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The Mongolian nation has a great cultural heritage of oral and written literature. From early times it was used widely when educating and bringing up children and this is the reason that folklore is still known to all Mongolians. It takes the forms of tales, legends, proverbs, wise sayings, teaching, riddles, verses, poetic verse, heroic epics and odes. Since it is an oral form, all of them would be narrated or sung to the accompaniment of national stringed instruments such as the Morin khuur (Horse head fiddle).

 

"The Secret History of Mongols" is a unique form of folklore, a combination of prose and poetry. Works that vividly continue the spirit and style of the Secret History include such notable monuments of Mongolian prose and poetry of the 13th century as "The Story of Chinggis Khaan's Two Steeds", "The Legend of Argasun, the Rhapsode", "The Wise Discourse of an Orphan Boy with Chinggis Khaan's Nine Warlords" etc., The largest form in native literary expression is the epic (tuuli), which originated many centuries ago.

 

There are a lot of Mongolian famous epics such as Geser, Jangar, and Khaan Kharangui. In the 17th and 18th centuries, translated books on religion, history and literature dominated. Through these and other efforts, the spiritual life of Mongols was enriched by the ancient Indian poetry of Kalidasa, the poetical theory of Dandina and the philosophical treaties of Nagarjuna. The literature of the Mongols developed as an entirely independent phenomenon in the process of continuous interaction with world literature, above all the literature of the Asian region: Indian, Chinese and Tibetan.

 

In the later half of the 19th century, a new tend in Mongolian written literature found expression in the works of the poets D.Ravjaa (1803-1856), V.Injinash (1837-1892), B.Gulrans (1820-1861), Gelegbalsan (1846-1923) and R.Khishigbat (1899-1916). The contemporary Mongolian literature began in the 1920s and is represented by famous poets and writers D.Natsagdorj, Ts.Damdinsuren, B.Renchin, S.Buyannemekh, D.Tsevegmed,    D.Namdag, Ch.Lodoidamba, B.Yavuukhulan, Ch.Chimed, L.Tudev. D.Purevdorj and others. More than a thousand works by 100 Mongolian writers were translated into 20 foreign languages to tailing 9.5 million published copies. The Law on the cultural policy of the State aims to encourage and strengthen the development of a national culture and promote these achievements in the world forum.

From the ancient times Mongols have a reverence for books and considered them as one of the three holy objects. History shows that nomadic Mongolia itself was respected for being as one of the three highly educated oriental states. As for books, except for the famous "The secret history of the Mongols" with 760 years of history, no earlier precedent has been found. Historical facts proved that the Mongols 2500 years ago knew not only a script but also the art of producing books. For example, in the State Central library we can see a book written on tree bark from this period. Readers at the Central library also have the opportunity of acquainting themselves with "Ganjuur" and "Danjuur", extremely rare Tibetan books of the llth century.

 

They set forth the fundamentals of ancient Indian sciences, philosophy, medicine, art, logic, grammar and astronomy. It proves that books were printed in Mongolia a thousand years ago. "Ganjuur" was printed by xylographic method in Sanskrit, Tibetan and Mongolian. The Mongolian translation of Ganjuur (109 volumes) and Danjuur (226 volumes) contains the fundamentals of the five ancient Indian sciences. Another book is the sacred sutra "Sunduin jud", created at the beginning of the 20th century by well-known jeweller Dagva and others.

 

Each of the 111 pages of the book is a thin silver plate, and the letters are engraved and covered with gold. The title page bears a relief representation of Buddhist gods embellished with coral and pearl. In total 52 kilograms of gold and 400 kilograms of silver were used for the creation of the sacred sutra. In fact, it is an art work in the application of the "nine precious" materials for making books: gold, steel, silver, pearl, coral, turquoise, azurite, mother-of-pearl, copper, all ground to powder. Since the era of printing books by modern methods about 9 million books on 800 topics have been published per year, which averages 7-10 books per person.

The 800th amiversary Of the Recognltion of Mongol Script as the State Script by Chinggis Khaan is marked on May 2, 2004. Starting this year the date is to be marked as a national script day. The old Mongolian script, the only vertical script in the world was one of the unique contributions made by the Mongolian nation to world civilization. The restoration of the old script has been supported by the international community.

 

It was registered as an intellectual property right internationally in 1991 and the code of Mongolian letters was approved in 2002 by the Geneva-based International Standardisation Organisation. In 1995 Parliament endorsed the national program on the traditional Mongolian script and decided to teach the script in secondary schools from the third grade up. Teachers and experts from the Mongolian State University are now engaged in the design of a computer program for old Mongolian and Latin scripts that will be financed by the state budget.

Mongolia is amongst the oriental countries with an ancient and unique culture. The Mongolian script created by Mongols is one of the 6 most recognised alphabets used in the contemporary world. The earliest monument, which scientists call "Chinggis' stone inscription", was created in 1225. It was dedicated to Esunkhui, a hero who managed to shoot all the targets from a distance of 500 meters during an archery competition to celebrate Chinggis Khaan's victory over the Sartuul tribes. In 1204 by the order of Chinggis Khaan, the Mongolian script was the official script of the state. The Mongols developed their alphabet many centuries ago, but because of their nomadic way of life and continuing wars, very few ancient literary monuments have actually survived.

 

All the best works of history, culture, philosophy and literature, written in Mongolian, are kept in the Mongolian Central Library with great care to preserve them. From the 1990s the renaissance of Mongolian script began by teaching it in all secondary schools. As a result, nearly half of all Mongols can now write and read in traditional script. It should be noted that the State Ikh Khural approved the Law on State Official Language. After the revolution of 1921, the Mongolian script was used in the MPR until 1941, when a Cyrillic alphabet was adopted. This helped to almost totally eradicate illiteracy by the end of the 1950s. The new Mongolian script has 35 letters.