Hello everyone, I hope that you are all keeping well!
Another month down and another episode released, this time a history of the Kereyid tribe. Its release was a bit of a surprise to me, as I had intended to include it as part of episode 3.5 of the Rise of Temujin, but the amount of material available meant that there was enough for a standalone episode. This episode leans heavily on the work of Chinese scholar Chen Dezhi (full reference on the Podcast Bibliography), who provides detective-like analysis to convincingly reconstruct the history of the Kereyids (Kerait) from a large number of Chinese and Muslim sources. The work pushes the history of the tribe back to the 840s and it is from this point the episode starts. We then follow the tribe as it becomes a vassal of the Liao Dynasty, converts to Nestorian Christianity and finally becomes independent again in 1125. The episode finishes by providing a biography of Toghoril Khan, Temujin’s patron.
The result of this episode being released is that 3.5 of the Rise of Temujin is also nearing completion and I plan to release that very quickly. My work is currently reorganising so that I can work from home (or be redeployed, I guess depending on need), but in the meantime I have a little more time to focus on it.
Last week I also implemented a few changes on this website (you may have noticed!). This is an attempt to present a more professional front and just make things a little easier to navigate; so, have a play around and let me know what you think. At the moment the non-critical pages (Biographies, Dynasty Lists and Resources) are a little sparse, but they should fill up as I create content.
Well that is it for now. As always, if you want to contact me I am at corey@mongolempirepodcast.com or on Twitter @mongolempirepod.