This chapter examines the construction and representation of borders in China under the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). It considers the spatial dimensions of the Mongol empire, which was the Ming dynasty’s immediate predecessor. It examines the Ming court’s efforts to conquer or coopt Mongol power-holders and their territories, its plans to establish lasting control over those regions and their peoples, and its discursive and administrative strategies to describe and regulate issues of diversity and distance. The chapter reviews changes in the Ming dynasty’s geopolitical engagement in eastern Eurasia, tracing the dynasty’s loss of territory and influence along the northern and western borders and simultaneously a steady expansion of state institutions into the southwestern frontier. The essay concludes with developments during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, including responses to early Western European agents of empire in East Asia and, more broadly, the expansion of Chinese interest into maritime Asia.

Chapter Two explores how court officials tried to come to terms with Zhu Di’s deep engagement with the steppe and its leaders. Zhu Di’s five steppe campaigns were more than military conflicts. Zhu Di visited the sites – sometimes ruins – of former Yuan palaces and lodges. He offered commentary on the Yuan ruling house, which accentuated his status as successor to the Great Yuan and as a ruler uniquely qualified to pass judgment on fellow sovereigns. Zhu Di’s actions challenged civil officials in many ways. They had to praise a sovereign who openly flouted the founder’s precedents. They celebrated the emperor’s newest subjects, men who drank blood, consumed raw liver, and exulted in physical strength. Court ministers’ writings depicted a style of rulership obviously connected to men from afar in ways that simultaneously satisfied their sovereign’s demands and minimized dangers to the polity and to themselves.

Using the unusually rich historical sources generated by the Tumu crisis, Chapter Four offers a reconstruction of Ming rulership in east Eurasia in the mid-fifteenth century. Chapter Four demonstrated that the fifteenth century’s first half saw a multigenerational, multifaceted competition among Mongol, Oirat, and Ming ruling elites to turn the Chinggisid legacy to their advantage. Each developed a genealogy or pedigree of rulership, which it advertised to its neighbors. The best-documented example, that of the Ming dynastic house, trumpeted the superior attributes of the rulership of Zhu Yuanzhang and his descendants. Just as emphatically, the Ming throne denied the qualifications of rival lords such as Toqto’a-Buqa and Esen. The Ming ruling family and its close supporters tried to persuade several audiences, including Jurchen chieftains, the Choson throne, and Oirat and Mongol leaders, of its historical vision of the past and the present.

Chapter Three is a group biography of Mongols in the early Ming throne’s service. Zhu Di and his advisers depicted Esen-Tügel’s decision to join the Ming dynasty in 1423 as a submission, which proved Zhu Di’s superior attributes of rulership. The emperor’s martial prowess, munificence, and ability to recognize men of outstanding ability regardless of their origin won the allegiance and service of a proven Mongol warrior and leader. As was often the case, this dramatic moment – an oath of personal fealty – commanded chroniclers’ attention, but the bigger story had yet to unfold. Imperial patronage continued for much of the remainder of the fifteenth century. It took material form in housing, wages, and personal gifts. It also came in the guise of tax exemptions, prestigious titles and posts, opportunities for advancement, and the throne’s conspicuous protection. Successive emperors displayed their favor through material, financial, political, and honorific means. Such patronage extended to hundreds of Mongolian men, their families, and their descendants for decades and decades. Men from afar embraced this face of rulership. At the same time, it was a pattern of behavior that many civil officials rejected, in part because they felt that such generosity came at their expense.

Zhu Di’s experience as imperial prince shaped his rule’s style and substance. He interacted with Mongolian men as subordinates, advisers, allies, negotiating partners, rivals, and traitors. He was known among them as Lord of Yan. Breaking with his father’s example, Zhu Di repeatedly campaigned in person on the steppe as emperor. There he met with steppe leaders, hosted banquets, conducted grand hunts, and organized vast military reviews. He spoke openly of his motives and objectives on the steppe, not just to audiences at home but also with Korean, Jurchen, Mongol, Moghul, and Timurid leaders. He inserted himself into a Chinggisid world as east Eurasia’s premier ruler and patron.