Many of the early reports of the Mongols that came to the west, both to Europe and the Middle East, in the thirteenth century carried horrific descriptions of the barbarian hordes, the Tatars, or denizens of Hell. These descriptions appeared very much to confirm the earlier reports of the carnage, savagery, and monstrous invincibility of this Satanic storm from the east. Many of the earlier reports from the east were wholly fanciful and bore little resemblance to reality. Fabulous tales of strange beings and wondrous lands predominated, but as news of the Tatar invasions began to infiltrate, the stories of horror began. Even though descriptions and pictures that began to be available later in the thirteenth century bear closer resemblance to reality, these early accounts of the appearance of the Mongols remain of great interest because they convey the emotional impact the devastating appearance of the Mongols made on the medieval societies of Europe and the Islamic world.
The Armenian historian Kirakos of Ganjak (1201-1272), a cleric and onetime captive of the Mongols, described them as "hideous and frightful to look upon." He remarked upon their lack of facial hair and "narrow and quick-glancing" eyes, "shrill and piercing" voices and notes that they were "long-lived and hardy." A contemporary of Kirakos, another Christian Armenian cleric, Grigor of Akanc, is more colorful in his depiction of the invaders from the Nation of Archers, as he called the Mongols.
Mongol hoi'scman, Xi'an Museum. Courtesy of Lan Tien Lang Tu Plications
They were terrible to look at and indescribable, with large heads like a buftalo's, narrow eyes like a iledging's |young bird ], a snub nose like a cat, projecting snouts like a dog's, narrow loins like an ant's, short legs like a hog's, and by nature no beards at all. With a lion's strength they have voices more shrill than an eagle's.'
The Persian poet Amir Khosrow (1253-1324) describes several hundred Mongol prisoners taken by the Muslim armies from Sind whose Delhi Sultanate (1206-1555) provided a haven from the Mongols for many of those seeking asylum and safety:
Tineir eyes were so narrow' and piercing that they might have bored a bole in a brazen vessel, and their stench was more horrible than their colour. Their heads were set on their bodies as if they had no necks, and their cheeks resembled leather bottles full of wrinkles and knots. I’heir noses extended from cheekbone
Craven images, Baku early thirteentli century. Courtesy of Lan Tien Lang Publications
To cheekbone. Their nostrils resembled rotting graves, and from them the hair descended as far as tlie lips. Their moustachc. s were of extravagant length, but the beards about their chins were very scanty. Their chests, in colour half-black, half-white, were covered with lice which looked like sesame growing on a bad soil. Their bodies, indeed, were covered with these insects, and their skins were as rough-grained as shagreen leather, fit only to be converted into shoes.'
A more measured account is given by a Franciscan monk and papal emissary who accompanied Friar Giovanni DiPlano Carpini's intelligence gathering party traveling (1245-47) to Qaraqorum, capital of the Mongol Empire. He reports that the Tatars are usually;
Of low stature and rather thin, owing to their diet of mare's milk, which makes a man slim, and their strenuous life. They are broad of face with prominent cheekbones, and have a tonsure [shaven circle] on their head like our clerics from which they shave a strip three finger. s wide from ear to ear. On the forehead, however, they wear their hair in a crescent-shaped fringe reaching to the eyebrows, but gather up the remaining hair, and arrange and braid it like the Saracens [Muslims).'’
The Franciscan Friar William of Rubruck traveled to the court of the Great Khan Mongke between 1253 and 1255, and on his return he sent a full account of his journey to King Louis fX of France. He mentions their shaved heads but describes the bald patch as square rather than round, and he says that the forehead and temples are a l. so shaved of hair, leaving a
Horse from Baku, early thirteenth century. Courtesy of Lan Tien Tang Publications
Long tuft of hair hanging from the crown to the eyebrows. Rubruck further describes the men as having long hair behind, which they braid in two plaits right up to the ears. He notes that girls, on the day following their marriage, shave their heads from the middle toward the forehead. Interestingly, he adds a detail about hygiene, explaining that in order to wash their hair, the Mongols first take water into their mouths. They then allow this water to trickle from their mouths into their cupped hands, which they use to wet their hair and wash their heads.
Though less eniotional in his description than others, William of Rubruck is quite pointed in his account of the women.
The women are astonishingly fat. The less nose one has, the more beautiful she is considered; and they disfigure themselves horribly, moreover, by painting tbeir faces."*
Later, he describes the wife of a local Mongol commander, Scacatai, whose appearance he finds particularly repellent. In order to enhance her nasal features, the snub nose being a prized sign of beauty, this lady had. It seemed to Rubruck, amputated the bridge of her nose. The horrible result was the almost complete lack of any discernahle nose, and worse still she had apparently applied some black ointment to that disfigured spot as well as to her eyebrows. She "looked thoroughly dreadful" concludes the Friar.
Baku, early thirteenth century. Courtesy of Lan Tien Lang Publications
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