The Pax Mongolica

                                                                           The Pax Mongolia

                                                           

                                                            Mitchell Bowen and Spencer Drost

                                                                             

                                                                             Senior Division 

 

                                                                             Group Website

 

For the history fair, we chose the impressive Mongolian Empire, mainly at its height. Also known as the “Pax Mongolica”, The Mongols connected east and west ideologically, religiously, and epidemically. WE wanted to choose an empire for our project, Specifically the Ottomans, however upon further research we concluded that the Mongol Empire was a better candidate. The Mongols had the largest continual Empire in the world, stretching from Korea to the Ukraine. With such a large Empire, encounters with different people and religion become common. People such as Marco Polo, explored Asia thanks to the Mongols Empire. Nations such as Venice and Genoa exchanged goods from their nations to and from China.

 

We conducted our research in an orderly fashion with a mixture of primary and secondary sources. In our research we did not have a book written in that time period, but relied on more modern books, and websites. For primary sources we acquired quotes from those living in the empire, living in Europe, and some from the government of the Empire. We also used pictures in form of paintings done showing what the Mongols looked like, painted back then. We also have maps showing territory of nations, such as the Jin Empire. For secondary sources, we got most of our research from books such as “What If” and the book “Genghis Khan”. The websites we used were mainly form universities and some from organizations dedicated to telling the story of the Mongols.

 

In creating our presentation style, we wanted to be different, and try something new. At first we thought about doing a documentary, but then we found that would be a tad bit out of our schedule. So, we decided to make a website. My partner, Spencer was a lot more tech savvy, so while he made the website, on Wix, I contributed with the research, and the writing of the project. Our research was copied down mainly from university website, plus quotes from books. We used few words from our mind, but gave due credit to the books and sites. We separated our research into three main categories. With the first one is a brief history on the Empire. The secondary was a mixture of encounters, explorations and exchange involved with the Mongol Empire. The third main tab is about China, what the Mongols did there, and how they changed it.

 

Our project perfectly relates to the NHD theme of encounters, exploration, and exchange. The Mongol Empire was gigantic, stretching Europe to Asia. With such a large territory, the Mongols encountered many new things, such as religion, peoples, and ideologies.  It relates to exploration because it allowed both Asians and Europeans to check out and explore parts of the world they have not seen before. The main explorer was Marco Polo, who explored Asia during the “Pax Mongolica”. Lastly it worked with exchange as well. The main example would obviously be the Silk Road.