23. Nomad Eruptions
In settled lands, only a minority could be mobilized as fighters, because the majority were needed in the fields and workshops. 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. So nearly the entire adult male population was available as warriors. Temujin, who was born into a Mongol tribe, was not the first to terrify the civilized world. In the seventh century BC, the Scythians – Iranian speaking nomads who inhabited the Steppe between China and the Carpathians – raided into the settled lands of the Middle East. In 612 BC, they played a key role in destroying the Assyrian Empire, forever extinguishing a nation that had existed for over a millennium, and that had dominated the Middle East for centuries. Other Steppe nomads continued to plague bordering empires, such as the Persians and Chinese.
