Central Asians in Mongol China: Experiencing the 'Other' from Two Perspectives

Abstract

The Mongols utilised personnel from several Central and West Asian subject states as administrators in China, where they constituted a separate class (Semuren). They also occupied a unique position be tween the Mongols and the Chinese since they were conquerors but also subjects. As such, they present an interesting example of alterity in the Mongol empire. Many Semuren successfully straddled both sides of that divide, thriving simultaneously as political and cultural elites. This paper examines those Semuren through the lens of alterity, and argues that the strategies they adopted to craft their identity were based in, and took advantage of, their bi-polar alterity.