The Mongol Storm: Making and Breaking Empires in the Medieval Near East

Description

The Mongols have long been viewed in the West as violent barbarians who plundered and wrecked the societies they invaded. But in fact the Mongol Empire was highly sophisticated, and through their conquests they built a new world order. Within the space of a single generation, they swept across the Middle East, tied Europe and Asia together through trade, and completely reshaped global geopolitics. The Mongol Storm tells the story of the Mongols and the empires they conquered. Drawing on years of deep archival research, historian Nicholas Morton traces the rise of the Mongols in the 13th century through their rapid invasions of eight different Middle Eastern societies. As Mongol armies advanced upon the Middle East, Morton shows, longstanding powers such as the Khwarazmian Empire, the Kingdom of Jerusalem, and the Abbasid Caliphate collapsed, while waves of refugees broke across borders and upset the region's delicate religious and social hierarchies. Amidst the chaos arose aggressive new empires including the Mamluks and the Ottomans, who would ultimately challenge the Mongol Empire's authority and dominate the Middle East for centuries. Even as the Mongols' power declined, the diplomatic and economic ties their conquests had established between once-disparate societies endured, and they left a much more connected Eurasia in their wake, permanently reconfiguring the balance of medieval world power. The Mongol Storm is an epic account of violent conflict unfolding against the vibrant backdrop of the Seljuk Turks' magnificent garden palaces, mighty Crusader fortresses, Egyptian pyramids, Damascus' sprawling markets, and the vast Mongol wagon cities. Vividly written and vast in scope, it completely revises our understanding of the Mongols and the world of the Middle Ages.

Nicholas Morton is a senior lecturer at Nottingham Trent University. The author or editor of ten books, Morton lives in Nottinghamshire, United Kingdom. His most recent book The Crusader States and their Neighbours is the winner of the Verbruggen Prize 2022.

Deeply researched and elegantly written - essential reading -- Dan Jones Erudite, often thrilling and much-needed -- Daily Telegraph Brain-stretching . . . pulsating . . . irresistable . . . A reminder that the best history writing is eminently readable -- The Sunday Times Revelatory, lively and stocked with colourful personalities -- Literary Review An unusual blend of serious scholarship with a narrative drive as galloping as the ferocious Mongol cavalry whose repeated battlefield triumphs Nicholas Morton recreates with relish -- The Sunday Times The most exciting study of the Mongols and their encounters with the peoples of the Near East I have ever read -- William Chester Jordan, Princeton University This expert study casts the Middle Ages in a new light -- Publishers Weekly For anyone who loves history, especially with military and diplomatic focuses -- Library Journal