Download PDF | Judith Kolbas - The Mongols in Iran_ Chingiz Khan to Uljaytu 1220–1309-Routledge (2013).
236 Pages
THE MONGOLS IN IRAN
The administration of Iran under Mongol rule was often complex. Nevertheless, the book is able to explore it by means of taxation and monetary policy. A consistent development emerges through the abundant numismatic material available from the conquest of Samarqand by Chingiz Khan to the reign of the penultimate ruler, Uljaytu. In many cases, the individuals responsible for initiating and conducting policies can be identified from the special marks of mint masters.
Moreover, the structure of the empire was clearly demarcated by mint production, coin styles and type of metal. The analysis illuminates many controversial historical points such as the meaning and function of an il-khan and the process and date of the establishment of the Toluid Dynasty after Hulagu. In Iran, the Mongols broke the crust of an inflexible and archaic Islamic monetary tradition that had been hampering economic growth. They did so by encouraging extensive trade and the advancement of sciences, especially astronomy and higher mathematics, with determined and always pragmatic programmes.
Judith Kolbas studied in the US and Lebanon, conducted research around the world and then lived in Mongolia and the UK. She is currently vice president of the Royal Asiatic Society, and explores trade routes, often by camel, in Chinese Turkestan and Inner Mongolia.
PREFACE
In the thirteenth century, the Mongols believed that they had the mandate of heaven to rule the world. In fulfilling that responsibility, they succeeded in creating the largest land empire the world has known, extending it from the edge of Egypt to Japan and from the Polish plain to the China Sea. Of all these lands, their longest tenure with a flourishing economic and cultural life existed in the area south of the Black Sea and west of the Himalayan Mountains. However, the Mongols severely challenged the economic life of that area. The battles between the indigenous systems and Mongol aspirations were reflected by changes in money.
This book explores the theory, structure, and techniques of monetary policy in the southwestern portion of the Mongol Empire from its invasion by Chingiz Khan in 616 H/1220 AD to the mid-reign of Uljaytu in 709 H/1309 AD. It begins with events in Transoxiana and then tracks the influence of policy from there on territory to the south and west. This territory constitutes Greater Iran, present-day Iran itself, Afghanistan, part of Turkmenistan, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbayjan, part of Turkey and all of Iraq. Since the core area was Iran, these adjacent ones have been added to it in the term. Since economic activity is a social phenomenon, other aspects of Mongol life are also examined, including social and political activities, administrative languages and cultural symbols. The area, initially regulated by the immediate interests of roving bands, slowly gained a sophisticated structure. The development process is disclosed by the geographic and production relationships of mint sites as well as the political announcement on coin types.
Ultimately, these points pale in interest to the upheaval the Mongols gave to money itself. The Mongols shook to the roots indigenous practices but preserved the theoretical foundation. For several centuries before their arrival, the archaic monetary system had been unable to meet the demands of a radically different economic environment. The Mongols accepted the system’s fundamental practices; but they manipulated the internal components, which included providing it with exchange flexibility, infusing it with massive quantity and practicing precise quality control. The accounting, administrative and technological innovations of the Mongols revolutionized monetary practice and propelled their society into the most advanced economic stage of the period.
Great wealth came from both a large cohesive internal market and the encouragement and control of foreign trade. Specific types of money were produced for each of these goals. However, the market was not the chief purpose of Mongol money. The government made and regulated coinage because it was the most effective means for taxation. New concepts advanced the theory of the basis of taxation from fixed resources to surplus value. Different monetary structures and the coin types reflected the progress. This study concludes in 1309 AD, twentyseven years before the close of the dynasty’s rule, when the system reached its fulfilment. For the last quarter of a century, the regime made adjustments to a mature economy that was monetised in almost all sectors. A massive amount of coinage was produced that over-shadowed all previous Mongol output and the subsequent dynasties. A study of the fine-tuning is a different project from this analysis of theory and development.
In spite of the fact that the Mongols were nomads, they established a stationary administrative centre in Tabriz. The city’s rise and decline under them is the focus for this study. At the start, there is no indication that the Mongols had a desire to centralize the monetary system. At the end, when all aspects of coinage were uniform, Tabriz was simply one of nearly a hundred mints. Tabriz was the financial centre not the cultural or political capital. As a result, its coinage reflected society rather than imposed a model on it. In particular, Mongol money expressed many views on religion and political legitimacy and authority in various images, scripts and languages. From the coinage, there is no indication of a single dominant or court culture but a fluid one exposed to many influences.
Unfortunately, Mongol eclecticism can be confusing if applied to English transliteration. Since Arabic script was the predominant one on the coins, Arabic spelling is used to render most of the words directly incorporated into the following text. The exceptions are words or names that are particularly common and Mongolian words written in Uighur script.
The coins examined are from the public collections of the American Numismatic Society in New York, the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, the Bibliotheque Nationale of Paris, the British Museum in London, the Dar al-Kutub or National Library in Cairo, the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, the Islamic Art Museum in Cairo, the Kunsthistorische Museum of Vienna, the Miinzsammlung of Munich, the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, the Yapi ve Kredi Bankasi in Istanbul and the private holdings of Steve Album, most of which are now public at the University of Tubingen, Bora Etkar of Istanbul, Jan Christoph Hinrichs of the Netherlands, Muhammad Limbada of London, Cunayt Olcer of Istanbul, David Priestely of Hove, Robert Tye of York, and the sale items of the London offices of Spink and Sons, and Sotheby’s.
With respect to additional information, John Mason Smith kindly provided his unpublished notes. He visited coin cabinets in the late seventies, which were impossible or difficult to enter after the late eighties. These were the Bank Sepah of Teheran, the Iran Bastan Museum in Teheran, the Iraqi National Museum in Baghdad, the Istanbul Archaeology Museum, the private collection of Alexander Morton in Teheran and portions of the Bibliotheque Nationale of Paris. Although Smith’s notes are sometimes sketchy, his work is reliable; and if a particular point in this study ever became crucial, his photographs would be available. His notes have been incorporated into the research catalogue and have added significantly to the volume of specimens needed to provide reasonably reliable statistics on weight standards. Moreover, his notes also added types unknown elsewhere. Therefore, the following comments on Mongol coins and their antecedents are based, when not otherwise indicated, on the working catalogue compiled from my photographs and his notes.
Although the corpus includes coins from twenty-six collections, many holdings remain inaccessible or unrecorded. New information is expected from these and from material that reaches the market in the future.
Those who say that history is written by the victor have not studied the Mongols. Their history was recorded by the people they conquered. Their own records have been lost except for The Secret History, an invaluable source for the earliest years. Otherwise, our knowledge comes from myriad languages and various types of reports. For Greater Iran, many have been translated into English or French. However, the different languages have provided various ways of spelling some standard Mongol words, which required a choice of just one form. In particular, the problem of rendering the name of the founder of the Mongol Empire is given as Chingiz Khan because that is the spelling on his coins from Ghazna.
The basic textual source for the major reform of Ghazan Mahmud is the unique report attributed to Ghazan’s wazir, Rashid al-Din. He compiled a universal history, the Jami al-Tawarikh, at the end of which he discussed the changes in administration under Ghazan. It is the only extant monetary edict from the place and time and sheds light on contemporary economic views. It was consulted in manuscript at the Sulaymania Library in Istanbul, the University of Edinburgh Library, the National Library in Vienna, the Bodleian Library in Oxford, the archives of Aya Sofya in Istanbul, the Bibliotheque Nationale of Paris, the University Library in Munich and the Yeni Kutubhane at the Top Kapi Seray in Istanbul.
There are no variations in the text or explanatory notes in the margins except, in some cases, for slight changes in titles and the addition of Lur to the list of regions. The text falls short of fulfilling its own requirements, which are announced in the heading of the chapters; yet the original was committed in this form. Thus, the printed editions provide exactly the same information as the manuscripts. Further, in these libraries as well as in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin, the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York, the University Library in Cambridge, the British Library in London and the Dar al-Kutub of Cairo, any untitled or partially relevant epistles in Arabic or Persian were reviewed for any other light on economic matters of the time. Unfortunately, no new information emerged. However, much material from contemporary or near-contemporary witnesses has been published already and translated. The works are more than sufficient for understanding the general outline of activity. In fact, only some published reports are used here, but there are more.
In conclusion, the foundation of this analysis of Mongol economic life is money. It first had to be located, photographed and described before the first full catalogue could be constructed. From that corpus, types were identified and weight systems discovered. The methods for studying Islamic coinage had to be modified constantly as variable production patterns emerged. In fact, normal numismatic problems and the techniques to solve them proved inadequate. Since there was no appropriate model, basic questions had to be asked repeatedly and the answers tested continually. Finally, the development of the hard coinage was given a human context by many eye-witness accounts.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This study of money received financial support from a Fulbright-Hays Dissertation Research Abroad Grant, a Dissertation Research Award from the American Association of Iranian Studies, a Dean’s Dissertation Award from New York University and grants from the Henry and Lucy Moses Foundation. Since the study called for a great deal of expensive travel, photography and extended foreign residence, without the help of these organizations, the original dissertation could not have even begun.
My grateful appreciation for sharing their depth of knowledge and/or for their necessary assistance is extended to Mahmud Ismail Abdullah, Steve Album, Muhammed Ibrahim Atfesh, the late Tuncay Aykut, Michael Bates, David Bivar, Barbara Brend, Helen Mitchell Brown, Paul Buell, Joe Cribb, Elizabeth DarleyDoran, Andre deClairemont, Carole Deeb, Bora Etkar, Tom Eden, Ryka Gyselen, the late Ray Hebert, Ludger Illisch, Edward Kennedy, Garo Kurkman, Rudi Lindner, the late Nicholas Lowick, Arlette Negre, the late Cunayt Olcer, Venetia Porter, Larry Potter, Robert Tye, Terry Volk, the late Estelle Whelan and ‘Abd alRa’uf ‘Ali Yusuf. Each has contributed to this work in a special way which will remain a cherished memory. The statistical graphs for the original study were most efficiently prepared by Richard Kolbas, who also provided technical knowledge about quality control in the field of manufacturing. Munkhjargal Purev provided substantial assistance in Mongolian and Russian titles and in the final editorial stages. David Bivar kindly printed the coins from S. Album’s collection, a task that can be difficult without expert knowledge of both coins and dark room techniques. Finally, this study of money greatly benefited from my years abroad, which could not have occurred without the financial management of Richard Kitts.
There are no words adequate to express my gratitude for the support, encouragement, friendship and active assistance of John M. Smith, Robert Darley-Doran, Alexander Morton and the advisor for the dissertation on which this work was based, Robert McChesney. I can never repay their personal generosity and their long-term faith in me.
All of the kind support that has been provided obliges me to use the information and privileges with the greatest respect. I have endeavoured to do so within my meagre ability, yet the mistakes that unwittingly have been made and the interpretation of the material are solely my responsibility.
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