2

The Early Life

Chinggis Khan, Temujin, was not born into greatness, nor did greatness come easily to him. The path he took was long and hard, and it was only late in his career that he would have enjoyed any kind of security. That he rewarded the loyalty of those who remained steadfast in their support for him is not surprising: his success was never assured and every victory was hard fought and often tempered by defeat. There are some who believe that Temujin was born into a very humble family and that all the subsequent genealogies are pure fabrications. How else could the destitution that befell his family after the death of his father be explained? A noble family would not have been allowed to undergo such privations. Such speculation must remain just that, however, since all the contemporary histories embellish him with at least a recorded history. Paul Ratchnevsky’s account of the Great Khan’s life is based on Rashid al-Din’s monumental history, which in turn is based on Chinese and Mongolian sources no longer extant as well as the anonymous Secret History, a Mongolian verse chronicle of suspect date and authorship, which is not the most objective of sources. As Igor de Rachewiltz points out in the introduction of his definitive translation of the great book, ‘[The Secret History] is the only genuine (not to be confused with reliable) native account of the life and deeds of Činggis Qan.’¹ If the resulting account still seems overly heroic, it should be remembered that Chinggis Khan was a hero by any criteria and it is hardly surprising that his remarkable success should be mirrored by a remarkable early life.

Fig. 3: Chinggis Khan, d.1227

Four events dominate Temujin’s early life, and two important episodes stand as decisive turning points in his climb for ultimate power. Firstly, the poisoning of his father by the Tatars, in complete breach of the rules of hospitality laid down in the yasa, and his family’s subsequent abandonment by his extended tribe would have taught him never to trust anyone, nor hold tradition sacrosanct, and to rely only on himself. Secondly, the murder of his half-brother demonstrated a characteristic ruthlessness and determination which the earlier tragedy might well have instilled in him. Thirdly, as a boy he was kidnapped and held prisoner by a rival clan, the Tayichi’uts, who were so convinced that he would cause trouble for them all as soon as he came of age that they reputedly intended to murder him as soon as he reached adulthood. With characteristic cunning, clever judgement of character and steely discipline, he escaped his captors and added to his reputation and growing mystique. A fourth event which was to have far reaching repercussions was the kidnapping by the Merkit of his beloved wife Borte, betrothed to him from an early age and reputedly chosen by the young Temujin against the wishes of his father. His initial reaction to the snatching of his young bride from right before his eyes revealed a very cold and calculating strategist but also a very human, determined man driven by love and honour, able to live with his decisions and act with resolve and justice.

Two telling episodes in particular stand out as harbingers of the future. First, the rallying of Temujin’s supporters in the valley of Baljuna has been so embellished with fables that the reality has become clouded, but in essence it marked the turning point in his fortunes and served as the defining test of true loyalty for his followers. And, second, the subsequent showdown with his blood brother Jamuqa has likewise no doubt been transformed unrecognisably from the telling but served as the defining moment when Temujin met his destiny.

FORMATIVE YEARS

Though not born into the nobility, Temujin’s early circumstances were respectable, and his father, Yesugei, the son of Bartan-Bahadur, was generally recognised as chieftain of the leading Mongol clan, though this position was contested by the Tayichi’ut, Temujin’s future abductors. His great-grandfather Qabul Khan was recognised as a Khagan (Qa’an), or chieftain of the Khamag Mongol confederation, by the Jin (Jurchen)² but after they switched their allegiance from him to the Tatars in 1161 his fate was sealed and Qabul Khan, just like his grandson a few decades later, was killed by the Tatars. Qabul Khan was a grandson of Qaidu Khan I, who is credited with being the first leader to attempt to unify the Mongol tribes and gain recognition from the Jurchen rulers of northern China. Temujin’s father, Yesugei, was named after a Tatar killed by his father, Qabul, in battle, and it was a Tatar who was to kill Yesugei and leave Temujin a nine-year-old orphan, too young to succeed his father as chieftain of the Kiyat clan. It would be some years before Temujin attained a position to exact his revenge on the Tatars.

Temujin, who was reputedly born ‘clutching a black clot of blood’³ in his closed hand, was himself named after a Tatar, Temujin-uge, who had been captured by his father, doubtless further accentuating the bad blood that existed between the two tribes. He was born in 1162, though it is sometimes claimed to be 1155, to Ho’elun-eke, a Merkit from the Olkhunut forest tribe. She had been abducted by Yesugei and his brothers, in true Turco-Mongol fashion, as she and her new Merkit husband Yeke Chiledu were travelling back to the Merkit camp. This scenario added yet more enemies to Temujin’s social baggage, and was reflected in the later abduction of his new bride, Borte. Though abduction was a common and traditional form of marriage ‘ceremony’, the custom continued to cause resentment and was a common cause of hostility and intertribal warfare. Even though Yesugei made Ho’elun-eke his chief wife, an honour as only one of his wives could bear his heirs, the Merkit were not prepared to forgive this insult, and memories were long on the steppe. Ho’elun-eke bore Yesugei Bahadur⁴ three more sons, Khasar, Khajiun and Temuge, and lastly a daughter, Temulin, born when Temujin was nine. There were also two other brothers, Bekter and Belgutei from a second wife. The Secret History, a chronicle increasingly condemned as unreliable Toluid propaganda,⁵ paints Ho’elun-eke as strong and resolute despite the impossible conditions she was left in after her husband’s murder and her young family’s abandonment by their tribe.

The family had their base by the River Onon, where the children learnt riding and archery from an early age. During these years Temujin formed a close friendship with Jamuqa, a son from a neighbouring family, with whom he formed a blood brothership (anda) by exchanging knuckle-bones and arrows. The relationship between andas was often considered stronger than that between blood brothers and could not be idly disregarded. It was also during this time that Temujin’s father betrothed him to Borte, a daughter of Dei-sechen from the Boskur tribe, a sub-group of a leading Mongol tribe, the Onggirat. Upon departing from the bride’s father’s camp, leaving his son with his new in-laws, Yesugei Bahadur passed by a group of Tatars who had struck camp in order to eat. He availed himself of the ancient nomadic custom of hospitality and was invited to share their meal. However, the Tatars recognised him as an enemy who had previously robbed them, ‘Yisügei the Kiyan has come’⁶ and so poisoned his food. He died upon reaching home and entrusted the loyal Father Monglik, the family’s oldest retainer, with ensuring his eldest son’s safe return.

After his father’s murder, Temujin’s family fortunes declined abruptly, and as eldest son Temujin was summoned home to provide for his family. His mother famously

hoisted her skirts up […] running upstream on the banks of the Onon, gathering wild pear, fruits of the region, nourishing the bellies and throats of her children […] digging up roots to nourish her children, she fed them with onions, fed them with garlic, saw how the sons of her belly could flourish […] Thus, on a diet of seeds they were nourished.⁷

This was a harsh and bitterly learnt lesson which left a profound impression on his character. The family’s predicament worsened when their relatives decided that continued loyalty to a departed leader was strategically prejudicial, politically inopportune and economically detrimental. Dismissing Temujin as too young to lead the clan, Yesugei Bahadur’s Tayichi’ut followers, his nokhod, deserted the camp declaring:

The deep water has dried up,

The shining stone is shattered.⁸

[Mongol proverb meaning ‘The situation has deteriorated to the point

where things can no longer be mended.’⁹]

With their expectations of plunder and martial adventure now dashed, the nokhod deserted Yesugei’s stricken family, but also less explicably the family’s close relatives also deserted them, including the mother of Bekter and Belgutei, Temujin’s half-brothers. According to steppe tradition, a widow should be taken in marriage and given protection by her husband’s youngest brother, in this case, Da’aritai-otchigin. Ho’elun-eke declined, asserting her wish to raise her family alone. However, since Rashid al-Din records that in fact the bereaved family received considerable support from family members including Yesugei’s elder brother, Kuchar, this might well be the Secret History overdramatising Temujin’s plight in order to portray the mounting adversities from which the future world conqueror was so remarkably able to extradite himself. If it had been true, it might support the view that Temujin came from a poor unknown family with no illustrious ancestors. What is clear is that times became considerably harder for Ho’elun-eke and her young family, and such filial occupations as horse-rustling became necessities rather than pastimes. The family’s perception was that they had been cruelly abandoned, and Temujin was moulded by this reality. ‘We have no friend but our shadow, we have no whip but our horse’s tail.’¹⁰

The murder, when Temujin was 13 or 14, of his half-brother Bekter is perhaps the most controversial of the four defining incidents from Temujin’s early life. It is an incident that figures prominently in the Secret History but which appears to have been ignored in the Altan Debter, an official history and a major source for Rashid al-Din. Whereas the Altan Debter avoids reference to the incident, the Secret History does not hide Ho’elun-eke’s anger at her sons whom she brands murderers: ‘Like a Qasar [Khazar] dog snapping at its own afterbirth; like a panther assailing a cliff; like a lion uncontrollable in its rage; like a dragon-snake swallowing its prey alive.’¹¹ Temujin and Qasar had confronted their half-brother, accusing him of failing to share the spoils of a hunting trip. The division and sharing of the hunt’s rewards is a steppe practice sanctified by custom and tradition. Bekter recognised his infringement of the yasa and, apparently accepting his fate, asked only that his younger brother, Belgutei, be spared. Bekter was dispatched with horn-tipped arrows, and Belgutei was spared to eventually find honour and recognition serving his brother’s murderer.¹² Chinggis Khan was later to speak of both brothers: ‘It is to Belgutei’s strength and Qasar’s prowess as an archer that I owe the conquest of the World Empire.’¹³ It seems likely that more than ownership of a fish was at stake to have caused this fratricide. The age of the half-brothers is not explicitly stated in the sources, and there is evidence suggesting that Bekter might have been older than Temujin, in which case he could have been perceived as a threat to Temujin’s leadership of the family.

In the Secret History, Temujin’s kidnapping and imprisonment by the Tayichi’ut follows immediately after the account of the murder, though no suggestion is made that the two events were linked other than portraying Temujin’s treatment as that befitting a common criminal. Whether his capture was retribution for the killing or because Tarkutai-Kiriltuk, a leading noble of the Tayichi’ut, considered him a potential rival, or both, is never clarified, and Rashid al-Din suggests that throughout his youth Temujin suffered continually at the hands of not only relatives from the Tayichi’ut but also rivals from the Merkits, the Tatars and other tribes. Such tribulations were hardly uncommon for the young Turco-Mongols, and kidnappings for ransom, servants or even forced fighters were not uncommon as the many examples mentioned in the Secret History testify.

The Secret History recounts how Temujin escaped still wearing the wooden cangue, a collar-like implement which entrapped his head and arms, and plunged into a river. ‘Temujin pulled the leash of his cangue away from that weakling, hit him once on the head and ran away.’¹⁴ By using the cangue as a pillow, he was able to lie on the bed of the river and keep his head above water. His escape had been cleverly planned and calmly executed. He had chosen the night of a feast when he was carelessly guarded. Rather than continue to flee, he bided his time and hid. He was discovered by Sorqan-shira of the small Suldus tribe who, rather than betraying him, assisted the fugitive in his escape. Sorqan-shira, like others who were to follow him, said of Temujin, ‘There is a fire in your eyes, there is light in your face.’¹⁵ Rejecting the advice of his saviour to head straight for his family’s camp, Temujin sought out the camp of Sorqan-shira himself where he knew Sorqan’s children were sympathetic towards him. While the Secret History might well have embellished this anecdote somewhat, the essential elements of Temujin’s character remain constant. The careful planning, the self-control, the understanding of people, the awareness of his powers over others and over young people in particular, and his lack of impulsiveness were all qualities that he was to develop over the following decades. The lessons he learnt from this encounter with the Tayichi’ut were never to be forgotten.

The fourth defining incident in Temujin’s early life resulted in a gradual turn in his fortunes and the beginning of his rise. Not long after his escape from the Tayichi’ut and having reached the age of fifteen, the Mongol age of majority, Temujin returned to reclaim his bride Borte Fujin from her father, Dei-sechen. He also sought to consolidate himself as head of his small tribe and gather supporters and outside protection in order that he might never again fall victim to the dictates of neighbouring tribes. To this end he summoned his friend and fellow horse-rustler Bo’orchu, collected his brothers, Qasar with his bow and Belgutei with his axe, packed his wife’s wedding gift, a black sable cloak, as a very persuasive and valuable offering, and set off in search of a powerful protector. The sable cloak had originally been presented to his mother, Ho’elun-eke, on behalf of Borte on her betrothal, and now Temujin thought it appropriate to present this valuable coat to the Ong Khan, his father Yesugei’s anda, who was now effectively his father and his protector, a powerful ally whom Temujin could rightly call upon for protection.¹⁶

Parallels between Temujin and the leader he chose as his protector are possible. Toghril, the Ong Khan and leader of the powerful Kereits, had been abducted by the Merkits when he was a boy and for a while forced into hard labour. Later, at 13, he and his mother were carried off by the Tatars, and the young Toghril was made to tend their camels. After the death of his father, Toghril also murdered his brother and as a result became head of his family. This role was short-lived, however, and as a consequence of the murder, Toghril’s uncle forced him into exile. It was Temujin’s father who assisted the exiled Toghril, the two becoming anda, and together they attacked Toghril’s uncle, the gurkhan. Thus, Toghril became the powerful leader of the Kereit clan with the title of Ong Khan or Wang Khan, and it was at this time that Temujin appeared to remind the Kereit ruler of his debt to Yesugei Bahadur, his anda.

When Toghril accepted the sable cloak and with it Temujin as an adopted son, he gained a much-needed ally against the intrigues of his own family and in return he bestowed some much needed status and security on Temujin. In recognition of this new status, Temujin was presented with a ‘son’ as a personal servant. This was Jelme, the future Mongol divisional commander of a toman. The value and advantages of this new alliance were to be made clear within a very short time.

The details of the abduction of Borte Fujin by the Merkits differ in the Secret History and Rashid al-Din’s Altan Debter-based account. Both agree, however, that a force of Merkits led by Toqto’a Beki attacked Temujin’s camp and seized Borte Fujin and Belgutei’s mother while the men, Ho’elun-eke and her daughter Temulin escaped. Both accounts also agree that Temujin sought immediate assistance from his adopted father, Toghril, who was only too pleased to wreak revenge on his enemies of old. The Merkits were in fact exacting revenge themselves for the original abduction of Ho’elun-eke from Yeke Chiledu by Temujin’s father, Yesugei. Borte was intended for Yeke Chiledu’s younger brother, Chilger Boko, and was seen as sweet and just revenge and honour satisfied.

Temujin has sometimes been rebuked for abandoning his new bride to an uncertain and certainly unpleasant future. She was defenseless against the Merkit attackers and she could have expected little mercy from her abductors who were likely to rape her and consign her to a life of slavery and servitude. Temujin’s reaction was cold and calculated and reflected his objective and clear assessment of the situation. If he had stayed to fight, all would have been lost and the women would still have been consigned to rape and slavery. If the Merkits had suffered casualties, they would have taken revenge on the women. By fleeing, he was giving his wife her best chance of survival. The Merkits would no doubt feel magnanimous after such an easy victory and they would also be feeling pride after apparently inspiring such fear in their enemies who would have great difficulty living down such a humiliation. Temujin simply employed a classic Mongol ruse, namely the feigned retreat, in order to lull the enemy into a false sense of security. Temujin would be back when he was in a position to secure victory, and meanwhile he assumed that a prize such as his beautiful Borte would be awarded as a wife to someone and treated with due respect.

The discrepancy in the accounts surrounding this episode is not difficult to explain. Temujin’s first son, Jochi, was born approximately nine months after Borte Fujin’s rescue, and the uncertainty of his paternity reverberated down through his line, sons and grandsons who became rulers of the Golden Horde, the ulus that held sway over Russia, Eastern Europe and the Qipchaq steppes. Women abducted from other tribes were awarded to members of the capturing tribe as a matter of course. Belgutei’s mother was filled with shame after her release, not so much because she had been given to a Merkit as a wife but because the Merkit to whom she had been given was a mere commoner while her sons were khans. Rashid al-Din’s account has Borte Fujin treated with the greatest respect by her abductors due to her pregnancy and claims that the Merkits happily turned her over to their sworn enemy the Kereit leader, Toghril. Toghril refused to take her as a wife since he considered her his daughter-in-law, returning her to Temujin. This account is obviously contrived and implausible and served the political aim of avoiding embarrassing a neighbouring Mongol dynasty, the Jochids of the Golden Horde, and tarnishing the name of Borte Fujin Khatun. Rashid al-Din adds that Toghril sought to ‘preserve her from the gaze of strangers and non-intimates’,¹⁷ an obvious anachronism since the Kereits were not Muslim and would never have entertained such sentiments, unlike Rashid al-Din himself and others in the Muslim Ilkhanid (Persian Mongol) court where he served. His account was to save Muslim sensitivities and blushes.

Though not explicit, the Secret History, a narrative written for insiders who would have been well acquainted with the facts of this incident, does not weave any falsehoods around the events, while at the same time it romanticises the eventual reunion of Temujin and his ‘beloved’ Borte, a depiction worthy of Hollywood.

And so, he came upon her, for Lady Börte was among those fleeing people. She heard the voice of Temujin and recognizing it, she got off the cart and came running towards him […] It was moonlight: he looked at them, recognized Lady Börte, and they fell into each other’s arms.¹⁸

Such romantic love and moonlight tenderness sits strangely with the fact that Temujin had abandoned his beloved apparently without a second thought when the Merkits launched their ambush. However, this might be explained by the fact that whereas Temujin and the other men in the party and possibly even Ho’elun-eke, who was also there, would have faced almost certain death had they been captured, young women were too valuable a commodity to wantonly dispose of, and though paternity of any children could be important, ownership of a woman’s body was never considered totally exclusive in Mongol society. This attitude is clearly evident in the inheritance laws which stipulate that the wives and concubines of deceased Mongols were inherited by their nearest relatives, with sons inheriting their father’s wives. Temujin would therefore have realised that it was imperative that he should escape rather than confront a stronger enemy and that he would later be in a position to impose his revenge and reclaim his bride.

Temujin called on his adopted father Toghril, his anda Jamuqa, his brothers Qasar and Belgutei, his noker Bo’orchu, and his servant and noker Jelme to assist him in rescuing his bride and his stepmother from the Merkits. Toghril had not forgotten his pledge:

Didn’t I tell you last time that you could depend on me? Your father and I were sworn brothers, and when you brought me the sable jacket you

asked me to be a father to you […]

In return for this sable I shall trample the Merkit;

Lady Börte shall be saved.

In return for this sable I shall trample the Merkit;

Lady Börte shall be rescued.¹⁹

The victory was total. However, having retrieved his bride and scattered his enemies, Temujin called a halt to the assault, and though taking some youngsters as slaves and women as concubines, he spared many of the Merkit men. In future encounters, this was often the case, and the defeated enemy were usually encouraged to join the growing Mongol forces and become incorporated into Temujin’s army, a welcome option for most since it offered the likely prospect of plentiful booty and future reward. Temujin had begun his rise to power.

Temujin’s ability to call on powerful figures for assistance and command the loyalty of a group of young warriors is indicative of his growing reputation and the expectations of those around him. Though cloaked in the language of honour, pledges and family ties, those who chose to support the young Temujin did so because they saw such support as politically expedient. Temujin had proved himself to be audacious and daring, but crucially he was successful. Coupled with his reputed charisma, his success now allowed many to view him as a figure who could bring them prosperity and power. The confidence he inspired swayed the khan of the Kereits, Toghril, to adopt him as a junior partner. Though their family history provided the backdrop, it was the Kereit king’s belief in Temujin which ultimately persuaded him to enter a political and military partnership.

Their alliance enabled the Toghril and Temujin to exploit the change in relations between the Jurchen and their steppe puppets, the Tatars, and also to satisfy their long brooding hatred of their tormentors. In 1196, with Jurchen encouragement, this new steppe power descended on the Tatars, though it was not until 1202 after the Battle of Khalkha that Temujin was able to fully avenge his father’s murder with a full-scale massacre of the Tatars. As a reward for their defeat of the Tatars, the Jurchen rulers abandoned their former allies and in 1197 bestowed the title ‘Wang’ on Toghril and lesser titles on his junior partner, Temujin. The Jurchen were behaving as the Chinese had always behaved towards their barbarian neighbours: they played one group off against the others. And so while the Tatars had enjoyed ascendancy over other Turco-Mongols, the Naimans and Kereits still exercised considerable power and influence and were available to receive their powerful neighbour’s blessing whenever they deigned to give it. With Wang or Ong Khan, Toghril of the Kereits, enjoying his own period in the Jin sun backed by his able protégé, Temujin, a loose alliance of disgruntled Naimans, Tatars, Merkits and Tayichi’uts were joined by Temujin’s one-time anda Jamuqa and began to coalesce in opposition to this new order.

Jamuqa

The break with his boyhood anda Jamuqa is often cited as the event that signified the real start of Temujin’s pursuit of power. Both Jamuqa and Temujin had been ambitious and both had enjoyed the advantages of the other’s support and loyalty, but both were ultimately hungry for the same cake and they were certainly not prepared to share it. The two would have both scented in each other a dangerous rival and, by some accounts, the contrived split saw their love immediately transform to a bitter hatred. Their rivalry reflected the wider rifts splitting the Turco-Mongol tribes, and Jamuqa found himself allied with Temujin’s oldest enemies. On the night of their split, a group of Jamuqa’s men defected to Temujin’s camp, responding to Temujin’s growing reputation as a just and generous leader who inspired and rewarded loyalty in contrast to Jamuqa whose ferocity and cruelty were legendary. Those who chose to defect to Temujin’s camp usually came as individuals and in so doing broke from their clans and families. With these individuals, there were also larger groups who chose to join Temujin’s growing ranks. Among those groups who rallied to Temujin’s banner were ancestral subject tribes, such as the Jalair, the Suldus and the Baya’ut. Individual serfs, were also welcomed with the result that representatives from all the tribes and from every level of tribal society could be found within Temujin’s following.

Temujin’s growing might and influence and his power to inspire loyalty over tribal ties was viewed with growing suspicion by many of the older, traditional leaders, and when he proposed a double marriage alliance between his oldest son, Jochi, and the Wang Khan’s daughter, and one of his daughters and the Wang Khan’s son, Nilka-Senggum, it was interpreted as a flagrant bid for leadership of the Kereit and by default leadership of the Eurasian steppe. The proposal was angrily rejected by Senggum in particular, and Temujin realised that he no longer enjoyed the popularity to which he had become accustomed. Therefore, when his showdown with Jamuqa occurred, Temujin suddenly found himself without much of the support on which he had calculated he could rely. In 1203, a year after his triumph over the Tatars, Temujin found himself rallying the remnants of his defeated forces by the banks of the Baljuna, which Ratchnevsky identifies as being in the south-east of Mongolia on the frontier of the Jin Empire.²⁰ Many former friends and sympathisers were now foes, envious of his rising fortunes.

The rallying of his loyalists at Baljuna after Temujin’s devastating defeat in 1203 could have been seen as his last stand. In fact, it was the opposite. Those who took part in the covenant of Baljuna became the hard core of the Chinggisid Empire, those whose loyalty had been tested and was now unquestioned. Temujin swore an oath and pledged to share the fruits of the coming showdown, both bitter and sweet, with all those trusted loyalists who partook of the covenant. He swore to ‘become as the [muddy] waters of Baljuna’²¹ should he break his word. The Baljuntus, or ‘Muddy Water Drinkers’, were all distinguished later with the highest honours and their presence at Baljuna is always mentioned with pride in the biographies. Khwaja Jaʿfar’s biography lists only the 19 leaders (noyat) as swearing the oath, though many more assorted warriors were present, including Khitans, Kereits, Tanguts and Muslims. Khwaja Jaʿfar was a Khwarazmian Muslim merchant present at Baljuna who rendered Temujin an invaluable intelligence service.²² The Secret History names another Muslim, Hasan the Sartaq, who it describes as having come from Alaqus Digit Quri of the Onggut on a white camel, driving a thousand wethers before him which he hoped to trade for squirrel and sable pelts.²³ It is likely that this is the same Hasan Hajji that Juwayni records as having been murdered in Utrar as part of Chinggis Khan’s peace delegation sent to the Khwarazmshah to initiate trading relations between the two parties.²⁴ Those who remained with him at Lake Baljuna were accorded the highest honours in the years to come.

The ensuing confrontations with his enemies, many of them former friends who opposed and resented his rise to power, saw them toppled one by one, leaving Temujin the practical ruler of the steppe. Wang Khan was taken unawares and, in the confusion, he was killed by a Naiman archer. His son Senggum escaped to Tibet, but sometime later was tracked down and killed in the Kashgar/Khotan region.²⁵ The success of Temujin’s attack on his old ally the Wang Khan, Toghril, was due largely to the intelligence given him by his brother Qasar, whose great sacrifice in warning his brother was acknowledged in the awards ceremony at the quriltai of 1206. The fall of the mighty Kereit kingdom, known in the West for its associations with Prester John,²⁶ was not followed by massacres such as those visited upon the Tatars and Tayichi’ut. The Kereit commander-in-chief was pardoned and praised for his bravery and loyalty to his fallen chief, while the Kereit princesses were married off to suitably high-ranking warriors from the Chinggisid army and family. Wang Khan’s granddaughter, Dokuz Khatun, was given to Tolui as an infant, though the marriage was never consummated and she eventually became the chief wife of Hulegu Khan, the first Ilkhan of Iran. The hand of the legendary Sorqoqtani Beki, younger daughter of Wang Khan’s uncle Jagambu, was also given to Tolui, but it was after her husband’s death in 1233 as a widow and mother of three, arguably four, kings, that she achieved her greatest influence.

Though not yet quite the undisputed leader of the steppe, Temujin, now occupying the Wang Khan’s throne, began to allow himself some of the trappings of power. He called on all those who still resisted his authority to bend to his will. Messages were sent to tribal leaders not only assuring them that their current status and rights as rulers would continue to be respected once they had submitted to him but also that his reign would herald in a new era of justice, generosity and law. He would abolish old, discredited practices such as theft and adultery and introduce a new legal system binding on all. All who now submitted to his will would benefit and those who resisted would be annihilated. Jamuqa and Senggum both understood what was at stake with Senggum recorded as declaring, ‘If he is victorious, our people are his. If we are victorious his people are ours.’²⁷ Senggum chose to flee, but Jamuqa allied himself with the Naiman to whose banner a variety of disgruntled, dispossessed tribal leaders had flocked in the increasingly vain hope of halting Temujin’s rise. Naiman power lay with Gurbescu Khatun, an arrogant woman who was both wife and stepmother to the nominal Naiman leader, Tayang Khan. She contemptuously dismissed the Mongols as uncouth, boorish upstarts.

The Mongol people have always smelt bad and worn grimy clothes. They live apart and far away. Let them stay there. But we might perhaps have their fine daughters and daughter-in-laws brought here and, making them wash their hands, perhaps just let them milk our cows and sheep.²⁸

She then had a message delivered to Temujin warning him that he was in danger of being ‘robbed of [his] quivers’.²⁹ Perhaps in respect for the gravity of the confrontation Temujin organised his army in the decimal manner, which would become so characteristic of the Chinggisid military forces, and employed ruse and subterfuge in recognition of the superior forces massed against him. He also created a regiment composed of elite troops whose purpose was his protection in both battle and peace time. Tayang Khan’s fate was sealed by two events. First was the contemptuous dismissal of his cautionary tactics by his son, Kuchluq, ‘Old woman Tayang again, he must have lost his courage […] Tayang who has never dared venture further afield than a pregnant woman would go to urinate.’ More decisive, however, was Jamuqa’s withdrawal from the battle and the defection of many of the Turco-Mongol troops tactically allied with the Naiman. Temujin’s victory was absolute, and only Kuchluq and a few of his closest followers managed to escape the bloody field of battle. Temujin claimed Gurbescu Khatun’s hand in marriage and according to the Secret History taunted her for her past comments, ‘You used to say that the Mongols had a bad smell, didn’t you? Why, then, did you come now?’³⁰

Jamuqa’s end as recorded in the Secret History is highly romanticised, though Rashid al-Din’s version is possibly overreflective of the statesman’s disapproval of Jamuqa. The Secret History has Jamuqa refusing Temujin’s offer of clemency and instead has the captive anda pleading only that his blood not be spilt and that his burial site should be on high ground so that he would be able to watch protectively over his dear brother ‘and be a blessing to the offspring of your offspring’.³¹ Rashid al-Din acknowledges Temujin’s qualms about killing his anda with his own hands and has the Great Khan pass the job to Otchigan Noyan for execution; though earlier in his text he quotes another version of the story which has Jamuqa endure the excruciating pain of being pulled apart limb by limb.³² Both accounts, however, observe the strict legality of Jamuqa’s demise as far as Temujin is concerned.³³

THE GREAT QURILTAI OF 1206

In recognition of Temujin’s achievements and his position as ruler of the Turco-Mongol peoples, a grand quriltai was called in 1206, the Year of the Tiger, and held near the source of the River Onon, on Mount Burqan Qaldun, first home of the mythical blue-grey wolf and fallow doe from whose union all the steppe peoples had sprung. The leaders of all the clans and tribes of the Eurasian steppe, the ‘people of nine tongues’,³⁴ the ‘people of the felt-walled tents’,³⁵ were summoned to the quriltai, where they hoisted a white standard with nine tails and to Temujin they awarded the title of ‘Chinggis Khan’ (Fierce or Hard Khan).³⁶ Earlier, in 1202, Temujin had already been declared Chinggis Khan by his cousins, Altan, Quchar and Sacha Beki, who predicted that

Fine-looking maidens and ladies of rank,

Palatial tents, and from foreign people

Ladies and maidens with beautiful cheeks,

And geldings with fine croups,

At the trot we shall bring.³⁷

However, in 1206 it was not simply his cousins abdicating their birthright to the khanship to Temujin but a confederation of the Eurasian nomadic tribes joining together as Yeke Monggol Ulus, or the Great Mongol Nation, officially announcing their unity under Chinggis Khan. It was a confederation which even the Chinese were prepared to recognise and which they called Da Menggu guo. In fact, de Rachewiltz, in his definitive translation and commentary on the Secret History, points out that Chinggis Khan continued to refer to his united polity as simply the ‘Mongqul Ulus’ and that the grander title was a calque of Da Jin guo (Great Jin Nation) adopted from the Chinese in 1210.³⁸

The quriltai of 1206 unequivocally granted Chinggis Khan, the Fierce Khan of the Monggol Ulus, the mandate to execute fundamental reforms and make appointments without regard to tribal loyalty, powers that he initiated immediately by the naming to office those who had been most loyal to him during the years of hardship. The Secret History lists exhaustively all those who were honoured with powerful office or with titles, with commissions and with other traditional rewards such as exemption from punishment. Ninety-five commanders of a thousand were named; Muqali was proclaimed ‘Prince of State’; Jebe Noyan the Arrow was sent to track down Kuchluq, the fugitive Naiman prince; Qorci was awarded 30 women of his choice for his accurate prophecies; Sigi Qutuqu, Chinggis Khan’s sixth younger ‘brother’ (by adoption) was exempted from punishment for nine crimes and made chief judge and keeper of the blue-script register of his decisions. No doubt the writer of the Secret History wished to emphasise how Chinggis Khan was quick to reward those who had helped him and demonstrate that good deeds were never forgotten.³⁹

In fact, the Secret History goes into great detail concerning the organisation of the state and the army. The oft-aired accusation that the Mongols had no flair for nor interest in statecraft and left the running of their empire to their Chinese and Persian lackeys is not supported by the content of this anonymous history which was obviously written by and for those with a great deal of interest in the minutiae of government and bureaucracy.

Chinggis Khan understood well the weaknesses and strengths of the Turco-Mongol tribes, and he knew that their often-ferocious loyalty to their leaders and their tribes was not only a source of strength but also their greatest weakness and it was of immediate concern if he wished to avoid the fate of so many of his predecessors forgotten in the ebb and flow of intertribal wars. He had been abandoned by his own tribe and now he was surrounded by fanatically loyal supporters who had abandoned their own tribes. He knew that to succeed he needed two things: loyalty and the means to pay for that loyalty. He was under no illusion that charisma alone would fuel and fire an army. To establish that initial loyalty, he would create a new tribe, a supratribe to which all his followers, past and future, would now belong which would be built and organised on a new lattice-work emanating from his core family. The bricks of his new tribe would be the individual family units grouped in units of ten pledging loyalty to the group leader and each other rather than the tribes of yore. Each unit of ten (arban) would in turn be part of a larger grouping of 100 (jaghun) and those would form part of the groups of 1,000 (mingghan). At the top, he personally appointed the commanders of 10,000 (tuman). With one stroke, he abolished the old tribal system that had stymied steppe history for generations.

The infamy which has dogged not only this newly elected leader of the Eurasian steppe but the united tribes that he led can be traced back to the early conquests and also to some particularly choice quotations (biligs) which date from this period. One notorious bilig in particular has often been cited as an example of the true steppe overlord speaking from the heart, though why this example of rather heartless bravado should be any more authentic than the many words of considered wisdom that have also been recorded is not explained. The bilig was a discussion on the pleasures of life, and Bo’orchu and his other companions expressed the pleasure they took in falconry during the spring. But for Chinggis this was nothing to the pleasures he derived from conquest, rash words spoken no doubt in the exhilaration of victory by which many have chosen to define him.

Man’s greatest good fortune is to pursue and claim victory over his foe, seize all his possessions, abandon his wives lamenting and wailing, ride his geldings, use the bodies of his women as nightshirts and support, casting eyes upon and kissing their rosy breasts and sucking their lips which are as sweet as the berries on their breasts.⁴⁰

Terror was a tactic and deliberate policy of conquest. The humiliation, cruelty and wanton killing that was routinely manifest in the acts of conquest were not indulged in for their own sake nor undertaken to sate the depraved appetites of barbarian hordes. The horrors of war were as real in the thirteenth century as they are today and are just as unavoidable and integral to battle and political violence as the technological warfare of modern times. The dehumanisation of the enemy is as crucial for the success of political aggression dependent on acts of individual killing as it was for the Chinggisid armies, and there is no compelling evidence that the armies of Chinggis Khan exceeded any boundaries or standards prevalent at that time either in acts of violence or in numbers of victims. What characterised the Chinggisid killing machine was the cold discipline and calculated efficiency of its soldiery. A less well-known bilig attributed to the Great Khan by Rashid al-Din inspired far more of his followers than the hot-headed remarks quoted above and guided his judgement as he ventured out from the steppe.

Every word upon which three learned men are agreed can be repeated everywhere; otherwise it cannot be trusted. Measure your own words, and those of others, against the words of the learned: if they are in conformity they can be spoken; otherwise they should not be spoken.⁴¹

In the same section, Rashid al-Din quotes the Great Khan reflecting on what he sought for his family and his descendants. His thoughts were not so much on conquering the world but on creating stability and safety. He had not had a good or secure childhood. His experience of the clans and of life on the steppe had not been one of honour and reward. It had been harsh, grueling and treacherous. Chinggis Khan harboured few romantic illusions or memories of life on the steppe. He knew that once his descendants had become accustomed to the pleasures of the wider world, once they had sampled the fineries of the world’s cuisines, clothed themselves in Persian nasij and brocades and the softest silks, and strode the world on the backs of the mighty stallion and in the arms of seductive courtesans, ‘on that day, they will forget us’.⁴²

My qorchis are as thick as a dense forest. My wives, daughters-in-law, and daughters are as colorful and radiant as red fire. It is my sole purpose to make their mouths as sweet as sugar by favor, to bedeck them in garments spun with gold, to mount them upon fleet-footed steeds, to have them drink sweet, clear water, to provide their animals with grassy meadows, and to have all harmful brambles and thorns cleared from the roads and paths upon which they travel, and not to allow weeds and thorns to grow in their pastures.⁴³