:''For the similar-sounding word Timor, see
Timor (disambiguation).''
'Tīmūr bin Taraghay Barlas' (
Chagatai Turkic: 'تیمور' - ''Tēmōr'', "''
iron''") (1336 – February 1405), known in the West as 'Tamerlane', was a 14th century
warlord of
Turco-Mongol descent,
[1][2][3][4] conqueror of much of western and central Asia, and founder of the
Timurid Empire and Timurid dynasty (1370–1405) in
Central Asia, which survived in some form until 1857. Perhaps, he is more commonly known by his pejorative Persian name 'Timur-e Lang' () which translates to 'Timur the Lame', as he was lame after sustaining an injury to the leg in battle. After his marriage into
Genghis Khan's family, he took the name 'Timūr Gurkānī' (), ''Gurkān'' being the Persianized form of the original
Mongolian word ''kürügän'', "son-in-law".
[5][6] Alternative spellings of his name are: 'Temur', 'Taimur', 'Timur Lenk', 'Timur-i Leng', 'Temur-e Lang', 'Amir Timur', 'Aqsaq Timur', as well as the
Latinized 'Tamerlane' and 'Tamburlaine'. As many as 17 million people may have died from his conquests.
[7]
Mongol in origin and
Turkic in language and identity
1[8][9], Timur was also
steeped in Persian culture.
[10]
He aspired to restore the
Mongol Empire, yet his heaviest blow was against the Mongol
Golden Horde, which never recovered from his campaign against
Tokhtamysh. He thought of himself as a
ghazi, but his biggest
wars were against
Muslim states.
[11]
Timur died during a campaign against the
Ming Dynasty. He was a patron of the arts, but also
raped, pillaged and
massacred, and destroyed great centers of learning during his conquests. He wielded absolute power, yet never called himself more than an
emir, and eventually ruled in the name of tamed
Chingizid Khans, who were little more than
political prisoners.
He ruled over an empire that extends in modern times from southeastern
Turkey,
Syria,
Iraq,
Kuwait and
Iran, through
Central Asia encompassing part of
Kazakhstan,
Afghanistan,
Azerbaijan,
Georgia,
Turkmenistan,
Uzbekistan,
Kyrgyzstan,
Pakistan, North-Western
India, and even approaching
Kashgar in
China. Northern
Iraq remained predominantly
Assyrian Christian until the destructions of Timur.
[12][13] When Timur conquered
Persia, Iraq and Syria, the civilian population was decimated. In the city of
Isfahan (Persia) he ordered the building of a pyramids of 70,000 human skulls that his army had beheaded,
[14] and a pyramid of some 20,000 skulls was erected outside the
Aleppo.
[15] Timur herded thousands of
Damascus citizens into the Cathedral Mosque before setting it aflame,
[16] and had 70,000 Assyrians beheaded in
Tikrit, and another 90,000 Assyrians more in
Baghdad, for rejecting Islam.
[13][18]
Timur's legacy is a mixed one; while Central Asia blossomed under his reign, other places such as
Baghdad,
Damascus,
Delhi and other Arab, Persian, Indian and Turkic cities were sacked and destroyed, and millions of people were
slaughtered. Thus, while Timur still retains a legacy in
Central Asia, he is vilified by many in Arab, Persian and Indian societies. At the same time, many Western Asians still do name their children after him, while
Persian literature calls him "Teymour, Conqueror of the World" ().
Early life
Main articles: Mongol Empire,
Barlas,
Chagatai
Timur was born in
Transoxiana, near Kesh (an area now better known as
Shahr-e Sabz, 'the green city,'), situated some 50 miles south of
Samarkand in modern
Uzbekistan. His father Taraghay was the head of the
Barlas, a nomadic tribe in the steppes of Central Asia. They were remnants of the original
Mongol invaders of
Genghis Khan of whom many had embraced
Turkic or
Iranian languages and customs.
The spurious genealogy on his tombstone taking his descent back to
Ali, as well as the presence of
Shiites in his army, led some observers and scholars to call him a Shiite. However, his official religious counselor was the
Hanafite scholar Abd alJabbar Khwarazmi. There is evidence that he had converted to extremist
Shia Nusayri sect under the influence of Sayyed Barakah, a
Nusayri leader from his mentor, Balkh. He also constructed one of his finest buildings at the tomb of
Ahmed Yesevi, an influential Turkic Sufi
saint who was doing most to spread
Sunni Islam among the nomads.
Military leader
In about 1360 Timur gained prominence as a military leader. He took part in campaigns in
Transoxania with
the khan of
Chagatai, a fellow descendant of Genghis Khan. His career for the next 10 or 11 years may be thus briefly summarized from the ''Memoirs''. Allying himself both in cause and by family connection with
Kurgan, the dethroner and destroyer of
Volga Bulgaria, he was to invade
Khorasan at the head of a thousand horsemen. This was the second military expedition which he led, and its success led to further operations, among them the subjection of
Khwarizm and
Urganj.
After the murder of Kurgan the disputes which arose among the many claimants to
sovereign power were halted by the invasion of the energetic Jagataite
Tughlugh Timur of
Kashgar, another descendant of Genghis Khan. Timur was dispatched on a mission to the invader's camp, the result of which was his own appointment to the head of his own tribe, the
Barlas, in place of its former leader,
Hajji Beg.
The exigencies of Timur's quasi-sovereign position compelled him to have recourse to his formidable patron, whose reappearance on the banks of the
Syr Darya created a consternation not easily allayed. The Barlas were taken from Timur and entrusted to a son of Tughluk, along with the rest of
Mawarannahr; but he was defeated in battle by the bold warrior he had replaced at the head of a numerically far inferior force.
Rise to power
Tughlugh's death facilitated the work of reconquest, and a few years of perseverance and energy sufficed for its accomplishment, as well as for the addition of a vast extent of territory. It was in this period that Timur reduced the
Jagatai khans to the position of figureheads, who were deferred to in theory but in reality ignored, while Timur ruled in their name. During this period Timur and his brother-in-law Husayn, at first fellow fugitives and wanderers in joint adventures full of interest and romance, became rivals and antagonists. At the close of 1369 Husayn was assassinated and Timur, having been formally proclaimed sovereign at
Balkh, mounted the throne at Samarkand, the capital of his dominions. This event was recorded by Marlowe in his famous work ''Tamburlaine the Great''
[19]:
It is notable that Timur never claimed for himself the title of
khan, styling himself
amir and acting in the name of the
Chagatai ruler of Transoxania. Timur was a military genius but sometimes lacking in political sense. He tended not to leave a government apparatus behind in lands he conquered, and was often faced with the need to conquer such lands again after inevitable rebellions.
Period of expansion
Timur spent the next 35 years in various
wars and expeditions. He not only consolidated his rule at home by the subjugation of his foes, but sought extension of territory by encroachments upon the lands of foreign potentates. His conquests to the west and northwest led him among the
Mongols of the
Caspian Sea and to the banks of the
Ural and the
Volga. Conquests in the south and south-West encompassed almost every province in
Persia, including
Baghdad,
Karbala and
Kurdistan.
One of the most formidable of his opponents was
Tokhtamysh who, after having been a refugee at the court, became ruler both of the eastern
Kipchak and the
Golden Horde and quarrelled with him over the possession of
Khwarizm and
Azerbaijan. Timur supported Tokhtamysh against Russians and Tokhtamysh, with armed support by Timur, invaded Russia and in 1382 captured
Moscow. After the death of
Abu Sa'id, ruler of the
Ilkhanid Dynasty, in 1335, there was a power vacuum in the
Persian Empire. In 1383 Timur started the military conquest of Persia. He captured
Herat, Khorasan and all eastern Persia to 1385 and massacred almost all inhabitants of
Neishapur and other Iranian cities.
In the meantime, Tokhtamysh, now khan of the
Golden Horde, turned against his patron and invaded
Azerbaijan in 1385. It was not until 1395, in the
battle of Kur River, that Tokhtamysh's power was finally broken after a titanic struggle between the two monarchs. In this war, Timur led an army of over 100,000 men north for more than 500 miles into the uninhabited steppe, then west about 1000 miles, advancing in a front more than 10 miles wide. After the
Timurid army almost starved, Tokhtamysh's army finally was cornered against the Volga River in the
Orenburg region and destroyed. During this march, Timur's army got far enough north to be in a region of
very long summer days, causing complaints by his Muslim soldiers about keeping a long schedule of
prayers in such northern regions. Timur led a second campaign against Tokhtamysh via an easier route through the
Caucasus. Timur then destroyed
Sarai and
Astrakhan, and wrecked the Golden Horde's economy based on
Silk Road trade.
Indian Campaign
Informed about civil war in
India, Timur began a trek starting in 1397 to invade the reigning
Sultan Nasir-u Din Mehmud of the
Tughlaq Dynasty in the north Indian city of
Delhi.
Timur crossed the
Indus River at
Attock on September 24. The capture of towns and villages was often followed by the massacre of their inhabitants and raping of their women, as well as pillaging to support his massive army. Timur wrote many times in his memoirs of his specific disdain for the 'idolatrous'
Hindus, although he also waged war against Muslim Indians during his campaign.
Timur's
invasion did not go unopposed and he did meet some resistance during his march to Delhi, most notably with the
Sarv Khap coalition in northern India, and the
Governor of
Meerut. Although impressed and momentarily stalled by the valour of Ilyaas
Awan, Timur was able to continue his relentless approach to Delhi, arriving in 1398 to combat the armies of Sultan Mehmud, already weakened by an internal battle for ascension within the royal family.
The Sultan's army was easily defeated on
December 17,
1398. Timur entered Delhi and the city was sacked, destroyed, and left in ruins. Before the battle for Delhi, Timur executed more than 100,000 captives.
Timur himself recorded the invasions in his memoirs, collectively known as ''Tuzk-i-Timuri''. In them, he vividly described the massacre at
Delhi:
In a short space of time all the people in the [New Delhi] fort were put to the sword, and in the course of one hour the heads of 10,000 infidels were cut off. The sword of Islam was washed in the blood of the infidels, and all the goods and effects, the treasure and the grain which for many a long year had been stored in the fort became the spoil of my soldiers. They set fire to the houses and reduced them to ashes, and they razed the buildings and the fort to the ground....All these infidel Hindus were slain, their women and children, and their property and goods became the spoil of the victors. I proclaimed throughout the camp that every man who had infidel prisoners should put them to death, and whoever neglected to do so should himself be executed and his property given to the informer. When this order became known to the ghazis of Islam, they drew their swords and put their prisoners to death.
One hundred thousand infidels, impious idolators, were on that day slain. Maulana Nasiruddin Umar, a counselor and man of learning, who, in all his life, had never killed a sparrow, now, in execution of my order, slew with his sword fifteen idolatrous Hindus, who were his captives....on the great day of battle these 100,000 prisoners could not be left with the baggage, and that it would be entirely opposed to the rules of war to set these idolaters and enemies of Islam at liberty...no other course remained but that of making them all food for the sword. [20]
As per Malfuzat-i-Timuri, Timur targeted Hindus. In his own words, "Excepting the quarter of the saiyids, the 'ulama and the other Musalmans [sic], the whole city was sacked". In his descriptions of the Loni massacre he wrote, "..Next day I gave orders that the Musalman prisoners should be separated and saved."
During the ransacking of Delhi, almost all inhabitants not killed were captured and enslaved.
'Timur' left Delhi in approximately January 1399. In April he had returned to his own capital beyond the
Oxus (Amu Darya). Immense quantities of spoils were taken from India. According to
Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo, 90 captured
elephants were employed merely to carry precious stones looted from his conquest, so as to to erect a
mosque at Samarkand — what historians today believe is the enormous
Bibi-Khanym Mosque. Ironically, the mosque was constructed too quickly and suffered greatly from disrepair within a few decades of its construction.
Last campaigns and death
Painting by Stanisław Chlebowski, ''Sultan Bayezid prisoned by Timur'', 1878, depicting the capture of
Bayezid by Timur.
Before the end of 1399, Timur started a war with
Bayezid I, sultan of the
Ottoman Empire, and the
Mamluk sultan of
Egypt. Bayezid began annexing the territory of Turkmen and Muslim rulers in
Anatolia. As Timur claimed sovereignty over the
Turkmen rulers, they took refuge behind him. Timur invaded Syria, sacked
Aleppo and captured
Damascus after defeating the Mamluk army. The city's inhabitants were massacred, except for the artisans, who were deported to Samarkand. This led to Timur's being publicly declared an enemy of Islam.
He invaded
Baghdad in June 1401. After the capture of the city, 20,000 of its citizens were massacred. Timur ordered that every soldier should return with at least two severed human heads to show him (many
warriors were so scared they killed prisoners captured earlier in the campaign just to ensure they had heads to present to Timur). After years of insulting letters passed between Timur and Bayezid, Timur invaded Anatolia and defeated Bayezid in the
Battle of Ankara on
July 20,
1402. Bayezid was captured in battle and subsequently died in captivity, initiating the 12-year
Ottoman Interregnum period. Timur's stated motivation for attacking Bayezid and the Ottoman Empire was the restoration of
Seljuq authority. Timur saw the Seljuks as the rightful rulers of
Anatolia as they had been granted rule by Mongol conquerors, illustrating again Timur's interest with Genghizid legitimacy.
By 1368, the Ming had driven the
Mongols out of China. The first
Ming Emperor
Hongwu demanded, and received, homage from many Central Asian states paid to China as the political heirs to the former House of
Kublai. Timur more than once sent to the Ming Government gifts that could have passed as tribute, at first not daring to defy the economic and military might of the
Middle Kingdom.
Timur wished to restore the Mongol Empire, and eventually planned to conquer China. Mongol khan Enkh sent his grandson Ulzitumur, also known as "Buyanshir." Timur made alliance with Mongols and prepared all the way to Bukhara. In December 1404, Timur started military expeditions against the Ming Dynasty, but he was attacked by fever and plague when encamped on the farther side of the Sihon (
Syr-Daria) and died at Atrar (
Otrar) in mid-February 1405.
[2] His scouts explored
Mongolia before his death, and the writing they carved on trees in Mongolia's mountains could still be seen even in the 20th century.
Of Timur's four sons, two (Jahangir and Umar Shaykh) predeceased him. His third son,
Miran Shah, died soon after Timur, leaving the youngest son,
Shah Rukh. Although his designated successor was his grandson
Pir Muhammad b. Jahangir, Timur was ultimately succeeded in power by his son Shah Rukh. His most illustrious descendant
Babur founded the
Mughal Empire and ruled over most of
North India. Babur's descendants,
Akbar,
Jahangir,
Shah Jahan and
Aurangzeb, expanded the Mughal Empire to most of the
Indian subcontinent along with parts of modern
Afghanistan.
Markham, in his introduction to the narrative of Clavijo's embassy, states that his body "was embalmed with musk and rose water, wrapped in linen, laid in an ebony coffin and sent to
Samarkand, where it was buried." His tomb, the
Gur-e Amir, still stands in Samarkand. Timur had carried his victorious arms on one side from the
Irtish and the Volga to the
Persian Gulf, and on the other from the
Hellespont to the
Ganges River.
Contributions to the arts
A magnificent madrassa in Samarqand commissioned by
Ulug Beg, Timur's grandson.
Timur became widely known as a patron to the arts. Much of the architecture he commissioned still stands in
Samarqand, now in present-day
Uzbekistan. He was known to bring the most talented artisans from the lands he conquered back to Samarkand. And he is credited with often giving them a wide latitude of artistic freedom to express themselves.
According to legend, Omar Aqta, Timur's court
calligrapher, transcribed the
Qur'an using letters so small that the entire text of the book fit on a
signet ring. Omar also is said to have created a Qur'an so large that a
wheelbarrow was required to transport it.
Folios of what is probably this larger Qur'an have been found, written in gold lettering on huge pages.
Timur was also said to have created
Tamerlane Chess, a variant of
shatranj (also known as
medieval chess) played on a larger board with several additional pieces and an original method of pawn promotion.
Timur's mandating of
Kurash wrestling for his soldiers ensured for it a lasting and legendary legacy. Kurash is now a popular international sport and part of the
Asian Games.
References
Timur's generally recognized biographers are Ali Yazdi, commonly called Sharaf ud-Din, author of the Persian ''Zafarnāma'' (Persian 'ظفرنامه'), translated by Petis de la Croix in 1722 , and from
French into
English by J. Darby in the following year; and Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Abdallah, al-Dimashiqi, al-Ajami (commonly called Ahmad Ibn Arabshah) translated by the Dutch Orientalist Colitis in 1636. In the work of the former, as
Sir William Jones remarks, "the Tatarian conqueror is represented as a liberal, benevolent and illustrious prince", in that of the latter he is "deformed and impious, of a low birth and detestable principles." But the favourable account was written under the personal supervision of Timur's grandson, Ibrahim, while the other was the production of his direst enemy.
Among less reputed biographies or materials for biography may be mentioned a second ''Zafarnāma'', by Nizam al-Din Shami, stated to be the earliest known history of Timur, and the only one written in his lifetime. Timur's purported autobiography, the ''Tuzuk-i Temur'' ("Institutes of Temur") is a later fabrication, although most of the historical facts are accurate
1.
More recent biographies include Justin Marozzi's ''Tamerlane: Sword of Islam, Conqueror of the World'' (Da Capo Press 2006), and Roy Stier's ''Tamerlane: The Ultimate Warrior'' (Bookpartners 1998).
Exhumation
Timur's body was
exhumed from his tomb in 1941 by the
Soviet anthropologist Mikhail M. Gerasimov. He found that Timur's facial characteristics conformed to that of Mongoloid features, which he believed, in some part, supported Timur's notion that he was descended from Genghis Khan. He also confirmed Timur's lameness. Gerasimov was able to reconstruct the likeness of Timur from his
skull.
Famously, a curse has been attached to opening Timur's tomb.
[21] In the year of Timur's death, a sign was carved in his tomb warning that whoever would dare disturb the tomb would bring demons of war onto his land. Gerasimov's expedition opened the tomb on
June 19,
1941.
Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the
Soviet Union by
Nazi Germany, began three days later. Timur's skeleton and that of
Ulugh Beg, his grandson, were reinterred with full Islamic burial rites in 1942.
Exchanges with the West
Timur had numerous epistolary exchanges with Western, especially French, rulers. The French archives preserve:
★ A July 30th, 1402, letter from Timur to
Charles VI, king of France, suggesting him to send traders to the Orient. It is in the Persian language.
[22]
★ A May 1403 letter. This is a Latin transcription of a letter from Tamerlan to Charles VI, and another from
Amiza Miranchah, his son, to the Christian princes, announcing their victory over
Bajazet, in
Smyrna.
[23]
A copy has been kept of the answer of Charles VI to Timur, dated June 15th, 1403.
[24]
After death
Timur became a popular figure in Europe for centuries after his death, not in the least because of his victory over the Ottoman Sultan and the humiliations he is said to have subjected his prisoner Bayezid to.
Timur was officially recognised as a national hero of newly independent
Uzbekistan. His monument in Tashkent takes the place where
Marx's statue once stood.
Fiction
★ There is a popular
Irish reel entitled ''Timour the Tartar''.
★ Timur was the subject of two plays (''
Tamburlaine the Great, Parts I and II'') by English playwright
Christopher Marlowe.
★
Bob Bainborough portrayed Tamerlane in an episode of ''
History Bites''.
★
George Frideric Handel made Timur the title character of his ''
Tamerlano'' (HWV 18), an
Italian opera composed in 1724, based on the 1675 play ''Tamerlan ou la mort de Bajazet'' by
Jacques Pradon.
★
Edgar Allan Poe's first published work was a poem entitled "
Tamerlane".
★ Tamerlane features prominently in the short story ''Lord of Samarcand'' by
Robert E. Howard which features a completely fictional account of his last campaign and death.
★ In
Microsoft's ''
Age of Empires II'', Tamerlane is a hero available only in the Map Editor.
★ In
Creative Assembly's '', he would lead his horde into the eastern portions of the map circa 1380-90. Here, his name is "Timur the Lame".
★ The
alternate history novel ''
The Years of Rice and Salt'' by
Kim Stanley Robinson portrays a Timur whose last campaign is significantly different from the historical truth.
★ Tamerlane features prominently in the
Russian
fantasy film Day Watch.
★ In the videogame "Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem", the character of Pious Augustus quotes Tamerlane's line before the sacking of Damascus (when performing a massive killing in order to create the Pillar of Flesh).
Notes and References
1. B.F. Manz, ''"Tīmūr Lang"'', in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Online Edition, 2006
2. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, "Timur", 6th ed., Columbia University Press: ''"... Timur (timoor') or Tamerlane (tăm'urlān), c.1336–1405, Mongol conqueror, b. Kesh, near Samarkand. ..."'', (LINK)
3. "Timur", in Encyclopaedia Britannica: ''"... [Timur] was a member of the Turkic Barlas clan of Mongols..."''
4. "Baber", in Encyclopaedia Britannica: ''"... Baber first tried to recover Samarkand, the former capital of the empire founded by his Mongol ancestor Timur Lenk ..."''
5. The Baburnama: Memoirs of Babur, Prince and Emperor, Zahir ud-Din Mohammad, , , Modern Library Classics, 2002, ISBN 0375761373
6. Note: Other sources like the reports of the contemporary witness Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo use a non-Persianized notation for this title of Timur, e.g. ''Timur Kurkhan'', and describe the meaning of ''Kurkhan'' as ''of the lineage of sovereign princes''. But this translation is widely rejected by modern scholars.
7. Timur Lenk (1369-1405)
8. Bosworth, A. H. Dani, V. Mikhaĭlovich Masson, J. Harmatta, B. A. Litvinovskiĭ: ''"History of Civilizations of Central Asia"'', p. 320
9. G. R. Garthwaite, ''"The Persians"'', Malden, MA : Blackwell Pub., 2007; p. 148, ISBN 9781557868602
10. Gérard Chaliand,''Nomadic Empires: From Mongolia to the Danube'' translated by A. M.
Berrett,Transaction Publishers,2004,pg 75 [1]
11. The Life of Timur
12. The annihilation of Iraq
13. http://www.nupi.no/cgi-win/Russland/etnisk_b.exe?Assyrian
14. Timur's history
15. The Seven Years Campaign
16. Battle of Damascus
17. http://www.nupi.no/cgi-win/Russland/etnisk_b.exe?Assyrian
18. New Book Looks at Old-Style Central Asian Despotism
19. The Timurid Dynasty
20. Turk-i-Taimuri, Taimur Lane, , , , ,
21. S. Z. Ahmed. ''Twilight on the Silk Road''. Infinity Publishing, 2002. ISBN 0-7414-1112-1. Page 23.
22.
Document preserved at Musée de l’Histoire de France, code AE III 204. Mentionned Dossier II, 7
23. Mentionned Dossier II, 7 bis
24. Mentionned Dossier II, 7 ter
See also
★
Tokhtamysh-Timur war
★
List of wars and disasters by death toll
★ Operas
Tamerlano by
Handel and
Bajazet by
Antonio Vivaldi on the subject of the capture of Bayezid I by Timur
★
List of wars in the Muslim world
★
List of the Muslim Empires
★
Nomadic people
★
Global Empire
★
Genghis Khan
★
Muslim conquest in the Indian subcontinent
External links
★
Timur's Life
★
Towers of Terror
★
The Battle of Ankara
★
The rise of Timur-i-Leng
★
The Timurid Dynasty
★
Memoir of the Emperor Timur (Malfuzat-i Timuri) Timur's memoirs on his invasion of India; describes in detail the massacre of Hindus, forced conversions to Islam and the plunder of the wealth of Hindustan (India). Compiled in the book: "
The History of India, as Told by Its Own Historians. The Muhammadan Period", by Sir H. M. Elliot, Edited by John Dowson; London, Trubner Company; 1867–1877
★
Tamburlaine the Great Part One
★
Concise Britannica Online,
Encyclopaedia Britannica For alternative information about Timur
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