The Turkish rehearsal for the Mongol conquests

The first nomads to build up a formidable empire in Asia were the Turks, and their extensive conquests may be fitly compared with those of the Mongols seven centuries later. In the general context of world history, the episode of the first Turkish empire possesses considerable significance. The Turks had shown that it was possible for a well-organized nomad confederacy to seize control of almost all the Eurasian steppe from Mongolia to the Ukraine. The Turks were the first barbarians to create a kingdom so extensive as to touch at different points the four great civilized societies of the day : China, India, Persia and Byzantium. The ambitions of the Turgesh had long undermined the western khanate, and all the Turkish tribes were caught between the Chinese and the Arabs, now contenders for the mastery of Central Asia. Under the rule of the Turks, not only writing, but a new system of reckoning time, was widely adopted in Asia.

Linguistics · Turkish · Byzantine Studies and History · Eurasian Exchange Networks · History · Philosophy