizm: the Xi-Xia, the Jin, and the Qaraqitai. This unprecedented situation remained intact for almost a century until the fall of the Qaraqitai in 1211, and thus, while unique, cannot be regarded as simply transient like the various configurations of the Northern and Southern or Five dynasties periods. Furthermore, two semiautonomous hybrid peoples also lay on this path – the Uighur and the Onggut. If we look at McNeill’s period of “Chinese dominance”, we can see that the flow of power was from Mongolia and Manchuria and not from China. To put it in sequence, the Khitan confederation stalemated the Sung Chinese; when defeated by the Jurchen, the defeated Khitan installed themselves in central Asia, dominating Khwarizm (already a somewhat Turkified state) for a time; the Naiman defeated by Temujin subverted and destroyed Qaraqitai; and when Chinggis Qan destroyed Khwarizm, the pitiful defeated Khwarizmian rabble contributed greatly in the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem.

It might be noted this complex northern configuration of states allowed Chinggis Qan to play the divide-and-conquer game, which was so often used successfully against the steppe peoples by civilized peoples, against the civilized peoples themselves.

Something happened in Mongolia and Manchuria around 900 AD and afterwards which had continental significance. I believe that this was the development of hybrid states combining the economic, technical, and organizational strengths of the agricultural peoples (including literacy) with the political and military strengths of the steppe peoples. On the steppe side, Temujin’s unification of the Mongols on a rational military basis (Chs. 8-10 of the Secret History) was also a major step. (I have seen this whole phenomenon explained by the new availability of iron to the Mongols, but in my opinion this is just a spinoff of the other institutional and political changes, and a reductionist explanation is to be resisted. One wonders, incidentally, about the role of Buddhism, which was strong in all the hybrid states.) The hybrid states were able to hold territory, conduct and resist sieges, and provide logistic support like the sedentary states, but also had the steppe strengths in aggressive warfare deriving from mobility, strategy, tactics, and a central command. The Qaraqitai and XiXia states could not have been established either by a purely nomadic or by a purely sedentary people.

But the ultimate winners were the Mongols – the only remaining steppe people in a world of hybrids. So the real story here is a rippling impact of steppe warfare on the political institutions of sedentary states. The hybrid states can be said to have appropriated steppe military methods, but they did so only after having been conquered. Steppe political configurations were military coalitions pure and simple. Steppe warriors flocked to whichever coalition looked likely to win, and when the Mongol power reached a certain tipping point, Jin military units (mostly but not entirely of steppe origin) started to join them. So it can perhaps be said that in its freedom and mobility the steppe component of the hybrid societies still belonged ultimately to the steppe, and that the period of Eurasian history between 900 A.D. and perhaps 1300 A.D. essentially amounted to the conquest of civilization by the steppe.

According to Lattimore, the primary purpose of the Great Wall of China (which Waldron does not think existed as such before the Ming) was not to protect against steppe invaders, but to prevent the formation of hybrid Sino-steppe societies. (According to Buell that was also the purpose of the Jin wall). For centuries the Great Wall has served as a symbol of Chinese xenophobia and insularity, but given my hypothesis here, the decision to build the Great Wall was a reasonable and basically successful one.

WHAT WAS THE ROLE OF TRADE?

This part of my theory is not yet well researched. It is my guess that the complex multi-state system comprising the Jin, the Xi-Xia, and the Qara-qitai was the outcome, first, of the strategic situation resulting from the military versatility of these hybrid states, and second, of the high volume of East-West land trade (driven by the powerful Sung economy) which was capable of supporting these states. I suspect that a considerable proportion of the Sung trade to the West followed this northern route (since the volume of trade from Jin alone would be relatively small). My assumption is that Sung attempts to forbid or limit this trade were usually futile, as is often the case. Presumably either there was an interruption of trade on the southern sea route during this period, or else the competitive advantage of shipping versus land transport was less significant at that time.

SOURCES

Buell, Paul D, “The Role of the Sino-Mongolian Frontier Zone in the Rise of Chinggis-Qan”, pp. 63-76, Studies on Mongolia, ed. Schwarz, Bellingham, 1979.

de R: de Rachewiltz, Igor, The Secret History of the Mongols, Papers in Far Eastern History, Canberra, 1971-1985.

Fletcher, Joseph F., Studies in Chinese and Islamic Inner Asia, Variorum, 1995.

Hambis, L., Gengis-khan, Paris, 1973.

Hambis, L., “Un episode mal connu de l’histoire de Gengis-khan”, Journal des Savants, January-March 1975, pp. 5-46.

Juvaini, Ata-malik (tr. Boyle), Genghis Khan, U. of Washington, 1997.

Khazanov, A. P., Nomads and the Outside World, Wisconsin, 1994.

Leach, Edmund, Political Systems of Highland Burma, Beacon, 1954.

Lindner, Rudi Paul, “What was a Nomadic Tribe?”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 1982.

Olbrecht, P. and Pinks, E., trs. , Meng-Ta Pei-lu Und Hei-ta Shih-lueh, Wiesbaden, 1980.

Onon, Urgunge (tr.), The Secret History of the Mongols, E. J. Brill, Leiden, 1990.

PH: Pelliot, Paul, and Hambis, L., Histoire des Campagnes de Gengis Khan, Leiden, 1951.

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Rashid ad-din, Shi Ji, tr. Xu Da-jun and Zhou Jien-qi, Beijing, 1983. (Translated from the Russian.)

Ratchnevsky, Paul, Genghis Khan, Blackwell, 1991.

SW: Wang Kuo-wei, Meng-ku Shih-liao Ssu-chung, Peking, 1934.

Tan Qi-xiang, The Historical Atlas of China, vol. VI, Beijing, 1982.

Togan, Isenbike, Flexibility and Limitation in Steppe Formations, Brill, 1998.

Waldron, Arthur, The Great Wall of China, Cambridge, 1990.

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