This expedition made Temujin’s reputation, and in due course he was elected chief of his tribe. This led to a quarrel with his ‘blood brother’ Jamuqa, who felt he had a better claim. Temujin triumphed eventually, but in the meantime suffered a heavy defeat in battle, after which Jamuqa had seventy of his followers boiled alive in cooking pots; later tradition ascribed the atrocity to Genghis Khan, a reflection of the terror that his name – which means mighty ruler -came to inspire.
By the beginning of the twelfth century, China was governed by the great Sung dynasty, whose first emperor, T’ai Tsu, had united most of the country. But the Sung emperors kept their armies small, for fear of rebellion, and this brought a worse evil – attacks by the barbarians, chief among whom were the Mongols. When Manchurian nomads called the Chin (or Golden) forced the Sung emperor to retreat south, the ‘Golden Emperors’ took over the court at Peking.
The Golden Emperor heard about this new and powerful khan and decided to suggest an alliance against the Tartars. Genghis Khan was delighted; the Tartars were traditional enemies. He and Torghril descended suddenly on their makeshift fortress and massacred the defenders. His old enemies among the Mongols decided that it was time to unite to destroy him before he became too powerful. They were too late. In a spectacular battle during a storm – raised, according to the Mongol historian, by tribal sorcerers – he defeated the rival army and put all the chieftains to death. This defeat is also the subject of a typical story of Genghis Khan. One of the enemy chieftains escaped and was taken prisoner by one of his own servants, who had decided to change sides. On the way to Genghis Khan, he relented and freed his prisoner; then he went to offer Genghis Khan his loyalty, apologising for not bringing his master as a prisoner. ‘If you had,’ said Genghis Khan, ‘I would have put you to death.’ As it was, he made the man a trusted retainer. The story gives an idea of why he inspired such powerful loyalty.
The conqueror now turned back to the Tartars and defeated them in a decisive battle in 1202. He executed all prisoners but took two beautiful daughters of a Tartar chief as his wives – like most world conquerors, he seems to have been sexually insatiable.
In the spring of the year 1206, Genghis Khan called together all the tribes of Mongolia to a great assembly near the headwaters of the river Onon; there, once again, he was proclaimed khan of all the Mongols. This event was to be as significant for Asia – and Europe – as Mahomet’s flight to Medina. At last, the dozens of warring tribes were united under one ruler. Now they were prepared to conquer the world.
In which direction should they expand? To the north lay Siberia, on the other side of the Altai Mountains: there was nothing to attract them in that vast, empty land. To the south-west lay the Persian Empire, now ruled by the Seljuk Turks. South lay China, whose northern half was ruled by the Golden Emperor. This became Genghis Khan’s first objective. But for the moment, he was not ready to attack the emperor. Instead he directed his attention to the only part of northern China not under the emperor’s domination: the fertile province now called Kansu, ruled by a semi-Tibetan people called the Tanguts. Genghis Khan began raiding them and his armies caused as much inconvenience as terror. The great Silk Road, the trading route between Kansu and Persia, was at their mercy and their threat strangled the economic life of north-west China. So after four years of harassment, the Tangut decided to beg for peace. As a special inducement, they offered Genghis Khan one of their princesses – Tangut girls, with their delicate features, were regarded by the Mongols as particularly desirable. There was also a large tribute that included a herd of rare white camels. The great khan made peace. Now he could turn his attention towards the Golden Emperor.
The old Golden Emperor – Genghis’s former ally – was dead, and his successor he regarded as an imbecile. In 1211, Genghis began his attacks against northern China. But it was well-fortified and most of his attacks were thrown back. Then a subject people called the Khitai decided to rebel against their Chinese masters. They were Mongols, and Genghis was glad to send them a task force under his lieutenant Jebe. They besieged the town of Liao-Yang, in Manchuria, and Jebe used a technique that was to bring the Mongols many later successes: he pretended to retreat, allowed the defenders to relax, then reappeared suddenly and took the town in a surprise attack. The Khitai were installed on the throne – but as vassals of Genghis Khan.
Now the Mongols began to fight their way grimly into China, through the northern passes. They besieged and conquered town after town. They took the Great Wall by storm. Sheer nomad cunning was as important as weight of numbers. They would reach the entrance to a pass where the enemy were in an impregnable position, pretend to run away and then suddenly turn and cut down the enemy as he foolishly pursued them. Then came the khan’s reward – the sight of the towers of Peking, and the Great Plain that stretched to the Yellow River with its beautifully cultivated fields of rice, millet and maize. To these barbarians of the Steppe, it must have looked like heaven on earth. They gleefully trampled the crops into the ground and burnt harvests. They besieged and sacked town after town. In Tsi-nan, the principal town of the Shantung province – famous for its silk – they were amazed by the palaces, enormous fountains, lakes of giant lotuses and parks with statues of the Buddha. But the Mongol response to palaces was to burn them down. They looted and burned for most of a year, then let the Golden Emperor buy them off with a huge bribe. But when Genghis heard that the Golden Emperor had decided to move farther south, he hastened back into China, took Peking and proceeded to burn down its palaces – the imperial palace smouldered for a month.
Yet it is here that Genghis Khan reveals the difference between his mentality and that of the Huns or Vandals. Among the ex-courtiers still in Peking was a scholar named Yelui Choutsai, a tall, bearded man with a sonorous voice and pleasing manner who also happened to be a nobleman. Genghis Khan was charmed by his honesty; when he told Choutsai that he was now ‘liberated’ from his previous master, the sage replied smoothly that he would have been disloyal if he had felt hostility to his former sovereign. Soon, Choutsai became one of the khan’s chief advisers. No matter how formidable they were on horseback, the Mongols became good natured and peaceable in their own tents, and Choutsai found he was able to speak firmly and frankly. He pointed out that it was simply bad policy to leave behind burning crops and palaces; it would be more sensible to leave them untouched and collect a yearly tax. Genghis Khan saw the sense of this and followed Choutsai’s advice. This did not mean that the Mongols ceased to burn, loot and massacre – particularly when Genghis was elsewhere – but that they did so only when it was not to their advantage to do otherwise.
Now northern China was conquered, and southern China – the retreat of the Sung emperors – looked disconcertingly far; Genghis decided to look to the west. For news had come that one of his subject-kings had been murdered by a prince named Kuchlig. He told Jebe (known as the Arrow) to go and execute Kuchlig, and Jebe did precisely that. Kuchlig took flight as soon as the Mongols invaded; Jebe, with all the nomad’s skill of tracking, followed him high into the Pamir Mountains, caught up with him and cut off his head. And now Genghis Khan discovered – probably to his mild astonishment – that he was master of a new country full of Turkish Muslims who were all delighted to see him (for Kuchlig had persecuted Islam). Moreover, he was peering through the passes that led into the land of the Arabian Nights.
In this land, the Turks had become the main rulers – not the Seljuks but a family from Khiva in Turkestan. These sultans, the Kharismians, had recently completed vast conquests, from the Ganges to the Tigris, and were settling down to enjoy their new possessions. Genghis was impressed by what he heard about them. He had no desire for war – he already had more territory than he could possibly handle, and the Turkish emperor, Mahomet, had sent an ambassador to encourage peaceful relations. Genghis responded by sending him three emissaries with a message saying ‘We have equal interest in fostering trade between our subjects – I shall look upon you as my son.’ Mahomet was no doubt mildly irritated by this presumption, but nevertheless sent back a diplomatically friendly reply. So Genghis ordered a caravan to set out for Turkestan, loaded with treasures – all stolen – and money to buy Turkish goods. It reached the border town of Otrar; but through some failure of communication – or perhaps simply out of contempt for these upstart barbarians – the governor ordered it to be seized. All the Mongols – a hundred of them – were killed.
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