Genghis Khan’s Warriors Had To Live By These Wild Rules

Genghis Khan’s Mongol hordes created one of the greatest empires the world has ever seen – but it came at a price. The warlord didn’t shy away from brutal cruelty, and so it was a very good idea for his army to follow his strict rules both on and off the battlefield. Here’s what it was really like to be one of Genghis Khan’s warriors — from the strategies they employed in war to the beliefs they had to hold in private.

20. Keep the secret of Genghis Khan’s tomb

Genghis Khan died on a summer’s day in 1227. And you’d assume that the great man – who, let’s not forget, had become the ruler of all he surveyed – was buried in a flashy, spectacular tomb. But this was very far from the truth. In fact, the emperor himself supposedly demanded the complete opposite.

The mystery lives on

Apparently, Genghis Khan ordered that he should be buried with great secrecy – and that absolutely nothing should mark his grave. So, when he passed away, grief-stricken soldiers carried his body to a secret location. They even went so far as to repeatedly ride 1,000 horses across his grave to obliterate any sign of its existence! And it seems to have worked. After nearly 800 years, still no one knows where Genghis Khan’s remains lie.

19. Become a master archer

One of the main reasons why Genghis Khan was so successful? His soldiers had incredible archery skills. But the art of marksmanship didn’t just spring out of nowhere. No, Genghis Khan ensured that the Mongol people were taught from childhood. Competitions were even held to test children – boys and girls – in various martial skills. These included wrestling, horse riding, and athletics as well as archery.

Multitasking

And Genghis Khan didn’t just need a high level of bowmanship in his men. Mongol warriors were also expected to be experts at firing arrows while they rode their horses at a gallop. But the dictator did make sure his soldiers had the best bows available at the time. They were state-of-the-art weapons with wooden cores. In the right hands, these were deadly.

18. The horse comes first

For a Mongol warrior, a horse was essential. But soldiers didn’t have just one! Apparently, they traveled with a small herd of four or five steeds. That’s so they would always have a fresh horse when Genghis Khan called upon them.

A symbol of wealth

This gave the Mongols a key advantage over their rivals. Using horses, they could travel great distances at high speeds. But the animals were important to Genghis Khan for another reason, too. Basically, horses were seen as a measure of wealth – so, the more you had, the better.

17. Be prepared to retreat

Picture the Mongol hordes going into battle, and you’re probably seeing them racing across the steppe and vanquishing all in their path. And, yeah, they did do that from time to time. Often, though, the soldiers were a lot more cunning than that. Sometimes, they used a tactical retreat to great effect.

Tricking the opposition

It’s said the Mongols would attack with a relatively weak force before suddenly retreating in disarray. Then, when the enemy set off in pursuit of what was actually a planned withdrawal, the main Mongol force would strike. Taking the advancing soldiers unawares, Genghis Khan’s men would comprehensively defeat them. This feigned retreat apparently resulted in many victories, too.

16. Tolerate different religions

Genghis Khan ruthlessly conquered large parts of Asia, the Middle East, and Europe. You’d think, then, that he would have tried to impose the Mongols’ religious ideas on the people he controlled. These beliefs centered around shamanism, spirits, and ancestor worship. Curiously enough, though, he let folks just worship however they liked. How come?

No rebellion

Well, Genghis Khan apparently thought that trying to impose religion on others would be more trouble than it was worth. The Mongols reportedly made efforts to get on the right side of religious leaders in the lands they annexed. They even granted tax breaks to clerics and holy places. But there was some clever thinking behind this decision. Supposedly, Genghis Khan believed that granting religious freedom would make the people less likely to rise in rebellion.

15. Compulsory military service

Perhaps above all else, Genghis Khan needed manpower. The more soldiers he had under his command, the easier it would be to achieve his territorial ambitions. But the Mongols didn’t depend on volunteers; people were conscripted. And strict laws dictated who must be ready to serve in the Mongol army.

A huge army

All able-bodied men from the age of 16 to 60 – some sources say 15 to 70 – could be called upon to serve as soldiers. In his 2017 book The Mongol Art of War, Timothy May estimated that a staggering one in seven of the Mongol population were soldiers. That is an astonishingly militarized society.

14. Share the plunder

If there’s one way to lose the loyalty of your soldiers, it’s failing to give them what they believe they’re owed. And so while the Mongols didn’t get anything like regular pay, the fighters naturally expected to be richly rewarded. Genghis Khan had a rule for this, and it’s a surprisingly fair one for a warlord.

Dividing the loot

As the Mongols conquered more people, they stole everything from gold and silver to horses and slaves. And Genghis Khan made sure there was an equitable system of dividing up the loot. But this didn’t happen until an enemy was utterly defeated. After that, a special committee called the jarqu administered the payouts.

13. Equality under the law

You wouldn’t expect a fearsome conqueror to be an equal opportunities kind of guy, but Genghis Khan was surprisingly progressive for his time. He laid down the law, in fact, to ensure that everyone got a fair shot. And he did this in two main ways.

Women’s rights

Firstly, Genghis Khan’s laws meant that it was the best soldiers who got promoted rather than those with links to ruling families. Yes, this meant his armies were pretty much meritocracies. Secondly, he actually gave protection and status to women. At a time when women’s rights were non-existent elsewhere, Mongol females often held positions of political power. They could also serve as shamans.

12. Always obey

Genghis Khan and his lieutenants were as one when it came to unquestioning obedience from soldiers. They believed that orders had to be followed at all times. This meant soldiers and even officers could be lashed if they did not follow commands to the letter. That’s right: if any of a soldier’s equipment went missing, it was the officer in charge of the man who was punished.

Consequences were severe

Some infractions were dealt with by using the ultimate sanction: execution. Offenses that were punished by death included falling asleep on guard duty, desertion, or retreating without orders. And this respect for the rules was noted by a European who traveled to the Mongol lands in 1245. Friar Giovanni di Plano Carpini wrote, “These men... are more obedient to their masters than any other men in the world. Fights, brawls, wounding, murder are never met with among them.”

11. Practice hit-and-run tactics

The main force of Genghis Khan’s army was the archers mounted on horseback. And these highly mobile troops were ideally suited to one of the Mongols’ favorite battle tactics. We’re talking about the hit-and-run assault, which had to be practiced and perfected all the time. But what was this exactly?

It’s all in the planning

Well, the armies would attack at speed – often making deadly use of their bows – and then retreat before an enemy force had time to re-form its ranks. They would make these rapid horseback sallies repeatedly while staying out of range of the enemy’s weapons. And only when their opponents were thoroughly disordered by the hit-and-run tactics would the Mongols make a final devastating attack.

10. Target enemy leaders

One way to disrupt an enemy army is to take out their leaders. And that was certainly a tactic Genghis Khan encouraged his troops to pursue. He picked it up in his earliest campaigns, when he was attempting to unite the Mongolian people under one ruler: him.

Only one thing to do

Genghis Khan quickly realized that allowing opposing leaders to escape was a mistake. It meant that even after battlefield defeat, they could muster their followers and live to fight another day. With that in mind, then, he soon made sure that his rival generals and rulers were put to the sword.

9. Right time, right place

Genghis Khan was a master of one of the most important rules of war: choosing the right time and place to engage his enemies in battle. The Mongol leader would deliberately avoid attacking an opponent until he was satisfied that the circumstances were entirely to his advantage. Only then would he launch an assault.

Catching everyone off guard

Under Genghis Khan’s skilled generalship, the Mongol forces would sometimes split into smaller groups to avoid an unsuitable battlefield. Eventually, though, they would come back together when the time was right to strike a conclusive blow. Often, this would take the shape of a surprise attack that would quickly overwhelm the enemy.

8. Take the flanks

The most obvious way to fight a battle is a headlong charge at the enemy force. But it also may be what your opponent’s expecting. No wonder, then, that Genghis Khan had an array of more cunning tactics in his repertoire! One of these was the practice of flanking. Mongol warriors would avoid the center of the enemy’s forces; instead, they would skirt around their sides.

Size didn’t matter

This way, Genghis Khan and his warriors could surround an opposing army. And the tactic could even be combined with a planned retreat. How did that work? Well, once the enemy advanced in pursuit, the Mongols could attack in the flanks and from the rear. Then the retreating Mongols could turn and mount a frontal assault. Using such clever tactics, Genghis Khan often defeated armies with superior numbers.

7. Win sieges with engineering

A fortified city presented Genghis Khan with an altogether different battlefield problem. Hidden behind high battlements, an enemy could hold out for long periods if they had sufficient supplies within their citadel. And unless such a stronghold was overcome, Genghis Khan could not feel secure in the territory he had invaded. So, what did he end up doing?

Aggression and inteligence

Well, naturally, Genghis Khan made sure that the Mongol army included engineers and specialists in conducting siege warfare. Many of these skilled men came from Chinese and Muslim territories that the leader had previously conquered. And these soldiers knew their stuff. They used gunpowder, artillery, massive catapults that could hurl boulders against castle walls, and even rockets to shatter defenses.

6. Divide your enemy

Genghis Khan often conquered by sheer force of arms. He wasn’t opposed to the use of diplomacy or deceit when they made victory easier, though, and that’s clear from one particularly clever strategy. Whenever they saw the opportunity, the Mongols would work to increase existing hostility among their enemies.

Bad blood

In his book The Mongol Art of War, Timothy May quoted the words of a 13th-century French nobleman called Jean de Joinville. Joinville wrote, “Whenever the Mongols wish to make war on the Saracens, they send Christians to fight against them and on the other hand employ Saracens in any war against Christians.” Yep, Genghis Khan weakened his enemies by using any bad blood to his advantage.

5. Move fast

One of Genghis Khan’s secret weapons? Mobility. With their hardy horses, the Mongol hordes could travel over great distances at speed. That allowed them to confuse their enemies or take them entirely by surprise. And it also made them ahead of their time. We’ve only seen such flexibility again when motorized armies arrived in the 20th century.

Keeping pace

Genghis Khan sometimes made Mongol warriors on horseback cover 75 miles per day. And to make sure they could maintain this high pace, soldiers were well-supplied with as many as 16 spare mounts. This, of course, meant they could travel great distances quickly. Most crucially of all, though, they could also act with deadly speed on the battlefield.

4. Gather intelligence

Genghis Khan didn’t lead his warriors into battle until he’d made thorough preparations. And one crucial element of this pre-attack groundwork was the gathering of intelligence. Obviously, it was important to know how many soldiers the general had at his disposal, so a headcount of available troops was the first step.

Spying

Then the Mongols would learn what they could about their opponents. Undercover agents disguised as holy men or traders would infiltrate enemy territory to gather information. They would also hunt out any potential turncoats who may defect to the Mongol cause. And once Genghis Khan’s troops had started advancing, spies would report on the lie of the land. Nothing was left to chance!

3. Use all available weapons

The thick cloud of arrows the Mongol warriors were capable of launching would have struck terror into the hearts of their enemies. But Genghis Khan had other strings to his bow. Or, to be more precise, his soldiers had a full armory of other fearsome weapons.

No match for Khan

Take the 1221 Siege of Nishapur in modern-day Iran. When the Mongols besieged the city, their equipment included 300 ballistae – large catapults that could launch rocks or spears at the enemy. Genghis Khan’s hordes also had 3,000 powerful crossbows for good measure. There was no way the citizens of Nishapur could match that.

2. Commandeer enemy technology

Genghis Khan certainly wasn’t too proud to use the technology of his enemies. And that’s just as well, as the Mongols’ weaponry was fairly primitive at the start of their campaigns. As the armies conquered more lands, however, they reaped the rewards in more ways than one. They were able to absorb more advanced military technology and even battle tactics.

Theft

As the Mongols traveled through West Asia, they stole steel helmets, chainmail, breastplates, and even armor for their horses. This meant that along with their traditional light cavalry, the Mongols could now deploy the heavy variant to good effect. Smart!

1. Horsemanship was mandatory

Horses were central to Mongol culture and a key element in their success on the battlefield. There was even a law that all children must learn to ride. And for Genghis Khan’s troops, commanding a horse was as familiar as walking. It helped that the Mongols took advantage of one simple invention: the metal stirrup.

Stirrups allowed success

When and where the stirrup was actually invented remains a mystery, but the Mongols certainly made full use of it. Riding with stirrups meant that a warrior could stay on his horse with both hands free. That allowed him to fire arrows as he rode at speed – a fearsome martial skill that helped the Mongols win so many battles.