The wide spread writings of Marco Polo and William of Rubruck provide an early account of world travel during the 13th Century. These dual accounts give readers a different perspective of the Mongol’s way of life, their social hierarchy, and their method of commerce. The Mongols, whether beheld as barbaric conquerors or as an Empire for its multiplicity, were transcribed in the writings of Polo and Rubruck. Details are important to establish a sense of place and their surrounding peoples as well as a personal view of foreign people. Polo’s lack of makes Rubruck’s account equally more reliable with his daily interactions with the social life and his descriptive nature of his trips.
William of Rubruck, who was a Franciscan Monk, took upon a mission in hopes for promoting the conversion of Christianity to the Mongol peoples. Though his primary focus was the Nestorian Christians and their practices, he as well provides a unique portrayal with helpful information about the Mongol customs, their food and how they loved to drink, to religious practices and their surrounding daily life. His careful account recorded intimate encounters that provide readers how the Mongolian people reacted and interacted with European foreigners. For example we know some of the customs of the Nestorian Christians from Rubruck’s account, “ they prostrated themselves, with their foreheads touching the ground in the Nestorian fashion, and next touched all the images with the right hand, always kissing the hand after they had done so; and then they preferred the right hand to all those who stood round about in the church,” (Rubruck 189). From this example Rubruck’s provides a personal account that there were some Christians in Mongolia and how ...
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...er knowledge as Rubruck when describing the women and how they were supposed to act, women were to act with strict decorum and if they do go out to places, it must be to a respectable one such as a temple with the company of there mother’s.
What these two travelers provide is unique information through foreign eyes. Though Rubruck provides a more reliable, hands on experience through his writings, his records of the daily interactions from the many people he’d encountered as well as their strange customs. Polo lacks a true form of travel writings because he is on the outside, observing as he passes by, only proving information that he has learn from someone else, such as the Queen of Bayan. Even though they speak of Mongol life, it is only in Rubruck’s account where we get a true sense of what people were really like instead of what Polo presented them to be.
... were positive, one may argue that these individuals only saw the tolerant and fair-minded side of the Mongols, and not the relentless warrior part of the society who was known for its “dirty” tactics of war, which went as far as launching diseased-ridden corpses over the walls of castles during sieges. Alternatively, one may argue that the scholars who provided negative documentation of the Mongols only saw the destructive side, not the open-minded side of the society who were known for their cultural acceptance. Although these accounts allowed for an adequate idea of the nature of the Mongols, a record from a peasant who was not a member of the upper class in their society, as all reports presented were from historians, scholars, and political leaders. This would allow for a different perspective on the issue and would produce a better understanding of the topic.
As you wrote in the assignment sheet, Louis XIV and Peter the Great both wanted to do great things. They had many goals in common, as well as many different goals, and, though the two had much in common, worked in very different ways to achieve said goals.
Rossabi, Morris. "Life in China Under Mongol Rule: Religion." The Mongols in World History | Asia
To begin, one factor that supported Mongols in their conquests was their capacity for foraging, allowing them to survive under harsh living conditions. According to Marco Polo, a Venetian traveler that journeyed to Asia stated "They are capable of supporting every kind of privation, and when there is
Recently in my class, we have been discussing different civilizations and how women were treated during that time. While reading the books, I was able to read things and relate them to notes that I had recently taken. Something in particular that I found that correlated was in chapter four of the book. This chapter talked about women’s role in Athens, which was motherhood. We had just talked about this in class, and how men were able to divorce women with no public humiliation, if the wife was not able to conceive a
Most classical society’s political and social organization revolved around the idea of patriarchy, a male dominated social system. This system exacerbated the inherit difference between men and woman and assigned gender roles based on these observations. Men were generally regarded as superior to woman therefore given greater religious and political roles as well as more legal rights. As the natural inverse, women were subordinated and seen as week; their main roles reproductive and domestic. Information about patriarchy in the classical era, though abundant, was, for the most part, written by men, therefore history does not give us an accurate depiction of women’s viewpoints. Four societies of the classical era, India, China, Greece, and Rome, adopted a patriarchal system, however, due to many factors, each developed identifiable characteristics.
Dawson, Christopher. “Mission to Asia.” Toronto: University of Toronto Press, for the Medieval Academy of America. 1980.
During this time period women were not respected at all and were belittled by all med in their lives. Even though men don’t appreciate what women they still did as they were told. In particular, “Women have an astoundingly long list of responsibilities and duties – th...
For the purpose of better understanding, I start by providing some background information about each of the two men. Marco Polo was an Italian citizen born into a wealthy Venetian merchant family. His most significant travel experience came in 1271, when he set out with his father Nicolo and his uncle Maffeo on a journey to the court of the Mongol Emperor of China, Kubilai Khan. Polo returned only twenty four years later to his homeland of Venice. On the other hand, Ibn Battuta was a jurist from Morocco who left his native city- Tangier, in 1325, for a journey to the East that would cover a total of seventy-five thousand miles and keep him twenty nine years away from home. In this essay, I will be dealing primarily with the aforementioned ex...
During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries there were a group of people called the Tartars. These people were members of the Mongolia and they called themselves Tata. “However, when people realized that this sounded a lot like Tartarus, Roman mythology’s variation of Hell, they started calling the Mongols Tartars – ‘people from Tartarus,’ meaning demons from hell” (Poisuo, 1). The Mongols were known for the violence and wanting to take over the world by attacking everyone. Therefore, people around the world started calling them “demons from hell.” Carpini who was one of the first Europeans to enter the Mongol Empire, wrote about his journey through the empire and everything that he learned about the Tartars, their religion, marriages, food, clothing, and many more, in his book “The Story of the Mongols Whom We Call the Tartars.” Carpini’s description of the Tartars throughout the book seems to be unpleasing to him and his values of life. Despite the fact that Carpini describes many different aspects of Mongol life in his book, in my judgment he is most interested in their family values and how different they are from the Western European family values that he has grown up into, Carpini was mostly blinded throughout the book by his previous judgment on Mongols, which could be trusted due to the fact that the Mongols really were violent. In comparison to post-Classical societies the Mongols fit in with some aspects such as how much power money can get for people, however, they differ in their beliefs such as family values.
I have chosen to compare Napoleon to Frederick the Great. I will compare these two extremely influential leaders through numerous techniques; including their military history, the administration of their territories, the legacy they left upon their countries, among others.
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During the late eighteen hundreds, according to society, women were not allowed to have their own identities. Their thoughts and opinions were irrelevant. Women were far from being an equal to their spouse. Married women with children had a role to play and were not expected to deviate from that role, unless they were mentally incapable. Society instilled what was to be expected, therefore women should know their position in a marriage.
Canadian history has shaped Canada's future for centuries now. Without the great explorers of their time, and maybe even our time, provinces and territories, gulfs, bays, rivers and land would be lost and undiscovered for many years. Our great country can thank many brave and brilliant explorers and their crew, for founding our name, and creating such an amazing land. Jacques Cartier, John Cabot and Henry Hudson, all managed to explore much of Canada. Through discovering the islands of Newfoundland, and Prince Edward Island to locating the Hudson Bay, these 3 explores endure Canada's harsh winters, famine, scurvy and much more, to begin the great discover of all of Canada.
The first part gives a record of the historical legend of the Mongols as obtained from pre-medieval oral traditions, legends, myths, historic events nad stories. This part starts by narrating the legend that a bluish wolf was the Mongolians forefather and this wolf was born destined from the heavens. Mor...