how cruel was changiz khan

how cruel was changiz khan

it is the general impression that changez khan was a cruel person.

in fact. in that period, cruelty was a regular feature between adversaries but it has to be distinguished that it had many forms.

although the army of genghiz killed at an unprecedented rate and used death as a matter of policy, they deviated from the standard [ractices of the time in an important and surprising way.this can eb contrasted with what their opponent did.

1.      in august 1228, four hundred mongol soldiers fell into enemy hands. the voctors tied them behind horses and dragged them through the bazaar of isfahan. all the mongol prisoners were killed as public sport and then fed them to the dogs.

2.      in another incident, the iranians killed the mongol captives by driving nails into their heads.

3.      in 1305, a century later, delhi sultan had apublic entertainment by getting prisoners trmpled by elephants.

4.      in year 1014,byzantian christian emperor basil defeated the bulgariansand captured 15000 bulgarian soldiers. he had them blinded leaving one person out of 100 with eyesight that he may lead them back to their homes.

5.      holy (sic) roman emperor barbarosa besieged city of lombard in 1106. his men beheade their prisoners and played football with their heads. the residents of the city borught their prisoners on the wall of the fortand pulled their limbs off in frtont of their colleagues down below. the army in the filed indulged in mass hanging of their prisonere. in response the city people did the same on the walls of the fort. the army down below gathered the children and strapped them in catapults and threw them on the walls of the fort.

by comparison. mongols never used torture as means to frighten their enemies. there was no bllod lust or ostentious use of public cruelty.

the cities that surrendered experienced mild and benign treatment. bt some cities fooled by such mild treatment rebelled as soon as mongol army went away. the mongol army came back and shwed no mercy to the inhabitants.

when the muslims in areas to the west of tian shan mountain invited gnaghiz khan to rid them of cruel budhhist rulers, khan obliged and because they were there by invitation, even looting was not allowed.