Episodes
The Yami System: How Mongol Logistics Fell Apart
For anyone coming with us through these conversations about Central Asia, we’ve looked at the political fractures between the Golden Horde and the Ilkhanate, and how the Toluid Civil War shattered the central authority. But there was another kind of collapse happening quietly in the infrastructure itself. This episode explores the yam system—the vast network of relay stations that made the Pax Mongolica possible—and how it became a vector for economic ruin. We trace the journey from Karakorum…
Mongol Empire Split: The Ilkhanate's Persian Shift
We explore the critical turning point in 1295 when Ghazan Khan converted to Islam, fundamentally altering the political landscape of the Mongol Empire. This episode examines how this religious shift triggered a cascade of diplomatic and military failures between the Ilkhanate and its Golden Horde cousins, particularly Berke Khan’s descendants. We detail the collapse of the Pax Mongolica along the western routes, the rise of rival factions like the Chobanids and Jalayirids, and the economic…
The Silk Road's Broken Trust: How Mongol Fraud Killed Unity
We often think of the Mongol Empire’s collapse as a story of civil wars and distant borders, but one of the fastest ways an empire dissolves is through the simple erosion of trust in its currency. In this episode, we look at the chaotic monetary landscape of the late thirteenth century, where local khans began debasing their coins to fund their own wars, breaking the Pax Mongolica that had connected East and West. We explore how Ghazan Khan’s radical reforms in the Ilkhanate tried to restore…
Mongol Empire Split: The Currency War That Broke Unity
This episode explores the economic fracture of the Mongol Empire through the lens of currency reform. We examine how Ghazan Khan’s conversion to Islam and his introduction of paper money in the Ilkhanate created immediate tension with the Golden Horde and Chagatai Khanate, who relied on traditional silver standards. Lucas details the logistical nightmare of managing the yam system when trust in the currency evaporated, leading to trade collapses across Central Asia. Luna asks clarifying…
Mongol Succession: The Battle of Tala River
Most people think the Mongol Empire fractured simply because it was too big to manage, but the real story lies in the specific mechanics of succession disputes that turned cousins into enemies. This episode dives deep into the Toluid Civil War, focusing on the brutal conflict between Khubilai Khan and his younger brother Ariq Böke. We explore how the election at the kurultai wasn't just a political formality but a contest of military logistics and regional loyalty. You'll hear about the siege…
Mongol Empire Split: The Ilkhanate's Persian Shift
We left off with the broad strokes of the Toluid Civil War and the initial fractures between the Golden Horde and the Ilkhanate. But how did a nomadic cavalry force, raised on steppe traditions and the Yassa law code, end up governing Persia through complex bureaucracy and converting to Islam? This episode explores the radical transformation of the Ilkhanate under Ghazan Khan. We look at Rashid al-Din Fazl-Allah Hamadani, the historian who codified Mongol history while serving as vizier, and…
The Oirat Tribes: Mongols Who Outlasted the Empire
Long after the Chinggisid line fractured and the great khanates fell to Timur or Moscow, a distinct group of Mongol confederations remained fiercely independent on the western steppe. This episode explores the Oirats—the Western Mongols who resisted both the Golden Horde and the rising Yuan dynasty by forging their own unique political structure. We trace how the Four Oirat Confederations, led by charismatic khans like Esen Taishi, managed to challenge the Ming dynasty directly in the early…
The Mongol Split: How Silk Road Cities Became War Zones
While earlier episodes explored the Toluid Civil War and the personal feuds between Berke and Hulegu, we often overlook how the empire’s greatest strength—its trade networks—became its fatal weakness. In this episode, Lucas and Luna trace the rapid economic collapse of the Ilkhanate and the Golden Horde in the mid-14th century. We look at how the Black Death traveled along the very routes Pax Mongolica had secured, turning bustling hubs like Tabriz and Sarai into ghost towns. The conversation…
How Mongol Bureaucrats Managed an Empire
We often think of the Mongol Empire as a force of pure cavalry and conquest, but its survival for nearly a century across three continents relied on something far less glamorous: paperwork. This episode explores the secret life of the scribes, translators, and administrators who turned chaotic steppe raids into functioning states. We follow Rashid al-Din in Tabriz and his Chinese counterparts in Dadu, examining how they navigated the Yassa, managed the Yam postal system, and kept the tax…
Mongol Succession Crisis: The Toluid Civil War's Hidden Roots
Most histories of the Mongol Empire focus on the military conquests or the eventual split into four khanates, but they often gloss over the precise mechanics of how Genghis Khan’s succession plan unraveled within a single generation. This episode examines the Toluid Civil War not as an inevitable collapse, but as a specific legal and logistical crisis triggered by the death of Möngke Khan in 1259. We explore how the lack of a clear, codified succession law—beyond the flexible traditions of the…
The Silk Road's Hidden Cost: Mongol Logistics and Disease
While the Toluid Civil War and the rise of individual khanates dominate the narrative of the Mongol Empire’s fragmentation, this episode shifts focus to the logistical and biological infrastructure that held the empire together—and ultimately contributed to its unraveling. Lucas and Luna explore the Yam postal system, the massive trade networks facilitated by the Pax Mongolica, and the unintended consequence of spreading the Black Death across Eurasia. We examine how the very mechanisms…
The Battle of Marj al-Saffar and the End of Mongol Power
In 1260, the Mongol Empire seemed unstoppable, but a single battle in Palestine changed everything. This episode explores the Battle of Marj al-Saffar, where the Mamluk sultan Qutuz and his general Baibars defeated Hulegu’s forces, halting the Mongol westward expansion into Africa and Europe. We examine the political vacuum left by Möngke Khan’s death, Ariq Böke’s civil war against Khubilai Khan, and how the withdrawal of key Mongol troops allowed the Mamluks to seize Egypt and Syria. Lucas and…
The Battle of Otrar: How One Siege Shattered the Mongol Peace
In 1219, the death of a single governor in Otrar triggered a chain reaction that erased the Khwarazmian Empire from the map. This episode examines the diplomatic breakdown between Genghis Khan and Shah Muhammad II, focusing on the merchant caravan massacre that served as the casus belli for the Mongol invasion of Central Asia. We trace the military strategy behind the siege of Otrar itself, where Subutai and Jebe led one of the most brutal sieges in history, and explore how the subsequent fall…
The Secret Life of Mongol Bureaucrats
We often picture the Mongol Empire as a relentless tide of cavalry, but its survival depended on scribes, tax collectors, and accountants. This episode explores the 'Urus'—the Mongol census and registration system that turned nomadic warriors into imperial administrators. We look at how Khubilai Khan and his successors relied heavily on Persian bureaucrats like Rashid al-Din and Chinese officials to manage a territory stretching from Korea to Hungary. The conversation examines the tension…
The Ilkhanate's Persian Bureaucracy and the Fall of Baghdad
While earlier episodes covered the Toluid Civil War and the feud between Berke and Hulegu, we have not yet examined how the Ilkhanate survived by becoming deeply Persian. This episode explores the critical role of Rashid al-Din Fazl-Allah Hamadani, the chief minister who built a vast administrative state from scratch after the sack of Baghdad in 1258. We look at how Mongol rulers like Ghazan Khan adopted Islam not just for faith, but to legitimize their rule over a sedentary population. The…
How Mongol Women Held the Empire Together
While we often focus on the battles of Khubilai Khan or the feuds between Berke and Hulegu, the real glue holding the fractured Mongol Empire together was the network of powerful women known as Khatuns. This episode explores the political agency of figures like Sorghaghtani Beki, who raised four future khans, and Töregene Khatun, who ruled as regent during a succession vacuum. We examine how widows managed the vast yam relay systems, negotiated alliances between rival uluses, and preserved the…
The Mongol Empire's Unsung Hero: Chagatai's Legal Legacy
In this episode of Fexingo History, Lucas and Luna explore the life and legacy of Chagatai Khan, the second son of Genghis Khan, whose name became synonymous with law, order, and the steppe itself. While his brothers rode off to conquer, Chagatai stayed behind to govern the heart of the empire, shaping the legal code known as the Yassa and fostering a unique cultural identity in Central Asia. From his fierce rivalry with Jochi to his patronage of the great city of Almaligh, Chagatai's story…
The Golden Horde's Blue Horde Feud That Split the West
In this episode, Lucas and Luna dig into the internal feud within the Golden Horde — the Blue Horde versus the White Horde — that fractured the western Mongol realm before the empire even fully split. They trace the origins back to the Jochid ulus, the inheritance of Batu and his brother Orda, and how the rivalry between their descendants, especially under Khan Özbeg and his successors, turned a succession dispute into a permanent division. The conversation covers the role of the Crimean trade…
The End of the Ilkhanate and the Rise of the Jalayirids
In this episode, we follow the abrupt end of the Ilkhanate in 1335 with the death of Abu Sa'id Bahadur Khan, the last effective Mongol ruler in Persia. With no clear successor, the Ilkhanate dissolved into a patchwork of regional powers, chief among them the Jalayirids, a Mongol dynasty that controlled Iraq and western Iran for decades. We explore the role of the Chobanids and the rise of Hasan Buzurg, who founded the Jalayirid sultanate in Baghdad. We also look at how the Mongols, once…
The Mongol Civil War's Hidden Trigger: Arpa Keun's Rise
The Mongol Empire's collapse wasn't just a matter of khans and kurultai — it was also the work of an obscure prince who set the stage for the Toluid Civil War. In this episode, Lucas and Luna pick up after the death of Möngke Khan and examine the forgotten figure of Arpa Keun, a great-grandson of Chagatai who briefly seized power in the chaos following Möngke's death. Arpa's short-lived reign — just a few months in 1259-1260 — exposed the deep fractures in the Mongol world, as he attempted to…
The Mongol Empire's Lasting Echo: How the Yasa Outlived Its Khans
The Mongol Empire fractured within a generation, but its legal code — the Yasa — outlived every khanate it was meant to bind. In this episode, Lucas and Luna trace the Yasa's shadowy origins, its contested content, and its strange afterlife. From Genghis Khan's death in 1227 to the Islamic conversions of Ghazan and Berke, the Yasa was invoked, ignored, and reinvented. We look at how the Great Khan's decrees shaped everything from postal relay stations to food taboos, and how later rulers like…
The Mongol Empire's Fracture: The Toluid Civil War's Roots
In this episode of Fexingo History, Lucas and Luna dig into the Toluid Civil War—the brutal succession struggle between Khubilai Khan and his brother Ariq Böke that tore the Mongol Empire apart. They trace how Chinggis Khan's death set up a succession crisis, how the kurultai system broke down, and how the war over Karakorum and Shangdu spiraled into a continent-wide fracture. Along the way, they explore the role of the Chagatai Khanate's Alghu, the Golden Horde's Berke, and the Ilkhanate's…
The Mongol Split: Berke and Hulegu's Feud
In this episode, Lucas and Luna dive into the bitter feud between Berke Khan and Hulegu Khan that tore the Mongol Empire apart. They explore the murder of the Abbasid Caliph, the Battle of Ayn Jalut, the Terek River clash, and the role of religion and loyalty in the split. With fresh perspectives on the Jochid and Toluid dynasties, the episode reveals how a family squabble reshaped the map of Asia. #BerkeKhan #HuleguKhan #MongolEmpire #GoldenHorde #Ilkhanate #BattleOfAynJalut #TerekRiver…
The Chagatai Khanate's Last Khan: Tarmashirin's Gamble
In the early fourteenth century, the Chagatai Khanate looked like it might reverse the Mongol Empire's fragmentation. Under Tarmashirin, a khan who converted to Islam and tried to knit together nomadic and sedentary worlds, the realm briefly stretched from the steppe to the heart of India. But his gamble alienated the nomadic old guard, who saw his embrace of settled life and Islamic law as a betrayal of the Yassa and the ways of their ancestors. In 1334, they rose up and killed him. This…
The Mongol Empire's Fall: A Civil War of Cousins
In 1260, the Mongol Empire was the largest contiguous land empire in history. Within a generation, it shattered into four rival khanates. This episode zooms in on the Toluid Civil War—the brutal succession struggle between Khubilai and Ariq Böke—and the ripple effects that tore the empire apart. We follow the contested kurultai of 1260, the defection of Chagatai Khanate's Alghu, and the first open battles between Mongol princes. We explore how Khubilai's victory in China isolated him from the…
The Chagatai Khanate's Final Collapse: A Steppe Dynasty's Last Gasp
In this episode, Lucas and Luna return to the Chagatai Khanate, the Mongol successor state that controlled Central Asia's heartland. Where earlier episodes traced its rise under Chagatai and Alghu, we now focus on its terminal decline in the 14th century. We follow the bitter rivalry between the western and eastern halves, the rise of ambitious amirs like Husayn and his former protege Timur, and the moment in 1369 when Timur seized power at Balkh, effectively ending Chagatai authority. We also…
The Silk Road's Golden Hour: Mongol Trade That Outlived the Empire
While the Mongol Empire fractured into warring khanates, the trade routes they'd opened didn't just survive—they thrived. In this episode, Lucas and Luna explore how the Silk Road became a conveyor belt of goods, people, and ideas across a divided Asia. They trace the ortoq merchant partnerships that financed caravans, the yam postal system that kept information moving, and the cosmopolitan cities like Tabriz and Sarai that grew rich on commerce. Along the way, they meet Marco Polo, whose…
The Ilkhanate's Conversion to Islam
In the decades after the Mongol sack of Baghdad, the Ilkhanate—the Mongol state in Persia and the Middle East—underwent a profound transformation. This episode explores how the descendants of Hulegu, the destroyer of the Abbasid Caliphate, gradually embraced Islam, culminating in the public conversion of Ghazan Khan in 1295. We discuss the role of Sufi shaykhs like Sadr al-Din Ibrahim, the influence of the vizier Rashid al-Din, the political and social pressures of ruling a Muslim majority, and…
The Mongol Split: Who Really Broke the Empire?
In this episode, Lucas and Luna dig into the messy, human reasons the Mongol Empire fractured so quickly after its peak. You'll hear about the Toluid Civil War that set Khubilai Khan against his brother Ariq Böke, and how that struggle for succession tore the empire apart. We trace how the Golden Horde under Berke Khan turned on the Ilkhanate of Hulegu, and how the Chagatai Khanate in Central Asia became a battleground for rival claimants. We also look at the role of the kurultai, the Mongol…
Why the Mongol Empire Split Apart So Quickly
In this episode, Lucas and Luna trace the Mongol Empire's fragmentation in the decades after Chinggis Khan's death. They revisit the succession crisis that followed Ögedei's passing, then focus on the Toluid Civil War of 1260–64, when Khubilai and Ariq Böke both claimed the throne. The conversation explores how this internal war tore the empire into four khanates—the Yuan dynasty, the Golden Horde, the Chagatai Khanate, and the Ilkhanate—each with its own ruler and ambitions. Along the way…
The Chagatai Khanate's Rise and Fall: A Steppe Dynasty's Struggle
In this episode, Lucas and Luna dive into the Chagatai Khanate, the often-overlooked Central Asian division of the Mongol Empire. From Chagatai's own conservative rule to the chaos of the Toluid Civil War, the khanate struggled to balance steppe traditions with the demands of settled neighbors. They explore how the Chagatai khans navigated the rivalries of the Golden Horde, the Ilkhanate, and the Yuan dynasty, and how internal strife over Islam versus Yassa law led to fragmentation by the…
The Mongol Empire's Postal Riders: Yams, Relays, and Revolution
In this episode of Fexingo History, Lucas and Luna explore the Mongol Empire's extraordinary communication network—the yam system. From Chinggis Khan's early couriers to the vast relay networks that stretched from Karakorum to Dadu, Sarai, and Tabriz, they uncover how this postal web held the largest contiguous empire in history together, and how its very efficiency accelerated its fragmentation. Along the way, they meet the men who rode the harsh steppe routes, the paizi—the golden tablets…
Berke's Choice: Faith and Feud in the Mongol West
In this episode, we explore the pivotal moment when the Mongol Empire fractured not just over succession but over faith. Berke Khan, grandson of Genghis Khan and ruler of the Golden Horde, embraced Islam, setting him apart from his cousin Hulegu, the Buddhist-leaning Ilkhan who had just sacked Baghdad. Their mutual distrust erupted into open war on the Terek River in 1262, a battle that pitted Mongol against Mongol for the first time. We trace Berke's conversion, his alliance with the Mamluks…
The Mongol Empire's First Tear: Ariq Boke's Lost Kurultai
In 1260, the Mongol Empire reached its widest point—and then split apart within a single generation. This episode zooms in on the pivotal succession crisis that followed Möngke Khan's death, when two brothers—Khubilai and Ariq Böke—each claimed the throne. We trace how Ariq Böke, based in Karakorum, won over the kurultai with traditional rituals and the support of the Chinggisid line, while Khubilai, commanding from Kaiping, countered with his own assembly and the backing of Chinese advisors.…
The Mongol Split: Berke and Hulegu's Feud
Berke Khan of the Golden Horde and his cousin Hulegu, founder of the Ilkhanate, never met on the battlefield, yet their rivalry split the Mongol Empire along a line that still shapes Central Asia and the Middle East. In this episode, Lucas and Luna trace how a succession dispute over the Mongol throne in 1260 escalated into open war between the Jochid and Toluid branches. They examine Berke's conversion to Islam and how that hardened his opposition to Hulegu's destruction of Baghdad and the…
The Mongol Succession Crisis That Split the Empire
Why did the Mongol Empire, the largest contiguous land empire in history, fracture within a single generation? In this episode, Lucas and Luna trace the fault lines of succession from Chinggis Khan's death in 1227 through the disputed kurultai of 1251, when Möngke's election triggered a purge of Ögedei's line. They explore how Chinggis's division of the empire among his sons created separate ulus, how Töregene Khatun's regency and Güyük's brief reign deepened rivalries, and how Ariq Böke's…
The Mongol Empire's Postal Riders: Yams, Relays, and Revolution
In this episode of Fexingo History, Lucas and Luna explore the Mongol Empire's astonishing postal system, the yam. Discover how Chinggis Khan's network of relay stations and riders transformed communication across Asia, from Karakorum to Dadu and Sarai to Tabriz. Listen as they uncover the role of the paiza, the ingenious metal passes that allowed riders to gallop through hostile territories, and the ortoq merchants who financed the system—and sometimes drained it. Along the way, they touch on…
The Mongol Empire's Last Great Khan: Timur's Steppe Reunion
After the Mongol Empire splinters into warring khanates, a new conqueror emerges from the ashes: Timur, the Turko-Mongol warlord who dreams of restoring Chinggis Khan's legacy. In this episode, Lucas and Luna trace Timur's rise from sheep rustler to ruler of a vast empire, his brutal campaigns across Persia, the Golden Horde, and India, and his uneasy relationship with the Chagatai Khanate he claimed to defend. They explore how Timur used Mongol symbols—the kurultai, the Yassa, the title of…
The Mongol Empire's Missing Heirs: How Succession Broke It
In this episode, Lucas and Luna explore the single most destabilizing flaw in the Mongol Empire's design: the absence of a clear succession law. From Chinggis Khan's own indecision to the bitter rivalries between Ögedei, Tolui, Chagatai, and Jochi's descendants, each Great Khan's death triggered a kurultai that often turned into a power struggle. Focusing on the pivotal moments—Ögedei's death in 1241 that halted the European invasion, the disputed election of Güyük, the Toluid coup that brought…
The Mongol Empire's Postal Web: How Yams Held It Together—and Tore It Apart
In this episode of Fexingo History, Lucas and Luna explore the Mongol Empire's extraordinary postal system—the yam—and how this network of horse relays, way stations, and imperial messengers became both the empire's greatest asset and a source of its unraveling. From Chinggis Khan's early couriers to the lavish stations under Khubilai Khan, the yam connected Karakorum to Dadu, Sarai to Tabriz, and made the Silk Road hum with intelligence, trade, and bureaucracy. But the system also carried the…
The Mongol Heartland After the Fall: Nomads, Ruins, and New Empires
In the centuries after the Mongol Empire's collapse, the steppe heartland didn't simply fade into silence. This episode follows the aftermath across the former Chagatai Khanate and the lands of the Golden Horde, where Mongol descendants, Turkic nomads, and new conquerors competed for control. We trace the rise of Timur, the last great steppe conqueror, and the eventual emergence of the Kazakh and Uzbek khanates. Along the way, we explore how the Mongol legacy lived on in trade, law, and…
The Mongol Postal Riders: Yams, Relays, and Revolution
Before the internet, before the Pony Express, there was the Yam — Chinggis Khan's lightning-fast postal and intelligence network that stitched a continent together. In this episode, Lucas and Luna ride the steppe relays from Karakorum to Sarai, from Dadu to Tabriz, to see how Mongol couriers could carry news across five thousand miles in weeks, not months. They follow the arrows of the Yam riders, the paiza tablets that gave them passage, and the relay stations stocked with fresh horses, grain…
The Mongol Silk Road Schism: Trade and Treason
In this episode, Lucas and Luna dig into a forgotten fracture in the Mongol Empire: the vicious trade war between Khubilai Khan's Yuan dynasty and the Chagatai Khanate under Kaidu. They trace how the Silk Road—once the empire's greatest unifier—became a battleground of tariffs, spies, and outright theft. We hear about the desert ambushes at Khotan and Kashgar, the Mongol-Persian merchants who switched loyalties, and the quiet diplomatic missions that tried to mend the rift. The episode also…
The Toluids' Last Stand: Negüder's Revolt
In the 1260s, as the Mongol Empire fractured into four rival khanates, one obscure figure — Negüder, a Chagatai prince — carved out his own domain in the mountains of modern Afghanistan. This episode follows Negüder's revolt against the Ilkhanate, his unexpected alliance with the Mamluks, and the birth of the Negüderi, a Mongol-Turkic confederation that survived for centuries in the Hindu Kush. We trace the political chaos after Hulegu's death, the Chagatai civil war that pushed Negüder toward…
Berke's Choice: Faith and Feud in the Mongol West
In this episode, Lucas and Luna take a close look at a moment when the Mongol Empire's westward expansion hit a wall. After the sack of Baghdad in 1258, Hulegu's Ilkhanate looked unstoppable, but his cousin Berke, Khan of the Golden Horde, had other ideas. Berke was a Muslim, something that set him apart in a family still mostly Tengri, and he was furious about the destruction of the Abbasid capital and the killing of the caliph. The clash between these two Mongol armies at the Battle of Ain…
The Ilkhanate's Last Stand: How the Mongol Heartland Collapsed
In this episode, Lucas and Luna dig into the neglected final chapter of the Mongol Empire's fragmentation: the collapse of the Ilkhanate in Persia. They follow the chain of weak khans after Ghazan, the power struggle between the Chobanids and Jalayirids, the devastating effects of the Black Death on Tabriz, and the rise of the Sarbadars. Along the way, they examine how the Ilkhanate's conversion to Islam under Ghazan and his successors failed to halt the slide into civil war, and how the death…
The Mongol Siege of Baghdad and Its Aftermath
In 1258, Hulegu Khan's Mongol army sacked Baghdad, ending the Abbasid Caliphate and reshaping the Islamic world. But the victory sowed the seeds of the Mongol Empire's disintegration. In this episode, Lucas and Luna explore the siege itself—the river that ran black with ink, the caliph's mysterious death, the destruction of the House of Wisdom—and then trace how the conquest deepened the rift between the Jochids and the Toluid line. They examine the role of the Shi'a vizier Nasir al-Din…
How Ögedei's Death Turned the Mongols Back from Europe
In the winter of 1241–42, Mongol armies under Batu Khan and Subutai were crushing every kingdom in their path—Knights of Poland fell at Legnica, Hungary's king fled after the Sajó River. Then a messenger arrived from Karakorum with news that changed everything: the Great Khan Ögedei was dead. To obey the Yassa, the generals had to turn for a kurultai, abandoning a campaign that had nearly opened all of Europe. This episode looks at the mechanics of that retreat, the succession crisis that…
Nayan's Rebellion: The Mongol Prince Who Defied Khubilai
In 1287, Khubilai Khan faced a rebellion not from the west, but from within the Mongol heartland. Prince Nayan, a descendant of Chinggis Khan's brother Temüge, led a coalition of eastern Mongol princes against Khubilai's sinicized Yuan court. This episode dives into the causes of the rebellion, the clash of cultures between steppe tradition and imperial bureaucracy, and the brutal suppression by Khubilai's loyal general Bayan. We explore Nayan's conversion to Christianity, his alliance with the…
The Ortoq Merchants Who Bankrupted the Mongol Empire
The Mongol Empire's rapid fragmentation is often blamed on succession disputes and cultural divides, but what if the seeds of collapse were sown in the steppe's own trade networks? This episode uncovers the role of the Ortoq—Muslim merchant associations who financed Mongol princes and became a hidden power behind the throne. Through their loans and influence, the Ortoq fueled rebellions, deepened regional disparities, and undermined central authority under Khubilai Khan and Ghazan Khan. We…
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