Temujin's Mongols

Who rules

Name

Temujin (not yet Chinggis Khan: that title is taken at the assembly of 1206 on the Onon)

Title

Khan (qan) of the Qiyat-Borjigin Mongols and holder of the Jin frontier rank ja'ut quri

Since

elected khan about 1189 (the year is not settled, 1186 to 1190); ja'ut quri from the Jin in 1196

Born

1162 on the usual count (Yuanshi, Rachewiltz, Atwood), so about 37 on 1 January 1200; 1155 in Rashid al-Din; 1167 in Pelliot and Ratchnevsky

Family

Son of Yesugei Ba'atur (Qiyat-Borjigin, d. about 1170) and Hoelun (Olqunut). Wife Borte (Onggirat). Four sons by Borte: Jochi, Chagatai, Ogedei, Tolui.

Confidence

high for the person and office, medium for the dates

Working chronology after Rachewiltz's commentary and Atwood, with the 1196 date fixed by the Jin evidence (see notes). Primary texts were not reopened for this record.

Overlord

None. He treats Toghrul (Ong Khan) of the Kereyit as a father and follows his lead; the Jin court is a distant patron that gave him a rank in 1196.

What the realm holds

• His household, the tents (ordo) of Hoelun and Borte and the herds that feed them
• Qiyat-Borjigin lineages of Altan, Khuchar and Daritai Otchigin (each with his own followers)
• Sworn clans and companions: Arulat, Uriangqai, Mangqut, Uru'ut, Ba'arin, Qongqotan, Olqunut, Qorulas, Dorben (in part), Barulas, Sukeken, Noyakin, Oronar, Besud, Suldus (in part), the Jalair, survivors of the Jurkin: see Temujin's sworn clans
• Winter pasture in the upper Onon and Kherlen valleys
• Burkhan Khaldun as refuge
• The share of the 1196 Tatar plunder (the silver cradle and the pearl-sewn coverlet of the Secret History) and the Jin rank ja'ut quri

How it was acquired

Khan by election at the Blue Lake in the Gurelgu hills about 1189 (Altan, Khuchar and Sacha Beki named in the Secret History as the three who raised him); rank from the Jin, summer 1196.

Allies and rivals

Allied with Toghrul (father-son pact of the 1180s, renewed in the Tatar war of 1196 and in the Merkit raids of 1198 and 1199). The bond is strained: English Wikipedia says Toghrul kept the Merkit booty, which upset Temujin greatly, and that in the Altai campaign (dated 1199 there) Temujin's captains Muqali, Boroqul, Chila'un and Bo'orchu saved Toghrul's people from the Naiman captain Kokse Sabraq, which leaves Toghrul in Temujin's debt. Enemies: the Tayichi'ut (oldest feud, from the abandonment of Yesugei's family), the Merkit (Borte's abduction), the Tatars (Yesugei's poisoning; beaten with the Jin in 1196 but not destroyed), and Jamuqa (sworn brother turned rival since the parting; but English Wikipedia has him riding with Temujin and Toghrul in 1199, so the rivalry may be quiet).

Restless cousins: Altan, Khuchar and Daritai.

The realm that morning

Morning of 1 January 1200: winter camp, not pinned (the campaign board puts it at the Onon headwaters, which fits the sources' pattern). The Jin rank and Toghrul's backing are his two supports. He holds the upper Onon and upper Kherlen; the Tayichi'ut hold the Onon below Dadal. The war against the Tayichi'ut has not begun; the likely course has it fought in 1200 with Toghrul's help. No battle with Jamuqa has been recorded since Dalan Balzhut.

Already behind him on the usual reading: Dalan Balzhut, the Ulja fight of 1196, the Jurkin war (1196 to the winter of 1197 to 1198) and the Merkit raids of 1198 and 1199. On Wikipedia's dating the Altai campaign of 1199 is behind him too; the Secret History's order puts it after Koyiten, and then it is still ahead.

Wealth

Horses, sheep and cattle; hunting; plunder (the Tatar cradle and coverlet); no taxes. Trade reaches him through Muslim and Uyghur merchants and the Jin markets; a Muslim merchant, Ja'far Khoja, appears in later sources as his agent in Jin lands (date not pinned).

Military

No standing army. The host is raised clan by clan; the nokod (companions) and the officers named at the election are the core. At Dalan Balzhut the host camped in thirteen circles (kurens); the Secret History's round numbers are not evidence of anything countable and none is given. He has Jin and Kereyit goodwill and a recent victory (Ulja, 1196).

Threats

• Tayichi'ut attack or flight beyond the Onon
• Jamuqa's grievance and the clans that dislike him (a coalition is in the likely course)
• Merkit revenge for the raids
• The Naiman, who stand behind Toghrul's enemies
• Toghrul's moods and his son Senggum's jealousy (later)
• Altan, Khuchar and Daritai changing sides
• Dzud (ice winter) killing the herds
• Jin policy of setting steppe peoples against each other

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

1. Spring and summer 1200 (season not settled)War against the Tayichi'ut on the Onon with Toghrul's help (English Wikipedia: Temujin and Toghrul move east along the Onon into Tayichi'ut country); the Tayichi'ut are broken and Tarqutai Kiriltuq is taken and killed (accounts differ on how).Depends on: Toghrul sends the Kereyit; the Tayichi'ut stand and fight on the Onon; Temujin's own clans muster. Stopped by: Toghrul refuses; a hard spring or dzud; Tarqutai withdraws beyond the Onon; Jamuqa moves first.
2. During the Tayichi'ut campaign, 1200 (some accounts put it at the 1201 fight)Temujin is struck by an arrow in the neck vein, fired by Jirqo'adai of the Besut (the later Jebe); Jelme tends the wound through the night. English Wikipedia puts the wound in the Tayichi'ut fight of 1200, at a river crossing where a sudden counterattack caught him as he chased the fleeing Tayichi'ut; the fight went on the next day until they were beaten.Depends on: Temujin is at the front of a hill fight with the Tayichi'ut. Stopped by: He stays behind the line; a different field.
3. Late 1200The Tayichi'ut serf families (Suldus of Sorqan-shira, Besut and others) come over or are taken; his following grows.Depends on: Victory over the Tayichi'ut. Stopped by: Defeat; a pause by Toghrul.

Later, on the likely course

1. Autumn 1201 (one line only)The clans hostile to him raise Jamuqa as gurkhan on the Ergune and the two sides meet at Koyiten.Depends on: Tayichi'ut and Merkit survivors, Tatars, Onggirat, Dorben, Qatagin, Saljiut and Naiman rally to Jamuqa. Stopped by: A Jin intervention; Jamuqa's rivals refuse him.

Where the sources disagree

• The campaign board entry mongol-orda: 'Toghrul's junior ally, about to campaign against the Taichiud': agreed. The campaign board's dot (48.7 N, 110.0 E, Onon headwaters) is kept as the winter-camp estimate; no source dates a camp for 1199 to 1200.
• The campaign board entry calendar ('During 1200 Temujin and Toghrul break the Taichiud on the Onon'): agreed as a 1200 event; it has not happened on 1 January.
• Dalan Balzhut is dated 1187 (Wikipedia, Genghis Khan), 1190 (popular accounts), 1186 to 1190 (usual range) and early 1194 (Sverdrup, a minority view quoted by Medievalists.net); Wikipedia's Timeline of the Mongol Empire uses 1194. We use 1187 to 1190. It is behind him on every reading.
• Wikipedia's Toghrul article puts the Jin-Tatar campaign about 1194; the Jin-side evidence (the Servan Khaalga inscription, May and June 1196, as summarised by Medievalists.net) fixes it in summer 1196, which is also the Secret History's year for the titles.
• The regional brief lists Dalan Nemurges among battles already fought. From memory of the Secret History it belongs to the Tatar war of 1202 (not checked: the text could not be opened). So only Dalan Balzhut and Ulja, with the Jurkin war and the Merkit raids, are behind him on 1 January 1200.
• English Wikipedia (Rise of Genghis Khan) dates the split from Jamukha, and with it Temujin's election, '1187 or 1193' and names no place; we keep about 1189 and the Blue Lake of the Secret History.
• The Jurkin: about 1197 in the usual reading; Wikipedia (Rise of Genghis Khan) has most of them subdued in 1196, with Muqali among them (the Secret History makes Muqali a Jalair), and the rest eliminated in the winter of 1197 to 1198.
• The Naiman campaign beyond the Altai: autumn 1199 on Rashid, the Chinese annals and Wikipedia; after Koyiten, in the Dog year (1202), in the Secret History as the mnw researcher read it. The same Wikipedia page puts Koyiten in 1202 and a coalition of the Khadagin, Salji'ut, Dorben, Tatars and Khongirad against Temujin and Toghrul straight after the Tayichi'ut war of 1200.

Evidence: The Secret History and Rashid al-Din are thick for the man but undated; the years from 1189 to 1200 rest on reconstructions that differ by one to three years. The Jin evidence fixes 1196. Records here come from the standard reconstructions, not from a fresh reading of the primary texts.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

On the map: A broad yearly range after the Secret History's route descriptions; no source fixes its edges. The Onon below Dadal is drawn as the Tayichi'ut's.

Primary sources for this realm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Record of the Personal Campaigns of the Holy Warrior (Chinggis Khan) (presented to Khubilai in 1288, finished in Mongolian in 1290; the surviving Chinese version dates from 1369). A year-by-year Chinese account of Temujin's wars, drawn from the lost Altan Debter (the same source behind the Yuan shi's first chapter and Rashid al-Din). Read online
• The Secret History of the Mongols (1228 or 1240 (the colophon's Year of the Rat is disputed), with later additions; the surviving Chinese transcription and gloss were made under the Ming in the 1380s). The only Mongol account of Temujin's rise, written within living memory. Read online
• Annals of the Western Xia, Wu Guangcheng (吳廣成) (1825 to 1827, compiled from Song, Liao, Jin and Yuan sources). A Qing scholar's year-by-year reconstruction of Tangut history from the Chinese histories, since the Xia left no surviving annals of their own in Chinese. Read online
• Compendium of Chronicles, Rashid al-Din Fadl Allah Hamadani (1300 to 1311, at Tabriz). The official Ilkhanid history, compiled from Mongol oral tradition and the lost Altan Debter. Read online
• Compendium of Chronicles: the Turkic and Mongol tribes and the life of Chinggis Khan, Rashid al-Din Hamadani (about 1300 to 1311, in the Ilkhanate). The fullest description of who held what on the steppe around 1200, written a century later from Mongol court records (the Altan Debter) and from informants such as Bolad Chingsang. Read online
• History of the Yuan, Song Lian (宋濂) and the Ming history office (1369 to 1370). Juan 1, the annals of Taizu (Chinggis Khan), gives a dated outline of Temujin's early wars drawn from the same lost Altan Debter as the Shengwu qinzheng lu: the Tatar war with the Jin in 1196, the Merkit and Naiman campaigns, the Tayichi'ut war, Jamuqa's coalition of 1201 and the Tatar and Kereyit wars of 1202 and 1203. Read online
• History of the Jin, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office, with Ouyang Xuan among the chief compilers (1343 to 1344, from the Jin veritable records and the Jin national history). The official history of the Jurchen empire that ruled north China and Manchuria in 1200. Read online
• Brief Account of the Black Tatars, Peng Daya (彭大雅) with notes by Xu Ting (徐霆) (1237 (Peng Daya's text from a 1232 to 1233 embassy, Xu Ting's notes from a 1235 to 1236 embassy)). Two Song envoys' notes on the Mongols under Ogodei: the steppe, climate, herds, hunting, the ruler's tent and court, the army, taxes, trade, the postal relay, the Uyghur and Khitan clerks, and the subject peoples. Read online
• Full Record of the Mongol Tatars, Zhao Gong (趙珙), formerly attributed to Meng Gong (孟珙) (1221). The earliest outside description of the Mongols, by a Song envoy sent to the Mongol commander Muqali at Yanjing (Beijing) in 1221. Read online