History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 6Gibbon, Edward
History
History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 6
Gibbon, Edward
Byzantine Empire -- History -- To 527; Rome -- History -- Empire, 30 B.C.-476 A.D.
18 (return) [ In his great History of the Huns, M. de Guignes has
most amply treated of Zingis Khan and his successors. See tom.
iii. l. xv.—xix., and in the collateral articles of the
Seljukians of Roum, tom. ii. l. xi., the Carizmians, l. xiv., and
the Mamalukes, tom. iv. l. xxi.; consult likewise the tables of
the 1st volume. He is ever learned and accurate; yet I am only
indebted to him for a general view, and some passages of
Abulfeda, which are still latent in the Arabic text. * Note: To
this catalogue of the historians of the Moguls may be added
D’Ohson, Histoire des Mongols; Histoire des Mongols, (from Arabic
and Persian authorities,) Paris, 1824. Schmidt, Geschichte der
Ost Mongolen, St. Petersburgh, 1829. This curious work, by
Ssanang Ssetsen Chungtaidschi, published in the original Mongol,
was written after the conversion of the nation to Buddhism: it is
enriched with very valuable notes by the editor and translator;
but, unfortunately, is very barren of information about the
European and even the western Asiatic conquests of the
Mongols.—M.]
Chapter LXIV: Moguls, Ottoman Turks.—Part II.
The arms of Zingis and his lieutenants successively reduced the
hordes of the desert, who pitched their tents between the wall of
China and the Volga; and the Mogul emperor became the monarch of
the pastoral world, the lord of many millions of shepherds and
soldiers, who felt their united strength, and were impatient to
rush on the mild and wealthy climates of the south. His ancestors
had been the tributaries of the Chinese emperors; and Temugin
himself had been disgraced by a title of honor and servitude. The
court of Pekin was astonished by an embassy from its former
vassal, who, in the tone of the king of nations, exacted the
tribute and obedience which he had paid, and who affected to
treat the _son of heaven_ as the most contemptible of mankind. A
haughty answer disguised their secret apprehensions; and their
fears were soon justified by the march of innumerable squadrons,
who pierced on all sides the feeble rampart of the great wall.
Ninety cities were stormed, or starved, by the Moguls; ten only
escaped; and Zingis, from a knowledge of the filial piety of the
Chinese, covered his vanguard with their captive parents; an
unworthy, and by degrees a fruitless, abuse of the virtue of his
enemies. His invasion was supported by the revolt of a hundred
thousand Khitans, who guarded the frontier: yet he listened to a
treaty; and a princess of China, three thousand horses, five
hundred youths, and as many virgins, and a tribute of gold and
silk, were the price of his retreat. In his second expedition, he
compelled the Chinese emperor to retire beyond the yellow river
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