Ap Euro Mongol Dbq Essay

It is without a doubt that the Mongols were a barbaric group of people whose legacy for being brutal and murdering millions is still alive and very well known today. But what we don't consider often enough is their reasons for acting this way towards outsiders from their own group. The reason for this was because from the beginnings the Mongol people were nomads. Being a nomadic civilization required one to compete for livestock and pasture land with other tribes. This does not excuse the Mongolians for the horrible acts committed but we need to consider their reasons behind their brutality. Nomadic customs and competions led to the ingraining of hostility in their society. If you look at Genghis Khan’s past you can see that his way of being started to form once his father was murdered by a member of a neighboring tribe. And once he became leader what he knew, which was

The document shows a scene from a Persian manuscript called “The Shah Namah” from the year 1300. There are Persians being executed by many horrifying different ways. Soldiers are being hanged, and being buried alive and while being upside down. Aside from being horrifying executioners their battle tactics also infused terror in to the enemy. “They make a strong attack with engines (catapults for slinging large stones) and arrows and they do not leave off fighting by day or night, so that those inside the fortress get no sleep; the Tartars however get some rest…’’(document D). John of Plano Carpini wrote this in 1955. It is titled History of the Mongols. What Carpini was trying to communicate to the reader was that the Mongols not only slaughtered but they also implanted terror during their attacks before the killing took place. The Mongolian army also burned down the people’s cities with fat of the victims. Causing inextinguishable fires that made the killings faster and more