Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World - Джек Уезерфорд

“We have made their breasts to become empty:” Francis Woodman Cleaves, trans., The Secret History of the Mongols (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1982), par. 113, pp. 47–48.

“let us love one another”: Urgunge Onon, trans., The History and the Life of Chinggis Khan (The Secret History of the Mongols), (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1990), § 117.

Jamuka and Temujin rode together: For a contrasting interpretation of the class relations between the two men, see Boris Y. Vladimirtsov, The Life of Chingis-Khan, trans. Prince D. S. Mirsky (New York: Benjamin Blom, 1930).

“Barren Island”: Rachewiltz’s translation of The Secret History, § 136, 1972.

never forgot how Jelme saved him: Temujin’s wound closely paralleled the nearly simultaneous battle wound suffered by King Richard the Lionhearted of England. In April 1199, while combating one of his rebel vassals, an arrow pierced his left shoulder. Richard tried to pull out the arrow, but its iron barb held and the shaft broke. For the next agonizing days, doctors treated him but without being able to combat the growing infection and fever. Finally, on the eleventh day, he died. His body was embalmed but disassembled to be buried with great ostentation in different places of sentimental importance to him. His brain was removed and sent for burial in an abbey in Poitiers. His heart went to the cathedral in Rouen, and his body to the Abbey Fonteurault. In marked contract, by sucking the blood from Temujin’s wound, Jelme prevented him from following the painful and untimely fate of King Richard.

He organized his warriors: For more information on troop estimates, see Bat-Ochir Bold, Mongolian Nomadic Society: A Reconstruction of the “Medieval” History of Mongolia (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2001), p. 85.

“Let no one set up camp”: Secret History, § 179.

People of the Felt Walls: This phrase is still used in Mongolia, “Esgii Tuurgatan.”

3. War of the Khans

“All the tribes were of one color”: Ata-Malik Juvaini, Genghis Khan: The History of the World Conqueror, trans. J. A. Boyle (Seattle: University of Washington Press), p. 38.

“Is not Genghis Khan ashamed”: Marco Polo, The Travels of Marco Polo, trans. Ronald Latham (London: Penguin Books, 1958), p. 94.

Lake Baljuna: Baljuna is called a lake in the text, but it may have been a river or a small lake connected to the Balj River, a tributary of the Onon. The exact timing of the event is in great debate. Some scholars believe that it occurred at another point in the long civil wars and not as part of the betrayal by Ong Khan. A few scholars discount the story entirely, but based particularly on heavy Chinese documentation, most scholars accept it. For a full discussion of the event and the various versions of it, see Francis Woodman Cleaves, “The Historicity of the Baljuna Covenant,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 18, nos. 3–4 (December 1955), pp. 357–421.

“more fires than the stars in the sky”: Secret History, § 194.

“If he sends me into fire”: “Hei-Ta Shih-Lüeh Kurzer Bericht über die schwarzen Tatan von P’eng Ta-Ya und Sü T’ing, 1237,” in Peter Olbricht and Elisabeth Pinks, Meng-Ta Pei-Lu und Hei-Ta Shih-Lüeh: Chinesische Gesandtenberichte über die frühen Mongolen 1221 und 1237 (Welisbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1980), p. 161.

“rotten logs”: Secret History, § 96.

“Let us be companions”: Urgunge Onon, trans., The History and the Life of Chinggis Khan (The Secret History of the Mongols) (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1990), § 200.

the headwaters of the Onon River: Regarding the location of the khuriltai of 1206, the Secret History describes the place as simply the headwaters of the Onon, but the seventeenth-century Erdeni-yin Tobchi places it more precisely on the island of Kherlen River. Paul Kahn, The Secret History of the Mongols: The Origins of Chingis Khan, exp. ed. (Boston: Cheng & Tsui, 1998), p. 189.

“placed him upon a black Felt Carpet”: François Pétis de la Croix, The History of Genghizcan the Great: First Emperor of the Ancient Moguls and Tartars (London: Printed for J. Darby, etc., 1722), pp. 62–63.

“obstinate and has a petty, narrow mind”: Secret History, § 243.

The Great Law of Genghis Khan: For more information on the law of Genghis Khan, see Valentin A. Riasanovsky, Fundamental Principles of Mongol Law, Uralic and Altaic Series, vol. 43 (Bloomington: Indiana University Publications, 1965), p. 33.

haggling over the value of a wife: For more information on marriage, see Paul Ratchnevsky, Genghis Khan: His Life and Legacy, trans. Thomas Nivison Haining. Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell, 1991), pp. 191.

Theft of animals: For more information, see ibid., p. 155.

hunting rights for wild animals: See Secret History, § 199.

tax exemptions: For more information on Genghis Khan’s tax law, see Riasanovsky, Fundamental Principles of Mongol Law, p. 83.

the supremacy of the rule of law: For more information on the application of law to the royal family, See Boris Y. Vladimirtsov, The Life of Chingis-Khan, trans. Prince D. S. Mirsky (New York: Benjamin Blom, 1930), p. 74.

“punish the thieves”: Onon, Secret History, § 203.

a system of fast riders: For a discussion of postal stations, see Bat-Ochir Bold, Mongolian Nomadic Society: A Reconstruction of the “Medieval” History of Mongolia (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2001), p. 168.

Genghis Khan’s shaman: Teb Tengeri’s name was Kokochu. In the Secret History, four men had this name, and the text is not always clear on which is meant as the trustee of Hoelun’s estate. Two Kokochus were already dead before this episode. In addition to the shaman, Kokochu was the name of the Tayichiud boy adopted by Mother Hoelun, and who later became the leader of a unit of one thousand. Many scholars assume that the adopted Kokochu was placed in charge of Mother Hoelun’s people, but a case can be made that since Kokochu Teb Tengeri took over Mother Hoelun’s people after her death, he was the Kokochu named as an administrator. While the issue of precise identity is