Chapter 738: The Genuine Article: True Mongols

Sonin truly is a learned man!

He wrote the state letter to the Emperor of the Mongol Empire in India using the old Mongol script created more than four hundred years ago. Not to mention Shah Jahan and his son who serves as the Mongol Empire's naval commander — even the scholars serving Shah Jahan in the city of Agra could barely understand it. Because the Mughal dynasty had never used Mongol script; their most formal official script was Chagatai script, a writing system spelled with Arabic letters that was once current throughout the former lands of the Chagatai Khanate and was later made the empire's official language by Timur. And Babur, the great emperor who founded the Mughal Empire, was a descendant of Timur and regarded himself as the legitimate heir of the Timurid Empire.

In fact, "Mughal Empire" or "Mughal dynasty" were names used by outsiders, not what they called themselves. Their formal self-designation was the Timurid Empire of Hindustan. "Mughal" or "Mongol" as the name of the state was something Indians had begun calling it in private, and later, through a chain of errors, Persians, Uzbeks, and Westerners all came to treat "Mongol Empire" as the official name of the country.

By the time of Emperor Akbar, the name "Mongol Empire" had become so habitual that "the Timurid Empire of Hindustan" was almost unknown. So Emperor Akbar had no choice but to legislate a correction: anyone who called "the Timurid Empire of Hindustan" the "Mongol Empire" was guilty of a crime!

But here in India, things were not handled so seriously. This was not Germany; if the top forbade it, the bottom went right on saying it anyway. As for foreigners, they cared even less.

In particular, how could the countries of Central Asia and West Asia possibly acknowledge that the state founded by Babur was the successor to Timur's empire?

You people had better just honestly stay Mongols!

So Shah Jahan could only be a Mongol who could not read Mongol script and could not speak the Mongol language.

Still, he was an emperor after all, and he had his ways. By the third day, Shah Jahan's officials had finally found in Delhi a learned Persian scholar who could barely make out Mongol script, enough to produce a rough translation.

The gist of it was that the authentic Great Mongol Nation had been revived, had unified Eastern Mongolia, Southern Mongolia, and the Mongol homeland, and had even retaken Dadu from the Ming!

And the Great Khan now ruling the Great Mongol Nation was called Ey-e-er Jasag Khan, who at the same time also held the concurrent post of Emperor of something called the Great Qing Empire.

Both a Great Khan and an Emperor — this Ey-e-er Jasag Khan must be truly formidable!

In Shah Jahan's mind there immediately appeared the image of a savage with a huge waist and round shoulders, of boundless strength!

No, not one — countless! Riding warhorses, brandishing curved sabers, carrying muskets on their backs, hauling cannon, unstoppable as a flood!

This is the Scourge of Allah!

Now that the Scourge of Allah, the Shunzhi Great Khan, had sent envoys to the Mongols of India, how could Shah Jahan and his sons dare be negligent? If the Great Khan grew angry and really sent men to attack, they would not even be able to cry!

Shah Jahan acted at once. On one hand, he sent his most capable son in battle, Aurangzeb, with fifty thousand troops to set up defenses at the Khyber Pass — the front door absolutely had to be held first!

The Great Mongol Nation had revived, so better to think first about self-preservation; the matter of marching north to attack Afghanistan and the Uzbek khanates could wait for later!

Then he sent his crown prince Dara Shikoh and his fourth son, who was also naval commander, Murad Bakhsh, together with gifts, and that Persian scholar who understood a little of the Mongol language, to go meet the envoys of the Great Mongol Nation.

Before they left, Shah Jahan gave them special instructions, telling his two sons to keep their wits about them and not be fooled by fake Mongols. So they had to set up a few tests and examine them carefully.

As for how to examine them, that was easy enough.

First, look at their faces. Blond hair and blue eyes definitely meant not Mongols! They had to have a Mongol face, right?

Second, compare riding and archery. Mongols were all excellent at riding and shooting; anyone who could not ride and shoot was definitely not a Mongol, right?

Third, compare drinking. Mongols could all hold their liquor; anyone who could not drink was definitely not a Mongol — unless the Mongol homeland had now converted to Islam. He had not heard of such a thing.

Fourth, ask about the affairs of the Chagatai Khanate — as for the other Mongol khanates, Shah Jahan and his people did not know much, but they did know a bit of the history of the Chagatai Khanate. And do not ask about later times; just ask about the situation in the first few decades.

If all of these checked out, then they were true Mongols!

At the Sutra military camp, on the great parade ground, the ceremony to entertain the Mongol envoys was underway.

The people were definitely Mongols!

Apart from the Westerners who handled the sailing, every member of the formal mission had a Mongol face. And except for one old man who was so ill he could barely go on (Fan Yongdou), the rest were all broad-shouldered and thick-waisted, looking very formidable.

The riding and archery contest on the great parade ground proved the point as well. Setting aside that old man who was nearly dead, the other Mongol envoys took the field one by one to compete against India's "Mongol warriors," and every one of them was thoroughly skilled in bow and horse!

Sonin was "last-place baturu"; Lambai was a veteran Manchu general; Dulan, the Grace-Bulwark Duke of the State, though he had little presence among the Manchu nobility, was no weakling at riding and shooting; and as for Shang Ke'ai, he had grown up in the army from childhood and had been forged on the battlefield!

And Shah Jahan himself was a war-lover, and his two sons had followed their father on campaigns north and south since childhood. At a single glance they could tell that the four Mongol envoys who rode and shot were all "raised on horseback." If these were not true Mongols, then what were true Mongols?

Even the diplomats they sent out were all skilled in riding and archery — how formidable must the Great Khan's kheshig be?

At the thought of a Mongol host sweeping in like the tide, the hearts of Dara Shikoh and Murad Bakhsh both rose into their throats.

In truth, the Mughal Empire was still very powerful at this time, at the very peak of its military strength. Although it was locked in an indecisive struggle with the Iranians and Uzbeks, the initiative still lay with the Mughal Empire. If the military power of the Great Qing really came to India, it certainly could not defeat the Mughals.

But the fearsome reputation of the Great Mongol Nation still endured!

How could Dara Shikoh and Murad Bakhsh not be worried?

"Envoy of the Great Khan," at the welcoming banquet, the crown prince of the Indian Mongols, Dara Shikoh, inquired in gentle tones, "may I ask from which line of the Golden Family the Great Khan descends?"

He spoke in Persian. His mother was a Persian beauty, so he could also speak fluent Persian.

Caballero had long since prepared interpreters who could speak Persian and "Japanese," and Sonin understood "Japanese," so Sonin answered in "Japanese."

"The Great Khan's mother is a direct-line descendant of Qasar, the second younger brother of Genghis Khan."

So he was also a "Yuan imperial son-in-law"!

Dara Shikoh and Murad Bakhsh exchanged a glance, but did not dare show the slightest contempt.

Because their own ancestor Timur had been just such a "Yuan imperial son-in-law." He was not himself a descendant of the Chagatai Khanate; only after achieving his great enterprise did he marry a princess of the Chagatai Khanate as his wife. That was why Timur did not dare call himself khan, but called himself emir.

"One whose paternal line does not come from the Golden Family can also call himself Great Khan?" the Indian Mongol naval commander Murad Bakhsh asked in a low voice, and immediately drew a glare from his elder brother.

Sonin smiled and said: "The late Great Khan, Bogda Sechen Khan, conquered Eastern Mongolia, Southern Mongolia, and the tribes of the Mongol homeland, then convened a khuriltai and was acclaimed khan by the leaders of the Mongol tribes."

So it was won by fighting. Impressive!

Sonin continued: "And now the Great Khan, Ey-e-er Jasag Khan, commands a great army, broke through the Great Wall, and seized Dadu, the old capital of the Great Yuan, and therefore concurrently holds the title of Emperor of China, called the Great Qing Emperor! The Great Khan controls the Mongols in the north and grips China in the south; the hegemony he has built is no less than that of Genghis Khan, and so he is fully worthy to be Great Khan of all the Mongols!

After his election, the Great Khan also received the allegiance of the Oirat Mongols in the west. From the Oirat Mongols he heard that in India there was still a Mongol Empire, and so he sent us as envoys to make contact, hoping to unite all the Mongols under heaven!"

(End of Chapter)