THE EASTERN WORLD

Introduction

To the European, Asia was fabulously wealthy but infinitely dangerous, a

mysterious amalgam of the splendours of Cathay, the heathen Saracens, who had
deprived Christendom of its rightful centre in Jerusalem, and the destructive and
devilishly cruet Mongol hordes. Occasional travellers, men such as Marco Polo,
ventured to the East and brought back accounts of what they found there; but this small
source of factual knowledge was worked up with a mountain of innuendo and
imagination which left the average educated European entirely ignorant of the real
conditions of the East.

In the same way, the East showed very little curiosity about the West. It was
absorbed with the spread and intermingling of its own cultures; and one of the features
of the age was the growth of the two Eastern religions that were to achieve an influence
beyond the cultural borders in which they developed – Islam and Buddhism. The former
spread throughout the Near East, and in alliance with the ancient culture of Persia,
spread in central Asia as far as India; the latter moved into China, South-East Asia and
Japan. Unlike medieval Christianity, these two religions were assimilated into their new
cultural homes, with benefit to both the religion and the older civilization in which it now
flourished. These new religions often brought in their wake a dramatic assertion of
cultural confidence in the form of huge building projects; the temple of Angkor Wat in
Cambodia was only the most spectacular of many such enterprises.

The age saw the consolidation of the main spheres of cultural influence in Asia –
China, south-East Asia, India – but it also saw the astonishing Mongol Empire which, as
well as being the largest land empire in history, dramatically changed the history of the
continent. To the Europeans, as has been noted, Genghis Khan, Timur and the lesser
Mongol rules were nothing more than rabid destroyers, scourges sent from God leaving
a trail of smoking ruins and mutilated bodies in their wake. This picture was true, and
yet the Mongols brought more to Asia than Christendom was aware: they brought a
peace and unity that lasted for more than a century and enabled safe longdistance trade
for the first time.
 To China, the Mongols brought a great catharsis. The effete Sung dynasty was
swept away, and the new Yuan dynasty, ruled by the legendary Kublai Khan, founded
the imperial City of Peking as a mark of the glory of its rule, a glory that was to grow
ever more brilliant under the Ming. To other civilizations, the struggle against Mongol
rule brought a new cultural identity, or helped to arouse a more certain idea of it – Japan
and Muscovy prospered in the defence of their lands against Mongol domination. India,
too, survived without effective Mongol penetration, and yet eventually it fell to another
conqueror from outside claiming descent from Timur – the Mogul dynasty. By
introducing a strong Persian influence to India, and consolidating the still weak Islamic
culture there the Moguls brought India to one of the most glorious periods in its history,
and created the most unified state in the subcontinent since the days of Ashoka. In
doing so, the Mogul Empire demonstrated all the best features of Asian rule at this date
– religious toleration, assimilation, diversity and mutual benefit – and it was not until the
first of these was replaced by an Islamic fanaticism that the Empire was seen to rest on
mere shadows.

The Asia that the Europeans set out to explore in the fifteenth century was close
to the peak of its splendor; it needed nothing from Europe, and wanted less. Nor was
the East yet decadent and passive when faced with the energetic Europeans, as was to
become true in the following centuries Christian missionaries were expected to justify
their beliefs in terms comprehensible to scholarly followers of Mohammed, the Buddha
or Confucius, and were accepted according to the quality of their philosophies and the
morality of their followers. Traders at Agra or Peking had to offer a worthwhile
exchange, or leave empty-handed. Asia was confident, by 1500; the complexity and
hierarch of its societies provided stability and an incredible richness which could offer a
full life without seeking beyond its frontiers. Yet this self-sufficiency would, eventually,
lead to its demise in the face of European assertion and confident energy.