The inclusion of the Black Sea basin into the long-distance trade network – with its two axes of the Silk Road through the Golden Horde (Urgench-Sarai-Tana/Caffa) and the Spice Road through the Ilkhanate (Ormuz-Tabriz-Trebizond) – was the two Mongol states’ most important contribution to making the sea a “crossroads of international commerce”.
The inclusion of the Black Sea basin into the long-distance trade network – with its two axes of the Silk Road through the Golden Horde (Urgench-Sarai-Tana/Caffa) and the Spice Road through the Ilkhanate (Ormuz-Tabriz-Trebizond) – was the two Mongol states’ most important contribution to making the sea a “crossroads of international commerce”. The closest recorded working relationship between European and Asian powers in the medieval period, achieved by the joint efforts of the Chinggisid rulers and the Italian merchant republics, was not realised via the usual geographic channels of the Eastern Mediterranean and the Fertile Crescent, but rather by roundabout routes to the Black Sea. Thus at the same time as the sea fulfilled its function as a crossroads of long-distance Eurasian trade, it was also a bypass.
The history of the Black Sea may be considered as alternating between an “inner lake,” when a single empire establishes control over the sea and its surrounding areas, and that of an open sea, in which various continental or maritime powers compete for the region’s resources. By taking into account the impact both of major powers and minor political actors, this volume proposes a long-term perspective of regional history. It offers a deep understanding of the political and commercial history of the Black Sea between the 14th and the 16th centuries, and provides insights into the political and economic developments of the region.
During the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, Chinggis Khan and his heirs established the largest contiguous empire in the history of the world, extending from Korea to Hungary and from Iraq, Tibet, and Burma to Siberia. Ruling over roughly two thirds of the Old World, the Mongol Empire enabled people, ideas, and objects to traverse immense geographical and cultural boundaries. Along the Silk Roads in Mongol Eurasia reveals the individual stories of three key groups of people—military commanders, merchants, and intellectuals—from across Eurasia. These annotated biographies bring to the fore a compelling picture of the Mongol Empire from a wide range of historical sources in multiple languages, providing important insights into a period unique for its rapid and far-reaching transformations. Read together or separately, they offer the perfect starting point for any discussion of the Mongol Empire’s impact on China, the Muslim world, and the West and illustrate the scale, diversity, and creativity of the cross-cultural exchange along the continental and maritime Silk Roads. Features and Benefits: Synthesizes historical information from Chinese, Arabic, Persian, and Latin sources that are otherwise inaccessible to English-speaking audiences. Presents in an accessible manner individual life stories that serve as a springboard for discussing themes such as military expansion, cross-cultural contacts, migration, conversion, gender, diplomacy, transregional commercial networks, and more. Each chapter includes a bibliography to assist students and instructors seeking to further explore the individuals and topics discussed. Informative maps, images, and tables throughout the volume supplement each biography.
Crossroads of Cuisine offers history of food and cultural exchanges in and around Central Asia. It discusses geographical base, and offers historical and cultural overview. A photo essay binds it all together. The book offers new views of the past.
Existing textbooks on international relations treat history in a cursory fashion and perpetuate a Euro-centric perspective. This textbook pioneers a new approach by historicizing the material traditionally taught in International Relations courses, and by explicitly focusing on non-European cases, debates and issues. The volume is divided into three parts. The first part focuses on the international systems that traditionally existed in Europe, East Asia, pre-Columbian Central and South America, Africa and Polynesia. The second part discusses the ways in which these international systems were brought into contact with each other through the agency of Mongols in Central Asia, Arabs in the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean, Indic and Sinic societies in South East Asia, and the Europeans through their travels and colonial expansion. The concluding section concerns contemporary issues: the processes of decolonization, neo-colonialism and globalization – and their consequences on contemporary society. History of International Relations provides a unique textbook for undergraduate and graduate students of international relations, and anybody interested in international relations theory, history, and contemporary politics.
The Routledge Handbook of the Mongols and Central-Eastern Europe offers a comprehensive overview of the Mongols’ military, political, socio-economic and cultural relations with Central and Eastern European nations between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries. The Mongol Empire was the largest contiguous land empire in history, and one which contributed to the establishment of political, commercial and cultural contacts between all Eurasian regions. The Golden Horde, founded in Eastern Europe by Chinggis Khan’s grandson, Batu, in the thirteenth century, was the dominant power in the region. For two hundred years, all of the countries and peoples of Central and Eastern Europe had to reckon with a powerful centralized state with enormous military potential. Some chose to submit to the Mongols whilst others defended their independence, but none could avoid the influence of this powerful empire. In this book, twenty-five chapters examine this crucial period in Central-Eastern European history, including trade, confrontation, and cultural and religious exchange between the Mongols and their neighbours. This book will be an essential reference for scholars and students of the Mongols, as well those interested in the political, social and economic history of medieval Central-Eastern Europe.
How the Mongol invasions of the Near East reshaped the balance of world power in the Middle Ages For centuries, the Crusades have been central to the story of the medieval Near East, but these religious wars are only part of the region’s complex history. As The Mongol Storm reveals, during the same era the Near East was utterly remade by another series of wars: the Mongol invasions. In a single generation, the Mongols conquered vast swaths of the Near East and upended the region’s geopolitics. Amid the chaos of the Mongol onslaught, long-standing powers such as the Byzantines, the Seljuk Turks, and the crusaders struggled to survive, while new players such as the Ottomans arose to fight back. The Mongol conquests forever transformed the region, while forging closer ties among societies spread across Eurasia. This is the definitive history of the Mongol assault on the Near East and its enduring global consequences.
The Land Between Two Seas: Art on the Move in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea 1300-1700 focuses on the strong riverine ties that connect the seas of the Mediterranean system (from the Western Mediterranean through the Sea of Marmara, the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov) and their hinterland. Addressing the mediating role of the Balkans between East and West all the way to Poland and Lithuania, as well as this region’s contribution to the larger Mediterranean artistic and cultural melting pot, this innovative volume explores ideas, artworks and stories that moved through these territories linking the cultures of Central Asia with those of western Europe.
