A.D. 1370-1405
EDWARD GIBBON
Timur, better known as Tamerlane ("Timur the Lame"), was born in Central Asia—probably in the village of Sebzar, near Samarkand, in Transoxiana (Turkestan). He is supposed to have been descended from a follower of Genghis Khan, founder of the Mongol empire; or, as some say, directly, by the mother's side, from Genghis himself. He is the Tamerlaine or Tamburlaine of Marlowe and other dramatists. Gibbon introduces him in the Decline and Fall, apparently because fascinated with the subject, although he gives as a historical reason the fact that Timur's triumph in Asia delayed the final fall of Constantinople—taken by the Turks in 1453.
In early youth the future ruler of so vast an empire was engaged in struggles for ascendency with the petty chiefs of rival tribes. His boundless ambition early conceived the conquest and monarchy of the world; his wish was "to live in the memory and esteem of future ages." He was born in a period of anarchy, when the crumbling kingdoms of the Asiatic dynasties were no longer able to resist the adventurous spirit determined to occupy the new field of military triumph which opened before him. At the age of twenty-five Timur was hailed as the deliverer of his country. When he chose Samarkand as the capital of his dominion, he declared his purpose to make that dominion embrace the whole habitable earth; and at the height of his power he ruled from the Great Wall of China to the centre of Russia on the north, while his sovereignty extended to the Mediterranean and the Nile on the west, and on the east to the sources of the Ganges. In his own person he united twenty-seven different sovereignties, and nine several dynasties of kings gave place to the unparalleled conqueror, who won by the sword a larger portion of the globe than Cyrus or Alexander, Cæsar or Attila, Genghis Khan, Charlemagne, or Napoleon.
It was believed in the family and empire of Timur that he himself composed the Commentaries of his life and the Institutions of his government, which, however, were probably the work of his secretaries. These manuscripts have been of great service to historians in their study of Timur's career.
T the age of thirty-four, and in a general diet, Timur was invested with imperial command, but he affected to revere the house of Genghis; and while the emir Timur reigned over Zagatai and the East, a nominal khan served as a private officer in the armies of his servant. Without expatiating on the victories of thirty-five campaigns, without describing the lines of march which he repeatedly traced over the continent of Asia, I shall briefly represent Timur's conquests in Persia, Tartary, and India, and from thence proceed to the more interesting narrative of his Ottoman war.
No sooner had Timur reunited to the patrimony of Zagatai the dependent countries of Karizme and Kandahar than he turned his eyes toward the kingdoms of Iran or Persia. From the Oxus to the Tigris that extensive country was without a lawful sovereign. Peace and justice had been banished from the land above forty years; and the Mongol invader might seem to listen to the cries of an oppressed people. Their petty tyrants might have opposed him with confederate arms: they separately stood and successively fell; and the difference of their fate was only marked by the promptitude of submission or the obstinacy of resistance. Ibrahim, Prince of Shirwan or Albania, kissed the footstool of the imperial throne. His peace offerings of silks, horses, and jewels were composed, according to the Tartar fashion, each article of nine pieces; but a critical spectator observed that there were only eight slaves. "I myself am the ninth," replied Ibraham, who was prepared for the remark: and his flattery was rewarded by the smile of Timur.
Shah Mansur, Prince of Fars, or the proper Persia, was one of the least powerful, but most dangerous, of his enemies. In a battle under the walls of Shiraz, he broke, with three or four thousand soldiers, the coul, or main body, of thirty thousand horse, where the Emperor fought in person. No more than fourteen or fifteen guards remained near the standard of Timur; he stood firm as a rock, and received on his helmet two weighty strokes of a cimeter; the Mongols rallied; the head of Mansur was thrown at his feet; and he declared his esteem of the valor of a foe by extirpating all the males of so intrepid a race. From Shiraz his troops advanced to the Persian Gulf; and the richness and weakness of Ormus were displayed in an annual tribute of six hundred thousand dinars of gold.
Bagdad was no longer the city of peace, the seat of the caliphs; but the noblest conquest of Khulagu could not be overlooked by his ambitious successor. The whole course of the Tigris and Euphrates, from the mouth to the sources of those rivers, was reduced to his obedience; he entered Edessa; and the Turcomans of the black sheep were chastised for the sacrilegious pillage of a caravan of Mecca. In the mountains of Georgia the native Christians still braved the law and the sword of Mahomet; by three expeditions he obtained the merit of the gazie, or holy war; and the Prince of Tiflis became his proselyte and friend.