Timur or Tamerlane: A Brief Biography - 0 views
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Throughout history, few names have inspired such terror as "Tamerlane." That was not the Central Asian conqueror's actual name, though. More properly, he is known as Timur, from the Turkic word for "iron."
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vicious conqueror, who razed ancient cities to the ground and put entire populations to the sword. On the other hand, he is also known as a great patron of the arts, literature, and architecture.
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The child's father, Taragay, was the chief of the Barlas tribe. The Barlas were of mixed Mongolian and Turkic ancestry, descended from the hordes of Genghis Khan
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"Tamerlane or Timur: The Great Amir," states that Timur was descended from Genghis Khan on his mother's side; it is not entirely clear whether that is true.
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During Timur's youth, Transoxiana was riven by conflict between the local nomadic clans and the sedentary Chagatay Mongol khans who ruled them. The Chagatay had abandoned the mobile ways of Genghis Khan and their other ancestors and taxed the people heavily in order to support their urban lifestyle. Naturally, this taxation angered their citizens.
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Timur was not directly descended from Genghis Khan on his father's side, so he ruled as an amir (from the Arabic word for "prince"), rather than as khan.
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Timur invaded Russia in 1380. He helped the Mongol Khan Toktamysh retake control, and also defeated the Lithuanians in battle. Timur captured Herat
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Persia revolted. He responded by leveling entire cities and using the citizens' skulls to build grisly towers and pyramids.
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The Turkic/Mongol invaders left carnage along their path; Delhi's army was destroyed in December, and the city ruined. Timur seized tons of treasure and 90 war elephants and took them back to Samarkand.
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The rulers of Europe were glad that the Ottoman Turk sultan Bayazid had been defeated, but they trembled at the idea that "Tamerlane" was at their doorstep. The rulers of Spain, France, and other powers sent congratulatory embassies to Timur, hoping to stave off an attack.
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the Timurid army set out in December, during an unusually cold winter. Men and horses died of exposure
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Timur started life as the son of a minor chieftain, much like his putative ancestor Genghis Khan. Through sheer intelligence, military skill and force of personality, Timur was able to conquer an empire stretching from Russia to India, and from the Mediterranean Sea to Mongolia.
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Unlike Genghis Khan, however, Timur conquered not to open trade routes and protect his flanks, but to loot and pillage. The Timurid Empire did not long survive its founder because he rarely bothered to put any governmental structure in place after he destroyed the existing order.
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While Timur professed to be a good Muslim, he obviously felt no compunction about destroying the jewel-cities of Islam
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Damascus, Khiva, Baghdad... these ancient capitals of Islamic learning never really recovered from Timur's attentions.
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Timur's line had better luck in India, where his great-great-grandson Babur founded the Mughal Dynasty in 1526. The Mughals ruled until 1857 when the British expelled them. (Shah Jahan, the builder of the Taj Mahal, is thus also a descendant of Timur.)