History Reckons

Genghis Khan (popularly known as ) / Chinggis Khaan (Mongolian) / Temujin (meaning Iron-Worker) the undisputed leader of Mongol Empire - touted as the largest ever contiguous empire in the history. His name ignited fear in the heart of each and every enemy here conquered. The very presence of his name was enough to demoralize the spirit of his enemies. So immense was his authority that his son Ogedei Khan fought the germans under his name for almost an year without revealing the news of his father's death to the enemies.

On the earth between : 1162-1227 (approx).

During his tenure the Mongol Empire extended from Atlantic ocean in the west to Pacific ocean in the east.

Like other notable conquerors, Genghis Khan is portrayed differently by those he conquered and those who conquered with him. Many cultural books and authors portray him as a cruel, destructive and blood-thirsty ruler. But a handful of them dealt on his positive side. The

• strategies he adopted,
• his outstanding foreign policy,
• equally outstanding civilian and military code called the Yassa (the first written Mongolian law)
• responsible for the emergence of the Mongols as a political and ethnic identity.

In this post we will deal with his positive perceptions and his grueling policies that made him one of World's Greatest and most legendary leaders.

Perceptions and Legacy

Internal

• Genghis Khan had a Mongol code of law called the Yassa written down, which was intended to be the legal code throughout his empire. It covered in detail many aspects of nomadic life and the concerns of nomadic people (stealing livestock was harshly punished, as was urinating or otherwise spoiling a source of fresh water.) Religious freedom was allowed, as long as one complied with the Yassa
• Genghis Khan created a wide-ranging postal system for the sending of government orders and reports.
• Obedience was expected from everyone from the lowest to the highest classes. Any disobedience by a subordinate officer to any order from a superior officer was reason for death.
• In the face of the ethnic, religious and tribal diversity of the civilians and soldiers of the Mongol Empire, which eventually included modern day Persians, Chinese and many Turkic peoples, Genghis Khan insisted on focusing all loyalty on himself as Great Khan and no others.
• Positions of honour were given on the basis of bravery in battle or outstanding loyalty, as opposed to the old system of inheritance through families.
• Freedom of Religion was given first and foremost importance though he is a cruel ruler in the eyes of many.

External

• Genghis Khan is credited with bringing the Silk Road under one cohesive political environment. This allowed increased communication and trade between the West, Middle East and Asia, thus expanding the horizons of all three cultural areas.
• Genghis Khan realised that he needed people who could govern cities and states conquered by him. He also realised that such administrators could not be found among his Mongol people because they were nomads and thus had no experience governing cities. For this purpose Genghis Khan invited a Khitan prince, Chu'Tsai, who worked for the Jin and had been captured by the Mongol army after the Jin Dynasty were defeated.
• One of the standard tactics of the Mongol military was the commonly practiced feigned retreat to break enemy formations and to lure small enemy groups away from the larger group and defended position for ambush and counterattack.
• Another important aspect of the military organization of Genghis Khan was the communications and supply route or Yam, adapted from previous Chinese models.

In Mongolia and Turkey

• In much of modern-day Turkey, Genghis Khan is looked on as a great military leader, and it is popular for male children to carry his title as name.
• Genghis Khan became the central figure of the national identity in Mongolia.
• It is not uncommon for Mongolians to refer to Mongolia as "Genghis Khan's Mongolia," to themselves as "Genghis Khan's children," and to Genghis Khan as the "father of the Mongols" especially among the younger generation.
• His face can be found on everyday commodities, from liquors to the largest denominations of 500, 1000, 5000 and 10,000 Mongolian tögrög .
• Mongolia's main international airport has been renamed Chinggis Khaan International Airport, and major Genghis Khan statues have been erected before the parliament and near Ulaanbaatar.

Mongolians maintain that the historical records written by non-Mongolians are unfairly biased against Genghis Khan; and that his butchery is exaggerated, while his positive role is underrated.




In China

• The People's Republic of China (PRC) considers Genghis Khan to be an ethnic minority hero. The rationale for this claim is the fact that there are more ethnic Mongols living inside the PRC than outside, including Mongolia.
• While Genghis Khan never conquered all of China, his grandson Kublai Khan completed that conquest, and established the Yuan Dynasty that is often credited with re-uniting China.
• There has also been much artwork and literature praising Genghis as a great military leader and political genius.
• The years of the Mongol-established Yuan Dynasty left an indelible imprint on Chinese political and social structures for subsequent generations.

However, the legacy of Genghis Khan and his successors, who completed the conquest of China after 65 years of struggle, remains a mixed topic, even to this day.


Recognitions

• The Conqueror, released in 1956 and starring John Wayne as Temüjin and Susan Hayward as Börte.
• Genghis Khan, released in 1965 and starring Omar Sharif.
• Genghis Khan: To the Ends of the Earth and Sea, also known as "The Descendant of Gray Wolf") a Japanese-Mongolian film released in 2007 about the life of Genghis Khan.
• Mongol, a film by Academy Award nominee Sergei Bodrov released in 2007.
• The Conqueror Series, by Conn_Iggulden 2007

DNA evidence -The Genghis Khan effect

With the recent popularity of genealogical DNA testing, a wider circle of people started to claim descent from the great conqueror. Zerjal et al [2003] identified a Y-chromosomal lineage present in about 8% of the men in a large region of Asia (about 0.5% of the men in the world). The paper suggests that the pattern of variation within the lineage is consistent with a hypothesis that it originated in Mongolia about 1,000 years ago. Such a spread would be too rapid to have occurred by genetic drift, and must therefore be the result of selection. The authors propose that the lineage is carried by likely male-line descendants of Genghis Khan and his close male relatives, and that it has spread through social selection.

According to Family Tree DNA, Genghis Khan is believed to have belonged to Haplogroup C3.

The 25 Marker Y-DNA Profile of Genghis Khan released by Family Tree DNA is:

DYS number	385a	|385b|	388|	389i	|389ii|	390|	391|	392	|393|	394|	426|	437|	439	|447	|448|	449|	454|	455|	458|	459a|	459b	|464a	|464b|	464c|	464d
Haplotype	12	13	14	13	29	25	10	11	13	16	11	14	10	26	22	27	12	11	18	8	8	11	11	12	16

So now don't worry thinking that u might be one of the 0.5 % people. I'll be very happy to know if were one of the descendants of this truly amazing master figure.

You may or may not be his descendant-it doesn't matter, whatt matters is we need to take inspiration from his ideas and policies and materialize them.

If u find this article interesting or u might want to give any suggestions please digg them in the chat box there or post a comment.

The merit of an action lies in finishing it to the end - Genghis Khan

Sources:

• http://www.fsmitha.com/h3/h11mon.htm
• wikipedia
• http://www.isidore-of-seville.com/genghis/
• http://www.leader-values.com/Content/detail.asp?ContentDetailID=799
• http://nobsnews.blogspot.com/1994/01/inspirations-of-historians.html#rashid-ad-din-juwayni
• http://www.accd.edu/sac/history/keller/Mongols/empsub2.html
• http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat0.htm#Mongol
• http://www.coldsiberia.org/
• http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=109217551
• http://web.archive.org/web/20060113174030/http://www.historychannel.com/thcsearch/thc_resourcedetail.do?encyc_id=210250

This list aims to put that right! Here are ten great unsolved mysteries of science. So you find me sharing this with you... Its worth reading this article...

• 10. Rongorongo
• 9. Lost City of Helike
• 8. The Bog Bodies
• 7. Fall of the Minoans
• 6. The Carnac Stones
• 5. Who Was Robin Hood?
• 4. The Lost Roman Legion
• 3. The Voynich Manuscript
• 2. The Tarim Mummies
• 1. Disappearance of the Indus Valley Civilization

read more | digg story

Time and again history has revealed many astonishing facts that are hard to digest. The design of first manned or un-manned aircraft is an excellent example. Flying high in the air has been a dream of humankind since they watched in awe so many birds flying effortlessly through the sky. According to accepted history the dream became a grave reality in the 1780's when that two Frenchmen achieved lighter-than-air flight when they were lifted into the air in a hot air balloon near Paris.But heavier-than-air flight was tested successfully by the wright brothers in 1903 even though it's design was thought to be in existence from as early as 13th century and,in the 16th century Leonardo-da-vinci designed a winged aircraft but it was not tested physically.

All the above facts have been repeatedly quoted in huge number of texts since then,but now comes the even more stunning revelation of these so-called ancient planes which existed some thousands of years back(as mentioned in manuscripts of Chinese,pre-Colombian,Indian and Egyptian culture) and with technology which is more sophisticated and intriguing than the one that is designed by the wright brothers.

I came to know about these ancient airplanes from my sanskrit teacher in my school days. Initially i argued with him that it is a misconception and a total myth.But he showed me this book 'Vimana-Aircraft of Ancient India and Atlantis (Lost Science Series)' by David Hatcher Childress and Ivan T filled with solid evidences of vimanas(ancient sanskrit word for aircrafts).This one has really propelled into history and taught me how our ancestors were equally or more advanced in their thinking.

Some researchers and a few rogue scientists believe there's evidence to suggest that humans achieved flight earlier in history - much earlier... so early, they say, that the knowledge of this technology has been lost and ancient stories that recount adventures of human flight have been relegated only to myth.

It seems rather incredible that someone, more than 2,000 years ago, for any reason, devised a model of a flying device with such advanced features, requiring quite extensive knowledge of aerodynamics. There were no such things as airplanes in these times, we are told by archeologists and historians. But this case seems to be an exception. Let's take a look at what some call the evidence - intriguing artifacts, carvings, inscriptions and legends - that they say point to the true record human of flight.

Another interesting fact is that these airplane models are not confined to manuscripts of just one civilization but found in Egyptian,Pre-Columbian,Indian and Chinese cultures.

Pre-Columbian Airplane Models


Gold trinkets were found in an area covering Central America and coastal areas of South America, estimated to belong to a period between 500 and 800 CE, but since they are made from gold, accurate dating is impossible and based essentially on stratigraphy which may be deceptive. However, we can safely say that these gold objects are more than 1000 years old.


What do you think about the object in the picture above. Is it a bird? or Is it a plane.....

The archaeologists labelled these objects as zoomorphic, meaning, animal shaped objects. The question is, what animal do they represent? When they compared these objects with animals and even fish found in that habitat but no match was found.If the zoomorphic explanation is supposed to hold, then why did the artist cut the head off almost three quarters from the body? And why is the nose is practically rectangular and the cut tilted forward, with eyes positioned at either side, when fish eyes are usually more near the center of bodyline and far forward on the head?

The wings when viewed from the side are perfetly horizontal, but when seen from the front, they curve slightly downward. The elevators, which are right behind the wings, are positioned on a slightly higher horizontal level and are square-ended, thus a definite geometric shape. Above them is another rectangular shape, with a relief which may be reminiscent of knobs. The tail is equally intriguing. No fish has only a single, upright and perpendicular flange. But this tail fin has an exact shape of fins on modern airplanes.

Well, some have said that the object in the top picture isn't very aerodynamic as there is a very large semi disk in the way where we would imagine the cockpit to be. True but then again some people have come up with another ingenious explanation.

See how the "nose" of this device is retractable? For landing you have it forward, for flying you put it underneath. I like this idea a lot.Let's assume that the nose is actually a jet. If the machine needs to slow down, the jet flow directed against the path of flight would accomplish just that.Now to accelerate the plane envision the nose as a movable part of the plane, turning around the point located where the nose and fuselage meet, thus pivoting the nose downward to tuck it under the fuselage, that would enable the desired effect.Also considering the ornaments on both wings, it was mentioned that in Amerindian culture spirals were representing "ascend" and "descent".


Egyptian Airplane Models

This object (shown in sketch) was found in 1898 in a tomb at Saqquara, Egypt and was later dated as having been created near 200 BCE. As airplanes were unknown in the days when it was found, it was thrown into a box marked "wooden bird model" and then stored in the basement of the Cairo museum.


It was rediscovered by Dr.Khalil Mesiha who studies about ancient models.He got support from the Egyptian government who appointed a team of scientists for research.The team revealed that the model has the exact proportions of a very advanced form of "pusher-glider" that is still having "some bugs ironed out". This type of glider will stay in the air almost by itself—even a very small engine will keep it going at low speeds, as low as 45 to 65 mph., while it can carry an enormous payload. This ability is dependent on the curious shape of wings and their proportions. The tipping of wings downward, a reversedihedral wing as it is called, is the feature behind this capability. A similar type of curving wings are implemented on the Concorde airplane, giving the plane a maximum lift without detracting from its speed.

It is also necessary to point out that Egyptians are known to have nearly always made scale-models of projects and objects which they planned to create or build.


Vimana: The Indian Aircraft Technology

Here i'll brief you about extensive Indian airplane designs and models and the way they caught the attention of World.

Hitler and the Nazi staff were exceptionally interested in ancient India and Tibet and sent expeditions to both these places yearly, starting in the 30's, in order to gather esoteric evidence that they did so, and perhaps it was from these people that the Nazis gained some of their scientific information for their V-8 rocket "buzz bombs."

According to ancient Indian texts, the people had flying machines which were called "Vimanas." The ancient Indian epic describes a Vimana as a double-deck, circular aircraft with portholes and a dome, much as we would imagine a flying saucer.

Click to view enlarged image
Volumes and Volumes of verses and books have written about vimanas in indian texts that it is so hard to decipher them easily.Only some of them have been translated to English now .

The Samara Sutradhara is a scientific treatise dealing with every possible angle of air travel in a Vimana. There are 230 stanzas dealing with the construction, take-off, cruising for thousand of miles, normal and forced landings, and even possible collisions with birds. In 1875, the Vaimanika Sastra, a fourth century B.C. text written by Bharadvajy the Wise, using even older texts as his source, was rediscovered in a temple in India. It dealt with the operation of Vimanas and included information on the steering, precautions for long flights, protection of the airships from storms and lightening and how to switch the drive to "solar energy" from a free energy source which sounds like "anti-gravity."

Wow!!! what an insight into science in an old text like that. These are just two books, huge number of books are still untouched.

This document has been translated into English and is available by writing the publisher: VYMAANIDASHAASTRA AERONAUTICS by Maharishi Bharadwaaja, translated into English and edited, printed and published by Mr. G. R. Josyer, Mysore, India, 1979.


Soviet scientists have discovered what they call "age-old instruments used in navigating cosmic vehicles" in caves in Turkestan and the Gobi Desert.It is evident that ancient Indians flew around in these vehicles, all over Asia, to Atlantis presumably; and even, apparently, to South America. Writing found at Mohenjodaro in Pakistan (presumed to be one of the "Seven Rishi Cities of the Rama Empire") and still undeciphered, has also been found in one other place in the world: Easter Island! Writing on Easter Island(one of the worlds most isolated island in southeastern pacific), called Rongo-Rongo writing, is also undeciphered, and is uncannily similar to the Mohenjodaro script.

The Ramayana, Mahabarata and other texts speak of the hideous war that took place, some ten or twelve thousand years ago between Atlantis and Rama using weapons of destruction that could not be imagined by readers until the second half of this century.

When the Rishi City of Mohenjodaro was excavated by archeologists in the last century, they found skeletons just lying in the streets, some of them holding hands, as if some great doom had suddenly overtaken them. These skeletons are among the most radioactive ever found, on a par with those found at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Which is an evidence for the usage of atomic weapons.

The ancient Mahabharata, one of the sources on Vimanas, goes on to tell the awesome destructiveness of the war:

"...(the weapon was) a single projectile
charged with all the power of the Universe.
An incandescent column of smoke and flame
As bright as the thousand suns rose in all its splendor...

An iron thunderbolt,
A gigantic messenger of death,
Which reduced to ashes
The entire race of the Vrishnis
And the Andhakas.

... the corpses were so burned
As to be unrecognizable.
The hair and nails fell out;
Pottery broke without apparent cause,
And the birds turned white.

... After a few hours
All foodstuffs were infected...
... to escape from this fire
The soldiers threw themselves in streams
To wash themselves and their equipment..."

It would seem that the Mahabharata is describing an atomic war!

The knowledge of aeronautics is described in Sanskrit in 100 sections, eight chapters, 500 principles and 3000 slokas including 32 techniques to fly an aircraft.

The question that comes to one’s mind is, what happened to this wonderful encyclopaedia of aeronautical knowledge accumulated by the Indian savants of yore, and why was it not used? But in those days, such knowledge was the preserve of sages, who would not allow it to be misused, just like the knowledge of atomic bombs is being used by terrorists today!


The Unsung Hero

Hundred years after Orville Wright’s first flight, K R N SWAMY remembers Shivkur Bapuji Talpade, the Indian who flew an unmanned aircraft, eight years before Wright.

Orville Wright demonstrated on December 17th 1903 that it was possible for a ‘manned heavier than air machine to fly’. But, in 1895, eight years earlier, the Sanskrit scholar Shivkar Bapuji Talpade had designed a basic aircraft called Marutsakthi (meaning Power of Air) based on Vedic technology and had it take off unmanned before a large audience in the Chowpathy beach of Bombay. The importance of the Wright brothers lies in the fact, that it was a manned flight for a distance of 120 feet and Orville Wright became the first man to fly. But Talpade’s unmanned aircraft flew to a height of 1500 feet before crashing down and the historian Evan Koshtka, has described Talpade as the ‘first creator of an aircraft’.

NASA (National Aeronau-tical and Space Administra-tion) world’s richest/ most powerful scientific organisation is trying to create an ion engine that is a device that uses a stream of high velocity electrified particles instead of a blast of hot gases like in present day modern jet engines.
But 108 years ago Talpade was able to use his knowledge of Vaimanika Shastra to produce sufficient thrust using electrified particles to lift his aircraft 1500 feet into the air!

Talpade passed away in 1916 un-honoured, in his own country.

As the world rightly honours the Wright Brothers for their achievements, we should think of Talpade, who utilised the ancient knowledge of Sanskrit texts, to fly an aircraft, eight years before his foreign counterparts.

With the cataclysmic sinking of Atlantis and the wiping out of Rama with atomic weapons, the world collapsed into a "stone age" of sorts, and modern history picks up a few thousand years later.

There is no shortage of descriptions of flying machines in ancient sources. If we try to extract the core of myths of different provenience and remove the embellishments, we discover to our surprise that flying in ancient times seems to be the rule, not the exception.

So how was the article friends???. This article is so important to me because it made me realize the importance and dignity of history.

Bury your valuable comments and opinion in the C-box there or click the post-a-comment link below.

Sources:

• DeccanHerald.com
• John Burrows
• Anti-Gravity Handbook by D.Hatcher Childress
• Photographs courtesy of Government of Colombia,
• Roy Pinney and Barney Nashold
• world-mysteries.com
• 2atoms.com
• Technology of Gods:The Incredible sciences of the ancients by D.Hatcher
• The Secret teachings of the vedas by stephen-knapp

Favourite Links:

• stephen-knapp.com-a tribute to hinduism
  
• http://www.crystalinks.com/ancientaircraft.html- offers excellent pictures on Indian and egyptian vimanas...must see.
• http://www.atlantisquest.com/Vimana.html- ariel vehicles of ancient India.
• http://www.mystae.com/restricted/streams/scripts/vimana.html -secrets of vimana
• http://www.ufoevidence.org/topics/vimanas.htm
• http://www.catchpenny.org/birdplan.html-Khalil Messiha's drawings of the bird model found in the Egyptian Museum
• http://www.catchpenny.org/model.html- Model Airplane

The word ’history’ is derived from the Greek noun ’historia’ meaning ’inquiry or research.’ Aristotle regarded it as a “systematic account of a set of natural phenomena, whether or not chronological ordering was a factor in the account.” The term “history” has now come to be applied to accounts of events that are narrated in a chronological order, and deal with the past of mankind.


Learning by inquiry about the past of mankind was later developed into a discipline by the Greek historians Thucydides and Heredeotus (who is popularly known as ’Father of History’). E. H. Carn defined history as an “unending dialogue between the present and the past.” Jawaharlal Nehru observed that man’s growth from barbarism to civilization is supposed to be the theme of history.” Will Durant called history “a narrative of what civilized men have thought or done in the past time.”

Proper historical reflection shows the reasons you developed your particular view of the world. It explains how you developed your outward physical characteristics. It allows you to appreciate your own views and the views of others that may seem different to yours.

Can anything worthwhile be gained from continued research into historical events?
History seen as study of the past is an integral part of many education systems across the world. Many countries spend huge amounts of money and resources to uncover their past. Every year new and new historical sites are uncovered, excavations on those sites are conducted and the result are studied by archeologists throughout the world.
But have we gained anything worthwhile from research into the past?
The answer seems clear: Yes, we have.

The Study of history especially into historical battles and wars is beneficial when not vital for the evolution of warfare in the modern world. Military strategists continually study wars such as the World Wars, the Napoleonic Conflicts and many modern wars.
Tactics and strategies are analyzed and continuously refined, so as to improve their effectiveness and efficacy in future conflicts, without historical study into conflicts, advanced warfare tactics prevalent today would never have evolved from those primitive tactics man used to use in wars.

Another importance of history is that it enables one to grasp one’s relationship with one’s past. For example if one wonders why the U.S. flag has 48 stars or why Great Britain follows monarchy, one has to turn to history for an answer.

History is of immense value to social scientists engaged in research. Thus the political scientist doing research on the parliamentary form of government, has to draw his materials from the treasure trove of history.

Excerpts from assosciatedcontent.com written by Anthony Odem:-

Few people would argue that history is important. Few people, that is, who are not students. I have taught American history and Mississippi history and most of the students I’ve had state that history is one of their least favorite subjects. The two main complaints about history is that it is irrelevant to their discipline, and that it is boring. When asked to elaborate on how it is boring, the complaint seems to come back to a question of relevance. “I don’t see how knowing a bunch of stuff about things that happened years ago helps me at all, its not like I’m going to use it” a student once told me on the first day of class. As prepared as I was to teach history, I have to say that I had no idea I’d have to be an apologist for the discipline as well.

One of the hardest questions most history teachers have to answer is, “Why is this stuff important?” In an age of streamlining education and when colleges are becoming more like vocational institutions than classical universities, the issue of relevance becomes all the more important. Most rely on cliche’ responses like “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Today’s savvy, cynical students don’t take to cryptic warnings or deep philosophical truths too well. Personally, I steer clear of this old maxim. When faced with the question of relevance, I prefer to speak in a language my students can understand. History teaches you how to think critically and analytically. These abilities are prized in any discipline, especially business-related fields and even scientific fields. Reading a research study is something anyone can do, but analyzing it takes a skill that history class can hone. Who wrote this study? What were their motives? Who’s paying for it? What is this research trying to prove or gain? Who benefits?