Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
In an era when ambassadors served as hostages to be publicly tortured or killed
during times of hostilities, Chinggis Khaan ordered that every ambassador be con-
sidered an envoy of peace. This law marked the beginning of diplomatic immunity
and international law. Today nearly every country accepts and promotes, at least in
theory, the ideas and policies behind the 'Great Law of Chinggis Khaan'.
Children of the Golden Light
The decline of the Turkic tribes gave the opening for a new tribe to emerge. Scholars of-
fer varying explanations for when and where these new people arrived, but the Mongols
ascribe their origins to the mating of a blue wolf and a tawny doe beside a great sea, of-
ten identified as Lake Baikal (in Russia). They further credit the origin of Chinggis
Khaan's own clan to a mysterious and sacred woman called Alan Goa, who gave birth to
two sons during her marriage, and had an additional three sons after her husband died.
The elder sons suspected that their younger brothers had been fathered by an adopted boy
(now a man) whom their mother had also raised and who lived with her.
Upon hearing of their suspicions and complaints, Alan Goa sat her five sons around
the hearth in her ger and told them that the three younger sons were fathered by a
'Golden Light'. She then handed each an arrow with the command to break it. When
they had done this, she handed each a bundle of five arrows with the command to break
them all together. When the boys could not do so, she told them that it mattered not
where the brothers came from so long as they remained united.
A Mongol is a member of the Mongol ethnic group; a Mongolian is a citizen of Mongolia.
Kazakhs of Bayan-Ölgii are Mongolians but not Mongols; the Kalmyks of New Jersey
are Mongols but not Mongolians.
No matter what the Mongol origin, the story of Alan Goa has had a persistent and pro-
found influence on the development of Mongolian culture, on everything from the role of
women and attitudes towards sexuality to the political quest for unity and the herder's
value of practical action over ideology or religion.
Chinggis Khaan never erected any statues or grand monuments to himself, but recent
years have seen modern Mongolians trying to rectify this. Statues of Chinggis can be
seen at Chinggis Khaan (Sükhbaatar) Sq in UB, on the Ulaanbaatar- Khentii road, in
Chinggis Khot (Öndörkhaan) and in Dadal.
