Three empires
In the previous article, we dwelt on the fact that the Chinese state itself, headed by the Song dynasty, faced a new situation in the north, when neighboring ethnic groups not only raided agricultural states, but began to seize their territory, creating their own states, including Chinese territories. …
When I write about the three empires in China, on the eve of the Mongol invasion, it turns out exactly the same as in A. Dumas's novel The Three Musketeers. When a logical question arises - why three, when it seems like there are four? So it is in our case.
Liao was the first nomadic state of the Kidan tribal alliance to occupy the northern territories of the Chinese.
In parallel with it, the Tangun state, the Xi Xia Empire, arose, which occupied the lands of northwestern China. At the beginning of the XII century. Liao was replaced by a new empire, the Golden one by Jin.
And Song fought alternately defensive and offensive wars with them. How these events took place, we will tell in separate articles dedicated to these empires.
So, at the time of the Mongol expansion, there were three empires on the territory of modern China, two of which were not Chinese.
Kidani
The Russian name "China" comes from the name "Kidani", which was used by various Turkic peoples for the name "Celestial Empire".
Kidani is a nomadic tribal union, Mongolian, possibly with elements of the Tungu language group. The disintegration of tribal relations among the Khitan took place at a time when their main enemies, the Uighur Kaganate and the empire in China, were significantly weakened.
They were at the 2nd stage of nomadism, according to the classification of E. A. The first semi-legendary Khitan leaders taught them to build dwellings and cultivate the land, but in general they remained nomads. When the Khitan captured the north of China, their emperor spent time in migrations, living both in a nomadic camp, a horde, and in city palaces.
The Khitan state was based on a horde, the Khitan were divided into horde-clans. At this time, they were in a transitional period from tribal relations to a territorial community, which was reflected in the "digital" division of the troops into thousands, hundreds, etc.
Among the nomads, as well as among the sedentary ethnic groups, during the period of tribal relations, the formation of the army occurs according to the clan, the period of the territorial community - in tens, hundreds and thousands.
This stage of development corresponds to irrepressible expansion and aggression.
This, as well as the harsh natural conditions, prompted the Khitan to conquer lands in the south from the lands of the Northern Han to the coast of the East China Sea, including the territories around Beijing (modern Hebei and Shanxi provinces). What happened during the reign of their leader Abaoji.
Creation of the Iron Empire
For twenty years the Khitan fought against the state of Bohao, the Tunguska-Manjur Mohe people. It was the first state on the territory of the Russian Far East, occupying lands from the northern part of Korea to Liaoning, and among the ethnic groups inhabiting it were Mohe, Khitan and Koreans.
Bohai's troops had eight commanders, who were called "ferocious left", "ferocious right", "north left guard", "north right guard", "south left guard", "south right guard", "guard - Himalayan bear", " the guardian is a brown bear. " But this did little to help them. The Khitan captured this state in 926, resettling many Bohais to the territory of Liao, and from their state they made a vassal principality, calling it, according to the Mongol tradition, Eastern Red - Dundan.
In the 20s. X century Liao is captured by part of the Jurchen tribes in the river basin. Amnokkan (now the border river between the DPRK and the PRC), having settled them in the area of Liaoyang, calling them "submissive". In total there were 72 Jurchen (Nyuzhen) tribes, which were divided into Khitan tribes "submissive", "attributed", who paid them tribute, and "wild".
In 936 the Khitan seized "16 districts in Lien and Yun", the Chinese lands proper from the Late Jin dynasty, and in 946 they even temporarily captured the capital, Kaifeng.
The founder of the Song dynasty, Zhao Kuan-ying, was proclaimed emperor during the campaign against the Khitan in 960. He began to unite the Chinese lands, already having a constant enemy in the form of the formidable Liao.
And the situation with the seizure of the lands of sedentary China led to a revolution in the psychology of nomads. The long struggle between Liao and Song showed the inhabitants of the steppe that China can become a tasty morsel and a constant source of comfortable existence in favorable climatic conditions:
“The possession of Chinese lands,” he wrote back in the 19th century. V. P. Vasiliev, - should have made a great coup between the inhabitants of Mongolia; they learned to own Chinese lands and saw that this first experience could be repeated on a larger scale."
In 986, three armies of the Song emperor Tang-tsong invaded Liao with the aim of regaining the northern districts, but suffered a crushing defeat. At the same time, the Tanguts of the new Xia empire recognized vassalage from the Liao empire.
In 993, the Khitan attacked Korea, but after receiving a serious rebuff, they proceeded to negotiations, demanding that Korea not cooperate with Sunami.
And in 1004 the Khitan almost took the capital of Song - Kaifeng, moving away from it after receiving a huge tribute.
Peaceful relations between Xia and Song caused discontent on the part of Liao, in 1020 the emperor went hunting with horsemen in the amount of 500,000 (?) And attacked Xia, but was defeated and signed a peace treaty.
And in 1044 the Emperor Xing-Tsung (1031–1055) attacked Xi Xia, weakened by the war with Song, but was defeated and almost captured. In such an ethnically unstable state as Liao, the Jurchen and Bohao revolted against the Khitan.
In 1049, Liao again invaded Xia territory with huge forces, their fleet operated on the Yellow River, the western group was especially successful at fighting. She attacked from the Mongolian steppes and captured a huge full, thousands of sheep and camels.
In 1075, Liao, under threat of attacking the Song, forced the empire to surrender five districts to them. This was the peak of power for the Khitan empire.
Empire of nomads
Nomads had already seized the lands of Chinese farmers, so the Turkic-speaking Tabgach (Toba) captured the north of China and founded the Northern Wei dynasty (386–552).
But, unlike Wei, for the first time in the history of relations between the steppe and China, the nomads not only announced the creation of an empire in 916, but achieved real equality with the Chinese state. The leader of the Khitan Abaotszi proclaimed himself emperor Tianhuang-wang, and the nomadic "empire" received the name Liao - Iron. Emperor Song - Shi Jintang was forced to recognize the nomadic khan as his father.
Chinese administrators, who decided to serve the new rulers, contributed to the rooting of nomads in the captured provinces:
“Yan-hui first taught Khitan,” he wrote in the 12th century. Ye Long-li, - the organization of official institutions, the construction of cities surrounded by internal and external walls, and the creation of trading places for the settlement of the Chinese, which gave each of them the opportunity to have a wife and engage in plowing and cultivating vacant land.
As a result, all Chinese began to live peacefully and go about their business, and the number of fugitives began to decrease more and more. Han Yan-hui played an important role in the conquest of other states by the Khitan."
This is how a symbiosis of a "nomadic" empire and an agricultural state arose, where the Chinese system of management and organization prevailed for the majority of the sedentary population, and for the Khitan there was a "horde" system at the same time.
The Liao Empire was a multi-ethnic structure, and this was its weakness - most of the peoples were forced to submit only to force, they had no other incentives to be in the Khitan state: the majority were Khitan (30%), almost the same number were Chinese (25- 27%), other ethnic groups made up the remaining 30% of the population.
At the beginning of the XI century. Song signed an agreement with Liao, increasing the payments of gifts and tributes, from 200,000 pieces of silk and 3,730 kg of silver to 300,000 pieces of silk and 7,460 kg of silver. It was the silver crisis that forced the introduction of paper money and credit notes into the Song dynasty empire, although, most likely, tribute payments to the Khitan were made in kind.
Khitan military forces
The Liao Shi describes in detail the tactics and weapons of this Mongol alliance of tribes, which anticipated the tactics of the Mongols of Genghis Khan.
“According to the military system that existed in the Liao State, the entire population between the ages of fifteen and fifty was entered on the military lists. For one soldier of the regular troops there were three horses, one forager and one person serving the camp.
Each had iron armor of nine items, a saddle cloth, a bridle, iron or leather armor for a horse, depending on the strength of the animal, four bows, four hundred arrows, a long and short spear, a gudo (club), an ax, a halberd, a small flag, a hammer, an awl, knife, flint, horse tub, one dhow of dry food, bag for dry food, hook, [felt] umbrella and two hundred ropes for tying horses. The warriors stored all this on their own."
Before the war, a mandatory inspection of the troops was carried out, and before the outbreak of hostilities, a sacrifice was arranged. The main sacrifice took place on Mount Mue. On the way, the troops, setting off on a campaign with the emperor, placed the criminals sentenced to death and shot them with bows, sacrificing them. On the way back, prisoners were also sacrificed. This was called "shooting arrows of the devil."
The nomadic "emperor" had a guard of 3 thousand desperate warriors. After the death of the emperor, the guards entered the service in the palaces (gong) and yurts (zhang) of his widow and concubines; during the war, young guards went on a campaign, and the elderly guarded the graves of the emperors.
Separately, detachments of brave and brave warriors acted - long-range reconnaissance, lanzi, who were both in the vanguard and in the rearguard. They acted according to the situation, destroyed small detachments of opponents, and reported large ones to the vanguard.
Horse guards moved in front, behind, and along the flanks. Thanks to these detachments, the Khitan army never acted blindly and had accurate information about the enemy.
On the way, all buildings were destroyed and trees were cut down, small settlements were taken outright, medium and large - after reconnaissance, depending on the situation. During the sieges, the Khitan used prisoners, even the elderly and children, and they were the first to be driven under the weapons of the besieged.
The Khitan cut off communications, preventing the enemy from joining forces, including by fraudulent means. They simulated deceptive attacks and portrayed huge forces where they were not there, throwing up dust or pounding big drums.
At the halt, the army settled down in a kuren; on vacation, they always set up a fortified camp, which the Chinese subjects of Liao, the militia of farmers, erected for them. The Chinese served in the wagon train and engineering units. For one Khitan in the army there were two soldiers from the service personnel.
When meeting an enemy in the field, if the enemy did not surrender after the first attack, they tried to wear him down with constant attacks, periodically feigning a deceptive flight. If this did not help, the Khitan did not allow the enemy to rest, attacking in waves, specially raising clouds of dust with the help of brooms attached to foragers' horses. This tactic has often brought them good luck.
Horde-wide hunting was the primary way of training troops.
Liao's death
But the Jurchen tribes became the gravediggers of the semi-nomadic, in fact, Liao empire. They, having entered into an alliance with the Song, by 1125 completely defeated the Khitan state, captured and deposed their emperor.
In fact, the Khitan fell victim to the process of sinking to the ground, like many of their predecessors and followers. Such a metamorphosis occurred with many warlike nomads, who achieved success even when they were weakly armed. But as soon as they joined the fruits of civilization, there was a weakening, and then the disintegration of the tribal structure, which, in fact, ensured their military victories.
The life of the last nomadic Khitan emperor confirms these observations:
"The situation was further aggravated by Tian-tso, who was on the wrong path, neglected all affairs: he indulged in excessive hunting and debauchery, used his favorites in the service, appointed inappropriate persons to positions and did not know any prohibitions, which caused unrest among his servants."
Part of the Khitan, led by Yelyu Dashi, migrated to the east. In 1130 they, having fought the lands of the Yenisei Kirghiz, occupied Semirechye and conquered eastern Turkestan, creating Western Liao. Another part withdrew to the northeast, where in 1216-1218 they unsuccessfully attacked Korea, while some remained in their former habitats and submitted to the Jurchens.
The Khitan will actively support the Mongol conquests.
The agricultural civilization of China used the system "i and zhi and" - "with the help of the barbarians to pacify the barbarians." So the Jurchens, with the support of Song, destroyed the Liao Empire.
Here, China, as a sedentary state, was not original. And Byzantium, for a long time not having its own military means in sufficient quantity and quality, attracted other nomads to fight the nomadic peoples.
The alliance with the Jurchen (Nyuzhen), tributaries of the Khitan, brought the Song dynasty tactical success, returning the provinces that fell into the Liao empire. But, as further events will show, it was a "Pyrrhic victory."
