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Cambridge orientalist, Edward Glanville One Khan, one Empire, one History, might have
Browne, issued proposals for publishing a comp­ been Rashid’s slogan. He was perhaps fortu­
lete critical edition of Rashid, but nothing was nately situated in Persia, an ancient civilized
done, and only *in recent years have steps been land with a tradition of history-writing, placed
taken to rescue him from long and undeserved midway between Europe and China. Contacts
oblivion. The Mongol History has been trans­ with the Far East and the Far West made Persia
lated into Russian by Soviet scholars since the a meeting-place of cultures in the Mongol age,
last war ; the History of the Franks was put and Rashid had rich resources to draw upon.
into French in 1951 ; the History of China is His fall and death was more than a personal
likely to appear soon, and the forthcoming tragedy, it was a severe blow to the development
translation by Professor Boyle of Manchester of of historical studies in Persia and beyond. His
the part dealing with the reigns of the Great writings were involved in his disgrace and his
Khans who followed Genghis, under the title of works went out of circulation. Had they been
The Successors of Genghis Khan, will introduce widely known, they might have founded a
him for the first time to English readers. The school or at least encouraged other scholars to
present-day Persians are eager to honour their pursue similar inquiries and so reach a leval
great historian, and the 650th anniversary of his not attained even in the West till several cen­
death was celebrated in 1968 in Tehran by an turies later. His belated rehabilitation in
international gathering of scholars. recent years is small compensation for the long
Professor Boyle describes the Jami’al- neglect from which his great Universal History
Tawarikh as ‘the first world history in the full is slowly emerging.
sense’. He adds : ‘On the rise and growth of Author :
the Mongol Empire it remains incomparably
our richest and most authoritative source’. Of J. J. Saunders. Reader in History, Uni­
course, one must not expect to find in Rashid versity of Canterbury, Christchurch, New
deep philosophical insight or exacting critical Zealand. Author of The Age of Revolution
standards. He was a man of his time, a ( 1947 ) ; Aspects of the Crusades ( 1962 ) ; A
patriotic Persian who saw the world through History of Medieval Islam (1965) ; The Muslim
Persian eyes. He had no doubt of the super­ World on the Eve of Europe’s Expansion (1966);
iority of Muslim civilization ; Islam was the The Mongol Conquests and their place in World
only true faith, and he could more easily re­ History ( Routledge & Kegan Paul ).
concile himself to Mongol rule now that the
Khans had embraced it. Christian Europe was Notes on Further Reading :
a world apart, a land of barbarism and unbe­ Rashid Al-Din, The First Universal Histo­
lief ; he devotes less space to Europe than to rian by J.J. Saunders. There is almost nothing
China, and his attitude to foreign cultures is on Rashid in English. His literary achievement
rather similar to that of those nineteenth- is assessed by E. G. Browne, A Literary History
century Western historians who wrote as though of Persia, vol. 3 ( Cambridge, 1920 ), and some
what happened in England, France and space is devoted to him in Toynbee’s Study of
Germany was really all that mattered. But History, vol. X, and ed. Lewis and Holt, His­
as the subject of a World Empire, he was well torians of the Middle East ( London, 1962 ). A
placed to write a World History which was not Rashid al-Din Commemoration Volume was
merely the sum of the histories of different published as Vol. XIV of the Central Asiatic
nations, and his conquests in the realm of his­ Journal in 1970 ; several of the articles are in
toriography were as global as those of Genghis. English. Professor J. A. Boyle will give an
The Mongols had brought forcibly together a appraisal of him in the introduction of his forth­
great concourse of people, had swept away coming translation of part of Rashid’s Mongol
kingdoms and frontiers, had unified a large part History, The Successors of Genghis Khan. For
of the great Eurasian continent, and tried to the general background see The Cambridge
govern the world as one universal monarchy. History of Iran, vol. V, 1968.
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