Word: mongol
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Azerbaijan may seem a remote corner of the world, but this was once the land of the all-powerful Medes, the birthplace of Zoroaster, and from its capital of Tabriz the Mongol Khans ruled an empire that stretched from Egypt to Cathay. Though a disastrous series of earthquakes leveled every trace of Tabriz's great palaces, the region's ethnic Turks remain a driving force in Iran. Not only do they represent more than a third of the population (5 million in Azerbaijan, 8 million more in the rest of the country), but they are the nation...
...under the patronage of Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovitch, Diaghilev opened his first season of dance in Paris. The jaded city was ripe for an invasion of exotica. His company, to the frenzied rhythms of the Polovtsian dances from Borodin's Prince Igor, swept Paris like a Mongol invasion. Next came Scheherazade, with its orgy of writhing dancers, the extraordinary half human, half feline Golden Slave portrayed by Nijinsky, and the unexpected colors of Bakst. That was succeeded by the most famous opening-night brawl in history, when a glittering crowd booed Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring. Nijinsky...
Later Islam fought successfully to preserve its ideological integrity in the face of Mongol invaders, Western Crusaders and, more recently, Western imperialists. But by the end of World War I, the Ottoman Empire had been dismembered and large portions of it brought under the domination of the colonizing nations of Christian Europe. European rule demonstrated how important it was for Islam to exercise temporal as well as spiritual power. At its nadir, in all the Arab world, only Yemen and Saudi Arabia, poor and backward, were nominally independent. Iran, Afghanistan and secularized Turkey, where Kemal Ataturk had disestablished Islam...
...Mongol warriors have bombs in their quivers. But if they attack the alarm bells will ring. And there will be plenty of fighters to defeat them...
Ever since the collapse of the Sino-Soviet alliance 18 years ago, a specter has haunted the U.S.S.R.: China's military might. While Poet Yevtushenko depicts Chinese soldiers as descendants of Genghis Khan's Mongol horde, which held Russia in thrall for three centuries, the Soviet press, radio and television more commonly compare the People's Liberation Army to Hitler's invading Wehrmacht in World War II. A film frequently screened on Soviet television showed Chinese officers shouting frenzied battle cries, while fanatic soldiers performed such smashing kung-fu stunts as breaking bricks with their fists...