Life of Genghis Khan

Genghis Khan wept when he heard of the murder of his ambassador, a man he'd specially chosen for his loyalty and diplomacy. Then he screamed: "Let the Eternal Blue Heaven help me to find energy for revenge!" The Eternal Blue Heaven was the deity of the Mongols and Khan often prayed to it. From the very beginning he felt his mission was divine and pre-ordained.

If not for the Shah's rash behavior, the Mongol Empire would have probably never extended farther than China. But as it was, the Shah opened the way for a Mongol invasion of the western half of the Asian continent. His slaughter of the Mongolian ambassador was one of the most pivotal events in history.

Khan knew he was setting out for the first time into unfamiliar territory to fight an unfamiliar enemy, against armies that far outnumbered his own. He also knew he was no longer young. Before he left Mongolia he named his youngest son, Ogotai, his successor, because Ogotai was known for his generosity, his ability to get along with everyone, and his common sense. Khan's other sons, Ogotai's brothers, readily agreed with his decision.

The Khan sent messengers throughout his empire and gathered an army of 250,000 men. Then he organized a siege train of catapults, battering rams, and flame throwers. To confuse the Muslims he ordered his army to approach from four different directions. Their first destination: the town of the governor who had murdered his entire caravan of traders and representatives. The town fought hard - it knew no one captured would be spared - and the battle raged for six months. When the Mongols finally took the city Khan ordered that the eyes and ears of the governor be filled with hot molten silver, after which he was slowly tortured to death.

The Mongol forces then moved from city to city, on a mission of pure rage and revenge. It was this sweep through Eurasia that gave Genghis Khan and the Mongols the reputation for savagery they have today. The Khan put his captives in the front lines, dressed as Mongols, so that Muslims ended up killing their own comrades first. His troops moved steadily westward, laying waste to everything in their path and showing little mercy. The Khan announced: "All who surrender will be spared; whoever does not surrender but opposes with struggle and dissension, shall be annihilated." In one town they split the stomachs of all their victims in search of jewels they believed the people had swallowed. In another town they rounded up 70,000 men, women, and children and shot them all with arrows. In still another town, where the Khan's son-in-law had been slain months before, they spent four days slaughtering everything that was alive: adults, children, babies, and even dogs and cats, while the Khan's grieving daughter sat and watched, satisfied her husband had been avenged. Then, to make sure no one had survived, every victim was decapitated. They spared only 400 artisans whose work would be valuable to the empire. All along their way, they destroyed oases, orchards, gardens, vineyards, corn fields, dams, palaces, and the work of centuries. Because of this ruthlessness a 13th century historian called them "a detestable nation of Satan that poured out like devils from Tartarus so that they are rightly called Tartars." Tartarus is a classical word for Hell and forever after Europeans referred to the Mongols as "Tartars."

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