5 ' '
shaman> Temujin sent for Temugu*and spoke to him.
" This day Tebtengri will come to* my yurt. Deal
with him as pleases |hee."
His position was no easy one. Munlik, chieftain
of a clan and father of Bourtai, had aided him in
many a war and had been honoured accordingly.
Tebtengri himself was a shaman^ a prophet and a
wizard. Temujin, the khan, was expected to play
the part of judge in dealing with quarrels not to
indulge his own wishes.
He was alone in the tent, sitting by the fire when
Munlik entered with his seven sons. He greeted them,
and they seated themselves on his right, when Temugu
entered. All weapons, of course, had been left at the
yurt entrance, and the youngster caught Tebtengri
by the shoulders. " Yesterday I was forced to
kneel to thcc, but to-day I will try strength with
thee."
For a while they struggled and the other sons of
Munlik rose to their feet.
" Wrestle not here ! " Temujin called to the two
adversaries. " Go outside." v
By the entrance of the yurt three strong wrestlers
were waiting had been waiting for this moment,
whether instructed by Temugu or the khan. They
seized Tebtengri as he came forth, broke his spine
and threw him aside. Without moving, he lay near
the wheel of a cart.
" Tebtengri forced me to my knees yesterday/*
Temugu cried to his brother the khan. " Now, when
I wish to try strength with him, he lies down and
not rse."
Munlik and his six sons went to the door, looked
-H \\i\\ Tiirn:\T,Ki. THE MON^DI. WIXVKD.
l-rnrii .ii i-l'i In-iuh Work .n I.itary.
GENGHIS KHAN 53
out, and saw the body of the shaman. Then
grief troubled *he old chieftain and he turned to
Tcmujin. " O Khan, I have served thec, until this
day I"
His meaning was clear, and his six sons made
ready to rush upon the Mongol. Temujin stood up,
He had no weapon and there was no way out of the
yurt except the entrance. Instead of calling for aid
he spoke sternly to the angry clansmen. " Aside !
I wish to go out ! "
Surprised by the unexpected command, they gave
way, and he went from the tent to the guard post of
his warriors. So far the affair had been only an
incident in the never-ending feuds around the red-
headed khan. But he wished to avoid, if possible,
a blood feud with Munlik's clan. A glance at the
body of the shaman told him that Tebtengri was
dead. He ordered his own yurt to be moved, so it
covered the body, and the entrance flap was tied shut.
During the next night Temujin sent two of his
men to lift the body of the priest conjurer through
the smoke hole at the top of the tent. When curiosity
began to be aroused among the men of the ordu as
to the fate of the wizard, Tcmujin opened the entrance
flap and enlightened them.
" Tebtengri made plots against my brothers and
struck them, and now the spirits of Heaven have
taken away both his life and his body."
But to Munlik when they were alone together
again he spoke gravely. " Thou didst not teach thy
sons obedience, though they had need of it. This one
tried to make himself my equal, and so I put an end
to him, as I have to others. As for thcc, I have promised
54 GENGHIS KHAN
to spare thee from death in erery case. So let us end
this matter." *
There was no end, however, to the tribal warfare
of the Gobi, to the wolf-like struggle of the great
clans the harrying and the hunting down. Though
the Mongols were still one of the weaker peoples, a
hundred thousand tents now followed the standard of
the khan. His cunning protected them, his fierce
courage emboldened his warriors. Instead of a few
families, the responsibility of a people rested upon
his shoulders. He himself could sleep sound of nights ;
his herds, increased by the khan's tithe, grew com-
fortably. He was more than thirty years of age, in
the fullness of his strength, and his sons now rode with
him, looking about for wives, as he had once travelled
the plains at Yesukai's side. He had gleaned his
heritage from his enemies, and he meant to hold it.
But there was something else in his mind, a plan
half formed, a wish half expressed.
" Our ciders have always told us," he said one day
before the council, " that different hearts and minds
cannot be in one body. But this I intend to bring about.
I shall extend my authority over my neighbours."
To mould the " venomous fighters " into one
confederacy of clans, to make his feudal enemies his
subjects. That was his thought. And he set about
realizing it with all his really great patience.
The Mongol saga of Ssanang Setzen is rather allegorical, and gives the
impression that the events in the Gobi were caused by the prowess, the
cunning or the treachery of a few men. In reality the conspiracy of the
shaman lasted a tag time amd involved strong parties on both sides. It
was a* important in its way a* the combat between church and king that
marked the reign of Fiedcrick II and Innocent IV U Europe not long after.
CHAPTER V
WHEN THE STANDARD STOOD ON GUPTA
WITH the wars of the nomad clans Tatars and
Mongols, Mcrkits and Karaits, Naimans and
Ugurs that passed and repasscd across the high prairies
from the great wall of Cathay to the far mountains
of mid -Asia in the west we are not here concerned.
The twelfth century was drawing to its end f and
Temujin was still labouring at what his elders told
him could not be brought about, a confederacy of
the clans. It could only come in one way, by the
supremacy of one clan over the others.
The Karaits, in their cities on the caravan route
from the northern gates of Cathay to the west, held
what might be called the balance of power. To
Toghrul, called Prcstcr John, went Temujin with the
suggestion of an alliance. The Mongols were strong
enough now for him to do so fittingly.
" Without thy assistance, O my father, I cannot
survive unmolested. Thou, too, canst not live on in
peace without my firm friendship. Thy false brothers
and cousins would invade thy land and divide thy
pastures between them. Thy son hath not wisdom
to see this at present, but he would be reft of power
and life if thine enemies prevail. Our one way to
keep our authority and survive is through a friendship
55
$6 GENGHIS KHAN
nothing can shatter. Were I thy son also, matters
would be settled for both of us."
It was Temujin's right to claim adoption by the
elder khan, and Prester John gave assent. He was
old, and he had a liking for the young Mongol.
To his compact Temujin remained faithful. When
the Karaits were driven out of their lands and cities
by the western tribes which were largely Moham-
medans and Buddhists and cherished a warm religious
hatred of the Christian-shamanistic Karaits, the Mongol
sent his Raging Torrents to aid the discomfited
chieftain.
And, tentatively as the ally of the old Karalt he
essayed statecraft.
The opportunity was an excellent one, to his
thinking. Behind the great wall the Golden Emperor
of Cathay* stirred in his sleep and remembered inroads
of the Buyar Lake Tatars that had annoyed his
frontiers. He announced that he himself would lead
a grand expedition beyond the wall to punish the
offending tribesmen an announcement that filled his
subjects with alarm. Eventually a high officer was
dispatched with a Cathayan army against the Tatars,
who retired as usual unscathed and unchastened. The
host of Cathay, being composed largely of foot
soldiers, could not come up with the nomads.
Tidings of this reached Temujin, who acted as
swiftly as hard-whipped ponies could bear his messages
across the plains. He rallied all his clansmen and sent
* Thirteenth century China, which was then divided between the Chin,
or Gold dynasty in the north and the older Sung dynasty in the south. Cathay
itself is derived from K'itai, the Tatar word for China and the dynasty
that had given Way to the Chin. In middle Asia and Russia to-day China u
still called K'itai. The early voyagers out of Europe brought the name
back with them.
EASTERN ASIA, AT THE END OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY.
I. The Chin Empire ; II. The Empire of the Lung ; III. The Kingdom of
Hia ; IV. The Empire oi Black Cathay.
5 8 GENGHIS KHAN
to Prester John, reminding his elder ally that the
Tatars were the clan that had slain his father. The
Karaits answered his call, and the combined hordes
rode down upon the Tatars, who could not retreat
because the Cathayans were in their rear.
The ensuing battle broke the power of the Tatars,
added numbers of captives to the victorious clans, and
gave the officer of the expeditionary force of Cathay
an opportunity to claim all credit for himself, which
he did. He rewarded Prester John with the title of
Wang Khan, or Lord of Kings, and Tcmujin with the
brevet of " Commander Against Rebels " an emolu-
ment that cost the Cathayan nothing at all, except a
silver cradle covered with cloth of gold. Both title
and gift must have astonished the hard-fighting
Mongol rarely. At any rate the cradle, the first ever
seen in the barrens, was put on view in the tent of
the khan.
New warriors joined the ranks of the Raging
Torrents. Temujin could watch his sons go forth
with Chcpi Noyon, the Arrow Lord, who had a
weakness for wearing sable boots and silvered mail
that he had plundered from a wandering Cathayan.
Chep Noyon was never satisfied unless he was afield
with a band of partisans to gallop after him. A good
tutor for the eldest son Juchi the Guest born under
a shadow, moody and defiant, and yet bold enough
in spirit to delight the khan.
It was the last of the twelfth century ; Tcmujin
had led his household people on a hunt down the
rivers toward the Karait land, flinging wide the circle
of riders. They had driven a good number of antelope,
RESM1A -3HXT H I B E T
PERSIA
THE KHARESMIAN EMPIRE AT THE BEGINNING OF
SHOWING THE POSITION OF THE OTHER MOHAMMEDAN
GENGHIS KHAN
some deer and lesser game, and closed the circle,
making play with stout curved bows until the last
living creature lay among the boulders. No dallying
about a Mongol hunt.
The covered kibitkas and the camel carts awaited
them, off somewhere in the prairie, and the hunters
returning, the oxen were unspanned. The wattles
of the yurts were set up and the felt covering drawn
taut over the framework. Fires lighted.
Much of the game was to be kept as a gift for old
Toghrul, now Wang Khan. The Karaits had been
overbearing to the Mongols. Spoil, rightly belonging
to Temujin's men, had been taken by the men of
Wang Khan, and the Mongol had suffered this.
He had too many enemies in the lands of the
Karaits, descendants of the Bourchikoun who wished
to oust him from the khanship and the favour of the
Karait lord. So he was going to his foster-father.
It had been agreed between them that if any differ-
ence arose, one would not act against the other, but
that they would meet together and talk quietly until
the truth of the matter was clear to them.
Temujin had learned much from bitter experience.
On the death of Wang Khan he knew there would be
war anew ; but among the Karaits were groups of
warriors who favoured him. The bodyguard of Wang
Khan, urged by the enemies of the Mongol khan to
seize him, had refused. And offers of marriage had
been 'sent to the Mongols. The Karaits had a bride
for Juchi among the girls of the chieftain's family.
But Temujin remained in his camp, keeping his
distance warily from the Karait ordus, while his men
went before him to see if the way were safe. His
GENGHIS KHAN 6k
riders did not return, but two horse-herds galloped in
at night with news of the Karaits, news both un-
welcome and ominous.
His enemies in the west Chamuka the Cunning,
Toukta Beg, chieftain of the dour Merkits, the son
of Wang Khan, and Temujin's uncles had deter-
mined to put an end to him. They had chosen
Chamuka as gurkhan. They had persuaded the
ageing and hesitant Wang Khan to throw his strength
in with theirs. The marriage overtures had been a
ruse as Temujin half suspected.
His efforts at statecraft had failed. He had bsen
working, it seems, to keep the Karaits at war with
the western Turkish tribes while he strengthened
himself in the east ; and to keep Wang Khan allied
to him until his eastern clans were strong enough to
face the Karaits on an equal footing. His policy had
been judicious, but his guile had been met by greater
cunning, and now by treachery.
The Karaits so the two herdsmen told him were
drawing near his camp, intending to rush upon it
during the night and slay him in his tent with arrows.
The situation was nearly desperate, since the
Karaits would be in greater force, and Temujin had
the families of his warriors to preserve if possible. Of
armed men he had six thousand some accounts
place the number at less than three thousand. He had
been warned and he lost not a minute in acting.
He sent the guards of his own yurt through the
encampment, rousing the sleepers,- warning the leaders,
and routing out the herd boys. The herds were driven
off, to be stampeded before daylight and scattered as
much as possible. No way to save than, more than
62 GENGHIS KHAN
that. The people of the ordu hastened to mount the
horses that were always kept at hand, and to fill the
lighter camel carts with their chests and women.
Without wailing or any argument began the long trek
back to their encampments.
The yurts and the great ox-carts he left standing as
they were, and detached a few men with good horses
to keep the fires burning high. With his officers and
the best of his clansmen he retired slowly, covering
the retreat. No chance, now, to escape the storm that
was drawing near under the screen of darkness.
They rode eight or nine miles toward a mass of
hills that would offer some shelter to his men if they
were forced to scatter. After crossing a stream, he
halted his riders within a gorge, before the horses
should become weary.
Meanwhile the Karaits had swept into his deserted
camp before daybreak and had pierced through with
their arrows the white felt tent of the khan before they
noticed the silence of the place, the absence of the
herds and the standard. They had then an interval
of confusion and consultation. The bright fires had
led them to think the Mongols were still within the
yurts. And when they understood the tents had been
left, with carpets and utensils even the spare saddles
and milk sacks it seemed to them that the Mongols
had fled from them in fear and without order.
The broad trail to the east could not be hidden by
darkness, and the clans of the Karaits took up the
pursuit at once. They went at a gallop, and they
arrived at the foothills after dawn, with the dust
douds rolling up behind them. Temujin watched
their approach, and saw that they had stretched out
GENGHIS KHAN 63
in the swift ride. The clans were scattered, the best
horses forging ahead of the slower-paced.
Instead of waiting longer in the gorge he led out
his warriors in close array, their horses rested. They
crossed the stream and scattered the vanguard of the
Karaits, and formed across the rolling grassland,
covering the retreat of the ordu. Then Wang Khan
and his chieftains came up. The Karaits were re-
alined, and the desperate battle of extermination
began.
Tcmujin had never been harder pressed. He had
need then of all the personal valour of his Raging
Torrents, and the steadiness of his household clans,
the heavily armed riders of the Urut and Manhut
dans that had always served him* His numbers did
not allow him to make a frontal attack and he was
reduced to holding what little advantage the ground
gave him which meant a last resort with Mongols.
As the day drew to its close, with inevitable defeat
in store for him, he called upon one of his sworn
brothers, Guildar the standard keeper, chieftain of
the Manhuts, and ordered him to circle the array of
the Karaits and take and keep a hill on their left
rear, a hill known as Gupta.
" O Khan, my brother," responded the weary
Guildar, " I will mount my best horse and break
through all who oppose me. I will plant thy yak-
tailed standard on Gupta. I will show thee my valour,
and if I fall, do thou nourish and rear my children.
It is all one to me when my end comes."
| This circling movement was the favourite man-
ioeuvre of tht Mongols, the tulughma, or " standard
[sweep " that turns an enemy's flank and takes him
64 GENGHIS KHAN
in the rear. With his clans scattered and the Karalts
breaking through his lines, and darkness coming on,
it was now no more than a desperate effort of defiance ;
but the stalwart Guildar did reach the hill and plant
his standard, and hold his ground. It held the Karaits
in restraint, especially as the son of Wang Khan had
been wounded in the face with an arrow.
When the sun set, the Karaits and not the Mongols,
withdrew a little from the field. Temujin waited only
to cover Guildar's withdrawal, and to gather up the
wounded paladins two of his sons among them who
rode in on captured horses, sometimes two men on a
single animal. Then he fled to the east, and the
Karaits took up the pursuit the next day.
It had been the most desperate of Temujin 's battles,
and he had been defeated. But he had kept the nucleus
of his clansmen intact, himself alive and the ordu
safeguarded.
" We have fought," said Wang Khan, " a man
with whom we should never have quarrelled."
In Mongol legend it is still repeated how Guildar
bore the standard to Gupta.
But on the long retreat, such was the necessity of
life in the barrens, the warriors " licking their wounds "
on their spent horses flung out again the circle of
hunters to gather in antelope and deer whatever
they could reach with their arrows. No love of sport
impelled them to do this. Food must be gleaned
fof the ordu.
CHAPTER VI
PRESTER JOHN DIES
immediate effect of the Karait victory was
1 to strengthen the alliance against Temujin.
Chieftains of the nomads were well inclined to ally
themselves with a growing power ; it meant pro-
tection and greater wealth for them.
To Wang Khan the angry Mongol sent eloquent
reproach.
" O Khan, my father, when thou wert pursued by
enemies, did I not send my four heroes to aid thee ?
Thou didst come to me on a blind horse, thy garments
in tatters, thy body nourished only by the meat of
a single sheep. Did I not give thee abundance of
sheep and horses ?
" In times gone by, thy men kept the booty of
battle that was mine by right. Then it all was lost
to thee, taken by thy foes. My heroes restored it.
Then, by the Black River we swore we would not
listen to the evil words of those who would divide us,
but would meet and talk together of the matter.
I have not said, ' My reward is slight, I have need
of a greater.'
" When a wheel of an ox-cart breaks, the oxen
cannot go forward. Am I not a wheel of thy ktbttka ?
Why art thou angered because of me ? Why dost thou
attack me now ? "
65 B
66 GENGHIS KHAN
In this can be detected an echo of contempt. And
the reproach is rather for the wavering man who did
not know hie own mind Prester John mounted on
a blind horse.
Tcmujin set about making the best of things with
his dogged determination. Couriers were sent to the
near-by clans and soon the khans of his own domain
and their neighbours were kneeling on either side of
the white horse skin of the Mongol chieftain, their
feet tucked under them decorously, their long coats
bound with ornamented girdles, their lined, bronzed
faces peering through the smoke of the yurt fire.
The council of the khans.
Each one spoke in turn, the Bourchikoun, the
Grey-eyed Men, many of whom had tasted defeat at
the hands of Temujin. Some wished to give in to
the powerful Karaits and submit to the overlordship
of Prcster John and his son. The bolder spirits raised
their voices for battle, and offered to give the baton
of leadership to Temujin. This counsel prevailed.
Temujin, in accepting the baton, said that his
orders must be obeyed in all the clans, and he must be
allowed to punish whom he saw fit. " From the
beginning I have said to you that the lands between
the three rivers must have a master. You would not
understand. Now, when you fear that Wang Khan
will treat you as he has treated me, you have chosen
me for a leader. To you I have given captives, women,
yurts and herds. Now I shall keep for you the lands
and customs of our ancestors."
During that winter the Gobi became divided into
two rival camps, the peoples east of Lake Baikal
arming against the western confederacy. This time
GENGHIS KHAN 67
Tcmujin was first in the field, before snow left the
valleys. With his new allies he advanced without
warning on the camp of Wang Khan.
The chronicle gives an amusing insight into the
trickery of the nomads. Temujin had sent a Mongol
into the enemy lines to complain of ill-treatment, and
to say that the Mongol horde was still far distant from
the camp. The Karaits, not too credulous, dispatched
several riders on picked mounts to go back with this
warrior and see for themselves the truth of the matter.
Not far from the Kara'it camp, the single Mongol
warrior who was keeping his eyes about him, beheld
the standard bar of Temujin's clans on the other side
of a knoll they were climbing. He knew that his
captors were well mounted and could gallop clear
if they noticed the standard. So he dismounted and
busied himself about his horse. When asked what he
was doing, he said :
" A stone is in one of the hoofs."
By the time the sagacious Mongol had relieved his
horse of the imaginary stone, Temujin's vanguard came
over the rise and made the Karaits prisoners. Wang
Khan's camp was attacked and a bitter struggle began.
By nightfall the Karaits were broken, Wang Khan
and his son both wounded and fleeing. Temujin rode
into the captured camp, and gave to his men the
wealth of the Karaits, the saddles covered with coloured
silk and soft, red leather, the thin and finely tempered
sabres, the plates and goblets of silver. Such things
could not serve him. The tent of Wang Khan, hung
with cloth-of-gold, he gave entire to the two herders
who had warned him of the Kara'it advance that first
night near Gupta.
68 GENGHIS KHAN
Following up the centre of the Karalts, he sur-
rounded them with his warriors and offered them their
lives if they would yield. " Men fighting as ye have
done to save your lord, are heroes. Be ye among
mine, and serve me."
The remnants of the Karaite joined his standard,
and he pushed forward to their city in the desert,
Karakorum, the Black Sands.
His cousin, Chamuka the Cunning, was made
captive afterward and brought before him.
" What fate dost thou expect ? " Temujin asked.
" The same that I would have bestowed upon thee,
had I taken thee ! " responded Chamuka without
hesitation. " The slow death."
He meant the Chinese torture of slow dismember-
ment that begins the first day with cutting off the
joints of the little fingers and continues up all the
limbs. Surely there was no lack of courage among the
descendants of the Bourchikoun. Temujin, however,
followed the custom of his people, which forbids
shedding the blood of a chieftain of high birth, and
sent away Chamuka to be strangled with a silk bow-
string, or stifled between heavy felts.
Prester John, who had entered the war unwillingly,
fled hopelessly beyond his lands and was put to death
by two warriors of a Turkish tribe. His skull, the
chronicle relates, was set in silver and remained in
the tent of this chieftain, an object of veneration. His
son was killed in much the same manner.*
A nomad chieftain might have been expected to
content himself with the fruits of such a victory. And
the results of a nomad conquest have ever been the
* See Note II, Prester John of Asia, page 212.
GENGHIS KHAN 69
same a gathering of spoil, idleness or restlessness,
then quarrels or a dividing up of the haphazard empire
of the wanderers.
Tcmujin showed himself made of different stuff.
He had now a core of a kingdom in the Karaits who
had cultivated the soil and built cities of dried mud
and thatch, it is true, but still permanent abiding places.
Using every effort to keep the Karaits settled and
reconciled, he launched his hordes into new conquests
without a moment's delay.
" The merit of an action," he told his sons, " is in
finishing it to the end."
In the three years following the battle that gave him
the mastery of the Gobi, he thrust his veteran horse-
men far into the valleys of the western Turks, the
Naimans and Ugurs, people of a superior culture.
They had been the foes of Prester John, and might
have banded together to resist Temujin, but he gave
them no time to realize what was in store for them*
From the long white mountains of the north, down
the length of the great wall, through the ancient cities
of Bishbalik and Khoten his officers galloped.
Marco Polo has a word to say here, of Temujin.
" When he conquered a province he did no harm
to the people or their property, but merely established
some of his own men in the country among them,
while he led the remainder to the conquest of other
provinces. And when those whom he had conquered
became aware how well and safely he protected them
against all others, and how they suffered no ill at his
hands, and saw what a noble prince he was, then they
joined him heart and soul and became his devoted
followers. And when he had thus gathered such a
70 GENGHIS KHAN '*
multitude that they seemed to cover the earth, he
began to think of conquering a great part of the
world."
The fate of his old enemies was hardly as desirable
as this. Once he had broken the armed power of a
hostile clan, the Mongol hunted down all men of the
reigning family and put them to death. The fighting
men of the clan were divided up among more depend-
^ble people ; the most desirable women were taken
as wives by his warriors others were made slaves.
Wandering children were adopted by Mongol mothers,
and the grazing lands and herds of the defeated clan
turned over to new owners.
Temujin's life, up to this point, had been shaped
by his enemies. From adversity he had gained
strength of body and the wolflike wisdom that seemed
to lead him to do instinctively the right thing. Now
he was strong enough to make conquests on his own
account. And after the first overthrow of the men
who faced him with weapons, he proved an indulgent
master.
He was entering new parts of the world, the age-
old caravan routes and cities of Central Asia, and a
vast curiosity stirred in him. He noticed among the
captives men richly dressed and upright in bearing,
who were not warriors, and he learned that they were
savants astrologers who knew the stars physicians
who understood the use of herbs such as rhubarb and
the ailments of sick women. ,,
A certain Ugur, who had served a defeated chieftain,
was brought before him still holding a small gold
object curiously wrought.
" Why dost thou cling to that ? " the Mongol asked.
GENGHIS KHAN ft
" I wished," responded the faithful minister, " to
care for it until the death of him who entrusted it
to me."
"Thou art a loyal subject, 11 the khan admitted,
" but he is dead, and his land, all he possessed, is
now mine. Tell me what this token is good for. 19
" Whenever my lord wished to levy silver or grain,
he gave a commission to one of his subjects ; it was
necessary to mark his orders with this seal to show that
they were in reality royal commands."
Temujin promptly ordered a seal to be made for
himself, and one was fashioned of green jade. He
pardoned the captive Ugur, gave him a position in his
court with instructions to teach his children the writing
of the Ugurs, which is a form of Syriac taught,
in all probability, by Nestorian priests long since
dead.
But to his paladins fell the greatest reward to those
who had aided the khan in some crisis. They were
created tar-khans* and raised above all others. They
had the right of entering the royal pavilion at any
time without ceremony. They could make the first
selection of their share of spoil taken in any war, and
were exempt from all tithes. More than that, they
could do, actually, no wrong. Nine times would the
death punishment be forgiven them. Whatever lands
they selected, they were to have, and these privileges
would be inherited by their children, to nine genera*
tions.
In the minds of his nomads, nothing was more
desirable than to be one of the fellowship of tar -khans.
They were fired by victory, by the rampaging of
those three years through new lands, and for the
7 GENGHIS KHAN
nonce they were held in check by awe of the Mongol
khan.
But around the person of the conqueror were
gathered the wildest spirits of all Asia, the Turko-
Mongol warriors from the sea to the T'ian shan where
Gutchluk would soon rule Black Cathay (Kara K'itai).
For the moment clan feuds were forgotten. Buddhist
and shaman, devil-worshipper and Mohammedan and
Nestorian Christian sat down as brothers, awaiting
events.
Almost anything could have happened. What did
happen was that the Mongol khan rose above the
limitations of his ancestors. He called together the
kurultai, the council of the khans, to select a single
man to rule all the peoples of high Asia. An emperor.
He explained to them that they must choose one of
their number to have authority over the others.
Naturally enough, after the events of the last three
years, the choice of the kurultai fell upon Temujin.
More than that, the council decided that he was to
have a fitting title. A soothsayer in the gathering now
came forward and announced that his new name
should be Genghis Kha Khan, the Greatest of Rulers,
the Emperor of All Men.
The council was pleased, and at the unanimous
insistence of the khans Temujin assumed his new title.
CHAPTER VII
THE YASSA
THE council had been held in 1206, and in the
same year the official of Cathay, the Warden
of the Western Marches, whose duty it was to watch
over the barbarians beyond the great wall and collect
tribute from them, reported that " absolute quiet
prevails in the far kingdoms." Following the election
of Genghis Khan as their master, the Turko-Mongol
peoples were united for the first time in several
centuries.
In the high tide of their enthusiasm they believed
that Temujin, now Genghis Khan, was in reality a
bogdo> a sending from the gods, endowed with the
power of high Heaven. But no enthusiasm could have
held these lawless hordes in restraint. They had lived
too long governed by tribal custom. And customs
vary as much as the natures of men.
To hold them in check, Genghis Khan had the
military organization of his Mongols, most of whom
were now veterans. But he announced that he had
made the Tassa, to rule them. The Tassa was his code
of laws, a combination of his own will and the most
expedient of tribal customs.*
He made it clear that he disliked particularly theft
and adultery, which were to be punished by death.
See Note III, The Laws of Genghis Khan, page 214,
74 GENGHIS KHAN
If a horse were stolen the punishment should be death.
He said that it angered him to hear of a child dis-
obedient to its parents, of the younger brother to the
older ; a husband's want of confidence in his wife,
a wife's lack of submission to her husband ; the failure
of the rich to aid the poor and of inferiors to show
respect for leaders.
Regarding strong drink, a Mongol failing, he said :
" A man who is drunk is like one struck on the head ;
his wisdom and skill avail him not at all. Get drunk
only three times a month. It would be better not to
get drunk at all. But who can abstain altogether ? "
Another weakness of the Mongols was fear of
thunder. During the severe storms of the Gobi this
fear had so overmastered them at times that they
threw themselves into lakes and rivers to escape the
wrath of the skies at least, so the worthy voyager,
Fra Rubruquis tells us. The Tassa forbade bathing
or touching water at all during a thunderstorm.
Himself a man of violent rages, Genghis Khan
denied his people their most cherished indulgence,
violence. The Tassa interdicted quarrels among
Mongols. On another point he was inexorable there
should be no other Genghis Kha Khan. His name
and the names of his sons were written only in gilt,
or were not written at all. Nor would the men of
the new emperor willingly speak the name of the
Khan.
A deit himself, raised among the ragged and
rascally shamans of the Gobi, his code treated matters
of religion indulgently. Leaders of other faiths,
devotees, the criers of the mosques were to be freed
from public charges. Indeed, a motley array of priest-
GENGHIS KHAN 75
hood trailed after the Mongol camps wandering
yellow and red lamas swinging their prayer wheels,
some of them wearing " stoles, painted with a likeness
of the true Christian devil " thus Fra Rubruquis.
And Marco Polo relates that before a battle Genghis
Khan demanded that astrologers take the omens. The
" Saracen " soothsayers failed to prophesy effectively,
but the Nestorian Christians had better success with
two little canes marked with the names of the rival
leaders, which fell one on top of the other when lines
from the book of Psalms were read aloud. Though
Genghis Khan may have listened to the soothsayers
and he listened attentively to the warnings of a
Cathayan astrologer in later life he does not seem
to have turned back from any venture on account of
them.
The Tassa dealt in simple fashion with spies,
sodomites, false witnesses and black sorcerers. They
were put to death.
The first law of the Tassa is rather remarkable.
" It is ordered that all men should believe in one
God, creator of Heaven and earth, the sole giver of
goods and poverty, of life and death as pleases Him,
whose power over all things is absolute." An echo
here of the teachings of the early Nestorians. But this
law was never pronounced publicly. Genghis Khan
had no wish to make a dividing line among his subjects,
or to stir up the always latent embers of doctrinal
antagonism.
A psychologist might say that the Tassa aimed at
three things obedience to Genghis Khan, a binding
together of the nomad clans, and the merciless punish-
ment of wrong-doing. It concerned itself with men,
76 GENGHIS KHAN
not property. And a man, by the way, was not to be
adjudged guilty unless caught in the act of crime if
he did not confess. It must be remembered that among
the Mongols, an illiterate people, a man's spoken word
was a solemn matter.
More often than not a nomad, faced with an
accusation of wrong-doing, would admit it if he were
guilty. There were instances of some who came in
to the Khan and asked to be punished.
In the later years of his life, obedience to the Khan
was absolute. The general of a division stationed a
thousand miles from the court submitted to be
relieved of his command and executed at the order
of the Khan brought by a common courier.
" They are obedient to their lords beyond any other
people," said the stout Fra Carpini, " giving them
vast reverence and never deceiving them in word or
action. They seldom quarrel, and brawls, wounds or
slaying hardly ever happen. Thieves and robbers are
nowhere found, so that their houses and carts in which
all their goods and treasure rest are never locked or
barred. If any animal of their herds go astray, the
finder leaves it or drives it back to the officers who have
charge of strays. Among themselves they are courteous
and though victuals are scarce, they share them
freely. They are very patient under privations, and
though they may have fasted for a day or two, will
sing and make merry. In journeying they bear cold
or heat without complaining. They never fall out and
though often drunk, never quarrel in their cups."
(This was a matter, apparently, of some surprise
to the voyager out of Europe.)
* Drunkenness is honourable among them. When a
GENGHIS KHAN 77
man has drunk to excess and vomits, he begins again
to drink. Toward other people they are exceedingly
proud and overbearing, looking upon all other men,
however noble, with contempt. For we saw in the
emperors court the great duke of Russia, the son of
the king of Georgia, and many sultans and other
great men who had no honour or respect. Indeed,
even the Tatars appointed to attend them, however
low their condition, always went before these high-
born captives and took the upper places.
" They are irritable and disdainful to other men,
and beyond belief deceitful. Whatever mischief they
intend they carefully conceal, that no one may provide
against it. And the slaughter of other people they
consider as nothing."
To aid one another and destroy other people. An
echo of the Tassa. These clansmen, war-hungry and
smarting from ancient feuds, could be held together
only in one way. Left to their own devices they would
soon have been at their old work of mutual exter-
mination, fighting for spoil and pasture land. The
red-haired Kha Khan had sown the wind and stood
to reap the whirlwind.
He realized this he must have realized it, judging
by his next actions. He had been weaned among the
nomads and he knew that the one way to keep them
from each other's throats was to lead them to war
elsewhere. He meant to harness the whirlwind and
direct it away from the Gobi.
The chronicle gives us a
time, before the long feasting of
an end. Standing at the foot of
78 GENGHIS KHAN
the mountain that shadowed his homeland, standing
beneath the now familiar standard pole with its
nine white yak-tails, he addressed the Bourchikoun
and the chieftains who had pledged allegiance to
him.
" These men who will share with me the good and
bad of the future, whose loyalty will be like the clear
rock crystal I wish them to be called Mongols.
Above everything that breathes on earth I wish them
to be raised to power."
He had the imagination to see this assemblage of
unbridled spirits united in one horde. The wise and
mysterious Ugurs, the stalwart Karaits, the hardy
Yakka Mongols, the ferocious Tatars, the dour
Merkits the silent and long-enduring men from the
snow tundras, the hunters of game all the riders of
high Asia, gathered into a single gigantic clan, him-
self the chieftain.
They had been united before, briefly, under the
Hiung-nu monarchs who harried Cathay until the
great wall was built to shut them out. Genghis Khan
had the gift of eloquence to stir deep-seated emotions
in them. And he never doubted his ability to lead
them.
He held before their eyes the vision of conquest
throughout unknown lands, but he exerted himself to
the utmost to mobilize this new horde. He invoked
the Tassa.
It was forbidden for any warrior of the horde to for-
sake his comrades the men of his " ten." Or for the
others of the " ten " to leave behind them a wounded
man. Likewise was it forbidden any of the horde to
flee before the standard withdrew from a battle, or to
GENGHIS KHAN 79
turn aside to pillage before permission was given by
the officer commanding.
(The inevitable inclination of the man in the ranks
to loot whenever possible was met by the rule that
they were entitled to all they found officers not-
withstanding.)
And the observant Fra Carpini is authority that
Genghis Khan enforced this portion of the Tassa, for
he describes the Mongols as " never leaving the field
while the standard was lifted, and never asking
quarter if taken, or sparing a living foe/ 1
The horde itself was no haphazard gathering of
clans. Like the Roman legion it had its permanent
organization, its units of ten to ten thousand the
tuman that formed a division, needless to say of
cavalry. In command of the armies were the Orkhons,
the marshals of the Khan, the infallible Subotai, the
old and experienced Muhuli, and the fiery Chcp
Noyon eleven in all.
The weapons at least the lances, heavy armour and
shields of the horde were kept in arsenal by certain
officers, cared for and cleaned until the warriors were
summoned for a campaign, when they were issued
weapons, mustered and inspected by gur-khans. The
sagacious Mongol did not intend to have several
hundred thousand men loose and fully armed, scattered
over a million square miles of plains and mountains.
To divert the energies of his horde, the Tassa
ordered the winter between the first heavy snow and
the first grass to be devoted to hunts on a grand
scale, expeditions after antelope, deer and the fleet-
footed wild ass.
In the spring he announced that councils would be
8o GENGHIS KHAN
held, and all the higher officers were expected to attend.
" Those who, instead of coming to me to hear my
instructions, remain absent in their cantonments, will
have the fate of a stone that is dropped into deep water,
or an arrow among reeds they will disappear."
No doubt Genghis Khan had learned from ancestral
tradition, and had availed himself of existing customs ;
but the creation of the horde as a permanent military
organization was his work. The Tassa ruled it, the
lash of inexorable authority held it together. Genghis
Khan had under his hand a new force in warfare, a
disciplined mass of heavy cavalry capable of swift
movement in all kinds of country. Before his time the
ancient Persians and the Parthians had perhaps as
numerous bodies of cavalry, yet they lacked the
Mongols* destructive skill with the bow and savage
courage.
In the horde he had a weapon capable of vast
destruction if rightly handled and held in restraint.
And he had fully determined to wield it against
Cathay, the ancient and unchanging empire behind
the great wall.*
See Note IV, The Numerical Strength of the Mongol Horde, page 218.
Part II
CHAPTER VIII
CATHAY
BEYOND the Great Wall things were vastly
different from those in high Asia. Here existed a
civilization of some five thousand years, with written
records extending back thirty centuries. And here
lived men who spent their lives in contemplation as
well as in fighting.
Once the ancestors of these men had been nomads,
a horse-riding people, adept in the use of the bow.
But, for three thousand years, instead of migrating
they had built cities, and much may be done in that
time. They had multiplied enormously, and when
men increase and crowd one another they build walls.
And they divide themselves into different classes of
human beings.
Unlike the Gobi, the men behind the great wall
were slaves and peasants scholars, soldiers, and
beggars mandarins, dukes and princes. Always they
had had an emperor, the son of Heaven, T'icn tsi,
and a court, the Clouds of Heaven.
In the year 1210, the Year of the Sheep in the
Calendar of the Twelve Beasts, the throne was
occupied by the Chin or Golden dynasty. The court
was at Yen-king, near the site of modern Peking.
81 ?
82 GENGHIS KHAN
Cathay was like an aged woman, sunk in medita-
tion, clad perhaps in too elaborate garments, surrounded
by many children, little heeded. The hours of its
rising and sleeping were all ordained ; it went forth in
chariots, attended by servants, and prayed to the
tablets of the dead.
Its garments were of floss silk, many-coloured
though the slaves might run barefoot and cotton-clad.
Over the heads of its high officials umbrellas were
carried. Inside the entrances of its dwellings, screens
served to keep out wandering devils. It bowed the
head to ritual, and studied how to make its conduct
perfect.
Barbarians had come down from the north the
Cathayans themselves, and the Chins, a century ago.
They had been absorbed into the great mass of human
beings behind the wall. In time they had fallen into
the manners of Cathay, clad themselves in its gar-
ments and followed its ritual.
Within the cities of Cathay were pleasure lakes,
and barges where men could sit with rice wine,
listening to the melody of silver bells in a woman's
hand. They might, perhaps, drift under a tiled pagoda
roof, or hear the summons of a temple gong.
They studied the Bamboo Books written in for-
gotten ages and discussed together at long-drawn
feasts the golden days of T'ang. They were the men
of Chin, followers of a dynasty, servants of the sitter
on the throne. Tradition ruled them, as it taught
them the highest duty was to the dynasty. Even
though they might, as in the days of Master K'ung,*
cry out at the imperial cortege wherein the emperor
* Confucius,
GENGHIS KHAN 83
rode with a courtesan in a carriage before the savant,
" Lo, here is lust in front and virtue behind."
Or even a vagabond poet, wrapped in drunken con-
templation of the beauty of moonlight upon a river,
might fall in the water and be drowned and be no less a
poet for all that. The pursuit of perfection is a labor-
ious business, but time did not matter much in Cathay.
A painter contented himself with touching silk with
a bit of colour a bird on a branch, or a snow-capped
mountain. A detail, but a perfect detail. The astro-
loger in his roof among the brass globes and quadrants,
noted down each movement of a star ; the minstrel of
war was contemplative.
" No sound of a bird now breaks from the hushed
'walls. Only the wind whistles through the long night y
where ghosts of the dead wander in the gloom. The
fading moon twinkles on the jailing snow. The josses of
the walls are frozen with blood and bodies with beards
stiff with ice. Each arrow is spent ; every bow-string
broken. The strength of the war horse is lost. Thus is
the city oj Han-li under the hand of the enemy."
So the minstrel, seeing a picture in death itself,
voiced the resignation that is the heritage of Cathay.
War engines they had twenty horse chariots,
ancient and useless, but also stone casters, cross-bows
that the strength of ten men did not serve to wind
catapults of which it took two hundred artillerists to
draw taut the massive ropes ; they had the " Fire
that Flies" and the fire that could be exploded in
bamboo tubes.
The waging of war had been an art in Cathay, since
the days when the armoured regiments and chariots
manoeuvred over the wastes of Asia, and a temple was
84 GENGHIS KHAN
erected in the camp for the general commanding to
meditate upon his plans undisturbed. Kwan-ti, the
war god, never lacked devotees. The strength of
Cathay was in the discipline of its trained masses, and
its enormous reservoirs of human life. As to its weak-
ness, a Cathayan general seventeen centuries ago had
written ominously :
11 A ruler can bring misfortune upon his army by
attempting to govern it like a kingdom, when he is
ignorant of the conditions faced by the army and
within it. This is called hobbling an army. This
causes restlessness among the soldiers.
" And when an army is restless and distrustful,
anarchy results and victory is thrown away."
The weakness of Cathay was in its emperor, who
must remain in Yen-king and leave matters of leader-
ship to his generals ; and the strength of the nomads
beyond the wall was in the military genius of their
khan, who led the army in person.
The case of Genghis Khan was very like that of
Hannibal in Italy. He had a limited number of
warriors. A single decisive defeat would send the
nomads back into their deserts. A doubtful victory
would be no gain. His success must be decisive with-
out too great a loss in man-power. And he would be
called upon to manoeuvre his divisions against armies
led by masters of tactics.
Meanwhile, out in Karakorum, he was still the
4< Commander Against Rebels," still the subject of
the Golden Emperor.
In the past when the fortunes of Cathay had been
ascendant, the emperors had demanded tribute of the
nomads beyond the great wall. In moments of weak-
GENGHIS KHAN S S
ness the dynasties of Cathay had bought off the
nomads, sending them such things as silver, floss silk,
worked leather, carved jade and caravan loads of grain
and wine, to keep them from raiding. To manifest
its honour, or, in other words, to save its face, the
dynasty of Cathay would call these payments gifts.
But in the years of power the payments demanded
from the nomad khans were called tribute.
The predatory tribes had not forgotten these
magnificent gifts, nor the annoying exactions of
Cathayan officials and the rare expeditions of the " hat
and girdle " people from the barrier of the great wall.
Thus the peoples of the eastern Gobi were at the
present moment nominally subjects of the Golden
Emperor, administered in theory by the absentee
Warden of the Western Marches. Genghis Khan was
entered in the roll of officials as " Commander Against
Rebels." In due course the scribes of Yen-king, comb-
ing over the records, sent emissaries to him to collect
tribute of horses and cattle. This tribute he did not pay.
The situation, you will perceive, was typically
Chinese. The attitude of Genghis Khan may be
described in two words watchful waiting.
In the course of his campaigns within the Gobi, he
had encountered the great wall and considered atten-
tively this rampart of brick and stone with its towers
over the gates and its impressive summit upon which
six horsemen could gallop abreast.
More recently, he had caused his standard to be
displayed from gate to gate along its nearest circuit
a circumstance to which the Warden of the Western
Marches and the Golden Emperor paid not the
slightest attention. But the frontier tribes, the buffer
86 GENGHIS KHAN
peoples, living within the shadow of the wall and
serving the monarch of Cathay upon his hunting
excursions, took full notice of this bold act and
decided among themselves that the Golden Emperor
was afraid of the nomad chieftain.
This was hardly the case. Secure within their
walled cities, the millions of Cathay thought not at all
of the horde of a quarter million warriors. Except
that the Golden Emperor, in the course of his continual
warfare with the ancient house of Sung in the south
beyond the Son of the Ocean, the Yang-tze, sent other
emissaries to the Mongols to request the assistance of
the nomad horsemen.
Several tumans were lent by Genghis Khan, quite
readily. Chepd Noyon and others of the Orkhons
commanded these cavalry divisions. What they
effected on behalf of the Golden Emperor is unknown.
But they used their eyes and asked questions.
They had all the nomad's ability to remember
landmarks. And when they rode back to the horde
in the Gobi they had a pretty good idea of the
topography of Cathay.
They brought with them, also, tales of wonders.
In Cathay, they said, the roads ran clear across the
rivers, on stone platforms ; wooden kibitkas floated
on the rivers ; all the largest cities had walls too high
tor a horse to leap.
Men in Cathay wore vests of nankeen and silks of all
colours, and even some of the slaves had as many as seven
vests. Instead of old minstrels, young poets entertained
the court not by droning hero legends but by writing
words on a silk screen. And these words described the
beauty of women. It was all very wonderful.
GENGHIS KHAN 87
His officers were eager to launch themselves at the
great wall. To have gratified them, to have led his
wild clans at that time against Cathay would have
meant disaster for the Khan, and calamity at home as
well. If he left his new empire and suffered defeat in
the east, in Cathay, other enemies would not hesitate
at all to invade the Mongol dominion.
The Gobi desert was his, but he could look south,
south-west and west and see there formidable foes.
Along the Nan-lu, the southern caravan track,
existed the curious kingdom of Hia the so-called
robber kingdom. Here were lean and predatory
Tibetans, come down from the hills to plunder, and
outlawed Cathayans. Beyond them extended the
power of Black Cathay, a kind of mountain empire,
and to the west, the roving hordes of Kirghiz who
had kept out of the way of the Mongols.
Against all these troublesome neighbours, Genghis
Khan sent portions of his horde, mounted divisions
commanded by the Orkhons. He himself rode several
seasons to war in the Hia country a war of raids in
open country that convinced the Hia chieftains it
would be well to make peace with him. The peace was
strengthened by a blood tie one of the women of
the royal family being sent to Genghis Khan for a
wife. Other ties were made in the west. All this was
caution in military parlance, clearing his flanks. But
it won him allies among the chieftains and recruits
for the horde. And it gave the horde itself some very
desirable experience in campaigning.
Meanwhile the monarch of Cathay died ; his son
was seated on the dragon throne, a son tall and
upcrbly bearded, interested chiefly in painting and
88 GENGHIS KHAN
hunting. He called himself Wai Wang, an imposing
title for a commonplace man.
In due course the mandarins of Cathay got out
the tribute rolls for the new monarch, and an officer
was sent into the plateaus of the Gobi to collect tribute
from Genghis Khan. He took with him also the
proclamation of the new sovereign, Wai Wang. This,
an imperial edict, should have been received on
bended knees, but the Mongol stretched out his hand
for it and remained standing, nor did he give it to an
interpreter to read.
" Who is the new emperor ? " he asked.
" Wai Wang."
Instead of inclining his head toward the south, the
Khan spat. " I thought the son of Heaven should be
an extraordinary man ; but an imbecile like Wai
Wang is unworthy a throne. Why should I humiliate
myself before him ? "
With that he mounted his horse and rode away.
That night the Orkhons were summoned to his
pavilion, with his new allies, the Idikut of the Swoop-
ing Hawks, and the Lion Lord of the western Turks.
The next day the envoy was called before the Khan and
given a message to take back to the Golden Emperor.
" Our dominion," said the Mongol, " is now so
well ordered that we can visit Cathay. Is the dominion
of the Golden Khan so well ordered that he can
receive us ? We will go with an army that is like a
roaring ocean. It matters not whether we are met
with friendship or war. If the Golden Khan chooses
to be our friend, we will allow him the government
under us of his dominion ; if he chooses war, it will
last until one of us is victor, one defeated."
GENGHIS KHAN 89
No more insulting message could have been sent.
Genghis Khan must have decided that the moment
for invasion was at hand. While the old emperor
lived he had felt bound, perhaps, by feudal allegiance
to Cathay. With Wai Wang he had no concern.
The envoy returned to Yen-king where the court
of Wai Wang resided. Wai Wang was angered by the
response he brought with him.* The Warden of the
Western Marches was asked what the Mongols were
about. He replied that they were making many arrows
and gathering horses. Thereupon, the Warden of
the Western Marches was clapped into prison.
The winter was passing and the Mongols went on
making many arrows and gathering horses. Unfor-
tunately for the Golden Emperor, they did much
more than that. Genghis Khan sent envoys and
presents to the men of Liao-tung in the northern part
of Cathay. He knew that these were warlike spirits
who had not forgotten their conquest by a previous
Golden Emperor.
This envoy met the prince of the Liao dynasty and
a compact was sworn between them, and blood drawn
and arrows broken to bind it. The men of Liao
literally the men of Iron would invade the north
of Cathay, and the Mongol Khan would restore to
them all their old possessions; a compact, by the
way, that Genghis Khan kept to the letter. Eventually
he made the princes of Liao the rulers of Cathay,
under himself.
Some accounts have it that a Chin army was sent against the nearest
of the Gobi clans, and this is very probably so, because we find the Mongol*
fighting outside the wall before their advance into the Chin empire.
CHAPTER IX
THE GOLDEN EMPEROR
FOR the first time the nomad horde was moving
to the invasion of a civilized power of much
greater military strength. We are able to sec Genghis
Khan at work in the field of war.*
The first of the horde had been sent out of the
Gobi long since spies and warriors who were to
capture and bring back informers. These were already
behind the great wall.
Next went the advance points, some two hundred
riders scattered over the countryside in pairs. Far
behind these scouts came the advance, some thirty
thousand picked warriors on good horses at least
two horses to a man three tumans, commanded by
the veteran Muhuli, the fiery Chep Noyon and that
surprising youngster Subotai, the Mass&ia of the
Khan's marshals.
In close touch by courier with this advance, the
main body of the horde came over the barren plateaus,
rolling up the dust clouds. A hundred thousand,
mostly Yakka Mongols of long 'service, formed the
centre, and the right and left wings numbered as
many. Genghis Khan always commanded the centre,
keeping his youngest son at his side for instruction.
Like Napoleon, he had his imperial guard, a
Set Note V. The Mongol Plan of Inraaion. page aaz.
90
GENGHIS KHAN 91
thousand strong, mounted on black horses with leather
armour. Probably in this first campaign of 1211
against Cathay, the horde was not in such strength.
It neared the great wall and passed through this
barrier without delay or the loss of a man. Genghis
Khan had been tampering for some time with the
frontier clans, and one of the gates was opened to him
by sympathizers.
Once within the wall the Mongol divisions separated,
going into different parts of Shan-si and Chih-li.
They had definite orders. They needed no transport
and did not know the meaning of a base of supplies.
The first line of the Cathayan armies, mustered to
guard the frontier roads, fared badly. The Mongol
cavalry divisions nosed our the scattered forces of the
Emperor, composed mainly of foot soldiers, and rode
them down, making havoc with arrows shot from the
back of a hard-running horse into the close packed
ranks of infantry.
One of the main armies of the Emperor, feeling its
way toward the invaders, wavered among a labyrinth
of gorges and small hills. The general in command,
newly appointed, did not know the country and had to
ask his way of peasants. Chepe Noyon, moving
toward him, remembered very well the roads and
valleys of this district, and actually made a night
march around the Chin forces, taking them in the
rear the following day. This army was terribly cut
up by the Mongols, and the remnants of it, fleeing
east, brought fear to the largest of the Chin armies.
This wavered in turn, and its general fled toward
the capital. Genghis Khan reached Taitong-fu, the
first of the large walled cities and invested it, then
92 GENGHIS KHAN
hurried on his divisions toward the reigning city,
Yen-king.
The devastation wrought by the horde and its
nearness filled Wai Wang with alarm, and this sitter
on the dragon throne would have fled from Yen-king
if his ministers had not restrained him. The greatest
defence of the empire was now rallying to Wai Wang
as it always has in China when the nation was menaced
the innumerable multitudes of the middle-class, the
stolid and devoted throngs, scions of warlike ancestors,
who knew no higher duty than to uphold the throne.
Genghis Khan had broken down the first armed
resistance of Cathay with amazing rapidity. His
divisions had captured a number of cities, though
Taitong-fu, the Western Court, still held out.
But he was faced, as Hannibal before Rome, with
the real vitality of a stout-hearted domain. New
armies appeared up the great rivers ; the garrisons of
beleaguered cities seemed to multiply. He passed
through the outer gardens of Yen-king itself and
beheld for the first time the stupendous extent of
lofty walls, the hills and bridges and mounting roofs
of a whole series of citadels.
He must have seen the uselessness of laying siege
to such a place, with his small numbers, because he
drew back at once, and when autumn came he ordered
his standards back to the Gobi.
In the following spring when his horses were
restored to strength he appeared again within the
wall. He found the towns that had surrendered to him
in the first campaign were now garrisoned and defiant,
and he set to work anew. The Western Court
GENGHIS KHAN 93
was invested again and here he now kept the horde
entire.
Apparently he used the siege as a kind of bait,
waiting for the armies that were sent to relieve it and
cutting them up as they came. The war made mani-
fest two things : the Mongol cavalry could out-
manoeuvre and destroy Cathayan armies in the field,
but could not as yet take strong cities.
Chep6 Noyon, however, managed to do this very
thing. Their allies, the Liao princes, were hard beset
by sixty thousand Cathayans up in the north, and
appealed to the Khan for aid. He sent Chep Noyon
with a toman, and the energetic Mongol general laid siege
to Liao-yang itself in the rear of the Cathayan forces.
The first efforts of the Mongols failed to gain them
anything and Chep Noyon, who was as impatient
as Marshal Ney, essayed a ruse that Genghis Khan
had used in the field, though not in siege work. He
abandoned his baggage, carts and supplies in full sight
of the Cathayans, and drew off with his horse herds
as if giving up the struggle or fearing the approach
of a relieving army.
For two days the Mongols rode away slowly, then
shifted to their best horses and galloped back swiftly
in a single night, " the sword in the rein hand.*' They
arrived before Liao-yang at daybreak. The Cathayans,
convinced that the Mongols had retired, were occu-
pied in plundering the baggage and carrying it within
the walls all gates open and the townspeople mingled
with the warriors. The unexpected onset of the nomads
took them completely by surprise, and the result was
a terrible massacre followed by the storming of
Liao-yang.
94 GENGHIS KHAN
Chep Noyon recovered all his own baggage and
a good deal more.
But in pressing the siege of the Western Court,
Genghis Khan was wounded. His horde withdrew
from Cathay, as the tide ebbs from the shore, bearing
him with it.
Every autumn it was necessary for them to go back.
Fresh horses must be gathered together. During the
summer they had foraged men and beasts on the
country, but a winter in north China would not yield
enough sustenance to the horde. Besides, there were
warlike neighbours to be kept at a distance.
The next season Genghis Khan did no more than
launch a few raids enough to keep the Cathayans
from resting too much.
The war, his first on a grand scale, had fallen into
stalemate. Unlike Hannibal, he could not leave
garrisons in the captured cities of the empire. His
Mongols, unaccustomed to fighting at that time from
behind walls, would have been annihilated by the
Cathayans during the winter.
A series of victories in the field, gained by screening
the movements of his squadrons and uniting them by
swift marches against the Cathayan armies, had
resulted only in driving the enemy forces within walls.
He had come within sight of Yen-king itself, in his
effort to get at the Emperor ; but the master of the
Chin could not be driven from the nearly impregnable
citadel. Meanwhile the Chin armies were prevailing
against the men of Liao-tung, and the riders of Hia
who were supporting the flanks of the Khan.
Under the circumstances, a nomad chieftain would
hive been expected to let well enough alone, and to
GENGHIS KHAN 95
remain outside the great wall with his booty of the
past seasons and the prestige of victories gained over
the great Chin power. But Genghis Khan, wounded
and still inexorable, was gaining experience and
profiting by it, while foreboding began to prey upon
the Golden Emperor.
Foreboding grew to fear when the first grass came
in the spring of 1214. Three Mongol armies invaded
Cathay from different points. On the south the three
sons of the Khan cut a wide swathe across Shan-si ;
on the north Juchi crossed the Khingan range and
joined forces with the men of Liao-tung ; meanwhile
Genghis Khan with the centre of the horde reached
the shore of the great ocean behind Yen-king.
These three armies operated in a new fashion. They
remained separated ; they settled down to the siege
of the strongest cities, gathering the folk from the
countryside and driving the captives before them in
the first storm. More often than not the Cathayans
within the walls opened their gates. At such times,
they were spared their lives, even while everything in
the open country was annihilated or driven off crops
trampled and burned, herds taken up, and men,
women and children cut down.
Confronted by this war a outrance, several Catha-
yan generals went over to the Mongols with their
commands, and were installed with other officers of
Liao-tung in the captured cities.
Famine and disease, two of the four horsemen of
the Apocalypse, followed upon the heels of the Mongol
riders. Across the sky-line passed the train-bands of
the horde, the endless carts, the bullock herds, the
horned standards.
96 GENGHIS KHAN
As the season drew to its close, disease took its toll
of the horde. The horses were weak, ill-conditioned*
Genghis Khan with the centre of the horde camped
near the battlements of Yen-king and his officers
begged htm to assault the city.
Again he refused, but he sent a message to the
Golden Emperor.
" What do you think now of the war between us ?
All the provinces north of the Yellow River are in my
power. I am going to my homeland. But could you
permit my officers to go away without sending gifts
to appease them ? "
A request extraordinary on the face of it, but a
simple stroke of policy on the part of the matter-of-
fact Mongol. If the Golden Emperor granted his
demand, he would have the gifts to reward his officers
and satisfy their restlessness, and the prestige of the
dragon throne would suffer greatly.
Some of the Cathayan councillors who knew the
enfeebled condition of the horde besought the
Emperor to lead out the forces in Yen-king against
the Mongols. What result this would have had, there
is no telling. But the Chin monarch had suffered too
much to act boldly. He sent out to Genghis Khan
five hundred youths and as many girl slaves, with a
herd of fine horses and loads of silk and gold. A truce
was agreed on, and the Chins pledged themselves
to allow the allies of the Khan, the Liao princes, to
remain unmolested in Liao-tung.
More than that, the Khan demanded if there was
to be a truce between them that he be given a wife
of the imperial blood. And this lady of the reigning
family was sent to him.
GENGHIS KHAN 97
Genghis Khan did turn back to the Gobi that
autumn, but on the edge of the desert he slew the
multitude of captives that had been carried along by
the horde an act of unprovoked cruelty.
(It appears to have been a custom of the Mongols
to put to death all captives, except artisans and
savants, when they turned their faces homeward after
a campaign. Few, if any, slaves appear in the native
lands of the Mongols at this time. A throng of ill-
nourished captives on foot could not have crossed the
lengths of the barrens that surrounded the home of
the nomads. Instead of turning them loose, the Mongols
made an end of them as we might cast off old
garments. Human life had no value in the eyes of
the Mongols, who desired only to depopulate fertile
lands to provide grazing for their herds. It was their
boast at the end of the war against Cathay that a
horse could be ridden Without stumbling across the
sites of many cities of Cathay.)
Whether Genghis Khan would have left Cathay in
peace is uncertain. But the Golden Emperor acted on
his own account. Leaving his eldest son in Yen-king,
he fled south.
" We announce to our subjects that we shall change
our residence to the capital of the south."
Thus the imperial decree a weak gesture to pre-
serve his honour. His councillors, the governors of
Yen-king, the elder Chin nobles, all besought him
not to abandon his people. But go he did, and
rebellion followed upon his flight.
CHAPTER X
THE RETURN OF THE MONGOLS
WHEN he fled with his entourage from the
imperial city, the Chin Emperor left in the
palace his son, the heir apparent. He did not wish
to abandon the heart of his country without keeping
in Yen-king some semblance of rule, some individual
of the dynasty for the people to see. Yen-king was
strongly garrisoned.
But the chaos foreseen by the elder nobles now
began to break up the armed forces of the Chins.
Some of the troops escorting the Emperor mutinied
and went off to join the Mongols.
In the imperial city itself a curious revolt took
place. The hereditary princes, the officials and
mandarins assembled and vowed fresh allegiance to
the dynasty. Deserted by their monarch, they resolved
to carry on the war themselves. Thronging into the
streets, bareheaded in the rain, the stalwart soldiery
of Cathay pledged itself to follow the fortunes of the
Chin heir apparent and the nobles. The old and deep
spirit of loyalty manifested itself again in this moment,
brought to the surface, as it were, by the flight of a
weak ruler.
The Emperor sent couriers to Yen-king to recall
his son to the south.
" Do not do that ! " the elder Chins protested.
But the Emperor was obstinate, and his wish was
loo GENGHIS KHAN
Chep Noyon was sent at a gallop back to the
Gobi, to quiet the chieftains at home.
Genghis Khan detached Subotai to go and look
at the situation. This Orkhon disappeared from view
for some months, sending back only routine reports
as to the condition of his horses. He found, apparently,
nothing worth while in northern Cathay, because he
returned to the horde bearing with him the sub-
mission of Korea. Left to his own devices he had kept
quiet and had circled the gulf of Liao-tung to explore
a new country. This disposition to wander, when he
was given an independent command, brought calamity
to Europe in a later day.
The Khan himself remained with the nucleus of
the horde near the great wall. He was fifty-five years
of age ; his grandson Kubilai had been born, back
in the pavilions no longer the feltyurts of the Gobi.
His sons were grown men ; but in this crisis he gave
the command of his divisions to the Orkhons, the
proved leaders of the horde, the men who could do
no wrong and whose descendants, by virtue of their
ability, were never to suffer want or punishment. He
had taught Chep Noyon and Subotai how to handle
mounted divisions, and he had tested the veteran Muhuli.
So Genghis Khan remained a spectator of the down-
fall of Cathay sitting in his tent, listening to the
reports of the gallopers who rode to him without
dismounting to cook food or to sleep.
It was Muhuli aided by Mingan, a prince of
Liao-tung, who directed the thrust at Yen-king.
With no more than five thousand Mongols at his
heels, he retraced his steps eastward, gathering as he
went a multitude of Cathayan deserters and wandering
GENGHIS KHAN 101
bands of warriors. Subotai hovering on his flank, he
pitched his tents before the outer walls of Yen-king.
With men enough in Yen-king to have endured a
siege successfully, and with ample stock of weapons
and all the paraphernalia of war, the Cathayans were
too disorganized to hold out. When fighting began
in the suburbs one of the Chin generals deserted.
The women of the imperial household who begged
to go with him, he left behind in the darkness. Looting
began in the merchants' streets, and the unfortunate
women wandered hopelessly among bands of shouting
and frightened soldiery.
Fire followed, springing up in various parts of the city.
In the palace, eunuchs and slaves were to be seen flitting
through the corridors, their arms filled with gold and
silver ornaments. The hall of audience was deserted,
and the sentries left their posts to join the pillagers.
Wang-Yen, the other general commanding, a
prince of the blood, had received not so long ago a
decree from the departed Emperor, pardoning all
criminals and prisoners in Cathay and increasing the
gifts to the soldiers. A futile last measure, it availed
the solitary Wang- Yen not at all.
Matters being hopeless, the general commanding
prepared to die as custom required, lie retired to his
chambers and wrote a petition to his Emperor, acknow-
ledging himself guilty and worthy of death in that
he had not been able to defend Yen-king.
This valediction, as it might be called, he wrote on
the lapel of his robe. Then he called in his servants
and divided all his garments and wealth among them.
Ordering the mandarin who attended him to prepare
a cup of poison, he continued writing.
102 GENGHIS KHAN
Then Wang-Yen asked his friend to leave the
chamber, and drank the poison. Yen-king was in
flames, and the Mongols rode in upon a scene of
defenceless terror.
The methodical Muhuli, indifferent to the passing
of a dynasty, occupied himself with collecting and
sending to the Khan the treasure and the munitions
of the city.
Among the captive officers sent to the Khan was a
prince of Liao-tung who had been serving the
Cathay ans. He was tall and bearded to the waist,
and the Khan's attention was caught by his deep,
clear voice. He asked the captive's name and learned
that it was Ye Liu Chutsai.
" Why didst thou abide with the dynasty that was
the old enemy of thy family ? " Genghis Khan asked.
" My father was a servant to the Chin, and others
of my family also," the young prince replied. " It
was not fitting that I should do otherwise."
This pleased the Mongol.
" Well hast thou served thy former master, and so
thou canst serve me with trust. Be one among mine."
Some others who had deserted the dynasty he caused
to be put to death, believing that they were not to be
relied upon. It was Ye Liu Chutsai who said to him
afterward ; " Thou hast conquered a great empire in
the saddle. Thou canst not govern it so."
Whether the victorious Mongol saw the truth of
this, or realized that in the learned Cathay ans he had
instruments as important as their war engines capable
of casting stones and fire, he permitted himself to be
advised. He appointed governors for the conquered
i districts of Cathay from among the Liao-tung men.
CHAPTER XI
KARAKORUM
UNLIKE other conquerors, Genghis Khan did
not settle down in the most luxurious part of
his new dominion, Cathay. When he rode through the
great wall after the fall of the Chins, he did not return.
He left Muhuli there as a war lord, and hastened
back to the barren plateaus that were his birthright.
Here he had headquarters. Of the desert cities,
he selected Karakorum, the Black Sands, as his ordu.
And here he assembled everything that a nomad
could desire. A strange city, Karakorum, a metro-
polis of the barrens, wind-swept and sand-whipped.
The dwellings, dried mud and thatch, arranged with-
out any thought of streets. Around it, the domes of
black felt yurts.
The years of privation and of wandering were
past. Vast stables housed in winter picked herds of
horses bearing the Khan's brand. Granaries guarded
against famine millet and rice for men, hay for the
horses. Caravanserais sheltered travellers and visiting
ambassadors who were flocking out of all northern
Asia.
From the south came Arab and Turkish merchants.
With them Genghis Khan established his own method
of dealing. He did not like to haggle. If the mer-
chants tried to bargain with him their goods were
104
GENGHIS KHAN ioj
taken without payment ; if, on the other hand, they
gave everything to the Khan, they received in return
gifts that more than paid them.
Beside the district of the ambassadors was the quarter
of the priests. Old Buddhist temples elbowed stone
mosques and the small wooden churches of Ncstorian
Christians. Everyone was free to worship as he
pleased as long as he obeyed the laws of the Tassa, and
the rules of the Mongol camp.
Visitors were met by Mongol officers at the frontiers
and forwarded to Karakorum with guides word of
their coming sent ahead by the busy couriers of the
caravan routes. Once within sight of the grazing
herds, the black domes of the yurts, and the rows of
the kibitkas on the treeless and hill-less plain that
surrounded the city of the Khan, they were taken in
charge by the Master of Law and Punishment.
In obedience to an old custom of the nomads, they
were made to pass between two large fires. No harm
came to them as a rule, but the Mongols believed that
if any deviltry were concealed in them the fires would
scorch them. Then they were given quarters and food
and if the Khan signified his assent were led into
the presence of the Mongol conqueror.
He held his court within a high pavilion of white
felt lined with silk. By the entrance stood a silver table
set with mare's milk, fruit and meat, so that all who
came to him could eat as much as they wished. On a
dais at the far end of the pavilion sat the Khan on a
low bench with Bourtai or another wife below him on
the left side.
Few ministers attended him Ye Liu Chutsai, per-
haps, in his embroidered robes, majestic enough with
106 GENGHIS KHAN
his long beard and deep voice a Ugur scribe with
his roll of paper and brush a Mongol #0y0tf ,*honorary
cup-bearer. On benches around the walls of the
pavilion other nobles sat in decorous silence, wearing
the long wadded coats with hanging girdles, the
uptilted white felt hats, the undress uniform of the
horde. In the centre of the pavilion glowed a fire of
thorns and dung.
Tar-khans, honoured above all others, might swag-
ger in at will, and take their seat on the benches, their
feet crossed under them, scarred hands resting on the
stalwart thighs of horsemen. Ork/ions*-\and divisional
commanders might join them, carrying their maces.
Conversation would be in low, drawling voices, and
utter silence would prevail when the Khan spoke.
When he had said anything, that subject was
closed. No man might add a word to his. Argument
was a breach of manners exaggeration a moral lapse,
and lying a matter for the Master of Punishment.
Words were few and painstakingly exact.
Strangers were expected to bring gifts with them.
The gifts were taken in to the Khan before the visitors
were passed in by the captain of that day's guard.
Then the newcomers were searched for weapons and
cautioned against touching the threshold of the
pavilion, or any of the ropes if it were a tent. To
speak to the Khan they must first kneel. After they
had presented themselves at this ordu they must not
depart until told to do so by the Khan.
Karakorum now vanished under the encroaching
sands of the Gobi was ruled by an iron will. Men
* Noyon or not an, commander of a tuman or division of ten thousand ;
sometimes merely a noble.
f Orkhon. or Ur-khan, commander of an army.
B
is
"1
II
Q
U>
io8 GENGHIS KHAN
entering the ordu became servants of the Master of
Thrones and Crowns. Other laws did not exist.
" On joining the Tatars," said the stout-hearted
monk, Fra Rubruquis, " I thought myself entered
into another world."
It was a world that moved by the laws of the Tassa,
and awaited in silence the will of the Khan. The
routine was all military and the utmost of order
prevailed. The pavilion of the Khan always faced
south, and a space was left clear on this side. To right
and left, as the children of Israel had their appointed
places about the Tabernacle, the people of the horde
had their fixed stations.
The household of the Khan had grown. In their
tents, scattered through the ordu, waited upon by their
own people, he had other women than Bourtai of the
grey eyes. He had taken to wife princesses of Cathay
and Liao, daughters of royal Turkish families and
the most beautiful women of the desert clans.
He could appreciate beauty in women, not less than
sagacity and hardihood in men, and swiftness and
endurance in fine horses. Once the attractive face and
bearing of a girl in a captured province were described
to him by a Mongol who did not know just where
she might be found. " If she is really beautiful,"
the Khan answered impatiently, " I will find
her."
An amusing story is told of a dream that disturbed
him a-dream that pictured one of his women plotting
to harm him. At the time he was in the field, as usual,
and when he waked he called out immediately :
" Who is leader of the guard at the tent entrance ? "
When the officer in question had spoken his name,
GENGHIS KHAN 109
the Khan gave an order. " Such-and-such a woman
is thine, as a gift. Take her to thy tent."
The matter of ethics he solved in a fashion all his
own. Another concubine had yielded to the advances
of a Mongol of his household. When he had pondered
this, the Khan did not put either of the two to death,
but sent them from his presence, saying, " I acted
wrongly in taking to myself a girl of ignoble instincts."
Of all his sons he recognized as his heirs only the
four born of Bourtai. They had been his chosen
companions, and he had watched them, giving each
a veteran officer as tutor. When he had satisfied him-
self as to their different naturer and abilities he made
them Orluks Eagles princes of the imperial blood.
And they had their part to play in the orderly scheme
of things.
Juchi the first-born was made Master of Hunting
from which the Mongols still gleaned a great part
of their sustenance. Chatagai became Master of Law
and Punishment ; Ogotai was Master of Counsel ;
the youngest, Tuli, nominally chief of the army, the
Khan kept at his side. Juchi, whose son Batu founded
the Golden Horde that crushed Russia Chatagai,
who inherited Central Asia and whose descendant
Babar was the first of the great Moghuls of India
Tuli, whose son Kubilai reigned from the China sea
to mid-Europe.
The youthful Kubilai was a favourite of the Khan,
who evinced toward him all the pride of a grand-
father. " Mark well the words of the boy Kubilai ;
they are full of wisdom."
Upon his return from Cathay, Genghis Khan
no GENGHIS KHAN
found the westerly half of his young empire highly
demoralized. The powerful Turkish peoples of Central
Asia, feudatories of the empire of Kara K'itai, had
come under the hand of a gifted usurper, a certain
Gutchluk, who was prince of the Naimans and had
been defeated some time before by the Mongols after
the battle with the Karaits.
Gutchluk seems to have raised himself to fame by
most profitable treachery. He allied himself with the
still greater powers of the far west, and put to death
his host, the Khan of Black Cathay. While Genghis
Khan had been occupied beyond the great wall, he
had disorganized the valuable Ugurs, and had slain
the Christian khan of Almalyk, a subject of the
Mongol. The always restless Merkits had left the
horde and joined him.
With Gutchluk and his brief empire* in the wide
ranges that extend from Tibet to Samarkand, Genghis
Khan dealt decisively upon his return to Karakorum.
The horde was remounted on fresh horses and led
against the Naimans. The lord of Black Cathay was
tricked out of position and soundly whipped by the
veteran Mongols ; Subotai was detached with a
division to bring the Merkits to their proper sense of
duty, and Chepl Noyon was gratified with the
command of two yumam and orders to hunt down
Gutchluk and bring him back dead.
Gutchluk's empire included what was later the heart of Tamerlane's
dominion. The military operations that brought about the defeat of the
Naimans and Kara K'itams were on a Jai^e scale. They were brilliantly
conceived and swiftly carruxl out. As in the last campaign in China, the
Khan entrusted the leadership of his divisions to his Orkhons and sons.
It would be impossible without going into the complex political history
of this region, with its chanpfs from Ugur overlordshin to Kirghiz and Catnayao
rule, to emphasize fully the importance of its conquest by the Mongols.
GENGHIS KHAN ill
With Chep Noyon's adroit manoeuvring among
the ranges we need not concern ourselves. He met the
zeal of the Mohammedans by offering amnesty to all
foes except Gutchluk, and opened the gates of the
Buddhist temples that had been closed by the war ;
then he chased the emperor of a year over the Roof of
the World until Gutchluk was slain and his head sent
back to Karakorum with the herd of a thousand
white-nosed horses that the energetic Mongol had
been collecting on the side, as it were.
The affair and it might have been disastrous to the
Khan if he had lost that first battle had two results.
The nearest of the wild Turkish tribes, that stretched
from Tibet across the heights to the steppes of Russia,
became part of the horde. After the downfall of
northern Cathay, these same nomads held what might
be called the balance of power in Asia. The victorious
Mongols were still a minority.
And the opening of the temples gave Genghis Khan
new prestige. It was told from mountain city to
valley camp that he had conquered Cathay, and the
vast and shadowy influence of Buddhist Cathay was
enveloped around his person. On the other hand,
the discomfited mullahs were gratified that they were
not molested and were freed of tithes and taxation.
Under the snow summits of Tibet, within the fiercest
amphitheatre of religious hatred in the world, bonze
and mullah and lama were placed on an equal footing,
and warned. The shadow of the Tassa. Envoys of
the Khan bearded Cathayans, intoning the new law
of the conqueror, appeared to bring order out of
chaos, even as they were struggling to bring relief
to Cathay behind the iron willed Muhuli.
iia GENGHIS KHAN
A courier galloped down the caravan tracks to the
exultant Chep Noyon, bringing word that the
thousand horses had reached the Khan. " Do not
become proud, through success ! "
Whether chastened or not, Chepd Noyon went on
gathering warriors under the ranges of Tibet. Nor
did he return to Karakorum. There was work ahead
for him in another quarter of the world.
Meanwhile, with the overthrow of Gutchluk, an
armistice as sudden and decisive as the fall of a curtain
settled down on north Asia. From the China to the
Aral sea one master reigned. Rebellion had ceased.
The couriers of the Khan galloped over fifty degrees
of longitude, and it was said that a virgin carrying a
sack of gold could ride unharmed from one border of
the nomad empire to the other.
But this administrative activity did not altogether
satisfy the ageing conqueror. He no longer relished
the winter hunts over the prairies. One day in the
pavilion at Karakorum he asked an officer of the
Mongol guard what, in all the world, could bring the
greatest happiness.
" The open steppe, a clear day, and a swift horse
under you," responded the officer after a little thought,
" and a falcon on your wrist to start up hares/'
" Nay," responded the Khan, " to crush your
enemies, to see them fall at your feet to take their
horses and goods and hear the lamentation of their
women. That is best."
The Master of Thrones and Crowns was also the
Scourge. His next move was one of conquest, terrible
in its effect, and it was toward the west. And it came
about in a most curious way.
Part III
CHAPTER XII
THE SWORD-ARM OF ISLAM
UNTIL now the dominion of Genghis Khan had
been confined to far Asia. He had grown up
in his deserts and his first contact with civilization
had been in Cathay.
And from the cities of Cathay he had gone back to
the grazing lands of his native plains. More recently,
the affair with Gutchluk, and the arrival of Moham-
medan merchants had taught him something about
the other half of Asia.
He knew now that beyond the ranges of his westerly
border existed fertile valleys where snow never fell.
Here, also, were rivers that never froze. Here multi-
tudinous peoples lived in cities more ancient than
Karakorum or Yen-king. And from these peoples
of the west came the caravans that brought finely
tempered steel blades and the best chain mail white
cloth and red leather, ambergris and ivory, turquoise
and rubies.
To reach him, these caravans had to cross the
barrier of mid-Asia, the network of mountain ranges
that extended roughly north-east and south-west of
the Taghdumbash) the Roof of the World. From time
immcmorablc this mountain barrier had existed. It
113 H
Ii 4 GENGHIS KHAN
was the mountain Kf of the early Arabs. It stood,
vast and partially desolate, between the nomads of
the Gobi and the rest of the world.
From time to time some of the nomad peoples had
broken through the barrier, driven out by stronger
nations still father east. The Huns and Avars had
disappeared into the ranges, and had not come back.
And at intervals the conquerors of the west had
advanced as far as the other side of these ranges.
Seventeen centuries before the kings of Persia had come
with their mailed cavalry toward the east, to the Indus
and Samarkand within sight of the bulwarks of the
Taghdumbash. Two centuries later the reckless
Alexander had advanced with his phalanx exactly as far.
So these ranges formed a kind of gigantic continental
divide, separating the plains-dwellers of Genghis Khan
from the valley-dwellers of the west, which was called
by the Cathayans Ta-tsin, the Far Country. A gifted
Cathayan general had once led an army up into these
solitudes, but until now no army had ventured to make
war beyond the ranges.
Now Chep Noyon, the most impetuous of the
Mongol Orkhons, had quartered himself in the heart
of these ranges. And Juchi had wandered toward
the setting sun into the steppe region of the Kipchak
tribes. They had reported two roads through the
mountain chains.
For the moment Genghis Khan was interested in
trade. The goods and especially the weapons of the
Mohammedan peoples beyond the rampart of mid-
Asia were a great luxury to the simple-living Mongols.
He encouraged his own merchants subject Moham-
medans to send their caravans to the west.
GENGHIS KHAN 115
He learned that his nearest neighbour to the west
was the Shah of Kharesm, himself conqueror of a
wide domain. To this Shah the Khan sent envoys,
and a message.
" I send thcc greeting. I know thy power and the
great extent of thine empire, and I look upon thee as
a most cherished son. On thy part, thou must know
that I have conquered Cathay and many Turkish
nations. My country is an encampment of warriors,
a mine of silver, and I have no need of other lands.
To me it seems that we have an equal interest in
encouraging trade between our subjects."
For a Mongol of that day, this was a mild message.
To the dead Emperor of Cathay, Genghis Khan had
sent sheer, provocative insult. To Ala-eddin Moham-
med, Shah of Kharesm, he forwarded a matter-of-
fact invitation to trade. There was, to be sure,
disparagement in calling the Shah his son which in
Asia implies a dependant. And there was a barb in
the mention of the conquered Turkish clans. The
Shah was a Turk.
The envoys of the Khan brought rich gifts to the
Shah, bars of silver, precious jade and white camel's
hair robes. But the barb rankled. " Who is Genghis
Khan ? " he demanded. " Has he really conquered
China ? "
The envoys replied that this was so.
" Are his armies as great as mine ? " the Shah then
asked.
To this the envoys made response tactfully they
were Mohammedans, not Mongols that the host of
the Khan was not to be compared to his own. The
Shah was satisfied, and agreed to the mutual intercourse
u6 GENGHIS KHAN
of merchants. Matters went well enough for a year
or so.
Meanwhile the name of Genghis Khan became
known in other Mohammedan lands. The Kalif of
Baghdad was then being oppressed by this same Shah
of Kharesm. And the Kalif was persuaded that his
cause might be aided by the shadowy Khan on the
borderland of Cathay. An envoy was sent from
Baghdad to Karakorurn, and since he must pass through
the lands of the Shah to get there, certain precautions
were taken.
The chronicle has it that the authorization of this
envoy was written on his skull with a fire pencil after
his hair was shaved off. The hair was then allowed to
grow, and the envoy given his message of appeal to
study until he had it by heart. All went well. The
agent of the Kalif reached the Mongol Khan, his skull
was shaved again, his identity established and his
message repeated.
Genghis Khan paid no attention to it. In all
probability the solitary emissary and the furtive
appeal did not impress him favourably. Besides, there
was the trade agreement with the Shah.
But the Mongol's experiment with trade came to
an abrupt end. A caravan of several hundred mer-
chants from Karakorum was seized by one, Inaljuk,
governor of Otrar, a frontier citadel belonging to the
Shah. Inaljuk reported to his master that spies were
among the merchants which may very well have
been the case.
Mohammed Shah, without considering the matter
overmuch, sent to his governor an order to slay the
merchants, and all of them, accordingly, were put to
GENGHIS KHAN 117
death. This, in due time, was reported to Genghis
Khan who dispatched envoys at once to the Shah to
protest. And Mohammed saw fit to slay the chief of
the envoys and burn off the beards of the others.
When the survivors of his embassy returned to
Genghis Khan, the master of the Gobi went apart to
a mountain to meditate upon the matter. The slaying
of a Mongol envoy could not go unpunished ;
tradition required revenge for the wrong inflicted.
" There cannot be two suns in the heavens," the
Khan said, " or two Kha Khans upon the earth."
Then spies were sent in earnest through the moun-
tain ranges, and couriers whipped over the desert
to summon men to the standards of the horde. A
brief and ominous message went this time to the
Shah.
" Thou hast chosen war. That will happen which
will happen, and what it is to be, we know not. God
alone knows."
War, inevitable in any case between these two
conquerors, had begun. And the careful Mongol had
his casus belli.
To understand what lay before him, we must look
beyond the ranges, where lay the world of Islam and
the Shah.
It was a martial world, appreciative of song, with
an ear not unmusical. A world beset by inward throes,
slave-ridden, wealth gathering, and more than a little
addicted to vice and intrigue. It left the management
of its affairs to extortioners and its women to the
custody of eunuchs, and its conscience to the keeping
of Allah.
U8 GENGHIS KHAN
It followed various dogmas, and it interpreted the
Koran in different ways. It gave alms to beggars,
washed scrupulously, gathered in sunlit courtyards
to gossip, and lived largely by favour of the great.
At least once during its lifetime it made the journey
to the black meteorolitc under a velvet curtain within
Mecca, the stone that was the Ka'aba. Upon this
pilgrimage the men of Islam rubbed shoulders,
renewed their zeal, and came home rather awed by
the immensity of their lands and the multitudes of
the believers.
Centuries ago their prophet had lighted a fire that
had been carried far by the Arabs. Since then all the
various peoples of Islam had been united in a common
cause conquest. The first waves of warriors had
spread to Granada in Spain, and all northern Africa,
Sicily and Egypt. In time the military power of
Islam had passed from the Arabs to the Turks, but
both had joined in the holy war against the mailed host
of Christian crusaders that came to wrest Jerusalem
from them.
Now in the beginning of the thirteenth century
Islam was at the height of its martial power. The
weakening crusaders had been driven to the coast of
the Holy Land, and the first wave of the Turks was
taking Asia Minor away from the soldiery of the
degenerate Greek empire.
In Baghdad and Damascus the Kalifs heads of
Islam maintained all the splendour of the days of
Haroun al Rashid and the Barmecides. Poetry and
song were fine arts ; a witty saying was the making
of a man. A certain observant astronomer, Omar al
Khayyam, remarked that men who believed that the
GENGHIS KHAN It9
pages of the Koran held all earthly lore looked more
often upon the engraving at the bottom of a bowl.
Even the reflective Omar could not ignore the
splendid pageantry of martial Islam
11 How Sultan after Sultan with his pomp
Abode his destined hour and went his way. 9 '
The courts of Jamshid, the golden throne of
Mahmoud Omar, penning his disconsolate quatrains,
paused to wonder at them, and to speculate upon
the possibilities of the paradise that awaited these
paladins of Islam.
Both Omar and Haroun had been for some time in
their graves, but the descendants of Mahmoud of
Ghazna ruled northern India. The Kalifs of Baghdad
had grown rather worldly wise, indulging in politics
rather than conquest. But the chivalry of Islam that
could forget its inward quarrels and unite against an
enemy of the faith was no less resplendent and high-
hearted than in the days when Haroun had jested with
his cup-companions.
They lived, these scions of warlike princes, in a
fertile world, where rivers flowing down from forested
ranges made the sand and clay of desert beds give
forth abundantly of grain and fruit. A warm sun
quickened intellect, and a desire for luxury. Their
weapons were fashioned by skilled armourers steel
blades that could be bent double, shields gleaming
with silver work. They wore chain mail and light
steel helmets. They rode blooded horses, swift of
foot but not too long enduring. And the secrets of
flaming naphtha and the terrible Greek fire were
known to them.
120 GENGHIS KHAN
Their life had many diversions :
M Verse and song and minstrelsy, and wine full flowing
and sweet.
11 Backgammon and chess and the hunting ground, and
the falcon and cheetah fleet.
" Field and ball, and audience hall, and battle and banquet
rare.
" Horse and arms and a generous hand and praise of my
lord and prayer. 1 ' *
In the centre of Islam, Mohammed Shah of
Kharesm had enthroned himself as war lord. His
domain extended from India to Baghdad, and from the
sea of Aral to the Persian Gulf. Except for the
Seljuk Turks, victors over the crusaders, and the
rising Mamluk dynasty in Egypt, his authority was
supreme. He was the emperor, and the Kalif who
quarrelled with him but might not deny him was
restricted to the spiritual authority of a pope.
Mohammed Shah of the Kharesmian empire *f
came, like Genghis Khan, from a nomad people. His
ancestors had been slaves, cup-bearers to the great
Seljuk Malik Shah. He and his atabegs or father-
chieftains, were Turks. A true warrior of Turan, he
had something of military genius, a grasp of things
political and no end of avarice.
We know that he indulged too much in cruelty,
putting his followers to death to gratify impulses. He
could slay a venerable sayyiJ, and then demand
absolution from the Kalif. Failing in this, he could
denounce the Kalif and set up another. Hence the
From A Literary History of Persia, by Edward G. Browne.
*t Kharesm hardly appears in the page's of history. Like Kara KMlai
and the empire of the Chin, it was blotted out by the Mongols before it reached
the full icope ol its power.
GENGHIS KHAN lai
dispute that led to the sending of an envoy to Genghis
Khan from Baghdad.
Then, too, Mohammed had his share of ambition
and love of praise. He liked to be called the Warrior,
and his courtiers extolled him as a second Alexander.
He matched his mother's intrigues with oppression,
and wrangled with the ivazir who administered his
affairs.
The core of his host of four hundred thousand
warriors was made up of the Kharesrn Turks, but he
had besides the armies of the Persians at his summons.
War elephants, vast camel trains, and a multitude of
armed slaves followed him.
But the main defence of his empire was the chain
of great cities along the rivers, Bokhara the centre of
Islam's academies and mosques, Samarkand of the
lofty walls and pleasure gardens, Balkh, and Herat, the
heart of Khorassan.
This world of Islam, with its ambitious Shah, its
multitudes of warriors and its mighty cities, was almost
unknown to Genghis Khan.
CHAPTER XIII
THE MARCH WESTWARD
TWO problems had to be solved before Genghis
Khan could lead his army against the Moham-
medan Turks. When he had moved to the conquest
of China he had taken most of his desert confederacy
with him. Now he must leave a vast empire behind
him for several years an empire newly knit, which
must be governed even from the other side of the
mountain ranges.
With this problem he dealt in his own way. Muhuli
was keeping Cathay occupied with fire and sword, and
the princes of Liao were busy enough restoring order
behind him. Genghis Khan combed over the rest of
his empire for notables in the conquered countries,
men of family and ambition who might cause trouble
in his absence. To each of these a Mongol courier
was sent with a silver tablet and a summons to the
horde. On the pretence of needing their services the
Khan took them with him out of the empire.
The government itself he proposed to keep in his
own hands wherever he went. He would communi-
cate by messenger with the council of the khans in the
Gobi. One of his brothers he left as governor in
Karakorum.
This accomplished, there remained the second and
greater problem to transport the horde of a quarter-
Z22
GENGHIS KHAN 123
million warriors from Lake Baikal over the ranges of
mid-Asia into Persia. A distance of some two thousand
miles as the crow flies, and a country wherein travellers
to-day only venture with a well-equipped caravan.
A march impossible for a modern army of that size.
He had no doubt of the ability of the horde to
make the march. In it, he had fashioned a fighting
force that was able to go anywhere on land. Half of
it never saw the Gobi again, but some of his Mongols
marched over ninety degrees of longitude and back
again.
In the spring of 1219, he gave orders for the horde
to rendezvous in the pasture lands of a river in the
south-west. Here assembled the tumam under the
different marshals, each man bringing with him a
string of four or five horses. Great herds of cattle
were driven to the pastures, and fattened comfortably
during the summer. The youngest son of the Khan
arrived to assume command, and in the first crisp days
of autumn the Khan himself rode over from Kara-
korum.
He had spoken a word to the women of the nomad
empire : " Ye may not bear arms, yet there is a duty
for ye. Keep well the yurts^ against the return of
the men, so that the couriers and the travelling noyons
may have a clean place and food when they halt at
night. A wife may thus do honour to a warrior."
Apparently it struck him during this ride to his
host that he himself might not return alive. Passing
through a fine woodland, and looking at a lofty grove
of pines, he remarked :
" A good place for roe-deer, and for hunting.
A good resting place for an old man."
134 GENGHIS KHAN
He gave orders that upon his death the Tassa, his
code of laws, was to be read aloud, and men were to
live according to it. For the horde and his officers
he had other words :
" Ye go with me, to strike with our strength the man
who has treated us with scorn. Ye shall share in my
victories. Let the leader of ten be as vigilant and
obedient as the leader of ten thousand. If either fail
in duty, he will be deprived of life, and his women and
children also."
After a conference with his sons and Orkhons and
the various chieftains, the Khan rode out to review
the different camps of the horde. He was fifty-six
years old, his broad face lined, the skin hardened.
He sat, his knees hunched up in the short stirrups, in
the high peaked saddle of a swift-footed white charger.
In his up-tilted white felt hat were eagle feathers,
and red cloth streamers hung down before either ear
like the horns of a beast, but serviceable otherwise to
bind on the hat in a high wind. His long-sleeved black
sable coat was bound with a girdle of gold plates or
cloth of gold. He rode down the lines of the assem-
bled squadrons, saying little. The horde was better
equipped than ever before. The shock divisions had
their horses encased in lacquered leatherred or black.
Every man had two bows, and a spare arrow case
covered to protect it against dampness. Their helmets
were light and serviceable, with a leather drop, iron-
studded, to guard the neck behind.
Only the regiment of the Khan's guard had shields.
Besides the sabre, the men of the heavy cavalry had
axes hanging from their belts, and a length of rope
lariats, or cords for pulling siege engines and bogged-
GENGHIS KHAN 125
down carts. Kits were small and strictly serviceable
leather sacks holding nose-bags for the pony and a
pot for the man ; wax, and files for sharpening the
arrow-heads, and spare bow-strings. Later on, every
man would have his emergency rations smoke-cured
meat, and dry milk curds. This dried milk could be
put into water and heated.
At present they were merely route marching. Many
Cathayans were with them, and a new division.
Apparently it was of ten thousand men, and its officer
was a Cathayan, the Ko pao yu or Master of Artillery,
and his men were skilled in building and working the
heavy siege engines, the ballista, mangonels and fire
throwers. These machines, it seems, were not carried
entire, but their parts were stowed in the wagons. As to
the /60-/tf
Slowly, the horde moved through the smaller
ranges, driving the cattle herds. It was about two
hundred thousand strong too great a number to
keep together, as they must live on the herds and the
country. Juchi, the eldest son, was detached with a
couple of tumans^ to join Chepe Noyon on the other
side of the T'ian shan. The rest spread out, keeping
to the valleys.
Early in the march an incident filled the astrologers
with misgivings. Snow fell before its proper time.
The Khan sent for Ye Liu Chutsai and demanded the
meaning of the portent.
" It signifies," replied the astute Cathayan, " that
the lord of the cold and wintry lands will overcome
the lord of the warm climates."
See Note VI. The Mongols and Gunpowder, page 224.
136 GENGHIS KHAN
The Cathayans must have suffered that winter.
Among them were men skilled in brewing herbs to
cure sickness, and when a lance, stuck with its point
in the ground before a tent, showed that a Mongol
was sick within, these savants of herbs and stars were
called upon for a remedy. Many other non-combat-
ants kept them company interpreters, merchants to
act as spies later, mandarins to take over the adminis-
tration of captured districts. Nothing was overlooked,
and every detail had to be kept in order. Even lost
articles had to be cared for an officer had been
appointed for this.
Metal work on the armour and saddles must be
kept polished, and kits filled. The march began when
the dawn drum-roll sounded, the herds being started
off first, and the warriors following with the carts.
At evening, the herds would be overtaken, the stan-
dard of the officer commanding pitched, and the
camp would rise around it, the warriors taking their
yurts from the camels or carts.
Rivers had to be crossed. The horses, roped
together, by the saddle horns, twenty or more in a
line, breasted the current. Sometimes the riders had
to swim, holding to the tails. A branch would be
thrust into the leather kit, and the lacing tightened,
so it would float, tied to the warrior's girdle. Before
long they could cross rivers on the ice.
Snow covered everything, even the sand dunes of
the wastes. Withered grey tamarisk danced under the
wind gusts, like the ghosts of old men. The trails were
marked by antelopes' or wild sheep's horns projecting
through the drifts.
Juchi's division of the horde tended off to the south,
GENGHIS KHAN 117
dropping from seven-thousand foot passes into the
Pe lu % the Great North Road, above the T'ian shan.
Here, on one of the oldest trade routes of Asia, they
encountered lines of shaggy camels, bound nose-cord
to tail, plodding along to the chiming of rusty bells
hundreds of them laden with cloth or rice or what-not,
following half a dozen men and a dog.
The main body of the horde moved more slowly
westward, dropping through gorges, and over frozen
lakes to the icy floor of the Sungarian gate, the pass
from which all the nomad clans have come out of high
Asia. Here they were buffeted by winds and chilled
by a cold so great that whole herds might be frozen if
caught in the pass during a bur an > a black wind storm.
By now most of the cattle had died off and had been
eaten. The last stores of hay had vanished ; the carts,
perforce, had been left behind, and only the hardiest
of the camels survived.
" Even in the middle of summer," the Cathayan
Ye Liu Chutsai wrote, of the westward march,
" masses of ice and snow accumulate in these moun-
tains. The army passing that road was obliged to
cut its way through the ice. The pines and larch trees
are so large that they seem to reach heaven. The
rivers west of the Chin shan (Golden mountains) all
run to the west."
To protect them, the hoofs of the unshod ponies
were bound up in strips of yak skins. The horses
seemed to suffer from the lack of fodder, and began
to bleed at the veins.
Entering the western ranges beyond the Gate of
the Winds, the warriors cut down trees, hewing out
massive timbers to be used in bridging the gorges.
128 GENGHIS KHAN
The ponies dug up moss and dry grass with their hoofs
from under the snow. The hunters went afield for
game. Forging ahead in the utter cold of high Asia,
a quarter-million men endured hardships that would
have put a modern division into hospital. The Mongols
did not mind it particularly. Wrapped up in their
sheepskins and leather, they could sleep under drifting
snow ; at need, the round, heavy yurts warmed them.
When food failed, they opened a vein in a horse,
drank a small quantity of blood and closed the vein.
On they went, scattered over a hundred miles of
mountain country, the sledges rolling in their wake,
the bones of dead animals marking their trail.
Before the snow melted they were out on the western
steppes, riding more swiftly around bleak Lake Bal-
kash. By the time the first grass showed, they were
threading into the last barrier of the Kara Tau, the
Black Range. On lean horses, they finished the first
twelve hundred miles of their march.
Now the various divisions closed up, liaison officers
began to gallop back and forth between the com-
mands ; the nondescript-looking merchants rode off
in groups of two or three to hunt for information. A
screen of scouts was thrown ahead of each column.
Men overhauled their kits, counted arrows, laughed
and gathered around the fires where the minstrels
knelt, droning their chants of departed heroes and
strange magic.
Through the forests, they could sec below them the
first frontier of Islam, the wide river Syr, now swollen
by spring freshets.
CHAPTER XIV
THE FIRST CAMPAIGN
MEANWHILE Juchi and Chepd Noyon had
had a pitched battle with the Mohammedans
under the Roof of the World. It is worth telling about.
The Mohammedan Shah was in the field before
the Mongols. Fresh from victories in India, he had
mustered his host of four hundred thousand. He had
gathered his atabegs, and strengthened his Turks with
contingents of Arabs and Persians. This host he had
led north, searching for the Mongols who were not
yet on the scene. He met and attacked some of
Chepd Noyon's patrols who were not aware of the
war, and the appearance of these fur-clad nomads on
their shaggy ponies aroused the contempt of the much
better clad Kharesmians. When his spies brought him
accounts of the horde, the Shah did not alter his
opinion. " They have conquered only unbelievers
now the banners of Islam are arrayed against them."
Soon the Mongols were visible. Raiding detach-
ments descended the heights toward the wide river
Syr. They appeared at villages in fertile valleys,
driving off the herds, gathering up all available grain
and foodstuffs ; they set fire to the dwellings and
retired in the smoke. Their carts and herds were sent
back to the north with detachments of warriors and
a day later they rode into a village fifty miles away.
129 i
I 3 o GENGHIS KHAN
These were the advance foragers, collecting supplies
for the main army. There was no telling where they
came from, or whither they went. They had been
sent out by Juchi who was approaching through a long
valley chain from the east, on the Pe Lu. Having an
easier route than the main body of the horde, he was
passing through the last ranges a little in advance of
his father's horde.
Mohammed Shah left the bulk of his host at the
Syr and pushed up the river toward its head-waters,
working east through the ranges. Whether he learned
of Juchi J s advance from his scouts, or stumbled against
this Mongol division by accident, he encountered it
squarely in that long valley hemmed in by the forested
bulwarks of the mountains.
His army was several times the strength of the
Mongol division, and Mohammed beholding for the
first time the dark mass of fur and leather clad warriors
without shields or chain mail thought only of
launching his attack before the strange horsemen
could escape.
His disciplined Turks mustered in battle formation,
and the long trumpets and cymbals sounded.
Meanwhile the Mongol general with Juchi advised
the Mongol prince to retire at once and try to draw
the Turks after him toward the main body of the
horde. But the eldest son of the Khan gave the order
to charge the Mohammedans. " If I flee, what then
dull I say to my father ? "
He was in command of the division, and when the
order had been given the Mongols got them to horse
without protest. Genghis Khan would never have
suffered himself to be caught thus in the valley, or
GENGHIS KHAN 131
being caught would have drawn back until the array
of the Shah had scattered in pursuit of him. But the
headstrong Juchi shot his men forward, the suicide
squad* first in the advance, the heavy shock cavalry
following, swords in the rein hands and long lances in
the right hands. The lighter squadrons covered his
flanks.
Being thus launched forward, without room for
manoeuvring, or time for their favourite play of arrows,
the Mongol horsemen drove in grimly, using their
heavier, slightly curved swords against the scimitars
of the Turks.
The chronicle relates that the losses of the Moham-
medans were beyond all counting, and as the Mongol
advance penetrated within the centre of the Turks,
the Shah himself was in danger. He saw within arrow
flight the horned standards of the horde, and only
the desperate efforts of his household divisions saved
him from death. And Juchi's life was saved, so the
story runs, by a Cathayan prince who was serving in
his command.
Meanwhile the Mongol flanks had been driven in,
and Jelal ed-Din, the favourite of the Kharesmian
army, the eldest son of the Shah a true Turk, small
and slender and dark, loving only hard drinking
and sword-play drove home a counter charge that
forced back the standards of the Mongols. The hosts
of horsemen separated, at the end of the day, and
during the night the Mongols played one of their
customary tricks. They either set fire to the grass in
the valley, or kept their own camp fires burning high
as long as darkness lasted. Meanwhile Juchi and his
The M**g*da*, or " God-belonging " squadron, pro-doomed.
I 3 2 GENGHIS KHAN
men had withdrawn, mounting fresh horses and
making a march of two days in that night.
Sunrise found Mohammed and his battered squad-
rons occupying a valley filled with the bodies of the
slain. The Mongols had vanished.
A ride over the battlefield filled the hitherto
victorious Turks with misgivings. The chronicle says
they lost 160,000 men in this first battle a number
certainly exaggerated, but evidence of the effect of
the Mongol impact upon them and Mohammedan
warriors were always influenced by success or failure
at the commencement of a campaign. Upon the
Shah himself the influence of the terrible struggle in
the valley was no less great. " A fear of these un-
believers was planted in the heart of the Sultan, and
an estimation of their courage. If anyone spoke of
them before him, he said that he had never seen men
as daring and as steadfast in the throes of battle, or as
skilled in giving blows with the point and edge of
their swords."
No longer did the Shah think of searching for the
horde in the high valleys. The country, arid in any
case, had been combed over by the Mongol foragers,
and could not support an army as large as his. But
more than this, his dread of the strange foemen
impelled him to turn back to his fortified towns along
the river Syr. He sent south for reinforcements,
especially for bowmen. He announced that he had
won a complete victory, and in token thereof distri-
buted robes of honour among the officers who had
attended him.
Genghis Khan listened to a courier's report of the
first conflict. He praised Juchi and sent him a
GENGHIS KHAN 133
supporting force of five thousand, with instructions to
follow after Mohammed.
The Mongols of Juchi the detached left wing of
the horde were riding through one of the garden
spots of high Asia, where every stream had its white
walled village and watch-tower. Here grew melons
and strange fruits ; the slender towers of minarets
uprose in growths of willows and poplars. To right
and left were mellow foothills, with cattle grazing on
the slopes. Behind them, the white summits of the
higher ranges reared against the sky.
" Kudjan (Khokand) abounds in pomegranates/*
the observant Ye Liu Chutsai noted down in his
geography of the journey. " They are as large as
two fists and of a sour-sweet taste. People take the
fruit and press out the juice into a vessel a delicious
beverage for slaking thirst. Their water-melons
weigh fifty pounds, and two are a load for a
donkey."
After the winter in the fro/en passes, this was luxury
indeed for the Mongol horsemen. The river widened,
and they came upon a large walled city, Khojend.
Here the supporting division of five thousand awaited
them, while laying siege to Khojend.
The commander of the Turks in the city was a
man of valour, Timur Malik, the Iron Lord. He had
withdrawn to an island with a thousand picked men
and had dug himself in. Events took a peculiar turn.
Here the river was wide, the island fortified. Timur
Malik had taken with him all available boats ; there
were no bridges. The Mongols had orders not to
leave a fortified city behind them. And they could
CHAPTER XV
BOKHARA
WHEN the Shah rode down from the higher
ranges, he turned north toward the Syr with
his host, waiting for the arrival of the horde itself,
intending to give battle when it attempted to cross
the river. But he waited in vain.
To appreciate what happened now we must glance
at the map. This northern portion of Mohammed's
empire was half fertile valley land, half arid and
sandy plains, cut up into strata of red clay, dust-
covered and lifeless. So the cities existed only along
the rivers and within the hills.
Two mighty rivers flowed north-west across this
desert floor, to empty their waters six hundred miles
away into the salt sea of Aral. The first of these rivers
was the Syr, the Jaxartes of the ancients. And here
were walled cities joined by caravan roads a kind of
chain of human life and dwellings extending through
the barrens. The second river, to the south, was the
Amu, once called the Oxus. And near this stood the
citadels of Islam, Bokhara and Samarkand.
The Shah was encamped behind the Syr, unable to
learn whither the Mongols were moving. He expected
fresh armies from the south and the revenues of a
new tax levy. This mobilization was interrupted by
alarming news. Mongols had been seen descending
136
GENGHIS KHAN *37
from the high passes two hundred miles to his right,
and almost in his rear.
What had happened was that Chepd Noyon, leaving
Juchi, had crossed the mountains to the south had
stolen up on the Turkish contingents that were
watching this route into Kharesm, and was now
marching swiftly around the glaciers of the Amu
head-waters. And, not more than a couple of hundred
miles distant, Samarkand lay in his path. Chep
Noyon had no more than twenty thousand men with
him, but the Shah could not know this.
Mohammed, instead of being reinforced, was now
in a fair way to be cut off from his second and main
line of defence, the Amu with its great cities, Bokhara
and Samarkand. Aroused by the new danger, Moham-
med did something for which he has been severely
criticized by Mohammedan chroniclers in later years.
He split up half his host among the fortified cities.
Some 40,000 were sent to strengthen the garrisons
along the Syr, and he marched south with the bulk
of his forces, detaching 30,000 toward Bokhara, and
leading the rest to Samarkand, the menaced point.
He did this, assuming that the Mongols would not
be able to storm his citadels, and would retire after
a season of raiding and plundering. He was mistaken
in both surmises.
Even before this two sons of the Khan had appeared
at Otrar, down the Syr to the north. Otrar, whose
governor had put to death Mongol merchants.
Inaljuk, who had ordered the execution of the mer-
chants, was still governor of the city. Knowing that
he had little mercy to expect from the Mongols, he
shut himself up in the citadel with the best of his men,
138 GENGHIS KHAN
and held out for five months. He fought to the end,
taking refuge in a tower when the Mongols had cut
down or captured the last of his men ; and when his
arrows gave out, he still hurled stones down on his
foes. Taken alive, in spite of this desperation, he was
sent to the Khan, who ordered molten silver to be
poured into his eyes and ears the death of retri-
bution. The walls of Otrar were razed and all its
people driven away.
While this was going on, a second Mongol army
approached the Syr and took Tashkent. A third
detachment scoured the northern end of the Syr,
storming the smaller towns. The Turkish garrison
abandoned Jend, and the townspeople surrendered
when the Mongols planted their ladders and swarmed
along the walls. In such cases in this first year of the
war, the warriors of the Shah, the Turkish garrisons,
were massacred by the Mongols, the townspeople
who were native Persians for the most part driven
out of the city, which was then plundered at leisure.
Then the captives would be sorted out, the strong
young men kept to labour at siege work in the next
city, the artisans to do skilled wcrk for the conquerors.
In one case, where a Mohammedan merchant, an
envoy of the Mongols, had been torn to pieces by the
men of a town, the terrible Mongol storm was begun
the attack that is never allowed to cease, fresh
warriors taking the place of the slain, until the place
was carried and its people slain with the sword or
arrows.
Genghis Khan did not appear at all along the Syr.
He vanished from sight, taking the centre of the horde
with him. No one knows where he crossed the river,
GENGHIS KHAN 139
or where he went. But he must have made a wide
circle through the Red Sands desert, because he
appeared out of the barrens, marching swiftly on
Bokhara jrom the west.
Mohammed was not merely outflanked. He was
in danger of being cut off from his southern armies,
his son and reinforcements and the rich lands of
Khorassan and Persia. While Chep Noyon was
advancing from the east, Genghis Khan was moving
in from the west, and the Shah at Samarkand might
well ^feel that the jaws of a trap were closing in on him.
In this predicament, he divided his main army
between Bokhara and Samarkand, sending other of
his atabegs to Balkh and Kunduz. With no more
than his own attendant nobles, his elephants and camels
and household troops, he left Samarkand. And he
took with him his treasure and his family, intending
to return at the head of a fresh army.
In this expectation, also, he was disappointed.
Mohammed, the Warrior, called by his people a
second Alexander, had been thoroughly outgeneralled.
The Mongols under the sons of the Khan, carrying
fire and sword along the Syr, had been no more than
so many masks for the real attacks thrust home by
Chep Noyon and Genghis Khan.
The Khan hastened out of the desert so eager to
make haste that he did not linger to molest the little
towns in his path, and asked only water for his horses.
He expected to surprise Mohammed at Bokhara ; but
when he arrived he learned that the Shah had fled.
He was confronted by one of the strongholds of Islam,
the city of academies, by a wall twelve leagues so
140 GENGHIS KHAN
says the chronicle in circuit, through which ran a
fair river, lined with gardens and pleasure houses. It
was garrisoned by some 20,000 Turks and a multitude
of Persians, and honoured by many an imam and
tayyidj the savants of Islam, the interpreters of the
Book to be Read,
It had within it a latent fire, the zeal of the devout
Mohammedans, who were at present in a very mixed
frame of mind. The wall was too strong to be carried
by assault, and if the mass of the inhabitants had
chosen to defend it, months might have passed before
the Mongols could have won a foothold upon it.
Genghis Khan had said with much truth, " The
strength of a wall is neither greater nor less than the
courage of the men who defend it." In this case, the
Turkish officers chose to leave the townspeople to
their fate and escape to join the Shah. So they went
out, with the soldiery of the Shah at night, by the
water gate, and headed toward the Amu.
The Mongols suffered them to pass, but three
tumans followed them and came up with them at the
river. Here the Turks were attacked and nearly all
of them put to the sword.
Abandoned by the garrison, the elders of the city,
the judges and imams, consulted together and went
out to face the strange Khan, yielding him the keys
of the city, and receiving his promise that the lives
of the inhabitants should be spared. The governor
with the remaining warriors shut himself up in the
citadel, which was at once beset by the Mongols, who
shot flaming arrows into the place until the roofs of
the palaces caught fire.
A flood of horsemen filled the wide streets of the
GENGHIS KHAN 141
city, breaking into the granaries and storehouses,
stabling their horses in the libraries, to the frantic
sorrow of the Mohammedans who beheld more than
once the sacred leaves of the Koran trodden under
the hoofs of the ponies. The Khan himself drew rein
before an imposing building, the great mosque of the
city, and asked if it were the house of the emperor.
He was told that it was the house of Allah.
At once he rode his horse up the steps and into the
mosque, dismounting, and ascending to the reader's
desk with its giant Koran. Here, in his black lacquer
armour and leather-curtained helmet, he addressed
the assembled mullahs and scholars, who had expected
to behold fire descend from Heaven to blast this
ungainly figure in strange armour.
" I have come to this place," he said to them,
" only to tell you that you must find provender for
my army. The countryside is bare of hay and grain,
and my men are suffering from want. Open, then,
the doors of your storehouses."*
But when the Mohammedan elders hastened from
the mosque they found the warriors of the Gobi
already installed in the granaries, and the horses stabled.
This portion of the horde had made a forced march
over the desert floor for too many days to linger upon
the threshold of plenty.
From the mosque, the Khan went to the city square
where orators were accustomed to assemble an audience
to lecture upon matters of science or doctrine.
" Who is this man ? " demanded a newcomer, of a
venerable sayyid.
This passage is almost invariably misquoted in histories, and riven as
follow* : " Genghis Khan rode into the mosque and shouted to his men,
The hay is cut give your horses fodder.' "
14* GENGHIS KHAN
" Hush ! " whispered the other. " It is the anger
of God that descends upon us."
The Khan a man who knew well how to address
a multitude, says the chronicle ascended the speaker's
rostrum and faced the people of Bokhara. First he
questioned them closely about their religion, and com-
mented gravely that it was a mistake to make the
pilgrimage to Mecca. " For the power of Heaven is
not in one place alone, but in every corner of the
earth."
The old chieftain, shrewd in gauging the moods of
his listeners, fanned the superstitious dread of the
Mohammedans. To them he appeared as a pagan
devastator, an incarnation of uncouth and barbaric
power, a little grotesque. Bokhara had seen none
but the devout within its walls.
" The sins of your emperor are many," he assured
them. " I have come I, the wrath and the flail of
Heaven, to destroy him as other emperors have been
crushed. Do not give him protection or aid."
He waited for the interpreter to explain his words.
The Mohammedans seemed to him to be like the
Cathayans, builders of cities, makers of books. Useful
in furnishing him with provisions, in yielding up their
wealth in giving him information about the rest of
the world ; useful in giving labourers and slaves to
his men artisans to send back to the Gobi.
" You have done well," he went on, " in supplying
my army with food. Bring now to my officers the
precious things you have hidden away. Do not
trouble about what is lying loose in your houses we
will take care of that."
The rich men of Bokhara were placed under guard
GENGHIS KHAN 143
of Mongols who did not leave them, day or night.
Some, on suspicion that they had not brought out all
their concealed wealth, were tortured. The Mongol
officers called for dancing girls and musicians to play
Mohammedan pieces. Sitting gravely, wine cup in
hand, in the mosques and palaces, they watched this
spectacle of the entertainment of the people who lived
in cities and gardens.
The garrison in the citadel held out bravely and
inflicted losses that angered the Mongols before the
governor and his^followers were cut down. When
the last valuables had been retrieved from cellars and
wells and dug up from the earth, the inhabitants
were driven out into the plain. The Mohammedan
chronicler gives us a clear glimpse of the misery of
his people.
" It was a fearful day. One heard only the weeping
of men, women and children, who were to be separated
for ever ; women were ravished by the barbarians
under the eyes of those who had no resource save
sorrow ; some of the men, rather than witness the
shame of their families, rushed upon the warriors
and died fighting."
Different parts of the city were fired, and the
flames swept through the dry structures of wood and
baked clay, a pall of smoke rising over Bokhara, hiding
the sun. The captives were driven toward Samarkand,
and, unable to keep up with the mounted Mongols,
suffered terribly during the brief march.
Genghis Khan only stayed two hours in Bokhara,
hastening on to seek the Shah in Samarkand. On the
way he was met by the detachments of the horde from
144 GENGHIS KHAN
the Syr, and his sons gave him the tidings of the
capture of the cities along the northern line.
Samarkand was the strongest of the Shah's cities.
He had started building a new wall, massive in size,
about the circuit of its gardens. But the swift advance
of the Mongols found the new rampart unfinished.
The old defences were formidable enough, including
twelve iron gates flanked by towers. Twenty armoured
elephants and one hundred and ten thousand warriors,
Turks and Persians, had been left to guard it. The
Mongols were less numerous than the garrison, and
Genghis Khan made preparations for a long siege
assembling the people of the countryside and the
captives from Bokhara to aid in the work.
If the Shah had remained with his men, or if an
officer like Timur Malik had been in command,
Samarkand might well have held out as long as food
lasted. But the swift and methodical preparations of
the Mongols alarmed the Mohammedans, who beheld
in the distance the vast multitude of captives, and
thought the horde much greater than it was. The
garrison sallied out once was drawn on into one of
the usual Mongol ambushes and fared badly. The
losses in this battle disheartened the defenders and
the imams and judges went out, on the morning the
Mongols were preparing to storm one portion of the
wall, and surrendered the city. Thirty thousand
Kankali Turks on their own account went over to the
Mongols were received amiably, given Mongol mili-
tary dress and massacred a night or two later. The
Mongols would never trust the Turks of Kharesm,
especially those who turned traitor.
When the skilled labourers of the city had been
GENGHIS KHAN 14$
led out to the horde and able-bodied men picked for
other work, the rest of the inhabitants were suffered
to go back to their houses. But a year or so later
they were summoned to the horde.
Ye Liu Chutsai writes of Samarkand, " Around the
city to an extent of several scores of miles there are
everywhere orchards, groves, flower gardens, aque-
ducts, running springs, square basins and round ponds
in uninterrupted succession. Indeed, Samarkand is a
delicious place."
CHAPTER XVI
THE RIDE OF THE ORKHONS
AT Samarkand it was reported to Genghis Khan
that Mohammed Shah had forsaken the city
and gone south. The Mongol was determined to make
the Shah captive before new armies could be raised
against the invaders. He had failed to come up with
the monarch of Kharcsm, and now he sent for Chcp
Noyon and Subotai and gave them orders.
" Follow Mohammed Shah wherever he goes in
the world. Find him, alive or dead. Spare the cities
that open their gates to you but take by assault those
that resist. I think you will not find this as difficult
as it seems."
A strange task, to hunt down an emperor through a
dozen kingdoms. It was a task, indeed, for the most
reckless and the most infallible of the Orkhons. They
were given two tumans, twenty thousand men. With
these instructions and with this cavalry division, the
two Orkhons set out at once toward the south. It was
then April, 1220, the Year of the Serpent.
Mohammed had gone south from Samarkand to
Balkh, on the edge of the lofty ranges of Afghanistan.
As usual, he vacillated. Jelal ed-Din was far off in
the north, raising a new army among the warriors of
the desert country near the sea of Aral. But Genghis
146
GENGHIS KHAN 147
Khan, at Bokhara, was between the Shah and this
possible rallying point.
He thought of entering the Afghan country, where
warlike clans awaited him. Finally, hesitating between
varied counsel and his own dread, he turned due west,
crossing the barrens to the mountain region of
northern Persia, and arrived at Nisapur, putting, as
he thought, five hundred miles between him and the
Mongol horde.
Chcprf Noyon and Subotai found a strong city
barring the passage of the Amu ; they swam their
horses across, and learned from scouts in the advance
that Mohammed had forsaken Balkh. So they turned
west, into the barrens, separating for greater protection
and to obtain all possible grazing for their horses.
Every man of the two picked tumans had several
horses, in good condition, and the grass along the
scattered streams and wells was fresh. They must have
covered eighty miles a day, changing to untired horses
several times during the day, and dismounting only at
sunset to eat cooked food. At the end of the barrens
they encountered the rose gardens and white walls of
ancient Mcrv.
Satisfying themselves that the Shah could not be in
this city, they galloped down to Nisapur, coming in
three weeks after Mohammed who had learned of
their mission, and fled on pretence of a hunting
expedition. Nisapur closed its gates and the Orkhons
assaulted it furiously. They failed to carry the walls
but became certain that the Shah was not within its
defences.
They picked up the scent again, and headed west
along the caravan route that leads to the Caspian,
148 GENGHIS KHAN
scattering the remnants of the Shah's armies that had
chosen this way to safety from the Mongol terror.
Near modern Teheran they met and defeated a
Persian army, thirty thousand strong.
Again they separated all trace of the fleeing
emperor vanished for the moment Subotai tending
north through the mountain region, Chcpd No yon
galloping south along the edge of the salt desert.
They had passed out of Kharesm proper had outrun
the very tidings of their coming.
Mohammed, meanwhile, had sent away first his
family, then his treasure. He left the caskets contain-
ing his jewels at a fortress where the Mongols found
them later and decided to journey to Baghdad, to
Baghdad where ruled the very Kalif with whom he had
quarrelled in other days. He picked up men here and
there, a following of a few hundred. He followed the
great road that leads to Baghdad.
But at Hamad an the Mongols appeared at his heels.
His men were scattered and ridden down, and a few
arrows shot at him the Mongols unaware of his
identity. He escaped and doubled back toward the
Caspian. Some of his Turkish warriors grew discon-
tented and rebellious, and Mohammed saw fit to sleep
in a small tent pitched beside his own. And one
morning he found the empty tent filled with arrows.
" Is there no place on earth," he asked an officer,
" where I can be safe from the Mongol thunderbolt ? "
He was advised to take ship on the Caspian and go
out to an island where he could be hidden until his
sons and atabegs could collect an army strong enough
to defend him.
This Mohammed did. Disguising himself, with a
GENGHIS KHAN 149
few nondescript followers, he passed through the
gorges, seeking a small town on the western shore of
the Caspian a place of fishermen and merchants,
tranquil enough. But the Shah, weary and ill, deprived
of his court, his slaves and cup companions, would not
sacrifice the prestige of his name. He insisted on
reading the public prayers in the mosque, and his
identity did not long remain a secret.
A Mohammedan, who once suffered oppression at
the hand of the Shah, betrayed him to the Mongols
who had scattered another Persian army at Kasvin,
and were questing after Mohammed through the
hills. They rode into the town that had sheltered him,
as he was preparing to enter a fishing skiff.
Arrows flew, but the boat drew away from the
shore and some of the nomads in their rage actually
urged their horses into the water. They swam after
the skiff until the strength of men and beasts gave out
and they disappeared in the waves.
Although they never laid hand on the Shah, they
had slain him. Weakened by disease and hardship
this overlord of Islam died on his island, so poverty-
ridden that his only shroud was a shirt of one of his
followers.
Chep No yon and Subotai, the two veteran
marauders who had been ordered to capture the Shah
alive or dead, did not know that he lay buried on his
barren island another unfortunate who had fared no
better than Wai Wang of Cathay, and Prester John
himself, and Toukta Beg and Gutchluk. They sent
back to the Khan the bulk of his treasure that the
careful Subotai had gathered up, and most of his
150 GENGHIS KHAN
family, and word that he had sailed eastward in a
ship.
Genghis Khan, believing that Mohammed would
try to join his son at Urgcnch, the city of the Khans,
sent a division in that direction.
But Subotai, wintering in the snow-bound pastures
of the Caspian, conceived the idea of marching to the
north, around the sea to rejoin his Khan. He sent a
courier to Samarkand to ask permission to make this
journey, and Genghis Khan gave his assent, sending
along several thousand Turkomans to strengthen the
Orkhon's force. Subotai, on his own account, had
been recruiting among the wild Kurds. After
going south a bit to besiege and storm the impor-
tant cities they had passed by in hunting down
Mohammed, the Mongols turned north, into the
Caucasus.
They raided Georgia. A desperate struggle took
place between the Mongols and the warriors of the
mountains. Chep Noyon hid himself on one side of
the long valley that leads up to Tiflis, while Subotai
made use of the old Mongol trick of pretended flight.
The five thousand men in ambush sallied out upon the
flank of the Georgians, who suffered terribly in the
battle.*
The Mongols slashed their way through the gorges
of the Caucasus, and passed the Iron Gate of Alexander.
Emerging upon the northern slopes they found an
army of the mountain peoples Alans, Circassians and
Kipchaks mustered against them. They were out-
numbered vastly, and had no way of retreat ; but
Subotai succeeded in detaching the nomad Kipchaks
See Note VII, The Conjurers and the Crow, page 228.
GENGHIS KHAN 151
from the others, and the Mongols rode through the
stalwart Alans and Circassians.
Then, following the Kipchaks into the salt steppes
beyond the Caspian, the marauders out of Cathay
scattered these wary nomads, driving them steadily
north into the lands of the Russian princes.
And here they were met by a new and utterly
brave foeman. The Russian warriors gathered from
Kiev and the far dukedoms, eighty-two thousand of
them. They moved down the Dnieper escorted by
strong bands of Kipchaks. They were sturdy horse-
men, shield-bearers, who had waged from times
forgotten a feud with the nomads of the steppes.
The Mongols drew back from the Dnieper for nine
days, watching the Russian masses, until they reached
a place selected beforehand to give battle. The
northern warriors were scattered in different camps,
formidable enough, but sluggish and quarrelling
among themselves. They had no leader like Subotai.
For two days the struggle between Russian and
Mongol their first meeting went on in the steppe.
The great prince died under the pagan's weapons,
with his nobles, and few of the host lived to ascend
the Dnieper again.
Left once more to their own devices, Subotai and
Chep No yon wandered down into the Crimea and
stormed a Genoese trade citadel. What next they
might have done there is no knowing. They were
intent on crossing the Dnieper into Europe when
Genghis Khan, who had followed their movements by
courier, ordered them to return to a rendezvous some
two thousand miles in the east.
Chep Noyon died on the way, but the Mongols
153 GENGHIS KHAN
turned aside long enough to invade and devastate the
Bulgars, who were then on the Volga.
It was an amazing march, and probably it remains
to-day the greatest feat of cavalry in human annals.
It could only have been accomplished by men of
remarkable endurance, utterly confident in their own
powers.
" Have you never heard," cries the Persian chron-
icler, " that a band of men from the place where the
sun rises, overrode the earth to the Caspian Gates,
carrying destruction among peoples and sowing death
in its passage ? Then, returning to its master it
arrived sound and hale, loaded with booty. And this
in less than two years."
This gallop of two divisions to the end of ninety
degrees of longitude bore strange fruit. Beside the
warriors rode the savants of Cathay and the Ugurs,
Nestorian Christians among them. At least we hear
of Mohammedan merchants with an eye for trade, who
sold Christian ecclesiastical manuscripts to some of the
horde.
And Subotai did not ride blindly. The Cathayans
and Ugurs noted down the positions of the rivers they
crossed, and of lakes that yielded fish of salt mines
and silver mines. Post stations were planted along the
route darogas appointed in captured districts. With
the fighting Mongol came the administrative man-
darin. A captive Armenian bishop he was kept to
read and. write letters for them tells us that in the
lands beneath the Caucasus, a census was made of
all men over the age of ten.
Subotai had discovered the vast pasture lands of
southern Russia, the black earth region. He rcmcm-
GENGHIS KHAN 153
bcrcd these steppes. Years later he returned from the
other side of the world to overrun Moscow. And he
took up his march again where he had been called
back by the Khan, crossing the Dnieper to invade
eastern Europe.*
And the Genoese and Venetian merchants were
brought into contact with the Mongols. A generation
later the Polos, of Venice, set out for the dominion of
the Grand Khan,*f
* See Note VIII, Subntai B,iha*t See Note IX, \Vhat Europe thought of the Mongols, page 236.
CHAPTER XVII
GENGHIS KHAN GOES HUNTING
WHILE the two Orkhons were raiding the west
of the Caspian sea, two sons of the Khan
journeyed to the other inland sea, now known as the
Aral. They had been sent forth to gather news of
the Shah and to cut off his return. Learning at length
that he was in his grave, they followed the wide Amu
through its clay steppes to the native city of the
Kharesmians.
Here the Mongols settled down to a long and
bitter siege, in which lacking large stones for their
casting machines, they hewed massive tree trunks into
blocks and soaked the wood until heavy enough for
their purpose. In the hand-to-hand fighting that
lasted within the walls for a week, the chroniclers say
they used flaming naphtha a new weapon that they
must have picked up among the Mohammedans, who
had handled it with devastating effect against the
crusaders of Europe. Urgench fell, and they trotted
back with their captives and spoil to the headquarters
of the Khan, but Jelal ed-Din, the valiant son of a
weak father, escaped to lead fresh forces against
them.
Meanwhile Genghis Khan withdrew his warriors
from the lowlands during the heat of the summer
a burning, sultry heat that distressed the men accus-
GENGHIS KHAN 155
tomed to the high altitudes of the Gobi. He led them
up into the cooler ranges beyond the Amu.
To keep them occupied while the horse herds grazed
and with an eye to discipline he issued an order
for the favourite pastime of the horde, a season's hunt.
A Mongol hunt was no less than a regular cam-
paign, against beasts instead of men. The whole horde
shared in it, and its rules had been laid down by the
Khan himself, which meant that they were inexor-
able.
Juchi, the Master of Hunting, being absent on
duty, his lieutenant galloped off to survey and mark
several hundred miles of hills. Streamers were planted
for the starting points of the various regiments.
Beyond the horizon the gurtai^ or closing point of
the hunt, was chosen and likewise marked.
Witness then, the squadrons of the horde, in high
fettle, moving off to right and left, bivouacking under
the orders of the hunters, waiting the arrival of the
Khan and the fanfare of horns and cymbals that would
start them off. They were thus arranged in a shallow
half-circle, covering perhaps eighty miles or so of
countryside.
The Khan appearing with his higher officers, and
princes and youthful grandsons, the riders mounted,
forming a close-knit line, sometimes two ranks deep.
They carried all weapons and equipment used against
human enemies, with the addition of wicker shields.
The horses surged forward, the officers dropped
behind their commands, and the rousing of the
animals began. The warriors were forbidden to use
their arms against the animals, and it was a real dis-
grace to allow any four-footed thing to slip through
i$6 GENGHIS KHAN
the line of riders. They crushed through thickets,
beat up gullies and climbed hillocks, shouting and
cjamouring when a tiger or wolf was seen sliding out
of the brush.
Matters went a little harder in the night. After the
first month of the hunt, great numbers of animals were
massing ahead of the half-circle of humans. The
warriors went into camp, lighted fires, posted sentries.
There was even the usual password. Officers went the
rounds. No easy matter to keep a line of pickets when
all the four-footed life of the mountains was astir in
front of them eyes glowing from the ground, the
howling of wolves and the spitting snarl of leopards
breaking through the silence.
Harder still a month later, when the circle had
drawn in a little and the multitude of animals began to
feel it was being driven. No relaxing the rigour of
the hunt. If a fox went to earth it must be dug out
again with mattocks ; if a bear trundled into a hole
in the rocks, someone must go in after it without
injuring the bear ! Many a chance here for the young
warriors to show their skill and fearlessness, especially
if a solitary tusked boar or a herd turned and
rushed the line of riders.
One part of the line encountered the wide bend of
a river, and was held up. Straightway couriers were
sent speeding along the half-circle of the hunters,
with orders to hold back the rest of the line until the
river could be crossed. The driven beasts were
already over, for the most part.
The warriors urged in their horses, and slipped
from the saddles, clinging to mane or tail. Some laced
up their leather kits air-tight and used them as rude
GENGHIS KHAN 157
floats. Once on the far bank they mounted again,
and the hunt went forward.
Here and there appeared the old Khan, watching
the behaviour of the men, and the way the officers
handled them. He said nothing during the hunt, but
he remembered such details.
Guided by the huntsmen, the half-circle closed its
wings, nearing the gurtat. The beasts began to feel
the pressure deer leaping into view with quivering
flanks, tigers turning this way and that, heads lowered,
snarling. Out of sight, beyond the gurfai, the circle
was closed, tightening around the game. The brazen
clamour of cymbals and the roar of shouting grew
louder ; the ranks formed two and three deep ; the
Khan, riding up to the mass of men and frantic
beasts, gave a signal. The riders parted to let him
through.
By old custom the Khan was to be first among the
cornered beasts. He carried a bare sword in one hand,
his bow in the other. It was permissible to use weapons
now. The chroniclers say that he picked out the more
dangerous of the brute antagonists, launching his
arrows at a tiger, or reining his horse against wolves.
When he had killed several beasts, he withdrew
from the ring, riding up a hill overlooking the gurtai
and sitting there under a pavilion to watch the exploits
of the princes and officers who next entered. It was
a Mongol arena, the gladiatorial games of the nomads,
and as with the gladiators of Rome not a few who
entered the arena were carried from it mangled or
lifeless.
When the signal for the general slaying was giveo,
the warriors of the horde surged forward, taking what
15* GENGHIS KHAN
lay in their path. A whole day might pass in this
slaughter of game until the grandsons and boy
princes of the horde came, as custom required, to the
Khan to beg that the surviving animals should be
allowed to live. This request was granted, and the
hunters turned to gather up the carcases.
This hunting trained the warriors, and the closing
in of the ring of riders was used in warfare against
human beings as well.
In this year and in an enemy country, the hunt
lasted no longer than four months. The Khan wished
to be ready for the autumn campaign, and to meet
Juchi and Chatagai, returning from the inland sea
with word of the death of the Shah.
Until now the Mongols had marched almost with-
out interruption through Islam. They had crossed
rivers, and taken cities, as swiftly as a modern traveller
with servants and a caravan might pass from place to
place. Mohammed the Warrior, too ambitious in the
beginning, too fearful in the end, had abandoned his
people to try to save himself and had earned thereby
only ignominy and a beggar's grave.
Like the emperor of Cathay, he had thrown his
armies into cities to escape the Mongol cavalry that
remained invisible until the hour of battle and then
manoeuvred in terrible silence in obedience to the
signals given by moving the standards signals that
were repeated to the warriors of a squadron by the
arm movements of an officer. This, during the day
and in the din of conflict when the human voice could
not be heard and cymbals and kettle drums might be
mistaken for the enemy's instruments. At night such
signals were given by the raising and lowering of
GENGHIS KHAN 159
coloured lanterns near the tugh or standard of the
commander.
After the first rush upon the northern line of the
Syr, Genghis Khan had concentrated his columns on
what he thought to be the chief cities of the empire,
Bokhara and Samarkand. He had broken this second
line of defence without serious trouble, and had
concentrated the horde again in what might be called
the third line the fertile hills of northern Persia and
Afghanistan.
So far the struggle between Mongol and Turk
unbeliever and Mohammedan had been utterly
disastrous for the latter. The Mongols appeared to the
dismayed Turks to be an incarnation of divine wrath
in all truth, a scourge visited upon them for their
sins.
Genghis Khan was at some pains to encourage this
belief. He had also taken care to clear his flanks to
the east, riding himself through the tablelands around
the Amu head-waters, and sending other divisions to
occupy the cities in the west that Chepd Noyon and
Subotai had passed by sending back a report of
them to the Khan. This done, he had made himself
master of Balkh and had devoted a summer to the
great hunt near by.
Here he occupied the trade routes in the centre of
the Mohammedan peoples. He had been gathering
information all this while, and he knew now that there
were forces still untouched to be dealt with, and greater
powers beyond the horizon. As the Chinese had done,
the population of Islam was arming against him.
Their Shah lost to them, and two of his sons killed in
battle against the Mongols, they began to muster
160 GENGHIS KHAN
under their natural leaders, the Persian princes and
the sayyids, the descendants of a warrior prophet.
Genghis Khan was quite aware of his situation. He
knew that the real test of strength was before him
that perhaps a million men, good horsemen and
exceedingly well armed, were now ready to move
against him. For the present they lacked a leader and
they were scattered throughout a dozen kingdoms, in
a circle around him.
The horde, in the beginning of this second year,
could not have numbered more than twelve tumans^
somewhat more than a hundred thousand. The Idikut
of the Ugurs and the Christian king of Almalykhad
asked leave to go back to the T'ian shan with their
forces, and he had given them permission to do so.
His best leaders, Chepe Noyon and Subotai, were in
the west, with two tumans. Tilik Noyon, the most
dependable of his remaining Orkhons, had been killed
in the assault of Nisapur. Muhuli, of course, was
occupied in Cathay. The fellowship of the Orkhons
had thinned, and Genghis Khan felt the need of
Subotai's counsel.
So he sent for his favourite general, all the way to
the Caspian. Subotai came back to Balkh in answer
to the summons, and talked for a few days with the
Khan, then galloped back to his headquarters a
thousand miles away.
The mood of the Khan had changed and he no
longer. thought of hunting. He reproached his eldest
son Juchi angrily for the quarrel that had delayed the
capture of Urgench or perhaps for allowing Jelal
ed-Din to escape. And the wayward and defiant
Juchi was sent from the horde. With his household
GENGHIS KHAN 161
troops, he rode north into the steppes beyond the sea
of Aral.
Then Genghis Khan ordered the horde forth, no
longer to manoeuvre and pillage with half-indifferent
contempt of theii foes, but to destroy the man-power
that existed around him.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE GOLDEN THRONE OF TULI
" T WAS living," relates the chronicle of a prince
JL of Khorassan, " at the time in my citadel on a
high and stony mountainside. It was one of the
strongest of Khorassan, and if tradition is to be
believed belonged to my ancestors since Islamism
was brought into these lands. As it is near the centre
of the province, it served as asylum to escaped prisoners
and to inhabitants who fled from captivity or death
at the hands of the Tatars.
" After some time the Tatars appeared before it.
When they saw that they could not take it, they
demanded as the price of their withdrawal ten thousand
robes of cotton cloth, and a quantity of other things
although they were already gorged with the sack
of Nesa.
" I consented to this. But when it came to carrying
the ransom out to them, no one could be found to
undertake it, because everyone knew that their Khan
made a practice of slaying whosoever came into their
hands. Finally two old men offered themselves,
bringing me their children and commending them to
my care if they should lose their lives. Actually, the
Tatars did slay them before leaving.
" Soon these barbarians spread all through Khor-
assan. When they arrived in a district they drove
162
GENGHIS KHAN i6j
before them the peasantry, and brought the captives
to the city they wished to take, using them in working
the siege-engines. Fright and desolation became all-
pervading. The man who had been made captive
was more tranquil than the one who waited in his
house, not knowing what his fate would be. Chieftains
and nobles were obliged to go with their vassals and
war machines. Everyone who did not obey was,
without exception, put to the point of the sword."
It was Tuli, the youngest son of the Khan, Master
of War, who thus invaded the fertile provinces of
Persia. He had been ordered by his father to look for
Jelal ed-Din, but the Kharesmian prince evaded him,
and the Mongol army marched against Merv the
jewel of the sands, the pleasure city of the Shahs. It
stood on the River of Birds, the Murgh Ab y and
sheltered in its libraries many thousand volumes of
manuscript.
The Mongols discovered a roving column of Turko-
mans in the vicinity, scattered them, and Tuli made
the round of the walls with his officers, studying the
defences. The Mongol lines were drawn up closer,
the investment completed ; the cattle of the Turko-
mans were turned out to graze.
Angered by the loss of a thousand of his best men
imperial guardsmen of the Khan Tuli launched
storm after storm against the wall of Merv, building
an embankment of earth against the rampart and
covering his onset with flights of arrows. For twenty-
two days this went on, and during the lull that followed,
an imam was sent out to the Mongols, who received
him with all courtesy and returned him safely to
his lines.
164 GENGHIS KHAN
This man of religion, it appears, had not come on
behalf of the city itself but on behest of the governor,
a certain Mcrik. Reassured, the governor went forth
to the Mongol tents bearing with him rich gifts of
silver vessels and jewelled robes.
Tuli, a master of deceit, had a robe of honour sent
to Merik, and invited him to his own tent to dine.
There he convinced the Persian that he would be
spared.
" Summon then thy friends and chosen com-
panions/* Tuli suggested. " I will find work for them
to do, and will honour them."
Merik despatched a servant to bring out his
intimates, who were seated beside the governor at the
feast. Tuli then asked for a list of the six hundred
richest men of Merv, and the governor and his
intimates obediently wrote out the names of the
wealthiest landholders and merchants. Then, before
the horrified Merik, his companions were strangled
by the Mongols. The list of the six hundred names in
the governor's handwriting was taken to the gate of
Merv by one of Tuli's officers, who demanded the
persons in question.
In due course, they appeared and were placed under
guard. The Mongols made themselves masters of the
gate, and their bands of horsemen pushed into the
streets of Merv. All the inhabitants were ordered out
into the plain with their families and such goods as
they could carry. This evacuation lasted four days.
In the midst of the multitude of captives Tuli sat
watching, from his chair on a gilded dais. His officers
singled out the leaders of the Persian soldiery and
brought them before him. While the others looked
GENGHIS KHAN 165
on, helpless, the heads were cut from the officers of
Merv.
Then the men, women and children were separated
into three masses the men forced to lie down, their
arms across their backs. All this unhappy multitude
was divided among the Mongol warriors who strangled
and slashed them to death, excepting only four
hundred craftsmen who were needed by the horde,
and some children to be kept as slaves. The six hun-
dred wealthy inhabitants fared little better being
tortured until they led the Mongols to where they
had hidden their most precious possessions.
The vacant dwellings were ransacked by the
Mongols, the walls razed to the ground, and Tuli
drew off. The only survivors of the city, apparently,
were some five thousand Mohammedans who had
concealed themselves in cellars and conduits, and these
did not live long. Some troops of the horde returned
to the city, hunted them down and left the place
empty of human life.
In this fashion, one by one, sister cities were tricked
and stormed. At one place some people saved them-
selves by lying down among the knots of bodies of
those already slain. The Mongols heard of this, and
an order was issued to cut the heads from the inhabi-
tants in future. In the ruins of another city some few
score of Persians managed to survive. A troop of
Mongols was sent back with orders to exterminate
the survivors. The nomads went into camp and tracked
and hunted down the miserable people with less
compunction than if they had been animals.
It was, in fact, very much like the hunting of the
166 GENGHIS KHAN
animals. Every trick of ingenuity was called into
play to root out human beings. In the ruins of one
place the Mongols forced a captive muezzin to cry
the summons to prayer from a minaret. The Moham-
medans, lurking in their hiding places, came forth
in the belief that the terrible invaders had left. They
were destroyed.
When the Mongols abandoned the site of a city
they trampled and burned whatever crops might be
left standing so that those who escaped their swords
would starve to death. At Urgench, where the long
defence had made them suffer, they actually went to
the trouble to dam up the river above the citadel,
altering its course so it flowed over the debris of
houses and walls. This changing of the course of the
Amu puzzled geographers for a long time.
Such details are too horrible to dwell upon to-day.
It was war carried to its utmost extent an extent
that was very nearly approached in the last European
war. It was the slaughter of human beings without
hatred simply to make an end of them.
It made a tabula rasa of the heart of Islam. The
survivors of the massacres lived on so shaken in spirit
that they cared for nothing except to find food and
to hide, too fearful to leave the weed-grown debris
until the wolves who came to the unburied dead
exterminated them or drove them away. Such sites
of destroyed cities were forbidden to human beings
-a scar on the face of a once fertile earth. More than
once earth was ploughed into the ruins, and grain
planted.
The nomads, valuing human life less than the soil
that could nourish grain and beasts, were eradicating
GENGHIS KHAN 167
the cities. Genghis Khan had paralysed the growing
movement of rebellion had broken resistance
before it could form against him. He would allow
no mercy.
" I forbid you," he said to his Orkhons, " to show
demcncy to my enemies without an express order
from me. Rigour alone keeps such spirits dutiful.
An enemy conquered is not subdued, and will always
hate his new master."
He had not used such measures in the Gobi, nor
such utter cruelty in Cathay. Here, in the world of
Islam, he showed himself a veritable scourge. He
reproved Tuli bitterly for sparing the inhabitants of
Herat with the exception of ten thousand partisans
of the Sultan Jelal ed-Din. And, in fact, Herat did
rebel against its yoke, putting to death its Mongol
governor.
Other cities flared up for a moment when the
youthful sultan visited them and harangued them. But
the squadrons of the Khan were soon at their gates.
The fate of Herat was not less hideous than that of
Merv. The embers of resistance were stamped out in
terrible fashion. For the moment a real danger had
shown itself the jihad, or holy war.
In whispers now the devout Mohammedans called
the Mongol the " Accursed." The fire of frenzy
died down. The men of Islam had a leader, but the
centre of their world lay in ruins, and Jclal ed-Din,
who alone could have held them together, and taken
the field against the old conqueror, was chivvied round
the borders by the Mongol corps of observation, and
given neither time nor opportunity for assembling
an army.
168 GENGHIS KHAN
When the second summer came with its heat, the
Khan led the greater portion of his horde up into the
forested heights of the Hindu Kush, above the
scorched valleys. Here he allowed them to build rest
camps. The captives, nobles and slaves, judges and
beggars, were set to work to raise wheat. There was
no hunt this time. Sickness had taken too great a
toll of the horde.
Here they could rest for a month or so in the silk
pavilions of vanquished courts. The sons of Turkish
atabegs and Persian amirs were their cup-bearers. The
fairest women of Islam went about the camps unveiled,
watched with haggard eyes by the labourers of the
wheat fields, who had only the remnants of garments
to cover their limbs, and must snatch their food with
the dogs when the warriors ordered them to be fed.
Wild Turkomans, robbers of the caravans, came
down from the heights to fraternize with the invaders
and stare at the silver and gold and the endless
embroidered garments that were heaped under sheds,
waiting to be carried back to the Gobi. Physicians
a novelty to the nomads were here to tend the
sick, and learned men to dispute with the Cathayans
while the marauders of the Gobi listened tolerantly,
half understanding and little caring.
But for Genghis Khan there was the endless task of
administration. Couriers came to him from the
Orkhons in Cathay, and from Subotai in the Russian
steppes. . While he was directing military operations
on these two fronts, he must keep in touch with the
council of the khans in the Gobi.
Not content with messages, Genghis Khan made
his Chinese councillors come to him in the Hindu
GENGHIS KHAN 169
Kush, and however they may have relished the wild
ride along cliff paths and over the desert beds- no one
complained.
To open up these new roads between east and west,
the Khan devised the yam or Mongol horse-post
the pony express of thirteenth-century Asia.
CHAPTER XIX
THE ROAD MAKERS
FOR generations the Gobi clansmen had been
accustomed to pass news from tent village to
tent village by mounted messenger. When a man
galloped up with a summons to war, or a bit of gossip,
someone in the ordu would saddle his horse and relay
the tidings to friends in the distance. These messengers
were accustomed to ride fifty or sixty miles during
the day.
As Genghis Khan extended his conquests, it was
necessary to improve the yam. At first, like most of
his expedients for government, it was purely a matter
for the army. Permanent camps were made at intervals
along the line of march, and a string of horses left at
each, with youths to tend them, and a few warriors to
keep off thieves. Where the horde had once passed,
no stronger guard was necessary.
These camps a few yurts, a shed for hay and sacks
of barley in winter were perhaps a hundred miles
apart, strung along the caravan roads. Up and down
this line of communication went the treasure bearers,
carrying back to Karakorum the jewels, the gold
ornaments, the best of the jade and enamel ware, and
the great rubies of Badakshan.
Over these roads the gleanings of the horde were
sent to the homeland in the Gobi. It must have been
170
GENGHIS KHAN 171
an ever-growing wonder to the nomad settlements,
when each month brought its load of rarities and
human beings from unknown regions. Especially
when warriors who had served in Khorassan or at the
edge of the inland seas rode back to sit by the yurt
fires and relate the deeds and incredible victories of
their hordes.
Nothing, perhaps, seemed incredible to the dwellers
at home who had grown accustomed to having treasures
brought by captured camels to their tent entrances.
What did the women think of the undreamed-of
luxuries, or the old men ponder as to the ride of the
Orkhons out of the world as they knew it ? What
became of the riches ? How did the Mongol women
make use of the pearl-sewn veils of Persia ?
How greatly did the herdsmen and boys envy
these returning veterans who led strings of Arab
racers, and displayed from their saddlebags the silver-
worked armour of a prince or atabeg i
The Mongols have left us no record of such
experiences. But we know that they accepted the
victories of the Khan as a matter predestined. Was he
not the Lord Bogdo, the sending from the gods, the
maker of laws ? Why should he not take what portion
of the earth pleased him ?
Genghis Khan, apparently, did not attribute his
victories to any celestial intervention. He did say,
more than once, " There is only one sun in the sky,
and one strength of Heaven. Only one Kha Khan
should be upon the earth. "
The veneration of his Buddhists he accepted with-
out comment ; he acquiesced in the role of the
Scourge of God bestow ed upon him by the Moham-
172 GENGHIS KHAN
mcdans he even reminded them of it when he saw
something to be gained by so doing. He listened to
the urging of the astrologers, but made his own plans.
Unlike Napoleon, there was nothing of the fatalist
in him ; nor did he assume, as Alexander had done,
the attributes of a god. He set about the task of ruling
half the world with the same inflexible purpose and
patience he had devoted to tracking down a stray
horse in his youth.
He viewed titles with a utilitarian eye. Once he
ordered a letter to be written to a Mohammedan
prince on his frontier. The letter was composed by a
Persian scribe who put in all the imposing titles and
flattery beloved of the Iranians. When the missive
was read over to Genghis Khan, the old Mongol
shouted with rage and ordered it to be destroyed.
" Thou hast written foolishly," he said to the scribe.
" That prince would have thought I feared him."
And he dictated to another of his writers one of
his customary messages, brief and peremptory, and
signed " The KAa Khan."
To keep up communication between his armies,
Genghis Khan knit together the old caravan routes.
Officers paused at the post stations to show their
falcon tablets and to have shaggy ponies led in from
the herd. Bearded Cathayans, wrapped in voluminous
quilted coats, trotted up in two-wheeled curtained
carts, and their servants broke off bits of the precious
tea bricks to prepare over the fire. Here paused the
Ugur savants now part and parcel of the horde in
their high velvet hats and yellow cloaks thrown over
one shoulder.
GENGHIS KHAN 173
Past the yam station plodded the endless lines of
camels of the caravans. They carried the woven
stuffs and ivory and all the goods of Islam's merchants
into the desert.
The yam was telegraph, railroad and parcel-post
all in one. It enabled newcomers from unknown
regions to seek the Mongols in the Gobi. Thin-faced
Jews led along the post road their laden donkeys and
carts ; sallow, square-chinned Armenians rode by
with a curious glance at the silent Mongol soldiers
sitting on their blankets by the fire, or sleeping under
an opened tent flap.
These Mongols were masters of the roads. In the
large towns, there would be a daroga^ or road governor,
with absolute authority in his district. With him
would be a clerk, to write down the personages who
called at the station, and the merchandise that went by.
The guards at the stations were so few as to be
little more than an escort for the station-master. Their
duties were light. Whatever they requisitioned from
the countryside must be forthcoming. A Mongol had
only to show himself, on his long-haired pony, with
the slender lance slung over his shoulder and his
lacquered armour peering from under his sable or
deerskin coat for the bystanders to hasten to him
submissively. The usual petty thieves of Asia did not
put in appearance. Who would dare plunder even a
horse-rope from a Mongol guard post, no matter how
seemingly sleepy and indifferent ?
At these posts halted the weary bands of Moham-
medan craftsmen, carpenters, musicians, brick makers,
smiths, sword welders, or rug weavers captives
Karakorum-bound, shivering and stumbling as they
174 GENGHIS KHAN
crossed the wastes of the inland seas, with no more
than a solitary rider of the horde as guard and guide.
What chance of escape had they ?
Past these posts hastened other curious bands.
Yellow hat lamas, swinging their prayer wheels, their
eyes fixed on remote snow summits black hats, from
the barren slopes of Tibet the smiling, slant-eyed
Buddhist pilgrims, bound to spend their years in
seeking the paths once followed by their Holy One.
Barefoot ascetics, long-haired fakirs indifferent to the
world about them, and grey-garbed Ncstorian priests,
very full of things magical but remembering only
snatches of prayer and ritual.
And often came a rider on a powerful, sweat-
streaked horse, scattering priests and mandarins, and
crying out one word shrilly as he reined in by the
yurts. This man carried despatches for the Khan, and
he covered a hundred and fifty miles a day without
rest. For him the best horse of the station was led
out swiftly.
Such was the yam, and two generations later Marco
Polo described it as he saw it in his journey to Kam-
balu,* which was then the city of the Khans.
" Now you must know that the messengers of the
Emperor travelling from Kambalu find at every
twenty-five miles of the journey a station which they
call the Horse Post House. And at each of these
stations there is a large and handsome building for
* Khan baligh, the City of the King. Kubilai Khan, who was emperor
in Marco Polo's time, resided in the Chinese capital. " Chandu " is Shanda
the " Xanadu " of Coleridge's poem.
" In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
Where Alph the sacred river ran "
Marco Polo relates that it took him six days' travel from Chandu to Kambalu,
and his marches must have been long ones.
GENGHIS KHAN 175
them to put up at. All the rooms are furnished with
fine beds and rich silks. If even a king were to arrive
at one of these houses, he would find himself well
lodged.
" At some of these stations there shall be four
hundred horses, at others two hundred. Even when
the messengers have to pass through a roadless tract
where no hostel stands, still the stations are to be
found, although at a greater interval, and they are
provided with all necessaries so that the Emperor's
messengers, come from what region they may, find
everything ready for them.
" Never had emperor, king, or lord such wealth
as this manifests. For in all these posts there are
300,000 horses kept up, and the buildings are more
than 10,000 in number. The thing is on a scale so
wonderful that it is hard to bring oneself to describe it.
" In this way the emperor receives despatches from
places ten days* journey off in one day and night.
Many a time fruit shall be gathered at Kambalu one
morning and in the evening of the next day it shall
reach the Grand Khan at Chandu. The Emperor
exempts these men from all tribute and pays them
besides.
" Moreover there are men in these stations who,
when there is a call for great haste, travel a good two
hundred or two hundred and fifty miles in the day
and as much in the night.* Every one of these messen-
gers wears a great wide belt set all over with bells, so
that their bells are heard jingling a long way off.
And thus on reaching the post the messenger finds
* This is probably an error. The account given here is quoted, slightly
condensed, from the Yule-Cordier edition of Marco Polo.
GENGHIS KHAN
another man similarly equipped who instantly takes
over whatsoever he has in charge, and with it receives
a slip of paper from the clerk, who is always on hand
for the purpose. The clerk at each of the posts notes
the time of each courier's arrival and departure.
" They take a horse from those at the station which
are standing ready saddled, all fresh and in wind,
and mount and go at full speed. And when those at
the next post hear the bells they get ready another
horse. And the speed at which they go is marvellous.
By night, however, they can not go as fast as by day,
because they have to be accompanied by footmen with
torches.
" These couriers are highly prized ; and they could
never do it did they not bind hard the stomach, head
and chest with strong bands. And each of them carries
with him a gerfalcon tablet in sign that he is bound
on an urgent express ; so that if perchance his horse
break down, he is empowered to dismount whomso-
ever he may fall in with on the road, and take his
horse. Nobody dares refuse in such case."
The post roads were the backbone of the Khan's
administration. The Mongol daroga of each town
naturally had the task of keeping up the string of
horses, and levying supplies from the vicinity. Besides,
in places not actually at war with the Khan, there
was tribute to be paid to the horde. The Tassa, the
Code of the Khan, became the law of the land, re-
placing the Koran and the Mohammedan judges.
A census was taken.
Priests and preachers of every faith were exempt
from the tax. So ran the Yassa. All horses taken over
GENGHIS KHAN 17?
by the horde were branded with the mark of the
owner, the Khan having a different brand.
To keep the census rolls, and the records of the
daroga* the industrious Chinese or Ugurs set up the
amen or government house. Beside the Mongol
governor some dignitary of the conquered district
was allowed to hold office. He served to give the
Mongols information they needed, and to act as
go-between.
But to a venerable sheikh in one province Genghis
Khan gave a tiger tablet of authority. The sheikh
could undo all the darogas did could save the con-
demned from death. This shadow of authority
extended by the Khan to the native rulers lightened
the reign of terror. The time had not come yet, but
would soon come, when the conquered peoples could
invoke the Tassa as well as the Mongols. Above all
things, the Mongol was consistent. After the throes
of the first military occupation, he often proved a
tolerant master.
But Genghis Khan spared little thought for any-
thing except the army, the new roads, and the wealth
that was flowing out of a conquered world to his
people. The officers of the horde now wore the finest
Turkish chain mail, and their swords were of Damascus
forging. Except for his constant curiosity as to new
weapons and new knowledge, the Khan heeded little
the luxury of Islam. He kept the dress and the
habits of the Gobi.
He could be indulgent at times. But he was
moody and intent on finishing the half-completed
work of conquest. His terrible flashes of temper were
frequent. He made quite a favourite of a peculiarly
178 GENGHIS KHAN
hideous-looking physician of Samarkand, who treated
his eyes for him. The man, waxing bold in the
Khan's tolerance, began to be something of a nuisance
to the Mongol officers. He asked for a particular
singing girl of beauty who had been captured in the
storming of Urgench.
The Khan, amused by his insistence, ordered the
girl to be given to him. The ugliness of the physician
proved distasteful to the beautiful captive, and the
man of Samarkand came to the Khan again, to plead
that she should be made to obey him. This angered
the old Mongol, who launched into a tirade on
men who could not enforce obedience, and who
turned traitor. Then he had the physician put
to death.
In this autumn Genghis Khan had summoned the
higher officers to the usual council, but Juchi, his
eldest son, had not come had sent instead a gift of
horses with the explanation that he was sick.
Some of the princes of the horde disliked Juchi,
held up to him the stigma of his birth, called him
" Tatar." And they pointed out to the Khan that his
eldest son had disobeyed the summons to the kurultai.
The old Mongol sent for the officer who had brought
the horses and asked whether Juchi were really
sick.
" I do not know," the man from Kipchak answered,
" but he was hunting when I left him."
Angered, the Khan retired to his tent, and his
officers expected that he would march against Juchi,
who had committed the crime of disobedience.
Instead, he dictated a message to one of his writers,
and gare it to a courier who started west. He was
GENGHIS KHAN 179
not willing to divide the horde, and very probably
he hoped that his son would not rebel against him,
because he had ordered Subotai to return from
Europe,* and to bring Juchi to his headquarters,
wherever he might be.
*Sce Note X, Correspondence between the European Monarchs
the Mongols, page 2 39.
CHAPTER XX
THE BATTLE ON THE INDUS
THERE was little time for anything except action
that eventful autumn. Herat and the other
cities rose against the conquerors. Jelal ed-Din was
mustering an army in the east so messages from the
corps of observation along the Hindu Kush reported.
Genghis Khan was planning to send Tuli, his most
dependable leader, after the Kharesmian prince, when
he heard of the rising in Herat. Instead, he sent Tuli
west into Khorassan with several divisions.
Genghis Khan took the field with 60,000 men to
find and destroy the new Kharesmian army. He found
in his path the strong city of Bamiyan in the Koh-i-
Baba ranges. He settled down to invest it, sending the
greater part of his forces under another Orkhon to
meet Jclal ed-Din.
In due course couriers arrived at Bamiyan with
word that Jclal ed-Din had 60,000 men with him
that the Mongol general had come in contact with
him, and had avoided several attempts of the Kharcs-
mians to ambush him. Scouts were watching the
movements of the redoubtable prince.
What had happened was that an Afghan army had
joined Jelal ed-Din in this crisis, doubling his strength.
Word came in not long after that the Turks and
180
GENGHIS KHAN 1*1
Afghans had defeated the Mongol Orkhon, driving
his men into the mountains.
i Genghis Khan turned with new fury to the city
before him. The defenders had laid bare all the
district, even removing the large stones that could be
used in siege engines. The Mongols had not the usual
equipment with them, and their wooden towers, raised
against the walls, were fired by arrows and flaming
naphtha until the cattle were slaughtered and their
hides used to cover the wood frames.
The Khan ordered an assault the storm that is not
to be abandoned until the city is taken. At this point
one of his grandsons, who had followed him under
the walls, was killed. The old Mongol ordered the
body of the child whom he had liked for his courage
to be carried back to the tents.
He urged on the assault, and, throwing off his
helmet, pushed through his ranks until he was at the
head of a storming party. They gained footing in a
breach, and Bamiyan fell to them not long after.
Every living being was slain within its walls, and
mosques and palaces pulled down. Even the Mongols
spoke of Bamiyan as Mou-batigh> the City of Sorrow.
But Genghis Khan left it at once to assemble his
scattered divisions. They were feeling their way
toward him through the hills, not much the worse
for their drubbing. The Khan rallied them, and praised
their devotion. Instead of blaming the unhappy
Orkhon who had been worsted by Jelal ed-Din, he
rode back with him over the scene of the action,
asking what had happened and pointing out the
mistakes he had made.
The Kharesmian prince did not prove himself &s
182 GENGHIS KHAN
able in victory as he had been sturdy in defeat. He
had his moment of exultation when his men tortured
to death the Mongol prisoners and divided up the
captured horses and weapons ; but the Afghans
quarrelled with his officers and left him.
Genghis Khan was on the march against him, after
detaching an army to watch the movements of the
Afghans. Jelal ed-Din retreated east to Ghazna, but
the Mongols were hard after him. He sent messengers
to summon new allies, but these found that the
Mongols had guarded the mountain passes. With
his thirty thousand men Jelal ed-Din hurried down
through the foothills and out upon the valley of the
Indus.
His hope was to cross the river and league himself
with the sultans of Delhi. But the Mongols, who had
been five days behind him at Ghazna, were now
within half a day's ride. Genghis Khan had barely
allowed his men to dismount to cook their food.
Desperate now, the Kharesmian prince hastened to
the river, found that he had come to a place where
the Indus was too swift and deep for the crossing, and
turned at bay, his left flank protected by a mountain
ridge, his right by a bend of the river.
The chivalry of Islam, hunted out of its own lands,
prepared to measure its strength against the inexorable
Mongol. Jelal ed-Din ordered all the boats along the
bank to be destroyed, so his men would not think of
fleeing. His position was strong, but he must hold it
or be annihilated.
At dawn the Mongols advanced all along the line.
They had emerged out of the darkness in formation,
Genghis Khan with his standard, and the ten thousand
GENGHIS KHAN 183
cavalry of the imperial guard in reserve behind the
centre. These, at first, were not engaged.
The impetuous Kharesmian prince was the first to
send his men forward. His right wing always the
strongest division in a Mohammedan army of that
day under Emir Malik skirmished with the left of
the Khan, and drove home a charge along the bank
of the Indus that forced the Mongols back at this
point. They scattered into squadrons as usual, re-
formed under one of the Khan's sons, and were forced
back again.
On their right, the Mongols had been checked by
the barrier of the lofty and barren ridges, and here
they halted. Jelal ed-Din detached forces from this
part of his line to aid the advancing right wing of
Emir Malik. And later in the day he withdrew still
more squadrons from the defenders of the mountain
to strengthen his centre.
Determined to risk everything in one cast of
fortune, he charged with the elite of his host, straight
into the Mongol centre, cutting through to the
standard, seeking the Khan. The old Mongol was
not there. His horse had been killed under him
and he had mounted another and gone elsewhere.
It was a moment of apparent victory for the
Kharesmian, and the ululation of the Mohammedans
rose above the din of beating hoofs, the grinding of
steel, and the cries of the wounded.
The Mongol centre, badly shaken by the charge,
kept on fighting stubbornly. Genghis Khan had
noticed the withdrawal of nearly all the Kharesmian
left wing, posted on the heights. He ordered a tuman
commander, Bela Noyon, to go with the guides he
184; GENGHIS KHAN
had been questioning and to cross the mountain at all
costs. It was the old turning movement of the Mongols,
the standard-sweep.
The noyon with his men followed the guides into
sheer gorges and ascended cliff paths that seemed
impassable. Some of the warriors fell into the chasms,
but the greater part gained the ridge late in the day
and descended on the remnant of men left by Jelal
ed-Din to protect this point. Over the mountain
barrier the Kharesmian flank was turned. Bela Noyon
charged into the enemy camp.
Meanwhile Genghis Khan had taken the leadership
of his ten thousand heavy cavalry, and had gone
not to the menaced centre, but to the defeated left
wing. His charge against Emir Malik's forces routed
them. Wasting no time in following them up, the
Khan swung his squadrons about and drove them
against the flank of Jelal ed-Din 's troops of the centre.
He had cut off the wing by the river from the
Kharesmian prince.
The stout hearted but wearying Mohammedans had
been rendered helpless by the sagacity of the old
Mongol, and by manoeuvring as perfect as the final
moves of a checkmate. And the end came swiftly,
inexorably. > Jelal ed-Din made a last and hopeless
charge against the horsemen of the guard, and tried
to withdraw his men toward the river. He was followed
up, his squadrons broken ; Bela Noyon pressed in
upon him, and when he gained the steep bank of the
Indus at last, he had around him no more than seven
hundred followers.
Realizing that the end had come, he mounted a fresh
horse, rid himself of his armour, and with only his
GENGHIS KHAN 185
sword and bow and a quiver of arrows, he forced his
charger over the edge of the bank, plunging into
the swift current, and making for the distant shore.
Genghis Khan had given orders that the prince was
to be taken alive. The Mongols had drawn in upon
the last Kharesmians and the Khan lashed his horse
through the fighting to watch the rider he had seen
leap from the twenty-foot bank. For a while he gazed
in silence at Jelal ed-Din. Putting his finger to his
lips he uttered an ungrudged exclamation of praise.
" Fortunate should be the father of such a son ! "
Though he could admire the daring of the Khares-
mian prince, he did not intend to spare Jelal ed-Din.
Some of his Mongols wished to try to swim after
their foe, but the Khan would not allow this. He
watched Jelal ed-Din reach the far bank, in spite of
current and waves. The next day he sent a tuman in
pursuit where the river could be crossed, giving this
task to Bela Noyon, the same officer who had led a
division over the cliff paths to the Kharesmian camp.
Bela Noyon ravaged Multan and Lahore, picked
up the trail of the fugitive, but lost him among the
multitudes upon the way to Delhi. The oppressive
heat astonished the men from the Gobi plateau
and the noyon turned back at length, saying to the
Khan :
" The heat of this place slays men, and the water
is neither fresh nor clear/*
So India all except this northern segment was
spared the Mongol conquest. Jelal ed-Din survived,
but his moment had passed. He fought against the
horde again, but as a partisan, an adventurer without
a country.
i6 GENGHIS KHAN
The battle of the Indus was the last stand of the
Kharesmian chivalry. From Tibet to the Caspian sea
resistance had ceased, and the survivors of the peoples
of Islam had become the slaves of the conqueror. And
with the end of warfare, as in Cathay, the thoughts of
the old Mongol turned to his homeland.
" My sons will live to desire such lands and cities
as these," he said, " but I cannot/'
He was needed in far Asia. Muhuli had died after
binding more firmly the Mongol yoke upon the
Chinese ; in the Gobi the council of the khans was
restless and bickering ; in the kingdoms of Hia
rebellion smouldered. Genghis Khan led his horde
up the Indus. He knew that Hia, on the far slopes
of Tibet, could be no more than eight hundred miles
distant, when he entered the long valleys of Kashmir.
But, as Alexander had done before him, he found
the road blocked by the massifs of impenetrable
ranges. Wiser than Alexander in his disappointment,
he turned back without hesitation and set out to
retrace his steps around the Roof of the World, to the
caravan route that he had opened in his invasion.
He stormed Peshawar and route-marched back to
Samarkand. In the spring of 1220 he had first seen
the walls and gardens of Samarkand, and now, in the
autumn of 1 22 1, his task under the Roof of the World
had ended.
" It is time/ 1 the sage, Ye Liu Chutsai, agreed, " to
make an end of slaying."
When the horde left the last ruins of the south
behind them the Khan gave the accustomed order
to put to death all captives, and in this way perished
the unhappy multitude that had followed the nomads.
GENGHIS KHAN 187
The women of Mohammedan monarchs, who were
to be taken to the Gobi, were placed at the roadside
to wail the last sight of their native land.
For a moment, it seems, the old Mongol pondered
the meaning of his conquests.
" Dost thou think," he asked a savant of Islam,
" that the blood I have shed will be remembered
against me by mankind ? " He recalled the higher
wisdom of Cathay and Islam that he had tried to
understand, and had dismissed incuriously. " I have
pondered the wisdom of the sages. I see now I have
slain without knowledge of what to do rightly. But
what care I for such men ? "
To the refugees gathered in Samarkand, who came
out to meet him in fear, bringing gifts, he was kind.
He talked with them, explained anew the short-
comings of their late Shah, who had neither known
how to keep his promise nor defend his people. He
appointed governors from among them and extended
to them what might be called suffrage in the Mongol
dominion a share in the protection of the Tassa.
These people would be ruled, before very long, by
his sons.
The conqueror was feeling the bite of old wounds,
and seemed to understand that his time in the world
was approaching its end. He wished to have things in
order rebellion quenched, the Tassa enforced, and
his sons in authority.
He sent out over the post roads a summons to all
high officers to attend a great council on the river Syr,
near the spot where he had first entered Kharesm.
CHAPTER XXI
THE COURT OF THE PALADINS
THE place chosen for the gathering was a meadow
seven leagues in circuit a place ideal to a
Mongol's thinking because water fowl filled the marshes
by the river ; golden pheasants flitted through the
lush grass. Abundant grazing game to be hunted
over the downs. The time was early spring, the
customary month of the kurultat.
And, punctual to the summons, the leaders of the
hordes began to arrive. Only the industrious Subotai,
recalled from Europe, was a little late.
They came in from all the quarters of the four
winds, Eagles of the empire, generals from far fron-
tiers, roving tar-khans^ subject kings and ambassadors.
They had journeyed far to this Camelot of the nomad
peers. And they brought with them no mean retinue.
The kibitkas from Cathay were drawn by matched
yokes of oxen and covered with silk. On their plat-
forms fluttered captured banners.
The officers from the slopes of Tibet had their
covered wagons gilded and lacquered, drawn by lines
of ponderous, long-haired yaks with wide horns and
silky white tails animals greatly prized by the
Mongols. Tuli, Master of War, coming up from
Khorassan, brought with him strings of white camels.
Chatagai, descending from the snows of the ranges
188
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I hi- -ho, th, lNf,r., r,f u-.iix.us u-l fur til.- .ha-...
GENGHIS KHAN 189
drove in a hundred thousand horses. They were clad,
these officers of the hordes, in cloth-of-gold and
silver, covered with sable coats, and wraps of silver-
grey wolfskins to protect their finery.
From the T'ian shan came the Idikut of the Ugurs,
the most cherished of all allies, and the Lion King of
the Christian folk broad-faced Kirghiz chieftains
coming to render their allegiance to the conqueror
long-limbed Turkomans in stately robes.
The horses, instead of weather-stained leather, were
barded in jingling chain mail, their harness bright
with polished silver work and afire with jewels.
From the Gobi appeared a much-prized youngster,
Kubilai, the son of Tuli, now nine years old. He had
been allowed to join in his first hunt, an important
event for this grandson of an emperor. Genghis Khan
with his own hand completed the ceremony of
initiation.
The leaders of the hordes now gathered in the
kurultai place, a white pavilion so large that it sheltered
two thousand men. It had one entrance to be used
by no one except the Khan ; the warriors bearing
shields at the great entrance facing south were merely
a routine guard mount. So rigid was discipline in the
hordes, and so firmly established was the routine of
the empire, that no unauthorized person ventured
within the quarters of the conqueror.
As they had once brought to the Khan captured
horses and women and weapons in the Gobi, the chiefs
of the hordes and the subject kings now offered him
their gifts of a new sort, the best of the treasure
gleaned carefully from half the earth. " Never," says
the chronicler, " was such splendour seen before."
190 GENGHIS KHAN
Instead of marc's milk, the princes of the empire
had mead of honey and the red and white wines of
Persia. The Khan himself admitted a fondness for
the wines of Shiraz.
He sat now in the gold throne of Mohammed that
he had brought with him from Samarkand ; beside it
rested the sceptre and crown of the dead emperor of
Islam. When the council gathered, the mother of the
Shah was led in, chains on her wrists. But under the
throne was placed a square of grey felt woven out of
animal hair, as a symbol of his old authority in the
Gobi.
To the assembled leaders out of the east, he
recounted the campaigns of the last three years. " I
have gained great mastery," he said gravely, " by
virtue of the Tassa. Live ye in obedience to the
laws."
The shrewd Mongol wasted no words in boasting
of his achievements ; the thing to be gained was
obedience to the law. He no longer needed to advise
and lead his officers in person. They were able to
wage war on their own account, and he saw clearly
the grave danger of a division among them. To
emphasize the extent of his conquests, he had all the
visiting ambassadors ushered to the throne one by one.
To his three sons he spoke a word of warning.
" Do not allow quarrels to come between you. Be
faithful and unfailing to Ogotai."
After that there was feasting for a month in the
kurultat^ and to this concourse came two most welcome
guests. Subotai rode in from the borderland of
Poland, bringing with him Juchi.
Juchi, the first-born, had been sought out by the
GENGHIS KHAN 191
veteran Orkhon who persuaded him to attend the
council and to face his father again. So Juchi appeared
before the Khan and knelt to press his hand to his
forehead. The old conqueror, who was deeply attached
to Juchi, was gratified though he made no display
of affection. The conqueror of the steppes had
brought as a gift to his sire a hundred thousand
Kipchak horses. Disliking the court, Juchi asked for
permission to return to the Volga, and this was
granted him.
The concourse broke up, Chatagai riding back to
his mountains, and the other hordes taking the trail
to Karakorum. The chronicler relates that every day
of the journey, Genghis Khan summoned Subotai to
come to his side and relate his adventures in the
western world.
CHAPTER XXII
THE END OF THE TASK
/^ENGHIS KHAN was not destined to spend
VJT his last years in his homeland. All had been
prepared for his sons but two things. Two hostile
powers still survived in the world as the old Khan
knew it the troublesome king of Hia near Tibet
and the ancient Sung in southern China. He
passed a season at Karakorum among his people with
Bourtai at his side, and then he was in the saddle
again. Subotai was sent to invade the lands of the
Sung, and Genghis Khan took upon himself the task
of quelling the desert clans of Hia for ever.
This he did. Marching in winter through frozen
swamps, he found his foes of other days drawn up
to receive him remnants of Cathayans, armies of
western China, Turks and all the forces of Hia. The
chronicle gives us a glimpse of the grim pageant of
destruction fur-clad Mongols fighting across the ice
of a river, the allies, seemingly victorious, charging
e n masse upon the veterans of the Khan's centre, the
heart of the horde. Three hundred thousand men
may haye perished here.
And then the aftermath. Tricked, shaken, and
hunted down, the remaining warriors of the allies
fleeing. All men capable of bearing arms put to
death in the path of the horde. The king of Hia,
192
GENGHIS KHAN 193
escaped to a mountain citadel, guarded by snow-
drifted gorges, sending his submission to the inexor-
able Khan, hiding his hatred and despair under the
mask of friendship, asking that the past be forgotten.
" Say to your master," Genghis Khan replied to
the envoys, " that I have no wish to remember what
is past. I will hold him in friendship."
But the Khan would not make an end of war.
There were the people of the Sung to be humbled,
as the allies had been. The horde marched in mid-
winter toward the boundaries of ancient China.
Ye Liu Chutsai, the sage, dared to protest against
the annihilation of the Sung.
" If these people be slain, how then will they aid
thee, or make wealth for thy sons ? "
The old conqueror pondered, remembering per-
haps that after he had made deserts of once populous
lands the sages of Cathay had helped to keep things
in order. He answered unexpectedly, " Be thou,
then, master of subject peoples serve thou my sons
faithfully."
He would not forgo the military conquest of the
Sung. That must be finished, to the end. He kept
his saddle and led his armies across the Yellow river.
Here the Khan learned of the death of Juchi in the
steppes. He said that he wished to be alone in
his tent, and he grieved heavily in silence for his
first-born.
Not long since, when Ogotai's little son had been
slain beside him at Bamiyan, the Khan had com-
manded the bereaved father not to show sorrow.
" Obey me in this thing. Thy son is slain. I forbid
thec to weep 1 "
194 GENGHIS KHAN
Nor did he himself show outwardly that the death
of Juchi troubled him. The hordes went forward, the
routine was as usual, but the Khan spoke less with his
officers and it was noticed that the tidings of a fresh
victory near the Caspian failed to rouse him, or to
draw cither comment or praise from him. When the
horde entered a dense fir forest where snow lay still
in the shadows, although the sun was warm, he gave
command to halt.
He ordered couriers to ride swiftly to his nearest
son, Tuli, who was camped not far away. When the
Master of War, now a man grown, dismounted at the
yurt of the Khan, he found his father lying upon a
carpet near the fire, wrapped in felt and sable robes.
" It is clear to me," the old Mongol greeted the
prince, " that I must leave everything and go hence
from thee."
He had been sick for some time, and this sickness,
he knew now, was draining away his life. He ordered
to his side the general officers of the horde, and while
they knelt with Tuli, listening intently to his words,
he gave them clear directions how to carry on the
war against the Sung that he had begun but could
not finish. Tuli, especially, was to take over all lands
in the east, as Chatagai was to do in the west, while
Ogotai must be supreme over them, the Kha Khan at
Karakorum.
Like the nomad he was, he died uncomplaining,
leaving to his sons the greatest of empires and the
most destructive of armies, as if his possessions had
been no more than tents and herds. This was in the
year 12 27, the Year of the Mouse in the Cycle of the
Twelve Beasts.
GENGHIS KHAN 19$
The chronicle tells us that Genghis Khan made
provision in his last illness for the destruction
of the Hia king, his old foeman, who was then
on his way to the horde. The Khan commanded
that his death be kept secret until this could be
done.
A spear was thrust, point in the earth, before the
white yurt of the conqueror which stood apart from
the rest of the camp. The astrologers and sages who
came to wait upon the Khan were kept without by
guards, and only the high officers came and went
through the entrance, as if their leader were indisposed
and giving orders from his bed. When the Hia
monarch and his train reached the Mongols, the
visitors were invited to a feast, given robes of honour
and seated among the officers of the horde. Then
they were slain, to a man.
Deprived of Genghis Khan, awe-struck at the
death of the seemingly invincible man who had made
them masters of all they could desire, the Orkhons
and princes of the horde turned back to escort the
body to the Gobi. Before burial it must be shown to
his people and carried to the abiding place of Bourtai,
the first wife.
Genghis Khan had died in the lands of the Sung,
and to prevent his foemen from discovering the loss
of the Mongols, the warriors escorting the death car
cut down all the people they met until they reached
the edge of the desert. There the men of the horde*
the veterans of long warfare, mourned aloud as they
rode beside the funeral car.
To them it seemed incredible that the great Khan
should have ceased to go before the standard, and
196 GENGHIS KHAN
that they were no longer to be sent hither and thither
at his will.
" O Lord bogdo" cried a grey-haired tar-khan*
" wilt thou leave us thus ? Thy birth-land and its
rivers await thee, thy fortunate land with thy golden
house surrounded by thy heroes await thee. Why hast
thou left us in this warm land, where so many foemen
lie dead ? "
Others took up the mourning as they crossed the
bed of the barrens. In this way the chronicler has
written down their lament :
44 Aforetime thou didst swoop like a falcon ; now a rumbling
cart bears thee onward,
O my Khan !
" Hast thou in truth left thy wife and children, and the
council of thy people ?
O my Khan !
44 Wheeling in pride like an eagle, once thou didst lead us ;
but now thou hast stumbled and fallen^
O my KAan/"
The conqueror was brought home, not to Kara-
korum, but to the valleys where he had struggled for
life as a boy, to the heritage that he would not desert.
The couriers of the hordes mounted and galloped off
into the prairies, bearing word to the Orkhons and
princes and the distant generals that Genghis Khan
was dead.
When the last officer had come in and dismounted
at the death yurt, the body was taken to its resting
place most probably to the forest he himself had
selected. No one knows the exact burial place. The
grave was dug under a great tree.
GENGHIS KHAN *97
The Mongols say that a certain clan was exempted
from military duty and charged to watch the site*,
and that incense was burned unceasingly in the grove
until the surrounding forest grew so thick that the
tall tree was lost among its fellows and all trace of the
gravc*f vanished.
A descendant of the conqueror, the Prince of Kalachin, believes that tkf
great Khan was buried in the Orrlou country, between the loop of the Hoanf
and the Wall, near Etjen Koro, and that every year the Mongols hold cere-
monies at the grave, bringing hither the sword and the saddle and the bow
of Genghis Khan. There is also a legend among the Mongols that every
year a white horse appears at the grave.
t See Note XI, The Tomb of Genghis Kuan, page 243.
Part IF
AFTERWORD
TWO years passed in mourning. During these
two years Tuli remained in Karakorum as
regent, and at the end of the appointed time the princes
and generals journeyed back into the Gobi, to select
the new Kha Khan, or emperor, in obedience to the
wishes of the dead conqueror.
They came as monarchs in their own right the
right of heritage, by the will of Genghis Khan.
Chatagai, the harsh tempered now the eldest son
from Central Asia and all the Mohammedan lands :
Ogotai, the good humoured, from the Gogi plains :
Batu, the " Splendid," the son of Juchi, from the
steppes of Russia.
They had grown from youth to manhood as Mongol
clansmen ; now they were masters of portions of the
world, with its riches, that they had not known
existed. They were Asiatics, raised among barbarians ;
every one of the four had a powerful army at his
summons. They had tasted the wine of luxury in
their new dominions. " My descendants," Genghis
Khan had said, " will clothe themselves in embroidered
gold stuffs ; they will nourish themselves with meats,
and will mount splendid horses. They will press in
their arms young and fair women, and they will not
198
GENGHIS KHAN 199
think of that to which they owe all these desirable
things."
Nothing was more natural than that they should
have quarrelled and gone to war over their heritage.
It was almost inevitable, after those two years
especially in the case of Chatagai, who was now the
eldest, and entitled by Mongol custom to claim the
khanship. But the will of the dead conqueror had
been impressed upon all this multitude. The discipline
established by an iron hand still held them bound
together. Obedience fidelity to their brothers and
the end of quarrelling the Tassa itelf !
Many times Genghis Khan had warned them that
their dominion would vanish and they themselves be
lost if they did not agree. He had understood that
this new empire could be held together only by
submission to the authority of one man. And he
had chosen not the warlike Tuli, or the inflexible
Chatagai, but the generous and guileless Ogotai as
his successor. Keen understanding of his sons had
dictated this choice. Chatagai would never have
submitted to Tuli, the youngest ; and the Master of
War would not long have served his harsh elder
brother.
When the princes assembled at Karakorum, Tuli,
the Ulugh Noyon, Greatest of Nobles, resigned his
regency, and Ogotai was asked to accept the throne.
The Master of Counsel refused, saying it was not
fitting for him to be honoured above his uncles and
elder brother. Either because Ogotai was obstinate or
because the soothsayers were unfavourable, forty days
passed in uncertainty and anxiety. Then the Orkhons
and elder warriors waited upon Ogotai and spoke to
200 GENGHIS KHAN
him angrily. " What docst thou ? The Khan himself
hath chosen thee for his successor 1 "
Tuli added his voice repeated the last words of his
father, and Ye Liu Chutsai, the sage Cathayan,
master of the treasury, used all his wit in averting a
possible calamity. Tuli, troubled, asked the astrologer-
minister if this day were not unfavourable.
" After this," responded the Cathayan at once,
" no day will be favourable."
He urged Ogotai to mount without delay to the
gold throne on the felt-covered dais, and as the new
emperor was doing so, Ye Liu Chutsai went to his
side and spoke to Chatagai.
" Thou art the elder," he said, " but thou art a
subject. Being the elder, seize this moment to be the
first to prostrate thyself before the Throne."
An instant's hesitation and Chatagai threw himself
down before his brother. All the officers and nobles
in the council pavilion followed his example, and
Ogotai was acknowledged Kha Khan. The throng
went out and bent their heads to the south, toward the
sun, and the multitude of the camp did likewise.
Then followed days of feasting. The treasure that
Genghis Khan had left, the riches gathered from all
the corners of unknown lands, were given to the other
princes, the officers and Mongols of the army.*
Ogotai pardoned all men accused of wrong-doing
since the death of his father. He reigned tolerantly
for a Mongol of that day, and heeded the advice of
Ye Liu Chutsai,*f who laboured with heroic fortitude
A legend exists that forty fair young women in jewelled garments and
forty fine stallions were taken to the grave of Genghis Khan and there slain.
*t See Notes XII and XIII, Ye Liu Chutsai and Ogotai, pages 245 and 248.
GENGHIS KHAN 201
to consolidate the empire of his masters on the one
hand, and to restrain, on the other hand, the Mongols
from further annihilation of human beings. He dared
oppose the terrible Subotai at a time when the
Orkhon who was carrying on war in the lands of
the Sung with Tuli wished to massacre the inhabi-
tants of a great city. " During all these years in
Cathay," the wise chancellor argued, "our armies
have lived upon the crops and the riches of these
people. If we destroy the men, what will the bare
land avail us ? "
Ogotai conceded the point and the lives of a
million and a half Chinese who had flocked into the
city were spared. It was Ye Liu Chutsai who put
the tribute gathering in regular form one head of
cattle for every hundred from the Mongols, and a
certain sum in silver or silk from every family of
Cathay. He argued Ogotai into appointing lettered
Cathayans to high office in the treasury and adminis-
tration.
" To make a vase," he suggested, " thou dost avail
thyself of a potter. To keep accounts and records,
learned men should be used."
" Well," retorted the Mongol, " what hinders thcc
from making use of them ? "
While Ogotai built himself a new palace, Ye Liu
Chutsai established schools for young Mongols. Five
hundred wagons drove in each day to Karakorum,
now known as Qrdu-baligh, the Court City. These
carts brought provisions, grain and precious goods to
the storehouses and treasury of the emperor. The rule
of the desert khans was firmly fastened upon half
the world.
202 GENGHIS KHAN
Unlike the empire of Alexander, the dominion of
the Mopgol conqueror remained intact after his death.
He had made the Mongol clans obedient to one ruler ;
he had given them a rigid code of laws, primitive, but
well adapted to his purpose, and during his military
overlordship he had laid the foundations for the
administration of the empire. In this last task, Ye
Liu Chutsai was of priceless aid.
Perhaps the greatest heritage the conqueror left
his sons was the Mongol army. By his will, Ogotai,
Chatagai and Tuli divided up his main horde his
personal army, as it might be called. But the system
of mobilization, of training, and manoeuvring in war
remained as Genghis Khan had formed it. More-
over, in Subotai and others, the sons of the conqueror
had veteran generals quite equal to the task of
extending the empire.
He had instilled into his sons and his subjects the
idea that the Mongols were the natural masters of the
world, and he had so broken the resistance of the
strongest empires that the completion of the work was
a comparatively simple matter for them and Subotai.
It might be called mopping up after the first
advance.
In the early years of Ogotai's reign a Mongol
general, Charmagan, defeated Jelal ed-Din and put
an end to him for ever and consolidated the regions
west of- the Caspian, such as Armenia. At the
same time Subotai and Tuli advanced far south of
the Hoang Ho and subdued the remnants of the
Chins.
In 1235 Ogotai held a council, and it resulted in the
GENGHIS KHAN a<>3
second great wave of Mongol conquest. Batu, first
Khan of the Golden Horde, was sent with * Subotai
into the west, to the sorrow of Europe as far as the
Adriatic and the gates of Vienna.* Other armies took
the field in Korea, China and southern Persia. This
wave withdrew upon the death of Ogotai in 1241
Subotai being again wrenched back by the inflexible
summons from his goal, Europe.
The ten years that followed were full of cross-
currents, the growing feud between the house of
Chatagai and that of Ogotai the brief appearance of
Kuyuk, who may or may not have been a Nestorian
Christian, but who ruled through Christian ministers,
one of them the son of Ye Liu Chutsai, and who had
a chapel built before his tent. Then the rule passed
from the house of Ogotai to the sons of Tuli Mangu
and Kubilai Khan.*f And the third and most exten-
sive wave of conquest swept the world.
Hulagu, the brother of Kubilai, aided by Subotai's
son, invaded Mesopotamia, took Baghdad and Damas-
cus breaking for ever the power of the Kalifates
and came almost within sight of Jerusalem. Antioch,
held by the descendants of Christian crusaders, became
subject to the Mongols, who entered Asia Minor as
far as Smyrna, and within a week's march of Con-
stantinople.
At almost the same time Kubilai launched his
armada against Japan, and extended his frontiers down
to the Malay states, and beyond Tibet into Bengal.
His reign (1259 to 1294) was the golden age of the
" La faix qui regnait dans le fond del* Orient devintjunc
Abel Remusat. See note on Subotai in Europe.
*| Note XIV, The Last Court of the Nomads, page 252.
204 GENGHIS KHAN
Mongols.* Kubilai departed from the customs of his
fathers, moved the court to Cathay, and made himself
more a Chinese in habits than a Mongol. *f He ruled
with moderation and treated his subject peoples with
humanity. Marco Polo has left us a vivid picture of
his court.
But the change of the court to Cathay was an omen
of the break-up of the central empire. The Il-khans
of Persia Hulagu's descendants, who reached their
greatest power under Ghazan Khan about 1300
were at too great a distance from the Kha Khan to be
in touch with him. Besides, they were fast becoming
Mohammedans. Such, also, was the situation of the
Golden Horde near Russia. Kubilai's Mongols
were being converted to Buddhism. Religious and
political wars followed the death of this grandson of
Genghis Khan. The Mongol empire dissolved gradu-
ally into separate kingdoms.
About 1400 a Turkish conqueror, Timur-i-lang
(Tamerlane) brought together the central Asian and
Persian fragments, and trounced the Golden Horde
founded by Batu the son of Juchi.
Until 1368 the Mongols remained masters of China,
and it was 1555 before they lost their last strongholds
in Russia to Ivan Grodznoi (the Terrible). Around
the Caspian sea their descendants, the Uzbegs, were
a power under Shaibani in 1500, and drove Babar
the Tiger, a descendant of Genghis Khan, into India,
where he made himself the first of the great Moghuls.
" He ruled over a wider extent than any Mongol or indeed any other
sovereign. He was the first to govern by peaceful means. The splendour
of his court and the magnificence of his entourage easily surpassed that
of any Western ruler." 1 'k* Cambridge Medieval History. Vol. IV. p. 645.
*f See Note XV, The Grandson of Genghis Khan in the Holy Land.
page 265.
GENGHIS KHAN 205
It was the middle of the eighteenth century, six
hundred years after the birth of Genghis Khan, before
the last scions of the conqueror relinquished their
strongholds. Then, in Hindustan, the Moghuls *
gave way to the British, the Mongols in the east yielded
to the armies of the illustrious Chinese emperor,
K'ien lung.
The Tatar khans of the Crimea became the subjects
of Catherine the Great at the same time that the
unfortunate Kalmuk or Torgut horde evacuated its
pastures on the Volga and started the long and dread-
ful march eastward to its former home a march
vividly pictured by De Quincey in his Flight of a
Tatar Tribe.
A glance at a map of Asia in the mid-eighteenth
century will show the final refuge of the nomad
clansmen, descendants of the horde of Genghis Khan.
In the vast spaces between stormy Lake Baikul and
the salt sea of Aral barely charted in the maps of
that day, and marked vaguely " Tartary " or " Indepen-
dent Tartary " in the ranges of the mid-continent,
they wandered from summer to winter pasture, living
in their felt yurts, driving their herds Karaits, Kal-
muks and Mongols, utterly unaware that through these
same valleys Prester John of Asia had once fled to his
death, and the yak-tail standard of Genghis Khan
had advanced to terrify the world. ^
In this fashion ended the Mongol empire, dissolving
into the nomad clans from which it had sprung,
leaving remnants of peaceful herdsmen where warriors
had once massed.
* Moghuls eo the first Europeans to visit India pronounced the word
Mongol.
io6 GENGHIS KHAN
The brief and terrible pageant of the Mongol
horsemen has passed almost without trace. The desert
city of Karakorum is buried under the sand-waves of
the barrens ; the grave of Genghis Khan lies hidden
somewhere in a forest near one of the rivers of his
birthplace ; the riches he gathered from his conquest
were given to the men that served him. No tomb
marks the burial place of Bourtai, the wife of his
youth. No Mongol literati of his day gathered the
events of his life into an epic.
His achievement is recorded for the most part by
his enemies. So devastating was his impact upon
civilization that virtually a new beginning had to be
made in half the world. The empire of Cathay, of
Prester John, of Black Cathay, of Kharesm, and after
his death the Kalifate of Baghdad, of Russia, and for
a while the principalities of Poland, ceased to be.
When this indomitable barbarian conquered a nation
all other warfare came to an end. The whole scheme
of things, whether sorry or otherwise, was altered,
and among the survivors of a Mongol conquest peace
endured for a long time.
The blood-feuds of the grand princes of ancient
Russia lords of Twer and Vladimir and Susdal,
were buried under a greater calamity. All these
figures of an elder world appear to us only as shadows.
Empires crumbled under the Mongol avalanche, and
monarchs fled to their death in wild fear. What would
have happened if Genghis Khan had not lived, we
do not know.
What did happen was that the Mongol, like the
Roman peace, enabled culture to spring up anew.
Nations had been shuffled to and fro or rather the
GENGHIS KHAN 907
remnants of them Mohammedan science and skill
carried bodily into the Far East, Chinese inventive-
ness and administrative ability had penetrated into
the west. In the devastated gardens of Islam, scholars
and architects enjoyed, if not a golden, a silver age
under the Mongol Il-khans ; and the thirteenth
century was notable in China for its literature,
especially plays, and its magnificence the century
of the Yuan.
When political coherence began again after the
retreat of the Mongol hordes, something very natural
but quite unexpected happened. Out of the ruins of
the warring Russian princedoms emerged the empire
of Ivan the Great, and China, united for the first
time by the Mongols, appeared as a single dominion.
With the coming of the Mongols and their foes
the Mamluks, the long chapter of the crusades ended.
For a while under Mongol overlordship, Christian
pilgrims could visit the Holy Sepulchre in safety, and
Mohammedans the temple of Solomon. For the first
time the priests of Europe could venture into far
Asia, and venture they did, looking about them in
vain for the old Man of the Mountain who had harried
the crusaders, and the kingdoms of Prester John and
Cathay.
In this vast shaking up of human beings, perhaps
the most vital result was the destruction of the growing
power of Islam. With the host of Kharesm disap-
peared the main military strength of the Moham-
medans, and with Baghdad and Bokhara the old culture
of the Kalifs and imams. Arabic ceased to be the
universal language of scholars in half the world.
The Turks were driven west, and one clan, the Oth-
208 GENGHIS KHAN
mans (Ottomans, so called) became in time the masters
of Constantinople. A red hat lama, called out of
Tibet to preside at the coronation of Kubilai, brought
with him out of his mountains the hierarchy of the
priests of Lhassa.
Genghis Khan, the destroyer, had broken down the
barriers of the Dark Ages. He had opened up roads.
Europe came into contact with the arts of Cathay. At
the court of his son, Armenian princes and Persian
grandees rubbed shoulders with Russian princes.
A general reshuffling of ideas followed the opening
of the roads. An abiding curiosity about far Asia
stirred Europeans. Marco Polo followed Fra Rubru-
quis to Kambalu. Two centuries later Vasco da Gama
set forth to find his way by sea to the Indies. Columbus
sailed to reach, not America, but the land of the Great
Khan*
Notes
I
THE MASSACRES
THE grim pageantry of death that appeared in
the tracks of the Mongol horsemen has not
been painted in continuous detail in this volume.
The slaughter that cast whole peoples into death-
throes is well depicted in the general histories of the
Mongols, written by Europeans, Mohammedans and
Chinese. Little allusion is made here to such scenes
of carnage as the blotting out of Kiev, the Court of
the Golden Heads, as the Mongols called the ancient
Byzantine citadel with its gilt domes. Here the
torturing of old people, the ravishing of younger
women, and the hunting down of children ended in
utter desolation that was rendered more ghastly by
the following pestilence and famine. The effluvium of
festering bodies was so great that even the Mongols
avoided such places and named them Mou-baligh)
City of Woe.
The student of history will find vital significance
in this unprecedented maiming and subsequent re-
building of human races. The impact of the Mongols,
brought about by Genghis Khan, has been well sum-
med up by the authors of the Cambridge Medieval
History.
209 o
no GENGHIS KHAN
" Unchecked by human valour, they were able to
overcome the terrors of vast deserts, the barriers of
mountains and seas, the severities of climate, and the
ravages of famine and pestilence. No dangers could
appal them, no stronghold could resist them, no
prayer for mercy could move them. . . . We are
confronted with a new power in history, with a force
that was to bring to an abrupt end as a deus ex machtna^
many dramas that would otherwise have ended in a
deadlock, or would have dragged on an interminable
course."
This " new power in history " the ability of one
man to alter human civilization began with Genghis
Khan and ended with his grandson Kubilai, when the
Mongol empire tended to break up. It has not
reappeared since.
In this volume no effort has been made to apologize
for, or further to drench with blood, the character of
Genghis Khan. Allowance has been made for the
fact that most of our knowledge of the conqueror has
been based, in the past, upon the accounts given by
medieval Europeans, Persians and Syrians, who with
the .Chinese proper were the greatest victims of Mongol
destructivencss. Caesar wrote his own memoirs of the
Gallic conquest, and Alexander had his Arrian and
Quintus Curtius.
We find in Genghis Khan when we look at the
man in his own environment a ruler who did not
put to death any of his sons, ministers or generals.
Both Juchi and Kassar, his brother, gave him some
occasion for cruelty, and he might have been expected
to execute the Mongol officers who allowed themselves
to be defeated. Ambassadors from all peoples came
GENGHIS KHAN *xx
to him and returned safely. Nor do we find that he
tortured captives except in unusual circumstances.
The warlike and kindred nations, the Karalts,
Ugurs, and Lia^-tung the Men of Iron were dealt
with leniently, as were the Armenians, Georgians and
the remnants of the crusaders by his descendants.
Genghis Khan was careful to preserve what he thought
might be useful to himself and his people ; the rest
was destroyed. As he advanced farther from his
homeland, into strange civilizations, this destruction
became almost universal.
We moderns are beginning to understand how this
unprecedented annihilation of human life and works
earned for him the vituperation of Mohammedans.
Just as his unexampled genius gained for him the
veneration of his Buddhists.
Because Genghis Khan did no*, like Mohammed
the prophet, make war on the world for a religion, or
like Alexander and Napoleon for personal and
political aggrandizement, we have been mystified.
The explanation of the mystery lies in the primitive
simplicity of the Mongol's character.
He took from the world what he wanted for his
sons and his people. He did this by war, because he
knew no other means. What he did not want he
destroyed, because he did not know what else to
do with it.
II
PRESTER JOHN OF ASIA
IN the middle of the twelfth century reports
reached Europe of the victories of a Christian
monarch of Asia over the Turks " lohannes Presbyter
Rex Armenia et India." Latter-day research assures
us that this first inkling of a Christian king east of
Jerusalem came from tidings of victories gained over
the Mohammedans by John, High Constable of
Georgia, in the Caucasus a region then vaguely
associated with both Armenia and India.
It was recalled that the three Magi had emerged
from this region ; the crusading spirit flamed in
Europe and stories of an all-powerful Christian
potentate in far Asia gained greatly in the telling.
The Nestorian Christians, scattered from Armenia to
Cathay, saw fit to indite and send to the Pope Alex-
ander III a letter purporting to be from Prester John
describing vast splendour and many wonders in the
medieval manner processions over the desert, an
entourage of seventy kings, fabulous beasts, a city upon
the sands. In short a pretty good summary of the
myths of the day.
But so far as there existed truth in the description,
it fitted Wang Khan (pronounced by the Nestorians
Ung Khan, or " King John ") of the Karaits, who
were largely Christians. His city of Karakorum might
213
GENGHIS KAHN 213
be termed the stronghold of the long-neglected
Ncstorians of Asia. It was a desert city, and he was
an emperor, having khans or kings for subjects.
Various chronicles mention the conversion of a king
of the " Keriths." Marco Polo found in Wang Khan
the actor of the shadowy rSU of Prester John.*
bee Yule CordifT, Trawls oj Marco Polo, I, 230-237. Also Baring GotiM'f
Myth$ oj the Middle Ages.
Ill
THE LAWS OF GENGHIS KHAN
1. " It is ordered to believe that there is only one
God, creator of heaven and earth, who alone gives
life and death, riches and poverty as pleases Him and
who has over everything an absolute power.
2. Leaders of a religion, preachers, monks, persons
who are dedicated to religious practice, the criers of
mosques, physicians and those who bathe the bodies of
the dead arc to be freed from public charges.
3. It is forbidden under penalty of death that any-
one, whoever he be, shall be proclaimed emperor
unless he has been elected previously by the princes,
khans, officers and other Mongol nobles in a general
council.
4. It is forbidden chieftains of nations and clans
subject to the Mongols to hold honorary titles.
5. Forbidden ever to make peace with a monarch,
a prince or a people who have not submitted.
6. The ruling that divides men of the army into
tens, hundreds, thousands, and ten thousands is to be
maintained. This arrangement serves to raise an army
in a short time, and to form the units of commands.
7. The moment a campaign begins, each soldier
must receive his arms from the hand of the officer who
has them in charge. The soldier must keep them in
GENGHIS KHAN at$
good order, and have them inspected by his officer
before a battle.
8. Forbidden, under death penalty, to pillage the
enemy before the general commanding gives permis-
sion ; but after this permission is given the soldier must
have the same opportunity as the officer, and must be
allowed to keep what he has carried off, provided he
has paid his share to the receiver for the emperor.
9. To keep the men of the army exercised, a great
hunt shall be held every winter. On this account, it
is forbidden any man of the empire to kill between
the months of March and October, deer, bucks, roe-
bucks, hares, wild ass and some birds.
10. Forbidden, to cut the throats of animals slain
for food ; they must be bound, the chest opened and
the heart pulled out by the hand of the hunter.
11. It is permitted to eat the blood and entrails of
animals though this was forbidden before now.
1 2. (A list of privileges and immunities assured to
the chieftains and officers of the new empire.)
13. Every man who does not go to war must work
for the empire, without reward, for a certain time.
14. Men guilty of the theft of a horse or steer or
a thing of equal value will be punished by death and
their bodies cut into two parts. For lesser thefts the
punishment shall be, according to the value of the
thing stolen, a number of blows of a staff seven,
seventeen, twenty-seven, up to seven hundred. But
this bodily punishment may be avoided by paying
nine times the worth of the thing stolen.
1 5. No subject of the empire may take a Mongol
for servant or slave. Every man, except in rare cases,
must join the army.
3i6 GENGHIS KHAN
1 6. To prevent the flight of alien slaves, it is for-
bidden to give them asylum, food or clothing, under
pain of death. Any man who meets an escaped slave
and does not bring him back to his master will be
punished in the same manner.
17. The law of marriage orders that every man
shall purchase his wife, and that marriage between the
first and second degrees of kinship is forbidden.
A man may marry two sisters, or have several concu-
bines. The women should attend to the care of
property, buying and selling at their pleasure. Men
should occupy themselves only with hunting and war.
Children born of slaves are legitimate as the children
of wives. The offspring of the first woman shall be
honoured above other children and shall inherit
everything.
1 8. Adultery is to be punished by death, and those
guilty of it may be slain out of hand.
19. If two families wish to be united by marriage
and have only young children, the marriage of these
children is allowed, if one be a boy and the other a
girl. If the children are dead, the marriage contract
may still be drawn up.
20. It is forbidden to bathe or wash garments in
running water during thunder.
21. Spies, false witnesses, all men given to infamous
vices, and sorcerers are condemned to death.
22. Officers and chieftains who fail in their duty,
or do not come at the summons of the Khan are to be
slain, especially in remote districts. If their offence be
less grave, they must come in person before the Khan/ 9
These examples of the laws of Genghis Khan are
GENGHIS KHAN 217
translated from Pltis de la Croix, who explains that
he has not been able to come upon a complete list of
the laws a " Tassa Gcngizcani" He has gleaned
these twenty-two rulings from various sources, the
Persian chroniclers, and Fras Rubruquis and Carpini.
The list given is palpably incomplete, and has come
down to us from alien sources.
The explanation of the curious tenth law may
probably be found in existing religious prejudices as
to the manner of killing game to be eaten. The
eleventh rule seems to aim at preserving a possible
source of food in time of famine. The twentieth law
concerning water and thunder is explained by
Rubruquis to prevent the Mongols, who were very
much afraid of thunder, from throwing themselves
into lakes and rivers during a storm,
Petis de la Croix says that the Tassa of Genghis
Khan was followed by Timur-i-lang. Babar, the first
of the Moghuls (Mongols) of India, says : " My
forefathers and family had always sacredly observed
the rules of Chcngiz. In their parties, their courts,
their festivals and their entertainments, in their
sitting down and rising up, they never acted contrary
to the institutions of Chengiz." Memoirs of Eahar^
Emperor oj Hindustan Erskine and Ley den edition,
1826, p. 202.
IV
THE NUMERICAL STRENGTH OF THE MONGOL HORDE
IT is a common and quite natural mistake among
historians to describe the Mongol army as a vast
multitude. Even Dr. Stanley Lane-Poole, one of the
most distinguished of modern authorities, cannot
resist the inevitable hi nehaiet and speaks of " Chingkiz
Khan followed by hordes of nomads like the sands of
the sea without number." Turkey (Stories of the
Nations).
In our understanding of the Mongols we have
advanced sufficiently far beyond the ideas of Matthew
Paris and the medieval monks to be certain that the
horde of Genghis Khan was not, like the Huns, a
migratory mass, but a disciplined army of invasion.
The personnel of the horde is given by Sir Henry
Howorth as follows :
Imperial Guards
The Centre, under Tuli
Right Wing
Left Wing
Other Contingents
230,000
This is apparently the strength of the army at the
time of the war against the Shah and the west. It is,
therefore, the largest assembled by Genghis Khan.
218
GENGHIS KHAN 119
The other contingents consisted of the 10,000
Cathayans, and the forces of the Idikut of the Ugurs,
and the Khan of Almalyk the last two being sent
back after the invasion began.
The brilliant scholar, Lon Cahun, maintains that
an army of Mongol effectives did not number over
30,000. There being three such army corps in this
campaign besides Juchi's 20,000 and the allies the
host would amount to some 150,000 warriors by this
calculation. And certainly no greater numbers could
have existed for a winter in the barren valleys of high
Asia.
The army commanded by Genghis Khan at the
time of his death is known to have consisted of four
corps with the imperial guard some 130,000 men.
Turning to the scanty figures available as to the
populations of the Gobi lands, we can approximate
the total at no more than 1,500,000 souls. From this
number no more than 200,000 effectives could very
well be mustered. Brigadier-General Sir Percy Sykes,
in his Persia, comments on the " Mongols who were
numerically weak and fought thousands of miles
from their base."
Contemporary Mohammedan chroniclers habitually
exaggerated the numbers of the horde, mentioning
five hundred to eight hundred thousand. But all
available evidence indicates that Genghis Khan per-
formed during the years 1219-1225, the remarkable
military feat of subjecting the country from Tibet to
the Caspian sea, with no more than 100,000 men
and from the Dnieper to the China sea with no more
than 250,000, in all. And of this number probably
not more than half were Mongols. The chronicles
220 GENGHIS KHAN
mention 50,000 Turkoman allies at the end of the
campaigns ; Juchi's forces were augmented by throngs
of the wild Kipchak, the Desert People. In China
the ancestors of the present-day Koreans and Manchus
were fighting under the Mongol standards.
In the reign of Ogotai, the son of Genghis Khan,
more Turkish tribes of mid-Asia joined the Mongols,
who gave them their fill of fighting. These made
up the greater part of the army with which Subotai
and Batu conquered eastern Europe. Certainly,
Ogotai had more than half a million effective fighting
men in his armies, and Mangu and Kubilai, grand-
sons of Genghis Khan, double that number.
THE MONGOL PLAN OF INVASION
THE horde of Genghis Khan followed a fixed
plan in invading a hostile country. This method
met with unvarying success until the Mongols were
checked by the Mamluks in their advance upon Egypt
across the Syrian desert about 1270.
1. A kurultai, or general council, was summoned
at the headquarters of the Kha Khan. All higher
officers except those given permission to remain on
active service were expected to attend the council.
Here the situation was discussed, and the plan of the
campaign explained. Routes were selected, and the
various divisions chosen for service.
2. Spies were sent out, and informers brought in
to be questioned.
3. The doomed country was entered from several
points at once. The separate divisions or army corps
each had its general commanding, who moved toward
a fixed objective. He was at liberty to manoeuvre,
and to engage the enemy at his discretion, but must
keep in touch by courier with headquarters the
Khan or Orkhon.
4. The separate divisions posted corps of obser-
vation before the larger fortified towns, while the
neighbouring district was ravaged. Supplies were
gathered off the country and a temporary base estab-
221
222 GENGHIS KHAN
lished if the campaign was to be a long one. Seldom
did the Mongols merely screen a strong city ; they
were more apt to invest it a tuman or two remaining
behind with captives and engines for siege work,
while the main force moved on.
When faced by a hostile army in the field, the
Mongols followed one of two courses. If possible,
they surprised the enemy by a rapid march of a day
and a night two or more Mongol divisions concen-
trating at the place of battle at a given hour, as in
disposing of the Hungarians near Pesth in 1241.
If this did not succeed, the enemy would be surrounded,
or the Mongols would envelop one flank, in the swift
tulughmd) or " standard sweep.
Other expedients were to feign flight and with-
draw for several days until the hostile forces became
scattered or off their guard. Then the Mongols
would mount fresh horses and turn to attack. This
manoeuvre brought disaster to the powerful Russian
host near the Dnieper.
Often in this deceptive retreat they would extend
their line until the enemy was surrounded without
realizing it. If the hostile troops massed together
and fought bravely, the Mongol enveloping line
would open, allowing them to retreat. They would
then be attacked on the march. This was the fate of
the Bokharan army.
Many of these expedients were practised by the
resourceful early Turks, the Hiung-nu, from whom
the Mongols themselves were in part descended. The
Cathayans were accustomed to manoeuvre in cavalry
columns, and the Chinese proper knew all the rules of
strategy. It remained for Genghis Khan to supply
GENGHIS KHAN
the inflexible purpose and the rare ability to do the
right thing at the right time and to hold his men
under iron restraint.
" Even the Chinese said that he led his armies like
a god. The manner in which he moved large bodies of
men over vast distances without an apparent effort,
the judgment he showed in the conduct of several
wars in countries far apart from each other, his
strategy in unknown regions, always on the alert yet
never allowing hesitation or overcaution to interfere
with his enterprises, the sieges he brought to a success-
ful termination, his brilliant victories, a succession of
* suns of Austerlitz,' all combined, make up the picture
of a career to which Europe can offer nothing that
will surpass, if indeed she has anything to bear com-
parison with it " so Demetrius Boulger sums up the
military genius of the great Mongol. (A Short
History of China> p. 100.)
VI
THE MONGOLS AND GUNPOWDER
WE have very little accurate knowledge of any
of the Chinese inventions before Genghis Khan
and his Mongols opened up the road into that much
secluded empire. After then, that is after 1211, we
hear of gunpowder frequently. It was used in the
ho-pao or fire-projectors.
In one siege the ho-pao are mentioned as burning
and destroying wooden towers. The discharge of
the powder in the fire projectors made " a noise like
thunder, heard at a distance of a hundred //'." This
means about thirty miles, but is probably an exagger-
ation. At the siege of Kaifong in 1232 a Chinese
annalist records the following : "As the Mongols
had dug themselves pits under the earth where they
were sheltered from missiles, we decided to bind
with iron the machines called chin-tien-lei (a kind
of fire-projector) and lowered them into the places
where the Mongol sappers were ; they exploded and
blew into pieces men and shields."
Again, in the time of Kubilai Khan : " The
Ertipcror . . . ordered a fire gun to be discharged ;
the report caused a panic among the (enemy) troops."
Dr. Herbert Gowen of the University of Washington
points out a Japanese reference to these Mongol
weapons, taken from a fourteenth century source.
224
GENGHIS KHAN 925
" Iron balls, like footballs, were let fly with a sound
like cartwheels rolling down a steep declivity, and
accompanied by flashes like lightning. 11
It is clear that the Chinese and Mongols knew the
detonating effect of gunpowder ; it is also clear that
their fire-projectors were used chiefly to burn or
frighten the enemy. They did not know how to cast
cannon, and made little progress with projectiles,
depending still on the massive torsion and counter-
weight siege engines.
Now these same Mongols overran central Europe
in 1238-40 and were still in what is now Russian
Poland or Polish Russia during the lifetime of the
monk Schwartz. Freiburg was well within the area
of their conquest, and the German monk must have
worked at his inventions within some three hundred
miles of a Mongol garrison. (In justice to Schwartz's
claim one must add that there is no established record
of the Mongols using powder in Europe. But it
must be remembered that merchants were constantly
dealing with them and passing back into the European
cities.)
Turning to Friar Roger Bacon, we find that he
did not, it seems, produce any gunpowder for public
use himself. He recorded the existence of such a
compound, and its fulminating qualities. Roger
Bacon met, talked with and availed himself of the
geographical and other knowledge gained by Friar
William of Rubruk, who was sent by St. Louis of
France as envoy to the Mongols. The Opus Majus
of Roger Bacon says concerning the book of William
of Rubruk " which book I have seen, and with its
author I have talked." (Against this it can be argued
226 GENGHIS KHAN
that Rubruk's book makes no mention of gun-
powder, and that we cannot assume he became
acquainted with it during his half-year's sojourn at
the Mongol court, while Bacon's first mention of the
specific ingredients of powder that is, of saltpetre
and sulphur ante-dates slightly Rubruk's return
from his journey.)
It is a matter purely of individual opinion how
much weight one chooses to give to the circumstance
that the two ostensible inventors of gunpowder in
Europe both lived during the seventy-five odd years
when Europe was aroused by the Mongol invasions,
and the weapons used by the invaders, and both had
contact of sorts with the Mongols.
But there is indisputable evidence that fire-arm*
and cannon both began to appear in Germany about
the time of the Monk Schwartz. Cannon were
improved and developed rapidly in Europe and
entered Asia by way of Constantinople and the Turks.
Thus we find Babar, the first of the Moghuls, equipped
with large bore-cannon, handled by Roumis (Turks)
in 1525. And the first metal cannon were cast in
China by Jesuits in the seventeenth century.
And a curious picture it is we see the European
Cossacks, invading the dominion of the Tartars in
1581 with serviceable muskets, while the men of
Asia dragged out an unloaded cannon, ignorant of
its use, expecting it to blast the invaders.
To sum up : The Chinese made gunpowder and
understood its explosive qualities long before Friars
Bacon and Schwartz, but put it to little use in warfare.
Whether the Europeans learned about it from them
or discovered it on their own account is an open
GENGHIS KHAN a7
question ; but Europeans certainly made the first
serviceable cannon.
The truth, probably, will never be known. It is
curious that Matthew Paris and Thomas of Spalato
and other medieval chroniclers speak of the fear
inspired by the Mongols who carried with them smoke
and flame into battle. This might be an allusion to
the trick often practised by the troopers of the Gobi,
of setting fire to the dry grass of a countryside and
advancing behind the flames. But very probably
this may indicate the use of gunpowder which was
not yet known in Europe by the Mongols, in their
fire pots. Carpini has a curious reference to a species
of flame thrower used by the Mongol horsemen, and
fanned by some kind of bellows.
At all events, this apparition of flame and smoke
among the Mongols was accepted by our medieval
chroniclers as certain indication that they were demons.
VII
THE CONJURERS AND THE CROSS
WHEN the Mongol divisions under Subotai and
Chep Noyon were forcing their way through
the Caucasus they encountered and defeated an army
of Christian Georgians. Rusudan, queen of the
Georgians, sent to the Pope a letter by David, bishop
of Ani, in which she stated that the Mongols had
displayed before their ranks a standard bearing the
Cross and that this had deceived the Georgians into
thinking that the Mongols were Christians.
Again at the battle of Liegnitz, the Polish
chroniclers relate that the Mongols appeared with
" a great standard bearing an emblem like the Greek
letter X." One historian observes that this might
have been a device of the shamans to ridicule the Cross,
and the emblem might have been formed by the
crossed thigh-bones of a sheep, used frequently by the
shamans in divination. It was rendered terrifying by
the clouds of smoke that eddied up from the pots
carried by the long-robed attendants of the standard.
It is not likely that military leaders as intelligent
as the Mongol Orkhons would endeavour to deceive
tn enemy by carrying a cross before them. It is
possible that Nestorian Christians in the Mongol
army might have marched with the Cross, and that
priests were seen accompanying it at Liegnitz and
perhaps carrying censers.
228
VIII
SUBOTAI BAHADUR V. MIDDLE EUROPE
THE test of strength between Mongol and
European did not come during the lifetime of
Genghis Khan. It followed the great council of 1235,
in the Khanship of Ogotai.
Briefly, this is what happened :
Batu, the son of Juchi, marched west with the
Golden Horde to take possession of the lands galloped
over by Subotai in 1223. From 1238 to the autumn
of 1240 Batu, the "Splendid," overran the Volga
clans, Russian cities and the steppes of the Black Sea,
finally storming Kiev and sending raiding columns
into southern Poland, or rather Ruthcnia, since Poland
was then divided into a number of principalities.
When the snows melted in March, 1 24 1 , the Mongol
headquarters was north of the Carpathians between
modern Lemberg and Kiev. Subotai, the directing
genius of the campaign, was confronted by the
following enemies :
In front of him Boleslas the Chaste, overlord of
Poland, had assembled his host. Beyond, to the north,
in Silesia, Henry the Pious was gathering an army
30,000 strong of Poles, Bavarians, Teutonic Knights
and Templars out of France, who had volunteered to
repel this invasion of barbarians. A hundred miles or
80 behind Boleslas, the king of Bohemia was mobilizing
229
ajo GENGHIS KHAN
a still stronger army, receiving contingents from
Austria, Saxony and Brandenburg.
On the left front of the Mongols, Mieceslas of
Galicia and other lords were preparing to defend their
lands in the Carpathians. On the Mongol left, farther
away, the Magyar host of Hungary, a hundred
thousand strong, was mustering under the banner of
Bela IV, the king, beyond the Carpathian mountains.
If Batu and Subotai turned south into Hungary,
they would have left the Polish army at their rear ;
if they advanced due west, to meet the Poles, the
Hungarians would be on their flank.
Subotai and Batu seem to have been perfectly well
aware of the preparations of the Christian hosts. Their
scouting expeditions of the previous year had brought
them valuable information about the country and the
monarchs opposed to them. On the other hand, the
Christian kings had little knowledge of the movements
of the Mongols.
Batu acted as soon as the ground was dry enough
for his horses to move over in spite of the marshes
along the Pripet and the damp forests that fringed the
Carpathian ranges. He divided his host into four army
corps, sending the strongest, under two reliable
generals, grandsons of Genghis Khan, Kaidu and
Baibars, against the Poles.
This division moved rapidly west and encountered
the forces of Boleslas as the Poles were pursuing some
scouting contingents of Mongols. The Poles attacked
with their usual bravery and were defeated Boleslas
fleeing into Moravia and the remnants of his men
withdrawing to the north, whither the Mongols did
not pursue them. This was March 18. Cracov was
GENGHIS KHAN ajt
burned, and the Mongols of Kaidu and Baibars
hastened on to meet the Duke of Silesia before he
could join forces with the Bohemians.
They encountered this army of Henry the Pious
near Liegnitz, April 9. Of the battle that followed
we have no first-hand account. We only know that
the German and Polish forces broke before the onset
of the Mongol-standard, and were almost exterminated;
Henry and his barons died to a man, as did the
Hospitallers. It is said that the grand master of the
Teutonic Knights perished on the field, with nine
Templars and five hundred men-at-arms,
Liegnitz was burned by its defenders, and the day
after the battle Kaidu and Baibars and their division
confronted the larger army of Wcnceslas, king of
Bohemia, fifty miles away. Wenceslas moved slowly
from place to place, as the Mongols appeared and
disappeared. His cumbersome array, too strong to be
attacked by the Mongol division, could not come up
with the horsemen from Cathay, who rested their
mounts and ravaged Silesia and beautiful Moravia
under his eyes, and finally tricked Wenceslas into
marching north while they turned south to rejoin
Batu.
" And know," Ponce d'Aubon wrote to St. Louis
of France, " that all the barons of Germany and the
king, and all the clergy and those in Hungary have
taken the Cross to go against the Tatars. And, if
* " Tartarin ont la tenre qui fu Henri le due de Fouiainne destnsite et
escillie, ct celui meismes ocis avec mout dcs barons, et six da new frtres et
trois chevaliers et deux sergans et 500 de nos hommes ont mort." letter
of the Grand Master of the French Templars to Saint Louis, quoted by Loa
Cahun.
Legend has it that the Mongols cut an ear from every dead enemy
tad filled in this manner nine sacks that they carried back to Batu, their
prince. The head of the unfortunate Henry was carried on a laace to LMfaiH
232 GENGHIS KHAN
what our brothers have told us is true, if it happens
by the will of God that they be vanquished, these
Tatars will not find anyone to stand against them as
far as your land."
But when the Master of the Templars wrote this,
the Hungarian host was already vanquished. Subotai
and Batu threaded through the Carpathians in three
divisions, the right flank entering Hungary from
Galicia, the left, under command of Subotai, swinging
down through Moldavia. The smaller armies in their
path were wiped out, and the three columns joined
forces before Bcla and his Hungarians near Pesth.
It was then the beginning of April, just before the
battle of Liegnitz. Subotai and Batu had not heard
how matters were going in the north ; they dispatched
a division to open communication with the grandsons
of Genghis Khan on the Oder.
The small army of the bishop of Ugolin advanced
against them ; they retreated to a marshy region and
surrounded the rash Hungarians. The bishop fled
with three companions, sole survivors.
Meanwhile Bela began to cross the Danube with
his host Magyars, Croats and Germans, with the
French Templars who had been posted in Hungary.
A hundred thousand in all. The Mongols retreated
slowly before them, at a hand pace. Batu, Subotai,
Mangu conqueror of Kiev had left the army and
were inspecting the site chosen for the battle. This
was the plain of Mohi, hemmed in on four sides, by
the river Sayo, by the vine-clad hills of Tokay, by
" dark woods and the great hills of Lomnitz."
The* Mongols retreated across the river, leaving
intact a wide stone bridge, and pushing into the
GENGHIS KHAN 233
brush on the far side for some five miles. Blindly the
host of Bda followed, and camped in the plain of Mo At.
Camped with its heavy baggage, its sergcants-at-arms,
its mailed chivalry and followers. A thousand men
were posted on the far side of the bridge, and explored
the woods without seeing a sign of the enemy.
Night. Subotai took command of the Mongol right,
led it in a wide circle back to the river where he had
observed a ford. He set to work building a bridge to
aid in the crossing.
The break of dawn. Batu's advance moved back
toward the bridge, surprised and annihilated the
detachment guarding it. His main forces were thrown
across, seven catapults playing on Bela's knights who
tried to stem the rush of horsemen across the bridge.
The Mongols surged steadily into the disordered
array of their foes, the terrible standard with its nine
yak-tails surrounded by the smoke of fires carried in
pans by shamans. " A great grey face with a long
beard," one of the Europeans described it, " giving
out noisome smoke."
No doubting the bravery of Bela's paladins. The
battle was stubborn and unbroken until near midday.
Then Subotai finished his flank movement, and
appeared behind Bela's array. The Mongols charged
in, broke the Hungarians. Like the Teutonic Knights
at Liegnitz, the Templars died to a man on the field.*
Then the Mongol ranks parted in the west, leaving
open the road through the gorge by which the host
of Bcla had advanced to the plain. The Hungarians
fled, and were pursued at leisure. For two days' journey
" Magistet vero Templarius cum iota acvc Latinorum occubuii." Thomaa
de Spalato, cited by L6on Cahon.
234 GENGHIS KHAN
the bodies of Europeans strewed the roads. Forty
thousand had fallen. Bela separated from his remaining
followers, leaving his brother dying, the Archbishop
slain. By sheer speed of his horse he freed himself
from the pursuit, hid along the bank of the Danube,
was hunted out and fled into the Carpathians. There,
in time, he reached the same monastery that shel-
tered his brother-monarch of Poland, Boleslas the
Chaste.
The Mongols stormed Pesth, and fired the suburbs
of Gran. They advanced into Austria as far as
Nicustadt, avoided the sluggish host of Germans and
Bohemians, and turned down to the Adriatic, ravaging
the towns along the coast except Ragusa. In less than
two months they had overrun Europe from the head-
waters of the Elbe to the sea, had defeated three great
armies and a dozen smaller ones and had taken by
assault all the towns except Olmutz which made good
its defence under Yaroslav of Sternberg with twelve
thousand men.
No second Tours saved western Europe from
inevitable disaster.* Its armies, capable only of moving
in a mass, led by reigning monarchs as incompetent
as Bela or Saint Louis of France, were valiant enough
but utterly unable to prevail against the rapidly
manoeuvring Mongols led by generals such as Subotai
and Mangu and Kaidu veterans of a lifetime of war
on two continents. But the war never came to a final
issue. A courier from Karakorum brought the Mongols
A summary of this campaign which has been much discussed and
Uttlc understood can be found in Henri Cordier's Melanges d'Histoir* et
i* G4ogr*pki* OrifnUtUs, Tome II ; also in Sir Henry Howorth's History
oj tkt MoNf*fc, Vol. I. Fuller details are given in I>on Cahun's
'
4 VHi9* t* L'Asu, pp. 3*9-374 ** "* #" i/tf der AtmgiU* in Afitlel
Ewop* by Suakosch-GrassuuA.
GENGHIS KHAN 135
the tidings of Ogotai's death and a summons to return
to the Gobi.
At the council there a year later, the battle of Mohi
had a curious aftermath. Batu accused Subotai of
being tardy in arriving on the field and causing the
loss of many Mongols. The old general made answer
tartly :
" Remember that the river was not deep before
thee, and a bridge was already there. Where I crossed,
the river was deep and I had to build a bridge. 11
Batu admitted the truth of this, and did not blame
Subotai again.
IX
WHAT EUROPE THOUGHT OF THE MONGOLS
T^NOUGH, perhaps, has been said here to show
JC-/ that the Mongol armies possessed several advant-
ages over the Europeans of that day. They were
more mobile Subotai rode with his division two
hundred and ninety miles in less than three days
during the invasion of Hungary. The same Ponce
d'Aubon makes the comment that the Mongols could
march in a single day as far " as from Chartres to
Paris/ 1
" No people in the world," asserts a contemporary
chronicler of Europe,* speaking of the Mongols, " is as
able especially in conflicts in open country in
defeating an enemy either by personal bravery, or by
knowledge of warfare."
This opinion is confirmed by Fra Carpini, who was
sent to the Mongol Khan not long after the terrible
invasion of 1 238-1 242, to exhort the pagan conquerors
to cease the slaughter of Christian peoples. " No single
kingdom or province can resist the Tartars." And he
adds : " The Tartars fight more by stratagem than
by sheer force."
This daring priest who seems to have had an eye
for things military remarks that the " Tartars " were
less numerous and lacked the physical stature and
strength of the Europeans. And he goes on to urge
European monarch? who always took command of
Thoxnaa de Spalato. cited by L6o& Gabon.
a 3 6
GENGHIS KHAN s$7
their hosts in a war, no matter how lacking they
might be in the qualifications of such leadership to
model their military system on the Mongol.
" Our armies ought to be marshalled after the order
of the Tartars, and under the same rigorous laws of
wan The field of battle ought to be chosen, if possible,
in a plain where everything is visible on all sides. The
army should by no means be drawn up in one body,
but in many divisions. Scouts ought to be sent out on
every side. Our generals ought to keep their troops
day and night on the alert, and always armed, ready
for battle ; as the Tartars are always vigilant as devils.
" If the princes and rulers of Christendom mean to
resist their progress, it is requisite that they should
make common cause and oppose them with united
council. "
Carpini did not fail to notice the weapons of the
Mongols and advised the European soldiery to improve
their arms. " The princes of Christendom ought to
have many soldiers armed with strong-bows, cross-
bows and artillery which the Tartars dread. Besides
these, there ought to be men armed with good iron
maces, or with axes having long handles. The steel
arrow-heads should be tempered in the Tartar manner
by being plunged, while hot, into water mixed with
salt, that they may be better able to penetrate armour.
Our men ought to have good helmets and armour of
proof for themselves and horses. And those who arc
not so armed, ought to keep in the rear of those who
arc."
Carpini had received a vivid impression of the
devastating archery of the Mongol children of war.
" Men and horses they wound and slay with arrows,
238 GENGHIS KHAN
and when men and mounts are shattered in this
fashion, they then close in upon them."
At this time the Emperor Frederick II the same
who waged the famous feud with the Pope called
for aid from the other princes, and wrote to the king
of England : " The Tartars are men of small stature
but sturdy limbs high-strung, valiant and daring,
always ready to throw themselves into peril at a sign
from their commander. . . . But and this we can-
not say without sighing formerly they were covered
with leather and armour of iron plates, while now
they are equipped with finer and more useful armour,
the spoils taken from Christians, so that we may be
shamefully and dolorously slain with our own weapons.
Moreover, they are mounted on better horses, they
sustain themselves on choicer foods and wear garments
less rude than our own."
About the time that he wrote this the Emperor
Frederick was summoned by the victorious Mongol
army of invasion to become a subject of the Great
Khan. The terms offered were fair from the Mongol
point of view for the Emperor to yield himself and
his people captive, so that their lives might be spared,*
and go himself to Karakorum and there occupy
himself with whatever official post might be selected
for him. To this Frederick answered good-naturedly
that he knew enough about birds of prey to qualify
as the Khan's falconer.
" // Jallait reconnattre lewt empire ou mourif " Abel Remusat. Sub-
mission involved paying a heavy tax, which was sometimes collected two or
three times over. The Mongols were both tolerant and rapacious.
One cannot read the annals of Genghis Khau without realizing that he
never moved to war without good occasion to do so. One suspects that he
often created the occasion himself, but it was, nevertheless, created. He
imtilled into his victorious Mongols three ideas that persisted for generations
that they most not destroy peoples who submitted voluntarily, that they
must never cease from war with those who resisted, and that they must
tolerate all religions in equal measure.
CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE EUROPEAN MONARCHS
AND THE MONGOLS
AFTER Batu and Subotai withdrew from Europe
in 1242, a widespread dread of another Mongol
invasion impelled the sovereigns of Christendom to
action in various ways. Innocent IV called the
Council of Lyons to discuss, among other matters,
some safeguard for Christianity. Heedless St. Louis
declared that if the " Tartars " appeared again, the
chivalry of France would die in the defence of the
Church. Whereupon, he started off on the disastrous
crusades into Egypt, sending at various times priests
and messages to the Mongols south of the Caspian,
commanded at that time by Baichu Khan.
One of his embassies was forwarded to the Khan at
Karakorum with an amusing result. Joinville, a
medieval chronicler, tells us that when the envoys
were presented with their slight gifts, the Khan turned
to the nobles gathered around him and said, " Lords,
here is the submission of the King of the Franks, and
here is the tribute he has sent us."
The Mongols frequently urged Louis to make
submission to their Khan, to give tribute and be
protected as other rulers were, by the power of the
Khan. They advised also, that he make war on the
Seljuks in Asia Minor, with whom they were then
240 GENGHIS KHAN
engaged. Louis some years later sent the lusty and
intelligent Rubruquis to the court of the Khan, but
was careful to instruct the monk not to present him-
self as an envoy, or to let his journey be construed
as an act of subjection.
Among the letters that reached Louis from the
horde was one mentioning the fact that many Christians
were to be found among the Mongols. " We have
come with authority and power to announce that all
Christians are to be freed from servitude and taxes
in Mohammedan lands, and are to be treated with
honour and reverence. No one is to molest their
goods and those of their churches which have been
destroyed arc to be rebuilt and are to be allowed to
sound their plates." *
It is true that there were several Christian wives of
the Mongol Il-khans of Persia, and that Christian
Armenians served them as ministers. Remnants of
the crusaders abandoned in Palestine fought at times
in the Mongol ranks. And the Il-khan Arghun did
rebuild churches that had been destroyed in the
previous wars.
And an angered Mohammedan wrote that in the
year 1259 the Mongol Il-khan Hulagu commanded
that, in the whole of Syria, " every religious sect should
proclaim its faith openly, and that no Moslem should
disapprove. On that day there was no single Christian
of the common people or of the highest who did not
put on his finest apparel." *f
Whatever may have been their leaning toward the
Christians in Palestine, the Mongol leaders did
* Howorth, History o) tk* Mongols, Part III.
*M Answer to the Dkimmis kichard Gottheil, " Journal of the American
Oriental Society/' Dec., 1921.
GENGHIS KHAN 241
sincerely desire the aid of European armies against the
Mohammedans, and in 1274 sent an embassy of
sixteen men to the Pope, and then to Edward I of
England who answered with a good deal of casuistry
since he had no intention of faring toward Jerusalem:
" We note the resolution you have taken to relieve
the Holy Land from the enemies of Christianity.
This is most grateful to us, and we thank you. But
we cannot at present send you any certain news about
the time of our arrival in the Holy Land."
Meanwhile, the Pope sent other envoys to Baichu,
near the Caspian. These offended the Mongols very
much, because they did not know the name of the
Khan and because they lectured the pagans on the
sin of shedding blood. The Mongols said that the
Pope must be very ignorant if he did not know the
name of the man who ruled all the world, and as for
slaughtering their enemies, they did that at the
command of the son of Heaven himself. Baichu was
minded to execute the unfortunate priests, but spared
them and sent them back safely because they were,
after all, envoys.
The reply of Baichu, given in a letter to these
emissaries of Innocent IV, is worth quoting :
" By order of the supreme Khan, Baichu Noyon
sends these words Pope, dost thou know that thine
envoys have come to us with thy letters ? Thine
envoys have uttered big words. We know not whether
they did so by thine order. So, we send thee this
message. If thou desirest to reign over the land and
water, thy patrimony, thou must come thyself,
Pope, to us, and present thyself before him who
reigns over the surface of all the earth. And if thou
*4* GENGHIS KHAN
comcst not, we know not what will happen. God
knows. Only, it would be well to send messengers
to say whether thou wilt come or no, and whether
thou wilt come in friendship or no."*
Needless to say, Innocent IV did not make the
journey to Karakorum. Nor did the Mongols return
again to middle Europe. But there is no indication
that the armed chivalry of western Europe restrained
them. At Nicustadt in Austria they had advanced
nearly six thousand miles from their homeland.
Subotai and the fierce Tuli died. Batu, the son of
Juchi, was well content with Sari, his golden city on
the Volga. Civil war smouldered along the wastes of
Asia, and the westward march of the hordes came to
an end. They ravaged Hungary again near the close
of the thirteenth century, then retired to the plains
of the Volga.
From the SpfcuJtim Historialc of Vincent oV Beauvais, Tn this letter
appears again the ominous phrase, " \\V know rnknows " the usual phrase of warning when the Mongols meant war. To
the Seljuk prince, Kai Kosni, they leturnrd n l.innr.r aiiswei. " Thou hast
s token bravely. God will give victory as He pleases." It seems that
they alwavs sent envoys to an enemy, after the custom of Genghis Khan,
offering terms. If these were refused, they uttered their warning and made
ready for war.
XI
v
THE TOMB OF GENGHIS KHAN
story printed in a London newspaper that
JL Professor Peter Kozloff had found and identified
the burial place of the Mongol conqueror excited
great interest recently. This report was later denied
by Professor Lozloff, according to a cable from
Leningrad printed in the New Tork Times> November
nth, 1927.
Professor Kozloff in relating the results of his last
trip to the site of Kara Khoto in the southern Gobi
during 1925-26, and the evidences of early Scythian-
Siberian culture found there, pointed out that the site
of the sepulchre of Genghis Khan is still unknown.
There exist many conflicting traditions as to this
vanished sepulchre. Marco Polo mentions it vaguely,
assuming it to be among the tombs of the later Mongol
sovereigns.
Rashid el-Din says that Genghis Khan was buried
at a hill called Yakka Kuruk near Urga, a place
frequently mentioned by Ssanang Setzen. Quat-
remcre and others go to some lengths to identify
this hill with the Khanula near Urga. But all this
is doubtful.
The Archimandrite Palladius says : " There arc
no accurate indications in the documents of the
Mongol period on die burial place of Chingiz Khan."
24.3
244 GENGHIS KHAN
A more modern tradition, cited by E. T. C. Werner,
places the tomb of the conqueror in the Ordos
country, at Etjen Koro. Here, on the twenty-first
day of the third month a ceremony is attended on this
site by Mongol princes. Relics of the great Khan,
a saddle, a bow and other things, are brought to the
burial site, which is not a tomb but an encampment,
walled in by piled stone. Here stand two white felt
tents containing, it is believed, a casket of stone.
What is in the casket is unknown.
Mr. Werner believes that the Mongols arc correct
in saying that the remains of the conqueror may lie
in this encampment, still guarded by five hundred
families who still have special rights. It is situated
beyond the great wall, south of the loop of the
Hoang, about 40 N. Lat. and 109 E. Long.
In evidence of this, he quotes the statement of the
Mongol prince of Kalachin, a descendant of Genghis
Khan. And this, perhaps, is better evidence than
the vague and conflicting accounts of the chronicles.
For farther details, consult the Yule-Cordier 1903 edition of Marco Polo,
Vol. I. pp. 247-251 ; also Tke Tomb of Marco Polo, by E. T. C. Werner;
and W. W. Rock hill's Diary.
XII
YE LIU CHUTSAI, SAGE OF CATHAY
FEW men have had a more difficult part to play
in life than this young Cathayan who caught
the eye of Genghis Khan. He was one of the first
Chinese philosophers to ride with the horde, and the
Mongols did not make matters easy for the student of
philosophy and astronomy and medicine. An officer
who was noted for his skill as a maker of bows chaffed
the tall and long-bearded Cathayan :
" What business has a man of books," he asked,
" among a fellowship of warriors ? "
" To make fine bows," Ye Liu Chutsai replied,
" a wood worker is needed ; but when it comes to
governing an empire, a man of wisdom is needed."
He became a favourite of the old conqueror and
during the long march into the west, while the other
Mongols were gathering rich spoil, the Cathayan
collected books and astronomical tables and herbs
for his own use. He noted down the geography of
the march, and when an epidemic seized the horde,
he enjoyed a philosopher's revenge on the officers
who had made sport of him. He dosed them with
rhubarb and cured them.
Genghis Khan valued him for his integrity, and
Ye Liu Chutsai lost no opportunity to check the
slaughter that marked the path of the horde. There
346 GENGHIS KHAN
is a legend that in the defiles of the lower Himalayas
Genghis Khan saw in his path a marvellous-appearing
animal, shaped like a deer, but green in colour and
with only a single horn. He called Ye Liu Chutsai
for an explanation of the phenomenon, and the
Cathayan made answer gravely :
" This strange animal is called Kio-tuan. He knows
every language of the earth, and he loves living men,
and has a horror of slaying. His appearance is un-
doubtedly a warning to thee, O my Khan, to turn
back from this path."
Under Ogotai, the son of Genghis Khan, the
Cathayan practically administered the empire, and
managed to take the infliction of punishment from the
hands of Mongol officers, appointing magistrates to
this duty, and tax-gatherers to the care of the treasures.
His quick wit and quiet courage pleased the pagan
conquerors, and he knew how to influence them.
Ogotai was a heavy drinker, and Ye Liu Chutsai had
reason to wish him to live as long as possible. Remon-
strances having no effect upon the Khan, the Cathayan
brought him an iron vase in which wine had been
standing for some time. The wine had corroded the
edge of the vessel.
" If wine," he said, " has eaten thus into iron,
judge for yourself what it has done to your intestines."
Ogotai was struck by the demonstration and
moderated his drinking though it was the real cause
of his death. Once, angered at an act of his councillor,
he had Ye Liu Chutsai thrown into prison, but
changed his mind later and ordered him to be freed.
The Cathayan would not leave his cell Ogotai sent
to find out why he did not appear at court.
GENGHIS KHAN H7
"Thou didst name me thy minister," the sage
sent back his response. " Thou hast placed me in
prison. So, I was guilty. Thou hast set me at liberty.
Thus, I am innocent. It is easy for thee to make game
of me. But how am I to direct the affairs of the
empire ? "
He was restored to office, to the great good of
millions of human beings. When Ogotai died the
administration was taken out of the hands of the old
Cathayan and given to a Mohammedan named Abd
el Rahman. Grief over the oppressive measures of the
new minister hastened the death of Chutsai.
Believing that he must have accumulated great
riches during his life under the Khans, some Mongol
officers searched his residence. They found no other
treasure than a regular museum of musical instru-
ments, manuscripts, maps, tablets and stones on which
inscriptions had been carved.
XIII
OGOTAI AND HIS TREASURE
THE son who succeeded to the throne of the
conqueror found himself an almost unwilling
master of half the world. Ogotai had all a Mongol's
good humour and tolerance, without the cruelty of
his brothers. He could sit in his tent-palace at Kara-
korum and do nothing except listen to the throngs
who came to bow down at the throne of the Khan.
His brothers and officers carried on the wars, and
Ye Liu Chutsai saw to the gathering of the revenues.
Ogotai, broad of body and placid of mind, presents
a curious picture a benevolent barbarian with the
spoils of Cathay, the women of a dozen empires and
the horse herds of unlimited pastures all at his
summons. His actions arc refreshingly unkinglike.
When his officers protested at his habit of giving away
whatever he happened to sec, he replied that he would
soon be gone out of the world and his only abiding
place would be the memory of men.
He did not approve of the treasures amassed by the
Persian and Indian monarchs. " They were fools,"
he said, " and it did them little good. They took
nothing out of the world with them."
Shrewd Mohammedan merchants, hearing the
rumour of his heedless generosity, did not fail to
GENGHIS KHAN 249
throng to his court with varied goods and a huge bill
of account. Such bills were presented to the Khaa
every evening when he sat in public. Once the nobles
in attendance protested to him that the merchants
were overcharging him ridiculously. Ogotai assented.
" They came expecting to profit from me, and
I do not wish them to go away disappointed.' 1
His goings-abroad were something in the nature
of a desert Haroun al Rashid's. He liked to talk with
chance-met wanderers and on one occasion was struck
by the poverty of an old man, who gave him three
melons. Having no silver or rich cloth about him at
the time, the Khan ordered one of his wives to reward
the beggar with the pearls from her ear-rings which
were of great size and value.
" It would be better, O my lord," she protested,
" to summon him to court to-morrow and give him
silver which he can put to more use than these pearls."
" The very poor," retorted the practical Mongol,
" can not wait until the morrow. Besides, the pearls
will come back to my treasury before long."
Ogotai had all a Mongol's fondness for hunting,
and watching wrestling matches and horse races.
Minstrels and athletes journeyed to his court from far
Cathay and the cities of Persia. In his day began the
feuds that eventually divided the Mongol dynasties
the strife between Mohammedan and Buddhist,
between Persian and Chinese. This bickering annoyed
the son of Genghis Khan. And his simplicity of mind
sometimes discomfited the intriguers. A certain
Buddhist came to the Mongol with a story that Genghis
Khan had appeared before him in a dream, and had
voiced a command.
GENGHIS KHAN
" Go thou and bid my son exterminate all believers
in Mohammed, for they are an evil race." '
The severity of the dead conqueror toward the
peoples of Islam was well known, and a yarligh a
command of the great Khan delivered in a vision was
an important matter. Ogotai meditated for a while.
" Did Genghis Khan address thee by the words of
an interpreter ? " he asked at length.
" Nay, O my Khan, he himself spoke."
" And thou knowest the Mongol speech ? " per-
sisted Ogotai.
It was an evident fact that the man honoured by
the vision spoke nothing but Turki.
" Then thou hast lied to me," retorted the Khan,
" for Genghis Khan spoke only Mongol." And he
ordered the antagonist of the Mohammedans to be
put to death.
Another time, some Chinese showmen were enter-
taining Ogotai with a puppet play. Among the
marionettes, the Khan noticed a figure of an old man,
turbaned, with long white moustaches, which was
dragged about at the tail of a horse. He demanded
that the Chinese explain the meaning of this.
" It is thus," responded the masters of the show,
" that Mongol warriors draw after them Moslem
captives."
Ogotai ordered the show to be stopped and his
attendants to bring from his treasury the richest
cloths, rugs and precious work both of China and
Persia. He showed the Chinese that their goods were
inferior to the western articles, and he added, " In
my dominion there is no single rich Mohammedan
who does not own several Chinese slaves and no
GENGHIS KHAN 251
wealthy Chinese* has any Mohammedan slaves. You
are aware, besides, that Genghis Khan gave command
that a reward of forty pieces of gold should be given
to the slayer of a Mohammedan, while he did not think
the life of a Chinese worth a donkey. How, then,
dare you mock the Mohammedans ? " And he sent
the showmen from the court with their marionettes.
" On the heels of the military conqueror came the administrative man*
darin " L on Cahun. " L' esprit bureaucratique des Chmois qtn dirigaient
1' administration Mongole." Ulochet.
The early Montis never accustomed themselves to the use of money,
and they had only contempt for the mail who spent his life in hoarding
it. Ijongfcllow has put into verse thf episode of the unfortunate kalif
of Baghdad, who was overcome and captured in spite of a vast accumulation
of treasury by Hulagu ---Cental's celebrated nephew.
" I said to the Kalif, ' Thou art old ;
Thou hast nn need of so much gold.
Thou shouM-it not have heaped and hidden it here
Till the breath of brittle was hot and near "
(For additional details on the lives of Ye Liu Chutsai and Opotai, sea
the Nouveaux Milling A*iatii\tti of Abrl-Rernusat, Tartarie by Louis
Dubcux, The Bo^k
Amiot, and Le SitUz dcs Youen by M.
XIV
THE LAST COURT OP THE NOMADS
Being the Arrival of Fra Rubruquis at the Lashgar,
or Travelling Court of Manga Khan, the Grand-
son oj Genghis Khan.*
ONLY two Europeans have left us a description
of the Mongols before the residence of the
Khans was changed to Cathay. One is the monk
Carpini, and the other the burly Fra Rubruquis, who
rode with a stout heart into Tatary, half convinced
that he would be tortured to death. On behalf of his
royal master, Saint Louis of France, he went not as an
envoy of his king, but as an emissary of peace, in the
hope that the pagan conquerors might be moved
somewhat to refrain from warfare against Europe.
For fellowship he had only a badly frightened
brother monk Constantinople left behind them and
the steppes of Asia closing around them. He had been
chilled to the marrow and half starved, and jolted for
three thousand miles. The Mongols had equipped him
with sheepskins and felt foot-socks and boots and
hoods of skin, and had been careful to select a powerful
horse for him each day during the long journey from
the Volga frontier, because he was corpulent and
heavy.
He was a mystery to the Mongols a long-robed
As given ia Astlej's Voyages, bat modified and <
GENGHIS KHAN *53
and barefoot man out of the far land of the Franks,
who was neither merchant nor ambassador, who
carried no arms, gave no presents and would accept
no reward. A curious picture, this, of the weighty
and dogmatic friar who had wandered out of stricken
Europe to behold the Khan a poverty-ridden, but
not a humble member of the long train that journeyed
east into the desert Yaroslav, duke of Russia,
Cathayan and Turkish lords, the sons of the king of
Georgia, the envoy of the kalif of Baghdad, and the
great sultans of the Saracens. And, with an observant
eye, Rubruquis has described for us the court of the
nomad conquerors, where the " barons " drank milk
in jewel encrusted goblets and rode in sheepskins
upon saddles ornamented with gold work.
In this fashion he describes his arrival at the court
of Mangu Khan :
On Saint Stephen's day in December we came to
a great plain where not a hillock was to be seen, and
the next day we arrived at the court of the great
Khan.
Our guide had a large house appointed for him,
and only a small cottage was given to us three
hardly room enough for our baggage, beds and a
small fire. Many came to our guide with drink made
of rice in long-necked bottles, no different from the
best wine except that it smelt otherwise. We were
called out and questioned about our business. A secret-
ary told me that we wanted the assistance of a Tartar
army against the Saracens ; and this astonished me
as I knew the letters from your majesty required
Saint Loots, King of Franca, who was than a captive of tkt Uamlaks.
SS4 GENGHIS KHAN
no army and only advised the Khan to be a friend to
all Christians.
The Mongols then demanded if we would make
peace with them. To this I answered, " Having done
no wrong, the King of the French hath given no
cause for war. If warred against without cause, we
trust in the help of God."
At this they seemed all amazed, exclaiming, " Did
you not come to make peace ? "
The day following I went to the court barefoot, at
which the people stared ; but a Hungarian boy who
was among them and knew our order,* told them the
reason. Whereupon a Nestorian who was the chief
secretary of the court asked many questions of us
and we went back to our lodgings.
On the way, at the end of the court toward the east,
I saw a small house with a little cross above it. At this
I rejoiced, believing there might be some Christians
within. I entered boldly, and found an altar well
furnished, having a golden cloth adorned with images
of Christ, the Virgin, Saint John the Baptist and two
angels the lines of their bodies and garments shaped
with small pearls.
On the altar was a large silver cross, bright with
precious stones and many embroiderings, Before it
burned a lamp with eight lights. Sitting beside the
altar I saw an Armenian monk somewhat black and
lean, clad in a rough hairy coat and girded with iron
under his haircloth.
Before saluting the monk, we fell flat on the ground,
singing Avt regina and other hymns, and the monk
* Rttbruquis was a Franciscan, and the first priest to appear in his robes
in lar Asia Carpim. the envoy oi the Pope, having put on secular diess.
GENGHIS KHAN 95$
joined in our prayers. We then sat down by the monk
who had a small fire in a pan before him. He told us
that he a hermit of Jerusalem had come a month
before us.
When we had talked for a while we went on to our
lodgings, making a little broth of flesh and millet for
our supper. Our Mongol guide and his companions
were very drunk at court and little care was taken of
us. So great was the cold that next morning the ends
of my toes were frost-bitten and I could no longer
go barefoot.
From the time when the frost begins, it never
ceases until May, and even then it freezes every night
and morning. And, while we were there, the cold,
rising with the wind, killed multitudes of animals.
The people of the court* brought us ram-skin coats
and breeches and shoes, which my companion and the
interpreter accepted. On the fifth of January we
were taken into the court.
It was asked of us what reverence we would pay
the Khan, and I said that we came from a far country
and with their leave would first sing praises to God
who had brought us hither in safety, and would after-
wards do whatever might please the Khan. Then
they went into the presence and related what we had
told them. Returning, they brought us before the
entrance of the hall, lifting up the felt which hung
before the threshold, and we sang A so/is ortus car dine.
They searched the breasts of our robes to see if
* When Rubruquis speaks of the court, he means the quarters of Manga
Khan, his women and higher officers, in the centre of the encampment.
Of the encampment of Ddtu Mangu's cousin on the Volga, he says, "Wo
were astonished at the magnificence of his encampment. The houses and
tents stretched out to a vast length, and there were great numbers of people
ranged round for three or four leagues."
256 GENGHIS KHAN
we had any weapons concealed, and they made our
interpreter leave his girdle and knife with one of the
guards at the door. When we entered, our interpreter
was made to stand at a table which was well furnished
with mare's milk, and we were placed on a bench
before the women.
The whole house was hung with cloth-of-gold, and
on the hearth in the middle there was a fire of thorns,
worm-wood roots and cow-dung. The Khan sat upon
a couch covered with bright and shining fur like seal's
skin. He was a flat-nosed man of middle stature, about
forty-five years of age, and one of his wives a pretty
little woman sat beside him. Likewise one of his
daughters, a hard-favoured young woman, sat on a
couch near him. This house had belonged to the
mother of this daughter, who was a Christian, and the
daughter was now mistress of it.
We were asked whether we would drink rice-wine,
or mare's milk or mead made of honey for they use
these three kinds of liquors in winter. I answered
that we had no pleasure in drink and would be content
with what the Khan pleased to order. So we were
served with rice-wine, of which I tasted a little out of
respect.
After a long interval during which the Khan
amused himself with falcons and other birds, we were
commanded to speak and had to bow the knee. The
Khan had his interpreter, a Nestorian, but our inter-
preter had been given so much liquor from the table
that he was quite drunk. I addressed the Khan as
follows :
" We give thanks and praise to God who hath
brought us from such remote parts of the world to
GENGHIS KHAN 357
the presence of Mangu Khan on whom he hath bestowed
such great power. The Christians of the west, especially
the King of the French, sent us unto him with letters,
entreating him to allow us to stay in his country, as it
is our office to teach men the law of God. We there-
fore beg his highness to permit us to remain. We have
neither silver nor gold nor precious stones to offer,
but we present ourselves to do service."
The Khan answered to this effect :
" Even as the sun sheds his beams everywhere, so
our power and that of Batu extends everywhere, so
we have no need of your gold or silver."
I entreated his highness not to be displeased with me
for mentioning gold and silver, as I spoke only to
make clear our desire to do him service. Hitherto
I had understood our interpreter, but he was now drunk
and could not utter an intelligible sentence and it
appeared to me that the Khan might be drunk like-
wise ; wherefore I held my peace.
Then he made us rise and sit down again, and after
a few words of compliment we withdrew from the
presence. One of the secretaries and interpreters went
out with us and was very inquisitive about the king-
dom of France, particularly whether it had plenty of
sheep, cattle, and horses, as if they meant to make it
all their own. They appointed one to take care of us
and we went to the Armenian monk, whither came
the interpreter, saying that Mangu Khan gave
us two months to stay, until the extreme cold be
past.
To this I answered, " God preserve Mangu Khan
and grant him a long life. We have found this monk
whom we think a holy man and we will willingly
258 GENGHIS KHAN
remain and pray with him for the well-being of the
Khan."
(For on feast days the Christians come to court and
pray for him and bless his cup, after which the Saracen
priests do the same and after them the idolatrous
priests.* The monk Sergius pretended that he only
believed the Christians, but in this Sergius lied. The
Khan believes none, but all follow his court as flies
do honey. He gives to all, and all think they are his
familiars, and all prophesy prosperity to him.)
We then went to our dwelling which we found very
cold as we had no fuel and were still fasting though
by then it was night. But he who had the care of us
provided us with some wood and a little food, and our
guide of the journey hither, who was now to return to
Batu, begged a carpet from us. This we gave him
and he departed in peace.
The cold became severe, and Mangu Khan sent us
three fur coats with the hair outward, which we took
gratefully. But we explained that we had not fit
quarters to pray for the Khan our cottage being so
small we could scarcely stand up in it, neither could
we open our books after lighting the fire, on account
of the smoke. The Khan sent to ask the monk if he
would be pleased with our company, who gladly
received us and after this we had a better house.
While we were absent, Mangu Khan himself came
into the chapel and a golden bed was fetched, upon
which he sat with his queen opposite the altar. We
were then sent for and a pavilion guard searched us
for hidden weapons. On going in with a Bible and a
breviary in my bosom, I first bowed down before the
* Buddhisti, with whom Robruquis had no previous acquaintance.
GENGHIS KHAN 259
altar and then made obeisance to Mangu Khan, who
caused our books to be brought to him and asked the
meaning of the miniatures with which they were
adorned. The Nestorians answered him as they
thought proper, because we had not our interpreter.
Being desired to sing a psalm after our manner, we
chanted Pent, Sanctu Spiritus. Then the Khan left,
but the lady remained and distributed gifts.
I honoured the monk Sergius as my bishop. In
many things he acted in a way that much displeased
me, for he had made for himself a cap of peacock
feathers, with a small gold cross. But I was well
pleased with the cross. The monk by my suggestion
craved leave to carry the cross aloft on a lance, and
Mangu gave permission to carry it in any way we
saw fit.
So we went about with Sergius, for the honour of
the cross, as he had fashioned a banner on a cane as
long as a lance, and we carried it throughout the tents
of the Tatars, singing Vexilla regis prodcunt^ to the
great regret of the Mohammedans, who were envious
of our favour, and of the Nestorian priests, who were
envious of the profit he had from its use.
Near Karakorum, Mangu has a large court, sur-
rounded by a brick wall, like our priories. Within that
court is a great palace where the Khan holds feasts
twice in the year, in Easter and in summer, when he
displays all his magnificence. Because it was indecent
to have flagons going about the hall of the palace as
in a tavern, William Bouchier, the goldsmith from
Paris, built a great silver tree just without the middle
entrance of the hall. At the roots of the tree were
four silver lions from which flowed pure cow's milk.
2 6o GENGHIS KHAN
On the four great boughs of the tree were twined
golden serpents that discharge streams of wine of
various sorts.
The palace is like a church with three aisles and
two rows of pillars. The Khan sits on a high place
at the north wall, where he may be seen of all. The
space between the Khan and the silver tree is left
vacant for the coming and the going of the cup-
bearers and the messengers who bring gifts. On the
right side of the Khan the men sit and on the left
the women. Only one woman sits beside him, not so
high as he.
Except for the palace of the Khan, Karakorum is
not so fine as the town of Saint Denis. It has two
main streets, that of the Saracens where the fairs are
held, and the street of the Cathayans which is filled
with craftsmen. Besides, there are many palaces in
which are the courts of the secretaries of the Khan
also markets for millet and grain, sheep and horses
and oxen and wagons. There are twelve idol temples,
two Mohammedan mosques and one Nestorian
church.
About Passion Sunday the Khan departed for
Karakorum, with his smaller houses* only, and the
monk and we followed. On the journey we had to
pass through hilly country, where we encountered
high winds, extreme cold and much snow. About
midnight the Khan sent to the monk and us, requesting
us to pray to God to make the storm cease as the
animals of his train were like to die, being mostly
with young. The monk sent him incense, desiring
him to put it on the coals as an offering. Whether he
* Kibitkas, or wagon tents.
GENGHIS KHAN 261
did this or no, I know not, but the wind and snow
ceased, which had lasted two days.
On Palm Sunday we were near Karakorum and at
dawn of day we blessed the willow boughs on which
there were as yet no buds. About nine o'clock we
entered the city, carrying the cross aloft and passing
through the street of the Saracens. We proceeded to
the church where the Nestorians met us in procession.
After Mass, it being now evening, William Bouchier
the goldsmith brought us to sup at his lodging. He
had a wife born in Hungary, and we found here also
Basilicus, the son of an Englishman.
After supper we retired to our cottage which, like
the oratory of the monk, was near the Nestorian
church a church of size very handsomely built, the
ceiling covered with silk embroidered with gold.
We remained in the city to celebrate the festival of
Easter. There was a vast multitude of Hungarians,
Alans, Ruthenians or Russians and Georgians and
Armenians, who had not received the sacrament since
they were taken prisoners. The Nestorians entreated
me to celebrate the festival, and I had neither vest-
ments nor altar.
But the goldsmith furnished me with vestments,
and made an oratory on a chariot, decently painted
with Scripture histories ; he made also a silver box
and an image of the blessed Virgin.
Until now I had hoped for the arrival of the king
of Armenia, and a certain German priest who was
likewise expected. Hearing nothing of the king and
fearing the severity of another winter, I sent to ask
the pleasure of the Khan, whether we were to remain
or to leave him.
,162 GENGHIS KHAN
Next day some of the chief secretaries of the Khan
came to me, one a Mongol who is cup-bearer to the
Khan, and the rest Saracens. These men demanded
on behalf of the Khan wherefore I had come to
them ? To this I answered that Batu had ordered me
to the Khan, to whom I had nothing to say on behalf
of any man, unless I were to repeat the words of God,
if he would hear them.
Then they demanded what words I would speak,
thinking I meant to prophesy prosperous things as
others had done.
I therefore said : " To Mangu I would say that
God hath given much, for the power and riches that
he enjoys come not from the idols of the Buddhists."
Then they asked if I had been in Heaven, that I
should know the commandments of God ? And they
went to Mangu saying that I had said he was an
idolater and a Buddhist, who kept not the command-
ments of God. On the morrow the Khan sent again,
explaining that he knew we had no message for him,
but came to pray for him as other priests did, yet he
wished to know if any of our ambassadors had ever
been in his country. Then I declared unto them all
I knew respecting David and Friar Andrew, all
of which was put down in writing and laid before
Mangu.
On Whitsunday I was called into the presence of the
Khan. Before I went in, the goldsmith's son who was
now my interpreter informed me that the Mongols
had determined I was to return to my own country,
and advised me to say nothing against it.
When I came before the Khan I kneeled, and he
asked me whether I had said to his secretaries that he
GENGHIS KHAN *6)
was a Buddhist. To this I answered, "My lord,
I said not so."
" I thought well you said not so," he answered,
" for it was a word you ought not to have spoken."
Then, reaching forth the staff on which he leaned
toward me, he said, " Be not afraid."
To this I answered, smiling, that if I had feared
I should not have come hither.
" We Mongols believe there is but one God," he
said then, "and we have an upright heart toward
him."
" Then," I responded, " may God grant you this
mind, for without His gift it cannot be."
" God hath given to the hand divers fingers," he
added, " and hath given many ways to man. He hath
given the Scriptures to you, yet you keep them not.
Surely it is not in your Scriptures that one of you
should dispraise another."
" Nay," said I, " and I signified to your highness
from the beginning that I would not contend with
any one."
" I speak not," said he, " of you. In like manner,
it is not in your Scriptures that a man should turn
from justice for the sake of profit."
To this I answered that I had not come to seek
money, having even refused what was offered me.
And one of the secretaries then present avowed that
I had refused a bar of silver and a piece of silk.
" I speak not of that," said the Khan. " God
hath given to you the Scriptures and ye keep them
not ; but he hath given to us soothsayers, and we do
what they bid us and live in peace."
He drank four times, I think, before uttering this,
264 GENGHIS KHAN
and, while I waited attentively in expectation that he
might disclose more respecting his faith, he spoke
again :
" You have stayed a long time here and it is my
pleasure that you return. You have said that you dared
not take my ambassador with you. Will you take,
then, my messenger or my letters ? "
To this I answered, if the Khan would make me
understand his words and put them in writing, I
would willingly carry them to the best of my power.
He then asked if I would have gold or silver or
costly garments, and I answered that we were accus-
tomed to accept no such things, yet could not get out
of his country without his help. He explained that he
would provide for us, and demanded how far we wished
to be taken. I said it were sufficient if he had us
conveyed to Armenia.
" I will cause you to be carried thither," he made
answer, " after which, look to yourself. There are
two eyes in a single head, yet they both behold one
object. You came from Batu, and therefore you must
return to him."
Then, after a pause, as if musing, he said, " You
have a long way to go. Make yourself strong with
food, that you may be able to endure the journey."
So he ordered them to give me drink, and I
departed from his presence and returned not again.
XV
THE GRANDSON OF GENGHIS KHAN IN THE HOLY LAND
A LITTLE-KNOWN chapter of history is the
contact of the Mongols with the Armenians
and the Christians of Palestine after the death of
Genghis Khan. Hulagu, his grandson, brother of
Mangu who was then Khan, took over the dominion
of Persia, Mesopotamia and Syria in the middle of the
thirteenth century. What followed is well sum-
marised in the Cambridge Medieval History -, Vol. IV,
P- 175-
" After more than a century's experience the
Armenians could not trust their Latin* neighbours
us allies. Haithon (king of the Armenians) put his
trust not in the Christians but in the heathen Mongols
who for half a century were to prove the best friends
Armenia ever had.
" At the beginning of Haithon's reign the Mongols
. . . did good service to the Armenians by con-
quering the Seljuks. Haithon made an offensive and
defensive alliance with Baichu the Mongol general f
and in 1244 became the vassal of the Khan Ogotai.
Ten years later, he did homage in person to Mangu
* The crusading barons who still maintained their fiefs in the Holy Land.
notably Bohemond of Antioch.
t Bachu in the text, as also Hethum, Ogdai, etc. The spelling has been
altered to conform with the other chapters of this book. Baichu is often
confused with Batu, who was a grnn.lson of Genghis Khan, and the first
rukx of the Golden Horde in Russia.
266 GENGHIS KHAN
Khan and cemented the friendship between the two
nations by a long stay at the Mongol court.
" The rest of his reign was filled with a struggle
against the Mamluks, whose northward advance was
fortunately opposed by the Mongols. Haithon and
Hulagu joined forces at Edessa to undertake the
capture of Jerusalem from the Mamluks."
Bibliography
I
SOURCES
earliest source was the Mongolian Altyn
jL debter^ the Golden Book, now lost. Upon this
was based the Chinese Yuan shi or Mongol Annals,
and the history of Rashid ed-Din. (See below.)
Another Mongolian work called the Secret History
is preserved only in the Chinese translation, the Yuan
cA'ao mi shi, originally written (1228) in Mongol, in
Ugur letters by a contemporary of the great Khan.
In the mid-seventeenth century the best known of
the Mongol annalists, Ssanang Setzen, compiled his
Chung taishi (Khadun Toghudji)^ a legendary account
of the ancestors and life of Genghis Khan. It is
distorted with Buddhist myths, but gives us the only
intimate picture of the early Mongols. Translated
into Russian by the Archimandrite Hyacinth, and
thence at least in part into German by Isaac Jacob
Schmidt in 1829. (See below.)
Of the Chinese sources, the most important arc :
The T'oung kien kang mou, or history of the im-
perial dynasties, compiled by Ssi ma Kouang. This
has very little to say about the early Mongol rulers.
Available in a French translation of doubtful value,
to-day, the Histoire generate de la Chine ^ tradutte du
267
268 GENGHIS KHAN
Tong-Kien-Kang-Mou par le Pere Joseph- Anne-Mane
de Moyriac de Mailla^ dirigee par M. U Roux des
Haute sr ay es^ Paris, 1777-1778.
The Ch'in chfag /u, by an anonymous writer, gives
a narrative of the Mongols beginning with Yesukai
and ending with the death of Ogotai.
From this, and the Yuan ch'ao mi ski, the most
important of the Chinese sources, the Yuan Shi* or
Mongol Annals, was compiled in 1370. It is more
accurate than the work of Ssanang Setzen, but as in
the case of the Mongol sagas of doubtful value when
it deals with the western countries. It has been trans-
lated into French under the title of the Histoire de
Gentchiscan et de toute la dinastie des Mongous, tiree
de r Histoire Chinoise by Anthony Gaubil, Paris, 1739.
By all odds the most valuable source is the Jami-
ut-Tavarikh, or Collection of Annals, by Fadrallah
Rashid ed-Din, a Persian who was administrator of
Persia under Ghazan Khan in the late thirteenth
century. " There remain," said Rashid in his intro-
duction, " in the archives of the Mongol Khan of
Persia some historical fragments of acknowledged
authority written in the Mongol language and
characters/' ... In his task of translating and
clarifying these documents Rashid a most gifted
historian was aided by a staff of historians, Chinese
Ugurs and Turks, and by the Mongols themselves.
Unfortunately, the Jami-ut-Tavarikh is still un-
translated, but has been published by Vrosset in the
Gibbs Memorial Series, Leyden and London.
The TaHkh-i-Jahan Gushai, or History of the
World Conqueror, by Ala ed-Din Ata Malik, called
Juvaini, written in 1257 or 1260 (Gibbs Memorial
GENGHIS KHAN 269
Scries, London, 1912-14), is almost of equal value,
but disappointing to the biographer of Genghis Khan
in that it gives at first hand only an account of the
last ten years of the reign of the conqueror.
Another contemporary source is the K'amil-ut-
Tavarikh of Ibn Athir, called Nissavi, 1231. This is
rather the history of Jelal ed-Din and the Persian
wars.
The later works of Khwdndamir, the Habiba Siyar >
1523, and the Raudata Safa y 1470, of his grandfather,
Mirkhwand, contain only fragmentary notices of
Genghis Khan. So also does the Fateh Nameh
TavarM al Osman, or Osman History of Abulcair,
1550.
II
HISTORIES OF GENGHIS KHAN AND THE EARLY
MONGOLS FROM THE SOURCES*
ABU AL FARAJ, GREGORIUS. (Bar Hebreaus.)
Historia Dynastiorium.
(The Syrian Gregorius lived in the mid-thirteenth
century, and came into contact with the Mongols. His
history of dynasties is valuable, and his anecdotes are
unique. Translated into Latin by Pocock, 1663.)
ABULGHAZI BAHADUR KHAN. Histoire genealogique
des Tartars , Leyden, 1726.
(The author, an Uzbek khan, wrote in the seven-
teenth century, drawing most of his information from
Rashid. Interesting, but of little value to the student
until the author deals with his own period.)
* Most of the sources for the life of Genghis Khan exist only in manuscript
form, untranslated. The volumes in Group II are rare for t ho most jjart.
Books that may be found in the larger public libraries and university libraries
are marked with an asterisk.
27* GENGHIS KHAN
DOUGLAS, ROBERT KENNAWAY. The Life of Jenghiz
Khan translated from the Chinese, London,
1877-
(Summarized in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.)
ERDMANN, FRANZ VON. Vollstaendige Uebersicht
der aeltesten tuerkischen, tatarischen und mog-
holischen Voelkerstaemme nach Raschid-ud-Din's
Vorgdnge> Kazan, 1841.
Temudschin der Unerschiitterliche, Leipzig, 1862.
KRAUSE, F. E. A. Cingis Han. Die Geschichte
seines lebens nach der Chinesischen Reichsannalen,
Heidelberg, 1922.
(A short account of the Khan from the Chinese annals.)
Geschichte Ostasiens> Gottengen, 1925.
(An excellent summary of the Mongol conquests.)
PETIS DE LA CROIX. Histoire du Grand Genghiz-
can Premier Empereur des Anciens Mogols
traduite de plusieurs Auteurs Orientaux & de
Voyageurs Europeens, Paris, 1710.
(The author devoted ten years to a translation of
the Persian and Arabic sources. He did not consult
the Chinese annals and the chief interest of his work
to-day is in its details and anecdotes of the Persian
campaign.)
SCHMIDT, ISAAC JACOB. Geschichte der Ost-Mon-
go/en, etc., verfasst von Ssanang Seteen Chung-
taidshij St. Petersburg, 1829.
(A valuable translation from the Mongol saga, un-
fortunately excessively rare.)
VLADIMIRTZOV, B. J. Jenghis Khan, Berlin and
Moscow, 1922.
(A work of 176 pp. in Russian that refers frequently
to the " Yuen-cao-mi-si.")
GENGHIS KHAN 171
III
GENERAL HISTORIES OF THE MONGOLS
BARTHOLD, WILHELM. Turkestan im Zeitalter des
MongolcneinfallS) St. Petersburg, 1900.
(Devoted in large part to Genghis Khan, and con
taining matter from the sources not hitherto published
elsewhere.)
Die Entstehung des Retches Tchinghiz-chans, St.
Petersburg, 1896.
CAHUN, LEON. Introduction a rhistoire de VAsie :
Turcs et Mongols > des origines & 1405, Paris,
1896.
(A curiously valuable book. The author, a brilliant
linguist, drew material from many sources, but became
fascinated by Turkish legends and Mongol military
achievement.)
*CORDIER, HENRI. Histoire Generate de la Chine et
de ses relations avec les pays etrangers> Paris,
1920.
(Notable for its account of the contact of China with
the west. The sketch of Genghis Khan in Vol. II
. is drawn chiefly from de Mailla and d'Ohsson.)
*CURTIN, JEREMIAH. The Mongols, Boston, 1908.
(A popular translation of the Mongol sagas, it is
uncertain from what source.)
DE GUIGNES, J. Histoire gfnerale des Huns, des
Turcs , des Mogols, Paris, 1756.
(A gigantic work, from Chinese and other sources.
It has little value to-day.)
GENGHIS KHAN
HOWORTH, SIR HENRY H. History of the Mongols^
London, 1876-88.
(A monumental work, valuable to the student, based
mainly upon Erdmann and d'Ohsson.)
MOURADGA D'OHSSON. Histoire des Mongols depuis
Tchinguiz-Khanjusqu'a Timour Bey, The Hague
and Amsterdam, 1834-5.
(A full and informative history of the Mongols, from
the Persian and Arab writers though Gaubil has also
been consulted. Like M. Cordier, Baron d'Ohsson
is antagonistic to Genghis Khan, and reveals him only
as a military commander of the Mongols.)
IV
ACCOUNTS OF THE EARLY VOYAGERS
BERGERON, PIERRE. Relation des voyages en Tar-
tarie de Fr. Gvittavme de RvbrvyvtSj Fr. yean
d*u Plan Gar pin. P/vs vn traicte des Tar tares,
Paris, 1634.
(The treatise on the " Tartars " is remarkable for
its day.)
*CARPINI, JOHN OF PLANO. Hakluyt Society, London,
1900, II Series, Vol. IV.
(The first European to visit the Mongols, less than
a generation after the death of Genghis Khan.)
IBN BATUTA. Translated by Defremery and San-
guinetti, Paris, 1853.
(The travels of the celebrated Arab who passed through
most of Asia at the end of the Mongol dominion.)
GENGHIS KHAN 273
*MARCO POLO. The Book of Marco Polo, translated
by Sir Henry Yule and edited by Henri Cordier,
London, 1921.
*RUBRUQUIS (WILLIAM OF RUBRUK). The Journey
of William of Rubruk to the eastern parts of
the World, Hakluyt Society, London, 1900.
II Series, Vol. IV.
MISCELLANEOUS
BAZIN, M. Le Siecle des You$n y ou tableau htstorique
de la litter ature Chinoise depuis favencment des
empereurs mongols, Paris, 1850.
*BRETSCHNEIDER, E. Medieval Researches Jrom
Eastern Asiatic Sources, London, 1888.
(Bits of the geography of Ye Liu Chutsai and a summary
of the western campaigns of Genghis Khan.)
*BROWNE, EDWARD GRANVILLE. A Literary History
of Persia. Vol. II from Firdawsi to Sa'dL
Vol. Ill under Tartar Dominion. Cambridge,
1906-1920.
(Contains a good modern dissertation on the Mongols.)
^Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. IV, the Eastern
Roman Empire, New York, 1923.
(A summary of the Mongol conquests, with a new
appreciation of their importance.)
CORDIER, HENRI. M Manges d'Histoire et de Gto-
graphie Orientales, Tome II, Paris, 1920.
(The Mongol invasion of Europe.)
174 GENGHIS KHAN
DUBEUX, Louis. TartariC) Paris, 1840.
DULAURIER, EDOUARD. Les Mongols cTapres Us
his tor tens armeniens. Journal Asiatique, fth
sen, 1858, pp. 192-255. Also 1860, pp. 295-
306.
PEER, LEON. La Puissance et la Civilisation Mon-
goles au treizieme siecle y Paris, 1867.
JOINVILLE. (Edited by Francisque-Michel) Paris,
1867.
(One of the best of the medieval chronicles.)
JORDAIN, CATALANI P. Mirabllia Descripta sequitur
de Magno Tartaro.
(A medieval viewpoint. To this might be added
the Relations taken out of Roger Wendover and Matthew
Paris, in Purchas.)
JULG, BERNHARD. On the Present State of Mon-
golian Researches, J.R.A.S., January, 1882.
*LANE-POOLE, STANLEY. The Mohammedan Dynas-
ties, Westminster, 1894.
MONTGOMERY, JAMES A. The History of Yaballaha
III. New York, 1927.
(A translation of the Syriac chronicle of the journey
of the Mongol bishop to Rome late in the thirteenth
century.)
WERNER, E. T. C. The Burial Place of Genghis
Khan. Journal of the North China Branch of
the Royal Asiatic Society. Vol. LVI 1925.
MOSHEIM, J. L. Historia Tartarorum ecclesiastica>
Helmstadt, 1741.
GENGHIS KHAN 275
PARKER, E. H. A Thousand Tears of the Tatars,
New York, 1924.
(An excellent account of the Tatar peoples up to the
birth of Genghis Khan.)
PETIS DE LA CROIX, FRANCOIS (the son of dc la
Croix, the author of the life of Genghis Khan).
Abrege Chronologique de rHistoire Ottomane y
Paris, 1768.
(Summaries of the rulers of the Mongol peoples
from Genghis Khan to the seventeenth century.)
QUATREMERE, M. Histoire des Mongols de la Perse
par Raschid-eldin, tradnlte^ accompagnee de notes,
Paris, 1836.
(The life of Rashid, and the splendid notes on Mongol
customs would make this valuable, even if it were not
the only translation of Rashid, though merely a portion
of the Jami-ut-Tavarikh.)
RfiMUSAT, JEAN PIERRE ABEL. Nouveaux Melanges
Asiatiques, Paris, 1829.
(Sketches of Subotai, Ye Liu Chutsai and others.)
Observations sur rHistoire des Mongols orientaux
de Ssanang Setzen, Paris, 1832.
RMUSAT, JEAN PIERRE ABEL. Memoires sur les
relations politiques des princes Chretiens et par-
culierement des Rois de France avec les Empereurs
Mongols.
Institut Royal, Memoires de rAcademie des in-
scriptions et belles lettres. Paris, 1822.
(An important summary of the correspondence be-
tween the Mongols and the monarchs of Europe, well
worth reading.)
276 GENGHIS KHAN
Melanges posthumes et de literature Orientates
Analyse de fhtstoire des Mongols de Sanang-
Setsen. Paris, 1843.
*STUBE, RUDOLF. Tschingizchan : seine Staats-
bildung und seine Persijhnlichkeit. In Neue
^ahrbucher jilr das klassische Altertun^ Vol.
XXI, 1908, pp. 532-541.
(A brief commentary on the conqueror.)
TIMKOWSKI, IGOR FEDOROVICH. Travels of the
Russian Mission through Mongolia to China.
With Corrections and Notes by Klaproth, Lon-
don, 1827.
(Translated apparently from the French. Valuable
geographic and historical research by a member of one
of the Russian embassies.)
VISDELOU, CLAUDE. Supplement to D'Hcrbelot's
Bibliotheque Qrientale, Paris, 1780.
*YuLE, SIR HENRY. Cathay and the Way Thither,
Revised by Cordier Hakluyt Society, 2nd series,
Nos. 33, 37, 38, 41.
Index
Abd el Rahman, 241
Abel Remusat. 245, not*
Accoutrements, 43, 124
Adriatic Sea. 203, 233
Afghanistan, 147, 159
Africa, zi8
Aia-eddin Mohammed, Shah
(set Mohammed Shah)
Alans, 150, 261
Alexander III, Pope, 212
Alexander the Great, n, 14, 114,
172, 1 86, 210, 2ZZ
Almalyk, 100, 2x9
Almalyk, Khan of, no
Amiot, Father, 251, note
Amir, 168
Amu River, 136, 140, 147, 154,
159, 166
Andrew, Friar, 262
Answer to the Dhimnris, An,
Richard Gottheil, 240, note
Antioch, 203
Aral Sea, 112, 120, 136, 144, 148,
161, 205
Arghun, Il-khan, 46, 240
Armenia, 14, 202
Armenia, King of, 261
Armenians, 200, 211, 240, 265
writings of. 15
Asia Minor, 203, 239
Astley's Voyages, 252, note
Astrologers, 70, 125
Atabeg, 120
Attila, 13
Aubon, Ponce d*. 230. 236
Austria, 228, 242
Avars, 114
Babar (grandson of Genghis
Khan), log. 204
opinion of (ienghis Khan, 217
Bacon, Roger, 13
Badakshan, 170
Baghdad, 120, 121, 148 203, 206,
Baghdad, Kalif of, nO, 118. 253
Baibars (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 230
P.aichu, 239
Papa! envoys to, 241
variations of name, 265, note
Balkul, Lake. 18, 25, 66. 123, 205
Balkash, Lake. 128
Balkh, I2T, 139, 146, zoo
Bamboo Books. 82
Bamiyan, 180
Barmecides, The, Zl8
Basilicus, 261
Batu (grandson of Genghis
Kban), 109, 198
army of, 220
capital of, 242
defeated by Tamerlane, 204
encampment of, 255, note
Europe, in 203, 228
Golden Horde of 228. 265. note
Bayan, 46
Barin. M., 251, note
Beauvais, Vincent de 242, note
Bela IV, King, 12, 229, 231, 132
Bda Noyon, 183
cities ravaged by, z8s
Belgutai (half-brother of Genghis
Khan), 29, 30
Bengal. 20^
Bibliography, 267
77
278 INDEX
Birds. River of, 163
Bishbalik, 69
Black Cathay (see Cathay, Black)
Black Sands, The (see Kara-
korum)
Black Sea. 229
Blanche of Castile, Queen* 12
Blochet, 251, note
Bogdo, Z5. 73. I?*
Bohemia, King of, 229
Bohemians, 230
Bohemond of Antioch, 265, note
Bokhara, Z2Z, 136, 139, 159. 207,
222
sacking of, 140
walls of, 139
Boleslas of Poland, 12, 228, 229,
232
Book of the Yuan, The, Father
Amiot, 251, note
Borchu, 31, 45, 49
Bouchier, William, 259, 261
Boulger, Demetrius, 223
Bourchikoun Stock, 22, 29, 60, 78
Bourtai Fid j en (wife of Genghis
Khan), 23, 29, 34* *9*. *95
burial-place of, 206
capture of, 39
marriage to Genghis Khan, 36
saves her husband* 40
sons of, 109
Brandenburg, 230
British in India, 205
Buddhism, in
Buddhists, 171, 211. 249, 258, note;
262
Mongols become, 204
Bulgars, 152
Bur an, 127
Caesar. Julius, 210
Caesars, The, n
Cahun, Le*on, 219 ; notes on pages
219, 231* 233, 234. 236, 251
Cambridge Medieval History. The,
104, not* ; 209* 265
Caravan Routes, 136, 148, 274
Carpathian Mts., 229, 234
Carpini, Fra, 13, 76, 79, 252 ;
254. ****
description of Mongols, 236
Carts, Battle of the, 35
Caspian Sea, 147, 160, 186, 194.
202, 204. 219, 239, *4Z
Cathay, 201
Christians in, 212
civilization of, 8z, 103
downfall of, zoo
dynasties of, 56, note; 8z, 89
emperor, new, 87
emperor, weak policy of, 96
Kubilai Khan in, 204
loyalty to throne, 98
meaning of name, 56, note
Mongol attacks on, 91, 95, zoo
savants of, 152
tribute paid to, 84
wall of, 85
war engines of, 83, Z34
weakness of, 84
Ye Liu Chutsai, 245
Cathay, Black, 72, 87, ZO9
Catherine the Great, Empress, 205
Caucasus Mts., 150
Chamuka, 61, 68
Charmagan, 202
Chartres, 236
Chatagai (son of Genghis Khan)
158
army of, 202
council, at, 188
duties of, 109
feud with Ogotai, 203
loyalty of, 200
monarch, a, 198
power inherited by, 194
Chep Noyon, 79, 91, zoo, zoo
against Cathay, 90, 92
Cathay, fighting for, 86
death of, 151
Gutchluk, defeat of, zzz
Mohammedan*, battle with, 130
northward march, z 5*
INDEX
Chep4 Noyon, Persia, inarch into,
5
pursuit of Mohammed Shah,
146
ruse of, 94
service in the Gobi, on, 99
strategy of, 140, 142
tutor to Juchi, 58
valour of, 47
wanderings of, 112
Chih-li, 91
Chin Empire, 91, 95, 102 ; notes on
pages 56, 89, 1 20
China (see Cathay)
China Sea, 112, 219
Chinese, writings of, 15
(see also Cathay)
Chin shan, 127
Christians. Mongols and, 240
(see also Nestorian Christians)
Chroniclers of Genghis Khan, 16,
152, 157, 189, 191, 193, 195.
196, 206, 210, 219, 236, 239
Circassians, 1 50
Cities, destruction of, 143, 164.
165, 167. 181
Columbus, Christopher, 208
Confucius, 82, note
Constantinople, 203, 208, 252
Cordier, Henri, 234, note
Cracov, 229
Crimea, The, 151, 205
Croats, 231
Crusaders, Fiefs of, .'65, note
Crusaders, End of, 207
Damascus, 203
Damascus, Kalif of, llS
Danube River, 232
Daroga, 152, 173
Delhi, 185
Deligoun-Bouldak, Mt., 77
De Quincey, Thomas, 205
Dnieper River, 151, 219, 222
Dubeux, Louis, 251, note
with
Easter Celebration, 261
Edessa, 266
Education, Mongol. 201
Edward I, King, 241
Egypt, xi 8, 221
Elbe River, 233
Europe, correspondence
Mongols, 238
opinion of Mongols, 236
Subotai v. Middle, 229
Fakirs, 174
Feasts, Mongol, 35
Flight of a Tatar Tribe. De Quincey,
205
France. 239, 252
Frederick II, Emperor, 12 ; 54,
note; 239
Gama, Vasco da, 208
Genghis Khan, administration,
tolerant, 177
alliance with Prester John, 55
allies of, 88, in
ambition of, 54
ancestry of, 22
appearance, personal, 23
attacks on Cathay. 91, 95, 100
Baghdad, envoy from, 116
Barmy an stormed by, 180
battle-front of, 135
battle with Prester John, 63
birth-name of, 19
birthplace of, 19
Bokhara taken, 140
Bourtai captured, 39
boyhood of, 21
burial of, 196
burial-place of, 196
capture of, 27
Carts, battle of the, 35
character of youthful, 33
2&>
INDEX
Genghis, Khan, chid of til khans,
chosen, 66, 72
Chinese title of, 58
chroniclers of; 14, 152, 157, 189,
I9L 193, 195. I96* 206, 2zo,
219, 239
code of laws of, 73, 2x4
commanders of, 79
communication, army, 172
conquests of, 69
costume of, 124
council of, 187, 1 88
court of, 105
culture and, 207
death of, 194
demands of, 45
descendants of, 204
desert march of, 138
effects of conquests, 205
empire, extent of, 14, 112, 113,
1 86
empire intact after death of, 202
enemies of, 26
envoys slain, 116
escape from Targoutai, 27
father's death, 24
first-born, mourning for his, 193
gifts from Cathayans, 96
governing Cathay, 102
governing in absence, 122
grandson slain, 181
Hia, destruction of, 192
home, return, 186
horde, strength of, 218
horse-posts established, 169, 270
horses stolen from, 30
hunting, goes, 154
Indus, battle on the, 182
inherits khanship, 24
instructions of, last, 194
Islam campaign, length of, 186
judgment of, 49
Karakorum. capital of, 104
Kha Khan, 72
letter- writing, 172
loyalty of followers, 40
manoeuvres of, 93
Marco Polo on, 69
Genghis Khan, marriage of, 36
message to Emperor of Cathay,
88
mourning, period of, 198
mystery of, the, zz
names of, iz, 112
night attack by Karaite, 61
non-combatants with, 126
notes on, 209
nucleus of kingdom, 69
obedience of sons to, 199
opinion of himself, 171, 187
orientation of pavilion, 189
paladins of, 47, 71
personality of, Z5
personal valour of, z8z
policy of, 167, 211
policy toward Cathay, 85
power of, 1 06
prayer of, 46
Prester John aids, 38
prestige of. 112
religion, treatment of, 74, 105
reproach to Prester John, 65
seal, first royal, 71
soldiers lent to Cathay, 86
sons of, legitimate, 109
statecraft of, 61
strength of, 54
Tatars crushed by, 58
temper of, terrible, 177
Temujin, 19
Torrents the, and, 47
trade, interest in, 116, 172
transport problems, 122
tribute asked from, 88
tribute demanded by, 176
war with Mohammed Shah, zi8
wives of, 87, 96, 1 08
wounded, 94
Ye Liu Chutsai and. 245
George of Russia, Grand-Duke, zx
Georgia, 150
Georgians, 211, 261
Germans, 230, 231, 233
Ghazan Khan, 204
Ghazna, 182
Ghazna, Mahmond of, ZZ9
INDEX
Gobi Desert, za. 17, 97, z86
life in the, 18
Gog. 13
Golden Horde, The, 203, 229
Gottheil, Richard, 240, note
Gran, 233
Granada, 118
Great Wall of China, 85
Guildar, 63
Gupta Hill, 55
Gur-kkan, 6z
Gurtai, 155
Gutchluk, 48. 72, 113, 149
death of, in
empire of, zzo
H
Haithon, 265, 266
Hamadan, 148
Hannibal, 84, 92, 94
Haroun al Rashld, 1 1 8, 249
Henry III of England, King, 12
Henry of Silesia, Duke, 12
Henry the Pious, 228, 230
Herat, zaz, 167
Hia, 87, 94, 1 86
destruction of, 192
Himalaya Mts., 246
Hindu Kush Mts., 168, 180
Hindustan, 205
History of the Mongols. Howorth,
240, note
Hiung-nu Monarchs, 78, 222
Hoang Ho River, 202
Holy Land, 207
Mongols in, 265
Holy Sepulchre, 207
Ho-pao, 125, 224
Horses, 32, 48, 191, 200, note
Hospitallers, 230
Houlun (mother of Genghis Khan),
az, 24, 27, 29, 39, 5*
Howorth, Sir Henry, 218 ; notes on
pages 234, 240
Hulagu (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 266
Hulagu, conquest of, to$
descendants of, 204
dominion of, 266
Syrian command of, 240
Hungarians, 229, 261
Hungary, 228, 242
Huns, 114
Idikut of the Swooping Hawks,
88
Idikut of the Ugurs, 160, 189, 218
/A/nWur, 36
Il-khans, 204, 207, 240
Imam, 140
Ir.aljnk, Governor of Otrar, zz6.
137
India. 119, 185, 204
Indus River, 114
battle on the, 182
Innocent IV, Pope, 54, not*; 241,
242
Invasion, Plan of, 221
Iron Gate of Alexander, 150
Islam, arming of, 159
destruction of power of, 207
faith of, 1x7
first view of, 128
military power of, 119
savants of, 140
Ivan the Terrible (Grodznoi), 204
Jamshid, 119
Japan. 203
Jaxartes River (see Syr River)
Jelal ed-Din. Sultan, 131, 135, 154
army, raising, 146
end of power, 202
escape of, 154, 185
Mongols defeated by, zto
pursuit of, 185
victory, action in, 182, 183
Jend, Z38
Jerome. St., 13
INDEX
Jerusalem, 118, 203, 241, 266
Jews, 173
Jihad, 167
John of Piano Carpini (see Carpini,
Fra)
Joinville, 239
Juchi (eldest son of Genghis
Khan). 58, 95. 155, 158, 210,
2**, 14*
army of, 220
attack on Mohammed Shah, 130
death at. 193
disobedience of, 178
duties of, 109
Mohammedans, battle with. 130
Persia, march into, 125. 126
reconciliation with father, 191
sent away from army, 160
tactics of, 131
wandering of. 114
Ka'aba, The, 118
Kabul Khan. 22. 25
Kaf Mountain, 114
Kaidu (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 230, 234
Kalifs, Baghdad, of, 116
power broken, 203
Kalmuks, 205
Kambalu. 174 and note ; 208
Kong, 28
Kankali Turks, 144
Karaits, 22, 30, 38, 55, 78, no, 2x1
defeat by Genghis Khan, 68
Mongol spoil taken by, 60
Kara Khitai, 109, 120, note
Karakorum, 68, 84, 103, no, 170,
194/198. 212, 235, 239, 242,
248
council, return from, 191
Court City, the, 201
fate of, 106, 206
headquarters of Genghis Khan,
104
Karakorum, Mangu's court at, 259
Kara Tau. 128
Kashmir, 186
Kassar (brother of Genghis
Khan), 21, 26, 29, 30, 45, 46,
50, 210
Kasvin, 149
Kerulon River, 25, 33
Kha Khan, 72 171, 172, 198. 204,
22X
choosing the, 199
Kharesm, 120, note; 154, 187, 207
Kharesm, Shah of, 115, 116
Khingan Mts., 25, 95
Khojend, 133
Khokond, 133
Khorassan, 121, 139, 162, 179, 180,
188
Khoten, 69
Kibitka, 42, 1 88 ; 259, note
K'ien lung. Emperor, 205
Kiev, 151. 209, 228
Kipchaks, 114, 150, 220
Kirghiz, 87
Kirghiz Chiefs, 189
Kiyat, 47
Koh-i-Baba. Mts., 180
Ko pao yu, 125
Koran, The, 118
desecration of, 141
Korea, 14, 100, 203
Koreans, 220
Kubilai Khan (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 16, xoo, 109, 174, note:
203, 210
army of, 220
court of, 204
council, at, 189
death of, results of, 204
Japan, against, 203
Kubla Khan (see Kubilai Khan)
Kumiss, 19
Kunduz, 139
Kurds, 150
Kurultai, 49. 72, 22 1
description of, x88
Kuyuk, 203
INDEX
83
Lahore, 184
Lamas, 174, 208
Lane-Poole, Stanley, 2x8
Lashgar, 252
Laws, Code of, 73, 2x4
Lemberg, 228
Liao Princes, 89, 93, 96
Liao-tung, 89, 94, 95, 96, 99, 100,
2X1
Liao-yang. 93
Liegnitz, 12, 230, 231
Lion King, The, 189
Lion Lord of the Western Turks, 88
Liquors, Mongol, 256
Literary History of Persia, A, Ed-
ward C. Browne, 120, note
Lomnitz, 232
Longfellow, Henry W., 251, note
Louis IX, King, 12, 230, 233,
252 ; 253, note
correspondence of, 239
Lyons, Council of, 13, 239
Magog, 13
Magyars (see Hungarians)
Mahmoud, 119
Malay States, 203
Malik, Emir, 183
Mamluks, 120, 207, 22 x, 253, 266
Manchus, 220
Mangu (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 203, 234, 265
appearance, personal, 256
army of, 220
court of, 253
hospitality of, 256
Mangudai, 131, note
Manhut Clan, 63
Maps, 57. 59
Massacres. Mongol, 209
Massena, Marshal, 90
Massif, 186
Mecca, 118
Memoirs of Bator. Emptrvr of
Hindustan, ErsJtine and Ley
den, 2x7
Merik, 164
Merkits, 39, 55, 78, XXO
Merv, 147
storming of, 163
Mesopotamia, 203, 265
Mingan, Prince, xoo
Moghuls, 205, note
Mohi, Battle of, 231, 232
Moldavia, 231
Mongols, 47
accoutrements, 124
ancestry of. 23. note
army, value of, 202
besieging Timur Malik, 133
Bokhara, in, 140
camping, 126
captives, treatment of, 69, 97,
139* 165, 1 66, 1 86
character, 74, 76, 211
council of khans, 66
councils of, 80
conquests after Ogotai't death,
203
correspondence with Europe, 230
education of. 201
empire dissolved, 204, 205
Europe, in. 12, 229
European opinion of, 236
feuds of, 38
fighting methods, 42
foraging, 129
golden age of, 263
Golden Horde, the, 203
heat on, efiect of, 185
horse-post camps, 70
hospitality of, 105
hunt, a clan, 60,
hunt, an army, li
illiteracy of,
Jclal ed-Din, i
laws, code of,]
liquors of. 25
loyalty, imp
massacres 1
INDEX
Karakorum. Mangu's court at, 239
Jews, 173
Jihad. 167
John of Piano Carpini (see Carpini,
afe
Jerusalem, xxS, 203. 241, 166
Kara Tau, 128
Kashmir. z86
Kassar (brother
of Genghis
Fra)
Joinville, 239
Juchi (eldest son of Genghis
Khan), 58, 95. 155. *58, 210,
**. 24*
army of, 220
attack on Mohammed Shah, 130
death e*. 193
disobedience of. 178
duties of, 109
Mohammedans, battle with, 130
Persia, march into, 125, 126
reconciliation with father, 191
sent away from army, 160
tactics of, 131
wandering ol 1x4
Ka'aba, The. 118
Kabul Khan, 22, 25
Kaf Mountain, 114
Kaidu (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 230, 234
Kalifs, Baghdad, of, 1x6
power broken, 203
Kalmuks, 205
Kambalu, 174 and note ; 208
Kang. 28
Kankali Turks, 144
Karaite, 22, 30, 38, 55, 78, no, 2x1
defeat by Genghis Khan, 68
Mongol spoil taken by, 60
Kara Khitai, 109. 120, note
Karakorum. 68, 84, 103, no, 170,
194. '^98, *. *35. 239, 242,
248
council, return from, 191
Court City, the, 201
fate of. 106. 206
headquarters of Genghis Khan,
104
Khan), 21, 26, 29. 30, 45, 46.
50, 210
Kasvin, 149
Kerulon River, 25, 33
Kha Khan, 72 171, 172, 198, 204,
22X
choosing the, 199
Kharesm, 120, note; 154. 187. 207
Kharesm, Shah of. 115, 116
Khingan Mts., 25, 95
Khojend, 133
Khokond, 133
Khorassan, 121, 139, 162, 179, x8o,
1 88
Khoten, 69
Kibitka, 42, 1 88 ; 250. note
K'ien lung, Emperor, 205
Kiev, 151, 209, 228
Kipchaks. 114, 150, 220
Kirghiz, 87
Kirghiz Chiefs, 189
Kiyat. 47
Koh-i-Baba, Mts., 180
Ko pao yu, 125
Koran, The, 118
desecration of, 141
Korea, 14, 100, 203
Koreans, 220
Kubilai Khan (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 16, 100, 109, 174, note'.
203, 210
army of, 220
court of, 204
council, at, 189
death of, results of, 204
Japan, against. 203
Kubla Khan (see Kubilai Khan)
Kumiss, ig
Kunduz, 139
Kurds, 150
Kurultai, 49, 72, 221
description of, x88
Kuyuk, 203
Lahore, 184
Lamas. 174, 208
Lane-Poole, Stanley, 2x8
Lashgar, 252
Laws. Code of, 73. 2x4
Lemberg, 228
Liao Princes. 89, 93. 96
Liao-tung. 89, 94, 95, 96, 99, 100,
2X1
Liao-yang, 93
Liegnitz, 12, 230, 231
Lion King. The. 189
Lion Lord of the Western Turks, 88
Liquors, Mongol, 256
Literary History oj Persia. A, Ed-
ward G. Browne, 120. note
Lomnitz. 232
Longfellow. Henry W., 251, note
Louis IX, King. 12, 230, 233.
252 : 253, note
correspondence of. 239
Lyons. Council of, 13, 239
Magog, 13
Magyars (see Hungarians)
Mahmoud, 119
Malay States. 203
Malik, Emir. 183
Mamluks, 120. 207, 221. 253. 266
Manchus. 220
> Mangu (grandson of Genghis
Khan), 203. 234, 265
appearance, personal, 256
army of, 220
court of, 253
hospitality of, 256
Mangudai, 131, note
Manhut Clan, 63
Maps. 57. 59
Massacres, Mongol. 209
Masse'na, Marshal, 90
Massif. 186
Mecca, n8
INDEX *8 3
Memoir* of Babar, Emperor of
Hindustan. Er&kine and Lay
den, 2x7
Merik, 164
Merkits, 39, 55, 78, no
Merv, X47
storming of, 163
Mesopotamia, 203, 265
Mingan, Prince, xoo
Moghuls, 205, note
Mohi, Battle of. 23X, 232
Moldavia, 231
Mongols, 47
accoutrements, 124
ancestry of. 23, note
army, value of. 202
besieging Timur Malik, 133
Bokhara, in, 140
camping, 126
captives, treatment of, 69, 97,
*39, 165, 166, 186
character. 74, 76. 211
council of khans, 66
councils of, 80
conquests after Ogotai't death,
203
correspondence with Europe, 230
education of, 201
empire dissolved, 204, 205
Europe, in, 12, 229
European opinion of, 236
feuds of, 38
fighting methods. 42
foraging, 129
golden age of, 263
Golden Horde, the, 203
heat on, effect of, 185
horse-post camps, 70
hospitality of, 105
hunt, a clan, 60,
hunt, an army,
illiteracy of,
Jelal ed-Din, (
laws, code of.j
liquors of, :
loyalty, imp
massacres
284 INDEX
Bokhara, merrymaking of, 36
Moghuls, 205
Mohammedan wars with, 56
notes on, 209
Persia, march into, 125
plan of invasion, 221
preparations for war, 88
pursuit of Wai Wang, 99
retreats, reason for, 93
Russians and, 151
silver age of, 207
strength of, 40, 90, 125, 218
struggle to live, 25
Taidjuts, 26
territory marched over, 123
trading of, 1 16
tradition of, 33
union of, 78
war engines, 134, 224, 233
weaknesses of, 77
weapons, 79
women, duties of, 38, 123
Moravia, 229, 230
Moscow, 153
Mou-baligh, 181, 209
Mourning, Period of, 198
Muezzin. 166
Mohammed the Prophet, 211
Mohammedans, 12
artisans, 173
hatred of Genghis Khan, 211
Mongols and, 15, 56, in, 184, 240
Mongols become, 204
title of Genghis Khan, 171
trade goods of, 1x4
Mohammed Shah, 115, 120
character of, 120
death of, 149
flight of, 139
losses in battle, 131
strategy of, 137, 158
strength of, 120, 129
throne of, 190
war with Genghis Khan, 1x7
Muhuli, 46. 78, 160
against Cathay, 90
omanding at Yen-king, xoo
Muhuli, death of, 186
governing Cathay, xxx, 121
Sung, conquest of the, 103
Mullahs, xxx
Multan, 185
Munlik, 52
Murgh Ab, 163
Myths of tkf Middle Ages
Raring-Gould, 2x3
N
Naimans, 55, 66, ixo
Nan-lu, 87
Napoleon, 13, 90, 172, sxz
Nesa, 162
Nestorian Christians, 38, 71, 75,
105. X52, 2X2, 254. 259
Ney, Marshal, 93
Nieustadt, 242
Nisapur, 147, 166
Nouveaux Melanges Asiatics, Abel
R6musat, 245, not*
Noyon, 106
Oder River, 431
Ogotai (son of Genghis Khan), 190,
198, 265
administrator of, 246
army of, 202, 220
cause of death of. 246
character of, 248
council of, 202
death of, 203, 235
duties of, 109
feud with Chatagai, 203
Genghis Khan's successor, 199
life of, 251, note
power inherited by, 294
rule of, 200
son, death of, 181, 193
treasure of, 248
tribute paid to, 201
Olmutz, 233
Omar al Khayyami, xxft
INDEX
Onon River, 25, 54
Or**. 24. 47
Ordu~b*ligh, 20X
Qrkhons, 79. 87, 88, zoo. 106,
195* 199
ride of the, 146
OrfeA, 109
Othmans, 207
Otrar, 116, 137
Oxus River (SM Ainu River)
Paladins, Bela's. 132
costumes of, 189
court of the, 1 88
Genghis Khan's 47, 71
Palestine, 240
Paris, 236
Paris, Matthew, 218
Parthians, 80
Peking. 81
Pe /. 127, 130
Persia, 139, 159. 203, 104, 265
kings of. 114
Persia, Sir Percy Sykes, 219
Persian Gulf, 120
Persians, 80
writings of. 13
Peshawar, 186
Perth. 222, 231. 233
P6tis d la Croix. 2x7
Physicians, 70, 126. 168, 178
Pilgrims, 174
> Poland. 190. 206, 228, 233
Polo, Marco, 69. 75. 153. 174. 204,
208, 2x3
Pony Express, The, 169, 172
Post Roads, description of, 173
stations, 173, 174, 175
tribute paid on, 176
Praster John. 22, 30, 38, 149
alliance with Genghis Khan, 30
battle with Genghis Khan, 63
Chinese title of, 58
death of, 68
enemy to Genghis Khan. 61
Presttr John, flight of, 205
notes on, 2x2
Pripet Marches, 230
" Raging Torrents, The," 47
Ragusa, 233
Religions, Treatment of, 105. xxo,
249
Roads, importance of, 208
making of, 176
Roof of the World, The, 113, 1x4,
1 86
Rnbruquis, Fra, 74, xo8, 208, 240
description of Mongols, 252
Russia, 151, 204, 206, 222, 229
Russians. 261
Ruthenia, 228
Ruthenians, 261
Saint-Denis. 260
Samarkand, no, 121, 136, 139. 159
administration. Mongol, 186
surrender of, 140
Saracens, 262
Saxony, 230
Sayo River, 231
Sayyid, 120, 140
Scriptures, The, 261, 263
Seal, Royal, 71
Seljuks, X2o, 239, 265
Sergius (monk), 259
Shaibani, 204
Shaman, 50, 52
Shan-si, 91, 95
Shiraz, 190
Short History of China, A, Deme-
trius, Boulger, 223
Sicily, 118
Sitcle des You**, ., M. Bazin, 251
Silesia. 22
Silesia, Duke of, 230
Smyrna, 203
286
INDEX
Soo, 4 6
Soothsayers. 75, 249
Spalato, Thomas de, 232 and 236,
notes
Speculum Historiale, Vincent de
Beauvais, 242, note
Ssanang Setzen, 15, 54, note
Stones of the Nations (Turkey), 218
Strakosch-Grassman, 234, note
Subotai Bahadur, 48, 79, 101, 160
1 68, 191, 201
against Cathay, 90
army of, 220
conquest of Europe, 203, 229
death of, 242
endurance of, 236
Europe, return from, 179, 188
190
Korea, in, 100
Merkits, against the, no
northward march, 150
observations of, 152
pursuit of Mohammed Shah, 146
service of, 47
value of, 202
Sung, The, 99, 103
conquest of, 193
sparing of, 201
Sungarian Pass, 127
Susdal. 206
Sykes, Sir Percy, 219
Syr River, 128, 129, 132, 136, 187
Syria, 240, 265
Tabula rasa, 166
Tagkdumba^h, 113, 114
Taidjnts, 26, 40
attack on Genghis Khan, 42
(see also Mongols)
Taitong-fu, 91, 92
Tamerlane, no, 217
Mongols conquered by, 204
Tang, 82
Targoutai, 26
Te*-kh*n, 71, 106
Tartarie, Louis Dubeux, 251, note
Tartars (see Tatars)
Tashkent, 138
Tatar Khans, 205
Tatars, 55, 78, 162
Buyar Lake, 40, 56
defeat by Genghis Khan, 58
Ta-tsin, 114
Tebtengri, 50, 52
Teheran, 148
Templars, Knights, 230
Temujin (see Genghis Khan)
Temugu (brother of Genghis Khan),
5i
Tengri. 46
Teutonic Knights, 231
T'ian, shan, 48, 72, 125, 127, 160,
189
Tibet, 14, 87, no, in, 174, 186, 188,
203, 208, 219
Tiflis, 150
Tilik Noyon. 160
Timur-i-lang (see Tamerlane)
Timur Malik, 133, 134
Toghrul Khan (see Prester John)
Tokay, 231
Torguts, 205
Torture, Chinese, 68
Toukta Beg, 61, 149
Tours, 233
Trade, Development of, 172
Travels of Marco Polo, Yule-
Cordier, 213, note
Tugh, 159
Tuli (son of Genghis Khan),
167, 1 80, 200
army of, 202
council, at, 188
death of, 242
duties of, 109
golden throne of, 162
Merv, storming of, 163
monarch, a, 198
Persia, invasion of, 163
power inherited by, 194
sons of, 202
strategy of, 163
Tulugkam, 63, 222
INDEX
Tuman, 79, 86
Turan, 120
Turkomans, 163, 168, 189
Turko-Mongols, Union of. 73
Turks, 69. 20"
Twer, 206
Women, Mangu's, 256
Writing, Syriac, 71
Xanadu, 174, not*
Ugolin, Bishop of, 231
Ugurs, 55, 69, 78* >9, *5** 1*9,
211
writings of, 15
Urga, 38
Urgench, 150, 154, 166, 178
Uriankhi, The, 48
Units, 63
Uzbegs, 204
Vienna, 203
Vladimir, 206
Volga River, 14, 152, 191, 205, 242.
252
W
Wai Wang, Emperor, 88, 92, 149
flight of, 97, 98
policy of. weak, 96
pursued by Genghis Khan, 99
Wang Khan (see Prester John)
Wang- Yen, Prince, 101
Waxir, 121
Wenceslas, King, 230
Wines, effect of, 246
Persian, 190
Women, duties of, 38, 123
Yakka (see Mongols)
Yarn, 169, 170, 173
Yamen, 177
Yang-tze River, 86, 96, 99
Yarligh, 249
Yaroslav, Duke, 234, 253
Yassa, 73, 105, 176, 214
Yellow River (see Yang-tze)
Ye Liu Chutsai, Prince, 102, 105,
5
administration of, 201
chancellor to khan, 201
character of, 245
death of, 247
imprisonment of, 246
influence of, 200
life of, 251, not*
Ogotai, power under, 246
report of campaign, 127, 133, 145,
1 86
sage of Cathay. 245
son of, 203
Yen-king, 8x, 84, 85. 89, 92. 94. 95.
96. 97. 98, 3
fall of, xoi
Yessoutai, 49
Yesukai (father of Genghis Khan)
, 23
death of, 24
Yuri, 19-20
Printed at the BURLEICH Putss. Ltwin's Mead. BRISTOL.