Khanbaliq in the context of "Möngke Khan"

Various nomadic empires, including the Xiongnu (3rd century BC–1st century AD), the Xianbei state (c. AD 93–234), the Rouran Khaganate (330–555), the First (552–603) and Second Turkic Khaganates (682–744) and others, ruled the area of present-day Mongolia. The Khitan people, who used a para-Mongolic language, founded an empire known as the Liao dynasty (916–1125), and ruled Mongolia and portions of North China, northern Korea, and the present-day Russian Far East.

In 1206, Genghis Khan was able to unite the Mongol tribes, forging them into a fighting force which went on to establish the largest contiguous empire in world history, the Mongol Empire (1206–1368). After the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire, Mongolia came to be ruled by the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368) based in Khanbaliq (modern Beijing) and administered as part of the Lingbei Province. Buddhism in Mongolia began with the Yuan emperors' conversion to and dissemination of Tibetan Buddhism.

The Yuan dynasty ruled over the Mongolian Plateau, including both Inner and Outer Mongolia as well as part of southern Siberia, between 1271 and 1368. The Mongolian Plateau is where the ruling Mongol Borjigin clan of the Yuan dynasty came from, thus it enjoyed a somewhat special status during the Yuan dynasty, although the capital of the dynasty had been moved from Karakorum to Khanbaliq (modern Beijing) since the beginning of Kublai Khan's reign, and Mongolia had been converted into a regular province, known as the Lingbei Province (Chinese: 嶺北行省), by the early 14th century.

From about 1270 to 1356, the Korean kingdom of Goryeo was ruled by the Mongol Empire and the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. After the Mongol invasions of Korea and the capitulation of Goryeo in the 13th century, Goryeo became a semi-autonomous vassal state and compulsory ally of the Yuan dynasty for about 80 years. It has been referred to as a "son-in-law kingdom in the Mongol Empire." The ruling line of Goryeo, the House of Wang, was permitted to rule Korea as a vassal of the Yuan, which established the Branch Secretariat for Eastern Campaigns (征東行省; literally "Branch Secretariat for Conquering the East") in Korea as an extension of Mongol supervision and political power. Members of the Goryeo royal family were taken to Khanbaliq, and typically married to spouses from the Yuan imperial clan, the House of Borjigin. As a result, princes who became monarchs of Goryeo during this period were effectively imperial sons in-law (khuregen). Yuan overlordship ended in the 1350s when the Yuan dynasty itself started to crumble and King Gongmin of Goryeo began to push the Yuan garrisons back.

Jicheng, less commonly called Ji and Yanjing, was an ancient city in northern China, which has become the longest continuously inhabited section of modern Beijing. It has been known by numerous other names over its long history, usually in reference to the changing territories it presided over. Historical mention of Ji dates to the founding of the Zhou dynasty in about 1045 BC. Archaeological finds in southwestern Beijing where Ji was believed to be located date to the Spring and Autumn period (771–476 BC). The city of Ji served as the capital of the ancient states of Ji and Yan until the unification of China by the Qin dynasty in 221 BC. Thereafter, the city was a prefectural capital for Youzhou through the Han dynasty, Three Kingdoms, Western Jin dynasty, Sixteen Kingdoms, Northern Dynasties, and Sui dynasty. With the creation of a Ji Prefecture in present-day Tianjin during the Tang dynasty, the city of Ji became more exclusively referenced as Youzhou or by its subsequent renamings including Yanjing. Youzhou was one of the Sixteen Prefectures ceded to the Khitans during the Five Dynasties. The city then became the southern capital of the Liao dynasty and then the main capital of the Jurchen Jin dynasty. In the 13th century, Kublai Khan built a new capital city for the Yuan dynasty adjacent to Ji to the north. The old city of Ji became a suburb to Khanbaliq/Dadu, whose site was developed under the Ming and Qing dynasties into modern Beijing.

The priest and patron relationship, also written as priest–patron or cho-yon (Tibetan: མཆོད་ཡོན་, Wylie: mchod yon; Chinese: 檀越關係; pinyin: Tányuè Guānxì), is the Tibetan political theory that the relationship between Tibet and China referred to a symbiotic link between a spiritual leader and a lay patron, such as the historic relationship between the Dalai Lama and the Qing emperor. They were respectively spiritual teacher and lay patron rather than subject and lord. Chöyön is an abbreviation of two Tibetan words: chöney, "that which is worthy of being given gifts and alms" (for example, a lama or a deity), and yöndag, "he who gives gifts to that which is worthy" (a patron).

During the 1913 Simla Conference, the 13th Dalai Lama's negotiators cited the priest and patron relationship to explain the lack of any clearly demarcated boundary between Tibet and the rest of China (ie. as a religious benefactor, the Qing did not need to be hedged against). According to this concept, in the case of Yuan rule of Tibet in the 13th and 14th centuries, Tibetan Lamas provided religious instruction; performed rites, divination and astrology, and offered the khan religious titles like "protector of religion" or "religious king"; the khan (Kublai and his successors), in turn, protected and advanced the interests of the "priest" ("lama"). The lamas also made effective regents through whom the Mongols ruled Tibet. According to Sam van Schaik, the Mongols ruled Tibet not as an administrative province of the Yuan dynasty but as a Mongol colony. The Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs and Imperial Preceptor in Khanbaliq were at the top of the Tibetan administration, but due to the great distance from Tibet, they had little direct influence on daily governance. Hence, the highest authority in Tibet was the administrator of the Sakya who deferred to the abbot in religious matters.

The Catholic Church (Chinese: 天主教; pinyin: Tiānzhǔ jiào; lit. 'Religion of the Lord of Heaven', after the Chinese term for the Christian God) first appeared in China upon the arrival of John of Montecorvino in China proper during the Yuan dynasty; he was the first Catholic missionary in the country, and would become the first bishop of Khanbaliq (1271–1368).

The Jesuit Matteo Ricci was successful in Catholic missionary work in China. His approach viewed certain Confucian and Chinese folk practices as non-religious in nature and therefore compatible with Catholic practice. Other missionaries objected to this approach and after the hundred year long Chinese Rites controversy, the Vatican ordered the Jesuits to abandon the culturally accommodating approach Ricci had developed.

Tibet under Yuan rule refers to the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty's rule over Tibet from approximately 1270 to 1354. During the Yuan dynasty, Tibet was administered by an organization that was structurally, militarily and administratively subordinate to the Yuan court. Tibet was conquered by the Mongols led by a general titled doord darkhan in 1240 and Mongol rule was established after Sakya Pandita obtained power over Tibet through the Mongols in 1244. This period and administration has been called the Sakya dynasty (Tibetan: ས་སྐྱ་, Wylie: sa skya, Chinese: 薩迦王朝; pinyin: Sàjiā Wángcháo) after the favored Sakya school of Tibetan Buddhism.

The region retained a degree of political autonomy under the Sakya lama, who was the de jure head of Tibet and a spiritual leader of the Mongol Empire under the priest and patron relationship. However, administrative and military rule of Tibet remained under the auspices of the Yuan government agency known as the Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs (Xuanzheng Yuan), a top-level administrative department separate from other Yuan provinces, but still under the administration of the Yuan dynasty. Tibet retained nominal power over religious and political affairs, while the Yuan dynasty managed a structural and administrative rule over the region, reinforced by the rare military intervention. This existed as a "diarchic structure" under the Yuan emperor, with power primarily in favor of the Mongols. One of the department's purposes was to select a dpon-chen, the de facto administrator and imperial representative in Tibet, usually appointed by the lama and confirmed by the Yuan emperor in Dadu (modern-day Beijing).

The foreign relations of Imperial China from the Qin dynasty until the Qing dynasty encompassed many situations as the fortunes of dynasties rose and fell. Chinese culture had influenced neighboring and distant countries, while being transformed by outside influences as well as being conquered. During the Western Han dynasty, the Silk Road trade routes were established and brought Hellenistic Central Asia, Persia under the Parthian Empire, and South Asia into contact with the Chinese empire. During the 2nd century BC, Zhang Qian became the first known Chinese diplomat to venture deep into Central Asia in search of allies against the Mongolic Xiongnu confederation. Han Chinese attempts were made at reaching the Roman Empire and although the mission led by Gan Ying in 97 AD was a failure, Chinese historical records nevertheless maintain that the Romans traveled to southern China and Vietnam via the Indian Ocean. Buddhism from India was introduced to China during the Eastern Han period and would spread to neighboring Vietnam, Korea, and Japan, all of which would adopt similar Confucian cultures based on the Chinese model.

Following the fall of Sasanian Persia to the Rashidun Caliphate, Chinese contacts with the Islamic world were initiated during the Tang dynasty. Foreign faiths entered China at this time, such as Zoroastrianism, Nestorian Christianity and Islam, although Chinese Buddhism and Taoism remained prominent. The Song dynasty dealt on a basis of equality with the neighboring Liao and Jin dynasties until falling to the Mongol conquest. The Mongol Empire became the dominant state in Asia, and the Pax Mongolica encouraged trade of goods, ideas, and technologies from east to west during the early and mid-13th century. Marco Polo could safely travel back and forth, for instance. The Mongol-led Yuan dynasty founded by Kublai Khan ruled from the capital of Khanbaliq (modern Beijing). The Yuan dynasty's failed diplomacy with the Kamakura Shogunate of Japan led to the Mongol invasions of Japan, which also ended in failure for the Yuan Empire.