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

Khalid Elhassan February 3, 2019 24 min

Herding horses on the Mongolian Steppe. All That is Interesting

35. Life on the Steppe Produced A Deep Pool of Tough Warriors

Another advantage enjoyed by Mongols and their Steppe kin arose from the disadvantage of living in the Steppe: a harsh existence, much of it spent on horseback, that created a deep pool of hardy warriors. In the settled lands, only a minority could be mobilized as fighters because the majority were needed in the fields and workshops. The Steppe nomads had no fields and little manufacture, while their food source, their animal flocks and herds, could be cared for by children and women. That left nearly the entire adult male population of fighting age available as warriors.

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.