The fall of the Mongol Empire in the 14th century led to the collapse of the political, cultural, and economic unity along the Silk Road. Turkic tribes seized the western end of the route from the Byzantine Empire, sowing the seeds of a Turkic culture that would later crystallize into the Ottoman Empire under the Sunni faith. In the East, the native Chinese overthrew the Yuan dynasty in 1368, launch The Mongol Empire — at its height the largest contiguous empire in history — had a lasting impact, unifying large regions. Some of these (such as eastern and western Russia and the western parts of China) remain unified today, albeit under different
