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Strongest possible recommendation: Dan Carlin's Hardcore History episode - "Wrath of the Khans" http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-wrath-of-the

• randomstudent 9y ago
  > from driving all the way to the Western shores of Spain. I don't think it was luck. It was probably the lack of cars ;)
  • duncan_bayne 9y ago
    They'd probably tried to go 100% solar by 2050 (BC)
    • baldfat 9y ago
      Um everyone was Solar? They feed their animals solar raised fuel, AKA hay and oats.
      • sorokod 9y ago
        Oil is solar in the same sense
        • AckSyn 9y ago
          But heavily aged, almost like cheese. Flammable cheese.
        • baldfat 9y ago
          The sun only provided the fuel's origin the chemical alteration of this material is caused by pressure, heat and millions of years. Though fossil fuel is scientifically photosynthesis based the alteration is what makes it a fossil fuel. Hench the name fossil. https://www.geochemsoc.org/files/6214/1261/1770/SP-2_271-284_Sato.pdf https://www.geochemsoc.org/files/6214/1261/1770/SP-2_271-284...
      • duncan_bayne 9y ago
        You get that I was joking, right? (If for no other reason than the wild anachronism; Khan was born in 1162).
  • Kpourdeilami 9y ago
    Judging by the amount of lands of that Mongols conquered, lack of cars wouldn't have stopped them from conquering Europe. Mongol empire at its peak spanned over 24 million square kilometres of land while To put that into perspective, the Roman Empire at its peak only spanned over 5 million square kilometres of land
    • NoCoastCoder 9y ago
      Pretty sure he was making a joke about the use of the term driving.
      • deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
  • Sleeep 9y ago
    You're trying to be clever but the word "drive" has more than one meaning and predates automobiles. >propel or carry along by force in a specified direction
• digitalzombie 9y ago
  > t really was dumb luck that prevented the Khans from driving all the way to the Western shores of Spain. You can say the same with Japan. Mongols never invaded it cause of bad weather. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_invasions_of_Japan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_invasions_of_Japan
  • bhnmmhmd 9y ago
    Given their vicious inhumane barbarity and brutality, I'm sure if his tomb was found, millions of people would want to destroy it and exhume his body and smash it into smithereens. What they did to Iran (formerly Persia) and the middle east can not be forgotten. Killing a mother while she was breastfeeding her infant baby? Even animals don't do that. I don't know how Mongols today live with that.
    • selectodude 9y ago
      I think they're a bit too worried about living on $1.25/day to have strong opinions on Ghengis Khan.
    • pavel_lishin 9y ago
      > I don't know how Mongols today live with that. Don't look too closely into your own ancestry; the only thing saving you from existential despair might be that some ancestor's violence and cruelty was only offset by their utter forgettability in the flow of history.
      • bhnmmhmd 9y ago
        > the only thing saving you from existential despair might be that some ancestor's violence and cruelty was only offset by their utter forgettability in the flow of history. I think you're forgetting about the fact that in all human history, Genghis stands out as one of the cruelest and most violent rulers. As far as I know, Iranians (Persians) never did the same thing to other nations, not even for revenge. I guess that's the main reason saving Iranians from "existential despair".
• oconnor663 9y ago
  He also does a good job of pointing out that not everyone in the world feels good about how the Khan "civilized" it.
  • GenericsMotors 9y ago
    All the raping and pillaging will have that effect...
• silassales 9y ago
  If you prefer books, a great series on this topic is: http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/221220/the-khan-series-5-book-bundle-by-conn-iggulden/9780345538468/ http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/221220/the-khan-seri... By Conn Iggulden
• davidreiss 9y ago
  Dan Carlin is an entertainer rather than a historian. So please take anything he says with a grain of salt. > It's sobering to think how utterly helpless Europe was against the Mongols. It really was dumb luck that prevented the Khans from driving all the way to the Western shores of Spain. It was dumb luck that the first major european campaign ended. But it was also lots of diplomatic negotiations and the Pope's willingness to "humble" himself before the "Great Khans". Because of the christian tradition of "Render under Caesar" set by jesus himself in the new testament, Popes and christian leaders were willing to "bow before the khan". Whereas other leaders ( muslim, chinese, russians, etc ) refused for variety of reasons and were conquered. Also, the pope had the benefit of seeing mongols crush one empire after another by the time the mongols reached europe, so they weren't blinded by hubris like the Khwarazmian empire. For example, when the mongols sent a delegation to the shah of khwarazmian, he had them tortured and killed and sent a humiliated surviving diplomat back to genghis khan. The pope knew about what happened to the shah and the khwarazmian empire and he knew to act accordingly. When the mongols sent a delegate to Rome, he didn't have them tortured and killed. Instead the pope sent out his own delegation to develop political ties. Even trying to form alliances with the mongols against the muslims. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco-Mongol_alliance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco-Mongol_alliance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cum_non_solum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cum_non_solum The history of western civilization changed completely because the "humility" of the pope and the catholic church. It was the friendly relations with the mongol empire which gave italians lucrative trade relations within the mongol empire which led to the rise of the medicis, the italian renaissance and a rebirth of europe from the doldrums of the dark ages. Arguably one of the most important events in human history is the many trade delegations the pope sent to mongolia to get favorable trade deals with the mongol empire. Without that, we don't have italian renaissance. And the collapse of the mongol empire and especially the golden horde which led to a completely severing of links between italy/europe to the rest of asia is what led to the age of european exploration. It was the collapse of the overland trade routes protected by the mongols that led to europe's search for a sea route. It isn't a coincidence that columbus set for sail a few years after Ivan the Great defeated the golden horde in 1480 and ended mongol rule over the rus. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_stand_on_the_Ugra_river https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_stand_on_the_Ugra_river
  • 9y ago
• devuo 9y ago
  Surely you mean western shores of Portugal, or the Iberian Peninsula? Portugal was founded in 1139, Spain as a single entity, and not a collection of Kingdoms was founded in 1469, 200 and so years after Genghis Khan (1162-1227).
  • dragonwriter 9y ago
    IIRC, “Spain”, like “Germany”, was a geographic name long before it identified a particular polity. In any case it's a geographic name coextensive with a modern polity now, and a modern speaker using it to identify a geographic location even for events that predate the modern polity is normal and clear.
    • devuo 9y ago
      Hispania != Spain. In any case, the westernmost region on the Iberian peninsula was and still is occupied by a country then known and still known as Portugal.
• dark_ph0enix 9y ago
  "Western shores of Portugal", FTFY
• RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago
  The Mongols would have had a much more difficult time than people assume, and probably would have failed in their attempt to conquer Europe. See https://www.quora.com/Did-the-Mongols-have-a-reasonable-chance-of-conquering-Europe-in-the-13th-century-had-Ogedei-not-died-just-before-launching-his-invasion https://www.quora.com/Did-the-Mongols-have-a-reasonable-chan... especially the answer by Tim ONeil.
  • Chathamization 9y ago
    > especially the answer by Tim ONeil. That's a pretty bad answer. Look at the conquest of Southern Song - the Mongols were operating far from the steppe, they were up against a large number of fortified positions, and in terrain that wasn't well suited for them (Southern China is not "open country", like Tim ONeill claims). It also didn't fall quickly (the way he says the centralized polities fell), it took decades of devastating war. It's true that people often exaggerate how close Western Europe came to being conquered by the Mongols. But people arguing against that idea often throw around just as much bad history.
    • notfromhere 9y ago
      Look to how the Hungarians stopped the Mongols from invading. Same strategy would work in western europe
    • gamblor956 9y ago
      The Mongols made no gains in Southern Song until the Song court was foolish enough to punish one of their generals for holding off the Mongol invasion, at which point he defected to the Mongols. Even then, it still took a years-long siege by a general who knew all of the weaknesses in the Song defenses to take the city. In addition, even a cursory reading of the Mongol Invasion of Southern Song will show that the Song dynasty maintained few castles; at the time of the Mongol invasion...it had 3. This meant the Mongols could capture the kingdom with a handful of simultaneous sustained sieges. In contrast, at this time, there were hundreds of castles in Europe, most built to withstand years-long sieges, and most within reinforcement range of their neighbors. Furthermore, Western Europe back then was heavily forested. Today, there are few such dense forests in Europe, but the most comparable visual is probably the thick African jungles you see in Hollywood films. Traversing this wilderness would have been possible but difficult for small groups. For an army of mounted horsemen, it would have been extremely difficult. For an army of horsemen each requiring multiple horses, it would have been effectively impossible. Combining the lack of grazing pasture for the horses, the wild forests preventing the Mongols from utilizing their hit-and-run tactics to any meaningful effect, and the necessity to carry out thousands of sieges and blockades against a well-fed and entrenched enemy, the Mongols had no chance to invade Western Europe.
• novembermike 9y ago
  I'm not really sure that Europe was that helpless. IIRC the mongols basically couldn't take European castles. As you go further west in the 1200s you start seeing higher population densities. Poland, Germany and France are all roughly the same size and in this time frame IIRC Poland had 2 million people, Germany had 10 million and France had 20 million. With the higher density came a higher density of fortifications. With a low density the Mongols could just bypass anything they couldn't take, but with enough of these forts an invading army opened itself to attack from every direction. The newer European fortresses were also a lot harder for the Mongols to attack. IIRC the Hungarians had 5 in the region the Mongols attacked and none of them fell. Germany had thousands, and they were generally higher quality. Even if they could get inside the city it was attackers in leather against defenders in plate or chain. The Mongols had no real advantages in a siege situation since they couldn't bring their coordination or mobility to bear.
  • nshm 9y ago
    Modern history gives significantly lower estimates for those numbers, it was likely less than 2 million people in France. At the same time the Mongol's army was probably about 20k people, not 500k as claimed.
    • novembermike 9y ago
      Are you sure you aren't thinking of post plague Europe? I just double checked wikipedia and it basically says between 13-20 million people in France depending on what you consider to be "France" (modern borders are closer to 20 million).
  • valuearb 9y ago
    The mongols adopted the best tools of their enemies, they had a complete army that included siege weapons built by chinese siege engineers. They were the first to use artillery in Europe. They conquered far larger and better fortified chinese cities than any piddling castles in Europe. And you can't trap the mongols, their mobile army lived off the land and moved far too fast with a lethality that european armies couldn't deal with. The death of Chenggis Khan was the only thing that saved Europe from a massacre and enslavement by the mongols.
• bwb 9y ago
  Best history podcast hands down, and in my top 5 all time podcasts. All his stuff is great, check out the WW1 series too.