Franco-Mongol alliance (modern interpretations)

Modern interpretations of the Franco-Mongol alliance vary in nature, and there is disagreement among historians over the nature and extent of the alliance between the Franks and the Mongols. There is also dispute AbOUT the definition of the term "Frank", and whether it should refer to the Kingdom of Cilician Armenia. Most historians agree that the Armenians, when the Mongols were advancing into their territory in the mid-1200s, did ally with the Mongols for a few years. The neighboring Frank Principality of Antioch and County of Tripoli, headed by Bohemond VI, was also long-time recognized allies of the Mongols. But there is dispute about whether or not the Mongols ever had a formal alliance with the Franks, meaning some of the Crusader States, Western Europe and the Papacy. Also, some historians describe the relationship of Armenia and Antioch/Tripoli as a "vassal" relationship, not as an alliance.

"An alliance", "an entente", "a combined force"

The French historian René Grousset, writing in the 1930s, the French historian of the Crusades Jean Richard, writing in 1996, or the English historian Christopher Tyerman, writing in 2006, used the terms "Franco-Mongol Alliance", "L'Alliance Franco-Mongole" or "La coalition Franco-Mongole". Grousset mentions especially "Louis IX and the Franco-Mongol alliance", "Edward I and the Mongol alliance", and the example of Franco-Mongol coalition given by the Hospitallers. Jean Richard in Histoire des Croisades, has the Franco-Mongol alliance start in earnest in the 1260s, and continue on-and-off until it was strongly revived by Ghazan, to continue to have an influence until 1322.. Claude Mutafian in Le Royaume Arménien de Cilicie describes "the Mongol alliance", and "the Franco-Mongol collaboration". The historian Zoe Oldenbourg in The Crusades mentions the 1280 "Alliance of Franks and Mongols against Qalawun". The modern French historian Demurger, in the 2002 Jacques de Molay biography The Last Templar, refers to it as the "Mongol alliance", which came to fruition through such events as the 1300 combined offensives between the Templars and the Mongols. Jonathan Riley-Smith mentionned in his Atlas of the Crusades that in 1285 the Hospitallers of the north agreed to ally to the Mongols. Angus Stewart called it "Franco-Mongole entente." Christopher Tyerman, in God's War: A New History of the Crusades, does mention the existence of "The Mongol alliance", but specifies that in the end it led nowhere, and turned out to be a "false hope for Outremer as for the rest of Christendom." He further describes successes and failures of this alliance from 1248 to 1291, with Louis IX's early attempts at capturing "the chimera of a Franco-Mongol anti-Islamic alliance",, Bohemond VI's alliance with the Mongols and their joint victories, and Edward's largely unsuccessful attempts.

"Attempts", "projects", "plans"

Other writers stress that there were only attempts towards such an alliance, which ultimately ended in failure. Prawer said simply, "The attempts of the crusaders to create an alliance with the Mongols failed." Dr. Malcolm Barber, world authority on the Knights Templar, called the alliance a "project" and wrote of "the possibility of an alliance." Michael Prawdin in The Mongol Empire: Its Rise and Legacy, called it "the failure of the attempt at an alliance." Dr. Sylvia Schein in her 1979 article "Gesta Dei per Mongolos" referred to it as "plans for an alliance." David Morgan in his well-respected book The Mongols said, "From 1263 until well into the fourteenth century repeated attempts were made to arrange an alliance." "No really effective joint action had ever been organized: in thirteenth-century conditions the problems of co-ordination appear to have been insuperable." and "Contacts were maintained under Oljeitu... But after Oljeitu's reign attempts at alliance at last ceased." Steven Runciman lamented that "chances of a Mongol alliance with the Christians faded out, and David Nicolle, another acknowledged expert on the Knights Templar, said that the Mongols were "potential allies", but that overall the major players were the Mamluks and the Mongols, and that the Christians were just "pawns in a greater game."

"A chimera", "a dream"

The 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica said, "The alliance with the Mongols remained, from the first to the last, something of a chimera." In the 1979 edition the Britannica does not refer to an alliance but does include a section on "Crusaders military relations." Amin Maalouf, in The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, explains that the Franks kept dreaming about an alliance with the Mongols that could defeat the Mamluks in a pincer movement, but is otherwise specific about the various occurences of this alliance. Claude Lebédel established a distinction between the Franks who allied with the Mongols and those who did not, stating that "the Barons of the Holy Land refused an alliance with the Mongols, except for the king of Armenia and Bohemond VI, prince of Antioch and Count of Tripoli".

Reasons for failure

There has been much discussion among historians as to why the Franco-Mongol alliance ultimately failed to bring effective results. Peter Jackson, in his book The Mongols and the West, 1221-1410 discussed multiple reasons for the failure:

One was that the Mongols at that stage in their empire, were not entirely focused on expanding to the West. By the late 1200s, the Mongol leaders were the grandchildren of the great Genghis Khan, and internal disruption was brewing. The original nomadic Mongols from the day of Genghis had become more settled, and had had to turn into administrators instead of conquerors. Battles were springing up that were Mongol against Mongol, which took troops away from the front in Syria. When Genghis had died, his empire had been split into four quarters, one for each of his sons. The quarter of the Mongol empire in the area of the Holy Land, the Ilkhanid, was being pressured by other sections such as the northern Golden Horde.

There was also some confusion within Europe, as to the differences between the Mongols of the Ilkhanid in the Holy Land, and the Mongols of the Golden Horde, who were making attacks on Eastern Europe, in Hungary and Poland. Within the Mongol Empire, the Ilkhanids and the Golden Horde considered each other enemies, but it took some time for Western observers to be able to distinguish between the different parts of the Mongol Empire.

Another reason for the failure, was the decreased interest in Europe, in pursuing the Crusades. After Jerusalem had been lost to Saladin in 1187, and the Crusaders fought an ever more desperate battle against the advancing forces from Egypt, it became harder and harder to drum up enthusiasm for the Crusades back in Europe. Monarchs often gave lip service to the idea of going on Crusade, as a way of making an emotional appeal to their subjects, but in reality they would take years to prepare, and sometimes never actually left to go do battle. Internal wars in Europe, such as the War of the Vespers, were also distracting attention, and making it less likely for European nobles to want to commit their military to the Crusades, when they needed them more at home.

Economics also played a factor, as the cost of Crusading had been steadily increasing. Which is one reason that some monarchs may have responded positively to Mongol inquiries, but became vague and evasive when asked to actually commit troops and resources. Logistics also became more difficult -- the Egyptian Mamluks were genuinely concerned about the threat of another wave of Crusader forces, and so each time the Mamluks captured another castle or port, instead of occupying it, they systematically destroyed it so that it could never be used again. This both made it more difficult for the Crusaders to plan military operations, and also increased the expense of those operations.

Another factor had to do with concerns among the Europeans about the longterm goals of the Mongols. The early Mongol diplomacy had been not a simple offer of cooperation, but a clear demand for submission. The Mongols would not have been content to stop at the Holy Land, but were on a clear quest for world domination. It was only in their later communications with Europe that the Mongol diplomats started to adopt a more conciliatory tone; but they still used language that more implied command than entreaty. If the Mongols had achieved a successful alliance with the West, and destroyed the Mamluk Sultanate, there is little doubt that the Mongols would have then proceeded to conquer Africa, where there would have been no strong state standing in their way until Morocco; and the Mongols would have also turned upon the Franks of Cyprus and Greece. Even the Armenian King, the most enthusiastic advocate of Western-Mongol collaboration, freely admitted that the Mongol leader was not inclined to listen to European advice, and that even if working together that European armies and Mongol armies should avoid contact because of the Mongol arrogance.

Jackson also points out that the court historians of Mongol Iran, made no mention whatsoever of the communications between the Ilkhans and the Christian West, and barely mentioned the Franks at all. It was not seen as important, and Jackson argues that the communications may have even been seen as embarrassing to the Mongols, especially when the Mongol leader Ghazan, a Muslim, could be seen as trying to gain the assistance of infidels, against his fellow Muslims in Egypt. In a 1300 letter to the Mamluk Sultan however, Ghazan boasted that the contingents ranged under his banner now included Franks. Also, Rashid al-Din, the Jewish Prime Minister of Ghazan and later Oljeitu, wrote an extensive History of the Franks (1305/1306), probably based on information from Isol the Pisan or Dominican friars, providing much details on Europe's political organization, the use of mappae mundi by Italian mariners, and regnal chronologies derived from the chronicle of Martin of Troppau (d. 1278). When the historians did make notes of foreign territories, they were usually categorized as either "enemies", "conquered," or "in rebellion.", and the Franks, in that context, were once mentionned in a list of enemies that could be conquered. The idea of "ally" was foreign to the Mongols.

There was also not much support among the populace in Europe for a Mongol alliance. Many in Europe were writing "recovery" literature with their ideas about how best to recover the Holy Land, but few mentioned the Mongols as a genuine possibility. In 1306, when Pope Clement V asked the leaders of the military orders, Jacques de Molay and Fulk de Villaret, to present their proposals for how the crusades should proceed, neither of them factored in any kind of a Mongol alliance. A later proposal of a Crusade drafted by Villaret in 1307/1308 envisaged a Mongol invasion of Syria as a preliminary to a Frankish assault on Egypt, but does not specifically mention cooperation. Later writers, such as Gargia d'Ayerve, bishop of Leon (1319) would however advocate cooperation with the Mongols to reclaim the Holy Land. The 13th century however saw a vogue of Mongol things in the West, so much so that many new-born children in Italy were named after Mongol rulers: names such as Can Grande ("Great Khan"), Alaone (Hulagu), Argone (Arghun) or Cassano (Ghazan) are recorded with a high frequency.

See also

• History of gunpowder
• History of printing
• Al-'Āḍid, the teenaged Muslim caliph in Egypt, who entered into an alliance with the Christians in the 1100s

Ancient sources

• Adh-Dhababi, Record of the Destruction of Damascus by the Mongols in 1299-1301 Translated by Joseph Somogyi. From: Ignace Goldziher Memorial Volume, Part 1, Online (English translation).
• Jean de Joinville, The Memoirs of Lord of Joinville, translated by Ethel Wedwood Online (English translation).
• Le Templier de Tyr (circa 1300). Chronicle du Templier de Tyr, Online (Original French).
• Hayton of Corycus (1307). Flowers of the Histories of the East, Online (English translation).
• Guillaume de Tyr (circa 1300). History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea, Online (Original French).
• Kirakos (circa 1300). History of the Armenians, Online, (English translation).

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Modern sources

• "The Monks of Kublai Khan Emperor of China", Sir E. A. Wallis Budge. Online
• Encyclopedia Iranica, Article on Franco-Persian relations
• Foltz, Richard (2000). "Religions of the Silk Road : overland trade and cultural exchange from antiquity to the fifteenth century". New York: St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-23338-8.