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Yan Tiemuer
Kipchak commander who seized Dadu in 1328, won the Two Capitals War for Tugh Temur and then ruled as sole chief councillor under Emperor Wenzong
In a council hall, a long table holds an unrolled map scroll, a brass-cornered chest and a brush pot, with tall-backed chairs around it and a bronze lamp at the left; a figure stands with their back turned on the balcony at the right, with palace roofs beyond.
El Temur, a Kipchak and the third son of Chong'ur, had served Khaishan as a guardsman on the steppe for more than ten years and was an assistant in the Bureau of Military Affairs when the Taiding emperor died in 1328. In the eighth month he led armed men into the Xingsheng Palace in Dadu, arrested the ministers loyal to Shangdu, proclaimed that the throne belonged to Wuzong's sons, and sent for Tugh Temur. With his brother Sadun and his son Tang Qishi he then beat the Shangdu armies at Juyong Pass, Gubeikou and elsewhere, and when Shangdu surrendered in the tenth month the new emperor made him Prince of Taiping and chief councillor. In 1329 Wenzong's elder brother Khoshila died suddenly at Ongqochad, and El Temur carried the imperial seals back to Wenzong; in 1330 an edict made him sole chief councillor. His last years were spent in excess, and he died in 1333 of a urinary haemorrhage; his daughter later became empress to Emperor Shundi.
Life and times
Dates c. 1285 CE–1333 CE