176. CONQUESTS OF THE MONGOLS, 1206-1405 A.D.
JENGHIZ KHAN
For ages the Mongols had dwelt in scattered tribes throughout their Asiatic wilderness, engaged in petty struggles with one another for cattle and pasture lands. It was the celebrated Jenghiz Khan, [4] chief of one of the tribes, who brought them all under his authority and then led them to the conquest of the world. Of him it may be said with truth that he had the most victorious of military careers, and that he constructed the most extensive empire known to history. If Jenghiz had possessed the ability of a statesman, he would have taken a place by the side of Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar.
MONGOL EMPIRE UNDER JENGHIZ, 1206-1227 A.D.
Jenghiz first sent the Mongol armies, which contained many Turkish allies, over the Great Wall [5] and into the fertile plains of China. All the northern half of the country was quickly overrun. Then Jenghiz turned westward and invaded Turkestan and Persia. Seven centuries have not sufficed to repair the damage which the Mongols wrought in this once- prosperous land. The great cities of Bokhara, Samarkand, Merv, and Herat, [6] long centers of Moslem culture, were pillaged and burned, and their inhabitants were put to the sword. Like the Huns the Mongols seemed a scourge sent by God. Still further conquests enlarged the empire, which at the death of Jenghiz in 1227 A.D. stretched from the Dnieper River to the China Sea.
MONGOL EMPIRE UNDER THE SUCCESSORS OF JENGHIZ
The Mongol dominions in the thirteenth century were increased by the addition of Korea, southern China, and Mesopotamia, as well as the greater part of Asia Minor and Russia. Japan, indeed, repulsed the Mongol hordes, but at the other extremity of Asia they captured Bagdad, sacked the city, and brought the caliphate to an end. [7] The Mongol realm was very loosely organized, however, and during the fourteenth century it fell apart into a number of independent states, or khanates.
[Illustration: Map, THE MONGOL EMPIRE]
TIMUR THE LAME, DIED 1405 A.D.
It was reserved for another renowned Oriental monarch, Timur the Lame, [8] to restore the empire of Jenghiz Khan. His biographers traced his descent from that famous Mongol, but Timur was a Turk and an adherent of Islam. He has come down to us as perhaps the most terrible personification in history of the evil spirit of conquest. Such distant regions as India, Syria, Armenia, Asia Minor, and Russia were traversed by Timur's soldiers, who left behind them only the smoking ruins of a thousand cities and abominable trophies in the shape of columns or pyramids of human heads. Timur died in his seventieth year, while leading his troops against China, and the extensive empire which he had built up in Asia soon crumbled to pieces.
[Illustration: TOMB OF TIMUR AT SAMARKAND Samarkand in Russian Central Asia became Timur's capital in 1369 AD. The city was once a center of Mohammedan wealth and culture, famous for its beautiful mosques, palaces, and colleges. The Gur-Amir, or tomb of Timur, consists of a chapel, crowned by a dome and enclosed by a wall. Time and earthquakes have greatly injured this fine building. The remains of Timur lie here under a huge block of jade.]