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40 Awe-Inspiring Facts About Genghis Khan and the Mongol Empire

Khalid Elhassan February 3, 2019 24 min

30. Other Mongol Predecessors: The Huns

Perhaps the closest analog to the medieval Mongol eruption was that of the Huns in the dying days of the Roman Empire. By the 5th century AD, the Huns ruled a Steppe empire that reached into Eastern and Central Europe. Scary to begin with, the Huns became outright terrifying under the leadership of Attila (reigned 434 – 453), who earned the moniker “The Scourge of God”. He terrorized the Eastern and Western Roman Empires, plundered the Balkans, extorted tons of gold from Constantinople, invaded Gaul, and struck into Italy, before drinking himself to death on his wedding night.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.