Question

How did the mongols impact cultural diffusion?

Answer 1

With the Mongols united, they embarked on an immensely successful military campaign; through these conquests, they built what some believe is the largest land empire in history. Like the other large empires that preceded them, they were active in commerce both within the empire (which consisted of numerous different cultures), and with other nations. This naturally led to the diffusion of multiple inventions, both those of the Mongols and those ideas the Mongols usurped from cultures they conquered. 

While the Mongols profited from the trade of silk and tea from China to Europe, they also spread the Chinese inventions of printing and paper. It is possible then, if not likely, that the Mongols helped ease Europe into the Renaissance and Reformation, by providing them with the means to facilitate the massive dispersion of thoughts and ideas via the printed word. 

Of perhaps equal importance to the present, was the Mongol's capture of some Chinese engineers during the siege of Beijing. The engineers, willing to help the Mongols (and eager to save themselves, no doubt), provided Genghis Khan's men with plans for war machines like catapults; more importantly, they gave Genghis Khan gunpowder. The Mongols began using gunpowder in crude cannons, and bombs for their catapults. Within just a few years, the Mongols had given gunpowder a permanent place in warfare, and they helped spread the potent substance to Europe. Europeans would perfect the use of gunpowder in guns and cannons, but without the Mongol's diffusion of inventions, it might have taken much longer for it to make it to Europ