After setting up the Mongol Empire in the north in 1206 , Genghis Khan waged pillaging war fares on the neighboring kingdoms . Having exterminated the Western Xia (1227) and the Jin (1234) , he led the Mongol cavalry troops on three successive expeditions westwards , reaching “Bobolier” ( modern Poland ) , and Magyar ( modern Hungary ) , and Bagdad and Damascus , making Mongol a great Eurasian empire .
The Yuan Shizu Kublai Khan ascended the throne in 1260. He adopted the Chinese institutions, made Kaiping (in Inner Mongol) the upper capital, and Yanjing (today’s Beijing ) the middle capital , and changed the title of the reign to Great Yuan in 1271 , and commenced a reformation of the Mongol institutions . In 1279 he exterminated the southern Song. In 1368, when the Ming forces entered the Middle Capital and Yuan Huizong and his forces withdrew to the northern Mongol Desert, the Yuan Dynasty came to an end.
During the reign of the Yuan Dynasty China was the most powerful country in the world. Its influence spread to Asia, Europe and Africa. Printing, gunpowder and compass, three of the four great Chinese inventions, spread to Europe via Arabia. Knowledge concerning astronomy, medicine and arithmetic in Arbian countries also spread to China, along with Islamism.
In literature and art , the Yuan dramas attained great achievement , with representative dramatists such as Guan Hanqing , Wang Shifu , Baipu , Ma Zhiyuan etc., and representative dramas such as the “Unjustice Done on Dou E” and the “West Chamber”.
