Garid ( Mongolian: гарьд) is a Mongolian word corresponding to the

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

Garuda Garuda (Sanskrit: ; Pāli: ; Vedic Sanskrit: गरुळ Garuḷa) is a Hindu demigod and divine creature mentioned in the Hindu, Buddhist and Jain faiths. He is primarily depicted as the mount (''vahana'') of the Hindu god Vishnu. Garuda ...

with several connotations related

Mongolian culture The culture of Mongolia has been shaped by the country's nomadic tradition and its position at the crossroads of various empires and civilizations. Mongolian culture is influenced by the cultures of the Mongolic, Turkic, and East Asian peoples ...

. The Garuda is a large

mythical Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narrati ...

bird-like creature or humanoid bird that appears in both

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

and

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

mythology. Garid is a rank in traditional

Mongolian wrestling Mongolian wrestling, known as Bökh (Mongolian script: ; Mongolian Cyrillic: Бөх or Үндэсний бөх), is the folk wrestling style of Mongols in Mongolia, Inner Mongolia and other regions where touching the ground with anything other th ...

meaning "mythical bird" as well as the name of the pet eagle of Genghis Khan.

Mongolian Wrestling Rank

has a seven thousand-year history and continues into the present during the annual Mongolian festival of Naadam. Cave paintings in the

Bayankhongor Province The Bayankhongor Province or Bayanhongor Aimag, , "Rich Darling Province" is one of the 21 aimags (provinces) of Mongolia. It is located in the southwest of the country and, at 116,000 square kilometers, it is one of the largest aimags. The cap ...

Mongolia Mongolia; Mongolian script: , , ; lit. "Mongol Nation" or "State of Mongolia" () is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. It covers an area of , with a population of just 3.3 million, ...

dating back to Neolithic age of 7000 BC show grappling of two naked men and surrounded by crowds. The art of Bökh appears on bronze plates discovered in the ruins of the

Xiongnu The Xiongnu (, ) were a tribal confederation of nomadic peoples who, according to ancient Chinese sources, inhabited the eastern Eurasian Steppe from the 3rd century BC to the late 1st century AD. Modu Chanyu, the supreme leader after 20 ...

empire (206 BC–220 AD). Originally, Bökh was a military sport intended to provide mainly strength, stamina and skills training to troops. Genghis Khan (1206–1227) and the all later Emperors of the Mongol Empire (1206–1368) and also the Emperors of later

Khanates A khaganate or khanate was a polity ruled by a khan, khagan, khatun, or khanum. That political territory was typically found on the Eurasian Steppe and could be equivalent in status to tribal chiefdom, principality, kingdom or empire. Mongol ...

were keen to support the sport for this reason so wrestling events were included in local festivals, or Naadam. Wrestling became a key factor when deciding the candidate rankings in imperial martial exams plus outstanding wrestlers were entitled to high distinctions. The winners are of the wrestling competitions at the Naadam festival are honored with ancient titles: the winner of the fifth round gets the honorary title ''nachin'' ("falcon"), of the seventh and eighth rounds ''zaan'' ("elephant"), and of the tenth and eleventh rounds ''arslan'' ("lion"). The wrestler who becomes the absolute champion is awarded the title of ''avarga'' ("titan"). Every subsequent victory at the national Naadam festival by a wrestler of the ''avarga'' rank adds an epithet to the title, for example ''Invincible Titan to be remembered by all''. Beginning in 2003, the State Great Khural adopted a new law on Naadam, making amendments to some of the wrestling titles. The titles of ''Iarudi'' and ''Khartsaga'' (meaning "mythical bird" and "hawk" respectively) were added to the existing titles.

Genghis Khan

The

Mongols The Mongols ( mn, Монголчууд, , , ; ; russian: Монголы) are an East Asian ethnic group native to Mongolia, Inner Mongolia in China and the Buryatia Republic of the Russian Federation. The Mongols are the principal membe ...

gained fame in the 13th century when under Genghis Khan they established a huge

Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelago ...

n empire through conquest. Genghis Khan came to power by uniting many of the

nomadic A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the popu ...

tribes of northeast Asia. After founding the Mongol Empire and being proclaimed "Genghis Khan", he started the

Mongol invasions The Mongol invasions and conquests took place during the 13th and 14th centuries, creating history's largest contiguous empire: the Mongol Empire ( 1206-1368), which by 1300 covered large parts of Eurasia. Historians regard the Mongol devastatio ...

that resulted in the conquest of most of Eurasia. These included raids or invasions of the

Kara-Khitan Khanate The Qara Khitai, or Kara Khitai (), also known as the Western Liao (), officially the Great Liao (), was a Sinicized dynastic regime based in Central Asia ruled by the Khitan Yelü clan. The Qara Khitai is considered by historians to be an ...

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia (country), Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range ...

Khwarezmid Empire The Khwarazmian or Khwarezmian Empire) or the Khwarazmshahs ( fa, خوارزمشاهیان, Khwārazmshāhiyān) () was a Turko-Persian Sunni Muslim empire that ruled large parts of present-day Central Asia, Afghanistan, and Iran in the app ...

Western Xia The Western Xia or the Xi Xia (), officially the Great Xia (), also known as the Tangut Empire, and known as ''Mi-nyak''Stein (1972), pp. 70–71. to the Tanguts and Tibetans, was a Tangut-led Buddhist imperial dynasty of China tha ...

and Jin dynasties. These campaigns were often accompanied by wholesale massacres of the civilian populations – especially in

Khwarezmia Khwarazm (; Old Persian: ''Hwârazmiya''; fa, خوارزم, ''Xwârazm'' or ''Xârazm'') or Chorasmia () is a large oasis region on the Amu Darya river delta in western Central Asia, bordered on the north by the (former) Aral Sea, on the ea ...

. By the end of his life, the Mongol Empire occupied a substantial portion of Central Asia and China. During this time Genghis Khan had a pet eagle, garid, which was honored in 2003 through Mongolian State Great Khural naming as one of the esteemed titles in

after this eagle. Eagles remain popular pets in Mongolia and continue to be used for hunting, as evidenced by the popularity of annual festivals such as the Golden Eagle festival in the Bayan-Ölgii aimag. During this festival, hunters catch small animals including foxes and hares by their trained eagles.

References

{{Mongolia topics Festivals in Mongolia Sport in Mongolia Mongolian culture

Mongolian Wrestling Rank

Genghis Khan

See also

References