Political Order in Pre-Modern Eurasia: Imperial Incorporation and the Hereditary Divisional System
Lhamsuren Munkh-Erdene
Abstract Comparing the Liao, Chinggisid and Qing successive incorporations of Inner Asia, this article is prepared to argue that hereditary divisional system these Asian empires employed incorporate administer their nomadic population was engine generated what scholars see either as ‘tribes’ or ‘aristocratic order’. This system, because its membership rulership, invariably tended produce autonomous lordships with distinct names identities unless central government took measures curb tendency. Whenever power waned, divisions emerged independent powers in themselves lords contenders for power. The structure did not destroy any tribal order; instead, it destroyed incorporated a variety former Liao politico-administrative into own decimally organized minqans transformed quasi-political named categories populace, irgens , stripping them structures. In turn, Qing, incorporating Mongolia, divided remains divisions, tümens otogs khoshuu ayimaqs . Thus, logic imperial incorporation produced multiple identity categories.
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society