Day of Empire

by Amy Chua

  34. Averil Cameron, The Later Roman Empire (London: Fontana Press, 1993), pp. 52, 56-59, 69, 71-72; Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. 4 (annotated by Dean Milman and M. Guizot, London: John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1862), pp. 179-80; Grant, The History of Rome, pp. 308, 311-12, 348; Lewis and Reinhold, Roman Civilization, p. 584; Millar, The Roman Empire and Its Neighbours, pp. 240-41, 24618; Montesquieu, Considerations sur les Causes de la Grandeur des Romains et de Leur Decadence (Paris: GF Flammarion, 1968), p. 162; Roberts, The New History of the World, pp. 287, 294-97.

  35. Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. 1, pp. 1046-51; Grant, The History of Rome, pp. 324, 343; Heather, The Fall of the Roman Empire, pp. 186, 211-12, 215; Roberts, The New History of the World, pp. 291-93, 294.

  36. Grant, The History of Rome, pp. 324-26, 343-45, 352-56; Heather, The Fall of the Roman Empire, pp. 211-12, 215-28; Roberts, The New History of the World, pp. 292-94, 301-11.

  THREE: CHINAS GOLDEN AGE: THE MIXED-BLOODED TANG DYNASTY

  1. See generally Arthur F. Wright and Denis Twitchett, Perspectives on the T'ang (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973), pp. 1-2, 29, 37-43.

  2. Jacques Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, J. R. Forster, trans. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 73-100, 680-84; Charles O. Hucker, China's Imperial Past (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 1975), pp. 37-40; see generally Wing-Tsit Chan, ed. and trans., A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963).

  3. Hucker, China's Imperial Past, pp. 21, 43-45; Conrad Schirokauer, A Brief History of Chinese and Japanese Civilizations, 2nd ed. (New York: Harcourt Brace & Co., 1989), pp. 51, 53.

  4. Yihong Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan: SuiTang China and Its Neighbors (Bellingham, Wash.: Western Washington University, 1997), pp. 18-24; Edwin G. Pulleyblank, “The An Lu-shan Rebellion and the Origins of Chronic Militarism in Late T'ang China,” in Essays on Tang and PreTang China (Hampshire, U.K.: Ashgate, Aldershot, 2001), pp. 33, 36-37; Denis Sinor, ed., The Cambridge History of Inner Asia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 4-5.

  5. Hucker, China's Imperial Past, pp. 135-36, 141; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, pp. 3-4, 169, 231-35.

  6. Edmund Capon, Tang China: Vision and Splendour of a Golden Age (London: Macdonald & Co., 1989), pp. 52-53; Valerie Hansen, The Open Empire: A History of China to 1600 (New York: W W Norton, 2000), pp. 153-57.

  7. Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 175-84; Hucker, China's Imperial Past, p. 140; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, p. 31.

  8. Hucker, China's Imperial Past, p. 140.

  9. Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, p. 181-82 (citation omitted); Pulleyblank, “The An Lu-shan Rebellion,” p. 38.

  10. Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, p. 182 (citation omitted); Pulleyblank, “The An Lu-shan Rebellion,” p. 38.

  11. Edward Schäfer, The Golden Peaches of Samarkand: A Study of T'ang Exotics (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1963), pp. 1, 28-29, 43-57, 81-86, 91, 134-39, 144-62, 176-84.

  12. Capon, Tang China, pp. 39, 59, 74-75; C. P. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1954), pp. 287-88, 336-37; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, pp. 37, 215.

  13. Tansen Sen, Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade: The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600-1400 (Honolulu: Association for Asian Studies and University of Hawai'i Press, 2003), pp. 46-49.

  14. Capon, Tang China, pp. 61-63; Hansen, The Open Empire, p. 205.

  15. Capon, Tang China, pp. 59, 62-63; Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, p. 336.

  16. Capon, Tang China, pp. 26-27; Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 244-45; Schirokauer, A Brief History of Chinese and Japanese Civilizations, p. 104.

  17. Capon, Tang China, pp. 32-33; Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, pp. 297-98; Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 256-57; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 199-202; Hucker, China's Imperial Past, p. 142.

  18. Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 199-202; Sen, Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade, pp. 56, 87-97.

  19. Capon, Tang China, pp. 27, 32-33; Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, p. 257; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 206-7; Wright and Twitchett, Perspectives on the Tang, pp. 47-49, 64.

  20. Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 200, 202.

  21. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, p. 325; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 191,206,208.

  22. Wright and Twitchett, Perspectives on the Tang, p. 1.

  23. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, pp. 330-31. On the protection the Tang court offered Uighur Manichaean priests, see Colin MacKerras, “UygurTang Relations, 744-840,” Central Asian Survey, vol. 19, no. 2 (2000), pp. 223, 224, 226-27.

  24. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, p. 329; G. R. Hawting, The First Dynasty of Islam: The Umayyad Caliphate AD 661-750, 2nd ed. (London: Routledge, 2000), pp. 2-3; William H. McNeill, The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963), p. 418; Bat Ye'or, The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians Under Islam, trans. David Maisel, Paul Fenton, and David Littman (Rutherford, N.J.: Fair-leigh Dickinson University Press, 1985), pp. 48, 60, 182-83.

  25. Enno Franzius, History of the Byzantine Empire: Mother of Nations (New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1967), pp. 99-100; Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. 2 (New York: Modern Library, 1932), p. 873; Constance Head, Justinian II of Byzantium (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1972), pp. 63, 68, 100; Cyril Mango, Byzantium: The Empire of New Rome (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1980), p. 91; McNeill, The Rise of the West, p. 418.

  26. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, pp. 327-30 (most brackets in original).

  27. J. K. Fairbank and S. Y Teng, “On the Ch'ing Tributary System,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, vol. 10, no. 2 (June 1941), pp. 135, 182, 187, 190 (portions omitted).

  28. J. C. Russell, The Fontana Economic History of Europe: Population in Europe: 500-1500, vol. 1 (London: Fontana Books, 1969), pp. 19-21; J. C. Russell, “Late Ancient and Medieval Population,” Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 48, part 3 (1958), p. 148 table 152; Hansen, The Open Empire, p. 191; Hugh Kennedy, The Armies of the Caliphs: Military and Society in the Early Islamic State (New York: Routledge, 2001), pp. 18-20; Howard Wechsler, “T'ai-tsung (Reign 626-49) the Consolidator,” in Denis Twitchett, ed., The Cambridge History of China, vol. 3, Sui and Tang China 589-906, part 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), p. 207; Charles Issawi, “The Area and Population of the Arab Empire: An Essay in Speculation,” in The Islamic Middle East 700-1900, A. L. Udovitch, ed. (Princeton: Darwin Press, 1981), pp. 381, 388.

  29. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, pp. 299-300; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 222-23; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, pp. 151-56.

  30. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, p. 300; Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 259-60, 266; Hansen, The Open Empire, p. 223; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, pp. 152-55.

  31. Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 260-61; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 221, 223-24, 227; Pulleyblank, “The An Lu-shan Rebellion,” p. 37.

  32. Capon, Tang China, p. 33; Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 259-62; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 227-28; Hucker, China's Imperial Past, pp. 144, 146; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, pp. 152-56.

  33. Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 267, 291-93; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, p. 161; Pulleyblank, “The An Lu-shan Rebellion,” p. 40.

  34. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, p. 338; Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 294-95; Pan, Son of Heaven and Heavenly Qaghan, p. 165.

  35. Gernet, A History of Chinese Civilization, pp. 294-95; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 241-42.

  36. Fitzgerald, China: A Short Cultural History, pp. 302-7; Gernet, A History of Chinese Civi
lization, pp. 268-73; Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 243-44; Hucker, China's Imperial Past, pp. 146-47.

  FOUR: THE GREAT MONGOL EMPIRE: COSMOPOLITAN BARBARIANS

  Epigraphs: Both quotes can be found in Jack Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World (New York: Crown Publishers, 2004), pp. 79, 160.

  This chapter draws heavily on the following secondary sources: Walther Heissig, A Lost Civilization: The Mongols Rediscovered, D.J.S. Thomson, trans. (London: Thames and Hudson, 1966); Harold Lamb, Genghis Khan: The Emperor of All Men (New York: Robert M. McBride & Co., 1927); David Morgan, The Mongols (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990); J. J. Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1971); Bertold Spuler, The Muslim World: A Historical Survey, F.R.C. Bagley, trans., part 2, The Mongol Period (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1969); and especially Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World. These modern histories in turn rely on various Chinese, Persian, and European primary materials, as well as, most critically, an extraordinary Mongol work known as The Secret History of the Mongols, believed to be written contemporaneously with the Mongols’ rise to world dominance. Neither the author of The Secret History nor its exact date of compilation is known. In addition, the original document, most likely written in an adapted Uighur script (the Mongols had no alphabet of their own), has never been found. The version of The Secret History that has come down to us is a Chinese character transcription, probably dating from the fourteenth century, which was discovered in Beijing in the nineteenth century. See Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 5—11; Weatherford, Genghis Khan, pp. xxvii-xxxv.

  In researching the Mongols, I came across a surprising number of factual discrepancies, no doubt reflecting the linguistic and interpretative difficulties involved in the study of Mongol history. (Even Genghis Khan's exact year of birth is reported differently by different authors.) In these instances, I usually relied on those sources based on the most recent scholarship, research, and archaeological evidence: The collapse of communism in the former Soviet Union opened up many exciting research opportunities for Mongol scholars and historians and cultural anthropologists from around the world.

  1. Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, p. xviii.

  2. Lamb, Genghis Khan, p. 13; Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 58-59; Weather-ford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. xviii, xxii, xxxiii, 9-27, 134, 169, 198.

  3. The authority for Genghis Khan's infamous quotation was a medieval chronicler from Asia Minor whose people had been conquered by Genghis Khan; many historians have questioned whether the quotation is authentic. The particular translation I use is from Lamb, Genghis Khan, p. 107; see also Heissig, A Lost Civilization, pp. 9-10. On the gruesome cruelty of the Mongols, quite possibly exaggerated by unsympathetic historians, see Lamb, p. 134; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 93-94, 113, 164.

  4. Lamb, Genghis Khan, p. 18; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, p. 162.

  5. Ala-ad-Din Ata-Malik Juvaini, The History of the World-Conqueror, John Andrew Boyle, trans., vol. 1 (Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1958), p. 21; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 14,27-28.

  6. Thomas J. Barfield, The Perilous Frontier: Nomadic Empires and China (Cambridge, Mass.: Basil Blackwell, 1989), pp. 187-89; Heissig, A Lost Civilization, pp. 44-45; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. xix, 13, 25, 50-53.

  7. Heissig, A Lost Civilization, p. 44; Juvaini, The History of the World-Conqueror, p. 35; Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 35-37; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 25-29. Even before Temu-jin was born, his father had, at a critical point, helped Ong Khan consolidate his power. The two men then formed a so-called anda bond, in which each pledged to aid the other in times of distress. See Paul Kahn, The Secret History of the Mongols: The Origin of Chingis Khan (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1984), p. xxiv.

  8. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 55-56; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 30-35, 42-54.

  9. Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 28, 52-53.

  10. Barfield, The Perilous Frontier, pp. 191, 193; Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 45-46; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 40, 52, 67, 152-54.

  11. Barfield, The Perilous Frontier, pp. 190-91; Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 57-59; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 32, 55-58.

  12. Barfield, The Perilous Frontier, p. 191; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 54, 58-59, 61-62, 64-65.

  13. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 2011; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 67-71. In addition to conquering much of the Eastern Hemisphere, Genghis Khan is usually credited with introducing the Yassa Gengizcani, or Great Laws of Genghis Khan. It is not known whether these laws were actually codified during Genghis Khan's lifetime. No complete version of the Yassa from Genghis Khan's time has ever been found, although the Persian chronicler Juvaini gave a lengthy description of Genghis Khan's rules and regulations thirty years after Genghis Khan's death. For an erudite discussion of the origins and widespread influence of the Yassa, as well as the scholarly debate surrounding it, see Robert D. McChesney, “The Legacy of Chinggis Khan in Law and Politics,” lecture delivered to the Indo-Mongolian Society at New York University, Mar. 28, 1997.

  14. Heissig, A Lost Civilization, pp. 36-39; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 70-71.

  15. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 77-80.

  16. Barfield, The Perilous Frontier, p. 199; Heissig, A Lost Civilization, p. 46; Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 83-84; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 82-85.

  17. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 85-87, 121; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 84, 86-87.

  18. Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 92-94.

  19. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 91-92; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 96-97.

  20. Heissig, A Lost Civilization, pp. 9, 46-47; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 96-99.

  21. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 13, 91-92, 101, 104-7, 119, 190-91; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 97-105.

  22. I quote Jack Weatherford's translation of Genghis Khan's message. Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 105-7; see also Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 109-11, 113-15.

  23. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 119-21; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 4-5, 7-8.

  24. Barfield, The Perilous Frontier, pp. 201-2; Heissig, A Lost Civilization, p. 10; Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 115, 135, 138-39; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 5-7, 108-9, 113-14, 117-18.

  25. Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 4-6, 9, 110-13.

  26. Kahn, The Secret History of the Mongols, p. xxvi; Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 14314, 175-76; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. xx-xxi, 128, 130-31.

  27. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 188-89; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 119-25, 130.

  28. Lamb, Genghis Khan, pp. 144, 181, 231; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 133-43.

  29. Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 144-50.

  30. Ibid., pp. 152, 155-59.

  31. Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 151, 153; Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 104-10; Spuler, The Muslim World, pp. 19-20; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 166-67, 177, 180-81.

  32. Thomas T. Allsen, Mongol Imperialism: The Policies of the Grand Qan Möngke in China, Russia, and the Islamic Lands, 1251-1259 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1987), pp. 3, 7; Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 153-54; Saunders, The History of the Mon
gol Conquests, pp. 110—11; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 178-84.

  33. Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 111-13; Spuler, The Muslim World, pp. 19-20; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 183-84.

  34. Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 171-73.

  35. Enno Franzius, History of the Byzantine Empire: Mother of Nations (New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1967), pp. 349, 353; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 173-74.

  36. Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 68, 103-4, 114-15; Spuler, The Muslim World, pp. 17, 20; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 6, 33, 82-84, 169-70, 185, 188.

  37. Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 117-20; Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 116, 119-21; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 185-91.

  38. Valerie Hansen, The Open Empire: A History of China to 1600 (New York: W W Norton, 2000), p. 347; Morgan, The Mongols, p. 120; Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 121-22; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 195, 208-9.

  39. Hansen, The Open Empire, pp. 344, 352, 366; Heissig, A Lost Civilization, p. 51; Lamb, Genghis Khan, p. 193; Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 119, 120-23, 127-28, 163; Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 121-27; Spuler, The Muslim World, pp. 32-33; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 195-97, 203-7.

  40. Hansen, The Open Empire, p. 352; Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 123-24, 128-30; Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 124-26; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 198-200,203.

  41. Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 128-30; Saunders, The History of the Mongol Conquests, pp. 124-25; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 223-24.

  42. Morgan, The Mongols, pp. 120, 131-32; Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, pp. 200-1, 206.