Genghis Khan's name has long been a household name. It is a symbol of devastation and colossal wars. The ruler of the Mongols created an empire, the size of which struck the imagination of contemporaries.
Childhood
The future Genghis Khan, whose biography has many white spots, was born somewhere on the border of modern Russia and Mongolia. He was called Temuchin. He took the name Genghis Khan as the designation of the title of ruler of the vast empire of the Mongols.
Historians have not been able to accurately calculate the date of birth of the famous commander. Different estimates put it in the interval between 1155 and 1162. This inaccuracy is due to the lack of reliable sources dating back to that era.
Genghis Khan was born in the family of one of the Mongol leaders. His father was poisoned by the Tatars, after which other applicants for power in his native uluses began to pursue the child. In the end, Temuchin was captured and forced to live with pads on his neck. This symbolized the slavish position of a young man. Temuchin managed to escape from captivity, hiding in the lake. He was under water until his pursuers began to look for him elsewhere.
Unification of Mongolia
Many Mongols sympathized with the escaped captive, who was Genghis Khan. The biography of this man is a striking example of how the commander from scratch created a huge army. Once free, he was able to enlist the support of one of the khans named Tooril. This elderly ruler gave his daughter Temuchin his wife, thereby securing an alliance with a talented young military leader.
Very soon, the young man was able to meet the expectations of his patron. Together with his army, Genghis Khan conquered the ulus behind the ulus. He was uncompromising and cruel to his enemies, which terrified the enemies. His main enemies were the Tatars who dealt with his father. Genghis Khan ordered his subjects to destroy all this people, except for children whose height did not exceed the height of the cartwheel. The final victory over the Tatars took place in 1202, when they became harmless to the Mongols, united under the authority of Temuchin.
New name Temuchin
In order to officially consolidate his leading position among his fellow tribesmen, the leader of the Mongols convened a kurultai in 1206. This council proclaimed it Genghis Khan (or Great Khan). It was under this name that the commander went down in history. He managed to unite the warring and scattered uluses of the Mongols. The new ruler gave them the only goal - to extend their power to neighboring nations. Thus began the aggressive campaigns of the Mongols, which continued after the death of Temuchin.
Genghis Khan Reforms
Soon, reforms began, initiated by Genghis Khan. The biography of this leader is very informative. Temuchin divided the Mongols into thousands and Tumens. These administrative units together constituted the Horde.
The main problem that could interfere with Genghis Khan was internal hostility among the Mongols. Therefore, the ruler mixed numerous births among themselves, depriving them of the former organization that had existed for tens of generations. It paid off. The horde became manageable and obedient. At the head of the Tumen (ten thousand soldiers entered one Tumen) were people loyal to the Khan, who obeyed his orders without question. The Mongols also attached themselves to their new units. For the transition to another tumen, the novices faced the death penalty. So Genghis Khan, whose biography shows in him a visionary reformer, was able to overcome the destructive tendencies within Mongolian society. Now he could take up external conquests.
Chinese camping
By 1211, the Mongols managed to subjugate all the neighboring Siberian tribes. They were distinguished by poor self-organization and could not repulse the invaders. The first real test for Genghis Khan at a distant frontier was the war with China. This civilization has been at war with the northern nomads for many centuries and has had tremendous military experience. Once the guards on the Great Wall of China saw foreign troops led by Genghis Khan (a brief biography of the leader cannot do without this episode). This fortification system was impregnable to previous uninvited guests. However, it was Temuccin who managed to take the wall first.
The army of the Mongols was divided into three parts. Each of them went to conquer hostile cities in their direction (in the south, southeast and east). Genghis Khan himself came with his army to the sea. He made peace with the Chinese emperor . The losing ruler agreed to recognize himself as a tributary of the Mongols. For this he received Beijing. However, as soon as the Mongols left back in the steppes, the Chinese emperor transferred his capital to another city. This was regarded as treason. The nomads returned to China and again flooded it with blood. In the end, this country was subjugated.
The Conquest of Central Asia
The next region, which was hit by Temuchin, was Central Asia. Local Muslim rulers did not resist the Mongol hordes for long. Because of this, the biography of Genghis Khan is still being studied in detail in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. A summary of his biography is taught at any school.
In 1220, the khan captured Samarkand - the oldest and richest city in the region.
The next victims of nomad aggression were Polovtsy. These steppes asked for help from some Slavic princes. So in 1223, Russian soldiers first met with the Mongols in the battle of Kalka. The battle of the Polovtsy and Slavs was lost. Temuchin himself at that time was in his homeland, but he closely followed the successes of the weapons of his subordinates. Genghis Khan, whose interesting biographies are collected in various monographs, took the remnants of this army, who returned to Mongolia in 1224.
The death of Genghis Khan
In 1227, during the siege of the Tangut capital, Khan Genghis Khan died . A brief biography of the leader, set forth in any textbook, necessarily tells of this episode.
The Tanguts lived in northern China and, despite the fact that the Mongols had long subjugated them, they rebelled. Then Genghis Khan himself led the army, which was to punish the disobedience.
According to the chronicles of that time, the leader of the Mongols received a delegation of the Tanguts who wanted to discuss the conditions for the surrender of their capital. However, Genghis Khan felt unwell and refused the audience the ambassadors. He soon passed away. It is not known exactly what caused the death of the leader. Perhaps it was age, since the khan was already the seventh decade, and he could hardly endure long campaigns. There is also a version that one of the wives stabbed him. The mysterious circumstances of death are also complemented by the fact that researchers still can not find the grave of Temuchin.
Heritage
There is little reliable evidence of the empire that Genghis Khan founded. Biography, campaigns and victories of the leader - all this is known only from fragmentary sources. But the significance of the acts of the khan is difficult to overestimate. He created the largest state in the history of mankind, spread over the vast expanse of Eurasia.
The descendants of Temuchin developed his success. So, his grandson Batu led an unprecedented campaign against the Russian principalities. He became the ruler of the Golden Horde and imposed tribute to the Slavs. But the empire, founded by Genghis Khan, was short-lived. At first it broke up into several uluses. These states were eventually captured by neighbors. Therefore, it was Khan Genghis Khan, whose biography is known to any educated person, who became the symbol of Mongol power.