The Chinggisid Crisis of the mid-fourteenth century: reasons and consequences

This article analyses the collapse of the Mongol empire in the mid- to late fourteenth century (1330s to 1390s) across Eurasia, looking at three facets of the Crisis: environmental-focusing on climate change; epidemiological-exploring the Black Death’s impact on the fall of the Chinggisids; and political-mainly the dilution of the Chinggisid charisma due to the halt of expansion. We argue that the main facet of the Crisis was political, and that it derived from the nomadic culture of the Mongols. This was the same political culture that enabled them to establish their huge empire. However, an integral part of this political culture was the need to secure the support of the nomadic elites who were also the backbone of the Mongol army. This proved to be much harder in a reality of excessive natural disasters on the one hand and the erosion of the Chinggisid charisma due to the renunciation of the ideal of world conquest on the other. The result was a growing number of elite groups who contested for power while nominally retaining the framework of the Chinggisid principle, among whom the imperial sons-in-law played a significant part, as well as the shrink and fragmentation of the Chinggisid polities that survived the Crisis.