The Ongud are Turkic Christians of the Church of the East (Nestorians), and the walled place of Olon Sume ('many temples') in the Yin Shan country holds their churches and graves.
A cemetery of stones with crosses and Syriac-Turkic inscriptions and the foundations of churches lie in the ruins, most of them from the Mongol period; the Ongud's Christianity is read back to 1200 from the Ongud's Turkic descent and from later sources (Marco Polo, Chinese tombstones), not from any text of 1200. The Church has no estates in the Latin sense: the priests and the church buildings live on the Ongud lords' support, on the offerings of the Turkic herdsmen and on the caravan trade which passes through Olon Sume. Its lay patron is the lord Alaqush Digit Quri.
Who holds it
- Title
- Priests and deacons of the Church of the East serving the Ongud; no bishop or priest named for 1200
- Confidence
- low
Overlord
the Jin (as the Ongud's overlord); the Catholicos of the Church of the East at Baghdad (in doctrine)
What it holds
- Church buildings and graves at Olon Sume
- Priests supported by the Ongud lords and by offerings
- A share in the caravan trade through the Jin march
How it was acquired
By long conversion among the Turkic Ongud (the dating is not pinned; the Catholicos of the Church of the East at Baghdad in 1200 is Yahballaha II, who held the see from 1190 to 1222).
Allies and rivals
Patron: Alaqush Digit Quri. The Church of the East among the Kereyit and Naiman (mnc and mnw sheets) is a sister community; the Ongud have no recorded quarrel with them.
How things stand that morning
Quiet. Under the Ongud's Jin-allied lords; the Jin tolerate the faith.
Wealth
Offerings and caravan hospitality; no known land or serfs.
Threats
- Steppe raiders
- Jin demands on the Ongud
What the year holds
What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.
- 1204 to 1205 (one line)The Ongud lord Alaqush sides with Temujin against Tayang Khan; the Ongud Christians become a Mongol ally.Depends on: Tayang's war on Temujin. Stopped by: A Jin demand on Alaqush.
Places of note
- Olon Sume: The walled place with the churches and the cemetery.
Where the sources disagree
- The brief says 'Church of the East among the Ongud: their churches at Olon Sume and elsewhere'. We cannot name any church other than the Olon Sume site; 'elsewhere' (Dongsheng) lies on the Jin side of the line and belongs to the North China sheet. The archaeology of Olon Sume is mostly of the Yuan period.
Evidence: Christian Ongud in the Mongol period are well attested; the 1200 community is inferred.
On the map: A point, not a district.
Primary sources for The Ongud
Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.
- Record of the Personal Campaigns of the Holy Warrior (Chinggis Khan) (presented to Khubilai in 1288, finished in Mongolian in 1290; the surviving Chinese version dates from 1369). A year-by-year Chinese account of Temujin's wars, drawn from the lost Altan Debter (the same source behind the Yuan shi's first chapter and Rashid al-Din). Read online
- The Secret History of the Mongols (1228 or 1240 (the colophon's Year of the Rat is disputed), with later additions; the surviving Chinese transcription and gloss were made under the Ming in the 1380s). The only Mongol account of Temujin's rise, written within living memory. Read online
- Compendium of Chronicles, Rashid al-Din Fadl Allah Hamadani (1300 to 1311, at Tabriz). The official Ilkhanid history, compiled from Mongol oral tradition and the lost Altan Debter. Read online
- Compendium of Chronicles: the Turkic and Mongol tribes and the life of Chinggis Khan, Rashid al-Din Hamadani (about 1300 to 1311, in the Ilkhanate). The fullest description of who held what on the steppe around 1200, written a century later from Mongol court records (the Altan Debter) and from informants such as Bolad Chingsang. Read online
- History of the Yuan, Song Lian (宋濂) and the Ming history office (1369 to 1370). Juan 1, the annals of Taizu (Chinggis Khan), gives a dated outline of Temujin's early wars drawn from the same lost Altan Debter as the Shengwu qinzheng lu: the Tatar war with the Jin in 1196, the Merkit and Naiman campaigns, the Tayichi'ut war, Jamuqa's coalition of 1201 and the Tatar and Kereyit wars of 1202 and 1203. Read online
- History of the Jin, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office, with Ouyang Xuan among the chief compilers (1343 to 1344, from the Jin veritable records and the Jin national history). The official history of the Jurchen empire that ruled north China and Manchuria in 1200. Read online
- Brief Account of the Black Tatars, Peng Daya (彭大雅) with notes by Xu Ting (徐霆) (1237 (Peng Daya's text from a 1232 to 1233 embassy, Xu Ting's notes from a 1235 to 1236 embassy)). Two Song envoys' notes on the Mongols under Ogodei: the steppe, climate, herds, hunting, the ruler's tent and court, the army, taxes, trade, the postal relay, the Uyghur and Khitan clerks, and the subject peoples. Read online
- Full Record of the Mongol Tatars, Zhao Gong (趙珙), formerly attributed to Meng Gong (孟珙) (1221). The earliest outside description of the Mongols, by a Song envoy sent to the Mongol commander Muqali at Yanjing (Beijing) in 1221. Read online
Sources and studies
- Ongud (Wikipedia)
- Alaqush (Wikipedia)
- History Atlas: the Ongud
- Christopher P. Atwood, Encyclopedia of Mongolia and the Mongol Empire (2004)
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.