The Rashīdī History 10.1.3

10.1.3

The decay of Mongol authority and the rise of Musulman influence, changed all this in the more westerly regions, while, on the side of China, the accession of an unwarlike dynasty tended to weakness at the extremities of the empire, and laid open large tracts of the interior of the continent to the misrule of unstable and lawless tribes, whose chiefs, while unable to gain permanency for themselves, repelled all intercourse with civilised nations, and were the means only of intensifying the barbarism of their people. For a time, towards the end of the fourteenth century and the early part of the fifteenth, the ascendency of Timur and his immediate descendants proved, to some extent, an agency for the preservation of order, and perhaps prevented the tide of nomad misrule from overwhelming the whole of the best parts of Central Asia. Except for this check, it is probable that the relapse into barbarism would have been even more lasting than it was, and would have had more far-reaching results. But the times of Timur and Ulugh Beg were stormy ones, and had little of the steadying influences of those of the Mongols. Being Musulman rulers, the advance of Islam, and the intolerance that always goes hand in hand with that system of religion and government, was encouraged, so that as soon as the secular authority of the Timuri began to weaken, the religious element grew stronger and came to the front.