Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series 68 The rise of the
Mongol empire transformed world history. Its collapse in the
mid-fourteenth century had equally profound consequences. Four
themes dominate this study of the late Mongol empire in
Northeast Asia during this chaotic era: the need for a regional
perspective encompassing all states and ethnic groups in the
area; the process and consequences of pan-Asian integration
under the Mongols; the tendency for individual and family
interests to trump those of dynasty, country, or linguistic
affiliation; and finally, the need to see Koryo Korea as part of
the wider Mongol empire. Northeast Asia was an important part of
the Mongol empire, and developments there are fundamental to
understanding both the nature of the Mongol empire and the new
post-empire world emerging in the 1350s and 1360s. In Northeast
Asia, Jurchen, Mongol, Chinese, Korean, and Japanese interests
intersected, and the collapse of the Great Yuan reshaped
Northeast Asia dramatically. To understa