Urgunge Onon

Urgunge Onon ( January 1, 1920 – December 2015, also known as Peter Onon ) was a Daur Mongol historian and Mongolist. He was a founding member of the Mongolian studies program at the University of Leeds and co-founder of the Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit (MIASU) at the University of Cambridge.

Biography Urgunge was born in 1920 in a village in North-Eastern Inner Mongolia, close to the border with Manchuria. A member of the Onon clan of Daur Mongols, growing up he was interested in shamanistic beliefs and rituals still surviving amongst his people. Amidst the growing instability in the area due to the Japanese invasion of Manchuria, his family were able to send him to a Japanese boarding school near Qiqihar, eventually becoming proficient in Japanese and being selected for university in Japan. to study political science at Toyo University, graduating in 1944. In Tokyo Urgunge became fascinated with the West, having had access to foreign films and newsreels for the first time.

Upon his return to Inner Mongolia he moved to Sonid Right Banner and worked for the Mongol Prince Demchugdongrub as a teacher and bodyguard. With the communist forces advancing he joined the Chinese local government and later became an Inner Mongolian delegate to the Nationalist government in Nanking. In Nanking he made contact with Owen Lattimore, who was to be a major influence in his life, and with his help obtained a one-year fellowship at Johns Hopkins University. Upon moving to the United States in November 1948 he was one of just a few Mongolian scholars resident there, including John Gombojab Hangin and Diluwa Khutugtu Jamsrangjab. Working for multiple agencies and organizations, due to the rise of McCarthyism and charges against Lattimore, Urgunge and others connected to Lattimore eventually lost their jobs.

In 1963 Lattimore was recruited by the University of Leeds to establish a Department of Chinese Studies (now East Asian Studies), and insisted on bringing Urgunge as a lecturer. In 1966 Urgunge first visited Mongolia and formed working relationships with senior academicians Shirendev, Damdinsuren, Natsagdorj as well as then-leader Yumjaagiin Tsedenbal, helping to nurture academic, business, and diplomatic ties between Mongolia and the UK. In 1968, together with Lattimore, they established a Mongolian Studies Programme at Leeds.

Urgunge retired from Leeds in 1985, but maintained his academic interests. In 1986, Urgunge and Caroline Humphrey jointly founded the Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit (MIASU) at the University of Cambridge, where he became general manager, as well as life member at Clare Hall, Cambridge. In addition, he was awarded the title of Honorary Professor at the National University of Mongolia, and served as a Visiting Professor at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.

He was the first Mongolian to translate the Secret History of the Mongols into English in 1990 (republished in 2001).

Personal life Urgunge was married to Narangerel and had four children: Solongowa, Oyongowa, Temujin, and Toli.