Download PDF | The Secret History Of The Mongols A Mongolian Epic Chronicle Of The Thirteenth Century By Anon.
292 Pages
PREFACE
The pages below represent a shortened version of the three volumes — totaling over 1700 pages — of Igor de Rachewiltz’s similarly-titled work published by Brill in 2004 and 2013.
The first two of these volumes provides a full English translation of the 13" century Middle Mongolian text known as the Secret History of the Mongols, with lengthy introduction explaining the nature and origin of that text (with much background information) plus detailed commentary on details in this new translation. After these come seven appendixes, full bibliography, and indexes of names, subjects, grammar and lexis. The volumes include also various maps and illustrations, and a table showing the genealogy of the man named Temiijin who became Cinggis Qan — better known in the west as Genghis Khan.
Volume 3 consists of addenda and corrigenda to the earlier two, correcting a number of minor errors and omissions discovered after publication, and adding information provided by newly published works or other scholars.
Publishing such a massive work must, of course, have been very expensive, and Brill can scarcely be blamed for passing such expense on to purchasers. But the high price for all three books makes it likely that most copies will remain in libraries or be owned by specialists or one sort or another. The de Rachewiltz translation deserves a much broader audience, for unlike earlier attempts in English, it is pleasant and easy to read while remaining close to the spirit of the original.
It is hoped that the present shortened version of this invaluable work will be useful to students in various fields of study other than merely linguistics, philology, and Mongolian studies: to students of history, cultural anthropology, and geography, for example, or East Asian or Central Asian studies in general. And that it may give pleasure to many general readers as well.
John C. Street 14 June 2015 Madison, Wisconsin
INTRODUCTION
The 13" century work known as the The Secret History of the Mongols (Monggol-un niuca [= ni’uca] to[b] ca an) is the earliest and most important literary monument of the Mongol-speaking people... . [It] is the only genuine (not to be confused with reliable) native account of the life and deeds of Cinggis Qan — our Genghis Khan — one of the world’s outstanding figures.’
So begins the Introduction (pp. xxv-Ixxxil) to de Rachewiltz’s volumes of 2004-2013, hereinafter abbreviated RSH, the chief points of which are summarized below.
The author continues: In form, too, the Secret History is unique, ‘for no other nomadic or semi-nomadic people has ever created a literary masterpiece like it, in which epic poetry and narrative are so skilfully and indeed artistically blended with fictional and historical accounts.’ ‘Its poetry reflects the pure, unmitigated tradition of the nomadic tribes of Mongolia and of the Turkic- and Mongolian-speaking inhabitants of the vast steppe-lands of Inner Asia.”!
‘Linguistically too, the Secret History provides the finest and richest source of Preclassical Mongolian (in its reconstructed “written” form) dating from the first half of the 13th century, and of Middle Mongolian, the language actually spoken in the second half of the 14th century — a language lacking any artificiality, simple and direct in style, [and] far removed from the learned and often convoluted syntax of so-called Classical Mongolian. In this respect, one can say with A. Waley that its “story-tellers’ tales...are some of the most vivid primitive literature that exists anywhere in the world”, words echoed by F. W. Cleaves who called the Secret History “one of the great literary monuments of the world”.””
Although at a later date the text was divided quite arbitrarily into twelve or fifteen chapters and 282 sections or paragraphs, ‘the Secret History is a continuous narrative with comparatively few lacunae and interpolations in the text. ... The order of events discussed is chronological, but the first date, corresponding to AD 1201, appears only in §141 (Chapter 4). Chapters 1-12 (up to §268) describe the life and career of Cinggis Qan from his birth, probably in 1162 ($59), to his death in 1227 (§268), prior sections being devoted to his ancestry and the legendary origins of the Mongol tribe and clans. The final portion of the work (§§269-281; see below) deals with the election of Ogédei Qa’an...and with some events of his reign (1229-41), without however mentioning his death. The narrative ends (§282) with a brief and apparently incomplete colophon recording where and when our text was completed.’
1. Origin and History of the Text
The colophon just mentioned is deceptively precise: it states that ‘The writing was completed at the time when the Great Assembly convened and when, in the Year of the Rat, in the month of the Roebuck, the Palaces (ordos) were established at Dolo’an Boldagq... ... The month of the Roebuck is the seventh lunar month, but to which Year of the Rat (in the duodenary animal cycle) does the colophon refer?
This whole matter has been extensively discussed by writers over the past seventy-five years.’ At first the year 1240 was generally assumed, though our sources report no Great Assembly (yeke qurilta) for that year. The prior Rat Year was 1228, and such an assembly was in fact scheduled for that year — called to choose a successor to Cinggis Qan, who had died just a year earlier — but at least partly because of internal dissention participants did not actually assemble until August of 1229.*
Cinggis had designated his third son Ogddei as his successor, but it was Tolui, the fourth and youngest son (and thus by Mongol tradition ‘keeper of the hearth’) who had assumed temporary control of the empire after his father’s death. Some participants instead supported the candidacy of Ca’atai (= Chagatai), the eldest surviving son.”
As matters turned out, the father’s wishes were respected, and Ogédei was eventually chosen to rule the empire; he did so with notable success for twelve years. But that decision was not easily reached: even after the yeke qurilta actually met during the autumn of 1229, both Chinese and Persian sources show ‘that there was disagreement in the assembly and that factional strife delayed the proceedings until almost mid-September.’
Thus it appears that the Secret History was in fact completed just in time for oral presentation at this assembly; it must then have ‘strengthened the hand of the “conservative” element at court which supported Ogédei’s candidature in accordance with Cinggis Qan’s will.’’ One could in fact suggest that the one-year delay until 1229 resulted in part from an attempt on the part of followers of Ogédei’s to gain support for their cause by composing the present text: to explain for younger listeners all that had transpired during the lifetime of Cinggis Qan, and to emphasize for all listeners the importance of maintaining traditional Mongol ways. Ey * *
Just who composed or compiled the original version of our text has never been definitively established. Clearly it was one or more family members or other individuals with intimate knowledge of all that had gone on during the lifetime of the man named Temiijin who eventually became Cinggis Qan.® The most likely candidate has long seemed to be one Sigi Qutuqu (ca. 1180-1260), who at an early age had been adopted by Cinggis’s mother, and eventually became one of the Qan’s most trusted associates; in 1206 he was appointed grand judge and entrusted with the keeping of legal and population records.” But many readers of Igor de Rachewiltz’s recent works have now become intrigued (if not fully convinced) by the author’s suggestion that it may well have been Ogédei himself who wrote some or all of the earliest version of out text, or at least directed the whole compilation of this text.!
However this may be, the first version of our text must originally have been written in the Uighur script (adapted to Mongolian by 1206), and was presumably referred to by its original first line: Cinggis Qan-u ujayur ‘The origin of Cinggis Qan.’
No copy has survived of the hypothetical earliest version of the Secret History to which the colophon properly applied.
What we know today as the Yiian ch Go pi-shih AWS (Secret
History of the Yiian Dynasty), or Monggol-un niuca to[b|ca an (Secret History of the Mongols), is a much altered, expanded, and elaborately edited version of the Mongol text that was first printed shortly after 1400. Precisely how these two versions are related, and just why, where, and when specific changes were made are matters as yet not fully understood: reconstruction of the textual history ‘is still to a large extent conjectural.’!!
Most changes in the original text apparently took place during the reign of Qubilai Qa’an (1260-94), son of Tolui. It was at this time that ‘research into the earlier history of the Mongol ruling house was officially promoted with the establishment in 1261 of a Department of National (= Mongol) History... within the College of Literature or Han-lin Academy... .” There scholar-officials ‘collected all the written sources available and prepared drafts in Mongolian (ca. 1290). These were duly revised and translated into Chinese. The [resultant] Mongol chronicle was known simply as Tobciyan or History; its Chinese counterpart was the Shih-lu 4% or Veritable Records. The records of Cinggis’ and Ogédei’s reigns...were completed in 1303.’ It was probably texts of this sort, written in the style of the Cinggis Qan-u ujayur (but that on Ogddei never completed), that were eventually incorporated into the Secret History as “supplementary chapters’ 11 and 12 (see below).
At the same time, but independently, some unknown editors apparently tried to ‘improve’ the Cinggis Qan-u ujayur by ‘1) introducing new material, including the passages favourable to the house of Tolui to which Qubilai also belonged; 2) expunging references to events and personages no longer approved of... ; and 3) altering titles to confer posthumous honours on the imperial ancestors.’'? As an example of their meddling with the text, one may mention the word ga’an (mo. qayan). This Old Turkic title, used for a supreme ruler, was first adopted as imperial title and personal epithet by Ogédei after his election in 1229. Sometime around 1266," early in the reign of Qubilai, this Qa’an was substituted for Qan whenever the latter occurred after Cinggis in the original text — except once in §255, ‘due to an oversight.’'> The same change was made for Cinggis Qan’s ‘most illustrious ancestors, both direct and collateral (Qabul, Qutula, Ambaqai, Yisiigei).’!°
But most revision was probably a gradual process, ‘carried out in all likelihood during Qubilai’s reign’ by Mongols: for ‘one cannot detect any Chinese historiographical bias or influence in the text itself.’'? The eventual result may be called the Cinggis Qayan-u ujayur, to distinguish it from the earlier Cinggis Qan-u ujayur. This altered text — or some intermediate version — is additionally reflected in the Altan Tobci, a text in the Uighur script containing much of the Secret History, a manuscript of which was discovered in Mongolia only in 1926." * * *
In early 1369, immediately after the fall of the Yiian dynasty, historiographers of the College of Literature began serious work on compilation of the official history of the previous dynasty, the Yiian-shih 7. Investigators retrieved from the secret archives of the former Imperial Library a variety of documents including at least two copies of the late 13" century Cinggis Qayan-u ujayur (one surely’ in Uighur script), and an additional text on the reign of Ogidei.'®
These copies were not used during preparation of the hastily-completed official history of the Ytian, but ‘attracted the attention of the Mongol and Chinese scholars in the College of Literature.’*° It was they who added to the older text two final, ‘supplementary’ chapters that dealt first with Cinggis Qan’s campaigns from 1215 until his death in 1227, then (less coherently, in §§269-281) with events during the years of Ogédei’s tule, but including no mention of his death. They then ‘transferred the original colophon to the end of [these twelve chapters] and made a free summarized version in Chinese of the entire text using one of the copies in Uighur script. Subsequently they prepared an interlinear phonetic transcription with a word by word interlinear translation into Chinese.’ (An example is shown in Figure 1 below.) By 1382 this whole work, which lacked a ‘proper’ title, was renamed Yiian pi-shih 7>%% 8 or Secret History of the Yiian, and Mongyol-un niyuca tobciyan in Mongolian, ‘the latter being merely the Mongol counterpart of the Chinese title.’
During this same period (1369-98) the Ming government decided ‘to train Chinese students as interpreters ~' in their dealings with the troublesome neighbours on the northeastern frontier, [and] the College of Literature prepared a basic SinoMongolian glossary with the Mongol words given in phonetic transcription, followed by a reader consisting of twelve official documents in Mongolian, interlinearly transcribed and translated into Chinese... . The work was published in 1389 under the title
of Hua-i i-yii Hi or Sino-Foreign (=Mongolian) Vocabulary.°22
During preparation of this work, the Yiian pi-shih had been mined for words to be included in the Hua-i i-yii vocabulary. At some point it was decided to supplement the Hua-i i-yii’s vocabulary and bureaucratic texts (some with quite complex syntax, and thus difficult for students) by using the entire text of the Yiian pi-shih: ‘i.e. the continuous free translation and the already “processed” Mongol text, to provide 1) an additional rich source of language material for future interpreters, and, at the same time, 2) a vast store of sundry information on the lore and customs of the Mongols.’ The aim of the editors at this period ‘was essentially linguistic’, so — fortunately for us — they ‘did not interfere with the text itself nor with the contents of the book, and they totally ignored problems of chronology, internal contradictions and historical accuracy.’
It must have been at this time, too, that Chinese editors divided the existing text into chapters and sections. The edition published for the first time probably during the years 1403-05 contained twelve chapters of almost equal length, but a version to be included in the monumental Ming encyclopedia Yung-lo ta-
tien K#£*KH (compiled in 1403-08) had fifteen. Division into
282 sections or paragraphs was the same in both, but in many cases quite arbitrary. In the Yung-lo ta-tien version the title was altered to the now-familiar Yiian ch’ao pi-shih AWS.
‘Thus, by 1408 we may assume the existence of three texts of the Yiian (ch’ao) pi-shih: (A) the printed text in 12 (10+2) chapters, (B) the manuscript copy of the Yung-lo ta-tien in 15 chapters, and (C) the manuscript, originally copied for the Yunglo ta-tien (in 1404), of the free summarized translation also in 15 chapters.’ ‘All the later manuscripts and printed editions of the text in transcription, i.e. of our Secret History, derive from A and B, and all the manuscripts and printed editions of the free summarized translation derive from C.’ Of the early 12-chapter version only 41 leaves have survived, and these were included in the photographic reproduction of the entire text published by the Commercial Press of Shanghai in 1936. (The remaining pages there come from manuscript Y’, the so-called ‘Ku certified text’ made in 1805, ‘which is regarded as the best modern edition.’) The original text of 15-chapter Yung-lo ta-tien edition was lost, ‘probably during the Boxer War and the destruction of the College of Literature in Peking in 1900’; but some manuscript copies have survived — as, almost miraculously, has C. * * *
A few remarks may be appropriate here concerning the formatting and transcription in Chinese printed versions of the Secret History text. Figure 1 below shows the first two leaves of Chapter 1 of our text. These are here very severely reduced in size from leaves of the above-mentioned Ku certified text of 1805; and here the vertical dimension has been increased slightly for better legibility. It is stated on the verso side of the title page of the Commercial Press edition of 1936 that the printed area on a half-leaf of the original edition of 1403-05 was 24 x 18 cm, or roughly 9% x 7 inches. When one realizes that the entire text occupied some 610 leaves of the sort shown below, the amount of work required to incise such wooden printing blocks is truly astonishing, not to mention all the time and labor put in by the earlier editors.
It will be noted that the title shown at the beginning of the text on leaf one (the extreme upper right hand corner here) is the newer Yiian ch’ao pi-shih, while at the leaf-fold line on each leaf we find the older and simpler title Yiian pi-shih. Beneath the latter is the chapter number (‘one’), and lower down the leaf numbers (‘one’ and ‘two’ respectively). At the end of each section is given the free Chinese summary-translation of the whole — in much smaller characters.
Each side of a leaf is divided into five columns, to be read, of course, from right to left. Within these, each syllable of the Mongol text is transcribed phonetically, proper names indicated as such, and other syllable-sequences broken into bracketed sequences demarcating words and suffixes. In the edition by Kuribayashi from which Figure 1 is reproduced, each page of the sort shown here is faced by one romanizing the Mongol text, line by line. In this case the following romanization is given for the start of SH §1:73
The Chinese translation follows; then the initial lines of §2. Contrasting with the immediate contiguity of sequential characters in the Chinese translation here (which follows normal Chinese practice within sentences), the columns of Figure 1 show notable differences in spacing between the Chinese characters here used to transcribe the Mongolian phonetically. It seems clear that 14th century editors attempted to use such differences in spacing as a kind of punctuation: characters representing syllables of Mongolian were grouped together (without significant intervening blank space) into sequences of one or more words that formed syntactic units; and larger blanks between successive groups indicated more significant syntactic breaks than smaller ones (or terminal silence at sentence-end). Thus, for example, in Kuribayashi lines 01:01:05-6 we find: [5]
And in proper English: “When [they had] settled on [Mt.] Burqan Qaldun, at the head of the Onan River, Bata¢iqan was born [to them].’
Here, in both languages, the essential clause ‘Bataciqan was born [to them]’ is modified by the much longer adverbial phrase.”°
But this attempt to use spacing as punctuation was doomed to failure, for it now seems that copyists who struggled with this system quite successfully in Chapter 1 of the Secret History and in parts of Chapter 2, paid less and less attention to this difficult spacing later on in the text. For it must have been indeed problematic to format or copy spacing of this sort while trying to fit different numbers of words, each varying greatly in length, into each of hundreds of relatively short columns. Traces of this punctuation can be found in later chapters, but there such differences in spacing are rarely of real help to the reader.
As for Chinese transcription of the Mongolian on leaves such as those in Figure 1, de Rachewiltz rightly points out (xv) that this ‘gives us only the phonetic representation of how the Ming transcribers read the manuscript of the Secret History in Uighur script in the second half of the 14" century. Therefore, the text in transcription does not reflect the spoken language of the time of composition, viz. the language spoken by Cinggis Qan, or, at any rate, in the Mongol court milieu of the early 13" century.” Among the phonetic changes that were taking place during this period are the following;° at some point the vowels ¢ and i fell together as i, g(i) became k(i), initial h dropped; any sequence of two identical vowels (with intervening apostrophe) became a single long vowel 2 € 6 6 @ d, and under certain circumstances an a was assimilated to o or u. Note too that the phonetic value of many Middle Mongolian phonemes is still uncertain. In short, we simply don’t know what the Secret History actually sounded like when presented orally at the Great Assembly of 1229.77
2. The Secret History as History and Literature
Writers have differed over the years as to the importance of our text as a historical document, some underestimating its unreliability, others considering it virtually useless as a historical record. And in fact ‘trying to separate all the purely historical facts from the semi-fictional or wholly fictional accounts in the Secret History is an extremely difficult and often impossible undertaking.’ °’ For the text is really ‘a clever mélange of historico-narrative prose and epic poetry constantly and unexpectedly blending fact and fiction’; hence an ‘epic story (or account) of Cinggis Qan’, or in Pelliot’s phrase, an ‘epic chronicle.’
The real importance of the Secret History lies in its ‘faithful description of Mongol tribal life in the 12" and 13" centuries, especially with regard to the role of the individual in that society. In this respect, the Secret History is a true mine of information. The central theme of our epic chronicle is the modus operandi of one dominating figure who, together with the other leading characters — his family and retainers — skillfully manipulates the society of his time to achieve his one goal, viz. tribal supremacy for himself and his clan against innumerable odds.’”” And one message conveyed in unequivocal terms is that ‘success as a leader cannot be achieved without good fortune and strength bestowed by Heaven and Earth, and the loyalty of one’s retainers and subjects. Such a leader, then, rules by the will of Heaven, i.e. by divine right. It goes without saying that the process cannot operate successfully without the leader observing on his part the principle of reciprocity, i.e. reward, care and protection, towards his followers and dependants. This conception has an almost exact counterpart in medieval Europe and is the cornerstone of the feudal system.’
No less important than such concern with the ‘aristocracy of the steppe’ are other aspects of our text’s portrayal of the social history of the Mongols prior to their entry onto the world stage. Reading through its sections and chapters one ‘gains constant insights, more than just glimpses, into the lives of ordinary people and the interplay between chiefs and subordinates.” Aside from the information supplied on the military organization of the Mongols under Cinggis Qan and Ogédei, the Secret History provides an unparalleled and detailed picture of nomadic life, social stratification, and the material culture of the medieval Mongols. It is a veritable encyclopedia on life in early Mongolia, during the short and critical period when the Mongols passed from the stage of nomadic tribalism to that of a tribal federation and steppe empire.
In addition to recording for his successors — and for posterity — Cinggis Qan’s ‘wisdom and organizational skill and foresight, the Secret History also sings the praise of the other (and perhaps the true) heroes in the saga — the valiant companions from early days such as “the four hounds” and “the four steeds”, *° as well as the commanders of a thousand without whose total commitment to their leader, Cinggis would have remained one of many tribal chiefs in northern Mongolia.’ These heroes ‘are real people (even if at times colourfully portrayed as supermen) and their feats on the battlefield, in spite of the occasional reverse, are only too true. It is in this regard that the Secret History is for us a special document: it adds both flesh and soul to much that we learn from the Persian and Chinese historians by giving us the facts as seen, or perceived, from the Mongol camp, in other words “from the inside”.’
The Secret History is perhaps most notable in that it ‘has no precursor nor real successor in the Mongolian _historiographical tradition.’ It is further the sole true literary monument of the pre-Buddhist period in Mongolia, before the increasingly heavy impact of Buddhism and the Tibetan culture. A third and more immediately obvious characteristic is the presence of some 165 rhymed passages that are interspersed throughout the text: over one-third of the entire work is in alliterative verse, i.e., in poetic form. Such epic pieces, most stemming from the preliterate period, ‘were originally sung by the story-teller, following the ancient tradition of the Mongol and Turkic bards.’
It must be remembered that for both the Mongols and the Turks of this period writing was a new and unfamiliar medium, ‘used for very definite purposes confined almost entirely to state and administrative matters.’ *! Compilation of a text as long as the Secret History would have been a major undertaking, and its completion implies some strong underlying motive: it must have been intended not only to record ‘the deeds and pronouncements of Cinggis Qan, but also those of his faithful companions in a language and style that reflect the attitudes and values of contemporary Mongols. It is at the same time a glorification of the conqueror’s clan for the sake of posterity, especially of his immediate successors.’ One is reminded of Alan Qoa’s prophetic words near the start of the Secret History, in §21:
“When one understands that, the sign is clear: They are the sons of Heaven. ... When they become the rulers of all Then the common people will understand.’
3. Later Editions and Translations of the Text
The first attempt at transcription into a western alphabet of the Chinese phonetic transcription of the Secret History was made in Russia by Palladii in 1872-78 but never published in full. (That same scholar, who did not know Mongolian, had published a translation of the Chinese free translation in 1866.) An annotated translation into Japanese by Naka Michiyo appeared in 1907, and it is to him that de Rachewiltz has dedicated his third volume of 2013. But full transcriptions and translations (full or partial), did not become widely available in the west until after World War II. A French transcription was completed by Paul Pelliot in 1920, but not published (with partial translation) until 1949, after his death. German, Russian, and Japanese publications by Haenisch, Kozin, Shiratori and others,*” available to only a few during the War, became more widely known some years later. The most important of these were three works by Erich Haenisch: his German translation of the entire Secret History (1937, 1948), a full transcription of the text (with variant readings in editions y!, Y’, and Y’: 1937, 1962), and a dictionary of the Secret History text (1939, 1962). Mongol scholars were similarly active during this period, and a Turkish translation by Ahmet Temir was published in 1948.
For a full list of translations in chronological order up through 2001, see RSH Ixxii-lxxiv; a similar list of transcriptions appears on 1xxi-Ixxii. Here one will also see names of the many scholars who have more recently made contributions to Secret History studies. Numerous additions to the lists were made, relating to reprints and works in a wide variety of languages, in RSH 3.8-9 and 19-27. The Introduction in Volume 1 of de Rachewiltz’s magnum opus concludes with two pages on modern and contemporary studies on the Secret History, then 374 endnotes to the earlier text.
As for translations into English, only two of the older ones need mention here. The first, included in a book by Arthur Waley published in 1963, was merely a partial but quite readable translation of the Chinese summarized version. The second is a truly scholarly work, ‘of paramount importance’;** written by Francis Woodman Cleaves of Harvard University in conjunction with Fr. Antoine Mostaert — both authors of important linguistic works on Mongolian of various periods — this is entitled The Secret History of the Mongols; For the First Time Done into English out of the Original Tongue and Provided with an Exegetical Commentary. It contains the first full English translation of the Secret History text, with 65-page introduction and hundreds of footnotes to the translation. Although published only in 1982, this work had been effectively completed twentysix years earlier. ** And despite being panned by several reviewers for the author’s use of King James English in the translation (‘to conserve the archaic flavor of the original’ in Mongolian, says Cleaves on p. xi), this remains a truly excellent translation. It is especially useful to anyone trying to learn the Middle Mongolian language, for Cleaves’ translation is more literal than that reproduced in the present volume, attempting ‘a meticulously literal rendering of the Mongolian text’ (RSH 1xxx). Unfortunately the planned commentary volume never appeared; nonetheless, the work is so important that four pages of additions and corrections are included as an appendix in RSH 2.1060-63.
Needless to say, however, the more readable and indeed elegant translation included below will be of far greater interest to the general reader.
4. The Present Translation.
The translation presented below is virtually identical with that in the original publication of 2004, with only the very few changes mentioned on pages 30-32 of the third volume published in 2013. Like the original, it seeks ‘a compromise between faithfulness to the Mongolian original and readability’, and ‘is primarily designed to provide the reader with an accurate but at the same time fairly fluent translation into modern English.’ * The conventions utilized in the translation are also unchanged: italic type is used for words not in the Mongolian text but supplied by the translator, while a special font, Monotype Corsiva — more delicate and elegant than the italics normally employed — shows Mongolian words (other than personal or geographic names) that are retained in their original form, and words from other languages such as Chinese or Turkish. For discussion of such matters, see RSH Ixxxi; see also p. vi of the present work for abbreviations and conventional signs utilized in the translation.
The footnotes accompanying the translation have been considerably modified in the present version. Of such notes it was said (RSH 1xxx-lxxxi) that these were intended ‘to assist [the reader] in solving immediate problems of interpretation without constantly referring to the Commentary, and to advise the reader whenever checking the Commentary is indispensable for a full understanding of the passage. Hence also the numerous crossreferences in the footnotes to other passages and to differently spelled proper and geographical names. Like most works of this kind, the same name can recur in slightly different forms. Thus the footnote serves as an instant aid to the intelligence of the text.’
Since the entire Commentary of pp. 221-1044 in the first volumes of RSH has been totally omitted here, the numerous instances of ‘See Commentary’ in the original notes have all been altered: if the purpose of a particular reference could be summarized in a few words, that summary replaces the two-word remark; otherwise a specific page reference to RSH is the replacement.
In general, it should be noted that the here-omitted Commentary, and the 374 endnotes to the original Introduction (on pp. Ixxxiii-cxiii) contain encyclopedic information about nearly every detail of the Secret History text, and Mongol language and culture in the early days. Readers may also want to consult a few other publications that could improve their understanding of the text and its subject matter. A few outstanding works may be mentioned here, with bibliographic information provided after the two indexes below: one article by Owen Lattimore in the Scientific American (1963), one by Joseph Fletcher in HJAS (1986), and either the new edition of John Man’s Genghis Khan; Life, Death and Resurrection, or that same writer’s The Mongol Empire.
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