5. The Tradition of Dining Over Defeated Foes
The Mongols enjoyed making examples out of vanquished foes. After their victory at the Battle of Kalka River, captured enemy commanders were laid on the ground, then a huge board was laid over their bodies. The victors then sat over the board to eat, drink, and celebrate their triumph, while slowly crushing and suffocating the defeated men beneath to death. However, the Mongols’ feasting over the bodies of defeated commanders was not the first time that vanquished leaders had faced such a fate.
Such ghoulish celebrations seem to have been pioneered by the first Abbasid Caliph Abul Abbas (722 – 754), nicknamed Al Saffah (“Spiller of Blood” – a well-earned nickname). He initiated a revolt against the Ummayad Dynasty of Caliphs, and crushed them in a climactic battle in 750. He then tracked down and killed as many members of the defeated dynasty as he could. In 751, Al Saffah declared an amnesty, and 80 surviving Ummayad princes emerged from hiding to receive their pardons at a banquet. He had them seized, stabbed, covered their quivering bodies with leather rugs, and bade the other guests to sit down and dine atop them.
