One thing to note is that while riding a horse was a common enough skill, directly riding wasn’t the only way of moving around. Just as an example, take Temujin’s mother, Ö’elun. Temujin’s father (Yisugei) marries her by abduction, and had found her when she was on her way back to her original husband’s (Ciledu) home. In the scene from Secret History, Ciledu was escorting her back, him riding a horse, and her in a wagon pulled by a 'beast' (perhaps an ox).

As reported by European travelers in the 13th century (such as Friar Giovanni DiPlano Carpini), the yurts/gers (the tent-like structures they lived in) the Mongols used back then were different than today, in that they were fixed structures. So when moving around, rather than disassembling and re-assembling them, they would be put the gers onto a wagon, and teams of oxen would pull them around as they moved. Lane also cites Marco Polo as observing that the wagons had purposes of 'carry[ing] provisions, the yurts themselves, and women and children, but they were utilized by the women to conduct trade, and the buying and selling would be carried on from atop the wagons themselves' (Lane, 55).

Now on the elderly in particular. In Atwood’s The Rise of the Mongols: Five Chinese Sources (his translation and commentary on just that), one of the sources he documents is a combined account from two Song envoys to the Mongols from the 1230s and 1240s, Peng Daya and Xu Ting ("{93} A Sketch of the Black Tatars"). Here, we find an observation from Xu Ting:

When I was on the steppe, I saw the commoner households under their chiefs, wagons loaded with supplies, their aged ones, youngsters, and livestock, traveling with their entire possessions for several days without cease. Also, there were many thirteen- and fourteen-year-olds among them.

So it appears the wagons would also carry the elderly, though I’m not sure if, with regards to livestock, the meaning here is some livestock was carried on wagons (as it literally sounds like), or traveled with the wagons. Certainly at least some oxen would be needed to pull wagons.

An interesting case is Tamerlane, the 'lane' deriving from him being lame - that is, unable to walk without difficulty. His right leg (and right arm) had been injured in battle. In From Genghis Khan to Tamerlane, Peter Jackson writes:

Those who certainly did meet the conqueror [Tamerlane] refer to his lameness, his need for assistance in mounting a horse and his use of a litter.

So though not entirely handicapped, he needed help mounting his horse, and might otherwise be carried around. As Tamerlane, we can expect he would have privileges others might not enjoy (such as a litter), but this does give a sense of how different handicaps might have been managed.

This bad leg doesn’t seem to have been a major hindrance on Tamerlane’s many and extensive campaigns however; at least Jackson doesn’t make any remarks, but for one (that I noticed at least):

‘The lofty purpose of His Majesty during this expedition’, writes Sharaf al- Dīn of Timur’s decision to punish the infidels of Kator for their attacks on Muslims, ‘was ever directed in particular towards the triumph of the faith, the strengthening of Islam, the holy war against the unbeliever and the demolition of idols.’ After the capture of Mīrat (Meerut) in 801/1399, when Timur’s leg had grown inflamed and painful, he was allegedly so enthusiastic at the prospect of combat with an approaching Hindu force that his pain abated and he mounted to play his part. Yazdī justifies the slaughter of Hindus in the Siwālik region during the return march on the grounds that they had once paid the jizya but had latterly withheld it, and their lives and property were the lawful object of holy war.

That is, his leg hurt a lot, but the excitement of battle ameliorated the pain ahead of battle.

However, I have not read much on Tamerlane otherwise, and there may be relevant details documented elsewhere about how his leg affected his conquests. Still, I thought to include some comment on him here at least, given the subject matter.

Atwood [Translation and Commentary] (2021) The Rise of the Mongols: Five Chinese Sources

Jackson (2023) From Genghis Khan to Tamerlane: The Reawakening of Mongol Asia

Lane (2006) Daily Life in the Mongol Empire

Atwood [Translation and Commentary] (2023) The Secret History of the Mongols

Having seen the movie and read the book it’s based on years before (“American Prometheus”), both the book and the movie note that in physics, most of your groundbreaking work is done while you’re young (Einstein’s most influential work is no exception) so as you enter middle age, you’re expected to go into management.

Midgely: a danger to himself and others

Can't write a good historic answer but will leave one as a placeholder here. The idea of other gods being demons came out of Second Temple Judaism which predates Christianity. Paul makes note of this in his letters and sacrificing to demons is written about extensively in the book of Revelations. Deuteronomy 4:28 "There you will serve gods, the work of human hands, wood, and stone, which neither hear nor eat nor smell anything" is more evidence that ancient Judaism viewed other Gods as fake or demons.

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Thank you for sharing your work!

He was identified by Lawrence, as almost noted in the film, because he worked as a theoretician with experimentalists, and thus could bridge them.

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Folklorists tend to avoid asking questions about belief because it is so problematic on several levels. I address how it is often viewed in my recent release, Introduction to Mythology: A Folkloric Perspective. An excerpt dealing with this:

Underpinning oral narratives is belief, but that assertion is also problematic. For example, if people today are asked if they believe in ghosts, answers may depend on the setting. Belief may be denied to avoid ridicule, and degrees of skepticism can come into play. Someone in the clear light of the noon sun may see little reason to profess a belief in spirits among us; place that same person in a cemetery at midnight, and the answer may be as nuanced as the interplay of moonlit tombstones and their deep shadows.

Whether believed in or not, the subject of this mind experiment depends on understanding the concept of “ghost.” Because the word “ghost” is part of a shared vocabulary with recognized meaning, spirits from the afterworld can be regarded as part of a collective tradition regardless of belief. This concept, then, is part of a cultural heritage held in common and expressed in circulating stories about these entities. Belief is irrelevant when considered this way. The same observation can apply to the myths of the ancient world. Belief is less important than familiarity with content.

Participants on the subreddit AskHistorians frequently ask whether the Greeks and Romans believed in their myths and gods. The answer is somewhere between the unknowable and something requiring additional exploration. If a team of folklorists conducted thousands of interviews in a modern nation dominated by Christians, they would no doubt find a wide spectrum of responses to a question about belief in the Resurrection of Jesus. Perspectives are not monolithic. Again, depending on the moment or the phase of life, anyone can have different thoughts on questions of belief. For these reasons, folklorists often avoid the subject of belief, and yet, it can seem essential to the subject of myths from historical times.

The answer to the question about belief is, simply, that it depends on the person and the circumstance. For virtually any motif, there would have been believers and skeptics - just as there are today.

All this said, keep in mind that Davy Jones' Locker was something of a metaphor, so it wasn't always put forward as a point of belief. It was a traditional - meaning a folkloric - way to refer to the depths of the ocean beneath the sailing vessels. There were, however, traditions about the dead lost at sea and continuing to exist in those depths, some the question of belief could be raised in that context.

In my article released last week, 'The treacherous waters of Lyonesse: seeking truths based on oral tradition', I describe legends about sailors peering through calm waters and seeing communities in the depths with dead sailors walking the underwater streets. The question of belief when it comes to these legends raises all the questions I bring up above. Belief is never easy to discuss!