The capital of the Mongol Empire — Genghis Khan's city on the Orkhon River, the Erdene Zuu monastery built from its own ruins, and infinite steppe in every direction
Karakorum (Kharkhorin) was the capital of the Mongol Empire at its world-historical peak under Ögedei Khan (son of Genghis Khan) — a city that in the 13th century received diplomats and merchants from China, Persia, Europe, and Korea at the centre of the largest land empire ever assembled. Today the city itself is gone, but the site is marked by the spectacular Erdene Zuu Monastery — built in 1586 using stones from the ruins of Karakorum's own palace walls, its white perimeter wall of 108 stupas visible from miles across the Orkhon Valley. The surrounding steppe is a UNESCO World Heritage lan…
Karakorum was founded by Ögedei Khan in 1235 on the Orkhon River, a site that had already been sacred to Turkic nomads for centuries. At its height in the 1250s it was visited by the Franciscan friar William of Rubruck (sent by King Louis IX of France) and the Persian historian Ata-Malik Juvayni, whose accounts describe a cosmopolitan city of multiple religions (Nestorian Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, and shamanist temples within the same walls). The Chinese Ming dynasty attacked and burned Karakorum in 1388 as part of their campaign against the Northern Yuan dynasty; the city was abandoned an…