In the Shadow of the Mongol Empire Ming China and Eurasia

During the thirteenth century, the Mongols created the greatest empire in human history. Genghis Khan and his successors brought death and destruction to Eurasia. They obliterated infrastructure, devastated cities, and exterminated peoples. They also created courts in China, Persia, and southern Russia, famed throughout the world as centers of wealth, learning, power, religion, and lavish spectacle. The great Mongol houses established standards by which future rulers in Eurasia would measure themselves for centuries. In this ambitious study, David M. Robinson traces how in the late fourteenth century the newly established Ming dynasty (1368?1644) in China crafted a narrative of the fallen Mongol empire. To shape the perceptions and actions of audiences at home and abroad, the Ming court tailored its narrative of the Mongols to prove that it was the rightful successor to the Mongol empire. This is a story of how politicians exploit historical memory for their own gain.

Introduction; Part I. The Wider Historical Context: 1. Eurasia in Empire's wake; 2. Daidu's fall; 3. Changing fortunes; 4. Black city; Part II. Chinggisid Narrative at Home: 5. Telling stories and selling rulership; 6. A precarious tale; Part III. A Hard Crowd: 7. Letters to the Great Khan; 8. South of the clouds; 9. Chinggisid fold; Part IV. East Asia: 10. Eastern neighbours; Conclusion.

David M. Robinson is Robert H. N. Ho Professor in Asian Studies and Professor of History at Colgate University, New York. He is widely published, including Seeking Order in A Tumultuous Age: The Writings of Chŏng Tojŏn, a Korean Neo-Confucian (2016), Martial Spectacles of the Ming Court (2013), Empire's Twilight: Northeast Asia under the Mongols (2009), and Bandits, Eunuchs, and the Son of Heaven: Rebellion and the Economy of Violence in Mid-Ming China (2000).