New articles on Mongols from De Re Militari site

I want to let the forum know that at De Re Militari (www.deremilitari.org) we have added two new articles that deal with the Mongols.  Both are republished from the Toronto Studies in Central and Inner Asia series. 

"Spurred on by the Fear of Death": Refugees and Displaced Populations during the Mongol Invasion of Hungary, by James Ross Sweeney -  from Nomadic Diplomacy, Destruction and Religion from the Pacific to the Adriatic

The Nomads' Armament: Home Made Weapons, by John Masson Smith Jr. - from Religion, Customary Law, and Nomadic Technology

We have also received permission to republish portions of two 16th century chroniclers that deal with Central Asia: Khwandamir and Mizra Haydar Dughlat.  It should be available sometime this month.

The Nomads' Armament: Home Made Weapons, interesting article

 

Fast Horses and Mongol bow were most used and main weapon . Its design is reflection of limitation of resource- with many curves, re-flexed. re-curved, using indifferent quality of woods. So Mongol bow is perfect reflection of talent of Archer-makers who overcome those difficulties of lack of material and technology.

 

 

According to article Mongols did not have good armament upto other's standard"- clumsy cumbersome armory, even lack of sword....

 

And club was most availablel weapon. Easy to make

 

 

My conclusion is that NOMAD PEOPLE, themselves were MAIN ASSET / WEAPON of Chinggis Warfare. War is fought by PEOPLE.

Edited by Zorigo - 03-Aug-2006 at 22:57

Let the debates begin!

I liked the first article because it focuses on a different side of the Mongol campaign in Europe, rather than become stuck in the military "debate" that tends to get tiring on online forums. However, one thing that would be interesting is an actual quantitative analysis on the refugee. The writer makes notes of a lot of anecdotal descriptions, but numerical estimates would also be interesting.

Speaking of refugees, one thing that is interesting about the Mongol conquests is that it caused no permanent relocation of political power that was common on the steppes before the Mongol empire (e.g. the movement of the huns, hepthalites, Kitans, Avars, who were pushed out of their homeland). Perhaps the Mongols moved so fast that most tribes did not have a chance to flee, and that the Cumans, being near the border may have been one of the only tribes that fled with their political system intact, but unlike the Avars or others, they had nowhere to reestablish their kingdom.

For the second article, I had these thoughts:

1) It seems like throughout history, some nomadic groups preferred to fight with heavier armor than others. For example, the Sarmatians, Jurchen, Kirghiz, Bactrians, and Manchu seem to favor heavy cavalry somewhat more than groups like the Mongols, scythians, etc. (though I may be incorrect) The author implies a limitation in manufacturing ability for nomads (which was not fully explained in the article), so why did some groups seem to have heavier weapons than others?

2) Why did the Mongols not utilize sedentary manufacturing for their equipment? The author cites sources from Carpini and Polo, whose times were after the Mongols had captured Khwarezm and Northern China, both of which were lands known to manufacturing heavy cavalry equipment.

Edited by Imperator Invictus - 04-Aug-2006 at 20:02

Concerning the second article on weapons.
With the Mongols preference for scouring the battlefiled and not leaving anything behind coupled with captured equipment from town and city arsenals, I think that there may have been more armoured warriors than possibly we give them credit for. By this I don't mean fully armoured, maybe just a mail coat or some shoulder protection.