This is an archive of past discussions about Genghis Khan. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
I saw some people are making accusations that this article is written by a fourth greater. If they are such great at this, why don't they write the article themselves. Accusing people of doing poor work, and they not doing anything is childish. The main important thing is that the readers understand, and copyediting and grammatical errors and mistakes are far secondary.
This article is great!!! Keep up the good work. Add more new content!!! This is one of the best articles on Wikipedia, especially in terms of NPOV, detail and understandability. I think there are a number of well-balanced editors and watchers dedicated to looking after this article, which is great!!!. We don't need any POV in this article, especially antagonistic viewpoint, which would only degrade the article and make it appear like childish rambling. 72.244.34.5019:36, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
Some of the above discussions are more than a year old, and may not refer to the current version of the article. I think I'm going to archive this talk page soon, so that old debates won't confuse people anymore. I'm not aware of any open issues and it has become very long anyway. --Latebird21:13, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
I think balance (npov) is critical for this article and we need to look at pov statements closely whenever there is edit. 67.41.157.504:27, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
Temujin's year of birth
Why does the text state that Ghengis was born between 1150 and 1160 when the text under his picture states that he was born in 1162? This lacks consistency.
This is a good question. Let's analyze the data:
My distant relative Samuel Sloan, who painstakingly assembled the best Genghis Khan genealogy that I've seen to date (which nonetheless might contain inaccuracies), reports here that Temüjin was born in 1161.
The Yesugei article reports that Temüjin was nine years old when Yesugei was poisoned to death by the Tatars.
This link points out that various sources allege that Yesugei died in 1180.
This article reports that Temüjin and Börte Ujin wed when he was about sixteen years old.
Samuel Sloan reports that Temüjin and Börte Ujin wed in 1182.
From this, it can only be deduced that Temüjin was born sometime between 1159 and 1171. I'm sure that there are other sources that can be brought into play here, but they probably won't alter this deduced range of time for his year of birth. I'm going to put that range in this article. -John Rigali (talk) 09:35, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm such an idiot. I just looked at the article's first reference for the very first time, which discusses much more authoritative citations of Temüjin's year of birth; I should've looked at it before letting my fingers "talk" here. I'm still putting in my two cents' worth, but it'll be more subtle and conciliatory. -John Rigali (talk) 09:51, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Aren'T many of these events (Yesügei's death, Temüjin's wedding with Börte, etc.) only known relative to Genghis Khan's birth? I.E. if you believe that Temüjin was born in 1155, Yesügei would have died in 1164, if you believe that Temüjin was born in 1162, then Yesügei would have been killed in 1170 etc? Plus does Rashid ad-Din really give "1155" or "year of (some animal)", i.e. a date that could refer to any year that gives the remainder 3 when divided by twelve, like 1131,1143,1155,1267,1179 etc.? Yaan (talk) 13:26, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
I have reverted your edits for now. 1162 seems to be the date most widely accepted, notably in Mongolia and the PRC, plus it's roughly in the middle of the other dates proposed (usually 1155 or 1167). Also, I think discussion pages should not be linked from the main article. Instead you could create a separate article on the topic Genghis Khan's year of birth or something. There are probably two or three historians that have dealt with the topic (Ratchnevsky? de Rachewiltz?), so I maybe it's possible to find some really authorative sources. Yaan (talk) 13:45, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Manipulation and unbalance to the original documents
In this article, some original documents have been manipulated and the different views about this issue is terribly unbalanced. It also contains too many mistakes. Although the view of the author is consistent with some “modern historians/politicians” in Mongol, Turkey and some Western countries who are trying to change the traditional conclusions that last hundreds of years/, the author simply ignored abundant original documents which he referred to as “exaggeration”
As one of the most terrible mistake, for the statement “Genghis Khan generally preferred to offer opponents the chance to submit to his rule.”, It is so terrible opposite to the truth that it would not be more mistaken to say Hilter. I believe the article would irritated most people with some history knowledge , especially historians, in Iran, Arabia, KoreaRussia, Ukraine and some other east European countries, if they have chance to read it from Wikimpedia. The anger would not be less strong than the Jewish people who found someone praise the "positive contribution to the world" from Hilter. In the history education in Russia and Ukrane, the invasion of the Mongols have been mentioned together with Hitler's invasion since WWII. There were museem in Russia and South Korea in memory of the millions of victims under the massacre.
According to hundreds authors from at least ten different countries during the period of Mongol Empire, including words from his own senior officers and Temujen himself, Genghis Khan generally preferred to kill at least all the male who would not become slaves of the Mongols, even they did not resisted not at all. Those who became his slaves was not any better because they were driven to dead by hard labor very soon, or they were simple used as human shield. He accepted surrender only if the opponents help him to kill more people. They raped all the women they captured and very often killed them after that, except a small part of them were kidnapped to Mongol as their slaves. As one of resource of their food supply, they often eated the meat of the victims they killed. They also use the dead body of victims as weapon, either for making fire or for bacterial infections. It was reported that the corruptive dead body was thrown into the city of their opponents. As a consequence, bubonic plague from their biological weapon caused death of more than 20 millions people in Europe. Although the result was not exactly they planned, but it was indeed what they try to archive all the time.
In his own words for educating his sons, Genghis Khan said “it is the greatest fun of men’s life who kill all the opponents and their family members, take over all the properties in order see how their women cries, than take their wives and dauthers to the bed and have sex with them.” Apparently his purpose of life is t making pains of other people. Genghis Khan and his men ripper opened people stomach looking for jewellery and zippered open womb of pregnant women and kill the unburned baby for fun. Although some “modern historian” praised Genghis Khan were generous to give valuable jewelers to his staff, however they “forgot” to mentions all the jewelers was plundered from other at expense of death for tens of millions people.
The article in Wikimedia avoid to quote tons of original documents from different countries so that evidence Gengish Khan engaged in larger scales of holocaust the Hilter was hided.
There are also many other inconsistency between original document and the citation. The Iranian historian (also a senior officer in the Mongol government) Rashid al-Din stated in his book that the Mongols systematically killed more than 1.3millions civilians in the Merv city, however, the author changed into a much smaller number into “killing more than 70,000”, without explanation. The article ignored many documents from different countries that records Gengiskhan and his army systematically murdered more than one millions civilians in a single city, including a report from a Italy ambassador which provided concrete description about how the Mongols systematically murdered every civilians including women and children; neither it failed to present the literature from the Mongols themselves, “secret history of mongol” in witch the authors present their proud for their success in murdering and plundering others. Instead, the article stated that whether the disappearing of 60 millions population after such systematic holocaust is due to the massacre is “unclear and speculative.”
Genghis Khan was regarded as hero and sometimes as a god in Mongolia and Turkey, due to their glory and proud in the past had been highly related to the conquers of Genghis Khan. Such warship was also supported by some historians in western countries, especially in America, probably as an effect to tense up relations between former Soviet Unions and it neighbors with nomad histories. While the author pointed out some “modern historians” believed the victims exaggerated the casualties, he failed to mention those “modern historians” forgot to present solid evidence to prove why those original documents from many different countries are unreliable and exaggerated.
The current article not only neglects the arguments from “worthless and untrustable bias of victims of” the poor Russians, Arabians, Chinese, Koreans and Russian, but also neglects negative conclusions about the impact of the Mongols. For example. In his book of “The history of the mongol conquests”, British historian Prof J.J. Saunders wrote: “As exponents of genocide, the Mongols was most notorious since the ancient Assyrians, who exterminated or deported whole nations, and their loathsome record in killings was unsurpassed till the NAZI massacres in our own day . Christian and Muslim chroniclers agree in this bloody tale of savagery.”
It is also not mentioned that the expense of the victims has never been considered by the “modern historians” when they were counting so-called “positive contribution” of Gengiskhan (such as bridging the silk road). It is comparable that some historians in former Soviet Union praise the positive contribution of Stalin without mentioning his victims. Similarly, the pro-Nazi historians the would not consider the victims of Hitler’s victims as any valuable thing so that they did not hesitate to count the “positive contribution of Hitler”. That type of historians should be considered as siding with the person they comments especially, after they tried to manipulate the original records as the author of this article did.
Based on more than above argument, It should be tagged that the neutrality of this article is disputed. If necessary I can present the original sources of all the above argument, and much more ancient documents which records the holocaust of the Mongols. As a neutral and balanced article, I think a major revision is needed in which the new materials should be included in the article without ruling out the existing ones.
Georgezh200722:06, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
This page is semiprotected; any username more than a few days old can edit it. There is no need for administrator assistance to edit this page. — Carl (CBM · talk) 02:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
However, given the highly emotional nature of the above complaint, there is a need to discuss any individual changes first, in detail and with specific citations to reliable published sources. If all you remember from Saunders' book is the nazi comparison, then you first need to demonstrate your willingness to actually follow NPOV. --Latebird09:07, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Take it easy, I won't edit the article if I am not welcome. Actually I am not sure that I plan to edit the article. but just a question, "If all you remember from Saunders' book is the nazi comparison, then you first need to demonstrate your willingness to actually follow NPOV", does this statement represent the official opinion of Wikepedia, i.e. anyone who cite the nazi comparison from Saunders' book might only remember that comparason and would be suspected as someone who do not follow NPOV? Could you kindly tell me whether you are an official administrator of Wikipedia?
I can certainly cite the reliable published source, many of them was written in the 13 century from different counties. but I am not sure if I am allowed to do it here. It would waste my time if I post here but will be deleted soon just because someone don't like to see those documents.
Let me test, the following texts were written by an arabiac author Ibn al-athir (1160 - 1233) and translated by Edward G. Browne, A Literary History of Persia, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1902), Vol. II, pp. 427-431. Does it meet the standard of Wikipedia or the Mr. Latebird for "reliable published sources"?"For even Antichrist will spare such as follow him, though he destroy those who oppose him, but these Tatars spared none, slaying women and men and children, ripping open pregnant women and killing unborn babes.
If the above document is reliable enough, the current article is certainly inconsistent to the original record. However, Wikipedia or Mr. Latebird perhaps consider the such record is highly emotional therefore unreliable and should not be present to the public?Georgezh200711:38, 19 June 2007 (UTC)"
Wikipedia doesn't have an "official opinion", so the answer to your first question is necessarily: no. Note also that being an administrator (which I'm not) is only a technical function, and does not give the opinion of an individual any more weight.
Sorry if my first comment came across as overly harsh, it's just that in most cases, someone starting a discussion with repeated hitler comparison tends to have other things in mind than NPOV. If that turns out not to be the case with you, so much the better!
As a third point: 13th century literature is regarded as primary sources, and needs to be treated very carefully. Those authors didn't follow the same scientific standards as historians do nowadays, so we can't just accept what they wrote as undisputed historic fact. To interpret their writings correctly, we need the help of secondary sources such as Saunders (preferrably several). The difference between those types of sources is explained in more detail in WP:NOR.
Last but not least, though, I can follow some parts of your criticism. Especially the introduction to the article is very "nice" to Genghis. But the rest of the text doesn't hesitate to mention the deaths he caused. I'm not familiar enough with the issue to say much about the 70,000 figure. The article Merv states that the city had about 200,000 inhabitants. But some historians seem to think that the killings there included fugitives from elsewhere. Does Saunders explain this in more detail? --Latebird12:41, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Well I think the original poster of this information could be correct, but there are still many sources in the web about Genghis Khan that 1) He and his armies were brutal when they fought 2) there is also abundant statement and impression that he held the motto of "surrender or die." I can also agree that he might not have abided by his surrender or die manifesto, particularly against the Chinese where I think he may have had personal reasons to massacre them even if they didn't resist, because of their long troubled history between Mongols and the Chinese. I agree that they Genghis' army was brutal, but to say that he killed anyone he saw is just a little extreme I think. There also seem to be an evidence that he destroyed resistance ruthlessly in the case of invasion of Khwarezmid Empire. He didn't attack the empire, but the Khwarezmian leader killed his messengers and caravans. I think extreme views are not really helpful in this article and say something like he killed on sight anyone is just little irrational to me. Also if Genghis killed anyone on sight, how did he made alliances with other people such as the Turks, Uighurs, etc.71.208.83.20403:55, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
Carpini
I have not read Saunders' book and the Mongol empire is not my core area of interest, but I also think there is a general problem with relying too much on primary sources since they are often the most biased ones. IMO it would be useful to at least inform the reader what source you are quoting from if it is a primary source. Something like "The arab author Ibn al-athir (1160-1233) wrote ...". Re. Carpini, he seems most focused on europe, he reports a lot of hearsay, some of it completely nonsensical (men like dogs), and in the version I have seen (here) he only seems to mention that the Mongols will destroy those that resist them (beginning of chapter 18, "How to resist them") Yaan12:58, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
If you read a version of Carpini's report with note of professional historians, you probably would find that part is not nonsense but how the Mongols proceed “information battle”. I read a version that translated into Chinese, in which a Chinese expert present notes on the original atrile. Concerning “men-like-dog”, he presents about 5 to 7 Chinese primary source, in which the author tell the same story as Carpini's did. And all the story directly came from the Mongols as retail It was suggested that this is an effort that the Mongols released false information to their foreigners.
In the same book, Carpini reported the Mongol heat the human dead body to obtain a sort of oil from the lipid and throw into the city siege for making fire that is very hard to put out. This was confirmed in many independent primary source in China how they make the fire oil. According to the note, Carpini was very wrong that it is Greece fire, because the Greek fire was made in a completely other way. He was also very wrong to say the fire from the oil can be put out by alcohol, it is opposite, the fire would become much stronger if alcohol was poured into it. The Mongols was very good to release this kind of false information as a tactic to puzzle others, to increase their chance of successful conquest.
In this two cases Carpini fell into their trap, however, there were also other ambassadors who was fooled with much more things. In the primary source “notandum for Mongol-tartart”(蒙鞑备录), which was written by a ambassador of Song dynasty (a southern Chinese state). The book serves as a propaganda for the Mongol Empire with much more false information comparing to Carpini’s book. Today people the information is false because they can check other primary source, for example, the Chinese ambassador claimed Gengiskhan was captured by the Jin Dynasty (a northern Chinese state) as a slave for more than ten years. However, people from plenty primary source prove Gengiskhan has never been slaves but a senor officer. So today people understand the Chinese ambassador transfer the false information because he was fooled. The Mongols told him they kill the civilians in Northern China because it is a justified revenge. They told him they would never raid Song Dynasty, because they have warm friendship with the Song state. In fact, after several years that book was written, when Gengiskhan exterminate Tangut (a western state in China), he send a part of his army to plunder inside Song territory. In the first town, they slaughtered 300 thousand civilians. Therefore, we know the false information in the primary source was released by the Mongols as a tactic in order to let opponenent be less alerted. The Chinese ambassador was apparently fooled and write his report for them.
In contrast, Carpini was much smarter and intelligent, however, the report from the poor Chinese ambassador is also highly valuable as Carpini. He wrote his observation that the Mongols systematically genocide the civilians after their conquest, but with a note that this is a justified revenge. He also written down that he was accompanied with beautiful concubines of the Mongols all the time during his mission with warm feelings, which confirmed that Maco Polo did not lie when he said he received similar entertainment. It also somehow explained why he was fooled so easily. After ten years, an other ambassador from the Song state did not receive the same entertainment. His report (a book called “Brief description for the black tartar”) is as alerted as Carpini. However, among these ambassadors , Carpini is the only one who noticed the Mongol deliberately release false information. Therefore I would regard him as a highly intelligent person
All the above primary sources, together as many others, such as “secret history of Mongols” as an education book written by the nobles, “compendium History” as official history book in the Mongol government in Persia, “Gengiskhan, history of the world conquer ” by Juvaini who was a Persian office in the Mongol government, book of Ibn al-alther’s (name forgotten) who was a famous school and historians in the area Gengiskhan fail to conquer (he wrote Arabic history with a lot of parts about crusader was quoted by modern historians) from are thought highly valuable and were used widely among the experts of Mongol Empire.
Carpini indeed retailed the false information in his report, however, it did not mean all the other information is false. Today people can check so many other primary source and compare each other and I am one of those who read most of the primary source. In fact I read more primary sources than many professional historians in western countries because I can read the ancient Chinese documents that have never been translated into other languages. Further more, there are translated version of many other primary source such as Persian, and Mongol source are only available in one of western language, such as French, Russian, but all of them are translated into Chinese from Western languages.
It is true that those primary sources are far from error-free and sometimes primary source lie about certain things. However, it is unlikely highly that authors from different ages and different countries cooperated to lie together in the exactly same way.. When their records are consistent, the primary source give reliable information. In the man-like-dog case, the reliable information is the Mongols release false information as tactic.
Comparing to different documents by different authors in different ages and different countries, it is not so difficult to know which one is reliable and which is not, even sometimes, which is wrong and why it is wrong. By comparing the documents, it is also not so difficult to know which authors for secondary source is more reliable and respectable and which is not. What kind of bias they have and why they have that kind. For me respectable historians’ means they did not make up false information deliberately.
By the same way, one can find that there are almost no historians are error free, however, respectable historians make error are due to lack of or misjudge the information. I found most historians both in western counties and in Russia, Arabia, Iran and China in the past are highly respectable. However, the author of the famous book “"Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World"”, deliberately release the false information. (He is not alone because there are some modern historians in China cooperate with him for some unknown reasons). However, I won’t sell my conclusion to any one, instead, I would only present the necessary information and leave the public to judge themselves.
BTW, you should re-read carpini’s book, in which he said those who submit themselves to Mongols did not have good chance to survive anyway. That is why he urge the Christian countries to resist. This was terrible true in China. In the area the resist was weak or zero, the population was sweept out by more at least than 90%. The Tangut was completely exterminated. In southern China where resistance was the strongest in the world, the Chinese population only disappeared 20%. If there is no resistance at all, Chinese population would have been completely disappear as what happened in Tangut, and there would be no China today. In fact, it is also very questionable if a lot of other nations can exist today if Chinese did not resist the Mongols for 70 years which the Mongols spend most of its resource on the richest country in the world at that time. The current article is really contradictive to the real history when it said Gengiskhan prefer to give mercy to those who would like to surrenders. Based on the various sources, it is simply not true, the truth is very close to what Carpani has written.Georgezh200723:03, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
According to the secret history, the Tangut did offer resistance after they had first tried to get behind Genghis' back (IIRC). Do you remember where exactly Carpini wrote that those who surrender would not survive long anyway, maybe offer a quote? I admit that the version of Carpini's text I linked to is rather old (late 16th, early 17th century), and it may be they just translated it from an inferior source. I don't think they had their latin wrong, though.
I've cleaned up the intro. It now contains much less unnecessary trivia, and focuses on the core points to describe Ghengis and his career. Any POV issues should now also be removed from that section. --Latebird16:40, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Thank you for your response. The current introduction part is very fair for me. But my compliant is still on the statements such as “Genghis Khan generally preferred to offer opponents the chance to submit to his rule without a fight” because I have read so many sources, both primary and secondary, that is contradictive to them. However, I know I have to present some solid evidence before requesting changes.
To answer your question:” The article Merv states that the city had about 200,000 inhabitants. But some historians seem to think that the killings there included fugitives from elsewhere. Does Saunders explain this in more detail?” No, Saunders did not because it is quite clearly described in the original book how they count. And your question is not difficult to answer at all for any one who read the primary source. In the case of Merv, according to the Juvani’s retailed some other distinguished muslim, the several thousand survivors spent 13 days to process (burn or bury) the dead body and they obtained the number. Juvaini also said this is only the dead body inside the city without including the dead body countryside.
For about 1700 years in history, those agricultural state neighboring to the nomad clans of Turkish or Mongol, sometimes Tungus speaking, and such as China, Korea and Persia, it is quite often that the nomad army come and kill a lager number of people in the whole city. And all of them knew very well that, if they did not burn or bury the dead body as soon as possible, some kind plague would be spread out very quickly and no one can survive. So there are many ancient Chinese literature which record they proceed the dead body and it is same in China that they only do it inside city but not in the countryside, presumably because the dead body is less dense so they are not so dangerous. It is not only in part of these literatures in which they count and record the numbers. In China, most such records are only kept in the local log book because Yuan and Qing dynasty have no interest to collect them.
It is even easier to answer the question how Merv, which only have 200,000 inhabitants, can give 1.3 million dead body. If you read Carpini’s book, you would find the Mongol’s killed almost every one they met. For those who live around the city, the only way to survive is to hide behide the strong wall of the city which the Mongols can not access on their horses. There are too many literature from different countries which records how Mongols drove the civilians in front of the wall and torture them to death. In the case of Kyiv, the Mongols run their horse with their victims drawing on ground to make them wail, so that people garding the city could not tolerance so they came out for surrender, but all in Kiev were killed. (My memory told me the number is more than 100,000 perhaps 300,000 but I have to check ). I saw more than 10 documents that records the Mongols drove the surrendered people in one city to attack next city, to let their opponents to consume their arrows. If the surrendered people did not die because of this, the Mongols will kill them and throw the dead body into the trench that protecting the city. In China the trench were quite deep and wide which implies that a large number of dead body are required to fill it. Carpini report the Mongols eat human meat if they do not find food. There are Chinese, Persian document also records the Mongols eat human body. This is also confirmed in “secret history of Mogol” by the authors who love Gengiskhan so much. In the case of Beijing, they have eaten all the people around the city so that Gengiskhan order them to eat their own soldier. Under such situtation people knew in hell that they would have no chance to survive other than hiding inside the city. Any historians who have read those documents would not ask questions how can a city with 200,000 inhabits gave 1.3 millions dead boby. But it is true that those supporters of Mongol empire who love Gengiskhan ask such questions in order to disqualify the documents. Instead of saying they are more scientific, I would say they are more political.
Concerning you statement “To interpret their writings correctly, we need the help of secondary sources such as Saunders (preferrably several).”. I have to say I do not agree at all. How did you know NPOV of Saunders have no problem? It is him but not me to compare Nazi and the Mongol Empire. I can present a lot more than several “secondary sources” to agree with Saunders, however, this is not definitely the reason I trust Sunders and the others. It also can not prove I am right, simply because Suanders and the others may have bias themselves. I trusted them because I read the primary sources myself and I did not find they are honest to the primary sources.
Suanders and the others live in 20 century and they have no way to know more than those who wrote primary sources in 13 century. How can anyone more scientific and get more accurate number of victims than those who count the number when they burn the dead bodies? I am afraid the recent scientific development such as DNA technology does not make people more intelligent about the murder case in 13 century, unless they can collect the finger print or DNA in the scene.
After all, how can one know secondary sources is more reliable than primary sources any way? When Josof Stalin (if Hitler is not allowed to mention) is loved by some academic historian in former Soviet Union and disliked by western historians, how can one judge who wrote correct information about the number of people Stalin executed. Any one can say those who escaped from Stalin’s execution may have bias. Their primary document are not reliable because they hate Stalin. However, the secondary source written by those historian loving Stalin in former Soviet Union is more reliable? Isn’t it the same for those “modern historians” who love Gengiskhan and ignoring the large amount of primary source from different countries and secondary sources against them? Georgezh200701:01, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
Can we please try to focus on the actual questions at hand? This talk page is meant as a tool for improving the article. Filling it with lengthy essays about only marginally related topics doesn't really serve that goal. Expecting us to search for the two or three relevant statements in all that text seems rather impolite. Most of it looks like Original Research anyway.
The Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines are not negotiable (at least not on article talk pages), so there is no point in arguing about source requirements here. Either accept, try to understand, and work with those requirements - or your efforts will likely be wasted. --Latebird08:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
You seem to be advocating blanket acceptance of primary sources at face value. Not only is this not acceptable on purely logical grounds, it's also rather contrary to the nature of wikipedia. Secondary sources are preferred-- this is not a scholarly journal of history, but an encyclopedia, and per NPOV we need to represent the research of others rather than our own original research. siafu16:49, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
There's a point in saying that it wasn't so nice and courteous. Let's look at the facts, Bukhara has a square called Shahidon (Martyrs). It is a place where Ghengis Khan and his army slaughtered people who sought refuge in a mosque (the square is outside the mosque).--Sahib-qiron (talk) 11:46, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
more violent deaths than any other individual before the 20th century
Is there a source for this? Ogodei, Hulagu, Khubilai and Timur probably were responsible for the death of tens of milions (each?) as well, and what about the guys who started/subdued the Taiping rebellion? I know it's a bit nit-picky, but IMHO WP should be as precise as possible. Yaan10:21, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
The main reference would be J.J. Saunders. I'm relying on the citations above by Georgezh2007, but I've found similar statements elswhere. I don't know if Saunders also makes him responsible for what happened after his death, though. --Latebird11:50, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
Actually, that reference only documents that some people don't like him, as far as I can tell. But an interesting data collection can be found among the external links: [1]. Several historians have commented on those figures, one of them is explicitly quoted further up on this talk page. --Latebird16:50, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
For some reason, the user reverting that part seems to entirely ignore talk pages (including his own), unless the article happens to be locked... --Latebird08:29, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
part on physical appearance
I cleaned up the wording on the section speculating on his appearance. The source clearly states that ad-Din (who never met Genghis, since he died before he was born, by the way) speculates that the legendary "glittering" visitor is the one with red hair, and blue eyes. NOT Genghis. Wikipedia isn't a place for "Aryan revisionism".
The high occurance of red hair in today's Khalka, Buryat, Uyghur, Kazak, Kirghiz and Tatar people makes it not unlikely that Genghis Khan actually did have red hair. Red hair should not be confused with Aryan. Central Asia's Turkic/Mongol peoples have a lot of red haired people amongst them. M0NG0LIANWARRI0R12:15, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Aren't there some references in the secret history where he is called/ where he calls himself black-headed (=black-haired)? Yaan21:33, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
That is not for you to decide. How can you delete it? Then I can delete all the stuff about Genghis khan which you find factual, I will call it contemporary. Add Ad-Din's description of Genghis khan a.s.a.p. Or can't you handle the truth, my friend? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.250.93.21 (talk) 17:50, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
The official Yuan Dynasty picture - the one in the infobox - shows a little circular braid right next to his ear. It is - not surprisingly - black. Might be worth mentioning in the article. Yaan19:53, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Nationalist/Racist Pro Mongolian Bias
Currently, almost every sentence in the article praises the murder and conquest of Khan and "his people". Someone actually wrote sentences that shamelessly claim that mongolians are the greatest people in the world. I will help, but more people need to edit this article and remove the blatant POV. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Closestyle321 (talk • contribs) --Latebird05:32, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
Of course, mongolian nationalists always watch this page and are preventing this article from becoming NPOV.Coolio133700:10, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
Which sentence are you exactly talking about? You are being vague? Which passage are you talking about? Point it? 67.41.152.9606:24, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
So we have three brand new accounts (Closestyle321 (talk·contribs), Coolio1337 (talk·contribs), Lyingwhile123 (talk·contribs)) created within half an hour, all immediately starting to say negative things about him, and you guy(s) think that will add credibility to your claims and help you "fight POV"? Think again... If you want to add phrases like "most of the civilized world" or "the rest of the world", or words like "criminal" and "heinous" to any Wikipedia article (not just this one), please provide multiple reliable published sources to support them. Don't just assume that every civilized person must automatically share your opinions. NPOV is what has been published by respected historians elsewhere, not just what happens to please you. Please also note that removing information from an article that is supported by sources is considered vandalism. --Latebird06:19, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
Agree with Latebird. If you provide any text of any kind you are required to provide credible sources because they are contentious issues, especially when describing his character, intentions, etc. The contents of this page is actual happenning. No one is making up this story and I'm sure there are changes that can be made in all the areas, but we don't want this to go the other way around like how it was before like 2-3 years ago. Objective and let's balance it out. "Murderous," "cannibal," "man-eater" words is really tough to include without any scientific and "credible" sources like university research, respective article like national geographic, science or whatever. We need sources above all. Thank you. If you try to make this POV in the other way, it will get removed very quickly no matter what you do. This is contentious issue for sure. I agree with you 67.41.152.9606:21, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
Section break
I just finished reading this article. There is NO doubt that article reaks of POV. There are ample citations for the fact that Genghis Khan raped a lot of women (or did not rape, but "consummated"). There is almost no mention of it: I can pick a lot of sentecces with weasel words and POV, and I really do not understand how any one can contest it without bringing in ulterior motives. Here is a sample:
Genghis Khan's practices: 1) Simplicity 2) Honesty... everything good. Tell me a man was born which was not criticized! Don't tell me he was Genghis Khan.
Large section discussing Mongol Empire, almost 1/3rd of whole article. Plus everything this ends with Mongol this, Mongol that. The article is about Khan. For example, the Mongolian Bow.. was it discovered by Khan? If it was in use previously, what is the need to mention it in here? Then the "fear" of Mongol army... not a sentence but lengthy sections with quotations!
Any leader's action is closely entertwined with his nation and politics. This was left for reason since it is closely related to Genghis Khan. These are not made up.
Positive perception of Genghis Khan leads to a large section of its own while negative section is 1 paragraph saying how the people he conquered think he was a bad guy. Let us keep our POV out, and present fact. "It is believed that the Hazara of Afghanistan are descendants of a large Mongol garrison stationed therein. Nevertheless, the invasions of Baghdad and Samarkand caused mass murders,.." Who believes it? What is the relevance of Hazara being Mongol descendants to the fact that he killed?
See above, Genghis Khan is closely related to his actions and the Mongols and the Mongol Empire. There is a reason that this is there. These were taken out earlier, but someone argued that this should be left in there. I think this should stay there. 67.41.145.8400:00, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Claimed descendants study: Is the study widely accepted? If not, is it widely criticized? If it is not, why not present it as a 'widely accepted theory' instead of "X in 2003 says something".
I agree with you, but the reason why this is there was there was a lot of talk of genghis khan's descendants, I mean a lot, there is arguments, hypothesis, i mean there is ton of it. This section was meant to recognize that. You can google those 67.41.145.8400:00, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
There are many many more problems, specially weasel wording of the whole article makes it a pain to read and get ANY idea about the Khan, instead it is more of a "starting of Mongol empire by this guy who was great but he killed so some people say he was bad".
The whole article is very low on citations, with big amounts of incoherent prose. There are also many images which will qualify for deletion.--Jahilia22:09, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
Then you can stop talking and start editing. Talk is cheap. You are welcomed to edit. There is nothing wrong with saying GK was bad and good. Fact. He killed a lot of other people and perceived very bad by them, but he is recognized as good and strong leader in Mongolia. That is just the fact. Look at his statue in front of the Mongolian government building. Do we just want to ignore that. He should be mentioned relative to all the viewpoints. Let's just describe what people think of him.67.41.145.8400:01, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
I have no interest in writing to please certain group of people. Counter attack is counter productive. I am talking because when I will do the "expensive" editing, you people will start edit warring which to me looks a lot cheap. And you know what. One MUST ignore the fact that he is worth ANYTHING in Mongolia. That kind of talk goes in 1 section, not the whole f***ing article! When I read this article I want to know about a guy, not some statue in Mongolia. So stop putting words in my mouth. Go read WP:NPOV and come back later.--Jahilia21:43, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
If you find weasel words, please just remove them, I'll certainly not defend those. On the other hand, there is the problem that many of his critics fail to take into account the historic context. They seem to think that human rights and the Geneva convention were already generally accepted standards at the time, which they clearly weren't. This is not to excuse any atrocities, but just to put things a bit more into perspective. If you look at how other medieval rulers of asia (and elsewhere) fought their wars before and after him, then you'll find that Genghis' cruelty was nothing out of the ordinary, as most of his opponents would have done the same deeds without hesitation. What differentiates him from them is that he was more successful overall, resulting in larger absolute numbers of victims. After some of the previous discussions, I've managed to mention those victims and to remove some glorification from the intro. I haven't done much with the rest of the article, mainly because I don't have any of the pertinent books at hand. However, I will systematically revert contributions in the style of "everybody must agree with me that he was a horrible person". Stuff like that simply doesn't belong in Wikipedia.
I agree that large parts of the "Mongol Empire" section should be merged into Mongol Empire (even if it will be difficult to figure out where exactly to draw the line). I disagree that his perception in Mongolia should be ignored. Are you also going to ignore the US perception on eg. Thomas Jefferson? That wouldn't make sense, would it? The subtitle "Claimed descendants study" is misleading. The study simply reports the genetic facts they found, while the many "claimed descendants" are really a seperate (even if somewhat related) topic. You're absolutely right that the article still needs a lot of work. A civil discussion about individual points (and without unfounded claims of "racism", or swearwords) will be a good start to get there. --Latebird13:50, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Thank you for a sane reply. Here is my idea: There should be NO section about "Mongol Empire", it is simply not needed. The information relevant about Genghis Khan is already in "Expansion and Military campaigns". There should be no section about "Genghis Khan's practices", "Perceptions of Genghis Khan today" and "Name and title". Instead, there should be a section named "Personal life", "Influences" and "Criticism". "Name and title" section should be moved to be 1st section, renamed as "Name". The "Influences" section may have different subsections, starting from "Mongol empire" which will state about Genghis Khan's role in bringing the Mongols together etc. Then we can have "central asia", "china" etc. In criticism section we can trash every thing bad about Genghis khan, and all the studies. Is it plausible?--Jahilia19:43, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Jahilia you are starting to sound POV with writing and expanding and rambling about the criticism section. I think the whole article can be tighted for sure (a lot), but I think "Mongol Empire" section can be tightened, perception of Genghis Khan is absolutely necessary. Nobody made that information up. Genghis Khan is "god" to Mongols and killer to others. That's just the fact. We are not trying to recreate history here. About the "criticism" section you can put criticism section in all the article of wikipedia under flower, human, country, etc. The negative things about GK's killing and conquest are fully discussed in the casaulty and destruction section. None of those information are ignored. You are being too emotional, chill out. There is a negative sections, but I think the article can surely be tighted but not delete full block and sections of text that someone did hard work on whether for good or bad. Just discuss. Nobody is planning to start edit wars with you, but if you put text out there that he "ate kid's livers", "scalped human heads," "boiled human eye," "drink his own urine" will surely be reverted back. Let's look at the other side of this issue here. Calm down first. Nobody is trying to destroy you here. So rational judgment and most of all need fact with credible sources and then we will have good article. 67.41.145.8401:13, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
No personal attacks, please. The IP is right: You need to stay cool if you want people to take you seriously. --Latebird17:21, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
Are you kidding me? Latebird, du bist total inkorrekt! du musst noch einmal lesen. ich finde kein PA, vielen dank! sondern die IP hat schlechter gesagt!--Jahilia22:35, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
Also, please read this article and stop putting words in my mouth! (You too, Mr. Anonymous) Then note that my basic accusation was of WP:POV. It is but a consequence if I point that out! Thank you very much. Here is something to cool down and re-read who is being^D^D^D^D^Dattacking personally.
"Perceptions of Genghis Khan today" would probably be better rolled into a "Legacy" section, discussing perceptions throughout history and the lasting effects of his actions. "Name and title" needs some discussion as this a confusing, though small, fact-- a contributor above in this discussion, for example, made the common mistake of referring to Genghis Khan as "Khan", as if this were a last name rather than a title. As for the Mongol Empire section, this should be shortened down to just a couple paragraphs, and all deleted information included in Mongol Empire, if it isn't there already. siafu01:31, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
Thank you! The article needs to be tightened up and needs to conform with Wikipedia standards should not look like an odd thumb! You are right about having a "Legacy" section. In this we can then have both positive and negative perceptions listed respectively in different subsections. I stick to the idea of having "mongolia", "central asia", "china" etc. as different sections. I also need different sections for positive and negative influences: "influence" and "criticism". So, we have two possibilities: +/- subsections in each "mongolia", "china" etc.; "mongolia", "china" as subsections in +/-. What do you say? We can remove/merge this subsections later if they don't have much content.
Then we need to cut down the article size which is 84kb as of now, totally inappropriate.
Also, it was probably me who referred to him as Khan, which is a correct use if you refer to someone as "the Emperor" or "the Queen" or something.--Jahilia17:00, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
It's hard to give constructive criticism when someone proposes to put an article almost entirely on its head. My suggestion would be not to throw out the baby with the bath water. Let's proceed step by step, and discuss seperate issues individually. Of course, uncontroversial maintenance edits like you did so far don't usually need any dicsussion. The predominant English variant of any article should be preserved, although I'm not very fluent in the subtleties. --Latebird14:11, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
I am sorry if I came too harsh. I am straightforward and the only thing I expect is to get this article up to GA at the least. Also note that IP was much more uncivil, telling me that if I write he used to "drink his own urine", I will be reverted. Is that the way to criticize constructively? I know Genghis is regarded as "god" in Mongolia but that does not mean this article should look like a pamphlet. He was an important person who shaped history of a lot many places other than Mongolia, good or bad is nothing I need to decide, and no one should. History was made by an important person, and it deserves to be at least GA.
Regarding English, I am not sure which kind of English is spoken in Mongolia. Is it British or American? A Mongolian can answer. As far as I know, Britain never ruled Mongolia so I think we need to use American.--Jahilia17:11, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
Hey Jahilia I'm sorry for saying stupid things. The reason why I said that was that the 2 year ago this article was really close to saying something like that. Barbaric was included everywhere I mean it was a mess. That was not a personal attack. Sorry. I think I would align with the American English for this one, like using "z" instead of "s," but who cares as long as it is good. Yeah I mean I try to be constructive, but I don't want this article to become something that people just come in and attack it in every way and keep neutral and worldwide viewpoint, that's what I'm trying to say. Let's just say it as it is objectively, if they killed millions let's just say that, if he is regarded as god in Mongolia let's say that. Let's just make it happen without any emotions, but I mean to the Mongolians this person is next to Buddha. I mean they really look up to this guy and is regarded as a savior. That's a fact just look at his big statue in front of the Mongolian parliament building basically 67.41.145.8405:25, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
Temüjin's ger
The article shows a modern ger from Mongolia, but gers from the 12th/13th century are often said to have had a more copped roof (see for ex. the 500 Tugrik note [2]). I guess the question of what these gers looked like is hard to decide nowadays, but I'll at least change the image's caption. Yaan15:50, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
It is captioned in the image that this image is close to genghis khan's ger. It doesn't say this ger is exactly like gk's ger 67.41.145.8400:02, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
The shape of the historic yurts is well known. The roof poles were curved to form a type of short chimney, helping the smoke from the open fire out of the yurt. The modern shape with straight roof poles was developed during the time of socialism, after iron stoves and chimneys had been introduced. The yurt on that picture would probably have looked severely broken to Genghis. I don't think it should even be in this article. Do we really have no image of a historically shaped yurt? --Latebird12:43, 4 August 2007 (UTC)
Yes that was the issue. There is no other images available. The reason why the picture is in there is to give some kind of concept and idea of what he lived in. I think the historical yurts are very close to this, especially since it is cirgular and angular roof. I think this image is better than nothing so that people don't imagine him living in like a concrete castle like earlier European times. This is better than nothing. The caption also states that it is "similar" and not like this is exactly it. 72.244.34.5020:23, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
"Similar" is a difficult word... The modern yurts have a distinctively different silouhette than the historic ones, which makes me reluctant to include one in the article. There must be some old pictures that we can use? Apparently there are none on Commons, so we should go search something. There are also a few reconstructed ones standing in UB as exhibitions or restaurants. Maybe we can send someone to take a picture. --Latebird14:10, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
If you have the exact image/picture that would totally work. That's fine with me, but without the image, having nothing is worse than the existing picture I think. 67.41.145.84
Walther Heissig's "Ein Volk sucht seine Geschichte" shows a picture of a ger with a more conical roof - and, it seems, a felt cover instead of a linnen one - at the Genghis Khan Mausoleum at Ejen Horo. But think it's rather unlikely that I'll go there and take an own picture in the near future, plus the picture was made before the cultural revolution. Btw. I think the present type of ger was introduced before socialism - a picture can be found on the later pages of a 1913 book and I'd dare to guess also on Mazar Sharav's (sp?) "One day of Mongolia". Maybe straight roof poles are simply easier to produce and transport? Yaan12:37, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
If you have images in such old books, then you can scan them and upload to the commons, as they will be PD. --Latebird15:26, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
The book with the picture from Ejen Horo is only from 1965. The picture is a bit older, but probably not much (1962?) The 1913 book shows a ger that looks just like those used today. Plus I only have it in digital form downloaded from the site linked to above, but in an earlier version of lower quality. Yaan16:09, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
Any photograph taken in Mongolia before 1972 is in the public domain both in Mongolia and in the US. See mn:Template:PD-Mongolia for details. We should probably create a similar template for the commons. --Latebird17:01, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
But what about photographs taken by MPR nationals in the People's Republic of China (INside a fixed building, if that makes a difference)?Yaan17:12, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
P.S. I'm not even sure the picture was first published in Mongolia. The picture was made by B.Rinchen, and he and Heissig were colleagues, so the 1965 book might well have been the first publication. Yaan17:15, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
I don't know personally and I never heard of exactly French people paying tribute but it is proven that may people paid tribute particularly the Russians, Chinese, Middle Easterners. Tributes were paid, but I'm not really sure about the French paying tribute. But Mongols invaded Poland, so it could happen, but I haven't heard of anything like that. 72.244.34.5020:25, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
The Mongol Hordes never made it into France. They did conquer places like Hungary, that's why a lot of Hungarians have red hair. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.102.35.179 (talk) 00:05, August 21, 2007 (UTC)
"A friend told me" is not a useful basis for discussion here. Please provide reliable published sources, and we'll consider the question. --Latebird16:51, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
André de Longjumeau was an envoy apparently sent to the Mongols by the king of France. He probably did not come to the Mongols empty-handed, and the Mongols at that time seem to have considered every foreign embassy as a gesture submission, and might therefore have interpreted any of Longjumeau's presents as tribute. But the intentions of the French were of course very different, and in any case France was never ruled directly or indirectly by Mongols.
IIRC there is evidence of French people being taken prisoner by the Mongols (like the guy who built the famous silver tree in Kharkhorin that is mentioned by Rubruck), and they would probably have had to pay as much tax as other prisoners in Kharkhorin.
I used to think that red hair was much more typical for Irish than for Mongols, btw.
There seems to be an awful lot of bizarre speculation in this thread. The Mongols did not conquer Hungary, though they invaded and fought there; they turned back on the death of Ogodei and stayed within Russia from then on. They also did not leave a genetic legacy of red hair there-- according to ancient Greek sources red-haired people were already living in Thrace and along the Volga (see Red hair). Finally, France was never subject to the Mongol Empire in any way, but most diplomatic missions involved a presentation of a gift or gifts during that period, so "tribute" in that sense was delivered (as eloquently explained by Yaan). Genghis Khan did say many times that he believed that the Mongols would eventually conquer the entire world, though, so it's no surprise that the Mongol Khans saw every visitting foreigner as a subject or as a tributary inferior. siafu16:17, 24 August 2007 (UTC)
Interest in Taoism
The article currently says, "The monk's negative answer disheartened Genghis Khan, and he rapidly lost interest in the monk." However, in the very next sentence, it goes on to say, "He also passed a decree exempting all followers of Taoist religion from paying any taxes." This seems to be a contradiction. Why would someone exempt an entire religion's followers from paying taxes, if they had no interest in even one of most well-known monks of that religion? --- Jel08:38, 27 August 2007 (UTC)
The clergy of all religions were exempt from taxes. This is the first time I hear that normal followers of taoism were included as well. Do we have good sources for that? Wouldn't that mean that most of China had to have been tax free? At least the latter seems unlikely... --Latebird —Preceding unsigned comment added by Latebird (talk • contribs) 20:25, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
The section "Objective View of Genghis Khan" violates NPOV
If not for content, then for the title. I honestly can't see any way to avoid this conclusion. In Wikipedia where we all admit to biasses, the only time anyone would use the words "an objective view" is to attempt to slip their own bias into the article.
"Assuming good faith" doesn't give this a pass -- although AGF does indicate what the person who wrote/maintains this section is trying to do. Obviously, every person has some good, praiseworthy qualities (sociopaths & the criminally insane aside), & this section is an attempt to highlight those qualities in Genghis. Also, I concede that something like this is needed to provide an NPOV view of Genghis. Yet looking at this section header & reading the text, it is hard not to summarize it as "But you know, although he was responsible for the deaths of countless people, Genghis wasn't all bad. He loved his children, provided for his followers, and never abused animals." Not only does this fail to convince, if it wasn't written to push one specific point of view, a suspicious reader can't help but suspect that it was so written.
And then there is the issue of original research: this section begins with the ominous words, "It is not entirely clear what Genghis Khan's personality was truly like, as with any historical person without an autobiography." In other words, since there are no firm facts, this article will attempt to prove a thesis. Were there an authority who discusses these matters & could be quoted -- even if it could be said that this section is based on the POV of Genghis taught in Mongolian schools -- it would help avoid this problem.
I offer this as disinterested advice; were I to be told {{sofixit}}, my response would be to simply delete the entire section. I hope that those who care can find a way to resolve this problem. -- llywrch18:18, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
People are going to be passionate about this subject. Whether he was a horrible killer or a great leader is really a matter of personal opinion. The only way to make this article non-biased is to include both viewpoints and why those viewpoints exist, to put it all in perspective for the reader.
Just MHO. Spritzie03:38, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Ok here is my conclusion Llywrch has extremelly good point. I think this should be section deleted and the relevant and stronger and concrete facts to be absorbed into rest of the sections. This does sound like POV but this section does have some tangible facts that partially in some way describes the actual person but how this is presented is matter of contention. I think this section is good in some way since there is negative and destruction and "casualty" section specifically detailing the negative things, but I mean even in Hitler wikipedia article, you can put objective view and include his love for the German people, country, industrialization, environmental record, but how this is persented is the matter of contention. Some of the texts in this section is definitely sourced and cited in the secret history of the Mongols and elsewhere but we need to present this in a non-weasel word kind of way. Good point. What do you others think about this? If we agree, let's do something about it. I'm kind of reluctant to just delete this whole section completely since there isn't a lot of good information on Genghis Khan anyway, which would make the article very short for this well-known person. 67.41.203.18106:09, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
I made changes regarding this. This section looked POV to me for some time. I absorbed the text into other sections, bulk of the text is still in the article but re-organizated into different section. Feel free to edit. 67.41.203.18106:31, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Why not just let the facts speak for themselves? It is well known that he was responsible for many deaths, but we still shouldn't call him a "killer". It is also well known that he cared very well for his family, which extended to all Mongols and similar nomadic tribes to some extent. It is less well known but still well documented, that his esteem for virtues like honesty varied a lot depending on the target audience. Among nomadic peoples, trust was an absolute, and the "surrender and survive" promise was always kept. Against enemies with different types of cultures (sedentary populations, and especially islamic cultures), deceit in warfare was more the norm. If we can describe this distinction based on facts, then the NPOV issue might go away for a while. --Latebird13:05, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
I understand your point but the issue here was that "how" this is presented. For instance this section even though says "objective" view of Genghis it in fact listed all positives and never the negatives. That was the issue. You can create this kind of section call it "objective views of Hitler" and then underneath it include all positives which he had in certain degree. Also I agree with the below editor's comment that this section was very poorly cited and reference included, which makes it kind of weasel and rambling section. Again, bulk of the text is inserted into other sections that I think should fit in. I'm convinced that this objective view section make this article kind of childish, rambling and poorly cited article. I also kind of agree that once this article is fully cited, this article will generally incline towards the negative view of Genghis Khan because so many people talked about his negatives, but positives views are stronger in Turkey, Mongolia, China and probably Japan or somewhere else, but this is emotional topic and we can't re-write history. How this is presented is very contentious and that section had subtle strong POV in it. 67.41.203.18120:57, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
As I wrote above, presenting the more positive attitude from one of these countries -- especially if it can be documented -- would be a useful corrective. And my hope would be that if someone from one of these countries passionately fights over this article for that reason, that person's energies is gently channeled to documenting what they were taught (e.g. if it was in their schoolbooks, provide a cite to the schoolbook), thus improving the article to everyone's satisfaction. -- llywrch22:08, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
My issue about this objective view of gk is mostly about how it is presented. The situation that can arise is when for instance on Idi Amin article, you cite all the sources but you include all the positives about him, which would be legitimate wikipedia article. Total and excellent citation doesn't solve the problem of NPOV since we need a little different tone. I'm kind of uncomfortable about creating a "objective" section and including all the positives since we can do that to Hitler, Mussolini, Columbus and Amin. You know? I like the set up right now since we deleted that special section to objective view 67.41.203.18101:23, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
The article is getting better. If there was a nation that believed Hitler was a great leader you'd have to include that too, if only to document how other people view him. It's not really good vs. evil. If the Mongols believe he is the greatest leader on earth and there is documentation to support that, it should be in the article. But the article shouldn't be an obvious love song about Geng. Kahn. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spritzie (talk • contribs) 14:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I agree the section is biased, but I don't feel comfortable deleting someone else's work. I actually don't know much about GK so I can't tell the fiction from the fact. That is the worst thing about this article. The author didn't include the citations needed to make it credible. I propose a joint effort. If someone can go through and cite the document as needed, I can rewrite the existing sentences and make it stronger. GK is a famous figure and this article probably gets viewed by thousands every day. Let's make it a Wikipedia article to proud of. Spritzie14:42, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
just a quick question:
Growing up i was told many versions of stories about Genghis Khan and then later learn a bit of it through history of the world class in school. One thing I keep wondering but never come across in history text books is the daughter(s) of Genghis Khan. In one version of a folklore, he has a daughter that he loved very much but in history books, no one ever talks about any of Genghis Khan's daughter, is there a reason why? Е
I'm pretty sure he had daughters otherwise he is dedicated to giving birth to all sons, which would be kind of nonsensical. I'm sure he had daughters, but the reason why they are not included much like the possible other sons and daughters of gk is that the history of Mongols around the world is mostly about military and conquests which usually involves the men, so there is I guess less documentation and writing about their daughters. Also women played important role in the Mongol empire as evidences by Toregene Khatun and others. I'm sure he had daughters, but this history is men-oriented for some reason, but there is no disrespect to the Mongol women. 67.41.194.15522:51, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Thank you for the reply, but why would folklore talks about a beloved daughter of GK when there are none recorded in history? Have anyone ever come across a text that would indicates her name? and/or of her the presence? mommyofif 10 09 2007.
I would guess that is just folklore and that doesn't necessarily a fact. Good question. I think the reason why the females are less talked about is that the Mongolian culture for centuries revolved around the men. They hunted, raided and found food etc. Secondly, because of the previous set up, younger women were basically given as a gift to other family's male so that some kind of tribal connection can be established. Younger women were not the major player to start off with, but they may get influential later if they are smart and stronger. I think that's why there are less known females related to Genghis. But history writes that gk had a sister named Temulen. On the other hand before we decide that the females were useless and less important that is very wrong, for instance Töregene Khatun, Borte (she was very respected among gk's followers and by gk himself and the totally unrelated Mandukhai Khatun. Mongols really respected women, especially the stronger and brave women because the males will usually see them as "men" because of she is decisive and strong. Older and tough women were respected much more than the week males in the society like lazy and drunkards. Since GK and his male successors created havoc, I think it has naturally overshadowed the females, but if we look we can read a lot about the older females in the history books. I don't read those a lot. I hope this helps. And about the beautiful legend and folklore about some females, the Mongols also liked beautiful women like others :) and the ordinary folks will start discussing how the GK family royalty families were beatiful and well taken care of. The ordinary females will see the GK related females as beatiful and as fashion and look wise will try to copy them. I think that is just fascination and that got finally got written in the novels. Everybody likes beatiful women and like talking about them:-) That is the simple explanation. It's kind of a romantic and dreamlike writings I would guess besides the havoc created by the males military personnel. Not all Mongols were in the military and women needs something to do and so they glamorize the looks of the royal females. 67.41.148.22602:06, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
Linking to Wiki-articles
User:71.94.158.71 asks why we don't generally link to Wiki-articles. Answer:
We wiki-link rather than link through http:
We generally link to secondary sources or sometimes primary sources, rather than tertiary sources, such as Wikipedia
When we link as a reference, we enclose it in a <ref></ref>
In this specific case [3] I'm changing the http: link to a wiki-link. The info box at Mongols is a satisfactory source for the statement. But the preceding statement (re: Chinese national hero) could use a citation. Sbowers313:26, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
In the specific case, the {{fact}} isn't there because of the numbers (those are well documented). But we need a source to confirm that those number are actually the reason why Genghis is considered a national hero in China. --Latebird14:50, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
Okay. So the first "fact" is whether the Chinese actually consider him a national hero; the second "fact" is, as you said, whether the ethnic numbers are the rationale. The now wikified link to Mongols doesn't verify either fact. If a citation is found for the first fact, it might also verify the second fact. Sbowers318:47, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
Jenghis Khan is the true spelling of the name, numerous documentries, my book i have from my library call him jenghis, and i suggest that we atleast go with the proper spellign and have this be a redirect page... plus then the pro mongol people here would be somewhat happy and we'de be speeling correctly.--Cody622:46, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
And who exactly decided on this spelling to be the only true one? In reality, it is by a huge margin less common than the one we currently use, so in light of the Wikipedia naming conventions, a name change is extremely unlikely. And what on earth does this have to do with someone being pro or anti mongol (whatever that means)? --Latebird23:16, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
The correct Mongolian name is mentioned in the introduction - in latin, cyrillic and classic Mongolian letters. Yaan18:35, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Really? i searched, jenghis didn't show up til a while later... And that dependso n if we want people ot learn the wrong or right name, it is jenghis kahn, or temuchin when not as a kahn--Cody600:52, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
So, Michael praawdin, who made a book, with sources over 6 pages, and mentions it only as jenghis, and the fact that any mongol will say its jenghis, and that ghengis is the mangled name, and the fact that mongol/asian/european/american histroians will learn that it is jenghis, ghengis is not his name, its the western worlds distortion of his name, temuchin was his real name but was hcnaged eventuly. You are wrong, the article is wrong about his True name.--Cody605:13, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Yes yes, and Rene Grousset wrote an entire book with an eight page bibliography using only the spelling "Chingis". Should we switch to that one, then? In fact, it's not even accurate to say "Khan", as Khan is just a shortening of the contemporary "Khagan". The whole purpose of the naming policies are to preserve the most recognizable names for page titles and use; this is an encyclopedia, things need to be looked up. Hence, we retain "Genghis Khan". siafu13:53, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Before continuing this discussion, please make sure that you have read and understand the relevant Wikipedia policies:
In light of those policies, and in light of the absolutely dominant use of "Genghis" in most other literature, the minority opinion of your Mr. Praawdin has no relevance for Wikipedia. --Latebird11:17, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Minority... An enire fucking nation beleives in this name, and ghengis is more used because the western world screwed up the name, his name is jenghis.... go to mongolia and ask anybody.--Cody612:46, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, seeing as the "entire fucking nation" writes everyting in Cyrillic these days, that statement is not exactly accurate. "Jenghis" is just one possible phonetic transliteration. "Chingis" and "Jingis" are equally acceptable on those grounds. siafu13:57, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Other than you (very obviously), I've been to Mongolia, have many Mongolian friends, am learning Mongolian myself, and edit in the Mongolian language Wikipedia. The idea that any reasonable person would "attack" you for using a name that is very common in most of the world (not just in English) is ridiculous at best. You are trying to sell your own personal opinion as general fact here, and you are bound to fail. Please learn to accept reality as it is (and not as you'd like it to be), and you'll avoid many pointless debates. --Latebird20:13, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I think you (not Latebird) need to look up Cyrillic alphabet and Mongolian script. The Mongolian name for Genghis is given in the first sentence in both scripts in use by Mongolians today, and in both cases it just doesn't seem to read Jenghis - unless I'm missing some peculiarity of the Mongol script which may still be the case. Anyway, six or eight pages of bibliography doesn't really seem to make a difference for me. I happen to know Groussets work, and he even has a Wikipedia entry, but Praawdin is unknown to me. Yaan15:50, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
Update: German Wikipedia has an article on Michael Prawdin. Interesting that he would use "Tschingis" as the German transscription for GK's Mongolian name in his 1938 book (the German version of this work seems to be the original one). The more common German name would be Dschingis, but Tschingis is of course much closer to the (current) Mongolian pronounciation. Yaan16:12, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
Name throughtout the article
Okay as I go through the article I notice he is referred to as both Temüjin and Genghis Khan. It needs to be consistent and organized. Any thoughts on how to do this? Spritzie23:46, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
My idea is that before 1206 he is Temujin and after 1206 when he became khan and took the new title "Genghis Khan" that is his title or name after 1206. Therefore after 1206 he is "Genghis Khan."67.41.212.19707:16, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
After the section of the article that actually discussed the life of Genghis, there is a long section on the Mongol Empire. That section has no place here, in an article that is supposed to be about Genghis. I am going to paste some of that material into the Mongol Empire as appropriate, but it has to go from here. Vidor04:41, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
"Kahn!" A rock opera based on the life of Genghis Kahn
Yes. Because something most people do not know is the very definition of encyclopaedic material. Makes perfect sense. Nothing like pop culture derivative art to bring new life to actual history. Go for it.
The section that discusses the origin of the name Temujin contains a statement that Temujin would have been familiar with the use of iron for horseshoes. Now the Secret history of the Mongols explains the name quite differently (Temujin was named after a captive of his father), but the more important question is: Did 12th century Mongols use horseshoes? I have been to Mongolia two or three times and also seen some horses, but never with horseshoes. Yaan17:39, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
Mongolians don't normally use horseshoes today, and it's very unlikely they did then. This is probably just one of those speculations added by western authors unfamiliar with the situation. --Latebird18:30, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
I woud say horseshoes are used today only when you need to ride inside a city on an asphalt road. So I think it is highly unlikely that horseshoes were used during that time. But it is possible Temujin has something to do with ironsmith, I think people used to make swords in Mongolia. Well on the other hand the name just could be a symbol for hardship and strength, nothing to do with one's profession. Temur16:54, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
Original research in "Controversy" section
The first paragraph in the "Controversy section" appears to be largely a work of original synthesis or interpretation. While a "controversy" section will understandably contain some subjective statements, there are currently no source citations for the stated perspective, and there appears to be only a weak attempt at providing multiple points of view. In particular, I am very uncomfortable with these sentences as currently presented: "Therefore, there is an entire culture that identifies with Khan as a leader and founder, much as George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and others are viewed as the “founding fathers” of The United States of America. Genghis Khan is undisputedly both the creator and destroyer of nations, and remains a debatable figure, even to modern scholars." Milnivlek16:46, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Since pretty much all of your assumptions are wrong (did you actually read the article?), your conclusions are the same. --Latebird07:06, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
This is controversial, but I think he wasn't like blue eyed and blond haired individual. He is reputed to have had green eyes, but that doesn't mean he is "white." There are a substantial number of Mongols, Kirgiz, Tatar people that have green eyes, but look like Asian in appearance. He wasn't nordic for sure, some kind of Central Asian mixture. I wouldn't say if you saw Genghis walking the streets, you will think he is 100% white just by his facial features. He was mixture like all Central Asian people, but I wouldn't say he is "white." He identified himself as "Mongol" he was born in present day "Mongolia," he in no shape or form identified himself as "Turkish." His identity is Mongol and Mongols see him as Mongol. Eye color, hair color, height isn't a big issue with Genghis Khan in Mongolia. Regardless of his eye color, hair color, etc. Mongols see him as one of them and that dude can get Mongol like no others. Green eyed Asian, how about that?67.41.192.1719:32, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not the place to speculate without sources. That being said, let's clear up the most basic misconceptions:
He wasn't "Tartar" (where did you get this from?)
Turkish is not the same as Turkic. The people of Turkey are of mediterrenian descent. They just happen to have adopted an asian (turkic) type of language. But they have no significant genetic connections to the original turkic tribes of central asia.
As a Mongol, Ghengis' tribe was vaguely related to the turkic and tungusic tribes of the region, which makes him 100% asian. Just because some people there happen (even today) to have red hair or green eyes doesn't make them "white" by any stretch.
Once you understand all this, you'll also understand that there is no actual "controversy". It's just that the word root "turk..." appears in several contexts, with entirely different meanings. People who aren't careful to keep those meanings apart will easily get confused. --Latebird06:06, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes there is no controversy. He is Asian, particularly proud Mongol and nothing else! There is no white person can be born in Mongolia, and even that happened history would've pointed that out very easily and he won't be nominated "Khan" from the Mongols. There has to be some relationship and similarity between him and his subjects. White people aren't that famous and charasmetic to be nominated from Mongols and physical difference in that case would be a big topic if he was white person among asians. lol 67.41.192.1706:58, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
It is very common in Mongolia to encounter yellowish (if not blonde) haired and/or green eyed person. Some of my relatives have green eyes, one of my friends had very blondish hair when he was kid and it became not so obvious now. Temur18:04, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
name and title section
There are two different explanations for how Chinggis became Genghis given in this section, without explaining the apparent contradictions between the two. To me, "medieval romanization" looks like complete nonsense, so I am a bit inclined to delete that one. But I don't really feel confident enough in that matter. In any case, it might be helpful to look up which spellings (if any) Rubruck,Carpini, or Marco Polo used. Yaan20:10, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
The "medieval romanization" that's referred to is from Persian, so they're really the same explanation. I wrote the first one, quite a while ago, as a footnote, but it's apparently since been moved into the article body. Apparently the rearrangement there left the article with parallel explanations that don't appear to match. siafu20:40, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
Unless any one has a source which shows the derivation of Genghis from Chenggis due to the fact that there is no "ch" sound in the Persian tongue (!!!!!) , I think it should be rewritten. As a matter of fact the name is written as Chenggis in several Persian historical documents. Perhaps whoever wrote this meant to write there was no "ch" sound in Arabic. The only reasonable explanation would be that the name was transformed not because of the way it was pronounced but because of the way it was written as most scripts recorded by the Persian historians of the time would have been recorded in Arabic. On a second note there is also no "g" ( as in grapes ) sound in Arabic which could explain the transformation of "gg" to "gh". 21 December 2007 (UTC)
![[2]](http://www.banknoteworld.com/banknotes/mongolia/MongoliaP66-500Tugrik-2003-dab_b.jpg){kind=link}