A Powerful Conqueror’s Millions of Descendants
In an earlier entry, we saw how Genghis Khan impacted the global climate by killing a whole lot of people. On the flip side, he also impacted it by making a whole lot of people. One of the more chilling quotes attributed to Genghis Khan, which says quite a bit about what he was all about, is about what made him happy. As he put it: “My greatest joy is to defeat my enemies and drive them before me. To see their cities reduced to ashes. To see their loved ones shrouded and in tears, and to embrace their wives and daughters“.
As turns out, Genghis Khan’s wide sweeping conquests afforded him the opportunity to embrace many an enemy’s wives and daughters. That is backed up not only by the historic record, but by science. A 2003 DNA study showed that 1 out of every 200 men in the world is descended from the powerful Mongol conqueror. That is based on a study of Y chromosomes, which are only passed from fathers to sons. Genghis Khan’s paternal chromosomes are even more prolific within the borders of what had once been his empire. Within those vast expanses, roughly 1 out of every 10 men is descended from the Great Khan.