Temujin

Also known as Genghis Khan · Qi Yan · Tie Mu Zhen

Temujin was a son of Yesugei, chief of the Kiyad Mongols; according to the Secret History of the Mongols (Menggu mishi), he was born just as his father captured a Tatar leader named Temujin Uge and was named after him. After the Tatars poisoned his father he built up a following and defeated the Tatars, Kereit and Naiman in turn, uniting the Mongolian plateau. The History of Yuan (Yuanshi) records that in 1206 he took the throne at the source of the Onon River and was given the title Chinggis (Genghis) Khan. From 1211 he led his armies against the Jin, whose capital Zhongdu fell to the Mongols in 1215, and from 1219 he campaigned west against Khwarazm while Jebe and Subutai rode beyond the Caspian. He died of illness in 1227 at a camp on the Sali River while his forces were destroying Western Xia; the Yuanshi gives his age as sixty-six, and Khubilai granted him the posthumous name Shengwu and the temple name Taizu in 1266.