Visit Mongol Identity, a platform for educational and cultural content about Mongols.
Crafts and shops
Why not start at the Mongolian Shop? Arts and crafts and wear, straight from Mongolia. Hint: the Paintings section is my hang-out, as usual – I strongly like what’s happening in Mongolian art these days. It’s like the old days, with Picasso thrown in. Except they always threw Picasso in.
Or Mongulai
Your purchase from Mongulai.com supports Mongolian herders, artisans, individual designers. And it also creates a real change with a sustainable income for hundreds of small business people in Mongolia.
Art
Did we mention art? Let’s go to the Mongolian National Modern Art Gallery.
Or ArtSiberia, and explore the artists there. Nudge: I suggest Dashi Namdakov. Though I have a fancy for several.
I am a profound admirer of Dashi, mentioned above. Here’s his site dashi-art. He does shamans, that are frequently… cute, and his ‘warrior series’ of slain warriors in twisty disjointed pieces on the ground like collapsed suits of armour, with great Mongol faces. Throughout the first book I had one of these set as my desktop background: he stood for the slain at Bor Nor.
Zaya has an online gallery at art-zaya where he fuses old and new art, and features noble or royal women in costume with wild animals. See these splendid Mongol queens beside their snow leopards.
Written and oral arts
Here’s The Center for Central Asian Literatures in Translation, where you can find Mongolian poetry and fiction, much on old themes – The brown steppe is like an ancient story (from ‘The Horses Neigh at Night Upon the Steppe’) – but modern life short stories, too. Jamuh’s Testimony is adapted from Jamuqa’s final exchange with Temujin in the Secret History – a sad ode to friendship. There are lovely poems, well translated. Try Queen Kherlen, a lyric that personifies the Kherlen River. There’s a great translation of Bilga Khaghan’s stone inscriptions. And a funny idiomatic Tuvan folktale, Strongman Curly-Black, Son-of-a-Bear – a hero with a human mother and a bear father, and ‘traits of both species’.
Here’s a link to The Kyrgyz epic Manas, which I’ve blogged about.
On this page of the site Monumenta Altaica you can download Francis W. Cleaves’ translation of the Secret History of the Mongols. It’s the translation I use most – cast in a King James Bible English, his arguments for which you can find in the preface.
Artefacts
Have an ogle at Jamuqa’s antique Hun crown. It’s as I describe. I’ll find other outfits for you, featured in the novel.
Blogs
Hans van Roon’s Mongols China and the Silk Road on the archeology and history of the Silk Road is a treasure-trove of material from about the net.
Film
Genghis Khan: 30 Episode Historical TV Drama
2002. 10 dvd set. Made in Inner Mongolia, Chinese language. Director Wang Wenjie.
Cast includes Barsen (Tiemuzhen), Saren Gaowa (Herlen), Zhao Hengxuan (Zhamuhe/Jamuqa).
See reviews at Amazon US. I can highly recommend this — aside from the subtitles.
Genghis: The Legend of the Ten
2012. Made in Mongolia, Mongolian language. Directors Shagdarsuren.U, Zolbayar.D.
Cast: Baasanjav, Sosorbaram.D, Jargalsaikhan.B, Onon.N, Jambal, Ayurdadi, Gantsetseg.D
See reviews at Amazon UK. Recommended.
The Story of the Weeping Camel
2003. Documentary-drama. Germany/Mongolia, Mongolian language. At IMDb
mongolian ping pong
2004. A film by Ning Hao. Made in Inner Mongolia, Mongolian language. At IMDb
Mongolian Bling
2012. A documentary by Benj Binks — hip hop in Ulaanbaatar. At IMDb
about me and my novels on the Mongols –
see my page Amgalant and me
Dear Amgalant.com Administrators,
My name is Batzorig. I am an artist from Mongolia. I was searching for a Khitan art and found this fabulous image titled “Rest stop for the Khan” from your site. Recently I have been making artworks inspired by the Khitan art and this image is also a great source of inspiration. I would like to find a higher resolution image as every single line in this image is great source of information. Your help will be greatly appreciated.
Dear Batzorig,
I’m delighted to hear from you, delighted that you found an image on the site to use in your artworks.
I believe I used the image from Wikipedia Commons (which I should have said in the post). It is here:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rest_Stop_for_the_Khan.png
With the painting also in two parts:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rest_Stop_for_the_Khan_part1.png
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rest_Stop_for_the_Khan_part2.png
I don’t know of a higher resolution than these being available. — If anybody else out there knows of more online sources for Khitan art, we’d appreciate hearing about it.
with every wish for your own art,
Bryn