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Genghis Kahn

Genghis Kahn

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by

mikeswelsh
in

How he shaped the modern world from secular culture to the postal service.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genghis_Khan

Publisher’s Summary

The Mongol army led by Genghis Khan subjugated more lands and people in 25 years than the Romans did in 400. In nearly every country the Mongols conquered, they brought an unprecedented rise in cultural communication, expanded trade, and a blossoming of civilization. 

Vastly more progressive than his European or Asian counterparts, Genghis Khan abolished torture, granted universal religious freedom, and smashed feudal systems of aristocratic privilege. From the story of his rise through the tribal culture to the explosion of civilization that the Mongol Empire unleashed, this brilliant work of revisionist history is nothing less than the epic story of how the modern world was made.

My Take

I love figures in history like presidents and leaders of all kinds. This mere mortal changed the world in ways I could never have imagined. History that I learned and likely you learned was filled with the ‘Mongol Hoards’ rapping and pillaging like savages for 700 years including the taking of wives and families and making them part of their own. All of that did happen but not in the way you might expect.

First, the basis for the Genghis Kahn takeover of the world was the willingness to be more inclusive of the people conquered or the foes vanguished. Less rape and pillage and more lets incorporate what we collected into a new and more diverse culture.

We talk today about cultural appropriation, well Kahn invented it. We talk about live and let live, again Kahn invented and fostered it. We understand the administrative state concept, the Silk Road, vassal states, freedom of religion, separation of church and state, rule of law over all these are all concepts that GK fostered.

He so distrusted family in the running of his empire that he created rule of law and meritocracies wherever they ruled. He left cultures, secular people, farmers, doctors and craftsmen alone and destroyed the aristocracies and dynastic rule…

He won nearly every battle and all the campaigns against all foes from Eastern step to ‘Brittany’ essentially all of eastern Europe.

More to come…