Genghis Khan

Genghis Khan was born in 1162, and was part of the Borjigin tribe. The Borjigin tribe was one of the tribes that made up the Mongol people.

Although he is most well-remembered as “Genghis” Khan, Genghis is not actually his real first name. His real first name is Temujin, but few people call him by this name.

Temujin was quite headstrong, and would not take advice from others. He was not a very social child, as he is said to have been mostly independent from the other children.

A few years later, at age sixteen, Temujin married a girl named Borte, which acted like a seal of alliance between the two tribes. Shortly after the marriage, Borte was kidnapped. Temujin was reckoned not to be someone taken lightly after he went and rescued Borte from the kidnappers

Although I have no clear evidence to back up this statement, my best guess as to the reasoning behind the kidnapping is that one or more people did not like the alliance between the two tribes.

Temujin had four children with Borte, but had other children through other wives as well.

The next important piece of information that I have to give sheds some light upon who exactly Temujin was in his earlier life. This information is that Temujin was actually captured during a raid on a nearby town. What this says is that from an early time Temujin was in a powerful possession as to have enough men to attempt to raid a town.

Temujin was put into slavery, but later escaped with the help of some friends. These friend may have been from outside of where he worked, or perhaps may have been other slaves he had come to know.

After his escape he began forming an army and started his march to form what would be known as the Mongolian empire.

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Temujin was absolutely brilliant when it came to militaristic strategies and better yet, led highly trained and highly skilled soldiers.

His massive armies had mastered special communications tactics, and had learned the art of horseback fighting where they learned to ride horses without using their hands, so the could fight on horseback.

One other major advantage that Temujin had instituted was a spy network system. This way, he could identify which people he was to consider enemies.

With his massive armies he easily dominated the surrounding tribes and was the coined the term “Genghis Khan”. Which meant “World Ruler”.  Many in fact believed that Temujin was destined to rule the world.

This title was above that of a military honor, and carried significance as a religious symbol as well.

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Although he was a very powerful person at this time, there were still people who would oppose him. One of these people being a governor called Otrar.

Otrar began invading the empire of Temujin, which was not taken very well by Temujin himself.

This out-lash of Otrar’s sent a hurricane of destruction right in his path when Temujin invaded the land of the Muslims obliterating everyone and everything in his path. This invasion started in 1219.

This invasion gave Temujin much power over Central Asia and Eastern Europe. It also ended the Khwarizmi dynasty that was currently in power.

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The laws in Temujin’s empire were strict, and most laws that were broken were punishable by death. This law code was called the Yassa.

Although he had very strict rules, he was tolerant to all religions, as long as the did not cause trouble against Temujin or his empire.

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However, like all people Genghis Khan did die, and what exactly killed him is still a mystery, it could be simple old age, or other thing like battle wounds.

His burial site is unknown, as he had a river directed over it, and all people that attended his burying killed. His reasoning behind the secrecy is itself a secret.

Genghis Khan is an inspiring icon in history, as he advanced not only warfare, but Asia itself. Through his ups and downs,  the Khan dynasty would put forth a new era for Asia one, although in time, would connect the people more to the government and prove to make the land a more than prosperous one.

 

 

One Project That I Worked On, What Steps I Took To Make It Succesful, And How It Relates To The Crusaders

When you first see this you may be thinking what a strange and random writing assignment this is. I agree, it is very strange and random. However, I look at this as my teacher saying that its time to take writing assignments up a notch, to a more difficult level. And he most definitely has taken writing assignments to a whole new level.

Living on a farm means that there are no shortages of projects or chores to do. So finding a project is easy enough. The one that I have chosen is moving cattle from one field to another.

Moving cattle is easier said then done, you think that it will be easy enough until you actually let them out and start moving them. I remembered this from past projects so we took certain steps to block other passages that the cows may want to go through, we also cleared moved anything that may cause the cows to go the other way (such as one of our dogs).

After blocking of passages and moving dogs around, we still had to move the cows across a clearing of grass. Of course we couldn’t block off such a large space with the resources around us, so we had to drive the cows along and make sure that none strayed away.

Cows are funny creatures, they react to things depending on how close they are. So we had to make sure that we were at the right distance from them, but close enough to keep them in line.

So with all of these steps complete, blocking of passages, clearing a safe way for them to go, and placing people at the right spots to keep them in line, we started to move the cows.

I remember that things went smoothly for the fist part of the move, but at the second part, about half way to where they needed to be… one of our calves (rusty is his name) decided that the grass was greener around 10 yards away to the right. If you have any experience with moving cows, you will know that when one goes, they all go. So soon Rusty was followed by his mom, who was followed by her friend, and so on.

So, with the cows veering off from the path, the closest person jumped a bit too soon to stop them, this caused too much pressure on the cow, which made them start running.

Like in looney tunes we chased them around for about a half of an hour before they got back on track. And after that, they got where they needed to be without any more trouble.

I believe that this links to the crusades in the issues of tactics and trial and error. Tactics are always important during times of war, just as they are in moving cattle. Trial and error is something that happens in war, you try to take the city, but it ends up as a failure, just like you try to have things go smoothly while moving cattle, but the cow wants to go the other way.

Canute The Great

Not all kings of old times settled peacefully. Some preferred, or had to, invade a certain land in order to start their kingdom. Canute the Great was not an exception to this. Canute the Great was one of greatest early kings of Britain. Canute was not actually British, but happened to be Danish. At his highest, Canute was king of: Denmark, England, Norway and parts of Sweden.

Canute was part of a royal family, but had an older brother who was in line for the throne before he was. So, instead of waiting around idly for his brother to pass the throne to him, he decided to conquer his own kingdom. The land in which he had an intent to capture, was none other than Great Britain itself.

He led Viking soldiers from all over Scandinavia as that combated the English for a full 14 months! The English king at this time was Edmund Ironsides.

Canute first made his move in Wessex in 1016 A.D. and did capture it. His next battle took him to London. This battle forced Edmund Ironsides to work a treaty out with Canute.

Canute became the king of England after Edmund conveniently died three weeks after the treaty was made. I believe this to not be pure coincidence, but instead to be a clever assassination. It does make sense; Canute makes a treaty to let Edmund off his guard, then takes him out leading to having all of England as his without losing any more of his soldiers. This does say something about his Canute’s character, he is not to be trusted, as he may go back on his word.

Canute married Emma (who was a widowed duchess from Normandy) which strengthened his claim on the English throne even more than before. Around this same time, Canute started his defensive plans; how he would keep his throne. He killed anyone and everyone who he thought might try to stand in his way or take his throne. Even Emma’s sons fled the country in exile. Although one son “Harthacnut” was designated to be the heir to the throne when Canute passed.

A while later Canute’s brother passed away leaving the throne that Canute waited for all for him.

Canute’s ties with the church were not good. As he had attacked many churches of England during his raids. But he did try to keep in their favor with claiming to be a Christian himself and restoring many churches and building new ones for them.

Charles Martel: The Unpredictable General

During the Merovingian dynasty in France, the rulers became weak, lazy, and incompetent. They were like puppets, but not the actual rulers. The actual ruler was called “The Mayor of the Palace”.  The mayor basically was the king with a different name, they did everything, including: Raising money, waging war, leading armies and carrying out government decisions.

Charles Martel was the son of one such “Mayor”. This mayor was called Pepin. When Pepin died in 714 A.D his wife took his place by force. She even went as far as to throw her own son in jail. However, this didn’t stop Charles. Charles soon escaped prison and started gaining support of the nobles.

Charles first taste of battle was when a band of outlandish franks invaded. Charles was chosen to lead a battle to defeat them. However, the very number of franks caused Charles to wisely disengage from the battle and regroup (he later came back and crushed them in a different battle). This was the only time Charles Martel let any enemy force beat him on the battle field. Charles was clearly an excellent leader.

Charles was best known for his tactics, this is what made him such an extraordinary and unpredictable leader. He had three such tactics: Attacking when, where and how they least expected. He would attack them in broad daylight when no one would think anyone would be so insane to do so. He would fake retreats to make them think they were winning, then he would turn around and catch them like a pack of wolves on their prey.

However, Charles Martel did not stop at just the military. Charles soon took over the government from his mother. Charles did something that I did not expect when he first became the leader of France, he forgave the people who imprisoned him. This goes to show how unpredictable he was. Charles never called himself a king during his reign.

Charles, through his politics and his military prowess, was able to gain the loyalty of the surrounding country’s and expand his territory to include some of Southern Germany.

One noticeable enemy was the Islamic Muslims. They spread across the globe like wildfire on a stack of hay. They had recently conquered Iberia, but were still left wanting more, so they invaded France. This is one mistake that they would never forget.

As they chipped away at the borders of France, Charles moved out with his armies. He waited for them with a carefully planned out surprise attack. After springing the attack, there were several skirmishes before Charles proved once again that he could not be beaten by any invading force. It was this, battering and pure destruction in battle of the Muslims that gave Charles his nick-name Charles Martel or Charles The Hammer.

This battle was called the battle that saved Christianity from the Muslims. However, as you know, Christianity would live on even if the Muslims won. It was also this battle that stemmed the tide of the Muslim advance.

During Charles Martel reign there was no king, or better put, no puppet head ruler. He did appoint a king, but this king did soon die. Charles did not appoint a new king after this.

Sadly, as all things die in this world, Charles Martel, the unpredictable amazing general who never lost a second battle, did die in 741. But his sons continued his legacy in France for some time. His son, Pepin was also a fantastic general, just like his father. He did lose more battles than his father, but nevertheless, he was an amazing general.

Charles Martel is by far my favorite, and I believe will continue to be my favorite character in history. He was merciful to those who threw him cruelly in jail, he was his enemies worst nightmare, and his people’s leader. Charles The Hammer, let neither him nor his tactics and military prowess be ever forgotten.