A Historical and Ethnozoological Study on Local Zoological Knowledge Recorded in the Book "Mongolia and Amdo and the Dead City of Khara-Khoto"

Background: Mongolia and Amdo and the Dead City of Khara-Khoto (MAKK) represents an expedition note by Pyotr Kuz’mich Kozlov (1863-1935), a famous Russian Central Asian explorer, completed after his expedition to northwestern China during 1907 and 1909. Although the record note lacks a professional adequacy on measures of zoology research, some valuable information of local knowledge on animals (MLKA) were recorded. These local knowledge provide valuable reference to the study of ethnozoology and history of science and technology among ethnic minorities in China. Method: The current study referenced the two Russian editions of MAKK (1923 and 1948) as research materials and collated, textualed, and analyzed the MLKA records through the methods such as textual research, zoological classication, comparison, and interview. Since the MLKA is mainly concentrated in Alxa and its adjacent areas, we conducted eld surveys and interviews in two separate visits during 2019 and 2020, following precisely Kozlov’s exploration routes in Alxa more than a century ago. The methods including key informants interview, snowball sampling, and rational sampling were used in the interviews. By investigating evidences and analyzing the interview data of 33 key informants, our eld work re-veried the MLKA in MAKK and obtained its concurrent situation in the above destinations. Result: According to textual research, the MLKA records included in MAKK contain a description of 23 species, belonging to 14 families and 21 genera. The local knowledge mainly consists of the naming, utilization, and wildlife preservation by the Mongolian community. Corresponding relations between Mongolian folk name and scientic name are existed in “one-to-one”, “multitude-to-one” and “one-to-multitude” forms. There are three types on the structures of animals’ Mongolian names: simple primary name, complex primary name, and secondary name. Animals’ morphological characteristics, living habits, and Mongolian traditional grazing experience are crucial naming basis. The utilization of animals by the Mongols mainly includes diet, textile, accessory, transportation, instrument, toponym, and weather forecast. Moreover, the Mongols mainly rely on folk beliefs and ocial decrees for wildlife protection. Field work indicates that much of this knowledge is still preserved among local folks, but some are becoming

Ejina River upstream from Subonur (East Juyan Lake Basin now) to the remains of the ancient city of Harahot (the Black City Ruins now). Soon after, a journey to the east, passing through Goizso (Wentugaole now), hiked along the northeast edge of Badain Jaran Desert, and ultimately reached Dingyuanying (Bayanhot now), then went on exploring Helan Mountains. After two months, Kozlov's team left Inner Mongolia along the Tengger Desert border to travel south-east; (c) Next, the expedition passed over Pingfan  [23]Alxa Khoshud Department, [24 ] along with the Khoshud Mongol regions in Gansu and Qinghai provinces. [25][26][27][28][29][30][31] There were many ethnic groups in Kozlov's investigation zones. It is suggested that the traditional Mongolian culture had not been in uenced and in ltrated by other ethnic cultures to a signi cant extent (especially the Han nationality's farming culture) when Kozlov visited. Mongolians who lived in these areas had not been signi cantly affected by modern civilization in the early 20th century. They cling to traditional nomadic lifestyles for a long time, retaining and inheriting the relatively complete Mongolian indigenous knowledge and culture. There had been little attention in the academic world regarding the zoological value of Kozlov's travel note. Because the book is widely considered inadequate for academic zoology research, and Kozlov's most signi cant accomplishment was unknown in zoology research. Also, information regarding Mongolians' understanding and utilization for animals had been quite fragmentary and occasionally mentioned along with his investigation. However, it is necessary to summarise, analyze and investigate MLKA mentioned in MAKK. Nobody has carried out the ethnozoological research in MAKK because a thorough survey was considered tremendously challenging, mainly if a continuing investigation to be conducted. Even so, the 100 years old records of Kozlov possessed a substantial academic value, namely the provision of reliable information, obtaining critical historical materials for the research of ethnozoology, and contributing a historical heritage of science and technology in China's ethnic minorities. The note records enable speci c reference to investigating the Mongolian Plateau fauna, zoology history, and relevant research.

Materials And Methods
Materials This paper took two Russian editions of MAKK (the rst edition of 1923 and the second edition of 1948) as the model and selected MLKA as the research object to collate, textually research, and thorough studying. For example, Kozlov recorded the expedition's whole process and many investigation results according to their itinerary.
Investigation areas Despite Kozlov's expedition featuring a sizeable geographical span, MLKA recorded in MAKK had mainly concentrated in Alxa and its adjacent areas. Therefore, this paper made Alxa League in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China as the central region of eld investigations employing allowed conditions. We surveyed Kozlov's main roads in Alxa during 2019 and 2020 (Fig.5). We veri ed and compared the zoology-related contents recorded in MAKK in the form of eld investigations and interviews. Additionally, to obtain more relevant investigation materials, telephone interviews were conducted with Mongolians living in Qinghai and other Inner Mongolian areas.

Methods
The rst step was to compare the two Russian versions of MAKK, reorganizing the relevant information of MLKA.

Species 2000 and CASD).
Thirdly, During the Kozlov's investigation month, we carried out along the routes of his inspection in Alxa by eld investigations in 2019 and 2020, respectively. According to the records in MAKK, the interviews were conducted with the local Mongolians to further verify the accuracy of Kozlov's records and investigate the status quo of those knowledge. A total of 33 key informants participated in the interviews via selection using snowball sampling and rational sampling [53,54]. Since 7 of them are Mongolians living in Ordos, Inner Mongolia, and Qinghai, we conducted the interviews by telephone. The key informants are herders, scholars, civil servants, teachers, vendors and students, and the ages of them ranged from 26 to 76.

Results And Discussion
A total of 20 indigenous names of 18 species of animals were recorded in MAKK, along with 7 applicatory knowledge of 10 species of animals by Mongolian folks and measures regarding prevention and protection of 2 animals. The ethnozoological classi cation involved 23 species of animals, related to 14 families and 21 genera. The MLKA recorded by Kozlov could be summarized into three sections: Mongolian naming, utilization, and protection.
Mongolian names of animals in MAKK One of the usual methods of recording a speci c animal in MAKK was that Mongolian words were pronounced and spelled in Russian alphabet as transliteration. However, the pronunciation of the Mongolian terms of animals recorded by Kozlov was proved slightly different from the standard Mongolian pronunciation and the formal speaking due to time, dialect accent, and transliteration deviation. Therefore, we identi ed, analyzed, and summarized these names and found that the Mongolian terms of animals recorded in MAKK can be summaried into the following two chatabories: (a) Mongolian name of a particular animal had been registered, for example, a speci c Mongolian character correlating an individual animal. Nine species of animals fall into this category (Table 1); (b) The Mongolian name was not speci ed, but the name was spelled in Russian and annotated with Latin scienti c names. Ten species of animals were recorded in this regard (Table 2).  The Mongolian folk names of animals are spelled according to their pronunciation.
Studies achieved by Gerelt Zhao[2,38,39] and other scholars had set the animal naming's methodological principles in Mongolian. Based on the above literature, our analysis and discussion on the Mongolian names of animals were summarised as follows: Veri cation of animals' Mongolian names In MAKK, the Mongolian name of Eremias przewalskii was recorded as Гюрьбюль-могой, which stands for the Mongolian expression of gurbel mogai. However, according to our interview at Kozlov's recording location, the local herders mentioned mogai gurbel, but not gurbel mogai. The two words were in reverse order, resulting in a shift in meaning. In speci c, mogai gurbel means "a snakelike lizard," which corresponds to the morphological characteristics of E. przewalskii. By contrast, gurbel mogai, which refers to "a lizard-like snake," does not match the description in MAKK. Thus, it is concluded as Kozlov mistakenly recorded the Mongolian name of E. przewalskii mogai gurbel as gurbel mogai.
On the eastern edge of the Tengger Desert, Kozlov caught a kind of ferocious venomous snake. Because of frequent incidences of bitten sheep by such snake, the local Mongolian herdsmen called it as honin mogai, which means "sheep snake." Its scienti c name mentioned in MAKK is Coluber dione (1948 edition was annotated as Elaphe dione). However, Elaphe dione is a kind of snake without nonvenomous and docile, which does not t the description in MAKK. It had been unfortunate that information about the snake was not acquired during our eld researches and interviews. According to the literature [40,41,55 ,56 ], only Psammophis lineolatus and Gloydius intermedius were documented to be poisonous snakes in the Tengger Desert vicinity. The former refers to an "arrow snake" on many occasions in MAKK, so "sheep snake" could probably be Gloydius intermedius. Given this, there were possible errors in the species correspondence in Kozlov's record. The cause of this phenomenon might be the result of the specimen he captured was Elaphe dione. Still, he mistakingly referred to species correspondence when compiling notes or asking local herdsmen incorrectly regarding E. dione as "sheep snake".
Similarly, the Mongolian folk name of Cygnus columbianus documented in MAKK is shown as Зребень. However, in literature review and interviews, the Mongolian name of C. columbianus is usually known as hun galuu, which is inconsistent with that mentioned in MAKK. Nevertheless, the Mongolian name urub (Ciconia spp.) was found to be pronounced very close to Kozlov's notes, and both C. nigra and Cygnus columbianus are found in their recorded locations. Since MAKK explicitly records the bird's scienti c name as C. bewicki (variant name of C. columbianus), C. columbianus should be a species seen by Kozlov. Because C. columbianus and Ciconia nigra are disparate in morphology and easily distinguished, and Kozlov had obtained high attainments in zoological research. We speculate that he could have improperly recorded the Mongolian name of Ciconia spp. as the swan's Mongolian name.
Kozlov hunted a new species of feral cat Felis chutucha (1948 edition was annotated as Felis ocreata) [18,57] around Goizso in Ejina Banner. The creature is usually regarded as chohondai by local Mongolians. The classi cation of wild cats has always been controversial in academic circles.
Haltenorth [58] and He [59]  recorded it as Хулан (Asinus kiang ?). Also, A. kiang is known as a synonym of Equus Kiang. However, E. Kiang has not been distributed on the Mongolian plateau. While the symbol of "?" might stand for questionable identi cation of the species that remains to be con rmed. In contrast, Kozlov`s note annotated Asinus kiang ? as Equus hemionus in the revised edition of 1948. Hence, in conjunction with our survey, hulan corresponds to the scienti c name as E. hemionus in Table 1. E. hemionus belongs to a rst-grade state protection animal in China [65] and IUCN near critical (NT) species. According to Kozlov's records, it once was vastly distributed in the vicinity of the Juyan Lake Basin and the northern desert area. Based on recent research, it is shown that the population of E. hemionus in Inner Mongolia has reduced drastically. [66,67] Interviews with herders revealed that E. hemionus has virtually gone extinct in Alxa, with only a few occasional sightings along the border between China and Mongolia.
In MAKK, Цзерен, which stands for the Mongolian expression of jeer, is de ned as the Mongolian name of Procapra gutturosa by Kozlov. The word, jeer, in the Mongolian folk is the general name of the antelope. Nevertheless, Mongolians lived in the place like Alxa and its northern Gobi region in Mongolia often call P. gutturosa as jeer, and Gazella subgutturosa as suult jeer. Procapra picticaudata was marked as Ада in MAKK, but we did not acknowledge such naming it in Inner Mongolia, Qinghai, and Xinjiang. By contrast, it has been clear that the Mongolians usually regard P. picticaudata as Ада in Nikolay Mikhaylovich Przhevalsky's writings [68][69][70]. Searching for Mongolian dictionaries, only the Mongolian Orthography Dictionary (Revised Edition) documented a brief explanation (ada is short for ad bor, which is a kind of jeer) [51]. It can be seen that after more than one hundred years of history, the name has practically disappeared in the Mongolian folk. Besides, the Mongolian names har tahia and maral for Crossoptilon auritum and Cervus elaphus noted in MAKK are no longer frequently used among Mongolians. Instead, namings have been replaced by sarleg tahia and torog bug. In conclusion, some animals' Mongolian folk names are vanishing gradually, or even becoming extinct with the change of living style. Apart from the few species mentioned above, the Mongolian names of other species have been veri ed through eld investigation in Table 1 and Table 2. Kozlov's century-old records are shown to correspond to modern Mongolian names of these animals.

Structures and types of animals' Mongolian names
Much published literature [71][72][73][74][75] is interested in plant naming with the Mongolian language, but very little research focused on animal naming. Structurally speaking, the Mongolian naming for animals and plants could be indistinguishable.
Mongolian folk names of animals are classi ed as Simple Primary Name, Complex Primary Name and Secondary Name in Table 1 and Table 2. hoilog, chohondai, hainag, buldurga, maral, orongo, argali and jeer belong to Simple Primary Names, speci cally referring to the relevant animals, and having no other meaning. Mongolian phrasal names and plays a crucial role in animals' naming. For example, gurbel mogai, mogai gurbel and har suult are Complex Primary Name, comprised of "common word + common word" or "Simple Primary Name + Simple Primary Name". Secondary Name is consisted of "modi er + Simple Primary Name", containing har tahia, huh yamaa and chagan jeer. Modi ers are used to describe a certain feature of an animal further. Among them, har, bor, huh as well as chagan are modi ers, simultaneously, tahia, jeer, yamaa, bug, and suult are Simple Primary Name. There is a very close resemblance between the Mongolian naming system and Linnaean binomial nomenclature, where the modi er is equivalent to a speci c epithet but existing in a different position.
The correspondence between animals' Mongolian names and scienti c names As shown in Table 1 and Table 2, some animals possess two or more Mongolian names. For instance, Gazella subgutturosa has two Mongolian names, bor jeer and har suult. Similarly, Cervus elaphus has two Mongolian names, maral and torog bug. The Mongolian folk name of Crossoptilon auritum in MAKK are texted as har tahia. Through interviews with local herdsmen in Alxa, older adults referred to the subject as sarleg tahia. There are two other Mongolian names of C. auritum enrolled in the literature: huh hadan haraa and huh gurguul. A phenomenon like this where two or more different Mongolian names refer to the same species is synonymy; thus, the indigene noted two or more Mongolian names for the identical creature. It is evident that a "multitude-to-one" relationship between the Mongolian names of animals and scienti c names. From the taxonomic point of view, such terminology may be at the species level. Table 1 and Table 2 have shown eight kinds of animals with only one Mongolian name in total, and the Mongolian name also speci cally refers to the animal. Therefore, there could be a "one-to-one" relationship between these animals' Mongolian and scienti c names. For example, huh yamaa is the special name of Pseudois nayaur, buldurga refers to the dedicated description of Syrrhaptes paradoxus, orongo is treated as the specialized designation of Pantholops hodgsoni, moreover, hainag the speci ed word of dzo (offspring of a hybrid of yaks and cattle). Conversely, each of these animals has only one Mongolian name. From the taxonomic perspective, both the "one-to-one" and "multitude-to-one" relationships are the corresponding species level. It indicates that Mongolian folk classi cation of some animals reached the level of species. Furthermore, there is a "one-to-multitude" relationship between the Mongolian names and scienti c names of animals. Based on our investigation, the Mongolian folk refers to Tetraogallus as hoilog. While chohondai refers to the general name of wild cats, such as Felis bieti, F. silvestris, F. chaus, and Prionailurus bengalensis. The white swan of the genus Cygnus is regarded hun galuu. Based on geographical distribution, the swan can be speci ed as C. cygnus, C. columbianus, and C. olor, while they are generally regarded to/despite species difference. There is a homonyms phenomenon in Mongolian folk; for example, a Mongolian name refers to various animals or animals that share the same Mongolian name. Therefore, the folk classi cation of these animals is the family or genus of modern animal taxonomy.

Meaning and naming basis of animals' Mongolian names
Traditional Mongolian grazing experience plays a signi cant role in the naming of animals in Mongolian. From the Mongolian name analysis of Gloydius intermedius, xonin is "sheep," and mogay refers to "snake." According to a description in MAKK, sheep and other domestic animals often suffer from snake bites. As a result, Mongolian herdsmen refer to snakes as "sheep snake." It subsequently proved that Mongolian folk's naming of animals could be closely related to the traditional grazing experience.
The living habits of animals are also one of the bases for Mongolian naming of animals. The Mongolian name of Elaphe dione is nomhan bor, and nomhan stands for the characteristic meaning of meek and honest. This Mongolian name accurately describes the temperament and habit of the mentioned snake species. The morphological characteristics of animals are the essential foundation for the Mongolian naming of animals. The naming is the essence of a Secondary Name, which comprises a modi er indicating the morphological characteristics or habits of an animal and a Simple Primary Name. For instance, because of the blue-black features of Crossoptilon auritum, its Mongolian name is har tahia. Har means black and tahia is a pheasant. Similarly, the corresponding color of the dorsal seta of Pseudois nayaur is cyan; hence its Mongolian name is huh yamaa, among which huh means cyan and yamaa refers to a goat.
A large number of Secondary Name is constructed from a comparison of similar names, and they are based on Simple Primary Name, using modi ers to identify features and distinguish similar species. The Mongolian names of Gazella subgutturosa and Procapra gutturosa are bor jeer and chagan jeer individually. Among them, bor is grey, chagan means white,and jeer refers to an antelope. Color modi ers distinguish the two animals because of their different fur.
From the Mongolian name of Crossoptilon auritum, Pseudois nayaur, Gazella subgutturosa, and Procapra gutturosa, we can conclude that tahia, jeer and yamaa are equivalent in terms of the generic name. Moreover, har, chagan and huh are equal indicates of the speci c epithet, which reveals the concept of genus and species. Therefore, the Mongolian folk naming methods and basis for animals are of extreme signi cance and practical value to drafting Mongolian names of animals in modern zoology.
Animal utilization of the Mongols in MAKK Animal husbandry has always been the pillar industry of Mongolian herdsmen, which involves all aspects of Mongolian life. Hence, the Mongolian style of domesticated animals (domestic animals) has been more abundant and frequent than wild animals. The contents about animal utilization mentioned in MAKK are also closely related to Mongolian life, featuring domestic and wild animals. According to the use of animals in Table 3, the Mongolians' utilization in MAKK was analyzed.

Diet
The purpose of diet mainly includes consumption of meat and milk. Domestic animals comprise the primary source of protein intake for Mongolians. It is recorded in MAKK that several steps involve air-dried mutton preparation, namely the slaughtering, aying, bone removal, thinly slicing of mutton, boiling and salting for 10~15 minutes, and hanging with a string for air drying in a well ventilated shady area. After that, the air-drying of mutton usually takes three or ve days before reaching readiness. [17,18] The purpose of making dried mutton is to preserve animal protein for a prolonged period when a provision of a "dry food" during a crossing of the uninhabited Gobi and desert is required. According to MAKK, Kozlov's team mastered the nomadic Mongolian folk's skills to cope with the practical food demand during their expedition. Based on our survey, the production method of preparing air-dried beef and mutton in Mongolian folk is still quite common. Although the Mongolians in the eastern part of Inner Mongolia used to make dried meats out of raw beef and mutton, drying of beef and mutton's currently increasingly relied on other methods, such as roasting or frying. Mountains, a large number of P. nayaur were reportedly witnessed. The Mongolians living near Dingyuanying were well aware of their living habits. They often went hunting in the mountains, especially in autumn when P. nayaur was fattened. However, due to the destruction of the natural environment and people's wanton hunting, the number of P. nayaur had remarkably declined by the end of the 20th century. [76][77][78] The population of P. nayaur in Helan Mountains has recovered in recent years, thanks to the establishment of Helan Mountains Nature Reservation Zone and listing of P. nayaur's as China's secondgrade national protected wildlife [79] and IUCN [80] (World Union for Conservation of Nature) low-risk species. [81][82][83] Tea drinking is a common hobby of the Mongolian people. A saying goes, "It is better to have no meal than a cup of tea." It can be seen that milk tea is an indispensable drink in Mongolian life. Nevertheless, the milk source of brewed milk tea in different regions remain varied. For example, Kozlov recorded that Mongolian people living in desert areas used camel milk to make milk tea. However, according to the survey, Mongolians distributing in grassland areas are more likely to use milk to prepare milk tea. This is because the Mongolians living in different regions have different kinds of animals as their primary sources of milk. Therefore, MLKA in various areas shares some common but differences in some cases.
Some customs of Mongolian brewing and drinking horse milk wine were also documented in MAKK. For example, in the lower reaches of the Ejina River, the expedition made daily trips to nearby pastures to drink home-brewed Mongolian horse milk spirit. Once, they visited a widow's yurt, where they were not allowed to take the horse milk spirit out of the yurt. Since the husband was just deceased, the widow was in an obligated mourning period of 40 days or more. Therefore, the team had to drink the spirit onsite before leaving.

Textile
Mongolian textile's primary raw materials are the wool and cashmere of camel, horse, sheep, and other livestock. Wool and cashmere were yarn into thread, cloth, and felt to make clothes, blankets, or other daily necessities by Mongolians. MAKK notes: "There is a ne well next to our station, carefully covered with felt by the Mongols. The felt cloth, which was named as taglaa by Mongols, was made of coarse animal hair or horse mane and was used by the Mongols to sew sacks." However, our investigation at the Kozlov's expedition's site revealed that it was not the felt that was called taglaa, but the wellhead covers made of such material. Due to the scarcity of water, local herdsmen cherish water resources very much. The purpose of making such wellhead covers is to protect the opening from being destroyed by animals and buried by sand and reduce the evaporation of water to a certain extent.
The investigation revealed that this kind of cover was no longer found in present-day Alxa. As a result of social development and material abundance, they were replaced by canvas or other products purchased from the market. Fortunately, we found not only the sack made of animal's mane as described by Kozlov in Alxa (Fig.6) but also saw another sack made of wool (Fig.7). The local herders said that they used to cover the wellheads with these worn-out sacks.

Accessory
Crossoptilon auritum, one of the precious birds in northwest China, is the national second-grade protected animal, [84] and the bird is listed as vulnerable species in China Species Red List [85]. The two pairs of long tail feathers are valuable decorative feathers in the center of its tail, and the outer rectrices can also be used as decorations (Fig.8). [43] In the Qing Dynasty, the tail feathers of C. auritum were inserted into low-level o cials' o cial hats as accessories called "Lán líng" in Chinese (Fig.9). "Local hunters were brutally killing these gorgeous and strange birds due to the beautiful feathers of its long tail, which were used for adornments in Chinese o cial hats," MAKK says. Literature records show that C. auritum was widely distributed in Helan Mountains. [68,86] According to recent research data, C. auritum has been greatly reduced due to environmental destruction and overhunting. [46,87] Their distribution area in the Helan Mountains is less than 20% of the total area, and the number of C. auritum is only more than 600. [83] Transportation As Kozlov described, the Mongols' primary transportation method was horses, while camel caravans were used to transport their supplies. That was the historical reason behind this since the areas were underdeveloped at that time. However, with modern technology development and mechanization, Mongolian herdsmen are no longer a common practice to take horses for transportation. The condition of relying on camel caravans for cargo transportation has long been replaced by modern transportation options such as trains or automobiles.
By using animals for an extended period, Mongolians invented and manufactured many accessories related to them, such as Lele cart, saddles, reins ( Fig.10-a), camel nasal stick (Fig.10 b), camel cushions, and stirrups (Fig.10-c), carry rack ( Fig.10-4) and many others. These accessories are the carrier of the Mongolian traditional culture, and their production skills and use methods compose part of the Mongolian traditional culture. However, these tools are gradually being replaced along with the change and advancement of technology, and fewer and fewer people would be pro cient in these skills. Hence, the inheritance of this cultural heritage is facing a severe challenge.

Instrument
It was also mentioned in MAKK that some Mongolian musical instruments were made out of animal leather. For example, a kind of percussion instrument in Mongolian Buddhist temples, called hengereg, have sidewalls of the drum tightened with sheep belts without hoops. The drumhead is made of sheepskin and is usually tanned to be as thin as paper.

Toponym
The Mongolian names of animals profoundly in uenced the local human geography, and many places were named after the local animals directly or indirectly. Such customs are still in use at present. According to MAKK, there was a place called "Horse Drinking Valley" in Alxa Left Banner, whose Mongolian name was aduun hudug-in am, Its translation meaning is understood as "the gorge where horse hooves dig out water" or "the gorge where horses drink." Interestingly, Kozlov happened to see some horses grazing and drinking at the spring while he was passing through the area. Again for instance, yamaat-in gool means "A valley with goats" in Mongolian. It was one of the key destinations of Kozlov's expedition to Helan Mountains. Our investigation con rmed that this place is located in the Zhenmuguan area of Helan Mountains today (Fig.11). It is named yamaat-in gool because Pseudois nayaur often appeared here. So far, the toponym's Mongolian name remains unchanged, and P. nayaur was often seen on the nearby hillside. For another example, the Mongolian name of East Juyan Lake Basin was written as "Сого-нор" in MAKK, namely Mongolian sub nuur, meaning "the Lutra lutra lake." It possibly used to be a habitat of L. lutra, and locals named the lake after it. [39] The name stuck till this day though L. lutra have long since disappeared there (Fig.12).
From the above evidence, we concluded that animals' distribution represents a key element to the naming of toponyms or a location. The toponyms related to animals also re ect the historical conditions of the ecological environment and animal distribution of those areas.

Weather forecast
The Mongolians summarized some impressive phenological knowledge from their prolonged interactions with animals. Tetraogallus altaicus is a common avian species in the Gobi Altai Mountains. According to Kozlov's records, their chirp was loud and reverberated in the mountains. The local Mongolian herdsmen used to predict weather changes relied on the chirp's timing during the day. For example, if the tweeting happens in the morning, it would possibly rain that day. However, this ancient forecasting method has been replaced almost by modern forecast technologies.
To sum up, the utilization of animals by Mongols is closely related to life and production, involving clothing, food, housing, transportation, and other aspects. Coexistence with animals through the ages, the Mongols have accumulated a mass of zoology knowledge and abundant experience and technology and formed a traditional culture with local characteristics. All these indicate that the folk culture in uenced the use of animals by the Mongolians and enriched Mongolian culture. Therefore, the knowledge on animal utilization of Mongols has an absolute scienti c and cultural value.
Like many nomadic people, the Mongolian populations in different areas share a high degree of consistency in lifestyle and cultural customs. Since MLKA is a form of Mongolian culture, they possess a broad unity despite being in geologically separate regions. [88] Nevertheless, due to the wide distribution of the Mongolian ethnics, their customs are slightly diverse in different areas, and animals in other geographical locations also vary, so their understanding and utilization of animals may also not the same. [75] From the usages of animals mentioned above, MLKA is uniform while exhibiting some differences and diversity.
The Mongols' protection and precaution for animals The Mongols have accumulated a mass of experience in livestock protection and risk prevention during generations of grazing life. MAKK recorded that a poisonous snake, Glydius intermedius, was captured in a meadow on the southeastern edge of the Tengger Desert. Kozlov described the snake as: "The snake is known for its ferocity and often bites livestock, especially sheep. Once the animal gets bitten, the wound swells and aches for about 1.5 to 2 weeks." Therefore, local herdsmen will try their best to avoid this kind of snake when grazing, not to suffer losses. Mongolian traditional thoughts and efforts on animal protection and prevention are one of the critical factors for their long-term harmonious coexistence with nature, and they are still of crucial practical signi cance and reference value for ecological restoration and biodiversity protection today. [53,89,90] Conclusion Firstly, in the long-term interaction between the Mongolians and animals, they have accumulated countless animal naming knowledge and utilization experience and formed a traditional culture with local characteristics. The local expertise of 23 species of animals recorded in MAKK con rmed traditionality and diversity regarding local knowledge and enriches ethnozoology contents in research.
Secondly, by analyzing the structure, meaning, and name basis of the Mongolian names of local wildlife, the Mongols probably possess a indigenous set of naming rules and classi cation system for animals.
And this is very similar to the naming and classi cation of plants in Mongolian folk, though the issue needs further systematic study. Scienti cally speaking, the Mongolian folk naming methods and basis for animals are of extreme signi cance and practical value to drafting Mongolian names of animals in modern zoology.
Thirdly, through summarizing and comparing the utilization of animals by Mongols, it can be seen that MLKA and Mongolian culture have mutual in uence and interdependent relationships. Meanwhile, the MLKA in different regions has both extensive unity and speci c differences.
Fourthly, according to the survey, some of the MLKA recorded by Kozlov is still in use. The historical notes are reliable supply information and momentous historical data for the studies on ethnozoology and history of science and technology of Chinese minorities. Besides, the thoughts and measures of the Mongols on the protection of animal resources more than 100 years ago provides high cultural value and a speci c practical value. All these mentioned above offer absolute reference values for the Mongolian Plateau's fauna and history of zoology research.
Finally, with social development, lifestyle changes, and the interference of various human factors, some MLKA is disappearing at an alarming rate. Some Mongolian folk culture associated with animals is also becoming unattainable simultaneously. Therefore, the excavation and research of ethnozoological knowledge in modern scienti c investigation documents should be paid enough attention, but the related protection and inheritance work is essential and urgent. Given this, we suggest that MLKA in literature should be reasonably protected and inherited in various forms, such as collation, reporting, promotion and re-studies.

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