4. The rise and spread of the Mongols was devastating to the Middle East and Europe. What impact did the Mongols have, and why were they an important element in the development of the Middle East?

Our text, The Middle East - a Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years, by Bernard Lewis, states quite clearly: "It is now agreed that the destructive effects of the Mongol conquests were neither as great, as lasting, nor even as extensive, as was once thought."(#50-Lewis, page 97) However, that is not to say that they were not devastating! Rather, Lewis simply argues that the historical evidence regarding the role the Mongols have played in history has, if truth be told, had a history of its own. Once blamed for all the ills of a submerged society, the impact of the Mongols is now seen in better perspective. It is now recognized that the fall of the Islamic Empire, if one can describe it as such, was written within its own annals. The faults were as much a part of Islam, and of its Empire, as they were precipitated by the Mongols, and their successive invasions. So, now that I've stated my conclusion, let me build a case for it...

Let’s start with the caliphate, that institution of religious authority and leadership so prominent in the early years of Muslim history.  Following the rule of the Rightly Guided Ones (632-661), and the Umayyad dynasty (661-750), the Abbasid dynasty (750-1517) had long ceased to have a strong structure of the caliphate (for dates, see References #19, 21, 22, and 25). The separation between the ones who held the power, and the ones who sanctioned the power, had taken place long ago.  “To the real organs of political and military power, the disappearance of the caliphate made very little difference.  In all Islamic states, the sultanate had acquired the recognition of the jurists and of the religious institution, and sultans began to arrogate to themselves religious titles and prerogatives formerly reserved to the caliphs.” (#50-Lewis, ibid) 

The immediate effect of the Mongols was, indeed, devastating.  It was an invasion, after all, and “whole areas were crushed, depopulated and destroyed.” (#50-Lewis, ibid)  Lewis goes on to enumerate each area of the map that was affected by the Mongols, and describes how lasting the effect was felt.  Egypt was not conquered by the Mongols at all.  Syria only suffered raids, and in fact became incorporated into the Egyptian sultanate such that they were protected from further attack.  Anatolia had long ago been “overshadowed and in many ways reshaped by the Mongol presence in Iran” – yet it was “still able to cradle the last and greatest of all Islamic empires” (#50-Lewis, p. 98) – that of the Ottoman Empire. 

Iran was the hardest hit of all the countries, yet entire areas of it were not affected.  In fact, those local dynasties that “voluntarily submitted” to the Mongols were allowed to survive.  Their cities were not looted, and they continued to flourish.  Some cities even came into new prominence – Fars became a center of Persian national life, and Shiraz “saw a rich flowering of Persian culture in the post-Mongol period.” (ibid)  Furthermore, in those parts of Iran that WERE overrun, the recovery was rapid.  “After the initial shock of the conquest, the Mongol khans gave Iran a period of relative political stability, encouraged the reconstruction of town life, industry and trade, fostered what they considered useful sciences, and, after their conversion to Islam in 1295 even Islamic literature and learning.” (ibid)  Taking this one step further, Lewis says that “In one respect the Mongol conquests actually helped to infuse new life into the faltering civilization of the Middle East.  Just as the first Arab conquerors, by uniting for the first time in one state the civilization of the eastern Mediterranean and of Iran, inaugurated a new era of fruitful social and cultural cotact, so now the Mongols united, for the first time under one dynasty, the civilizations of the Middle East and of the Far East.  At the same time they opened the door to new and mutually advantageous contacts with Europe…”

The one area in which the Mongols left permanent damage was this: Baghdad and Iraq “never again recovered their central position in the Islamic world.”  (#50-Lewis, p. 99)  The immediate effect - ironically, just like now - was the breakdown of civilian government.  The consequent effect, however, was not the oil pipelines, but the elaborate irrigation which had allowed Iraq to flourish in an area surrounded by desert.  Whereas the Iran experienced order and prosperity once again once the Mongolian regime was in control, Iraq never again reached the heights to which it had one enjoyed.  Its ruin was unchecked, as Lewis says, and it became an open invitation for the return of the nomadic Bedouins, who, unlike the Mongolians in Iran, stayed.  Instead of being the center of a great empire, Iraq became an “outlying frontier province”, one that “could no longer serve as a channel for East-West trade, which moved northwards and eastwards to Anatolia and Iran, westwards and southwards to Egypt and the Red Sea, leaving Iraq and the fallen city of the caliphs to centuries of stagnation and neglect”.

As the destruction of the caliphate became permanent, and with the removal of Iraq as a central player, the Middle East became divided into two zones: the northern zone of Persian influence, and the southern zone of Arabic influence.  In the north, “Literary and artistic life was dominated by the traditions of Muslim Iran, which had begun during the ‘Iranian Intermezzo’, continued under the Turkish dynasties, and achieved a new renaissance under the Mongols and their successors.” (ibid)  Persian continued to be spoken in Iran itself, but to the east and west of it, in central Asia and Anatolia, new languages and literatures appeared. 

South of the Iranian zone was Iraq, the old center of the Arabic-speaking world and now a derelict frontier province, and Egypt, which extended its influence into North Africa, both west and south of itself.  In these areas, some Persian influence was also prevalent, but “Politically, the Turk and the Mongol were everywhere dominant.” (#50-Lewis, p. 100) 

Into this world of mixed races and religions, of ancient heritages and renascent traditions, the Muslim faith found new, fertile ground.  Whereas once the religion was the carrier of culture – the culture of the Arabs, out of which it originated, now it became the creator of culture.  “In this age of growing cultural diversity and political conflict between the two zones, the chief unifying factor was religion, especially in the new Sufi form that had been spreading since the great compromise between mysticism and orthodoxy achieved by al-Ghazälï in Seljuk times.” (ibid) Whereas the Islamic faith had once divided the people into believers or non-believers, it now served to unify people who were divided by their languages, ethnicities, and nationalities into a community of one.