The Secret History of Mongolia was written by Genghis Khan's 22nd ancestor (about 700 AD), and ended more than 500 years later, Genghis Khan's son Wokuotai Khan 12 (AD 1240). The book records the historical context of the development of the Mongolian nation.
The Secret History of Mongolia, with its unique historical value, literary value, documentary value and complete and systematic cultural value, has attracted the attention of many researchers all over the world, triggered a research upsurge in international academic circles, and formed a special subject "Secret History".
The publication and spread of The Secret History of Mongolia is legendary and has many mysteries. The earliest existing version is the Mongolian transliteration of Chinese characters in the Ming Dynasty, which is called a "heavenly book" as difficult to interpret as rock paintings. The modern Chinese version of The Secret History of Mongolia published by Xinhua Publishing House is its first popular book, which makes this "heavenly book" really fall into the homes of ordinary people.
The original Mongolian has long been lost.
The years of the Secret History of Mongolia are 1228, 1240, 1252, 1264, 1276, 1324 and so on. This is because the Mongolian empire at that time adopted the zodiac calendar, with twelve years as a cycle. As for the "July of the Year of the Rat" mentioned in the book, people have different opinions. Before 20 13, many scholars recognized that this book was written in 1240.
According to the research of historians, the original version of Mongolian secret history is Uighur Mongolian. Therefore, the writing style of this book is completely different from all China history books in history, and it has a strong nomadic language feature. The author's distinct ideological tendency in The Secret History of Mongolia is not only revealed naturally through vivid descriptions, but also devoted to lyrical chapters, directly expressing his inner thoughts and feelings with the author's tone or characters in his works, so as to achieve the purpose of passing on people's feelings, shaping images with feelings and chanting history with feelings. For example, when Genghis Khan was awarded the title of hero in the book, he praised the Suwei people, and the folk songs were repeated, and his feelings were sincere and lasting:
"Lying in the dark night/around my dome/what makes me sleep peacefully/what makes me sit in this big position/my old Suwei Gate/lying around my starry palace/what makes me rest in peace/what makes me sit in this high position/my auspicious Suwei/in the cold snow/in the pouring rain/never standing around my felt.
The Secret History of Mongolia, as the hereditary genealogy of Genghis Khan's golden family, was called the "Golden Collection" at that time, all of which were collected in the palace and handed down from generation to generation by emperors. At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang led a great army to the Northern Expedition and besieged the Yuan Dynasty (present-day Beijing). The last emperor of the Yuan Dynasty paid tribute to Moore at the right time and fled in a hurry before he had time to carry the secret history of Mongolia. After Zhu Yuanzhang led a great army to capture the Yuan Dynasty, he got this ancestral secret book of the Yuan Dynasty royal family.
After Zhu Yuanzhang established the Ming Dynasty, he ordered people to compile yuan dynasty history according to the Secret History of Mongolia, which only took 33 1 day. Later, the Uighur Mongolian version of "The Secret History of Mongolia" mysteriously disappeared and still has no whereabouts.
Chinese transliteration becomes a Millennium gobbledygook
The Secret History of Mongolia, which is preserved today, is neither the original work of Uighur Mongolian style nor the history book of ancient classical Chinese, but a wonderful book different from all history books.
During the Hongwu period of the Ming Dynasty (1368 ~ 1398), Zhu Yuanzhang ordered the Hanlin to teach Huo Yuanjie and compile Ma Yichi Hei, and according to the original "Secret History of Mongolia" kept in the court of the Yuan Dynasty at that time, he spelled it into Mongolian with Chinese characters (so-called "cutting its characters and its sound"), and attached a Chinese translation to the right of each Mongolian word. Later, the Uighur Mongolian version of The Secret History of Mongolia mysteriously disappeared, but the Chinese transliteration of the Ming version survived.
In the Qing Dynasty, the Ming version of The Secret History of Mongolia was included in the Yongle Ceremony. Since the Qing Dynasty, Han translators, such as He, Gu Guangqi, Qian Daxin, Hong Jun and Xie Zaishan, have written many valuable research works on engraving, collating, annotating, translating and studying the secret history.
The Chinese transliteration of The Secret History of Mongolia has attracted the attention of translators all over the world since it was published in the mid-9th century. It has been translated into Russian, German, Japanese, French, Turkish and Czech. In the People's Republic of Mongolia (now Mongolia), the former Soviet Union, Japan, Europe and America, many people have made serious research on Chinese characters and written a number of monographs and papers. Over the past hundred years, an international discipline-"The Secret History of Mongolia" has gradually formed. Especially since the founding of New China, The Secret History of Mongolia is a valuable historical and literary heritage of the Mongols, which is cherished by the Party and the people. Mongolian and Chinese versions of The Secret History of Mongolia have been published in China for many times, and specialized institutions have been collating, sorting out, restoring, translating and studying Mongolian, and achieved gratifying results. Since the beginning of this century, some Mongolian intellectuals, such as Buhe Hessger, Hoshik Batu, Bazar and others, have conducted in-depth research on the Secret History of Mongolia, and then restored it into Mongolian according to Chinese transliteration.
The author of The Secret History of Mongolia has become an eternal mystery.
After The Secret History of Mongolia was written, its author was not signed for some reason, and there was no relevant information in the historical documents of the Mongolian and Yuan Dynasties, which caused considerable difficulties for scholars and experts at home and abroad to verify its author. Everyone can only make various speculations based on some historical materials. After years of research, the late Buzzard, a famous expert on Mongolian studies, thinks that the author of The Secret History of Mongolia is Genghis Khan and historians of Wokuotai, such as Zhenhai, Cherie, Xuechewuer and others. Bajard also thinks that the Chinese translator of this book is Huo He. However, neither of them is transliteration. The transliterater may be the translator of Zhenguan dignitaries and Chahan, a musician from the Western Region. At the end of Yuan Dynasty, the royal aristocrats could not understand the secret history of Mongolia written in fearsome words, so they needed Chinese transliteration.
There are also some foreign researchers who believe that The Secret History of Mongolia is the secret history of Genghis Khan's Kim family, and it must have been written by the Mongols themselves, so it is likely to be a well-educated and ignorant work in the Yuan Dynasty.
Batu Yin Bao, a professor at the Central University for Nationalities, believes that the task of compiling the Secret History of Mongolia must be given to confidant guards and other confidants, and it is very likely that Lu Ye Chucai, an important official who was loyal to Genghis Khan and the Wokuotai Dynasty, will be appointed to this position. Batu Yin Bao pointed out that Yeluchucai was a Khitan, not a Mongolian, but he was one of the founding advisers of Genghis Khan, the founding emperor of the Yuan Dynasty, and a real oral secretary (prime minister) during the reign of Wokuotai Khan, the former emperor of the Yuan Dynasty. Once, Genghis Khan pointed to Lu Yechu and said to Wokuotai, "This man is a godsend in my family. Later, when the military came to power, it should be notified. " In addition, as an important writer and poet in Yuan Dynasty, Yeluchucai is quite familiar with various genres of Mongolian folk literature, with more than 660 articles and poetry anthologies "Zhanran Jushi Collection" and The Journey to the West. Since Genghis Khan and Wokuotai Khan entrusted Yeluchucai with the task of writing the Secret History of Mongolia with infinite confidence, they will also provide Yeluchucai with all the materials that record the pedigree of the golden family and the "true record" of historical events without reservation. These materials can be used free of charge when they reach Lu Ye Chucai. So, why didn't Lu Ye Chucai sign the Secret History of Mongolia? Batubaoyin believes that The Secret History of Mongolia is not a book to let the world know about the history of the gold family, nor a book for later translators to study, but a palace secret that is forbidden to be read by historians, and only the supreme ruler can see it. The Secret History of Mongolia written for this purpose does not need to be signed by a translator.